[disclaimer before i write this] I'm very sorry at this posts length, but you posted a shitload of information to tackle in those links. So here it is.
[disclaimer after the fact] shit this is long, also proofreading was shoddy. apologies for grammatical/spelling errors.
Quote:
Originally posted by evangel
All I'm saying is that the quote you used (above) is ridiculous because it uses an intelligence insulting analogy to say that the shape of the earth is a \"theory\" which is equated with fact. FYI: It's no theory. It's been verified in several different ways tyhat the earth is spherical :roll: In your reasoning, you are saying that the theory of evolution, which every good scientist would defend as a theory (not a verifiable \"fact\") is as factual as the earth is round. Don't confuse fact with theory.
Well, I read the articles you posted, but I'd like to talk about that ^^ for a second. The shape of the earth was not a \"fact\" 500 years ago (or however long). In fact, it was generally accepted as a \"fact\" that the earth was flat - a \"fact\" espoused by the church - relying on evidence from the bible.
The history of the christian church is full of bogus scientific claims, claims they've had to go back on over the years or lose all credibility. The fact its, when the bible was written people were ignorant. Noone knew basic scientific process, and it shows in many glaring scientific errors in the bible. But anyways, maybe thats the startings of another thread. Back to your articles you posted.
I'll break it down into (most of) the main arguments:
-The whole radio halo's in granite deal
-The male-female argument against macroevolution
-Decay of earths magnetic field
-Evidence for the global flood
----Radio Halos in granite.
This isn't about evolution, it's all about the development of radioactive isotope halos in granite. Gentry's theory states that these halo's can be distinguished by the radioactive decay of isotopes in the element Polonium. The catch is that Polonium has a very short halflife, ranging from microseconds to 140 days (very short in geological terms). His assumption based on this:
Quote:
Concentric haloes associated with polonium decay - but without any rings corresponding to any other uranium decay series isotopes were taken to be evidence that the host rock had formed almost instantly rather than by the slow cooling of an original magma over millions of years. Gentry extrapolates that all Precambrian granites - his primordial crustal rock - must have formed in less than three minutes, and that polonium haloes are therefore proof of the young Earth creation model according to Genesis.
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Ok, reading up on this made my head hurt. I'm not a scientist or a geologist. But by the same strenghs I'd say that most people who use this as evidence for creation understand at most as much as me.
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/po-halos/gentry.html
http://www.csun.edu/~vcgeo005/revised8.htm
I lack the background and general knowledge to even start to tackle this on my own. But these sites give a good starting point for someone seriously wanting to look at both sides of this evidence. They raise quite a few questions that Gentry has (as far as I can tell) ignored or not been able to answer. In the main I think it's agreed that Gentry's scientific process to get his results is fine, its his analysis of these results thats faulty.
----Male-female argument against evolution
Quote:
If an animal mates with another animal not of its exact species, the result will be a sterile creature... Therefore, how could the macro evolutionary process advance?
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Macroevolution is probably the most misunderstood concept debated in evolution. It does not mean jumps in different species from parents of offspring. Evolution doesnt happen because one day 2 animals of different species decide to mate. Macroevolution happens given 2 things:
1) microevolution
2) + a LOT of time
This being said, macroevolution might be spurred to take slighltly less time with dramatic climate changes or lasting environmental factors such as that. Slighly less time still means millions of years. linkage
---- Decay of earth's magnetic field
what is is
Quote:
The earth's magnetic field energy has been decaying at a factor of 2.7 over the past 1,000 years. At this current decay rate, the earth could not be greater than 10,000 years old. (Science says the age of the earth is around 5 billion years old)
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Again, not about evolution, its about proof for a young earth as depicted in the bible (like the radio halos above).
Again, not a scientist. But these people are!
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/magfields.html
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-meritt...e.html#magnetic
They do a better job than I'd ever have. Apparantly the majory of scientific evidence refutes this one. Interesting reading, wouldn't make for interesting retelling.
----Evidence for global flood
It's kinda funny, I was talking to a friend of mine last night. He's never been christian, never even considered it to be remotely true. So he's never even looked into it. Of course he knew about the stories of noah and the flood, but absolutely refused to believe that people would accept it as truth. Anyways.
Several reasons not to believe this one.
-Lack of ANY geological evidence for an event as big as this
-With that much water in the atmosphere, breathing might have been a little.... hard. Ok not hard. Impossible. Much death on the ark.
-Speaking of water, where the hell did it all go after 40 days?
-Sea life would have died out. Entirely.
-With what we now know about engineering, it is flatly impossible to float a wooden ship that big. Even with nothing on it.
-Given the measurements in the bible (what, 500feet long isn't it?) it couldnt even fit all the LOCAL animals to noah onto it. Let alone 2 of every kind.
-Anyone been to my home country (australia)? Explain to me how kangaroo's apparantly hopped all the way over to this ark. Then back again after the flood. That works for any landbound regional animal's that didnt exist on noah's continent.
-Where did the sparrow (or whatever bird it was) get the fresh plant material after the end of 40 days? Plants woulda been just as buried under much water as the rest of the earth.
-The other civilisations at the time didn't seem to notice this flood and die according to god's plan. Funniest thing I've read all day:
Quote:
Reporter: So your civilization was wiped out by a flood that covered the entire earth right? Why are you still around?
Egyptian: [Monty Python Voice] We got better.
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I could go on all day. One more thing though. Does anyone besides me see how HARSH this story is? One day god looks at his creation, doesn't really like it. So he drowns every animal, adult, child, baby, tree. And if he's omnipotent as it says in the bible, he KNEW this was gonna happen as soon as he created us.
Better hope he doesn't see how much the worlds turned away from him now. Well, better hope, or grow gills.
One last word. Evolution is a theory yes, but its a scientific theory. Its testable, and has been proven by science time and time again. YEC, ID, Creationisms are theories. Not scientific ones though. They are based on faith, are untestable if true and upon scientific examination they dont stand up.
long. too long.
-spoon