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  • I guess you have to travel to come up with evolution. Not conceivable from an armchair as you are blinded by the stuff you always see. Have to see the difference, new views often open eyes.

    Relativity did not need to be observed in the world (and how so at the time?), so its theory can be developed only inside a brain.

  • Summary of part two:

    Krauss: I think Darwin was a greater scientist than Einstein

    Dawkins: I actually think Einstein was greater.

    Krauss: Nuh-uh

    Dawkins: Ya-huh

  • great talk, as usual

  • "If the universe as a whole is a quantum mechanical system... then what does it mean if you're inside of it?"... I started drooling and gibbering inanely at that point =>

  • perhaps a factor in the delayed discovery of evolution is chance, I mean of all the things that make sense and fit the modal-ized model of how a society, science, technology, exc. should evolve, its not insane to think that one of them came a lot later than it should have, I'd say it wasn't by complete chance, perhaps religious oppression and society itself were the key factors.

    But in an average society (amongst an infinite alternative hypothetical worlds) evolution is discovered in maybe 1500

  • humans didn't evolve from apes, apes evolved from humans

  • @Diosukekun

    Actually, humans are apes; African Great Apes.

  • @Nilguiri depends on your point of view

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  • @Diosukekun

    Well, yes, if your point of view is to deny evolution and want to create an artificial chasm between our ape ancestors and us. However that "point of view" is incorrect.

    I think I am right in saying that all hominids are great apes. When do you think that humans stopped being hominids or apes? When we started to walk upright? When we developed speech?

    You might as well say that mobile phones are not telephones or mugs are not cups.

  • @Nilguiri no, you don't get it. nowadays we have humans and apes. they have a common ancestor. since we like to think of us humans as something extraordinarily special, we call that common ancestor apes, but that common ancestor was just as much ape as it is human. i see nothing wrong with calling those common ancestors ancient humans instead of ancient apes. just a matter of point of view

  • @Diosukekun

    It's not really a point of view as much as a choice of words.

    Humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans and gibbons are all apes. It is only a matter of semantics to exclude humans from that group, although admittedly, some people do. It is not a very specific term and varies in usage in that respect.

    All apes, including humans are, as you know, descended from a single proto-ape species that lived millions of years ago and no longer exists.

  • Two of my favourite men on Earth

  • Actually Richard is wrong that Darwin was the first to think along the lines of evolution. There were pre-Socratic Greek philosophers who had similar ideas, and there were thinkers in ancient India and China who had written about these things too.

  • @adi87tya

    I noticed that as well, but didn't have the guts to say it because I can't remember their name nor where I read it. But it's true, there were several pre-Socratic philosophers noticing the effect.

  • I don't think that Richard's account of Platonic essence in this clip is entirely on the mark, which is typical of scientists who try to explain philosophical ideas. Plato's idea of the Forms is not inconsistent with the idea of things evolving without a purpose in view, Aristotle's on the other hand absolutely is. Recall Descartes for example, whose goal was to get rid of the idea of Substantial Forms, because they are superfluous for science. The early moderns opted for something more Platonic

  • What a wonderful and stimulating conversation!

  • @CamoKhan2000 What ever your ingesting, injecting, smoking, eating or snorting please share because I want to be that high.

  • @Khemist82

    He just took a hit of charlie sheen :)

  • @WaltonSauce I heard about that tiger blood shit. Man I gotta find me some. Makes you so high you become Camokhan2000 stupid.

  • Something evolved on his face.

    Is it progress?

  • Krauss and I share the reason why I disliked biology as a kid - Classification.

  • @prabhatpalpal can you explain the meaning of classification to me?

  • @MrDelusionalPenguin Sent you a PM.

  • @prabhatpalpal May I have a copy of that PM? I am interested as well.

  • I wish Krauss would stop using the terms 'observer' or 'look at' for 'measurement'. We don't need to encourage more misunderstanding from the new-age quantum consciousness people.

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  • Thank you for posting this, richarddawkinsdotnet.

  • Listen up America, Guys and gals like Lawrence Krauss are the only hope your country has....

  • @torontoBluejays87 And they're extremely few and far between around here. Sad, really.

  • @torontoBluejays87

    dont get too cocky, lots of us Canadians are just as ignorant towards science.

    we arent as religious, but that doesnt mean we're any more scientific either

  • @thisscreensucks Difference between us and the Stares is we don't have to fight to keep "intelligent design" out of the science classes. But I agree completely that Canada has it's fair share of whack jobs who want to push organized religion on people.

  • 1:06 i always thougth that!!!! :)

  • wht did dawkins say at 0:37?

  • @thcci He says Heredity.

  • @Ryosuke1208 thank u

  • Hehe the electron "interferes with itself". I had to say it..

  • The people who don't fully understand evolution,actually tend to be Leftists. While they superficially embrace it (as a way to beat up on Christians), they really do not understand it for the most part, and especially they don't understand the implications of evolution. The quintessential Leftwing response to evolution? Feminists dumping ice water on EO Wilson's head. The Left currently ignores all the social and political implications of evolution but they will have to face them soon.

  • @Jasonlittlex There are no "implications" of Darwinism, it is what it is. As Dawkins noted he was suprised that right wing americans havent embrassed evolution more, as it reflects a lot of capitalistic functions. What does feminists and dumping ice have to do with an in depth understanding of a law? What's absolutely wrong is America's politicisation of anything, especially science. Yes, feminism like most unions have overstenched their welcome.

  • @skydome29 Can we say there are no implications for Darwinism for social and political policy? I'm not advocating a dog-eat-dog return to the jungle, but it seems to me that it informs our knowledge of human nature, and therefor what is most likely to work in a social program. Isn't it the fact that Sociobiology and evolutionary thinking undermined some feminist ideas what infuriated them? I like Dawkins, but he seems to have an almost irrational dislike of the Right.

  • @Jasonlittlex Up to a certain point would it work in a social program, I think the best thing science can do for that is neurobiology, which lags behind other sciences due to moral reasons (experiments on a functioning brain eg.) I think Dawkins dislikes more the American right, which is a dubious walk through a minefield. "Isn't it the fact that Sociobiology and evolutionary thinking undermined..." can you expand on this one for me, I think i see where ur going, but just to be sure

  • Krauss' comment about scientists "doing but not understanding" quantum physics is exactly how I felt about mathematics in high school.

  • Best explication of the Slit Experiment I've heard yet. Krauss truly captured the utter bizarreness of quatum mechanics in his explanation.

  • @superjaykramer What is 1+1? Depends on your axioms.

  • Richard is wrong about Darwin being the first who discovered evolution. Evolution was discovered by a Muslim scientists known as Ibn Khaldun 400 years before Darwin in his book "Al Muqaddimah". Many other Muslim scientists reached similar conclusions to Ibn Khaldun. What Darwin discovered was the method by which evolution occurs i.e. natural selection.

  • @lotr450

    Actually, Aristotle sort of predicted natural selection. From The Physics, 198b25:

    "If so, whenever all the parts came together as if generated for the sake of something, the wholes which by chance were fitfully composed survived, but those which came together not in this manner...perished and still do so."

    Of course, Aristotle probably didn't believe in evolution, but he still gave some thought to natural selection over 2000 years ago.

  • @CIBike6 Forgive Dawkins. He's admittedly not a philosopher. But, yeah, I had kind of the same thought when Dawkins said classical thinkers didn't even come near to the thought of evolution.

  • wow i love these guys. but man they make me feel stupid, just because im a 20 year old male that slacked at school his whole life in addition to naturally low IQ. One day though i aspire to be 1/8th as smart as these guys, thats still probably near genius.

  • @cardmastad READ READ READ EVERYTHING and then READ a bit more! :)

  • @PeterStevens01 Thank you for that great advice, its working. My first step is improving my reading skills. Then understanding the material at higher levels of comprehension. Then using the knowledge as a tool to formulate my own ideas. The mind can succeed at anything when we refuse to give up. Im still at level one ;P but refuse to give up.

  • I wish even 10% of humanity could comprehend 10% of what these two men are talking about. We live in consensus of morons.

    Between the fields of knowledge these two men cover, it explains the meaning of life, and what is it? Nothing! Just plain nothing! A possibility, period. You start with a chemical that can replicate, and it becomes more and more complex! You have DNA....your arms..brain..legs..are physical manifestation of that once a simple code...if that does not give you goose pumps

  • Two awesome quotes:

    1. "Any fool could've been a Darwin."

    2. "ehh..It's, it's it's so beautiful yet it's subtle, that I, although that his expedition on the Beagle and,and,and all the years he spent observing things was an essential part of,of ramming into the skull of someone huuht--- after all Evolution is EVERYwhere, but at the same time NOwhere. (pleading look)

    Two geniuses in their fields just havin a chat, lol

  • "But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead:" 2COR1:9

    i have grasped the power of the cross and the saving power of God, who is Jesus Christ. I love Dawkins as he speaks and the gospel of Jesus Christ, if he really understood what he speaks would bow at the foot of the cross which Jesus was on and it's reason.

    turn from your sins Mr Dawkins and see who really seeks you.

  • @hyrocket If you want to start quoting bible verses, why don't you quote some of the fucked up things in Exodus or Deuteronomy? Doesn't sound like a very loving god in those books, huh? If you TRULY believe the bible is the word of god, go out right now and kill a homosexual. Or a non believer. Or rape a virgin woman, because according to the bible your only punishment is paying money to her father and being forced to marry her. If you wouldn't do any of these things, stop quoting ancient books.

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  • Schopenhauer sort of had the idea of evolution before darwin, he at least got the survival of the fittest idea.

  • @steak820 survival of the fittest isn't it though. As you probably know you're not likely to find an evolutionary scientist talking about survival of the fittest other than to say that its not like that.

  • Kick-ass Zebra tie.

  • Professor Richard Dawkins M.A., D. Phil., Dr. Sc., FRS, FRSL

    

  • Dumb Lady: "Who decided which Ape would evolve and which wouldn't."

    LOLOLOLOL!!

  • @WeinerschnitzeI wasn't it Darwin?

  • @WeinerschnitzeI She probably was thinking of that scene in "2001 A Space Odyssey".

  • Any fool could have been a Darwin. LOL

  • 6:45 that part about people believing in an ideal abstract for each object, like all triangles are triangles, and all rabbits are rabbits, is one that applies to so many things. People get handicapped or stuck because of their need to classify things, by sexuality, by species, by colour, essentially limiting their understanding of the true nature of most things in the universe, the continuum essentially.

  • This is most entertaining, but I am surprised that they don't understand why the electron behaves in accordance to observation. Don't they know the mind controls electrons?

  • I personally feel like there is enough evidence in the form of genetic data work, to prove evolution better than fossils ever could or will. Spontaneous life experiments have also proven (to me at least) that automatic assimilation of organize compounds not only happens, but likely happens under a vast array of yet unknown senarios.

  • why there are not subtitltes in other laguajes to hear better the conference, d´oh i need to improve my engilsh jejeje

  • GAY POWER

  • Oh but Richard. Richard, Richard, Richard... *tsk* ... You didn't have to wait till Darwin for Evolution. Al Jahiz, Ibn Miskywan and other Arab scientists proposed the theory of evolution, indeed even Human Evolution, starting as early as the 8th century C.E. It even predated the scientific method which was not published by Ibn Al-Haytham until the 10th century... *tsk tsk*

  • @rlinfinity He said Evolution "by natural selection." My understanding is that Al-Jahith proposed evolution and was close to the idea of 'natural selection' and never quite got it.

    Also, you may be interested to know that there were other people b4 that who proposed various ideas of evolution. Go to wikipedia and look up, "History_of_evolutionary_thoug­ht".

  • @jessc1979 1)Sigh... I know about competing theories. I do research in mathematical theory that explains the mechanics of evolution using topological spaces, real and complex analysis and differential equations.

    2) Al-Jahiz's and Ibn Miskywan's theory of evolution was essentially natural selection. Those who say otherwise are either nitpicking or arguing over senseless semantics.

  • @rlinfinity But is it really nitpicking? I havent't read the book so I don't know, but there is some discussion on whether he even suggests natural selection. I skimmed a bit of a discussion from wikipedia, you may have already seen it:

    Talk:Al-Jahiz#Dubious

    One of the contributors claims to be fluent in arabic and has read the book and claims that natural selection is nowhere in there.

  • @jessc1979 How species develop new characteristics, according to Al Jahiz, is Lamarckian. But Darwin never offered a thesis on HOW. His theory only explained how the gene pool is pruned. (Even though genetics was not understood at the time.) And in that respect Al Jahiz makes the exact same observation.

  • @rlinfinity I haven't read the Origin of Species, but I have read some Dawkins's books. Are you sure that Darwin never offered a thesis on how? Not even natural selection.

    If what you said about Al-Jahiz is true, then isn't Dawkins right that Darwin's contribution of evolution by *natural selection* (as opposed to something else) was not preceded by anyone?

  • @jessc1979 Yes, Darwin never explained how. He explained the process by which selective pressures favoured the survival of fitter individuals. This was his insight, and it was also the same insight of very many Arab scientists who preceded him by as many as 1000 years. He couldn't have explained how in his time because genetics was not understood. That, and later work on DNA by Watson and Crick established the finer details of evolution through molecular biology-- i.e. very, very recently!

  • @rlinfinity When I said 'how' I don't mean genetics. I meant Lamarkian vs. Natural Selection.

    I could only find an abstract for the paper you mentioned and it says that most earlier references to 'natural selection' was used previously to describe increased the fitness of a species, but not speciation.

  • @jessc1979 "Animals engage in a struggle for existence; for resources, to avoid being eaten and to breed. Environmental factors influence organisms to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming into new species. Animals that survive to breed can pass on their successful characteristics to offspring"

    If you disregard semantics that is the central thesis in Natural Selection.

    Then again I look at these English statements in terms of the maths, and in that they are the same.

  • @rlinfinity Ok sure, I'll try to avoid engaging in semantics.

    That said, I don't believe that paragraph (it may have been poorly translated) necessarily explains evolution. Passing on successful characteristics may just mean like, longer necks, stronger claws, better eyes, etc.

    But it doesn't suggest anything about speciation or something more drastic like evolving a fin into a foot, or amphibians into reptiles, etc.

  • @jessc1979 Then perhaps you ought to educate yourself. There are many excellent primary sources. A good starting point would be:

    Conway Zirkle's paper on 'Natural Selection before the "Origin of Species"' which appeared in the Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society in 1941 -- a reputable journal for the natural sciences.

    Al Jahiz was merely the tip of the iceberg -- the earliest of the Saracen evolutionists.

  • @jessc1979 Several other scientists went even further. Al Tusi described human evolution (Cf. Darwin's "Descent of Man"). Al Biruni not only worked on Natural Selection but also on Artificial Selection and the relationships between (Wilczynski, 1959).

    -----

    Wilczynski, J. Z. (December 1959). "On the Presumed Darwinism of Alberuni Eight Hundred Years before Darwin". Isis. University of Chicago.

    ----

    And very many more. You only have to look. It may take you a good while to pore over them all.

  • @jessc1979 In the mathematics, they both described the same optimization process, with stochasticity thrown in to prevent local maxima problems. i.e. they translate into the same mathematics -- and thus are equivalent. If there are biologists who disagree, that may be because this may not be immediately obvious: the pitfall of using a natural language like English, instead of a formal language like mathematics.

  • Why do religious zealots even try to post their rubbish on videos like these? Do they really think that a small blurb of bullshit in capitol letters will convert the majority of rational viewers?

  • As Steven Weiberg said, most physicists care less about religion, and so least was the idea that they wouldn't even classify themselves as atheist.

  • "how about baseball?" ... insain...could listen for hours to these people...

  • I think all People who teach evolution speak too fancy ... if you want some people to understand you ... sometimes it is a must to explain to them in detail as simple as possible ... for instance i know guys who don't understand the word ''population'' .

  • @Akirilus

    "I think all People who teach evolution speak too fancy ... for instance i know guys who don't understand the word ''population'' ."

    Evolution is covered in high school biology. If they can't understand it, then need to go back to grade school. The basics of evolution are just that: basic. You don't need to know all about the differet types of mutations and rates of muation, etc. to understand it. If he doesn't know what the word "population" is, then I suggest 2nd grade.

  • @KemaTheAtheist often you may find that to understand the meaning of the word and to know the word are two different things and that the great majority of people do not understand the meaning of certain words .

  • Actually Anaximander in the 6th century BC came up with the first evolutionary theory and various greek thinkers built on his work. And the concept of evolution is found in indian philosophy also. The problem was, shock horror, Christianity teaching that everything was fixed and unchanging.

  • On heredity, perhaps Mendel deserves a mention.

  • Krauss - "Oh Richard, your field had the smartest scientist whoever lived, and that was Darwin!"

    Dawkins - "Oh, but Lawrence, Einstein was the most intelligent of scientists. Any schmuck could have done what Darwin did!"

    Krauss - "Well, no, because we always say that 'after the fact.' Darwin WAS really really smart, Richard!"

    Dawkins - "Yeah but you physicists are a pretty rare bunch...SUPER intelligent!"

    Krauss - "Yeah but you biologists are incredible..."

    ASS KISSING CENTRAL!

  • @WSGAC Their points went right over your head.

  • Science is 90% ass kissing.

  • I don't think 'essentialism' was the reason that the idea of evolution was delayed so long. After all, many Eastern philosophies are centered on the idea of everything having no inherent existence, being in an eternal state of flux and change. Yet the idea of evolution never arose in the East either. I think they hit on it earlier- thinking of ourselves as related to chimps and cows and trees and fungi on a geological time scale is just too far beyond what our brains evolved to deal with.

  • @sam51092 Actually evolution as a concept has been present in indian philosophy for millenia.

  • @ketsan Ah, but did indian philosophy really say 'all the diversity and complexity of life evolved gradually from a single, simple origin' or did it say something vague like 'life is change' which was only interpreted to mean 'evolution' after evolution was discovered by science... (most religions play this game, which is why I don't trust claims like yours without support, with all due respect).

  • @sam51092 More or less, yes. Get rid of you notions about hinduism, there was much more going on in ancient india. That's the really interesting thing about it. I'm trying to think where the hell I read it. Like some of the buddhist creation stories descrbe a naturalistic process of evolution. The greeks too had a schools of philosophy that taught evolution; it's not a particularly modern idea.

  • @ketsan I've heard of the Greek one, it's a little iffy. Maybe it reads a bit like Darwin if Darwin had taken a hard hit on the head. I've definitely read a passage from Buddhist scriptures that is taken by some to be about evolution, but I don't credit it at all. It sounds nothing like evolution and is exactly the sort of thing that could only be associated with evolution after evolution was discovered by science. Let me know when you find the Indian reference.

  • @ketsan By the way, my notions about hinduism include the notion that all religion, philosophy, and literature in India were subsumed under the label 'hinduism', and that, therefore, the label is pretty incoherent. Rather like subsuming all western religion, science, philosophy, literature and pop culture under a label like 'Westism' and saying they're all the same thing.

  • krauss is a boss

  • I have trouble understanding Krauss he seems to have a way of making all his explanations seem like an uphill battle when someone else could say the same thing alot more simply.

  • Matter does'nt exist unless it interacts with conciousness. I believe my mind has just been blown!

  • quick poll of the people more impressive darwin or einstein?

  • @tupacalypse88 1 vote for Einstein

  • @enkeksinickia yeah ill make that 2

  • vvvvvvv Troll, much? Was an atheist on the previous video vvvvvvvv

  • Have fun watching your atheist videos. I'm sure you and Darwin will have a fun time in hell. The only true salvation is Jesus Christ our lord and saviour. 

  • @yuyudude1112 Have fun in your cesspit of ignorance :)

  • @Alexdurrant7 Send me a postcard from Hell!

  • @yuyudude1112 Send me a postcard from the afterli- oh, wait, there is none :')

  • @yuyudude1112 Send me a postcard from Wonderland

  • @johnaiton Actually im probably going to hell because I worked on a sunday. lol

  • Explaining the Universe in a single simple elegant mathatical formula or explaining life in a single simple elegant theory are both equally works of genius.

  • to me, even general relativity is something I have yet to grasp. and I consider myself as having above average intelligence. every so often I will grasp something new and go ah ha now I've got it. but shortly afterwards, something new will enter my brain and a new problem will arise. my brain just ends up getting twisted in knots :|

  • It was virtually impossible for anybody who hasn't traveled as much as Darwin, to grasp the idea of evolution!

  • this is much better than the bible. so many strange puzzles in life that may not have even been detected had people followed cults and the myopic views associated with them.

  • these two should co-write a book.

  • Dawkins has an unfortunate face. It always looks like he's super-angry, which makes people more readily reject what he has to say.

  • As people age their facial muscles become weaker so it is normal to have a slight frown. Look at early photos of him where just the opposite was the impression.

    I've seen him in person and his humor, gentle manner and humanist nature is obviously evident.

  • @Flophole // he has books if you don't want to look at him

  • If the earth was 6000 years old we'd be jamming tree trunks and crustaceans into our gas tanks, not fossil fuels.

    Some teenagers' shorts are 6000 years old!

    We need to laugh and laugh hard at this absurdity ... to make fun of the notion ... and refuse to give it credence whatsoever.

    Cheers.

  • @bando8000 Yes we must be ready to laugh at the absurdity and make fun of the notion BUT NOT at the poor brainwashed victim who spouts it. All behavior is learned.

  • many scientists are starting to think that it was actually our persuit of meat that made us what we are, think about it: we made tools to get meat, then we made weapons, and finally at one point we reached a turning point which anything seemed possible.

  • wait I thought that god zapped humans on to the earth with super magic.

  • no silly, he zapped the dirt and the dirt formed into humans in a day

  • Your comments are interesting but, like religionists, you offer not a syllable of evidence. Just another religion?

  • Two geniuses in their fields having a discussion. Is there anything more enlightening? Hard to believe we let the Ted Haggards of the world into these kind of forums. What a shame.

  • @sfmike20

    I agree with you on almost everything there, however there are far worse things than ted haggard....take those stupid tv shows....

  • @sfmike20 Accually Ted Haggard is a genius of his field, it´s just that his field is retarded

  • I like that Dawkins brought up the point of natural selection being conceptualized during a fevered state. Altered states of consciousness in people with a strong base of knowledge are something that have driven new ideas and integration of ideas for a long time, and there are many other examples.

  • Plato or Aristoteles actually suggested that learning new things could work that way.

    you would learn alot of things that were already known, and let them float in your memory and suddenly, for some reason, a trigger is hit and you know something new.

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  • I'm reading a wikipedia article called: "History of evolutionary thought," and I'm shocked at how many people long before Darwin proposed the idea of evolution.

    I was always under the impression that everybody else before was essentially a creationist and I'm only just realizing that Darwin's contribution was not evolution so much as the *mechanism* for evolution, that being natural selection.

  • I know, I had a similar feeling when I found out that ancient Greek philosophers had postulated a round planet, centuries before Galileo.

  • "-and I'm shocked at how many-"

    Learning is an extreme pleasure, isn't it? :)

  • I may solve quantum mechanics soon because I think I'm getting meningitis.

  • Why can't a scientist compare and contrast the brain of a genius to that of a simpleton.

    See what makes someone a genius compared to the simpleton. That would be interesting as all hell.

  • @batfly haha that would be sick, but alas at this point, impossible considering we cant measure every single neuron firing in the human brain.

  • Could break it down to a simple wave pattern maybe. All you have to do is get a collection of wave patterns for both groups.

  • I give up trying to explain to the ignorant what evolution is. They are just too stupid to get it. Even though it is really quite simple.

  • the eye is complicated, but was not always so. the first eyes were simple affairs, the very first eye could only tell light from dark, not as good as our eyes, but more useful than none, plus dont forget our eyes are a complete mess, upside down and back to front with an enormous blind spot. the mark of evolution, thats has to build on what is has, rather than start from scratch, or go back to the drawing board.

  • i don't get evolution sometimes. I understand that there's random mutations, which get selected as useful or not useful over a period of time. Like a flap of skin under a arm evolves in a tree animal, it acts like a parachute, that animal survives living at heights, so the flap of skin gets passed on...

    But what about an eye. How does something just randomnly mutate something that senses light and then passes the signal on as an electronic message?

    I wish I knew more about the theory.

  • Its actually quite simple when you realise exactly how long evolution has had to work on the planet earth. Billions of years between the simplest form and us. Millons of years for cells to learn to tricks (like sensing light) and millions and millions more for that trait to propogate to many cells, and then millions more years to become refined into a simple eye - more and more millions of years to get to our eyes. Like how rivers cut valleys over time, but much much more slowly.

  • I just looked up some stuff about the eye and it makes more sense now.

    When did the first life forms appear on Earth?

  • About 3.5-3.6 billion years ago. But ofcourse this life was drastically simplier than life today - almost to the point where you wouldn't strictly call it alive. Yet there were replicating bacteria-like organisms back then. Evolution by natural selection didn't kick in until DNA-like code was being passed to decendants, which started a while after the earliest life - because code was passed between cells more at the beginning, instead of mostly being passed down through time; as it is now.

  • Maybe a billion or so years after it came into existence.

  • David Attenborough had explained it very well in one of his films.

    The point is that eye doesn't have to contain lens or to be round. If you are a protozoa, you need only a tiny spot which can receive light signals and tiny brain which can understand it. If you are more complex, you would need more complex eye: concave, round and finally with lens. But the point is that all of these solutions are good on proper level and not only the eye like the human eye will work.

  • May I recommend Dawkin's book "Climbing Mount Improbable?"

  • Your argument is a false dichotomy. You're assuming that If evolution is wrong, that a magic man in the sky must have done everything, when in fact there are other options. Let's say that evolution is disproved, for the sake of argument. How does this prove Creationism? it's not the the default position.

  • I still don't understand the two slits idea.

  • google "electrons through two slits" and you should get a wikipedia article which explains it... sort of...

    i still haven't read how it specifically works... like if you were to follow a single particle through the double-slit experiment: what would its path look like?

  • if you were following one particle it would only go through one slit

  • can you actually point towards a source on this?

    Quantum Physics is too strange to use simple intuition.

  • @kukulza Ive done this experiment, and the point is that with two slits open, and the fact that we can definitively show that there is only one particle in the box at a time, we can see that after many individual particles passing through, the pattern that they form in striking a detector on the other side is that of a wave passing through both slits and interfering with each other. This wave is actually the wave of probability of the position of the particle as dictated by quantum. PHEW!

  • I think that a big gun in our arsenal is that Darwin came up with evolution having no idea what DNA or genome was...then later discoveries in genetics fully substantiated evolution. Also who said we cannot see evolution at work? The chromosome crossover is EXACTLY evolution at work.

    I challenge anyone to explain the chromosome crossover using the bible the quran or geeta or any of them religious books.

    so frustrating we have to try convincing people to realize the obvious....

  • [...]

    It could be anywhere in the universe. But it's very unlikely to see it there. But as soon as you observe it in the game, all probabilies for any other location than the one you're seeing instantly becomes zero. There is a chance that every player can catch the ball at random, but never at the same time.

  • @Mike41020:

    well, first of all: this only works for extremely small and simple systems. You can't really apply it to complex ones, like the baseball.

    But if we would apply it anyway, it would look like this: The baseball does not have a definite location at all (until we observe it). Instead it has a probability to be in one place or the other; it could be in the game or in another galaxy. But the probability for the latter is almost zero. [... read further]