October 17th, 2009, 10:40 PM
I've seen creationists list all the intermediate fossils between apes and humans and then proclaim this proved creationism. How? Because they were all frauds of course. How do we deal with the idea that every piece of evidence for evolution is just fraud?
by claiming that those who claim it to be fraud are uneducated, and then proceeding to demonstrate that they are uneducated.
“Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth.” -Albert EinsteinOriginally Posted by Arcane_Mathematician
I don't think showing people to be uneducated, and thus having less authority, will work. Mainly because it's self-contradictory, Einstein made that so just by making that statement.
October 18th, 2009, 09:08 AM
What is fraudulent? The fossils themselves? The dating methods employed? The scientists all over the world who must partake in some vast conspiracy? Are there ANY legitimate fossils of anything to be found anywhere in the world? And what about the DNA evidence (see THEIST and biologist Ken Miller's video on chromosome 2), which corroborates the fossil evidence? Of course, even these observations won't carry much weight with the hard core believers, but it might be a worthy approach.
Anyway, the creationist's dismissal of the fossil evidence (even if they turn out to be right) does not then legitimize their claim of an invisible magic man in the sky. They would still have to provide evidence for their claim.
Ron
By providing facts to the contrary.
October 18th, 2009, 09:26 PM
It would be more meaningful for a discussion here if you were to actually cite this list. As it is, we have no idea what these "intermediate fossils" or "frauds" are supposed to be.
There are, of course, many intermediate fossils between modern humans and the points at which modern non-human primates diverged from the line that ultimately became the genus Homo. And these are hardly "frauds."
When faced with that kind of claim, you shake your head and walk away.
Heres the quote:
Just to clarify, the new nominee he speaks of is Darwinius masillae, apparently this intermediate between lemurs and other primates was supposed to be an intermediate between apes and humans(even though it had a tailPrevious nominees all proved to have to have been hoaxes or otherwise unsuited to the role, include Australophithecus africanus (Taung Child), Java Man, Homo erectus, Sinanthropus pekinensis (Peking Man) and other Homina fossils, ranging to the embarassing mythical Nebraska Man, a "pre-human" concocted on the basis of a single fossilized tooth, later found to be that of a boar.).
Homo erectus, Australopithecus africanus, and others are hardly frauds. I'm not familiar with "Nebraska man," but I do seem to recall a hoax by that name along with "Piltdown." The cool thing about these hoaxes is this: they were perpetrated at a time when sensationalism was high regarding hominid species and scientific techniques ranging from amino acid racemization and even radiocarbon analyses were not in use. Ultimately, it was the science of dating and the physics of the "artifacts" that revealed the hoaxes, demonstrating the solidity of evolutionary theory.
Au. africanus is very much an intermediary between modern humans and the point at which the chimp/gorilla clade split with the human. The even older Ardipithecus ramidus, recently revealed in Science closes that gap even further. Most modern geneticists and paleoanthropologists agree that the clades mentioned above split at around 6-10 mya (with most leaning closer to the 6 million year range). Au. africanus roamed South Africa at around 2.8 - 3.3 mya; Au. afarensis also at about 3.3 mya; and Ar. ramidus walked the African Savannah at around 5.5 mya.
Does the source of the quote above go into detail about why they erroneously believe Au. africanus, H. erectus, et al are *not* intermediary? Their inclusion of them with scientifically demonstrable hoaxes are not justified or shown and appear to be wholly fallacious.
thats pretty interesting!
That's just the thing though. I have seen a lot of creationist "debunking" video's and posts about Nebraska man and Piltdown man. They usually claim that "science regarded these as true, and when they later discovered they were frauds, tried to play it off." They try to claim that, since these couple were frauds, then all of the humanoid remains found are frauds. So they theorize, and I use the term lightly here, that either all of science is in on these hoaxes now being discovered, to try to disprove the need for God, or they are simply all hoaxes that have yet to be discovered as hoaxes.
As for Nebraska Man, a man found a tooth in a field, I can't recall if he found a jaw bone too, I think it was just a tooth though, and claimed it was from an extinct hominid. They recreated an entire theoretical figure from this single tooth, which upon examination, they later discovered was from a wild pig. I think that's how it went.
I agree, various creationist sources *do* take this position. But they do so fallaciously and at the expense of intellectual discourse and integrity since their arguments are fallacious in many ways at once. Simply substituting the argument on religious claims shows this to be the case: since one pastor is shown to be a fraud (i.e. a pedophile), all must be; since one "miracle" is a fraud (i.e. weeping statues, shroud of Turin, etc), they all must be; and so on.
But its more telling that the hoaxes mentioned (Nebraska man & Piltdown) weren't revealed by creationists or other superstitious believers, rather they were revealed by scientists following rigorous scientific methods.
If there were any credence to the claims of creationists, they would provide more than logical fallacy for their arguments, they would demonstrate where Au. africanus and H. erectus hoaxes. What evidence supports it?
The answer, of course, is none. It could potentially exist, but hasn't been shown to.
I think you are correct.As for Nebraska Man, a man found a tooth in a field, I can't recall if he found a jaw bone too, I think it was just a tooth though, and claimed it was from an extinct hominid. They recreated an entire theoretical figure from this single tooth, which upon examination, they later discovered was from a wild pig. I think that's how it went.
October 20th, 2009, 01:27 PM
I wouldn't want to have to do it myself, but, suppose you asked the creationist for a way to show that something is or is not a fraud. I suppose some kind of use of comparative evidence would be necessary and the nature of the actual real evidence of whether something is true or not could be worked out.
It seems like insisting on a completely undetectable being of infinite power that cares about you and is constantly unloading infinite Love on you....might not even make it to the level of fraud. A fraud is more truthful than an undetectable infinite being etc. etc....
So frauds teach us a lot and stuff that is not coherent enought to be fraudulent is not at all helpful.
October 21st, 2009, 12:00 AM
You could tell them that organized religion (the Catholic church in particular) is the biggest scam in history, and that "give us money and you'll be rewarded in the afterlife" has conned people out of billions of dollars and made the Catholic church very rich.
October 21st, 2009, 12:34 AM
As an aside you really have to take your hat off to L.Ron Hubbard for initiating a similar scam in the supposedly enlightened 20th century and making it stick. (Once you've taken your hat off, just pass it around and see if it comes back with money in it.)
Not really, it's not a book just a brief article though, but still...
October 21st, 2009, 01:48 AM
It's from a protestant periodical sometimes known for bashing other denominations. Problem is they'd probably agree with you.You could tell them that organized religion (the Catholic church in particular) is the biggest scam in history, and that "give us money and you'll be rewarded in the afterlife" has conned people out of billions of dollars and made the Catholic church very rich.
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