HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: bvickers@valentine.ics.uci.edu (Brett J. Vickers)
Subject: Re: More Gish
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Reply-To: bvickers@ics.uci.edu (Brett J. Vickers)
Organization: Univ. of Calif., Irvine, Info. & Computer Sci. Dept.
Date: 22 Jan 93 08:39:02 GMT

trott@remus.rutgers.edu (Rich Trott) writes:
>[Gish's] CLAIM #3:  "The alleged horse series was created more out of
>imagination than from fossil evidence.  The fossils for this series
>are not found in the proper time sequence as indicated by the
>evolutionist, and the major types _appear abrubtly_ without
>transitions.  And there is an interesting discrepancy in the skeletal
>development of this series.  [Visual showing Eohippus with 18 pairs of
>ribs, Orohippus with 15 pairs of ribs, Pliohippus with 19 pairs of
>ribs, and Equus scotti with 18 pairs of ribs]"

The skeletal evidence Gish refers to is the toe structures in North
and South American horse ancestors.  The North American horse ancestor
phylogeny (equidae) is largely orthogenic and shows a diminishment
from three toes (in Eohippus) to the one toe of modern Equus.  Gish
then compares this with a totally different lineage of horse-like
ungulates in South America known as the litopterns.  Here, Gish argues
that horse ancestors show a progression from three toes to one toe
back to three toes again.  Thus, there seems to be some problem with
evolution since there are two horse-like lineages illustrating
different directions as far as the number of toes goes.

There are basically two problems with Gish's reasoning.  The first is
that Gish fails to realize or to understand that litopterns were an
isolated group of ungulates (afterall they evolved in South, not
North, America), thus they were not on the same phylogenetic branch as
equidae.  In other words, they had diverged from a common ancestor
prior to the Eocene.

The second is that the evolution of the litopterns was not as
orthogenic as that of equidae.  The phylogeny of the litopterns shows
the following development of toe structure in litopterns:

                       3 toes (M)
                         /
                       /
1 toe (T)            /
   \   3 toes (D)  /			Key: (M) _Macrauchenia_
    \  /         /			     (T) _Thoatherium_
     \/        /			     (D) _Diadiaphorus_
      \      /
       \   /
        \/
        3 toes

As you can see, the one toed _Thoatherium_ shared a recent ancestor
with the three toed _Diadiaphorus_ (two of these toes were
substantially recessed), and they even coexisted during the Miocene
epoch.  If this phylogeny were approached as though it was purely
orthogenic, it would appear to someone like Gish that the litopterns
had started with three toes, went to one toe, and then returned to
three toes (at the top with _Macrauchenia_).  However, that is not the
case.  Instead, _Thoatherium_ was merely a one-toed cousin of the
rest of the litoptern lineage which maintained three toes.

Source: _Science and Earth History_, by Arthur Strahler. Prometheus
	Books, Buffalo, NY, 1987.
--
Brett J. Vickers
bvickers@ics.uci.edu
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: sandvik@newton.apple.com (Kent Sandvik)
Subject: Re: Ideology and Indoctrination
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 02:08:08 GMT
Organization: The Language Game Inc.
Followup-To: talk.origins

In article <1k0tpu$5mp@agate.berkeley.edu>, philjohn@garnet.berkeley.edu
(Phillip Johnson) wrote:
> I recognize that this frank talk will cause offense.  My purpose
> is not to insult anyone, however, but to free minds.  Many of you
> have been indoctrinated not to question assumptions that are
> based on ideology rather than evidence.  You can be free of that
> indoctrination if you wish to be.

The issue of indoctrination is certainly valid (thinking about the horrible
theories Stalin's biologists created as part of the political
indoctrination).
This works the other way around, a religious indoctrination makes it hard
to gasp the possibility that chance rules in the universe. Actually I do
think the biggest limitation the human mind has is the constant assertion
that things are constructed or created because they show elements of
intelligence. I do think that the evolving complexity theory will show how
small parts could interact in random and suddenly show rational behavior.
Many
of the current experiments in artificial life has also already shown us
that randomness actually creates organizational behavior,  easily.

And there's not a big step to the next level where biological entities
using random processes are able to create higher level intelligence levels
that suddenly becomes aware of the environment.


Kent
---
sandvik@newton.apple.com. ALink: KSAND
Private activities on the Net, opinions are not Apple's, they are mine.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: cdminter@icaen.uiowa.edu (Corey D Minter)
Subject: Re: More Gish
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 11:08:20 GMT
Organization: University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA, USA
X-Newsreader: NN version 6.4.19
Keywords: one more

I had the 'pleasure' of seeing a rigged debate here at the Univ of
Iowa with MR Gish about 4 years ago.  Reflecting now, I suppose any 
real biochemist wouldn't stooped to Gish's level.
The local religious brought him here then set up a rigged debate where
a communication major attempted to rebut him.  The student admitted his
position only at the end of the 'debate', which I thought he did a good
job though he just didn't have the right background for the second
rebuttal, he sort of broke down.
    I remember Gish's big claim was the unlikeliness that a protein
could just assemble itself given the astronomical number of configurations.
I gathered that he didn't understand evolution at all.
    Someone correct me but I believe he's very literal with the bible
suggesting floods etc,  (not that there were no floods, just not The
Flood).

In addition, I wonder why he thinks that GOD put the fossils there in
the first place, the ones that have survived because of lucky conditions.
-- 
cdminter@icaen.uiowa.edu / cdminter@eng.uiowa.edu (Qlink: EarthsWake)
"The face of a child can say it all, especially the mouth part of the face."
"We tend to scoff at the beliefs of the ancients.  But we can't scoff at them
personally, to their faces, and this is what annoys me."  -Jack Handy, SNL
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Subject: Re: Moon Dust
Reply-To: danwell@IASTATE.EDU (Daniel A Ashlock)
Organization: Iowa State University
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 21:53:16 GMT

In article <1k1a58INN3d1@dmsoproto.ida.org>, rlg@omni (Randy garrett) writes:
> One piece of evidence advanced for a young universe concerns
> the depth of dust on the moon.  In my younger years, I remember
> quite a bit of concern about the depth likely to be encountered
> on the moon.  Many people expected 20 - 40 feet of the stuff
> based on calculated accumulations.  Fortunately for Neil 
> Armstrong, there turned out to be much less -- of order
> a few inches.  Anyone know what the accepted reconcilation
> of the discrepancy is?
> 
>
   Vacuum bonding.  Dust stays dust on earth in part because adsorbed air 
makes it hard for dust particles to bond.  On the moon they flow back 
together slowly.

Dan
Danwell@IASTATE.EDU
From: livesey@solntze.wpd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Topic for Discussion?
Date: 27 Jan 1993 06:39:25 GMT
Organization: sgi
Distribution: world
NNTP-Posting-Host: solntze.wpd.sgi.com

In article <1993Jan26.063616.1725@smds.com>, rh@smds.com (Richard Harter) writes:
|> In article <1k1qapINN2t7@fido.asd.sgi.com> livesey@solntze.wpd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:
|> >In article <1993Jan25.073120.16066@smds.com>, rh@smds.com (Richard Harter) writes:
|> >|> In article <1jvl9vINNl54@fido.asd.sgi.com> livesey@solntze.wpd.sgi.com (Jon Livesey) writes:
|> 
|> >|> >I think you are misunderstanding what I'm saying.   I'm not saying
|> >|> >that there can't be unreachable places in such a graph.   I'm saying
|> >|> >that you can't prove in general that divergence has some limit.
|> 
|> >|> No, he understood what you were saying; he just misunderstood what
|> >|> you meant to say.  Now that you've said what you meant to say, we
|> >|> all understand what you said.
|> 
|> >Really?   From the original post:
|> 
|> >	"Perhaps you hold that there is some "limit" to micro-evolution 
|> >	which would prevent cumulative micro-evolution producing macro-
|> >	changes.
|> 
|> >	Then the question is, how is this limit implemented? " 
|> 
|> >In what way is what I said different to what I meant to say?
|> 
|> But Jon, you said a great deal more than that.  It was the material
|> following that (which I quoted in another post) that he was arguing
|> about, i.e. the implementation of the limit.

No, Mr Harter, as I suggested before, I think you have it backwards.   

It's the creationists who are arguing for a limit.   I'm arguing that 
no such limit exists.  I ask how it might be implemented in order to
show how difficult I think it would be to implement such a limit.

in other words, I'm arguing that  "you can't prove in general that 
divergence has some limit"

jon.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: schumach@convex.com (Richard A. Schumacher)
Subject: Re: Moon Dust
Organization: CONVEX Computer Corporation, Richardson, Tx., USA
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 02:28:13 GMT
X-Disclaimer: This message was written by a user at CONVEX Computer
              Corp. The opinions expressed are those of the user and
              not necessarily those of CONVEX.

Vacuum welding of the dust grains. Dust does not stay dust
very long.
From: jtisdel@digi.lonestar.org (J. Michael Tisdel)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Re: Voyagers on the Ark of Noah
Date: 27 Jan 93 17:19:07 GMT
Organization: DSC Communications Corp, Plano, TX


Another point, Ray.  I quote:

>>   If God is omnipotent, why not kill what He wanted killed directly?
>
>For the sake of allegory.  Jesus spoke of "the last days" as like the days
>before the flood.  Thus, since Jesus affirms the occurance of the flood, all
>Christians must believe it actually happens.  Otherwise Jesus is either
>ignorant or a liar.

Here you have tied your Christianity (as embodied in Christ) to an Old
Testament story to the effect that if said story is proved false or specious,
then your whole belief structure is irrevocably damaged.

Assume the following:  Christ knew his audience was quite familar with the
Noah story -- could he have used this as an Allegory of what was to come?
If I allude to the final scene in "Hamlet" when discussing the outcome of a
meeting, do I require the events in "Hamlet" to have actually occurred?

Earlier you have stated that Evolution requires the expugation of God.  No
work claims this, but by your statement YOU have equated it.  There is,
apparently, no room in your philosophy for a God grand enough to have designed
a universe in which His creation evolved.  Isn't it a bit presumptous to set
such a limit on the Almighty?

"There are more things in Heaven and Earth than are known of in your
philosophy, Horatio" (apologies to the Bard if I have misquoted him)

jmt
-- 
J. Michael Tisdel                   \\\\\\\\\\\\  digi!jtisdel@uunet.uu.net
DSC Communications Corporation       \\\\\\\\\\\\ jtisdel@digi.lonestar.org
1000 Coit Rd, MS 120, Plano Tx 75075  \\\\\\\\\\\\         jmtisdel@aol.com
                     Better living through workstations.
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: keck@athena.cs.uga.edu (Paul)
Subject: Re: Yet Another Saturn Myth Variant
Organization: University of Georgia
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 19:16:05 GMT

In article <1993Jan21.134106.16927@linus.mitre.org> m23364@mwunix (James Meritt) writes:
>}^In article <222@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
>}Unfortunately, I do not possess a time machine to allow me to see precisely
>}which form (of those proposed) the Saturnian configuration actually took,
>}or to tell you precisely how it worked.  Perhaps the earth was being held
>}in an electro-magnetic baricenter, and the gravitational forces were yet
>}unequal.
>
>Unfortunately, you do not possess the knowledge of physics to preceive the 
>absurdity of this statement.  What is an "electro-magnetic baricenter"?
>
I think Ted means (flame me if I'm wrong, Ted) that the earth was being held
in place by magnetism or some other such force, stronger than gravity, so
that gravity could still pull up on the surface of the earth and lessen the
felt effect.

Unfortunately, Ted has never played with an electromagnet.  Say one is hanging
from your ceiling, and you stick a hunk of metal to it.  Pull the metal away
about an inch, let it go, and it will jump right back up, defeating gravity.
This might even work at a foot away.  But, get it a couple of feet away, and
it will fall.  Why?  Gravity is much stronger than any known force _at a
distance_!  For Ted's explanation to work, there would have to be an 
incredibly large "electro-magnetic" force at work, more powerful than any
now-known force.

I don't have a time machine either, but I abstain from postulating "forces
not now at work" whenever possible.

To cover myself, I'll change my above statement to "To my knowledge, Ted
has never played with an electromagnet" or "Ted was not observant when he
played with an electromagnet".  ;-)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: jbm@hal.trl.OZ.AU (Jacques Guy)
Subject: Re: Yet Another Saturn Myth Variant
Organization: Telecom Research Labs, Melbourne, Australia
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 06:21:50 GMT

MANDTBACKA@FINABO.ABO.FI (Mats Andtbacka) writes:

>In article <222@fedfil.UUCP> news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:

>>This would involve Earth and possibly one or two other small planets
>>being suspended BETWEEN Jupiter and Saturn, possible at or near some point
>>of equal attraction, which you might call a "baricenter" or some such.

>      Do you mean a Lagrange point, Ted? That would not diminish the
>gravitational field of the Earth at all.

I still think my very own homebrewed theory explains it all much better:
in those days the earth revolved in two hours, so that near the equator
you weight half as much as at the poles, courtesy of "la force centrifuge"
(sounds much more convincing when put in a foreign language).

This theory has the advantage of being falsifiable: we ought to find
fossils of very much larger creatures near the equator only.

Do I believe in it myself? Why yes, sometimes I catch myself wondering
if, after all...
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: mls@panix.com (Michael Siemon)
Subject: Re: Future evolution of Creationism
Summary: aha! a NEW argument for Creation!
Organization: Panix Public Access Internet & Unix, NYC
Date: Sat, 23 Jan 1993 17:20:39 GMT

In article <1768@tdat.teradata.COM> swf@tools3teradata.com (Stan Friesen)
writes:

>In article <1993Jan13.142610.16361@medtron.medtronic.com>, ds0007@medtronic.COM
(Dale Skiba) writes:

>|> 1) The central belief of Christian Fundamentalist Creationists is
>|>    that the world is on a downward spiral of moral decay.  (This
>|>    really does seem to have alot truth to it.) 

>Hmm, people have been saying this as far back as there are sufficient records.

Actually, my summary line lies -- the argument is essentially a converse
to the original sin argument propounded so clearly by Richard Harter:

	Since each generation through human history has seen a sad (and
	possibly accelerating) decline and moral decay, it *must* be the
	case that our first parents were perfect, or as nearly perfect
	as could be humanly measurable.  We need to work on quantifying
	this accelerating decline (probably using the techniques pioneered
	by Norman-Setterfield) -- it is possible that we can numerically
	confirm the long lives of the patriarchs and locate the Creation
	when the graph of the decay function comes to within Planck distance
	of its asymptote. 
-- 
Michael L. Siemon	"We honour founders of these starving cities
mls@panix.com		 Whose honour is the image of our sorrow ...
			 They built by rivers and at night the water
			 Running past the windows comforted their sorrow."
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Subject: Re: Yet Another Saturn Myth Variant
Reply-To: kv07@IASTATE.EDU (Warren Vonroeschlaub)
Organization: Ministry of Silly Walks
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 1993 20:59:30 GMT

In article <234@fedfil.UUCP>, news@fedfil.UUCP (news) writes:
> Again, the historical evidence, or the evidence involving large antediluvian
> life forms either one alone would be sufficient grounds for believing in
> SOME form of Saturn myth.
> 
> Unfortunately, I do not possess a time machine to allow me to see precisely
> which form (of those proposed) the Saturnian configuration actually took,
> or to tell you precisely how it worked.  Perhaps the earth was being held
> in an electro-magnetic baricenter, and the gravitational forces were yet
> unequal.

  Look, Ted.  It is obvious that the correct version had the Earth orbiting
Uranus.  The proof is simple:

  The ancient greeks worshiped the god Uranus.  This is a _historical fact_. 
According to astronomy textbooks, however, Uranus wasn't discovered until 1781! 
This means that the ancient greeks knew about Uranus over 2000 years before it
was dicovered!  It would be rediculous to think that this was a coincidence.

  But there is more: Uranus has 5 major moons: Miranda, Ariel, Umbriel, Titania,
and Oberon.  Any look through text on ancient greeks will tell you that they
knew about these too, yet the first of them wasn't discovered until 1787, and
the last was detected for the first time in 1948!!!

  How could this possibly have happened?  Only one explanation: the Earth used
to be in orbit around Uranus!  Stunning proof!!!

--
Warren Kurt vonRoeschlaub
HTE
From: news@fedfil.UUCP (news)
Newsgroups: talk.origins
Subject: Ages in Chaos
Date: 22 Jan 93 04:53:47 GMT
Organization: HTE

This one is going to have to be brief, since it's from memory and since it
involves the one aspect of Velikovsky's studies which I'm least familiar
and/or comfortable with.

Velikovsky discovered that, given standard chronologies, Egyptian and Isrealite
history do not match up at all;  nowhere do accounts from the two nations
appear to be describing the same events at the same time, despite their being 
close neighbors.  Egyptian chronologies, as I understand them, are pieced
together from dynastic lists and other historical documents which were
common in Roman times.  Velikovsky figured there might be some flaw in this,
and attempted to synchronize the two histories using the big catastrophe
of 1500 BC and descriptions of it as a timing point.

He discovered that moving Egyptian accounts forward several hundred years
produced total harmony, producing many generations in which the two
histories were in lock-step.

This introduces several problems immediately.  Number one is that many
sites in the near east are dated by Egyptian artifacts, and that an error
of several hundred years in dating in Egypt introduces errors all over.

Two is ghost and double images.  Assume some historian in the year 4500
were to lose track of 500 years worth of British history, and figure that
documents (British) from the 1940's were from the 1440's.  He would then
have to deal with two Adolph Hitlers, the one Americans warred against in
the 1940's and the one the British fought in the 1440's, and they couldn't
be the same guy, since there would be a 500 year time span between them.
Two Nazu Germany's, two Stalins, two Tojos...  That would make the study
of history pretty difficult.

More recently, a brilliant German archiologist, Heinsohn, who I believe is 
from Bremen, has written at least one book along similar lines, backed
by extensive archeological work.  A team of more traditional German scholars
set out to disprove the thesis of the recent book by actually demonstrating
the existence of an archeological layer (intervening), the non-existence
of which was crucial to Heinsohn's thesis, and they discovered that this
layer did not exist and, thunderstruck, they called in an internationally
recognized expert who confirmed this finding.

This is the gist of one article in the first issue of the VELIKOVSKIAN
journal.

Another article along similar lines is by Ginenthal himself, and concerns
the great Babylonian king Hammourabi who is thought to have lived around
2500 years before Christ.  Scholars have long noted striking similarities
between Hammourabi and Darius;  both were sixth in lines of eleven kings, 
and the careers of the two appear in many ways to have been nearly
identical.  They should appear nearly identical;  Hammourabi turns out
to be a ghost image of Darius;  other than that, he never existed.



-- 
Ted Holden
HTE

Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: watson@sce.carleton.ca (Stephen Watson)
Subject: Re: Evolution implied by the Bible
Organization: Carleton University
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 1993 00:08:59 GMT

cotera@woods.ulowell.edu writes:
>However here is the Theory of Creationism in a nutshell: God created the
>universe.
>--Ray Cote

Thank you, Ray.  Did you intend that as a scientific statement, or a
theological one?  

If the latter, I have no quarrel with it.  In fact, I even agree with
you!  

If the former, then please propose a test for it.  Just for starters,
how does it account for the 2.7 Kelvin background radiation?  Does it
arise from a natural process set in motion by God at the instant of
Creation?  Or did God just put it there to deceive unbelievers and
back-sliders like myself into concocting some theory about a Big Bang
in order that we could escape our moral responsibility to God and
indulge in drugs, sex, murder, left-wing politics, movies, dancing,
failing to signal turns, not cutting the lawn, forgetting to add
fabric softener to the rinse cycle, and other such heinous sins, to
our heart's content?

Failing that, could you at least fill in a few dates for us?  *When*
did God do this?  What happened after?  For e.g.  reading the Flood
thread, I see you reject Whitcomb and Morris (this is to your credit),
but I'm not clear on just what you *do* believe happened, or when.

Just where does the religion leave off and the science begin?  Which
bits of history got done directly by God, and which ones did He just
"let happen" by allowing things to follow their natural courses?


--
| Steve Watson a.k.a. watson@sce.carleton.ca === Carleton University, Ontario |
|  this->opinion = My.opinion;  assert (this->opinion != CarletonU.opinion);  |
"Somebody touched me / Making everything new / Burned through my life / Like a
 bolt from the blue / Somebody touched me / I know it was you" - Bruce Cockburn
Newsgroups: talk.origins
From: cotera@woods.ulowell.edu
Subject: Re: Voyagers on the Ark of Noah
Organization: University of Lowell
Date: Mon, 25 Jan 1993 18:15:04 GMT

In article <1993Jan13.160901.9720@aurora.com>, isaak@aurora.com (Mark Isaak) writes: 
> And doesn't Genesis specifically say that Noah collected two of *every*
> kind?  The ICR is saying that the Bible is false!
> -- 
> Mark Isaak           "Every generation thinks it has the answers, and every
> isaak@aurora.com      generation is humbled by nature." - Philip Lubin

This is wrong on two points.
     1. Noah didn't collect the animals, they came to him. (OK, it's a small
distinction)
     2. Genesis specifically says that there were seven of each ritually clean
animal, but only two of each ritually unclean animal.

--Ray Cote
From: daemon@jatz.aarnet.edu.au ()
Newsgroups: aus.netstatus
Subject: AARNET Victorian Hub/Ballarat University College
Date: 27 Jan 1993 00:14:12 GMT
Organization: Australian Academic and Research Network (AARNet)
Reply-To: Anne Isherwood <aei@ariel.ucs.unimelb.EDU.AU>
NNTP-Posting-Host: 139.130.204.4

The DDN link between the Victorian Hub and Ballarat University College came
up at approx 11:00. Problem was due to power failure because of a lightning
strike at the Ballarat end.

Anne Isherwood,
ITS, University of Melbourne
From: daemon@jatz.aarnet.edu.au ()
Newsgroups: aus.netstatus
Subject: RE: Sydney/Macquire Uni Link
Date: 21 Jan 1993 06:05:29 GMT
Organization: Australian Academic and Research Network (AARNet)
Reply-To: Stephen Chung <steve@extro.ucc.su.OZ.AU>
NNTP-Posting-Host: 139.130.204.4

Telecom is still trying to fix up problem. Hopefully, the link
can be restored sometimes tomorrow morning.

Stephen Chung
University of Sydney