No, go back and read the YEC'ers argument. His ENTIRE FUCKING POINT is that the layers of sediment are less than 6,000 years old. There are two theories, one states that the sediment layer built up over billions of years and hence the Earth is billions of years old. The other is that the sediment appeared over a short time period (via a gigantic flood) and therefore the sediment is less that 6000 years old. The two are mutually exclusive. The sediment cannot be both 6,000 years old and billions of years old. If you believe the Earth is billions of years old, you cannot believe the sediment layer developed over the course of a year. (Well you can believe it, but your beliefs are contradictory). If the Earth is billions of years old, his theory about how the sediment layer formed is false. How long it took the sediment to form is an integral part of his argument and you can't just seperate it out because you like that part of it.

Yeah, AIG, two links to them now even though you say you don't believe them. I already pointed out my issues with the first one. The second one, I linked to a legitimate research article pointing out that the entire idea that fusion is impossible is bullshit. Which quite frankly, is more respect than the loons at AIG deserve, they are about as credible as Scientologists. 

No, it is proof that people not getting drunk is in no way "incredible".

 

Caposkia wrote:

Also, you do understand that in all the Bibllical stories, wine wasn't in created vessels right?  What do you think wine skins are?

Yes, once again you are making a foray into an area where I have extensive knowledge. Until recently, I was in the wine industry. Wine was created in vessels- clay ones to be precise. Wineskins were not used for making wine- they were used after the wine was made for consumption (drinking from a giant clay jar isn't very practical). Wine was brewed in clay jars until about 300AD when the Romans started using the wooden barrel (invented around 350 BC). The practice of using wood barrels instead spread throughout Europe and today is the most common.

Trying to brew wine is a wineskin would be impractical, the process releases CO2 which needs to be vented out. The most common use of wineskins was either to store unfermented wine (grape juice) and PREVENT it from fermenting, or to store already fermented wine. 

Regardless, wineskins were not invented until long after clay. You can't just skin an animal and make a wineskin. You have to learn the process of tanning, which wasn't discovered until a good 4,000 years AFTER the invention of clay jars. And as far as we know, it was several thousand years after that when the Greeks figured out how to make leather waterproof and use it to carry liquids. 

YEC's have one flaw, they don't use the scientific method on any of their bullshit. Nothing they do is scientific, they use scientific terms to obfuscate and rationalize their preconceived answers. Which is why in every single field they decide to talk about, the YEC'ers disagree with the mainstream scientists. Whether it is genetics, geology, archaelogy or whatever, their "science" is consistently debunked by their peers. Which is why you never find them published in any scientific articles outside their own. So yeah, since I KNOW they spout bullshit about every topic I am informed on, I am not going to take them as a credible source for any topic I am ignorant about. If they pretend to be experts on geology and genetics and I know they are flat out lying about those, then I am not going to trust them about meteorology even though I personally don't have the knowledge to recognize their bullshit as bullshit. 

What links? Two links to YEC'ers? That is your evidence? I thought you read "all kinds of science", how about linking to one of those? 

What other "writings of the time" do you have to prove that it was a common theme? You can't just assert that it was common, because quite frankly I doubt it. I suspect that you are just making that up like you did about the wineskins. 

The link yuou presented was by a "geologist" (using the term VERY loosely). I am moving on from the geology, to a very different discipline. You claimed to have knowledge about meteorology- which I don't believe you have linked to a single source on. 

That is a pretty big "if". Is there any evidence that such significant global warming existed? Also, those hypotheticals are based on all the ice melting instantaneously. Over time, no doubt a significant amount of that water would find its way to our underground water tables, and hence contribute far less to the depth of the ocean. 

So if it rained at the world record for a single location across the entire world.... we get to 240 feet. Okay, that is alot, and probably deadly. Is it meteorlogically possible? That kind of sustained downpour requires exponentially more evaporated water than there was above Foc Foc in 1966.

How much water would have to be suspended to sustain 40 days of 72 inches of water? Let's give you the benefit of the doubt and assume the flood only occurred in an area of 400,000 square miles and every human in the world was in that area. 

[/quote wrote:

no, you're not a fucking idiot, you just don't think sometimes   The point here is, we have never observed a Noah like flood, so we have to go with what we have.  The fact that such a dramatic amount of rain could fall over a 24 hour period of time opens doors to the possibility that such a rainfall could last longer if that particular weather pattern did not change.  

If you look at weather patterns as a whole, they work in lines or chains.  They follow the jet streams which are strong wind patterns in our atmosphere.  Storms will follow those winds wherever they go.  If the situation came up where a jet stream was set up perfectly to spawn such a strong storm and rain it down on a particular place... and did not move or change for a long period of time, there is no reason to think the dramatic rainfall wouldn't repeat consistently until jet stream moved.  

Other factors involved are convections and how strong they are... the stronger the convections, the more rain can be held in the atmosphere before dropping it.  If a weather pattern stalls (which we have observed many times even in our lifetimes)  the same thing will keep happening... maybe not even stopping.   The floods and droughts we observe today are in some instances casued by such a stall in the jet stream.  either it stalls too far to teh north or south and leaves a place without rain for extended periods of time, or it stalls over a particular place channeling storm after storm into the same location causing flooding.  

Again, i tried to answer your questions thoroughly... if you feel I didn't, please just let me know where you need more information.

Jabberwocky wrote:

Using the bible to prove the bible mostly here. Nothing to see here.

no, using the Bible to prove the power of word in history.  Regardless whether you think the Bible is true or not, it still is a reflection of the cultures of the times and is viewed by all historians as a compilation of historical documents.  That's not to say all historians believe its claims, they don't, but they do accept how it opens a window into the culture of the time.  The question at hand for this link wasn't, how do you prove the Bible, it's the level at which spoken word was held.  

I won't deny that the Bible does prove itself, but you can't use that excuse here.  

Jabberwocky wrote:

As far as the actual evidence, a person named Jesus was written, but only after his death. If there was a large group of people claiming that he did exist pre-Pauline epistles (which I don't think is the case, unless my timelines are wrong), if people hadn't made up a person out of whole cloth before, it may have been reasonable to take their word for it. 

However, that's not even important. Most of the references to Yeshua/Jesus (if not all) mentioned nothing of crucifixion. References to Christus/Christos did. Was there anything aside from the testimonium Flavianum (understood by essentially ALL scholars to be at least part forgery) that linked the 2 people together? The best part is if the answer to all these questions is "Yes" is doesn't prove a damn thing. If there was a historical Jesus who was known by his followers as the saviour, and that was who Paul spoke of, and that is who the early Christians based their religion on, it doesn't mean he performed a single legitimate miracle. 

Funny story is that Hitchens elaborated well on why he thought that it was more likely that he WAS a historical person. Because he's mentioned in the bible as "Jesus of Nazareth" so many times, it seems to be someone who had to be from Nazareth (and if he was made up, they could have made him from anywhere). The birth in Bethlehem (which was necessary for theological reasons) was a clear fabrication. The census by Quirinius has absolutely 0 records. Also, Quirinius was not governor of Assyria in a time within the range of dates that the story could have taken place. These are parts of the new testament that are demonstrably wrong. 

I never claimed everything you're posting here in that last thread, only that Jesus is generally considered an actual person in history.  The miracles He performed and exactly what He did is not as clear to many scholars who don't accept scripture.  

Also, if you read the gospels, you might see why the census might not have had Jesus in it... at least not the proper census.  

Jabberwocky wrote:

Was everyone there of adult or at least adolescent age then? Or did god kill infants/toddlers? I've asked this before, but your arguments all exist in a vacuum ignoring all prior information. Of course, that's nothing unique as religious arguments must necessarily do that, since religions are incoherent. 

I'm sure there were people of all ages.  I've also addressed this before and talked about how even today the actions of the adults in our culture directly affect the innocent children.  Innocent babies die every day because families even in the United States can't afford either proper health care, food, etc.... that's not to include other reasons... so why have we not overthrown the government for those babies deaths?  That was unjust wasn't it?  It's not fair that the government killed those babies!

Jabberwocky wrote:

 

"something tells you". That might be the most accurate thing you said. It's a hunch, a feeling, and nothing more. 

Also, creating something doesn't mean you're just in destroying it. It just isn't. 

it was meant to be a statement of sarcasm to emphasize the obviousness of the situation... but I guess it wasn't that obvious to you.

Jabberwocky wrote:

Gen 6:3 is vague, and has been used as an argument that the bible predicted human lifespan. The doctrine of the holy spirit is stupid.

If you believe in it, you must believe the following. We all have this knowledge, 100%, but we choose to deny it (as I've mentioned before, knowing the consequences), but we're fucking idiots. This is what you're asserting. You are also asserting that the people back then had the same evidence (but Noah was said to have been literally spoken to by god, thereby seemingly getting better evidence than the rest of humanity at the time, and certainly better than what we get today). I will keep saying the following BTW, but once again, your story has more gaps than you propose that biology has. 

I hope you can reflect on your own posts... I mean you would walk all over me if I tried a response like that... Basically I show you Gen 6:3 and your defense is, the doctrine of the Holy Spirit is stupid. 

Jabberwocky wrote:

Nope. You haven't. You showed how they could circumnavigate the globe, not cover all populated areas. 

...with time to spare... and it is logical to conclude that humanity and even possibly any other wildlife had not spread across the globe yet... in other words, not only would a single person have the time to circumnavigate the globe, but they would have plenty of time to cover all the settlements within a more confined area of the globe... This is also to assume that literally one person went around telling people as if they didn't know what they were doign in the first place, which is quite a stretch in and of itself.

Again all addressed before... every single word of it.  

jabberwocky wrote:

Did you give me a good reason to believe that what you're saying is true? If you did, I would probably refrain from drawing such stick figures. EVEN if you did, are these killers righteous in killing me? Are they commiting a moral good by doing it? 

Once again, your argument only works in a vacuum, ignoring all prior details. Also, you're asserting that in the flood story that people knew, without supporting it, for probably at least the 20th time. 

no, it's very simple... I tell you there are people who will kill you for doing something, whether you think it's a good reason or not, you will die for it.  Do you do it?  if so do you not understand why you died moral or not?  

Jabberwocky wrote:

So you're saying that obedience is all that matters? Totalitarianism under any other name is still...

if you view Laws as totalitarianism then sure... We all live under laws.  If we are disobedient to any of those laws we live under, there are consequences... soem small some big depending on what law you broke and how many times... and to what degree... God is not as subjective when it comes to consequences for Law breakers.  

Jabberwocky wrote:

Missing links in the fossil record aren't a problem. The reason we have missing links is because fossilization does not occur all the time. We should expect that there are some lineages of species that we may never find.

 Jennifer A. Clack, a Cambridge University expert on tetrapod evolution, said of Tiktaalik,"It's one of those things you can point to and say, 'I told you this would exist,' and there it is.

As this was only discovered in 2004, it shows how difficult it is to find a certain type of fossil. However, it was predicted by biologists that such an organism once indeed did exist. It was perhaps not said (although it would be hard to examine whether it was) that "one day, we will find fossil evidence suggesting something like (Tiktaalik before it was known)". This was an estimate based on what we did know. Then, 10 years ago, 145 years after Charles Darwin wrote his biggest work, and 133 years after his other, perhaps even more controversial, great work (the Descent of Man), something was found. The finding itself could have surprised biologists (that only now was something of this sort discovered, after looking for it for over a century). However, the nature of the finding, the details of it, was something that biologists all expected. This is the predictive power of evolutionary biology. Once again, the gaps are NOT a problem. Not even a little bit. If you found a fossil that was actually unexplainable, then you would have something to go on. Research which missing links actually do exist. Write them down. Save them on your computer. Screenshot modern articles from real biologists today. Learn about it. Then, every time a fossil is discovered, find me one SINGLE one that defies the possibilites of what biologists thought. 

why would a fossil have to defy biology to not have a progressive link?  I see the logic behind connecting certain ancestries, but just as one of the articles posted by BS said very explicitly, there really isn't evidence to prove it.  It's a theory based on bits and peices of information.  You may not see a problem with this, but I find its consistency among all species quite a problem for the theory.   

Creation had a plan, a very specific one... there's no reason to consider that if God created everything that there would be any "surprises" in fossil records.. rather you'd find they're very consistent because they call come from the same creator.  

jabberwocky wrote:

Now, am I reading your post correctly in that you accept that our 2nd largest chromosome is fused from an ancestral chromosome, but despite that you assert that it does not prove common ancestry between us and chimpanzees? I want to know your answer to this question before I continue further on this point, as I don't want to put any words in your mouth. 

Based on the links BS posted, a fused chromosome does not bode well for the creature as far as reproduction is concerned.  I didn't see anywhere were they had proof that it not only modified a creature into a whole new creature, but that it was of any benefit for the species in question.  This would defy the purpose of evolution if in fact this is the proof of a connection.   

so to answer it directly.  I accept the reasoning AIG has.. I also accept the possibility that it could have fused, but likely not from a chimp, rather 2 similar chromosomes fused from an already human ancester.    The key words I'm finding are that they are "similar" not exact or not identical to that of a chimp.  

As far as this, I don't have to assume that the article is credible or not. I can dismiss it immediately very easily. They assert that the differences between the human chromosome and the chimpanzee pair of chromosomes that are quite similar prove that it didn't fuse. Of course, that ignores any mutations that could (and would) have occurred in the meantime. The last common ancestors of humans and chimps is estimated by biologists to be 4-6 million years old. Can you show me the rate of genetic change from generation to generation, and show me that the differences that AiG called problematic couldn't have occurred by mutation over that many years? Until you do, you can not legitimately call that a problem, or say that the fusion between an ancestral chromosome is disproven. 

Jabberwocky wrote:

Nope! To show that the understood science is wrong is to win a guaranteed nobel prize. Einstein proved Newtonian physics to be quite inaccurate (to the point that if it made it this far without that revision, our GPS systems would suck I am to understand). Of course, one might try to create a GPS system and figure out the issues at that point. However, Einstein figured it out before that level of testing was available. The theory of evolution makes predictions, and new findings corroborate the predictions, rather than disprove them. This happens all the time. You're suggesting some sort of monolithic opposition here. I don't buy it. Hell, the Vatican have an observatory, and they accept evolution because it's simply foolish not to at this point (As they're more international than just the USA where that's prevalent). Even in Bill Maher's movie Religulous (which I have no problem saying did a bad job of fact-checking), he goes to the Vatican observatory only to be told there that creationism is ridiculous in just about every way. 

nope?  it's exactly what you've been claiming about believers this whole time and you're answer is nope?  I only opened it up to the whole gallery.  

the problem with a nobel prize is the understanding has to be addressed and understood... if no one wants to address it, then it will not win.  period.  This peice of science does not have enough concrete evidence to solidify either side, which is why it's still theory.  Thus it's unlikely that either side will "prove" the other wrong to the degree needed and therefore it's why many avoid addressign the issue in the first place.  

jabberwocky wrote:

You failed to address the point. As I said about speciation, you can have 3 distinct groups where group 2 is reproductively compatible with all 3, whereas groups 1 & 3 are not compatible with one another. Now, let's kill off group 2 (which happens ALL the time). What mechanism prevents groups 1 & 3 from genetically diverging further and further indefinitely? We've proven they diverge enough to not be reproductively compatible. What prevents this from going further? 

not sure what prevents it... I think it's just the DNA code.  There is absolutely no evidence that a species from one genus can reproduce with a species from a completely different genus.. it's possibly the distance from common ancestors if you're looking at it from the darwinistic POV, or Christians would say that's how it was designed.  

jabberwocky wrote:

Also, define "kind"...wait scratch that. To say "what is a species" is kind of stupid. The answer is the same as the answer to "what is a phylum" "what is a genus" and "what is a 'kind'". The answer to all of those questions is "It is a word used to classify a certain group of life on Earth". The question "what separates one species from another" is well defined. The same goes for genus, family, order, class, phylum, and kingdom. What separates one 'kind' from another? You seem to put it at the genus level. Ken Ham states it's approximately at the family level. Which is it, and what do you have to support it? On the other end of it (same crazy level as Ham, but just sounding WAY dumber) is Ray Comfort in his stupid evolution vs. God video, where he says "They're still finches, they're the same kind" followed by "They're still birds, they're the same kind" (thereby jumping freely from family to class where he sees fit). I hope you're better than that. Can you give me a proper specific description of what separates "kinds"?

I likened kind to genus based on my own quick homework done specifically for this thread.  I could be wrong and Ham could be right... I'm not sure.  either way, I don't know if I could accurately give you a proper specific description of what separates Kinds.  I am not an expert in the field and have not really thought about it.  My explanation would be based moreso in scripture and that line will not work for you.  The general consensus is there never was and there never will be cross breeding or evolution between kinds, rather they will evolve and reproduce within their own.  

Jabberwocky wrote:

The fertility problem doesn't necessarily occur with all chromosome fusions. http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2009/02/the-rise-of-hum-1.html

The above link describes testable examples of that. Now, would you address any of the points I made above? Let me re-iterate them in list form. 

Are all Australopithecines either human or ape? Or are the fossils thought by biologists to be links divided elsewhere? So that you don't have to root through a bunch, let's go one by one. Answer this here: Is Australopithecus Afarensis a human fossil, or an ape fossil (Assuming you disagree that humans are apes)?

How come every time we DO find a fossil, it's nothing that is far removed from what we expected to find when it came to fossils we haven't found anything similar to?

Regarding chromosome 2, the time between what I believe to be our common ancestor with chimps will easily account for discrepancies in the chromosome. Why is so much of it similar? 

I'll ignore the logistics of coralling animals onto the boat from the whole world. Free pass for you, because I desire an answer more to a more specific question:

How do you account for geographic distribution?

How did they feed everything?

ok, if I understand you correctly, you want to focus just on the last 2 questions and just forget about the above questions for now?   Just to answer some of the above quickly, similarities are common with the same creator.  

moving on

Geographic distribution?  HOw do I account for that?  Is this a trick question?  Honestly, migration.  What else?  If plants, then by all the means we can observe today of seeds spreading, animal, winds, spores, etc...

How did they feed all the animals.  Don't know.  the story doesn't say.  Though if it was just 2 of each kind.. I'm not sure how many Kinds there would have been at the tiem... or how many there are now, but there likely wouldn't have been an excessive number of animals on the ark and thus they'd have plenty of space to store the appropriate amount of food for the duration.  

jabberwocky wrote:

You see, every time you propose a problem, I at least address it, even if you don't accept my answer (typically dismissing it without much thought). I asked you several questions here, and all you said is that there is a problem with fusion. I addressed it immediately, and asked a few more questions. Any good answers for these?

I've attempted to address everything you've brought to the table... if I missed something, it wasn't because I was ignoring it.   I believe I answered the questions you wanted me to here.  I even addressed one of the above questions that you claimed I'd get a free ride for.  If I missed something, just point it out.   I am only 1 person trying to answer everyones questions on a story that has little information to go on.  

No it doesn't. However, if scripture has to be treated differently than any other book when one is trying to verify the authenticity of its claims, then that is special pleading by default. When you pick up any science book in the world, you use the same methodology of testing to verify its claims. If you insist that a different methodology must be adopted to test the claims in the bible, well I would ask, why? The bible has verses that 100% contradict one another. The skeptics annotated bible online for instance has a contradiction detector that's a little over-sensitive in my opinion, but it will list for you the relevant verses one against the other to compare and check. It's a great place to begin when looking for such contradictions. If the bible says that someone has seen the face of god (which it does) and says later that nobody has seen the face of god (which it does), that is a contradiction. One of those phrases must be untrue. This is one example. I can probably provide a hundred. 

Science books do not contradict themselves internally in this way. A newer book may contradict an older book. The newer books often address findings made in error (or findings that were somewhat correct, but previously less accurate) as well. The bible does not. The bible asserts things, some of which are in direct conflict with one another. That to me makes it impossible that it is 100% true. 

First of all, the reason I put "true fact" in quotations is because it's a redundant phrase, much like "single bachelor" or "scared coward". The noun is all the description required, and does not require the verb to supplement it. Bible thumpers love to introduce into conversations the idea that there is a difference between "truth" and "fact" when there really isn't. All facts are true. If something is the truth, it is a fact. There is never any reason to put those words together. Let's read a sentence from above again "True fact is dependent in your statement on what you accept as truth, not what might actually be true."...what? I understand that facts are facts whether you agree that they're facts or not. 

You believe the bible to be 100% true it seems. The bible contains internal contradictions, which makes that actually impossible. 

Now the topic at hand is that this particular quote-block was myself calling you on your evasion of the language complexity vs. population spread problem. When you got backed into a corner, you implied something along the lines of "well they knew they were sinning anyway, etc. they knew they had to repent, etc. etc.". Why not start with that? I believe that you didn't start with that because you knew that that wouldn't be sufficient argument, so you tried to explain it away in a way involving less direct supernatural intervention. Now when I called you on all of this, you ended up spouting some crap about "true fact." and said "case closed". No it's not. Why didn't you start with "people knew they were sinning?" Why go through the trouble of saying "they must have told everyone about the impending calamity"?

No the bible isn't evidence. The bible is a claim. It is a claim that is internally incoherent, contains statements that can be examined scientifically (and most of those statements fail that test). It contains statements about history (some which have been disproven by Jewish archaeologists who tried to set out to prove them!). These things mean that it can't be 100% true. No book can prove itself. Every science book has content where you can experiment yourself and verify the findings. Hence the books don't actually prove themselves, but they are accurate and correct and you can verify it. The bible contains content that can be tested (which it largely fails) and content that can't (hence we can't verify the claims). 

Eye-witness accounts, biblical and extra-biblical...listen closely. We! Believe! That! The! Bible! Stories! Are! Fabricated! Myth! Why would we accept eye-witness accounts written within it? You can humour me with the extra-biblical accounts if you like though. List them with links. 

As you said, people call into the Vatican with claims that the Vatican ignores. I agree that that probably happens. The Vatican are probably wise to ignore many of them. They're waiting for something big like cancer remission, or at least a growth that may be understood as cancer in a less wealthy country. These miracles must be marketable. The Catholic Church really is into the same crap like Peter Popoff's miracle healing water, they're just far, FAR more subtle about it. 

However, I doubt the Vatican ever gets calls that go like the following. "I prayed for Mother Teresa to intercede, but my husband died anyway". These people probably live in silence and largely outnumber the rest. Also, if you read about the first miracle of mother Teresa, there are major MAJOR problems with it. The fact that the Vatican haven't reversed the ruling on that miracle suggests that they're not so interested in scientific accuracy as you claim. There are doctors who treated her who reject any sort of miraculous cure, and her husband did so initially as well, but later changed his mind.

You're calling what I say excuses? What in here is an excuse? What in here is a dismissal? The closest thing to a dismissal is the part in the last paragraph regarding the husband. However, for her husband to change his mind, it may take nothing more than immense social pressure, or one single threat. Why did the doctors and the husband all agree on the "not a miracle" explanation initially? Is it because they wanted to reject god? No. It's because the doctors diagnosed the woman's illness, and prescribed her medication for it. They are professionals, and trusted their diagnosis. She took the meds and got better. In your opinion (if you believe this to be a miracle), they got the diagnosis wrong. Her condition wasn't as deadly as thought, and they prescribed medication that was in no way effective. Then, god fixed it because mother Teresa was summoned. Now, didn't you mention before that you're no longer Catholic despite being brought up that way? Do you still believe in saintly intercession? Your view on this seems very wacky to me.

So you believe, to use your analogy, that the person threatening you to not draw the cartoon is real, and serious about the threat. They also believed he was righteous in doing so. Because if I were to draw a cartoon despite terrorist threats, it may be detrimental to my life, but it wouldn't be necessarily morally wrong to do so despite the threat. A universal succumbing to terrorists is not the right thing to do, as it would create a society where the most hostile and violent people are the ones who get what they want. Defiance (even if it's dangerous) is unfortunately important in such situations. You have basically likened god to a terrorist by even using that analogy. How, then, do you claim that he was righteous?

Drop the pronouns and explain what you mean by this. I don't want to answer the wrong question.

caposkia wrote:

What is your basis for the formation of language?  It needs to be beyond written evidence..complex language would have formed much earlier.  

Much the same as we learn language as children. We start with simple concepts, usually associating sounds with objects and people (nouns). We then go on to things like verbs that are easy to understand, and the rest comes later. It has been said that some aspects of complex language have to be learned in early childhood to be understood. It would be cruel to run tests, but in cases where feral children were found, it has been shown that the ability to develop a certain level of language has been difficult. Since parents tend to teach their children language (BTW, my parents never taught me English, I learned it all in school), one can acquire a great knowledge of their native language over the first few years of their life. When language first came about, it was important to identify objects and nouns (and probably people as well, by attaching a label to them). Verbs would be the next important thing (if we are to co-operate, we need to be able to tell people what we need them to do, and what we will do in return, etc.). Language developed as the need for language did. In the example of the feral children, we find that not learning language early on means that you won't have the ability to understand the complex parts later. Our infant and toddler brains are great sponges for such things, and allow us to cram a lot of information into it, so that we can learn more difficult concepts later. Each successive generation had the ability to expand on language. If I could learn 2 languages in ~5 and a half years, surely people could slowly expand on language over the years, and make it more complex gradually. 

So, what is your basis for language being organized into quite a similar observable tree as life in the world? The Slavic countries are all close to one another, and share a lot of grammar. There are several alphabets. Primarily, there is the roman as I'm typing in, used by the Polish (including dialects that are far removed and hard for me to understand such as Silesian and Kashubian), Czech, Slovaks and the Croatians (probably some more I'm missing) and the Cyrillic, used by Russians, Ukrainians, Belarussians, Serbians, (and some more I'm sure). You may notice that the last in each set are Croatian and Serbian. Funny as they are the same language, but use different alphabets. Do you think that's because of babel too? Let me tell you that it took me under 6 months to learn to read cyrillic 2 years ago (Russian cyrillic to be exact, but the variations are negligible and can read any of it). If god meant to confuse people, he must have not meant to do it for a very long time. I DO mean to be condescending here, because I hate when people precede a sentence with the opposite of what they mean. Don't argue with me about languages if you don't know what you're talking about. You will lose. Polish has more in common with Ukrainian, Russian, Czech, Slovakian and Serbo-Croatian than English does with any other language to my knowledge. You happen to speak a language that is on a linguistic "island" so to speak. Of course when you look at the geography of the United Kingdom, you'll find it is indeed separated from the rest of Europe by water, hence this is no surprise.

If god meant to confuse us with these languages, he did a shit job. I can speak Polish to a Czech or a Slovak person (and they can speak their language to me) and we can't have a conversation about literature, but I could go to a small town in any part of either country (where English isn't spoken) and get around without issue. 

See above. You've skipped parts, and offered insufficient explanations for the rest. You don't need to address each individual quote here. Explain the geographic distribution of life that makes sense in the context of a worldwide flood.

And in the time of Noah, what book did the illiterate people have? How did THEY know? How were they to know that this was legitimately going to happen? Some guy building a floating wooden zoo is not enough, I'm sorry.

caposkia wrote:

Choice is perfect..

No it isn't.

per·fect adjective \ˈpər-fikt\
: having no mistakes or flaws

: completely correct or accurate

: having all the qualities you want in that kind of person, situation, etc.

The flaw with choice is that any given choice can be the wrong choice. Any wrong choice is necessarily imperfect, as per the definition of perfect. Therefore choice is not perfect.

caposkia wrote:

So then should parents be partially culpable for the crimes their children commit as adults?

There is no comparison between a all knowing god and a mortal who knows almost nothing. If a parent absolutely knew in advance the crimes that their children would commit, and did nothing to prevent those crimes, then they would be culpable. Alas, we mere mortals can't see the future. We can't even see the past all that well. So no, a parent should not automatically be culpable in any way for the crimes of their children.
No omniscient god gets a free pass though. It knew the crimes and it could have prevented them. It chose not to, and therefore is nearly as guilty as the perpetrators.

caposkia wrote:

Too bad there are no solid links to such an evolution.

Too bad for you that every life form ever observed is a solid example of evolution. Your denial merely proves your ignorance.

caposkia wrote:

Let's be honest... if there were gaps in the roads, e.g. there were no roads that connected consistently from your home to your work in some way or sidewalks that likewise were consistently connected from your house to your work, i would very logically doubt that you were able to use the roads or sidewalks to get there.  That's typically not a problem for most people unless you live in Juneau AK and work out of town.

Flawed metaphor. You look for gaps in the road, and automatically assume that the road was never connected. Despite the fact that doing some basic math and extrapolation shows that every road is headed in the direction of another. And that many roads have junctions showing there was once a connection. Logically, there's no reason to build fragments of a road, it can't accomplish its function that way. Logically, the roads were once connected. Portions were simply destroyed at some point. Either through lack of maintenance or direct attempts to destroy them. Even indirect destruction that was the result of the pursuit of another goal. It is foolish to assume that fragments of roads that all point to one another does not indicate a greater road system that has since decayed. Especially when you can measure when the roads were built in the first place, and you can dig up more road fragments that support the hypothesis that there was once a road network that was completely connected.

caposkia wrote:

Right.  if I believe that, then I also have to beleive we are decendents of plants as well.

Not at all. In fact, plants and animals would have a common ancestor that was neither plant nor animal.

Which of the 2 links and where? Clearly you've read it, and I'm too busy reading our thread to read others, and certainly too busy to read that link at least tonight. If I get to it before you respond, I'll address it here. But help me out here if you can. I doubt it states that there "isn't evidence to prove it". 

What consistency among all species make the evidence skim?

Now that's stupid. I'm not sure if we talked about vestigial structures (I think we have, but it may have been elsewhere). Our appendix is minutely beneficial to the immune system, but if you were able to redesign from the ground up, it would be more efficient. Either a mechanism more effective at replacing the appendix's helping hand to the immune system, or a smaller appendix that doesn't have the bursting problems would have been designed. It wasn't. Our eyes are wired backwards. Our genital areas are so discombobulated, that if girls don't have a pee after sex, it greatly increases the odds of urinary tract infections (and what of those who peed first? Might be hard to go again in an hour...). For those who believe gay sex is wrong, the male G-spot (basically direct prostate stimulation as I understand) is up their ass (but god says it's wrong). For those who believe it isn't wrong (where everyone SHOULD fall, and I have no problem asserting that), until the invention of condoms and lubricant, penetrative anal sex would have almost always inevitably resulted in bleeding, increasing greatly the transfer of disease. This could make it a somewhat dangerous practice. Until modern pre-natal medical practice, dying during childbirth was common for both mother and child. 

Every one of these things makes sense in biology assuming the theory of evolution to be true. They range from puzzling to really fucking stupid if you think some being (especially an intelligent one) designed it.

One of BS's links (I skimmed them) showed that a human with 44 chromosomes, other than his genetic quirk, seems normal in every other way. I never asserted that the fusion is what made homosapiens into homosapiens. I already posted a link regarding the fertility problem (I think). If I didn't, here. http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2009/02/the-rise-of-hum-1.html . BS's link addressed that problem as well. Where in his links does it say that it "doesn't bode well for a creature"? A modern example is that not every mule is sterile. Fertile mules do occur. They are compatible with both donkeys and horses. BS's link also mentioned that it's more likely to occur in populations that engage what's known as inbreeding. If the early human population was small (or an early pre-human ancestral population was small), such a thing could, and would happen.

So your answer to my direct question is that early humans had 48 chromosomes and those fused?

It's AiG. You disagree with them on dating something major. The reason they don't even tackle the mutation problem is they don't acknowledge an earth/universe older than 6000 years old. You seem to acknowledge that possibility. So what is your education on the rate of mutation that tells you that a YEC site is correct when talking of genetics, even though the timelines between your beliefs and theirs varies greatly? 

Once again, you misunderstand what a scientific theory is. You seem to think that biology is on some ridiculous shaky foundation. It's not. The theory of evolution is demonstrable in a lab. The theory of evolution has predictive power. The theory of evolution explains a number of things that creationism can not (vestigial organs, geographic distribution) and explains far BETTER things that creationism does a poor job of explaining (homology between organisms for example). Don't you even imply that creationism has to be proved wrong. It already is. From a scientific standpoint, it is a non-starter. Unfortunately, even if you believe that "truth" and "facts" are separable, you're wrong. The theory of evolution does a more than sufficient job of explaining the diversity of life (ALL of it, not just some of the most similar bits) and creationism explains nothing. Creationism + a global flood introduces giant problems (geographic distrubution, the complete lack of marsupial fossils between biblical-ish locations and Australia)

That's not what I fucking said! Not even close! Where did I say that two animals of varying genuses (Genii?) cross-breed? Group X reproduces (I'll use a letter for the parent group). Group X has descendants in groups 1, 2 & 3. Groups 1, 2 & 3 are geographically isolated. A scientist takes them into a lab. Group 2 can produce offspring with groups 1 & 3. Groups 1 & 3 can not produce offspring. This much has been demonstrated in a lab. The reason for the reproductive incompatibility is because the genes between groups 1 & 3 have varied too far from one another (even though they share a common ancestor). What prevents from the genes getting even MORE different from one another in the descendants of groups 1 & 3? The genes changed enough to be reproductively incompatible. There is no mechanism known that prevents the genes from changing indefinitely given enough time. If you concede speciation (which can be shown in a lab, and occurs due to gene variation), what prevents further gene change? 

Fair enough. I'm glad you're not trying to bite off more than you can chew. However, a biologist will tell you what allows two animals to produce fertile offspring. A biologist will tell you what allows two animals to produce sterile offspring. A biologist will tell you what allows two animals to be reproductively incompatible. A biologist will tell you this in precise detail. They will tell you what has to be compatible genetically. They will tell you how much genes can change from generation to generation. They will measure how selection pressures will vary the change. They will tell you how this change can increase with a change in environment (which severely changes selection pressures). They will not cite one book and say "well this is right, because it says so."

I don't mean how life got spread out when I mention geographic distribution. I mean why everything is distributed in the manner it is? Why are the marsupials exclusively in Australia? How did they get there after the catastrophe? I don't think there is any good explanation for these sorts of things under creationism. 

The Bill Nye/Ken Ham debate covered this topic well. Under creationism you are stuck in a situation where you can't fit all of the animals onto the ark. If you reduce the number of animals and state that the rest "micro-evolved", then evolution would have to occur faster and more drastically than creationist say it possibly could (and also several orders of magnitude quicker than anything we have ever observed). I think the numbers used would make for 11 new species every single day. The math doesn't work. 

Maybe I was unclear in my post (although I think it was pretty clear). I just gave you a free pass on how all of the animals were coralled onto the thing. I wanted the rest of it answered still. Let's ask again:

The fertility problem doesn't necessarily occur with all chromosome fusions. http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2009/02/the-rise-of-hum-1.html

The above link describes testable examples of that. Now, would you address any of the points I made above? Let me re-iterate them in list form. 

Are all Australopithecines either human or ape? Or are the fossils thought by biologists to be links divided elsewhere? So that you don't have to root through a bunch, let's go one by one. Answer this here: Is Australopithecus Afarensis a human fossil, or an ape fossil (Assuming you disagree that humans are apes)?

How come every time we DO find a fossil, it's nothing that is far removed from what we expected to find when it came to fossils we haven't found anything similar to?

Regarding chromosome 2, the time between what I believe to be our common ancestor with chimps will easily account for discrepancies in the chromosome. Why is so much of it similar? Not to mention the rest of our genome?

 

or is it that it's the choices people make that aren't perfect.

Rather "choice" as in the ability to make them is perfect... and if we couldn't make bad choices, then choice would not be perfect because it would have drastic limitations.

So knowledge is the power to control others... 

He has given US the responsibility for our actions.

too bad you decided to generalize the term "evolution" rather than put it in context with what we were talking about.

 Now would I be just as out of line as you were to claim this merely proves your ignorance?

so how deep does the rabbit hole go?  You have to admit, you're starting to stretch a bit to prove your point.

If you can say with confidence that what you said is a very logical conclusion than it is just as logical to see the broken connections in the roads and conclude that the roads, though they look like they may have had paths, do not show evidence of travel through those broken areas and thus could have never been fully functional.

precisely... and that belief takes more faith than the God following

remember just like your gut reaction to this statement is to say there's evidence, so do those who believe in God see evidence for their belief.

 

Anyway, The point that the change is NEVER abrupt leads me further into doubt about those changes as described taking place... You're telling me they are never abrupt, which means the fusion likely happens over an extended period of time.... and we have NO actual physical proof of the transformation... not even a part of it... that to me is a problem for the theory.  

Tracing the Human-Chimp Ancestor

By comparing DNA sequences from humans and chimpanzees, experts calculated that the last human-chimp ancestor lived roughly six million years ago. Later, the discovery of a hominid fossil dating back six to seven million years supported this claim.

What you say makes a lot of sense...

Anyway, even you had to admit extreme circumstances in the human animal for that change to be successful.  I see you have faith in the idea that because it is observed in populatinos that produce much quicker that makes it more possible that it happened with humans.  The only issue I have with that, is the populatinos that reproduce quicker would likely have much better odds of finding another of the same because so many reproduce so quickly.  Humans ultimately became humans because of a lucky hit somewhere in history, is that what you're basically saying?

I find the isolation of people groups would make the odds even worse for this to succesfully happen.  even so, as we've also observed, the change in Chromosomes does not necessarily create a new species, but it can, which means we got even luckier.  Not only did we have to have the initial mating of the modified Chromosome carriers, but then there had to be a consistent progress through a long evolutionary process to make it actually work.  What are the odds of that?  

Jabberwocky wrote:

Once again, you misunderstand what a scientific theory is. You seem to think that biology is on some ridiculous shaky foundation. It's not. The theory of evolution is demonstrable in a lab. The theory of evolution has predictive power. The theory of evolution explains a number of things that creationism can not (vestigial organs, geographic distribution) and explains far BETTER things that creationism does a poor job of explaining (homology between organisms for example). Don't you even imply that creationism has to be proved wrong. It already is. From a scientific standpoint, it is a non-starter. Unfortunately, even if you believe that "truth" and "facts" are separable, you're wrong. The theory of evolution does a more than sufficient job of explaining the diversity of life (ALL of it, not just some of the most similar bits) and creationism explains nothing. Creationism + a global flood introduces giant problems (geographic distrubution, the complete lack of marsupial fossils between biblical-ish locations and Australia)

Creationism explains how things got started... evolution doesn't, it explains how things progress.  The problem does not lie in proving evolution, it's proving darwinism.  The question isn't do things evolve, it's how far does that evolution really go?  

I love how you try and use scientific theory against me here.  It is also interesting how you see what i bring up putting biology on a shaky foundation.  I merely bring up the reasons why its' still a theory and not scientific fact.  There are parts that we just don't have evidence for to really drive the theory home.  

jabberwocky wrote:

That's not what I fucking said! Not even close! Where did I say that two animals of varying genuses (Genii?) cross-breed? Group X reproduces (I'll use a letter for the parent group). Group X has descendants in groups 1, 2 & 3. Groups 1, 2 & 3 are geographically isolated. A scientist takes them into a lab. Group 2 can produce offspring with groups 1 & 3. Groups 1 & 3 can not produce offspring. This much has been demonstrated in a lab. The reason for the reproductive incompatibility is because the genes between groups 1 & 3 have varied too far from one another (even though they share a common ancestor). What prevents from the genes getting even MORE different from one another in the descendants of groups 1 & 3? The genes changed enough to be reproductively incompatible. There is no mechanism known that prevents the genes from changing indefinitely given enough time. If you concede speciation (which can be shown in a lab, and occurs due to gene variation), what prevents further gene change? 

But I got exactly what I wanted out of you here... 

now, hoestly I want to research it a bit.  Do you have any links that show the evidence in life of group 2 mating and reproducing with 1 and 3?  I mean cross genus... there would have to be a inter-genus group right?  

jabberywocky wrote:

Fair enough. I'm glad you're not trying to bite off more than you can chew. However, a biologist will tell you what allows two animals to produce fertile offspring. A biologist will tell you what allows two animals to produce sterile offspring. A biologist will tell you what allows two animals to be reproductively incompatible. A biologist will tell you this in precise detail. They will tell you what has to be compatible genetically. They will tell you how much genes can change from generation to generation. They will measure how selection pressures will vary the change. They will tell you how this change can increase with a change in environment (which severely changes selection pressures). They will not cite one book and say "well this is right, because it says so."

that's because they're experts in their field.  In my strengths I don't need to reference books either.  My issue is I have yet to see the missing links.  No one has been able to show them to me yet.  Those would be the transitional groups mating and creating with both sides on the genus level.  

Jabberwocky wrote:

I don't mean how life got spread out when I mention geographic distribution. I mean why everything is distributed in the manner it is? Why are the marsupials exclusively in Australia? How did they get there after the catastrophe? I don't think there is any good explanation for these sorts of things under creationism. 

The Bill Nye/Ken Ham debate covered this topic well. Under creationism you are stuck in a situation where you can't fit all of the animals onto the ark. If you reduce the number of animals and state that the rest "micro-evolved", then evolution would have to occur faster and more drastically than creationist say it possibly could (and also several orders of magnitude quicker than anything we have ever observed). I think the numbers used would make for 11 new species every single day. The math doesn't work. 

that problem is only for the YEC's.  

also, Creationism just like evolution never claimed to have all the answers.  There are some things we just don't know.  Migrational patterns and geological events along with weather patterns and food supplies have a part in all distribution patterns.  I'm sure if I did some homework on marsupials in Australia, there would be some event or chain of events in Earth history that directed them to that location and allowed them to get there.  

jabberwocky wrote:

Maybe I was unclear in my post (although I think it was pretty clear). I just gave you a free pass on how all of the animals were coralled onto the thing. I wanted the rest of it answered still. Let's ask again:

The fertility problem doesn't necessarily occur with all chromosome fusions. http://pandasthumb.org/archives/2009/02/the-rise-of-hum-1.html

The above link describes testable examples of that. Now, would you address any of the points I made above? Let me re-iterate them in list form. 

Are all Australopithecines either human or ape? Or are the fossils thought by biologists to be links divided elsewhere? So that you don't have to root through a bunch, let's go one by one. Answer this here: Is Australopithecus Afarensis a human fossil, or an ape fossil (Assuming you disagree that humans are apes)?

It is categorized as Hominidae or Great Ape family so no despite their upright walk.

jabberwocky wrote:

How come every time we DO find a fossil, it's nothing that is far removed from what we expected to find when it came to fossils we haven't found anything similar to?

because evolution is predictable.  Nothing has shown proof of darwinism.  

jabberwocky wrote:

Regarding chromosome 2, the time between what I believe to be our common ancestor with chimps will easily account for discrepancies in the chromosome. Why is so much of it similar? Not to mention the rest of our genome?

 

All made by the same creator, why would they be more different?  

If any choice can be imperfect then choice itself is imperfect.

 Choice already has drastic limitations, so by my argument AND your own, choice is imperfect.

 

caposkia wrote:

He has given US the responsibility for our actions.

Oh wonderful. So if I kill you I can give you responsibility for it. Responsibility cannot be handed off at a whim. If there's a god, and that god created everything and knows everything, then that god is responsible for everything. Period.

Too bad for you that evolution is evolution, and every life form that ever existed is a demonstration of it. You don't know what qualifies a genus in the first place so you're in no position to say there are no examples of a genus evolving into another. If you did know then you'd never claim there were no examples, since you'd know that it takes more than one generation before a new genus can evolve in the first place, and therefore there cannot be any examples. You creationists think a duck should pop out a crocodile all of a sudden if evolution were true. Problem is it doesn't work that way.   

 

caposkia wrote:

 Now would I be just as out of line as you were to claim this merely proves your ignorance?

You can say whatever you like, but only you are demonstrating ignorance.

 No I don't. You made the metaphor. I just fixed it so it would fit with reality as best it could.

Except the roads do show signs of use. There are oil spots and tire fragments everywhere, and the roads have been demonstrably worn by traffic.

caposkia wrote:

precisely... and that belief takes more faith than the God following

No it doesn't.

Problem is that theist evidence isn't evidence. You can't point at anything and quantify why it is evidence for a god. Meanwhile all the evidence for evolution is non-contradictory and fits together perfectly. The evidence that would convince you is impossible, because you don't want evidence for evolution. You want a turtle giving birth to an eagle. But that isn't evolution. So you'll never have it.

caposkia wrote:

 

Anyway, The point that the change is NEVER abrupt leads me further into doubt about those changes as described taking place... You're telling me they are never abrupt, which means the fusion likely happens over an extended period of time.... and we have NO actual physical proof of the transformation... not even a part of it... that to me is a problem for the theory.  

Are you deliberately trying to misunderstand this? The fusion isn't gradual. The fusion is a very specific detail. If you compare a human and a chimp chromosome, you can calculate roughly how many generations ago a common ancestor would have existed. By abrupt, I mean something like creationists typically look for (one "kind" giving birth to another "kind" where kinds are at LEAST at the genus level, and sometimes all the way up to the kingdom level in the most idiotic cases, like when Ray Comfort says "They're still bacteria!&quot.

http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/past-exhibitions/human-origins/understanding-our-past/dna-comparing-humans-and-chimps

Here is a little page with some information about DNA. It's very basic information, but if you read that, it says that there are about 35 million differences between human and chimpanzee base pairs. When talking of these 35 million differences, those 35 million diverged gradually. However, each single one of those 35 million changes had to happen abruptly. So if it's 6 million years, that's about 6 differences a year. If we take an age range for how long one generation was, and use a broad range like 15-35 years between each parent/child, you get between 90 and 210 differences in base pairs between parent and child. Even 210 out of 3 billion (roughly the number of base pairs that both us and chimps have total) certainly doesn't seem like a lot. All it takes is selection pressures to drive it a specific way.

 

Here is an exerpt from a different page on that same site.

Quote:

Tracing the Human-Chimp Ancestor

By comparing DNA sequences from humans and chimpanzees, experts calculated that the last human-chimp ancestor lived roughly six million years ago. Later, the discovery of a hominid fossil dating back six to seven million years supported this claim.

Why do you think that when geneticists run the math, they come up with the same numbers as geologists/archaeologists?

 

Caposkia wrote:

What you say makes a lot of sense...

Of course it does. When you draw conclusions that logically follow from observable evidence, it makes sense. When you make up random hypotheses that bear no relation to observable evidence, it often doesn't make sense. 

 

 

Caposkia wrote:

Anyway, even you had to admit extreme circumstances in the human animal for that change to be successful.  I see you have faith in the idea that because it is observed in populatinos that produce much quicker that makes it more possible that it happened with humans.  The only issue I have with that, is the populatinos that reproduce quicker would likely have much better odds of finding another of the same because so many reproduce so quickly.  Humans ultimately became humans because of a lucky hit somewhere in history, is that what you're basically saying?

 

Which is why populations that breed faster have it happen very frequently, while in humans we believe it has only happened once so far. We are all who we are because of many lucky (or unlucky) hits in history. Of any one of our ancestors had sex with someone else, we would be someone else, for better or for worse. The conditions that early hominids lived in were ideal for rapid genetic change to occur. It isn't at all unlikely or really even lucky. It is just as likely or unlikely as the dozens of other genetic mutations that occurred.    

 

 

Caposkia wrote:

I find the isolation of people groups would make the odds even worse for this to succesfully happen.  even so, as we've also observed, the change in Chromosomes does not necessarily create a new species, but it can, which means we got even luckier.  Not only did we have to have the initial mating of the modified Chromosome carriers, but then there had to be a consistent progress through a long evolutionary process to make it actually work.  What are the odds of that?  

 

Exactly the same odds as any other species surviving, and that is why many species have not survived, including other hominids. And you "find" wrong. Isolation greatly increases genetic drift. That is absolutely proven. Small populations are more likely to be taken over by changes that affect breeding compatability. It is also supported by a basic understanding of statistics. Every single time a child is born, the odds of that child having a fused chromosome is approximately 1:1000. The size of the population it is born into is irrelevant. Every single time someone with a fused chromosome chooses a sexual partner, the odds are 1:1,000,000 their partner also has a fused chromosome. Regardless of how large or small the population they live in is. The sample size has no effect on the odds when the number of mutations within that sample size is unknown. Where the population size has a huge effect on the odds, is when you know you have two people with fused chromosomes. 

 

If the population is 10 people and two of them have fused chromosomes, they make up 20% of the population. When they have a baby, suddenly those with fewer chromosomes make up 27% of the population. In such a small group, the number of people who are capable of breeding is going to be rather small and it is quite probable that all the children born come from one or two couples and the offspring of those couples. In that case, once the initial 1:1,000,000 odds are hit, it is extremely probable that the mutation is going to become prevalent inside that group and eventually push out the line that doesn't have the mutation. Obviously, in a much larger group, any line that has problems breeding outside of their line is much more likely to become irrelevant and die out, because it will never make up a significant percentage of the population.      

 

The larger genetic diversity in large societies and cross breeding between historically isolated social groups, is why humans have evolved much faster over the last 5,000 years than we have over the last million (percentage wise, we are more different from humans 5,000 years ago than our ancestors were from Neanderthals), but the mutations in our genetics that have been successful have not been the type that cause isolation like in the past and if you could travel back in time, you could probably get Helen of Troy pregnant. Our population is so large and intermingled that genetic changes that cause isolation have a very small chance of surviving past a generation or two. Genetic changes that don't effect the ability to have children however, spread rather quickly- such as a tolerance to lactose. Genetic changes that are "positive" (increase your odds of surviving) spread really fast, such as those that increase resistance to diseases, which account for the majority of genetic changes between us and our most recent ancestors.  

 

http://www.answersingenesis.org/articles/am/v2/n4/geologic-evidences-part-one

 

The basis of his entire argument is that the idea that rock formations are hundreds of millions of years old is "impossible" and that they could only be formed by a single massive flood. It is not recognized as evidence of ANY flood by most geologists. ]

 

Yes, there is evidence of drastic floods. I have never doubted that. All it does is show that if there had been a bigger flood, we would expect to see similar evidence of it. A large flood in a portion of the world where there weren't even humans doesn't even help your theory that it was a large flood localized where every human in the world was since in locations where we know our ancestors were 2-3 million years ago, there is no similar evidence of similar massive flooding, let alone the significantly larger flood suggested in the bible. 

No, they didn't. And if you read their writing, every time they refer to a source they call the conclusions drawn by the real scientists "ridiculous" and "impossible". The sources they site don't support their rantings. You would be far better off reading the sources because they at least have logical conclusions stemming from an examination of the available evidence. 

 

 

Caposkia wrote:

how are we aware of when wine skins were invented?  

 

Because you can't just take dried rawhide (the earliest leather used for clothing) and put a liquid in it. It won't work. Go ahead, buy some rawhide and try it, see what happens. In order to make bags capable of carrying liquid, you have to tan the hide first. Tanning is a relatively complex process which requires fine tools and some knowledge of chemicals. It is something that is typically discovered in conjunction with animal husbandry when people settle down into villages and start raising their food rather than just hunting it. Ancient methods of tanning took several months. Additionally, once you tan the hide, you have to have a method to shape the leather and sew it into the shape you want. That means metal knives and needles, you aren't doing it with stone. The earliest culture known to discover tanning was in Mehrgahr (modern day Pakistan along the India border) who discovered tanning sometime between 7500 and 5500 BC. 

http://books.google.com/books?id=GXzycd3dT9kC&pg=PA128#v=onepage&q&f=false

Evidence of using leather to carry liquids doesn't come around until the Egyptians and it was the Greeks who first created the wineskin. 

Nowhere near to the extent you have suggested. Technological advancement tends to follow similar, and rather linear, paths since certain inventions/discoveries are required before others can even be possible (for example, until you have containers for storage and practice farming excess food you will never discover alcohol) We can compare cultures that were completely seperated and see the similar paths they take. What you have suggested is that a culture existed that was literally millions of years more advanced than anyone else, but didn't leave a shred of evidence. The reason why there is significantly more archaeological evidence from 20,000 BC on, is because that was the time period where humans really started farming and settling into areas for extended periods of time. As soon as you do that, it dramatically increases the rate of technological advancement and leads to a significantly higher level of traces left behind. If you are going to suggest that some culture in 2 million BC was that advanced, you might as well suggest that they had airplanes, spaceships and nuclear bombs, it wouldn't be any less absurd. 

Why is it strange that wine making was discovered after clay pots? Discovering clay pots is easy. All you need is opposable thumbs, fire and mud. Then you just have to notice that the mud next to your fire is getting really hard. So you make a shape out of the mud, throw it by the fire and shazaam, you just invented pottery. It doesn't take much longer to figure out that some mud is better than others and to discover that a bowl/pot shape is pretty damn useful. You have a vessel that is fairly durable, waterproof and portable- no tools needed. Hell, put a kid at a beach with decent clay and they are going to be making all sorts of shapes out of it for fun without any prompting. The only step you really have to figure out is heating it. 

Caposkia wrote:

every single writing during that time from any source that tried to portray a history and was not writing about current events.  AS far as ancients were concerned, historical people were using or donig the same things they were.  I don't have specific titles or links, but I remember going through many docmuments on the subject not connected to the bible.  

Name one. I tried googling it and I couldn't find anything. The history I have read that comes from the biblical era has been from the Romans or from the Chinese (I went through a phase where I was fascinated by Chinese history) and neither of them edited their history in that way. 

Are there any credible meteorologists who have posited that it is theoretically possible? 

Somehow I doubt any meteorologist would agree that is possible. Do you have any sources at all? (Preferably meteorologists who are actually respected and credited with advancing their field. Not kooks who never write in peer reviewed journals and have no research that they allow their peers to see, like your favorite geologist and so-called quantum physicist Gotswami)

No it doesn't. That is like saying hurricane force winds is proof that 200 mph winds could be sustained for 40 days when we know for a fact that once a hurricane makes landfall it loses its power in a predictable manner and the winds die down. Or saying that because Usain Bolt has been clocked running 27 mph that he can run to a store a mile away and back in less than 5 minutes. 

 

Proof that something can occur short term is not at all evidence it could be sustained long term and even though I am ignorant of meteorology, even I know that all weather patterns have a finite amount of energy that is expended at a more or less predictable rate. A quick check of rainfall records on wiki confirms that the record for rain over one minute is an exponentially higher rate than the record for an hour, which is an exponentially higher rate than the record for 24 hours, which is exponentially higher than the record for a week etc. which creates an exponential curve, not a linear one. It is absolutely insulting to my intelligence that you think I would believe a short term measure of the intensity of anything is proof that it could be sustained long term. And then when I call you out on such utterly blatant bullshit to suggest I'm not the one thinking? 

And yet it has never produced anything even approaching Noah's flood, so obviously a stall in the jet stream is not enough.  

Jabberwocky wrote:

I will respond here, but heed my advice and stop being dishonest. When people tell you things such as I did regarding what a scientific theory is, don't continue asserting what we know is incorrect. 

there's a difference between being dishonest and misunderstanding.  Your dramatic conclusions to directly accuse me of being dishonest are quite suspect to your intentions on this thread with me.

Jabberwocky wrote:

It might be dumb luck. It may have been a small difference as well that was then selected for. Also, it has been proven that our species went through a bottleneck and was nearly extinct at one point, which was the driver behind our exit from the desert climate where we had our lowly beginning. Now, irregularities in chromosomes happen quite frequently. Downs syndrome is one. Another is the extra copying of a sex chromosome, with possibilities of XXX chromosomed women, and both XXY and XYY men. XXY is the one with the most noticeable irregularities compared to those with 2 sex chromosomes. Occasionally more serious disorders can occur as the result of the translocation, but overwhelmingly, the differences are minor (a taller average height that only begins to show after puberty for instance). 

Now do we have to assume that either a small favoured trait or just dumb luck allowed the 46 chromosome humans to win? Sure. However, that is a safe assumption since we are here. You can look at it as a lottery. If you were to win the lottery, it would seem so very unlikely, and indeed it is. However, if the odds of winning are 1 in 13 million, and 15 million people play the thing, it's very likely that SOMEONE will win. While this particular occurrence (of homo-sapiens in their current form) may be statistically improbable on its own, it's important to remember that there is nothing special about our species in the grand scheme of things. This result may be unlikely, but every other result was equally unlikely as well. It just is what it is. 

yet none of what you said gives me doubt that there could be a God behind any of that.  is it the erronius DNA problems throughout history that give you the doubts?  I believe God put the wheels in motion and that all choices evolve either successfully or unsuccessfully.  

caposkia wrote:

jabberwocky wrote:

What consistency among all species make the evidence skim?

the consistent lack of evidence on how the Chromosomal changes actually allowed the transformation of the species and didn't hurt them.

Addressed above

I must split this to address this point individually. To begin with your first sentence(ish), evolution never claims to explain how things got started. That lies in other scientific fields. Creationism doesn't explain it either. It asserts it without any supporting evidence. Evolution doesn't tackle it because it's not equipped to, and doesn't claim to. On average, evolutionary biologists probably know more about abiogenesis than the average layperson, but they are certainly not deemed experts at it. So, to your next bit, proving evolution vs. proving darwinism...

The point here is that nobody has ever demonstrated that there is a limit, or a cutoff to how far it WILL go. Nobody has ever shown that genes all of a sudden stop changing. They mutate. Copying errors happen. Based on rate of genetic change that we can measure, the conclusion is that us and chimpanzees 100% could have evolved from a common ancestor. There is no odd bump in that road that is unexplainable. It is also proven that even further back a common ancestor between us and all of the other great apes, and further still, the other primates is possible as well. It is proven that a common ancestor between us and all other animals is possible. It is proven that a common ancestor between all animals, plants, AND fungii could have existed as well. No geneticist, not even a creationist one, has EVER proven that this can not happen. Isn't this puzzling, considering that creationists want so SO badly to find this? 

As far as proving evolution vs. proving darwinism, the only difference is time. More time = more change (although the rate of change does vary depending on selection pressures driven by environment). As I said in the above paragraph, we have seen that there is nothing to suggest that there is a limit to this rate of change. So what is it that prevents you from accepting this? Is it a lack of time? Do you believe that there is indeed a limit on genetic change regardless of large quantities of time (even though nobody has ever demonstrated this)? Or is it some third option I can't see at the moment? 

I don't see it as having a shaky foundation. It appears to me that you do. You mention that it's not a scientific fact. This shows your misunderstanding. Let me list some facts. 

- No fossil has EVER been located that puzzled the scientific community as to its location in a geological column, or its location geographically

- In modern times, many previously undiscovered fossils have been found that were similar to expectations based on data we already had

- Geographic distribution of living organisms and fossils suggest that a gradual change over time has occurred

- Study of DNA and genes in general (a more recent ability we now have) has agreed 100% with all assumptions of universal common descent.

- Dating by the study of DNA has shown similar dates to dates by geologists.

- No feature has ever been located in DNA that prevents change from occurring indefinitely.

Every time a new discovery is made, it is another piece of evidence in favour of evolution, and common descent among all life on Earth. I am not saying this as a dogma. I am just saying that every time new evidence is uncovered, it fits with the explanation given. This explanation is "the theory of evolution". Could you find me any evidence in genetics that disproves this? Could you find me any evidence in the fossil record that is out of place either geographically or geologically? Could you come up with any other potential issues that could disprove the theory? Because until then, all evidence that we find just so happens to fit in with the theory of evolution. In fact, the theory of evolution in its entirety is the ONLY explanation that has been shown to work to explain what we find. The details of how we know this are very very specific, and come from several fields of science. Until you can come up with an actual competing theory that is supported by this many fields of science, and can make specific predictions, you are just saying random crap. Either address one of my points that would actually disprove evolution, or present your own specifically, get me to agree with it, and demonstrate to me something that would disprove it. That's all you need to do. 

Regardless of a model with 3 groups, the truth is that even with a model of 2 groups, speciation events occur because the genes of two lineages from one common ancestor have diverged too far. What prevents them from diverging further?

This description of missing links shows me that you don't seem to understand the way this works. If humans and chimps had a common ancestor, there isn't one single intermediary. There is no point where one species becomes another, as every offspring is the same species as its parent. Much like if you look at a rainbow, it's not possible to say at which point one colour becomes another. The names of colours are just arbitrary points. However, in biology, it's as if we have something quite reddish, and something quite blu-ish, but nothing really distinctly purple in most cases. In rarer cases, it's as if we have some royal blue and some blu-ish red, and they can produce these sterile offspring (such as mules). The point is, though, that the only reason we are able to classify species is because the indermediaries have died off. There is no instant at birth where one species simply births another. If we were able to go back in time, we would be able to attempt to mate one generation further and further back until we found the point where most humans were no longer reproductively compatible with an ancestor. However, we can't travel back in time, and I don't believe that anybody would be willing to participate even if time travel were possible (eww...sorry, haha)

On your first point, it's still a problem for you. The math Bill Nye did had 11 new species every day. So that would be 36865 new species a year. If you do the math from a flood 4000 years ago to one 2 million years ago as you posit, that's 73.73 (so almost 74) new species a year. This is simply not a rate of speciation that we observe. This is to believe that evolution occurs FAR quicker than non-creationists do. We know this does not happen right now. If you posit that it happened quicker before, then you're positing an EVEN quicker rate of speciation. Your position here is still scientifically absurd, just less so by a few orders of magnitude than Ken Ham's. Also, that's if you agree with Ham that a "kind" is more on the family level. Even if it is at the family level, there is no way the Ark could have held all of the mammals, birds, insects, aquariums full of fish (fresh-water+salt-water mix = bad for all involved here), reptiles, amphibians, etc. etc., If you put it at the genus level, this problem becomes several orders of magnitude bigger. 

So you either have to posit evolution occurring at what seems to be beyond an impossible rate, or you have to posit cramming an impossible number of animals onto a wooden boat. 

The event or chain of events that caused marsupials to end up in Australia is that they evolved there, or near there. The separation of Pangaea is likely responsible for their geographic isolation which made way for the evolution of the variety of marsupials we see today.

I just asked you if it's human or ape, and you answered "no". I assume, though, that you mean that Australopithecus Afarensis is not human because it is classified as a great ape? Or did I misunderstand what you meant?

There is no difference between the two. Those who make the predictions are almost exclusively those who accept darwinism. Although I have to say I would prefer to use the term "universal common descent" or something of that sort. Not because I'm necessarily adverse to the term darwinism, but because it is a term that is often later used to attempt to conflate biological theory with things that are awful such as eugenics, and the idea of social darwinism. 

Because even a creator of a car only uses the same parts over multiple models if it makes some sense! A car company has things to think about such as financial viability, assembly lines, parts supplying, etc. If they can design all of their cars to use the same door handles, they'll damn well try to. Most car companies have a range of engines, and they put them into many models of their cars. If funds were limitless, they would not do that. They would custom make each engine for each type or at least size of car, in order to provide the best balance of power, fuel economy, smoothness, etc. Are you suggesting that god had a resource or economy problem? 

 

caposkia wrote:

Jabberwocky wrote:

caposkia wrote:

I know what Theory is.. I'm pretty sure we've covered it long ago... or if not directly with you, on a few threads you were involved in.

caposkia wrote:

I merely bring up the reasons why its' still a theory and not scientific fact.

Ok. Unless you quit being dishonest, I will stop answering you completely (and I understand I'm not the first one to do so). You have just blatantly demonstrated that you have absolutely NO interest in being honest and coherent in your discussions. These above two quotes occur in back to back posts. You clearly do not know what the definition of "theory" is in a scientific discussion. Under your worldview, isn't such blatant dishonesty sinful? If so, why do you engage in it?

 

I happen to agree with this definition... so how is that being dishonest?... and when have you started answering me completely?   Stop with the excuses.  Anyone can claim anyone's dishonest when they don't want to agree, but show me how I'm being dishonest.

a coherent group of tested general propositions, commonly regarded as correct, that can be used asprinciples of explanation and prediction for a class of phenomena: 

Does it say in there after "Commonly regarded as correct" something along the lines of "but not necessarily"? No it does not. Scientific theories are explanations for libraries of facts. In some cases, competing theories exist. In some, they don't. In the case of the theory of evolution by natural selection, there are no competing theories. Everybody who is serious about doing science accepts it. You are hinging your entire belief here on the premise of it maybe being erroneous. The theory of evolution by natural selection is a scientific fact in every sense of the word. It is not a law because it can't be expressed by only mathematics, but it is a fact. It is a fact that we and chimpanzees have a common ancestor. It is a fact that our DNA shares more in common with chimps and bonobos than they (chimps and bonobos) share with gorillas. It is a fact that the same DNA tests used to determine paternity when it is unknown is used to determine how closely related other primates are to us (and there is nothing, NOTHING that comes up in that test that makes it impossible or even unlikely). It is a fact that the dates deduced by DNA testing fall within the range of dates deduced by fossils. It is a fact that when selection pressures change, different genes are favoured and it can speed up genetic change. It is a fact that no creationist ever....not ONE, has ever identified a genetic mechanism (and nobody's even tried it!) that prevents genes from diverging indefinitely once two populations that were previously the same species became isolated. If you want, you can go ahead and say that all of these facts don't prove it. I'm not going to stop you. However, whether or not a supernatural agent is present in this world, the fact remains that given all we know and I have said in this ridiculously long paragraph, we could have evolved from a common ancestor with chimps and bonobos. Further, we could have evolved from a common ancestor with all primates. Further still, all mammals, and all vertebrates, and all animals. This had been posited most famously early on by Charles Darwin. Now, our vast riches of fossil evidence compared to then, and DNA evidence which we couldn't have examined in Darwin's time, has corroborated and confirmed that it is all possible. 

Given all of that, the only thing you can say is "well, it's implausible that it all ended up this way, and I think a god had to do something". I will accept that the odds that everything ended up exactly this way are slim. However, you have to consider the difference in "I won the lottery" vs. "Somebody won the lottery". 

I'm sure you accept the scientific theories concerning weather patterns. Those fly directly in the face of Thor throwing lightning. Do they fly in the face of Yahweh's actions? Probably not although I haven't read the entire bible yet. I've also not seen a Christian complaining about meteorology being taught in a classroom, so I'll assume maybe not (and if so, it's one of those parts of the bible all Christians ignore...). You probably accept heliocentrism and an (oblate) spherical earth, even though verses in your bible seem to contradict that! Because of popular rhetoric, that is your comfort zone. Accept the astronomy, the meteorology, but be cynical when it comes to the biology. If you've been on a plane you have some personal experience regarding the earth's curvature as it's somewhat evident from that altitude. However, when it comes to meteorology, I guarantee you that you have about the same level of evidence to the validity of meteorology as you do to biological science regarding our origins. You can have a hot shower and see droplets on your ceiling and steam on your mirror. Equally, you can DNA test yourself and your children, and your parents, and your siblings, and your cousins, and your second cousins, and see how the change occurs. If you were to map whole genomes, you could even see which genes you got from each parent, and which were copied perfectly, and which not (AKA mutations). The assumed age of our common ancestor with chimpanzees (before we were able to examine DNA) fell in line with the age when we measure the rate of DNA change between generations. Do you not consider this solid evidence? (As usual with my posts, please be sure to directly address the bold bits)

caposkia wrote:

Jabberwocky wrote:

caposkia wrote:

 

Anyway, The point that the change is NEVER abrupt leads me further into doubt about those changes as described taking place... You're telling me they are never abrupt, which means the fusion likely happens over an extended period of time.... and we have NO actual physical proof of the transformation... not even a part of it... that to me is a problem for the theory.  

Are you deliberately trying to misunderstand this? The fusion isn't gradual. The fusion is a very specific detail. If you compare a human and a chimp chromosome, you can calculate roughly how many generations ago a common ancestor would have existed. By abrupt, I mean something like creationists typically look for (one "kind" giving birth to another "kind" where kinds are at LEAST at the genus level, and sometimes all the way up to the kingdom level in the most idiotic cases, like when Ray Comfort says "They're still bacteria!&quot.

http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/past-exhibitions/human-origins/understanding-our-past/dna-comparing-humans-and-chimps

Here is a little page with some information about DNA. It's very basic information, but if you read that, it says that there are about 35 million differences between human and chimpanzee base pairs. When talking of these 35 million differences, those 35 million diverged gradually. However, each single one of those 35 million changes had to happen abruptly. So if it's 6 million years, that's about 6 differences a year. If we take an age range for how long one generation was, and use a broad range like 15-35 years between each parent/child, you get between 90 and 210 differences in base pairs between parent and child. Even 210 out of 3 billion (roughly the number of base pairs that both us and chimps have total) certainly doesn't seem like a lot. All it takes is selection pressures to drive it a specific way.

 

Here is an exerpt from a different page on that same site.

Quote:

Tracing the Human-Chimp Ancestor

By comparing DNA sequences from humans and chimpanzees, experts calculated that the last human-chimp ancestor lived roughly six million years ago. Later, the discovery of a hominid fossil dating back six to seven million years supported this claim.

Why do you think that when geneticists run the math, they come up with the same numbers as geologists/archaeologists?

I want to read the link before posting a reply to this, but for some reason the link brought me to an "error page"... will you try to post it again?  

The article appears to be gone. Try this link:

http://web.archive.org/web/20140419091212/http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/past-exhibitions/human-origins/understanding-our-past/dn...

If that doesn't work (you might have to do it yourself) then go here:

https://archive.org/web/web.php

Paste the original link in there, and click April 19th. It worked for me, but I do get an error page as you do with just the original link now. 

Jabberwocky wrote:

 I must split this to address this point individually. To begin with your first sentence(ish), evolution never claims to explain how things got started. That lies in other scientific fields. Creationism doesn't explain it either. It asserts it without any supporting evidence. Evolution doesn't tackle it because it's not equipped to, and doesn't claim to. On average, evolutionary biologists probably know more about abiogenesis than the average layperson, but they are certainly not deemed experts at it. So, to your next bit, proving evolution vs. proving darwinism... The point here is that nobody has ever demonstrated that there is a limit, or a cutoff to how far it WILL go. Nobody has ever shown that genes all of a sudden stop changing. They mutate. Copying errors happen. Based on rate of genetic change that we can measure, the conclusion is that us and chimpanzees 100% could have evolved from a common ancestor. There is no odd bump in that road that is unexplainable. It is also proven that even further back a common ancestor between us and all of the other great apes, and further still, the other primates is possible as well. It is proven that a common ancestor between us and all other animals is possible. It is proven that a common ancestor between all animals, plants, AND fungii could have existed as well. No geneticist, not even a creationist one, has EVER proven that this can not happen. Isn't this puzzling, considering that creationists want so SO badly to find this?  As far as proving evolution vs. proving darwinism, the only difference is time. More time = more change (although the rate of change does vary depending on selection pressures driven by environment). As I said in the above paragraph, we have seen that there is nothing to suggest that there is a limit to this rate of change. So what is it that prevents you from accepting this? Is it a lack of time? Do you believe that there is indeed a limit on genetic change regardless of large quantities of time (even though nobody has ever demonstrated this)? Or is it some third option I can't see at the moment?  

 What prevents me from accepting this is lack of evidence that it actually happens that way... Sure we can deduce that there is no limit to how things can evolve, but the oxymoron that us and chimpanzees 100% could have is not compelling evidence that Creationism is wrong.   A "could have" conclusion is in no way scientific, it's an assumption based on what we think we know.   I don't disagree that there really is no limit that we are aware of as far as how much something can evolve.  but I do believe due to lack of evidence as you so blatently state about Creationism that it does not prove Darwinism over Creationism.  I think we're all pretty much on the same page with evolution with the exeption of origins which you and I agree is not evolution.  Therefore, evolution i don't think is going to bring progression to the Noah conversation.  

 

Jabberwocky wrote:

 I don't see it as having a shaky foundation. It appears to me that you do. You mention that it's not a scientific fact. This shows your misunderstanding. Let me list some facts.  

 ok 

Jab wrote:

 - No fossil has EVER been located that puzzled the scientific community as to its location in a geological column, or its location geographically 

 why would it? 

 - In modern times, many previously undiscovered fossils have been found that were similar to expectations based on data we already had 

 - Geographic distribution of living organisms and fossils suggest that a gradual change over time has occurred 

 - Study of DNA and genes in general (a more recent ability we now have) has agreed 100% with all assumptions of universal common descent. 

and what are the odds of all that being planned?  Created that way if you will?  And based on what?  I only ask that based on the idea that the "odds" we are talking about are quite small.

Jabberwocky wrote:

caposkia wrote:

Jabberwocky wrote:

caposkia wrote:

 

Anyway, The point that the change is NEVER abrupt leads me further into doubt about those changes as described taking place... You're telling me they are never abrupt, which means the fusion likely happens over an extended period of time.... and we have NO actual physical proof of the transformation... not even a part of it... that to me is a problem for the theory.  

Are you deliberately trying to misunderstand this? The fusion isn't gradual. The fusion is a very specific detail. If you compare a human and a chimp chromosome, you can calculate roughly how many generations ago a common ancestor would have existed. By abrupt, I mean something like creationists typically look for (one "kind" giving birth to another "kind" where kinds are at LEAST at the genus level, and sometimes all the way up to the kingdom level in the most idiotic cases, like when Ray Comfort says "They're still bacteria!&quot.

http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/past-exhibitions/human-origins/understanding-our-past/dna-comparing-humans-and-chimps

Here is a little page with some information about DNA. It's very basic information, but if you read that, it says that there are about 35 million differences between human and chimpanzee base pairs. When talking of these 35 million differences, those 35 million diverged gradually. However, each single one of those 35 million changes had to happen abruptly. So if it's 6 million years, that's about 6 differences a year. If we take an age range for how long one generation was, and use a broad range like 15-35 years between each parent/child, you get between 90 and 210 differences in base pairs between parent and child. Even 210 out of 3 billion (roughly the number of base pairs that both us and chimps have total) certainly doesn't seem like a lot. All it takes is selection pressures to drive it a specific way.

 

Here is an exerpt from a different page on that same site.

Quote:

Tracing the Human-Chimp Ancestor

By comparing DNA sequences from humans and chimpanzees, experts calculated that the last human-chimp ancestor lived roughly six million years ago. Later, the discovery of a hominid fossil dating back six to seven million years supported this claim.

Why do you think that when geneticists run the math, they come up with the same numbers as geologists/archaeologists?

I want to read the link before posting a reply to this, but for some reason the link brought me to an "error page"... will you try to post it again?  

The article appears to be gone. Try this link:

http://web.archive.org/web/20140419091212/http://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/past-exhibitions/human-origins/understanding-our-past/dn...

If that doesn't work (you might have to do it yourself) then go here:

https://archive.org/web/web.php

Paste the original link in there, and click April 19th. It worked for me, but I do get an error page as you do with just the original link now. 

thank you.  I don't have time righ tnow, but I will get to this... I didn't want you to think I ignored it