Australopithecus Sediba

Well, that is a tough question, isn't it? I've actually thought about this before and I'm still unsure. Say a being comes down from the sky claiming to be "God" and he can perform miracles, yeah? We still can't just right off the bat believe that this truly is God because really, it could just be an entity that has control over incredibly advanced technology that we can't distinguish between the divine.

It has happened and we have evidence of this.

 

What the hell is a kind?

 

All bears are a kind. All insects are a kind. All bacteria are a kind. All mammals are a kind. All apes are a kind.

It depends on which argument against evolution you're using.

 

I'm okay with "I don't know." To me, that is an honest answer.

Either I missed your point when you said, "Well no, we haven't had a genus splitting event, obviously"--or... Please explain. You say it hasn't happened "obviously" and yet you say it has. Something is amiss here.

 

Family. Sorry that the term is so freaking controversial.

 

I said we haven't seen a genus or family splitting event but we obviously have evidence that it has happened.

 

You also said it has happened. Anyway...what is the evidence that it has?

 

Fossil record, DNA evidence.

 

I guess you'll need to spell it out for me. I'm not one to just "take the word" of the "scientific" community on all aspects of human "evolution."

 

Sounds fine to me, but I'm gonna do that tomorrow. Sleep time, night!

 

Yeah...I went to bed too. Hope you slept well.

 

I haven't been sleeping well, been sick. But anyways, I guess I'll start by asking you what you know about DNA.

 

Assume I'm as educated as you are. I'm a bright cookie, despite what you may hear.

 

Okay then, you know that every organism on this planet at least shares a little DNA. Now, for anybody that knows anything about inheritance, this would seem to indicate that every organism on this planet is related. How can we take this further? Well, if evolution were to be true and if we were to be related to every organism on this planet, we should share more DNA with our closer relatives (chimpanzees, mammals in general) than with our not so close relatives (sea sponges, bananas). This is EXACTLY what we see. So, this alone is pretty definitive evidence.

 

Stop right there. Isn't that assuming that the function of DNA is fully known? DNA is simply a code. And, there is really no evidence that the code was passed on from ancient ancestors since DNA doesn't survive long enough to find it in fossils. Furthermore, RNA is the prime candidate for ancient and earliest organisms gene transfer. You are starting with an unproved and unprovable assumption. Because of this assumption, the paradigm of evolution history and the phylogenetic tree is begun.

This isn't definitive at all. Can you see that you start with an assumption and then build a premise upon that assumption, and then from there extrapolate a theory?

 

You're right, that totally proves the Bible right and science wrong. How silly of us.

Face it, you're out of your depth here.

 

You're not impressing me with your quick wit and intellectual intercourse. Move on, little boy.

 

What do you mean there is no evidence that the code was passed on? We KNOW how DNA passes on to offspring.

 

Certainly, but not across families of creatures (but technically, we don't know "how" it does it, but rather just that it does).

The code does not have to be a single line that then branched. That is an unevidenced assumption.

 

You're absolutely right that evolution is based on the assumption that a living organism based on DNA descends from living organisms that are most likely to be based on DNA as well.

If you see anything wrong with this assumption then please state your concerns. Because there can indeed be concerns; it is not unprovable (or unfalsifiable, which is the preferred term). In fact, it is quite easy to falsify, - simply present evidence of a DNA based organism that does not descend from DNA based parents.

 

Huh? We know perfectly well how DNA "does it".

Oh, and we do actually have inter-familiar crosses (though not in 'creatures', but in plants).

 

I will hurry up and retract this statement as taxonomy today does not allow for such occurrences. There only remains taxonomically valid examples of inter-generic hybridization.

 

Sure--but there is no evidence of families branching.

That's not what I'm arguing. I'm saying there is no evidence to suggest that different families of organisms are related in any way except that the "stuff" that makes up the organism is the same "stuff." All claims that there is inter-relatedness biologically are pure speculation based on an assumption of all DNA branching from the same source--a trunk of the phylogenetic tree. The fact that all organic life is "similar" in how it fundamentally functions, does not NECESSARILY mean that there is a unity of origin. That is simply an assumption and supposes INCREDIBLE odds for it to be true considering the age of living organisms (simple cells=3.8 bill. yrs. ago, complex cells=2 bill. yrs. ago, multi-cellular=1 bill. yrs. ago).

 

Taxonomic groups are arbitrary designations. If you agree that DNA is inherited, then what you're arguing makes no sense. Continuous speciation is eventually going to result in an organism that diverges from its ancestor so greatly that it will be classified as belonging to a new family. How else do you explain our shared DNA with every organism on this planet?

 

It isn't pure speculation because we know how DNA works. The only other possibility is that "God" poofed down every organism to have some of the same DNA sequencing. The problem is that this isn't a scientific hypothesis because it is untestable and it flies in the face of Occam's Razor and what we already know about DNA inheritance.