Two short comebacks

[six_flavours]

Right now, I'm quite pleased I live in England because there aren't too many overt Christians here (unless you count the headmaster of my school and some of the crazier RE teachers, and the little old lady who stands near WH Smith in Leeds and goes on about how Jesus died for our sins etc. and he loves us and we should all fall down at his feet because we're useless etc.).

But I like the internet. I go on it a lot. I talk to lots of very nice, intelligent people from America on the 'net. And it all goes fine until they say something along the lines of 'Oh, evolution is all lies'. (Why is it only ever North Americans who do this to me? I don't recall ever talking to anyone from anywhere else ever talking about religion.)

I don't have any paticularly incisive, succinct comebacks - and I really need two. The two infuriating questions people ask me are:

'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'

Can anyone give me some help in answering those questions totally convincingly? I just need an example and some impressive rhetoric to stun these people into submission. The best I've done so far is to link to the Evolution/Creation forum on here. I need to do better.

(I go to a very annoying Catholic school, and it's driving me crazy whenever I hear a teacher say in assembly 'Talent comes from God' or some other such nonsense. I've worked out how to evade assembly by working in the library, but I'm still wondering how long it will be before they realise I think Catholicism is rubbish. I got in trouble once for deliberately doing an oral on condoms for GCSE English (still got an A for it though, due to class response - everyone else was being serious and talking about drug addiction).

I seriously can't wait until I get out of the place - I have about 6 months to go - and never, ever hear anything about 'talent from God' again, never have to mime the Our Father, never have to sing another hymn about sitting in God's hands, and never have to deal with some of those teachers again, some of whom display quite un-Christian mercy on people who miss RSG (supposed to be General Studies, mostly General God-Talk) for entirely legitimate reasons like discussing their future.

I was quite disappointed in one of my teachers once. I am doing A-levels in the sciences, and when we were learning about evolution in Biology recently my teacher (very nice man, great teacher) gave an interesting talk about evolution and ruined it all by saying at the end 'But we shouldn't dismiss Creationism entirely'. I began to bang my head against the desk repeatedly.)

[Roland98]

I think this is more of an E/C topic...they should be able to give you all sorts of quick comebacks, as well as more in-depth info!

-Roland98
Secular Lifestyle Moderator

[Doubting Didymus]

'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'

If your opponent knows so little about evolution that they make statements like these, there is precisely zero hope of any snappy one liner having any effect at all. They are not going to be able to grant evolution any credit if they don't know what it is. If you know about the theory yourself, your best hope is to tell them about it. If not, or if you haven't the spare time, direct them to an online remedial source. If they are still not willing to learn about the theory, then give up.

[Dr.GH]

There are essays that you can access from the II home page.

Additionally, I strongly recommend talkorigins and talkdesign

http://www.talkorigins.org/

http://www.talkdesign.org/

Also good is:


http://nsmserver2.fullerton.edu/departments/chemistry/evolution_creation/web/#24.


For a quick look-up try these:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/index.html

http://chem.tufts.edu/science/FrankSteiger/questions.htm

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/quotes/mine/project.html

http://www.angelfire.com/ak4/ratman/PRATTslist.html

[Herakles]

'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'
First of all, humans did not evolve from modern monkeys. Instead we share a common anscetor with them. Going back further we share a common anscestor with mammals, then the rest of the vertebrates, and so on. Any species alive today is a cousin to our species. Much like you did not descend from your brother or anyone else of your generation, but you do share a common anscestor with them.

A better question though would be to ask why couldn't they share a common anscetor with monkeys.

Evolution is defined as the change in the gene pool of a local population over time. For example, suppose that there is a particularly harsh winter. During this time natural selection will favor those animals born with a thicker coat of hair. In the summer, a thin coat was favored. Thus a majority of the animals in the population would have a thin coat. In the winter the reverse was true. Natural selection favored those animals with a thick coat, and therefore animals born with that evolutionary advantage would be more likely to survive. Their genes would then begin to dominate the population's gene pool. That, in a nutshell, is how evolution works.

As far as the evolutionary history of humans goes, the generally accepted theories are that they originated in Africa. Several million years ago, when the jungles and forests began to give way to the savannahs, those apes with increased bipediality and intelligence and opposable thumbs would be favored by natural selection. The ground dwelling population of apes would gradually have their gene pool taken over by those apes more equipped to survive on the plains (i.e. more human like)

[variant 13]

Right the important thing is to talk really slowly and in a loud voice because otherwise they won't understand :D. Apart from that there's nothing snappy that comes to mind apart from

"Idiot!"

But will give it some more thought

Ah Catholic school, the fun I had, especially in the last few years when I was an atheist.

I liked to cause trouble in RE when the teacher asked stupid questions, one was to come up with alternatives to why/how jesus' body disappeared.

I mistakenly thought that he wanted all possibilities and said that maybe, just maybe, his body was stolen by Roman necrophiliacs. The look on his face was priceless.

Wish I'd had known more and been more confident back then I could have given them hell.

Well I'm sure you can survive the last few months :D

[Herakles]

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'

They do. This person, however, probably doesn't understand that in most cases evolutionary changes are rarely noticable in a few thousand years. And we have only been studying evolution for the past 150 years.

Sickel cell anemia is an excellent example however. There is a gene in humans that causes this bad disease, but it also provides some protection against malaria. If a person gets the two genes, one each from the mother and father, that cause the disease, the detriments of the disease outway the benifits of the protection from malaria. If a person gets one allele that causes the disease and one that doesn't (therefore making them heterozygous) there are some ill effects, but the good outweighs the bad. In most cases however, a person does not carry any of the genes that cause this disease.

Interestingly enough, these people live in malaria free regions such as Europe and North America. Those peole who live in Africa, where malaria is a very real threat, have a higher frequency of the heterozygous gene. But with malaria on the decline, heterozygotes are also on the decline. If there is no malaria, then it harms the survival and reproduction ablities of the carrier and therefore that gene will be selected against.

[Coragyps]

A closely related mutation of humans that I tend to just babble on about is the hemoglobin C trait. It's actually a different mutation in the same spot as that for sickle-cell - a different amino acid shows up in the sixth position of the beta chain of hemoglobin. The biggest difference between HbC and sickle-cell is that most people with HbC never even know they have it - though some do have enlarged spleens or gallstones.

Malaria resistance with HbC is a lot like that with sickle-cell, though. Schoolkids in a study in Burkina Faso had 71% as many cases of clinical malaria if they had one HbC gene, as compared to classmates with just "normal" hemoglobin. With two HbC genes, incidence fell to 7%. (Sickle-cell heterozygotes had 73% less malaria than "normal", and sicke-cell homozygotes were all dead but one.)

The geographic incidence of this gene is sort of a "bull's-eye" pattern in the malarious area of West Africa, and indicates that it likely arose from maybe only one mutation in the last 1000 years or so.

References and more details are available for the asking.

[Doubting Didymus]

Originally posted by Coragyps
References are available for the asking.

Yes, please.

[Wolf-Tas]

Originally posted by six_flavours
I got in trouble once for deliberately doing an oral on condoms for GCSE

An oral on condoms. With a mastery of wordplay such as that, how could you not get an A? :)

When a creationist refers to the ancestry of Homo sapiens as "coming from monkeys" you have already won the debate, it shows that they are either ignorant, deceitful, just plain stupid, or a bit of each. To be fair, most will fall into the first category, which can be attributed simply to poor education, those are the people I feel sorry for.

[Coragyps]

DD - the study itself is
D. Modiano et al., Nature, 414, pp 305-308 (1991), but I haven't found that both online and free. A "backgrounder" on malaria and hemoglobin variants is here (http://sickle.bwh.harvard.edu/malaria_sickle.html) ; some info on medical effects of HbC is there (http://www.vh.org/pediatric/patient/pediatrics/faq/hemoglobinc.html) and yonder (http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000572.htm).

To the best of my non-peer-reviewed biological knowledge, the codon for plain ol' hemoglobin A is gaa, for HbC is aaa, and HbS, or sickle-cell, gua. These code for, respectively, glutamic acid, lysine, and valine.

[simian]

The Vatican's position is that evolution is true. If you are experiencing this stuff in a Catholic school, locate the info at the Vatican web site. I don't have time to find it right now.

Simian

[Rhaedas]

To address the OP of a simple one liner, perhaps given the naivity of the two questions presented, you could lead off with the response, "How can you be critical of a theory, when your questions demonstrate you don't even know the basics of that theory?"

That can either lead into a discussion of specifics (and hopefully some education on their part), in which the info and links given above can help you and them, if theyre willing to try and learn something...or they'll just stick their fingers in their ears and spout off that they must be right anyway. In which case how can you debate anything with them?

[Dark Jedi]

'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'

"This is a creationist lie. Man did not evolve from monkeys, man and monkeys had a common ancestor. They are our remote cousins, not our grandparents.


'How come humans don't evolve, then?'
They do. Sicle Cell anemia to ward off malaria is one example. Evolution is ongoing and takes a LOT of time. Man is merely the current form of this particular line of evolution.

[gallo]

Herakles said:
Interestingly enough, these people live in malaria free regions such as Europe and North America. Those peole who live in Africa, where malaria is a very real threat, have a higher frequency of the heterozygous gene. But with malaria on the decline, heterozygotes are also on the decline. If there is no malaria, then it harms the survival and reproduction ablities of the carrier and therefore that gene will be selected against.
Since the sickle cell gene is not beneficial, and is in fact detrimental, in regions where malaria is not endemic you might expect that the frequency of the gene would be decreasing in populations of West African origin. Studies in the U.S. seem to indicate that this is true. As I recall, the frequency is about two percentage points lower.

I can't verify that because I don't remember where I read it.

[budgie]

Originally posted by six_flavours
'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'

How about switching the questions around a bit, such as . . .

"So how could monkeys evolve from humans?"

Followed quickly with the reply . . .

"Oh, I see in your case they have":p

-jim

[Balrog of Morgoth]

'So how could man evolve from monkeys?' Close enough (since they'll probanly ask this one too) to #6 from here: (http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000D4FEC-7D5B-1D07-8E49809EC588EEDF) 6. If humans descended from monkeys, why are there still monkeys?

This surprisingly common argument reflects several levels of ignorance about evolution. The first mistake is that evolution does not teach that humans descended from monkeys; it states that both have a common ancestor.

The deeper error is that this objection is tantamount to asking, "If children descended from adults, why are there still adults?" New species evolve by splintering off from established ones, when populations of organisms become isolated from the main branch of their family and acquire sufficient differences to remain forever distinct. The parent species may survive indefinitely thereafter, or it may become extinct. They do. Since with technology we can pretty much stabalize our environment, wouldn't there come a point when our evolution would slow down? doing an oral on condoms :notworthy The Vatican's position is that evolution is true. If you are experiencing this stuff in a Catholic school, locate the info at the Vatican web site. The best I could find was this. (http://www.newadvent.org/docs/jp02tc.htm) For some reason I couldn't get it on the Vatican site. This (http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/speeches/index_spe-pc-culture.htm) was the closest that I could get. :confused:

[simian]

Here's some resources:
catholic.net (http://www.catholic.net/RCC/Periodicals/Dossier/0102-97/Article3.html)

Catholic Information Network (http://www.cin.org/jp2evolu.html)

I can't locate it at vatican.va right now.

Simian

[Doubting Didymus]

Since with technology we can pretty much stabalize our environment, wouldn't there come a point when our evolution would slow down?

People get too hung up on the death killing disease blood spurt artery murder kill-the-cripples part of natural selection. It is vital to remember that the most important factor in natural selection is NOT survival, but reproductive success. Survival is just a particularly good strategy for reaching that goal.

Even in a pupulation where every individual lives to a healthy old age, the frequency of heritable traits will still be altered by natural selection if some people leave more children than others, which they do.

[MrDarwin]

Answer the questions with questions.

1. If humans are so important and unique, and specially created in God's image, then why did God make apes first, then use the same basic blueprint and recycle approximately 98% of the same genes to create humans? Were the apes practice, or were humans an afterthought?

2. How do you know that evolution wasn't the tool that God used to create humans?

[Roland98]

Originally posted by simian
The Vatican's position is that evolution is true. If you are experiencing this stuff in a Catholic school, locate the info at the Vatican web site. I don't have time to find it right now.

Simian

Minor quibble. They don't say that "evolution is true," they say that it's not contradictory to the Bible (or that it's compatible with the faith, or something of that nature). They leave it up to the individuals whether to accept it or not (though most Catholics I know do, and I in fact taught it at a Catholic college). I just don't think JP's statement will get you very far.

[djmullen]

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'

Try this on him:

What makes you think that humans aren't evolving? Some people can eat a modern high fat, high calorie, high cholesterol, huge portions diet without ever suffering from it while others eat the same diet and drop dead from heart attacks and stroke.

Some of those who survive modern diets live because they have slightly mutated enzymes in their bodies that are very, very good at controlling cholesterol and keeping plaque from forming in their arteries. Those mutations used to be useless or even harmful because people didn't get enough to eat to suffer from cholesterol buildup and similar modern ills.

Today, those lucky mutants will live longer than "normal" humans and they will, on the average, have more offspring than ordinary "unevolved" humans and their numbers will slowly increase in the population because of this.

That's evolution in action, son.

[Zygote]

Which came first, the chicken or the egg?

If you're a creationist, it's the chicken. God didn't create an egg and an incubator.

If you're and evolutionist, it's the egg, since the egg is genetically different from the parent creature and is where chicken-ness would first be manifest. The resulting chicken has the same genes as the egg from which it hatched.

Seriously, though, if they can't grasp the following concepts, give up and save your breath:

- Genetic material and characteristics are passed from parent to offspring.

- Mutations occur between every generation.

- Different environmental conditions favor different characteristics.

- Evolution acts on populations, not individuals.

- Isolated populations experiencing differing conditions will diverge.

- Fruit flies evolve faster than elephants.

Best of luck to you.


"A zygote is a gamete's way of producing more gametes. This may be the purpose of the universe." - Heinlein

[Nic Tamzek]

The egg came before the chicken, but not because of any supposed key trait of chicken-ness originating in an egg of a supposedly non-chicken mother.

Eggs predate chickens by hundreds of millions of years. They were found in theropod dinosaurs for starters.

[RufusAtticus]

It depends on how you define a (chicken) egg.

Is a chicken egg an egg from which a chicken hatches or an egg that a chicken lays? The answer to which came first falls directly from the answer to that question.

[Adora]

Originally posted by six_flavours
'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'


1) Human's didn't evolve form monkeys. Monkeys and humans share a common ancestor, like you and your cousin share your grandfather as a common ancestor.

2) Human's do evolve. It happens over tens of millions of years. Therefore, the short 10-7 thousand years of human history we currently comprehend are inadequate for judging the evolution/non-evolution of man.

I hope they're short and simple enough for you.

[rlogan]

The "one-line quip" is the art of stand-up comics and superficial phonies.

So what if you aren't one of them. You are forgiven.

[Zygote]

Okay, RufusAtticus, let me think about this.

If a chicken lays an egg, we would call it a chicken egg.

If that egg then hatches into a mutant lizard creature, would we still call the egg it came from a chicken egg? Or would we call it a mutant lizard creature egg, since that's what it hatched into?

In either case, the mutant lizard creature existed in the egg before it hatched as a mutant lizard creature. So I would say the egg came first - even if it was a chicken egg.

Genetics trumps semantics.

[RufusAtticus]

Originally posted by six_flavours
'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'
Descent with modification.


Now it needs to be said that the creationist is correct, man did evolve from monkeys; or more accurately, apes evolved from monkeys.


/-------New World Monkeys
|
|
#---+
| /---Old World Monkeys
| |
\---+
|
\---Great Apes


The MCR (marked by #) of these three clades would definately fall under the term "monkey."

The error many of you are comitting is forgetting that "monkey" covers a large clade of species and does not just apply to extant ones. While it is true that humans didn't evolve from chimps, but share a common ancestor with them, the same is not true of monkeys.

[Karalora]

The MCR (marked by #) of these three clades would definately fall under the term "monkey."

Would it? In the evolutionary anthropology class I took a while back, the instructor said that the most recent common ancestor of Old World monkeys and New World monkeys was actually a prosimian. Both groups evolved into "monkeys" because monkey-like traits--emphasis on vision over smell, increased intelligence, etc.--were valuable for both.

Eh, it's a minor quibble in this case. The important thing is that we, Homo sapiens, did descend from animals that would certainly be considered monkeys if they were alive today.

[Bumble Bee Tuna]

Originally posted by six_flavours
'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'

The same way everything else evolved.

'How come humans don't evolve, then?'

They do.

Not too witty, I know, but it sure is snappy!

[Thesto Neroses]

Originally posted by six_flavours
'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'
Change in allele frequency over time
Originally posted by six_flavours
'How come humans don't evolve, then?'
Because humans are individuals, and individuals can't evolve. (this second reply practically begs to have the word "dumbass" appended to it, although I am sure you are too polite to succumb to the temptation.)

Tell me, with regards to loonies in Leeds, have you ever been approached by the crazy Hare Krishna guy who claims that it is impossible to understand the workings of a cell because scientists cannot build a completely functional cell from scratch? I had an entertaining debate with him in the street outside HMV (just down from the Headrow) - my friends were rather amused because it was the street preacher driven away shaking his head rather than me. :D

[RufusAtticus]

Originally posted by Karalora
Would it? In the evolutionary anthropology class I took a while back, the instructor said that the most recent common ancestor of Old World monkeys and New World monkeys was actually a prosimian. Both groups evolved into "monkeys" because monkey-like traits--emphasis on vision over smell, increased intelligence, etc.--were valuable for both.

Hmm. I'll admit that I no little about primate evolutionary history other than phylogenetic relationships. Or would be able to remember a reference to this?

[Dr.GH]

There was just an article in this week's Nature on the new fossil (55 Ma) Teilhardina asiatica which they placed near the root of the euprimates ("modern appearing" primates).

The last common ancestor (LCA) of the euprimates was a little insectivorous critter that would have looked sort of like a tarisuer.

The LCA of anthropoids was much more "monkeyish."

When creatos make the "monkey" argument, they are wrong in four ways; 1) Thinking that our last Hominid ancestor outside our genus was a "monkey," 2) that the evolution of Homo sapien was acomplished in one step from a "monkey" to a human, 3) thinking that our LCA with the other apes was a "monkey," and 4) that primate evolution was "targeted" to make humans.

[Gawen]

My problems is, when asked how humans evloved from monkeys, (the easy answer is the common ancestor), but when they say 'prove it'...this is where I choke up. It's difficult to not go into a 1/2 hour long dissertation with someone that doesn't know the theories and usually doesn't WANT to know the theories anyway. Besides, I don;t know all the info I need to know when addressing this question. The easy cop-out is to say, "read a book"...or to just walk away. But those seem lacking and I want to say more.
How does the humble atheist explain these things as if talking to a 5 year old?

[Ellis14]

You don't necessarily need to, but it depends on the person and how serious the discussion is.

If they are never going to examine your reason and evidence logically then what is the point of trying to show them anything?

I am not an expert in evolution so I couldn't explain the process in great detail, although I can give a brief overview of how evolution in general works. However, what would be the point of an expert explanation if the listener is no expert or has no desire to understand?

I would tell them to run off and investigate it themselves. This isn't ducking out of the argument, because evolution is readily available for people to investigate and prove to themselves. If you were to ask the theist to "prove it", what would he say?? Would he tell you to read the bible? Would that prove anything at all? I don't think so.

However since the theist, by nature of his position, must be an expert on God, they should be able to explain their position better than a novice evolutionist, shouldn't they?

In any case, the evidence is there for them to investigate, if they wish.

[Mullibok]

Originally posted by six_flavours

'So how could man evolve from monkeys?'


Maybe you could tell them that even Answers In Genesis thinks this is a hopeless argument.

[rlcjhardesty]

Well...

First, you need to understand that we crazy old yanks have twice had to go into Europe and straighten out the mess caused by evolutionary theory. No God = no need for conscience, morality or accountability. Do whatever you want! Hey... The imperial leaders were only looking out for themselves and their nations, and Hitler was only doing what he felt was necessary for the survival of his fittest. What's the big deal? Weed out a few Jews... Get rid of the unproductive... And what about those Commies? Wow! That went over real well... But Hey... We love our money, and our money says that we trust in God. It must be so. Only, we've long since kicked Him out of our classrooms.

Ya know... Maybe, we idiots just can't figure out how evolution works because there's never an answer to the constant questions of: "Ok, then where did that come from? How did it get there? Since the universe is expanding and dying out, how could it just suddenly discard the laws of physics and recombine?" I hike and camp often, and have yet to find evidence that the charred remains of a campfire could just suddenly recombine and spontaneously ignite. I doubt that anyone else has - including the evolutionary faithful.

Now... I've got no problem with mutation, adaptation and so on. In fact, here in New Mexico, we have white lizards and rattlesnakes at White Sands National Monument. They're cute too. But really... Maybe a good comeback would be: "By faith, I believe we evolved from monkeys, even though there is such confusion as to whether it was an actual monkey, or a common ancestor or an alien". "By faith, I believe man is evolving and the evidence can be seen by the really cool weapons he develops".

Keep the faith...

[Worldtraveller]

Wow, so much misinformation, so little time.
Originally posted by rlcjhardesty
First, you need to understand that we crazy old yanks have twice had to go into Europe and straighten out the mess caused by evolutionary theory. No God = no need for conscience, morality or accountability. Do whatever you want! Hey... The imperial leaders were only looking out for themselves and their nations, and Hitler was only doing what he felt was necessary for the survival of his fittest. What's the big deal? Weed out a few Jews... Get rid of the unproductive... And what about those Commies? Wow! That went over real well... But Hey... We love our money, and our money says that we trust in God. It must be so. Only, we've long since kicked Him out of our classrooms.

We 'crazy old yanks' tried to avoid helping out anyone for the longest time in both situations. It was only when US interests were directly threatened did we get involved. Do a little research and learn some history. I'm going to paraphrase our good friend Buffman here...look for original documentation. Do not trust to someone quoting someone else. If there aren't references, toss it, follow the references, eventually they will either lead to the original document where the quotes come from, or you will find that it was fabricated a la Bartman.

ummm...Hitler...
why does he always get brought up to 'prove a point'? You know how many examples of 'good christians' I coud dig up in much more recent history....like the woman who drowned her five kids, and say christianity is to blame for all this?
These people are anomolies!!! They are wacked to begin with, do not keep using this cheap tactic and appeal to emotion.
...Hitler was a Christian. :) Again, do some reading, check out this thread (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=74885&highlight=Hitler) for some good links regarding that issue.

And as far as xianity being the only basis for any kind of morality, I again suggest you do a little learning. Maybe start with some of the threads in Moral Foundations, right here at IIDB.


Ya know... Maybe, we idiots just can't figure out how evolution works because there's never an answer to the constant questions of: "Ok, then where did that come from? How did it get there? Since the universe is expanding and dying out, how could it just suddenly discard the laws of physics and recombine?" I hike and camp often, and have yet to find evidence that the charred remains of a campfire could just suddenly recombine and spontaneously ignite. I doubt that anyone else has - including the evolutionary faithful.

Hrm...well, it is true that there are still a lot of answers we don't know. However, don't you think it's more honest to say "I don't know, but I want to learn" than to trust in a book (to borrow a phrase) written by some goat herders 2000 years ago?

I assume you don't use any kind of modern medicine, or take advantage of modern transportation, or....wait, you posted this on the internet using a computer. Guess it was a good thing we thought to do a little investigating into things like electricity, materials, etc. Otherwise, we would still be writing on papyrus with charcoal probably. :rolleyes:

And your campfire spontaneously recombining....you are commiting a common fallacy (747 in a junkyard anyone??), but don't ask me the latin name of it. All I can say is try and actually learn something about that which you are criticizing. There are plenty of very knowledgable folks here who are more than willing to help.

Now... I've got no problem with mutation, adaptation and so on. In fact, here in New Mexico, we have white lizards and rattlesnakes at White Sands National Monument. They're cute too. But really... Maybe a good comeback would be: "By faith, I believe we evolved from monkeys, even though there is such confusion as to whether it was an actual monkey, or a common ancestor or an alien". "By faith, I believe man is evolving and the evidence can be seen by the really cool weapons he develops".

No problem with mutation or adaptation....but you do have a problem with evolution? I don't follow you, maybe you can explain which part of evolutionary theory you do have a problem with. Biologists are, to this day, trying to answer a lot of the questions still about all of the mechanisms involved in the process, but mutation, adaption and natural selection, are simply some of the processes. There is nothing that has been demonstrated that cannot mutate into something completely different given a long enough period of time.
And tool building has nothing to do with evolution. Again, you're simply hoisting a big red flag of ignorance there.

Oh yeah, and welcome to IIDB.

Cheers,
Lane

[Oolon Colluphid]

Originally posted by rlcjhardesty
First, you need to understand that we crazy old yanks have twice had to go into Europe and straighten out the mess caused by evolutionary theory.
Bollocks. “Crazy old yank”... hmmm, seems right so far...
No God = no need for conscience, morality or accountability. Do whatever you want!
Naturalistic fallacy. See my posts to Mike in this thread (http://www.iidb.org/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=75054). I repeat myself enough here already (though funnily enough, this may be due to having to refute the same old shite over and over...)
Hey... The imperial leaders were only looking out for themselves and their nations, and Hitler was only doing what he felt was necessary for the survival of his fittest. What's the big deal? Weed out a few Jews... Get rid of the unproductive... And what about those Commies? Wow! That went over real well...
Hope you feel better after that rant. Actually, I hope no such thing, because it’s made me feel sick.
But Hey... We love our money, and our money says that we trust in God.
I guess I missed the ‘must’ on your bank notes then.
It must be so. Only, we've long since kicked Him out of our classrooms.
Please demonstrate thatthere’s anything to be kicked anywhere.
Ya know... Maybe, we idiots just can't figure out how evolution works
That much stands to reason. Scientists and intelligent lay folks don’t seem to have this trouble.
because there's never an answer to the constant questions of: "Ok, then where did that come from?
Did you have something specific in mind? (Okay, so this question assumes that a self-confessed idiot has a mind... and assumes that someone who “just can’t figure out how evolution works” would understand the answer anyway. But hey ho, one has to try.)

Full marks for spelling and punctuation though.
How did it get there?
How did what get where?
Since the universe is expanding and dying out, how could it just suddenly discard the laws of physics and recombine?"
Ah, the good old Second Law of Thermodynamics, I’ve not seen that one this week. Perhaps you can tell us just why this is a problem please? Could you explain why it was not equally impossible for you to have developed into a trillion-cell, highly complex organism from a single fertilised egg?
I hike and camp often,
< Hmmm... ‘decamp’.... ‘take a hike’... nah, too obvious >
and have yet to find evidence that the charred remains of a campfire could just suddenly recombine and spontaneously ignite.
What has this to do with the price of fish in Reykjavik?
I doubt that anyone else has - including the evolutionary faithful.
I doubt you’d know what evolution is actually about if a macrolide-resistant group A streptococcus chewed your leg off.
Now... I've got no problem with mutation, adaptation and so on. In fact, here in New Mexico, we have white lizards and rattlesnakes at White Sands National Monument.
My US geography isn’t that great, but I think you have nearby a pretty good example of evolution. It’s the salamander Ensatina eschscholtzi ring species (http://www.santarosa.edu/lifesciences/ensatina.htm).
But really... Maybe a good comeback would be: "By faith, I believe we evolved from monkeys
Nope. By evidence. It’s hardly our fault if you are unfamiliar with that evidence. What would you like to know?
even though there is such confusion as to whether it was an actual monkey, or a common ancestor or an alien".
Where’s the confusion? It was ancestral; if it were alive today it would undoubtedly be called a monkey. It would not be an alien: the chances of it fitting into the phylogenies -- hell, the chances of an alien possessing DNA -- are infinitessimal.
"By faith, I believe man is evolving
Good. But, you may believe it if you like, I’d rather see the evidence. In fact, I have seen some of the evidence. What would you like to know?
and the evidence can be seen by the really cool weapons he develops".
Huh?
Keep the faith...
You can keep yours thanks. I’ve seen some of your designer’s designs.

TTFN, Oolon

[Dr.GH]

:p

[Ellis14]

Oolon Colluphid's refutation was excellent, it pretty much covered everything I was gonna say.

I'd like to see rlcjhardesty come back and answer your points.

He demonstrates a complete misunderstanding of history, evolution, argumentative reason, and a desire to correct any of these flaws.

If you are going to attack a theory or scientific position, it is useful at best to learn about it and arrogant at worst not to.