Real Science Friday Interviews Walter ReMine Pt. 2

Jefferson

Administrator
Staff member
Administrator
Super Moderator
RSF Interviews Walter ReMine Pt. 2

This is the show from Friday, July 13th 2012.

SUMMARY:



* Illusions of Evolution Exposed by Information Engineer: Real Science Friday's Bob Enyart and Fred Williams continue their fascinating interview of electrical engineer and information expert Walter ReMine who made a significant contribution to the anti-evolution literature with his book, The Biotic Message.

* Naive Natural Selection and Uphill Evolution: Today's program explains the difference between naive natural selection, that is, the way the evolutionists sell Darwinism to the public, vs. the convoluted reality of how the theory has itself evolved to attempt to, even theoretically, account for the origin of organs, functions, and species. Fred mentions that Walter ReMine was a contributor to an online evolution simulator, Mendel's Accountant, which anyone can use to see for themselves some of the severe problems with evolution theory including a mutational lode problem called error catastrophe.

* Fitness Terrain as an Example of Natural Selection: Like Richard Dawkins' Climbing Mt. Improbable, Darwinists sell to the public the simple and naive idea that evolution is uphill, ever upward. While that was how the theory began, it's intellectuals soon realized that such a mechanism could not account for Earth's varied species. It turns out that by their own theory what is called "the fitness terrain" presents severe obstacles to evolution, and populations get stuck and further theoretical evolution ceases. Consider Walter ReMine's quote of the Darwinist text, Principles of Population Genetics:

Any population on a... fitness peak is destined to stay there because natural selection will not carry the population down into any of the surrounding valleys and thus, perhaps, into the domain of atrraction of a higher fitness peak. The population is simply "stuck". -Harvard Professor Daniel L. Hartl, 1980

* You'd Get Bad Legs Long Before You Got Good Wings: By Darwin's theory, consider a species that had partial legs and was evolving legs. Conceptually speaking, they are marching up the hill, up the fitness terrain. By the theory, eventually, they may end up with great legs! But how are they going to get wings? Wings allegedly evolved from legs in dinosaurs, insects, and bats. A species of dinosaurs, for example, would have to start evolving down the fitness hill, and across a fitness valley, and over some berms, cross a ditch, and up some other fitness hill that would create wings. So, to theorize how a whole species would, over countless generations, evolve back down a fitness hill (essentially de-evolving some functinality), and go across a fitness valley, over to another hill, and start again another improbable climbing, is quite the bizarre intellectual exercise. And this is the soft underbelly of actual Darwinian theory that the evolution evangelists, the high school biology books, and the popular science media, keep far from the public. The masses are simply dumbed down to believe in naive natural selection: upward, ever upward! But in reality, you'd get bad legs long before you got good wings, and since it's survival of the fittest, the whole alleged evolutionary process ends in catastrophe.

* The Fog of Evolution: Bob and Fred ask Walter ReMine about his widely quoted observation that evolution theory is more like a fog. A fog settles on the landscape. Neo-Darwinism is not a theory that can be tested. Rather, you throw data at it, and the theory simply morphs around the data.

* RSF Walter ReMine Programs
- RSF Interviews Walter ReMine Pt. 1
- RSF Interviews Walter ReMine Pt. 2 (this show)

* Enyart's Creationist Claim from 1997 Eventually Confirmed By Richard Dawkins: Real Science Friday co-hosts Fred Williams and Bob Enyart play audio from an old Bob Enyart Live program in which Bob claimed that in Richard Dawkins' books, he just assumed evolution and he didn't give evidence. A dozen years later, Dawkins admits that in all of his previous books, he assumed, but did not provide evidence. That vindicates Bob Enyart's direct statement of a 1997 caller who was recommending that Bob read Dawkins (which Bob had done, but which the caller had not).

* The Altenberg 16 -- Evolutionists Doubting Natural Selection: For the meeting that Walter mentioned, see on CMI's website the section in Dominic Statham's article on the Altenberg 16 for a brief account of leading evolutionists who are beginning to admit that Natural Selection cannot explain biological diversity. Statham also mentions ReMine's recently published review of a book on the Altenberg 16. One of the reasons that evolutionists are recognizing that natural selection is insufficent to explain life on Earth is that a genetic toolbox exists in more or less all organisms. This genetic toolbox is so widely distributed that according to evolutionary theory, it would have had to be present before the diversificatin of those life forms. That is, it would have had to be present in the so-called Precambrian era, back when single-celled organisms would have no need for all those regulatory genes. (The problem is similar for evolutinists to the discovery that 70% of sponge genes are similar to human genes, even to build structures that sponges lack, like muslces and nerves.) So, how would those genes originate prior to the need for these genes, since natural selection cannot look ahead? For this reason and others, evolutionists themselves are beginning to admit, first that Darwin was wrong on the tree of life, and secondly, that he was wrong about the sufficiency of natural selection!

* Origin of Life: As Walter ReMine stated on this program, "Creationists own the origin of life issue." And Bob Enyart rebutted the typical atheist claim that, "God didn't make man, man made God." For, belief in aliens is irrefutably, undeniably a manmade thing. Then atheists say that aliens made man. So, atheists are doing exactly what they falsely accuse Christians of. See also a discussion about Richard Dawkins' belief in aliens and how it falsifies certain atheist claims.

* Quote-Mining Deep, Rich, and Wide Veins: Evolutionists make knee-jerk accusations against creationists, including ReMine, whenever we reference evolutionists, claiming, virtually always without even attempting to explain how it is that we are taking quotes out of context. What we are typically doing however, is quoting the contrary-to-interest claims of hostile witnesses, which kinds of statements tend to be the most reliable in all of human history. Mining is most profitable where the vein runs rich and deep and wide. Everywhere evolutionists have expressed intensely disappointment with the evidence? for evolution in their own fields. Many assume the real evidence is in some other field, and that phenomena is repeated so often and pointed out so often by we creationists that the Denver audience chuckled when this exact thing happened in Bob Enyart's Age of the Earth Debate with a geophysicist, who was asked for the best evidence that the earth is old. And, as many guessed he might, he answered, "star light." (Even if star light were billions of years old, that doesn't mean that, say, a satellite on which if falls, nor the earth, is billions of years old.) Merely mouthing the mantra "quote mining" doesn't negate all the contrary-to-interest observations published by countless evolutionists.

Example -- Out-of-Context Accusation Against Enyart by Popular Atheist AronRa: To this accusation, Bob Enyart responded to Ra, "There's not one person in your audience or my audience, or that you can name in the entire world -who knows about Darwin, who doesn't think that Darwin believed in evolution." AronRa accepted my challenge to justify his claim that creationists allege that Darwin didn't believe in evolution. He responded by naming... who? An anonymous poster to a web-based street-slang dictionary. That's who. And that's not a name. That's how far Aron had to go to justify his part in the relentless claim against creation authors and ministries that we commonly take our sources out of context. For example, regardless of the urban legends about Darwin that untrained members of the general public might claim, creationists have every right and are not taking Darwin out of context to quote him saying that, "To suppose that the eye... could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree." There is nothing about repeating that point that is out of context.

Programming-of-Life-DVD.jpg


Today’s Resource: Get the greatest cell biology video ever made! Getting this on DVD:
- helps you to share it with others
- helps keep Real Science Friday on the air, and
- gets you Dr. Don Johnson's book as a bonus!
Information is encoded in every cell in our DNA and in all living things. Learn how the common world view of life's origin, chemical evolution, conflicts with our knowledge of Information Science. Finally, information Science is changing the way millions of people think about all living systems!

Also, have you browsed through our Science Department in the KGOV Store? You just might LOVE IT! We offer a 30-day money back guarantee on all purchases.
 

Flipper

New member
* You'd Get Bad Legs Long Before You Got Good Wings: By Darwin's theory, consider a species that had partial legs and was evolving legs. Conceptually speaking, they are marching up the hill, up the fitness terrain. By the theory, eventually, they may end up with great legs! But how are they going to get wings? Wings allegedly evolved from legs in dinosaurs, insects, and bats. A species of dinosaurs, for example, would have to start evolving down the fitness hill, and across a fitness valley, and over some berms, cross a ditch, and up some other fitness hill that would create wings. So, to theorize how a whole species would, over countless generations, evolve back down a fitness hill (essentially de-evolving some functinality), and go across a fitness valley, over to another hill, and start again another improbable climbing, is quite the bizarre intellectual exercise. And this is the soft underbelly of actual Darwinian theory that the evolution evangelists, the high school biology books, and the popular science media, keep far from the public. The masses are simply dumbed down to believe in naive natural selection: upward, ever upward! But in reality, you'd get bad legs long before you got good wings, and since it's survival of the fittest, the whole alleged evolutionary process ends in catastrophe.

Bob talks about how he had initially thought that Remine had come up with the concept of the fitness landscape, but that he had discovered during the interviews that the idea actually came from evolutionary biology.

Although his honesty is admirable, it's a startling admission from someone who is so publicly contemptuous of evolutionary biology. Should Bob be an expert in evolutionary biology to argue against it? No, but fitness landscapes are not exactly novel or obscure concept in evolution; they've been around since the 1930s. It's a good example of how biologists were (and are) kicking the tires of the evolutionary engine to challenge it. Furthermore, although he says that evolutionists seem to want to keep the concept away from the public, he reveals that he's obviously never read Richard Dawkins's book "Climbing Mount Improbable".

Not only that, but fitness landscapes play an integral part in the arguments put forward by intelligent design advocates. I know this, because I read ID books and papers (which is pretty easy to do as there are so few of them).

I think Bob owes it to his audience to be more familiar with the system he believes is so very incorrect (at least by reading some of its better known pop sci books). Heck, he could even read what's out there in the ID world. Otherwise, a bit more humility would be a welcome relief on his show. A fool may say in his heart "there is no god", but what do we call a man who scoffs at something he actually not familiar with?
 
Last edited:

Flipper

New member
Also, on the subject of scaling fitness landscapes, let's look at some adapted appendages.

I think we'd all agree that penguins are birds, right? Look at these lousy wings!

url


Check out the Campbell Teal... looks like it should be able to fly, but can't. Great swimmer though.

campbell-teal-fc81a008b4ddbe8325200fddbee77ce0.jpg


The loon is another great swimmer - its legs are further back on its body than for most aquatic birds, giving it strong propulsion advantages. It has short wings that give it hydrodynamic control, and they have relatively heavy bodies. These adaptions, however, mean that loons mostly avoid going on land and build their nests right next to the water because they are slow and ungainly on solid ground (the name "loon" derives from the old English word for 'clumsy'. These adaptions also have costs in terms of flight - a loon requires hundreds of meters of calm water running into the wind before they are able to take off, and they often have to try multiple times before being able to get into the air.

As you can see, Loons are making fitness trade-offs.

loon_2.jpg



...Not to mention these ludicrous forelimbs. What's up with those?

t-rex-skeleton-lg.jpg
 

Granite

New member
Hall of Fame
Dunning Kruger strikes again.

And for Enyart to knock people for quote mining is awfully rich.
 

chatmaggot

Well-known member
Hall of Fame
* Enyart's Creationist Claim from 1997 Eventually Confirmed By Richard Dawkins: Real Science Friday co-hosts Fred Williams and Bob Enyart play audio from an old Bob Enyart Live program in which Bob claimed that in Richard Dawkins' books, he just assumed evolution and he didn't give evidence. A dozen years later, Dawkins admits that in all of his previous books, he assumed, but did not provide evidence. That vindicates Bob Enyart's direct statement of a 1997 caller who was recommending that Bob read Dawkins (which Bob had done, but which the caller had not).

Interesting.
 

Stripe

Teenage Adaptive Ninja Turtle
LIFETIME MEMBER
Hall of Fame
Also, on the subject of scaling fitness landscapes, let's look at some adapted appendages.
Or designed ones. :idunno:

I think we'd all agree that penguins are birds, right? Look at these lousy wings!
Wings are for flying.

Those are flippers.

Surely you should know that. :chuckle:
 

Alate_One

Well-known member
Wings are for flying.

Those are flippers.

What we call them makes little difference when the anatomy is virtually identical. It's still a forelimb with the same bones in the same orientation as in flying birds. (The image above shows a flying bird at top, a penguin on the bottom) The only bone penguins lack, is the alula and the bones are overall more flattened, but it's clear where the flippers came from. Or do you think Penguins didn't evolve from flying birds? :chuckle:

penguin-skeleton-lg.jpg


zoology-musueum-birds4-2012-03-30.jpg
 

Stripe

Teenage Adaptive Ninja Turtle
LIFETIME MEMBER
Hall of Fame
Very pretty pictures again. :thumb:

What we call them makes little difference when the anatomy is virtually identical. It's still a forelimb with the same bones in the same orientation as in flying birds.
A forelimb designed for swimming. I've no problem calling such a "flipper". :idunno:

The only bone penguins lack, is the alula and the bones are overall more flattened, but it's clear where the flippers came from.
It's clear they were designed for swimming.

Or do you think Penguins didn't evolve from flying birds?
Yes. :dunce: :duh:
 

Flipper

New member
There's a huge amount of anatomical evidence that has been glaringly apparent to scientists since the 1700s that Penguins are birds with more characteristics in common with flying birds than with other flightless birds. In fact, six different naturalists had no problems classifying penguins as birds before Charles Darwin published On The Origin of the Species. Three of those naturalists placed them in categories with Loons, based purely on the physical evidence.

Genetic evidence places loons, storks, albatrosses and petrels as the closest living relatives to the penguin. You may notice that these are all flying birds.
 

Flipper

New member
You'd think that if there was anything scientific about creationism that by now there'd be agreement on something as basic as whether a penguin constitutes a monobaramin or whether it is the product of post-flood adaption.
 

Stripe

Teenage Adaptive Ninja Turtle
LIFETIME MEMBER
Hall of Fame
You'd think that if there was anything scientific about creationism that by now there'd be agreement on something as basic as whether a penguin constitutes a monobaramin or whether it is the product of post-flood adaption.

That's the problem. Firstly, you don't think and, secondly, you think this sort of nonsense is valid reasoning in a scientific discussion.
 

Flipper

New member
In which case, why is it that the Penguin's closest living ancestors based on genetic analysis are all birds that can fly?
 

Stripe

Teenage Adaptive Ninja Turtle
LIFETIME MEMBER
Hall of Fame
In which case, why is it that the Penguin's closest living ancestors based on genetic analysis are all birds that can fly?
Doesn't pay to assume the truth of your ideas and use it as evidence.

Genetics are similar where design is similar.
Also, I'd be very cautious if I were you regarding the ability of others to take part in a scientific discussion...
I'm not the :troll: in this conversation, picking and choosing when to respond based on some silly game. And I'm not the one pretending disagreement means an idea can be disregarded.
 

Alate_One

Well-known member
Doesn't pay to assume the truth of your ideas and use it as evidence.

Genetics are similar where design is similar.
Really? Then how do you explain the fact that rats and mice are more different from one another at the genetic level than humans and chimpanzees?

(Oh wait you've never even attempted that) :dunce:

I'm not the :troll: in this conversation, picking and choosing when to respond based on some silly game.
Oh no you'd never do that. :chuckle:
 
Top