HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: cust_ts@klaava.Helsinki.FI (Tero Sand)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: macroevolution
Date: 1 Sep 92 10:27:10 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki

In article <95045@bu.edu> colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
>1.) I didn't mention Margulis by name.
>2.) I can't count the plant examples because unspecified animal
>crosses yeilded different results.
>3.) Antti doesn't count speciation as macroevolution.
>4.) Antti thinks I'm lying about the rocks (no support given for
>this assertion).
>5.) I can't be absolutely sure two species of brachiopods from
>the Jurassic were not "good species" reproductive isolated.
>6.) An irrelevant ad hominem attack.
>7.) Some (unspecified) net biologists disagree with me.
>
>All but number two and four are irrelevant. Number two indicates
>Antti is incapable of rational thought. Number four indicates that
>Antti would like to dismiss portions (as we have seen, _large_
>portions) of reality that don't conform to his cartoonish view
>of the world in which he is a prominent biologist (snicker) and
>evolutionists (such as myself) are lying about data for some as
>yet unspecified reason. Gee, I guess that about raps it up for
>evolution, eh? ;-) Come on Antti, can't you better than that?

Just to clear things up, as I understand it Antti is not a biologist,
he's a birdwatcher. He compares himself to Darwin and calls himself a
"field biologist".
-- 
-Tero Sand
  EMail: cust_ts@cc.helsinki.fi     Snail mail: Auroran Sairaala os. 6-1
  (if that doesn't work, try                    Nordenskioldinkatu 20
   cust_ts@kruuna.helsinki.fi)                  00250 Helsinki 25, Finland
From: mcgrath@cs.uiuc.edu (Robert McGrath)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Linguistics and evolution
Date: 2 Sep 92 20:16:44 GMT
Reply-To: mcgrath@cs.uiuc.edu
Organization: University of Illinois, Dept of Computer Science

In article <87705@netnews.upenn.edu>, weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) writes:
|> In article <1287@tecsun1.etl.army.mil>, riggs@descartes (Bill Riggs) writes:
|> >	It would help most of all if Matt translated this blurb into
|> >English. I read it through three times and still didn't understand the
|> >point he was trying to make. (i.e "linguistic, dental, and genetic
|> >classification...were (?) found...")
|> 
|> If you can't even comprehend something as basic as what I wrote, and
|> have no idea what I'm alluding to, you certainly are in no position to
|> comment about the evidence for evolution.
|> 
|> Is the word "dendogram" even part of your vocabulary?
|> -- 
|> -Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Hmm.  Its not in mine either, at least in the sense that I never hear or
use it.  I guess I'm a total idiot despite my degrees in anthropology and 
psychology.

I thought Wiener's remarks were intelligent and to the point, but 
scarcely simple or easy to read.

Since there are no prerequisites to reading this news group, authors 
are presented with the difficult task of writing clearly without knowing 
the background of the reader.  I sympathise, but I think it is incumbent
upon the author to attempt to communicate clearly.

I do not sympathize, however, with the "if you can't read the technical
jargon of my field you must be a moron" attitude.  Wouldn't it be
more appropriate to assume that Riggs is intelligent enough to know
he didn't know the words, and even better, brave enough to admit that 
he didn't.  When I teach, I give people A's for such behavior.
Perhaps you should exchange some private e-mail explaining some of the
terms instead of insulting him and all of us with this attitude.

It's not amusing nor productive and it makes you look like an idiot.
If you don't mind my pointing that out.

-- 
  Robert E. McGrath
  Urbana Illinois
  mcgrath@cs.uiuc.edu
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: ford@hpmcaa (Dan Ford)
Subject: Re: Proof: God wrote the Bible
Organization: HP Cardiology Business Unit - McMinnville, OR
X-Newsreader: Tin 1.1 PL5
Date: Tue, 01 Sep 1992 15:51:14 GMT

Ka Chun Yu (kachun@astro.as.arizona.edu) wrote:
> 
> Let's see, we can let A=1, B=2, C=3, . . . , X=24, Y=25, Z=26.  Then
> 
>   R o n a l d  W i l s o n  R e a g a n
> 
>   18+15+14+1+12+4 + 23+9+12+19+15+14 + 18+5+1+7+1+14 = 202.
> 
> Then we multiply by 3 since that's how many names we're using giving us 606.
> But wait, RWR's most 'important' job was the presidency, so we should add that
> in too as well as the fact that he served two terms:
> 
>   P r e s .
> 
>   16+18+5+19 + 2 (terms) = 60.
> 
>   606+60 = 666!!!
> 
> --
> *Ka Chun Yu                 * "Deputy dog dog a ding dang depa depa deputy     *
> *kachun@as.arizona.edu      *  dog dog a ding dang depa depa . . ."            *
> *                           *                         --"Don't Let's Start"    *


  Here's an easy one for Ronald Reagan, just count the letters in each of
his names!

      | Ronald |  | Wilson | | Reagan |
      +--------+  +--------+ +--------+
          6           6          6          = 666       !!!

That should be enough to tell us his true colors.  :-)

Dan
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen)
Subject: Re: macroevolution
Organization: University of Joensuu
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 12:26:15 GMT

czl30@duts.ccc.amdahl.com (Chris Lee) writes:

>In article <1992Sep2.171616.11246@cs.joensuu.fi> asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen) writes:
>>	You seem be willing to misunderstood things and make white seem black. 
>>	That is called lying and in this you evolutionists are good. 
>>

>A question for Andreas:

>I do not know what an "evolutionist" is. Can you give me your definition?

	Evolutionist is a person that believes in macroevolution (only).
-- 

		Andreas - Siperian Sirri   Siberian Stint

	No ITU, love, evolution.           Tuusniemi ! Siis imein suut !
From: Dr.Pepper@f241.n103.z1.fidonet.org
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Young earth creationist logic NOT!
X-Sender: newtout 0.02 Aug 21 1992
Date: 28 Aug 92  00:36:00

 > From: lawson@acuson.com (Drew Lawson)
 > Message-ID: 1992Aug25.153745.9579@acuson.com

 > I know that biblical content is not admissable in a scientific
 > context.  I have said so repeatedly.  What disturbs me is the
 > trend to
 > use the presence of {fossils, isochron dates, sediment layers,
 > etc.} as
 > EVIDENCE for the non-existence of God.  While it may lead an
 > individual
 > to loose faith, it is not proof of that matter.

Then you are absolutely in the wrong place. This is about EVOLUTION, not
ATHEISM. Do i have to slam your head against the wall before it sinks in? WE
are NOT, repeat, we utterly REFUSE to declare that God does not exist!!! I
will gladly swear in a court of law that the presence of fossils, etc do NOT
prove there is no God! Some people believe he does, other don't. BOTH groups
can be found doing evolutionary science.

What will it take to get you to understand?

+--------------------------+--------------------------------------+
| 10                    2  | Garden Grove Institute of Technology |
|        DR PEPPER         | Community Outreach Center            |
|                       4  |                                      |
+--------------------------+ Snail Addr: Unit #1, 7872 Trask      |
| The best thing about     |             Westminster, Ca  92683   |
| voting Republican is it  | Modem:      714-894-7039             |
| feels so good when you   | Fidonet:    1:103/241                |
| stop.                    | Candynet:   42:1001/1                |
|                          |                                      |
+--------------------------+--------------------------------------+

---
Xref: sparky talk.origins:10609 sci.skeptic:15693
From: riggs@descartes.tec.army.mil (Bill Riggs)
Newsgroups: talk.origins,sci.skeptic
Subject: Re: Linguistics and evolution
Date: 2 Sep 92 00:54:07 GMT
Followup-To: sci.skeptic,talk.origins
Organization: LNK Corpoarion, Riverdale, MD

In article <87429@netnews.upenn.edu> weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener) writes:
>In answer to the question of how biological evolution is important to
>linguistics of all subjects, I know of two.  One is the question of the
>origin of language itself.  The second is the origin of the variety of
>languages.
>
>Direct comparison between monkey brains and ours reveals different roles
>for various speech areas.  Some researchers, in reconstructing what a
>proto-language must have been like, argue based on such differences.
>Such work is still too speculative to be considered required reading
>in linguistics, but it's by raising hypotheses and testing them that
>scientific progress gets made.  And yes, aspects of this are testable,
>for example, in regards to how children learn language, or network
>models of what happens when fine larynx control overlaps with spatial
>learning.
>
>The question of the origins of the variety of language is turning into
>yet another glorious triumph for evolution.  Working independently,
>linguistic, dental, and genetic classification of people around the
>world were found to fall into almost the exact same patterns, with
>certain obvious exceptions (eg, American Blacks speaking English).
>The linguistic side is still highly controversial (the relevant work
>came to a head ~5 years ago), but the massive coincidences involved are
>just too implausible and important to ignore, and will probably do more
>(for now, anyway) than any purely internal linguistic deductions to
>establish the linguistic classification.
>
>As an aside, contrast this with the paucity of linguistic research
>inspired by the tower of Babel story.
>
>The Santa Fe Institute has a new collection out on the role of complexity
>and evolution in the origins of language.  My copy is at home--if anyone
>wants more details, let me know and I'll post a complete reference and
>perhaps replace the mushy descriptions above. 

	It would help most of all if Matt translated this blurb into
English. I read it through three times and still didn't understand the
point he was trying to make. (i.e "linguistic, dental, and genetic
classification...were (?) found...")

	Bill R.


	"My opinions do not represent those of my employer or any
government agency."
-- 
Bill R.
Newsgroups: talk.origins,sci.skeptic
From: prl@csis.dit.csiro.au (Peter Lamb)
Subject: Re: macroevolution
Organization: CSIRO Division of Information Technology
Date: Thu, 3 Sep 1992 06:52:16 GMT

asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen) writes:

>	The real biologist has rubber-boots that are never dry. 

Gosh. Does this mean that there's no biology to be done in arid areas? I'd
better run over to the local Uni's Biol Sciences people and tell them that
they're only allowed to work in swamps from now on.

-- 
Peter Lamb (prl@csis.dit.csiro.au)
From: bvickers@valentine.ics.uci.edu (Brett J. Vickers)
Subject: Re: ICR and Hugh Ross
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Reply-To: bvickers@ics.uci.edu (Brett J. Vickers)
Organization: Univ. of Calif., Irvine, Info. & Computer Sci. Dept.
Date: 31 Aug 92 23:53:17 GMT
Distribution: world,local

lippard@skyblu.ccit.arizona.edu (James J. Lippard) writes:
>I have a single extra copy of each of the July and August 1991 issues
>of the ICR's _Acts & Facts_ and _Impact_ periodicals.  The two _Impact_s
>are attacks on Hugh Ross.

Just curious:  Does the ICR call Hugh Ross' Christianity, faith,
or lack thereof into question?

--
 ___            _    _     _  _        _
(  _) ___ ___ _( )__( )_  ( )( ) o  __( ) _  ___  ___  ___
(___)(_) (__=) (_)_ (_)_   (__) (_)(_((_)(_'(__=)(_) _(_)
Brett J. Vickers (bvickers@ics.uci.edu)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: dave@hpdstma.ptp.hp.com (Dave Waller)
Subject: Re: Evol & God : CANNOT Co-exist!
Organization: Hewlett Packard
Date: Fri, 28 Aug 1992 18:49:03 GMT

In article <1992Aug28.004002.4893@ccu.umanitoba.ca>, vnelson@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Gerald Vernon Nelson) writes:
|> In <1992Aug27.125924.21174@linus.mitre.org> m23364@mwunix (James Meritt) writes:
|> 
|> >In article <1992Aug27.050110.21622@ccu.umanitoba.ca> vnelson@ccu.umanitoba.ca (Gerald Vernon Nelson) writes:
|> >}All life on this planet can only have a single point of origin.
|> 
|> >Why?
|>  What caused the origin of the very first cell?
|>  Did God make the first cell?  Yes or No?  It is a binary question.
|>  
|>  You cannot answer, god did, but it did it by itself too.
|> 
|>  God and evolution are contradicting theories.

No, Vern, Creation and Evolution are contradicting theories. There is no
reason at all that, assuming evolution is true, God *must* be non-existent.
For example, I can make a car, put gas in it, and turn the key. The motor now
runs all by itself without any intervention or participation on my part.
The fact that, examination of what makes the motor run does not indicate
that I am actively involved in making it go does not preclude my existence.

Similarly, God could very well have created the Universe 15 billion years
ago with a physical nature that would, running by itself, result in the
spontaneous generation of life and the concomitant evolution of intelligent
species, all without the hand of God having anything to do with the progress
of the process. This does not preclude the existence of God.

God and evolution are not at odds with each other. Creation theory and
evolution are at odds with each other, and it is what creationists believe
to be the nature of God that leads to a conflict between evolution,
spontaneous abiogenesis, and creationist theory.

In my view, God, if s/he does exist, is having a good laugh at the expense 
of the creationists, who just can't seem to see how much more miraculous
and wonderful a creation that runs by itself is vs. one that requires
constant fiat tinkering.

Retract that. S/he probably cries in sad anguish.

-- 
Dave Waller
Hewlett-Packard Co.
Workstation Systems Division
Sunnyvale VAB Consulting
(408) 746-5324
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: Tim.ONeill@utas.edu.au (Tim O'Neill)
Subject: Re: answer to John Ata's whining
Organization: University of Tasmania, Australia
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 04:23:58 GMT

In article <1992Sep1.013810.28124@augean.eleceng.adelaide.edu.AU>, dabbott@augean.eleceng.adelaide.edu.AU (Derek Abbott) writes:

> If one party is polite and the other is rude (in any debate or argument)
> then to an outside observer, the "rude party" is the one that looks
> suspicious and insecure about its own theory.
> 
> I know this is a cruel assumption that people make (as the real reason could
> be that the "rude party" simply is immature & has bad communication
> skills, but happens to have the correct theory) but that is the way things
> are.

Another reason, Derek, could be that after refuting the same tired old 
non-arguments time after time, after having the same sophistical tricks 
attempted day in and day out and after having masses of evidence presented 
but ignored over and over again, your politeness fuse burns down and you 
start switching into scorn-mode.

But what are you doing here Mr Abbott? What hath Creationism to do with JFK?
(Or were evolutionists in on the plot too?)

Tim O'Neill
Tasmanian Devil
From: dkristof@Pt.hq.af.mil (Capt Dave Kristof)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Question for Creationists
Date: 2 Sep 92 11:00:01 GMT
Organization: Headquarters Air Force, The Pentagon Washington, DC

For you Creationists out there, a simple question:

What is the purpose of mankind?  

-- 




______________________________________________________________________________
   CPT Dave Kristof USAF               COMM:  703-697-3576
   dkristof@pafosu1.hq.af.mil
From: rh@smds.com (Richard Harter)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: macroevolution
Date: 3 Sep 92 06:47:36 GMT
Reply-To: rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter)
Organization: Software Maintenance & Development Systems, Inc.

In article <1992Sep2.170957.11021@cs.joensuu.fi> asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen) writes:
>colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby) writes:
>>Her name is Lynn Margulis.

>	Thank you. And she is majoring at ...

You are putting us on, aren't you?

-- 
Richard Harter: SMDS Inc.  Net address: rh@smds.com Phone: 508-369-7398 
US Mail: SMDS Inc., PO Box 555, Concord MA 01742.    Fax: 508-369-8272
In the fields of Hell where the grass grows high
Are the graves of dreams allowed to die.
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Logic and God (was: Young earth creationist logic NOT!)
Date: 1 Sep 92 18:13:55 GMT
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: duffy@aslss02.asl.dl.nec.com (Joseph Duffy)

In article <1992Sep1.161110.15317@asl.dl.nec.com>, duffy@aslss02 (Joseph Duffy) writes:
>>We have no direct evidence--in your sense--regarding the building of the
>>Pyramids, but I think the evidence is conclusive that they were indeed
>>built, on location, roughly 3-4 millennia ago.  Do you?

>Yes, I do believe the pyramids were built.

I see we are making progress!  We agree that it is possible to make inesca-
pable conclusions about the past, without live videotapes.

>					    As to exactly how they were built
>I don't see how I can make any definite statments however. I can come up
>with some good theories. In any event I will be interpreting the pyramids
>based on my current knowledge of cause and effect, etc.

So you see that there is a spectrum of knowledge.  And you agree that it's
possible to be quite certain about the general facts, yet clueless regarding
the particulars that go along with the facts.  You and I are quite certain,
and not in any dogmatic way, that people built the Pyramids.  And I've read,
and maybe you have too, plausible speculations of how they did so.  And yet
that's pretty much all such explanations can be for now, short of a tablet
explaining construction or other such, yet this major gap in the details in
no way diminishes our certainty regarding the building of the Pyramids.

>							 What current
>knowledge is there for interpreting "constructive" processes that have
>occurred in the past? To continue our example, based on my current cause
>and effect associations, I would conclude that the pyramids did not occur as
>a result of natural processes (unaided by human intervention) in the past 
>since I dont see carved stone structures occurring that way today.

And just as important, no such natural process is known, or even remotely
plausible.  If there were some such, and the conditions for them to operate
were simply rare, we might have doubts concerning the human building.

>								    So I'm
>just asking the question to those whose knowledge of evolution exceeds mine:
>What current processes do we have that parallel those in the example above
>to interpret the construction of say, the first cell?

We're not quite at this level.  Enough to be pretty certain regarding
abiogenesis--most of the required steps seem to be possible.  It's hard
to be convincing regarding quantity.  Certain aspects seem to favor a
deep vent origin, say, and others an ultraviolet exposed ocean surface.
There's no contradiction--we don't know enough to specify which parts
came first.

Anyway, I don't see your point at all.  Do you agree that it's possible
to be nondogmatically convinced regarding the building of the Pyramids
by humans, without having a foggiest notion of how they were actually
built by humans?
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen)
Subject: Re: macroevolution
Organization: University of Joensuu
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 11:03:41 GMT

kring@efes.physik.uni-kl.de (Thomas Kettenring) writes:
>Anti-evolution books are discussed on t.o, and they generally contain nothing
>but misrepresentations of scientists' utterings, bold assertions, and strawmen.
>Could you be more specific?  Which of those three things do you talk about?

>There exists a saying in German, "you have to pull the worms out of his nose
>one for one", meaning that you have to ask several times until you finally get
>an answer...

	Here in Russia it's rude to answer right to the question. 

	Have you read the little blue book "Life - how did it get here, by 
	evolution or creation ?". 
-- 

		Andreas - Siperian Sirri   Siberian Stint

	No ITU, love, evolution.           Tuusniemi ! Siis imein suut !
From: duffy@aslss02.asl.dl.nec.com (Joseph Duffy)
Subject: Re: Logic and God (was: Young earth creationist logic NOT!)
Organization: NEC America, Inc. Irving, Texas
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 1992 14:20:14 GMT

In article <1992Sep1.014954.18408@rhrk.uni-kl.de> kring@efes.physik.uni-kl.de (Thomas Kettenring) writes:
>In article <1992Aug31.194458.7777@asl.dl.nec.com>, duffy@aslss02.asl.dl.nec.com (Joseph Duffy) writes:
>>My point is that the origin of life is not directly observable
>>and therefore dogmatic statements about origin are out of line
>>on either side of the issue.
>
>Dogmatic statements are always out of line, about every subject, and we all
 ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
>know that.
 ^^^^^^^^^^
>
>>P.S. If you follow the original thread you'll see that videotape
>>was given as an example of good evidence in a burglary case. Hence the
>>satirical videotape comments. 
>
>Ah, that was satire!  (I mistook it for ignorance.  Well, it's probably ignorant
>satire.)
>
>I set Followup-To: talk.origins.
>
>-- 
>thomas kettenring, 2 dan, kaiserslautern, germany
>Science is like democracy - it's not perfect, but it's the best thing available.

Should I take the above dogmatic statement as satire, ignorance, or 
ignorant satire? 

Thomas, are you having a bad day? Your response seemed a bit emotional.
From: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Shuffling a new deck
Keywords: chance
Date: 27 Aug 92 15:49:34 GMT
Reply-To: weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu (Matthew P Wiener)
Organization: The Wistar Institute of Anatomy and Biology
In-reply-to: jjh00@outs.ccc.amdahl.com (Joel J. Hanes)

In article <a30G02lt1fa001@JUTS.ccc.amdahl.com>, jjh00@outs (Joel J. Hanes) writes:
>In _Wonderful_Life_, S.J. Gould points out that most phyla that exist
>today were present in the Cambrian, along with a bunch of others that
>have gone extinct -- there's actually less diversity today at the
>phylum level (among animals) than there was 500 M years ago.

Gould's assertion is strongly disputed by numerous paleontologists.
-- 
-Matthew P Wiener (weemba@sagi.wistar.upenn.edu)
From: swf@teradata.com (Stanley Friesen)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: _Evolution From Space_ odds, part 2
Keywords: Hoyle, chance, probability, histones, amino acids, DNA
Date: 3 Sep 92 01:20:06 GMT
Reply-To: swf@tdat.teradata.com (Stanley Friesen)
Organization: NCR Teradata Database Business Unit

In article <1992Aug29.013645.2143@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU> lfoard@Turing.ORG (Lawrence C. Foard) writes:
|I think the biggest problem is the assumption that life started as
|is. Why can't there be a bootstrap process involved?

No reason at all.  This is in fact central to Cairns-Smith's clay-origin
hypothesis.  I think he even uses the word 'bootstrap' in some of his
writings.


-- 
sarima@teradata.com			(formerly tdatirv!sarima)
  or
Stanley.Friesen@ElSegundoCA.ncr.com