Evolutionists: How did legs evolve?

iouae · Dec 16, 2017

The Barbarian said:
We don't see the first chordates until the Cambrian, so it's likely behind the mollusks and arthropods. Animals that appear to be primitive mollusks and arthropods are found in the Ediacaran.

Would you like me to show you about that?

Here is a complete list of Ediacaran Fauna.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ediacaran_genera

And most of these died out.

Then we get most of the modern Phyla suddenly appear.

Another lie that I was taught about evolution was the lie that "given enough time..." not that evolutionists could ever say what "enough time" was. How long is a piece of string? Answer to that question for evolutionists seems to be "No matter how short the time is between nothing and everything, that's enough time". I am not going to play that game with evolutionists, the "what's enough time?" game.

The Ediacarans die out which is bad.
The Ediacarans did not belong to modern phyla - that is worse.
The modern Phyla pop into existence like quantum particles in the Cambrian WITH NO MISSING LINKS - which is worst for evolution. The answer to this used to be taphonomy excuses - these missing links did not get preserved.

Some say spriggina is the trilobite ancestor. I don't think it has legs, so not an Arthropoda, but they look close. I say, show me then the Spriggina missing link.

The start of the Cambrian is the perfect place to demonstrate the absence of missing links.

And, Barbarian, I am hard to impress. I look at those supposed horse evolutionary trees and think, what kind of an idiot do they think I am. Rhetorical question. A 3 year old could arrange animals that look alike into an evolutionary tree.

But its much harder to play this deceitful game around the Cambrian. But Barbarian, if you want to search for trees of fossils around that time, or just arrange known fossils of that time into trees, by all means - I sit here dying to be impressed.

What makes evolutions job so much more difficult is this...
Suppose the Ediacarans are Act 1 of multicellular life. The curtain comes down on them in a mass extinction of the Ediacarans. The curtain immediately rises on a completely new cast, the modern phyla of animals.

The Ediacarans were wiped out. They had no chance to evolve while the curtain was down. And there are no missing links between end of Ediacarans and rise of Cambrians. I doubt it's valid to even make a tree of life across the Precambrian-Cambrian boundary since there is a mass extinction between.

Thus its illogical to say Spriggina evolved into Trilobites while the curtain was down, because Spriggina was too dead to evolve.

But Evolutionists, ever men of faith, want to BELIEVE that in its last gasp, Spriggina pooped out a Trilobite.

Bad enough, that there was nothing around to poop out all the other new phyla.

gcthomas · Dec 16, 2017

[MENTION=17583]iouae[/MENTION], if you looked at my digital photographic record for my family you would believe that my children all appeared on one day, fully formed only with the appearance of different stages of development (I was a late adopter of digital cameras).

Should you believe there was some special creation event? Or that their earlier growth was simply unrecorded through the lack of a suitable recording method or tardiness on my part resulting in an incomplete record?

iouae · Dec 16, 2017

gcthomas said:
[MENTION=17583]iouae[/MENTION], if you looked at my digital photographic record for my family you would believe that my children all appeared on one day, fully formed only with the appearance of different stages of development (I was a late adopter of digital cameras).

Should you believe there was some special creation event? Or that their earlier growth was simply unrecorded through the lack of a suitable recording method or tardiness on my part resulting in an incomplete record?

Gcthomas lets suppose someone posted this photograph

I would not believe that the two were related, or that the one came from the other.

I expect species and their kin to look similar.

Nice analogy of incomplete evidence, but it is precisely the lack of complete evidence which keeps evolution going.

But answer me this...
Suppose, just suppose (hypothetically) that the fossil record were complete, that every kind that ever lived, managed to get buried and fossilised, and we have the complete record before us today. Would you still believe in evolution?

gcthomas · Dec 16, 2017

iouae said:
Suppose, just suppose (hypothetically) that the fossil record were complete, that every kind that ever lived, managed to get buried and fossilised, and we have the complete record before us today. Would you still believe in evolution?

Since no-one has found an organism that doesn't fit into the evolutionary paradigm, I have no reason to believe that your hypothetical would result in anything different.

6days · Dec 16, 2017

The Barbarian said:
You're still resentful that you were caught lying about what Dr. Wise called transitional forms.

I will continue exposing your dishonesty if you wish. I can again post the quotes showing that the honest paleontologist says the word 'transitional' is ambiguous...as is the evidence. He continued on to say that fossils evolutionists call transitional are often better evidence for the creation model.

The Barbarian said:
As you were shown, St. Augustine wrote that the "days" could not have been literal days..

Augustine goes the opposite direction from that which you wish. He, like some others thought God had more of an instantaneous creation. (He had some false ideas because he only used a latin translation, not the Hebrew). As you know, or perhaps willfully forget, Augustine says that those who believe more than 6000 years have passed since God created have been deceived.

The Barbarian said:
I notice that Benno doesn't bother to cite anything these people actually wrote. Can you guess why?

Funny how you are so conveniently 'forgetful' (Or dishonest) when it comes to things that contradict your belief system. Quotes have been provided to you more than once showing that your 'modern revision' claim is dishonest.
Here is one of the quotes you have seen before
"So no one can think there is anything allegorical in the works of the six days. No one can rightly say that the things pertaining to those six days was symbolic.... " (Ephrem the Syrian died AD373)

iouae · Dec 16, 2017

gcthomas said:
Since no-one has found an organism that doesn't fit into the evolutionary paradigm, I have no reason to believe that your hypothetical would result in anything different.

Every current or extinct species has a tree of life. You don't seem to notice the huge gaps (missing links) in the fossil record. If we currently have the complete population of all life that ever lived, then its obvious that the gaps between one ancestor and the next supposed one is huge.

You have to believe that EVERY gap will be filled once EVERY fossil is found such that there was a smooth transition from one form to the next in microscopically small steps. If there is one gap, evolution did not happen.

The Barbarian · Dec 16, 2017

Barbarian observes:
You're still resentful that you were caught lying about what Dr. Wise called transitional forms.

6days said:
I will continue exposing your dishonesty if you wish.

Here you go...

Towards a Creationist Understanding of Transitional Forms
DR KURT P. WISE
https://creation.com/images/pdfs/tj/j09_2/j09_2_216-222.pdf

No point in pretending otherwise.

I can again post the quotes showing that the honest paleontologist says the word 'transitional' is ambiguous...

Darwin points out that the word "species" is ambigous. So no you're claiming Darwin didn't think there are species? C'mon.

Augustine goes the opposite direction from that which you wish.

That's not honest of you. St. Augustine points out that the "days" of Genesis can't be literal ones. You know this; why pretend otherwise?

He, like some others thought God had more of an instantaneous creation.

From which all things developed over time. You know that, too. Why are you not being honest with us?

Saint Augustine (353-430) painted an even clearer picture. He taught that the original germs of living things came in two forms, one placed by the Creator in animals and plants, and a second variety scattered throughout the environment, destined to become active only under the right conditions.

He said that the Biblical account of the Creation should not be read as literally occupying six days, but six units of time, while the passage `In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth' should be interpreted:

As if this were the seed of the heaven and the earth, although as yet all the matter of heaven and of earth was in confusion; but because it was certain that from this the heaven and the earth would be, therefore the material itself is called by that name.

Augustine likens the Creation to the growth of a tree from its seed, which has the potential to become a tree, but does so only through a long, slow process, in accordance with the environment in which it finds itself.

God created the potential for the heavens and earth, and for life, but the details worked themselves out in accordance with the laws laid down by God, on this picture.

It wasn't necessary for God to create each individual species (let alone each individual living thing) in the process called Special Creation. Instead, the Creator provided the seeds of the Universe and of life, and let them develop in their own time.

In all but name, except for introducing the hand of God to start off the Universe, Augustine's theory was a theory of evolution, and one which stands up well alongside modern theories of the evolution of the Universe and the evolution of life on Earth.'
http://www.sullivan-county.com/id2/evolution.htm

Funny how you are so conveniently 'forgetful' (Or dishonest) when it comes to things that contradict your belief system. Quotes have been provided to you more than once showing that your modern revision of scripture is dishonest.

You have set yourself against scripture and Christian belief. Let it go, and you won't be troubled any longer.

The Barbarian · Dec 16, 2017

iouae said:
Here is a complete list of Ediacaran Fauna.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ediacaran_genera

And most of these died out.

Then we get most of the modern Phyla suddenly appear.

Another lie that I was taught about evolution was the lie that "given enough time..." not that evolutionists could ever say what "enough time" was. How long is a piece of string? Answer to that question for evolutionists seems to be "No matter how short the time is between nothing and everything, that's enough time". I am not going to play that game with evolutionists, the "what's enough time?" game.

The Ediacarans die out which is bad.
The Ediacarans did not belong to modern phyla - that is worse.
The modern Phyla pop into existence like quantum particles in the Cambrian WITH NO MISSING LINKS - which is worst for evolution. The answer to this used to be taphonomy excuses - these missing links did not get preserved.

Some say spriggina is the trilobite ancestor. I don't think it has legs, so not an Arthropoda, but they look close. I say, show me then the Spriggina missing link.

The start of the Cambrian is the perfect place to demonstrate the absence of missing links.

And, Barbarian, I am hard to impress. I look at those supposed horse evolutionary trees and think, what kind of an idiot do they think I am. Rhetorical question. A 3 year old could arrange animals that look alike into an evolutionary tree.

But its much harder to play this deceitful game around the Cambrian. But Barbarian, if you want to search for trees of fossils around that time, or just arrange known fossils of that time into trees, by all means - I sit here dying to be impressed.

What makes evolutions job so much more difficult is this...
Suppose the Ediacarans are Act 1 of multicellular life. The curtain comes down on them in a mass extinction of the Ediacarans. The curtain immediately rises on a completely new cast, the modern phyla of animals.

The Ediacarans were wiped out. They had no chance to evolve while the curtain was down. And there are no missing links between end of Ediacarans and rise of Cambrians. I doubt it's valid to even make a tree of life across the Precambrian-Cambrian boundary since there is a mass extinction between.

Thus its illogical to say Spriggina evolved into Trilobites while the curtain was down, because Spriggina was too dead to evolve.

But Evolutionists, ever men of faith, want to BELIEVE that in its last gasp, Spriggina pooped out a Trilobite.

Click to expand...

It could be a trilobite. But the point is that precursors to those forms were already present in the Precambrian. As you know, mollusks had evolved by the Ediacaran, and they certainly survived. There were soft-bodied organisms burrowing in mud, since we have their tracks preserved. The Cambrian explosion was the point where complete exoskeletons had finally evolved. So we have a lot more preserved organisms to find, while we don't have much from the Precambrian, but the few precursors that happened to have hard parts.

It is now known that the chordates, our own phylum, appeared late in the Ediacaran or at the beginning of the Cambrian:

The slender, spine-shaped, apatitic protoconodonts appear in the fossil record near the Precambrian-Cambrian boundary and persist through the Cambrian.
http://foreninger.uio.no/ngf/FOS/pdfs/F&S_15_005.pdf

For a long time, it was believed that chordates didn't evolve until later in the Cambrian, but when the conodont animal was found, another transitional form was demonstrated, much earlier than expected.

Clete · Dec 16, 2017

gcthomas said:
Since no-one has found an organism that doesn't fit into the evolutionary paradigm, I have no reason to believe that your hypothetical would result in anything different.

Question begging.

The modern evolutionary paradigm is defined by WHATEVER is found. This, among other things, is what makes it patently unscientific. It has been turned into the equivalent of a religious belief system, and an unfalsifiable one at that.

Any intellectually honest and consistent evolutionist should be convince that evolution is false by the first few seconds of the computer animation in the video I posted but none of them ever will be. The fact is, that what you would intuitively expect to be "an organism that doesn't fit into the evolutionary paradigm" is displayed for all to see in that video but it doesn't penetrate their paradigm filter precisely because their paradigm isn't so rigidly defined as to allow anything to ever falsify it. This coupled with what is perhaps the worst example of confirmation bias that exists outside of Flat Earther convention makes these debates almost universally fruitless except as an opportunity to sharpen one's own steel.

Clete

Clete · Dec 16, 2017

The Barbarian said:
Actually, all nucleic acids are duplicated by other nucleic acids. m-RNA is duplicated by DNA. Even the transcription of RNA into proteins is done by tRNA in a ribosome. As you suggest, it would probably be more efficient to use proteins for that purpose, but as in the cytochrome C case, the system is so basic that it appears a more efficient pathway cannot evolve.

Is this supposed to convince anyone of something? Are you denying that proteins are not involved in the replication process of either DNA or RNA? All it'll take is about a three second Google search to prove you wrong. If that isn't the point then what is - that the replication process is done in some other wildly complex manner that could not possibly have evolved via random mutations in a RNA base pair here and there?

The fact remains that DNA replication is error-prone.

Now this is really starting to tick me off a little. This is just a lie. There's no way you didn't know that this was false when you said it.

The error rate in DNA replication is 10^-8 errors per base pair.

That's one error for every one hundred million base pairs!

Built in error correction fixes at least 99% of those errors.

That leaves you with one error for every ten billion base pairs.

That comes to something like 125 or so total mutations per fertilized egg (it varies based on a lot of factors).

125 divided by 3,000,000,000 (# of base pairs in human DNA) times 100 yields an error rate of .0000041666666666666666666666666666667%

If you had a system that messed up several dozen times per run, I don't think you'd call it error-free. Yet that's what DNA does. There are various correction mechanisms, but none of them are such that they couldn't evolve. Indeed, some are clearly evolved from others.

Saying it doesn't make it so. The DNA itself couldn't evolve at all, never mind a replication process that has to be encoded in it from the proto-type model or else it dies.

Clete

Silent Hunter · Dec 16, 2017

Clete said:
Is this supposed to convince anyone of something? Are you denying that proteins are not involved in the replication process of either DNA or RNA? All it'll take is about a three second Google search to prove you wrong. If that isn't the point then what is - that the replication process is done in some other wildly complex manner that could not possibly have evolved via random mutations in a RNA base pair here and there?

Now this is really starting to tick me off a little. This is just a lie. There's no way you didn't know that this was false when you said it.

The error rate in DNA replication is 10^-8 errors per base pair.

That's one error for every one hundred million base pairs!

Built in error correction fixes at least 99% of those errors.

That leaves you with one error for every ten billion base pairs.

That comes to something like 125 or so total mutations per fertilized egg (it varies based on a lot of factors).

125 divided by 3,000,000,000 (# of base pairs in human DNA) times 100 yields an error rate of .0000041666666666666666666666666666667%

Saying it doesn't make it so. The DNA itself couldn't evolve at all, never mind a replication process that has to be encoded in it from the proto-type model or else it dies.

Clete

Clete said:
And I don't intend to try to pick apart whatever explanation is offered. It isn't about that. I'm simply curious to know what evolution has to say about legs and why they exist and how they got here. Feel free to just offer whatever it is you understand to be what evolutionary theory has to say on the topic.

It would appear, to even the most casual of readers, that you didn't REALLY mean what you said in your O.P.

GODDIDIT!!!!!

Is that your final answer?

Silent Hunter · Dec 16, 2017

Clete said:
And I don't intend to try to pick apart whatever explanation is offered. It isn't about that. I'm simply curious to know what evolution has to say about legs and why they exist and how they got here. Feel free to just offer whatever it is you understand to be what evolutionary theory has to say on the topic.

Were you lying then or are you lying now?

The Barbarian · Dec 16, 2017

Now this is really starting to tick me off a little. This is just a lie. There's no way you didn't know that this was false when you said it.

Most people would say that 125 errors per genome would be a lot. And yes, you're correct in saying that DNA has a very low error rate per base pair. But with millions of base pairs you still end up with a lot of errors in each new organism. A few dozen, by most estimates so your estimate of 125 is in the ballpark.

If there was a high probability of an error in every base pair, life would quickly end. It's instructive that the error rate is close to optimal for population health. A population with little or no variation is doomed. This is what will likely result in the extinction of cheetahs; they are so alike that you can do skin grafts between any two of them.

I'm certainly not trying to tick you off, and I'm not telling you anything I can't support.

The point is that there are lots of mutations in every one of us, mutations that did not exist in either of our parents.

Is this supposed to convince anyone of something? Are you denying that proteins are not involved in the replication process of either DNA or RNA?

No, I'm pointing out that proteins don't replicate or translate nucleic acids. Only other nucleic acids do that. For example, histones can prevent expression of particular genes, even if they don't have any role in actual transcription or translation. Large parts of the ribosomes are proteins, but they are merely scaffolding to hold the t-rna in the right orientation; they don't transcribe or translate anything.

Things have been civil between us, and I'd like to leave it at that. Could be my fault. I'm way too blunt and careless with the feelings of others. So, perhaps we need to call this to an end.

I've been impressed by your integrity and willingness to listen. Thanks for the discussion.

iouae · Dec 16, 2017

The Barbarian said:
It could be a trilobite. But the point is that precursors to those forms were already present in the Precambrian.

Are you saying that as a fact, or as a statement of faith? All the literature I have read says the opposite.

As you know, mollusks had evolved by the Ediacaran,

Right, that's just one Phylum.

and they certainly survived. There were soft-bodied organisms burrowing in mud, since we have their tracks preserved.

And the literature is very uncertain as to what these are.

The Cambrian explosion was the point where complete exoskeletons had finally evolved. So we have a lot more preserved organisms to find, while we don't have much from the Precambrian, but the few precursors that happened to have hard parts.

This actually favours my argument and counts against your argument which is an appeal to taphonomy and bad fossil preservation. The soft Ediacarans were preserved, so if there had been hard Ediacarans, they too would have been preserved.

It is now known that the chordates, our own phylum, appeared late in the Ediacaran or at the beginning of the Cambrian:

Right, which is completely contrary to what I was taught. Chordates were supposedly very late to evolve because of their complexity, yet here they are from the get go.

The slender, spine-shaped, apatitic protoconodonts appear in the fossil record near the Precambrian-Cambrian boundary and persist through the Cambrian.
http://foreninger.uio.no/ngf/FOS/pdfs/F&S_15_005.pdf

For a long time, it was believed that chordates didn't evolve until later in the Cambrian, but when the conodont animal was found, another transitional form was demonstrated, much earlier than expected.

I ask you what I asked gcthomas. If these fossils found to date were the complete population of all organisms which ever lived, would you say the Ediacarans and the change from Precambrian to Cambrian looks like a Creation event, or an evolution event?

gcthomas · Dec 16, 2017

Clete said:
Question begging.

The modern evolutionary paradigm is defined by WHATEVER is found. This, among other things, is what makes it patently unscientific. It has been turned into the equivalent of a religious belief system, and an unfalsifiable one at that.

Any intellectually honest and consistent evolutionist should be convince that evolution is false by the first few seconds of the computer animation in the video I posted but none of them ever will be. The fact is, that what you would intuitively expect to be "an organism that doesn't fit into the evolutionary paradigm" is displayed for all to see in that video but it doesn't penetrate their paradigm filter precisely because their paradigm isn't so rigidly defined as to allow anything to ever falsify it. This coupled with what is perhaps the worst example of confirmation bias that exists outside of Flat Earther convention makes these debates almost universally fruitless except as an opportunity to sharpen one's own steel.

Clete

I'm happy to discuss and debate, Clete. But please don't call me dishonest just because I don't share your faith that evolution must be false. You make grand assertions that this or that can't possibly have happened, simply because or seems fantastic to you. Arguments from incredulity are not strong arguments for those who don't share your incredulity.

SUTG · Dec 16, 2017

iouae said:
Every current or extinct species has a tree of life.

It is all the smae tree of life, no?

iouae said:
You don't seem to notice the huge gaps (missing links) in the fossil record.

I notice them.

If we currently have the complete population of all life that ever lived, then its obvious that the gaps between one ancestor and the next supposed one is huge.

That's a pretty big if, unless you're referring to the thought experiment you raised earlier.

You have to believe that EVERY gap will be filled once EVERY fossil is found such that there was a smooth transition from one form to the next in microscopically small steps. If there is one gap, evolution did not happen.

You'd also have to assume fossilization were a much more common occurence than it is.

Clete · Dec 16, 2017

Silent Hunter said:
It would appear, to even the most casual of readers, that you didn't REALLY mean what you said in your O.P.

GODDIDIT!!!!!

Is that your final answer?

Unresponsive.

Ignored.

Clete · Dec 16, 2017

Silent Hunter said:
Were you lying then or are you lying now?

I haven't picked apart any explanation given in relation to the evolution of legs. I don't (generally) debate details when discussing this issue. It's flawed conceptually. To debate details concedes ground that evolutionists have not earned.

And, in fact, when I started the thread, I really didn't intend to debate it at all. It lead to that mostly due to the feeble so called "evidence" that was presented.

Besides, it my thread. I am perfectly free to change my mind whenever I like. If you don't like it leave. If you think I give a damn about what you think of me, think again.

Clete

Clete · Dec 16, 2017

gcthomas said:
I'm happy to discuss and debate, Clete. But please don't call me dishonest just because I don't share your faith that evolution must be false. You make grand assertions that this or that can't possibly have happened, simply because or seems fantastic to you. Arguments from incredulity are not strong arguments for those who don't share your incredulity.

Dishonest?

That's not really the term I'd use, not naked like that. Intellectually dishonest fits but even with that, I was speaking in general terms.
However, I've made an argument that you can't refute but won't allow to persuade your mind. That's the definition of what it means to be intellectually dishonest.

And they aren't arguments from incredulity. It isn't merely that self-replicating systems would have a really really hard time happening by accident. That IS NOT the argument. The argument is that they CANNOT happen. It is not possible. Any belief to the contrary is unfalsifiable blind faith. Faith that is supported by exactly nothing. You have no evidence that it even could happen, never mind that it did happened nor do you even have the slightest notion of how it could potentially happen. You might as well believe it possible that a random DNA mutation in your skin cells might produce horns growing from your elbows. Take a guess which random set of mutations would be more likely to happen, DNA for elbow horns from existing DNA or one single strand of self-replicating DNA from randomly mixed amino acids. Take one wild guess.

And I am not merely making an assertion of impossibility. If you think I am, I suggest watching a handful of videos about statistical analysis and mathematics. Spend some time getting to understand what the numbers mean and how the so called "odds" against such an grand succession of accidental happenings that evolution would require means that it would never ever happen, no matter how much time you give it. It isn't merely unlikely, it is impossible.

A particular video comes to mind that sort of illustrates the point. It has to do with how many possible ways a fifty-two card deck of cards can be arranged. It's a far bigger number than you can fathom. If you take a deck of cards and do a good job of randomizing the order, the likelihood is that no one ever, in the history of fifty-two card decks of cards, has ever held a deck in the exact same order as what you just produced. Watch the video and then just spend a minute or two considering which is more complex, a fifty-two digit code or one single strand of DNA (i.e. half of a DNA molecule), which is just one of hundreds of wildly complex things that would have to come together by accident via chance chemical reactions and random errors in the reproduction of otherwise working DNA that existed prior to the development of those systems.

Clete

Arthur Brain · Dec 16, 2017

Clete said:
I haven't picked apart any explanation given in relation to the evolution of legs. I don't (generally) debate details when discussing this issue. It's flawed conceptually. To debate details concedes ground that evolutionists have not earned.

And, in fact, when I started the thread, I really didn't intend to debate it at all. It lead to that mostly due to the feeble so called "evidence" that was presented.

Besides, it my thread. I am perfectly free to change my mind whenever I like. If you don't like it leave. If you think I give a damn about what you think of me, think again.

Clete

Why do you start these threads though? In that 'electric universe' thread you categorically stated that you wouldn't entertain evolution as even remotely possible so you were never going to entertain any answers on this one either in honesty were you? You would dismiss any argument and Barbarian has provided you with shed loads to support the ToE and you just bluster and assert that 'evolution is fantasy' blah blah blah.

If you want to stick to some creationist belief system or whatever you ascribe to then fine. It isn't going to impact on science and you wouldn't waste so much time on a subject that you clearly aren't interested on being objective about anyway.

Evolutionists: How did legs evolve?

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