Dothan Debate demo

[DouglasJBender]

Rick Pierson's logic fails when he tries to imply that because we can't visually discern which embryo is human and which is not, this shows that we share a common ancestry with those other animals. By his logic, the fact that we can't visually discern if a just-fertilized egg (an embryo in the very earliest stages of development) was human or not would likewise be evidence that we shared a common ancestry with those animals. And that would simply be foolish, as is his argument in this case.

[pelonisas]

my unaquivicated first guess was the bottom left picture, no hesitation.

[DNAunion]

... "In a universe of blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The *UNIVERSE* that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, *NO DESIGN, NO PURPOSE, NO EVIL AND NO GOOD, NOTHING BUY BLIND, PITILESS INDIFFERENCE.*" (p132-133)

Dawkins was talking abou the Universe, not about life.

[DNAunion]

Dawkins: "On the contrary, if the universe were just electrons and selfish genes, meaningless tragedies like the crashing of this bus [full of school children, killing many of them] are exactly what we should expect, along with equally meaningless good fortune. Such a universe would be neither evil nor good in intention. It would manifest no intentions of any kind. ...

[DNAunion]

... We cannot admit that things might be neither good nor evil, neither cruel nor kind, but simply callous -- indifferent to all suffering, lacking all purpose." (p95-96)

And next I'll show the best match betwee Dr. Carter's misquote of Dawkins and what Dawkins actually wrote. ...

[DNAunion]

...

NATURE

"This [wasp's method of reproducing, in which it stings a caterpillar, grasshopper, or bee over and over in order to paralyze -- but not kill -- it; and lays its eggs inside the victim's body, allowing the young that hatch to feed on the fresh, living body of the paralyzed prey, from the inside out] sounds savagely cruel but, as we shall see, nature is not cruel, only pitilessly indifferent. This is one of the hardest lessons for humans to learn. ...

[DNAunion]

Dr. Carter quotes Dawkins: "Life has no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind, pitiless indifference."

This part of Dr. Carter's quote of Dawkins appears to have been taken out of context. Internet searches on keywords contained in that sentence kept bringing up the chapter "God's Utility Function" in Dawkins' book "River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life" (Basic Books, 1995). But in it, Dawkins is talking about impersonal things, like nature and the universe.

...

[DNAunion]

There are currently (at least) 5 genera demonstrating the transition from fish to amphibians (Eusthenopteron, Panderichthys, Tiktaalik, Acanthostega, and Ichthyostega).

There is an even better series of transitional fossils documenting the transition from 'reptiles' to mammals.

Ans we also have multiple species of hominin fossils.

In addition to the fossils, we also have the molecular evidence, from comparative genomics, comparative developmental genetics, etc.

[PeteWaldo]

So where is the infinite variety, in the interspecies fossil record, between us and fish?