Evolution

I have a problem.

I used to believe in evolution. I literally used to laugh at anybody who said otherwise. I used to believe that creationism was, essentially, a metaphor for the history of man. An oral history, a big game of telephone, at best, that we passed down to the best of our ability.

Recently, I've started to look into the situation more and think critically and, for lack of better words, I'm beginning to have my doubts.

For those of you who believe/know about evolution, can you please help me rectify some questions I, quite frankly, just can't seem to answer?

Other urls found in this thread:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture#History
news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/07/060714-evolution.html
boxcar2d.com/
libraryofbabel.info/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolved_antenna
twitter.com/NSFWRedditVideo

Fire them at me senpai

First,

Evolutionists laugh that creationists only believe the Earth is like 8,000 years old. Yet, in the next sentence they'll say that humans discovered agriculture like 8,000 years ago and first began forming civilizations like 8,000 years ago.

I'm not denying that the Earth is older than 8,000 years. I just feel like the question becomes, if "humans" did not exist as we know them today prior to 8,000 years ago, then is the creation theory still a plausible explanation? That somewhere along that long line, we "woke up" so to speak? That our modern "consciousness," so to speak, became reality? Would that not be the "in the beginning", at least, as far as we're concerned?

>I believe in evolution
>After thinking critically I get doubts
You are not supposed to believe in evolution. First you think critiacally and then you come to the conclusion that this thread is bad bait

Consciousness is an illusion. We don't have a soul or anything special driving the cogs. Your brain is just a computer with an input output mechanism like anything else, it's just highly advanced. We never "woke up" we just became more and more intelligent to the point where we gained self awareness and eventually philosophical thought.

Because humans have been shit tier nomadic creatures for the first like 150.000 years of their existence.

There's lots of traces of humans older than 8000 years old.

Figuring out agriculture ment that humans could settle down where they wanted to live and breed like rabbits, which makes for interesting archeological dig sites.

>We never "woke up" we just became more and more intelligent to the point where we gained self awareness and eventually philosophical thought.

Well that leads me to another question. Is there a good explanation for why we're the only species heretofore develop this intelligence?

this.

Consciousness is a collection of many different processes and factors that can turn reality into more than the sum of it's parts.

For being an illusion it's impact is undeniable.

This would be more accurately answered by an anthropologist rather than a biologist.

I don't think evolutionary biology would accurately address some occurrence of "consciousness" as you said that has only occurred once as far as we know, and within the last 10,000 years no less.

Not in biology.

We aren't. Almost all animals have self-awareness (with the exception of stuff like jellyfish and oysters) and it is believed that some animals are capable of philosophical thought to various degrees, including Apes and Dolphins.What holds these animals back is their environment, Dolphins never built anything because they didn't have the body parts nor any reason to do so. Apes lack the fine motor skills we do so have yet to work out how to build tools, but should they so they would be very similiar to ancient man.

Yes of course, I am more refuting the idea that we have souls, or anything special separate from the mind that guides us, when this is just an illusion created by the brain to rationalise itself.

god did it

thats all you need to know goyime

Other than us being clearly more capable of it in every biological sense. (We haven't very specified limbs like birds, fish, cats etc. Opposable thumbs. We can make a wide array of noises, we work together, blah blah blah.)

Nothing but baseless assertions here. Ignore this guy, OP.

What exactly am i asserting? The idea that some kind of soul exists is a much greater assertion, and one that disagrees with all neuroscience done to date

Holy Fuck I just got red pilled.

You asserted lots, but the basis of it was

>all neuroscience done to date

>We aren't. Almost all animals have self-awareness (with the exception of stuff like jellyfish and oysters) and it is believed that some animals are capable of philosophical thought to various degrees, including Apes and Dolphins.What holds these animals back is their environment, Dolphins never built anything because they didn't have the body parts nor any reason to do so. Apes lack the fine motor skills we do so have yet to work out how to build tools, but should they so they would be very similiar to ancient man.

I guess I just don't know what to think of that. There are millions and millions of species on the planet and we're the only ones to develop under the perfect conditions to produce this type of sentient life? Isn't there something inherently strange about that?

I guess what I'm asking is, either it turns out to that we're a product of God/some outside force that could be confused as God or we're, essentially, cancer? If we think of species as cells in our body, out of the millions and millions, we're the ones to develop a malignant growth? Does that make sense?

And if cancer exists, does the existence of cancer prove evolution? Does cancer disprove the concept of God?

That's because the soul isn't considered physical. The brain wouldn't lead us to it, means nothing. If saying that the idea of God not existing is simply an illusion is actually an argument, let me know. It is an assertion because I can replace it with anything else. All you are saying is; "x is an illusion, therefore x is an illusion. Also, there is no way I am not having illusion of something which could vary well be real being an illusion, because I can trust my sense. But yeah totally anything I don't like or that I can't personally rationalize is definitely an illusion.".

evolution is a belief. science is proven, documented and repeatable, evolution is none of those things. to date there is no empirical proof that evolution happens. it might be the case the we did evolve , but to date there is nothing to suggest that it did

>they'll say that humans discovered agriculture like 8,000 years ago
Who exactly said that?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agriculture#History

>does cancer disprove the concept of god?

No, are you really high or something? Try to think about things a little more rationally.

>we're, essentially, cancer?

I guess. This will all boil to your conception of good and evil and so on and so forth. Philosophy.

>isn't there something inherently strange about us being under the right conditions to create this sort of sentient life?

I don't know. What are the qualifications of our intelligence? How likely do you think it is for the correct conditions to arise for this sort of sentient life to develop?

How many different kinds of sentient life can develop?

None of this has anything to do with evolutionary biology.

I guess that's another question. If I'm to believe that the process takes millions and millions of years, then, when "we" developed agriculture/civilization 8,000 years or so ago, my body as it exists today should, theoretically, be indistinguishable from the humans that existed 8,000 years ago? Correct?

As in, if I magically time traveled back to 8,000 years ago Mesopatamia, I would still find a cutie that had a great ass and want to fuck her? Correct?

I mean, minus the hygiene, of course.

>There are millions and millions of species on the planet and we're the only ones to develop under the perfect conditions to produce this type of sentient life? Isn't there something inherently strange about that?
No, because intelligence is not a goal evoloution works to reach.

Keep believing lizards turned into birds goy, rationalize away soft tissue found in dinosaur bones. Remember, it happened over millions of years with time anything can become anything!

That's a strange analogy, particularly considering the beauty of the intellect we possess. I think whether God exists or not is somewhat irrelevant to this debate, but until there is any decisive evidence for creationism we should at least accept the idea that evolution is true, even if it is a tool used by God (who i do believe exists by the way)
All I'm going off is physical evidence, so of course I can't disprove something you claim isn't physical, though if you apply Occam's razor my argument makes far fewer assumptions than yours.

Nice b8 m8, I r8 9/11

Is the fossil record showing the incremental change in some animals biology not evidence - not testable evidence, but some sort of evidence nevertheless.

If you have an infinite amount of gorillas typing away at a computer, will one of them ever create a Shakespearean piece?

>my body as it exists today should, theoretically, be indistinguishable from the humans that existed 8,000 years ago, correct?

No. Not at all correct. Population sizes and habits HEAVILY influence its environment and can have significant changes on the population.

Evolutionary changes are shown to most rapidly occur in smaller populations. The larger the population the harder it is for genes to change heavily.

Yes, you could. There are some minor differences but these are more due to changes in hormones than major genetic changes. The only difference between us and our ancestors is that we are infinitely more wise.

Literally does not exist. Nice try, libtard. Go back to your safe space.

People were shorter back then.
Malnutricious fucks.

Also, sexual selection.
We fuck people with traits we find sexy, despite that it might not have any evolutionary advantages.

People have changed the past 8000 years, not ape-to-humanoid-tier, but changes have happened.

>No, are you really high or something? Try to think about things a little more rationally.

Why is that such an irrational thought, though? It was a question about being the only species to evolve to intelligence.

>I guess. This will all boil to your conception of good and evil and so on and so forth. Philosophy.

I wasn't asking in a good and evil sense. I was asking that as a biological sense, I guess.

>I don't know. What are the qualifications of our intelligence? How likely do you think it is for the correct conditions to arise for this sort of sentient life to develop?

I don't know how likely it is, that's what I'm asking. I mean, ignoring the astronomical calculations it takes to address the likelihood of our planet having the correct conditions to not only be able to support life but also vibrant life and intelligent life, isn't it not just a tiny bit strange the astronomical calculations it takes to address the likelihood of one of those species of life developing into the intelligence we call ourselves?

>How many different kinds of sentient life can develop?

As far as we have any evidence for, one.

>None of this has anything to do with evolutionary biology.

Help me understand why it's the wrong word. I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm saying I don't know.

it's irrational because nothing can disprove God.

We could still breed with man from 8000 years ago, we share the same number of chromosomes which means we are the same species. It's more like how you get different breeds of dog.

Nothing good ever came out of Africa. Name one award winning piece of Literature by a writer in Africa; you can't.

Nothing can prove it either. Again, I believe the existence of God is likely but this is just a stupid argument

>If you have an infinite amount of gorillas typing away at a computer, will one of them ever create a Shakespearean piece?

Yes. And we know this to be true because we have Shakespeare.

Evolutionarily speaking, of course.

yeah it doesn't exist, the opposite exist actually, you find lots of creatures and plants that are millions of years old and are the exact same as they are today, only smaller.

besides a fossil is a rock, there is no dna, so you are just assuming that because it looks similar to two species that it is a genetic inbetween

Lol, not where I was going. I'm talking about actual gorillas. You were probably joking.

Aren't Corvids getting there? They have fine tool manipulation, they can remember and distinguish different humans and things, have a language precise enough to describe human faces to their descendants, self-awareness, ect.

> I just feel like the question becomes, if "humans" did not exist as we know them today prior to 8,000 years ago, then is the creation theory still a plausible explanation?

No, not because of agriculture, but because of creationism itself not being testable and falsifiable in the first place.

>People have changed the past 8000 years, not ape-to-humanoid-tier, but changes have happened.

Are there good examples of this?

In the biological sense, no we aren't cancer, we're Humans. What the fuck are you asking?

Evolutionary biology is the theory we use to address gene changes in a population. What you're talking about are significant changes in the environment, which evolution can somewhat address, but also what could be key conditions for some weird change in thinking that we've only seen occur once, and it was in ourselves. Those parts of your questions cannot be answered by biology.

There is no explanation whatsoever for the loss or addition of chromosomes.

Apes have 48, we have 46. How? They have no fucking idea.

Windows doesn't evolve into Windows 2, 3, 4, etc. It is UPDATED.

I'd say we are Apes 2.0 and are clearly designed.

What about fossils showing how some dinosaurs developed feathers, the surviving ones most likely being the avian species we know today. Or the mutation and variation amongst birds of paradise on the Galapagos?

I'm out saying evolution is legit or anything, but there are some instances which could be considered evidence for it.

>evolution
>creationism
these are NOT mutually exclusive by any means famalam

t. Genetic Algorithms Ph. D.

I think that's one of the many ways you could square evolution with the bible. I'm a huge atheist faggot/ex-roman catholic and I never saw a huge issue with the two being compatible.

Anyone who can model any abstract idea in their mind should be able to easily and intuitively confirm that evolution is real.

Denying evolution is the same as denying genetics, which would be roughly on par with believing the earth is flat.

Plants that are the same now as they were millions of years ago never had any reason to adapt and so didn't. Any mutations they had were negative so these just died out, leaving you with the technically genetically perfect plant we still have today.

Genes go in.

Humans come out.

You can't explain that!

the finches of galapagos prove natural selection (selecting information that is already present in their gene code) not evolution.

How is a gorilla going to create anything that makes sense? Just imagine it.

t. high school dropout

In case you're wondering "Why here? Why is?" This is explained by the anthropomorphic principle.

We evolved to suit our environment, which is why it seems so finely tuned for us. If our environment was different we would have evolved differently.

And given that the universe is potentially infinite, it doesn't matter how unlikely it is that life on Earth emerged in the way that it did because it would have inevitably happened somewhere, and we're only here to marvel at how lucky we are because we are here to behold it.

>I have a problem.

evolution is real, your problem is that you did not come to the correct conclusion after your research. think about that and try to figure out why not

ill give you a strong argument against evolution

to go from 48 chromosomes to 47 chromosomes, a species can either merge two chromosomes together or get rid of one altogether

our closest chimp ancestor, with which we share 98% of our DNA with, has 48 chromosomes

humans have 46
so the mutation happened not once but TWICE
very coincidental that we have no transition fossils to suggest that this double lightning strike occurred without intervention!

I hadn't heard of that. They will probably evolve to be similar to us given time

"Omfg evolution takes 6 gorillon years, that's why we have no modern proof."

"Lol these random birds have evolved multiple beak types in our life time."

"Remember that one feather like piece of fur we found literally one fucking time? Conservatives BTFO!!!"

>Consciousness is an illusion
>We don't have a soul or anything special driving the cogs
> Your brain is just a computer

any proof of those claims?
All I see here is a belief system, a different flavor of religion.

15000 years ago people started domasticating pigs. Where did you get 8000 years old. Also you can date stones back billions of years. I dont understand the question. What has the number 8000 to do with anything ?

i was more refering to animals not plants. dragonflies for one

I never said you couldn't breed with them. I said that significant changes could have occurred. You could be significantly taller, blah blah blah. But yeah you could definitely breed with them.

this

>flavour

Fixed that for you.

>the finches of galapagos prove natural selection (selecting information that is already present in their gene code) not evolution.

Yeah, grand, I take your point. I'm no evolutionary biologist. But, Darwin did claim that natural selection is the method by which genes are chosen to be passed on - is this not the very mechanism by which evolution over time is supposed to occur?

Human's didn't come from chimpanzees. Ourselves and chimpanzees share a common ancestor.

(((neuroscience)))

literally nihilism: the science

>There are millions and millions of species on the planet and we're the only ones to develop under the perfect conditions to produce this type of sentient life? Isn't there something inherently strange about that?

Another thing to keep in mind is there were other types of humans/neanderthals/etc. who may have had comparable mental abilities but who all went extinct.

There were humanoid subspecies like Neanderthales. And others which developed independently and were very human like with ways to communicate. But humans assimilated and exterminated them over time.

news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/07/060714-evolution.html

lol people actually believe this shit. instant evolution lol. natural selection is not evolution, but 'smart' people can't seem to grasp this concept

i'm not sold on genetic algorithms, as far as comp.sci is concerned. can you cite an effective application?

The real question is why people believe evolution and creationism can't be true at the same time. Evolution does not claim to explain the starting point of all life, only what seems to be true about the development of life on earth. Namely that lifeforms change over time to suit enviromental needs over generations, which is easily observable in the mutation of viruses, husbandry of plants, differences between insects of the same species, etc.
It does not explain how life appeared in the first place, which creationism attempts to do. Creationism currently can't be denied, as there is no scientific explanation for the origin of everything. As such, if you want to use it to scratch your itch for "why everything exists" go ahead. Good luck figuring out which human idea of "creator" is anywhere close to what might really be true though.

Go check out some of the studies, it's kinda neat. Like I remember a problem solving test, where they couldn't get the food, they had to take a stick, use it to get another stick and then put them together to create something long enough to open the door.
After the first one figured it out, he described it to the rest and they all could get to the food right away.

If they ever get to our point, hopefully we still exist so we can welcome our avian brothers.

>cite an effective application?
boxcar2d.com/

Watch cars evolve by natural selection to "fit" a track environment. Programmed by man.

My point was that if we truly evolved from apes, that eventually led to Shakespeare. Thus proving that statement.

Just having a conversation, man.

This is an interesting theory. I'm going to read more about it.

Same logic, dragonflies reached a point where they were perfect for their environment and had no reason to evolve further

The burden of proof is on the claimant. What evidence is there for a soul? There are plenty of similarities between the brain and a computer. It is believed that at base level the brain works in binary code.

Yes.
libraryofbabel.info/

There is no proof that we have a soul.

And as such it is good science to conclude that a soul probably doesn't exist until proven otherwise.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolved_antenna

but is it more effective than other methods?

>when this is just an illusion created by the brain to rationalise itself.

This is an opinion, not science.
Moreover you couldn't be more wrong. the Soul is real and our mind is a byproduct of its interaction with matter (brain). The only illusion here is the mind, what you call "I" doesn't exist.

Natural selection is the changing of traits to suit the organism's environment. It is only within a single family

The theory (emphasis) of Evolution involves the retarded idea that a canine can fucking become a fish and then turn into a manbearpig because muh "science".

Organisms CANNOT jump Family. They can only differentiate into new species based purely on physical traits.

You can't prove a statement is true with a theory that is not entirely proven.

Creationism can never be denied. In any case that is the problem. Scientific Theories can be proven wrong. God and Creationism can never be proven wrong. Because there are no falsifiable predictions made.

and how many chromosomes did that common ancestor have?

it is how it is supposed to happen, or so they say. there is no evidence that this is the case tho. what we can observe is that each animal has a huge resource of genetic material. we view the evolution model on many generations providing a change, we use our generation as the measuring point , many species have generations that are less than a few days, so we can observe thousands of generations of virus / bacteria and we see no evolution.

>but is it more effective than other methods?

It depends.

When we understand the problem fully (e.g. sorting) we design custom algorithms, and can even define lower bounds on the best ones (n log n).

We we are clueless as how to solve the problem (i.e. too complex), we throw either genetic algorithms or neural networks at them. It's effective, and our only hope.

>And as such it is good science to conclude that a soul probably doesn't exist until proven otherwise.

Following that logic, it's as much good science to conclude that it exists and the mind doesn't.
Your science is nothing but a mix of words to make believe, just a new religion without anything of value underneath.

>by Mason Inman

I'm sure that's just a coincidence.

Why does the body get lighter immediately after you die?

I personally cant explain the Cambrian Explosion but am still a firm believer in Evolution.

I could believe life began under the Earths surface near a volcanic vent, this "Vein of Life" broke open to the upper waters exposing these different Kinds(see what I did there) to the oceans where there could be more oxygen more food and the sun. This energy could lead to the already established Kinds could then use this energy to heavily adapt and diversify

I literally pulled this theory from my ass.

>nothing became nothing and then became something
>tee hee

Because your colon immediately releases itself and expels everything contained inside it at the moment.

based on your idea of no need to evolve further, then the earth should just be covered in one huge asexual slime.

>then the earth should just be covered in one huge asexual slime
We have that, just look at all the lefties.

This will blow your mind.

Forget hominids. ALL mammals, including humans are directly related to this mammal-like reptile, Dimetrodon.