Evolutionary establishment tactics

by hooberus 157 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  Abaddon

  hooberus

  Don't you think you have consistantly ignored CREATIONIST establishment tactics?

  I mean, look at these threads;

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/48010/1.ashx

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/96390/1.ashx

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/91820/1.ashx

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/10/91371/1.ashx

  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/87640/1.ashx

  ... in them you or other Creationists or ID-ots show a remarkable ability to ignore evidence, misinterpret facts due to lack of knowledge or over-zealous belief (or be so poorly informed about the subject that the ear-tickling Creationist websites seem to be good sources of reliable information).

  Time and time again, key flaws with Creationist or ID-ot (a new term I've coined) theory are not so much dealt with by the supposrteres of such theories as ignored. Or, even worse, they don't know enough about the subject to see the faults in the arguments they use (or copy and paste).

  In the case given in this thread, the fact that the,er, 'gentleman' concerned completely violated professional ethics due to his beliefs, is essentailly not dealt with. In other instances you have gone back to websites which have shown themselves to be innacyrate or potentially deceptive, or to Creatuionist authoer who have likewise had their credibility destroyed.

  It seems the substance of the Creationist's argument is not as important to you as the fact they are arguing against Evoluiton, but I have to say, with 'friends' like that, you certainly don't need any enemies.

  Your desire to cram god into a conceptual box made by bronze-age goatherds seems to stem from a literalistic interpretation of the Bible that you are loathe to abandon, even though the literalistic interpretation is obviously incompatable with the evidence (such as the Flood's date is impossible given extant arcaelogical and living biological remains older than any of the the Flood's potential dates which could not be present if there was a literal Global Flood).

  I have before asserted that this is probably due to the fact that literalism is probably key to other beliefs of yours, and accepting that the Bible is NOT the literal accurate word of god is so disasterous to your worldview that you will go to any lengths to avoid it.

  Likewise I have asked why you have so little faith in god that you have to believe in a primative violent diety and a Creation myth one level of credulity up from god masturbating to create everything (such kyths do exist).

  In view of this, you talking about 'Evolutionary establishment tactic' is a bit of a joke. It isn't even the pot calling the kettle black, as it's already been demonstarted that the kettle ISN'T black. It's more like 'the pot talking nonsense'.

  I am very interested if you or any other beliverer in primative creation-myths (as theere are Hindu creationists and Muslim creationist who will say YOU are wrong as well) are capable of responding to this in substansive terms, instead of further unjustified complaints about how unfair it is (when at every opportunity over the past years you and the rest of the god-dishonouring literalists have only managed to show how fair criticisms of Creationists and their crack-pot theories is).

  From past experienece you'll either absent yourself from the thread or fail to respond to the allegations regarding your behaviour.

  Funny how someone claiming they have the truth needs to hide, quote erroneous twaddle, or remain silent....
• 

  hooberus

  From past experienece you'll either absent yourself from the thread or fail to respond to the allegations regarding your behaviour.
  Funny how someone claiming they have the truth needs to hide, quote erroneous twaddle, or remain silent....

  
  Abaddon, I have already spent (wasted) considerable time responding to many of your accusations against myself (and sources that I use). The post history between us is sufficient enough to establish the fact of the matter. For the interested, here are a few sample dialogues:
  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/72354/4.ashx
  http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/89867/5.ashx

  ... in them you or other Creationists or ID-ots show a remarkable ability to ignore evidence, misinterpret facts due to lack of knowledge or over-zealous belief (or be so poorly informed about the subject that the ear-tickling Creationist websites seem to be good sources of reliable information).

  Time and time again, key flaws with Creationist or ID-ot (a new term I've coined) theory are not so much dealt with by the supposrteres of such theories as ignored. Or, even worse, they don't know enough about the subject to see the faults in the arguments they use (or copy and paste).

  
  Furthermore, you should not charge others with not knowing "enough about the subject to see the faults in the arguments they use (or copy and paste)" when you yourself copy and paste quotes such as this (your full post is between the lines): http://www.jehovahs-witness.com/6/72354/1172867/post.ashx#1172867
  
  ___________________________________________________________________________________ hooberus, when you're defending something it's wise to check what you're defending it against. You are so sure that you can rely upon the honesty and scientific knowledge of the people involved that you completely fail to defend this AIG claim from what is wrong with it.
  
  
  
  

  Read the second link I provided. It's educational. There's a bit you should really consider

  This is another excellent example of supposed 'creation science'. All creation science is reactionary. There is no creation model and there is no original research aimed at establishing a creation model. Creationists, like Snelling, rely on a false dichotomy and conclude that if evolution is wrong, then their narrow misinterpretation of Genesis is correct.

  
  ______________________________________________________________________________________
  
  
  
  
  
  *The creation model can be found in many introductory Creation science books: Even the anti-creationist NCSE admits that there is one: http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/articles/3690_issue_01__volume_1_number_1__7_1_1980.asp#Virginia
  
  
  ?
• 

  hooberus

  ___________________________________________________________________________________
  

  Read the second link I provided. It's educational. There's a bit you should really consider

  This is another excellent example of supposed 'creation science'. All creation science is reactionary. There is no creation model and there is no original research aimed at establishing a creation model. Creationists, like Snelling, rely on a false dichotomy and conclude that if evolution is wrong, then their narrow misinterpretation of Genesis is correct.

  _____________________________________________________________________________________-

  Even your bolded point is wrong:

  http://www.answersingenesis.org/tj/v12/i2/logic.asp

  Many evolutionary propagandists dispute this reasoning when creationists use it, on the grounds that creation and evolution are not the only alternatives. Creationists are thus accused of the fallacy of false alternatives, that is, the disjunctive premise leaves out a possible alternative. But as shown, many evolutionists agree there are only two, so there are double standards at work.26 This can be shown by the Law of Excluded Middle: either things were made (creation) or they weren’t (evolution). It is true that biblical creation is not the only alternative, so it is not proven by disproof of evolution. Biblical creation is certainly consistent with disproof of evolution, unlike atheism.
• 

  rem

  Hooberus,
  
  >> I am familiar with this definition. This is one of the definitions that evolutionists like to use to establish the "fact" of evolution (indeed it would). The problem is that it is so bland that it is compatible with virtually any origins scenario (from creationism, to panspermia, to universal common ancestry, polyphyletic origins, etc). Its really of little explanatory value. In fact, it doesn't even necessarily even require the formation of new genes, merely that frequencies of existing genes are changing (perhaps back and forth ultimately to exactly where they were before). In reality the above definition it is more accurately a definition of what population genetics studies.
  
  Well now you're starting to get the picture. You would just LOVE to argue a strawman, wouldn't you. It doesn't matter what you FEEL the definition of the Theory of Evolution should be, it can only be what it is.
  
  Remember, Darwin's book was called "Origin of Species"... not origin of life. Even Darwin did not touch on the topic of origins because that was not what the theory was about. Any origins hypothesis is speculative at this point, but Evolution as defined is well observed and documented.
  
  And you are correct - Evolution is compatible with many different origins scenarios - even creation of the first biological organisms by one or more gods. So, what is your complaint with the Theory of Evolution again?
  
  rem
• 

  Midget-Sasquatch

  Many of the precursors to life have been found in comets, meteorites, and even in space. (i.e.glycine in space). The materials are all there. Sure we don't currently have a solid natural explanation of how life arose from them. . IDers at best can only say: An intelligence was responsible. And its left at that. What else can we derive? Searching for materialist explanations can increase our knowledge and possibly redirect us to practical information.
• 

  rem

  Hooberus,
  
  Also to say that the Theory of Evolution as defined above has little explanatory power is laughable. Of course it has little explanatory power about ultimate origins - because it has nothing to do with that. It does, however, have much explanatory power regarding the relatedness of life on earth and genetic studies and is useful in helping us understand much about life on earth.
  
  The Bible's explanation of how the current life we see today got here has zero explanatory power and zero usefulness understanding the relatedness of organisms, genetic studies, and even the creation of cures for diseases, etc. An explanation that is not useful at all is most probably wrong.
  
  rem
• 

  hooberus

  Hooberus,
  
  
  >> I am familiar with this definition. This is one of the definitions that evolutionists like to use to establish the "fact" of evolution (indeed it would). The problem is that it is so bland that it is compatible with virtually any origins scenario (from creationism, to panspermia, to universal common ancestry, polyphyletic origins, etc). Its really of little explanatory value. In fact, it doesn't even necessarily even require the formation of new genes, merely that frequencies of existing genes are changing (perhaps back and forth ultimately to exactly where they were before). In reality the above definition it is more accurately a definition of what population genetics studies.
  
  
  Well now you're starting to get the picture. You would just LOVE to argue a strawman, wouldn't you. It doesn't matter what you FEEL the definition of the Theory of Evolution should be, it can only be what it is.

  Allowing "the Theory of Evolution" to be potentially defined as including more than merely "any change in the frequency of alleles within a gene pool from one generation to the next" is not setting up "a strawman." Evolutionists themselves frequently do it.

  In fact, the claim that "allele-frequency definition" is "the definition of the Theory of Evolution" is even at variance with another "talk origins" arcticle which (in responding to a creationist claim) admits that "the theory of evolution" "encompasses a much broader range of observations and ideas" than merely biological change over time (ie: changes in allele frequencies).

  http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA212.html

  _________________________________________________________________________________

  Claim CA212:

  Evolution is defined ambiguously, and claims that it is fact are based on the ambiguity. It is usually defined as "change in heritable characteristics in a population over time" (often expressed as "change in allele frequencies"), which everyone accepts as fact, but that does not mean that macroevolution or common descent are fact.

  Source:

  POSH (Parents for Objective Science and History), n.d. Biology text review. http://posh.roundearth.net/biology.htm

  Response:

  1. Language tends to be ambiguous at times (e.g., the entry for the word "set" covers more than twenty-two pages of the original Oxford English Dictionary.) The word "evolution" is an unfortunate instance of that ambiguity; it is used for the fact of biological change over time; as shorthand for the theory of evolution, which encompasses a much broader range of observations and ideas; and for change generally, in any realm. The ambiguity can usually be resolved by the context in which the word is used, at least by people who know something about biological evolution.
     
     Mixing contexts is indeed improper, and the fact of allele frequency change, by itself, does not establish the theory of evolution.

  ______________________________________________________________________________________

  Furthermore, (even as the NCSE admits) some evolutionists (including Mayr) don't even accept the "alle-frequency" definition:

  http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/rncse_content/vol21/9925_defining_evolution_12_30_1899.asp

  _____________________________________________________________________________________

  The "allele-frequency" definition of evolution has survived to become the "standard" definition in textbooks and discussions about the nature of evolution . . . A more important controversy, however, is between the proponents of the allele-frequency definition and those who reject it altogether as too narrow:

  I pointed out more than a decade ago (1977) that the reductionist explanation, so widely adopted in recent decades — evolution is a change in gene frequencies in populations — is not only not explanatory, but is in fact misleading. Far more revealing is the definition: "Evolution is change in the adaptation and in the diversity of populations of organisms" (Mayr 1988: 162).

  ______________________________________________________________________________________

  Mayr ("the worlds greatest living evolutionary biologist" according to Gould) even said in the preface of his recent book "What Evolution Is" that: "Evolution deals with phenotypes of individuals, with populations, with species; it is not "a change in gene frequencies.""

  The fact is that "evolution" and/or "the Theory of Evolution" can be defined in many different ways from the minimalist "any change in alle frequencies" to possibly also include things such as universal common ancestry, amphibians descending from fish, humans descending from ancient apes, the origin of life itself, etc. (for a source that includes the orign of life see for example George Gaylord Simpson' s "The Meaning of Evolution").
• 

  hooberus

  Hooberus,
  
  
  Also to say that the Theory of Evolution as defined above has little explanatory power is laughable. Of course it has little explanatory power about ultimate origins - because it has nothing to do with that. It does, however, have much explanatory power regarding the relatedness of life on earth and genetic studies and is useful in helping us understand much about life on earth.

  Mayr ("the worlds greatest living evolutionary biologist") disagrees:

  http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/rncse_content/vol21/9925_defining_evolution_12_30_1899.asp

  ___________________________________________________________________________________

  I pointed out more than a decade ago (1977) that the reductionist explanation, so widely adopted in recent decades — evolution is a change in gene frequencies in populations — is not only not explanatory, but is in fact misleading. Far more revealing is the definition: "Evolution is change in the adaptation and in the diversity of populations of organisms" (Mayr 1988: 162).

  ___________________________________________________________________________________

  The problem with claim that the minimalist (ie: "any change in alle frequencies") definition has "much explanatory power regarding the relatedness of life on earth and genetic studies and is useful in helping us understand much about life on earth" is that such a thing does not even attempt to explain the origin of anything -not even different alleles (let alone biological structures, body plans, how the various phyla ultimately came about, etc.).
• 

  Midget-Sasquatch

  hooberus,

  Say we lump in abiogenesis into evolution, since IDers are very adamant to do so. Its a firewall after all. If evolutionists can't show how it all started then the whole notion of evolution is to be scrapped right?

  Thats like saying that cops on a manhunt should just call off the search as worthless and wrong, that because they zeroed in on a motel room only to find it empty, he wasn't even real. The trail may have gone cold, but that doesn't negate the route the suspect took, especially if there were alot of concrete traces that gave away his locale (like cellphone use, credit card use, ATM/bank/store cameras).

  Rem, and you, already mentioned that if its seems astronomically unlikely for life to have started out abiotically here on earth, there can be other alternatives to a supernatural creation. Like it came from elsewhere. Am I biased in repeating that one? Maybe.

  Back to the thread topic, the ID proponents are just trying to get as much mileage as they can from the ill-will between one of there own and his workmates. Yep people can be cold to one another when either or both sides feel they were unduly treated. That doesn't mean "the evolutionary establishment" is so biased that people shouldn't believe what's been discovered. That "its" trying to supress the truth that its all a feeble deck of cards. The crook was never real?
• 

  Abaddon

  Hey, hooberus, did you just totally fail to address the point I made regarding dishonesty and or incompetence amongst Creationists, and how you carry on using sources that have been shown in the past to be dishonest or incompetent?

  Yup, you did.

  There is no creation model

  Well, the Jews, Christians and Muslims all have a very similar one, but no proof that the time scales involved if one insists upon literal interpretation are realistic, and indeed masses of proof that things are far older than these forms of literalistic Creationism allow.

  The literalistic Hindus Creationists have the opposite problem; the time scales that we know life has developed in are far too SHORT for their Creationism.

  As such, there is no definative Creationist model, just a couple of ancient myths whose literal interpretation in this day-and-age would have probably surprised even some of those who wrote them. Have you disproved the Hindu Creationists claims hooberus? Or the Muslims? If you guys had the same model, you wouldn;t have to. But you don't, and your theory of Creation is just as valid or invalid as theirs without proof.

  Which you don't have, just like them, although OF COURSE, they will claims they are right, just as you do.

  And again, it is not about GOD, at all, is it? It is about YOUR OPINION that god HAD to have made the world exactly how a bronze-age goatherd imagined god made the world. You cling to this as to accept the Bible is not literal inspired and accurate removes the keystone to your entire beliefs structure.

  Rather than trying to discover god as he might be, you want him to go in the nice little box you have prepared for him that places you in the 'good' catagory where you can direct your complacent eyes opon the world and feel superior to it.

  You yourself have evaded answering severe flaws in your beliefs on pretexts. That's your level of personal honesty hooberus.

  Yeah, I can imagine Jesus sulking like that and saying "Well, you Pharasees are wrong, but you've upset me and I won't tell you why you are wrong or try to prove you are wrong!"

  Truth need not hide; your evasion alone marks you as a fantasist caught up in something which, despite your posturing is all about you and nothing to do with god, as you DON'T WANT GOD, unless he's like you've already decide he is.

  Such faith!