Homestar Runner Wiki Forum

You can't see atoms with the naked eye, but they're still there.

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Why do you say carbon dating is one of the holes in evolutionary theory?



It cannot be given as a possibility in class because there is no scientific justification for it. Only science should be taught in a science class. Here's another example.

"I think it is possible that the entire universe is just an elaborate dream of a really advanced alien in an inconceivably larger universe. Since we can't prove that it isn't, I think it should be taught in school as a 'possibility.'"

It's the same principle.



You can't see evolution in action either, but there is strong evidence to back it up.

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beep beep I'm a Jeep

Just making a point. There are lots of things that are obviously true that one could choose not to believe in just because you can't observe it with the naked eye. The theory of atoms was around long before we had microscopes good enough to see them, and we knew about electrons and protons and such also before being able to observe them directly. We know about them because of indirect methods. Likewise, we know about evolution because of indirect methods. Using indirect methods doesn't mean something you can't prove something.

On the other hand, scientific theories are by definition unprovable. They are, however, falsifiable. Evolution is falsifiable -- something could conceivably happen that makes us say, "Evolution is false!". Intelligent design is not falsifiable, therefore, it isn't scientific. So from a scientific standpoint, evolution has a lot more going for it than intelligent design does. Note that evolution and intelligent design aren't necessarily mutually exclusive, either, but the way the idea is taught generally makes it so.

- Kef

Well, sometimes theories are proven to be true (like Atomic cloud, or DNA), but in this case, you are right. Evolution will never be 100% bona-fide, no doubt true, but can ID or Creationism? Not to say they are wrong, which I believe ID to be partially true, but that doesn't matter. My opinions don't matter in a scientific sense. Neither do my beliefs. Science is supposed to be science, and ID is not science. You cannot say it is, nor teach it in the same context. Even a suggestion is wrong, because a slight adjustment in the education system costs way too much money. Regardless, ID is a public opinion, and like I said, opinions don't matter in science without stuff behind them. In fact, you can't even call ID a hypothesis.

By the way, C14 dating is more accurate. They've gotten to the point they can use it to determine an object's age within a month buffer.

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You have to be JOKING. Do you stick your head in the sand every once in a while or something?

Luckily the always usefull talk.origins site has it all summed up very nicely.



crap. Particle accelerators, my friend....

If you don't know what youre talking about, then just say so, you don't have to hide it. I think that it is you that have been falsely informed, and have not put forth effort to see both sides of this issue. The reason I asked, is that many of the so called "remains of early man" consist of exactly two bones, found a mile away from each other. Im not exaggerating this either. So before you go off about "casting my eyes" places, it would be nice to know what places youre talking about.



Well, Carbon dating, although put forth in many institutions and universities as constant, has a lot of problems with it. For instance, take a log that has been dead for a long time, its remains will have pockets of areas where the decomposition of the carbon atom is much greater than other places. When scientists take something to be dated, they tell the lab what time frame they want the date to be, or what period they think it should fall in.



I see what you're saying, and you have some really good points. I think I should make it clear that I don't think that ID should be taught as a scientific thoery, but that I should be covered briefly as an alternative theory to evolution, and that they should also point out some of the gaping holes in evolution.

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I just GAVE you a site and appearantly you haven't checked it out. If you aren't even going to look, debating with you is a tiresome and fruitless waste of time.



O lolz, atoms decompose . No, atoms FALL APART and become entirely different elements. They don't decompose.

[quote="seamusz"I see what you're saying, and you have some really good points. I think I should make it clear that I don't think that ID should be taught as a scientific thoery, but that I should be covered briefly as an alternative theory to evolution, and that they should also point out some of the gaping holes in evolution.[/quote]

Sorry, there are no gaping holes. Otherwise these would already be teached. Sorry dude, you're just sounding like a big advocate for ID now.

Yeah, Im not going to waste my time on some website, I was asking you for a simple example, I see that you are either unwilling or unable to do so.



ohhhhh, I see, fall apart is obviously a very technical and scientific term... Well, you call it what you like, Im not going to give you a lecture on ion decomposition, you can chalk it up to being in a far off land and not using the same terminology. But I seriously wonder if you know what youre talking about. Esspecially since you stated in another thread that even when something is proven to you, you still might not believe it... sounds quite ignorant to me...



This... is what Ive been talking about! They aren't taught, or teached, as it seems you prefer. The holes of evolution should be focused on for more than a paragraph on "the missing link" in the text book. There are mounds and mounds of things that can be said, scientific things mind you, against evolution. Just cause you havent heard them, doesn't mean they don't exist. If you are unwilling to acknowledge this, then you are the one that will not open his eyes.



Wow, me, an advocate for ID????? Who would have thought?.... dude.

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That website is actually a highly respected site offering issues from the evolution AND creationism vantage points. The stuff there is quality stuff, and maybe you should check it out. Also, there's Lucy, the australopithecus skeleton found in Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania. You could check that out if you don't want to read the other site.

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beep beep I'm a Jeep

Perhaps I should have clarified my response to KN. I am familiar (although far from a scholar in any sense of the word) with most of these things. I did check out the site on Lucy, Ive studied a bit about her before, and I went and checked out the rest of the site. I found it very informative and certainly has some evidence to support evolution. My question to KN was "Has evolution been verified", to which he responded vaguely "cast your eys upon the skeletal remains of early man". Unfortunately evolution is not as simple as that, and I asked for some specifics, to which he was unable to give. All Im trying to get at is that evolution, although evidently sciences best explaination for how we got where we are, is not fact. You cannot compare the 1+1=2 to evolution which would be more like 1+x(2y-z)^x-42=brown. <--- poor attempt at humor I do not mean to discount evolution as a viable answer.

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*shakes head*

You're beyond help. Really

Maybe you'll understand when you're older.

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Please, let's cancel the flaming before it begins. Nobody wants to get banned.

Now, toastpaint. Ready go.

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beep beep I'm a Jeep

Umm.... regardless of whether or not this alleged inaccuracy is true (I don't know, but I would think decay of carbon would statistically be fairly uniform), I say over and over again that carbon dating is NOT the only method to estimate the age of a fossil. Also, I really doubt many scientists would tell a lab what time frame it "should" be from because they would realize that doing so is not scientific! Hey, if even I can realize that then certainly some hotshot scientists who are all about science would. Real scientists go through great pains to ensure that they won't simply find what they're looking for whether it's there or not. (Why do you think we invented the double-blind placebo test? ) Yet you just blithely assume that scientists consistently commit this error, just because this assumption, however implausible it may be, may support your argument.



I maintain that something that has nothing to do with science does not really need to be in a science book.

- Kef

Some good points. As far as carbon dating goes, this is how I understand it. There is a consistant decomposition of the Carbon ion used in carbon dating, so, as I was saying in my paragraph, before, as long as they can find a place in the dead matter that falls into the time frame that is thought to be correct you have a verification. I really don't have a complete grasp on the concept, but my purpose wasn't really to deny carbon dating or evolution, just to point out that there is evidence that some think is contrary to evolution. I am not using this as just something I dug up to support my case, there is plenty sites out there that can point out the flaws of evolution, and Im not saying that evolution shouldn't be taught. I think that we diefy scientists to the point that we think that they are believers of a sort of "pure religion" of science and that they are intaintable by bias. They are people who make their living and work from grants provided by people who fund them because they want certain outcomes for their work. Now although it might be understood that the outcomes may not be exactly what was wanted, the direction of work is not going to go against the purpose of the benifactor. This goes for people on both sides of the fence. All scientist represent a bias, just as the reports they write. They write to convice that the way they interpreted the facts is justifiable if not inevitable.



And I can respect that. I just disagree.

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I found a rather nice page covering this question. Here. Note that it has multiple pages. Read it. Funny and educational.

EDIT: In case you're lazy, The second page is most important

Did anyone catch Ape to Man? That's pretty much how I feel. There is way too much evidence of evolution for me to stick my fingers in my ears and ignore the facts.

But don't get mad at me for having an opinion. Believe what you want.

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[porplemontage studios]
>>internet entertainment

*glomps*

Porplemontage saves the day! That page is awesome.

Explanation of carbon dating: All living matter contains a special type of radioactive carbon: Radiocarbon-14. Scientists calculate how long it takes for half of the radiocarbon in an object to decay. This is called a half-life. Then, the scientists calculate how many half-lives the object has had based on the current amound of radiocarbon in it. Multiply the number of half-lives by how long a half-life is, and you have the object's approximate age.

Indeed. And that's where the christians start to disagree. "ZOMFR it's inaccurate!'. They appearantly think SOME parts of Radiocarbon-14 decay faster then other parts, thus essentially telling us the world is much younger. I've even heard people saying that "light used to travel much faster and then slowed down, so all those starts we see as being billions of years old are in fact exactly *fit age the theist wants the universe to be here*". When will they learn?

I wonder if they've read the page I've posted earlier.

I have looked at the pages listed, and indeed they have some interesting facts... as I said before there are many pages both for and against evolution, each one is biased and none (that Ive run across) give info that is balanced. I do not deny that there is tons of data supporting evolution, but I would again state that there is much information that contradicts evolution and almost none is taught in schools. I think that this discussion illistrates that there is not a balanced presentation given in schools on evolution. I think that many scientists find it comforting to think that they have been able to explain God away, so be it. I know that many ID advocates are nutty to the other extreem, claiming a young earth, and other things that is hard for anyone to swallow. I certainly don't support the young earth theory and think that it does the ID cause a disservice to be associated with the more extreem and flimsy ideas.

Personally, I support the cause to get some form of ID into classes. But if that doesn't happen, Im not going to loose any sleep over it. What really bothers me is the misrepresentation of the theory of evolution.

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I can understand where they're coming from, but do they have to pervert science like that? >.O

That's not surprising, because most people feel strongly one way or the other and think it's silly to try to "balance" an argument when they feel their side has such an edge it's impossible to balance it anyway.



Like what? I'm not necessarily just denying there is any, I really would like to know what.



Why should it present a "balanced" view? We're talking about science books. Science books present scientific views. Do you think a history book needs to go into a lengthy discussion on whether or not we really landed on the moon, presenting both sides of the argument as equals?



I absolutely hate this line, because it unfairly invokes emotion. It's the old, "Oh, no, people are trying to secularize and take God out of everything." First off, you and I both know that evolution does not "explain away" God, or even make the slightest conjecture about the existence of God, so I think by stating this you're being unfair. All it questions is one very, very, very specific notion of God -- a god who literally had created Earth in six days and put all kinds of plants an animals on it and a pair of humans, out of nowhere.

Listen, nobody is trying to take God out of anything. Yes, most scientists are atheists, but that doesn't mean they are actively trying to prove God doesn't exist, or explain him away. (I'm sure some scientist out there is, but he's crazy.) They don't have time for that stuff.



I'm not understanding this. As I explained above, evolution only questions one very specific notion of God, and now you more or less state that you don't believe that specific notion yourself! (After all, some parts of the Bible do assume a young Earth.) So what's your problem?



By all means discuss Intelligent Design in class. Just not a science class.

- Kef

There are other classes, like Kef mentioned, that could discuss ID in detail without leaving it out of education: world cultures, religious studies, modern history, and other sociological classes. It has no place in science because it has no physical or chemical proof. That's pretty much it. Yes, evolution might have holes, for it is a theory, but it is a scientific theory. You can't fill in the holes of a scientific theory with ideological theory.
Take the M-theory of string energies. Since hadrons (atomic particles) had been discovered, the search went on to see what quantum property, whether it was mass, energy, whatever made up the particles themselves. First came quarks. Through mathematical computation, it became widely accepted that quarks, or small “flavors” as they have been categorized, fit in perfectly with chemical action and quantum physics. So, then what makes up quarks, or photons or gravity and other quantum non-hadrons? This is where Dr. Witten’s M-theory comes in. It claims that superstring energies, or bands and loops of energy, vibrate at different levels in different dimensions (there are 11 that cosmologists and physicists calculated) within multiple p-branes (geometrical dimentialities). By reverse computation, scientists figured out that which they have observed in chemistry and quantum physics for the past 500 years. It all came out in math, and it all seems darn right plausible.
How does this relate to ID? Well, because in scientific textbooks, they never speculated what hadrons were made of until they found quarks. They never speculated the composition of quarks until the superstring and supergravity theories were combined into the M-theory. For all we know, the vibrating energies in M-theory could be vibrating because tiny angels are plucking them. But they won’t put that in textbooks. Why? Because there is no physical, mathematical, chemical or observational proof of it. Much like there is no physical, mathematical, or observational proof of ID. Talk about it in other classes; I won’t mind. But not in science classes.

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Yesssss, one place of agreement!



Hereis one site that try’s to take apart the theory of evolution. There are a jillion on the web. I'll bet that if you spend a week in pursuit of such information that contradicts the theory of evolution, your position will soften a great deal. I am not saying that all the info put out by these people is 100% accurate, but it might surprise you what is and is not actually "true" about evolution theory. I will try to find a really good site, that is quite reputable... perhaps Didymus knows of one?



When I say balanced, I’m not talking about ID vs Evolution, I’m talking about the before mentioned holes in evolution need to be brought up in classes.



I strongly disagree. Evolution does make a statement about the existence of God. I don’t know what you are basing your statement that nobody is trying to take God out of anything, but this fight is going on everywhere. There are lawsuits from the ACLU all over the place that are specifically pitted against spirituality or religion. There are many groups of people that have specific agenda’s against the belief in God. Many scientist have shown themselves to be a part of this movement.



I would like to know, what parts of the Bible assumes a young Earth? The creation story really doesn’t assume a young Earth, it simply splits the creation into 6 specific periods. And we have no way of knowing how long Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden before partaking of the fruit, it could have been for Millennia, or even eons.

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I'm too busy playing poker right now to really look, but I'll try to remember to.





I take offense to the line of thought that we're trying to impose our atheism on others. It is usually the other way around. I also believe the ACLU has every right to do what it's doing because they're looking out for us. Too often Christians get their way about something and atheists get nothing. Usually when one talks about "Taking God out of [whatever]", religion does not belong in it in the first place. You might say the United States is a Christian nation, and if so, you would be wrong. Many of our founding fathers were secularists, and we have as many secular traditions as spiritual ones. All the ACLU wants is that every person, whatever their religion, be treated equally, and that all religions be treated equally. (For example, imagine how many Christians would be up in arms if they found that their students' teachers quoted Qur'an passages, placed Islamic symbols throughout the school...)

That argument aside, I have no idea where you get the idea that evolution attacks the idea of God. It doesn't say anything about God. For all we know, God created the bacterium everything else evolved from. Evolution says nothing about the origin of life. It just says what happened after life began.



I seem to recall parts tracing the lineage of Jesus back to Adam. Somebody correct me if I'm wrong...

- Kef

Yes, you're correct.

by all means, take your time.



I guess we could talk about the role of religion in schools. Personally, I have no problem with positive uplifting messages being quoted in school, wherever they come from. Freud, The Bible, the Koran, wherever. Why should anyone be threatened by something good?

My personal opinion is that the ACLU is tearing the county apart and are the most responsible party to the disintegration of the family and moral living... just my opinion.



This is true (there is actually two lines recounted in the new testiment going back to David, and from there one can go back to Adam). But this doesn't assume a young Earth. Like I said in my previous post, there is no way of saying how long the Creation took, or how long Adam and Eve were alone in the paradise of the Garden of Eden.

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Excuse me, isn't that a civil rights organization? YOu sound.... damn.. I would WANT to say how disgusted I am by you, but you know... debate thread.

We've managed to get god out of most things. Works pretty well

Except that you seem to know very little about the ACLU's most recent activities, KN. What they are doing now isn't so much promoting civil rights as it is trying to squash them. They have degenerated greatly over the past few decades.

And while you might find it amusing that they've "gotten God out," what both you and they fail to recognize is that worship is one of the fundamental rights of human beings, in fact protected by the US Constitution.

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