Please quote me the section that says “humans have genes for feathers development.”
I’m not making an argument from authority. Mainstream science could be wrong.
Rather, I’m stating a fact: “mainstream science has moved on from this debate because the evidence is so strong in favor of common descent.” I can explain this data to you, and how scientists interpret it, but I have no interest in debating it. I can also guarantee you that arguing on a forum is not going to change anything about how mainstream science understands the evidence for evolution. Science proceeds by other means.
Particularly telling, even the articles you quote disagree with you. It appears like you have not read them carefully, and are just quote mining things to take out of context on your behalf. I’m not interested in arguments like this. Science isn’t really meant to be debated this way. Frankly, if you just read the papers you quote closely, there would be no need for me to respond.
So, no thank you. Not interested in a senseless debate.
Instead, tell me more about why you think it is so important to argue against evolution? Do you have a theological problem with it? What do you think you are accomplishing by arguing about it?
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Sorry, I was referring to this statement. I looked at the abstract but cannot make the connection to your conclusion.
I think @dcscccc is trying to apply “evolutionary logic” to make an absurd claim, to demonstrate the logic is false. The problem is that he doesn’t really understand “evolutionary logic.” The claim that humans evolved from birds is absurd because it doesn’t follow from “evolutionary logic” in the first place, not because their is a flaw in “evolutionary logic” per se.
I think he is also mistaking the point that this genetic data shows we share a common ancestor with birds, not that we “evolved from birds.” There is a big difference between these claims. In the same way, we did not evolve from chimps, rather we think we evolved from a common ancestor with chimps.
Sigh … so how do you suppose you are going to DEFINE the phrase “believe the Bible is true” ?
There are MILLIONS of Christians … GOOD Christians … who think the Bible is true in some way … but who DONT believe the languages of the world originate from the Tower of Babylon. Do YOU believe the world’s languages come from the Tower of Babylon?
And so why do **** I **** care if atheists agree with this or that ? I know many Atheists who think Coca Cola is the REAL THING … as do I. This does not make me itchy to be an Atheist.
You are essentially arguing that because I believe God is involved in Evolution … ipso facto… I will eventually be forced to believe there is no God.
You are one hilarious fellow, right?
You originally asked:
@deliberateresult, I’m still curious your response to my answer…[quote=“Swamidass, post:462, topic:4944, full:true”]
This is a really important question that deserves a good answer.
This question cuts to the core of the debate. For many Christians, arguments against evolution builds their faith, giving us confidence that our faith is true. Anti-evolutionist become an epistemology: the reason why we know our faith is true. In this mindset, theistic evolution is particularly dangerous, because directly challenges this foundation, suggesting to many that our faith is false.
For me, I search for confident faith too, but I find a different foundation. I ask: how do I know my faith is true? Is it through science or scientific arguments? Is it through intently studying nature? Or it another way?
I believe that God makes Himself known to the world is through the death and Resurrection of Jesus. This is the “one sign” (quoting Jesus) that God offers to prove that He exists, is unimaginably good, and wants to be known. This is a “sign,” a miracle with public evidence to which we can point (both inside and outside the Bible) when we ask “why” we know our faith is true. For me, the Resurrection is my epistemology.
Of course there is evidence of God in nature, but without Jesus it is hard to appreciate it. Whether evolution is true or false, I follow Jesus because He rose from the dead. Jesus is my starting point, not anti-evolutionism.
What evidence did God leave for us regarding the Resurrection?
There are over 100,000 relevant texts. There is a whole academic field devoted to studying 1st Century Palestine. There are a few holdouts, but even those that reject the Resurrection agree that there is compelling evidence for it. It is without doubt the most substantiated ancient miracle. For example, look at this remarkable dialogue between NT Wright and Sean Kelly (chair of philosophy at harvard) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RsKv9uX8rwE. I really reccomend NT Wright’s masterpiece “the Resurrection of the Son of God”. And for those with short attention spans, this article: http://ntwrightpage.com/Wright_Historical_Problem.htm.
In our scientific world, it is normal to look to science to lead us to God. This is the allure anti-evolutionism and ID. However, we know from Scripture, that God comes to us another way. He comes to us through Jesus.
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Hi Chris,
I have recently heard of this approach and have read his paper, “A chemical systems approach to evolution,” R. J. P. Williams, Dalton Trans,2007, 991–1001. It is an interesting approach, and my impression is that he is trying to link the relative distribution of metals needed for various biochemical systems with their relative abundance on earth, and energetics that involve systems containing various chelated metal systems. I have also looked at a few papers that try to link structures of some enzymes with the common descent outlook, and also how random mutations performed under laboratory conditions may impact on enzyme activity.
Overall, I agree that there are many pointers to the suitability of earth for life, and variation is axiomatic. I would find a notion of direction in the bio-world interesting, but this does not sit well with my reading of evolution, where the majority (that I can see) all argue for a chance/random based outlook that relies purely on some type of scientific argument(s) - even laboratory experiments on enzyme activity require intervention by the scientist, and screening/selection methods, to isolate the modified enzyme showing greater activity. Thus most of these arguments fall far short of a scientifically verifiable notion within the general areas they infer from their work.
From a faith perspective, my reasoning is as follows:
God raised Christ from the dead, because God gives/creates life and that is God’s omnipotence.
God created life
The earth has been created to sustain life.
These points all agree with the revelation of God as taught by the Christian faith, and as spelled out in scripture.
see this article by carl zimmer for more information:
http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/11/20/your-inner-feather/
too bad. i can show you a lot of other evidence that contradict evolution theory if you want. but if you dont what to talk about those evidence i realy have nothing to say. its sound like you believe in evolution because mainstream science say so and not because of the evidence.
actually no. i just use the evolutionery logic- and according to this logic- if human have a vit gene= therefore human (mammal) evolved from reptiles. in the same way- if human have a feathers genes= therfore human (mammal) evolved from birds. same logic.
[quote=“Swamidass, post:530, topic:4944”]
Instead, tell me more about why you think it is so important to argue against evolution? Do you have a theological problem with it?[/quote]
good question. first- i care about the scientific evidence (that strongly support the id model). second- evolution doesnt fit well with the creation model. but its good to hear that we both believe in a designer, with or without evolution. if you want do discuss about the evidence for design (without any conection to evolution) i will like to do that. have a nice day.
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Let me rephrase your three steps:
1.) The TOE is defined as a purely natural, non-teleological process.
2.) My brothers and sisters at BioLogos support and promote the TOE.
3) Being Christians, my brothers and sisters at BioLogos believe that God was involved.
The issues I am raising do not dispute the above. The issues I am raising do not go away simply because someone who believes in evolution says they also believe in God. Indeed, the issues I am raising are magnified when someone who believes in evolution says they also believe in God…
…Unless they qualify their belief in evolution with an acknowledgement of the obvious evidence from life that life requires a Creator, and deliberately distance themselves against the TOE.
When you say that BioLogos teaches evolution with God, you are speaking erroneously. BioLogos promotes naturalistic evolution, claiming that the science strongly supports it, and then adds an affirmation of faith. That is not at all teaching evolution with God. If you want to understand what teaching evolution with God looks like, pick up Lee Spetner’s two books, “Not By Chance,” and “The Evolution Revolution.” Spetner makes a strong case for non-random evolution, citing the clear evidence for intelligent agency in life. The evolution that Spetner endorses is clearly distinguish as a different theory of evolution than the TOE. Many here at BioLogos present a palpable aversion to the evidence for intelligent agency, citing the fear of some future scientific discovery that cannot even be imagined today, but will supposedly explain that evidence in purely naturalistic terms.
That imagined fear will never be realized. In the meantime, the evidence for intelligent agency is very real and it is a very powerful Christian apologetic which we should embrace and proclaim.
To nitpick, science isn’t really meant to be debated at all.
It’s meant to be discussed so that those with conflicting hypotheses can agree on the empirical predictions that will discriminate between the hypotheses in the future.
The only real prediction that comes from the ID camp is that junk DNA will turn out to be functional. Then they grossly misrepresent the proportion of junk DNA that is reclassified as functional.
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How so, Joe? Please be specific.
Please be sure to address the fact that negatives can never logically be proven.
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Fascinating article! I love Carl Zimmer. Have read several of his books and many of his articles. Is this article true, in your opinion?
Seems like you are swallowing Dawkin’s definition of evolution whole, and forgetting about the scientific definition. What a shame. I do not trust Dawkins about very much at all, certainly not the philosophical implications of evolution.
The historical, consistent, and scientific definition of evolution is just common descent (CD). There is has been a great deal of debate over the last 150 years about the exact mechanism, and there is currently a “strategic ambiguity” in effect about if God could be part of that mechanism. Science makes no claims one way or the other on God’s action here.
As explained by Eugenie Scott (a non-theist)…
Because creationists explain natural phenomena by saying “God performed a miracle,” we tell them that they are not doing science. This is easy to understand. The flip side, though, is that if science is limited by methodological materialism because of our inability to control an omnipotent power’s interference in nature, both “God did it” and “God didn’t do it” fail as scientific statements. Properly understood, the principle of methodological materialism requires neutrality towards God; we cannot say, wearing our scientist hats, whether God does or does not act.
Science and Religion, Methodology and Humanism | National Center for Science Education
I’ll point out that this is from the NCSE, the main political body that organized opposition to ID in the Dover Trial of 2005. NCSE is not a theistic evolutionist group, but an organization devoted to promoting the mainstream science understanding of evolution. To be clear, a God-neutral view of evolution is the dominant view in science right now. Any scientist that tries to argue otherwise is extending science much farther than it can go, and disputing the current consensus.
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Here is a key and helpful figure with the caption. It is really interesting genomic work, showing a clear pattern in the data that entirely consistent with common descent. Of course, humans share a common ancestor with birds, and do not “evolve from birds.”
Figure 2. Major genomic events underlying the origin of feathers. The colored backbone of the tree is comprised of three tracks: CNEEs, non-keratin feather genes (n=126), and keratin genes (n=67). Rates of origination of these three genomic classes are indicated by the colors for each stem internode and track in the tree, with blue colors indicating low origination rates and red colors indicating high origination rates. Key events at the level of coding regions (genes) and regulatory elements are indicated. The colors of the silhouettes at right indicate the percent of the feather regulatory component present in the chicken genome inferred to have arisen in the ancestor of each indicated taxon. For example, the fish are inferred to possess about 28% of the CNEEs associated with feather genes in chicken, whereas 86% of the observed chicken CNEEs are inferred to have arisen by the ancestral archosaur, including non-avian dinosaurs.
Hi Steve, and welcome to the conversation! I am glad you have weighed in.
You have put a lot on the table here. I can only hope to begin to flesh things out for you:
You harness natural processes to purposeful ends, as does everyone. Indeed, our technological civilization has been built by our knowledge of, and ability to harness natural processes to our own ends. But whence the purpose, Steve? Left alone, natural processes themselves do not make intentional choices. They cannot make intentional choices. Gravity cannot “steer” events to an intended end. Purpose requires choice. Purpose is always the product of a mind. Moreover, when Steve uses natural processes to achieve a desired result, the activity of Steve - an intelligent agent - is often manifested in the physical result produced. For example, if you build a house or a bicycle, we can see clear evidence of the activity of an intelligent agent who had a purpose in mind. We can see that natural processes have been enlisted toward the goal that an intelligent agent had in mind. Thus, the activity of intelligent agency is clearly manifested in living organisms.
Concerning Miller, I think that even your larger context quote does nothing to bail him out. His phraseology that the “lucky historical contingencies” are not “incompatible with a divine will” sheds light only on his belief in God. It does nothing to mitigate his statement about natural processes. Moreover, consider his textbooks. In the first four editions of the textbook “Biology,” which he co-authored, we read: “evolution is random and undirected.” In two editions of his textbook, “Biology: Discovering Life,” he goes even further, saying, “Darwin knew that accepting his theory required believing in philosophical materialism.”
But perhaps you are right. Perhaps Miller’s belief is indeed an opposite one. But again, it is not opposite the one I ascribe to him. It is opposite the one he himself teaches. And indeed, this is the way the TOE has always been understood. And that, my friend, is a big problem. A problem that turns believers into atheists.
[quote=“pacificmaelstrom, post:408, topic:4944, full:true”]
I don’t think intelligent design is the right place to dig trenches. Intelligent design is the same as creationism in that it assumes that God must interfere with the natural order in order to create. This in turn is an based on the assumption that the natural order is a universe made of physical objects which are somehow independent from God.
With all due respect, I would suggest that you research ID from those who are doing real work in the field, and not from its opponents. ID does not assume that God must interfere. ID theorizes that certain physical effects manifest evidence of intelligent agency. ID is employed in such diverse fields as archaeology, forensic science, and cryptography, to name but a few. To deny the evidence of intelligent agency in living organisms is to de facto promote the rediculous propositions that the most advanced integrated data processing system we have ever encountered and the most technologically advanced engineered systems we have ever encountered have come about in some manner other than intelligent agency.
Are you suggesting that God does not actively intervene in our lives? That He never intervenes or intervened? What do you do with the Resurrection? The miracles of Jesus?
I tell you the truth, the closer I walk with Him, the more I know just how much He actively intervenes in my life. He has miraculously cured two different medical conditions, one of which required periodic surgery in order for me to continue eating solid food. He answers prayers daily. He manipulates people and circumstances to bring about purposeful results as He pleases. He is a God Who is near, not one Who is far off.
“The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. Elijah was a man, with a nature like ours and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain; and it did not rain on the land for three years and six months. He prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth produced its fruit”
James 5: 16b-18
Of course I know that.
I imagine you do. Sorry how that came off. I wasn’t trying to imply you were saying something different.
Hi Joe,
Happy Friday!
For the past 520-something posts or so, pretty much everyone in this thread has been disagreeing with your insistence that the theory of evolution must of necessity be “purely natural” and “non-teleological.”
We have tried to point out that the theory of evolution, like any scientific theory such as gravity, chemical bonding, and meteorology, properly takes no position on matters of faith and cannot prove or disprove a lack of purpose.
As you explained in your initial post, the insistence that the TOE is purely natural was drilled into you by zealous YEC advocates during your youth. Indeed, you portrayed this stance as a deeply embedded, important part of your identity. So I understand why you might be slow to move in a different direction.
At the same time, in your first post you seemed to be asking how the relationship between faith and science might have been more fruitfully presented to you and those like you.
So I’m confused when, in response to various formulations of more constructive relationship between science and faith, you have insisted so adamantly on clinging to that “warfare” relationship that you learned at the knee of YEC leadership.
I urge you to reflect on why you feel that you must so vociferously insist on warfare between biology and Christianity. A strong majority of biologists, and most especially Christian biologists, do not feel the need to insist on such warfare. So I will restate the question you raised in your original post: must you really be stuck in the warfare paradigm of science-faith dealings? Is there really no way out? Or is there a better way for you to think about this relationship?
The Lord’s blessings on your journey.
EDIT: grammar
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