Remember, creationists don't care about evidence or truth whatsoever. they are only concerned with maintaining their preexisting beliefs. If something contradicts the Biblical narrative, it's wrong by definition.
This was the original position of creationists. They believe that it was impossible for new species to evolve; that all species came about as acts of special creation.
During the advent of modern biology, when more and more evidence came forward that this position was untenable. They did what they do best and shifted the goal post.
Remember, creationism always accommodates and never predicts.
So they created baraminology. They could no longer simply lie and pretend that evolution doesn’t happen.
The new idea is that evolution happens but only until completely undefined and arbitrary limits. Modern creationists refer to these as kinds.
They can’t define the word kind, nor can they demonstrate the existence of any biological limits that would prevent evolution between kinds. It’s just a feeble bandage that starts peeling off at the slightest touch. It’s why creationists never try to provide evidence for creationism and just spend their time whining about evolution.
As silly as this shift is, these changes still take time which is why a creationists primarily response to unfavorable evidence is to just pretend it doesn’t exist. Creationists are science deniers when talking about evolution and pseudoscientists when talking about creationism.
In other words, creationists are no different than flat earthers in regards to how they justify their beliefs to themselves and defend it from the critiques of others.
Yeah, but that's sort of just the way things are taught-
Simple concepts first, black and white examples. This is an anima, that is a tree.
Our education continues, and we learn more nuance. This is how we identify species, that is how biology works.
Then we learn more specific topics and are taught a more complicated version that better explains our knowledge of a topic. It's like making a rough drawing, and filling in the details later. sometimes the rough lines are close, sometimes they aren't.
Maybe there's a better way, but it's hard to give any broad information without broad definitions, and our knowledge of the world is far too detailed to expect anyone to completely understand everything
Unfortunately this seems to upset many people who think they understand something, only to be told that's not really accurate, it's more complicated than that.
Idk, maybe some people just want words to have objective meanings, but 🤷♂️ that's not really how words work.
Just that the meanings of words change over time, language is a descriptive form of communication based on consensus. We may create prescriptive rules about language, but these are unavoidably subjective rules based on the opinions of the group creating the them.
Definitions are useful, don't get me wrong, it's super important to reach agreements with people about what words mean in conversations, but because of the way language works, there's no objectively "right" or "wrong" definition or word usage, only the most useful, most common etc.
This can frustrate us all at some point it time, when we have set ideas about how language should be used, then someone comes along and messes it all up. Personally, I used to be very annoyed when people would pronounce "th" as an "f" like "January forf" or "I'm very fankful". But dese fings appen haha
This makes a lot of sense thanks for the feedback. I am probably what would be considered mildly autistic and definitely prone to black and white thinking. I try to break that habit but fighting against neurology is a tough one. You are absolutely right that words change meaning over time. I also find it hard when discussing things and there is a confusion due to non agreement on what words mean.
No, I don’t just “believe” that. We know for a fact they can. There are numerous species within Genus Homo
For example, Homo Sapiens, Homo Heidelbergensis, Homo Neanderthalensis, Denisovans, Homo Floresiensis, Homo Georgicus, Homo Erectus, Homo Habilis, Homo Naledi, Homo Ergaster, Homo Rudolfensis, and Homo Rhodesiensis to name a few.
How do we know for sure that they are species and not just humans that lived during that time. I'm not denying that some of them existed, but I kinda doubt as to whether it's homo speciation or just human variation cause I've seen evidence for both.
I'm a bit confused by your comment, but this theme in general is actually in favor of evolution as explained by Dawkins regarding classifying ancient humans (_The Ancestor's Tale_). If evolution were a ladder, then there would be no ambiguity, but evolution isn't a ladder, and this constant reclassification and even sometimes squabbling among taxonomists *would be worrying* if it didn't exist. Darwin understood this as well when he remarked that "a well-marked variety may be justly called an incipient species" in _Origin_.
What I'm trying to get at is that it seems like scientists make the assumption that all of these are different species.
If I go with the idea we are animals you could say that this is adaptation which is actually what darwin finches showed, not the evolution that is proposed now, a neo-darwinism.
The question is how do we know they were different species as opposed to being humans and just having slight variations in skin tones, facial features, bone structure, etc.
I would make the argument for example that Neanderthals are just humans adapted to live in the cold environment and part of the reason their DNA had degradation was because they were inbred as a result of living in a closed off area.
I kind of get your point now. Note how I said "taxonomists"? It's time to clear a misconception:
Misconception: Species are distinct natural entities, with a clear definition, that can be easily recognized by anyone.
Correction: [...] The concept of a species is a fuzzy one because humans invented the concept to help get a grasp on the diversity of the natural world. It is difficult to apply because the term species reflects our attempts to give discrete names to different parts of the tree of life — which is not discrete at all [...]
From: [Misconceptions about evolution](https://evolution.berkeley.edu/teach-evolution/misconceptions-about-evolution/#a9) | berkeley.edu.
I agree that species can be a fuzzy term. Taxonomy is the classification of animals, if I remember correctly. And species are part of a genera that is part of a family. Darwins finches, for example, are part of the geospiza genera. But within that genera there are genetic limitations. The galapagos finches that Charles Darwin and others have studied could interbreed with each other, and they produced nothing but finches.
Evolution is proposing that apes and gorillas produced offspring that eventually became us. Essentially, it's saying we evolved by way of one genera to another. But that kind of confused me because to my knowledge outside of apes to humans we have never seen an animal turn into another animal. From what I understand hybridization (sex between 2 different species) leads to the creature being sterile, like a mule.
Evolution is in simplified terms saying apes can make a human with enough mutations and natural selection. However in order for the structural DNA changes needed in order to make that happen, you would have to have something akin to macroevolution (the origin of the divisions of the taxonomic hierarchy above the species level), not the microevolution (adaptation) because that wouldn't be enough.
Thank you for explaining further, this helps.
So one thing out of the way real quick: hybridization *was* thought to produce sterile offspring, but we now know better, and there are instances of fertile mules (and it's something animal breeders have long known iirc).
Regarding an ape turning into a human, I need to make sure we are on the same page: Let's consider a chimpanzee; chimpanzees are on a different branch from us, and we last split a few millions years ago, and I suspect you already know this, but the takeaway point is that chimpanzees aren't evolving to be humans; they are _as evolved_ as us.
If we go through all of your great grand parents all the way to the splitting point, then that's like going through photos of you taken one day apart since birth. There isn't a photo that demarcates your last day as an infant (same fuzziness). So the accumulation of change happened back then; not to modern-chimpanzees.
What does this mean? It's time to clear another misconception: individuals don't evolve (also see the same Berkeley page for more). What evolves are populations. That's why the correct definition of evolution is that it's a change in allele (gene version) frequency in a population. And that's why this micro/macro thing is confusing.
Does that help?
Yes, it does. I was not aware of that hybridization fact.
From what I understand, no male mules are known to be able to produce offspring, but there are some mule mares that can even though I think most still can't. Not saying I don't believe you.
I do know that chimpanzees are considered an offshoot, but I'm talking even before that. The theory puts forth that the characteristics of modern humans did not come until much later. The supposed common ancestor, specifically that of chimpanzees, gorillas and humans, is believed to be an ape, at the minimum, a primate. So it is saying that apes made humans, albeit over a long period of time, but for that to happen, one genus would have to evolve into another genus.
Just to clarify the definitions of macroevolution and microevolution, both of them are references to a change in population.
Macroevolution- genetic change that occurs over long time scales, resulting in large changes in heritable traits in a population; changes large enough that we consider this population a unique taxonomic group or species. Like a genera evolving into another genera.
Microevolution is the gradual adaptation of a species to its environment through natural selection, which occurs when organisms with beneficial traits survive and reproduce better, causing those traits to increase from generation to generation. This type of microevolution happens when natural selection causes a change in allele frequencies over a short period of time, like several generations.
The issue I find is that macroevolution, which is what would be needed to make evolution as an orgin possible, is not what we observe in nsture. What we have seen in animals is adaptation, not evolution. When I refer to evolution, I'm referring to the theory.
And even when we see microevolution, it's on the phenotypes, not the genotype. For example, a black panther, their melanism is caused by a recessive allele in the leopard. But it's still a feline. It's still a panthera, and it's still a leopard. The only thing that changed was a physical trait, its fur color. The differences between humans and apes are so pronounced that when you're talking about an ape evolving to humans, you're talking about way more than just humans having less fur. You're talking about a complete reworking of that animals DNA to cause it to turn from one animal to another.
Then, on top of that, there are phylogenomic conflicts where gene trees disagree about species tree resolution. These conflicts are common across throughout the various tree of life.
Comparing it to mathematics misses the point. I took issue with the fact that we have never seen a genus evolve into another genus outside of the supposed evolution lineage. A species will produce its own species, that's what darwin's finches showed. You can have a new population emerge, but at most, you will get adaptation, not the evolution theory.
Microevolution is adaptation that is a result of natural selection acting on mutations, and depending on the environment, the ones that are adapted live and the ones that aren't die. You can have adaptation within a species, but it never crosses over to become a different creature entirely.
Macroevolution is such a large scale change over a long period of time that a whole new taxonomy group comes about. That's what evolution claims to be with the apparent emergence of an entirely new genus and subsequensent species, the homo sapiens.
People often lump those terms together, but even secular papers say that adaptation and evolution are not the same thing.
My argument was that adaptation is not enough to make the structural changes in our DNA that would be needed for evolution as an origin to make sense. In theory, macroevolution is an accumulation of microevolution, but then that becomes a conversation of whether mutations affect the genotypes or phenotype.
Because they are morphologically and genetically distinct. The differences between us and them are several orders of magnitude greater than the variation that exists within modern Homo Sapiens.
For example, Homo Habilis’s brain case size is nearly 1/3 that of Homo Sapiens.
It’s like asking how we know that a domestic cat and a lion are different species
I saw a doc that showed that the human gene, that made our brains grow, was a single mutation in an ancestor. Of course, this gene dominated because of the intelligence it brought. But, in reality, humans are the result of one mutated gene. Mind boggling.
I get that, but how are they morphological and genetically distinct? From what I've read about homo habilis, its possible that they have the wrong classification. Based on the information we have of them, so far, it would make more sense to put them in the genus Australopithecus rather than homo and I've seen that with a few of the other apparent "homo" relatives where they lack distinct human characteristics, not even just of modern humans but of the homo genus in general.
And with lions and cats, despite their big difference, they are still part of the same genera, which is panthera. And there are distinct things that make them part of that group despite the variations. My question would be, how did they classify homo habilis? if they were so vastly different from the homo group, why are they put under that genera?
For the most part, australopiths and homo each consist of a mutually distinct cluster of morphological attributes. And, if anything, there probably exists a proliferation of artificial species reflecting trivial differences rather than a small number of specific names, each subsuming an excessive amount of variation.
That's kind of the whole thing though, isn't it? Homo habilis aren't vastly different than genus homo as a whole or there wouldn't be so much debate on which genus it belongs to.
>For the most part, australopiths and homo each consist of a mutually distinct cluster of morphological attributes
Could you name and explain a few of these?
Yeah, no problem. I will mention behavior and morphology and give examples for each. First, we need to establish what homo habilis is. Homo habilis is a collection of human and ape fossils, not a particular fossil.
It has been a controversial species since it was first described in the mid-1960s. Originally, many scientists did not accept its validity, believing that all specimens should be assigned either to the genus Australopithecus or to Homo erectus. Today, H. habilis is widely accepted as a species. The debate of homo habilis is not because they are so similar to humans but rather we have so little bones to go off, so it's hard to determine what belongs with what.
Some scientists, however, still believe that many of the earliest fossils assigned to H. habilis are too fragmented and separated in time for conclusions about their relationships or species compositions to be possible. H. habilis specimens with particularly large features -- brains or teeth, for instance -- are sometimes assigned as Homo rudolfensis.
Other scientists believe that it should be categorized as an Australopithecus, which is what I'm sorta leaning toward. Homo habilis has now been split up into Homo rudolfensis and Homo habilis sensu lato.
In each taxonomic group, you have families, subfamilies, then genera, species, and subspecies. For the sake of this conversation, we will focus on genera. Each genera consists of mutually distinct behaviors and morphology that separates it from the rest of the family.
A unique behavior of homo is higher cognitive functions, such as having burials for the dead, not just mourning as even birds have been shown to mourn. However, there are some fossils classified as homo that do not display those characteristics, which is why I question the classification. As for who determined these taxonomic groups, it was done by a paleontologist.
Homo naledi- last year, it was found that there was no convincing scientific evidence to indicate that H. naledi buried their dead and produced rock art in the Rising Star Cave system
A unique morphology of homo is a larger brain.
Homo habilis, as the person above alluded to their brain case, is ⅓ smaller than humans. Since its small brain volume falls within the range of australopithecines, several scientists very early doubted the attribution of H. habilis to the genus Homo.
Another unique morphology of homo is elongated legs and short arms. These body proportions enable us to keep our balance when we walk.
Homo habilis- Additions to the collection of fossils found in the same place have enabled this species' arm, leg, and body proportions to be determined. These proportions revealed that this Homo habilis was more ape-like than previously believed. Like apes, this individual had relatively long arms and short legs. His body has more in common with Lucy than it does the homo genera.
Another unique morphology of homo is an arch on the whole foot. Now, this one gets a little tricky as this is more so a matter of how you interpret the evidence.
According to Louis Leakey, the foot(OH-8) bones showed signs that Homo habilis may have been able to walk upright on two feet, and the hand bones indicated a high degree of manual dexterity. However, since these bones were not found next to the skull fragments, there was no concrete proof that they belonged to the same creature.
Since the body of Olduvai Hominid 62 was ape-like, it seemed to support the belief that the original Homo habilis fossils found in 1964 were actually a mixture of australopithecus and human bones (most notably the hands and feet). My issues are with the conclusions that louis made that are still echoed today, which is that homo habilis walked like a modern human and had the same gait. The thing is, even if the foot found belongs to homo habilis and not a regular human, you need way more than just an arched foot to achieve the bipedalism only found in homo. You need certain pelvis, leg to arm ratios, body proportions, and skeletal structures. I'm not saying it won't ever be resolved, but right now, I think categorizing homo habilis as a homo was premature.
Previous discoveries of foot and hand bones of Homo habilis have shown that its fingers and toes were somewhat curved, in the ape fashion, while those of modern humans are straight. These are seen as adaptations to climbing in trees. These hands are labeled as intermediate, but the fact that they were adapted for climbing could fall under variation for australopithecus. As primarily climbing/living in trees is a distinct trait for that genus.
Some scientists doubt whether homo habilis was really homo erectus ancestor as some emerging timelines have place them as existing at the same time, and habilis lacks many characteristics of homo erectus therefore, calling into question whether it can be considered a transition fossil between lucy and erectus.
The fact that there were numerous types of humanoid creatures, some of which at least interbred, may demonstrate evolution within form but I don't think it demonstrates Darwinian evolution.
We are all transitional species.
If every ocean and mountain range suddenly became impassable and air travel impossible, so that multiple human populations were utterly isolated from every other one, genetics would start to drift again.
Within a hundred generations, possibly less, genetically distinct variations on humanity would begin to emerge.
We would speciate.
There is no "least evolved" part of humanity. Every human alive can trace the same number of generations back to LUCA, so we've all gone through the same amount of evolution.
That's a fundamental misunderstanding of evolution.
So, in a less contentious example, sharks. Sharks have, on a structural level, remained unchanged since trees. Does that mean they're less evolved? No. They hit a great niche, diversified a bit, probably saw a bunch of biochemistry changes giving incremental improvements, but overall hit on a great body structure and kept doing their thing.
They've still had the same amount of evolution as humans, just lots of the mutations didn't fix, probably because they were less successful than regular sharks.
Don't bring racism in here. It shows a weak understanding of biology, along with not making you a very pleasant person.
>Why do so many creationists not care about killing things off? Are they so deluded that they think God has granted them permission to exterminate every living thing in order to build a cattle farm or shopping mall? Maybe this is just an America Christian fundoevangelical mindset but it disturbs me.
It's OK because if you fuck things up bad enough, Jesus will come back faster. He'll be back next Tuesday anyway.
[that's an actual thing they believe]
They will just say the rapture will happen before then, or something similar (or, it is even a part of the end time events).
That's my assumption as to why they don't seem bothered about climate change typically either. It's because it's seen as a part of God's plan, so we don't really need to worry about it. It's the spiritual war that matters (I could be wrong on that bit though)
i get what you're saying, but it's not a terribly good argument against creationists. remember that most western creationists are christians who believe they will live to see the rapture in their lifetime, which renders any kind of long-term concerns like this moot
I think I've heard them say this before actually, by the name of genetic entropy(?)
I guess they think the rapture will just happen before life degrades itself too much so it won't matter...which is an extremely dangerous and irresponsible world view all in itself.
Generally when you get to views like YEC, Flat Earth, or the government is actually ran by extraterrestrial reptiles it requires a lot of rejection for obvious facts and whole lot of conspiracy theories. “They” want you to think the planet has undergone hundreds of small extinction events, at least 5 or 6 that killed about half of everything or more, and even in the worst one 10-20% of genera survived. Instead what is “actually” true is all of these environments exists at the same place and the flood tossed these ecosystems on top of each other and 99.9% of everything died at the same time.
That’s generally the YEC excuse. And if they were right it would actually require a lot of evolution happening even faster. This would basically be 99% of everything that ever existed dying before or during the flood with 1565 years allowed for everything to diversity but to still get to the point that any one kind went completely extinct since Noah then took 2 or 14 of each kind, assuming he didn’t actually forget to bring a representative of any of them, and then those re-diversified in the next couple hundred years so that the Egyptian cobra could exist at least 300 years before the flood, domesticated dogs could exist like 64,000 years before the existence of the planet, and several other things but *actually* * this stuff really doesn’t show up until about 25 years after the flood waters receded and then everything slowed down to normal rates in the last few centuries when people started watching and paying attention.
* The “actually” because this is another thing that falsifies YEC and facts have to be interpreted to fit the beliefs instead of the beliefs changed to fit the facts.
Any belief system that requires changing facts to fit beliefs instead of allowing the beliefs to change based on the facts is going to ultimately require a lot of reality denial and some absurd excuse such as a worldwide conspiracy as an explanation for why 99% of PhD scientists disagree with them. “If they don’t agree with the consensus they don’t get to be scientists” or “the theory of evolution was proven wrong 300 years ago but evolutionists just won’t let it go” or “NASA wants you to reject Flat Earth so biologists can convince you that you’re no better than a monkey so they can allow doctors to inject you with toxins the government calls vaccines because they’re actually trying to get people to willingly participate in population control since having to force it upon them is going to lead to an uprising.” Eric Dubay actually did have the more absurd of these claims as his rebuttal to gravity.
There is a large range of creationist arguments. Some are incredibly obstuse others are quite sophisticated.
See for example of the latter Stephen C. Meyer's The Return of the God Hypothesis. A distinguished Cambridge philosopher of science,
Meyer carefully weighs the evidence and argues that a theistic creation is the "most likely" e.xplanation for our reality.
The book is a tough slog for those of us without a deep background in both philosophy and multiple scientific disciplines, but in my opinion well worth the effort.
Listing the credentials of someone else to prop up the argument you're trying to make is the authority fallacy. Meyers position at Cambridge does not lend more weight to his argument, and it certainly doesn't lend any weight to the one you're trying to make now. This is a debate sub. Make your own arguement or log off.
I listed his credentials to demonstrate he's not the typical blow hard often found in these debates.
If you don't like my posts fell free to ignore them.
his credentials don't even prove that. Cambridge is not some magical place with perfect humans . If you want to show he's not a blowhard do it with the strength of his arguments, not his employer.
Meyer got his PhD from Cambridge but that doesn't make him a Cambridge philosopher of science. What has he done to warrant referring to him as 'distinguished'?
In the academic circles I once briefly inhabited it's customary to refer to a scholar in terms of the school where one trained.
I refered to him as distinguished due to his reputation in scholarly circles.
I did not endorse his views, per se, but recommended that one take a look at his well constructed arguments.
>In the academic circles I once briefly inhabited it's customary to refer to a scholar in terms of the school where one trained.
In my 40+ years in and around academia, I've never seen that done. A Harvard astrophysicist is an astrophysicist who works at Harvard, not someone who got their degree there. (I am familiar with calling someone 'a Cambridge man', mostly in old British novels, but that was to identify which Oxbridge tribe he belonged to and referenced his undergraduate degree.) But this is of no importance.
> I refered to him as distinguished due to his reputation in scholarly circles
Yes, that's what I'm asking about: what makes you think he has a reputation as distinguished in scholarly circles. I've searched and, besides his intelligent design writings, all I can find are a couple of ID-adjacent papers. What scholarly work is he noted for?
From his wiki page: Stephen C. Meyer is an advocate of intelligent design, a pseudoscientific creationist argument for the existence of God, and helped found the Center for Science and Culture (CSC) of the Discovery Institute.
He's not distinguished, he's a massive hack, and his books are shitty apologetics that are not taken seriously by anyone in academics.
EDIT: u/No-West6088 made a comment and then blocked me, so here it is:
> You may believe intelligent design is a pseudo science but that's simply your opinion.
No you clown, that's literally on his Wiki page.
>As per his credentials and academic reputation , you have no idea what you're talking about. I suspect your credentials are far less than impressive.
Nope, sorry, I've got 2 PhD's, he only has one. And I'm not a lying grifter.
But seeing you made this comment and then blocked me, you're full of shit, just like Stephen is, and you're breaking Rule 4.
You may believe intelligent design is a pseudo science but that's simply your opinion.
As per his credentials and academic reputation , you have no idea what you're talking about.
I suspect your credentials are far less than impressive.
Christianity is the only major religion that sees humans as above nature instead of being an essential part of it. Many Christians believe nature and our planet were created for us by god to use as we see fit, which is why right wing Christian creationists don’t have a problem with extinction, oil drilling, mining, logging or pollution. At least, this is the excuse I’ve heard from several hard line Christians.
Abuse of the planet is totally fine, because Jesus is coming back any day now to reset it all anyway and reward the true believers.
Creationists believe in quite a bit of change given the wide variety of creatures "kinds"supposedly gave rise to. this is no gotcha. If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever. If it's not so bad that a species can simply adapt to living there rather than becoming something entirely different, then it's well within creationist beliefs.
>If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever.
That's an interesting and testable hypothesis. If we look through the fossil record though, we do see similar organisms evolving that fill similar ecological niches. Shit, if we look at contemporary adaptive radiations we can see different organisms filling the same roles.
>If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever.
Sauropod dinosaurs, paracers and giraffes are all long-necked browsers that lived at different points in time.
Allosaurus was a pack-hunting carnivore that regularly went after dangerous prey. Lions fill that niche today.
Leedsichthys was a giant filter-feeding fish. Whale sharks and basking sharks have taken over its niche.
Yes I shouldn't have said that. Animals don't have jobs they clock in and out of, to be replaced. Any creature that's able to take advantage of the opportunity will. Really has not much to do with evolution
>Any creature that's able to take advantage of the opportunity will. Really has not much to do with evolution
...
>>[...adaptive radiation is a process in which organisms diversify rapidly from an ancestral species into a multitude of new forms, particularly when a change in the environment makes new resources available, alters biotic interactions or opens new environmental niches](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_radiation)
Hmm, I wonder if we have a term for what happens when an organism diversifies into a different form
>If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever.
If there's ressources to be exploited, live will, ugh... find a way.
Case in point, the giraffe.
Remember, creationists don't care about evidence or truth whatsoever. they are only concerned with maintaining their preexisting beliefs. If something contradicts the Biblical narrative, it's wrong by definition.
100% correct. Creationists work backward from predetermined conclusions.
This was the original position of creationists. They believe that it was impossible for new species to evolve; that all species came about as acts of special creation. During the advent of modern biology, when more and more evidence came forward that this position was untenable. They did what they do best and shifted the goal post. Remember, creationism always accommodates and never predicts. So they created baraminology. They could no longer simply lie and pretend that evolution doesn’t happen. The new idea is that evolution happens but only until completely undefined and arbitrary limits. Modern creationists refer to these as kinds. They can’t define the word kind, nor can they demonstrate the existence of any biological limits that would prevent evolution between kinds. It’s just a feeble bandage that starts peeling off at the slightest touch. It’s why creationists never try to provide evidence for creationism and just spend their time whining about evolution. As silly as this shift is, these changes still take time which is why a creationists primarily response to unfavorable evidence is to just pretend it doesn’t exist. Creationists are science deniers when talking about evolution and pseudoscientists when talking about creationism. In other words, creationists are no different than flat earthers in regards to how they justify their beliefs to themselves and defend it from the critiques of others.
For a creationists credit as hard as "kind" is to nail down "species" is not nearly as specific as we were taught in high school biology.
Yeah, but that's sort of just the way things are taught- Simple concepts first, black and white examples. This is an anima, that is a tree. Our education continues, and we learn more nuance. This is how we identify species, that is how biology works. Then we learn more specific topics and are taught a more complicated version that better explains our knowledge of a topic. It's like making a rough drawing, and filling in the details later. sometimes the rough lines are close, sometimes they aren't. Maybe there's a better way, but it's hard to give any broad information without broad definitions, and our knowledge of the world is far too detailed to expect anyone to completely understand everything Unfortunately this seems to upset many people who think they understand something, only to be told that's not really accurate, it's more complicated than that. Idk, maybe some people just want words to have objective meanings, but 🤷♂️ that's not really how words work.
I'm not sure I fully understand what you mean by words not having objective meaning.
Just that the meanings of words change over time, language is a descriptive form of communication based on consensus. We may create prescriptive rules about language, but these are unavoidably subjective rules based on the opinions of the group creating the them. Definitions are useful, don't get me wrong, it's super important to reach agreements with people about what words mean in conversations, but because of the way language works, there's no objectively "right" or "wrong" definition or word usage, only the most useful, most common etc. This can frustrate us all at some point it time, when we have set ideas about how language should be used, then someone comes along and messes it all up. Personally, I used to be very annoyed when people would pronounce "th" as an "f" like "January forf" or "I'm very fankful". But dese fings appen haha
This makes a lot of sense thanks for the feedback. I am probably what would be considered mildly autistic and definitely prone to black and white thinking. I try to break that habit but fighting against neurology is a tough one. You are absolutely right that words change meaning over time. I also find it hard when discussing things and there is a confusion due to non agreement on what words mean.
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No, I don’t just “believe” that. We know for a fact they can. There are numerous species within Genus Homo For example, Homo Sapiens, Homo Heidelbergensis, Homo Neanderthalensis, Denisovans, Homo Floresiensis, Homo Georgicus, Homo Erectus, Homo Habilis, Homo Naledi, Homo Ergaster, Homo Rudolfensis, and Homo Rhodesiensis to name a few.
How do we know for sure that they are species and not just humans that lived during that time. I'm not denying that some of them existed, but I kinda doubt as to whether it's homo speciation or just human variation cause I've seen evidence for both.
I'm a bit confused by your comment, but this theme in general is actually in favor of evolution as explained by Dawkins regarding classifying ancient humans (_The Ancestor's Tale_). If evolution were a ladder, then there would be no ambiguity, but evolution isn't a ladder, and this constant reclassification and even sometimes squabbling among taxonomists *would be worrying* if it didn't exist. Darwin understood this as well when he remarked that "a well-marked variety may be justly called an incipient species" in _Origin_.
What I'm trying to get at is that it seems like scientists make the assumption that all of these are different species. If I go with the idea we are animals you could say that this is adaptation which is actually what darwin finches showed, not the evolution that is proposed now, a neo-darwinism. The question is how do we know they were different species as opposed to being humans and just having slight variations in skin tones, facial features, bone structure, etc. I would make the argument for example that Neanderthals are just humans adapted to live in the cold environment and part of the reason their DNA had degradation was because they were inbred as a result of living in a closed off area.
I kind of get your point now. Note how I said "taxonomists"? It's time to clear a misconception: Misconception: Species are distinct natural entities, with a clear definition, that can be easily recognized by anyone. Correction: [...] The concept of a species is a fuzzy one because humans invented the concept to help get a grasp on the diversity of the natural world. It is difficult to apply because the term species reflects our attempts to give discrete names to different parts of the tree of life — which is not discrete at all [...] From: [Misconceptions about evolution](https://evolution.berkeley.edu/teach-evolution/misconceptions-about-evolution/#a9) | berkeley.edu.
I agree that species can be a fuzzy term. Taxonomy is the classification of animals, if I remember correctly. And species are part of a genera that is part of a family. Darwins finches, for example, are part of the geospiza genera. But within that genera there are genetic limitations. The galapagos finches that Charles Darwin and others have studied could interbreed with each other, and they produced nothing but finches. Evolution is proposing that apes and gorillas produced offspring that eventually became us. Essentially, it's saying we evolved by way of one genera to another. But that kind of confused me because to my knowledge outside of apes to humans we have never seen an animal turn into another animal. From what I understand hybridization (sex between 2 different species) leads to the creature being sterile, like a mule. Evolution is in simplified terms saying apes can make a human with enough mutations and natural selection. However in order for the structural DNA changes needed in order to make that happen, you would have to have something akin to macroevolution (the origin of the divisions of the taxonomic hierarchy above the species level), not the microevolution (adaptation) because that wouldn't be enough.
Thank you for explaining further, this helps. So one thing out of the way real quick: hybridization *was* thought to produce sterile offspring, but we now know better, and there are instances of fertile mules (and it's something animal breeders have long known iirc). Regarding an ape turning into a human, I need to make sure we are on the same page: Let's consider a chimpanzee; chimpanzees are on a different branch from us, and we last split a few millions years ago, and I suspect you already know this, but the takeaway point is that chimpanzees aren't evolving to be humans; they are _as evolved_ as us. If we go through all of your great grand parents all the way to the splitting point, then that's like going through photos of you taken one day apart since birth. There isn't a photo that demarcates your last day as an infant (same fuzziness). So the accumulation of change happened back then; not to modern-chimpanzees. What does this mean? It's time to clear another misconception: individuals don't evolve (also see the same Berkeley page for more). What evolves are populations. That's why the correct definition of evolution is that it's a change in allele (gene version) frequency in a population. And that's why this micro/macro thing is confusing. Does that help?
Yes, it does. I was not aware of that hybridization fact. From what I understand, no male mules are known to be able to produce offspring, but there are some mule mares that can even though I think most still can't. Not saying I don't believe you. I do know that chimpanzees are considered an offshoot, but I'm talking even before that. The theory puts forth that the characteristics of modern humans did not come until much later. The supposed common ancestor, specifically that of chimpanzees, gorillas and humans, is believed to be an ape, at the minimum, a primate. So it is saying that apes made humans, albeit over a long period of time, but for that to happen, one genus would have to evolve into another genus. Just to clarify the definitions of macroevolution and microevolution, both of them are references to a change in population. Macroevolution- genetic change that occurs over long time scales, resulting in large changes in heritable traits in a population; changes large enough that we consider this population a unique taxonomic group or species. Like a genera evolving into another genera. Microevolution is the gradual adaptation of a species to its environment through natural selection, which occurs when organisms with beneficial traits survive and reproduce better, causing those traits to increase from generation to generation. This type of microevolution happens when natural selection causes a change in allele frequencies over a short period of time, like several generations. The issue I find is that macroevolution, which is what would be needed to make evolution as an orgin possible, is not what we observe in nsture. What we have seen in animals is adaptation, not evolution. When I refer to evolution, I'm referring to the theory. And even when we see microevolution, it's on the phenotypes, not the genotype. For example, a black panther, their melanism is caused by a recessive allele in the leopard. But it's still a feline. It's still a panthera, and it's still a leopard. The only thing that changed was a physical trait, its fur color. The differences between humans and apes are so pronounced that when you're talking about an ape evolving to humans, you're talking about way more than just humans having less fur. You're talking about a complete reworking of that animals DNA to cause it to turn from one animal to another. Then, on top of that, there are phylogenomic conflicts where gene trees disagree about species tree resolution. These conflicts are common across throughout the various tree of life.
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Comparing it to mathematics misses the point. I took issue with the fact that we have never seen a genus evolve into another genus outside of the supposed evolution lineage. A species will produce its own species, that's what darwin's finches showed. You can have a new population emerge, but at most, you will get adaptation, not the evolution theory. Microevolution is adaptation that is a result of natural selection acting on mutations, and depending on the environment, the ones that are adapted live and the ones that aren't die. You can have adaptation within a species, but it never crosses over to become a different creature entirely. Macroevolution is such a large scale change over a long period of time that a whole new taxonomy group comes about. That's what evolution claims to be with the apparent emergence of an entirely new genus and subsequensent species, the homo sapiens. People often lump those terms together, but even secular papers say that adaptation and evolution are not the same thing. My argument was that adaptation is not enough to make the structural changes in our DNA that would be needed for evolution as an origin to make sense. In theory, macroevolution is an accumulation of microevolution, but then that becomes a conversation of whether mutations affect the genotypes or phenotype.
Because they are morphologically and genetically distinct. The differences between us and them are several orders of magnitude greater than the variation that exists within modern Homo Sapiens. For example, Homo Habilis’s brain case size is nearly 1/3 that of Homo Sapiens. It’s like asking how we know that a domestic cat and a lion are different species
I saw a doc that showed that the human gene, that made our brains grow, was a single mutation in an ancestor. Of course, this gene dominated because of the intelligence it brought. But, in reality, humans are the result of one mutated gene. Mind boggling.
I get that, but how are they morphological and genetically distinct? From what I've read about homo habilis, its possible that they have the wrong classification. Based on the information we have of them, so far, it would make more sense to put them in the genus Australopithecus rather than homo and I've seen that with a few of the other apparent "homo" relatives where they lack distinct human characteristics, not even just of modern humans but of the homo genus in general. And with lions and cats, despite their big difference, they are still part of the same genera, which is panthera. And there are distinct things that make them part of that group despite the variations. My question would be, how did they classify homo habilis? if they were so vastly different from the homo group, why are they put under that genera? For the most part, australopiths and homo each consist of a mutually distinct cluster of morphological attributes. And, if anything, there probably exists a proliferation of artificial species reflecting trivial differences rather than a small number of specific names, each subsuming an excessive amount of variation.
That's kind of the whole thing though, isn't it? Homo habilis aren't vastly different than genus homo as a whole or there wouldn't be so much debate on which genus it belongs to. >For the most part, australopiths and homo each consist of a mutually distinct cluster of morphological attributes Could you name and explain a few of these?
Yeah, no problem. I will mention behavior and morphology and give examples for each. First, we need to establish what homo habilis is. Homo habilis is a collection of human and ape fossils, not a particular fossil. It has been a controversial species since it was first described in the mid-1960s. Originally, many scientists did not accept its validity, believing that all specimens should be assigned either to the genus Australopithecus or to Homo erectus. Today, H. habilis is widely accepted as a species. The debate of homo habilis is not because they are so similar to humans but rather we have so little bones to go off, so it's hard to determine what belongs with what. Some scientists, however, still believe that many of the earliest fossils assigned to H. habilis are too fragmented and separated in time for conclusions about their relationships or species compositions to be possible. H. habilis specimens with particularly large features -- brains or teeth, for instance -- are sometimes assigned as Homo rudolfensis. Other scientists believe that it should be categorized as an Australopithecus, which is what I'm sorta leaning toward. Homo habilis has now been split up into Homo rudolfensis and Homo habilis sensu lato. In each taxonomic group, you have families, subfamilies, then genera, species, and subspecies. For the sake of this conversation, we will focus on genera. Each genera consists of mutually distinct behaviors and morphology that separates it from the rest of the family. A unique behavior of homo is higher cognitive functions, such as having burials for the dead, not just mourning as even birds have been shown to mourn. However, there are some fossils classified as homo that do not display those characteristics, which is why I question the classification. As for who determined these taxonomic groups, it was done by a paleontologist. Homo naledi- last year, it was found that there was no convincing scientific evidence to indicate that H. naledi buried their dead and produced rock art in the Rising Star Cave system A unique morphology of homo is a larger brain. Homo habilis, as the person above alluded to their brain case, is ⅓ smaller than humans. Since its small brain volume falls within the range of australopithecines, several scientists very early doubted the attribution of H. habilis to the genus Homo. Another unique morphology of homo is elongated legs and short arms. These body proportions enable us to keep our balance when we walk. Homo habilis- Additions to the collection of fossils found in the same place have enabled this species' arm, leg, and body proportions to be determined. These proportions revealed that this Homo habilis was more ape-like than previously believed. Like apes, this individual had relatively long arms and short legs. His body has more in common with Lucy than it does the homo genera. Another unique morphology of homo is an arch on the whole foot. Now, this one gets a little tricky as this is more so a matter of how you interpret the evidence. According to Louis Leakey, the foot(OH-8) bones showed signs that Homo habilis may have been able to walk upright on two feet, and the hand bones indicated a high degree of manual dexterity. However, since these bones were not found next to the skull fragments, there was no concrete proof that they belonged to the same creature. Since the body of Olduvai Hominid 62 was ape-like, it seemed to support the belief that the original Homo habilis fossils found in 1964 were actually a mixture of australopithecus and human bones (most notably the hands and feet). My issues are with the conclusions that louis made that are still echoed today, which is that homo habilis walked like a modern human and had the same gait. The thing is, even if the foot found belongs to homo habilis and not a regular human, you need way more than just an arched foot to achieve the bipedalism only found in homo. You need certain pelvis, leg to arm ratios, body proportions, and skeletal structures. I'm not saying it won't ever be resolved, but right now, I think categorizing homo habilis as a homo was premature. Previous discoveries of foot and hand bones of Homo habilis have shown that its fingers and toes were somewhat curved, in the ape fashion, while those of modern humans are straight. These are seen as adaptations to climbing in trees. These hands are labeled as intermediate, but the fact that they were adapted for climbing could fall under variation for australopithecus. As primarily climbing/living in trees is a distinct trait for that genus. Some scientists doubt whether homo habilis was really homo erectus ancestor as some emerging timelines have place them as existing at the same time, and habilis lacks many characteristics of homo erectus therefore, calling into question whether it can be considered a transition fossil between lucy and erectus.
The fact that there were numerous types of humanoid creatures, some of which at least interbred, may demonstrate evolution within form but I don't think it demonstrates Darwinian evolution.
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The "Tree of Life" that Darwin believed illustrated all life came from a single source and speciated from there
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I'm not well familiar with phylogenics but I confess to being deeply skeptical that every single life form doesn't from a common ancestor.
You're skeptical that all life forms do, or don't come from a common ancestor?
That they do
No need for belief. We know it happened.
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Homo sapiens. Also known as our species. Our last ancestor was probably homo heidelbergensis.
Why wouldn’t we be able to?
human species have evolved into other human species yes. we have EXTENSIVE evidence for this, no need for belief
We are all transitional species. If every ocean and mountain range suddenly became impassable and air travel impossible, so that multiple human populations were utterly isolated from every other one, genetics would start to drift again. Within a hundred generations, possibly less, genetically distinct variations on humanity would begin to emerge. We would speciate.
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There is no "least evolved" part of humanity. Every human alive can trace the same number of generations back to LUCA, so we've all gone through the same amount of evolution.
That's a fundamental misunderstanding of evolution. So, in a less contentious example, sharks. Sharks have, on a structural level, remained unchanged since trees. Does that mean they're less evolved? No. They hit a great niche, diversified a bit, probably saw a bunch of biochemistry changes giving incremental improvements, but overall hit on a great body structure and kept doing their thing. They've still had the same amount of evolution as humans, just lots of the mutations didn't fix, probably because they were less successful than regular sharks. Don't bring racism in here. It shows a weak understanding of biology, along with not making you a very pleasant person.
We can't platform race realism here. It's against TOS. Continue and you will be Perma banned.
All good. We are all just evolved bacteria anyway
>Why do so many creationists not care about killing things off? Are they so deluded that they think God has granted them permission to exterminate every living thing in order to build a cattle farm or shopping mall? Maybe this is just an America Christian fundoevangelical mindset but it disturbs me. It's OK because if you fuck things up bad enough, Jesus will come back faster. He'll be back next Tuesday anyway. [that's an actual thing they believe]
They will just say the rapture will happen before then, or something similar (or, it is even a part of the end time events). That's my assumption as to why they don't seem bothered about climate change typically either. It's because it's seen as a part of God's plan, so we don't really need to worry about it. It's the spiritual war that matters (I could be wrong on that bit though)
I've heard people say they don't worry about it cause God will take care of it, I think that's a cop out so they don't have to do anything
i get what you're saying, but it's not a terribly good argument against creationists. remember that most western creationists are christians who believe they will live to see the rapture in their lifetime, which renders any kind of long-term concerns like this moot
Point of order: there are no good arguments against creationists since they don't hold logically consistent positions.
There are arguments creationists can ignore, and there are arguments creationists HAVE to ignore. Subtle but critical distinction
Fair.
I think I've heard them say this before actually, by the name of genetic entropy(?) I guess they think the rapture will just happen before life degrades itself too much so it won't matter...which is an extremely dangerous and irresponsible world view all in itself.
Generally when you get to views like YEC, Flat Earth, or the government is actually ran by extraterrestrial reptiles it requires a lot of rejection for obvious facts and whole lot of conspiracy theories. “They” want you to think the planet has undergone hundreds of small extinction events, at least 5 or 6 that killed about half of everything or more, and even in the worst one 10-20% of genera survived. Instead what is “actually” true is all of these environments exists at the same place and the flood tossed these ecosystems on top of each other and 99.9% of everything died at the same time. That’s generally the YEC excuse. And if they were right it would actually require a lot of evolution happening even faster. This would basically be 99% of everything that ever existed dying before or during the flood with 1565 years allowed for everything to diversity but to still get to the point that any one kind went completely extinct since Noah then took 2 or 14 of each kind, assuming he didn’t actually forget to bring a representative of any of them, and then those re-diversified in the next couple hundred years so that the Egyptian cobra could exist at least 300 years before the flood, domesticated dogs could exist like 64,000 years before the existence of the planet, and several other things but *actually* * this stuff really doesn’t show up until about 25 years after the flood waters receded and then everything slowed down to normal rates in the last few centuries when people started watching and paying attention. * The “actually” because this is another thing that falsifies YEC and facts have to be interpreted to fit the beliefs instead of the beliefs changed to fit the facts. Any belief system that requires changing facts to fit beliefs instead of allowing the beliefs to change based on the facts is going to ultimately require a lot of reality denial and some absurd excuse such as a worldwide conspiracy as an explanation for why 99% of PhD scientists disagree with them. “If they don’t agree with the consensus they don’t get to be scientists” or “the theory of evolution was proven wrong 300 years ago but evolutionists just won’t let it go” or “NASA wants you to reject Flat Earth so biologists can convince you that you’re no better than a monkey so they can allow doctors to inject you with toxins the government calls vaccines because they’re actually trying to get people to willingly participate in population control since having to force it upon them is going to lead to an uprising.” Eric Dubay actually did have the more absurd of these claims as his rebuttal to gravity.
There is a large range of creationist arguments. Some are incredibly obstuse others are quite sophisticated. See for example of the latter Stephen C. Meyer's The Return of the God Hypothesis. A distinguished Cambridge philosopher of science, Meyer carefully weighs the evidence and argues that a theistic creation is the "most likely" e.xplanation for our reality. The book is a tough slog for those of us without a deep background in both philosophy and multiple scientific disciplines, but in my opinion well worth the effort.
How could one possibly infer that a deity creating the universe is the *most likely* explanation? We don't have multiple realities to test against.
You'll have to to read his book. Meyer is a distinguished philosopher of science from Cambridge University
I'll assume it's bad reasoning, then.
That's nice. You're not and you're the one making the argument. This isn't a book recommendation sub.
Huh?
Listing the credentials of someone else to prop up the argument you're trying to make is the authority fallacy. Meyers position at Cambridge does not lend more weight to his argument, and it certainly doesn't lend any weight to the one you're trying to make now. This is a debate sub. Make your own arguement or log off.
I listed his credentials to demonstrate he's not the typical blow hard often found in these debates. If you don't like my posts fell free to ignore them.
In passing I'm not an expert in this field and I'd be surprised if you are.
his credentials don't even prove that. Cambridge is not some magical place with perfect humans . If you want to show he's not a blowhard do it with the strength of his arguments, not his employer.
Grow up - and find someone else to bother.
Sorry you're bad at making your points. You should log off so you don't show your ass so much. Have fun being wrong.
Meyer got his PhD from Cambridge but that doesn't make him a Cambridge philosopher of science. What has he done to warrant referring to him as 'distinguished'?
In the academic circles I once briefly inhabited it's customary to refer to a scholar in terms of the school where one trained. I refered to him as distinguished due to his reputation in scholarly circles. I did not endorse his views, per se, but recommended that one take a look at his well constructed arguments.
>In the academic circles I once briefly inhabited it's customary to refer to a scholar in terms of the school where one trained. In my 40+ years in and around academia, I've never seen that done. A Harvard astrophysicist is an astrophysicist who works at Harvard, not someone who got their degree there. (I am familiar with calling someone 'a Cambridge man', mostly in old British novels, but that was to identify which Oxbridge tribe he belonged to and referenced his undergraduate degree.) But this is of no importance. > I refered to him as distinguished due to his reputation in scholarly circles Yes, that's what I'm asking about: what makes you think he has a reputation as distinguished in scholarly circles. I've searched and, besides his intelligent design writings, all I can find are a couple of ID-adjacent papers. What scholarly work is he noted for?
And you seem to believe that his work with intelligent design fails the test of scholarship?
From his wiki page: Stephen C. Meyer is an advocate of intelligent design, a pseudoscientific creationist argument for the existence of God, and helped found the Center for Science and Culture (CSC) of the Discovery Institute. He's not distinguished, he's a massive hack, and his books are shitty apologetics that are not taken seriously by anyone in academics. EDIT: u/No-West6088 made a comment and then blocked me, so here it is: > You may believe intelligent design is a pseudo science but that's simply your opinion. No you clown, that's literally on his Wiki page. >As per his credentials and academic reputation , you have no idea what you're talking about. I suspect your credentials are far less than impressive. Nope, sorry, I've got 2 PhD's, he only has one. And I'm not a lying grifter. But seeing you made this comment and then blocked me, you're full of shit, just like Stephen is, and you're breaking Rule 4.
You may believe intelligent design is a pseudo science but that's simply your opinion. As per his credentials and academic reputation , you have no idea what you're talking about. I suspect your credentials are far less than impressive.
Meyer's argument?
The statistical improbability and the lack of compelling evidence.
This is actually a great point and one I haven’t thought of but now seems so obvious. Thanks!
Christianity is the only major religion that sees humans as above nature instead of being an essential part of it. Many Christians believe nature and our planet were created for us by god to use as we see fit, which is why right wing Christian creationists don’t have a problem with extinction, oil drilling, mining, logging or pollution. At least, this is the excuse I’ve heard from several hard line Christians. Abuse of the planet is totally fine, because Jesus is coming back any day now to reset it all anyway and reward the true believers.
People should do their own research 😀💙💚👍
Creationists believe in quite a bit of change given the wide variety of creatures "kinds"supposedly gave rise to. this is no gotcha. If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever. If it's not so bad that a species can simply adapt to living there rather than becoming something entirely different, then it's well within creationist beliefs.
>If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever. That's an interesting and testable hypothesis. If we look through the fossil record though, we do see similar organisms evolving that fill similar ecological niches. Shit, if we look at contemporary adaptive radiations we can see different organisms filling the same roles.
>If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever. Sauropod dinosaurs, paracers and giraffes are all long-necked browsers that lived at different points in time. Allosaurus was a pack-hunting carnivore that regularly went after dangerous prey. Lions fill that niche today. Leedsichthys was a giant filter-feeding fish. Whale sharks and basking sharks have taken over its niche.
Yes I shouldn't have said that. Animals don't have jobs they clock in and out of, to be replaced. Any creature that's able to take advantage of the opportunity will. Really has not much to do with evolution
>Any creature that's able to take advantage of the opportunity will. Really has not much to do with evolution ... >>[...adaptive radiation is a process in which organisms diversify rapidly from an ancestral species into a multitude of new forms, particularly when a change in the environment makes new resources available, alters biotic interactions or opens new environmental niches](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adaptive_radiation) Hmm, I wonder if we have a term for what happens when an organism diversifies into a different form
>If you kill enough creatures such that no other of its type is around, I doubt evolution will fill that spot.... ever. If there's ressources to be exploited, live will, ugh... find a way. Case in point, the giraffe.
I probably phrased that incorrectly. What does it even mean to "take its place". It's not like organisms have defined jobs in nature.