Healthy Debate (1 Viewer)

[crvz]

But Brandon, isnt that a bit of circular logic? Radiometric dating is based on the geologic column, right? But the geologic column is based on the fossil record. How does that work?

 

[AquaNerd]

But Brandon, isnt that a bit of circular logic? Radiometric dating is based on the geologic column, right? But the geologic column is based on the fossil record. How does that work?

no, its not circular unless you reasoned it that way. but radiometric dating is its own entity based on its own findings.

a fossil is found and dated. fossils found above the original fossil should be younger and those below the original fossil should be older. however, to determine the true age of all the fossils, they must be radiometrically dated. if the fossil itself can't be dated the dirt/rocks will be dated and the age of the fossils found in the same layer should also be the same age.

the geologic column is used to give an estimated date based on relative position. this estimated date can either be accepted, rejected, or modified based on the date provided by radiometric dating, but it's not used to give an exact, accepted date.

 

[crvz]

Well fill me in on radiometric dating. My understanding is that it's essentially measuring the amount of a certain radioactive isotope in a substance, comparing that value to the "expected" value, and then using the half life of the material to compute the age.

How are we confident in the "expected" values?

Another thing you mentioned a while ago are ice cores; but I find these are flawed as well. The rings in ice cores don't show years, but merely shifts in temperatures. Multiple rings can be made in each season, often in just a few weeks. What's that report of a WWII jet that was left in greenland for about 50 years and ended up being in an ice core thousands or rings thick? I know you were only giving this as an example to back up radiometric dating, but I don't find it really yields any factual data.

 

[Scott]

again, based on assumptions...

we can know the t1/2 of a given material, its current strength (curies) and therefore when it will reach an immeasurable amount of radiation. What we cannot know is how strong (extra electrons) the material was when it was fossilized, frozen, etc. Again, all speculation.

 

[AquaNerd]

i'm no expert at radiometric dating. if i was i'd probably be able to afford a much larger tank. it would be pointless for me to try to explain it because i know i would be doing it injustice. the points you all bring up are valid concerns, but don't you think the scientists thought of these already?

but check out wikipedia's answers:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiometric_dating

i know wikipedia isn't the greatest resource, but it's a good starting point.

scientists didn't just think up this topic overnight and decided to run with it. like all other theories and ideas, this topic was well developed and has been in use for several decades. radiometric dating has been refined and repeated continually.

if we, a bunch of non-scientists, can come up with these ideas about the possible flaws about radiometric dating, don't you think the scientists have too? if this idea had such a fundamental flaw then why is it still in practice and the be foremost used method of dating ancient items?

 

[crvz]

scientists didn't just think up this topic overnight and decided to run with it. like all other theories and ideas, this topic was well developed and has been in use for several decades. radiometric dating has been refined and repeated continually.

Now we're starting to get into the meat of it!

Just because something is used, refined, and repeated for several decades does not give it credence. First example, though somewhat poor, may be Haekel's emrbyo drawings. Who learned about those in school? I surely did; taught me that human embryo's went through a phase with gills. But that was a piece of data wholely fabricating in 1869 by Haekel to support evolution; I'm sure we all now know that it was debunked in 1875 and that he was tried and found guilty by his peers for fraud. But it's still taught today as fact. Haekel, a scientist, quite literally made something up overnight and decided to run with it.

The ages in the geologic column where similarly arbitrarily defined in the late 1800s, well before radiometric dating was employed. I'll grant you that they've been changed and refined over time, but it's foundation has the same history. Scientists came up with values that supported the evolution theory. That's where the circular logic comes in; for decades the fossil record was aged by the geologic column, and the geological column was aged by the fossil record. Only recently are they trying to employ more sophisticated methods of dating rocks and bones; but they're not without similar holes. It works if you want it to work, but as Scott mentions there is tons of speculation that is too often passed along as fact.

if we, a bunch of non-scientists, can come up with these ideas about the possible flaws about radiometric dating, don't you think the scientists have too? if this idea had such a fundamental flaw then why is it still in practice and the be foremost used method of dating ancient items?

Because there is no alternative way available to date fossils that aligns with the theory of evolution, and a large portion of the scientific community does not want to admit the consequences of being wrong. I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist, but this one I often find myself nodding along with. If evolution starts to fall apart, what other choices are there? I'm dangerously close to theology here, so I'll go ahead and squelch the rest of this train of thought, but it's not too hard to chase down.

I'll more explicilit restate that I've never seen a piece of evidence that supports evolution that could not as easily be scientifically interpreted to support design and creation. And I've surely looked!

 

[Guest]

debate

Ok I've been at work all day, what did I miss, have we done a 360 yet,
just kidding. Of course I'm off for the next three days,
let me get a good nights sleep and I'll be fired up and be ready
for some more debate tomorrow I z tired see yall tomorrow
I ma gonna go surf the forum

 

[Guest]

Okay, you guys got me on this one! I have never been known to not participate in discussions regarding evolution. So this is my first post. It will be brief.

and if man evolved from apes, why haven`t all apes evolved to man?

Just want to clarify that man didn't evolve from apes. Apes and man have a common ancestor. Apes and man are what we have today. I think this misunderstanding leads to a lot of confusion.

I'm not sure I understand the reasoning of the question "why haven't all apes evolved to man?" I think another misunderstanding is that man is the ideal life form. Why would apes evolve into humans? They're perfectly adapted to where they live. And humans aren't leaving much room elsewhere.

Thanks for starting this topic!!

 

[Guest]

Thank you Mzungu, i think you made made my point.Just that i did not know how to express it.Animals and man adapt to enviroments and not evolve.North US is cold.So is there fatter people up North than the South where it is warmer? In actuallity its that people in the south are fatter.By saying this i don`t mean to insult anyone( i wiegh a slim 280#s ha, ha!)I believe that all life forms are ideal for what they were created for.Fish for the seas and mamals for the earth etc.The greatest creation is man.Just read on what we are disscussing.these ideas are facinating and that we can dispute them calmly and rationaly is wonderful.

 

[Guest]

Debate

I do believe that there is someone else in this debate that also expressed
that man and animals change to their environment. Also good point
and observation. But the debate is on a basis of, now quote me if I'm
wrong, the information at hand, we read these theory's and see the info,
but is that the facts. Oh wow I have this great idea kind of rush. I believe
also that what people can actually know, is better defined, like in the
DIY section of this forum, it is so cool to see everybody's inventions
and how they work. Now to me they know what their talking about
because they created something, not just read something and repeated
what they read.

 

[Guest]

Debate

Bump already edit above sorry

 

[AquaNerd]

sorry i've been away from the topic the last few days, been at my grandfather's funeral and taking care of all the family stuff that comes with it. but i'll post a quick response so y'all know i'm still here . there are a few other things that i've skipped over for now, but i plan on going back over them tomorrow. so i'm not avoiding the posts.

Thank you Mzungu, i think you made made my point.Just that i did not know how to express it.Animals and man adapt to enviroments and not evolve.North US is cold.So is there fatter people up North than the South where it is warmer? In actuallity its that people in the south are fatter.By saying this i don`t mean to insult anyone( i wiegh a slim 280#s ha, ha!)I believe that all life forms are ideal for what they were created for.Fish for the seas and mamals for the earth etc.The greatest creation is man.Just read on what we are disscussing.these ideas are facinating and that we can dispute them calmly and rationaly is wonderful.

no, humans in colder regions won't become fatter. this is because we have a brain that is so developed that we can make coats and stay inside a warm and cozy house. we also have transportation. so when it gets too cold for some they move to somewhere a little warmer.

animals in a specific environment don't always have these options. they may be able to physically move, but the place they go may not have the type of food they need. also, animals can't simply go indoors to a thermally regulated building. they can go into caves and whatnot, but they don't build heaters.

humans don't rely on their fat content to keep them warm like all the animals do.

Okay, you guys got me on this one! I have never been known to not participate in discussions regarding evolution. So this is my first post. It will be brief.

and if man evolved from apes, why haven`t all apes evolved to man?

Just want to clarify that man didn't evolve from apes. Apes and man have a common ancestor. Apes and man are what we have today. I think this misunderstanding leads to a lot of confusion.

I'm not sure I understand the reasoning of the question "why haven't all apes evolved to man?" I think another misunderstanding is that man is the ideal life form. Why would apes evolve into humans? They're perfectly adapted to where they live. And humans aren't leaving much room elsewhere.

Thanks for starting this topic!!

humans are a branch off of a very complex family tree. on neighboring branches the apes came along. modern day apes and humans all came from a common ancestor. we share a range of 95-98% of our dna with monkeys, believe it or not. but something doesn't have to die out in order to have a more advanced form pop up down the road.

and not everything evolves at the same rate. look at the ceolocanth, it has barely changed at all in the last few million years. it didn't need to, its environment was stable enough for it to barely have to change.

 

[Guest]

Debat

My deepest condolences on your lose with your grandfather Brandon,
I don't what type of relationship you had with him, but I was named
after my grandfather, so when he passed I was deeply saddened.
Ever need to just talk, give me a call.


Lloyd, mobile#832-381-7008

 

[AquaNerd]

thanks lloyd

it was one of those situations where you knew it was coming, but was just a matter of time. he had brain atrophy really bad and it caused a lot of alzheimers like conditions. so we had pretty much already prepared ourselves for the inevitable. it was sad, but it will be ok. that's just what happens in life.

 

[AquaNerd]

The exactness of Ernst Haeckel's drawings of embryos has caused much controversy among Intelligent Design proponents recently and Haeckel's intellectual opponents in the past. Although the early embryos of different species exhibit similarities, Haeckel apparently exaggerated these similarities in support of his Recapitulation theory, sometimes known as the Biogenetic Law or "Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny". Furthermore, Haeckel even proposed theoretical life-forms to accommodate certain stages in embryogenesis. A recent review concluded that the "biogenetic law is supported by several recent studies - if applied to single characters only".[1]

Critics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Karl von Baer and Wilhelm His, did not believe that living embryos reproduce the evolutionary process and produced embryo drawings of their own[2] which emphasized the differences in early embryological development. Late twentieth and early twenty-first century critics, Jonathan Wells and Stephen Jay Gould, have objected to the continued use of Haeckel’s embryo drawings in text-books.

On the other hand, Michael K. Richardson, Professor of Evolutionary Developmental Zoology, Leiden University, while recognizing that some criticisms of the drawings are legitimate (indeed, it was he and his co-workers who began the modern criticisms in 1998), has supported the drawings as teaching aids,[3] and has said that "on a fundamental level, Haeckel was correct"[4].

haeckel did exaggerate his drawings, but we have tools to get around that now such as digital photography and sonograms and what not to see what's going on. and even though his drawings were fraudulent, some of the ideas and theories he proposed are still accepted. his ideas aren't accepted to save embarrassment from the scientific community, but because they still have some scientific validity.

and just because one person exaggerated his findings, should that taint the entire theory of evolution and all the other scientific findings and processes? no, it shouldn't. man is capable of making mistakes, lying, and sometimes being just plain wrong. but you must keep that in mind when you look at the bible as well. both the evolutionary theory and the events of the bible are subject to scrutiny by members of their own respective communities as well as people outside their perspective communities.

i'm reminded by my evolution professor. he was giving a lecture about intelligent designers and stated that one of their arguments was that pro-evolutionary scientists have this agenda to fabricate data and blatantly lie to promote evolution. he then joked that those scientists must have forgotten to send him the memo.

 

[Guest]

Thank you Mzungu, i think you made made my point.Just that i did not know how to express it.Animals and man adapt to enviroments and not evolve.

Hmm, that's not really what I meant. Maybe the word 'adapted' wasn't correct. But I didn't mean that adaptation replaces evolution.

i'm reminded by my evolution professor. he was giving a lecture about intelligent designers and stated that one of their arguments was that pro-evolutionary scientists have this agenda to fabricate data and blatantly lie to promote evolution. he then joked that those scientists must have forgotten to send him the memo.

 

[aggie4231]

i'm reminded by my evolution professor. he was giving a lecture about intelligent designers and stated that one of their arguments was that pro-evolutionary scientists have this agenda to fabricate data and blatantly lie to promote evolution. he then joked that those scientists must have forgotten to send him the memo.

Good old Dr. Kanz. How are you liking his exams?

 

[AquaNerd]

i'm reminded by my evolution professor. he was giving a lecture about intelligent designers and stated that one of their arguments was that pro-evolutionary scientists have this agenda to fabricate data and blatantly lie to promote evolution. he then joked that those scientists must have forgotten to send him the memo.

Good old Dr. Kanz. How are you liking his exams?

they suck of course...got one back today and the class average was like 17 out of 80 or something like that. i swear he's evil.

 

[aggie4231]

Good old Dr. Kanz. How are you liking his exams?

they suck of course...got one back today and the class average was like 17 out of 80 or something like that. i swear he's evil.[/quote]

your telling me. I had to take an extra semester because of him. I had a 75 and needed a B to graduate.

 

[AquaNerd]

yeah, kanz has single handedly killed my gpa . i had almost a 4.0 when i transferred in, took a few kanz classes and now i'm hovering around 3 .