Natural Science Forum / Biology / Paleontology / January 2006

<<And yet you will not pay heed to evolutionist Edmund Samuel, Associate
Professor of Biology, Antioch College, Ohio:>>

No such person at Antioch College.  See for yourself:
http://www.antioch-college.edu/database/hrdir/index.html
http://www.antioch-college.edu/Academics/faculty/index.html

"The concept of evolution cannot be considered a strong scientific
explanation for the presence of the diverse forms of life in space and
time. . . . This is because the data must be used circumstantially and no
fine analysis . . . of the fossil record can directly support
evolution."?Order: In Life (1972), p. 120."

The only place you will find that quote is at some creationist sites.
such as:
http://www.j-lorber.de/kee/5/a-scienc.htm (see footnote 26)

Could you really mean Dr. Edmund J. Ambrose, who said

"We need to remember that the only evidence about the way events occurred
in the past is found in the geological records. However sophisticated
advances in molecular genetics and molecular engineering may become
eventually, the fact that a genetic change or even a new species might be
generated eventually in the laboratory does not tell us how new species
arose in the past history of the earth. They merely provide possible
mechanisms. At the present stage of geological research, we have to admit
that there is nothing in the geological records that runs contrary to the
view of conservative creationists, that God created each species
separately, presumably from the dust of the earth. My own view is that
this does not strengthen the creationists' arguments."

"History tells us that how much we want to believe a proposition is
not a reliable guide as to whether it is true." -- Steven Pinker

What was  replaced by the ellipses, and what was the context?

You are lying by trimming the paragraph, because he would know that
the word "evolution" was coined as the label for the observed change
and divergence in collected and collated fossils.

You also give yourself away by calling him an evolutionist. This is a
dishonest label used by creationists to pretend that acceptance of
reality is only an -ism.

Christopher A. Lee wrote:

Of course please relay your definition to Princeton.

http://wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn?s=evolutionist

S: (n) evolutionist (a person who believes in organic evolution)
============================================================
I am sure there is some sort of reward when those of higher education
makes this sort of grave mistake.

Not only is the above over 30 years old but do tell what was omitted frmo
the quote?

Do *you even know?

Too bad you accidentally took things out of context and made a fool of
yourself again. Luckily, Google is your friend and we find in this
<http://www.geocities.com/osarsif/ce04.htm> page a discussion of the
particular quote, and <http://www.geocities.com/osarsif/ce01.htm> starts
the entire article.

<begin quoted material>

Creation again quotes out of context and misapplies what an author said
in paragraph 37, on page 70:

   "The concept of evolution cannot be considered a strong scientific
explanation for the presence of the diverse forms of life," concludes
evolutionist Edmund Samuel in his book Order: In Life. Why not? He adds:
"No fine analysis of biogeographic distribution or of the fossil record
can directly support evolution."

What Samuel was discussing was more subtle than the author of Creation
realized. He was discussing how humans can bring order to general
systems of thought, and discussing the fact that some systems can be
shown to be self-consistent in a logically strong or logically weak
sense. His use of "strong," therefore, is not in the absolute sense
implied by Creation, but rather in the sense used by philosophers in
evaluating logical arguments. Logical arguments may have bearing on
reality or may not. Certain arguments in mathematics may have little or
no present bearing on reality but can be evaluated rigorously by logical
methods. Reconstructing the scene of a crime is a very different sort of
logical process, and is the sort Samuel is talking about with respect to
evolution. Here is a more complete version of what he said:64

   ... on the whole, evolution has been extremely beneficial in
ordering our thoughts. On the other hand, the concept of evolution
cannot be considered a strong scientific explanation for the presence of
the diverse forms of life in space and time. It must remain as a rather
low level explanation to any purist. This is because the data must be
used circumstantially and no fine analysis of biogeographic distribution
or of the fossil record can directly support evolution. Biogeographic
data are so complex that even with island studies only the rough
generalities similar to those Darwin found for Galapagos can be stated.
The fossil record is very uneven and so scarce that fine points
regarding the pathways of evolution remain obscure...

   If there is no regularity in these historical records, what is their
meaning and where are they going? Are there any characteristics that
somehow influence the directions of change? One can say that in general
the biomass has increased, the numbers and kinds of species have
increased, organisms have increased in complexity in terms of number and
diversity of cell types, and food-webs have become more complex. There
are always those cases, however, that violate each of these general
statements, e.g., extinction, degeneracy, and man's cultivated fields...

   Perhaps the greatest contribution of the fossil record to the
support of the concept evolution is the absence of negative
observations. If a mammal could be dated with certainty at 500 million
years, the concept would suffer considerably. The weakness of the
concept (as a scientific explanation) makes it extremely vulnerable. The
fact that exceptions of this sort have not held up under careful
scrutiny, and the fact that there is a tremendous amount of
circumstantial evidence that is consistent within itself means that the
explanation is still a good one though it may not satisfy the purists...

   ... With all due respect for [Darwin's] attempt [to provide a
logical mechanism for evolution], and even in spite of the fact that
natural selection has been successfully tested as a means to modify
species, there remains a major difficulty for our search. Even if
natural selection is proved to be a way in which evolution could have
occurred, it does not prove that it was the way or the only way that it
did occur. No mechanism can stand alone without applying it in a test to
the actual phenomenon the mechanism is supposed to produce. This is
impossible to do and so the mechanism itself must remain as
circumstantial evidence -- to the purist.

   My point is that apparently different explanations can have
different values. Evolution and natural selection may not explain in a
certain way the presence of diverse living and fossil forms of life, but
it is still a good explanation, at least until something better comes
along.

<end quoted material>

Could you resolve not to post any false claims in 2006, please.

Whoever said this, if it actually was said, was simply wrong.  The
Theory of Evolution is not only the best explanation for the fact of
evolution, it is the *only* scientifically supported explanation.  It's
the only explanation that makes sense, that fits all the facts, that is
testable, and that has withstood the test of time.

So really, it is very simple.  It's only complex if you're an idiot
and/or don't pay attention.

Now, **PAY ATTENTION**:
While certain colossally clueless congenital cretinists lie that
there's no proof or evidence, the Theory of Evolution accumulates
mountains of evidence published in peer-reviewed science journals the
world over by people of all faiths, and is now honored by _Science_
journal: "Research into how evolution works has been named top science
achievement of 2005":
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4552466.stm

26 proofs of macroevolution:
http://tinyurl.com/79btb

666 items of evidence strongly supporting macroevolution:
Example    1: http://tinyurl.com/dxqjc
Example    2: http://tinyurl.com/d4376
Example    3: http://tinyurl.com/d5vqm
Example    4: http://tinyurl.com/dmbxj
Example    5: http://tinyurl.com/cy7r7
Example    6: http://tinyurl.com/dj9sh
Example    7: http://tinyurl.com/aplxu
Example    8: http://tinyurl.com/clpsx
Examples   9-539: http://tinyurl.com/cy9m2
Example 540: http://tinyurl.com/dsjku
Example 541: http://tinyurl.com/bhxw2
Example 542: http://tinyurl.com/77tyl
Example 543: http://tinyurl.com/bpdqm
Example 544: http://tinyurl.com/czsdq
Example 545: http://tinyurl.com/9qnrc
Example 546: http://tinyurl.com/dxg8s
Example 547: http://tinyurl.com/88kch
Example 548: http://tinyurl.com/88kch (shared with 547 thread)
Example 549: http://tinyurl.com/ccw8y
Example 550: http://tinyurl.com/7cxsz
Example 551: http://tinyurl.com/74o4q
Examples 552-577: http://tinyurl.com/7u8lv
Example 578: http://tinyurl.com/9xo8o
Example 579: http://tinyurl.com/avzzk
Example 580: http://tinyurl.com/7segx
Example 581: http://tinyurl.com/8c8od
Example 582: http://tinyurl.com/9voan
Example 583: http://tinyurl.com/76zao (misnumbered as 582)
Example 584: http://tinyurl.com/crzmz
Example 585: http://tinyurl.com/exagp
Examples 586-590: http://tinyurl.com/c4pea
Example 591: http://tinyurl.com/9aveh
Example 592: http://tinyurl.com/d2vmd
Example 593: http://tinyurl.com/dsg6z
Example 594: http://tinyurl.com/75rdt
Example 595: http://tinyurl.com/ak3oo
Example 596: http://tinyurl.com/anqh5
Example 597: http://tinyurl.com/89zjr
Example 598: http://tinyurl.com/e3f2b
Example 599: http://tinyurl.com/7oorv
Example 600: http://tinyurl.com/cujkx
Examples 601-608: http://tinyurl.com/bnflb
Examples 609-615: http://tinyurl.com/9pl7b
Examples 616-635: http://tinyurl.com/b4brg
Examples 636-666 http://tinyurl.com/chfv2

Readily available information on, and evidence for evolution:
A Christian take on radiometric dating:
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/Wiens.html#page

Abiogenesis:
http://home.houston.rr.com/apologia/orgel.htm
http://informationcentre.tripod.com/abiogenesis.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/abioprob/default.htm

Proto cells:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/239787.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/1142840.stm

Factories of life:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/275738.stm

Lab molecules mimic life:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/217054.stm

Mechanism for evolution described:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/222096.stm

Smallest genome a lot smaller than smallest modern cell:
http://mednews.stanford.edu/releases/2001/

Precambrian to cambrian:
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/topics/evolution/PSCF12-97Miller.html

Early diversification:
http://cas.bellarmine.edu/tietjen/Ecology/early_animal_evolution.htm

Transitional forms:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-transitional.html

Primitive fish different:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/504776.stm

Fish with fingers:
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/science/DailyNews/fishfossil0312.html

Snake with legs:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/680116.stm

Ant-wasp evolution:
http://www.antnest.co.uk/Origin.html

Mosquitoes still evolving:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/158522.stm

Origins of flight:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2664541.stm

4-winged dinos:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2684927.stm

Dog evolution:
http://www.provet.co.uk/online/dogs/evolution%20of%20the%20dog.htm

Human evolution:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/

Computer simulated evolution:
http://necsi.org/postdocs/sayama/sdsr/

Evolution vs. creationism debates:
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/science/creationism/debates.html

Evolution not "atheist religion":
http://www.catholic.net/RCC/Periodicals/Inside/01-97/creat2.html

29 Evidences supporting evolution:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

The evolution of the eye:
http://www.cs.colorado.edu/~lindsay/creation/eye.html

The woodpecker's tongue:
http://omega.med.yale.edu/~rjr38/Woodpecker.htm

Radiometric dating - a Christian perpective:
http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/Wiens.html#page

Noah's ark never happened:
http://www.abarnett.demon.co.uk/atheism/noahs_ark.html

Ex-creationist on why young Earth creationism doesn't work:
http://www.glenn.morton.btinternet.co.uk/

Another ex-creationist:
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Thebes/7755/

Creationists cannot define "kind":
http://www.geocities.com/CapeCanaveral/Hangar/2437/kinds.htm

Even evolutionists believe in God!:
http://www.exn.ca/Stories/1997/04/04/01.asp

General anti-creationism/pro-evolution FAQs:
http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/evol/index.html
http://www.rice.edu/armadillo/Sciacademy/riggins/newindex.htm
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-meritt/complexity.html
http://www.infidels.org/library/modern/dave_matson/young-earth/
http://www.nobeliefs.com/Creationism.htm
http://vuletic.com/hume/cefec/index.html

Questionable creationist credentials:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/credentials.html

Even dyed-in-the-wool creationists think a lot of their arguments are
bad:
http://www.answersingenesis.org/home/area/faq/dont_use.asp

Budikka