Okay, I've looked over the articles, and I have to say that neither of them would stand a chance in a science magazine, much less a scientific journal. But I'll look past that and try to see them on their merits alone.
Okay, the first article starts off with a quote from some guy who might be a computer science professor at a college I've never heard of. Note that "computer science" != "biology". His quote "Instead, each stage of evolution is like already having a good hand and then drawing another card which improves that hand." pretty much shows that he doesn't understand evolution at all. From his analogy, it's as if there is only ever one instance of a species (the "good hand"), and that it's only allowed ONE mutation which HAS to improve it. If that were the case, then yeah, evolution would be a pretty stupid idea. But consider the populations of species. And how many times there is an accidental error when the DNA is copied. So basically, you have hundreds of thousands of good hands of cards, and you can draw a new card many times each one. Yes, a lot will become worse, but a few will be better. Of course the quality "better" in the natural world is defined as "more likely to reproduce successfully", and as such the "better" hands of cards (or new generations) will reproduce more, therefore increasing the frequency of the good mutations.
The second and third paragraphs are talking about abiogenesis, not evolution, and thus can be ignored.
Here, I'll put this in really big letters so that the creationists can't
possibly miss it this time:
EVOLUTION IS ABOUT SIMPLE ORGANISMS EVOLVING INTO MORE COMPLEX CREATURES. IT IS NOT, NOR HAS EVER BEEN, ABOUT NON-LIVING MATTER BECOMING LIFE. THE NEXT TIME SOMEONE BRINGS UP ABIOGENESIS AND TRIES TO LUMP IT IN WITH EVOLUTION I WILL PERSONALLY GO TO YOUR HOUSE, TIE YOU DOWN, AND SLAP YOU WITH A COLD FISH UNTIL YOU REPENT.
Okay. So the first article has been refuted as being simply a horrible analogy and complete ignorance as to what evolution is trying to explain.
Now, onto the second article. It's a big longer.
Okay, it starts with a bible passage, which is unfortunate for something trying to be scientific (here's a hint: when's the last time you saw a quantum physics paper or medical article prefaced by a quote from the bible?) But we'll look past that and try to see the rest of the article for what it is.
Well, the first paragraph is a doozy: "Creationists have often pointed out that evolution is unscientific because it can never be proved by science to be true. It is not happening at present and without a time machine, they can never be sure that it happened in the past." Oh really? So those "superbugs" that are changing to become immune to antibiotics, that's not evolution. So then, pray tell, what is causing their genetic codes to change if not evolution? Say "God" and I will tie you down and slap you with a cold fish again. But this paragraph shows a much deeper ignorance than that. It seems that whoever wrote this article
actually does not understand the purpose of science and scientific theories. I'm not going to bother explaining this; we've gone over it several times every time there is a thread like this. You all know why his labelling of evolution as "unscientific" is blatantly wrong. So, continuing on.
This second paragraph is pretty funny, because you could switch the words around and it would say exactly the opposite. Here, let's try this: "Regardless of how much an organism looks like it has evolved, creationists (without even sounding embarrassed) will insist that God has the power to make it look like it was evolved, even though it wasn't. Furthermore, no matter what fossil they find in its accepted place in the evolutionary record, the creationsts can "explain" how it got there."
It's really laughable, though, that anyone with a complete knowledge of biology (as someone who is trying to refute as important a theory as evolution shoud definitely have) could look at any given organism and say "oh yes, this was designed." Let me put it this way: if we were designed, then I would not hire God as an engineer. Again, you've all heard these arguments over and over again so I won't go into them. By now we're all agreed that if there was a designer, he was a few bricks short of a load.
The article goes on to talk about a couple of fossils found to have a little more detail and intact components than would be expected after tens or hundreds of millions of years. I don't know the explanation for why this is, so I'll give this one to the creationists. However, they ignore the tens of thousands of fossils found that look exactly like they should if they've been buried for tens of millions of years. I suppose God must have put them there. For fun. Or was it Satan trying to undermine our faith? I'd say he's done a pretty good job, seeing as no self-respecting biologist would ever say that they don't believe in evolution.
Next they start talking about something called the "Mohorovocic[sic] Discontinuity". They complain that it has never been seen except by observing seismic waves. Ignoring the very tenuous link between this and evolution (it's mentioned nowhere except on anti-evolution sites), it's still an odd thing for them to be wondering about. I wonder how else you would explain the seismic interference that clearly places the boundary exactly where it should be? Are the creationists arguing against the laws of physics and wave mechanics now? In any case, they don't even explain how this is supposed to disprove evolution. My guess is that it doesn't, and they're just *****ing about science in general.
And this is where the article gets weird. String theory? I thought this was supposed to be an article about evolution. Sure, string theory might be, and in fact probably is wrong... but I'd like to see an explanation as to how disproving string theory proves creationism. And I'm putting a condition on this: the next creationist who posts has to explain this to my satisfaction prior to making any other arguments. I think this is a reasonable demand.
So anyways, skipping down to where it actually mentions evolution again, and we see some evidence that our common ancestor is only a few thousand years old. The kicker, of course, is this sentence here: "But even if there were people living all during the past million years, how come they all kept the same genetic makeup until just a few thousand years ago?" Aha, so even the creationists admit that this doesn't necessitate an "Adam and Eve", just a small population with a fairly similar genetic makeup. However, they didn't "keep the same genetic makeup", as is stated there. The humans of a million years ago and the humans of ten thousand years ago were subsantially different, I'm sure. Then something happened which reduced the population to a very small pool of individuals (gee, could this happening be called "The Ice Age?"), which effectively erased any genetic variability. But the best part is still how the creationists admit that it doesn't even disprove evolution if we have a relatively recent common ancestor.
Then the next paragraph tries to cram every anti-evolution argument into as small a space as possible. So I'm going to cram every rebuttal into as small a space as possible. A link:
http://www.sciam.com/print_version.cfm?articleID=000D4FEC-7D5B-1D07-8E49809EC588EEDF
Actually that is a very good piece of writing. Everyone in this thread should read it.
Then we get into more stuff that has less to do with disproving evolution and more to do with, well, making **** up: "Yet evolutionists continue to control the scientific and education establishments, insisting that total evolution is a scientific fact and creation is religion, so only evolution can be allowed to be taught in public schools and colleges." There is one statement in here that's actually factual, and it is that we insist that creation is religion. I don't think there's any way around that, folks. Everything else stated in that sentence is garbage.
And then it talks about percentages of people who believe in God and don't believe in God. Yeah, okay, uh-huh. evolutionists "gloat" that the number of atheists is rising (wow, an astounding 14 percent!). Do you religious types really feel so persecuted that you think we're laughing at you when people convert to atheism? This, and the statement about there still being 85% of people who believe in God, has absolutely nothing to do with disproving evolution. I think it's trying to make the point that we should only believe and teach what the majority believes. Yeah, I think they're trying this over in some Arab countries. Maybe you guys should move there.
At this point I'm getting rather angry at the article. Where's the evidence against evolution that I was promised? What can you present that proves creationism? If I want to hear people piss and moan about science, I'll talk to SF_Gold and Obi. It ends with some more bible passages, but I do want to point out this little gem from the last paragraph: "The fact is that there is an abundance of objective evidence that the Bible really is the Word of God."
Let that sink in. The author of this article
actually believes that there is scientific evidence that the Bible was written by God.
I'll give you a few minutes to stop laughing.
One last thing, in really big text.
EVOLUTION IS NOT A FACT. EVOLUTION HAS NEVER BEEN, NOR NEVER WILL BE A FACT. STOP CLAIMING THAT WE CALL IT A FACT. THIS IS WRONG. THIS IS WRONG. THIS IS WRONG. DO YOU UNDERSTAND? NOBODY WHO STUDIES OR BELIEVES IN EVOLUTION WOULD EVER, EVER CALL IT A FACT. SO STOP MAKING UP LIES.
I have a challenge to the anti-evolutionists. Show me an article in a referreed, well-known, respected science journal that disproves every bit of evidence that we have for evolution, and I will convert to a religion of your choice. (Difficulty: I'm already Christian)
I hope this thread isn't closed by the time I post this.
