Liberty - why do you make the assumption of bad design?
I think that you are asking the wrong questions looking for answers that aren't relevant. Let's look at it another way:
1/ Death isn't a problem (assuming God exist God has that covered - its called heaven - a place where death and pain are not)
2/ Pain is relative. I haven't given birth and so I wince at the thought of an injection. If you removed pain (an obviously very very beneficial life preserving trait) death happen more often (which you said was bad.) Pain also forms a very good comparison with well being - we enjoy our health more after a period of loosing it. Without pain we'd die quicker and get maimed more requently and also we would still find things we found exesivelly 'awful' and the object of our fears. Pain would be replaced with something else in our loathing. In any heaven that might exist - all other things being equal - the former blind man will appreciate sight more than the one who always had 20/20 vision - an eternity of greater appreciation.
3/ If you want to remove the traits you consider 'bad' design where would you stop - as far as my thinking goes you'd end up reversing evolution as you found more and more pointless features. While we are still in make believe design world why would God even bother with organic life - how daft is that - why bother with the laws of the universe or any of it - I mean its all pretty poor design from some angle.
OK some different questions that look at the problem another way.
Why does consciousness exist?
What, if any, are the limits of thought?
If we think are we not therefore gods?
Is conscious thought the eventual terminus of evolution?
Are we alone?
Is there any other conscious life out there and is it aware of us?
Why do we live with the potential for joy?
Why are so many people happy?
What possible way could we be any 'better' without ending up as some borg/cyberman collective since we all value diversity in form as well as in thought?
If Creationism is true explain races.
by DeViL DriVeR 76 46 Replies latest watchtower bible
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Qcmbr
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MadTiger
Why do I, with 27 years of semi-professional music experience, still don't know how to play "Chopsticks?"
Seriously, every animal, WITHOUT mankind's butting in, does fine. That, incidentally, is why I hate it when a
person says some animal is stupid. Invariably, it is due to some interference by mankind that the animal is in the
situation, like "the deer is in the headlights."
God designed them how he saw fit. Without mankind's interference, they do quite nicely. They were never meant to be eternal
or immortal, for whatever reason. -
dawg
I'm so sick of you all of not having faith. Jehovah God, the God that guides the WT organizatoin; made everyone not be able to talk to each other at Bable... He obviously made the languages race appropiate, as he gave the white boys the romantic languages and the asians their language and so on and so forth. Jehovah didn't want the races all mingling together. I'm just so thankful that I was a witness as my education is so far beyond my peers. Oh,and the whole ark thing, how many hunkies like me were on that boat? How many asians and so on? Here's the bottom line, anyone that takes the Bible seriously, really needs to stay a witness; no way is that book in anyway literal!
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Marcel
Beneficial mutations
A very small percentage of all mutations actually have a positive effect. These mutations lead to new versions of proteins that help an organism and its future generations better adapt to changes in their environment. For example, a specific 32 base pair deletion in human CCR5 (CCR5-32) confers HIV resistance to homozygotes and delays AIDS onset in heterozygotes.[1] The CCR5 mutation is more common in those of European descent. One theory for the etiology of the relatively high frequency of CCR5-32 in the European population is that it conferred resistance to the bubonic plague in mid-14th century Europe.[2]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation#Beneficial_mutations
if there occurs NO beneficial mutation how can it be that bacteria can develop resistance against NEW antibiotica (i.e.)? if there would be ONLY natural selection there needs to be at least ONE bacteria who is already resistant (or carrys the gene to be resistant in its genotype). speak: every resistance MUST be already coded in the genes. even complete new hazards needs to be precalculated and stored in the genes. how likely is that?
for me it looks like beneficial mutation is proven enough. i dont know really, because as i said im not working in that field and know how strong is the proof. but i know that the evidence that it does NOT occur is very weak and unlikely (at least to me). its like saying "it was never proven that there is NO cockroach on the back of the moon sitting under some dirty lil' rock and singing madonna songs - so its probably there!" every logic says that it is VERY unlikely to find that cockroach there - its not smart to believe that.
beneficial mutations dont conflict with the bible btw. -
funkyderek
Mad Tiger:
Beneficial mutation has never been proven.
Nonsense. You've been given several examples already but here's one that's both obvious and irrefutable: Lactose tolerance in humans. This has apparently occurred about four times in the history of our species, each time with a different mutation conveying the same benefit.
Four alleles, two, ten; does not take away from what I wrote above.
Yes it does. Completely. You seem to believe the only variation within a species is the result of recombination of existing genes, all of which were contained in the genome of the original pair of the species. The fact that there are more than four versions of particular genes means that this cannot be true.
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truthsearcher
Referring back to the original question: If we were all created with the genes to produce the different features that we see in all the races, then it wouldn't take much time at all to produce offspring that showed the dominant features. For example, there have been cases of "black and white" twins born to parents.
Twins in Black and White
The birth of twins with different skin colours in Britain in August 1994 has been claimed to be a more common occurrence in New Zealand.
A couple in Tauranga (New Zealand) reminded people that they have seven-year-old twin daughters—one light and one dark—and in Dunedin 12-year-old twins Michael and Alastair Fraser are known as the 'black and white' twins because Michael looks European while Alastair has Maori features.
The Tauranga twins, Melissa and Marianna Waamu, have become less alike as they have grown older. Melissa is taller, with dark brown eyes and black curly hair. Marianna took on the light European tonings of her mother, with straight red hair.
Doctors in Britain said the chances of producing such black and white twins were a million to one. The Dominion (Wellington, NZ), August 31, 1994 (p. 8).
An entire range of skin colour, from very white to very black, can occur in just one generation with the right parents. This is a strong argument against the idea that the races have been evolving separately over a long time and have needed to do so to produce national characteristics seen today.
--from http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v17/i1/focus.asp
This week, Australia’s Courier-Mail reports on “black and white” twin sisters, born in May near Brisbane. One of the girls has dark brown skin and hair, while the other has very light skin and blonde hair. Because of the stark difference in skin and hair color, most would never think of the two as siblings. The twins’ mother is of Jamaican-English heritage, and the father is from Germany. The article also points out that light/dark twins were born last year in Britain as well (it is unclear if a similar story from the AP, released yesterday, refers to the same British twins), though neither represents the first time this has happened.
What does this interesting rarity have to do with the Bible? Sadly, racism has plagued humankind since just after the Tower of Babel. For the same reason that people ostracize those with other so-called abnormalities, human societies have often relegated minorities to second-class individuals, even considering them less than human. The theory of evolution did much to increase this bigotry.
The Bible clearly teaches that we are all of one blood, having all descended from Adam and Eve. Understanding this gives humans a basis for dismantling racism, as does recognizing that “racial” differences represent only 0.012% of the human genome, whereas other types of differences (e.g., height) account for 0.2%. Stories of “mixed twins” remind us of our universal heritage.--from http://www.answersingenesis.org/news-to-note/1028.asp
I would like to add the following article for your consideration.
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Abaddon
Argh!!!
Mad Tiger. First of all, please tell me why god cannot use evolution to bring about the life he wants?
Is your faith in god so limited you have to believe in a 'builder' god just like the bronze-age goatherds who made the Creative story up?
Why can't you believe in a far cooler and more majestic god who can get the dice to land the way he wants everytime they get thrown?
Second, you say;
Adaptation does not equal mutation.
The author's journal article used the term "adaptation" multiple times.
Adaptation does not equal mutation.
Now, tell me, are you such an expert in the subject you didn't bother to read the evidence cited? For example;
10.) 12% (3 out of 26) random mutations in a strain of bacteria improved fitness in a particular environment.
I would suggest that you firstly consider why you believe in a bronze-age goatherds explanation of creation, when obviously god could bring the world about any way he liked, and when all the evidence points to evolution.
I would also suggest you have the kindness to actually read the posts made by people who repond to you; it's really rude not to, and when your reply shows you haven't, it makes you look silly.
Thirdly, if you studied evolution to any small extent, you would realise that mutation allows the environment to 'experiment' with new genetic characteristics. Whilst mutation is random, those new characteristics do not haver equal chances of being passed on to the next generation; only those that increase an organsims chance of survival get passed on. Thus mutation (as well as normal no-mutaton genetic variation of organisms) allows adaptation.
Qcmbr
I love the fact that (it seems to me) you are becoming far less insistent on literalism than you used to be.
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MadTiger
Abaddon:
I read peoples' posts.
The author of the journaled article is relating results of his experiments that illustrate ADAPTATION, and he is saying it is mutation.
Speaking of lactose intolerance. I used to not have it, then I developed it in my 20s, and now it is gone again. According to the logic of some in this thread, I have mutated several times in the last few years.
Hahahahahahahahaahahahhhahhahahaahahaaaa -
funkyderek
truthsearcher:
Referring back to the original question: If we were all created with the genes to produce the different features that we see in all the races, then it wouldn't take much time at all to produce offspring that showed the dominant features.
That's true, and as the Answers in Genesis article correctly explains, only a small number of genes influence skin colour, and with suitable selection pressure an initial rare variation or a point mutation could come to be ubiquitous in a relatively short time (Leolaia's figure of 10,000 years seems about right).
The intractable problem for the creationist viewpoint (aside from the issue of timescales) is that there are more genetic differences between humans than can be expressed in a single pair of genomes. Some of the variation must be original, including such undeniably beneficial mutations as lactose tolerance.
It's important to remember that the purpose of the Answers in Genesis site is not scientific discovery or truth, but rather to prop up a belief in biblical literalism regardless of the facts. Hence, it cannot be relied on for accurate information.
MadTiger:
Speaking of lactose intolerance. I used to not have it, then I developed it in my 20s, and now it is gone again. According to the logic of some in this thread, I have mutated several times in the last few years.
HahahahahahahahaahahahhhahhahahaahahaaaaOh dear. I hope that was a joke. It wasn't particularly funny but better that than your ignorance being as boundless as a serious interpretation of that sentence would require. The hubris implied by your laughter if it was intended to be derisory should embarrass someone who knows as little about the subject as you appear to.
But perhaps it was just a joke that fell flat. If so, do you have a serious answer for what would appear to be an insurmountable flaw in your hypothesis?
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Abaddon
Mad Tiger
Your answers show you to be fairly uninformed about evolution. Don't take this personally - I've been discussing evolution with people for a decade and I can pretty much tell how much someone knows about the subject from what they say; I don't mean to suggest I assume if they don't agree with me they know nothing, but rather, their lack of knowledge and misconceptions about the subject are manifest in how they talk about it.
There are no transitional forms in historical evidence to substantiate any evolution.
See? This is probably the most repeated literalistic creationist lie. You may not know it is a lie, but it is. Note I say 'literalistic creationist'; many people have a belief in a god that fits in with evolution. How? They assume modern science has a better idea than a bronze-age goatherd, and also assume if Genesis was metaphorical (as you cannot prove Creation or the Flood this is a fair assumption), then there's no reason god couldn't do it whatever way they liked. You limit god's power!
Now, go read Talk Origins, and stop repeating lies, be it because you're unwittingly repeating them or whatever other reason; here's some brand new evidence of transitional forms that won't be in the Talk Origins archive yet;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6683261.stm
As regards lactose intolerance; it is a pet subject, as my fiance is.
You seem to be unaware that even those without adult lactose tolerance (the majority of the human population; it's only the mutants who can digest it) have lactose tolerance as an infant, and that it is lost naturally unless one is carrying the mutated gene. Your pattern of symptoms suggests you might actually have some degree of genotypical lactose tolerance but became intolerant due to diet, coeliac disease, giardia, or some other factor. Alternately you may have become more sensitive to an allergy to dairy products due to stress or other environmental factors that have now mitigated.
Sadly, from experience if you follow the patten of behaviour shown most often by Creationists in these threads, it is most likely you will decide that your personal interpretation of a allegorical fairy story told by a bronze-age goat herd is more accurate than modern science even though you don't have a shred of evidence to support this opinion. Often we see Creationists seem to have some form of conceit that prevents them taking part in the discussion in any reasonable fashion, as it seems even if they have errors pointed out (and proved) to them by people who obviously know what they are talking about, they're too arrogant to even consider they might be wrong.
I hope not. It would be nice if you'd stop treating us (and an overwhelming majority of scientists) like idiots, go away, do some real study, and come back for a conversation where we can help you as is needed. I'm sure I or others of my ilk can suggest good resources for learning if you ask.
I hope you'll understand if you instead merely deny established scientific fact time and time again and ignore when people try to show you you are wrong in a nice way, you'll not really be that interesting a debating partner.