WTF is this forum coming to? Awesome discussions on life, the universe & everything!

The very title of the article itself states 'A' missing link and not 'THE' missing link. Furthermore did you even read it yourself? It actually goes on to explain that there is no all important 'missing link' but that for every new (or old depending on your perspective if course ) species found it opens up areas of study for other creatures which are required, but as yet undiscovered, in order to further complete (note I say further complete, i.e. make more complete but not yet completely complete) the evolutionary chains.

Just from a quick read and look at the pictures (and a genuine interest in animals of many forms) I would say this is providing a previously unknown connection between the evolutionary chains of Primates and potentially a primeval species leading to Mustelidae and/or Marsupials(yes, I am fully aware that the two are not at the same level of scientific classification and not directly comparable but the comparison between the two is reasonably valid I think). Obviously this is only my own viewpoint on it (I'm probably completely wrong but hey, I like to speculate).

Oh and by the way,

The article itself (or, even better, a quote from the authors of the paper about which the article is written) states that the context in which you are using this as an argument is NOT what they are saying. Just thought I'd mention that

 

These leaps of logic are amazing, being against homosexuality =/= Intolerant homophobe.

Disagreeing with a career psychologist =/= being an idiot.

I'll address the other lumps of genius later today.

 

"I'm not homophobic, I just think they're all child molesters"

If it is going to be of the same quality as your previous contributions, please don't bother. We've moved on.

 

Seconded.

 

Indeed, but saying that you know more than a a carrer psycologist is daft...

 

...Fixed...

Context is everything; say he was a nuclear physicist and they were discussing, nuclear physics. Nothing wrong with disagreeing / claiming to know more than the psychologist in that scenario.

 

Indeed, what i was trying to say was that. Thank you.

 

Maybe one day members of this forum will understand that being against homosexual acts =/= hatred for homosexuals.

You simply presuppose that the people who report real change are lying, sounds like science.

Study carried out with a sample size of 90, doesn't seem that deep.

Yet it is acceptable for the book & its references to be dismissed on the profession of the author (Ad hominem btw).

The Reference list for the book is available on her website.

The author of that article does not discredit the peer review process. The emails which were exposed in the Climategate scandal, showing the perversion of the process discredit peer reviews. I would recommend you read them for yourself.

Your ability to read and comprehend simple statistical statements contains a massive flaw, allow me to assit you further.

1. Men are the offender for the majority of child sexual abuse cases.
2. 30%+ of offences are against boys.
3. Less than 3% of men are homosexual.
4. Therefore less 3% of of men commit the majority of these 30%+ of offences against children.

If you would like the go further and separate bisexuals from homosexuals, statistically it really doesn't help the argument for homosexuals in anyway, do the maths...

The reasoning is that male molesters of male children are homosexual. The basic definition of homosexual doesn't in anyway make mention to age. Isn't a male who sexually molests another male (note the definition again), then claim to not be a homosexual (self report), therefore be in denial according to psychology?

Why is a pschologist arguing against the scientific method and English Language, since both are beyond the reach of your expertise?

 

So the average rate of evolution is the average rate of evolution...

1. There is a total amount of change.
2. There is a total time period over which this change occured.
3. Therefore by dividing the total amount of change by period of time, should provide an average rate of change.
4. What is the unit used to measure this change? (Darwins only apply to specific traits)
5. One would expect such an area of science, which is supported by a mass body of unbiased indisputable research to be able to answer these simple questions.

Bacteria turn into bacteria, macro evolution confirmed!

Learning maths and how to play the violin refer to a subset of skills, i.e a level of competence. While your analogies may be valid, your equivocation of mastery to fact is incorrect. Knowledge of an area of study is not the same as providing indisputable evidence as to the validity of the study's conclusion.

If such indisputable evidence exists, a request for the exact or at a minimum approximate dates it was discovered, results published and the promotion of evolution from the status of Theory to Scientific Law is not an unreasonable request.

The accumulation knowledge is incremental, the proving of an established fact is not.

On this topic of missing links.

1.) Silly typo.

Your reponse.

2.) I never said the missing link.

My response simply showed as found in the caption directly under the title of the link (hailed by some as 'the missing link' and by others, such as David Attenborough, as proof of evolution). Shows that some people are claiming that it was the missing link. Showing that David Attenborough is not a scientist does not change the fact that him and others are making such a claim.

3.) If this claim is so blatantly false, why do scientists continue to let this "missing link" oversimplification error continue to be published repeatedly? The majority of the average laymen will not read this article past the title and caption to see the title of the article is in error.

I agree with all of what's said here in the context of micro evolution. I don't however believe what's stated above is sufficient for macro evolution since mutations are unable to add the new information needed to get us from a replicating single cell oranism to an organ as complex as the human brain.

If it is not working towards a specific goal, then is it all not random chance?

 

Please don't bother, this thread had moved on from your basic level many posts ago. Don't spoil it with your rubbish now, you are just wasting thread space and derailing it as we have already covered your problems.

 

Not what he is saying. You asked for a plausible alternative explanation; we gave you one. No ammount of reinterpretation is going to change that.

Been confirmed over and over and is now accepted fact.

No, based on her own blatantly wrong statements, which are the fundamental premise of her work, no less: "87% to 95% of the illnesses that plague us today are a direct result of our thought life". Yeah, let's forget about viruses, bacteria, noxious chemicals, congenital abnormalities, metabolic malfunction, malnutrition and all that stuff. What does medical science know, eh?

A bunch of scientists bitching in private emails is not the peer review process, and no amount of arguing that it is will make it so.

Skipping over some minor issues (such as how the exact proportion of homosexuals in the population was derived), I have already pointed out that 4. is the big reasoning error. You assume male child molesters of boys to be homosexual, because you assume that only homosexuals would molest boys (and that heterosexual male paedophiles would molest only girls --which had again been proven not to be true). They deny being gay? "Why, denial of course!" You say. But the homosexuals who claim to have been converted to heterosexuality are not in denial of course; they speaketh the truth. Riiight.

The study that your figures are based on, by Paul Cameron (a psychologist who was already strongly and publicly opposed to homosexuality before this research) is the only study of many on this topic to support your assertions. It has many methodological flaws (ah, peer review again!), and in a few cases made-up figures. Always check your sources!

Fun fact: Cameron was quoted in Rolling Stone magazine as saying that homosexual sex was more pleasurable than most heterosexual sex, and as a result, if homosexuality were tolerated then it would become predominant within a few generations.

What's that about denial of one's sexuality again?

A Merriam-Webster's definition is not a scientific argument (nor is it a diagnostic manual), but I fail to see how it supports your point any more than it does for heterosexuals, the definition of which does not mention age either. There is sexual orientation, the nature of the sexual acts themselves, paedophilia as a fixated orientation and child sexual abuse as an act. All very tricky: in anonymous surveys 20% of adults have reported having engaged in a homosexual act on at least one occasion while not considering themselves homosexual or bisexual. Some people admit to being sexually attracted to children but have never acted on it. Others live a heterosexual lifestyle (marriage and all) but have slept with underage partners or sexually abused children. You have to understand the distinction between all these variables to think about the issue in an informed way.

So some homosexuals molest children? Some heterosexuals do, too. In fact, the ratio of sexual orientation in child molesters appears to be about the same as for the general population.

They're not (I am classed as a 'scientist-practitioner' and have published scientific papers in the English language, so I guess I manage) and I'm not. You just claim I am.

About evolution:

No, and if you care to read up on the subject, you'll find lots of research with dates attached to them. Or shall we talk about how humans have been exploiting the principles of natural selection to breed a range of plants, pets and livestock since times immemorial? Or how bacteria have grown resistant to antibiotics in the last 50 years?

OK, tell me how it isn't.

Oh, you mean like we have been trying to explain evolution to you, and homosexuality, and you just won't accept it? Like there is a whole vast body of scientific knowledge out there, in libraries, on the internet, on TV, but people will still maintain their own uninformed prejudiced beliefs? Like teachers try to teach evolution in science lessons, but are forced to include unsubstantiated, non-scientific viewpoints? Sorry, since when are scientists responsible for what you choose to believe?

It's cause and effect, but basically yes, it is all random chance.


We're moving on now, OK? Asking a bunch of dumb questions to which there cannot be simple answers does not mean that little old you is catching out thousands of scientists who are a lot brighter in their field than you or I are. Just carry on disliking gays and seeing them as child molesters while feeling secure in the belief that you are a tolerant, sensible Christian who has cleverly seen through the misguided ruse that is science. 'Cause you know that makes sense.

 

What about the 70% of girls that are molested? Are you suggesting that only gay men perform the 30% of attacks on boys, and straight men perform the 70% of attacks on girls? Your reasoning skills are bordering on the ridiculous...

In addition, saying you are against homosexuality & homosexual acts, but that you are perfectly tolerant of homosexuals is an enormous logical fail; you cannot be intolerant & tolerant at the same time, just to try and appear less of a bigot. By default, a christian should be totally against it, hence why there is such an uproar about openly gay clergymen & women; christianity is forgetting its core values and making things up as it goes along in order to try and fit in with modern society, albeit rather slowly. I find this rather entertaining as it goes back to the whole 'you make your own religion' issue- you don't mind gays, but you don't like tha idea of what they do behind closed doors as it were. Mucho failo...

 

I was reading and was preparing some rebuttals until:

Are you serious? I think you know nothing about the subject you are debating...


Wait, you know nothing of the subject and are just parroting ID and christian anti-science talk points, this debate is over as this is not a debate, this has turned into a soapbox.


As i have to kill some time i will try to show why I say this:

Climate scientists bitching over email... SCANDAL!!!! No, just some scientists bitching over email. The emails were reviewed and nothing wrong was found, if something wrong was found they would be totally screwed and everyone and his dog would know.

To show you how stupid this sounds lets say that Coelacanths have been Coelacanth for the last 400 million years, sharks have looked and worked like sharks for the last 100 million years, dolphins for about 20 million years, cats for about 6 million, and nylon eating bacteria for the last few decades...

Try making an average from that.

You will say that nylon eating bacteria are still bacteria, this does not count as "macro evolution"

A bacteria turning into a bacteria is the same as a mammal turning into a mammal or a reptile turning into a reptile. If this is within micro evolution then micro evolution allows for cats turning into cows.
A bacteria getting the ability to eat nylon is the same as a cat getting the ability to sustain itself with plants, without external help.

That comes from about every single anti-evolution talking point sheet i have seen and it is not true.

Furthermore quantity of genetic information =\= complexity. A grain of rice has more genetic information than you have.

 

I agree that he's definitely demonstrated reasoning error, but I'm surprised that you've pitched the response this way.

I don't think it is about denial. Paedophilia is as much about sex and sexuality as rape is. The sex is in there but it's far more complex than that [and it feels odd to be responding to a psychologist about this!]. I think one will find that plenty of paedophiles who have targeted boys will be genuinely heterosexual.

In a nutshell.

It not about the volume of genetic material, it's about the configuration. A tiny change to one part of the formula could have a radical impact, and yet in another instance, the loss (or gain) of a significant amount of DNA might not be noticed by the creature.

And it is entirely plausible that a cat could evolve into a cow, it's just that the person who observes the creation of this new cow, would have no sense of what a cat ever was, so long since would it have perished. Such radical changes would take time. Probably a bit longer than the 6000 years [sic] that the earth has been in existence.

 

I don't think it is about denial either; he just raised denial as an argument and am illustrating how he is applying it inconsistently to support his own reasoning bias.

 

Nexxo's already gotten to this for the most part, but I'd like to chime in as well. Paedophilia is not about being attracted to younger members of the sex one is normally attracted to, it's typically a separate issue such as an attraction to pre-pubescent children, or re-enactment of events from the abuser's own childhood though there could be endless variations and individual tastes. Male or female might not even come into the equation, particularly when dealing with young and undeveloped children, or in the case of same sex abuse the abuser might not even consider their acts as homosexual, they're likely just doing what was done to them and consider it normal behaviour for a heterosexual person.

What needs to be understood is that you're dealing with atypical behaviour which is often brought on by a traumatic event(s). The rules for normal sexual interaction between adults, heterosexual and homosexual alike, do not apply.

Actually, you're performing your own fail. He's only claimed not to hate homosexuals. It's entirely possible to be against someone's beliefs and actions without hating them.

 

Umm, homosexuality isn't a belief, nor are their actions a matter of choice, it's a genetic & psychological predisposition; we aren't talking about beleiving in cosmic jewish zombies or different interpretations of the zombie-jesus instruction manual for how to be a good person here...

Sure though, you can not hate gays but not be entirely comfortable with the thought of their 'lifestyle', but saying you tolerate them, yet don't agree with how, who & what they are- that's a massive contradiction in what you are trying to say ( ergo, trying to appear like a moderate when your belief system does not allow for it in any way, shape or form if you follow it to the letter- and we aren't talking about extremism either since people who bomb abortion clinics or beat up gays in the name of the church don't have the fainted idea what it actually means to be a real practising christian )....

 

I'm afraid that I have to agree with SuicideNeil here. There is something unpleasantly duplicitous in saying that you don't hate a certain minority, but at the same time propagating quite damaging prejudices about them. It's a bit like the biggot starting off with: "I've got nothing against foreigners/blacks/immigrants, but...", as if this proclaimed neutrality is supposed to lend more objective credibility to the ensuing prejudice. Yeah, right. He doesn't fool us either.

 

Their actions absolutely are a matter of choice; it's their disposition (sexual orientation) that is not.

Tolerance is a myth of modern society, as is the opinion that a person's sexual orientation is a part of their identity. Who am I? I am a heterosexual male. Wow, aren't I unique!! My sexual orientation doesn't make me who I am.

I agree with Nexxo that people who propagate damaging prejudices about certain minorities are absolutely in the wrong, but that accounts for only a percentage of people who believe that homosexuality is wrong. It's possible to hold a particular moral value without clothing it in prejudice.

 

One of the great issues with religion is it's obsession with peoples sex lives. Repressing your natural sexual desires because religious dogma tells you it is sinful is plain wrong and I believe psychologically damaging. Does sexual repression in the Catholic church lead to more extreme manifestations of perversion such as child abuse?