Mod Idea: Simulating surfaces -> Borg Technology -> Twinkie Physics -> Worldviews

[Fyron]

Wow Krsqk, that long post hurt your argument a lot more than helped it.

It is nice to alter evidence to fit in with your pre-conceived notions, isn't it?

[ December 18, 2002, 19:37: Message edited by: Imperator Fyron ]

[Wanderer]

So many tuppenies in the pot. Perhaps enough to buy a round? Here's another couple:

Originally posted by Krsqk:
The truth is, there are no "simple" life forms; single-celled organisms are far more complex than we understand. As you've said, each cell has a built-in defense system, power plants, feeding system, etc.

Just as physicists keep finding smaller and smaller sub-atomic particles, so I found my biology classes spoke of smaller and smaller bits of organisms until I lost count/got bored.

The odds of all of those parts evolving simultaneously (as you say must have happened) would be much, much higher than what I've posted here.

I don't think any 'defence' system would appear immediately - you'd need the presence of hazards (defend itself from other organisms? but this is the first one ) and time for those to develop. Yes this would make any such creature very vulnerable for a (long) period, but if enough survive...

You're right that such complex things aren't likely to appear (talking evolution-style not creation-style ) all at once. The logical answer is that they didn't but developed over time. If that makes the initial stages of life on earth that we're postulating look utterly useless compared to modern-day amoebae, so be it. That doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

As for the probability stuff - did you factor in the number of stars in the universe and the number of planets likely to be circling them? It could be that life on Earth was an amazing piece of luck and that there are 10^20 (is it a billion galaxies with a billion stars? guess 20 planets per system including all the satellites) lifeless hulks out there. Is trying 100 trillion times a second reasonable? How did you get that number?

Plus you needn't run the simulated attempts enough times to ensure that the initial formation occurs, only to show that there is a significant chance of it happening. If you said "I can only get the figures to say 5%" I'd say "Well, we're here aren't we?"

A quick sound-bite:
Just because something is statistically improbable doesn't make it impossible.

On the other hand, I doubt play the lottery...

Oh, and the current vogue for universe age is about 14 billion years (at least at the time of writing, by the time I hit Preview Post it could have changed again... )

"How many [comets] did we start with?"
Short-period comets only have a life-span of 10,000 years.

I don't know the figures for comet-life, but surely it matters little given that new ones can appear? They're only icy rocks that get too close to the sun, and there's a huge number of rocks out there.

"Jupiter and Saturn are losing heat twice as fast as they gain it. They should have cooled off long ago."

Er, I don't think so. But I can't find anything useful, either way, in the first twenty Google results.

Volcanic "spewing" doesn't account for enough new mass to make up for it, though.

Aye, it's plate tectonics - if two plates meet they tend to push each other up (e.g. the Himalayas are the result of the Indian sub-continent pushing against the main Asian plate [or someone hid a lot of ancient fish fossils up there for a laugh ] also see Iceland and the mid-Atlantic ridge). Eroded soil doesn't disappear off the planet - I'd expect to see the material again eventually.

Sorry if this is a bit rambling, have been on the phone whilst writing it.

[Phoenix-D]

Fyron, I don't say this very often, but.. That wasn't helpful. Sssh.

Phoenix-D

[Krsqk]

I'm at a loss for where to start. First of all, I am not capable of personally verifying every piece of information I post here in the time frame permitted by this discussion. If all parties followed this rule, Posts would come about once every three weeks. I rely on others who have done research and trust that their information is both reliable and up to date. Obviously, both I and my sources are capable of error, and I am ready to learn when my information is in error. I am not a master of every branch of the sciences, nor do I have the time or the ability to stay current of even the major scientific journals. If you do, you either have a lot more free time than most or play much less SE4 than the majority of forum-readers.

That said, there is no cause to label me as "disingenuous" or state that I have altered the facts. On the one hand, I am to be an ignoramus, unlearned in basic science. On the other, I am to be learned enough in all the sciences that I am consciously editing or selecting which data I present. Which one is it to be?

Frankly, I am disappointed that members of this usually tolerant and friendly community would jump to such a conclusion so rapidly. One might recount previous instances where individuals determined to cause strife were shown much more courtesy than I have been here. An attack on one's character is not helpful to either side in a debate. Indeed, that is how debates of this nature have been stereotyped, although this one had not been personalized up to this point.

If this debate will continue in this direction, it is over on this side. E-mail and personal Messages are much better suited for that kind of communication.

I will do what research I can on the points I have posted. I do find it unlikely that none of them have merit or pose challenges to the evolutionary perspective. Keep in mind, again, that nothing I post is intended to be empirical proof for or against either viewpoint. Both are outside of the realm of empirical science. My post dealt with what I would or would not expect to observe in our universe based on each worldview. To construe it as submitted proof is to take it out of context.

I would enjoy the continuance of this civil debate, provided all parties (and the Moderators) involved find it agreeable.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Krsqk:
Neanderthal man was shown to be an old man with severe bone/joint disease (arthritis?). The misshapen face is a result of acromegaly--the forehead and other bones thicken with age.

What year do you think this is? We're not a the end of the 19th century when Piltdown man was still thought to be an ancient human. It's been around a century since the first Neandertals were found, and the several dozen specimens certainly aren't all simply misshapen individuals.

Further, you have the entire Homo genus going back 2.5 million years, then the Australopithecines before that.

No "transitional form" in the fossil record has stood the test of time. Each one has been shown to be something other than what it was first thought to be. Have you seen photos of the skeletons? Or just drawings of the fleshed-out artist's conception? Need I remind you of Java man and his history?

This is a completely false statement. You can see the transitionary forms of horses for example as they go from dog sized with many toes to modern-sized with a hoof. Or take bison, who have more than halved in size in the past 100,000 years.

Volcanic "spewing" doesn't account for enough new mass to make up for it, though. AFA the continental drift maps, why is Africa actually shrunk?

If it's shrinking it's because one edge is being pulled down into the magma.

What about all that dirt in between the continents on the ocean floor? The continents don't actually float, you know.

Yes, the continents do float. They float on a bed of molten rock. There is absolutely no reason why a continent can't shrink, all it takes is a subduction zone. Iceland grows larger every single year as the mid-Atlantic ridge pulls apart.

[Baron Munchausen]

Krsqk,

If you are using 'information' from someone else then let this be a warning to you about taking sources uncritically. At the very least you ought to have more than one source for a claim before using it. I am not a 'professional scientist' by any stretch. I merely read publicly available books and articles at the 'popular' level. Yet I could instantly see the obvious distortions and omissions in those claims.

All of the points I made can be checked Online using a good search engine like Google. There are lots of science magazines and even some pretty decent technical references (like the Usenet Physics FAQ at http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/ ) available. There are even some good references for common misunderstandings of scientific knowledge, like the Science Misconceptions Page at http://www.eskimo.com/~billb/miscon/miscon.html And of course you can look things up at any reasonably well-stocked library.

Given how easy the access to vast quantities of detailed scientific information is these days, I cannot see how anyone could look up the depth of the icecap on Greenland and not also learn about the fact that it is constantly being renewed. So the depth of the lost plane in the ice proves nothing except the high rate of turnover. Either this is a very over-eager partisan just grabbing 'facts' out of an encyclopedia and rushing to hurl them at the enemy, or this is a deliberate attempt at deception. The combination of all those distortions together makes it seem more likely to be the latter. I advise you to be very careful of the 'source' of these claims.

[ December 19, 2002, 16:30: Message edited by: Baron Munchausen ]

[capnq]

Even multiple sources agreeing doesn't necessarily mean a piece of information is correct.

Sometimes a source cites other sources as support, but if you trace the chains of references, you find a closed loop with everybody agreeing with each other and not mentioning any conflicting references. Groups that are pushing a political agenda are often the worst offenders here.

I had a friend in college who one discovered that a research paper she had cited had gotten the info from one of her own papers.

Then you have the "urban legends" that keep circulating even after they've been publically debunked.