On Wed, 24 May 1995 14:44:06 -0500 you wrote:
>
>Terry said (clip)
>Please explain. How is common ancestry *not* the same as
>evolution?
>
>SJ>My children have me as their "common ancestor" but they did not
>evolve from me.
>
SC>You are correct that common ancestry is not strictly the same thing
>as evolution, but I think you are picking nits here, Stephen. I
>don't think many people would confuse Terry's use of common ancestry
>in a context of evolution as a parent-child relationship.
Sorry Steve. Terry asked "common ancestry not the same as evolution"
and I gave one example. Then you rule it out by saying this is not
Terry's use of it. Of course it isn't! Terry has already defined
"common ancestry" = "evolution", and by his (and your) definition
counter examples are just disallowed.
My point was that "common ancestry" is a *relationship* and
"evolution" is a proposed *mechanism* to explain that relationship.
>SJ>How do you know that "primates all share a common ancestor"? Why
>could not their observed similarities be due to common design
>and/or convergence?
>
>TG>Primates are a separate branch: all member share the deficiency.
>Guinea pigs are in a completely different branch (independent loss of the
>Vitamin C "gene").
>
>SJ>How do you know that they were not originally designed without this
>vitamin C `gene'.
>
>SJ>On the other hand, if Guinea pigs can independently lose this
>vitamin C `gene', why could not the primates?
>
SC>Additional information about the nature of the primate pseudogene
>that renders them unable to synthesize vitamin C would be useful for
>answering several questions here.
>If the pseudogene contained much of the coding information for making the
>necessary enzyme, but lacked some crucial regulatory sequence, or had a
>fremework mutation, then one might ask why would a designer create a gene
>that contained much of the required information, then insured that it wasn't
>expressed? Why not just ignore the whole gene?
Do you *really* know why God does things, Steve? I'm sorry but I
don't!
SC>What are the characteristics and structures of the pseudogenes that
>prevent expression of a functional gene product in different primates
>and guinea pigs? Do all primates have an identical defect in the
>gene that prevents its expression? If so, this would be strong
>evidence for a common ancestor, especially if guinea pigs failed to
>express the gene via a different defect. Does anyone know the
>answer to this question?
It would be evidence for either: 1) a common ancestor; or 2. a common
design.
SJ>"Despite these difficulties, many scientists consider molecular
>classification to be not only possible, but, in principle, more
>objective than classification based on visible characteristics.
>Molecular studies have also produced claims having important
>philosophical implications, particularly on the sensitive topic of
>human evolution, because by some molecular measurements chimps are
>much more similar to humans than they are to other non-human primates.
>This degree of similarity may call the importance of molecular
>comparisons into question, because it does little to explain the
>profound dissimilarities between humans and animals of any kind.
Yes. Even if common ancestry is proved, it would not automatically
prove Darwinism was the mechanism. Before Darwinism can be accepted,
it would need to explain not only the confirming facts but also the
disconfirming facts (of which there are many).
TC>There are also quite striking differences between individual humans
>as well, even though the DNA information is almost identical.
>Consider the difference between men and women based on only one
>chromosome or the difference between persons with and without Down's
>syndrome who only differ genetically by having 2 or 3 copies of
>chromosome 21, or more striking, the Elephant man syndrome which
>arises from a single mutated gene. I'm not sure that one can make a
>simple correlation between genomic relatedness and morphological
>similarity.
This is another point. Neo-Darwinism was originally based on a simple
model of the genotype-phenotype relationship. Now we know it is very
complicated. Can Darwinism's random mutation + natural selection
mechanism *really* account for its development?
SJ>Because Darwinists take for granted that relationship is equivalent
>to common ancestry, they assume that the molecular classifications
>confirm the "fact of evolution" by confirming the existence of
>something which by definition is caused by evolution. They also tend
>to assume that the particular relationships determined by taxonomists
>were "predicted" by Darwin's theory. When these fallacious
>assumptions are made, it seems that a 99 per cent" molecular
>similarity between men and apes confirms Darwinism decisively.
See above my earlier comments about "relationship" and "common
ancestry". This fundamental distinction must be made. The science of
Cladistics has recognised this point.
SJ>The misunderstanding is fundamental. Darwin did not invent
>classification or reform its practice. His contribution was to
>provide an explanation in materialistic terms of how the categories
>Came about and why the classifiers were right in their instinct that
>the "types" are real natural entities and not arbitrary sorting
>systems (such as a library uses for books). Pre-Darwinian classifiers
>also were aware that humans are physically very much like the
>anthropoid apes. That is why the creationist Linnaeus, the father of
>taxonomy, unhesitatingly included humans among the primates. The
>genetic similarity confirms Linnaeus, not Darwin.
TC>This seems to be a marginal point. Does it really matter who began
>the field of taxonomy? It is quite remarkable that genetics provides
>significant corroboration of taxonomic schemes.
Phil's point is that Darwinists cannot claim that their discovery of
similarities automatically confirms their common ancestry theory.
Before Darwin similarities were able to be accommodated within a
creationist typological theory too.
In fact Denton (a molecular biologist) argues that this "corroboration
of taxonomic schemes" by "genetics" is the last thing that Darwinism
wanted:
"The prospect of finding sequences in nature by this technique was,
therefore, of great potential interest. Where the fossils had failed
and morphological considerations were at best only ambiguous, perhaps
this new field of comparative biochemistry might at last provide
objective evidence of sequence and of the connecting links which had
been so long sought by evolutionary biologists.
However, as more protein sequences began to accumulate during the
1960s, it became increasingly apparent that the molecules were not
going to provide any evidence of sequential arrangements innature, but
were rather going to reaffirm the traditional view that the system of
nature conforms fundamentally to a highly ordered hierarchic scheme
from which all direct evidence for evolution is emphatically absent.
Moreover, the divisions turned out to be more mathematically perfect
than even most die-hard typologists would have predicted."
(Denton M., "Evolution: A Theory in Crisis",1985, Burnett Books,
pp276-278)
SJ>It tells us once
>again that apes and humans are remarkably similar in some ways, just
>as they are remarkably different in others, but it does not tell us
>how either the similarities or the dissimilarities came to exist.
>
>Yeah ok. But genetic similarities that confirm an evolutionary model are
>valuable. The model could have also been falsified by genetic data.
The "evolutionary model" *was* "falsified by genetic data" (read
Denton), but Darwinists just changed their model (as per usual)!
Sorry Steve, but "genetic similarities" don't "confirm an evolutionary
model" unless you already believe in evolution. The only way you can
confirm your evolutionary model is to: 1) demonstrate the mechanism
by which these similarities came about; 2. deal satisfactorily with
all the counter-evidence of disimilarities; and 3. show conclusively
that other mechanisms (eg. Progressive Creation) do not fit the
facts.
Stephen