Do Evolutionary Theory And Scripture Contradict Each Other?

@gbrooks9

To be honest, I’m not sure that we never find these things. If we have found so few transitional forms (of which many, many, SHOULD exist) this stuff may be forthcoming.

Pardon me, but I don’t really know what this means in light of dinosaurs and humans… : (could you show me some pictures and articles etc?)

I’m beginning to resent people constantly asserting this without carefully and with an open mind examining all of the evidence.

Is this meant to be an insult?

@J.E.S, And why would that statement be an insult?

What I think is a little insulting is that you reduce my presentation of a complex set of interlocking evidences into a “mere circular argument” … while you defend yourself against all possible refutations with inexplicable carvings of prehistoric creatures that do not fit any known paradigm for how they could be authentic - - while at the very same time - - all the other things that would also have to be true have zero supporting or corroborating evidence.

And so while I invoke such variables as different life forms, different methods of comparing patterns of fossilization and different methods of dating them, you invoke a single line of evidence, along your own circular template: there are unexplained engravings of dinosaurs, so there must be truth to dinosaurs being witnessed by humans, so the engravings must be true. I find your analysis to be pretty ironic.

If you check the BioLogos archives, you will find this topic rarely explored, almost certainly because so few YEC’s are bold enough to delve into a soup so thin.

And just how many is “so few”? There are enough of them to have got Answers in Genesis to admit that they are a thing.

But the admissions of fakery by the people who faked them are all the evidence! Everything else that you’ve cited has been nothing but unsubstantiated assertions!

Do we really have to turn this thread into a Monty Python dead parrot sketch too? The Ica stones are a parrot which is no more. It has ceased to be. It’s expired and gone to meet its maker. This is a late parrot. It’s a stiff. Bereft of life it rests in peace. If you hadn’t nailed it to the perch it would be pushing up the daisies. It’s rung down the curtain and joined the choir invisible! This is an ex-parrot!

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I think we have to define evidence. Perhaps that word does not mean what you think it means. If there is demonstrable evidence that something is true, it can be reproduced or confirmed by others, and can be quantified in some way. Sort of the old saying, if you can’t put a number on it, it is just an opinion.

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@jpm @gbrooks9 @jammycakes

On that front, there is even more evidence for dinosaurs and humans coexisting than there is for the opposite. The coelocanth was said to be extinct. everyone thought we had a lot of evidence for that…until we discovered a good population of them living off the coast of Africa. The ginkgo plant was thought to be extinct…until it was discovered in Japan!

“Never” arguments really don’t seem to be the best. You can say, “we never have” or “x never has”…but there’s always the until!

As for demonstrable evidence…has anyone ever been able to recreate macroevolution in a laboratory?

@gbrooks9
you can check this out too:

The Ica stone may not be the best evidence (they are certainly not the least controversial) for dinosaurs and humans, but as, this article seeks to show, they are not alone in their testimony to the history of dinosaurs and man.

Jonathan, I would encourage you to examine what you are calling evidence. We have a tremendous amount of “evidence” for Bigfoot. Eye witness accounts, footprints, blurry photographs. Also for aliens: photographs around Roswell , eye witness accounts, abductions. And for the Loch Ness Monster. But, really?

As for “macroevolution” by definition it takes thousands to millions of years. Some researchers have been around awhile, but not that long. We also have not been able to create a supernova in the laboratory, thank goodness, but have little doubt that they exist.

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@J.E.S.

Even if they did, I doubt if you would agree to its relevance. We’ve had any number of YEC’s come through here taunting their correspondents by asking the same thing. But as soon as someone starts showing that some microscopic life has been altered in such a way as to make them less reproductively compatible with an ancestral population (though not completely incompatible) - - the next refrain is:

“…But that’s just the same ‘kind’ … what about macro evolution which leads a hippo to become a whale!?!”

How does one prove anything to someone who thinks that even Common Descent is a false doctrine? It’s like saying nuclear DNA isn’t really in the nucleus of the cell - - the real DNA is hiding in supernatural pockets invisible within the cell.

The closest thing to demonstrating that populations can develop increasingly less reproductive compatibility (the very foundation of speciation) are the various Ring Species around the world. Give the Wiki article a look and learn something about how populations and biology can do unusual things!

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@J.E.S

But your evidence is a hot-house.

What do I mean by that? It’s a single species flower that stands all by itself, like most frauds do. For the Ica stones to be true, thousands of other things would need to be true … and we have zero evidence for even hundreds of these thousands.

It’s a fable. It’s a fake. And the solitary nature of this category of evidence is the best proof of that … even with various dragon stories around the world.

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Neither the coelacanth nor the ginkgo plant are evidence that dinosaurs and humans coexisted.

I know your point is that absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but there are a number of key differences between the coelacanth and dinosaurs that mean you’re comparing apples and oranges here:

  1. The coelacanth is a marine animal. Dinosaurs were mainly land animals. Land is far, far more accessible to study, and even today there is a vast amount that we don’t know about the oceans.
  2. Dinosaurs were far, far larger than the coelacanth.
  3. The coelacanth was rediscoverd in 1938. That is seventy-nine years ago. At the time, what was known about the oceans was a tiny fraction of what is known today. As for dinosaurs and humans coexisting – we’re still waiting for any definitive evidence of that.

These differences mean that if dinosaurs really had coexisted with humans, evidence for them would have been far more abundant and far more accessible than the coelacanth. It’s not impossible that dinosaurs could have survived to modern times, but given the lack of evidence, it is extremely unlikely.[quote=“J.E.S, post:246, topic:36218”]
As for demonstrable evidence…has anyone ever been able to recreate macroevolution in a laboratory?
[/quote]

Ah, the good old “were you there?” fallacy. Evidence does not work that way and doing everything end to end in a lab is not a criterion for its validity.

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@jpm

Those are also somewhat fascinating topics (which would make for an interesting discussion if they applied to the Creation v. Evolution debate…) but I digress.

Many consider the Loch Ness monster to be a living plesiosaur. I would encourage you all to research that a little too (and then there’s the “surgeon’s photograph.” I’m sure you are all going to tell me that there is absolutely nothing to the monster because of one supposedly fake photograph. However, I’m on the fence about that picture. A “deathbed confession” is what discredited it in the first place, but, upon reading further, I stumbled upon the interesting reasons to lie that existed in those interesting circumstances…but I digress again).

As for demonstrable evidence, are you agreeing with me that there is no “demonstrable evidence” (yet) for evolution?

No, I think the fossil record has tremendous value as evidence, and the fact that advances in genetic sequencing have only served to support it makes the evidence overwhelming. So overwhelming in fact, that I shy away from arguing the science of evolution, but just ask that you read the literature, and try to consider more the theologic objections, which is really the root cause of disagreement.

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I am glad you see my point.

One thing, though. Doesn’t the Coelocanth surprise you almost as much as a living dinosaur would? I mean, it’s the same concept…right?

Personally, I do not like to use the “where were you” argument, and I dislike it when it is used by other YEC’s (assuming you are speaking of the semi-cliche argument that I have in mind). I brought it up in this case in an effort to show that demonstrable evidence (or evidence able to be reproduced) is not the only type of evidence people believe in…

So far, your only evidence is faked Ica stones. Have any other evidence?

“The” coelacanth? There are nearly 100 species of coelacanth in the fossil record, and the modern species is not found in the fossil record at all. Coelacanth is the name of an entire group of fish, not a single species.

What the complete lack of fossils for the modern coelacanth demonstrates is how spotty the known fossil record is, and why gaps in the fossil record are not a reliable indication for gaps in the evolutionary history of life. We have living species that we have no fossils for.[quote=“J.E.S, post:246, topic:36218”]
“Never” arguments really don’t seem to be the best. You can say, “we never have” or “x never has”…but there’s always the until!
[/quote]

And yet you continue to use the argument that there are no transitional fossils when we have searched such a tiny, tiny fraction of the Earth for fossils.[quote=“J.E.S, post:246, topic:36218”]
As for demonstrable evidence…has anyone ever been able to recreate macroevolution in a laboratory?
[/quote]

The demonstrable evidence is fossils and the genomes of living species.

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No, because it’s a completely different scale.

Large dinosaurs are far more likely to leave fossils or carcasses than much smaller fish.

Said carcasses would be far easier to find on land than at sea.

Said carcasses would be far more likely to have turned up by 2017 than by 1938.

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Here are some more areas where you can find evidence (I will list them AGAIN):

www.genesispark.org

I had not heard of this…some sources please?

I simply stated that in response to the assertion that no dinosaurs are alive today, or that the things mentioned in one of @gbrooks9’s last post have never turned up, therefore dinosaurs and humans never coexisted. As said before, there’s always the Never…yet!

@T_aquaticus

Do you have any scientific evidence?

“The oldest known coelacanth species, the ones that are known from before 80 million years ago, were far more diverse (more than 120 different known fossil species) smaller, lacked certain internal structures found in modern coelacanths and belonged to a different genera and suborder. Modern coelacanths also belong to a different genera than the 80 million year genera.”
Scrivenings: Creationists Love to Talk About “Living Fossils” Like the Coelacanth, Shark, Horseshoe Crab, etc. So Long As Evolutionists Aren't Allowed A Word in Edgewise.[quote=“J.E.S, post:257, topic:36218”]
I simply stated that in response to the assertion that no dinosaurs are alive today, or that the things mentioned in one of @gbrooks9’s last post have never turned up, therefore dinosaurs and humans never coexisted. As said before, there’s always the Never…yet!
[/quote]

Wouldn’t the same apply for the current gaps in the fossil record?

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Maybe the dinosaurs grow to be less large today than they did before the flood (and please don’t make some “Yes because they’re birds, ha ha ha ha ha” comment [even though I know you wouldn’t do something like that, others might], because that seems related to your “dead parrot” comments of late [that was a terrible joke])? And maybe their remains are in very hard to reach areas. Reading about some of Mr. Woetzel’s expeditions rather gave me an idea of this.

The world is a big place, @jammycakes!

@J.E.S

I, for one, would not want to say that. What I would say is that Loch Ness was not created until long after all the giant marine reptiles had been long extinct! And if they were not extinct, how exactly did it find its way thorough miles of solid rock to reach this isolated body of water!!!

In this article about the “Great Glen”, the fault line in which Loch Ness was formed:

We read:

“Erosion along the fault zone during Quaternary glaciation formed the famous Loch Ness. The fault is mostly inactive today, but occasional moderate tremors have been recorded over the past 150 years.”

The article for the Quaternary Glaciation:

… we read: "The Quaternary glaciation is the last of five known glaciations during Earth’s history. The other four are the Huronian glaciation, Cryogenian, Andean-Saharan glaciation, and Karoo Ice Age. "

Lakes: “The Quaternary glaciation created more lakes than all other geologic processes combined. The reason is that a continental glacier completely disrupts the preglacial drainage system. The surface over which the glacier moved was scoured and eroded by the ice, leaving a myriad of closed, undrained depressions in the bedrock. These depressions filled with water and became lakes.”

“Very large lakes were created along the glacial margins. The ice on both North America and Europe was about 3,000 m (9,800 ft) thick near the centers of maximum accumulation, but it tapered toward the glacier margins. Ice weight caused crustal subsidence which was greatest beneath the thickest accumulation of ice. As the ice melted, rebound of the crust lagged behind, producing a regional slope toward the ice. This slope formed basins that have lasted for thousands of years…”

And from an article on Loch Ness itself, we read this interesting item:

“Loch Ness … is a large, deep, freshwater loch in the Scottish Highlands extending for approximately 37 kilometres (23 miles) southwest of Inverness. Its surface is 16 metres (52 feet) above sea level.”

The ocean would have to elevate more than 52 feet to give access to this landlocked body of water.

“It is one of a series of interconnected, murky bodies of water in Scotland; its water visibility is exceptionally low due to a high peat content in the surrounding soil.”

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Dinosaurs are not identified by their size but by their specific features. One obvious diagnostic feature is the angle at which their limbs exist their torso. Reptiles like crocodiles and lizards have limbs that exit their bodies parallel to the ground. Dinosaurs had limbs that exited their torso perpendicular to the ground allowing them to hold their bodies well above the ground. Dinosaurs also had hips that are very different from reptiles such as turtles, lizards, and crocs. Suffice it to say that if there were a chicken sized dinosaur alive today we would be able to recognize it quite easily, not to mention that there were many, many species of dinosaurs that were the size of a chicken.

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