Freedomain Radio

The definition evolutionist work with is using a religious style definition of a tautology.  When I ask someone to define what evolution is they define the principles of genetic mutation, survival of fittest, etc.  When I get deeper into the explanation of how the principles explain reality, the variation, rapid change, etc, there are large gaping unknowns and the some principles, while completely unproven, are thrown in as placeholders with no meaning and no evidence.

The big bucket of evolutionary principles has been shaken many times and ideas have been thrown out because of evidence.  If what what defines evolution can't change and can't be disproved because they say, "oh, we really meant that,[see look...we need more money]."  Then it is absolutely not like the law of gravity.  If rocks started falling up the law of gravity would be completely thrown out.  The definition of gravity is things attract by mass and if things don't, then gravity can't be true. There must be some other undiscovered force and what was once gravity will be redefined as the new force.

Evolutionist claim evolution is the answer to biological origins.  However, every question asked about biological origins has an answer of Evolution.  If you already define evolution to be the answer to the question, then it doesn't answer the question.

Some evolutionary principles are answers to what we see of reality and we must fully accept; however, you can't make the claim that evolution is true because it has no meaning and doesn't stand because, as a concept, if its ties to reality continually change then evolution is a process of discovery and not a conclusion that can be true. 

(I know this is how math works.)  If evolutionary theory is just any answer that is the opposite of a god (ID) made us, then you are defining it as the negation of a null statement.  Then there is no evolutionary theory because the negation of null is still null.

Your post is:

• a long string of assertions with no facts to back them up
• plus a misunderstanding of the difference between theories of the origin of life and the theory of the origin of speciation
• plus a false dilemma about evolution being in some way an opposite of "god" (whatever that is).
  

Bill:

Evolutionist claim evolution is the answer to biological origins. 

Well, "God Delusion" doesn't really explain or defend Evolution as a scientific theory, in any serious way. It's just a polemical criticism of religiosity (which is fine, in and of itself).

If you're looking for a positive exposition on modern evolution, I'd suggest either  "What Evolution Is", by Ernst Mayr, or maybe "The Blind Watchmaker", by Dawkins (though that is quite a bit older).

Actually, that's one that slipped off my radar...

But I did read Gould's "Full House"... 

Greg Gauthier:

But I did read Gould's "Full House"... 

Never heard of it before. Recommended?

Part 1 and Part 4 deal more directly with Gould's view of the science of evolution, but the whole book, overall, is more of a philosophical criticism of the notion of evolution as a process of graduated progress. He thinks he's attacking Dawkins' "Mount Improbable", but what he's really doing is dispelling the 19th century "Rise of Man" conception of evolution -- which is still a good thing.

I like that Gould works more in metaphors than Dawkins does. Part 3, for example, is an explanation of probability in genetics, through the metaphor of baseball ("The Extinction of .400 Hitting") but scientific purists will probably hate that.

If Stef were a scientist, he probably would have written books like Gould did.

Well, in Bill's defense, I do see two tiers of "evolutionist" out there.

There is the scientist (and occasionally, the scientist who can write), and then, there is the "groupie".

There are a lot of folks at places like The Center for Inquiry (and elsewhere), who spend all their time skimming uncritically through books by Ridley, Dawkins, Pinker, and others, and then just gushing all over them, every chance they get, like these guys are rock stars or superheroes. That, to me, is very religious.

Dawkins' own uncritical willingness to simply accept Peter Singer's ethics as practically axiomatic, is an example of a scientist turning into one of these "groupies".  

Greg Gauthier:

Well, "God Delusion" doesn't really explain or defend Evolution as a scientific theory, in any serious way. It's just a polemical criticism of religiosity (which is fine, in and of itself).

If you're looking for a positive exposition on modern evolution, I'd suggest either  "What Evolution Is", by Ernst Mayr, or maybe "The Blind Watchmaker", by Dawkins (though that is quite a bit older).

Actually he does address the claim of evolutionists or atheists as being extremist, religious, or dogmatic.

Nathan:

Greg Gauthier:

Well, "God Delusion" doesn't really explain or defend Evolution as a scientific theory, in any serious way. It's just a polemical criticism of religiosity (which is fine, in and of itself).

If you're looking for a positive exposition on modern evolution, I'd suggest either  "What Evolution Is", by Ernst Mayr, or maybe "The Blind Watchmaker", by Dawkins (though that is quite a bit older).

Actually he does address the claim of evolutionists or atheists as being extremist, religious, or dogmatic.

Which, in fact, some proponents of evolution are dogmatic (but, they are also mistaken).

I think there actually are TWO distinct groups of people we're talking about, here. The scientists (and serious followers of evolutionary biology), and (at least some of) the rest of us, who do treat evolution dogmatically, as a substitute "cause" that has replaced God for them. Dawkins speaks for the first group, and ignores the second as inconsequential. Theists hold up the second group as paramount examples of the first. You can see this confusion of the two groups as one, in Bill's own comments. Observe:

The "rest of us": 

Bill:

When I ask someone to define what evolution is they define the principles of genetic mutation, survival of fittest, etc.  When I get deeper into the explanation of how the principles explain reality, the variation, rapid change, etc, there are large gaping unknowns and the some principles, while completely unproven, are thrown in as placeholders with no meaning and no evidence.

The scientists: 

Wouldn't those proponents be inconsequential only because they aren't scientists and aren't directly involved in testing the theory to find out what does actually fill the "gaps"?  I mean what we observe is evolution, if it is not evolution then something will come along to prove it isn't, until then all we have to work with is evolution.  What I don't get is what Bill is talking about as far as the gaping unknowns. How well versed in evolutionary biology is the person he is talking to?

That there are gaping unknowns does not present a flaw in the entire theory nor does it imply that god must be filled into those gaps instead of figuring out what really explains them.

I'm not saying that Bill is proposing we fill in "God", but I am saying that you can't throw out the theory of gravity because there may be a flaw in the theory of how it works.  If I can't explain how a certain motherboard chipset technology works doesn't mean that it doesn't exist or work at all.
 

Nathan:

Wouldn't those proponents be inconsequential only because they aren't scientists and aren't directly involved in testing the theory to find out what does actually fill the "gaps"?  I mean what we observe is evolution, if it is not evolution then something will come along to prove it isn't, until then all we have to work with is evolution.  What I don't get is what Bill is talking about as far as the gaping unknowns. How well versed in evolutionary biology is the person he is talking to?

That there are gaping unknowns does not present a flaw in the entire theory nor does it imply that god must be filled into those gaps instead of figuring out what really explains them.

I'm not saying that Bill is proposing we fill in "God", but I am saying that you can't throw out the theory of gravity because there may be a flaw in the theory of how it works.  If I can't explain how a certain motherboard chipset technology works doesn't mean that it doesn't exist or work at all.
 

I agree. Those who hold up dogmatic proponents of evolution as some sort of evidence of the failure of evolution itself, are engaging in a kind of straw-man objection to evolution.

But, if we are to call ourselves true followers of science, then we should be careful not to confuse the theories with the observed phenomenon. I would not at all hesitate to "throw out" any theory that seemed flawed to me, by reason or evidence. But that is not the same thing as denying the reality of observed facts. We SEE rocks falling down. We SEE creatures evolving and mutating. Those are axiomatic facts. How we choose to EXPLAIN those facts is an entirely different matter.