h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Again, we see MICROevolution in operation, which creationists term as one small facet of the action and thus existence of G(g)od. But this article is dealing with the topic of MACROevolution. And for creationists, anything in existence exists because it was created to, so the weight of evidence isn't exactly on the side of MACROevolution, as you say.

Fascinating! I've never actually met a Creationist before!

I presume that you accept that there were no chickens 300 million years ago. So sometime since then God must have created the species. How did that happen, then? Was some dinosaur walking along and zap, a pair of chickens, male and female, appeared in front of him? Or did he do it at night? Did he ever create the pair but they didn't know what to do about procreation, so they died out immediately? Given that millions or even billions of species have died out and become extinct, can you suggest any reason why God does it this way rather than the simpler way of MacroEvolution? Can you suggest any evidence that it happens this way?

I'm not being facetious here. I'd really like to know what you think.

I would say me too, but I have met a couple. ...
I personally don't really side with either, er, side. But I do make a point of hearing both sides of an arguement. I guess I'm playing devils advocate here, so to answer your questions, I assume what happened was pretty much what I said. A decendent of the chicken was present when G(g)od created everything. The species eventually was fruitful and multiplied, excelling in their own ways according to the demands of their environment. Filling their niches and filling the land. Until they were domesticated, and then one day two men from their own niches came forward and changed everything.





That's right, General Tsao and Colonel Sanders. Who did you think I was talking about?!

As for what I think as a person rather than a possible creationist, Everything I see is more easily accounted for by saying God did it than random chance, stemming from a massive explosion of a matter causality. Which is utterly impossible. ...Though to quote somebody, probably the Bible,


With God, all things are possible.

As I said, I'm all about getting both sides of a story. I guess that's where this whole thing started, so once again, sorry.

Don't apologise!

So in the story of life as you've outlined it, all the different species were created at the same time. So by that reckoning, there must have been people, chickens etc around in 300 million BC, even though no trace of them has ever been found and the atmosphere was a totally different composition to what it is now and the plants were much simpler. I'm afraid that doesn't really make any sense to me.

I know everything is possible to God, if you believe in an omnipotent creator, but it doesn't really explain much. To me it's just a cop-out.

If you take 300M BC as the ...what is that? If that is when the earth was formed, no. There was a long period of Vulcanization, creating water and eventually a stable atmosphere, after which life began to develop. Evols say it crawled out of a pool of complex acids (Laws of entropy, be damned!) Creats say G(g)od made everything (chickens included) in a garden of eden, and lastly man.

What I say? We're here now. Whether from pool of goo or power of God, I can't say. But one thing I know. If we did come from the ooze, then God was in control of it every step of the way. It was not some random, purposeless occurrence. It is a cop out for some. Those who refuse to believe in it. I can't say what you should believe. All I can say is what I should.

> Evols say it crawled out of a pool of complex acids (Laws of entropy, be damned!)

Processes which result in a decrease in the entropy of the system are thermodynamically feasible, so long as there is a greater increase in the entropy of the surroundings.

Rho

I just picked 300M years ago as a suitably long ago time. Life itself is believed to have been around a lot longer, more like 3000 M years.

I have no problem with the ooze, and no problem with it all happening without any reference to God myself, but that's not the point of these discussions. Most God-fearing people accept evolution, or macro-evolution as you call it, and have no problem reconciling it with the Bible or Koran by which they live.

True, the system as a whole must increase. But in 195? a scientist named Miller (sorry I don't have more details) electrocuted a 'primeval goo' to simulate the early earth environment. He eventually made a couple molecules more complex than he started with, although nothing near what could be called life, and the energy expenditure was utterly prohibitive. He couldn't have estimated or really even imagined what conditions were really like, but the experiment is thought to be a good model for describing a missing factor in the spark of life.

Creat say the missing factor is G(g)od. Evols ...don't.

FM - i'm not pushing for other theories in this entry for balance, i'm pushing for factual evidence of this theory being shown in the entry!

The entry offers an answer to an oft-posed question. This thread offers an argument, which is becoming increasingly dogmatic.

If the words "biology is in fact in a position to answer the question" were amended to read "biology offers a way to provide an answer", the entry could not be faulted.

The argument could be continued in a more appropriate forum (or abandoned).

**catches up**

I fail to see what about this entry leads NuclearConfusion to describe it as macroevolution. Who is to say that a chicken is a higher form of life than a protochicken? Surely after man got involved and domesticated the chicken then any form of Darwinian (is that a word?) evolution went right out the window because it was humans who were being selective about the genes, not hit-and-miss process of evolution.

Given Nuclear's definitions on the previous page (minus the bits about digital watches), it seems clear to me that Darwin's viewpoint was correct. Macroevolution, as you call it, is in fact a load of cobblers.

B

"I fail to see what about this entry leads NuclearConfusion to describe it as macroevolution. Who is to say that a chicken is a higher form of life than a protochicken? Surely after man got involved and domesticated the chicken then any form of Darwinian (is that a word?) evolution went right out the window because it was humans who were being selective about the genes, not hit-and-miss process of evolution.

Given Nuclear's definitions on the previous page (minus the bits about digital watches), it seems clear to me that Darwin's viewpoint was correct. Macroevolution, as you call it, is in fact a load of cobblers."

then that would prove the entry wrong, since the chicken supposedly evolved from a reptilian lifeform, and a change that big would have had to be macro.


spook

"If the words "biology is in fact in a position to answer the question" were amended to read "biology offers a way to provide an answer", the entry could not be faulted."

the suitability for the edited guide can still be faulted, which is what i am continuing to post. the WG state the entry should:

- Be Instructive, Informative and Factual: the entry itself is not very informative and does not contain any factual evidence of the theory

- Try to Make your Entry Balanced: Well, it obviously isn't balanced, and although this is emant to be just 1 solution, an entry on the question containing multiple theories and opinions would be better. as shown in this thread, there is disagreement over evolution as an accurate explanation.

But you're missing a point in made in a different thread (something about hearts and cats, I think):

At some point, the creature would be neither reptile nor chicken, so macroevolution would not have taken place, as the creature would not fall into a definite class by today's zoologists standards. It is only our classification system for animals that determines the boundaries of macroevolution. Even today, we have creatures that straddle the line between mammal & marsupial, fish & amphibian, and a dozen others.

As a rather silly example: what is to stop us classifying every single chicken as a different species? They have different DNA after all. Then, when a new chicken is born, macroevolution will have taken place, by our new classification system. Scaled up, there is no difference between that and the reptile-chicken evolution.

B

it's all great talk Master B, but where is the proof? If there was a species neither reptile nor chicken, a species that could have evolved from a reptile with microevolution, then evolved in to a chicken through microevolution later (perhaps two or 3 different species between?), then where is the evidence? what are the species names? when do scientists think this evolution likely took place?

my whole argument is not that it COULDN'T happen this way, or that this isn't the most likely solution. my argument is that the entry DOESN'T PROOF this, and for it to be suitable for the EG it needs to.

spook

You're going to have a whale of a time when Ben's Belief Project hits the Front Page next week, then.

B

Spook, it is proved beyond doubt that birds evolved from reptiles. I have no intention whatsoever of providing any evidence. It is a given, not in dispute. I know that there are some people who refuse to accept Evolution despite the evidence, and it is not my intention to try and persuade them in this or any other entry. Such people can not be persuaded, because they do not understand reason.

This entry is for people who know about evolution, which is just about everyone, because we've all been taught it since we were toddlers, but have never really thought about it in terms of the chicken and the egg.

(I was secretly hoping that a creationist might come along and explain their version of the story to me, but that hasn't happened. I haven't ever found a creationist who would talk to me without ranting about some book called the Bible which I am not in the slightest bit interested in).

Belief: A378254

Aha: A934283

My point exactly.

We have Jimster's assurances that that project is going to hit the Front Page next week, and I am expecting an uproar over certain entries.

I'm intending to deny all culpability as the Sub-editor, despite having re-worded several of them quite extensively.

B