Evolution

[AkSaber]

Nope, I'm a Creationist.

[Undisguised Sockpuppet]

Yes.

[Alcon]

Nope, but you might have came form a "monkey" but I did not...

That's not even close to what the theory actually says.

[afleitch]

Nope, but you might have came form a "monkey" but I did not...

That's not even close to what the theory actually says.

Exactly. We don't 'descend from apes'. We just all share a common ancestor. If you go even further back we share an ancestor with the common shrew.

[ian]

Absolutely.  It's hard not to.

[David S]

We should also note that it is called the theory of evolution.

I like being skeptical as much as the next guy, but that's not a relevant or valid point at all.  Do you question the theory of gravity?  Theory has a different meaning in a scientific sense than in an everyday common use sense.

Gravity is not theory. It is fact. Mathematically it is expressed as the Gxm1xm2/r^2. We can test it and show that it is true. Our understanding of it is sufficiently accurate to allow us to navigate a spacecraft to mars. But no one has been able to create DNA from the primordial ooze. And while breeders can create new types of dogs through selective breeding, at the end of the day they still have a dog, not a cat or some other animal. It has not been proven that all of the steps necessary to get from ooze to man can actually happen, so evolution remains a theory.

[Gabu]

Gravity is not theory. It is fact. Mathematically it is expressed as the Gxm1xm2/r^2. We can test it and show that it is true. But no one has been able to create DNA from the primordial ooze. And while breeders can create new types of dogs through selective breeding, at the end of the day they still have a dog, not a cat or some other animal. It has not been proven that the steps necessary to get from ooze to man can actually happen, so evolution remains a theory.

Not quite.  Gravity is indeed a theory, and the reasons and explanation for it are not fully understood by scientists.  Newton's theory of gravity in the 1600s was very good, but not exact.  It was later revised by Albert Einstein in his theory of general relativity.  Pre-Einstein, gravity was thought to be this mysterious force between two bodies of mass.  Now that general relativity is in existence, scientists now believe that motion due to gravity is due to the curvature of spacetime from the presence of objects inside it.  It is entirely possible that our understanding of gravity may again radically change a century from now.

In short, to state that gravity is simply "a fact" is, well, false.  The attraction between two objects has certainly been observed in reality; however, scientists do not claim to totally understand this observation.  Likewise, mutations like those present in the theory of evolution (though on a smaller scale) have certainly been observed in reality.  Few debate the notion that micro-evolution is real.  It's the notion that we all evolved from single-celled amoebas that is not currently known as a fact.

In addition to Einstein's general relativity, it should be noted that there do exist other theories of gravity, as well.

[Emsworth]

We should also note that it is called the theory of evolution.

I like being skeptical as much as the next guy, but that's not a relevant or valid point at all.  Do you question the theory of gravity?  Theory has a different meaning in a scientific sense than in an everyday common use sense.

Gravity is not theory. It is fact.

"Things fall" is a fact; the theory of gravity explains that fact. "Organisms evolve" is another fact; the theory of evolution by natural selection explains that fact.

[David S]

Gravity is not theory. It is fact. Mathematically it is expressed as the Gxm1xm2/r^2. We can test it and show that it is true. But no one has been able to create DNA from the primordial ooze. And while breeders can create new types of dogs through selective breeding, at the end of the day they still have a dog, not a cat or some other animal. It has not been proven that the steps necessary to get from ooze to man can actually happen, so evolution remains a theory.

In short, to state that gravity is simply "a fact" is, well, false. 

In the Gabu universe do objects fall up? Do they accelerate at some acceleration which deviates measureably from the formula I posted? Did scientists in your universe not manage interplanetary travel because they could not accurately predict gravity?  If you want to look at the universe on the scale of galaxies you need Einstein's relativity, and if you want to look at subatomic particles you need quantum theory, but in the world in which you and I live the laws of motion developed by Newton 3 centuries years ago are very  accurate and form the basis of virtually all engineering calculations today.

As to evolution, have you ever seen a new species evolve from another?

[John Dibble]

In the Gabu universe do objects fall up? Do they accelerate at some acceleration which deviates measureably from the formula I posted? Did scientists in your universe not manage interplanetary travel because they could not accurately predict gravity?  If you want to look at the universe on the scale of galaxies you need Einstein's relativity, and if you want to look at subatomic particles you need quantum theory, but in the world in which you and I live the laws of motion developed by Newton 3 centuries years ago are very  accurate and form the basis of virtually all engineering calculations today.

David, gravity is still in the theory stage because we don't have a full understanding of how it works - take for instance ultra-high gravity situations such as the area around a black hole, where it is theorized that time is slowed down relative to our own time progression rate. If we did understand it completely, or at least close enough, it would be called the law of gravity. In science there are three progressions an idea has to go through - hypothesis, theory, and law. Hypothesis indicates what is basically an educated guess based on some basic observations, theory indicates that a hypothesis has gained enough evidence supporting it through experimentation and more thorough observation though not enough for a complete understanding, and law indicates a complete understanding.

We know enough about gravity to call it a theory, and thus we have enough information to work with it in a good deal of situations such as calculating interplanetary courses. We know for a fact that there is force that pulls objects together, and we call it gravity, but we can't state for certain what that fact really is. Evolution is similar in this regard, though not quite as mathematically neat - we have enough information to call it a credible theory, that the basic idea is more than likely true, but we lack a full understanding and thus can't call it the law of evolution.

[David S]

John
If I throw a ball up in the air its velocity and position at any time are quite predictable. If I throw the ball at an angle it will follow a parabolic path and its path is also quite predictable as long as you throw in a few corrections for air resistance. Artillery shells are aimed quite accurately this way. We know these things to be true because we have done countless experiments which show that they are. We have observed the results.

But as far as I know, no one has seen a new species evolve from another one. And scientists have not been able to create DNA from the primordial ooze.  While evolution theory may seem quite plausible there are no actual observations of evolution in action.

Lets say you have to place a bet on one of the following hypotheses:

1) You throw a ball up it will come back down.

2) Start with muck, and wait long enough and you get mammals.

Which would you bet on? (Assumming your lifespan was long enough to test the second hypothesis)

[Emsworth]

If I throw a ball up in the air its velocity and position at any time are quite predictable. If I throw the ball at an angle it will follow a parabolic path and its path is also quite predictable as long as you throw in a few corrections for air resistance. Artillery shells are aimed quite accurately this way. We know these things to be true because we have done countless experiments which show that they are. We have observed the results.

You have observed the fact that a ball will fall after being thrown into the air. You have not observed, however, that the Earth is exerting a force causing the ball to fall (or, alternatively, that spacetime is curved as a result of the stress-energy it contains).

Gravity itself is not a fact. It is nothing more than an explanation.

[CheeseWhiz]

Microevolution:  Yes, of course.
Macroevolution: Definitely not.

[John Dibble]

John
If I throw a ball up in the air its velocity and position at any time are quite predictable. If I throw the ball at an angle it will follow a parabolic path and its path is also quite predictable as long as you throw in a few corrections for air resistance. Artillery shells are aimed quite accurately this way. We know these things to be true because we have done countless experiments which show that they are. We have observed the results.

I never denied that, but gravity is still theory. We know the force exists, we just do not have a full explanation for it. For instance, we don't fully understand the mechanism that causes the force to exist in the first place - we only have theories. Sure, you can make calculations using the force of gravity, but I'd bet you could not prove to me with 100% certainty the mechanism by which that force is generated.

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Both are possible, though it's not as simple as 'muck' that the idea where life originally came from(though this is really a seperate thing from the theory of evolution, which only proposes that species change over time through various processes) - that 'muck' was a pool of chemical reactions that supposedly created proteins essential to life. If you really think about it, a lifeform boils down to being a big sack of chemical reactions.

We get evidence for evolution through the fossil record, which is unfortunately imperfect. Combined with comparing similarities between fossils and modern animals, we also have dating methods(which have become more accurate over time) that show these animals are far older than species currently alive - if these species were ever alive at the same time as modern species, there should be fossils of the modern species that could be dated the same age as those others. Based on the evidence, we can conclude that species have changed over time - if they did not, if there is no evolution, since the evidence points to many species not existing on the planet at the same time where then do new species come from?

[CheeseWhiz]

Weird, with all those first responses saying "Yes (sane)" I thought for sure we'd get into a flame war about the proof behind evolution and stuff, but somehow we're arguing about gravity

P.S.  ilikeverin: Intelligent Falling, haha!

[Emsworth]

[Gabu]

Gravity is not theory. It is fact. Mathematically it is expressed as the Gxm1xm2/r^2. We can test it and show that it is true. But no one has been able to create DNA from the primordial ooze. And while breeders can create new types of dogs through selective breeding, at the end of the day they still have a dog, not a cat or some other animal. It has not been proven that the steps necessary to get from ooze to man can actually happen, so evolution remains a theory.

In short, to state that gravity is simply "a fact" is, well, false.

In the Gabu universe do objects fall up? Do they accelerate at some acceleration which deviates measureably from the formula I posted? Did scientists in your universe not manage interplanetary travel because they could not accurately predict gravity?  If you want to look at the universe on the scale of galaxies you need Einstein's relativity, and if you want to look at subatomic particles you need quantum theory, but in the world in which you and I live the laws of motion developed by Newton 3 centuries years ago are very  accurate and form the basis of virtually all engineering calculations today.

As to evolution, have you ever seen a new species evolve from another?

You need to differentiate between observation and explanation.  Gravity is not the observed data that shows objects propelled upwards coming back down again.  Gravity is a scientific theory that attempts to say why that happens.  Objects came back down to earth long before the word "gravity" was in the vocabulary of science.  I think we're forgetting what this argument was all about: it was started when you asserted that gravity was not a theory, and I'm explaining why it is indeed a theory (and, in doing so, also explaining why the fact that something is a "theory" does not in itself invalidate it).

By the way, you might be interested to read this.  It's not as if scientists are just sitting on their butts doing nothing and expecting people to simply take the theory of evolution and of our ultimate origins on faith.

[David S]

When I look up gravity in my handy dandy American Heritage dictionary it tells me that gravity is a force whose magnitude is given by the formula I quoted earlier. The word "theory" is not mentioned. When I look up evolution it refers to it as a theory.

[Emsworth]

When I look up gravity in my handy dandy American Heritage dictionary it tells me that gravity is a force whose magnitude is given by the formula I quoted earlier. The word "theory" is not mentioned. When I look up evolution it refers to it as a theory.

The views of the authors of the American Heritage Dictionary are irrelevant.

Assuming that gravity is defined as a force whose magnitude is given by a particular formula, it is clearly only a theory, and not a fact. Can one observe the Earth actually exerting a force on a falling ball? No, all one can observe is the fact that the ball is falling. The theory of gravity explains this observation.

It is also inaccurate assert that the formula you gave earlier is "fact." The classical viewpoint has been superseded by general relativity.

[© tweed]

[Gabu]

When I look up gravity in my handy dandy American Heritage dictionary it tells me that gravity is a force whose magnitude is given by the formula I quoted earlier. The word "theory" is not mentioned. When I look up evolution it refers to it as a theory.

Is the American Heritage Dictionary suddenly an expert on all topics physics?  A cosmologist with a Ph.D whose lecture I went to see at UVic referred to it as the "theory of gravity".  I don't know about you, but it seems to me that a cosmologist would have a better idea than the people who write dictionary entries.

Did things not fall down before the notion of gravity came along that said that bodies of mass attract one another?

[Speed of Sound]

Overall, Id say yes, although, like many, i also believe that God had a hand in the making of evolution.

[David S]

Gabu and John
After giving it more thought I think I understand your point. When I speak of gravity I'm speaking of the force which is currently holding my butt in this chair. When you speak of gravity you are speaking of the underlying mechanism which causes gravity to operate. The behavior of gravity, the force, is well understood but the mechanism behind it may not be.

[minionofmidas]

Nope, but you might have came form a "monkey" but I did not...

That's not even close to what the theory actually says.

Exactly. We don't 'descend from apes'. We just all share a common ancestor. If you go even further back we share an ancestor with the common shrew.

Actually we're closer to shrews than most other mammals are...

[minionofmidas]

Nope, but you might have came form a "monkey" but I did not...

You didn't come from a monkey, you are a monkey. And so am I. As by the way, Carl von Linné recognized a century before Darwin, and without any public outcry.

Well said, Lewis Trondheim.  Anyone who opens their eyes and looks around themselves will see that we live in an ape-society.  Have you ever read Great Apes by Will Self?  Good novel about a chimpanzee society very similar to our own type of ape-society:

No.

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He didn't have a theory of evolution, he just classified animals according to how closely related they seemed to be, and included man among the monkeys.