Out of Africa

Every now and then, apostate Ed Babinski favors me with a core dump. I'm reposting my side of the correspondence:

Creationist admits at AIG website that humans (dispersing from Tower of Babel [sic]) began shorter and small brained (H. habilis and H. rudolfensis) BOOKZ

To answer this challenge specifically with humanlike animals (or ape-like humans) in mind, we must develop a new understanding of biological similarity, one that embraces common design and creation but that also explains the meaning of the similarities, which admittedly is a theological problem as much as a scientific one.

Gee, Ed, that's impressive!

While we're on the subject:

1. Asian-Americans are generally taller than native Asians. And since there's a rough correlation between brain size and body length (e.g. pygmies), it is evident that Asian-Americans evolved from protohuman hominids in 19C Japan, China, &c.

By the same token, Northern Europeans are generally taller than South Americans. Therefore, Northern Europeans evolved from South Americans.

2. Salamanders have fish-like properties and lizard-like properties. Therefore, salamanders evolved from fish–unless salamanders evolved from lizards, or lizards evolved from fish, or fish evolved from lizards.

By the same token, the Thylacine has lupine properties and marsupian properties. Therefore, the Thylacine evolved from wolves, unless wolves evolved from marsupials.

“You don't see Prof. Todd Wood of Bryan College as straining to accommodate data that clearly fits evolution?”

That begs the question by treating evolution as the standard of comparison.

“Evolution is not a theory in crisis. It is not teetering on the verge of collapse. It has not failed as a scientific explanation.”

Then why did we witness all that internecine warfare between Gould, Dawkins, Ruse, Piker, and John Maynard Smith? Looks like a fight to the death.

“There is evidence for evolution, gobs and gobs of it. It is not just speculation or a faith choice or an assumption or a religion. It is a productive framework for lots of biological research, and it has amazing explanatory power.”

That’s a nice string of assertions.

Of course macroevolution is speculation. At best, evolution is underdetermined by the evidence. It extrapolates from bits and pieces of trace evidence from the past, or extrapolates from the present into the distant past.

“There is no conspiracy to hide the truth about the failure of evolution.”

Then why do Eugenie Scott et al. turn to the courts to censure dissent in the classroom?

“Behe at the Discovery Institute also has come out in favor of common ancestry based on the genomic evidence, including not just overall similarity but based on shared non-functioning genes (for creating vitamin C for example, that are still there but no longer functioning in both chimps and humans), and shared non-functioning genes from retroviruses that have inserted themselves into the same regions of human and chimpanzee genomes.”

Thanks for telling me something I already know. I can always count on you to arrive right after closing time.

I own Behe’s book, in which he says that. (I also own Collins’ book in which he makes the same claim.)

As a matter of fact I emailed Behe and asked him about an alternative explanation, and he agreed with me.

I notice that you don’t interact with the arguments of Dembski and Wells to the contrary (in The Design of Life).

“As with most YEC treatments of this issue, Wood fails to explain why, as one goes back in time (stratigraphically lower) the less like us the most advanced hominds look.”

Of course, on a YEC timescale, “going back in time” would be going back a few thousand years. So what does more or less “advanced” mean within that tight chronological framework?

The commenter seems to be subconsciously superimposing his own timescales onto YEC, then attempting to generate a problem. But, of course, that’s incoherent. It conflates some elements of an internal critique with some elements of an external critique. But that’s for documenting the incompetence of the opposition.

“Neither the ‘common designer’ argument nor Flood geology begins to account for this, or the similar patterns for countless other animal and plant groups.”

Since YECs don’t generally view “less advanced” hominids as precursors to modern man in the first place, they don’t view this as a more primitive stage of the same hominid line. So what is there to account for?

“YECs also fail to grasp that debating whether ‘humans’ are descended from ‘apes’ is largely moot in view of the fact that biologically and taxonomically we _are_ apes. Humans are members of the family hominidae (great apes) which includes gorillas, chimpanzees, orangutans, and several extinct genera.”

Of course, these taxonomies are merely human constructs.

There are different ways to group various biological organisms, depending on which features you wish to single out (to the exclusion of other features).

“Then there is the contradiction between YECs denying evolution (at least macro-evolution), and their suggestion that major genetic changes (including the creation of new allelles--essentially ‘new information’ ) took place since the Ark landed a few thousand years ago. That would require more rapid and dramatic evolution than even mainstream scientists allow, but they pretend to not notice these glaring inconsistencies, as they talk out of both sides of their mouth.”

Of course, that objection confuses macroevolution with accelerated microevolution.