…and this is a 
This is an important new fossil, a 47 million year old primate nicknamed Ida. She's a female juvenile who was probably caught in a toxic gas cloud from a volcanic lake, and her body settled into the soft sediments of the lake, where she was buried undisturbed.
What's so cool about it?
Age. It's 47 million years old. That's interestingly old…it puts us deep into the primate family tree.
Preservation. This is an awesome fossil: it's almost perfectly complete, with all the bones in place, preserved in its death posture. There is a halo of darkly stained material around it; this is a remnant of the flesh and fur that rotted in place, and allows us to see a rough outline of the body and make estimates of muscle size. Furthermore, the guts and stomach contents are preserved. Ida's last meal was fruit and leaves, in case you wanted to know.
Life stage. Ida is a young juvenile, estimate to be right on the transition from requiring parental care to independent living. That means she has a mix of baby teeth and adult teeth — she's a two-fer, giving us information about both.
Phylogeny. A cladistic analysis of the fossil revealed another interesting point. There are two broad groups of primates: the strepsirrhines, which includes the lemurs and lorises, and the haplorhines, which includes monkeys and apes…and us, of course. Ida's anatomy places her in the haplorhines with us, but at the same time she's primitive. This is an animal caught shortly after a major branch point in primate evolutionary history.
She's beautiful and interesting and important, but I do have to take exception to the surprisingly frantic news coverage I'm seeing. She's being called the "missing link in human evolution", which is annoying. The whole "missing link" category is a bit of journalistic trumpery: almost every fossil could be called a link, and it feeds the simplistic notion that there could be a single definitive bridge between ancient and modern species. There isn't: there is the slow shift of whole populations which can branch and diverge. It's also inappropriate to tag this discovery to human evolution. She's 47 million years old; she's also a missing link in chimp evolution, or rhesus monkey evolution. She's got wider significance than just her relationship to our narrow line.
People have been using remarkable hyperbole when discussing Darwinius. She's going to affect paleontology "like an asteroid falling down to earth"; she's the "Mona Lisa" of fossils; she answers all of Darwin's questions about transitional fossils; she's "something that the world has never seen before"; "a revolutionary scientific find that will change everything". Well, OK. I was impressed enough that I immediately made Ida my desktop wallpaper, so I'm not trying to diminish the importance of the find. But let's not forget that there are lots of transitional forms found all the time. She's unique as a representative of a new species, but she isn't at all unique as a representative of the complex history of life on earth.
When Laelaps says, "I have the feeling that this fossil, while spectacular, is being oversold," I think he's being spectacularly understated. Wilkins also knocks down the whole "missing link" label. The hype is bad news, not because Ida is unimportant, but because it detracts from the larger body of the fossil record — I doubt that the media will be able to muster as much excitement from whatever new fossil gets published in Nature or Science next week, no matter how significant it may be.
Go ahead and be excited by this find, I know I am. Just remember to be excited tomorrow and the day after and the day after that, because this is perfectly normal science, and it will go on.
Laelaps has some serious reservations about the analysis — the authors may not have done as solid a cladistic analysis as they should, and its position in the family tree may not be as clear as it has been made out to be.
Franzen JL, Gingerich PD, Habersetzer J, Hurum JH, von Koenigswald W, Smith BH (2009) Complete Primate Skeleton from the Middle Eocene of Messel in Germany: Morphology and Paleobiology. PLoS ONE 4(5): e5723. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0005723.
Life Science
Comments
Posted by: James Sweet | May 19, 2009 4:02 PM
Meh, I think the overhype is fine. If every single time an interesting transitional fossil is found, the papers blare "MISSING LINK PROVES DARWIN WAS RIGHT!", maybe a few burgeoning Creationists will get a clue...
Posted by: Glen Davidson | May 19, 2009 4:04 PM
I'm transferring a modified comment I made on another thread to here:
I'd just add that PZ's information seems to confirm the transitional nature of the specimen, which I wasn't going to accept more than tentatively from the accounts I'd seen.
Posted by: Kevin Schreck | May 19, 2009 4:07 PM
There IS a lot of hyperbole about this find, but at least people are excited about it.
Posted by: truthspeaker | May 19, 2009 4:08 PM
In other words, don't believe the hype.
Chuck D. was right about so many things.
Posted by: roestigraben | May 19, 2009 4:13 PM
Ironically, I first saw the news on that right-wing website you linked to earlier...
Posted by: Brian Switek
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May 19, 2009 4:14 PM
Thanks for the link, PZ. I just posted my take on the fossil here. The funny thing is that the researchers did not do a real cladistic analysis, and I don't think their haplorrhine placement for Darwinius holds up. That said, it really is awesome and I hope it is studied in more detail soon!
Posted by: Alan Millar | May 19, 2009 4:17 PM
I haven't checked phyrangula for a few days but checked back because I saw this on CNN.
I'm no biologist, but it hit me in the gut when they triumphantly dismissed this announcement as, "not the missing link."
I saw clearly how badly the Turner empire represents biology, when I saw how they made this into a small, amusing soundbyte. This fundamental revelation about the origin of our being as a species. A crack about the "book deal" that the scientists will get.
Pitiful. Like writing off the Roman or Incan Empires as if they were hour-long variety shows. Let's cut to the important chatter about the (dubious) economic recovery.
What should have been a celebration was dismissed over 100 years after Darwin put two and two together.
Posted by: Jackal | May 19, 2009 4:19 PM
Soft tissue stains, stomach contents, and skeletal completeness of this 47 million year old fossil makes Ida pretty spectacular. This discovery deserves the amount of hype it's getting. Too bad the media is hyping the wrong part of the story.
Posted by: James F | May 19, 2009 4:21 PM
James Sweet #1 wrote:
You know what, despite my reservations I can't deny that there are some positive aspects to this. OK, creationists, pack it up! Darwin was right, you just heard it on the news! Thanks for playing!
Posted by: Skeptico | May 19, 2009 4:24 PM
That's two new gaps in the fossil record then.
Posted by: puseaus | May 19, 2009 4:24 PM
Looks more like she was caught while sitting at her computer writing a nice comment for Pharyngula. She's got that cute German nose as well...
Posted by: RamblinDude
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May 19, 2009 4:26 PM
I'm not even a scientist and the exaggerated rhetoric from some of the media is extremely annoying.
“THIS CHANGES EVERYTHING!” Sheesh, dumbasses. Way to kick science in the nuts.
It’s an awfully nice find, though.
Posted by: Gadfly22 | May 19, 2009 4:26 PM
That "missing link" meme is annoying and misleading in the extreme. We are all transitional specimens.
Posted by: Di | May 19, 2009 4:33 PM
I thought this was an awesome discovery when I read about it this morning...Over-hyped, probably, but I'd rather get the public excited about this kind of hype instead of another Brangelina story any day! :)
Posted by: Anonymous | May 19, 2009 4:36 PM
There is a rather long interview with Jørn Hurum in this link:
http://www.nrk.no/programmer/tv/schrodingers_katt/1.6617057
Unfortunately, its in Norwegian, which means most of you wont understand it.
I cant be bothered to translate the whole thing, but it's Hurum being very excited about the fossil. Unfortunately he DOES refer to it as "a missing link" at one point, and although he is quick to point out, like PZ, that "all fossils are" it is of course smacked up as the headline.(The Missing link found!!!111oneone) Hurum says he and his colleagues has spent 2 years studying and describing the fossil, and he also gives a good clue on the price the Oslo Natural History Museum paid for the sample, saying that the sellers initial offer was $1million, and they agreed on a lower price that was "still pretty high" but that he couldnt disclose it.
He also describes how and why they classify this as ape/primate and not half-ape, and that this is the oldest and best preserved specimen of its kind.
Posted by: RF | May 19, 2009 4:36 PM
Question: When was the last major scientific discovery made?
Answer: Last Thursday.
Posted by: BAllanJ | May 19, 2009 4:36 PM
"We are all transitional specimens."
Not me, I'm just like everybody else.
Posted by: skyotter | May 19, 2009 4:37 PM
she is, dare i say it, a HAPPY MONKEY
yeah, i dared =P
Posted by: Matt M | May 19, 2009 4:37 PM
Why is this fossil so well preserved? I would (in am not literally sense) kill to own something so old and delicate. Are there more, and can I get one?
Posted by: Richard Wolford
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May 19, 2009 4:38 PM
Sorry to be OT, but the mother of Daniel Hauser (the 13 year old boy ordered to undergo chemo) has had an arrest warrant issued; she apparently did not show up for court, big fucking surprise.
http://dailymail.com/ap/ApTopStories/200905190565
Posted by: BicycleRepairMan | May 19, 2009 4:38 PM
#15 was me. Damnit, thats the second time I post anon.
Posted by: Jim Etchison | May 19, 2009 4:39 PM
I am in line with James Sweet. If we should ever hope that the general populace will grasp evolution as it actually is, then PZ would be right. But since most people only remember the lame soundbyte that there is a "missing link" we can squelch it with the equally lame soundbyte that "this is the missing link."
The ethics of this turn my brain into a pretzel, but I think the end result is good.
Posted by: Ryan | May 19, 2009 4:42 PM
See also: PhD Comic's take on the science news cycle.
Posted by: penguinsaur | May 19, 2009 4:44 PM
Are you SURE thats not a chupacabra?
Posted by: Robert Woerheide | May 19, 2009 4:48 PM
To quote Oscar Wilde, "The only worse than being talked about, is not being talked about." At least this gets biology some air time amidst the useless blather that is today's media.
Posted by: Patrick Q. | May 19, 2009 4:50 PM
This is a bit off-topic, but I wonder what impact this find will have on the field of theological anthropology.
I just stumbled across the existence of this fascinating area of research. I believe that it may be related to astrological chemistry. Students who are new to the study of theological anthropology should be aware that the name is short for Catholic theological anthropology. Other theological explanations of doubt - that it is the result of Pandora opening a box or Marduk fashioning humanity from the flesh of the treacherous god Kingu - are ignored.
Apparently acknowledging the existence of thousands of other contradictory versions of theological anthropology, all of which Catholics dismiss due to a lack of evidence, might lead people to doubt. Which is bad. Unless it is applied to non-Catholic theology in which case it is good.
This theology stuff is confusing.
Posted by: Robert Thille
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May 19, 2009 4:51 PM
I'm not a transitional form yet, I don't have kids (at least not biologically, just one adopted daughter)
Posted by: Hans | May 19, 2009 4:52 PM
and god gets tinier and tinier...what a wonderful discovery!
Greetz from the Netherlands PZ keep up the good work, love this site!
Posted by: shonny
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May 19, 2009 4:54 PM
Have a look at these two links:
http://www.aftenposten.no/viten/article3083738.ece
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/video/2009/may/19/ida-fossil-attenborough-missing-link
Pretty exciting stuff, and Ida, is named so after Jørn Hurums daughter (should somehow have been the other way round?).
Posted by: James Sweet | May 19, 2009 4:56 PM
"We are all transitional specimens," while technically true, is not a particularly helpful model for looking at the world. Clearly genetic populations go through periods of relative stability and periods of rapid change (a la punctuated equilibrium, to use the old term) and it is useful to refer to a specimen from a period of rapid change as "transitional."
I could come up with some silly analogy, but I think you get my point. To say "we are all transitional specimens" because genetics are not static is somewhat of a counter-productive cop-out.
Posted by: Fred the Hun
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May 19, 2009 5:06 PM
skyotter @ 18,
Dunno, she had a severely fractured left wrist, I'm sure she was able to feel the pain and wouldn't have been very happy.
As for beautiful and interesting, for sure!
Posted by: bobxxxx | May 19, 2009 5:06 PM
Another important scientific discovery. It's time for the lazy Christian creationists of the Dishonesty Institute to wake up and crank out some more lies for their retarded customers.
Posted by: Funkopolis | May 19, 2009 5:07 PM
The really disturbing thing is that if Ida turns out NOT to have been a direct ancestor of humans, the creationists will shout "Another fake missing link! Peking man! Peking Man!" Real data, misinterpreted, can be as damaging as a hoax.
Posted by: E.V. | May 19, 2009 5:22 PM
So only time will tell if Ida ever becomes a meme to rival her much younger cousin Lucy.
Posted by: raven | May 19, 2009 5:23 PM
It is an important fossil about a time where we don't have many. It is in fact, from 47 million years before the creation of the universe. Who knew primates existed then?
I also thought the media hype was a bit overdone. Missing link? Maybe.
Shedding light on human evolution? In the same way that Tiktaalik sheds light on human evolution.
Changes everything and confirms that Darwin was right? We already know Darwin was right.
Still, it is always fun to poke the creationists with yet again another sharp stick coated with their nightmare, literally hard facts. Their last great discovery was that the ancient Jews kept dinosaurs as pets. Newspaper reporting on that was pretty thin. LOL
It would be cool to find a more recent human ancestor from the 6 to 3 million year old range with the same preservation completeness. All we need is a protohuman to have gone for a drink or swim in a volcanic lake giving off toxic fumes. Or buried in a mud flow.
The Messel fossil deposits in Germany sound wonderful. Just from the news reports it was a volcanic crater filled with water that filled up with sediments and preserved some complete examples of Eocene life.
Posted by: eddie
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May 19, 2009 5:25 PM
I think she looks a little "grrr arrrg!".
As for the hype, I think we should appreciate that the ground has shifted with this find, as with all important discoveries from afarensis to cmb.
The centre ground has moved further from 'mumbo jumbo' to 'science, it works bitches'.
It's a small victory in the culture war. We seem to be winning. Let's not squabble amongst ourselves over just what she was a transition between or not and shout the truth that there was never any transition from dunno to goddidit.
Posted by: Paleos | May 19, 2009 5:26 PM
Yay paleontology! And Gingerich.
Also notice that plate B had originally been classified as
'Godinotia neglectus'
which I think is a great name for a primate fossil.
Posted by: Derrick | May 19, 2009 5:30 PM
Hey, PZ, can we have an embiggenable version for our desktops? Where'd you snag it from?
Posted by: norm! | May 19, 2009 5:31 PM
See? The Earth was all yellowy back then, just like it says in the Bible.
Posted by: raven | May 19, 2009 5:34 PM
The courts in Minnesota have jurisdiction only within the state borders. If the kid and mother flee the state, they are all but beyond reach.
Some netsters read the whole court document and it seems that Daniel is a bit more than "learning disabled". Retarded is more like it. He may never understand what is going on.
It is probably impossible to treat someone with Hodgkins who actively resists. This is a severe and complicated 6 cycle chemo protocol. The Hausers might well get away with medical neglect. Whether they get away with the likely aftermath will be up to another judge and a jury.
Posted by: Quiet Desperation | May 19, 2009 5:37 PM
Is the fossil smiling? I can't tell.
Posted by: eddie
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May 19, 2009 5:37 PM
Ida, Lucy.
I know this is an unrepresentative sample but what is it about little girls that fosilises so well?
Wasn't that chinese mini saur last year also a little girl o saur?
Posted by: Quiet Desperation | May 19, 2009 5:39 PM
I thought it was, like, dark, and then it became, like, light, or something.
Posted by: genesgalore | May 19, 2009 5:41 PM
damn, that's a sweet specimen.
Posted by: Crudely Wrott | May 19, 2009 5:44 PM
Truthspeaker nails it at #4--
"In other words, don't believe the hype."
Media, with a deep nod to TeeVee, usually have a given template to employ for different types of stories.
Tornadoes and hurricanes have a style characterized by voices tinged with alarm, stern but compassionate delivery and not much smiling. Oh, and idiots out in the wind trying to stand up.
The death of a statesman known for his chicanery and philandering is delivered in the same reverent tones as the death of a beloved priest, or a young starlet. The expressions and delivery always makes me wonder why I am not as grieved as the reporters.
Science stories are delivered in a single run-on sentence, breathlessly. And whatever field of inquiry, the reporters will inevitably pick the holy grail of that discipline and, with vigorous tiltings and noddings, back lit by a half acre of UV white TeeVee teeth, assure us all that the final piece of the puzzle, the ultimate proof of the theory is at hand and all is new!
Hype-Orama. Nothing in the reportage but corn stalks and bean poles. Don't believe it.
*I really, really miss Chet Huntley. He had the perfect screen delivery; he dead panned everything.*
Posted by: Kel | May 19, 2009 5:51 PM
It's so beautiful.
Posted by: Joe Duhaime | May 19, 2009 5:57 PM
There is a solution to the problem of hominid evolution. We did not evolve from ancient apes; they evolved from us which is why we share similar DNA. Around the time of Darwinius masillae, our "missing link" was a bipedal species that never went into the trees. Those who did became the apes we know today. Either way, someone is going to have to rewrite how physical anthropology is taught in college classrooms.
Posted by: MadScientist | May 19, 2009 5:57 PM
Someone pointed me to an article a few days ago and I said "that sounds like a great fossil, but it's no missing link; `missing link' is a creationist myth". There were no pictures though - that fossil is awesome - she looks pretty good for 47Myo and is so well preserved I'd bet the creationists say it's proof the devil put her there (or it was one of god's better jokes).
Posted by: Hugo | May 19, 2009 6:06 PM
Australia's Channel Nine (like FOX, really) had this to say:
"Scientists have found what they believe is proof that humans evolved from primates."
The stupid...it burns.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 6:07 PM
David Attenborough is doing a BBC documentary about little Ida.
Next week!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/5351315/Scientists-unveil-stunning-fossil.html
Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, oh boy!
Posted by: Foy | May 19, 2009 6:08 PM
So is it to late to baptize her?
Posted by: Rick R | May 19, 2009 6:09 PM
I have a soft spot for animals, so when I first saw this (and read PZ's description about how she may have met her end) I experienced a quick familiar stab of sympathy, and a touch of sadness.
Then, I marveled at the sheer improbability that here I am, feeling a touch of sympathy for an animal that died 47 million years ago. I even know what her last meal was.
47. Million. Years.
Amazing.
Posted by: Stephen Wells | May 19, 2009 6:10 PM
@47: if you're capable of writing a sentence like "We did not evolve from ancient apes; they evolved from us...", then you are hopelessly confused about either English grammar or the direction of time or both.
Posted by: resimleri | May 19, 2009 6:12 PM
A reason for the hype?:
My heart started beating extremely fast," said Hurum, "I knew that the dealer had a world sensation in his hands. I could not sleep for 2 nights. I was just thinking about how to get this to an official museum so that it could be described and published for science." Hurum would not reveal what the university museum paid for the fossil, but the original asking price was $1m. He did not see the fossil before buying it – just three photographs, representing a huge gamble.
From the Gaurdian.
Posted by: Kel | May 19, 2009 6:12 PM
What can you expect from Channel 9, or any other commercial network really? It's all been downhill since the Carlos incident.Posted by: Drew | May 19, 2009 6:20 PM
"Meh, I think the overhype is fine. If every single time an interesting transitional fossil is found, the papers blare "MISSING LINK PROVES DARWIN WAS RIGHT!", maybe a few burgeoning Creationists will get a clue..."
Except that when scientist have to walk back the shoddy claims and overhype, creationists will have been handed yet another propaganda tool. Drudge may be blaring "missing link" stuff now, but in a week it'll be all about the big lie and how it isn't a direct ancestor to humans after all (which it isn't). That's a PR step backwards, and even since the step forwards was based on inaccurate media hype and irresponsible science via press-release in the first place, it's just not worth it.
Posted by: Gadfly22 | May 19, 2009 6:21 PM
""We are all transitional specimens," while technically true, is not a particularly helpful model for looking at the world. Clearly genetic populations go through periods of relative stability and periods of rapid change (a la punctuated equilibrium, to use the old term) and it is useful to refer to a specimen from a period of rapid change as "transitional."
I could come up with some silly analogy, but I think you get my point. To say "we are all transitional specimens" because genetics are not static is somewhat of a counter-productive cop-out."
I'm afraid I have to disagree completely. A scientist wanting a useful heuristic model might find the phrase "We are all transitional specimens" to be about as useful as "We are all made up of molecules". But to get the Creationist crowd to stop thinking in terms of evolution up or down or toward some ideal or in terms of stages of attainment, I think the concept suits very well. Any particular "transition specimen" may represent only a miniscule change compared with the general population and/or lead to a genetic dead end in any event. But every living thing is a new chromosomal experiment that might prove to be better adapted to current conditions, if even in the smallest way.
Posted by: raven | May 19, 2009 6:21 PM
Silly question. The Mormons baptize the dead all the time. They are very efficient, I'm sure it was done already.
"She said she was going to leave," Hauser testified. "She said, `That's all you need to know.' And that's all I know."OT, well looks like the mother and kid are on the run.
On the present trajectory, we are looking at a slow motion homicide. Hitchens had a point. Religion poisons everything.
Posted by: Brock | May 19, 2009 6:21 PM
"almost every fossil could be called a link"
Not a biologist, but in the cladistic sense, isn't it also quite probable that any particular fossil find is near a "dead end" branch? Ok, technically that would mean the fossil was a "link" to whatever was actually AT the dead end, but you know what I mean. Dodo bird bones from 350 years ago are not links because its line went extinct in a relatively short time thereafter. Right?
@Joe Duhaime (#47): That's funny, but requires a whole ton of morphological evidence for australopithecus and Homos habilis, ergaster, etc. and why they look more like us the further forward we check in time.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 19, 2009 6:23 PM
Another good transition fossil over-hyped by the MSM. A very well preserved specimen. It will be interesting when the final consensus of where it belongs is arrived at.
Posted by: Kel | May 19, 2009 6:24 PM
If we take that definition of transitional form, how can juvenile skeletons be considered? ;)
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 6:43 PM
Just to say it again:
Laelaps has some serious reservations about the analysis – the authors did not do any cladistic analysis, and they really should have.
It's rather baffling to see this failure from these authors, and it's one of the bigger recent failures of peer-review.
How can anyone describe such a splendidly preserved fossil, make grand proclamations about the uprooting of Paleogene primate phylogeny, and then not do a phylogenetic analysis? The mind boggles.
Basically because it fell into a deep lake.
No and no, respectively.
would require about as many miracles as the story of Noah's Flood.
Or anywhere else anywhere near to where they might have been had some tiny chance of getting fossilized. Right?
Why isn't there a single human tooth that's older than Sahelanthropus and Orrorin? Dance, pseudoscientist! Dance!
Posted by: ERV | May 19, 2009 6:52 PM
ScienceBlogs: In your science news, killin yer buzz.hehe!
Posted by: Uerba | May 19, 2009 6:55 PM
Am I the only one who thinks this animal looks like a small dinosaur? Wow, it must be a REALLY primitive mammal...
Posted by: Tom | May 19, 2009 6:56 PM
Awesome, but I am sure someone will declare it to be only 4000 years old and post flood. I do wish that some people would take advantage of all the education there is available out here. Thanks for the website, it is always informative.
Posted by: AVSN | May 19, 2009 6:57 PM
Liked it.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 7:00 PM
AIG is poo-pooing little Ida:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/2009/05/19/ida-missing-link
The fun begins!
Posted by: Josh
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May 19, 2009 7:10 PM
Seriously. It's like a 27 page paper. I kept paging through, looking for the damn cladogram. None. And Gingerich is second author? Weird. Although I don't know what the world is coming to when I'm disappointed that there is no claddobabble in the article.
Posted by: CJO | May 19, 2009 7:13 PM
While the researchers believe Ida sunk to the bottom of a lake and was buried, this preservation is more consistent with a catastrophic flood.
Well, sure. Isn't everything?
Dumbasses. I could have written that AIG screed myself. Hell, any of us could have.
Posted by: Patricia, OM
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May 19, 2009 7:15 PM
Patrick Q @26 - Thank you for finding that link, until now I didn't know what to color onto my diploma.
Doctor of Theological Anthropology
sounds ever so much grander than Champion Quoter of Bullshit.Posted by: Anonymous | May 19, 2009 7:15 PM
Josh, I agree with you. If it had been a short article for Science or Nature, I could understand no cladogram. But for a 27 page article? I don't see it.
Posted by: littlejohn | May 19, 2009 7:15 PM
Just watched CBS news, and sure enough, "missing link" references were slung around wildly, at least in the teasers for the story. But when they got to the story itself, Katie Couric was much more subdued. They actually handled it pretty well.
The astonishing part was that the discovers of the fossil have been sitting on it for two years, and went to TV despite not having written anything (so far) for the journals. That's what the cranks usually do. Joe Newman and his perpetual motion electric motor come to mind.
Posted by: Uerba | May 19, 2009 7:17 PM
Great. Let's see how long it takes AIG to crap this one up, too. Such insipid assholes, I swear...
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 19, 2009 7:18 PM
Typepad timed out again. Grrr. #71 was me.
Posted by: Tony Whitson | May 19, 2009 7:20 PM
@67, quoting AIG:
What they deny is not really evolution, since they don't know what evolution is.
Evolution is not a "process of change in organisms," it's a process of change in populations.
If only they could understand that, they might begin to understand the foolishness of how they claim to recognize "microevolution" while denying "macroevolution."
Posted by: CJO | May 19, 2009 7:20 PM
2. A fossil can never show evolution.
5. If evolution were true, there would be real transitional forms.
*facepalm*
Posted by: Josh
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May 19, 2009 7:23 PM
Yeah. Although, heck, I think that even in one of the One Word Journals, the diagnosis of a new genus is going to necessitate an analysis if there is enough material available. I think that the High Priests and Priestesses of phylogenetic systematics tend to be way too religious about their method, but if I had been a reviewer on this manuscript, even I would have been like WTF in seeing a new mammal genus diagnosed on the basis of a nearly complete holotype, and no attempt to place it within Mammalia.
Posted by: Tony Whitson | May 19, 2009 7:23 PM
I won't know what to believe about this until I read Casey Luskin's rebuttal of the article.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 7:24 PM
Actually... yes :-)
OK, unlike most mammals, it's got a halfway serious tail. But that's it.
Nope. It's a primate.
Almost correct.
Correct. It's claimed to be closer to us than to the tarsiers, but that's it.
Ooh, never heard of the concept of "evidence".
Ooh, never heard of the concept of "parsimony". Pity, that, because it's one of the two parts of the scientific method. Too bad.
Ooh, never heard of the concept of "homology". It was developed by the last creationist anatomists... funny, that...
Also, note the use of "prove", which simply isn't something that's done in science.
Parsimony again. Really, they should read the writings of Owen and Agassiz. It's almost painful how close they came to evolution, and what convulsions they had to throw in order to not quite reach it. It's funny, however, how obvious it is that both would immediately be excommunicated by AiG...
Ooh, never heard of apomorphies or plesiomorphies. Why am I not surprised.
Hint: we don't think it's a primate because it's got 5 fingers per hand.
Bingo.
Morons who couldn't tell a lake deposit from a flood deposit if their lives or – worse, much worse! – their faith depended on it.
It's black, it's got fine layers, it's very fine-grained in general and it preserves exclusively freshwater animals, flying animals, and a few terrestrial animals. How to explain that unless by a deep lake which lacked oxygen in the bottom layers of the water column? I mean, just imagine what kind of sediment a flood would leave!
And what would those look like?
Go ahead, cretinists. Tell us evolutionary biologists what our own theory predicts. We're waiting!
None are so blind as those who don't want to see because they're afraid they might actually learn something. None are so stupid as those who are afraid of knowledge.
Rather will a camel go through the eye of a needle than a journalist writing about science understand what they're writing about.
It does happen. It's just... so rare you need quantum theory to calculate the frequency.
Note how what follows "Researchers say" is not a direct quote.
Note how the cretinists are too stupid to notice that.
Posted by: Alan R. | May 19, 2009 7:25 PM
Will New Scientist run this under the headline: "Darwin was right after all!" ?
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 7:27 PM
Oops, I closed a <span> tag when all there was was a <blockquote> tag. The last paragraph, which is fortunately in the right font, is mine.
Posted by: Diego | May 19, 2009 7:30 PM
A co-worker of mine loves to forward brief science news bits, and today I got one on Darwinius. I found it incredibly irritating though because the author kept babbling about how it was the earliest human ancestor yet (yup, that's what he/she said) and completely missed the real points which were far more interesting and salient. I wonder if the blurb author even read the article.
I just kept thinking of this recent comic:
http://www.phdcomics.com/comics/archive.php?comicid=1174
Posted by: James F | May 19, 2009 7:31 PM
#71
Still no excuse, since you can take as much space as you need for supplementary information. Nowadays what appears in print for short reports is usually a small percentage of the actual paper!
Posted by: Josh
|
May 19, 2009 7:33 PM
Retraction. There is a cladogram. It's not in the main body of the paper, but appended online. I missed the reference to it while reading through their systematics section.
Posted by: CaptainKendrick
|
May 19, 2009 7:34 PM
Goddidit.
Godditit.
Godditit.
Posted by: rgz | May 19, 2009 7:35 PM
Aren't primates cutter than cephalopods?
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 7:40 PM
The Maiacetus paper hasn't got a cladogram either.
Unfortunately.
That's the science of phylogenetics you're talking about here. :-)
I could not. I've seen Nature papers with ninety-five pages of supplementary information.
ARGH! I didn't even notice that blunder. It's like a Gish Gallop, on average every sentence is wrong...
What I just said. I tried to rip through the Gish Gallop in real time :-)
Which brings us to the next point. As someone noted in the first Laelaps thread, PLoS ONE is an online journal. Does it "distribute at least 100 identical and durable copies in public libraries on at least five continents"? If not, the name Darwinius masillae doesn't exist. (Which would be a pity, because it's a very fine name.)
Posted by: Josh
|
May 19, 2009 7:41 PM
Either way, though, the analysis is really strange. It's only slightly better than having done no analysis at all, I think.
Posted by: Josh
|
May 19, 2009 7:46 PM
Yeah, I was actually wondering about that earlier...
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 19, 2009 7:49 PM
Yes, that is where much of the data like MS, IR, NMR, and the like is now presented by ACS journals.Posted by: Josh
|
May 19, 2009 7:53 PM
I guess I'm still in the mindset of not expecting major figures to be part of the supplemental information. Although I can definitely see why people are having reservations about the analysis.
Posted by: Revyloution | May 19, 2009 7:58 PM
"Furthermore, the guts and stomach contents are preserved. "
You need to be careful with comments like this. Ive just spent far too long helping someone understand that there are no dinosaur 'bones', and that everything we find are fossils.
Someone who doesn't have a decent grasp on the fossilization process might think that you found some preserved fruit and leaf samples.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 8:01 PM
No, Figure S7 is not a cladogram. It's called one, but that's just another failure of peer-review, because "cladogram" means "outcome of a cladistic analysis", and no such analysis was done.
If you represent a phylogenetic hypothesis in tree shape, it's not a cladogram, not even if you map shared derived characters on it – unless it's the output of a cladistic analysis, and this one isn't. A cladogram has been tested for whether the phylogenetic hypothesis it represents is the most parsimonious one given a certain dataset, and this one wasn't tested – there isn't even a dataset in the first place!
(Incidentally, I can't fathom why a completely banal black-and-white line drawing with black-on-white text was uploaded as a TIF with four point seventy-three fucking megabytes. That's simply stupid. Burning stupid. I'm sitting behind a criminally overloaded connection here, so that even at 2 at night it took about ten minutes to download that one figure. If someone needs a TIF version, they can pixelize it themselves! IrfanView is freeware.
And then it's got a typo and a mistake in it: "Sterpsirrhini" should be Strepsirhini... or, alternatively to the second error, "Haplorhini" should be the etymologically more correct Haplorrhini.)
The second Laelaps thread explains this in more detail.
<dramatic removal of glasses>
<facepalm>
Posted by: Frank Anderson | May 19, 2009 8:01 PM
I wish everyone would shut up about ancestors. It is impossible to prove that any fossil is the ancestor of any lineage, and not a side branch or early stem representative of a sister group.
That doesn't make this fossil any less interesting, and I understand that it's much sexier to call this a human (or anthropoid, or whatever) ancestor, but give it a rest!
Posted by: Fernando
|
May 19, 2009 8:08 PM
Fantastic!
Another nail on the creationism/id coffin.
Quite frankly, only extremly deluded people can still believe in the creation fairy tale.
... But, im almost sure, that someone will say that God put this fossil here to test our faith!
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 8:09 PM
Actually, Josh, it's very easy to guess that Fig. S7 is not a cladogram. That's because it's only got three taxa in it. <headdesk>
Problem is, you're wrong. The original mineral is mostly still there (...and occasionally even some of the protein still is), even if it's recrystallized (which is not always the case). What happens in fossilization is that all the hollow spaces get filled in with minerals; that's why fossil bones are so much heavier than fresh ones.
I do, however, agree, that "the guts" are not preserved unless you count the big dark stain which might be carbon-rich.
That is the case; they've just more or less turned to coal, means, the hydrogen, nitrogen and oxygen have wandered off for the most part.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 8:22 PM
DI:
http://www.evolutionnews.org/
Posted by: James F | May 19, 2009 8:26 PM
Here is yet another icon of evolution.
Research or STFU.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 19, 2009 8:29 PM
Replace "Darwinists" by "journalists", and you'll get somewhere.
Posted by: MikeTheInfidel | May 19, 2009 8:36 PM
My god... it's full of stars!
Posted by: Otto
|
May 19, 2009 8:38 PM
From the article in the NYT:
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2009/05/19/science/AP-Ancient-Primate.html?hp
"The fossil was unearthed by a private collector in 1983 and remained in private hands until Hurum's museum bought it in 2007."
I wonder how much more is hidden in private collections?
Posted by: Josh
|
May 19, 2009 8:44 PM
Nope--you're fucking right. Shit. That's why the systematics section read so weird--there was no analysis done (but they kind of talk like there was). And as you say, three taxa? What the fuck is that?
*headdesk*
That's not quite accurate. That's the GEO101 view of fossils, and it's too simple. There is no on/off switch with respect to fossilization. Mineral replacement is by far the most common situation in fossil bone, but it's not 100%. It's a continuum from bone that's been hardly replaced at all to the fossils that you're describing, where virtually all of the available cavities have been replaced by minerals which weren't in the original material. As we go back in time, there is generally more replacement, but so many factors impact on buried remains that it's almost a case by case basis with respect to the geological formation in question. Unaltered preservation isn't common, especially as we get older, but it happens, especially in non-vertebrates. Insects in amber are fossils, and I don't think there is much alteration of that material.
See, for example:
URL LINK:www.geo.arizona.edu/geo3xx/geo308_fall2002/backup/cha1.html
URL LINK:facstaff.gpc.edu/~pgore/geology/historical_lab/preservationlab.php
URL LINK:www.geol.umd.edu/~tholtz/G104/lectures/104fossils.html
URL LINK:www.geology.wmich.edu/haas/geos2000/4s.pdf
URL LINK:tolweb.org/tree/learn/marinediscovery/4.3MarineFossils.pdf
URL LINK:www.clas.ufl.edu/users/pciesiel/gly3603c/fossils.html
URL LINK:www.geology.ucdavis.edu/~cowen/HistoryofLife/biases.html
URL LINK:www.cartage.org.lb/en/themes/sciences/Paleontology/FossilsAndFossilisation/Fossils/Fossils.htm
Posted by: Andrew | May 19, 2009 8:45 PM
I'm surprised at how many are so concerned over how Creationists will view this fossil. Are there not but a few individual's (no numbers, I was not in the group to count the rest) who saw this fossil. So anyone who believes that this is in fact a transitional species believes it solely because someone who did see it told them what this fossil means to the Scientific community and they blindly agree with it. So that indicates just as much faith as an individual who believes in Creation. Whether individuals use Scientific data or the Bible to support their view, no one was around at the beginning, so it remains someone's personal belief system. Not wrong or right, just what it remains.
Posted by: MikeTheInfidel | May 19, 2009 8:49 PM
No, it's not just a matter of belief systems. There's this thing called "evidence" which makes a difference, and the viewpoints are neither equally likely nor equally respectable.
Take your postmodernist nonsense and get thee hence.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 8:50 PM
Christwire:
Posted by: MikeTheInfidel | May 19, 2009 9:01 PM
Already the lies are being spun.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 9:06 PM
Christian Skepticism blog:
http://christianskepticism.blogspot.com/
Posted by: MikeTheInfidel | May 19, 2009 9:06 PM
Already the lies are being spun. Why am I not surprise?
Posted by: D | May 19, 2009 9:17 PM
Damn, she's awfully pretty.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 9:18 PM
Downshoredrift:
http://www.downshoredrift.com/downshoredrift/2009/05/alleged-missing-link-ida-47-million-year-old-fossil-is-found.html
Posted by: Glen Davidson
|
May 19, 2009 9:24 PM
Interpretation: Because I believe in a certain kind of creator god, I get to deny all evidence which falsifies it, even though I accept (implicitly or explicitly) falsification standards in other areas.
And because evolutionists do not believe in god, they don't have any reason to lie about the tests of evolution.
The simple fact that any number of theists (whether they are consistent in their religion or not I barely care) also will not take the easy out of denying the data that falsify any legitimate design hypothesis is simply to be ignored, as the IDiots typically do--when they're not denouncing Xians who are honest about science, that is.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/6mb592
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 9:28 PM
The End Time blog:
http://the-end-time.blogspot.com/2009/05/are-you-ready-to-defend-christianity-in.html
Hahahhahahahha!
Posted by: GMacs | May 19, 2009 9:42 PM
That's amazing. It looks like she still has the same basic shape I associate with non-primate mammals. And that tail is huge. I wonder if it was prehensile.
Posted by: James F | May 19, 2009 9:44 PM
#112
There you go.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 19, 2009 9:51 PM
Posted by: Rick R | May 19, 2009 9:53 PM
"I'm also giving up my Christianity, my belief in God, and I'm going to go out and do whatever I want."
Yikes. Another data point supporting the "christianity is for sociopaths" hypothesis.
How they must secretly hate their self-imposed bondage to the lord.
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 9:53 PM
Speculum et Lavacrum blog:
http://speculumetlavacrum.blogspot.com/2009/05/ida-missing-link-at-last-darwinus.html
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 19, 2009 9:59 PM
CHIMPY!
The second paragraph is mine.
Posted by: Rorschach
|
May 19, 2009 10:03 PM
I like the idea that everytime a new fossil is presented the xtian fundies have to give out bulletins to the faithful,in desperate attempts to reconcile the facts with their fiction.
You can feel the collective xtian cognitive dissonance in the air.
In other news,Daniel Hauser and his mum have absconded and didnt show up for treatment,and a warrant has been issued for them,as per CNN.
Posted by: GMacs | May 19, 2009 10:06 PM
@#64
No, Uerba, you aren't. I thought that, too. I think it's from all the pictures of feathery dinos I've seen. I don't think it's that primitive of a mammal, though, since mammals have been around for, what, 200-ish million years?
I even thought I saw a hooked claw in the toes for a second. I though "Oh, shit! It's Velocimonkey
Posted by: Rorschach
|
May 19, 2009 10:06 PM
Link
Posted by: jpf | May 19, 2009 10:11 PM
Since we're sharing eye-roll-inducing articles about D. masillae, here's a lighter one from a non-creationist source, a horse-focused site called Horsetalk: "Human ancestor lived in world with tiny horses". (That would, of course, be true almost by definition if at any point in the past there were tiny horses.)
While it does have interesting info on other fossils discovered at the Messel Pit, I just get this absurd image of these horse-obsessed people trying to connect every news story to horses in some way. Like, "US drops A-bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki; Hundreds of horses killed" or "Man lands on Moon; no horses found".
Also, I can't read that headline and not think of Whiplash the Cowboy Monkey.
Posted by: SphinctOr | May 19, 2009 10:22 PM
Here's a link to the new site for the upcoming TV documentary:
http://www.revealingthelink.com
And a High-res JPG of the fossil plate:
http://www.revealingthelink.com/more-about-ida/resources/fossil_plate_full.jpg
Documentary TV Dates:
History Channel
The world premiere of The Link, a two-hour event special, airs on Memorial Day – Monday May 25th, 2009 at 9pm ET/PT. It is being screened by History across the US.
BBC
The UK premiere of Uncovering Our Earliest Ancestor: The Link will be shown on BBC One at 9pm on Tuesday 26th May. The version of the film made for the BBC is written and narrated by Sir David Attenborough.
ZDF
Viewers in Germany can watch The Link on Sunday 31st May on ZDF.
BBC Worldwide
The Link is being distributed to broadcasters around the worldwide by BBC Worldwide on behalf of Atlantic Productions. Please refer to http://www.bbcworldwide.com/ for details.
NRK
Viewers in Norway can watch The Link on Tuesday 26th May on NRK.
==================================================================
Excited SphinctOR
Posted by: raven | May 19, 2009 10:24 PM
Hmmm, Andrew. Tens or hundreds of millions have seen this fossil. There is a picture right on top of this blog post. There is also a peer reviewed scientific paper ONLINE accessible to anyone for the investment of a few electrons and photons.
Besides which, this fossil is one of millions or tens of millions that we have dug up while just barely literally scratching the surface of the earth. There are some on my deck. I know they are real, dug them out of the rock myself.
Way more than anyone has in evidence that jesus even lived much less died and was resurrected.
This is Nihilistic nonsense or maybe Solipsistic. Basically it says there is no objective reality, no real world, and all beliefs are equal, none are true or false. It also means the universe and your existence are meaningless.
Speaking of no one seeing anything. Who saw jesus's life? There is very little no solid evidence that he even existed. In contrast, we can see back in time to the Big Bang. The results are all around us. If a car crashes and no one saw it, can you conclude that a wrecked vehible wrapped around a tree was another case of goddidit? In that real world you don't believe in, we use evidence and data to determine past events on a daily basis.
Scientific data or the Bible to support their view, One difference between science and nihilistic Solipsism. Science works. We produced a hi tech civilization. Besides hating most of the earth's people, what have the fundie Death Cults done?
Posted by: Rorschach
|
May 19, 2009 10:31 PM
Anderson Cooper spouting nonsense about " the fossil that will change everything " on CNN, awful.
If we only could hit every YEC over the head with a stone spear glued together 12000 yrs ago....
Posted by: Alyson Miers | May 19, 2009 10:44 PM
With the dark halo, she looks sort of like a baby dinosaur.
Yeah, that was pointless. It was just my initial reaction.
Posted by: Drew | May 19, 2009 10:46 PM
"Retraction. There is a cladogram. It's not in the main body of the paper, but appended online. I missed the reference to it while reading through their systematics section."
While the rollout of this find looks to be nothing short of disastrously foolish, a big fat gift to creationist propagandists, I do have to say that I am pretty sold on publishing in online venues like PLoS ONE, where the space you're given to present additional figures and data is almost limitless. More data, more figures, more cladograms, more space = good thing.
Posted by: Geoff | May 19, 2009 10:48 PM
I'm twittering the hell out of this.
And I hate twitter.
Posted by: raven | May 19, 2009 10:57 PM
Hit a few websites to see what scientists had to say. Everyone wants a cladistic analysis.
One think I haven't seen is the artis'ts reconstructions. Those drawings of what the primate might have looked like in real life. With this complete a skeleton, they should be able to make a highly accurate one.
Posted by: Revyloution
|
May 19, 2009 10:58 PM
David Marjanović, OM, Thats exactly what I'm trying to explain to this fellow. Yes there is calcium, but it has changed from its original state. He was trying to understand why we cant 'carbon date' bones. I was telling him that none of the minerals were in their original state, and virtually all of the carbon 14 has decayed.
As 'proof' that we still find 'organic' matter (wow, I hate over using the quotes, but its so damn hard when referring to creationists speech) he kept quote mining well meaning scientists using this type of language.
Its not the fault of the scientists. They should be able to use simple language. And the public should be educated well enough to know that fruit and leaves does not mean fruit and leaves.
Should be, and is are obviously far apart. I do my part to educate as many people one on one as possible. I hope that the science community tries to keep their language as clear as possible for that same endeavor.
Posted by: John Scanlon FCD | May 19, 2009 11:00 PM
Reyvolution @92 was mistaken to say
as David M and Josh pointed out, though their point was blunted by partly disagreeing with each other.Some fossils are replacements by mineralization, some are barely altered at all; even within the same rock type or the same deposit there can be plenty of variation. In the Messel deposit, electron microscopy shows that organic remains such as hair, feathers and most plant tissues are replaced by bacteria that digested them and then became mineralized when they choked on their own waste, while the bones are probably decalcified due to the acid conditions of burial. With other chemistry, bone minerals may be preserved almost unaltered, and as Mary Schweitzer et al. have shown some organics may last megayears too; we can often do isotope studies on fossil bones and teeth to determine the food and water sources used by the living animal, which would not be the case if the bone minerals were completely replaced.
Given that the title of the paper has "Morphology and Paleobiology" after the colon, I think we can expect a follow-up subtitled "Phylogenetics and Implications for Primate Evolution". Soon, I hope.
Posted by: Rik G | May 19, 2009 11:24 PM
It looks like the hype surrounding this interesting fossil may not be just the work of scientifically illiterate journalists. According to an article in the New York Times, Jorn Hurum himself is helping to coordinate the media rollout...
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/19/business/media/19fossil.html?hp
Here is the relevant quote:
On Tuesday morning, researchers will unveil a 47-million-year-old fossil they say could revolutionize the understanding of human evolution at a ceremony at the American Museum of Natural History.
But the event, which will coincide with the publishing of a peer-reviewed article about the find, is the first stop in a coordinated, branded media event, orchestrated by the scientists and the History Channel, including a film detailing the secretive two-year study of the fossil, a book release, an exclusive arrangement with ABC News and an elaborate Web site.
“Any pop band is doing the same thing,” said Jorn H. Hurum, a scientist at the University of Oslo who acquired the fossil and assembled the team of scientists that studied it. “Any athlete is doing the same thing. We have to start thinking the same way in science.”
As a layman, I love having the chance to learn about this kind of thing, and I can understand his desire to share the excitement of discovery, but I'm not sure this is the best way to go about it.
Posted by: Darren Garrison | May 19, 2009 11:24 PM
Proof of evolution AND proof that there is no god!:
http://english.pravda.ru/photo/report/mutant-3050
Posted by: CalGeorge | May 19, 2009 11:42 PM
“As a layman, I love having the chance to learn about this kind of thing, and I can understand his desire to share the excitement of discovery, but I'm not sure this is the best way to go about it.”
Not to worry. Matt Nisbet is on the case!
Don't get me wrong, I love the innovative strategy, it's just that as I blogged earlier today, it might not be appropriately used around a single study, and best applied to a body of knowledge and scientific subject generally. Indeed, in this case, the strategy might be larger than the science.
http://scienceblogs.com/framing-science/2009/05/darwinius_masillae_is_the_hype.php
Every party need a pooper!
Posted by: breadmaker | May 20, 2009 12:02 AM
raven #124
fundi-death cults?
by fundi-death cults do you mean jews or nazis.
if memory serves correct jesus was a jew, was crucified by the jews, forgave the jews for crucifying him and the christians supposedly worship jesus who taught to love ones neighbor as onesself, yet the nazis killed the jews.
by fundi-death cults do you include those who worship the above mentioned jesus, bcs again, if memory serves correct, they worship him because of his resurected life, not death?
at what point do your comments become as pathetic as ignorant YECs when most of the hyperbole that you use to convey your point is unsubstantiated?
cool fossil.
i wish i could hang it right next to my guitar, the colors match.
Posted by: Rik G | May 20, 2009 12:06 AM
CalGeorge @134.
Actually, I liked his idea that the media strategy is better used for a broader body of knowledge than for a single study. I didn't mean to poop on anyone's party, though!
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 12:24 AM
Hmmm, lets see. If you remove 98% of my brain, it would start to resemble yours. Then add in all the drugs and alcohol you seem to have imbibed. At that point, a horse kick in the head and I'm at breadmaker level. You seem to be nearly illiterate. Ever heard of capital letters?
The fundie Death Cults are called that for good reasons. They have inverted the religion and worship lies and hate. They can be violent and occasionally kill people.
Most of them are desperately waiting for the apocalypse. God is supposed to show up any day and destroy the earth and kill everyone, 6.7 billion people. As wannabe mass genocide it is OK I guess. The more thoughtful are hoping we discover UFO aliens. Then god can kill them too.
I suppose in your murky and muddy world, wishing sincerely for the earth to end and everyone to die is no big deal. Hard for you to imagine but most of us have better things to hope for and do.
Posted by: Rick R | May 20, 2009 12:28 AM
"raven #124
fundi-death cults?"
Yeah, death cults. Fundamentalist christian "thought", and especially the rapture-ready crowd, are very clearly in love with death. Not life. Not Jesus' everlasting love.
The god they worship is a killer god. And they wouldn't have it any other way.
Unsubstantiated? Listen to them.
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 12:36 AM
Science and scientists have produced a Hi Tech civilization. You do realize that there weren't computers and cars a thousand years ago? Well there weren't.
Lifespans in the USA thanks to medicine have increased 30 years. We feed 6.7 billion people. We send space probes to Saturn and robots to Mars. There is much more.
So what have the Death Cults accomplished. They lie, they hate, they kill. They did some serious damage to the US and world economies when Bush was president as well as leaving piles of bodies in a pointless war in Iraq. Polls show the majority of the US population are sick and tired of them.
Anything else here? Breadfruit, what have the fundies accomplished? {won't get an answer here, just a drive by}
Posted by: Silver Fox | May 20, 2009 1:02 AM
She looks a little like SUE.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 20, 2009 1:13 AM
oh brother...
Posted by: fastpathguru | May 20, 2009 1:15 AM
The search for the missing link is dead!
Long live the search for the missing link!
Days since missing link discovered: [78]
Posted by: skyotter | May 20, 2009 2:31 AM
i stopped reading there. i swear, it's better than a shibbolith
*suddenly self-conscious about his missing Shift key*
Posted by: astrounit | May 20, 2009 2:37 AM
"Furthermore, the guts and stomach contents are preserved. Ida's last meal was fruit and leaves, in case you wanted to know."
That just blows me away.
A tragedy that poor little thing suffered one agonizing moment one day comes to us 47 million years later and informs us not only what happened to her and how she lived, but about ourselves.
That "long view" is enough to give anybody with any sense and intelligence vertigo - 47 million years she rested there...peaceful, undisturbed, just another feature of the local rock, undiscovered...
Until science discovered her, gave her a voice and found what she had to say: a little being who speaks louder and more eloquently than all the arrogant, conceited religious-creationist fantasies and howling caterwaulings throughout their trifling written history put together...garbage which can be contained within the sack of time barely 1/10,000 as long.
A mind unbesmirched by religious drivel reels ecstatically at the sheer power and beauty of such authentic revelation, a majestic new chapter and verse in the pages of natural reality.
A book which religion never reads at all.
Indeed, religion has no monopoly on grandeur, or inspiration, or rapture. And whatever there is which religious people are inspired by is a cheap farce.
Religion never discovers such wonderments.
Science does.
Religion is too busy thumbing through a completely different and inconsequential book, written by people. They never notice anything that actually goes on in the book of "creation", even as they insist their scriptures tell the whole tale... they never ever accept any updated information, never ever bother to check what they believe, never ever doubt it has all been "written" and thus "arranged". It's all about "So be it" (AMEN!).
One would think they would have a big stake in learning about the actual book they say God wrote, but they're much too absorbed in the already-written version to bother with the REAL WOR[L]D.
Just how important can such a useless activity possibly be?
Ida has a very arresting answer to that simple question. And after 47 million years of repose she is not about to shut up.
The thing that brings palpitations of excitement to my heart is that the future holds many more such marvels of authentic revelation.
Science rules.
Posted by: Rodger T NZ
|
May 20, 2009 2:44 AM
Mama?......?
Posted by: Bruce Gorton | May 20, 2009 2:48 AM
All too often the missing link seems to turn out to be a Rickroll.
Off topic, but sort of on topic.
Okay, I am a reporter in South Africa, we have a serious lack of science reporters, I think there are only three in the country - and I am finding that half the blogs I visit most are in fact science blogs (I don't comment all that much, because to some extent I feel over my head.)
So I think I have at least got the basic interest.
The thing is, I feel it is not enough to write about science, I want to write about science ethically, so I am looking for some training in at least knowing what I am talking about when it comes to science reporting, and courses on that are few and far between.
I was wondering if anybody here had any suggestions.
Posted by: astrounit | May 20, 2009 2:48 AM
On the media hype?
feh
old tune
Posted by: Rik G | May 20, 2009 2:57 AM
Bruce @146,
This is far from complete, and it's just one person's opinion, but here's something E.O. Wilson had to say on the subject in 2002....
http://www.poynter.org/content/content_view.asp?id=10457
Posted by: wina | May 20, 2009 3:17 AM
the authors may not have done as solid a cladistic analysis as they should, and its position in the family tree may not be as clear as it has been made out to be.
Posted by: Drosera
|
May 20, 2009 3:38 AM
A wonderful fossil, but...
Since when does the theory of evolution require more confirmation?
And since when does on-line publication constitute a valid publication of a scientific name?
Posted by: astrounit | May 20, 2009 4:07 AM
Bruce Gordon: "The thing is, I feel it is not enough to write about science, I want to write about science ethically, so I am looking for some training in at least knowing what I am talking about when it comes to science reporting, and courses on that are few and far between."
That is something you shall have to acquire through the process of "experience". And a bit of patience mixed with a good deal of determination.
You may wish to report on the "ethics of science" OR report on science ethically. The former is going to be an opinion piece, and the latter simply requires that you objectively report what the SCIENTISTS say about their own research.
Just be sure you are accurate. DON'T say anything you aren't sure of UNTIL you get it clear from the scientists involved.
In order to be accurate, you have to learn. I don't mean through any academic curriculum. I mean learning on your own - by reading.
Just READ.
You may not fully understand what they're talking about, but if you keep reading you'll find that you learn more every time you do.
Just keep READING.
Even incredibly hard stuff becomes clear eventually, as long as you keep reading.
Truly. In the absence of any academic course, there is no alternative but to do it yourself.
Posted by: DiscoveredJoys | May 20, 2009 4:35 AM
Ida is 47 million years old...
Altogether now:
"Happy birthday to you,
happy birthday to you..."
There's already a documentary, and no doubt a pop-science book. And next, the Ida T shirts, and mugs.
Not so much a 'missing link' as a merchandising opportunity.
Posted by: Phillip | May 20, 2009 4:39 AM
Another nail in the creationist coffin.
Posted by: Phillip | May 20, 2009 4:41 AM
Another nail in the creationist coffin.
Posted by: Tim Danaher | May 20, 2009 5:15 AM
And another one:
http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/human-evolution-the-spin-machine-in-top-gear/
Dembski, this time.
Posted by: Bernard Bumner
|
May 20, 2009 5:24 AM
For some reason, when the BBC radio station 5 Live covered the story this morning, they decided that they needed the expert opinion of Stephen Green. Who he? - The director of Christian Voice (UK)which represents fundamentalist Christians in the UK.
Obviously he proceeded to give his highly trained analysis of the fossil; it is just a Lemur-like creature; evolution doesn't happen; Lemurs give birth to Lemurs; need a mal and a female at the same time; yeast has been growing in the Carlsberg brewery for the equivalent of 1 milliom human years and is still just yeast; fossils are dated from rocks, and rocks from fossils; blah, blah, blah....
I can think of no good reason to ask Stephen Green's opinion on this (or anything else, but especially this). Why do we need to know the opinion of one loony, representing a small group of loonies, none of whom have any ability to give educated commentary on this story?
So, on the one hand the BBC rushes out a documentary by the Godfather of Natural History in order to celebrate (hype) the science, whilst it simultaneously provides a platform for clueless Creationist drivel.
Posted by: Sangomasmith | May 20, 2009 5:38 AM
@Bruce Gorton:
I'm a South African science student, so I think I might be able to help.
Firstly, I wouldn't bother with a course (although if you do anyway then Unisa is a good bet); the knowledge you would gain doing a BSc would be too narrow to apply properly and I don't think there's anything journalism-specific available at present.
I would go and talk to people at Universities. They're usually only too glad to help random strangers (as I know only too well) and finding a specialist in the field you're writing about is always good for clarification. The Uni itself would, of course, depend on where you are.
Posted by: skymonkey | May 20, 2009 6:00 AM
wow, that is one ugly creature
Posted by: AnaHadWolves | May 20, 2009 6:04 AM
Just curious: how was Darwinius Masillae dated to 47 million years ago? Radio-carbon dating? The age of the surrounding material? How?
Thanks...
Posted by: Matt Heath | May 20, 2009 6:11 AM
I don't think they even do that. CV represent Birdshit Green's desire to have his face on TV and little more.Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 6:12 AM
There is a volcanic unit that can be radiometrically dated that sits just under the fossil-bearing rocks.
Radiocarbon doesn't work on material that is this old. They used Argon-Argon:
Mertz DF, Renne PR (2005) A numerical age for the Messel fossil deposit (UNESCO World Heritage Site) derived from 40Ar/39Ar dating on a basaltic rock fragment. Courier Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg 255: 67–75.
Posted by: Shambhavi Shukla | May 20, 2009 6:15 AM
Its really worth congratulating the proud scientists..
Cheers!
Posted by: DaveH | May 20, 2009 6:23 AM
Can I just say thanks to CalGeorge et al for searching the fundie sites for us all? Do you have to wear special goggles so that you can look at that shite, without your brains dribbling out of your ears in a desperate attempt to escape?
Kudos
DaveH
Posted by: Maia | May 20, 2009 6:37 AM
Darwin was a cokehead who became a cristian.
can anyone tell me where my tail has gone? I need the bl*&dy thing!
Posted by: Knockgoats | May 20, 2009 6:38 AM
So, on the one hand the BBC rushes out a documentary by the Godfather of Natural History in order to celebrate (hype) the science, whilst it simultaneously provides a platform for clueless Creationist drivel. - Bernard Bumner
That's "balance". Like until recently (this has got a bit better) they always had some denialist twerp on every time they had an item on anthropogenic global warming. I notice the documentary is to be called "Uncovering Our Earliest Ancestor: The Link" - yuk. Attenborough's piece in The Grauniad is headed "She's called Ida, she's 47m years old - and she's our link to animal life" - ughh. Whether the sainted Attenborough is responsible for these atrocities, I don't know. The Grauniad also has a 2-page spread including a detailed account of how Hurum acquired the fossil; and a short piece noting the problems with the "missing link" meme, despite Hurum using it While not raising the doubts about Darwinius's place in the phylogeny of primates discussed here, this short piece does end "The paper's scientific reviewers asked that they tone down their original claims that the fossil was on the human evolutionary line."
Posted by: Snout | May 20, 2009 6:41 AM
Not sure how Google works in other countries, but when you start a search tonight in Australia the Google search page includes a picture of Ida as part of their logo.
http://www.google.com.au/ig?hl=en
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 6:46 AM
google.com has ida too :-)
Posted by: Jordan Clarke | May 20, 2009 6:48 AM
There's no doubt in my mind that Stephen Jay Gould would've been jumping up and down all over the place at this find! But, just the author said, the importance of this discovery has been overstated, so Stephen would've gotten used to jumping up and down during his career.
As for Richard Dawkins... I'm sure he'll mention it in the book he's writing at the moment on all the evidence for evolution, once he also stops jumping up and down!
Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 7:05 AM
Just think, 47 million years ago it could be that your distant ancestor would think something like that the sexiest thing on the planet... well not that one in particular, that would make our ancestor a paedophile.Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 7:08 AM
Given the book is being published in September, would something like this really go in there?Posted by: puseaus | May 20, 2009 7:36 AM
The only thing I really think is sad about this story is that some hungry (probably Norwegian) scientist has removed the huge fish that was caught between her jaws.
The sad truth. Some religious map-reader observes that the map is not in accordance with reality... and concludes: Let's ditch reality. The infallible map has never lied, and everybody who disagrees is in bed with the Devil.
Posted by: SphinctOr | May 20, 2009 7:43 AM
I cannot believe that this post has not EXPLODED yet...
This is frakin huge. I saved the IDA Google.com logo for future permanent insertion into my future Firefox theme.
BTW:
Thank you "astrounit" | May 20, 2009 2:37 AM post #144
You're little post put me over the edge, and I actually teared up at work. The funny thing is that I'm too elated to care. You expressed my feelings in a way I could not.
Science Rules.
Posted by: Carlie | May 20, 2009 8:05 AM
Couldn't resist
Posted by: Lauren | May 20, 2009 8:27 AM
Google.com (in the US) still has the logo mentioned above. I heart science. And I heart when Google makes the right moves.
Posted by: uoflcard | May 20, 2009 8:30 AM
Bad news for creationists, exciting find for ID advocates (at least those who believe in the general term "evolution"). Those above saying this is a death blow (one of thousands or millions from the rest of the fossil record) don't know what ID is. It's interesting - when PZ posts about fossil finds or the fossil record, I'm generally in 100% agreement. I open Google this morning and they've got Ida as their logo, with the subtitle "Missing link found!", and I'm thinking, "Okay, so now Google has joined the shock and awe media community." They usually rarely use special logos, and they're planned weeks in advance. This is only the 2nd logo I can think of that was immediately put up in response to a current event - the other was 9/11. I concur with PZ on , but just wanted to point out that a fossil record that proves evolution doesn't prove RM+NS did it all. It just proves that it's impossible to honestly believe the Earth is 6,000 years old (along with many other factors, like the size of the universe...how could a star that is 10 million light years away even be seen? If it takes 10 million years for the light to travel to Earth, why can we see it if it was created 6,000 years ago?)
Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 8:32 AM
to CalGeorge (the 'hahahahahaha' guy):
A call to articulate why a person believes as they do is always a good thing. Most Christian laypeople are not fluent in science to the specific degree that may be necessary to defend evolutionary biology, astrophysics, or natural history. Most secular laypeople are not fluent in those topics either. Indeed, if you, or any other person, were suddenly confronted with a person demanding you articulate your scientific stance in a few words or less, likely in a hostile discussion, out of the blue, could you do it? Do you think about WHY you believe as you do, on a daily basis, and have at the ready a response that would be given in calmness and certitude despite the mocking or hostility of the questioner, as Christians endure these days on a daily basis?
More likely you would say "I believe in science because I believe in science" but may fumble for a few moments before arising with a cogent defense of whatever it is you are asked to defend. Thinking about WHY you believe something, be ready to express it in terms that the hear-er understands, is always a good thing, whether a believer or a non-believer.
Have a wonderful day
Posted by: Matt X | May 20, 2009 8:36 AM
Did you have to go there with the creationist thing? Why are you so anti-religion. There is some truth in both science and religion. Live and let live bro! THAT'S THE ONLY CLUE TO GET. If we are here, if there is a existent universe, anything is possible.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 8:36 AM
On this I must laugh.
I think.
Are you speaking of only here on Pharyngula or in the rest the world?
Posted by: Domino | May 20, 2009 8:37 AM
Obviously, this is a space alien.
Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 8:51 AM
Well science can demonstrate it's validity of thought, what can religion do? The live and let live methodology simply doesn't work because religions of all shapes and colours make claims that it's a way to understanding truth. What truth can religion give that secular thought cannot? If you can't answer that, then why should we sit back when religions claim to have a truth they simply cannot know?!?Posted by: Al thomas | May 20, 2009 8:52 AM
And so the fossil of yet another perfectly formed extinct creature is hailed as an intermediate form and even an ancestor of man. Ho hum.
In all the over-excited hype about this creature, please remember to replace the term "cladistics" by "claptrap". Because similarities do not prove common ancestry. The infantile con that is now used to mass-produce intermediate forms where none existed before, is well explained in a book I found recently on Amazon: "The Darwin Delusion".
Meanwhile, evolution cannot to explain the origins of sex in any and all organisms. And meanwhile also, Sean Carroll cannot explain the Cambrian Explosion, beyond the childish suggestion that "they must have invented toolbox genes". Oh, how clever!
And all this due to the fortuitous accumulation of zillions of random DNA copying errors. You cannot be serious, man! And where did they get the DNA? Ah, well , that would be telling . . . Anyway, when you know evolution is a fact, you don't need to ask stupid questions like that.
Posted by: bobxxxx | May 20, 2009 8:52 AM
There is some truth in both science and religion.
Actually Matt X, all religions, all religious ideas, and all magic god fairies are pure bullshit. If you have a shred of evidence to prove me wrong, let's have it moron.
Posted by: alejandrito | May 20, 2009 8:54 AM
shittt,, that is amazing!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: alex k | May 20, 2009 9:00 AM
Domino did you know that the profoundly retarded cannot vote in Missouri. I am just saying this to let you know that YOU cannot vote in Missouri
Posted by: bobxxxx | May 20, 2009 9:01 AM
Al thomas, which Christian death cult do you belong to?
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 9:02 AM
Xians make up 76% of the US population. How in the hell can a huge majority be a persecuted minority at the same time? Some of that mocking hostility is hard earned by stupid statements like that.
The rest is earned by some xians habits of lies, hate, and attempts to take over the USA (with some success) and destroy it. "As you sow, so shall you reap." Many of us like living in a free democracy and have no desire to return to the Dark Ages. The proof of this is very simple. The Amish reject modern technology including electricity. No one cares because they aren't running around on horses destroying power plants and transmission lines. If the fundie Death Cults left everyone else alone, they could make their hells on earth and no one would care.
Science is a way of studying and understanding the world. It doesn't require belief. If I don't believe in quantum mechanics or the Theory of Internal Combustion it doesn't matter. My computer turns on, the microwave works, and the car starts. No praying or belief required.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:03 AM
Ray is that you?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:07 AM
You trust that steaming pile of creationist idiocy?Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 9:07 AM
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 8:36 AM
as Christians endure these days on a daily basis?
On this I must laugh.
I think.
Are you speaking of only here on Pharyngula or in the rest the world?
---------------------
Why is it laughable? Christians are increasingly living in a world hostile to our philosophy. I think this can be acknowledged widely. And here on this blog the first two comments addressing me were mocking laughter.
Posted by: bobxxxx | May 20, 2009 9:07 AM
Today (5/20/2009 Wednesday), at least here in Florida, clicking on the word Google on the Google search screen, gives information about "Scientists unveil fossil of Darwinius masillae".
Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 9:11 AM
That's the difference between creationists and us. When we don't know a topic, we don't pretend that we do. I have heard several times: "Evolution violates the 2nd law of thermodynamics"(it doesn't), "evolution is only a theory" (equivocating colloquial use of the word with the scientific use) "how can can bring about us?" (evolution is selection acting on chance) "something can't come from nothing" (the big bang is not evolution, and on a side note the big bang does not state something came from nothing) "there are no transitional forms" (need I respond?) and so on and on and on and on.Yes, many laypeople don't know the first thing about the world around them. But that doesn't prevent creationists from talking out of their arse, defending an ideological position that is scientifically absurd. We know better, and just because some stay in ignorance on the matter, it doesn't mean that the knowledge isn't out there. Get creationists to stop talking about what they have no idea of, and you'll find the insults will go away.
Posted by: bobxxxx | May 20, 2009 9:15 AM
"Christians are increasingly living in a world hostile to our philosophy."
Maybe it's because your philosophy is childish insane bullshit, or perhaps it's because many Christians are assholes, and all Christians are idiots.
Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 9:15 AM
Yeah, those 2 billion Christians are really being persecuted...Your philosophy is being dismissed by academia because your philosophy is nothing more than a pile of manure. Christianity is ignorance manifest - it's finding satisfaction in not knowing and pushing that ignorance onto others. Saying Goddidit tells us nothing about the world. Saying Goddidit 6000 years ago is making a false statement given what we know about how the universe works.
If you want to show that Christianity is relevant, show that the philosophy fits the modern scientific interpretation of the world. After all, science works - and by using a computer you are implicity agreeing that science works.
Posted by: uoflcard | May 20, 2009 9:16 AM
bobxxxx
Judging by the ad hominem attacks, I assume you're not actually open to discussion on this. The problem is science gives verifiable truth, atheism does not. Somehow, atheists (after hearing other atheists continually replace "materialism" with the word "science) believe their faith is science-based. While rejection of certain worldviews (young Earth creationism) is science-based (at least for me), my belief in Christianity is not science-based (nor is it in conflict with science, as the Bible was not meant to be a science book), and neither is your belief in atheism science-based.
As for evidence for my religious ideas, most of my belief is based on personal experience, but an interesting book is "Case for Christ" be Lee Stroebel. Go ahead and immediately check out the 1-star reviews on Amazon, but I would hope you would read that book with an open mind (which is difficult, as it was difficult for me to read books like those by Dawkins with an open mind). Keep in mind that it is the case "for" Christ, not the "trial of Christ", as most of the negative reviewers have judged it as. There definitely was a man named Jesus in the middle East about 2,000 years ago, and there are many interesting things to consider, like why did dozens of people, who doubted him for months or years, suddenly give up their life, submitting to torture and horrible deaths just because they wouldn't say he wasn't God's son.
I know I've been blasted on here for proselytizing, but he asked for it. Let me end by saying you don't come to know God by studying anything, but by pursuing a relationship with Him
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:17 AM
Oh the poor persecuted Christians who claim at the lowest levels 75-80% of the population of the US. Really. Save it.
Yes here on this blog I don't disagree what so ever. What did you expect on an atheist blog that is polluted daily by theist ignoramuses?
If you are feeling the pressure in the world on Christianity it is solely due to the fault of Christians and how they treat people and how they dismiss reason and empiricism in favor of blind faith and distortion. The more we know about the world, the more damage is does to any faith, Christianity included. It's not persecution, it is liberation. Liberation from the weight of ignorance perpetrated on the world by all faiths.
The more we know the more people start to realize they don't need to fear your superstitions, only fear those who hold them.
Posted by: Ompompanoosuc | May 20, 2009 9:19 AM
Good.
You should use that as an excuse to not learn anything while you are here. Just complain about the delivery, we are used to it. If your skin is thick enough I'm sure someone will find the time to show you (if you listen) why what you believe is a load of $hit.
Posted by: Raegan Elane | May 20, 2009 9:21 AM
Wow, very cool fossil. Although I don't believe all that '47 million years old' stuff, that fossil has to old. Maybe it was destroyed from volcanic acid or gases, but I believe it was alive around the time of Noah and the Ark, or possibly even sooner. Like I said, very cool fossil. It helps you believe that dinosaurs are real, not just bones that scientists piece together. To see the whole body form of Ida, well, that's pretty amazing, you've got to say.
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 9:24 AM
I first saw the dinosaur on google. It was pretty cool, and I was interested.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:25 AM
yawn
Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 9:27 AM
So many falsehoods in such a short space.1. Atheism is simply a lack of belief in the supernatural. There's no faith, it's an absence of faith by very definition. It says nothing about the universe, it has no doctrine, no dogma, no anything. Think of what it means to believe in astrology, then think of what it means not to believe in astrology. That is atheism.
2. If tomorrow scientists came out and showed scientifically that Jesus rose from the dead, I don't think there would be many Christians who wouldn't point to that and argue that they wouldn't base their beliefs on science. It's only that science shows a distinct absence of god that theists like to say "well, science can't stop our belief"
3. To say that the bible was never meant to be a science book is only valid if you take science to be anything from Francis Bacon onwards. In terms of giving order to the universe, in terms of understanding events, the bible is full of scientific assertions and has been used throughout the centuries to interpret evidence. It's only in the last few hundred years that science and the bible are not matching up, so again people are trying to shy away from those throughout the history of Christian thought you have used the bible as a scientific guide - not to mention the hundreds of millions of believers who still use it as a scientific guide.
4. Atheism is not a science-based belief, it's an absence of faith. Atheists use science to understand the world because science has proven itself time and time again. The device you are sitting can do more calculations per second than the entire human race combined. It has put a man on the moon, eradicated small-pox, fed billions, split the atom, etc. Of course an atheist would use science to justify non-belief - after all, what does an interventionist God do in a world governed by forces? Science makes God obsolete, an honest person recognises this.
Posted by: Lucy | May 20, 2009 9:27 AM
I agree with you, Raegan Elane. That dinosaur probably was alive around the Ark time. Glad I'm not the only one who still believes the Bible. :)
Posted by: iman | May 20, 2009 9:29 AM
"""
... Look at the worldly and all who set themselves up
above the people of God; has not God’s image and His
truth been distorted in them? They have science; but in
science there is nothing but what is the object of sense.
The spiritual world, the higher part of man’s being is
rejected altogether, dismissed with a sort of triumph, even
with hatred. The world has proclaimed the reign of
freedom, especially of late, but what do we see in this
freedom of theirs? Nothing but slavery and selfdestruction!
...
"""
The Brothers Karamazov,
F.M.DOSTOJEWSKI
Posted by: bobxxxx | May 20, 2009 9:30 AM
uoflcard wrote "As for evidence for my religious ideas, most of my belief is based on personal experience, but an interesting book is 'Case for Christ' be Lee Stroebel."
Look it god-soaked idiot. Your Jeebus is dead. When he was alive, if there really was a Jeebus, he was nothing more than a worthless preacher man, as stupid and nuts as today's preachers. If you don't understand these obvious facts, then you're a gullible moron.
Your personal experience? Let's have it shithead. Did Jeebus talk to you?
Sorry if I sound rude, but I'm convinced all Christians are insane and a disgrace to the human race. They have no moral values so they brainwash young children so they grow up to as stupid as you are. I'm strongly in favor of somehow eradicating your death cult and all other religions. The best way to do that is better science education and relentless ridicule of religious scum.
An example of Christian stupidity is creationism. How do they explain this 47 million year old fossil? They will probably say their magic fairy created it out of nothing. It's impossible to be more idiotic than a Christian.
Posted by: Raegan Elane | May 20, 2009 9:31 AM
Wow, Rev. Bigdumbchimp, pretty immature, wouldn't you think? I still support my own opinion, whether you do or not. Ida is cool, just scientists have the time figures and frame all messed up.
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 9:32 AM
Well, I actually made an effort to be polite to a christofascist troll. Waste of time.
Liz, xians make up 76% of the USA population. This is just a fact determined by counting them up.
Once again, how can a huge majority simultaneously be a persecuted minority? Try to answer a real question rather than restating a stupid statement.
If your particular brand of Death Cult lunacy is met by mocking laughter and derision, chances are you earned it the hard way. "As you sow, so shall you reap". Remember that, it is in the NT of the magic book?
If the world thinks your "philosophy" is malevolent delusion, it is because some xians insist on cramming a poisonous version of it down everyone else's throat. Once again, the majority of the population doesn't want to live in the Dark Ages in a world of lies and hate. Deal with it.
I think this can be acknowledged widely. Another lie. What can be acknowledged widely is that you are a paranoid lunatic. It is OK, they can be amusing for whole minutes as long as they aren't waving loaded guns around.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:33 AM
Like I said yawn.
We've heard it before.
Show your work.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 9:34 AM
Then maybe it's time to take a good hard look at that philosophy, with an eye to what other people find wrong with it. Really read the old testament, and ask yourself is Yahweh the god you really want to worship? (I don't want to worship such an amoral thug.) Why not Odin? Or no god?Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 9:34 AM
How do you know this? Have you radiometrically dated the rocks above and below this? Have you checked what part of the geological column this is from relative to other columns where it can be shown it is of a different age? Or are you simply talking out of your arse and thinking you know better than the palaeontologists / geologists / biologists who actually study this?Posted by: Lucy | May 20, 2009 9:35 AM
The dinosaur is very interesting.
Posted by: ADS | May 20, 2009 9:36 AM
PZ -- enjoyed hearing you on Michael Smerconish this morning. I was happy to hear you explain the misconception regarding the "missing link".
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:37 AM
Lucy and Raegan are poe.
even more yawn
Posted by: imanligenc | May 20, 2009 9:37 AM
"""
...
Look at the worldly and all who set themselves up
above the people of God; has not God’s image and His
truth been distorted in them? They have science; but in
science there is nothing but what is the object of sense.
The spiritual world, the higher part of man’s being is
rejected altogether, dismissed with a sort of triumph, even
with hatred. The world has proclaimed the reign of
freedom, especially of late, but what do we see in this
freedom of theirs? Nothing but slavery and selfdestruction!
...
"""
The Brothers Karamazov,
F.M.DOSTOJEWSKI
Posted by: Kel | May 20, 2009 9:38 AM
When religious nuts come on and espouse such asinine garbage where quite clearly they are talking on matters they know nothing about, damn they make it easy to be an atheist. So much stupidity in such a small space!
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 9:39 AM
You know what? No offense to anyone, especially the scientists (I am just observing), but that picture looks...I don't know, maybe animated? Or false? Take a real good look at the picture, whoever reads this. Does it look false to you?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:41 AM
iman we heard you the first time
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:44 AM
lea, lucy and raegan or which ever name you use next
piss off
Posted by: iman | May 20, 2009 9:45 AM
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:41 AM
iman we heard you the first time
...
cause its my first post
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution
|
May 20, 2009 9:46 AM
iman = the intellectual equivalent of a 4 year-old holding his hands over his ears and shouting "la la la la I can't hear you la la la la"...
Pretty much the last resort for the intellectually challenged.
Got anything original to say? Or are you only capable of regurgitating someone else's verbal diarrhea?
Posted by: Moxie | May 20, 2009 9:47 AM
I read about this on a mainstream news sight and made the mistake of reading the comments. They were dreadful and exactly what you would expect. Eventually it degenerated into rants about America being a Christian nation.
Obviously I came here as quickly as I could. I need to replace the stench of used kitty litter with the baked bread of reason.
Posted by: Raegan Elane | May 20, 2009 9:49 AM
Ok, maybe you have your opinions Rev. Bigdumbdchimp, and I have mine. But I've got something you don't. Faith. I don't have work, because I'm not a scientist. But you know, the Bible tells all, and the Bible says the Earth has only been around for 6-7,000 years, not some-odd millions of years that scientists claim. And, for the record, evolution is a pile of crap.
Posted by: alex | May 20, 2009 9:50 AM
ok all the fuck heads out there who keep talking about religious bullshit and Atheist assholes i don't give a flying fuck just stfu and talk about the damn fossil or go to a different website that can handle you incompetent morons.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:51 AM
YAWN
Intentional Poe or not you are boring.
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 9:52 AM
You got it. There is a troll with multiple IDs messing around. It is either a 12 year old kid of dubious sanity or someone pretending to be such. This is probably the drive by from last night, breadfruit.
Not worth paying attention to.
Elizabeth is the real thing though. She has posted before. It is always the same, paranoid lunacy about a persecuted majority.
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 9:54 AM
Rev. Bigchimp, I was just noticing, I am NOT reagan, or Lucy, and I don't know what made you think that. I was just looking at the picture, and I thought it didn't look like a real picture.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 9:55 AM
Obviously new here.
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution
|
May 20, 2009 9:56 AM
Reagan Elane @ 220
I call Poe. But, if not...
Good luck with that.
And a simple question... why in the heck are you even here? I think you're in over your head in a forum you clearly wouldn't enjoy. I'd move along if I were you. I think if you google it you'll find an interesting article on how ostriches manage to breathe whilst their heads are buried in the sand. I think you might find that information more useful.
Posted by: james | May 20, 2009 9:57 AM
looks like a lizard to me?
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 9:58 AM
Rev. Bigchimp, I was just noticing, I am NOT reagan, or Lucy, and I don't know what made you think that. I was just looking at the picture, and I thought it didn't look like a real picture.
Posted by: YO MOMMAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA | May 20, 2009 10:02 AM
yo momma bitch!
Posted by: Childers09 | May 20, 2009 10:05 AM
I completely agree with the article. The flesh is most definitely deteriated, (sorry, my spelling is off) and the structure is very interesting. I'll have to research the creature at my lab. Hopefully new info will come up.
Posted by: Rey Fox | May 20, 2009 10:07 AM
"I don't have work, because I'm not a scientist."
If you're for real, then you are exactly what's wrong with this country. You are the poster child for Idiot America, thinking you can say any unsupported crap you want just because you go to church every week. Do us a favor and stay as far away from our schools as you possibly can.
Posted by: Raegan Elane | May 20, 2009 10:10 AM
I don't know where you [Rev. Bigdumbchimp]get off telling me what I am or who I am, because I have nothing to do with lucy or lea, and you need to get your facts straight before you blab your mouth. Put your money where your mouth is, or so they say. Oh, and to you raven, I am not some 12 year old kid with multiple accounts. I am one person. Like bigdumbchimp, get your facts straight.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 10:10 AM
Yep some 13 year old is loose. Lea, yo mama, Childers99, Lucy and Raegan etc...
No wonder the comments from a few above are what they are, you, sir or madam dumbass should be in school.
It looks like you're really going to need it.
Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 10:10 AM
Overwrought about Ida
http://elizabethprata.blogspot.com/2009/05/overwrought-about-ida.html
and to answer the poster above, fitting Christianity into "modern science" is backwards. Which 'modern science' do I rely upon, the science that explained wrongly, or the science that cannot explain? The one that confirmed the Piltdown Man? Or the Cardiff Giant? or the Sokal Controversy? And can science confirm which branch of primates man sprang from? Adapids, or not? Scientists cannot even decide. Or rely upon the modern science that cannot explain why sunspots have not emerged? Or the science that cannot explain why Comet Holmes brightened a million-fold overnight? Or the science still struggling with explaining the Big Bang? Or the science that cannot repeat the moment that inorganic material formed into single celled organisms and launched out of the primordial soup?
I am not deriding science. God-given inspiration has caused many a breakthrough and scientific good that has aided man. But that is where it began: God gave it. I cannot and will not demean my God into a box that flawed and error-prone science want to put Him in. Why should I, when Science has been wrong, and God never is or will be?
Posted by: Raegan Elane | May 20, 2009 10:13 AM
I don't know where you [Rev. Bigdumbchimp]get off telling me what I am or who I am, because I have nothing to do with lucy or lea, and you need to get your facts straight before you blab your mouth. Put your money where your mouth is, or so they say. Oh, and to you raven, I am not some 12 year old kid with multiple accounts. I am one person. Like bigdumbchimp, get your facts straight.
Posted by: PZ Myers
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May 20, 2009 10:14 AM
Lucy, Lea, and Raegan Elane are all the same person, with the same IP address and even using the same email address.
Posted by: Ellis Pawson | May 20, 2009 10:16 AM
Check out Google.com today!
Posted by: PZ Myers
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May 20, 2009 10:17 AM
Oh, yeah, and Childers09: same IP.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 10:19 AM
Oh you can not be serious.
Piltdown man was exposed by scientists as a hoax.
Cardiff Man was a hoax to make fun of a creationist and turned into a money maker. Has nothing to do with science.
And the sokal affair. Please read up.
Your "science has been wrong before" gambit is a an own goal because science is what corrects errors in science. Not religion. That's exactly how science is supposed to work. It is not stagnant like faith or religion.
Seriously. You should go immediately to the emergency room to patch that giant hole you just shot in your own foot.
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution
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May 20, 2009 10:21 AM
Brainwashed simpleton Elizabeth Prata spews:
That's a joke... right? Have you actually read the bible?
Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 10:22 AM
Overwrought about Ida
http://elizabethprata.blogspot.com/2009/05/overwrought-about-ida.html
and to answer the poster above, fitting Christianity into "modern science" is backwards. Which 'modern science' do I rely upon, the science that explained wrongly, or the science that cannot explain? The one that confirmed the Piltdown Man? Or the Cardiff Giant? or the Sokal Controversy? And can science confirm which branch of primates man sprang from? Adapids, or not? Scientists cannot even decide. Or rely upon the modern science that cannot explain why sunspots have not emerged? Or the science that cannot explain why Comet Holmes brightened a million-fold overnight? Or the science still struggling with explaining the Big Bang? Or the science that cannot repeat the moment that inorganic material formed into single celled organisms and launched out of the primordial soup?
I am not deriding science. God-given inspiration has caused many a breakthrough and scientific good that has aided man. But that is where it began: God gave it. I cannot and will not demean my God into a box that flawed and error-prone science want to put Him in. Why should I, when Science has been wrong, and God never is or will be?
Posted by: Josh
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May 20, 2009 10:23 AM
Well then, in order to avoid being a complete hypocrite, I expect you will immediately stop using the technological advances that are provided to you with the help of research into evolution, such as, for example...petroleum*.
*Our understanding of evolution helps us prospect, successfully, for oil. If you don't accept that evolution happens, and you think that we're full of it, then you should go find your own dman oil.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 10:24 AM
Elizabeth, a little friendly advice for posting here.
When you get the submission error message, please read it.
You do not need to repost. Hit back and then refresh. Your post will show up. If you repost it will show up twice or more.
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 10:25 AM
Who started pairing me with them? (Raegan, lucy, yo mama, childers99) I was just commenting on the picture, like I said. Maybe I am over my head. I saw the google image, thought it was cool, then saw this blog. I just posted my comment, like a blog is meant for. I'll admit, I'm a 'freshman' in college. Studying to be a biologist. But, why does everyone assume I'm fake just because I don't know as much as the scientists who uncovered the darwinius masillae in the first place?
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 10:25 AM
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 10:27 AM
You haven't shown your imaginary god exists. Until you do so, stop talking about a delusional figure that only exists in your mind. Physical evidence that will pass muster with scientists, magicians, and professional debunkers as being of divine, and not natural, origin is required. Presuppositions on the existence of god have been refute here, time and time again.Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 20, 2009 10:28 AM
Elizabeth Prata, one does not answer the challenges to your assertions by repeating the same post. Answer Rev Chimpy or go away.
Or are you here to just whore your blog? If that is the case, you will find few people who will bother. We see the likes of you all the time. You are not at all impressive nor persuasive.
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 10:28 AM
Who started pairing me with them? (Raegan, lucy, yo mama, childers99) I was just commenting on the picture, like I said. Maybe I am over my head. I saw the google image, thought it was cool, then saw this blog. I just posted my comment, like a blog is meant for. I'll admit, I'm a 'freshman' in college. Studying to be a biologist. But, why does everyone assume I'm fake just because I don't know as much as the scientists who uncovered the darwinius masillae in the first place?
Posted by: Emmet, OM
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May 20, 2009 10:29 AM
The Bible says nothing of the kind.
Posted by: Josh
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May 20, 2009 10:31 AM
Another dishonest Christian, popping in here to throw some feces about? I'm shocked! Shocked, I tell you.
Posted by: KemaTheAtheist
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May 20, 2009 10:32 AM
@#194
We're completely open to discussion if you can provide a rational argument to support your case.
I have a question though... Since when is atheism anything more than lack of belief in a deity?
What? Atheism doesn't have faith.
Where do you get this stuff?
If anyone's belief in Christianity is science-based, they suck at science.
Belief in atheism? Atheism is lack of belief, directly related to the inability of theists to substantiate their claims with verifiable evidence. Or even with logical arguments to show belief is better than non-belief.
Personal experiences (i.e. anecdotes are not evidence). It's subjective and nothing more than correlative.
I've read the Case for Christ and the margins of the book are now marked with tons of remarks like "assertion without evidence" and "circular logic."
It's not about keeping an open mind, it's about being able to back up what you say is true.
First, there are zero contemporary writings of Jesus. The earliest are 3 decades after his supposed death, and all writings are likely to be 3rd party sources at best.
Second, convincing people to give up their lives for something doesn't mean it's true. For example, I'm sure you don't think the mass suicide cults' beliefs were correct.
I'll translate. Critical thinking and study don't do anything. You have to want to be deluded and belief based on faith.
Posted by: Wowbagger, OM | May 20, 2009 10:36 AM
Elizabeth
PrataPrattler wrote:What, as opposed to flawless Christianity? Say, can you remind me of exactly how many tens of thousands of different sects of Christianity there are? Heck, Christians can't even agree on who is and isn't allowed to be called Christian; you're saying science is flawed?
And as for your god not ever being wrong, if that's the case why then did he make so many mistakes with humanity, fucking up so badly that he had to a) cast Adam and Eve out of Eden, b) destroy all of humanity save for Noah and his incestuous brood of animal-shit cleaners, and c) be rendered so powerless that he was forced to come to earth in human form and be tortured and executed so he could be allowed to forgive us?
Seems like your god is all kinds of wrong.
Posted by: Joe | May 20, 2009 10:37 AM
People are really fired up on here. I like it. ;D
Posted by: Emmet, OM
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May 20, 2009 10:37 AM
It was probably your asinine notion that the picture of the fossil was faked that marked you out as a troll.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 20, 2009 10:37 AM
Lea, the above was posted by PZ Myers, who runs this blog. He (and only he) has access to your sign in data, which includes your e-mail account used for verification and IP address. So either a group of you were sharing an e-mail account and computer to sign in with, or you are morphing and sockpuppeting.Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 10:38 AM
Thank you Rev. BigDumbChimp for explaining about the error message.
I find it interesting that my comment about how and where science has failed, its overreliance on theory to fit facts, and how easy it is to hoax, has been met with ad hominem attacks rather than reasoned debate. I had hoped for better.
And to the poster who asked if I read the bible, yes, I do, every day. It is a privilege and joy to do so. I especially love the part when it is explained to us that God made the world in 6 days. :)
I am not delusional nor a simpleton. I am highly educated and professional. I came to the Lord in my mid forties, not 'brainwashed' as a child. I prefer reasoned debate on the issues and prefer not to call people names who hold an opposite view.
Science is great and I love it. I love Fibonacci numbers as a way to explain the complexity of the world in its purposeful Design. However, as everyone knows, science is flawed and oftentimes wrong. God never is. In my life, there is room for both. Contrary to common belief, Christians do not walk around grinning dumbly in tiny Christian circles stumbling against padded walls. We are intelligent, curious, compassionate, realistic people. Just because I believe in God it does not mean that belief precludes science. However, as an intelligent thinking person I recognize science's limits in explaining the human condition. God has no limits, and though He is beyond understanding, He does reveal Himself to us, sometimes...through science.
Posted by: Joe | May 20, 2009 10:41 AM
People are really fired up on here. I like it. ;D
Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 10:43 AM
"Elizabeth Prata Prattler wrote:"
well, that was mean. Sorry it is so hard to debate maturely.
Posted by: Raegan | May 20, 2009 10:45 AM
I am ONE person! Get it through your thick minds! And thats to EVERYONE who thinks otherwise! Stop laying fault where its none of your concern and where you don't even know what you're talking about!
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 20, 2009 10:45 AM
Elizabeth, lots of lies you keep using. Your god doesn't exist. Your bible is fiction. And science and god don't recognize each other. So science is independent of god. Anybody believing in imaginary deities is delusional by definition. So, to quit being delusional, either stop believing in your god, or show the physical evidence for god.
Posted by: Josh
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May 20, 2009 10:47 AM
Instead of chewing on the rather boring troll, perhaps we can chew on this. Pretty intrieging, based on the report. I'm off to see if I can find the paper itself.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/8058185.stm
Posted by: Emmet, OM
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May 20, 2009 10:48 AM
How can you love something when you know nothing about it and reject its most basic principles?
Posted by: Joe | May 20, 2009 10:48 AM
Elizabeth,
Are you Christian?
People are confusing me.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 10:52 AM
In what way is my response ad hominem?
How do you define theory when discussion science?
Science is not easy to hoax. It's quite difficult. Even the examples you used above do not support the notion that science is easy to hoax. Far from it. If it was you would have many good examples of such hoaxes instead of the weak ones you (and not surprisingly, nearly every creationist) choose to cite.
Seriously.
Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 10:53 AM
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM Author Profile Page | May 20, 2009 10:45 AM
Elizabeth, lots of lies you keep using. Your god doesn't exist. Your bible is fiction. And science and god don't recognize each other. So science is independent of god. Anybody believing in imaginary deities is delusional by definition. So, to quit being delusional, either stop believing in your god, or show the physical evidence for god.
Because I believe in God I am a liar? Interesting debate technique. I could (and I will) ask you to produce evidence that God does NOT exist.
Science and God don't recognize each other? I differ with that assessment. Copernicus believed in God. As did Francis Bacon, Kepler, Galileo...and more recently genome mapper Francis Collins. They all not only recognized each other, they had a deep relationship.
And wasn't it science (archaeology) that dug up the items that confirm the bible over and over? For example, the Temech seal very recently?
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 10:53 AM
Lots. Boatloads. It's depressing how much, and what, is being withheld from the scientists and the public in general.
(Calcium is an element… it can't change… do you mean the apatite, the mineral that bone mostly consists of? It often recrystallizes to various extents.)
The reason why we can't carbon-date bones older than about 50,000 to 60,000 years (and even this requires special conditions) is that 1) most of the carbon is no longer there, having been eaten away by bacteria or absconded as carbon dioxide, methane, or who knows what; 2) the half-life of 14C is less than 6,000 years, and after 10 half-lives practically nothing remains. Thus, most fossils do not contain any 14C.
It does happen that 14C is found even in coal and diamonds (and that's the next thing your creationist friend will bring up). But that's only close to radioactive minerals which have generated new 14C by radiation. The closer to such a mineral, the more 14C is found. Obviously there's no point in trying to date that.
You should explain the other radiometric dating methods…
It does mean fruit and leaves. It just doesn't mean fresh fruit and leaves. Or anywhere near fresh. :-)
What? The bones are decalcified in Messel? What has replaced them?
I bet they'll start selling replicas soon, if they haven't already.
They did not do any at all.
Christianity is a philosophy now? Not a religion?
Yeees, but this blog isn't representative of the world at large, let alone the USA.
No.
Science cannot prove, only disprove – and it's not even possible to disprove ideas like solipsism.
You seem to be on a quest for absolute certainty; but there is no such thing. Give up, you're wasting your time.
Science is a quest for falsehood: it takes ideas and shows why they are wrong.
Under the most common definition of "atheism", that's a contradiction in terms.
<headdesk>
This is the most embarrassing argument I've encountered in… weeks. Du-ude, all halfway big religions have martyrs. This includes even ideologies that only count as "religions" under the widest possible definition of that term. National Socialism had martyrs; the Nazis sang songs to Horst Wessel all the time, to mention the most prominent one. Communism has martyrs by the boatload. (One kind of it – the Kurdish version of Stalinism – has even had suicide bombers: people whose conviction was so strong that they believed it was worth killing and dying for, and this time really dying, because they didn't believe in an afterlife.) Manichaeism, which is now extinct as a separate religion (but has left lots of influence on Christianity), has martyrs – most notably the founder, who was not merely crucified, but skinned alive.
Doesn't it hurt to be that ignorant? Doesn't the air pressure on your empty skull hurt?
Translation: in order to get to believe in God, you have to start by assuming that God exists.
Logic: ur doin it rong.
Scroll up a little, and you'll find Josh citing the paper where that figure comes from.
Try to get that paper and read it.
Dinosaur? What dinosaur?
Show me such a thing exists, and we can start talking.
In this order. Not the other way around.
"You're entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own facts."
– Sen. Patrick Moynihan
Frankly, that's entirely the wrong question. What is true doesn't depend on what I'd like to be true.
The right question is: What's the evidence?
Posted by: abel | May 20, 2009 10:54 AM
how many chromo is in its dna end of story.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 20, 2009 10:55 AM
I am not delusional nor a simpleton. I am highly educated and professional. I came to the Lord in my mid forties, not 'brainwashed' as a child. I prefer reasoned debate on the issues and prefer not to call people names who hold an opposite view.
well, that was mean. Sorry it is so hard to debate maturely.
You come in here, claiming that the people here have have no idea of what they are talking about and claim connection to a being that is never wrong. That is ignorant and patronizing, hardly the way to have a mature debate.
You have no idea how science work. The Cardiff Giant was the work of a showman. Piltdown Man is an example of how science corrects itself. Yet you claim this shows how science gets it wrong and misleads people. And that you have clarity of vision.
Funny how people who claim to have been saved late in their lives end up sounding like they have had part of the brain removed.
And to answer your question, I am being mean. That is because you did not come here for a mature debate. You are here to convert.
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 10:55 AM
Okay, well, that was my mistake for commenting that the picture looked fake. It kinda does to me. Sorry to all of you. Please don't call me fake.
Posted by: Wowbagger, OM | May 20, 2009 10:55 AM
Elizabeth
PrataPrattler wrote:You believe in a being who is one part invisible magic fairy who grants wishes, one part security blanket to make you feel like you're special, and one part hate-filled, genocidal murderous tyrant who'll 'get me and my kind in the end'.
Which of us sounds more immature?
You haven't presented anything worthy of debate, only inane criticisms of the 'weaknesses' of science and some vapid drivel about your ill-written, poorly-cobbled-together book of antique folk tales.
We can - and do - tell when science is 'wrong'; it's part of how science works. How about your god? What measures and devices do you use to analyse your god's work?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 10:57 AM
add joe to the list.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 10:57 AM
You are correct, but the problem is with childish people like yourself, who believe in delusional deities, and keep lying to themselves and us. As long you are posting with childish attitudes, there will not be a mature debate, which requires the use of hard evidence with invoking anything you are unwilling to back up. Welcome to science.Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 10:57 AM
I don't know how to use quotes on this blog. Any help is appreciated. Thanks
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 10:57 AM
So, Little Lizzie Prattler, you're incapable of addressing the content of Wowbagger's post, so you're reduced to whining about tone like a small child. Then you have the total lack of self awareness to whine about mature debate, while yourself being utterly incapable of engaging in such.
Bottom line: your moldy book of myths is not evidence. Your god is not real. As long as your arguments are built entirely on myths, dogma, and lies, you will be nothing more than a laughingstock. If you have a problem with that, quit whining and bring some evidence to the table.
Posted by: Wowbagger, OM | May 20, 2009 11:01 AM
More prattling from Elizabeth
Well, you're mostly lying to yourself. Which doesn't really bother me all that much. But the point still stands.
Oh dear. You're one of those.
Elizabeth, I need you to prove you don't owe me a million dollars. If you can't, then I'll let you know where to send the cheque.
Do you grasp what I'm hinting at there?
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 11:17 AM
Okay, well, that was my mistake for commenting that the picture looked fake. It kinda does to me. Sorry to all of you. Please don't call me fake.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 11:18 AM
No, why? That's what Messel fossils look like. It's normal.
Du-u-uh! It's gone. Decayed. Decomposed.
The Senckenberg Museum doesn't borrow fossils to random trolls.
Especially lying ones.
How many Leas are there on this thread?
Not being PZ, I can't see your IP or e-mail address. But I notice you were stupid enough to use "yahoo.com" as the address of your homepage. This is also what Raegan Elane did, and Childers09 and Joe were stupid enough to use "bellsouth.com".
The principle of parsimony says we should assume the existence of a single stupid person here, rather than four.
Oh, BTW, it's spelled Reagan. With ea. And if that's what your parents called you, let me express my heartfelt condolences.
Fascinating!
Posted by: Peter Ashby | May 20, 2009 11:18 AM
i couldn't care less about the hype or the debatable cladistics*. One look at the pictures of the fossil were enough for me, especially since I know most early primates are known only from isolated teeth. This is one seriously stunning fossil, I know my limb anatomy and this fossil kept me looking long and hard.
*Also criticising them for their cladistics seems a little like sour grapes to me. They have a much more complete skeleton than for any other early primate so sticking with the careful measuring to the nth degree of tiny variations because that is all you have is rather pointless for a first paper so what they did with all the 30 features looks fine to me. The detailed stuff can come later for them that find that stuff interesting.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 11:19 AM
Pharyngula go boom?
Posted by: KemaTheAtheist
|
May 20, 2009 11:21 AM
@256
It is NOT easy to create a hoax. Every hoax that is used as a talking point by Creotards was uncovered BY SCIENTISTS, not by theists. Science is self-fixing. That's how the method works. That's how we can trust in it.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 20, 2009 11:22 AM
*Gack, can't proofread today*
#272 next to last sentence ...evidence without invoking.....
@#$!#!@ computer/link from work. Slow only begins to describe it today.
Posted by: Emmet, OM
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May 20, 2009 11:25 AM
OK, if that is the standard for believing in things, then you must either believe in leprechauns, unicorns, and hobbits or produce evidence that they do not exist.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 20, 2009 11:26 AM
Pharyngula go boom?
Bigger. ScienceBlogs go boom.
Posted by: raven | May 20, 2009 11:27 AM
If they did that would be a vast improvement. Medicine has had problems with death threats from xians backed up with the occasional doc murder by xian terrorists.
Most people aren't too happy with the christofascist's attacks on children's education and the destruction of the US and world economies while Bush was in power.
Two of my friends were killed in Iraq.
The constant lies and hate from the Death Cults aren't all that impressive either. Really, a national program to provide bibles, padded cells, and TV evangelist shows for a few million fundies would go a long way towards freeing our society from a large dragging weight.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 11:31 AM
At the risk of a repost because I think the Pharyngula site is on full freak out
Elizabeth
<blockquote>text you want to quote here</blockquote>
looks like this
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 20, 2009 11:32 AM
How about we lure all of them on to a giant spaceship with the promise that they will meet Jesus in a better world and send off in a random direct?
Why yes, I have read The Hitchhiker's Guide Trilogy.
Posted by: iman | May 20, 2009 11:33 AM
iman = the intellectual equivalent of a 4 year-old holding his hands over his ears and shouting "la la la la I can't hear you la la la la"...
Pretty much the last resort for the intellectually challenged.
Got anything original to say? Or are you only capable of regurgitating someone else's verbal diarrhea?
"""""""""""""
defining Dostojewski's "The Brothers Karamazov" which is the zenith of his works as "verbal diarrhea" shows your own intellectual level which is not even equal to a maggot.
the most interesting fact about you people is your HATE. although being a closed -atheist- community you wont stop offending religios people. anyone who reads the comments can learn manifold insults from you. WHY is this so? cant you just share your thoughts without insulting others? Why do i have to counterattack after my first post?
your second hopeless disease is your gross illusion about science. i quoted Dostojewski because i hoped that you may break the doom loop which he described nearly 100 years ago.
further, i totally agree with CalGeorge's post #110.
i'll add only one thing; clinging so strong on one found fossil (like the archeopterix) and shouting "evolution is proved!" is completely enough to picture the slenderness of the evolutionist concept.
The discovery of 'ida' is for us believers NOT a proof against creation. the base assupmtion of evolution is that all species derived from eachother. so is 'ida' -not totally agreed by scientists yet- for an evolutionist a new transitional branch. our base assumption is on the other side that all spcecies belong to branches of creation. that means 'ida' merely belongs to one of those branch of creation. just like millions of unknown species.
so you can celebrate and feast but dont think that we are grieving about 'ida' and our belief is shattered.
science provides facts for everyone. be it atheists or theists. its neither the ultimate weapon of evolutionists nor of the creaionists.
nowadays you have the media to back you up. what will you do when it turns vice versa ?
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 11:35 AM
Little Lizzie Prattler @ #265:
No. You are a liar because you make false statements that you should know are false, and continute to repeat these falsehoods after being corrected. You are a liar because you tell lies. Isn't your imaginary god supposed to have some sort of problem with bearing false witness?
Little Lizzie Prattler @ #265:
I will do so as soon as YOU have produced evidence that all the gods OTHER than yours do not exist. Start with the following:
Amaterasu
Bokonon
Coyote the Trickster
Dionysius
Enki
The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Ganesh
Hekate
Isis
John Frum
Kali
Loki
Moradin Soulforger
Nefertiti
Osiris
Poseidon
Quetzalcoatl
Ra
Suzumiya Haruhi
Tiamat
Ungoliant the Unlight
Vecna
Wotan
Xemnas
Yog-Sothoth
Zeus
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 11:35 AM
What? Which story would that end, and why? (And I suppose you mean chromosomes?)
Besides, there is no DNA left. DNA falls apart when stored in water, and the Messel shale is 40 % water (it's very difficult to get the fossils out without destroying them). In general, DNA doesn't last longer than 100,000 years (I repeat: 0.1 million years) unless it's frozen.
You misunderstand. The authors make grand pronouncements on how the adapids (including Darwinius) are more closely related to us (monkeys) than the tarsiers and the omomyids are. And then they hardly even try to test that rather extraordinary hypothesis. That's a failure of peer-review. They should have either taken the statements about the phylogeny out and just said "look what a gorgeously preserved adapid we've got here" or done an analysis.
I mean, it gets worse. They use the absence of lemuriform characters (like the tooth comb and the "toilet claw") to argue that Darwinius is more closely related to us than to the lemuriforms. Logic – they're doing it wrong.
Posted by: Raegan | May 20, 2009 11:35 AM
No, Thank you very much, IT's Raegan, female ray is spelled rae. Maybe you should go back to kindergarten.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 11:37 AM
iman you obviously didn't read to carefully.
The criticism is that some were selling it as the final proof, when it's just another piece like so many many other pieces that support the theory.
Posted by: Raegan | May 20, 2009 11:39 AM
No, Thank you very much, IT's Raegan, female ray is spelled rae. Maybe you should go back to kindergarten.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 20, 2009 11:40 AM
Iman, it is only the news presenters who are calling Ida the final proof of evolution. For every one else, she is but one more piece of the puzzle. And you would know this if you took time away from being indignant and read what PZ and just about every other biologist on the web had to say about her.
Posted by: Peter Ashby | May 20, 2009 11:44 AM
i couldn't care less about the hype or the debatable cladistics*. One look at the pictures of the fossil were enough for me, especially since I know most early primates are known only from isolated teeth. This is one seriously stunning fossil, I know my limb anatomy and this fossil kept me looking long and hard.
*Also criticising them for their cladistics seems a little like sour grapes to me. They have a much more complete skeleton than for any other early primate so sticking with the careful measuring to the nth degree of tiny variations because that is all you have is rather pointless for a first paper so what they did with all the 30 features looks fine to me. The detailed stuff can come later for them that find that stuff interesting.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 11:45 AM
bullshit. Unadulterated bullshit.
False equivalence defined.
Science provides facts that scientists then use the scientific method to apply to building theories and making predictions. They follow where the facts lead them.
Creationists do not use these same facts when they do not support their predetermined conclusion of biblical innerrancy, which so far is never.
Posted by: GMacs | May 20, 2009 11:45 AM
Why not Odin?
Odin can be mean. Try the Dagda, he makes your fields grow, and he can manipulate the passage of time.
But, if you are a king, he may be sleeping with your wife (thus the usefulness of time manipulation).
BTW, why did so many people call it a dinosaur earlier? I thought it looked like a dinosaur. But it's pretty clearly a mammal. No Dino-simians, no velocimonkeys, no crocoducks.
Oh and, Prata:
Copernicus believed in God. As did Francis Bacon, Kepler, Galileo...
How could you forget Newton?
Posted by: JBlilie | May 20, 2009 11:45 AM
Zimmer gives some nice examples of how scientists immediately question and criticize eachother and the conclusions drawn from the evidence:
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/loom/2009/05/19/darwinius-it-delivers-a-pizza-and-it-lengthens-and-it-strengthens-and-it-finds-that-slipper-thats-been-at-large-under-the-chaise-lounge-for-several-weeks/
Kind of like theologians ... no wait, they argue about non-evidence.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 11:48 AM
The argument from authority is a logical fallacy.
Not all religious people are creationists… in fact, most aren't… and, judging from the fact that you spell it "Dostojewski", you must be from a country where this is very, very easy to see, because creationists are practically absent. (I mean, just think about how j and w are pronounced in English.)
The people we offend are those who want to teach falsehoods in school. Very simple.
Then why don't you answer my question in comment 266? You start from the assumption that there is a supernatural world. Have you ever tried to test that assumption?
You haven't read the entire first half of the thread. Shame on you.
Don't confuse the journalists with the scientists. Almost no journalists who write about science have any idea what they're talking about.
(Also, it's Archaeopteryx, not "the archeopterix". The italics and the capital letter are part of the spelling.)
Posted by: Matt Penfold | May 20, 2009 11:49 AM
Raegan, earlier you said:
Now you have told someone they may need to go back to kindergarten. I grant that you may have gone to kindergarten but clearly you did not study any science once you have moved onto school.
Evolution happens. We can see it happen. Your claiming that it does not just makes you look ignorant, uneducated and foolish. And since there is no excuse for not being aware of the fact evolution happens (try using google sometime, to look examples) you are also dishonest.
Posted by: GMacs | May 20, 2009 11:55 AM
Who started pairing me with them? (Raegan, lucy, yo mama, childers99)
He didn't say anything about yo mama
Hmmmmm....
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 11:56 AM
raegan, joe, lucy, lea and childers are all the same troll. Ignore them.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 11:59 AM
want
Posted by: Lea | May 20, 2009 12:03 PM
Yes he did. Quote: "Yep some 13 year old is loose. Lea, yo mama, Childers99, Lucy and Raegan etc..." It's the 233rd comment. Look it up.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 12:47 PM
Science blogs go BOOM
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 12:51 PM
Oh, so my latest comment really didn't go through. Will it be there twice an hour from now?
––––––––––––––––––––––––––––
Just silly.
Dance, trollboy! Dance!
But first learn to read error messages. I know why you posted that twice.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 12:55 PM
Weird. It pretends to take comments, but doesn't. Let's try a third time…
––––––––––––––––
Just silly.
Dance, trollboy! Dance!
Posted by: God | May 20, 2009 1:03 PM
-Ricky Gervais, on being an atheist.And another thing, professional smart educated Elizabeth. Fibonacci numbers? Seriously? That was what impressed you? Not quantum mechanics, wave-matter duality, theories of general and special relativity, to state a few? Excellent.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 1:05 PM
Yes I grouped yo mamma in with your commenting-personality-disorder. Yo mamma's comment was equally stupid and childish.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 1:09 PM
If you doubt this is possible, how is it there are PYGMIES + DWARFS?
Posted by: Jon Pear (a.k.a. NeuroAster) | May 20, 2009 1:12 PM
Hi, yeah I just found out about this from http://news.google.ca/ when I logged onto Google this morning :) Kewl :)
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 1:30 PM
Hi, yeah I just found out about this from http://news.google.ca/ when I logged onto Google this morning :) Kewl :)
And the award for most useless post of the day goes to...
GodDAMN that shit is annoying.
Posted by: mdh | May 20, 2009 1:34 PM
Oh boy, another find that the Creationists can mis-represent to caricature what Evolutionists believe.
This truly is a great day for science, but you gotta know, it's a great day for Creationists too. They were running out of stones to throw.
Posted by: unknown | May 20, 2009 1:35 PM
People on here are rude to each other...
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 1:41 PM
Your unasked for concerned is noted and rejected. We like it this way. If you can't stand the heat...Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 1:44 PM
what Evolutionists believe
- There is no such thing as an Evolutionist.
- The reality-based community does not "believe" in evolution. We accept it is the best explanation for natural processes we see at work every minute of every day.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 1:48 PM
...get your pack of sockpuppets out of the kitchen! :P
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 1:48 PM
People on here are rude to each other...
And ANOTHER sock puppet. Holy crap this one is dense.
Pro-tip, clueless wonder: hotmail or yahoo or bellsouth as your URL is a bit of a giveaway.
Posted by: unknown | May 20, 2009 1:49 PM
What was that?!?:
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 1:49 PM
Lighten up, Stu.
It is kewl.
Posted by: unknown | May 20, 2009 1:51 PM
What was that?!?:
Oh, and why does everyone sit around a trash comments people made two hours ago?
Posted by: PZ Myers
|
May 20, 2009 1:55 PM
Yes, "unknown" is also Lea, Raegan, Lucy, and Childers09.
Warning: sockpuppetry is a bannable offense. Stick to one recognizable name, please.
Posted by: breadmaker | May 20, 2009 1:55 PM
raven-
"Ever heard of capital letters?"
THANKS FOR THE SUGGESTION, MAYBE I'LL LEAVE CAPS LOCK ON.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 1:58 PM
I can't believe that the scientists could dig up an almost complete fossil, which is so hard to do. Congrats and good job to the scientists.
Posted by: unknown | May 20, 2009 2:00 PM
Oh, I can stand the heat....
Just wondering if maybe you can't.
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 2:02 PM
Elizabeth Prata:
You claim you want a mature discussion, but you start from the position that you have a magic book that is never wrong. How can I possibly have a mature discussion with someone who has a magic book that is never wrong? Any time we disagree, you are merely going to point to your book and say "Never wrong."
You also don't know what an ad hominem is or what science is. You spew misconceptions and common lies about science and you expect people to treat you with respect?
You are the one precluding a mature discussion by assuming you know more about evolution that people who have devoted their lives to studying it. If you could be a little more humble, a little more willing to accept criticism, and a little more willing to actually read what people are writing and respond to it, you could probably end up learning something.
For example:
A)"Prove God doesn't exist!" No one can prove a universal negative existential proposition like that. It's a well-known law of logic often oversimplified as "you can't prove a negative." You can't prove that there isn't a teapot orbiting Mars, but that's not a good reason to believe there is one.
B)"Science is wrong sometimes!" Yes, everyone is wrong sometimes. Part of growing up is realizing that. But science is not so much a body of knowledge as a process for finding that knowledge, and the process is what is important. When some scientific finding turns out to be wrong (including, for example, Newton's law of gravity -- corrected by general relativity), science as a process keeps working on the problem until the error has been corrected. Science, like mature human beings, can admit when it's made a mistake and work to correct it. Religion, like a child, can't even admit when it's wrong in the first place.
Lea:
You're not very clever, are you? When you post on the internet, the message you send across the wire includes a numeric code specifying the computer where the message came from. The guy who runs this blog and has access to this numeric address and the email address you used to register told us specifically that you and the other trolls who you were accused of being in fact have the same IP address (the address of your computer) and even the same email address. So you are all using the same computer, and most of you are using the same email address. You have been outed. You can stop lying now.
By the way, the behavior you have been engaging in is grounds for being blocked from posting here.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 2:05 PM
Maybe 'dig up' wasn't so good a phrase. They 'found' the fossil.
Posted by: Elizabeth Prata | May 20, 2009 2:08 PM
"Overselling an Adapid" From Science Blog:
"So the big day is finally here. "Ida", a 47-million-year-old primate skeleton from Messel, Germany has finally been unveiled on PLoS One and in a flurry of press releases, book announcements, and general media hubub. Under different circumstances I would be happy to see an exceptional fossil receiving such treatment, but I fear that Ida has become a victim of a sensationalistic media that values audience size over scientific substance."
read more here
http://scienceblogs.com/laelaps/2009/05/poor_poor_ida_or_overselling_a.php?utm_source=sbhomepage&utm_medium=link&utm_content=channellink
scientists argue over which primate branch man may have stemmed from: adapid or omomyid. Ida is adapid, the less credible branch. But the scientists rarely let the world know of their internal debate and uncertainty. That Ida represents a "missing link" is hardly a done deal, as a matter of fact the debate is just beginning.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 2:08 PM
Yeah, the proper term for what the scientists did here is that they 'bought' the fossil.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 2:11 PM
But the scientists rarely let the world know of their internal debate and uncertainty.
Bullshit. It's all out in the open, AS PROVEN BY THIS VERY DAMNED POST.
What color is the sky in your world?
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 2:14 PM
Oh, also, Elizabeth, why exactly do you feel the need to quote from an article PZ already links to? Did you even read the damned post before you started holding forth?
Posted by: Watchman | May 20, 2009 2:14 PM
And, when challenged, lied through her teeth.
Listen, kid. Get an education. The earth is not 6,700 years old. The evidence against a young earth is insurmountable. You're confusing mythology with fact.
By the way, readers; "Raegan" is an acceptable variation of "Reagan".
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 2:18 PM
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 2:21 PM
Are you not even paying attention?
No shit Elizabeth. If you do a even tiny bit of research and reading here you'll see many a comment, including from the Author of this blog that the discovery is just another piece in the puzzle not the completed puzzle. It was the reporting of the find that was blown out of proportion.
Do you think that every time a find is made in science that the first idea is automatically accepted as the correct one?
You don't have a clue how science works do you? You're just here attacking strawmen. Strawmen that allow you to keep thinking you've got some GOTCHA!!!!!11one11 on science and how inaccurate and built on guesses it is. Which in turn gives you the ability to stay in the cozy warmth of ignorance in your faith without seeing the reality of what is going on outside your little cocoon. The truth is you don't have a clue what you are talking about.
Seriously, if you are going to criticize something at least know what you are talking about.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 2:24 PM
Who is Elizabeth?
Posted by: PZ Myers
|
May 20, 2009 2:26 PM
OK, unknown, Lea, Raegan, Lucy, Childers09, and now Macy: you've been warned. Stop inventing pseudonyms. You've been caught, rather easily, and you should stop digging a hole like this. ONE PSEUDONYM. Stick with it.
Stupidity is also a bannable offense.
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 2:26 PM
@Elizabeth Prata:
This is why no one takes you seriously. This whole post is complaining about how the media is misrepresenting the fossil find while scientists are insisting that no, we don't know the whole story yet, more study needs to be done. Every single post I've read about this fossil from scientists agree with this. Scientists are not hiding anything here.
This is just more evidence that you're not interested in having any kind of discussion. You're not even reading what anyone's saying, you're just blathering. Please be more willing to engage or just go away.
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution
|
May 20, 2009 2:27 PM
This is why we get so annoyed with you and your type, Elizabeth Prata. Dammit did you even READ PZ's article? Or did you just come here, glancing at the headline and roaring for a debate on the merits of science?
The point you made that I quoted above? That was the whole point of the friggin article PZ wrote!!! It's a wonderful and significant find, but the DANGER is that the media will latch on to it and mis-represent it as something the scientific community never intended. And that's EXACTLY what happened. And furthermore, PZ made a point of saying that the reason this is a problem is that people like you will try to use it as fodder for your anti-science claims. And lo and behold, that's exactly what you did. You've become a parody of yourself, Elizabeth... you didn't even have the intelligence enough to read the article and most of the thread comments before posting something as an argument, which was a main point of the article.
Please... go find something better to do.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 2:36 PM
Are you SERIOUS? The only reason why I started this 'pseudonym' was because I wanted a fresh start. I won't create anymore, just don't ban me. And I was hoping you wouldn't notice,(stupid fancy)so everyone wouldn't know it was me so I COULD RESTART. And if I do create another account, which I seriously doubt now that I would or could, for that matter, just please don't announce it to all the bloggers IF I do make another account, and I won't cause problems. That's all I ask.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 2:40 PM
I think it's nap time.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 2:44 PM
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 2:47 PM
Macy, look at the top of the blog in the masthead. Find the dungeon. Click on it, and see the crimes against Pharyngula, and those who ignored PZ's warnings. So far, you are not showing any intelligence. Posting under many names at any blog is just downright rude. I suggest you just lurk for a few days.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 2:51 PM
"Macy", if you don't want to be exposed as a lying, brain-dead, sockpuppeting troll, there's a simple solution:
DON'T ACT LIKE A LYING, BRAIN-DEAD, SOCKPUPPETING TROLL!
If you don't like people pointing out that you keep changing your name and lying about it, STOP CHANGING YOUR NAME AND LYING ABOUT IT!
It really is that simple. And it says something about your level of intelligence and maturity that you are incapable of grasping this concept.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 2:52 PM
People, it is now worth clicking the moron's link. Pure. Comedy. Gold.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 2:56 PM
level of intelligence and maturity
Don't hold your breath:
"What's Something Funny To Type In To See A Funny Video? Like Give Me Some Ideas Of What To Look Up That's Funny."
Personally, I'd start with "funny" -- but that might just be me.
Also, on the truthiness front:
"I am a young teen, home-schooled, never been kissed. I want so bad to make out with someone or have sex. I'm still a virgin. I can't have sex, because I have hardly no social life"
vs.
"Birthday: 1987-09-30"
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 3:01 PM
Ugh. PLONKHAMMER PLEASE.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 3:08 PM
HA! That's hilarious! You know, the funniest part about all this is that you all were STUPID ENOUGH to fall for that crap! That's not even me! You all are STUPID!
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 3:13 PM
That's not even me!
So you lied AGAIN. Big surprise.
Still a hilarious profile though. Friend of yours?
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 3:14 PM
wait...who's not even you, again?
Posted by: Lee Picton | May 20, 2009 3:15 PM
Consider this a formal request to get rid of the moron.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 3:15 PM
PZ, while you're already playing with the banhammer, what about this one?
See, Elizabeth:
1) ScienceBlogs is plural.
2) The blog you cited from is called Laelaps, not "Science Blog".
3) This here, too, is a ScienceBlog. If you weren't too stupid to look at the address bar of your browser, you'd see that the address begins with "scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/".
4) This very post links to the one you cited. If you haven't read the post, why on the planet do you comment on it?
Too much is too much.
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 3:16 PM
@Macy:
Well, you were stupid enough to come here, sock puppet, and lie about it. As soon as you replied to your own post it was painfully obvious that you were clumsily sock-puppeting. Your spelling and grammar are bad and the content of your posts is consistently vapid. There was no mystery there.
That's right. You are too stupid to even pull off sock puppeting correctly, and too stupid to realize that site administrators obviously have access to your IP address.
You are one of the dumbest people I have encountered on the internet, and that is a whole lot of dumb.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 3:19 PM
I am not even her. And to add to that, I am not Col. Mustard and I did not kill her in the library or with a candle stick.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 3:20 PM
Is that so in the USA? Hard to imagine, because little kids simply aren't tired during the day. Have you never been one? Naps are for adults.
And in comment 346 you admitted to trolling. Next time PZ looks, you'll be banned. Good riddance.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 3:21 PM
Nope. You all are more retarded than I thought. No, that's not my 'profile'. Not my friend's either. Wow...
I guess I really overestimated how smart you 'science' people are. I guess you just couldn't figure out what I did, could you? I'll give you a few minutes to think it over...
See if you're smart enough to figure it all out...
Real fat chance...
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 3:24 PM
there's something to figure out?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 3:25 PM
No we figured it out, immediately. Remember, I outted you from the get go.
You're not clever, you're an idiot.
Now please go play in some traffic somewhere.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 3:27 PM
So, in addition to being stupid, whiny, and a lying sack of shit, the sockpuppeting troll is an arrogant stupid whiny lying sack of shit.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 3:29 PM
Oh yeah, Rev. BigdumbChimp, what did you find out? What was your 'discovery' that gave you your fat ego? Oh, because I assure you, there's more to be learned.
Posted by: Watchman | May 20, 2009 3:30 PM
You have a strange definition of the word "all", Macylucylearaegan. Considering how easily you were outed, even without PZ confirming it, I suggest you go easy on the "You all are STUPID" thing.
Alright then. Back to class.
Lea, can you think of ONE THING that the Bible might be wrong about?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 3:33 PM
a.) that you are an idiot
b.) that you are a bigger idiot than I first thought
/clutches pearls
OH GOODNESS NOES!!! WHAT IN HEAVENS COULD IT BE?
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 3:33 PM
Not arrogant, just confident. There's a difference. By the way, it takes a moron to know one.
Posted by: Watchman | May 20, 2009 3:37 PM
Not in this case.
LOL!
Ok, comic interlude over.
So, Lea. Will you be brave and gracious enough to answer my question as truthfully as you can?
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 3:38 PM
Oh, because I assure you, there's more to be learned.
I'm sorry, you must be confusing us with those that give a flying fuck.
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 3:38 PM
@Macy:
You're a waste of organic matter. Seriously. You would add more value to society by dying and rotting in a field than by anything you could do with your life. At least then you would be fertilizing plants.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 3:43 PM
"macy" the stupid arrogant whiny lying sack of shit:
No, actually, it doesn't. But since you're a moron, I'd expect you to say that. It's just the kind of bullshit that comes naturally to someone who hasn't mentally progressed past kindergarten. What's next, "i'm rubber you're glue"?
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 3:46 PM
there's more to be learned about what, again?
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 3:48 PM
cuz i r STUPID, u c
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 3:49 PM
You want the truth? The ABSOLUTE truth? First of all, let me start off by saying, having multiple accounts doesn't make you a liar. Secondly, no matter what I say, if it was truthful or not, you wouldn't believe me because (like I said you wouldn't believe me, you don't believe what I said about multiple accounts not making you a liar) you think I am just a big fat liar because I had multiple accounts. So, the answer.
No, I cannot think of 'ONE THING', as you so...expressively... put it, that the Bible is wrong about. Can you? And don't manipulate the words and verses of the Bible, because that doesn't count.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 3:50 PM
this sockpuppet troll is from the bargain bin at the dollar store...
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 3:53 PM
I bet PZ will find that that Sven comment comes from the same IP.
plonkhammer
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 3:55 PM
What:
That? Good thing your not PZ, cuz then you'd have to find out your wrong the hard way.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 3:55 PM
naw, that was me. Trying to communicate with the kid on her level.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 3:58 PM
The "hard way"
Which is what?
Is that part of the super scary thing that is still to be learned?
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 4:01 PM
Oh, really? How kind of you Sven. Since that's the way you usually talk, I didn't think anything of it. It just blended right in with the rest of your personality.
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 4:01 PM
Noah's Flood. Either it didn't happen (=Bible is wrong) or the deity responsible is playing games, because it subsequently erased all evidence of said event.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 4:03 PM
And so, if I was a kid, why would a 'mature adult' like yourself be so rude to a 'kid' like me?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 4:05 PM
Because you are an arrogantly idiotic childish little shit?
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 4:06 PM
@Macy:
Sock puppeting on its own does make you a liar. You're misrepresenting your identity. You're one person pretending to be four or five. That is dishonest.
But that's not why we're calling you a liar:
And the most dishonest move of all:
We're calling you a liar because you straight-up lied. Multiple times. Even after someone who knows your IP address and email was able to tell us without any doubt whatsoever that all these accounts are the same person -- you.
You clearly don't think you should be held responsible to the consequences of your own actions. You think that just because you lied, that's no reason for us to call you a liar. This is the mark of a truly immature person. Adults can take responsibility for their actions. You're stuck in an adolescent stage of mental and emotional development.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 4:12 PM
No, I cannot think of 'ONE THING', as you so...expressively... put it, that the Bible is wrong about. Can you?
http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/contra/accounts.html
You're really, really not very good at this, are you?
Posted by: GMacs | May 20, 2009 4:12 PM
First of all, let me start off by saying, having multiple accounts doesn't make you a liar.
Technically no, but it is still dishonest. Seriously, I pity you if this is your only way of achieving your jollies. I know you probably get some little sick high, feeling like you've defeated, like you've conquered. It's excusable, if you are very young, and plan on changing (and I mean really young, I'm 19 and I would be frightened by anyone near my age acting like this).
But, when we all walk away from the computer, who are we, and who are you? Some of us are bright-eyed, hopeful students. Some are teachers with appreciative students. Some are scientists, or engineers with salaries and accomplishments. Who are you? You briefly made us look like fools, bringing yourself down in the process I might add, on a website that will go unseen and inconsequential to most people we all know.
Do you get a sick taste in your mouth, or a knot in your stomach after such empty conquests? I would, in fact I have. Was punking on us really worth your time? Step back, stop doing things like this.
I pity you, but pity is short-lived, and soon you are just a sack of shit. Do yourself a favor and STOP TROLLING.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 4:15 PM
To answer Chimp's question, the hard part would be that you find out that your ugly ego isn't always right, and to Josh, well you're wrong too. The Flood DID happen, and God was NOT playing games, because He had a purpose. His purpose was that He couldn't handle the sins that the worldly people committed, so He gathered Noah and his family and restarted Earth's population. So that was nothing wrong on God's or the Bible's point. And all evidence of the flood was NOT erased, because the Ark was split in half and is still on the same mountain that it landed on, all those years ago.
Posted by: Ichthyic | May 20, 2009 4:15 PM
Ida is adapid, the less credible branch.
the less credible branch?
wtf?
wait... you guys are actually spending time arguing with someone who says things like that?
must have been a slow day?
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 4:16 PM
I'm 19
Holy crap, there's hope for the future yet.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 4:19 PM
"macy" the stupid lying arrogant whiny sockpuppeting troll:
Having multiple accounts, while claiming you do not, and repeating that claim after it has been shown to be false DOES make you a liar.
You pretended to be several different people. You denied doing so, knowing full well that the denial was a lie. Once it was pointed out that you were lying, you whined, but continued speaking falsehoods. You are a lying sack of shit, that's all you've ever been, and all you ever will be. Isn't your imaginary god supposed to have some sort of problem with bearing false witness?
Posted by: MAJeff, OM | May 20, 2009 4:20 PM
The Flood DID happen, and God was NOT playing games, because He had a purpose. His purpose was that He couldn't handle the sins that the worldly people committed, so He gathered Noah and his family and restarted Earth's population. So that was nothing wrong on God's or the Bible's point. And all evidence of the flood was NOT erased, because the Ark was split in half and is still on the same mountain that it landed on, all those years ago.
*giggle/snort*
Posted by: Knockgoats | May 20, 2009 4:21 PM
Josh@261,
Wow! Amazing. I'm not sure I understood exactly what the technique involves from that article, but assuming it is valid, I'd say it could revolutionise much of archaeology: pot-sherds by the million are sitting in museums waiting to be dated!
Posted by: James F | May 20, 2009 4:24 PM
For the last time, THIS is how everything began.
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 4:24 PM
This is funny. I have a bunch of Armenian friends, and since Mt. Ararat is in Armenia, they will occasionally talk about the Armenian villagers who know where the ark is and have gone up and seen it and stuff.
To date, none of them has ever thought to bring a camera.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 4:26 PM
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution
|
May 20, 2009 4:29 PM
Can we officially just be done with Macy now?
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 4:29 PM
KG @386--pretty cool, eh? I still haven't managed to put my hands on the article itself, but I'll let you know when I do.
Posted by: GMacs | May 20, 2009 4:33 PM
Macy, your greatest giveaway was that you, under your many pseudonyms, do not know how... nevermind, I'm not going to help you.
Let's just say, you're pretty obvious.
Inspire me by picking up a book... no, not that one, unless your going to read it critically... and learning. Life is inspiring, the unfathomable accident of it all. Live Life is short. Go live it and leave us alone. Goodbye.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 4:34 PM
Listen kid. Grow up and get an education. You're really going to need it.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 4:36 PM
wait, there was a comment about new dating methods that I missed?
*scrolls back past inane troll-drivel to find interesting post*
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 4:36 PM
macy the arogant whiny lying delugionist troll in response to a direct quote of her falsely pretending to be two different people:
No, you lying sack of shit, it WAS dishonest. You replied to your own post made under a different name, falsely representing yourself as two different people. You made a false statement, knowing it to be false, for the purpose of deception. That is the DEFINITION of lying. There is no gray area here. You lied. Everyone knows you lied. And no matter how many times you try to pretend you weren't lying, no matter how many times you try to sweep it under the rug, the fact remains that you DID lie.
You're a liar, macy. Admit it.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 4:38 PM
Ok, Gmacs, what WAS my biggest giveaway? My URL? cuz i've heard that before.
Posted by: Knockgoats | May 20, 2009 4:38 PM
macy,
"He couldn't handle the sins that the worldly people committed"
Couldn't handle? This is the being that's supposed to be omnipotent.
Have you ever thought just how big the ark would have to be to get two of every one of the literally millions of species of animal on board? (Oh, wait, according to one version of the story in the Bible, there were more than that, weren't there?) Plus the food they would need for 40 days? Or about why the lions didn't eat the antelope? Or about how - for example - koalas got from Ararat to Australia afterwards? Or where all the water went, and why there aren't geological signs of a flood covering the whole Earth? Do you even know that the geologists who showed that the flood story couldn't be true, in the early 19th century, were mostly devout Christians who expected to find the evidence of a worldwide flood, but were honest enough to change their minds when they didn't?
Even if there were the remains of a boat on Ararat (there aren't, despite the lies you've no doubt been told), the whole story is such an obvious pile of crap that even someone as stupid and ignorant as you should be able to see it.
Posted by: Dan L. | May 20, 2009 4:39 PM
No, you were pretending to be someone else that was agreeing with your original post. That is to say, you were trying to convince us that two people had the same opinion when it was really just you. That is lying. That is bearing false witness. When you see Satan in the end times, be sure to tell him I said "Hi."
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 4:39 PM
Almost...
Of course I am. And, of course, you can demonstrate that, right?Your all powerful, all knowing deity couldn't handle the sin that he set up to happen and foresaw? The being that created the fucking universe couldn't handle the sins of one of its creations? Awesome. That's a pretty weak-ass god you've got there. Perhaps you should give Thor a try.
Right. And of course you can point me right to where this ark is, yes?
Hey, is Macy admitting by omission that there isn't any geological evidence?
Now...
Posted by: Knockgoats | May 20, 2009 4:43 PM
James F.@387,
Right! And we Pastafarians are not depending on some mouldy old book - we have the video!
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 4:45 PM
so He gathered Noah and his family and restarted Earth's population.
Whilst making sure that every other boat on Earth suddenly stopped working. Makes sense.
Okay, I'll stop -- this one is truly pathetic. I just wanted to plug this thorough, informative review of the Ark myth again.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 4:47 PM
Phantom,
Does that ever get old for you? You obviously don't have anything better to do than call me a 'lying sack of shit'. Is that your goal in life? To criticize everyone? To see their faults and pick at them?
Well, like I said earlier, I came on here to see the fossil, saw the blog, made the comment, and it was purely to say what I did about the fossil. This whole thing is blown way out of proportion, and tell me, have you ever lied? Have ANY of you ever lied? Answer truthfully, and you know what you get. YES. Everyone has lied. Everyone makes mistakes. Yes, even all of you. Yes, even me. So you know what? I never intended to cause all this. And its not entirely my fault.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 4:50 PM
Let's just say, you're pretty obvious.
No foolin'. Being dumb as a sack of hammers never fails to shine through.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 4:51 PM
*reads article in #261*
*hugs Josh*
this is awesome! though, what do you want to bet that the following line will soon appear in every creationist quotemine collection: "Used on medieval brick from Canterbury, the technique repeatedly dated the sample as being 66 years old."
:-p
what I really want to know is how this method will compare to thermoluminescence dating in accuracy, needed sample size, range of applicability and cost. it already seems from the article that it's far more accurate and can be used on a greater range of pottery, but I'd like a chart :-p
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 4:52 PM
I wonder what wonderfully tortured logic you'll use to explain that?
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 4:53 PM
That's an interesting point.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 4:56 PM
now I'm having the mental image of god going around poking poles in all the world's boats and laughing maniacally...
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 4:56 PM
Everyone has lied. Everyone makes mistakes. Yes, even all of you. Yes, even me. So you know what? I never intended to cause all this. And its not entirely my fault.
Spoken like a true air-headed asinine teen. Are you SURE that wasn't your profile?
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 4:56 PM
*smile*
I've emailed the lead author; we'll see how fast before I get a .pdf sent to me.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 4:57 PM
So, you're still lying, you're still whining about being called on your lies, and you still can't bear to admit that you've been lying all along, and everyone has been right in calling you a liar.
Macy, you have nothing to say worth reading. All you have are lies, that's all you've ever had, all you ever will have. There might be a slim chance for you to have an adult discussion SOMEDAY, maybe in a decade or two, but first you'd have to stop lying and whining, stop declaring that bullshit myths trump observable documented FACT. And it's clear you have no interest in doing those things.
You don't like being called a lying sack of shit? There's a simple solution. Don't act like one.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 4:57 PM
OK, then, let's get back to the fossil.
a) it is not a dinosaur
Let's start there.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 5:00 PM
have you gotten it yet?
how about now?
how about now?
how about now?
Posted by: RanXerox | May 20, 2009 5:00 PM
Hey campers,
Glad to see little has changed, other than a bit of text formatting. :)
I was being certified on a new technology recently. (It was a four day session and it became apparent on the first day that the instructor and the regional manager were vocal christians.)
The instructor and I got to chatting one day. He mentioned that his daughter was starting a good christian school where they start by teaching Logic, Reason & Critical Thinking. I smiled and said, "That's good".
Also...
During a class discussion someone mentioned the 'Chicken or the Egg' problem as it related to our current topic. I piped up by saying the Egg came first, because it did. The regional manager, who was leading the discussion, quickly responded by saying no to the egg and that he was a creationist. I smiled but didn't bite. Wrong time and place. :)
Since my last post many months ago I have had a number of opportunities to reinforce 'my belief' that ridicule is the most effective weapon in countering those whose brains have them believe in sky fairies.
RANX
Posted by: John Smith | May 20, 2009 5:01 PM
I fail to see where this proves anything about the theory evolution. I think it is funny to see people say see creationists this proves you wrong, do you ever give your comment a second of thought? Evolution does not prove creationism wrong and neither does the Big Bang theory. I refuse to believe either until actual proof instead of things like this where they just find an old fossil.
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 5:02 PM
not far now...
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 5:02 PM
And macy, if you had really wanted to make an honest comment, you would have done so honestly. You didn't. You chose to misrepresent yourself, and whine when you got caught. You chose to pretend to be several different people in order to prop up your utterly uninformed and delusional opinion. You lied, and you did so of your own free will. If you didn't intend to be called out as a liar, you shouldn't have lied.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 5:04 PM
Good strategy, John Smith. Refuse to Believe!
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 5:05 PM
Ok, so the other boats didn't stop working, because Noah went around and told the people of the Earth that there would be a flood, and they didn't listen. Therefore, they never built any boats, and drowned. To say as to why its not entirely my fault, because if all of you hadn't pushed me and acted the way YOU DID, I wouldn't have either. I'll admit, I lied. Ok? Happy now? And okay, it's not a dinosaur, just a fossil. Dinosaur was my first impression.
Posted by: GMacs | May 20, 2009 5:05 PM
If it were a dinosaur, then it would be a pretty awesome dinosaur. I wonder how fast velocimonkey would run.
So this is a more monkey-like as opposed to lemur-like primate? I'm still caught up on that tail. It's doesn't seem very primate-like to me, but I'm not a biologist (yet?). I would have guessed it to be a contemporary of the ancestors of both monkeys/apes and lemurs. Although the face...
It really is a fascinating fossil, and I wish people would appreciate it for what it is.
Posted by: SC, OM | May 20, 2009 5:07 PM
And once again...:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2qezQzfgIY
How silly these fludheads are.
I've mentioned this before, but I'll do so again: One of the critical experiences that pushed me toward being a scholar was watching the movie (I think it was this one that I saw with a church group) "In Search of Noah's Ark." I was a kid, and it hadn't occurred to me that people studying history of any sort actually went out and did research. All I had heard in church and school were stories. Despite the fundies' intentions, the effect was to make me think that people (including me) could go out and investigate these matters on our own. Thank you, crazy movie!
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 5:09 PM
lol. right. because there were no boats before the flood. which is why the oldest found boat in the world was 7000 years old
*facepalm*
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 5:11 PM
And what may I ask gives you the reason to believe creationism? They don't even have fossils (well except for Bill Graham, Pat Robertson,
Dr. James Kennedyand Ken Ham etc..).Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 5:11 PM
That is the spin the authors and hype-machine are selling it with, yes. Whether they are correct still seems far from clear. What it definitely is, is an exquisitely detailed specimen of a primate from near the lemur/tarsier/monkey branchpoints. That's cool enough right there. We'll be hearing more about this fossil for sure.Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 5:12 PM
John:
I refuse to believe either until actual proof instead of things like this where they just find an old fossil.
Okay, I'll bite. What would you consider proof?
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 5:12 PM
Oh, for everlivingfucksake. What are you, twelve? You did not just seriously append that bullshit to your apology.
Posted by: Macy | May 20, 2009 5:12 PM
Alright, so you people should AT LEAST know that Jesus is coming back and that we all will be judged. If we don't repent, which i fully intend to, we will be punished. The Bible tells us to shake the dust of the people's town from out feet. That's exactly what I'm doing, shaking you people off, and you should ALSO know that I'm not leaving because I don't want to argue with you people--because trust me, I do, so I can prove a point-- I'm leaving because there's no swaying you people's minds and you truly don't care. And for the record, that profile was not MY profile describing me and what I'm really like. Just know that only what we do for God will last.
Posted by: Celtic_Evolution
|
May 20, 2009 5:14 PM
In and of itself, it doesn't, which you'd know we already understand if you'd READ THE FRIKKIN POST. It's just another supporting piece, albeit an important and exquisite example, in the mountains of already existing evidence in support of evolution.
*Sigh*. THIS is not what proves creationists wrong. And no-one here is saying otherwise. Honestly, if you're not going to take the time to actually read anything, stop wasting our time.
If you are a creationist, if you believe in creationism, than this statement is an out and out lie. In fact, in your case the absolute reverse is true... you INSIST on believing without a single SHRED of actual proof.
Posted by: Patricia, OM
|
May 20, 2009 5:15 PM
Wait...when the godless lie it's a lie, but when the godly lie it's motivation.
The things I learn here are utterly amazing.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 5:16 PM
Macy, stupid arrogant whiny lying troll @ #418:
FINALLY! And all it took was hours and hundreds of posts pointing out to you in excruciating detail that you were lying! What's next, gonna admit that water is wet?
Seriously, admitting you have a problem is the first step. Unfortunately, you clearly have no interest in taking the next one, as evidenced by the fact that you're still trying to weasel out of responsibility for your dishonesty.
You were lying from the start, you chose to lie, no one forced you to create fake identities and run a circle-jerk with your own imaginary friends. You did that all on your own. It was your decision. That makes it your fault. You knew you had no evidence to support your claims, so you tried desperately to create phony supporters to prop them up. You got caught, and you're STILL whining about how unfair it is to call you a liar, just because you've been lying for most of the day.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 5:17 PM
'bye
Macywhoever the hell that kid was.With the final flourish of desperate prosyletizing, too. Nice touch. Wonder if she'll pray for me.
Posted by: Josh
|
May 20, 2009 5:20 PM
I can only imagine what the "point" was gonna be--that lying for Jebus isn't really dishonest?
Heard it before, pal.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
|
May 20, 2009 5:20 PM
yeah, because, you know, none of us has ever heard THAT one before. and we would have never heard that one if YOU hadn't told us.
lol
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 5:21 PM
Ok, so the other boats didn't stop working, because Noah went around and told the people of the Earth that there would be a flood, and they didn't listen. Therefore, they never built any boats, and drowned.
Ah, so Noah built the first boat ever? Quite an accomplishment to build one the length of a football field on the first try.
By the way, were mountains invented yet back then? Must have been, since the ark came to rest on one, right? Was the flood deep enough to cover all the mountain tops?
To say as to why its not entirely my fault, because if all of you hadn't pushed me and acted the way YOU DID, I wouldn't have either.
Wait, we MADE you lie?
Seriously, how old are you?
Posted by: Knockgoats | May 20, 2009 5:24 PM
"I fail" - John Smith
John, if you'd only had the nous to stop there, you would at least have said something that made sense, and was true.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 5:26 PM
Yawn, typical boring stupid godbot. Here (s)he had a bunch of atheists in audience, perhaps including Dawkins, and failed to present the physical evidence for his/her deity that might actually convince us. But then, (s)he kept yapping about irrelevant things like the flud and bible, that are delusions without evidence for god.Posted by: RanXeroX | May 20, 2009 5:27 PM
Buh bye Macy,
The thing is that we do care because we know that we only have one shot at this existence.
You are the one that doesn't care as you think your problems will all go away once you enter the next life.
Ever wonder if there is a life after heaven, just in case things don't go as well as planned?
Posted by: CJO | May 20, 2009 5:32 PM
Alright, so you people should AT LEAST know that Jesus is coming back and that we all will be judged.
Any day now, for two thousand fucking years. I'll take my chances.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 20, 2009 5:34 PM
Alright, so you people should AT LEAST know that Jesus is coming back and that we all will be judged.
Says who?
If we don't repent, which i fully intend to, we will be punished.
Well, you'd best get started on repenting for bearing false witness here for a good part of the day. Good luck.
The Bible tells us to shake the dust of the people's town from out feet.
I've read somewhere that preaching works better without glaring typos.
That's exactly what I'm doing, shaking you people off
Finally. What convinced you, after all this time and all these posts?
and you should ALSO know that I'm not leaving because I don't want to argue with you people--because trust me, I do, so I can prove a point--
You had a point? Really? Now you're making me curious, damnit, and on your way out the door, too.
I'm leaving because there's no swaying you people's minds and you truly don't care.
About what?
And for the record, that profile was not MY profile describing me and what I'm really like.
Sure, because your word is as good as gold. Maybe in another 400 posts, you'd admit it was you.
Just know that only what we do for God will last.
I hear tattoos can be pretty permanent, too.
Anyway, good luck with the Lying For Jesus. You will be sorely missed.
Posted by: GMacs | May 20, 2009 5:35 PM
The thing is that we do care because we know that we only have one shot at this existence.
And if poor Ida could see today how people were wasting their shots. I think it would blow her little monkey mind...(/Minchin).
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 5:38 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3hIcKkKID8kPosted by: Watchman | May 20, 2009 5:39 PM
Lea et al.:
No, but explicitly denying that you're behind all the different personas does. You have to acknowledge that.
Incorrect, by way of my previous statement.
"You won't believe me mo matter what I say" is a cop-out, and is itself a dishonest ploy. If you tell the truth, chances are you'll be believed. If you're a skillful liar, chances are you'll be believed. The reason your claims are called into question is because you were caught in multiple lies.
It's simple, really. How old did you say you were? Nineteen? Then surely know already know this.
Own your own mistakes. That's what mature people do.
My advice to you is to start telling the truth, period. If you do, you will be believed far more often than not. As ye sow, Lea. As ye sow.
You have a problem with my mode of expression? At least I'm not lying to you. You have a lot of nerve getting snarky with me, girl. Mind your manners.
To answer your question: Yes, I can think of one.
There was no global flood.
By the way, do you agree with all the laws, stricture, and punishments detailed in Leviticus? If not, which ones, and why?
Manipulate? You mean, like, translate, edit, or revise? I promise you, I would never do that.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 20, 2009 5:45 PM
Macy, lying, arrogant, trolling godbot:
No, he isn't. It's been 2000 years, and not one of your fellow cultists has ever been able to come up with a single speck of evidence that your imaginary god even exists, much less that it's "coming back". But if you truly believe there is some judgement coming, do you really think jesus would like the fact that you've been lying in his name?
Macy, lying, unrepentant, arrogant, trolling godbot:
Don't make me laugh. You have no intention of repenting anything. You're PROUD of your lies, happy to have the chance to spread falsehood in the holy name of jeebus. You were caught in your own web of lies hours ago, and it took you this long to even admit it, and even then you desperately tried to deflect responsibility to someone else, anyone else. You never stopped spinning and hiding from your own lies for a single second. The idea of being honest with yourself has never even crossed your mind.
You've learned NOTHING here, Macy. And the reason is simple: you don't WANT to learn. You came in here a lying delusional troll, and you're leaving a lying delusional troll.
macy, arrogant godbot, still unrepentantly lying:
If you could really prove a point, you would have done so. You didn't. You didn't even try to. You just spewed lies and desperately spun to hide from the fact that you were bearing false witness. You'd have a chance of changing people's minds here, if you had any evidence. You don't. The very idea of evidence is against your religion.
Macy, if you truly had the truth on your side, why did you need to lie? Why was lying your first impulse? Of all possible tactics, why did you immediately choose dishonesty? Why, if you were truly acting in the service of an all-seeing, all-knowing, all-powerful god, did you so completely fail to offer the slightest speck of evidence?
macy, unrepentantly lying about irrelevancies:
So, you lied about that too, without any remorse at all, even though it was completely irrelevant to what you were trying to say. Even in a situation where it didn't make a damn bit of difference whose profile it was, your first and last impulse was, as always, to lie. This says something about your character.
But really, no one gives a flying fuck about the profile anymore. You've shown your true face here for all to see. You're arrogant, stupid, narcissistic, dishonest, hypocritical, hateful, delusional, and willfully ignorant. And you think that because you believe some nonsense about a jewish zombie who was his own father, all these glaring character flaws magically become virtues. They don't.
macy's pointless proselytyzing parting shot:
Is that true? You'd better hope it isn't, because all you've done here for your god is lie. Isn't your imaginary god supposed to have some sort of problem with bearing false witness?
Lucily, your god doesn't exist, any more than the sockpuppets you created were actually real people. Your god is a delusion that exists only inside your hollow head. After all the lies you told to us, the biggest lie you've ever told is to yourself.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 20, 2009 6:24 PM
Josh already knows this, but for the edification of the interested:
I checked the Proc. Roy. Soc. A site ( http://rspa.royalsocietypublishing.org/ ), and I cannot find a paper with that title (or by the authors). I think the line saying that the paper was published online might be wrong. The current issue is June 8, and it isn't there.
However, a general Google turns up a few hits, including a seminar by one of the authors on that very topic.
http://www.see.ed.ac.uk/research/IMP/seminar%20posters/March_12.pdf
Posted by: Anonymous | May 20, 2009 6:36 PM
It's like an athiestic cult in here. Instead of being ignorant to other peoples beliefs, why don't you guys try backing up your words?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 6:37 PM
/waves
Do be a good little ignorant child and actually leave when you say you are going to.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 20, 2009 6:43 PM
Why don't you try showing hard physical evidence for your imaginary deity? We know the answer to that question. You have no evidence, so you just lie about the existence of the delusion between your ears.Also, I would estimate about 75% of us have read the bible cover to cover. Which is why we are atheists. Truly read the old testament. Look at all the actions Yahweh condones. Like genocide, rape, sexual enslavement, and incest. Then ask is this god an amoral thug, or something you could really worship? Our answer was forget that shit...
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 20, 2009 6:48 PM
There's nothing that sez "duh" like a misspelled oxymoron. Why, you have some new ones? We've heard the usual ones. Which words need backing up, how?Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 20, 2009 6:51 PM
Such as?
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 20, 2009 7:00 PM
Macy, read the list of miracles required for the Flood story to work.
Will take some time. It's a horribly long list.
Then, when you've finished reading, come back, and we can talk. Have a nice rest of the week.
Posted by: James F | May 20, 2009 7:00 PM
ADS #210
Is there a podcast or transcript?
Posted by: Danny | May 20, 2009 7:12 PM
I still prefer Tiktaalik, it's more awesome. :)
Posted by: Patricia, OM
|
May 20, 2009 7:29 PM
No shit moron. What part of godless at the top of the page can't you understand?
/echo
Posted by: Rey Fox | May 20, 2009 7:58 PM
"It's like an athiestic cult in here. Instead of being ignorant to other peoples beliefs, why don't you guys try backing up your words?"
We got the fossils. We got the molecular evidence. What have you got?
Posted by: blockhead | May 20, 2009 8:19 PM
The religious creationist nutjobs are going to distort and lie about this no matter how much hype it gets. So, maybe the publicity will get a few people interested who would not hear about it otherwise.
Posted by: Maldoror | May 20, 2009 11:15 PM
It's appearance is remarkably similar to the kinkajou, which also mainly eats fruit. Kinkajous are animals that creationists point to as being proof of creationism because they are carnivores that don't eat meat, which somehow makes them perfect examples of how all animals were vegetarians in the Garden of Eden before the fall of man. (!)
So I expect creationist will ignore everything about the fossil apart from the fact that it didn't have meat in its belly.
Posted by: MikeTheInfidel | May 20, 2009 11:53 PM
Elizabeth P. brought up something about the recently-discovered "Temech seal", as evidence of archaeology confirming the Bible. It's a shame she didn't bother to do her followup work, though I can't say I'm surprised. Here's the latest on that discovery:
In other words, the "Temech" seal does not confirm the Bible. Oopsy-daisy!
Posted by: TI | May 21, 2009 12:51 AM
Correction. A certain interpretation of God gets tinier and tinier. You see it as making a creator-entity appear smaller (specifically, the one held to exist by fundamental Judaic religious sects).
However, I object to the general use of the term. I see it as making a creator-entity 'larger,' as it provides further circumstantial evidence for evolution, which itself can be interpreted as further circumstantial evidence that if there was a creator involved at some point in the universe, they clearly knew what they were doing, as static organisms and species in a morphic environment would be quickly wiped out of existence.
Also, if I may be allowed to soapbox: all those proclaiming (fantastically) that this proves that God does not exist should be ashamed of themselves, as the basic tenets of logic and reasoning state that you cannot prove something does not exist. The only way to actually prove that something does not exist is if you went over all existence everywhere with a fine-toothed comb, and did not find it.
Any claims that an argument proves something does not exist fail automatically on pure logic. You can say that it doesn't have sufficent evidence to be scientifically true, as the scientific process of deduction places the burden of proof upon the claim. However, you cannot say that something is "proven" to not exist. That is impossible. It's also why the entire issue of whether or not a creator exists is unsolvable via logical debate. Neither side can claim that logic is on their side.
Watch.
This is already a logical stalemate. No further moves can be taken on either side of the debate, as neither side has any actual evidence for their claim. X can provide no evidence to prove that God exists. Y can provide no evidence to prove that God does not exist. All evidence for either side is circumstantial, and there is no argument that can be made for either side that does not possess at least one equally valid counter-argument or counter-interpretation. Thus, stalemate. Unless we inject personal opinion into the equation (and we do. Far too often, and to our great detriment and hypocrisy), the issue can be taken no further than this.
Besides, the entire debate is off the topic itself. This isn't about whether or not God exists, or how foolish radicals on either side have made themselves look with their groundless claims. This is about a very interesting fossil that will help us further refine our theories and hypothesis for how life developed and lived in the distant past. Unless we find a "Made by Zeus" line etched into her pelvis, discussions about whether or not God exists should not be involved.
In short, this fossil will help us take a few steps closer to understanding the truth about how things happened. It will do nothing more and nothing less than that. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to rethink their position. It's our job and privilege to objectively examine the universe and try to understand it. Using what we find to further our own personal agendas instead educating ourselves and others is incredibly selfish, and a disgusting abuse of that privilege.
If there is a God, I seriously doubt he would begrudge us our free will and our considering of all possibilities, including those that do not involve him. If there is not a God, the argument does not actually matter in the slightest. Either way, we should be ashamed of ourselves for how far we have allowed this completely fruitless debate to propagate.
Posted by: John Morales | May 21, 2009 1:06 AM
TI:
Not in the sense of an undefined something that the label 'god' can be applied to, but yes in that something the attributes of which are contradictory can indeed be inferred to be non-existent. That set of incoherently defined putative entities includes the god of the Bible.Posted by: God | May 21, 2009 1:59 AM
Macy, this is God speaking.
First of all, what you do every night is a sin, but I was going to let that slide since I kinda one-upped you on the whole brains department. But now that you lied... Hm.
Secondly, you owe Mrs. Henderson an apology for that gawdafwul haircut you gave her yesterday.
Finally,
you and I know that is not true. You are leaving because you heard there is a tortilla in Mexico City resembling St. Bartholomew and you are going to book your tickets. Do not take the cheapest flight. It will crash and everyone will be killed. Do not say I did not warn you.
Posted by: John Scanlon FCD | May 21, 2009 2:12 AM
SC, OM @ 420, I had a similar inspiration ("Thank you, crazy movie!"), but for me it was seeing Chariots of the Gods when I was 10. Including the 2012 Mayan prophecy stuff as well as the biblical archaeology; I decided to study some ancient languages so I could look into the sources and find out if I was being lied to by the makers of the film (duh!) or my parents and priests, or all of them (duh!). I calculated how old I'd be when the Mayan calendar ended (I still have the piece of paper, somewhere), and decided I'd have time to figure some stuff out by then. Thank you, Erich von Däniken!
Posted by: TI | May 21, 2009 2:56 AM
To suggest or infer is not the same as proof, and he specifically used the term proof. Proof means that sound evidence has been put forward that definitively asserts a claim beyond all reasonable doubt.
You cannot "prove" that something does not exist or is not real. Not scientifically, and not logically. This is a facet of deduction that seems to escape many people, who are convinced that there is a 'yes' and a 'no.' This is not the case. Rather, there is a "there is sufficient evidence to suggest X," and a "there is insufficient evidence to suggest X."
In this particular debate, there is insufficient evidence to prove God exists, and there is insufficient evidence to disprove God's existence. Thus, neither side has any genuine platform to stand on in regards to logic or science, and neither logic nor science can provide an answer.
As far as the Scientific method is concerned, you cannot prove anything. Merely infer that something does or does not have evidence that points to it being true. This is because there are some things that are incompatible with the scientific method to varying degrees, because they themselves cannot be directly observed or examined. Rather than muddle the method with different sets of rules for things we can directly test and things we are forced to indirectly test, we simply 'raise the bar' universally to the things we can indirectly test.
That is why the highest level of recognition science can give to an idea or concept is Theory (note the extra-shiny capital 'T'), and why people confuse the scientific definition of Theory with mundane definition of theory. Theory is to science what fact is to casual language (in the sense that we're 99.97% sure), and hypothesis is to science what theory is to casual conversation.
This has lead to the major misuse and misunderstanding of the term, on both sides of the fence. On the one hand, we have those who say "oh, it's just a theory" in dismissal of scientific theories, ignoring that the criteria to be labeled a theory by the scientific method are incredibly strict. And on the other, we have those who forget in what I can only optimistically hope is their zeal to defend the validity of science that the reason we use the word "theory" instead of the far more convenient "fact" is because there are things that can never logically be facts or falsehoods.
Thus, I say no, you cannot "prove" that God does not exist, any more than you can prove God does. You can infer through logical examination that there is insufficient evidence to suggest God's existence, and thus make the Scientific (again with the shiny capital letters!) proclamation that God does not exist. However, it is a farce to then pretend as though that settles the matter utterly or helps either side of the debate, because not only is science constantly correcting and revising itself as new information comes to light, but because of the incredibly strict requirements needed in the scientific method (which themselves exist because our perspective of the universe is limited), something not existing by the scientific definition of the term is not much to write home about.
People are not arguing that God does or does not exist in accordance with the scientific method. They are arguing that God does or does not exist period. And in that regard, they have no evidence to support their arguments, and no logic to use to cement their stance.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 21, 2009 3:08 AM
Correction. A certain interpretation of God gets tinier and tinier. You see it as making a creator-entity appear smaller (specifically, the one held to exist by fundamental Judaic religious sects).
First of all, I think you're looking for the term "Abrahamic". That's a pro-tip from getting your sorry, delusional ass stabbed by the closest Muslim fundamentalist.
Anyhoo, "making God tinier" is but a metaphor for fewer and fewer things being open to supernatural interpretation as science progresses. But you knew that. You're already down several for the count on veracity.
But hey, let's take a look at what else you have to say.
However, I object to the general use of the term.
Uh-oh. Sounds like you really feel like telling people not to be rude. The reason you would not want people to be rude is that you agree with the viewpoint being disparaged. Dissemination, false representation and concern trolling ahead? (No, really, I cut and paste this shite and comment as I go along -- I haven't even seen the end of your screed).
I see it as making a creator-entity 'larger,' as it provides further circumstantial evidence for evolution,
Okay, you're one of THOSE. Provide evidence that the process of evolution needs or even remotely implies a "creator-entity" (oh, you wishy-washy deist douche, you), and we will talk.
No, really. Why should there be, what evidence do you have for, what evidence for the need do you have for any type of creating entity? We're waiting. And in true Nerd Of Redhead fashion... if you don't have any, you should just shut the fuck up and go away. Put up or shut up. Proof. Real proof. Proof that does not involve a pathetic arbitrary collection of myths.
which itself can be interpreted as further circumstantial evidence that if there was a creator involved at some point in the universe, they clearly knew what they were doing
Antropomorphisize much? You just begged the question. You just presumed that there was a reason for existence. You just presumed that there is a plan. You just presumed that there was forethought in it. By that, you presumed that there was an intelligence involved in creating you.
You sad, sad arrogant little shit.
Nobody cares. Nobody cares whether you live or die. Yes, that is a scary proposition. That does not allow you to presuppose all kinds of self-serving excrement just because it makes you feel better.
as static organisms and species in a morphic environment would be quickly wiped out of existence.
There are at least five words in that sentence you glaringly have no fucking clue about. For starters, "static", "organisms", "species", "morphic", "environment", "existence". That you do not feel embarrassment typing that particular sentence for publication on a public forum is embarrassing to sentient beings everywhere.
Yes, I am telling you you are wrong. Yes, I am telling you you have no clue what you are talking about. This is painfully obvious to everyone who spent over a farthing on a clue.
Also, if I may be allowed to soapbox
From your track record so far, oh clueless wonder, this should be precious indeed. (Again, I just cut and pasted the entire treatise without reading... the anticipation is killing me -- more in transferred embarrassment for sharing genes with this creature than anything, but still...)
all those proclaiming (fantastically) that this proves that God does not exist should be ashamed of themselves
This would work a LOT better if anyone said anything of the kind. Just a hint.
as the basic tenets of logic and reasoning state that you cannot prove something does not exist.
Hello, newbie. The phrase you want to google is called "proving a negative".
Also, just for the record, you have not said a single word or expressed a single idea that we have not heard at least a thousand times before... expressed vigorously, defended far more competently than you will ever be able to and regarded objectively (something you are obviously incapable of). But hey, cut your teeth Lying For Jeebus here... we're game.
The only way to actually prove that something does not exist is if you went over all existence everywhere with a fine-toothed comb, and did not find it.
Yes, thank you. We know you cannot prove a negative.
My personal theory is that it's all the fault of the Great Green Arkleseizure. The only way to actually prove it does not exist is if you went over all existence everywhere with a fine-toothed comb, and did not find it. That should strike you as asinine, as intended. If it strikes you as different from your claims for your God, well... you are completely irrational and deluded, and it would behoove you to admit as much.
Any claims that an argument proves something does not exist fail automatically on pure logic.
Oh, that's so cute. You know just enough logic to make a complete and utter ass out of yourself.
Again, there's no way to prove a negative. You seem to disagree. Go find a professor in any logic discipline and explain your position.
Pro-tip: even Aristotle would have laughed in your face.
You can say that it doesn't have sufficent evidence to be scientifically true
Yes we can, and we do, and thank you for admitting that.
as the scientific process of deduction places the burden of proof upon the claim.
Yes... if you have an alternative, we're all ears...
However, you cannot say that something is "proven" to not exist. That is impossible.
Oh fuck me. Yes, we cannot prove a negative. Find me someone who can, then we'll talk.
It's also why the entire issue of whether or not a creator exists is unsolvable via logical debate. Neither side can claim that logic is on their side.
Oh hell no, you fucking clown. Google parsimony and get back to us.
Watch.
Oh dear. Here we go, and I bet it'll be good.
X: I believe in God.
Y: I do not believe in God.
This is already a logical stalemate.
No it is not, you ass. X asserts something, and any assertion requires proof. There is none, by design (and if that doesn't tell you something, I have great New York infrastructure projects to sell you).
No further moves can be taken on either side of the debate, as neither side has any actual evidence for their claim.
Again, fuck you and the horse you rode in on. X claims something. It is up to X to prove it, not for Y to disprove it.
The world was created by a giant goat sneezing in what I call the Great Green Arkleseizure. Prove it did not.
Go on, prove it.
X can provide no evidence to prove that God exists.
Well durrrr, because proof denies faith, and without faith, God is nothing.
Y can provide no evidence to prove that God does not exist.
Fuck you, you are defaming the Great Green Arkleseizure.
You are a heathen, and you will be the first against the wall when the revolution comes.
All evidence for either side is circumstantial, and there is no argument that can be made for either side that does not possess at least one equally valid counter-argument or counter-interpretation.
Hi, this is logical fallacy "false equivalence" calling.
Google it. Moron.
Thus, stalemate.
Only in our puny little mind. Do some research.
This isn't about whether or not God exists, or how foolish radicals on either side have made themselves look with their groundless claims.
Wait, what? Which claims, exactly, have biologists and/or atheists made that are groundless?
Name one.
Just one.
Go.
(Preventative pro-tip: you might want to get something better than Piltdown "man").
This is about a very interesting fossil that will help us further refine our theories and hypothesis for how life developed and lived in the distant past.
What the fuck are you talking about? There is no distant past. The Earth is 7,000 years old, tops.
Unless we find a "Made by Zeus" line etched into her pelvis
Oh Buddha on a Segway, you are pathetic.
discussions about whether or not God exists should not be involved.
No they should not. Please observe, deputy dipshit, who is involving God in the public discourse and who is trying to shape policy assuming things they have no proof for.
Pro-tip: it ain't fucking atheists.
Let me put it this way: please take your middle-of-the-road, everyone's-gotta-be-a-bit-right, I'm-above-all-of-this, nobody-really-knows shtick (because we've heard it all before, done better, and then some) and prepare it for rectal insertion toute-suite.
Thank you for stopping by though. As soon as you're prepared to actually start thinking, we'll be here.
In short, this fossil will help us take a few steps closer to understanding the truth about how things happened. It will do nothing more and nothing less than that. Anyone who claims otherwise needs to rethink their position. It's our job and privilege to objectively examine the universe and try to understand it. Using what we find to further our own personal agendas instead educating ourselves and others is incredibly selfish, and a disgusting abuse of that privilege.
If there is a God, I seriously doubt he would begrudge us our free will and our considering of all possibilities, including those that do not involve him. If there is not a God, the argument does not actually matter in the slightest. Either way, we should be ashamed of ourselves for how far we have allowed this completely fruitless debate to propagate.
Posted by: John Morales | May 21, 2009 3:16 AM
TI:
It seems to me that your claim rests on equivocation on the semantics of 'prove', as your scare quotes indicate.As we've often pointed out here, proof is the domain of mathematics and logic. Outside of that, there is only 'proof beyond reasonable doubt', which is the most rational epistemologically sustainable criterion.
We can prove, for instance, that Elvis Presley does not exist (though he was once real and did exist) beyond reasonable doubt.
I can 'prove' that a God that is omniscient, omnipotent and benevolent would imply no evil or suffering, yet this is empirically not the case, hence this disproves such a god. Other, less testable gods, perhaps not.
Got one you care to define? :)
Posted by: Thantos | May 21, 2009 3:23 AM
Don't try to convince these academics that God exists. They have professor myers......the eminent moron....as there leader. This site is bullshit. Give me a break. You people are students? Bull fucking shit. One day..........very soon.....I will snap.
Posted by: windy | May 21, 2009 3:32 AM
"Intend to" repent?? Christianity FAIL
Posted by: Stu
|
May 21, 2009 3:36 AM
Figures... I missed a few paragraphs. Pleas disregard anything past "we'll be here" in the previous dissertation.
To be continued... well, how 'bout now?
What's left?
In short, this fossil will help us take a few steps closer to understanding the truth about how things happened.
Yes, that's totally how that science-thing works.
It will do nothing more and nothing less than that.
Oh, do dig up credible sources who claim otherwise.
Anyone who claims otherwise needs to rethink their position.
I gotta tell ya, doing these loggarheic farts one sentence at a time does make it far more entertaining. For some reason (*cough watching Republicans for 8 years cough*), I knew that utterly predictable dodge was coming.
Hey, not reading the entire post is very, very exciting. I know there's a bunch of garbage coming, but I haven't even seen it yet. I can just look at the scrollbar and think "WHOO! THERE'S SO MUCH MORE STUPID CRAP AHEAD!". Yes, I hoard it... I am like that. Sue me.
It's our job and privilege to objectively examine the universe and try to understand it.
Yes, totally, which is what scientists do, and...
Hey, Bobo, where are you going with this? I've got less than 40% of this message left, and Goddammit it better be good. I spent a multiple of dozens of minutes on your sorry, incoherent ass already fighting emetics.
Using what we find to further our own personal agendas
Ah, I get it now. Projection is your game. No problem, and thank you. It allows me to scroll down past anything you say, because you've proven yourself to be a hypocritical and pathological case study for projection.
Anyhoo...
instead educating ourselves and others is incredibly selfish, and a disgusting abuse of that privilege.
That's .8 InsanoFlex on incoherency, paranoia and plain old insanity. CAN YOU BEAT IT?
If there is a God
Prove it, hot-shot.
I seriously doubt he would begrudge us our free will
You're a fucking moron. READ THE BIBLE.
and our considering of all possibilities, including those that do not involve him.
Your total inability to be realistic about how Christianity works is funny, in a completely abhorrent and scary way.
If there is not a God, the argument does not actually matter in the slightest.
Hi, this is Pascal's wager. I'm feeling a little long in the tooth. Could you invigorate me by some serious rectal inversion?
To put it another way... been there, done that, show me the money.
Either way, we should be ashamed of ourselves for how far we have allowed this completely fruitless debate to propagate.
It's only debate if both sides actually listen. Hi, assclown, could I buy you a mirror?
Posted by: Stu
|
May 21, 2009 3:49 AM
Hello, troll.
Don't try to convince these academics that God exists.
Why not? Isn't that your Christian Duty(TM)?
They have professor myers......the eminent moron....
Okay, waiting for substantiation of that targeted claim...
as there leader.
...aaaaaand we're done. Not only did you not substantiate, you can't even fucking spell.
You are the weakest link.
Good-bye.
Awesome. I am SO impressed by the way you back up your spittle-flecked disapproval.
You people are students?
Yes, we're all students! Except that we're not. And that nothing here said that we were. And that...
...oh, never mind. You were dropped on the head as an infant quite a bit, weren't you?
One day..........very soon.....I will snap.
Awesome. Nothing like vague threats. Back it up! What will you do, short-stop?
Posted by: Dog | May 21, 2009 4:22 AM
Stu, that was fucking brilliant. Maybe it is my sleep-deprived state, but I found that tunnel you dug where his ass used to be really, really funny. Scrapbooked. You're a Godsent.
Posted by: Dog | May 21, 2009 4:27 AM
More, More! Come on, do a muslim now!
Posted by: Anonymous | May 21, 2009 6:35 AM
I am not interested in the semantic waffling of any specific religion or their adherents. Islam is the youngest of the three major monotheistic religions of the world, with both Judaism and Christianity predating it by significant margins. Judaism has an unknown origin of it's timeline, with solid archaeological evidence placing it as being at least several centuries before 516 B.C., and text within Judaic scripture and writing would, if taken at their word, place it as far back as the dawn of recorded history, over 6000 years ago. Christianity began in the mid-first century, around year 50 or so. Islam is generally considered to have begun in the seventh century in year 632, the date of Muhammad's death, though some argue that it began when Muhammad and his followers fled from the Meccans to Medina in 622.
Regardless of how loudly fundamentalist Muslims protest or how many things radical Islamic terrorist groups blow up, they cannot change historical fact. Islam is clearly predated by both Christianity and Judaism by several centuries at the very inside. That makes Islam a Judaic religion, as it came after Judaism, and is primarily based off of Judaism. Islam is also an Abrahamic religion, but that is in addition to being a Judaic religion, which is the more historically precise term, if not the more politically correct one.
In regards to the imminent danger threatening my ass, I appreciate your concern. However, it is unwarranted and unnecessary, as I live in a developed, technologically advanced nation in the 21st century, and thus have no need for a beast of burden. My ass cannot be stabbed, as I am blatantly lacking one.
I am aware of that. It is the reason why I am not taking anything you say seriously, and why I do not consider your own counterpoints worth discussing. You cannot give a point-by-point breakdown during an initial read-through, as doing so removes all meaning and context from the individual points being addressed.
I would, however, like to point out that according to you and your statements that I fail at both religion and science, there are only two stances that can be taken. Apparently, I either have to believe everything that a thousand year old scroll says is true and nothing else ever by anyone or anything, or I have to be a stupendously hardcore, balls-to-the wall pratical-Darwinistic materialistic atheist.
You are aware that there is middle ground, aren't you? Vast amounts of it?
I have a number of theoretical scenarios and cosmologies that I have hypothesized might exist. Some of them involve 'God,' and some do not. Most of them, however, involve a Prime Mover of some sort, as I have concluded a Prime Mover to currently be the most rational explanation available for the current state of existence. Anything beyond that, though, I consider to be very debatable semantics.
But, I'm not so rude as to talk you ear off about them. If you're interested, I'd be happy to elaborate. Otherwise, yes, I have, in fact, cooked up several versions of the universe that I feel make sense.Posted by: Chi | May 21, 2009 6:47 AM
Yes, yes, yes. But what baramin is it in?
Posted by: Leishtek | May 21, 2009 7:26 AM
God (THE god, of the Christian Old Testament) created the Heavens, and the Earth. And this Darwinius Masillae as well. There is no missing link, because God did not create it. We are humans. They are monkeys, apes and other primates. There is no link between the divine (us) and the animals of this Earth. Get over it!
Evolution is a fraud, a scam made up by corporations, Devil-worshippers, and "scientists" to de-sensitive us from living a whole, encompassing life based on Christ's life. What is "science" but the little, dirty secrets of man that go against Jesus, his Father the Almighty God, and the Holy Spirit that dwells within the souls of Christians who believe.
Sorry to say, but "science" will destroy the human race. Ultimately, the scientists will prove that existence itself is meaningful. "Science" has a very emo quality about it. This will culminate in the final World War, which will destroy roughly 99% of all humans on Earth. Ahh....but Jesus will return. It is in the book of Revelations, of the New Testament. And all these so-called Masters of the Universe (the un-Christian universities, scientists, doctors and other Devils & conjurers) will disappear into the Lake of Fire. Let all these scientists dwell with their Master, the Anti-Christ, Satan! "Science" is nothing more than a tool of the Devil, Satan, the Anti-Christ, to lure us away from living with our Father, the Almighty God. Death to these science infidels!!
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 21, 2009 7:32 AM
Leishtek.
Having said that are you now willing to give up your computer, all medicine, your car, clean drinking water, safe food and every other modern convenience provide by science (no quotes)?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 21, 2009 7:54 AM
Leishtek, what, proclaim god, but show no physical evidence for one? Not the way to convince this crowd. This crowd is all about evidence. You have none for your imaginary deity. Science has stacks and stacks of journals with papers showing the evidence for science. Yawn, what an inane, boring, and illogical creature you are.
Posted by: John Scanlon, FCD | May 21, 2009 8:12 AM
I guessed earlier that, in the Messel fossils,
To which David Marjanović, OM respondedWell, I didn't say completely decalcified, did I? I've got vols 252 and 255 of Courier Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg (Current Geological and Paleontological Research in the Messel Formation, 2004 and 2005) sitting right here beside me in the Australian outback, as well as Heil et al (1987) Fossilien der Messel-Formation and (hmm, maybe still in a box) have also read Schaal and Ziegler (eds) (1988) Messel - Ein Schaufenster in die Geschichte der Erde und des Lebens, so of course I knew that there's enough calcium for decent X-ray contrast. As seen in the Darwinius paper which I've now got round to looking at (not as bad as I feared, by a long shot). I suppose I was thinking of the way the bones crumble to dust if you let the shale dry out; a lot of other fossils just don't do that. But I don't recall actually reading in any of these things that calcium has been leached out, and my German isn't good enough to skim all the text for relevant bits (I can only do serial, not random-access).Posted by: strange gods before me | May 21, 2009 8:16 AM
And in your next comment, you're going to say something even stupider.
This "prime mover" regurgitation is a sign of both poor logic and poor imagination.
Posted by: GMacs | May 21, 2009 8:22 AM
Ida does not need to "prove" evolution insofar as humans being closely related to apes. Nor could she, since she is from a time before apes even became distinct from monkeys (right?).
What do provide insurmountable evidence for human-ape connection are: the fact that we look like, and in fact are apes (by classification of many scientists); and that our DNA is shockingly similar to that of chimps, with evidence of where two pairs of chromosomes fused.
Of course, I'm just kinda going off Ken Miller's speech and what I see when I look at an ape. There is also the fact that other primates act like humans.
And to the troll: Would divine beings suffer the same diseases and pathogens as animals? Would they have testicles that, quite honestly, are not that advantageous, since they can get tangled and are in a vulnerable position?
Your shit does stink. You are an animal.
Posted by: John Morales | May 21, 2009 8:24 AM
Anon @470,
Can't say as I am. You've claimed it's impossible to disprove all god-conceptions, I've agreed but said specific ones can indeed be disproved.If your conception is not disprovable (and that's not hard to achieve), and you can show it's a parsimonious explanation (that's a bit harder), then you have a goer for a rational deity-belief.
I note whenever I see 'prime mover', I think infinite regression. If anything is to be uncaused, that which exists (the mass-energy space-time that is our reality) is surely a far more likely candidate than a putative something that caused that which exists.
Posted by: Knockgoats | May 21, 2009 8:25 AM
as far back as the dawn of recorded history, over 6000 years ago. - TI
History fail, too. The first event with any claim to belong to recorded history is the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt around 3100 BCE - and that was only recorded centuries after the supposed event. You have a full palette of ignorance there, TI.
Posted by: Kel | May 21, 2009 8:28 AM
Poe or someone needs to get me a new irony meter.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 21, 2009 9:49 AM
I am not interested in the semantic waffling of any specific religion or their adherents.
Awesome, neither am I.
Islam is the youngest of the three major monotheistic religions of the world
Yes, and...
with both Judaism and Christianity predating it by significant margins.
Yes, and...
Judaism has an unknown origin of it's timeline, with solid archaeological evidence placing it as being at least several centuries before 516 B.C., and text within Judaic scripture and writing would, if taken at their word, place it as far back as the dawn of recorded history, over 6000 years ago.
Yes, AND...
Christianity began in the mid-first century, around year 50 or so. Islam is generally considered to have begun in the seventh century in year 632, the date of Muhammad's death, though some argue that it began when Muhammad and his followers fled from the Meccans to Medina in 622.
Yes, AAAAANNNNDD....
Regardless of how loudly fundamentalist Muslims protest or how many things radical Islamic terrorist groups blow up, they cannot change historical fact. Islam is clearly predated by both Christianity and Judaism by several centuries at the very inside.
Yes, AAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNDDDDDDD.......
It makes Islam a Judaic religion, as it came after Judaism, and is primarily based off of Judaism. Islam is also an Abrahamic religion, but that is in addition to being a Judaic religion, which is the more historically precise term, if not the more politically correct one.
Holy shit, if I didn't know any better, you just engaged in quite a bit in semantic waffling of a specific religion.
Must be that beam in your eye.
My ass cannot be stabbed, as I am blatantly lacking one.
Wait, what? Should we start a drive to buy your colostomy bags in bulk?
You cannot give a point-by-point breakdown during an initial read-through, as doing so removes all meaning and context from the individual points being addressed.
Actually, you're right, if there were points being addressed. Which there weren't. Please stop overestimating your own coherence, it's embarrassing for all involved.
I would, however, like to point out that according to you and your statements that I fail at both religion and science, there are only two stances that can be taken.
I KNOW this is gonna be good. It's not like you're going to put up a ridiculous straw-man and engage in the false equivalence fallacy, right?
Apparently, I either have to believe everything that a thousand year old scroll says is true and nothing else ever by anyone or anything, or I have to be a stupendously hardcore, balls-to-the wall pratical-Darwinistic materialistic atheist.
- Nobody said that.
- Provide any and all reasons for being wishy-washy.
- While we like our prats, we prefer being practical.
- Using the term Darwinistic gives you away. Nobody here is "Darwinistic", you ignorant ass.
You are aware that there is middle ground, aren't you? Vast amounts of it?
No, I was COMPLETELY unaware of that. Please enlighten me. Oh, and while you're at it, could you throw in some fucking justification for it?
I have a number of theoretical scenarios and cosmologies that I have hypothesized might exist.
All ears.
as I have concluded a Prime Mover to currently be the most rational explanation available for the current state of existence.
Again, go for it. With justification, please.
But, I'm not so rude as to talk you ear off about them.
You just did. Self-awaremess does not seem to be your strong suit.
If you're interested, I'd be happy to elaborate.
Yes, please do, because it is preferable to your tired, long-winded allusions to them.
Otherwise, yes, I have, in fact, cooked up several versions of the universe that I feel make sense.
So have I. Great Green Arkleseizure for the win!
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 21, 2009 10:00 AM
Quoted for uniqueness.Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 21, 2009 10:20 AM
TI, people have been remarkably rude to you here... but please don't confuse how they say it with what they say, because what they say is for the most part right on.
Here, for example, you imply that the existence of evolution requires being set up by an intelligence. This is an argument from ignorance on your part: Because of the way chemistry works, mutations inevitably happen; this inevitably creates diversity in populations; inevitably, some parts of that diversity will have more fertile offspring given their environment than others, which is called natural selection; and, well, that's it. I've seen it happen in a petri dish overnight.
There is simply no need to assume the existence of such a planning intelligence.
(And besides, the term "morphic environment" doesn't exist.)
I fear that's another argument from ignorance – completely apart from the philosophical issue that there's no reason to cut the infinite regress off at precisely that point.
You see, uncaused causes happen all the time. Heisenberg's uncertainty relation! No radioactive decay was ever caused, for example; everything that's not outright forbidden happens, at random, constrained only by probability.
=================
John Scanlon, German being my mother tongue, I'd be happy to translate any short excerpts you'd send me.
Posted by: Stu
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May 21, 2009 11:13 AM
David:
TI, people have been remarkably rude to you here...
Kai su, teknon?
Posted by: Stu
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May 21, 2009 11:15 AM
By the way, party people... check out "Dog"'s URL. Seem familiar? I swear we had one of those in here just the other day...
(Need. Better. Sycophants. Damnit.)
Posted by: Watchman | May 21, 2009 11:42 AM
LMAO
That was as robust a satire of a fundie creationist as any I've seen in months Thanks, Leishtek, I needed the laugh. You rock!
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 21, 2009 11:54 AM
Isn't there supposed to be a rule? Wait for three stupid posts, not just one with only two logical fallacies, before launching the full assault?
:-)
Posted by: Stu
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May 21, 2009 12:11 PM
David: I was not aware of All Internet Traditions(TM).
Posted by: Watchman | May 21, 2009 12:19 PM
Stu, David is citing one of PZ's rules, though perhaps "suggestions" would a better word to use in this case. It's not written down anywhere, and never comes up (some "rule", huh? LOL) so I wouldn't expect you to magically KNOW about it.
The object was to cut back on flame wars and to give people a few changes to explain themselves.
Posted by: Watchman | May 21, 2009 12:21 PM
Oops. "a few changes" should be "a few chances".
Posted by: Stu
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May 21, 2009 12:31 PM
Watchman, I know -- I was being snarky:
http://encyclopediadramatica.com/I_am_aware_of_all_internet_traditions
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 21, 2009 12:34 PM
WINDMILLS OF THE WORLD LOOKOUT!!!
Posted by: al thomas | May 21, 2009 12:45 PM
The first point to clarify in these discussions is that the Bible does NOT say the earth is only six or seven thousand years old. That error was dealt with decades before Darwin by Rev William Buckland, early geologist and Oxford University's first professor of geology.
Sadly, crazy creationist claims of a young earth continue to bring the Bible into scientific disrepute, as did deluded bishops in the days of Galileo, who likewise adamantly misrepresented what Genesis says. Once again I recommend "The Darwin Delusion" for a simple new paradigm that easily reconciles Genesis and geological fact -- and eliminates evolution in so doing.
Let's face it -- Darwin KNEW he was wrong from the start, which is why his heavy burden of guilt destroyed his health -- causing him to write to a friend: "I have been very bad lately; having had an awful 'crisis' one leg swelled like elephantiasis -- eyes almost closed up -- covered with a rash & fiery Boils...it was like living in hell."
He knew very clearly, for example, that his theory required that the overwhelming bulk of fossils in any and all strata be from unfit, failed, intermediate organisms. He knew that was not the case. Still true today. The fatal blow to his infantile theory. To repeat the facts -- not a few supposed unfit intermediate forms manufactured out of thin air by the nonsense of cladistics, but the overwhelming, vast majority of fossils in all and every strata ever explored. Darwinius is yet another example of a perfectly formed creature.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 21, 2009 12:50 PM
Interesting--though of course completely wrong--assertion. You greatly overestimate your own understanding. This is the stupidest "objection" to the veracity of evolution by natural selection that I have ever seen.Posted by: Satan | May 21, 2009 12:52 PM
It's Revelation, singular, not Revelations, plural.
John of Patmos was a fun guy, wasn't he?
He's currently wandering around the afterlife, babbling to anyone who will listen about satellites spying on him, among other things. I think paranoid schizophrenics infect each other with stray memes.
Posted by: God | May 21, 2009 12:56 PM
Oh, yes. Most of the voices in his head weren't Me, although I might have whispered a few imaginative hints, now and then.
Yes, but he isn't quite caught up to modern times. I get the impression that he thinks that "satellites" are some sort of demon that work for You.
Posted by: Satan | May 21, 2009 1:01 PM
Yes, that bit about not being lukewarm does have Your sort of feel to it.
Posted by: Stu
|
May 21, 2009 1:01 PM
The first point to clarify in these discussions is that the Bible does NOT say the earth is only six or seven thousand years old.
Yes it does. Just because you're uncomfortable with the fact that it is provable nonsense does not make it any less so.
That error was dealt with decades before Darwin by Rev William Buckland, early geologist and Oxford University's first professor of geology.
Ah, I actually had to look up Buckland:
"Buckland developed a new hypothesis that the word "beginning" in Genesis meant an undefined period between the origin of the earth and the creation of its current inhabitants, during which a long series of extinctions and successive creations of new kinds of plants and animals had occurred."
Nice, except Genesis DOES NOT SAY THAT. If you can interpret your text that loosely, it becomes meaningless. What a weasel way to try and re-interpret an obviously flawed text when it turns out to be hokum.
Let's face it -- Darwin KNEW he was wrong from the start
Yeah, exactly! Except no, actually, not at all. What on Earth makes you say that, other than wishful thinking?
which is why his heavy burden of guilt destroyed his health
If you don't see how that sentiment is vile, reprehensible and extremely un-Christian, I fear for those around you.
He knew very clearly, for example, that his theory required that the overwhelming bulk of fossils in any and all strata be from unfit, failed, intermediate organisms.
Evolutionary theory has never and will never predict any such thing. Ever. But I suspect you bloody well know that.
To repeat the facts -- not a few supposed unfit intermediate forms
1. There is no such thing as an "intermediate form" as opposed to any other. Every form is intermediate, as evolution is still going on today and will go on forever.
2. Extinct forms were not unfit at the time. That's the entire point.
Darwinius is yet another example of a perfectly formed creature.
Please, please read something other than Jack Chick tracts before you open your mouth again.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 21, 2009 1:02 PM
Is Al Thomas a real idiot, or a Poe?
Posted by: Josh
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May 21, 2009 1:07 PM
Do you commonly spout off assertions in subject areas that are completely out of your sphere of understanding?
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | May 21, 2009 1:08 PM
While that may be a corollary effect, the bible does a perfectly good job of bringing itself into scientific disrepute and really needs no help from young earthers or creationists (no need to add crazy to that, it is implied).
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 21, 2009 1:12 PM
Let's face it -- Darwin KNEW he was wrong from the start, which is why his heavy burden of guilt destroyed his health -- causing him to write to a friend: "I have been very bad lately; having had an awful 'crisis' one leg swelled like elephantiasis -- eyes almost closed up -- covered with a rash & fiery Boils...it was like living in hell."
Let me see if I understand this. Darwin wrote to a friend about his physical ailments. This proves that Darwin knew that he was spreading a lie when he released On The Origin Of Species. Are you fucking out of your mind?
Sadly, as one ages, one's body gathers more aches and pains. This is called growing old. It does nothing to prove what Darwin believed or did not believe. You need a better understanding of cause and effect.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 21, 2009 1:13 PM
"Failed", as in dead? I'm pretty sure that all fossils are dead. It kind of follows.
Obviously not.Because believing in a big sky daddy who will magically make everything all better is so much more mature.
Pfft.
Learn a bit of what you're confused about:
http://www.csicop.org/intelligentdesignwatch/fishibian.html
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 21, 2009 1:18 PM
It has been about fifteen years since I last listened to Rush Limbaugh but one of his common claims is that liberals, atheists and other assorted nogoodniks know in their heart that they are lying. Al Thomas is just an other dittohead; he knows that we know that we are up to no good.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 21, 2009 1:23 PM
Off topic but I have to say this. Owlmirror, you are using one of my pet phrases, big sky daddy. Thank you!
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 21, 2009 1:56 PM
Janine, OMnivore @ #504:
So, in addition to being a hypocritical drug addict, a "sanctity of marriage" blowhard with three failed marriages, and a big fat idiot, Rush is the poster boy for projection.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 21, 2009 1:58 PM
Oh, dude.
Whether an organism is unfit depends on the environment. And sometimes the environment changes.
Really, why isn't that obvious to you?
Example: The adapids (such as Darwinius) were tropical-rainforest animals that lived in Europe and North America. There is no more tropical rainforest in Europe or North America… and no more adapids.
More importantly, what Darwin believed and what he didn't believe is completely irrelevant. Darwin has been wrong before. We scientists talk about hypotheses and theories, not about people; who came up with a particular theory is only interesting if you're interested in history – what's really important is how well the theory fits the evidence.
And that's where creationism loses.
Oh, BTW: Genesis 1:11 – 1:27 says that Elohim created man & woman at the same time and last (6th day, after all other animals and the plants). Genesis 2:7–2:22 says Yahwe first created one man, then all other living beings, and then one woman. What do you suggest? A celebrity deathmatch?
This is more like what it says: "In the beginning of Gods'[*] creation of Heaven and Earth, when the Earth was empty and chaotic and darkness was over the deep and Gods' breath/spirit hovered over the waters, Gods said: 'Let there be light'; and there was light."
It's also a blatant rip-off of the Babylonian creation story, but I digress…
* 'elohim is the plural of 'eloha, the word "god". In all known manuscripts – none of which are really old –, it takes a singular verb, but still gets to say things like "let us make man in our image".
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 21, 2009 2:06 PM
"Understand this about Limbaugh. He doesn’t believe half the junk he spouts. I’ve met him, and had pleasant enough conversations with him, twice - at the 1980 World Series when he was still a mid-level baseball flunky with a funny name, and once in the mid ‘90s at ESPN when he was just beginning his campaign to get a toehold there. He is a quiet, almost colorless man who, if he could be guaranteed similar success in sportscasting, would sell out the sheep who follow his every word - and would do it before close of business today.
But with that ESPN bid having gone up in flames just under two years ago, and sports forever closed off to him, he’s gotten into what the novelist Robert Graves called a “Golden Predicament” - overwhelming success in a field he really had no intention of pursuing - and he has to keep churning this stuff out every day. And when you’re just free associating to kill time and keep the ditto-heads happy, you sometimes drive right off the end of the pier."
– Keith Olbermann, about halfway down this page
Posted by: Stu
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May 21, 2009 2:07 PM
It's also a blatant rip-off of the Babylonian creation story
Now I'm confused. Rip-off? Didn't we prove that Christianity is the firstest and the bestest religion ever just the other day? I mean, Noah invented the boat, didn't he?
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 21, 2009 2:18 PM
David, while you correct in this assertion and you undoubtedly have a better grasp of reality then al thomas; for al thomas, this is a meaningless statement. Darwin was wrong and that he knew he was lying. It begins and ends there. It has to be pointed out that al thomas was mistaken from the very start. I doubt that al will accept it but one has to try.
Posted by: Josh
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May 21, 2009 2:25 PM
Or at least inadvertently cornered the market by telling everyone who would listen that there was going to be a flud. Apparently not a great salesman, that Noah...
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 21, 2009 2:29 PM
Josh & Stu -- have you ever read "The Origin of the Species" and Darwin's own discussion of objections to his theory? Evidently not.
Insults and foul language are not scientific arguments. People who know more about Darwin's theory than you, such as Derek Hough, author of "Evolution -- a case of stating the obvious" openly admits that Darwin's theory is "infantile nonsense". But like you he still feels compelled to believe evolution happened, being an atheist. But he don't know how. Like others before him he therefore theorizes that "life" arrived on earth from outer space on a comet.
The general public do not yet realize what a load of crap the whole thing is.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 21, 2009 2:48 PM
Have you read beyond the quote-mining?
Who?
See, that's what quote mining looks like.
Hey, I can quote mine too!
Here's Thomas Aquinas, the famous medieval theologian, asserting that God does not exist:
See? Thomas Aquinas did not believe in God. All of theology is destroyed!
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 21, 2009 2:50 PM
Al Thomas, you are quotemining. Also, you are at the wrong place to claim that you know more about the subject then everybody else here, as you will soon find out. That is if you are honest enough to stick around.
Like others before him he therefore theorizes that "life" arrived on earth from outer space on a comet.
Ooooohhhh! Someone just watched Expelled. Sorry, that is not a theory. That is a speculation and one that Dawkins does not think is very likely.
But I have a question Al Thomas, please point out the proof that Charles Darwin knew he was lying. Quotes from a letter about physical ailments does not prove your claim.
Posted by: God | May 21, 2009 3:00 PM
After he died, Aquinas tracked down the Muslim and the pagan that he so admired, and spends much time cheerfully arguing with them.
Every now and again, a disenchanted theologian will track him down, wave his finger, and sputter "It's all your fault!"
Aquinas shrugs, and responds with something along the lines of "At the time, it seemed eminently reasonable and profoundly logical."
Posted by: phantomreader42 | May 21, 2009 3:02 PM
Al Thomas, are you aware that On The Origin of Species was written A CENTURY AND A HALF AGO? As in, before the birth of the grandparents of anyone now living?
I know this concept is far beyond your understanding, but we've actually learned things in the past one-hundred fifty years. Yeah, freaky, isn't it? Learning? Looking at evidence? Refining models, gaining a better understanding of reality? Yeah, I know you find this hard to believe, but not everybody latches onto a moldy old book of myths as the one true source of all knowledge and worships it until the end of time.
Science moves on. Science adapts. Science evolves. Science improves. Science learns.
Meanwhile, religion sits in the same silly costumes, in the same ostentatious building, repeating the same bullshit translated from the ancient myths of primitive nutcases written in languages long dead. Religion stagnates, and promotes stagnation, lies, and willful ignorance as the highest nobility.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 21, 2009 3:06 PM
This Derek Hough?
Posted by: Josh
|
May 21, 2009 3:09 PM
*yawn*
Yes, I have. But thanks for asking.
Really? Oh, that's where I've been going wrong all these years. Thanks for clearing that up. By the way, care to perhaps point out where I directed foul language your way?
And you're familiar with my training in evolution exactly how? Moreover, you know what my publication record is exactly how?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 21, 2009 3:12 PM
Al Thomas, you ever look at the shit you say? Back it up with citations from the peer reviewed primary scientific literature. That is what separates the men from the boys, and the scientists from the cranks. You sir, are a crank.
Posted by: Janine, OMnivore | May 21, 2009 3:14 PM
Phantomreader42, while you are correct, for Al Thomas, that means nothing. Prove that Charles Darwin's ideas were stillborn from the start and one can ignore everything that comes afterward. If it were all a lie, it can be dismissed out of hand.
Just keep in mind, for Al Thomas, all atheists have to support evolution. But he has to ignore the likes of Ken Miller.
Posted by: amphiox | May 21, 2009 3:14 PM
David Marjanovic #507:
It's not a "rip-off" of the Babylonian story. It's a descendent - with modification.
And my dear Al Thomas, I must apologize for being unable to resist adding my own heel print onto your already flattened and thoroughly stomped intellectual carcass, but you do realize that this Darwinius was a juvenile, right? You know what that term means, don't you? That the poor critter died before sexual maturity? Without ever reproducing herself? And that is precisely what "unfit" refers to, and nothing else?
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 21, 2009 3:18 PM
Or better yet, I can quote mine the Bible itself!
The bible says: "There is no God".
Therefore, there is no God.
Posted by: Watchman | May 21, 2009 3:18 PM
Al Thomas
Posted by: God | May 21, 2009 3:24 PM
Hell is full of sophists.
Posted by: Satan | May 21, 2009 3:27 PM
True, but they have enormous fun arguing that they are not dead, and that where they are is not Hell.
Since Hell is by and large a state of mind, they are rather happier than most of the religious.
Posted by: Stu
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May 21, 2009 3:42 PM
Insults and foul language are not scientific arguments. People who know more about Darwin's theory than you
Nor are transparent and pathetic arguments from authority.
Jackass.
Posted by: Sigh | May 22, 2009 4:36 AM
wow creationists.
I actually read a stub in internet,
which says:
"if god is omniscient, then he must have known that eve was gonna eat that stupid apple, which means that god did stop eve from wrong things, and it means god is never holy.
Or should he not realize that eve has eaten that apple, then god is not omniscient..."
Think about it dude,
If you ever get deeper into the christianism,
what you see is fraud and errors,
not glory and salvation...
and one more thing..
I was christian either, and got quit a little time ago
I asked a pastor about a single question,
"what would happen to a person who killed a lot of people, but received christ before he died?"
the pastor said
"well then jesus paid the sin and he will go to heaven"
I asked him again
"what about a person who sacrificed himself to save a life, but did not receive christ before he died?"
then the pastor said
"Then he shall go to HELL"
after this,
I got quit
how can you speak of god's holiness,
if you guys never become humanistic?
don't go lunatic people,
this is sick.
do you know why people are gradually shifting
into other religion or to atheistic group?
it's because you guys never show an example of how people of "christ" should live...
this is nuts...
Posted by: Rajinder Soni | May 22, 2009 6:51 AM
I agree with all the statements by Professor PZ Myers and his understanding. He is a great experienced man and his writing reveals his expertise and talent. Actually, there has been a hype on the issue of Darwinius Masillae by not only media but also by many journalists and bloggers. When I read the whole issue on the net and came to know about Ida's discovery, it was all fine but when I read somewhere like Ida is the Holy Grail of Human Evolution, the Great Missing Link, and Monalisa of Human Evolution, and many more words and phrases, I laughed at them. Then, all these ironical statements led me to write something which I think is true according to me. I am not sure about other people but I have written whatever I think after researching on this issue. I am not a professor, nor a scientist but a simple content writer. If you would like to read what I think about Darwinius Masillae, you can through the link in my name above. At the end, I would thank Professor Myers opening my eyes.
Posted by: John Morales | May 22, 2009 7:43 AM
Rajinder Soni, first, I note your English is excellent, if idiomatically unusual. Second, I note in your post you append a poll question*: After reading all the facts, do you think Ida is the missing link between apes and humans?.
You might consider PZ's comment on this:
--
* That is, I'm assuming it's yours.
Posted by: Rajinder Soni | May 22, 2009 9:16 AM
Thank you very much Mr. Morales for giving me some feedback on my article.
"Rajinder Soni, first, I note your English is excellent, if idiomatically unusual.", regarding this statement of yours, I am highly obliged that you have told me about this. I will definitely work up on my weakness and try to improve my writing skills.
"Second, I note in your post you append a poll question*: After reading all the facts, do you think Ida is the missing link between apes and humans?" but regarding this statement of yours, I am not clear at all. If possible and you have time, please tell me what should I do or where I have to improve. It would be really helpful for me.
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 22, 2009 11:06 AM
Sorry to cite some more stuff from that little book I found on Amazon, "The Darwin Delusion", but I think they have cracked it.
Having accepted that the earth is probably many millions of years old, their next thesis is that there was a prehistoric world that was destroyed by the K-T event, and with it the dinosaurs and other extinct creature. Buckland helped explore that world and name its fossils.
Interestingly, this matches with the scenario in Gen1:1 that the earth created in the beginning was, or became, "without form and empty" of life. As some Bible scholars acknowledge the so-called Genesis creation account would therefore be a re-creation, a restoration. Some Jewish scholars suggested this take on Gen 1 centuries before Darwin. They had never heard of evolution.
It follows that the organisms of that prehistoric world were not the evolutionary ancestors of today's organisms. But just as there is ongoing variation or micro-evolution today, resulting in many varieties of dogs, for example, no doubt that was the case in the prehistoric world, with it various dinosaurs and fishbians, etc. The fossils of the Paleozoic and Mesozoic strata therefore seem to represent the complete flora and fauna of that prehistoric world, rather than an evolutionary sequence from sea onto land.
For some strange reason, biologists in Darwin's day thought that all organisms existed then as when created in Genesis. When every plant and animal breeder knew better -- and Jacob's experiments in cattle breeding are even described in Genesis.
So it's Micro-evolution -- Yes, but Macro-evolution -- No. As Derek Hough now postulates, there seems to be a creative "Self-developing Genome" engineered into all organisms driving micro-evolution. Trouble is, he cannot explain where it came from. It is in fact described in the Genesis account when God commanded creatures to reproduce "after their kind" -- so that dogs remain dogs and roses remain roses, no matter how exotic they become. The kinds of animals we are familiar with, cows and sheep, etc., did not exist in the prehistoric world.
This new take on old-earth creationism is apparently called "G-Theory". Makes sense to me.
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 22, 2009 11:11 AM
Sorry to cite some more stuff from that little book I found on Amazon, "The Darwin Delusion", but I think they have cracked it.
Having accepted that the earth is probably many millions of years old, their next thesis is that there was a prehistoric world that was destroyed by the K-T event, and with it the dinosaurs and other extinct creature. Buckland helped explore that world and name its fossils.
Interestingly, this matches with the scenario in Gen1:1 that the earth created in the beginning was, or became, "without form and empty" of life. As some Bible scholars acknowledge the so-called Genesis creation account would therefore be a re-creation, a restoration. Some Jewish scholars suggested this take on Gen 1 centuries before Darwin. They had never heard of evolution.
It follows that the organisms of that prehistoric world were not the evolutionary ancestors of today's organisms. But just as there is ongoing variation or micro-evolution today, resulting in many varieties of dogs, for example, no doubt that was the case in the prehistoric world, with it various dinosaurs and fishbians, etc. The fossils of the Paleozoic and Mesozoic strata therefore seem to represent the complete flora and fauna of that prehistoric world, rather than an evolutionary sequence from sea onto land.
For some strange reason, biologists in Darwin's day thought that all organisms existed then as when created in Genesis. When every plant and animal breeder knew better -- and Jacob's experiments in cattle breeding are even described in Genesis.
So it's Micro-evolution -- Yes, but Macro-evolution -- No. As Derek Hough now postulates, there seems to be a creative "Self-developing Genome" engineered into all organisms driving micro-evolution. Trouble is, he cannot explain where it came from. It is in fact described in the Genesis account when God commanded creatures to reproduce "after their kind" -- so that dogs remain dogs and roses remain roses, no matter how exotic they become. The kinds of animals we are familiar with, cows and sheep, etc., did not exist in the prehistoric world.
This new take on old-earth creationism is apparently called "G-Theory". Makes sense to me.
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 22, 2009 11:16 AM
But Al, that's because you are ignorant.Posted by: Watchman | May 22, 2009 11:17 AM
Putting icing on it won't make it taste any better.
There are so many things wrong with this I don't think I can even begin to address it. Not without quitting my job first.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
May 22, 2009 11:20 AM
Yawn, still nothing of cogency from a creobot and the creationist/ID movement. Science is way ahead of you, and is working on filling the gap you find so impossible. It will be solved. Where you see god, we so no need for god. In fact, if you were to remove god from every facet of your life, you would notice no difference. God is a null hypothesis.Posted by: Josh
|
May 22, 2009 11:29 AM
Al, what's your take on what a kind is?
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 22, 2009 1:31 PM
For the interested: I did another search on "Dating fired-clay ceramics using long-term power-law rehydroxylation kinetics", and found this excellent write-up of the paper for laypersons here:
http://archaeoastronomy.wordpress.com/2009/05/22/rehydroxylation-dating/
There's also a link at the bottom to the paper on the RSPA site itself. There's a DOI that doesn't work, but there is also a page that the editors apparently put up because of interest in the paper, that gives direct access to the PDF.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 22, 2009 1:52 PM
Ehem.
It's not "the Species", it's just "Species": "On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life."
Lots and lots of creationists make this silly little mistake. The simplest explanation is that they all copy from each other. They don't ever get the idea of considering any other sources, least of all the book in question itself!
This is sooooo ignorant.
There wasn't just a single "prehistoric world". There wasn't even just a single mass extinction event; there've been five big ones in the last 500 million years, and many smaller ones interspersed! And even between these, throughout the history of the Earth, we see change in the fossil record.
Really. Learn something – anything – and then come back.
Not that it matters, but that's based on a mistranslation. Gen 1:1 isn't even a complete sentence.
"In the beginning of Gods'[*] creation of Heaven and Earth, when the Earth was chaotic and empty, darkness was above the deep, and Gods' breath/spirit hovered above the waters, Gods said: 'Let there be light'. And there was light."
That's more like it.
Compare this.
* You know, 'elohim, the plural of 'eloha, the Hebrew word for "god"… it takes a singular verb in all known manuscripts, but still gets to say things like "let us make man in our image".
Posted by: Josh
|
May 22, 2009 2:06 PM
Ahhh, that's excellent. I didn't see that yesterday. The lead author has sent me a copy, though. Here's the abstract:
I thought it was a pretty nice, tight paper. Follow Owl's lead or email the authors for a copy. Lead author is Moira Wilson from the University of Manchester. I'm not going to put her email up on a blog, but it's easy to find with a Google search.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 22, 2009 3:32 PM
Problem is, it doesn't match anything else in Genesis.
(This sounds vaguely like a form of the "Framework Interpretation")
Thing of it is, those scholars lived in the Mediterranean world, and occasionally took the time to ponder things like rocks and rivers and such. They also studied the works of philosophers who commented on geology and natural history.
It's quite possible that in their travels and/or studies, these philosophers and scholars came across fossils of one sort or another, and came up with the idea of primordial worlds or previous creations in which these creatures had lived, in order to account for them.
As David Marjanović notes, which prehistoric world?
Cows and sheep did not exist before the Cretaceous, true, but we can trace their evolution from earlier mammals that existed well before the end of the Cretaceous.
And there are other animals that we are familiar with, that existed before the Cretaceous, which are still alive today. Many crocodilians, for example, and birds, and fish, and turtles, and snakes, and amphibians, and insects, as but a few examples. We also know of fossil plants that existed before the end of the Cretaceous that exist now.
Given that there are many obvious counter-examples, this theory is falsified, and must be rejected, just like every other creationist theory.
Posted by: John Morales | May 22, 2009 7:59 PM
Rajinder @530,
Sure, but remember I have no more authority than you in these matters, unlike some of the other posters here who are biologists (such as PZ himself).The poll question I addressed is After reading all the facts, do you think Ida is the missing link between apes and humans? [my emphasis]
First, in your poll question, the definite article indicates there is but one 'missing link' (transitional form), and an indefinite article would make the question more appropriate.
Second, in PZ's words, "It's also inappropriate to tag this discovery to human evolution. She's 47 million years old; she's also a missing link in chimp evolution, or rhesus monkey evolution."
Since Ida predates apes, she can't really link between them and humans.
Posted by: John Morales | May 22, 2009 8:04 PM
correction @541, I bolded the wrong 'the' - it should've been:
After reading all the facts, do you think Ida is the missing link between apes and humans? [my emphasis]
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM
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May 23, 2009 1:00 AM
yay!
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 23, 2009 4:01 AM
Owlmirror -- you make some good points.
My final comment is that both creationists and evolutionists seem to assume that animals, and man in particular, are nothing more than atoms and molecules. But as people like Rupert Sheldrake suggest, that cannot explain intellect and emotion and instinct -- the action of slime moulds, for example, or the fact that the young of migratory birds are born knowing how to navigate by sun and stars.
In "Pleasurable Kingdom", Balcombe discusses the sophisticated emotional lives of animals, and I read recently that a dog can read your facial expression. The more we discover, the more complex it becomes. The idea that these things can be accounted for by the fortuitous accumulation of accidental DNA copying errors is just not credible to me -- or even to many evolutionists.
Athough the BBC claim that evolution is a "fact", they have to admit that there is no credible mechanism. Now Sean Carroll is reduced to explaining the Cambrian Explosion by suggesting that "they must have invented toolbox genes". Not credible to me.
For both sides of the debate, it is a matter of faith.
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 23, 2009 4:09 AM
Owlmirror -- you make some good points.
My final comment is that both creationists and evolutionists seem to assume that animals, and man in particular, are nothing more than atoms and molecules. But as people like Rupert Sheldrake suggest, that cannot explain intellect and emotion and instinct -- the action of slime moulds, for example, or the fact that the young of migratory birds are born knowing how to navigate by sun and stars.
In "Pleasurable Kingdom", Balcombe discusses the sophisticated emotional lives of animals, and I read recently that a dog can read your facial expression. The more we discover, the more complex it becomes. The idea that these things can be accounted for by the fortuitous accumulation of accidental DNA copying errors is just not credible to me -- or even to many evolutionists.
Athough the BBC claim that evolution is a "fact", they have to admit that there is no credible mechanism. Now Sean Carroll is reduced to explaining the Cambrian Explosion by suggesting that "they must have invented toolbox genes". Not credible to me.
For both sides of the debate, it is a matter of faith.
Posted by: John Morales | May 23, 2009 4:22 AM
Al Thomas, Athough the BBC claim that evolution is a "fact", they have to admit that there is no credible mechanism.But biologists think there is.
An 'explosion' that takes tens of millions of years is only so in the context of deep time.Posted by: Anonymous | May 23, 2009 4:41 AM
except that it actually can. yet another Argument from Ignorance *yawn*Posted by: Ichthyic | May 23, 2009 4:48 AM
But as people like Rupert Sheldrake suggest, that cannot explain intellect and emotion and instinct -- the action of slime moulds, for example, or the fact that the young of migratory birds are born knowing how to navigate by sun and stars.
um, genetics can't explain innate behaviors?
news to me.
tell us more about the things that have already been explained decades ago but you seem to have utterly missed?
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 23, 2009 5:06 AM
Owlmirror -- you make some good points.
My final comment is that both creationists and evolutionists seem to assume that animals, and man in particular, are nothing more than atoms and molecules. But as people like Rupert Sheldrake suggest, that cannot explain intellect and emotion and instinct -- the action of slime moulds, for example, or the fact that the young of migratory birds are born knowing how to navigate by sun and stars.
In "Pleasurable Kingdom", Balcombe discusses the sophisticated emotional lives of animals, and I read recently that a dog can read your facial expression. The more we discover, the more complex it becomes. The idea that these things can be accounted for by the fortuitous accumulation of accidental DNA copying errors is just not credible to me -- or even to many evolutionists.
Athough the BBC claim that evolution is a "fact", they have to admit that there is no credible mechanism. Now Sean Carroll is reduced to explaining the Cambrian Explosion by suggesting that "they must have invented toolbox genes". Not credible to me.
For both sides of the debate, it is a matter of faith.
Posted by: AdamK | May 23, 2009 1:06 PM
Personal incredulity is, of course, an empty and fallacious argument. Just because you are not convinced by an explanation doesn't make the explanation inadequate. It may just mean you are not well enough versed in the details to understand the explanation's power or implications.
And what, exactly, would be "credible" to you? If chemistry and evolution (the "mechanisms" of which are very well understood indeed) are inadequate, what's better? Magic?
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 23, 2009 1:20 PM
Wrong again. Science works by evidence. We have a million or so scientific papers with physical evidence directly or indirectly backing evolution. So there is no faith involved, since there is evidence, and no need for imaginary deities. You need a deity (yet unproven), so you need faith. So, good hard physical evidence, or a hearsay circumstantial case. Which would you rather have behind you at a trial?Posted by: A.J. Allen | May 23, 2009 2:13 PM
i don't what the big deal is, Darwinuis is just a bunch of bones, that's been dead and gone, for over 47.000.000 ( 47e6 ) million years, now. We need to first worry about solving our current problems, before studying the past, of dead animals, and building, or space issues.
Posted by: John Morales | May 23, 2009 9:45 PM
A.J. Allen, you don't think ignorance about the natural world is problematic?
Posted by: Kel | May 23, 2009 10:05 PM
People who say this have no idea about the processes of science. It's amazing that they think science is a faith while they sit in front of one of the achievements of the scientific method: the computer. The computer works because we understand nature well enough to put it to practical use. Those magic flying machines in the sky, the magic picture box in your living room, those god pills you take when you are sick, or the magic song brick you use to listen to music - all these are triumphs of the scientific method.Science is not a faith because quite simply: science works. Anyone who pretends otherwise is either a fool, a liar or a hypocrite.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 23, 2009 10:17 PM
How does that even follow?
1) The young of migratory birds are born knowing how to navigate by sun and stars.
2) Therefore, they cannot be explained as being composed of only atoms and molecules.
Seriously, what?
Such as who?
And why would dogs being able to understand facial expressions be too incredible to explain by genetic variations?
What are you even talking about?
Given that that is a 6 word summary of the vastly complex field of genomic analysis in light of evolutionary development, perhaps your incredulity is because you don't really know the scientific knowledge that it represents.How so? Science is based on the evidence. Disagreement with the conclusions of science is based on ignorance of the evidence, so far as I can tell, or arises from some problem with the methodology of science.
Posted by: SC, OM | May 23, 2009 10:42 PM
Gosh, can't think of any evolutionary explanation for that. That is problematic...
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 24, 2009 6:59 AM
Kel, please do not confuse the vague waffle and speculation of evolutionary biology with the testable scientific process of physics.
Because you want to believe in evolution, you assume it occurred. You then feel free to speak in generalities, descriptive language with no specific chain of causality, and use vague verbs such as "invented", "acquired", "evolved", etc. Because you see the micro-evolutionary variation at work that God engineered in the Genesis kinds that has created varieties of dogs and roses, fruit flies, etc., you assume that macro-evolution is also a reality. That is the basic "Darwin Delusion", the schoolboy error of extrapolating way beyond the range of available data.
True believers trot out the party line, but top scientists know better -- that evolution simply cannot explain the the basic complexity of life on earth. Which is why Francis Crick, for example, suggests that "life" arrived from outer space on a comet. This is serious science man!
The best evolution can do is claim that complexity arose from the fortuitous accumulation of random DNA copying errors -- and then of course where did the DNA come from, let alone tiers of slave and master genes. It really is infantile, as Derek Hough admits.
The impressive "abstract" someone quoted above about the Cambrian Explosion is a fine example of this generalized, non-specific waffle and jargon that explains absolutely nothing. Such waffle may be comforting to evolutionists but it avoids hard questions of How? How? How?
How for example did sex arise and the existence of different but complementary reproductive organs in vast numbers of different organisms? How? How? How? Evolution cannot answer. And please do not refer me to more vague waffle that explains nothing specific. No wonder Dawkins admits that he avoids the subject. Yes, let's get scientific. Let's get specific, not just comforting speculation and wishful thinking.
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 24, 2009 7:03 AM
Kel, please do not confuse the vague waffle and speculation of evolutionary biology with the testable scientific process of physics.
Because you want to believe in evolution, you assume it occurred. You then feel free to speak in generalities, descriptive language with no specific chain of causality, and use vague verbs such as "invented", "acquired", "evolved", etc. Because you see the micro-evolutionary variation at work that God engineered in the Genesis kinds that has created varieties of dogs and roses, fruit flies, etc., you assume that macro-evolution is also a reality. That is the basic "Darwin Delusion", the schoolboy error of extrapolating way beyond the range of available data.
True believers trot out the party line, but top scientists know better -- that evolution simply cannot explain the the basic complexity of life on earth. Which is why Francis Crick, for example, suggests that "life" arrived from outer space on a comet. This is serious science man!
The best evolution can do is claim that complexity arose from the fortuitous accumulation of random DNA copying errors -- and then of course where did the DNA come from, let alone tiers of slave and master genes. It really is infantile, as Derek Hough admits.
The impressive "abstract" someone quoted above about the Cambrian Explosion is a fine example of this generalized, non-specific waffle and jargon that explains absolutely nothing. Such waffle may be comforting to evolutionists but it avoids hard questions of How? How? How?
How for example did sex arise and the existence of different but complementary reproductive organs in vast numbers of different organisms? How? How? How? Evolution cannot answer. And please do not refer me to more vague waffle that explains nothing specific. No wonder Dawkins admits that he avoids the subject. Yes, let's get scientific. Let's get specific, not just comforting speculation and wishful thinking.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 24, 2009 7:18 AM
Al Thomas, Kel was correct, no you. If there is another scientific theory for explaining biology, trot it out from the peer reviewed scientific literature. Otherwise, evolution occurred. I notice people like you who try to challenge evolution never bother to show physical evidence for your deity/creator. In any scientific argument, that would be the first thing to prove, since without the god/creator, your idea falls apart. So Al Thomas, show us the physical evidence for your creator, that will pass muster with scientists, magicians, and professional debunkers as being of divine, and not natural, origin. Until you do so, evolution is the only scientific theory to explain biology.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself
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May 24, 2009 7:24 AM
Shorter Al Thomas: Goddit. No evidence for this, but evolution doesn't require god so evolution is wrong. GODDIDIT!
Unspoken Al Thomas: All you evilutionists are big meanies for not accepting that goddidit.
Posted by: 'Tis Himself
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May 24, 2009 7:30 AM
Al, just because YOU don't know about the evolution of sex doesn't mean that actual biologists don't know the answer. A few minutes with Google gives whole bunches of sources. Here's one.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 24, 2009 7:49 AM
Al Thomas, this isn't a philosophical debate. It is a scientific debate, which uses different rules. Evidence, hard physical evidence, is required. Evolution has a million or so scientific papers, with that physical evidence, directly and indirectly supporting evolution.
Posted by: Kel | May 24, 2009 8:15 AM
I'm not confusing anything. Science is science, and what is discovered by the scientific method is still a product of that same line of thinking regardless of if it's physics or biology. Though if you want to argue physics: the physics of electromagnetism shows that the universe is billions of years old. We know it is billions of years old because of the red-shifting of light as we see the light emitted by distant galaxies. The speed of light holds constant and the distance is measured through a variety of standard candles based on that assumption grounded in physics.Likewise the earth is about 4.55 billion years old. Again, this comes down to an understanding of physics. The nuclear decay of certain isotopes is able to be used to measure just how old rocks are, so combining that with relative ageing of rocks (older layers must be laid down first) and by using multiple dating techniques with different half-lives means that we can accurately date rocks of various ages. This again has nothing to do with biology but physics.
So now we come to applications of physics - we are able to date rocks from using the laws of physics. And in those rocks we see the gradual emergence of life. 3.7 billion years ago there are the first signs of bacteria, multicellular life is still 3 billion years off. But in those 600 million years, we see the diversity of life from layer to layer, and by putting animals from the different layers together, we see a pattern emerge. We see simple life 530 million years ago, but we don't see fish or any animals on land 370 million years ago sees the first emergence of amphibians from fish ancestors. 230 million years ago sees the first steps towards mammals, 150 million years ago and the first signs of dinosaurs evolving into birds... and so on.
Then we can look at the genome of humanity - the same technology used in paternity testing is able to be used to see common ancestry. And we do. We are able to see that creatures with similar morphological features have closer DNA - it's backed by the genes they have and the genetic drift exhibited on pseudogenes long switched off. We are able to see precise genetic markers such as those pseudogenes, virus DNA being injected at precise points of the genome, and morphological vestigial structures that are shared among types. We don't see feathered mammals, but we do see feathered birds.
Then there's the biogeographical distribution of life. Ever wondered why all large Australian mammals until about 40,000 years ago have pouches? They are marsupials, and we can see the similar morphological features therein. Koalas have an upside down pouch - terrible for climbing trees. But they are closely related to the burrowing wombat, that has a backwards pouch so when it is digging it doesn't fling dirt into its pouch. The Koalas still have this upside down pouch, but have evolved what is the equivalent to a draw-string, a muscle which tightens so the cubs won't fall out while it is climbing. Australia's unique wildlife is seen nowhere else on earth, it is that unique, but that happens when you have 30 million years of isolation.
I could go on all night if you really wanted, but the simple fact is that science works. Whether it is physics, dirty-physics (chemistry), or dirty-chemistry (biology), the same kinds of observation and drawing conclusions based on evidence is still there. We can show that the universe is old through physics. We can show that the moon is not a light in the sky, rather it is a mirror for the sun's light. We can show that we weren't made of clay, but share the same genetic markers that ultimately indicate common descent. While there is still much to learn, it should not follow that we shun what we do know about nature and our place within. We evolved, just like every other creature on this planet. This has nothing to do with belief or finding comfort in such an idea, it's where the evidence points. If you reject it on a conflict with your beliefs, then you are showing yourself to be close-minded. I'm not married to evolution and neither is anyone else here. If it was shown tomorrow that evolution is wrong, then we could change to whatever idea superseded it. Could you say the same for your beliefs?
Posted by: Kel | May 24, 2009 8:42 AM
Just for amusement, I would like you to actually trot out who these top scientists are. Here's the top academy of scientists, this is where the absolute top scientists belong to. How many of them reject evolution? How many Nobel Laureates reject evolution? You have physics, Chemistry and medicine to choose from.This should be interesting - I love that creationists have no problem in lying to suit their own ends. The top scientists say evolution can't happen? Well, prove it!
Posted by: al Thomas | May 24, 2009 2:19 PM
Do you really believe that all Nobel Laureates believe in evolution, and is that the most serious you can take issue with. Here is a quote from one such prize winner in medicine: “I would rather believe in fairies than in such wild speculation. …I have said for years that speculations about the origin of life lead to no useful purpose as even the simplest living system is far too complex to be understood in terms of the extremely primitive chemistry scientists have used in their attempts to explain the unexplainable that happened billions of years ago.
I have already mentioned Francis Crick, and could add Sir Fred Hoyle. My serious point is that evolution is not the proven scientific fact you maintain -- and those who know the subject best are less dogmatic because they appreciate the assumptions and speculation involved.
This Berkeley University site is honest enough to recognize those uncertainties: "Some of the questions that evolutionary biologists are trying to answer include:
Does evolution tend to proceed slowly and steadily or in quick jumps?
Why are some clades very diverse and some unusually sparse?
How does evolution produce new and complex features?
Are there trends in evolution, and if so, what processes generate them?"
Posted by: Sven DiMilo | May 24, 2009 2:32 PM
Assertion troll keeps on asserting.
P.S. There is no such thing as Berkeley University.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 24, 2009 2:33 PM
Al Thomas, still no evidence for your imaginary god.
What people do, like Francis Collins, away from the lab is there business, like it should be. Collins never uses god in his science work. Science ignore the existence of god, since it makes science work harder for naturalistic explanations. The god of Collins is mere a personal add on for him. Until you are wise enough to see this, you are another totally ignorant godbot.
Philosophy doesn't count here. True physical evidence and citations from the peer reviewed primary scientific literature do. Do you have any evidence for god or ID to offer? If not, you are wasting both your and our times.
Posted by: Rey Fox | May 24, 2009 3:14 PM
"Because you want to believe in evolution, you assume it occurred. "
You have no idea what any of us want, so I'll have to assume that you're projecting from your own desire to believe that the universe was created by some being that loves him.
"Because you see the micro-evolutionary variation at work that God engineered in the Genesis kinds that has created varieties of dogs and roses, fruit flies, etc., you assume that macro-evolution is also a reality."
At what point does accumulated micro-evolution become macro-evolution, and therefore, in your view, impossible? What is the barrier beyond which evolution cannot occur, and why can this barrier not be surmounted? Show your work.
"It really is infantile, as Derek Hough admits."
You sure like to drop names.
"How for example did sex arise and the existence of different but complementary reproductive organs in vast numbers of different organisms?"
Do you really think that sex had to be evolved independently in every species? And yet you seem to be reluctant to drop Ray Comfort's name... That's the nice thing about common ancestry, you know. Things like sex only have to come into being once.
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/03/elephantine_errors_from_ray_co.php
"No wonder Dawkins admits that he avoids the subject."
You know, forget what I said earlier about showing your work. Obviously, this is nothing but a big rhetorical battle for you, and facts mean far less than little snippets of quoted or paraphrased material from the respective players. Obviously, talking with you any further on this subject wouldn't be enlightening.
Posted by: Kel | May 24, 2009 5:14 PM
I was asking you to back up your claims. After all, you were the one who claimed that the top scientists reject evolution - I gave two lists of what are considered the top scientists: the National Academy of Science and Nobel Prize winners. Asking you to back up your claims with evidence? Shit, seems to be an impossible standard for creationists.As for the most serious issue? Read my #563 and that's where the most serious issue lies. You simply do not understand the relationship between physics and biology, and the application of the scientific method in regard to either. I noticed you ignored that to bring up the "only a theory argument:
Gah! Evolution is better than fact, it is theory. All theories in science are tentative knowledge, they change as new evidence comes to light. Life shares a common ancestor - the evidence for this is overwhelming. But as to the process by which this took place is still being determined. After all, we are talking about events that happen over millions of years with the evidential support of observing what happens in but a few years.We evolved, how we evolved is another matter and that is where the controversy in biology lies. But this doesn't mean that saying "God did it" is going to be any more of an answer, evolution will hold true even if the mechanisms behind evolution change. There's just too much fossil, anatomical, biogeographical and genetic evidence showing common ancestry to throw out evolution. The mechanisms of natural selection, horizontal gene transfer, speciation, mutation, genetic drift, etc. these aren't as strongly supported as evolution itself.
We evolved, just as all life did. Be intellectually honest and recognise this fact. Whether natural selection can account for all that we see is another matter.
Posted by: Kel | May 24, 2009 5:17 PM
"We've looked at evidence from many areas - the fossil record, biogeography, embryology, vestigial structures, suboptimal design, and so on - all of that evidence showing, without a scintilla of doubt, that organisms have evolved. And it's not just small "microevolutionary" changes, either: we've seen new species form, both in real time and in the fossil record, and we've found transitional forms between major groups, such as whales and land animals. We've observed natural selection in action, and have every reason to think that it can produce complex organisms and features." - Jerry Coyne, Why Evolution Is True, p242
Posted by: Kel | May 24, 2009 5:24 PM
"Every day, hundreds of observations and experiments pour into the hopper of the scientific literature. Many of them don't have much to do with evolution - they're observations about he details of physiology, biochemistry, development, and so on - but many of them do. And every fact that has something to do with evolution confirms its truth. Every fossil that we find, every DNA molecule that we sequence, every organ system that we dissect, supports the idea that species evolved from common ancestors. Despite innumerable possible observations that could prove evolution untrue, we don't have a single one. We don't find mammals in Precambrian rocks, humans in the same layers as dinosaurs, or any other fossils out of evolutionary order. DNA sequencing supports the evolutionary relationships of species originally deduced from the fossil record. And, as natural selection predicts, we find no species with adaptations that only benefit a different species. We do find dead genes and vestigial organs, incomprehensible under the idea of special creation. Despite a million chances to be wrong, evolution always comes up right. That is as close as we can get to a scientific truth" - Jerry Coyne, Why Evolution Is True, p242-p243
Posted by: Ichthyic | May 24, 2009 5:29 PM
Do you really believe that all Nobel Laureates believe in evolution, and is that the most serious you can take issue with. Here is a quote from one such prize winner in medicine: "I would rather believe in fairies than in such wild speculation. …I have said for years that speculations about the origin of life lead to no useful purpose as even the simplest living system is far too complex to be understood in terms of the extremely primitive chemistry scientists have used in their attempts to explain the unexplainable that happened billions of years ago.
*whew* good thing the person you quoted was talking about abiogenesis instead of evolution then.
*rolleyes*
you're a moron, Al.
...and a quoteminer.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 24, 2009 5:37 PM
You creobots never disappoint in your lack of imagination and lack of citational accuracy. Just another Liar for Jebus™.Posted by: Kel | May 24, 2009 5:47 PM
And it must be stated again: Abiogenesis IS NOT evolution. Abiogenesis has to do with the formation of life, from organic molecules to replicating life. Evolution is what comes afterward, it's the way in which replicating life changes over time. It's intellectually dishonest to complain that evolution can't explain the origin of life because evolution doesn't try to explain the origin of life. It's like complaining that evolution doesn't explain gravity.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 24, 2009 5:59 PM
Says the one who hypocritically wants to disbelieve in evolution, and therefore assumes that it could not have occurred.
Says the one who hypocritically invokes vague verbs like "engineered" and vague words like "kinds" and "varieties" in the very next sentence.
Where is the evidence of this God who "engineered" the Genesis "kinds"? Why does this biotechnician God of yours need you to speak for him? Especially since you are obviously deeply ignorant of biology and a hypocrite to boot.
No creationist has ever, ever, ever, ever, ever shown that "macro-evolution" is unsupported by the data. They just assert that it is, in arrogant contradiction to the scientific evidence for evolution.Top scientists know no such thing.
A few scientists who are also in some way creationists assert it, but assertion is not fact.
For pity's sake. Francis Crick was not a creationist, and neither was his co-writer Leslie Orgel. They suggested panspermia as a hypothetical alternative to life arising here on Earth -- and agreed that it would have originally evolved in its original location.
The paper by Crick and Orgel hypothesizing Directed Panspermia is here ( Icarus 19, 341-346 (1973) ). It is only 6 pages long.
http://profiles.nlm.nih.gov/SC/B/C/C/P/_/scbccp.pdf
That, in a nutshell, is the mechanism of evolution over time. But that is vastly oversimplified, of course.
Many organic chemists are indeed working on the problem. You could, for example, read up on them here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abiogenesis
Although you will no doubt whinge because they are not creating amoeba from scratch.
Says the one who hypocritically posits a Big Sky Daddy to frown at DNA and tell it "NO excessive variation! Or else!"
In other words, you're too ignorant to understand it, and too stupid to learn, and too arrogant to admit that you're both ignorant and stupid.
The full paper is available for free, and it includes references.
HOW did God come into existence? HOW is it that God is supposed to exist with NO EVIDENCE of that existence? HOW did God create DNA? HOW did God make life? HOW did God make life evolve? HOW did God make it look like life evolved with NO GOD WHATSOEVER being involved?
Hypocrite.
HOW did God cause sex to arise and the existence of different but complementary reproductive organs in vast numbers of different organisms?
The bible doesn't say HOW. It just says: "God did it". That's not an explanation.
Hypocrite again, you with your "God engineered" and "Genesis kinds"
Hypocrite squared and cubed.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 24, 2009 6:07 PM
*sips libation while reading Owlmirror's spot on takedown of the creobot. Makes note to recommend Owlmirror for another tentacle cluster, hoping Owlmirror's chest is big enough for all the decorations.*
Posted by: amphiox | May 24, 2009 6:16 PM
Macroevolution IS a reality. It was the FIRST documented fact biology. Only the mechanism is at issue.
Even if you insist that God poofed all life into being from wads of clay, smote the forms He didn't like and poofed new ones into existence to replace them, either once in a ginormous flood or repeatedly over the eons, THAT'S STILL MACROEVOLUTION.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | May 24, 2009 6:35 PM
Wake me up when al Thomas returns... or, better yet, when he has learned to read the error message. (His last two comments got posted three times each.)
Posted by: J.on | May 25, 2009 1:55 AM
Thank you Mr.Myers. I was wondering why Ida was repeatedly being referred to as "The" (instead of A) missing link (along with our other unearthed transitional forms) and I thought media giddiness might have played a part. She is an amazing find, regardless and it was nice to get a little more about her.
Posted by: Al Thomas | May 25, 2009 4:28 AM
I think we must agree to disagree, but I hope any Christian person reading this site will realize from the irrational anger and insult stirred up that evolutionists have something to hide -- basically the simple fact that despite all the hype, they have no credible theory for the origin of "life" (which is more than chemical self-replication anyway) or the existence and complexity of some 50 million species. It is a massive con trick.
I would recommend three books -- "Evolution -- a case of stating the obvious" and "The Darwin Delusion". Also "The Doctrine of DNA" by Lewontin.
END
Posted by: John Morales | May 25, 2009 4:51 AM
Al Thomas:
Whatever makes you think Christianity* and acceptance of evolutionary science are exclusive?Yet another belief you espouse which is counterfactual. Clearly, intellectual honesty is not your strong point.
--
* indeed, theists in general.
Posted by: Kel | May 25, 2009 8:08 AM
Again, diversity of life != origin of life. Evolution happened, the evidence is overwhelming. And by all accounts it can build the complexity seen as we can see the increase in genetic code, observations of gene duplications, and the emergence of novel features. So while we can't yet account for how life started (can you account for it?) we can account for the state of life as it is today - to say otherwise is being dishonest or ignorant.Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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May 25, 2009 8:21 AM
Al Thomas, you never once presented any evidence. Science is all about evidence. You just made accusations against evolutionists. And wonder why you got nowhere? Show us the evidence. You finally posted some books, but those are books that have already been refuted (didn't check to see if that was the case did you--poor scholarship if you didn't). We know what they say, why they are wrong and unscientific, and why people who keep proposing them are dunderheads. Total failure of knowing how to convince scientists. Only science refutes science, and you presented none. Bye Bye.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 25, 2009 12:35 PM
I hope that any sane person -- whatever they might believe or not believe about God or about evolution -- will realize that you, personally, continue to demonstrate deep moral hypocrisy; inasmuch as you have expressed irrational anger, contempt, snide accusations, smears, and outright insults, while whinging loudly and angrily whenever your bullying behavior is noted and reacted to....
...and you continue to whinge and bluster insultingly!
You may call yourself a Christian, but it reflects badly on you that you ignore and reject the commandment to "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
And you do it again. Hypocrite.
Since evolutionary biology has an evidence-based and very detailed theory for the existence and complexity of life, and biochemistry has some good working hypotheses about the origin of life, it is obviously massively superior to religion, which has nothing and never will have anything.
It is indeed religion which is the "massive con trick". And you're just a sucker who is trying to con others.
I would offer reading recommendations in return, but what would be the use? It's obvious that you everything you read is through the filter of your massive con trick.
If only.
Posted by: Rey Fox | May 25, 2009 1:05 PM
"but I hope any Christian person reading this site will realize from the irrational anger and insult stirred up that evolutionists have something to hide"
Aaaand it looks like Al didn't read a single word we wrote. Well, maybe he skimmed a little to find things to inflame his persecution complex. You might want to consider that when you're in educated company and everyone disagrees with you that you might, juuuust might, be wrong.
But why is your hope limited to Christians? Why not someone of any other religious persuasion? Is it because this is nothing more than tribal identity to you? Us vs. them? Or do you somehow realize how unconvincing your myths are to anyone not indoctrinated into them? Is it because you think that Christians have the mental blinder that anyone who uses insults must be wrong? The evidence does seem to show that they fall for any smooth-talking con man who strokes their egos.
"It is a massive con trick."
Uh huh. So what is the motive behind this con? Why such an elaborate scientific construct? Who benefits and how? And how is it that thousands of scientists all over the world are in on it?
Oh, by the way, I don't think Lewontin is exactly on your side.
Posted by: Owlmirror | May 25, 2009 1:37 PM
Speaking of Lewontin, I went hunting for more info about the book Biology as Ideology (subtitled: "The Doctrine of DNA"; title and subtitle are reversed in the UK), and found this interesting discussion here:
http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/comments/biology_as_ideology/
On the one hand, I have not read the book, and PZ appears to be favorable towards it (or was favorable at the time, 4 years ago). But Alon Levy shows up in the thread, and appears to make a good defense of his criticism of the book. I don't have time to read all the back-and-forth just now, but it's out there for the interested.
Posted by: Rupert | May 27, 2009 9:08 PM
Beelsebub placed this below the ocean jammed it into som rocks and made it into a swamp 5950 years ago while on picnic.
You have to see the connection, Germany and Norway!
Germany is a evil place, and has always been one. Part of the UN and stuff. Norway is filled with socialists and universal healthcare and atheistic scientific eduacation is a human right or something. Atheism seem to be quite normal there aswell.
Open your minds people!
:)
Posted by: Stephen Goedon | June 1, 2009 3:41 PM
Woopi dooo!! What, another missing link? Ho ho ho ho. I can hardly wait for the next one. Get a life you Darwinian drains. I think you Dartwinians are the missing links - that's missing as in brain-dead.
Stephen. (Proud to be correct)
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | June 1, 2009 3:44 PM
You obviously didn't read, um, anything here did you?
Posted by: sikişme | June 15, 2009 12:16 PM
And it's not even a pure cost issue -- though cost is important, as we're spending far more than other countries and getting worse outcomes. So cost (a word used with disdain by outfits like this new one formed by pharma, as if cost is the concern only of cynics, cheapskates, and those who don't "value" human life) is obviously one concern being addressed by the comparative effectiveness drive -- and it's a legitimate concern, because big money spend on so-so or lousy treatments is money we can't use to treat the vast unwashed and uninsured.
Posted by: iddaa | June 16, 2009 4:51 AM
Woopi dooo!! What, another missing link? Ho ho ho ho. I can hardly wait for the next one. Get a life you Darwinian drains. I think you Dartwinians are the missing links - that's missing as in brain-dead.
Stephen. (Proud to be correct)
Posted by: Stephen | July 8, 2009 3:28 PM
Come on...haven't we been "finding" the missing link for the last 30 years?
Posted by: Stephen | July 8, 2009 3:38 PM
Come on...haven't we been "finding" the missing link for the last 30 years?
Posted by: Adolph | July 19, 2009 12:08 AM
What are creationists?
Are there still people that believe the world is twelve thousand years old, and homo erectus just popped into being? I thought it was mandatory in most countries for children to at least go to elementary school.
Ok, in that case I no longer believe in gravity, or in plant life for that matter, and if I hold my hands over my ears and squeeze my eyes shut real tight, then I might go through life without ever being challenged, and spend eternity hanging out in the big white, watching people on earth have all the fun sinning.
Ida is just one fossil that has been brought to light, a link, but not the link. There is no such things as a missing link, evolution is just adaptation and mutation over millions and billions of years. No matter if we uncover a fossil from every species that has even inhabited earth, religious zealots will never change their minds.
Why does religion have the monopoly on god?
If science has taught us anything, it is that science is always changing, it is the knowledge of right this second. There is a lot more in this universe that we have yet to discover, so atheist and godfags beware.
Posted by: Mike | August 14, 2009 1:56 PM
All this hype over a lemur.
Posted by: keith | August 18, 2009 10:50 AM
How do you know how old this new-found animal is
Posted by: keith | August 18, 2009 11:01 AM
im just starting out in the wrld n all and was wondering what all i could gather from a nice repository chat.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
August 18, 2009 11:17 AM
Keith, click on the article link at the bottom of PZ's review. The article is in the open literature. Short answer, they dated the rocks.
Posted by: keith | August 19, 2009 9:54 AM
sorry i tried many links but could not find the one you mentond but did read about a cladisic analisis...would that happen to be carbon dateing?
Posted by: keith | August 19, 2009 9:58 AM
by read i mean on someones chat box. sorry for not being clear the first time around.
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
|
August 19, 2009 10:18 AM
No, carbon14 dating is only good to about 50,000 years ago due to its short half-life. The paper had a reference that used argon40/argon39 to measure a piece of basalt (igneous rock). You can check Wiki for radiometric dating methods. Note that creationist sites lie about the accuracy of radiometric methods without being able to cite the peer reviewed (gold standard) scientific literature.Posted by: keith | August 19, 2009 11:56 PM
oh I see now it uses the decay rate to mesure the time that it has been dead...but from what i'v learnd many variations can happen during decay to speed or slow the process such as temprature, parasites, bactiria, chemicals and so on and so forth. then all proven dateing methodes would have to run the trial with the conclusion being the lest variated number being the answer.
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | August 20, 2009 12:04 AM
keith, radioactive decay != decomposition of body
none of the things you mention (or anything else for that matter) affect radioactive decay. that's why we use it for dating methods.
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 12:14 AM
hmmm...i got wind of somthing while reaserching stuff like a good little nerd and i stumbled across this bit of info. when the first spaceship landed on the moon the scientists estemated the amount of stardust that the moon collects per-year, useing the amounts of studies that showd how much it collected for the past few years (then) and for fear of the apolo sinking in they put discs at the botom of this ship, then the people were launched out to the moon and landed safely atop the settled dust. they then suit up and eas onto the sediment and did not sink themselves. then pulling out their ruler measered considerably less than what was supposed to be there...(the measure taken was a few centemeters but the amount that landed during studies were multipied by the number of years eath was said to be old meaning that it was enough to cover the ship...)
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 12:21 AM
hmm thats neat so it would measure just the radioactive parts that entered unafected by rate of decay...ingenious!
Posted by: Jadehawk, OM | August 20, 2009 12:23 AM
the estimate ranged from a few inches to a few feet, because there were too many variables. they played it safe and planned for a lot of dust, but it turned out that the lower estimates were correct. Not even Answers in Genesis uses that argument anymore: Moon-dust argument no longer useful.
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 12:32 AM
i was wondering...what if there was a leap or withdraw of radioactive isatopes or any other radioactivemtirial would radioactive abundace have an effect? (sorry for all the Q and A bu im an eager learner as are all scientist)
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 12:40 AM
hmm..thanks for the reply =) so there was a range of estimted variable for this and too many risk factors lead to the precauton.
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 12:49 AM
wuldnt it b great to study the sun someday and bring back samples? then we could learn to harvest energy usein the knowledge gathered from the composition of the sun to create a flame that burns forever...that is of corse we can gather te proper matirial and finaly know why it buns so furvently...sorry had a brainstorm thundering outof controll. =)
Posted by: Owlmirror | August 20, 2009 12:51 AM
*sigh*
Radiometric Dating : A Christian Perspective
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 12:54 AM
checking back over my talks i noticed a spelling catstrophy sorry for that the buttons on my computer are sticking. =)
Posted by: John Morales | August 20, 2009 12:55 AM
keith,
There isn't. Isotopes are physically and chemically almost identical, and decay rates are not affected by ordinary processes.
Posted by: Owlmirror | August 20, 2009 1:04 AM
*sigh*, again.
We don't need to go to the sun to find out what it's made of or why it burns. We know that it's made of mostly hydrogen and helium, and that it burns because it fuses hydrogen nuclei into helium.
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 1:09 AM
so...beacause it fuses and burns it does so continuously...it creates its own fusion products?
Posted by: Ichthyic | August 20, 2009 1:10 AM
the buttons on my computer are sticking
That's because you keep drooling on your keyboard, moron.
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 1:46 AM
heheh (forgot how to laugh wen through th motions ;-D )
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 1:57 AM
this would just so happen to be an intelegent conversation where obvious and unobvious are exploered sientifically and th best possible answer discovered. i know i haven't finished colledge and im not in on most recent discoveries. i only found this web adress a few days ago and iv only had internet for a few weeks. i cant help that my computer's slow like your jokes or a type-o apears im just starting out and the nice jentlemen are informing me on those subjects i have yet to fully understand beacause the points in which to study are at suc opposites fudes break out and bounderies are placed so please let me enjoy a little insight without repremand for an appology over a few misspellings on a rinkydink computer with bad internent connection...
Posted by: keith | August 20, 2009 2:10 AM
back to john morales...
i read the link that was posted (radioactive dateing presentation with hourglass concept was pretty insighfull. had no idea that happens thnx for the insight owlmirror andalso jade owl and nerd of redhd with yor insights guess ill come back next night or whenever with more Q and A