Darwin Monkey Business

1. Tyler
   April 9th, 2007 at 8:31 pm

   If it really was 'the (now proven) theory of evolution,' then it would become the 'Law of Evolution.'

   I'm not claiming that evolution isn't real or unprovable, but the nature of the theory is that evolution takes a very long time and so it takes a very long time to prove. Until then it is still a theory.

2. Zipper
   April 9th, 2007 at 9:14 pm

   Ditto, that is a point I first thought.

3. secret man agent
   April 9th, 2007 at 9:31 pm

   I gotta agree. It's mighty ballsy to call it proven. The fossil record is unfinished and there are too many missing links to validate the theory. I heard somebody say that, if anything, the fact that animals just appear on the fossil record might be proof of a higher power creating the animals instead of evolving from an animal before it.. That might be ballsy to say, too, but it just shows how wishy-washy the fossil record is at this point. Also shows how people still interpret things with bias.

4. mrgoodbar
   April 9th, 2007 at 10:42 pm

   No one debates that evolution is provable (just radiate some fruit flies and you can see the results of genetic mutation in a few days) but to state parenthetically that it is "now proven" is just beyond snarky.

   Neatorama works best when the posters stay away from their amateurish politicizing of topics.

   The other posters here are also missing the point when they say its "debatable". No one is debating evolution, but the continued obsession by the mis-informed about the theory's "status" is laughable.

5. anonymous
   April 9th, 2007 at 11:56 pm

   Darwin's contribution wasn't the theory of evolution, but the THEORY OF NATURAL SELECTION -- evolution clearly and scientifically takes place. Natural selection is the theoretical mechanism by which species evolve.

6. Alex
   April 10th, 2007 at 12:37 am

   Here's a nice, easy to understand article about the difference between how scientists and a layman define theory:

   "In layman’s terms, if something is said to be “just a theory,” it usually means that it is a mere guess, or is unproved. It might even lack credibility. But in scientific terms, a theory implies that something has been proven and is generally accepted as being true."

   Link

7. yayo
   April 10th, 2007 at 1:51 am

   Have you ever heard that corn when first met by europeans was a black small seed?

   I don't mix my political thoughts with this science facts. Those are the words of a fanatic.

8. Jehovah
   April 10th, 2007 at 5:32 am

   god is a delusion. Evolution is a fact.

9. Tyler
   April 10th, 2007 at 7:02 am

   Wow... I sparked a debate. And yes, it IS a debate.

   Semantics are important. And theories are just 'THEORIES' even when 'GENERALLY' accepted as being true. Science uses theories becuase it makes things easier to understand and explain, but a theory is a theory. A LAW is a LAW.

   I agree that evolution makes sense and is logical explaination of how plants and animals become plants and animals. But I am a stickler for semantics and theories are theories.

10. MisterTrilby
    April 10th, 2007 at 7:27 am

    This needs reposting.

    “In layman’s terms, if something is said to be “just a theory,” it usually means that it is a mere guess, or is unproved. It might even lack credibility. But in scientific terms, a theory implies that something has been proven and is generally accepted as being true.”

    "Theory" means more than "guess" or "hunch". Look it up. To debate evolution's factual status by pointing out that it is referred to as a theory doesn't just display ignorance of evolution, but also ignorance of dictionaries.

11. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 9:16 am

    If evolution is a process of natural selection and adaptation to ones environment, why did all the species, other than humans, that evolved from monkeys not make it? Wouldn't they have been better suited for the environment than the monkeys? If everything started with a single cell organism, where did that single cell organism come from?

12. yayo
    April 10th, 2007 at 11:01 am

    After a lot of new born materials and a lot of them lost in reactions, there came some capable of stand the environment without dissolving away in it...

    Everything did not started from a single cell organism but with a conjunction of materials, I mean that a cell can't be created by a thunderbolt as you may think. A cell is the joint of a lot of materials and single cell "entities" such as Golgi apparatus.

    Everything started with a protein.

    Monkeys DID in fact evolve, the selection and evolution can't stop. You may think that they did not evolve but they're perfectly addapted to their environment... why should they have some those long strong arms to climb up trees? We share common ancestors but they're not like them at all.

13. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 12:13 pm

    Everything started with a protein? Where did we get this protein? If a cell can't be created by a thunderbolt, how do you explain where this protein came from?

14. yayo
    April 10th, 2007 at 12:22 pm

    Ever heard about these two guys??

    http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aleksandr_Oparin

    http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Miller

15. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 12:58 pm

    Oparin - Taking into account the recent discovery of methane in the atmospheres of Jupiter and the other giant planets, Oparin postulated that the infant Earth had possessed a strongly reducing atmosphere, containing methane, ammonia, hydrogen, and water vapor. In his opinion, these were the raw materials for the evolution of life.

    ~He has an opinion, not a fact.~

    Miller - In the 1950s, Urey theorized that the early atmosphere of the Earth was probably like the atmosphere now present on Jupiter --i.e., rich in ammonia, methane, and hydrogen. Miller, working in his laboratory at the University of Chicago, demonstrated that when exposed to an energy source such as ultraviolet radiation, these compounds and water can react to produce amino acids essential for the formation of living matter. However, the early atmosphere of the Earth is no longer believed to have had this composition.

    ~Did you read that last part?~

16. Tonewah
    April 10th, 2007 at 1:52 pm

    '...(now proven)...'

    Oh, brother.

17. Hyper7
    April 10th, 2007 at 1:53 pm

    I agree with Jehovah. I always do. (Lightning, y'know?)
    Anyway, http://www.talkorigins.org/ has the answers.

18. yayo
    April 10th, 2007 at 2:06 pm

    Then you'll never get the truth... never ever...

    You must see the things from a neutral point of view and learn only from empirical facts.

    btw... do you chat with that Jehovah in that talkorigins forum? because I've read that hottie19 and JehovahUrSavior are not real hottie nor savior at all... They are just prea... I mean... Some fat ugly boys trying to make a foul of you...

19. yayo
    April 10th, 2007 at 2:40 pm

    I studied them at school when I was nine or ten years old. They recreated EMPIRICALLY those facts.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin_of_life

    now:
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protein
    "Proteins are large organic compounds made of amino acids..."

    I mean that once we've got rum and cola we've got Cubalibre. hahaha!

    Those reactions are posible in nature without the hand of a man. Those reactions are happening everyday everywhere ^^.

20. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 3:34 pm

    Looks to me like a bunch of ideas that nobody has conclusive evidence for. Therefore all you have is a theory. Just a bunch of scientific ideas. You still can't say evolution is to credit for today's life on earth. I still have a completely accurate New Testament about a man that really lived, and really did fulfil the prophecies of the older writings of the Old Testament. Therefore he has proven the Old Testament to be accurate as well. God is our intellegent designer. You can't prove the Bible wrong, and you can't prove your evolution to be right. As a Christian, I have nothing to lose and everything to gain in my beliefs. You, on the other hand, well, good luck.

21. mrgoodbar
    April 10th, 2007 at 3:44 pm

    "If evolution is a process of natural selection and adaptation to ones environment, why did all the species, other than humans, that evolved from monkeys not make it? Wouldn’t they have been better suited for the environment than the monkeys? If everything started with a single cell organism, where did that single cell organism come from?"

    ^^^ If the person who asked this question is genuinely seeking answers then I invite them to take some college level biology classes.

    Evolution and its underlying principles are hard to understand because like much of science they are counter intuitive to both human experience and the "just-so" stories that we pass down from one generation to the next in the form of creation myths.

    In absence of detailed observation and experiment the earth seems uniquely tailored for human beings, the sky (or "heavens") seem focused on the earth (and by extension, man) as the sole supreme inhabitant of the universe. It would be extraordinary for humans not to have dreamed up their own human-specific creation myths over the previous thousands of years and even more amazing for those beliefs to be easily discarded within just a few generations after Darwin...

    Understanding science (whether its biology, astronomy, geology, etc.) takes work in the form of lengthy study and its not always fun. The beauty of science though is that anyone, with enough study, can understand it all.

    What I see above are comments from people (some well meaning, some not) who are technically ignorant (I'm not saying they are dumb) of the underlying principles involved in evolution.

    Getting back to the poster who asked about monkeys and "single cell organisms" though... More than likely this person has already made up their mind about evolution and is using tired and uninformed arguments from religious creationists in an effort to shore up their own belief system. I challenge this person to put their money where their mouth is and enroll in college level biology classes... you'll be surprised just how much we know about biology and evolution.

22. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:05 pm

    It sounds to me like mrgoodbar has not done the research for the opposing side. How can you say "The beauty of science though is that anyone, with enough study, can understand it all."? Even the brightest sceintific minds don't understand it all. If that were so, they wouldn't have to keep studying it. You act as though you think science is flawless. Science constantly contradicts itself over and over. It's not a solid structure to base ones beliefs on. Science is constantly changing, often disregarding previous beliefs for new ones.

23. mrgoodbar
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:07 pm

    "Everything started with a protein? Where did we get this protein? If a cell can’t be created by a thunderbolt, how do you explain where this protein came from?"

    ^^^ By this line of reasoning, where did God come from, or rather, who or what created God? What existed before God? Did another, bigger, more powerful God created the current God which so many of us seem so familiar with?

    Life origins is an area of science which is still undergoing much research and theorizing. What's increasingly clear is that the supernatural (magic, God, whatever) probably didn't play a role in the start of life on earth. The origin of life can probably be articulated using natural phenomenon, rather than relying upon Zeus, or God, or Allah, or the Tooth Fairy.

    Everywhere we look in nature we don't find evidence of a creator, rather we find that natural processes, when allowed to run their course over billions of years can produce things (like us) which are capable of find other things (namely themselves) pretty amazing.

    Few places is the lack of evidence for a creator more evident that in the science of microbiology. The interior of cells are really messy, obviously cobbled together in a hap hazard way which no omniscient engineer would be proud of. Mitochondrial DNA is perhaps the most glaring example I can think of.

    As humans we often become entangled in language. We seem to divide the world into easily (to us) identifiable bits. Something is either alive or it is not. As intelligent beings we have a conscious notion of creating things (cars, computers, bad tv shows) from other components and for some reason we try to lay this human quality (of creation) on nature in the form of Gods or Devils. We have the feeling that because we are here, something must have placed us here. We feel self-important and the notion of life on our planet being caused by a series of chances seems insulting on a personal level.

    "Life" is a messy word and it doesn't always apply across the board to everything we encounter. Are proteins alive? Would you say that a virus is living? Where do you want the cut off to be? Plutonium is a natural element which changes over time (it decays into uranium) - would you say that it is alive? Hobbs said that humans were "matter in motion" - perhaps we're too caught up on what possess these ill defined characters of "life" and what doesn't?

24. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:25 pm

    God doesn't have a beginning. Without faith, you can't comprehend that. "Few places is the lack of evidence for a creator more evident that in the science of microbiology. The interior of cells are really messy, obviously cobbled together in a hap hazard way which no omniscient engineer would be proud of. Mitochondrial DNA is perhaps the most glaring example I can think of." This to me looks like a perfect example of intellegent design. Yeah, it is a mess and very complex, but it's all necessary for it to function correctly. I find it hard to believe that all those pieces fell together just right to make that cell function the way it does. The more complex something is, the more it points to an intellegent designer.

25. mrgoodbar
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:25 pm

    "Even the brightest sceintific minds don’t understand it all."

    ^^^^But science is accessible to anyone with access to a library, the internet, or a college campus. And anyone can contribute to the body of scientific knowledge. You don't have to be a high priest, a disciple, or chosen to transcribe mysterious golden plates (which are conveniently taken away) by an angel.

    "Science constantly contradicts itself over and over."

    ^^^ Science has an error-correcting mechanism which is unique in all of human knowledge. It is under continual refinement, in a way that myth and superstition is not. Einstein's theories replaced Newtons. Newton corrected assumptions by Galileo. Brahe refined Copernicus' notion of the heliocentric solar system. Copernicus tossed out Ptolemy and Aristotle's model of the universe... and so on.

    In so far as the concept of "truth" can be grasped by the human mind, science gets us much more closer to it than any system of knowledge which previously claimed to do so...

    We know that the earth goes round the sun despite what the bible says because our perspective is fundamentally different than the earthly authors of the bible who lived thousands of years ago. This is perhaps the best example of science getting closer to the "truth" than myth that I can think of...

    "It’s not a solid structure to base ones beliefs on."

    ^^^^ Indeed, I'm fond of saying that I don't have beliefs, I have well reasoned opinions.

    Science does change (it is refined and corrected over time) and for some people (often religious-types who have a strange obsession with getting to some sort of universal "truth") this causes them to be uneasy.

    It seems that some people need to grasp onto and support themselves with what they consider to be a fundamental "truth". Notions like "God is Good, he loves me and my family, he created everything" are very strong statements about the nature of reality. By comparison science never makes such black and white statements and I can understand why people are uneasy with a system which is so obviously open to revision by anyone willing to put in the time and research.

    The irony is of course that in locking themselves into such a ridged interpretation of "truth" these people wind up ultimately believing in a form of reality which is very likely false.

26. mrgoodbar
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:33 pm

    "I find it hard to believe that all those pieces fell together just right to make that cell function the way it does. The more complex something is, the more it points to an intellegent designer."

    Only that Mitochondrial DNA doesn't serve any purpose in cellular processes and it is theorized to be a four billion year left over from early single-cell evolution.

    But forget your cells for a minute. Have you ever had your appendix removed or known someone who has? Why would an intelligent designer create such a malformed organ for which the only apparent function is to occasionally blow up and kill us? And don't even get me started about cetaceans and their hip bones...

27. yayo
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:42 pm

    So... I've readed up there that everything in that book is true ^^

    And... So... ¡¡Don Quijote existed!!

    It's true! it's wrote in a book!

    It's the same argument of those products with a big star reading "As seen on tv!"

    "With walk on water action, As seen on the bible!!" haha ^g^

28. Someguy
    April 10th, 2007 at 4:43 pm

    http://www.remnantofgod.org/creation.htm#brain

29. yayo
    April 10th, 2007 at 5:08 pm

    T-Rex eat vegs? My dog eaten them the whole life! he felt better eating those (only one species of grass). He died old and omnivorous as any other home dog. But a dog is omnivorous because of it's relation with the man. The original wolves remain carnivorous.

    That femur is not human. I'm not a biologist but it's clearly not human because it's a fab haha:
    http://www.mtblanco.com/html/giant_tale.html

    I can't tell you a word about IMAX history because it's clear that there's a wrong word in the begining: "Censorship"

    Polystrate fossils are singularities among the whole fossil record. The same way as a single dinosaur being fossilized from the billions and billions ever on earth is a singularity, there must be some environment conditions for it to happen. The fossil record is uncomplete because of that... I mean that you can't take as the truth that some hand put those bones in stone and scattered them around because... It's a tale and not a reason ^^
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polystrate_fossil

    And I'll stop reading those fairy tales because it's ten past mid night and I wake up at 6 ^^

30. Alex
    April 10th, 2007 at 6:47 pm

    "Only that Mitochondrial DNA doesn’t serve any purpose in cellular processes and it is theorized to be a four billion year left over from early single-cell evolution."

    Mitochondrial DNA does have function - mutations in mitochondrial DNA lead to several diseases such as Kearns-Sayre Syndrome.

31. secret man agent
    April 10th, 2007 at 9:50 pm

    I just gotta say, I love how none of these comments have anything to do with the booze being advertised.

32. mrgoodbar
    April 10th, 2007 at 10:06 pm

    "I just gotta say, I love how none of these comments have anything to do with the booze being advertised."

    It just shows how completely asinine and tone deaf some of the authors here at Neatorama can be.

    What could have been an interesting and historically curious post was sidelined by yayo's amateurish attempt at politicizing the post.

    And I'm the guy who has spent the entire thread trying to offer a semi-articulate defense of evolution and science.

    Careless posts like this, and the ignorant, overly reactive magical thinkers they enrage make my daily internet fix a lot more stressful.

33. yayo
    April 11th, 2007 at 2:04 am

    Sorry, but I said in the post that evolution is considered a fact by actual science and not in those times. Do you really think that scientific knowledge is a political or religion belief?

34. secret man agent
    April 11th, 2007 at 10:13 am

    'Do you really think that scientific knowledge is a political or religion belief?'

    Not so much scientific knowledge, just evolution. It threatens most religions throughout the world, and politicians tend to be religious. Politics and religion.. yep, there you go.

35. reid
    April 12th, 2007 at 8:07 pm

    ABSOLUTE PROOFS DO NOT EXIST OUTSIDE OF MATHEMATICS, THREAD OVER

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