Feedback Letter | |
From: | The Dire Puppy |
Comment: | Yours is a truly magnificent site, and all of you should be commended. I have been monitoring it for the past several years and even though not a lot has changed (so goes it with evolution) it never fails to thrill me. As a mermber of an area fossil club, I'm always pushing to have your stuff published in our newsletter- unless of course there's any objection. The information you provide is not as important to those that want or need armament against creationists, but to those who have a true interest in the natural sciences in general. I would like to see your site as a vast storehouse of information on evolutionary biology available to the general public, and so it would seem that I need to give a call to all authors to SUBMIT ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING THAT THEY CAN TO FURTHER THIS SITE IN A MANNER TO BETTER EDUCATE ALL WHO HAVE AN INTEREST IN THE WONDERS OF THE NATURAL WORLD AND SCIENTIFIC INQUERY! Also I would like to commend those of you who deal with the feedback on this site, because after your belly-laughs have ceased, have been able to reply to some of the most inane C**P I have seen without adding too much satirical comment. Keep up the good work, and if I have anything that can help you in the future, I will give it to you freely. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | Thank you
for your kind words.
Copyright in the FAQs on the Talk.Origins Archive is retained by the original authors and is not controlled by the Archive. Some FAQ authors have released their work into the public domain, but many have not. Most authors are willing to allow their work to be redistributed freely; if the FAQ itself does not specify the redistribution rights released by the author, we ask only that you contact the author before disseminating the FAQ in other forms. The name of the author at the top of the FAQ should be linked to the email address of the author, so that you can send a request directly to him or her. You may, however, freely distribute the HTML reference to a FAQ or link to them on other Web pages without any additional permission. The Talk.Origins Archive is always searching for new FAQs. See the FAQ submission guidelines for the submission process. Also, if you need an idea for a FAQ, check the Request for FAQs list. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | 1...DNA
disproves evolution 2...carbon dating is inaccurate
3...there is NO evidence of evilution 4...darwin wrote in
"my life and letters"...we cannot prove that a single
species has been changed referring to "origin of the
species" 5...scietific evidence proves the earth is only
7-10,000 years old
There is more but it isn't worth the effort..... |
Response | |
From: | Chris Stassen |
Author of: | The Age of the Earth |
Response: |
Your arguments were unsupported, but this feedback area is not the appropriate forum for lengthy debate anyway. If you wish to see how well your claims stand up, I'd recommend the USEnet newsgroup talk.origins. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | What are the religious influences of the author(s) of this site? |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | The religious backgrounds of the people who maintain the Talk.Origins Archive are diverse. They include Protestants and Catholics, devout and lapsed, a few atheists, a number of undecideds, and even some former creationists. There's also quite a few who have not divulged their religious beliefs, preferring to keep them private. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | In your Creation area under the "questions that stump creationists", one of the questions was "How do Creationist's explain how symbiotic animals lived after the flood"? Well, How do evolutionists explain how symbiotic animals came into to being in the first place. The only way possible for them to live, is if they were created at the same time...so they couldn't have evolved. |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Punctuated Equilibria |
Response: |
There is a problem with the conclusion made here. There is observational data concerning the origin of symbiosis in a strain of amoebas in a laboratory. We know that it can happen, because it has been observed to happen. In this particular case, the symbiosis is between the amoeba and an infecting bacterium. Originally, the bacterium was simply a pathogen. In one population, however, certain of the amoebas survived the infection. This group was found to have developed an obligate dependence between the amoebas and the bacteria. This example of the formation of a symbiotic relationship between organisms demonstrates that symbiosis can evolve. There is a lot of research going on with this example. I provide the following reference as a jumping-off point for further study. Pak J W. Jeon K W. Localization of a symbiont-produced protein in the host nucleus in Amoeba proteus. 49th Annual Meeting of the Society of Protozoologists, June 11-15, 1996. Journal of Eukaryotic Microbiology 44(1). 1997. 14A-15A. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | Webmaster: How can an intelligent being as yourself still believe in the myth of evolution, when both historical and scientific evidence disproves every aspect of the theory? Even Darwin himself said, "If evolution could happen, it would happen this way"; even Darwin himself didn't believe his theory. If you can produce concrete evidence that proves evolution, I'll believe in that theory. I used to share the same views you do and after hearing a RealAudio file on the following website, I changed my mind. Check out the site then disprove anything you can in the speaker's plain facts. Here's Hope |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | I attempted
to listen to the RealAudio files at the address you
provided; however, the RealAudio page seems not to be
there. I doubt it matters much, as I suspect it contains
the same rehashed nonsense available elsewhere.
It should first be noted that science does not concern itself with "proof." The theory of evolution is not proved any more than any other theory in science is. What scientific theories have instead is evidence. You are incorrect about the historical and scientific evidence, as both firmly support the theory of evolution as the best explanation for the diversity of life on Earth. This status has not been in question by the scientific community for over a century; the theory of evolution has yielded consistently correct predictions for thousands of experiments. Step into any large university library and look for the section containing biology journals. You'll find millions of pages of experimental data that support evolution. If you'd like a starting point, look through the numerous FAQs on this site. Most contain lists of references for you to look up. Certain creationists have misconstrued Darwin's writing style in On the Origin of Species to think that he didn't believe what he was writing. Darwin often provided examples of difficult questions that, at first glance, would seem to be contradictory to evolutionary theory. Then, later in the chapter, he would resolve those difficulties. Far from weakening his argument, Darwin was strengthening it by saying, "Look, even these difficult questions can be answered by evolution." When taken out of context, however, the initial questions Darwin poses might make it seem as though he is questioning his own theory. But more to the point, it doesn't make any difference whether Darwin believed what he was saying or not. The theory of evolution was not accepted by science because Darwin said it was so. It was accepted by science because it was rigorously tested and found to provide the most consistent explanation of the evidence. Moreover, since Darwin's day, new discoveries in genetics, immunology, and embyrology (just to name a few) have provided independent lines of confirmation for the theory. That is why it is accepted by science, not because Darwin said so. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | Reverend |
Comment: | If you are an atheist, I cry for your soul. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | Of course,
if one is an atheist, one doesn't believe in souls.
However, one need not be an atheist to accept evolution as the explanation for the diversity of life on Earth. Many devout believers of every faith, including many Christian denominations, accept evolution. See the God and Evolution FAQ, the Evolution and Chance FAQ, and the Evolution and Chance: Chance from a Theistic Perspective FAQ. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | I'd like to know how you PROVE the process of evolution to be fact? Now, I know that limited evolution happenes within a speices. But I've looked around a lot, and can't find any conclusive evidence to prove that man evolved from a lower state. Looking forward to a reply. |
Response | |
From: | Jim Foley |
Author of: | Fossil Hominids FAQ |
Response: | I suggest you visit the Fossil Hominids FAQ on this site to see the evidence for human evolution. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | William D. Mayercheck |
Comment: | Dr. Carl Sagan, an avowed and famous evolutionist, once calculated the probability of man evolving at 1 chance in 10 to the 2 billionth power. Muncaster (1997) calculated the probability of randomly producing one single living cell at 1 chance in 10 to the 100 billionth power. Since Borel's Single Law of Chance states that beyond 1 chance in 10 to the 50th power events never occur, I'd say that both Sagan and Muncaster proved the chance of life via macroevolution/abiogenesis to be zero. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | You might
wish to consult a book such as John Allen Paulos's
Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and its
Consequences, and then reconsider your argument. In
short, you have confused the probability of a particular
outcome with the probability of some outcome.
Here is an example from the card game Bridge. Suppose I deal you a hand of cards. There are 52 cards in the deck, and 13 cards in your hand, so the number of possible hands is: 52! ------------ = 635013559600 13! (52-13)!And the odds of getting a particular hand are 1 in 635013559600. But the odds of getting some hand are exactly 1. If I dealt you a hand, and you said "Wow! This was a one-in-600 billion deal!", you would be exactly correct; but the implication that something amazing had happened would be completely wrong. For another example, suppose we throw 5000 quarters on the ground. Each one, we assume, will land with either "heads" or "tails" facing up. That means that the outcome which results is a one result of 2^5000 possibilities. Since this is WAAAAYYY bigger than the relatively small number 10^50, your position must be that the coins cannot land at all. But what will happen instead? Do they just evaporate into thin air before touching the ground? What Sagan and Muncaster have done is talk about the probability that evolution would come out the way it did, and you have mistakenly extended that as if they were talking about the probability that evolution would happen at all. Their comments only mean that if we wound the universe back a few billion years, and set it running again, the outcome would not be the same as what happened the first time through. Just as, if we pick up all 5000 coins, and throw them again, we probably won't get the same result as we got from the first throw. (Precisely, the odds would be 1.4 x 10^1506.) Improbable things happen all the time; every lottery win, the order of radioactive decay events in every nuclear reactor, the fertilization of an egg by one sperm out of millions. The path of evolution involved many events, and in many cases might have taken a different path. But that's not particularly astonishing or unexpected. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | Hi,
I have a question to people in atmospheric science or in physics. My question is related to Genesis 7:19-20 "Until finally the water covered all the high mountains under the whole heaven, standing 22 ft. and more above the highest peaks". To elaborate this statement a little more.., the flood water at Noah time (i.e.~2,000 BC) covered the world tallest peaks including Mt. Everest, which is 29,028 ft. high. Since Mt. Everest is growing @ ~0.5 inch per year; 4,000 years ago it was 29,028-167 = 28,961 ft. Then in 150 days, the flood water evaporated. Now, my question is:- Does the earth atmosphere has capacity to hold that much water vapor? Can water vapor escape the earth atmosphere? Any comments will be appreciated. Thanks. Ganesh nprizew@yahoo.com |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | Even under
the most favorable circumstances imaginable, the atmosphere
will not hold enough water vapor to make more than a few
centimeters of liquid when condensed. Generally, the
atmosphere holds 1-2 cm, but maybe under weird and
favorable conditions we can allow even as much as 10.
That's a far cry short of Noah's flood. The rest of the
water would have to be in liquid form, not vapor. A small
amount of liquid in small droplets can stay aloft in the
form of clouds, but not that much water.
The atmosphere cannot hold that much water, and it can't be parked in space either, so whereever it came from, it didn't come from the air. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | Ettevy |
Comment: | Eyes and ears can easily be tricked or influenced by preconceptions. That is the most basic premise of magic. A simple misconception can lead to compounded errors that can take centuries to correct. Examples: the world was flat, women control the sex of a child (ask those poor queens that lost their heads over that one), nothing was smaller than an atom (which is something that can't be "seen" but is accepted, on faith, is there by its "finger print" on life, strangely like God), the speed of sound could not be broken, man would never walk on the moon, man could never fly, etc... Observation and sometimes experience, told people this was true. It was a minority who persisted and proved otherwise. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | (The reader
is referring to my response to the January 1998
feedback of Brandon M Ward.)
I should have been more clear in my initial response. The reader is correct to point out that an individual's eyes and ears may deceive him. However, science corrects for the possible bias, error, or misguidedness of individual scientists. How does it do this? Through the process of peer-reviewed publication of data. Scientists publish their findings for other scientists to see. If the observations of other scientists conflict with these results, then additional data are collected. People did think the speed of sound could not be broken, for example, but there were no data to support a result either way. Once such data were collected, it became clear that no such barrier existed. The problem comes when people make assertions without checking them against the real world. So while it is true that the eyes and ears of an individual may be deceived, our collective eyes and ears are not. Oh, and by the way, the existence of atoms are not accepted on faith. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | stephanie summers |
Comment: | Faith is simply believing, not everyone needs facts to support every little thing. I believe in God and I believe his word (the Bible) that's enough for me. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | Patrick Gaetzke |
Comment: | There is no evidence supporting evolution and there never will be because it is not the truth! The truth will come out one day; it even says in the Bible. All your so-called proof for evolution can be disproved by Dr. Kent Hovind. Also, he can answer all your questions about anything dealing with creation or evolution. You can e-mail him and read his info at www.drdino.com. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | The
scientific evidence in favor of evolution is overwhelming
to anyone without religious blinders on. Any good
university library should contain thousands of journal
volumes with observations and experiments that confirm the
theory of evolution as the best scientific explanation for
the diversity of life on Earth. Some of that evidence is
summarized here on this site in our FAQs. Read them for
yourself, then look at the references they provide.
The claims of Kent Hovind have been adequately debunked. See Dave Matson's exhaustive analysis of Hovind's claims, as well as his claims of people over ten feet tall and claims of 90-foot plum trees. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | We use fossils to date rocks, yet use rocks to date fossils. Talk about unreliable! |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Punctuated Equilibria |
Response: |
The use of index fossils to assign a relative date to strata was first employed by creationist geologists. See the Matson-vs-Hovind FAQ for more information. When combined with the principle of superposition, relative dates allow us to sort strata which are examined in disparate parts of the world. Later, radioisotope dating methods have allowed us to assign absolute dates to strata. Absolute dates tell us how old rocks of particular strata are. Does this imply unreliability? I can't see how it could. The two classes of methods are independent of each other, and accomplish different functions. Such claims of unreliability rely upon the impression that the fossils used in biostratigraphy are evaluated according to some notion of a "chain of being". This is untrue. Index fossils are most useful if they are geologically widespread, abundant, distinctive, show little morphological variation either with geography or in time, and are limited to a specific (and better if geologically short) period of time. No assumptions are made due to the taxonomic placement of the index fossils. An illustration of this point is the long use and significance of conodont fossils as index fossils, yet their taxonomic affinities were only resolved in the 1980's. It is difficult to sustain an argument that evolution uses state-of-advance of a fossil to assign a date, when the state-of-advance (which no biologist believes in anyway) or even taxonomic category of certain important index fossils was entirely unknown. Other useful information can be found in the Geological Timescale FAQ. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | My comment
is twofold. One, I've been reading my Pentatauch-the first
five books of the Bible-given to me at my Bar Mitzvah. And
you know something? It's written in TWO languages-English
and Hebrew. Then I remembered how translators always have
trouble conveying certain concepts, how learning new
languages is also learning new ways to think. So I figured,
what if these "literal words" had been misinterpreted, to
English from Latin, from Hebrew, from Ancient Hebrew, etc.
SO, if we simply alter the seven DAYS of genesis to he
seven AGES, then it becomes strong evidence FOR evolution.
First day-LET THERE BE LIGHT! Big bang, anyone... Second day-And the blue above was seperated from the blue below. I understand that our earth was a lump of molten magma, until the clouds of water above cooled it enough to fall and become the seas in which life formed...? Third day-I don't remember the exact wording, but it talks about the creation of sea dwelling creatures and small-Single cell?-animals. Fourth day-land dwelling plants... Fifth day-Evolution of land dwelling animals suited to an enviroment inundated with oxygen from the plants created in the Fourth day/age... Sixth-People time... Seventh age-we're in the middle of it... My second comment is that science is all about FACTS. Einstein's THEORY of Relativity is more properly termed Einstein's LAW of Relativity, as it is proven with every atomic explosion in every bomb and nuclear power plant in the world. So until proof either for OR against the existance of God, the Soul, or the Afterlife is given, in a methodical experiment, scientists have no right to lecture on the subject under their credentials. And it IS possible to prove or disprove, we just may not have the technology at present, just as we did not have computers to assist in putting together fossilized skeletons which were in fragments when the first Iguanadon was portrayed as a reptillian rhino... Feel free to E-Mail me on these two subjects. I love a good debate! |
Responses | |
From: | Jim Foley |
Author of: | Fossil Hominids FAQ |
Response: | This is not a debating page. If you enjoy a debate, post the above to talk.origins, and I'm sure you'll get one. |
From: | Jim Foley |
Author of: | Fossil Hominids FAQ |
Response: | This is not a debating page. If you enjoy a debate, post the above to talk.origins, and I'm sure you'll get one. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | Dear Fellow
Scientists,
First, I want to commend the excellent in depth articles on Evolution vs. Creation. It makes me happy to see that logic and science are trying to be upheld as the basis for discussion. Also finally, I am also glad to see there is a place such as this where discussions and comments can be taken from the public and responded in return. I have been studying this topic ever since my childhood and I am constantly learning more. I want to begin by referring to one of the articles on Evolution that dealt with Evolution not being a religion. There was a definition of metaphysics in the article: "Metaphysics is a name given to a branch of philosophy that deals with issues of the fundamental nature of reality and what is beyond experience." I can right now tell you scientifically that Evolution beyond known written human history is indeed metaphysics!!! Beyond written human history is indeed beyond experience and beyond known reality. You must make basic assumptions to go beyond human written history. You must assume that what exists during written history existed before written history. This assumption alone makes anything beyond written history religion (i.e. metaphysics). This is also known commonly as Uniformitarianism. Anything beyond the present or written records is a guess or a estimate and will never ever be a testable known. It is absolutely beyond science. Just to let you know. All rock dating methods are blind estimates. There is no control! I have conducted thousands of experiments. This is what I do for a living. (I told you this because I would lose my job so quick for fraud if we had no controls!) In rock dating they measure the radioactive half-lives. Where is the control rock to confirm the results of the dating??? There is no such rock because someone would have to have been around for millions or billions of years to confirm the control. Talk about a FUBAR. How did these scientists get a Nobel Prize for developing a blind estimate? I could have done that. Since rock dating is blind estimation, then how do we really know the age of rocks? How do we know the age of fossils? How do we know that the geologic scale is correct??? Please tell me I am wrong. I would be most happy if you can show me the logical errors in my argument here. Also, there are several other arguments I have that could alter science as we know it today. I have not discussed them because it would take a long time to explain them. They are so simple, you will say to yourselves. Why didn't I think of that before? I know you might think I am crazy, but please take the time to send me a serious reply. I hope that I am crazy and my arguments are just oversights on my part. I am looking forward to a intelligent and logical reply. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: |
We thank you for your commendation and are glad that you appreciate the effort that has gone into the Talk.Origins Archive. As for an intelligent and logical reply, I can only try. One quick point: This forum is not really a debate forum, though we do try to respond to a good portion of our feedback. Debate and discussion about questions of origins should be carried out in the talk.origins USENET newsgroup, where a far greater number of people can participate and where you will receive answers much more quickly than through feedback to this Web site. You say that ". . . Evolution beyond known written human history is indeed metaphysics." Perhaps. But why stop there? Why not say the same for everything that happened before you were born? How do you know the world didn't come into existence the second you were born? Your parents weren't around before, either; they were created at the same time with implanted memories of living before you were born. And why stop there? One frequent talk.origins poster (jokingly) asserts that the universe was created Last Thursday by his cat, and that the universe will end with the Judgment Day of the Litterbox Next Tuesday. He may be correct--there's no way of telling if he's right or not. Since we cannot tell the difference between the universe of Last Thursdayism and the universe as we think it operates, we can only assume that there is no Trickster God fabricating evidence everywhere we look, including evidence--multiple independent lines of evidence -- that the universe is billions of years old. That doesn't mean geology or cosmology or evolutionary biology is metaphysics; it just means that science can't ultimately prove anything. All science can say about any question is, "It looks like this is the case, and this is what all the evidence we have points towards." With regards to radioisotope dating: It is not necessary to have a "control rock" to determine the accuracy of radioisotope dating methods. Radioisotope dating is based on nuclear decay processes that have been studied for almost a century now, and are a consequence of quantum mechanics. The same basic theories that drive radioisotpe dating also drive your computer and everything electronic you own. The application of nuclear decay to dating procedures can be checked against objects of known age. Multiple decay processes can be checked for the same sample, to see if they yield the same results for the age of the sample. In fact, Andrew MacRae recently answered a question in talk.origins on this very subject:
See Andrew's article and a similar article by Chris Stassen on DejaNews. Also, see Chris Stassen's superlative Isochron Dating FAQ for more information. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | How old have the remains of the oldest Caucazoid skeleton to have been found to date ??? |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | Ardipithecus
ramidus is the oldest known hominid species, dated
at 4.4 million years.
See the Hominid Fossils FAQ, specifically the Hominid Species FAQ, for more information. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | Hi...
For my termpaper I need to obtain some detailed information about the age of the earth and , age determination techniques. How they work, and how the earth's age calculated If you can send me any information about this subject I will be very happy. Thanks a lot... |
Response | |
From: | Chris Stassen |
Author of: | Isochron Dating |
Response: | Check out the Age of the Earth FAQ and Isochron Dating FAQ. If you have further questions after reading these, you may contact me directly. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | Has dynamic time remained contant? Does not the 2nd law of thermodynamics demand that dynamic seconds have been becoming longer and longer as the amount of REAL time that it takes the Earth to orbit the sun increases? (because the orbit must be decaying as the Earth slows down) Therefore the speed of light measured against dynamic time should be INCREASING! Since it is not shown to be increasing, but rather decreasing then the TRUE decrease is probably even greater than measurments show. (Unless this is taken into account)Your comments please to John_Hazen@MSN.com |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Creation Science and the Earth's Magnetic Field |
Response: | I presume
that by "dynamic time" you mean time based on the rotation
of the earth. If you define 1 second as 1/86400 of a day,
you are in principle correct. The earth's spin slows, due
to lunar tides, such that one day becomes about 0.001
seconds longer each century. We have been measuring the
speed of light, with increasing accuracy, for about 300
years. Hence, we expect a day today to be about 0.003
seconds longer than a day 300 years ago, which translates
into a "modern" dynamic second being shorter than an "old"
dynamic second, by about 1 part in 108. That's
far too small for older techniques to detect, only modern
instruments can detect that small a change. Hence, we would
not expect to see any observatble effect on the measured
speed of light as a result of this change.
You can learn more from the National Earth Orientation Service |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | I am a philosophy grad student working on a critique of creationism within the context of the philosophy of science and religion. With all the talk in your Feedback about God, the Bible, etc., I thought I might point out that evolution and creationism both bear a 'burden of proof'. Remembering that scientific knowledge is probabalistic, evolution has met its burden "beyond a reasonable doubt". Creationism bears a double burden of proof - first it must establish a coherent, consistent god concept supported by evidence (bearing in mind the 'Design argument' fails). THEN, it must provide specific scientific arguments or theories. Wherever creationists attempt to begin meeting this proof (regardless of where they LOGICALLY should begin) they fail. There is an invincible ignorance to creationists (dare i say theists?) which pushes ones' patience to the breaking point. |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Evolution and Philosophy |
Response: | I agree, but would only add that there is a burden of proof only in the old English sense of a burden of surviving testing, and that only in the context of scientific explanation. Nobody minds if creationists want to make theological claims, and if they had remained doing that then there would be no creation/evolution controversy. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | For the record, I'm a Christian who believes that broadly speaking the theory of evolution is good science. My comment is that those who try to affirm or deny the existence of God or a creed via evolution or its negation must not be misled by language; i.e. Whose God? Whose concept of God are they affirming or denying? The Bible is not a science book. Was never intended to be such. Thank you. |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Evolution and Philosophy |
Response: | I take it
that you mean that the use of science to simply affirm or
deny the existence of "God" is wrong because this fails to
define terms. While I agree with you that the Bible is not
a science book, and would add that science is not a work of
theology or moral philosophy, and certainly not revelation,
there is something far deeper at stake here than
terminological inexactitude.
The only concepts of God that can be denied on the basis of facts are those concepts that make false factual assertions. The only concepts of God that could be affirmed by science are entirely physical or natural concepts of God. Concepts of God that assume God is neither physical nor naturally constrained are beyond all scientific validation or invalidation. Some scientists make claims for or against some notion of metaphysics, of whom some are anti and some are pro. All of them are making philosophical or religious claims no matter how much they are dressed up in scientific terms, and they should be tested and assessed as such. There's nothing wrong with a scientist making nonscientific arguments, but they carry no more weight than those of a nonscientist would. If Dawkins argues that the world looks undesigned, or Paul Davies argues that it looks designed, the emphasis lies in their own subjective or moral views, not in the science. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | Toalty Confused |
Comment: | Are you guys for real? You really think the wourld is flat? I thought I was the only one I feel better |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | No we don't. This is an external link to a page by those who say that they do. |
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | After
searching for about 40 hours on Creationism (my belief,
entirely), and really trying to find a good devil's
advocate, I was not able to find anything
worthwhile...until yours. I have yet to find anything I
agree with on your site, but it is exceptionally well laid
out. My main complaint is that you present yourself as an
intermediate ("exploring the creation/evolution
controversy"), when in apparent actuality, you're strictly
evolutionists, not giving the open-minded chance of
creationism being the correct answer.
I was in-the-middle until a week ago, when I found enough information to give plenty of reasonable doubt to evolution; not to say it's wrong. Your site doesn't say the opposite of my belief "belief in creation, and a young earth, with the distinct possibility that it's not the case". It more or less says Evolution must be the answer. Unfortunately this debate will go on forever, because no true facts will ever be found, only speculation. A great example is the layering of sedimentary rock; for all time, it has been assumed that it takes millions of years to make, and that it's laid down horizontally; the possibility of this happening wasn't absolutely proven wrong by creationists, but the fact that sedimentary layers can and are created in a very rapid time frame eliminates the "proof" that something at a particular layer is of a particular age. 5000 years of sedimentary rock has been created in minutes in a lab, and check out the "little Grand Canyon" at Mt. St. Helens for proof of a quick-formed canyon; took 1 1/2 hours: 100ft x 200ft. The presentation I like to make is not that evolutionists are wrong, but that they are not necessarily right, because there are strong evidences to the contrary of their beliefs. I contend, that you will never find evidence contrary to my beliefs, because of my faith, even if I can't proof them right, you will never prove them wrong. Some things from evolutionary theory have been proven wrong. I'm not saying that creationists always are right; I would guess that just as many statements have been incorrect on each side, but creation could have happened, because it did happen. I truly hope and pray that everybody will discover this in their lifetime. The wisdom of my understanding can only be realized with faith: John 14:6 Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father, but by me." Good luck, folks. |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | We are glad
that you have found our site informative and useful. As to
your main complaint, I shall direct you to the talk.origins home page, which clearly states
that the purpose of this site is to present mainstream
scientific views. It is not a debate forum; that is the
purpose of the talk.origins
newsgroup. The Talk.Origins Archive does maintain,
however, a large list
of links to other sites, including many creationist
sites. We feel that it is best for creationists to make
their own arguments, and are confident that an unbiased
examination of the evidence presented on our site will find
it to be compelling.
I would like to correct a misapprehension you seem to have about the message this site intends to convey. We are not stating that evolution "must be the answer." Instead, we are saying that evolution is backed by over a century of observation and experimentation, and that no other theory seems to be consistent with all of the evidence we see. Science does not deal in proof, but in evidence, and the evidence is solidly in favor of evolution as the explanation for the diversity of life on Earth. The layering of sedimentary rock is not evolution, but geology. Any geologist worth the paper her degree is printed on can tell the difference between sediments laid down in a catastrophic explosion and sediments laid down over millions of years. Although we do not have a FAQ yet on this particular topic, it has been discussed widely in the talk.origins newsgroup. See the August 1997 Feedback for Chris Stassen's previous response to this question. You might also read this FAQ on Mt. St. Helens and coal beds and this FAQ on dating the Grand Canyon. Before you "guess" how many statements are "wrong on each side," I suggest that you attempt to verify them independently. That's the whole point of science: discovering evidence about the physical world that can be independently verified. I'm not saying you have to become a biologist or a geologist, but keep your mind open and look carefully at which explanations make more accurate and precise predictions. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | It seems that the old argument of the "meteorite dust on the moon" is born again. Here is a quote I found: "There is, however, another process occuring on the moon which should have produced much moon dust. British astronomer R.A. Lyttleton of Cambridge University had proposed in 1950 that the action of ultraviolet light and X-rays upon moon rocks should continually spall off surface layers to produce dust. He estimated the rate of this process to be a few ten-thousandths of an inch per year. If only 0.00001 inches of dust were produced annually for 4.5 billion years, the result would be about 375 feet of dust! No such dust layer exists, even in the lunar seas (large low-lying areas) into which electric fields and solar wind would tend to sweep loose dust. Thus the lack of lunar dust still is suggestive of a young moon that is not billions of years old." It is intersting to note that this "new" argument (at least new to me, I had never seen it before) relies on a "proposition" made in 1950 .... Regards |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Meteorite Dust and the Age of the Earth |
Response: | In the
absence of a reference, I can't tell if this was part of
Lyttleton's serious work, or an off-the-cuff suggestion. In
any case, it's a mighty fishy argument. For one thing,
photons might ionize surface material, but are unlikely to
knock pieces off (even tiny pieces). It's far more likely
that solar wind particles would break up the surface, but
then they would carry away most of it too. The rate 0.00001
in/year looks whopping large for that kind of process. But
I have no idea what this stuff about sweeping loose dust
into the seas is all about, that's just a fairy tale.
If these "creation scientists" are all that tough, why can't they use modern techniques to duplicate the process Lyttleton was talking about, and prove it for today, rather than hoping 1950 still works. I doubt they will; too much "science" and not enough "creation". |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | This is truely one of the best and most informative sites I have come accross. I am by no means a very intelligent person, however, I do plan on studying science in the future. Until then, I can learn a great deal from this web site and others like it. Thank you |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | Lindsay Poling |
Comment: | Thank you for putting together this website. I am doing a research paper for my 9th grade English class and looking on the Internet, almost all I could find were sites on Creation. I believe that you can be religious but you don't have to take the Bible word for word. I appreciate the hard work put in to making this website, and I found quite a bit of information for my paper. Thanks! |
Response | |
From: | |
Response: | You're quite
welcome. We're glad you found the archive useful.
If you would like to visit other sites related to this topic, don't forget to consult our list of other links. |
Feedback Letter | |
From: | |
Comment: | I found in the book "Beyond Star Trek Physics" an intersting fact about the sun. It takes approximately 10,000 years for the light from the core of the sun, where fusion is taking place, to go to the exterior of the sun. This clearly rules out the possibility of a universe of less than 5,000 years of age. If it were, the sun wouldn't be shining! |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Creation Science and the Earth's Magnetic Field |
Response: | Actually, it
takes about 1,000,000 years to make the journey, due to the
extreme density of the solar interior. But this is realy
just a chance for me to post a bunc of web URL's related to
the sun, slar observing, and solar and stellar structure.
You should be able to learn even more from these sites.
|
Feedback Letter | |
Comment: | I just want to know what the theory is called that says that people evolved from amoebas?? Please answer i am a high school student. |
Response | |
From: | |
Author of: | Evolution and Philosophy |
Response: | It is called
the theory of common descent, but the single celled
ancestors of humans were not amoebas, but some other kind
of single celled organism. Multicellularity (organisms
called metazoa) has evolved several (17?) times, and around
700 million years ago we find evidence of the first large
metazoans. We come from a lineage of soft cells (plants
from hard cells) that split from sponges before that time.
The split with the line leading to amoebas occurred long
before then.
See if you can find a book by John Tyler Bonner called The Evolution of Complexity published by Princeton University Press in 1988 for a good introduction to these issues. |