There is no difference between microevolution and macroevolution. Microevolution + time = macroevolution. "Changing fish to philosopher" is a straw-man. Thought experiment: assume, for sake of argument, evolutionary theory as we know it is currently true. If you had immortality and used a time machine to go back to the moment of abiogenesis (or the moment where theistic-driven evolution began, or whatever), and just started observing life for 3.8 billion years until the present, at no point would you notice any changes at all. For every day X that you woke up, you would notice literally no changes in morphology compared to days X-1, X-2...X-10...X-100...yet if you could view the various morphologies in discrete large chunks, you would certainly notice profound differences.
It's like having a child. When your child is 1 day old, it looks the same as it did when they were just born. When they are 2 days old, they look the same as they did when they were 1 day old....When they are 4 years old, they look the same as they did when they were 3 years 364 days old...When they are 14 years old, they look the same as they did when they were 13 years 364 days old...When they are 22 years old and getting married, they still look the same as they did the previous day, and then you look at a baby picture and go "Wow, kids grow up so fast" as you realize how all the incredibly small changes have added up quite massively. (not intending to say that child development is like evolution [although it is, just in a different meaning], just providing an analogy for "micro" vs "macro").
5:19 to 5:54 of
video demonstrates this quite well, IMO (ignore the title and certain other things, by the way, as the uploader's opinions have nothing to do with the concept). The contents of the video were created with an evolutionary algorithm.
In any case, your definition of "macroevolution" determines where this part of the discussion goes next. Also, can you elaborate your point on information? That argument is extraordinarily common among creationists, but each creationist defines "information" differently and has different reasons why "information" cannot be created.
@ Age of the Earth, how do you interpret the evidence? Well, we obviously know your conclusions, but what specifically leads you to reject the scientific consensus of a ~4.5 billion year old Earth? Also, your thoughts on "worldviews" seem to imply that if a person has viewpoint X, they will never relinquish viewpoint X and will always interpret things as supporting X and will always reject things that go against X and will never even think about questioning X and so on. While people obviously do view the world in different ways, I think you may underestimate the people who try to be objective and open-minded about their views, as well as the amount of people that gladly welcome challenges to their views. (It's also quite possible, and I fear quite likely in this case, that I have misinterpreted and/or misapplied and/or misremembered something you said, but I'm having difficulties searching for your previous posts on the subject...apologies if any one of those three is true).
That hardly applies to science. If science operated on dogmatic principles, it would fail profoundly; in fact, its lack of dogma and its openness to change is its fundamental strength. One need only look at all the points in time when prevailing scientific thought has been completely turned on its head...by no other than science itself.
Skepticism of prevailing thought is more a sign of the existence of thinking skills rather than a way to practice them. If one does not have thinking skills, one will not be capable of questioning the prevailing thought in the first place. And you are quite right that truth is not a popularity contest, but at the same time one must be able to account for the reasons why current thought became so prevalent in the first place. Also, one who accepts claims contrary to prevailing thought is not necessarily more open-minded, or skeptical, or intelligent, or <insert similar quality here>, as 0:54 to 1:23 of
conveys nicely.
Not going to comment on the climate change bits, as I don't have enough knowledge on the subject to put up a decent discussion.
It's like having a child. When your child is 1 day old, it looks the same as it did when they were just born. When they are 2 days old, they look the same as they did when they were 1 day old....When they are 4 years old, they look the same as they did when they were 3 years 364 days old...When they are 14 years old, they look the same as they did when they were 13 years 364 days old...When they are 22 years old and getting married, they still look the same as they did the previous day, and then you look at a baby picture and go "Wow, kids grow up so fast" as you realize how all the incredibly small changes have added up quite massively. (not intending to say that child development is like evolution [although it is, just in a different meaning], just providing an analogy for "micro" vs "macro").
5:19 to 5:54 of
video demonstrates this quite well, IMO (ignore the title and certain other things, by the way, as the uploader's opinions have nothing to do with the concept). The contents of the video were created with an evolutionary algorithm.
In any case, your definition of "macroevolution" determines where this part of the discussion goes next. Also, can you elaborate your point on information? That argument is extraordinarily common among creationists, but each creationist defines "information" differently and has different reasons why "information" cannot be created.
@ Age of the Earth, how do you interpret the evidence? Well, we obviously know your conclusions, but what specifically leads you to reject the scientific consensus of a ~4.5 billion year old Earth? Also, your thoughts on "worldviews" seem to imply that if a person has viewpoint X, they will never relinquish viewpoint X and will always interpret things as supporting X and will always reject things that go against X and will never even think about questioning X and so on. While people obviously do view the world in different ways, I think you may underestimate the people who try to be objective and open-minded about their views, as well as the amount of people that gladly welcome challenges to their views. (It's also quite possible, and I fear quite likely in this case, that I have misinterpreted and/or misapplied and/or misremembered something you said, but I'm having difficulties searching for your previous posts on the subject...apologies if any one of those three is true).
Quote:Dogma: A principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true
That hardly applies to science. If science operated on dogmatic principles, it would fail profoundly; in fact, its lack of dogma and its openness to change is its fundamental strength. One need only look at all the points in time when prevailing scientific thought has been completely turned on its head...by no other than science itself.
Skepticism of prevailing thought is more a sign of the existence of thinking skills rather than a way to practice them. If one does not have thinking skills, one will not be capable of questioning the prevailing thought in the first place. And you are quite right that truth is not a popularity contest, but at the same time one must be able to account for the reasons why current thought became so prevalent in the first place. Also, one who accepts claims contrary to prevailing thought is not necessarily more open-minded, or skeptical, or intelligent, or <insert similar quality here>, as 0:54 to 1:23 of
conveys nicely.
Not going to comment on the climate change bits, as I don't have enough knowledge on the subject to put up a decent discussion.