bryanf said:
So, it's not quite the number that I had, but even at that rate, it would have been touching the earth 100 million years ago, still far short of the 4-5 billion years that evolution "scientists" claim to be the age of the universe.
First, please see this excellent debunking of the Incredible Shrinking Sun theory. From
The Legend of the Shrinking Sun-
A Case Study Comparing Professional Science
and "Creation Science" in Action:
"In recent years, advocates of the young earth hypothesis have assembled numerous lists of "scientific evidences" for their recent creation scenario. In this paper we critically evaluate the scientific adequacy of one such evidential claim of "creation-science," viz., that the sun's diameter has been shrinking in such a manner as to preclude the credibility of the standard multibillion-year chronology for terrestrial history. Within the professional scientific community, a preliminary report which suggested a long-term and rapid shrinkage of the sun presented a puzzle for solar astronomers. Consequently, additional studies were made and the credibility of the original data was re-evaluated. The result is that secular shrinkage has not been substantiated, but an 80-year oscillatory behavior was discovered. Within the "creation-science" community, however, the response to the original report has been remarkably different. The suggestion of rapid long-term shrinkage was uncritically accepted, the evidence and conclusions drawn from subsequent studies were generally dismissed, and extrapolations of the presumed rapid solar shrinkage have been performed without restraint. Isolated from the corrective of continuing professional investigation and evaluation, the "creation-science" community continues to employ this unwarranted extrapolation of a discredited report as a scientific evidence" for a young earth. The credibility of the Christian witness to a scientifically knowledgeable world is thereby clouded."
Second, this doesn't even make logical sense. The sun can not be "touching" the Earth. If it were, the Earth would be vaporized. How would this even work, exactly? The Earth was somehow ejected from the sun as it shrank? And in order to believe this discredited theory, you essentially have to discredit the validity of
radioactive and carbon dating, which places the age of the earth at several billion years old. And if you do that, you might as well call all of science a fraud. The Earth is older than 100,000 years old.
Third, you easily accept this discredited theory, based on the claim of one scientist, yet you use this as evidence discrediting evolution, which has been verified by nearly every other branch of science and whose validity has only grown more robust since Darwin proposed it.
We seem to be going in circles, here, but, again, evolution is an observable fact, and not just from the fossil record, but in the amazing variety and adaptability of life on Earth. Evolution explains this better than any other "theory." This it not only did back in Darwin's day, but has only been further verified as science has progressed. "Creationism" on the other hand collapses under scientific scrutiny and doesn't explain any of the observable phenomena. Why do snakes have rudimentary pelvic bones? Why are there flightless birds? Why do human embryos exhibit gill slits and tails early in development? Is this God playing a practical joke? "Even though I created every species of animal at the same time, I'm going to make it look as if they "evolved" from simple to complex, and I'm going to create rocks that when tested will seem to be billions of years old when really the Earth is only 6 thousand years old. That'll confuse those humans!" Please.
bryanf said:
The absence of proof in the fossil record is only a part of my argument that evolution cannot be proven, and as regards to the burden of proof being on evolution and not on creationism, that is absolutely my position. I am not trying to say that creation should be taught in science class, I'm saying that evolution should not be. Since that is my position, I think that it is reasonable to put the burden of proof lies completely upon evolution.
There is no "absence of proof" in the fossil record. The fossil record is just that, a fossil record, and it is what it is. How do you explain not just the fossil record but life on Earth? Evolution. That's it. That's all evolution has to do to be valid, is explain better than anything else, which it does. You want to throw it out of the science class because it doesn't meet your preposterous standards, which you only seem to demand of evolution. The burden of proof is actually on you. If you want to have evolution thrown out of the science class, all you have to do is come up with a competing theory that explains life on Earth better than evolution. That's all anyone has to do, including "creation scientists." It's that simple. And "creationism" ain't it by a long shot.
bryanf said:
It is interesting that you used "principle" to describe the "theory" explaining gravity. Principle mean "Law," or "A basic or essential quality or element determining intrinsic nature or characteristic behavior," again from the American Heritage Dictionary. A principle is not a theory, because it is an expression of something absolute, or "characteristic." So, again, comparison between gravity and evolution is a weak one.
Darwin discovered the principle of evolution in biology just as surely as Newton discovered the principle of gravitation in physics. My point was that evolution has been so thoroughly validated since Darwin that to call it a theory is like calling gravity a theory. Or a round Earth a theory. Or electricity a theory. No one but "creationists" bent on discrediting evolution believe evolution to be anything other than fact. Like gravity, the theoretical aspect is in how evolution works, not that it works.
bryanf said:
Look back to my definition of a hypothesis. Under that definition, which was the one I was applying here, both creationism and evolution are hypotheses.
So "creationism" is a hypothesis? OK, then, please explain the hypothesis because apparently I'm a little fuzzy on it. How does it work exactly? Mythical super being creates all life in one fell swoop, complete with evidence that seems to disprove "creationism"? And are we talking biblical creationism? If so, why that one? I'm a Buddhist, we have our own creation "hypothesis." I'm also half Greek. The Greeks had a creation "hypothesis." There are people who believe aliens visited Earth and intervened in our development and site all sorts of "evidence" for this.
In science, a valid hypothesis is
a posteriori, meaning, it is derived from the empirical data, not the other way around. "Creationism" is a priori. Creationists believe a fairy tale they read in the Bible as fact, and they go about trying to prove it. (Actually, they don't even do that, because they can't. They merely attempt to discredit evolution through specious argumentation, trumped up "evidence" and bogus double standards.)
bryanf said:
Finally, I think that you're missing what is, perhaps, the biggest point of my argument, namely, that evolution should NOT be taught as fact in a science class room. I am NOT trying to argue that creationism should be taught in science class. That is why I am putting the burden of proof on evolution, and not on creation.
On the contrary, I completely understand your argument. And thousands of reputable scientists disagree with you. I'll take their word for it.
Lastly, we see the evidence of evolution when bacteria "evolves" into more resistant strains. When you watch a horse race or a dog show. (There were no shitsus or thoroughbred horses on Noah's ark. Man created them, by selective breeding. Yet "creationists" deny nature the same power as man.) And to deny evolution is to deny a fundamental force of nature we experience all the time: ideas evolve, culture evolves, art evolves, economies evolve, religions evolve, technology evolves. This debate we're having evolved from a simple post into a complex, multi-argument tirade. And yet "creationists" deny this obvious, verifiable, common sensical force in nature because it challenges their hidebound, dogmatic belief in fairy tales as fact.
P.S. Please see this excellent primer on evolution in the November issue of National Geographic [
http://magma.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0411/feature1/], which eloquently covers everything we've been debating here. And contradicts your claim that evolution cannot be replicated in a lab:
"Can [evolution] be observed in the laboratory? The answer is yes. Peter and Rosemary Grant, two British-born researchers who have spent decades where Charles Darwin spent weeks, have captured a glimpse of evolution with their long-term studies of beak size among Galapagos finches. William R. Rice and George W. Salt achieved something similar in their lab, through fruit fly Drosophila melanogaster. Richard E. Lenski and his colleagues at Michigan State University have done it too, tracking 20,000 generations of evolution in the bacterium Escherichia coli. Such field studies and lab experiments document anagenesis---that is, slow evolutionary change within a single, un-split lineage. With patience it can be seen, like the movement of a minute hand on a clock."