As with the other bearded antihumanists, voicing happy thoughts about Darwin was a fashion statement, an accesory sported to impress, wow, and cow. Fitting that such giants should have so base a following.

Aaaach, more Darwin-bashing. I really don't get the hatred, since evolutionary theory makes perfect sense to me, seems to fit the evidence, and can be modeled and even tested in limited ways. (Obviously it's hard to do complete experiments to prove something that happens over many thousands of years, but astrophysics is also real science, even though we can't perform experiments by moving stars and planets around.)

So how did life on Earth come about, Orrin? Did God create all living things at once, in 4004 B.C., as per Bishop Usher? Are fossils tricks of geology?

Papaya:

No one knows but Him. :)

Actually, I suspect we'll figure it out but have been sidetracked by ideological rigidity.

OJ writes:

"I don't know a single person whose intellectual rigor I respect who isn't dubious about it."

Ummm, aren't you applying Adams' single-question IQ test in reverse. In other words, if someone isn't dubious about Darwinism, does that inherently lead you to lose respect for their "intellectual rigor"? It seems to me that it's either that, or you don't know many people, or you travel in very limited circle. I know many people who's intellectual rigor I respect, who do not consider the theory of macro-evolution as dubious (though since it's only a theory, they retain at least some skepticism). You would apparently not respect their intellectual rigor, but without listening to a debate between you and them on the subject I'm having trouble imagining why.

If one believes in a deity who is a creator, then that deity directing the creation of life is a simple and compelling explanation for the state of the world. If one is an atheist, then macro-evolution, though unproven, is a fairly compelling theory, the best explanation there is at the moment. Both beliefs are perfectly rational starting with differing initial assumptions and beliefs.

Robert Heinlein's one question IQ test was: Do you read the daily horoscope?

However many problems there are with evolution, there is zippo evidence for the Biblical theory of creation, outside of the Bible itself. You have no idea how funny educated scientific types in other countries find it when American political entities impose creationism on our schools.

There is no evidence in this world, from a scientific perspective, of a deity beyond Jefferson's Great Watchmaker. There is no way that one can look at world history and believe that there is a divine being dispensing justice.

jd:

Which way did the answer cut?

Fred:
Why, do you read them?

Bret:

Yes. The question is valid.

Bart:

Sure. I know exactly how funny they find us.

"Do you BELIEVE in evolution?" Does the fool realize what he is asking?

Lou:

Do they ever?

Bart:

Then where did you get your notions of justice from?

Peter B,

Classical history and the Enlightenment, not unlike the Founding Fathers. I have a WWJD bracelet, except it stands for 'What would Julius Caesar do?'

I think the Founders all believed in God, not Zeus.

I don't know a single person whose intellectual rigor I respect who isn't dubious about Christianity.

Now that is a pretty silly thing to say, because clearly many Christians are also demonstrably intellectually rigorous. Although one might draw the line at Bible literalists and fervent believers in Revelations.

Mike Adams doesn't know what he is talking about. Variations within all species exist at every instant (not just over time), for instance.

But consider that every land mass on the planet has been through every climatological zone the Earth has to offer.

Since no pre-human life form can exist in all climates, how else to explain the continued existence of life except through naturally driven extinction?

Unless someone has a better explanation, than Darwinism is the best theory on offer.

Making it far more than an expression of faith among people who have no other. (Keeping in mind, of course, that the Catholic Church accepts evolution. What's their reason?)

Jeff:

No, you're absolutely right when you say: "I don't know a single person whose intellectual rigor I respect who isn't dubious about Christianity."

The parallels are exact.

Why is he limiting evolution to just two theories?

The parallels are not exact. I know plenty of people who are absolutely certain that Christianity, on the whole, is absolutely true, and that all other religions are absolutely false.

Whilst I disagree with them on that point, that does not mean they have given up all intellectual rigor thereby.

I know people who think Darwinism is true and all other explanations of evolution are false.

They have given up all intellectual rigor thereby, as have your Christian friends.

Agreed.

Intellectual rigor means, I suppose, looking at evidence and analyzing it.

Orrin is on record against analysis (though he's a backslider in practice).

People who accept Darwinism without analysis are equivalent to people who accept theism without analysis.

There is this difference. Darwinists (or antidarwinists, for that matter) have evidence to analyze. Theists (or antitheists) do not.

Harry:

The evidence for the two is identical, only the "analysis" (or faith) differs.

OJ:

That is where you go off the rails, and I lose respect for your intellectual rigor.

Recently, when I posed the incursions of the Barred Owl upon the Spotted Owl as evidence of Darwinism in action, you asserted it was because we were cutting down the forest. When corrected, apropos of nothing, you asserted it was because we were encroaching upon the Barred Owls habitat (as if it matters; as if humans are the only source for environmental change ever).

What you are faced with, and what shocks, shocks, the environmentalists, is Darwinism in action. Oddly, they neglected to cite habitat as an issue; you'd think they would.

The evidence for the two is not identical.

No, I didn't assert. I posted the story about how we've forced Barred Owls into the territory of Spotted Owls. I don't dispute that man can make species extinct. I dispute that this proves Darwinism. I dispute it only with you because you're the only one who believes such inanities.

OJ:

Something happened--could be natural or human--to change the environment.

Competition between non-human species looks very likely to result in the extinction of one. Man is not making Spotted Owls extinct, Barred Owls are.

That is Darwinian.

The position you must maintain is that of the nearly infinite number of changes in the environment since the start of life on Earth, none of them resulted in such competition and extinction.

I have lost complete respect for your intellectual rigor on this. From claiming (and never admitting your mistake) evolution could only produce 25 species over all of natural history, to maintaining a wholly fallacious (and completely contradicted) description of how wings evolved, you have taken the converse of the absolutist view you criticized above, with far less justification.

Yet the Barred Owl's encroachment on the Spotted Owl is indeed man-made as all the stories say, right?

OJ:

Possibly correct. There might be a correlation, or mere post hoc ergo propter hoc. The encroachment might well have happened anyway.

However, it is irrelevant. Unless you are willing to defend the position that the only source of habitat change is human, then the why of habitat change is independent of the results of habitat change. In this case, one species is likely to lead to the extinction of another.

Despite the individual animals existing in a resource permissive environment. Well, permissive in all respects except one: space. That just happens to be the one element you ignore when throwing Malthusian critiques at Darwinism.

The only source of extinction causing habitat change is humans or natural disasters. Graduated natural selection never causes it.

"Graduated natural selection never causes it."

Now there is where I lose respect for your intellectual rigor. Here is a case of "Graduated natural selection" (I have never heard that term--did you make it up?) unblinkingly staring you in the face, and you dismiss it because human induced habitat change might be the cause.

Not only is it just as likely that the contest between the two owls has been going on for much longer than the human induced habitat change, you, without any justification whatsoever, insist habitat change is never natural and gradual.

Ever hear of plate tectonics? Right there is a host of gradual climatic changes happening no faster than continents crawl.

You used two absolutes in two sentences without the tiniest justification. And you criticize others for lack of rigor?

The contest started when we changed the habitat--it's in all the newspapers.

Barred Owls and Spotted Owls never tried to encroach on each other's territories before Europeans arrived ?

Given the animal behavior I've observed on The Discovery Channel, I'm skeptical of that.

Michael:

Exactly. For thousands of years they've cohabited comfortably but Man is forcing them to compete now. Extinction, as we've ever observed it, is a Man driven process, though catastrophic natural events appear to have driven it also in punctuated periods.

If barred owls are capable of expanding into a territory (whether inhabited by spotted owls is immaterial), they will expand. But they cannot be pushed into a habitat that is unsuitable for them.

Orrin is simply wrong about gradual natural selection. There are some very good, highly quantified observations showing how orange-spot geckos gradually drive smaller geckos out.

"For thousands of years they've cohabited comfortably" What, they had a peace treaty?

It is precisely that sort of sentence, uttered without any justification at all, that highlights your utter lack of intellectual rigor on this subject, as well as a singular susceptibility to post-hoc reasoning.

How is it the Barred Owls in the Olympia forest know about habitat change elsewhere?

Answer: they don't.

They are doing what owls do, compete for territory. And they just happen to be outcompeting the Spotted Owl in a blatantly Darwinian way.

Jeff:

Agreed.