Theory of Evolution

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#2168009 26-Jan-2019 15:22

nunz:

If we really want to discuss evolution lets ditch the Christian / Genesis / Religion arguments and discuss evolution. I'm more than happy to discuss at a scientific level without dragging God into it. How about you aetheists / agnostics? Or is it that you need to argue God to hide the fact your scientific view point is too shallow to maintain without distraction? :b

If god exists, who made god? Where did god come from? What is the first principle?

Science says life started spontaneously from inanimate ingredients and developed from there. Even if the mechanism cannot yet be explained, that still makes more sense to me than the idea of god. Especially, especially, a self-aware personal god that cares about anything that happens in the Universe.

I am sorry, but I just can't share your faith. I respect the right of everyone to believe whatever they want to, but my belief tells me yours is utter nonsense.

I don't think there is ever a bad time to talk about how absurd war is, how old men make decisions and young people die. - George Clooney

nunz

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#2168011 26-Jan-2019 15:27

gzt:
nunz: I may be a Christian but I thought evolution was complete bollocks well before ever discovering God.

I agree. Some people in this topic keep confusing those two things. The vast majority of people who identify as christian have no problem with the established facts of evolution and evolutionary theory from Darwin to the present day.

How do you feel about carbon dating?

Problematic as it is based on assumptions we cant prove and that are likely to be false. e.g. steady rates of decay, steady rates of uptake, steady rates of exposure etc.

Carbon dating then leads to the idea of strata - that we date things based on what is above and below - again based on assumptions that can be knocked and not proven.

It is a bit of a circular argument. https://secularmoralatheist.wordpress.com/2011/03/29/is-there-circular-logic-in-fossil-dating/

However the assumption is one layer of strata proves others in other areas. E.g we date one stack of fossils and that then lets us say that the same fossil in another location lets us date that geography. If we data a TRex here as being so old, then when the trex is found over there it must come from the same time period so other strata in location b(there) can be dated based on location a(here).

Take this as an example:

The above article states carbon dating can only go back 30k years. The article below claims 50k - 80k years. One of them is wrong about decay rates, leaching and absorbtion.

cannot date fossils older than 60,000 years old and generally only date fossils within the range of 100 – 30,000 years old . The Carbon has completely disappeared if the fossil is older than this.

https://www.quora.com/On-what-scientific-assumptions-is-the-accuracy-of-carbon-dating-predicated

6) The object to be dated is older than the 1950s, and not older than about 50,000 years old. If it is not, this is usually detected during examination. The problem is that atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons in the 1950s completely changed the C-14 ratios to be off the charts, and not realistically trackable. The known range of calibrated dates for C-14 does not extend beyond 50,000 years. You can get uncalibrated dates up to "80,000" years, but these are understandably inaccurate due to measurement limitations and lack of calibration.

Then add in stuff like this stating the uptake of carbon changes depending on atmospheric conditions: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090624093458.htm

Did you know it was warmer in UK in the 1200s than now? That's an atmospheric difference.

kingdragonfly

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#2168013 26-Jan-2019 15:30

Here's the video I alluded to.

Oddly it's been posted by an anti-evolution pro-Christian organization Answers in Genesis, so you can't accuse me of posting a one-sided pro-science video.

It's a long debate, over two hours.

Bill Nye is the "lighter-weight" debater, as far as credentials, but I think anyone who watches it will agree: he clearly won the debate.

Because Bill Nye is a TV presenter, the debate has the advantage of using clear, easy to understand language. Anyone over 16 should be able to easily follow arguments on both sides.

So if you have some time to kill, Skip the first 14 minutes, as it's just a "please wait for stream to begin" text.

Bill Nye debates Ken Ham - HD (Official)
Answers in Genesis

"Is creation a viable model of origins in today's modern, scientific era? Leading creation apologist and bestselling Christian author Ken Ham is joined at the Creation Museum by Emmy Award-winning science educator and CEO of the Planetary Society Bill Nye"

nunz

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#2168015 26-Jan-2019 15:32

Rikkitic:

nunz:

If we really want to discuss evolution lets ditch the Christian / Genesis / Religion arguments and discuss evolution. I'm more than happy to discuss at a scientific level without dragging God into it. How about you aetheists / agnostics? Or is it that you need to argue God to hide the fact your scientific view point is too shallow to maintain without distraction? :b

If god exists, who made god? Where did god come from? What is the first principle?

Science says life started spontaneously from inanimate ingredients and developed from there. Even if the mechanism cannot yet be explained, that still makes more sense to me than the idea of god. Especially, especially, a self-aware personal god that cares about anything that happens in the Universe.

I am sorry, but I just can't share your faith. I respect the right of everyone to believe whatever they want to, but my belief tells me yours is utter nonsense.

Where did God come from? - read Hawkin's conjectures that time didn't exist before the big bang. That means time is a construct of our universe. It is a similar idea to the one that if the universe is expanding .. then what is it expanding into. Hawkins says it creates a place to expand into ??? So maybe he is saying the universe is God? Ditto time - it was created at the big bang .. according to Hawkin.

Back on track .. the Bibles first imagery shows God .. who then created time (seasons) ... so if there is no before , before time began..... then the question of who created God becomes moot. It was an argument by Hawkin that upset the Catholics amongst others.

As I said .. lets ditch the God argument and discuss the science.

.... Or is it that you need to argue God to hide the fact your scientific view point is too shallow to maintain without distraction? :b he he he.

Respectfully (but with a bit of leg pulling)

Shane

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#2168019 26-Jan-2019 15:47

The science tells me that we don't have all the information needed to form a definitive conclusion, but we do have enough to make some pretty good guesses. As far as climate change goes, whether Britons were eating grapes in the 12th century or ice-skating on the Thames in the 16th, there is no question that things are heating up now and we will have big problems unless we can find a way to cope with that. People arguing about what did or didn't happen 500 years ago are not helping. If we don't take appropriate measures while we still can, it won't matter anyway.

I don't think there is ever a bad time to talk about how absurd war is, how old men make decisions and young people die. - George Clooney

floydbloke

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#2168066 26-Jan-2019 16:50

Rikkitic:

... If we don't take appropriate measures while we still can, it won't matter anyway.

Here’s a radical left-field thought.

Maybe nature want us to carry on as we are and self-destruct as soon as possible. It has somehow recognised it has ‘made a mistake’ and now wants rid of us pronto. The sooner all humans are gone, the sooner the planet and the life left on it can start to recover.

"I have noticed even people who claim everything is predestined, and that we can do nothing to change it, look before they cross the road." - Stephen Hawking

Rikkitic

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#2168067 26-Jan-2019 17:00

I just spotted this on RNZ, which is very pertinent to this thread. It illustrates how science should work, and how scientists should think. They learn from their mistakes, and if natural selection is one, they will learn from that and a better idea will come along.

I don't think there is ever a bad time to talk about how absurd war is, how old men make decisions and young people die. - George Clooney

nunz

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#2168097 26-Jan-2019 18:38

Rikkitic:

The science tells me that we don't have all the information needed to form a definitive conclusion, but we do have enough to make some pretty good guesses. As far as climate change goes, whether Britons were eating grapes in the 12th century or ice-skating on the Thames in the 16th, there is no question that things are heating up now and we will have big problems unless we can find a way to cope with that. People arguing about what did or didn't happen 500 years ago are not helping. If we don't take appropriate measures while we still can, it won't matter anyway.

Agreed :) Uh oh ... that's a worry when the Christian and the non agree. :)

I am skeptical about some of what the scare mongers are hitting us with - based on older facts like the 1200s...

but I totally agree we need to alter what we are doing. More than heating is plastic, destroying limited resources so our children wont have them, chemicals killing insects and our desire to keep growing our cities .. why? When is enough enough. Auckland, Chch etc suck to live in owing to too many people.

I hate to think what environmental factors are causing cancer, allergies, autism etc - and yet we keep piling more on.

I'm a fan of the Zombie Apocalypse .. .the killing will be sad but we might get back to a sustainable and relational life style.

nunz

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#2168100 26-Jan-2019 18:41

kingdragonfly: Here's the video I alluded to.

Oddly it's been posted by an anti-evolution pro-Christian organization Answers in Genesis, so you can't accuse me of posting a one-sided pro-science video.

It's a long debate, over two hours.

Bill Nye is the "lighter-weight" debater, as far as credentials, but I think anyone who watches it will agree: he clearly won the debate.

Because Bill Nye is a TV presenter, the debate has the advantage of using clear, easy to understand language. Anyone over 16 should be able to easily follow arguments on both sides.

So if you have some time to kill, Skip the first 14 minutes, as it's just a "please wait for stream to begin" text.

Bill Nye debates Ken Ham - HD (Official)
Answers in Genesis

"Is creation a viable model of origins in today's modern, scientific era? Leading creation apologist and bestselling Christian author Ken Ham is joined at the Creation Museum by Emmy Award-winning science educator and CEO of the Planetary Society Bill Nye"

Watching it.

So far round one to Ham. Round two is shaping up to Nye .. some big body blows .. but Ham did make some great points .

gzt

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#2168105 26-Jan-2019 19:30

Ham's strange ideas are only a viable model if you ignore, cast doubt on, and plain close your eyes to mountains of scientific evidence. Nothing wrong with being in a minority, but that's why he's in a minority.

nunz

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#2168184 26-Jan-2019 21:35

gzt: Ham's strange ideas are only a viable model if you ignore, cast doubt on, and plain close your eyes to mountains of scientific evidence. Nothing wrong with being in a minority, but that's why he's in a minority.

But interestingly - his idea of an orchard of life actually makes more sense than evolutions single tree of life as it fits better - it meets the observable data better with no huge leaps of imagination required.

And he is right about the language used to discredit those who hold religious views - "as religious people do x while scientists do y" ... meaning religious people are labeled as unable to reason and think logically.

If nothing else he should cause us to think through the biases we bring ... including the tenacious hold of early darwinistic ideas .. still spouted in schools and text books.

TwoSeven

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#2168209 26-Jan-2019 22:37

nunz:
Similarly what we do know of other solar systems / galaxys shows thousands of not a hope of life and only a couple have been listed as being maybe possibles.

I shall try making this post again, the last attempt seems to have vanished.

At last count there are roughly 4000 identified planets, and I think the calculated number for our galaxy is about 40 billion.

It would be a good idea for people to define want they mean by life and I would also suggest the word intelligent. The two terms are being bandied around in this thread without any thought to the fact that in the context of this topic, they have a very specific definition.

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#2168220 27-Jan-2019 05:37

frankv: Adding to that... our first signals are now 60 light-years from Earth. So our nearest possible neighbours at Alpha Centauri could only have seen them 56 years ago. Or, put it another way, they have reached only only a few hundred stars ATM.

Our first signals have become so diluted (inverse-square law) that they long ago became indistinguishable from the background noise of the universe - in other words, they haven't reached anywhere. Professor Brian Koberlein (astrophysicist) explains all this quite simply and succinctly.

tdgeek

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#2168232 27-Jan-2019 08:08

gzt:

Also need some cross pollination and fertilisation apparently:

Rice University study 2019: Study: Planetary delivery explains enigmatic features of Earth’s carbon and nitrogen

Most of Earth’s essential elements for life — including most of the carbon and nitrogen in you — probably came from another planet.

Earth most likely received the bulk of its carbon, nitrogen and other life-essential volatile elements from the planetary collision that created the moon more than 4.4 billion years ago, according to a new study by Rice University petrologists in the journal Science Advances.

“From the study of primitive meteorites, scientists have long known that Earth and other rocky planets in the inner solar system are volatile-depleted,” said study co-author Rajdeep Dasgupta. “But the timing and mechanism of volatile delivery has been hotly debated. Ours is the first scenario that can explain the timing and delivery in a way that is consistent with all of the geochemical evidence.”

The evidence was compiled from a combination of high-temperature, high-pressure experiments in Dasgupta’s lab, which specializes in studying geochemical reactions that take place deep within a planet under intense heat and pressure

Yes, that's right. Any rocky planet has been coalesced from dust and is molten all over. It cools, but that still just leaves a rock with chemicals and minerals and thats pretty much it. The creation of a planet doesn't stop there, the solar system is still active and in our case we were hit by the Great Bombardment, which is still our planet bring created from objects within our solar system. Its not coalescing in the true sense as that has already created Earth and it has created other smaller objects that never coalesced into a planet, but they are still orbiting the Sun, and they still are right now. That bombardment went on for millions of years, bringing water here.

The deep ocean vents were expelling chemicals and heat, and life exists there now, so it makes sense that life on Earth may have been created there. These vents sometimes slow down over tone and stop, evaluation could allow this organisms to adapt to ambient water temperature. The belief is that life was created in the oceans.

Im not sure where Theia fits in, I never saw much on docos as to bringing life creating capability, just that it gave us a tilt which helps provide a seasonal weather system, and a Moon which helps water movement, thereby avoiding stagnancy.

tdgeek

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#2168235 27-Jan-2019 08:22

nunz:

2 - As for larger number of opportunity's for life ... how do you quantify that? You see my reasoning would be. We know 9 planets (shout out to Pluto - what's up??) and lots of moons etc of which only ours can sustain life. We have said no to far more planets and moons and only yes to Earth. As such the ratio of possible to impossible is well skewed towards impossible.

Similarly what we do know of other solar systems / galaxys shows thousands of not a hope of life and only a couple have been listed as being maybe possibles.

Im not aware our Moon can system life, where did you draw that conclusion?

As to other moons, the solar system is rife with water, not just Earth. There are moons that are frozen, one erupts flares, apparently due to distortion from orbit activity, leading scientists to believe that under the ice is liquid water, and that could contain life.

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