Doesn't the very definition of a "species" mean that they are closely related? And the point is?
Ratch
Actually genetic tracking and comparison techniques used in archaeology and anthropology have shown how many of todays species are related through past ancestry.
https://www.geneticarchaeology.com/
and
https://anthrogenetics.wordpress.com/anthrogenetics-website/
For easy starters.
How did you jump to the conclusion I believe in evolution? I never addressed my beliefs as they are mot germane to my statement.
Who can say with absolute scientific certainty that God did or did not have a hand in the evolution of man. Does anyone really have a clue the number of minutes in God's day? I know, by agreements, man's day is 1440 minutes in length
I would not think that someone who can create life would need to go through such a process. Besides, where are the missing links that show our evolvement?
Hi again,
Interesting discussion here and i am happy to see that most are keeping it civil and real.
There is too much to say in one post, so i'll summarize my own thoughts on these topics.
First, whatever we believe partly depends on how we collect our data and who we get it from. Someone claiming anything out of the blue is hard to believe these days because there are so many different motives, money of course a big one. People lie so it's hard to believe anyone when there are big stakes involved, but at the same time we do have to go with what we believe to be the most true at the time.
Second, climate change could be influenced by man if not directly caused.
Third, there has to be as least some validity to evolution even if it has not been scientifically proven to be a "self starter", and not all things HAD to evolve. A possible explanation for the starting mechanism could simply be advanced civilization initialization, or perhaps panspermia. Most scientists now believe that intelligent exo-life exists somewhere else in the universe, and this can be taken to be God or just a more intelligent life form. Many also believe that non intelligent dormant life or the starting elements of life could have been deposited from space.
As far as basic universal structure goes, small things can grow to be more complex things. We see this enough to know how it works. Small particles have to obey laws too, and these laws mean they have to behave in a certain ordered way, and that leads to higher complexity. I did not realize the power in this myself until a few years ago. When we look at how particles arrange themselves when they are around other particles, we start to see patterns. These patterns evolve into other larger patterns. It's amazing. Experiment with magnetized steel balls, see how they only have certain patterns they will arrange themselves into, yet each pattern could be different. It would not be uncommon to see a 'hex' shape form, and certainly a 'square' shape. It goes without saying a triangle shape. But who would think that a circular shape of almost any length can form, and still be somewhat stable. How about a figure 8 ? Sure, it's easy.
Doesn't the very definition of a "species" mean that they are closely related? And the point is?
Can you give me one concrete example of something going from simple to complex without it being predestined to do so in the first place?
Just a thought (more an idea) that Ive always had regarding the big bang and the origin of species-What if Life only exists because it needs to exist, because It has to exist. The Universe makes it so. There is no logical reason behind this, It just "is". In the beginning there was nothing, but then the nothing said "I want to become something" and something it became. As time went on, that something become everything we know; you, me, every tiny little atom has a part of that something. That something is the universe itself. We only exist because we chose to exist, because in order to sustain the universe, we need to exist. When we die, our atoms are still part of that something. That something lives continues on into the atoms of something else. We are all omnipresent and omnipotent. All life is god and we are god.
Evolution took place because it needed to. Quite possibly, in another alternative universe, there is no such thing as evolution, and so that universe died off because it's species didnt evolve.
This is all pure philosophy and possibly not what I may or not believe.
Have any monkeys evolved into man?
I have to say it's an idea that I'm not comfortable with because it abandons a key principle of science, but it is interesting nonetheless.
They began to argue — explicitly — that if a theory is sufficiently elegant and explanatory, it need not be tested experimentally, breaking with centuries of philosophical tradition of defining scientific knowledge as empirical. We disagree. As the philosopher of science Karl Popper argued: a theory must be falsifiable to be scientific.
...
post-empirical science is an oxymoron
Why? How do you create a foundation if you don't proceed using the principles of science. This is why science does not label any subject a non-starter. All things in nature are a subject for science. If you have no foundation, you start building one.
Did Copernicus have a solid foundation for a sun-centered universe? No, because his model did not even work as well as the Ptolemy earth centered model. It was an idea that gradually gained traction as new experimental data came in. Eventually, Kepler figured out that the orbits were not circular, but were eliptical which made the model match perfectly and then a solid foundation was established. Then Newton fully described the theory of gravity and mechanics which made it all understandable. But, there were people trying to supress Copernicus' ideas because the subject matter was "outside the perview of science", and "in the domain of the creation by God".
It's not a deficiency, it's a motivation to keep working. Copernicus did not know why planets would go around the sun, and Kepler didnt either. Newton made significant strides there, and Einstein did even better. But still we contemplate a quantum theory of gravity and we know we still dont have it all figured out yet. Even gravity might be controlled by God on a daily basis. Who can say, but that is not the question science can deal with. Science simply tries to describe how nature works. Whether it works as the end result of creation by God, or existance by accident is not the question science deals with. Humans deal with those harder question by different methods.
Total understanding will never happen. Partial understanding does happen gradually. But, if we follow your lead and label any question or field as "a non-starter", then it never will happen. My prediction is that science will uncover the explanation of how basic laws of physics and chemistry lead to the formation of life under the right conditions. The explanation will not require the "active hand of God", but I won't object to anyone who wants to believe that the laws that guide the formation of life might involve a God. Call it a hope or dream if you like, but really I have no hope or dream about it. It's just something I feel with confidence based on the past history of science. Every time someone tries to draw a line in the sand and say science stops here, and God starts there, they are eventually proved wrong and the line is moved a little farther.
To me the issue of creation of life is relatively small compared to the creation of the universe itself. We can figure out the details of how life originates and evolves within the laws of physics and chemistry. The real mystery will continue to be how the fundamental laws themselves exist and conspire to create a universe. After that happened, the rest is all just details.
That is not quite accurate. I expressed faith that science can crack the origin of life mystery and relate origin of life as a logical consequence of laws of physics an chemistry. But, I also expressed doubt that science will crack the mystery of the origin of the universe. I would also add, that I have doubts that it can crack the mystery of "consciousness" itself. I'm not saying that science cant do those things, but I really dont know if it can, and I dont have faith that it can. Hence, I dont have faith that science can do all and explain all. I only expect that science will continue to be a useful tool to provide insight into difficult questions and to help make useful and interesting discoveries.Ratch said:There is a word for the belief you articulated above. It is called "faith". Your faith is that science can do all and explain all.
The world is full of many examples and every good physicist knows there is no fundamental law to prevent complex things from being the result of simple things and random or ordinary events in nature. Physics just tells us that we need some energy input to counteract the law of entropy. The best examples occur in living organism, and one could argue that the origin of life (since it happened) is an example, but let's not consider those examples for the obvious reason that you say God did those things.Can you give me one concrete example of something going from simple to complex without it being predestined to do so in the first place?
Well there were a number of prehistoric human species living all together at the same time up to a few 10's of thousands of years ago.
How'd they get here and where did they go and why?
No further points from me. When a persons wording and the like start becoming the side tracking tangents to keep the aim of the primary debate from continuing thats where I step off. No one wins and very little further educational information follows typically from this point on.
Science tries to find answers to questions and admits when it makes a mistake or comes to the wrong conclusion . Religion generally does not.
That is not quite accurate. I expressed faith that science can crack the origin of life mystery and relate origin of life as a logical consequence of laws of physics an chemistry. But, I also expressed doubt that science will crack the mystery of the origin of the universe. I would also add, that I have doubts that it can crack the mystery of "consciousness" itself. I'm not saying that science cant do those things, but I really dont know if it can, and I dont have faith that it can. Hence, I dont have faith that science can do all and explain all. I only expect that science will continue to be a useful tool to provide insight into difficult questions and to help make useful and interesting discoveries.
Your first sentence is a statement without proof. You will never know if they are tractible unless you try. Science has penetrated deeply into both quesitons. They are not intractible problems so far, but are difficult problems to fully resolve in every detail. We are in a process or "tracking" both problems, with impressive results in both areas. The only question is how far into the process can we go. Can we ever resolve the more difficult and most fundamental questions in these areas.The origin of life and the origin of the universe are both intractable problems for science. I don't see why you think one can be solved by science and not the other.
Ratch
The world is full of many examples and every good physicist knows there is no fundamental law to prevent complex things from being the result of simple things and random or ordinary events in nature. Physics just tells us that we need some energy input to counteract the law of entropy. The best examples occur in living organism, and one could argue that the origin of life (since it happened) is an example, but let's not consider those examples for the obvious reason that you say God did those things.
So, in chemical reactions with energy input, there are various known examples of order coming from chaos. It is these types of processes that people consider as somehow spawning the first primative DNA, or precursors to life based on DNA. This is one of many ideas of research on the origin of life, and it is not something trivial to figure out.
But, this article mentions a few mechanical examples that will be easier to visualize than chemical moleculalar-level machinery.
https://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/philosop/design.htm
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