LOLtastic dodge.

This.

I dont know why humans cant be humble enough to just admit we dont know yet. Its intellectually bankrupt to just put gods name where "I dont know" should be.

If you think that your god is the answer then cool. But until you prove it, keep it out of schools (teach them all or none at all) and dont ask to be tax exempt and I wont havea problem with religion.

Actually, it doesn't mean anything close to that on a scientific basis. Though if this is an article of your faith, okay.

It's unclear how refusing to play along with a "let's talk about you instead" change of topic request is a "dodge" of anything, except perhaps as a deft step around a pile of dog poop on the pavement.

No response at all might have been better though.

Or you could just save us and say nothing to do evolution.

im mostly curious based on all your posts regarding evolution (and actually, science in general) that are in direct contradiction to what experts in those relevant fields believe.

If you don't want to tell us what your scientific/education background is, then don't. Just thought it would provide important context to your out-of-band claims ... getting a tad defensive though aren't you?

Meh, you can stay curious. If you think you see a flaw in my reasoning, you are welcome to be precise in pointing it out (rather than resorting to the usual fallacious appeals to consensus, experts, etc, which you show no sign of understanding anyway). Otherwise, consider this an on-the-job lesson in your ad hominem career to avoid revealing the intention to rely on "let's talk about you instead" misdirection until after inquiring about the personal details necessary to make that technique work.

I don't know what that's supposed to mean, but it does confirm a Tourette syndrome level of ad hominem tendency on your part.

We now return this thread to the topic it was intended to discuss.

You can't grasp the idea of saying "I don't know" in the face of a mystery instead of just blatantly making **** up?

You could have answered his question in half the time it took you to write this...

OPs question seems to be pretty well answered... Theres little point in talking evolution with Concerto. In the previous evolution threads hes quite clearly shown a lack of understanding and has no desire to educate himself on the subject.

If people stop talking to theists about science and or logic when they're clearly wrong and/or misinformed then about then 50% of the traffic on this forum goes away. And, of course, pretty much all dialogue with 2 or 3 regulars should cease entirely.

but then he wouldn't get to use his favorite word "fallacious" and ironic phrases like "Tourette syndrome level of ad hominem tendency".

If he doesn't want to reveal his scientific background (which i'm guessing is none), then just say you don't want to. Most posters who discuss scientific topics on this board are happy to give a brief description of their relevant experience, and i think it helps bring more context to the discussion. But i guess if you are concerto and just enjoy falsely pointing out "appeal to authority" fallacies, and making random jabs at the scientific community, then its not like he adds much to the discussion anyways.

I'll point out a fairly big flaw. You constantly say people us the "appeal to authority" fallacy, when in fact the way they are using it is not a fallacy. Recently someone pointed this out to you, but as per usual, you ignored it.

IIRC, you have some sort of physics background, not a biology background, and most certainly nothing involving evolution. Its really ironic that you tell dk he shows no sign of understanding, when you do not own the tools to assess such a thing.

From what I can see, your argument boils down to unless you're an expert on something, everything must be taken with faith. People have attempted this reasoning before with regards to evolution, it however, holds no intellectual weight.

no idea.

wrong.

Is possible an atheist could believe in something that currently cant be explained, but not in the matter of a deity by definition, an atheist could believe in yeti, UFO's, and other supernatural phenomenon and that doesnt make him any less an atheist ( rejecting a belief in a "Deity"), in fact by definition it does not have anything to do with one or the other.

maybe asking how the first cell began is a more important question than others or maybe not, given the universe size life could be a normal or rare event depending on the universal constants that we have come to understand that are needed for our kind of life.

Life could have begun here in a different kind of event that spawned other types of lifeforms on other parts of the universe.

Even with experiments that could reproduce life out of the same chemicals that were on the earth at the time, we could never prove that it happened that specific way.

Note: I am not an expert and could be wrong in some statements, but i would recommend the latest Stephen HAwkings video for more info on the subject, is really good.

Story of everything

If you can't see why this is an important question then there is no chance. You are clearly AGAINST the vast majority of scientific consensus and so it is a fair question to ask what your personal experience with science is.

Reading popular science books and criticisms of currently accepted theories is not what scientists do. I'm a research student in a Biochemistry/Physiology lab and nearly all the work I do relies on macro-evolution being true. About 6 months ago I encountered a strange problem in the tracking of a particular protein where there seemed to be no clear evolutionary parthway when tracing back through the species. My supervisor liased with 3 other experts and discovered what seems to be quite a novel way for the protein to have evolved and has allowed us to identify a whole new family of proteins in this particular organism. The observations we've made would only have been possible through macro-evolution and we looked for the answer when we came across an obvious impossibility because it is so overwhelmingly certain that Theory of Evolution is fact.

Also, we've had a Summer intern in the lab who is a creationist and he's just about beginning to come around to accepting evolution may be true after spending the summer here. Funnily enough he is seriously considering doing a PhD.

Does this mean you have made an observation that is inconsistent with macro-evolution being false? Please elaborate. I'm very interested.

I don't really know what you mean by the bolded so I'll just explain what happened.

I had an undergrad do a little project on some random protein. This project encompassed a load of different experiments/ideas and he was in about 3 or 4 labs doing experiments. Anyway, I work mainly with C. elegans and occasionally Drosophila and zebrafish. So he told me that this was the protein he wanted to express because he was comparing the same version of this protein in different organisms. So I made a flourescent version that could be incorporated into C. elegans (relatively simple procedure). Basically the method I use involves a technique called PCR which involves copying DNA so there is a chance of errors. So we sequence the final vector that we "shoot" into the C. elegans genome. Everything goes well and he takes some basic pictures and my colleague maps where the insertion went.

After Christmas he comes back and he's been writing his project and he accuses me of not using the correct DNA sequence because there's a mutation in the active site. I'm surprised as I checked the sequence myself with wormbase. I check the sequences again and sure enough I'm right.

What had happened was this protein had a different function than what he had been looking for because of a few select mutations in it's past. The protein still came up on a BLAST search recognising homology to the one he was looking for. Anyways, the protein that is responsible for the function in worms had taken on a very different route in evolutionary terms that seems to be conserved among other worm species. Anyway, this new group seems to have a few other members too although from the experiments my lab has performed they seem mostly redundant apart from one which prevents embryos from developing so I think somebody is looking into that now.

I'll PM you more if you're interested, sorry I'm not being that clear I'm tired and a bit tipsy.

Thanks for the reply. I think you explained it fine, though we differ as to conclusions. This will no doubt be on-topic again somewhere soon.

I'd be interested to hear your thoughts. You never answered whether you had a scientific background but one of the things I've learnt is that it's impossible to make an invalid suggestion. Every Thursday and Friday there is 1 hour of talks about the research happening in the department by PIs. The questions and feedback from other staff members is crucial in breeding an open and inquisitive mind.

There is one lecturer who is the nicest guy socially but known as the "The Bulldog" when it comes to work because he will tear conclusions to shreds. At first I thought he was being an arsehole but when I listened to him more closely he was questioning everything from the control used to the error bars on the data and the validity of the conclusions. This sort of attitude is really important in academia. FWIW I asked a question implying that his research was pointless when it was his turn and he argued his point well. Later in the pub he admitted he wasn't particularly proud of the quality of paper he was going to churn out from that particular grant.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11161493


There is no place for God in theories on the creation of the Universe, Professor Stephen Hawking has said.

He had previously argued belief in a creator was not incompatible with science but in a new book, he concludes the Big Bang was an inevitable consequence of the laws of physics.

If you are referring to matter as we generally perceive it, as I understand, the first matter that formed after the big bang, which was hydrogen, came into existence a small fraction of a second after he event(like, a millionth of a second, or something to that effect), when the sub nuclear particles were cool enough to form atoms.

Unknowns.

There are more than four atheists in this thread.

I count more than double that. Maybe you're not familiar with the posters, or you're making a conservative estimate.