Don't tell me there's any proof for creationism.

parados wrote:

real life wrote:

A pool of non-living chemicals has no mechanism to regulate and harness energy to produce extraordinarily complex molecules that carry information and the ability to replicate themselves.

An interesting argument after you have been telling us that Shapiro is correct. Do you now think Shapiro was incorrect?

Shapiro's contention was that an RNA/xNA molecule could not have produced itself, but he believed that a proto-cell with a rudimentary cell wall and active metabolism could.

Obviously I don't agree with everything he said.

You need to be more specific and reference which parts of his article you are referring to .

It would help if you read it first. A few days ago I made a plain reference to a quotation from a Nobel prize winner from the article only to have you ask 'where was that? I never saw it.'

neologist,

Rosborne and others have explained the scientific method which tests evolutionary theory. It is based on evidence that is already available (the fossil record). If you are looking for lab results - microbiologists have studied the evolution of viruses. There is also the genome study.

I never cease to be amazed at the absolute certainty claimed by some in the scientific community.

. . . If evolution were to be proven impossible, we would have to rethink our ability to understand reality itself.

rosborne979 wrote:

. . . If evolution were to be proven impossible, we would have to rethink our ability to understand reality itself.

This statement and its converse application may be more profound than you think.

neologist wrote:

rosborne979 wrote:

. . . If evolution were to be proven impossible, we would have to rethink our ability to understand reality itself.

This statement and its converse application may be more profound than you think.

Ha, I knew you would say that. And no, it's not more profound than I think. I realized the philosophical implications as well as the scientific ones when I wrote it, and the statement is still true.

But I'm not going to do the work for you. If you want to challenge it, then you will have to be more specific with the implications you propose.

I have no inclination to dispute studies of microevolution, although I prefer the term adaptation.

Mexican truce until I start a new thread, I suppose.

neologist wrote:

I have no inclination to dispute studies of microevolution, although I prefer the term adaptation.

well, you know what they call microevolution over very long periods of time, eh?

neologist wrote:

I have no inclination to dispute studies of microevolution, although I prefer the term adaptation.

well, you know what they call microevolution over very long periods of time, eh?

Evolution is a process that results in heritable changes in a population spread over many generations.
This is a good working scientific definition of evolution; one that can be used to distinguish between evolution and similar changes that are not evolution. Another common short definition of evolution can be found in many textbooks:


"In fact, evolution can be precisely defined as any change in the frequency of alleles within a gene pool from one generation to the next."
- Helena Curtis and N. Sue Barnes, Biology, 5th ed. 1989 Worth Publishers, p.974

real life wrote:

How did they know that these large reptiles existed and could represent them so accurately in their art and lore if they had never seen one?

What evidence do you have that any culture accurately portrayed dinosaurs in their "art and lore?"

In 1945 Waldemar Julsrud, a German immigrant and knowledgeable archeologist, discovered clay figurines buried at the foot of El Toro Mountain on the outskirts of Acambaro, Guanajuato, Mexico. Eventually over 33,000 ceramic figurines were found near El Toro as well as Chivo Mountain on the other side of town. Similar artifacts found in the area are identified with the Pre-classical Chupicuaro Culture (800 BC to 200 AD).

The authenticity of Julsrud find was challenged because the huge collection included dinosaurs. Many archeologists believe dinosaurs have been extinct for the past 65 million years and man knowledge of them has been limited to the past 200 years. If this is true, man could not possibly have seen and modeled them 2,500 years ago.

During the years 1945 to 1946,Carlos Perea was Director of Archeology, Acambaro zone, for the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City. In a recorded interview he described Julsrud excavations as unauthorized, as were many similar discoveries made by local farmers, but he had no doubt that the finds were authentic. He acknowledged that he examined the figurines, including dinosaurs, from many different sites. He was present when official excavations were conducted by the National Museum and the American Museum of Natural History. They found many figurines, including dinosaurs, which he described in detail.

In 1954 the Mexican government sent four well known archeologists to investigate. A different but nearby site was selected and a meticulous excavation was begun. Six feet down they found numerous examples of similar figurines and concluded that Julsrud find was authentic. However, three weeks later their report declared the collection to be a fraud because of the fantastic representation of man and dinosaur together.

In 1955 Charles Hapgood, respected1 Professor of Anthropology at the University of New Hampshire, conducted an elaborate investigation including extensive radiometric dating. He was accompanied by Earl Stanley Gardner, former District Attorney of the city of Los Angeles, California and the creator of Perry Mason. They falsified the claim that Julsrud manufactured the figurines, by excavating under the house of the Chief of Police, which was built 25 years before the Julsrud arrived in Mexico. Forty three more examples of the same type were found.
............

A 1987 article in the Journal of Paleontology begins as follows:

"Hadrosaur bones have been found on the Colville River north of Umiat on the North Slope of Alaska." 52

What is perhaps most interesting about these "many thousands of bones" is that they "lack any significant degree of permineralization." 53,54 In fact, the people who discovered them didn't report it for 20 years because they thought they were bison bones. Because these bones were partially exposed in a "soft, brown, sandy silt," 55 and because every year the snow melts, this means that every year these bones were likely subject to the elements for two to three months..........

.....many dinosaur bones are not per mineralized (i.e. turned into stone). This means they can be directly dated by the Carbon-14 method, the exact same way a mammoth or Neanderthal bone is dated. This has also been done at least 30 times, by various laboratories in the United States and Europe, and the dates indicate that dinosaurs were alive from 9,800 -- 50,000 years ago.29,30,31 This author discussed this with Paul LeBlond, Professor of Oceanography at the University of British Columbia. Dr. LeBlond said that any C14 date over 5,000 years is highly questionable.32 Therefore, despite what popular publications may report,33 we can establish that all mammoths, Neanderthals, or other bones "dated" over 5,000 years by the C14 method are likewise "highly questionable." If we accept any, then we must accept them all (including the dinosaur dates)[/u]

Interesting article.

Quote:

A 1987 article in the Journal of Paleontology begins as follows:

"Hadrosaur bones have been found on the Colville River north of Umiat on the North Slope of Alaska." 52

What is perhaps most interesting about these "many thousands of bones" is that they "lack any significant degree of permineralization." 53,54 In fact, the people who discovered them didn't report it for 20 years because they thought they were bison bones. Because these bones were partially exposed in a "soft, brown, sandy silt," 55 and because every year the snow melts, this means that every year these bones were likely subject to the elements for two to three months..........

from http://www.earthage.org/youngearthev/evidence_for_a_young_earth.htm#Unfossilized%20Dinosaur%20Bones

and

Quote:

.....many dinosaur bones are not per mineralized (i.e. turned into stone). This means they can be directly dated by the Carbon-14 method, the exact same way a mammoth or Neanderthal bone is dated. This has also been done at least 30 times, by various laboratories in the United States and Europe, and the dates indicate that dinosaurs were alive from 9,800 -- 50,000 years ago.29,30,31 This author discussed this with Paul LeBlond, Professor of Oceanography at the University of British Columbia. Dr. LeBlond said that any C14 date over 5,000 years is highly questionable.32 Therefore, despite what popular publications may report,33 we can establish that all mammoths, Neanderthals, or other bones "dated" over 5,000 years by the C14 method are likewise "highly questionable." If we accept any, then we must accept them all (including the dinosaur dates)[/u]

from http://www.earthage.org/youngearthev/evidence_for_a_young_earth.htm#Direct%20Dating%20of%20Dinosaur%20Bones: emphasis mine

I'm not surprised, though, to see "real life" offer this as "proof."

The member "real life" has gone to a lot of trouble to dredge up the Acamabro hoax. In his 1953 article in American Antiquity, volume 18, number 4, "The clay figurines of Acambaro, Guanajuato, Mexico," Don De Peso raises the following objections to the claims of Herr Julsrud, and evidence that this is a hoax:

* The surfaces of the figurines were new. They were not marred by a patina or coating of soluble salts characteristic of genuinely old artifacts from the same area. The owner said none of the figures had been washed in acid. Edges of depressions were sharp and new. No dirt was packed into crevices.

* Genuine archeological relics of fragile items are almost always found in fragments. Finding more than 30,000 such items in pristine condition is unheard of. The excavators of the artifacts were "neither careful nor experienced" in their field technique, yet no marks of their shovels, mattocks, or picks were noted in any of the 32,000 specimens. Some figurines were broken, but the breaks were unworn and apparently deliberate to suggest age. No parts were missing.

* "The author spent two days watching the excavators burrow and dig; during the course of their search they managed to break a number of authentic prehistoric objects. On the second day the two struck a cache and the author examined the material in situ. The cache had been very recently buried by digging a down sloping tunnel into the black fill dirt of the prehistoric room. This fill ran to a depth of approximately 1.30 m. Within the stratum there were authentic Tarascan sherds, obsidian blades, tripod metates, manos, etc., but these objects held no concern for the excavators. In burying the cache of figurines, the natives had unwittingly cut some 15 cms. below the black fill into the sterile red earth floor of the prehistoric room. In back-filling the tunnel they mixed this red sterile earth with black earth; the tracing of their original excavation was, as a result, a simple task" (Di Peso 1953, 388).

* Fresh manure was found in the tunnel fill.

* Fingerprints were found in freshly packed earth that filled an excavated bowl.

2. The story of their discovery gives a motive for fraud. Waldemar Julsrud, who hired workers to excavate a Chupicuaro site in 1945, paid workers a peso apiece for intact figurines. It very well may have been more economical for the workers to make figurines than to discover and excavate them. Given the quantity that he received, the contribution to the peasants' economy would have been substantial.

3. The figurines are not from the Chupicuaro. They came from within a single-component Tarascan ruin. The Tarascan are post-classical and historical, emerging between 900 and 1522 C.E.

4. If authentic, the figurines imply even more archeological anomalies:
* If the figurines really were based on actual dinosaurs, why have no dinosaur fossils been found in the Acambaro region?
* Why did no other Mexican cultures record any dinosaurs?
* What caused the dinosaurs to disappear in the last 1,100 years?

5. There is no credible information to support the claims. The only sources are pseudoscience journalists, creationists, and crackpots, who have obvious ulterior motives for gullibility. Their own dating results are discordant with each other and with the ages of the native cultures, and even attempting to do carbon dating on the inorganic figurines shows their incompetence.

Note that young earth creationists, among the forefront of those who claim that raido-carbon 14 is an unreliable dating method, happily refer to radio-carbon dating as having established the age of the figurines. The radio-carbon 14 dating method is used for organic materials, and cannot be used to date stone or ceramic.

I'm not surprised, though, to see "real life" offer this as "proof."

The material above was found at Talk Origins.