Real Science Friday: 2011's List of Not So Old Things Pt. 2

[fool]

PBS and Google 1: "Mendel read Darwin with deep interest, but he disagreed..."

The whole sentence is;

Mendel read Darwin with deep interest, but he disagreed with the blending notion, hypothesizing instead that traits, such as eye color or height or flower hues, were carried by tiny particles that were inherited whole in the next generation.

Mendel actually solved a problem that Darwin had with his theory. (If you read the link you provided)

 

[Bob Enyart]

Mendel actually solved a problem that Darwin had with his theory. (If you read the link you provided)

Fool, yes, Mendel solved a lot of people's problems. And as to the relevant matter in this thread, Mendel wasn't unaware of but rejected Darwinism and believed in special creation, AND he was very aware of Darwinism.

As to that incorrect guess about Mendel and Darwin above: Here's my psychoanalysis of how that fabricated idea came into existence. Someone believed the claim, false on its face, that nothing in biology makes sense apart from evolution. If that were true (as so many gullible people believe) then it wouldn't be possible that the father of genetics rejected Darwinism. So the guess is made that Mendel must not have known about Darwin. And that nothing-makes-sense claim also is disproved in that the father of modern biology believed in the special creation of mankind. These two observations add to the mountain of evidence that refutes that silly, propagandist claim.

-Bob

p.s. Nice to hear from you fool.

 

[DavisBJ]

The whole sentence is;

Mendel actually solved a problem that Darwin had with his theory. (If you read the link you provided)

I am a bit surprised to see this. Enyart is normally a bit more circumspect in his critiques of science. In this case, this almost smacks of overt dishonesty.

Enyart either did not bother to read beyond the few words he posted about Mendel’s ideas about Evolution, or Enyart does not understand the place blending has in the history of the subject, or else he simply saw an opportunistic chance to try to score points against evolution by dishonestly quoting out of context.

And this prime (but sad) example of Creationist argumentation garnered a POTD award from Knight. That shows how little vetting is done of the POTD selections – if it sounds good to Creationist ears, give it an award – truth be damned.

 

[Alate_One]

AO, I couldn't imagine that Mendel could live and work for 25 years after Origins, and not know of it. I wonder why you assumed that. Just look at the first result after searching for mendel darwin, and you get, from PBS and Google 1: "Mendel read Darwin with deep interest, but he disagreed..."

Well, my mistake on Mendel not being aware of Darwin.

Darwin was certainly not aware of Mendel's work. If he had been he might have been able to give Mendel a better explanation of evolution. Since Darwin didn't understand genetics (Mendel obviously did), Genetics was apparently Mendel's main objection to Darwin's book, which fool already pointed out (nice how you deleted the part of the quote that gave actual context). The "mixing" part of Origin is one of the things that Darwin got wrong. So, Mendel disagreed on that, I do too!

Of course that's what modern synthesis is (the union of evolution and genetics/DNA), which brings us to Dobzhansky, on MY list.

And then AO, as to your list, perhaps you didn't understand the point of our list. It's not to prove that creation is correct. It's to disprove the claim that only scientifically ignorant people believe in creation.

Um. Your list doesn't prove that at all. Most of your list was before Darwin and most of those that were after were not biologists.

What you did is make a list of apples and compared it to oranges. The claim that scientifically ignorant people are the ones that don't accept evolution is TIME dependent. What is scientific ignorance now was forgivable not too many years ago.

Early on, Darwin didn't have tons of evidence. He didn't really know how evolution worked since he didn't know genetics. But now that there is DNA data and the science of evo-devo, far more fossils etc. it's really scientifically inexcusable to deny evolution. So making a list of scientists that are before Darwin or barely after isn't actually answering the challenge at all.

And then AO, as to your list, perhaps you didn't understand the point of our list. It's not to prove that creation is correct. It's to disprove the claim that only scientifically ignorant people believe in creation. Since so many of the fathers of the natural sciences, both before and after Darwin, reject evolution and natural origins, the above list falsifies that common atheist claim.

My list was not to falsify your list (which is a list of talented scientists certainly), but to show, contrary to popular YEC AND atheist perception that either you accept evolution and are an atheist OR you're a YEC and believe God, that there are plenty of scientists that are both believers and evolution/old earthers. I would like you to acknowledge that the third way exists.

AO, we were listing the FATHERS of the branches of science, and Google 1 for: father of modern biology is Linnaeus, and he's in our list.

Funny, Google is telling me it's Charles Darwin. But I don't think Google is the authority on this issue regardless. I do know that the first historical scientist mentioned in most Biology texts is Darwin. Though Mendel, Linnaeus, Watson and Crick usually get their own photo shot also.

Linnaeus is certainly the father of biological TAXONOMY he gets a mention in every classification discussion. However, his system actually has evolutionary implications, even though he was a creationist and didn't see it. Linnaeus lived long before Darwin, so I wouldn't really have expected him to put the pieces together.

And as for Walcott and the Cambrian Explosion, adding to his being stunned by the complexity of life so low in the geologic column, I imagine you've thought through the stunning discoveries in microbiology that supercharges the "explosive" part of all that variety?

I'm not sure what exactly you are referring to since the Cambrian explosion is multicellular life and microbiology normally covers unicellular organisms (frequently only prokaryotes). We also know now what Walcott didn't, that there are fossils of multicellular life that's even older than the fossils he found. Last thing I remember reading on this subject was it's thought that the evolution of eyes really drove the diversity, and more importantly the hard shells of the Cambrian explosion.

And now, reportedly, sponges are genetically 70% the same as humans?

You YECs love to throw around "the same" as if it always means identical. You're sloppy with the terminology so that you can make it sound like chimpanzees aren't actually that similar to us.

When talking about sponges and other "simple" animals 70% is not 70% identical but in general 70% of the same genes (i.e. protein coding regions). Having the same genes doesn't mean those genes have the same sequence. When we compare humans with chimps we are looking at large amounts of identical sequence not only in genes but in DNA regulatory regions.

And what was so much of the genetic toolbox doing in "ancient" species that would not need those tools for tens and hundreds of millions of years?

You do understand that we now know that an organism's complexity is not due to the genes it has, but how they are used. We have the same number of genes as most other animals. Sponges do not have a lot of the regulatory DNA we have. They have what they need, and it only takes changes to when and where genes are expressed and how they interact to make a "simple" organism more complex.

AO, you might dismiss all this, but it's part of the powerful evidence that's been lining up that forced New Scientist to do their cover story admitting that DARWIN WAS WRONG: on the tree of life! Check it out at KGOV.com! And now, we're just waiting for Darwin's other shoe to drop...

Um. I've read the article before. There are plenty of things Darwin didn't know and was wrong about (we've covered genetics extensively). You know that magazines like that LOVE making headlines that sound provocative right?

The only point of that article is there is a lot of horizontal transfer of genetic information at the base of the tree of life. There is even some higher up in the tree and the more scientists look, the more can be found. That means that a pure tree isn't really 100% correct. But it's pretty close to right.

The fact that we can tell the difference between rare instances of horizontal transfer and descent with modification is a problem for your side, not evolution.

FYI Bob this isn't your radio show so you don't get to make misleading statements without being called on it. So far I think the score is one for me and at least three for you.

 

[Alate_One]

As to that incorrect guess about Mendel and Darwin above: Here's my psychoanalysis of how that fabricated idea came into existence. Someone believed the claim, false on its face, that nothing in biology makes sense apart from evolution. If that were true (as so many believe) then it wouldn't be possible that the father of genetics rejected Darwinism.

Evolution is a "big picture" view of Biology. Mendel didn't have the "big picture" view that we have now.

When I teach it's hard to avoid evolution because almost everything we talk about touches on it in some way.

So the guess is made that Mendel must not have known about Darwin. And that nothing-makes-sense claim also is disproved by the father of modern biology who believed in special creation of mankind.

These two observations add to the mountain of evidence that refutes that claim.

My, you are willing to make a huge claim from nothing. How about you provide a citation for your assertion that Mendel believed in the special creation, not only of mankind but all species? If your last quote was your only evidence, you've failed to make your case.

Sorry, But I'm not willing to take your word for it.

 

[DavisBJ]

It's to disprove the claim that only scientifically ignorant people believe in creation. Since so many of the fathers of the natural sciences, both before and after Darwin, reject evolution and natural origins

Specifically, who is making this claim?

 

[Pragmatic_Liberal]

Fool, yes, Mendel solved a lot of people's problems. And as to the relevant matter in this thread, Mendel rejected Darwinism and believed in special creation, AND he was very aware of Darwinism.

If that's true, why did you feel the need to hack a sentence in half to make it appear that Mendel disagreed with Darwin's entirely, instead of just one aspect of his theory, to make your case? That's pretty extreme as decontextualization goes, and very troubling to see in a public figure. Obviously Knight didn't bother to check your link, but did you really think no one would?

Like Alate_One, I'm curious to see your evidence for Mendel's belief in special creation. Not that tallying up arguments by authority is a very good way of getting to truth, even were you to do it with intellectual honesty and rigor. And yes, I saw your claim that it wasn't an argument by authority, and that 'evolutionists' would no doubt think of it as one. Well, there's a good reason they (and others, like lawyers and students of logic) would do that. It's also a very bizarre tactic for someone who accuses those who disagree with him of 'personal credulity' and 'widespread gullibility'.

The thing that strikes me as oddest of all is the list posted by Jefferson at the beginning of this topic. A quick once-over indicates to me that the views he hopes to promote there (young earth creationism, by way of trying to discredit its opponenents) rely heavily on logical fallacies, frequently bifurcation fallacies. Do you endorse that list, or are you more of the bent that says God put everything there to test us? It seems like a more practical approach, if an ultimately flawed one, than trying to reappropriate scientific discoveries to disprove scientific theories by means of fallacious arguments. Or are you not a young earther at all?

PL

 

[Jukia]

Jukia, it doesn't really matter how appealing the choices are. On this score, what matters is whether biological material can survive in rock for tens of millions of years without decaying and whether bits of C-14 will not decay for millions of years. That's what matters.

You misstated my choice. My choice is that the earth is 4.5 billions of years old based on the evidence or 6000 years old based on the magic book.

Misstating the choice is a favorite tactic of creationists becasue they are afraid to face the facts.

 

[Alate_One]

Jukia, it doesn't really matter how appealing the choices are. On this score, what matters is whether biological material can survive in rock for tens of millions of years without decaying and whether bits of C-14 will not decay for millions of years. That's what matters.

Anyone that actually knows much of anything about C-14 also knows it can be generated within the earth's crust from nitrogen due to decay of other radioactive elements nearby. (in much the same way as it is in the atmosphere) Because of this, it is certainly possible to find SOME C-14 in deposits where the original C-14 has all decayed away. This is why C-14 isn't used to date when the level of C-14 is below a certain point because you're more likely to be detecting relatively "new" C-14 than a scant remainder of old C-14.

Nuclear tests in the 1950s and 60s generated elevated levels of C-14 in the atmosphere which means that living microbes contaminating a surface can now "throw off" a measurement very easily.

But of course you'd know all of that if you just read a wikipedia article on C-14.

Or you could have read this too . . .

 

[Bob Enyart]

DavisBJ, let me clarify what it is that you'll accept without question...

DavisBJ, let me clarify what it is that you'll accept without question...

Without question? ... scientific sites ... discussed the possibility that what was found was not dinosaur tissue at all...

DBJ, thanks for your comment. Even in my conversation with Jack Horner he repeated what much of the scientific community was trying to do, to deny that the soft tissue was from the t-rex femur that it was encased in, even though many tests had already shown otherwise, and even though there had been many years of such finds documented in the literature, including fossils with protein, DNA, and bacteria. Here's a small list:

- allegedly 17 million year old magnolia leaf contains DNA (Scientific American 1993)
- allegedly 100 million year old dinosaur fossil contains protein (Science News 1992)
- allegedly 120 million year old insect fossil contains DNA (Nature 1993)
- allegedly 200 million year old fish fossil contains DNA (Science. News 1992)
- allegedly 30 million year old bee fossil contains LIVING bacteria (Science 1995)
- allegedly 600 million year old rock contains LIVING bacillus (Nature 2000).

So when the evidence on the face was that this was soft tissue from a T-rex from allegedly 65 million years ago, that evidence was consistent with a couple decades of findings and so not shocking.

Now, here's the point that perhaps I didn't clarify sufficiently: As soon as the existence today of original biological tissue from dinosaurs (like now even from that 150-million year old archaeopteryx containing original biological matter) is acknowledged, THEN "without question" the entire evolution community will just flip a switch and believe that biological matter can survive for geologic eons without decaying.

 

[Granite]

You misstated my choice. My choice is that the earth is 4.5 billions of years old based on the evidence or 6000 years old based on the magic book.

Misstating the choice is a favorite tactic of creationists becasue they are afraid to face the facts.

They're also fond of selectively quoting people who disagree with them and know more than they do in order to give creationism the appearance of respectability.

 

[Bob Enyart]

fool, you gave Jukia something to bite on...

fool, you gave Jukia something to bite on...

From the link;
Does anyone other than me see a big difference between;
found soft tissue
And
after removing the minerals from the specimen, the remaining tissues were soft and transparent ?

When reading about the rex it seems to me that they were able to de-mineralize the structures using a solvent, so they "unfossilized" them.

Bob makes it sound like they cracked it open and found it full of steaming dino burger (fire up the grill)

fool, I'm a bit surprised that Jukia took a bite of your burger here. Jukia, you should have explained to fool that scientists do not have a secret formula that they can use to bathe fossils and restore original biological material.

Fool, you just have to read a bit more on all these discoveries, including now that this find has motivated other scientists to start looking for soft dino tissue. So as reported by Nat'l Geographic, a hadrosaur has now been excavated which has soft blood vessels and connective tissue and what looks like blood cell protein amino acid chains that have already been partially sequenced at Harvard. This supposedly 80-million year-old non-fossilized duck-billed dinosaur tissue was discovered by a team led by researchers at North Carolina State University. Fool, there is no potent known to man that turns rock back into amino acid chains. And I'm sure that Jukia will back me up on that.

-Bob Enyart

 

[Bob Enyart]

from dino burgers to jelly sandwiches... fool's a veritable snack bar

from dino burgers to jelly sandwiches... fool's a veritable snack bar

So, Bob says;

Rare School of Jellyfish Fossilized: Previously, seven sedimentary layers had been described as taking a million years to form. And because jellyfish have no skeleton, it is rare to find them among fossils. But now, a school of jellyfish fossils have been found in those same seven layers showing that they were not deposited over a million years, but during a single event and quickly enough to trap a school of jellyfish.
​

But when we go to the link...
We find it says;

Nothing about them being a school or being rapidly buried.
Isn't the reference supposed to support your point and not contradict it?

It's so nice to have fool back in my life

Rapid Burial: Hi fool, now even you would have to disagree with yourself and admit that jellyfish can only be fossilized if they are buried rapidly. No? Would it really matter whether or not the article stated the blatantly obvious? However, even your excerpt showed they believe that somehow each jelly fish was rapidly buried, as "severe tropical storms provide a plausible mechanism." So the question is, whether all of those jellyfish were buried via THE SAME severe mechanism, that would also have deposited their encasing strata.

Getting Schooled: And after you get done disagreeing with yourself, then there's us to deal with. Fool, we know that you also disagree with us, but you haven't yet indicated that you understand the point about the jellyfish. Once you do, I imagine that you will automatically disagree, but then at least you'll be able to address our point.

Darwin supposed that jellyfish and other soft-bodied organisms would never be fossilized because of how extraordinarily unlikely that would be, and jellyfish fossils remain rare finds to this day. So, on the program Fred and I were chuckling about finding a collection of them in a small area, spread over a number of strata. The evolutionists think that over hundreds of thousands of years, every so often a few jellyfish came back to the same beach, somehow ended up fossilized, and then:
- 150,000 years later, same extraordinarily rare thing, same place, and then
- 200,000 years later, same extraordinarily rare thing, same place, and then
- 100,000 years later, same extraordinarily rare thing, same place, and then
- 250,000 years later, same extraordinarily rare thing, same place,
- etc.

Or, a school of jellyfish, same species no doubt, were all caught in the same extraordinarily rare circumstance that could fossilize soft-bodied organism.

BTW fool, Jukia, et. al., while polystrate fossils are systematically ignored by evolutionary geologists (instead of being systematically cataloged as objective scientists would do), can you admit that even if polystrate fossils existed, say a half-mile away from that quarry, across those same seven layers, that you guys would still insist that the strata were laid down over a million years. Do you admit that? And if so, you should be able to realize that you're belief system is not evidence-driven, but pre-suppositional, being predisposed against God's Word.

-Bob

 

[Bob Enyart]

DavisBJ, "Thou protesteth too much." (Or did I take that quote out of context)

DavisBJ, "Thou protesteth too much." (Or did I take that quote out of context)

I am a bit surprised to see this. Enyart is normally a bit more circumspect in his critiques of science. In this case, this almost smacks of overt dishonesty.

Thanks for the compliments DBJ. From evolutionists, I've got to take them any way I can get them (except from Hannam as quoted by PZ Myers).

Enyart either did not bother to read beyond the few words he posted about Mendel’s ideas about Evolution, or Enyart does not understand... blending...

DavisBJ, I was quoting that to disprove AO's claim that Mendel knew nothing of Darwin, but for him to disagree with Darwin, he had to know something of him. And I'm thankful that AO has admitted, "Well, my mistake on Mendel not being aware of Darwin." Thank you AO. The fact that Mendel also disagreed with Darwin on evolution was something that you could read into that excerpt, but it certainly was in know way required. The excerpt was to correct AO, and even if you read more into it than was there (in the link that I provided), what you read into it was true, and not false.

And this prime (but sad) example of Creationist argumentation garnered a POTD award from Knight...

Davis, you're the one who read into the quote, not Knight. That's called raising a straw man. You make an argument that your opponent didn't make, and you get all self-righteous in defeating it (Ok, ok, so that's my definition of a straw man fallacy. )

-Bob Enyart

 

[Bob Enyart]

As to Mendel's MAIN objection, Alate_One overlooks that bit about evolution...

As to Mendel's MAIN objection, Alate_One overlooks that bit about evolution...

Well, my mistake on Mendel not being aware of Darwin.

Thanks A_O. I've noticed Stripe apologizing to you guys in a recent post, and this always helps.

Darwin was certainly not aware of Mendel's work. If he had been he might have been able to give Mendel a better explanation of evolution.

What, a better explanation than appeared in Darwin's own writings?

... Genetics was apparently Mendel's main objection to Darwin's book...

A-O, do you mean, other than that bit about Mendel rejecting Darwin's dumping of God's special creation of mankind?

(nice how you deleted the part of the quote that gave actual context)

See above. The part I quoted corrected your error. Correcting fool's and DavisBJ's errors would have to wait, since they read something into my post that wasn't there, and since I'm an open theist, the world would have to wait for them to actually make that error in interpretation before it could be corrected.

-Bob Enyart

p.s. More to follow if I still have the time. Thanks for the fun interaction.

 

[Nick M]

Yep. That original T-Rex isn't the only sample of soft tissue found. Hopefully the Japanese investors don't back down with all the problems they are having over there.

From the NatGeo article on the Duck Billed Dinosaur...

A confirmed dinosaur-hemoglobin discovery would open the door to the recovery of many dinosaur proteins, including DNA proteins, he noted—raising the specter of Jurassic Park-style "resurrections."

 

[Nick M]

Now, here's the point that perhaps I didn't clarify sufficiently: As soon as the existence today of original biological tissue from dinosaurs (like now even from that 150-million year old archaeopteryx containing original biological matter) is acknowledged, THEN "without question" the entire evolution community will just flip a switch and believe that biological matter can survive for geologic eons without decaying.

Sort of like a holiday fruit cake.

 

[Bob Enyart]

exactly

exactly

Sort of like a holiday fruit cake.

Yes Nick, exactly like a fruitcake

-Bob Enyart

 

[Alate_One]

Thanks A_O. I've noticed Stripe apologizing to you guys in a recent post, and this always helps.

I can admit it when I'm actually wrong on something. You, on the other hand, have a somewhat mixed record on that.

You have ignored my corrections of your science in the rest of your reply to my previous post, as well as my correction of your understanding of Mitochondrial eve in the other thread.

What, a better explanation than appeared in Darwin's own writings?

Of course. Do you think Darwin actually knew everything that is now in the modern Synthesis of evolution? Darwin had no clue about genetics and genetics is key to understanding how evolution works mechanistically.

A-O, do you mean, other than that bit about Mendel rejecting Darwin's dumping of God's special creation of mankind?

You haven't shown that Mendel actually rejected Darwin's central thesis with a relevant quote or piece of evidence. You made the assertion in your original list, how about you support it?

Nor would believing in the special creation of Mankind necessarily mean Mendel rejected all of Darwin's work, since Origin of Species barely touches on human evolution.

You haven't supported your assertion about Carver's position on evolution either.

See above. The part I quoted corrected your error.

The only error it corrected was me not being aware that Mendel had read Darwin. It did NOT support what you asserted originally and repeatedly, that Mendel rejected Darwin completely.

The full quote shows that Mendel rejected the portion of Darwin's book that is *actually* scientifically wrong. You tried to hide the fact that the quote contradicts YOUR original assertion about Mendel by chopping the end off of it.

p.s. More to follow if I still have the time. Thanks for the fun interaction.

If you are nothing else, you are "entertaining" at times. But that's what a radio host does for a living.

 

[Bob Enyart]

The Beagle is listing...

The Beagle is listing...

...perhaps you didn't understand the point of our list. It's not to prove that creation is correct. It's to disprove the claim that only scientifically ignorant people believe in creation.

Um. Your list doesn't prove that at all.

The Many Creationist Fathers of the Natural Sciences: These men rejected atheistic origins (like Copernicus, Bacon, Kepler, Galileo, Pascal, Boyle, Newton, Cuvier, Dalton) and even after Darwin, great scientists who founded major branches of modern science (like Faraday, Mendel, Pasteur, Joule, Kelvin, Lister, Carver) continued to reject evolution. This is not an argument from authority, as a typical evolutionist might claim. Rather, this list rebuts the claim you make frequently that it's uneducated people who reject evolution! Consider these strong creationists:

Philip Paracelsus, died 1541, Chemical Medicine
Nicolas Copernicus, 1543, Scientific Revolution
Francis Bacon, 1626, Scientific Method
Johann Kepler, 1630, Physical Astronomy
Galileo Galilei, 1642, Law of falling bodies
William Harvey, 1657, Circulatory System
Blaise Pascal, 1662, Probability and Calculators
Robert Boyle, 1691, Chemistry
Isaac Newton, 1727, Gravitation
Carolus Linnaeus, 1778, Taxonomy
George Cuvier, 1832, Anatomy/Paleontology
John Dalton, 1844, Atomic Theory

Most of your list was before Darwin and most of those that were after were not biologists.

A_O, MOST? Let's see, of the seven fathers of the physical sciences listed after Darwin, three were from the field of physics, and four from the life sciences. Darwin himself was a naturalist, and I don't know that in an objective comparison that it would be determined that he knew more about biology that the fathers of the branches of life sciences in my list.

Yet now, to my previous list, I'm going to add TENS OF THOUSANDS of educated people who doubt Darwinism. To continue...

So for those who worked AFTER Darwin’s Origins, consider those who don't believe Darwin was correct on the origin of species:

- Michael Faraday, 1867, Electromagnetism
- Gregor Mendel, 1884, Genetics
- Louis Pasteur, 1885, Microbiology
- James Joule, 1889, Thermodynamics
- Lord Kelvin, 1907, Thermodynamics
- Joseph Lister, 1912, Modern Surgery
- G. W. Carver, 1943, Modern Agriculture
- TENS OF THOUSANDS OF MEDICAL DOCTORS

For as I recently wrote to Denver evolutionist Dr. Fred Ebert after he said on air that he would [correction: probably] debate me on origins:

Dr. Ebert, According to Gallup, on the 200th anniversary of Darwin's birth, only 39% of Americans "believe in the theory of evolution." And to factor in education levels, for example, you can look at the surprisingly large percentage of MDs, one third, who are not committed to neo-Darwinism with only 63% of physicians agreeing that the theory of evolution is more correct than intelligent design (Jewish Theological Seminary study of 1,472 MDs). And this is not just southern Bible-belt fundamentalists but one sixth of Jewish docs, half of Catholic, and three-fifths of protestant MDs believe that ID is a "legitimate scientific speculation."​

The claim that scientifically ignorant people are the ones that don't accept evolution is TIME dependent. What is scientific ignorance now was forgivable not too many years ago.

A_O, I trust that these U.S. doctors meet your time condition, and that now you'll agree with the point that it's false to say that only uneducated people don't accept Darwinism.

Thanks A_O for chatting,
-Bob Enyart