HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: Real issues for Antti
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Date: Wed, 30 Sep 1992 23:23:42 GMT

In article <1992Sep30.155024.14018@cs.joensuu.fi>, asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti
Siivonen) writes:
> kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub) writes:
> >  Now math, is that Empirical or not?  None of the concepts expressed in
math
> >allows any kind of direct observation until it is applied to the real world. 
On
> >the other hand, mathematics is probably the only field where one can prove
> >things in the strictest sense of the word prove.
> 
> 	You answered your own question. If I have one apple and then another,
> 	that makes two apples, mathematically 1 + 1 = 2. The rest of math is
> 	just applications of this rule. Very empiric. 

  Non-mathematicians often get stuck on this idea.  Mathematics has no garantee
that 1+1=2 without a large number of axioms added on.(*)  And math makes
absolutely no claims about apples.  As far as math is concerned, there is no
reason to believe "having apples" is additive.  this is merely an application.

(*) Z2 comes to mind as a simple counterexample.  In Z2 1+1=0.

  Consider just Field Theory.  Most people are used to just dealing with
numbers, but this is only one possible Field out of an infinite selection, most
of which are not even slightly homomorphic to the reals (hmm, what exactly would
"slightly" homomorphic by? :)

>>  No, some people say there is a small chance of it not being true.  There
are
>>enormous mounds of evidence _for_ evolution, while I have yet to see even a
>>single piece of evidence against evolution which stood up to analysis.  It is
>>you who are grasoping at the 1%.
> 
> 	No, I said the probability of evolution is 
> 
> 			1
> 		----------------
> 			350,000
> 		      10

  No, you claim that is the probability of abiogenesis.  This probability is
calculated from some "formula".  The example you gave, at least, delt with
_evidence_.  That means one has to look at _evidence_ to make a proper
comparison.  There is a great deal of evidence, probably enough to make the
chances evolution did not occur considerably smaller than the odds you give for
abiogenesis.

 |  __L__   *******************************
-|-  ___    * Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub   *
 |  | o |   * kv07@iastate.edu            *
 |/ `---'   * Iowa State University       *
/|   ___    * Math Department             *
 |  |___|   * 400 Carver Hall             *
 |  |___|   * Ames, IA  50011             *
 J  _____   *******************************
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: lking@athena.mit.edu (Loren King)
Subject: Re: Observations
Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1992 15:33:01 GMT


In article <1992Sep28.123356.25628@city.cs>, lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun)
writes:

|> In article <1992Sep25.132130.19649@athena.mit.edu> lking@athena.mit.edu
|> (Loren King) writes:
|>
|> >In article <19920924.131829.48@almaden.ibm.com>, mannk@fshvmfk1.VNET.IBM.COM
|> >(Ken Mann) writes:
|> >
|> >|> Lawrence C. Foard writes:
|> >|> >And why can't an animal evolve into another? Evolution is >>observed<<
|> >|> >all the time.
|> >|> 
|> >|> I frequently see this statement in this newsgroup.
|> >|> Please list >>observations<< of animals evolving into other animals.
|> >|> Who has observed this happening?  And what did they observe?
|> >
|> >
|> > ... and while they're at that, could you please show me
|> >some examples of divine creation ... show me God creating
|> >things; don't just tell me that she or he did ... I want
|> >to see the act AND the actor ... I want to observe it
|> >happening!
|> 
|> You just need to be at the right place at the right time. There
|> are numerous examples of withered arms and legs being grown back
|> or re-created by God. Check out one of these maybe.
|> 
|> --
|> Lionel Tun   (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk)
|> Vision Group, City University, London, EC1V 0HB. 071-477 8000 x 3889


No-no!  I don't want to see withered limbs growing back ... I want to see a
divine, omniscient, omnipotent being actually do it.  You see?  I want to see god
in the same way that Ken Mann wants to "see" a species evolve.


________
Loren King
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: History of Creationism
From: lippard@skyblu.ccit.arizona.edu (James J. Lippard)
Date: 28 Sep 1992 13:26 MST  
Distribution: world,local
Organization: University of Arizona
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.41    

I've just seen a new book which should be of great interest to both
creationists and their opponents in this newsgroup.  The book is
Ronald L. Numbers, _The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific
Creationism_, 1992, N.Y.: Alfred A. Knopf.  The back cover has favorable
comments from Martin Gardner, Walter Hearn (of the American Scientific
Affiliation), and Henry Morris.  Numbers is a professor of the history
of science and medicine at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.  His
previous contributions to the history of creationism include the book
_God and Nature_ which he co-edited.

Jim Lippard              Lippard@CCIT.ARIZONA.EDU
Dept. of Philosophy      Lippard@ARIZVMS.BITNET
University of Arizona
Tucson, AZ 85721
From: schnitzi@cs.ucf.edu (Mark Schnitzius)
Subject: Re: Randi's award (was Re: Observations)
Organization: University of Central Florida
Distribution: world,local
Date: Fri, 2 Oct 1992 03:34:17 GMT

lippard@skyblu.ccit.arizona.edu (James J. Lippard) writes:

>In article <1992Sep30.181531.4453@desire.wright.edu>, sbishop@desire.wright.edu writes...
>>Then there is The Amazing Randi, debunker extraordinaire, who has offered
>>a $10,000 reward for years to anyone who can produce a genuine bonafied
>>miracle for him.  So far, no takers, none, not one......

>Oh, there have been plenty of people who have taken him up on his challenge--
>over 50 of them, I believe.  None have collected.

I quote Randi's book "Flim Flam", published in 1987:

	In response to [the challenge], over 650 persons have applied
	as claimants.  Only 54 (as of this writing) ever made it past
	the preliminaries, and none of them ever got a nickel.


Mark Schnitzius
schnitzi@eola.cs.ucf.edu
Univ. of Central Florida
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu (Scharle)
Subject: Dryopithecine fossil
Reply-To: scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu (Scharle)
Organization: Univ. of Notre Dame
Date: Mon, 5 Oct 1992 17:42:35 GMT

    In a recent issue of Science, there is a review article and a
research article about a dryopithecine fossil (Dryopithecus branchoi)
which is possibly the most recent common ancestor of apes, 
chimpanzees and humans yet found.  Apparently this is also evidence 
for the idea that humans and chimps are more closely related to each 
other than either is to gorillas.  Any comments from knowledgeable 
people?

    Science vol. 257, 25 September 1992
    Ann Gibbon: Hungarian Fossils Stir Debate on Ape and Human
Origins, pp. 1864-5
    D. R. Begun: Miocene Fossil Hominids and the Chimp-Human
Clade, pp. 1929-33


-- 
Tom Scharle                |cm65n6@irishmvs(Bitnet)
Room G003 Computing Center |scharle@lukasiewicz.cc.nd.edu(Internet)
University of Notre Dame  Notre Dame, IN 46556-0539 USA
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: jbm@hal.trl.OZ.AU (Jacques Guy)
Subject: Re: self-deceptive belief maintenance
Organization: Telecom Research Labs, Melbourne, Australia
Distribution: world,local
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 22:08:58 GMT

markwc@barney.esl.com (Mark Christiansen) writes:


>Define creationist, please.

Ah yes, not everyone owns a dictionary.

From "The Heritage Illustrated Dictionary of the English
Language, International Edition":

creationism n. Theology. 1. The doctrine ascribing the origin of
all matter and living forms as they now exist to distinct acts
of creation by God. Compare evolutionism. 2. The doctrine that 
each human soul is a distinct and new creation by God. Compare
infusionism.

From "The Collins Dictionary of the English Language":

creationism n. Theol. 1. the belief that God brings individual
human souls into existence at conception or birth. Compare
traducianism. 2. the doctrine that ascribes the origins of 
all things to God's acts of creation rather than to evolution.

Note the reverse order. The Heritage Dictionary is American,
the Collins British.
From: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Real issues for Antti
Summary: I bet he doesn't answer this one, either.
Date: 29 Sep 92 19:11:45 GMT
Reply-To: isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak)
Organization: The Aurora Group

In article <1992Sep28.184330.19054@cs.joensuu.fi> asiivo@cs.joensuu.fi (Antti Siivonen) writes:
>isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak) writes:
>>I propose a more basic quiz for Antti:  Accurately state the
>>theory of evolution by natural selection.  Briefly describe
>>at least four independent lines of evidence which support it.
>
>	Ha ha ! How can I answer such question, when I claim that there are 
>	no supporting lines of evidence at all !

I didn't ask whether you agreed with it.  The object is to demonstrate
that you have some knowledge of the subject you're talking about.
If you don't know enough about a controversial issue to argue in favor
of it, you don't know enough to argue against it.

Answer the questions, or admit you don't know the answers.
-- 
Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every
isaak@aurora.com      generation is humbled by nature." - Philip Lubin
From: watkins@uctvax.uct.ac.za
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Use of quotes around "evolutionist"
Date: 2 Oct 92 11:46:30 +0200
Organization: University of Cape Town

> "Evolutionist" is a word that was hijacked by the fundamental Christian
> sects that believe the Genesis creation legends actually happenned. Anyone
> else who uses it implicitly accepts the creationist meaning of the word,
> including all their assumed attributes.
> 
> Likewise "macroevolution" and "microevolution" are also their words. It
> is very difficult to use them in a debate because they are like moving
> goalposts. They have not been defined to everybody's satisfaction and
> seem to mean whatever the creationists want at the time.Which makes it
> difficult to debate constructively.
> 
> '"Evolutionist" = "person who believes in the theory of evolution"'
> is an example: belief implies acceptance without taking account the
> overwhelming evidence. To use it implicitly denies the evidence.
> 
> Until the definitions are fully understood by everybody, I will continue
> using quotes.
> 
> Chris Lee

The terms Evolutionist, Microevolution and Macroevolution are terms derived
from people who hold to the validity of the theory of evolution. They were not
derived by people who hold to the validity of the theory of creation. If the
term Evolutionist HAS been hijacked by creationists, as you maintain, then it
is simply because people dicussing the issue HAVE NOT DEFINED THEIR TERMS.ie.
Evolutionists have ALLOWED the ground to be cut from under their feet by having
their terminology transformed. 

However, I disagree with your premise that whoever uses the term Evolutionist 
implicitly accepts the creationists' meaning of the word, including all their
assumed attributes. This would include a number of prominent authors who
maintain the validity of the theory of evolution. YOU may continue to place 
quotes around the word Evolutionist, the rest of us prefer to ask what is meant
when someone uses the term. For understanding from where the other person is
coming-from is essential in any form of dialogue.

Gary
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: amorgan@Xenon.Stanford.EDU (Crunchy Frog)
Subject: Re: pi=3 (was Re: Abuse By t.o Regulars
Organization: Computer Science Department, Stanford University.
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 1992 20:26:18 GMT

In article <1992Oct1.174958.14160@wdl.loral.com> 
  mab@wdl39.wdl.loral.com (Mark A Biggar) writes:
>In article <1992Sep30.165653.12051@lsil.com> gascan@dcst16.dc writes:
>>That's either pi=3 or the most underrated miracle in the Bible.  
>>Show me a circle
>>ten units across with a circumfrence of 30 units and I'll accept creationism.
>
>Come on now, that's just a granularity of mesurement error. 

God doesn't make granularity of measurement errors (hey, maybe the
days in Genesis are just an "approximation" too...... what an amazing
concept).

>Mark Biggar

C Frog
From: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: the unbearable lightness of Antti
Date: 28 Sep 92 02:08:29 GMT
Organization: animal -- coelomate -- deuterostome

In article <1992Sep24.183319.4015@aurora.com> isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak) writes:
>In article <Bv26E3.191@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu> adpeters@sunflower.bio.indiana.edu (Andy Peters) writes:
>>(10 - the $20,000 question) Do you understand evolution?  Acceptable
>>    evidence would be answering Chris's short quiz of a couple of
>>    weeks ago (heck, just answer any two questions from it).
>
>In fairness to Antti, I would say that Chris' quiz was over
>the heads of even fairly well informed insterested laypersons

But, Antti is claiming that a scientific theory that is firmly
established (and has been for about 100 years or more) is wrong.
Such a statement surely requires extraordinary evidence in favor
of the new hypothesis _and_ a very clear understanding of the
current theory; you have to understand something before you can
rebut it. As it is Antti doesn't even seem to have a grasp of
his own specialty.

Any those questions could have been answered easily by opening a
population genetics text, looking up the key words in the index
and doing a little bit of reading. As you can see, Antti, the self
proclaimed biologist of greater stature than Darwin, couldn't even
manage this rather meager task. I actually worried about getting that
post slapped back in my face, but Antti's marvelous stupidity saved
me from net.embarrassment. Thank you Antti (if you are reading this,
or if someone is reading it (slowly) to you) for being the absolute
pinhead you are. "Don't go changin', to try and please me."

>Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every


Chris Colby 	---	 email: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu	---
"'My boy,' he said, 'you are descended from a long line of determined,
resourceful, microscopic tadpoles--champions every one.'"
 	--Kurt Vonnegut from "Galapagos"
From: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu (Chris Colby)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: evolution and natural selection
Date: 4 Oct 92 01:49:47 GMT
Organization: animal -- coelomate -- deuterostome

In article <73018@apple.Apple.COM> mikel@Apple.COM (Mikel Evins) writes:
>Point of curiosity: do the definitions below assume (as they
>seem to) some constant environment in which fitness is
>defined? 

Yes, for the most part they do. Most simple pop gen models assign a
fixed fitness value to each allele (although in frequency dependent
selection models each alleles fitness is proportional to it's
frequency in the population).

>It seems to me that evolution might alter the
>environment (in the smaller sense of changing the populations
>of organisms sharing it, or the larger sense of having effects
>on the climate or on chemical composition of the environment
>and so on), thus altering the fitness of the organisms in
>the environment.

Yep, fitnesses change over time (the white color morph of
_Biston_ _betularia_ (the Brithish moth) is reported to be
on the rebound). Environments change and (more importantly,
IMHO) populations change their own environments and the 
environments of other species they interact with. The 
simplest pop gen models don't reflect this, but you can 
always slap on added layers of complexity if you want.

Chris Colby 	---	 email: colby@bu-bio.bu.edu	---
"'My boy,' he said, 'you are descended from a long line of determined,
resourceful, microscopic tadpoles--champions every one.'"
 	--Kurt Vonnegut from "Galapagos"
From: mrl@st-andrews.ac.uk (  Michael Ladomery)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Atheistic creationism -- a tutorial
Date: 29 Sep 92 11:52:49 GMT
Organization: St. Andrews University, Scotland.

In article <1992Sep26.063123.5448@smds.com> rh@ishmael.UUCP (Richard Harter) writes:

deletion

>But that's not all folks, there's more bad news to come.  Let us
>suppose that the AB combination can propagate just as though it were
>a single favorable allele even though, as we have seen, it can't.
>It takes many generations for a favorable trait to fix itself in a
>population.  The number of generations depends on the selection
>coefficient, k.  This number is almost always quite low, e.g. .01

This is conveniently vague ("almost always quite low").

>or less, because fitness depends on many factors.  In turn this means
>that it takes thousands of generations to fix a trait.  When we take
>the fact that it takes on the order of a thousand generations to
>produce a single inidividual, we see that it takes millions of
>generations to fix the trait.

What about bottleneck effects? You see if a small population
carrying the trait becomes isolated, the frequency of that trait
will have increased (locally), and (locally) it would take less
time to fix it.

>Now we are talking about incremental improvements, i.e. the accumulation
>of traits.  Even allowing for overlap we end up with tens of millions
>of generations to produce species changes.  For animals with a generation
>of >=10 years, e.g. the hominid line of descent, we end up with
>hundreds of millions of years.  If we assume that the evolution of
>homo sapiens sapiens took 100,000 years from neandethal forbears,
>we seem to have lost three orders of magnitude of time.

Such a conclusion is derived from oversimplifications.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: jgacker@news.gsfc.nasa.gov (James G. Acker)
Subject: Re: antti's file of "nonr
Organization: Goddard Space Flight Center
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.1 PL6]
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1992 12:52:12 GMT

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

: 	Perhaps you don't actually know what Genesis teaches. Young earth is 
: 	rubbish. 
: -- 

	Perhaps you are actually a sophisticated computer program 
designed to mimic intelligent responses, too.  In which case, your syntax
is rubbish.
	
	Read my on-going presentation of progressive creationism, which 
accepts an old earth as both geologically and Biblically correct.

	Jim Acker
	jgacker@neptune.gsfc.nasa.gov
From: livesey@solntze.esd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Observations
Date: 28 Sep 92 20:03:29 GMT
Organization: sgi

In article <1992Sep28.123356.25628@city.cs>, lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
>
> You just need to be at the right place at the right time. There
> are numerous examples of withered arms and legs being grown back
> or re-created by God. Check out one of these maybe.

If there are "numerous" cases, then it should be easy to 
give us a reference to a few of them.

While you are at it, explain how you distinguish between a
spontaneous recovery, and "God did it".       I've always 
wondered about that one.

jon.
From: ksand@apple.com (Kent Sandvik)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: God = that which is most amazing...  why Jupiter and/or Saturn
Date: 28 Sep 92 00:41:48 GMT
Followup-To: talk.origins
Organization: Apple

In article <22@fedfil.UUCP>, news@fedfil.UUCP (news) wrote:
> 4.  Astronomers, members of the t.o crew etc. worshiping Carl Sagan
>     (very similar to 3).
     
> 5.  Africans destroying former idols, and creating new ones in the image
>     of Putt Mossman (the Evel Knieval of the 30's) after a fabulous
>     motorcycle diver off of a waterfall (which Mossman walked away
>     from).

I've seen silly examples, but these are the most insane artificial
ones I've ever seen. I'm sure all astronomers are turning to Carl Sagan's 
house direction four times a day for a prayer session.
 
> I have claimed that this planet once orbitted a small electromagnetic
> star, one pole forever pointed straight at that star, animals on the
> earth feeling gravitational pull not only of the earth, but of the star
> as well.  Only this allowed the giant antediluvian animals.

Are you working on a Conan story?

Cheers,
Kent
	Faith is often the boast of the man who is too lazy to	investigate. -F.M.
Knowles
-------------------
Kent Sandvik (UUCP: ....!apple!ksand; INTERNET: ksand@apple.com)
DISCLAIMER: Private activities on the Net.
From: bill@bessel.as.utexas.edu (William H. Jefferys)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: A question Bob has never answered.
Date: 30 Sep 92 17:01:47 GMT
Organization: McDonald Observatory, University of Texas @ Austin

...and while we're at it, just before Bales disappeared
the last time (in April) I posted the following article.
I see no reason to respond to his latest ruminations until
he has followed up on his promise made over a year ago.


Date: 11 Apr 92 13:35:33 GMT
Organization: McDonald Observatory, University of Texas @ Austin
Status: R

...and while we're at it, just before Bales disappeared
the last time (in August) I posted the following article.
I see no reason to respond to his latest ruminations until
he has followed up on his promise made over a year ago.

----------------[Reposted article follows]-------------

>From ut-emx!bill Wed Aug  7 14:01:52 CDT 1991
Article: 17064 of talk.origins
From: tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode)
Subject: Re: Holden, Jumbo, and the Fenykoevi elephant
Organization: Nyx, Public Access Unix @ U. of Denver Math/CS dept.
Date: Tue, 6 Oct 92 05:51:47 GMT

In article <1192@tdat.teradata.COM> swf@tdat.teradata.com (Stanley Friesen) writes:
>In article <1992Oct5.054244.23838@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> tlode@nyx.cs.du.edu (trygve lode) writes:
>|2) if a divine creator was involved in the selection of human muscle
>|origin and insertion points, we can conclude that this creator
>|failed its mechanical engineering courses very badly.
>|
>No, actually what we conclude is that the human being is not designed
>to do squats.
>
>Of course that is why we choose it as a sporting event (most performance
>sports involve pushing the functional limits of the human design).
>
>Now, for balancing a flexible rod (the backbone) in an upright position
>while providing steady propulsion across an uneven landscape, the set of
>muscle insertions we have are much more effective they do pretty much
>what is needed.

Point taken--though I still think our hypothetical creator should have
lost some points for providing us with a spine that seems only partially
adapted from one that would be used in a quadruped instead of one 
designed optimally for an upright posture.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Water Sorting
From: sbishop@desire.wright.edu
Date: 6 Oct 92 13:01:25 EST
Organization: Wright State University 

In article <1992Oct6.131208.23016@city.cs>, lionel@cs.city.ac.uk (Lionel Tun) writes:
> In article <n0b4et@ofa123.fidonet.org> David.Rice@ofa123.fidonet.org writes:
>>Tag: Lionel Tun (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk)
>> 
>>>The fossil record (even as assembled by 19th-century
>>>Creationists, not to mention the much more extensive work
>>>that has been done since then) clearly shows that different
>>>forms of life appeared at different times. Change
>>>unquestionably occurred; the only question is how.
>> 
>>LT> "All it shows is that different forms of life appear in the
>>LT> fossil record at different _layers_! [P] As to the interpretation
>>LT> of that, evo's say its because of evo, but an equally if not more
>>LT> valid interpretation is that of hydrological sorting in the flood.
>> 
>>Alas, you haven't been paying attention. Just how did water sort
>>the fossils by their age?
> 
> Hahaha, hahahaha. As the old saying goes, Circular Reasoning (TM)
> strikes again! You jest, no?
> 

No.  I'll rephrase the question.  Just how did the water sort the fossils
according to species?  

Sue


> --
> Lionel Tun   (lionel@cs.city.ac.uk)
> Vision Group, City University, London, EC1V 0HB. 071-477 8000 x 3889