[_ Old Earth _] Just curious..

[zeke]

Well, let's take a look...

Here's a line of therapsids leading to primitive mammals.

Lol - are you really saying you can take a line of fossils and claim that they represent a lineage? Tell me you not. Your fallacy is not a scientific hypothesis that can be tested. It is however, an assertion that carries the same validity as a bedtime story. Listen to Gee my friend - he is trying to save you some embarrassment...

To take a line of fossils and claim that they represent a lineage is not a scientific hypothesis that can be tested, but an assertion that carries the same validity as a bedtime story... ― Henry Gee​

 

[Barbarian]

Barbarian observes:
A competent designer wouldn't use a design that was suitable for a tetrapod, to make a biped.

Again - do you have science to support your assumption.

Again, yes. A good number of functional deficiencies exist in humans because our backs, hips, knees, etc. are evolved from tetrapods.

Barbarian observes:
Yep. For example, we can show that the space in the tunnel is tightly restricted for humans, but not so for tetrapods, which have less robust tendons.

Do you have science to support your assumption

Yep.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpus

http://jhs.sagepub.com/content/24/5/570.short

Barbarian observes:
This demonstrates that humans were not designed, but evolved from tetrapods, and retain the basic tetrapod anatomy, slightly evolved to a bipedal way of life.

Lol - humans evolved from tetrapods. Really?

Yep.

Do you have science to support your assumption.

Yep. The line that led to us didn't become mostly bipedal until the Australopithecines or thereabouts.

Does kalvan agree with you? Does anyone agree with you?

Pretty much all physical anthropologists, paleontologists, anatomists, etc.

Barbarian observes:
But it's not fully adapted, and that causes problems. A competent designer would never have done it this way.

Do you have science to support your assumption

Yep. For example, a simple release of one constricting tendon can greatly relieve or cure carpal tunnel syndrome. The relocation of the foramina for spinal nerves would prevent the crippling effects of prolapsed disks.

Things like that.

 

[Barbarian]

Lol - are you really saying you can take a line of fossils and claim that they represent a lineage? Tell me you not. Your fallacy is not a scientific hypothesis that can be tested. It is however, an assertion that carries the same validity as a bedtime story. Listen to Gee my friend - he is trying to save you some embarrassment...

I notice you dodged my offer to show you such a lineage.

 

[zeke]

But we can learn about the way populations change over time, by observing the changes in the fossil record.

Did Haeckel’s fraudulent illustrations represent an embryonic lineage? Why must Darwinians invent mythology to support their assumptions?

 

[zeke]

I notice you dodged my offer to show you such a lineage.

Are you saying you can prove Henry Gee wrong? Be careful - it may hit the fan.

 

[zeke]

I notice you dodged my offer to show you such a lineage.

Here is your challenger - take a line of fossils and show us via the scientific method that they represent a lineage from tetrapods to humans. Can you do it this time?

 

[zeke]

Yep. For example, a simple release of one constricting tendon can greatly relieve or cure carpal tunnel syndrome. The relocation of the foramina for spinal nerves would prevent the crippling effects of prolapsed disks.

Things like that.

Well, your 'things like that' is just your simplified projection - there is no science there at all. Provide some science that demonstrates a direct connection between basic tetrapod anatomy and carpal tunnel syndrome in humans. No hand-waving, conjectures, or assumptions, please.

 

[lordkalvan]

Actually, the primary source is noted as January 1987.

Have you read that 'primary source'? Can you quote from that 'primary source' where Gould says that homology supports common design as well as it does common ancestry? Or did you simply rely on Davis and Kenyon at second-hand to provide this assertion for you? These are all straightforward questions which you can answer with a simple yes or no.

You may be referring to the Darwinian sleight of hand artist and evolutionist, Ernst Haeckel whose fraudulent embryological drawings were exposed back in the 19th century but can still be found in recent biology textbooks.

Can you reference those 'recent biology textbooks', please?

Darwinian mythology dies hard but its practitioners must periodically rely on such fraud to stay afloat. See the Piltdown Man hoax.

Before we get on to 'Piltdown Man' (which, incidentally, had precious little to do with validating evolutionary theory), perhaps you can tell us how you are getting on with providing us details of the alleged 'Darwinian horse hoax' and the claims it makes about specific fossils being directly antecedent to later specific fossils and actual living equids?

 

[lordkalvan]

Question for kalvan - does your 'science' also demonstrate that humans evolved from tetrapods - slightly tweaked to a bipedal way of life?

When you get around to answering questions, you will be entitled to expect answers to those you ask yourself.

 

[lordkalvan]

In a nutshell - biological evolution is science and Darwinian lore is mythology. The former is science - the latter is non-science.

This is not an explanation, but simply offers more assertion. Do you understand what an explanation is?

 

[lordkalvan]

Well, I don't want to be accused of making personal attacks but maybe you can decipher Barbarian's "several points" as noted below and how they relate to science in general and biological evolution specifically. If early tetrapods really needed to run both tendons down to their feet as Barbarian insists how did they kinda/sorta come up with a plan to do that type of plumbing? Where did the tendons run before they figured out how to route then to their feet? Scientifically, can we really draw a sequential line between early tetrapods and carpal tunnel syndrome in humans? Is that hypothesis testable?

Barbarian's explanations seem quite straightforward to me. If your difficulty lies in the fact that you suppose that in some way evolutionary theory proposes that there was an element of conscious decision engaged in coming up with 'that type of plumbing' and that tendons 'figured out' anything, then I can see where more of your problems lie in coming to terms with the adaptive and co-optive compromises that are strongly evidential for the hypothesis of common ancestry rather than that of common design.

 

[lordkalvan]

Okay - how about fuzzy science?

Can you explain what 'fuzzy science' is and how the referred to example amounts to this 'fuzzy science'?

 

[lordkalvan]

Are you saying you can prove Henry Gee wrong? Be careful - it may hit the fan.

If the spin you wish to impart to Gee's words is that which he intended, perhaps you can explain why he offers the use of those words as evidence of quote mining by creationist sources and why he states emphatically in the same place that he addresses this quote mining that we have ancestry and ancestors and that the fossil record is evidence of this?

 

[zeke]

Have you read that 'primary source'? Can you quote from that 'primary source' where Gould says that homology supports common design as well as it does common ancestry?

Lol - are you not equipped to look up the primary source at your local library. Dean Kenyon repeats Gould's statement in my secondary source. If Gould didn't make that remark the Darwinian PC squad would have been all over it like flies on sherbert - and they weren't. The truth remains - homology supports common design as well as it does common ancestry. This is a truth that you cannot digest. Why?

The existence of homologous structures merely raises questions of relationship, but it cannot answer them. This is why Stephen Gould remarked that homology supports common design as well as it does common ancestry. Both Darwinists and design proponents can explain the existence of homologies within their respective frameworks of interpretation. Because of this, neither side can disprove the other’s interpretation of homology, and neither view stands solely on its own interpretation of homology. ~ Percival Davis and Dean Kenyon​

 

[zeke]

When you get around to answering questions, you will be entitled to expect answers to those you ask yourself.

But I have answered your questions - you simply dislike my answers. Unless you clarify your views we will conclude that your 'science' also includes the silly notion that humans evolved from tetrapods - slightly tweaked to a bipedal way of life? Do you have science to support that notion or do you also rely of evolution of the gaps? You are not a scientist - are you?

 

[zeke]

Barbarian's explanations seem quite straightforward to me.

Really? Then can you explain why early tetrapods really needed to run both tendons down to their feet and how they did this. Was this also true of late tetrapods?

 

[lordkalvan]

Lol - are you not equipped to look up the primary source at your local library. Dean Kenyon repeats Gould's statement in my secondary source. If Gould didn't make that remark the Darwinian PC squad would have been all over it like flies on sherbert - and they weren't. The truth remains - homology supports common design as well as it does common ancestry. This is a truth that you cannot digest. Why?

The existence of homologous structures merely raises questions of relationship, but it cannot answer them. This is why Stephen Gould remarked that homology supports common design as well as it does common ancestry. Both Darwinists and design proponents can explain the existence of homologies within their respective frameworks of interpretation. Because of this, neither side can disprove the other’s interpretation of homology, and neither view stands solely on its own interpretation of homology. ~ Percival Davis and Dean Kenyon​

So can we be clear that this is your roundabout way of admitting that you haven"t read the primary source, that you don't know exactly what he said, that you are relying on Davis and Kenyon to have reported it correctly, that you are depending on them not to have omitted relevant context and that you are relying on hearsay authority from someone you characterise simplistically as a Marxist-Atheist to support your assertion that homology supports common design as well as it supports common ancestry? A simple yes or no will suffice, but please feel free to elaborate your argument, for example by explaining why homology supports common design.

 

[zeke]

Can you explain what 'fuzzy science' is and how the referred to example amounts to this 'fuzzy science'?

Fuzzy science is the non-scientific notion that Barbarian can take a line of fossils and show via the scientific method that they represent a lineage from early or late tetrapods to humans with carpel tunnel syndrome. It is a notion that cannot be tested. It is a rather new Darwinian myth that I will add to my collection.

Can you help Barbarian accomplish this magic act or was Henry Gee correct - such a notion is a bedtime story?

 

[lordkalvan]

But I have answered your questions - you simply dislike my answers. Unless you clarify your views we will conclude that your 'science' also includes the silly notion that humans evolved from tetrapods - slightly tweaked to a bipedal way of life? Do you have science to support that notion or do you also rely of evolution of the gaps? You are not a scientist - are you?

Please link to or provide the number of the post where, for example, you have answered the question I have asked several times about your assertion regarding the 'Darwinian horse hoax'. When you have done that, you can show me where you have addressed other questions that I will list for you again.

 

[lordkalvan]

Really? Then can you explain why early tetrapods really needed to run both tendons down to their feet and how they did this. Was this also true of late tetrapods?

What do you mean by 'needed to'? And what do you mean by 'how did they do this'? What is the context of your question and what understanding of these features drives it?