John....

    As you well know we are at odds when it comes to this particular subject.

I'll spare you all the creationists arguments as you probably heard most of

them. But.... I can't resist just a couple. They're not scientific arguments,

but more intuition.

    If you walk down the beach and find a fine Rolex watch do you say to

yourself: "What fine random processes created this watch?" No, of course

not. You know it was created by talented watchmakers. If the human body

is infinitely more complicated than a Rolex watch wouldn't it make sense

that it was created?

     You take about common denominators in the design of the eye. So these

common denominators just kinda float around randomly until they have the

perfect combination to make an eye? So, when an eye is created something

says " wala" now I have an eye? What's to keep that eye from evolving

into something else? or evolving to a less complicated structure? There has

to be an intelligence behind it to say: "I have an eye", now stop evolving.

       The crux of the matter boils down to one thing: belief or unbelief in

God. For the unbeliever there cannot be a creator so the unbeliever must

find other ways to explain his existence.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:05:33 PM

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Yes, we do disagree on this, despite agreeing on political issues.

If you read the articles that I linked to (tough reading, to be sure), you will have a better appreciation of the inherited connectedness of all life on earth.

This connectedness could theoretically be due to a superior being making the proper conditions for all things as they are now. But even if that were the case, the inherited relations between all species on earth exist, showing that later-derived animals are descended from earlier species. So if some “super being” started events in motion, the same results obtain that biological organisms evolve over time into differentiated species.

No rational, educated person thinks that “6000 years ago, God made things as they are today”. Evolution is a fact, the only possible debate remaining is what started evolution on it’s course.

But that’s another discussion altogether!

by John R Moffett (89 articles, 18 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 697 comments [14 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:21:27 PM

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Then....

    All creationists are irrational, uneducated people?

C'mon John. That's a rather strong statement.

Evolution is an established fact?  Well, there are an awful lot of people

that don't know the facts do they?

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:32:28 PM

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Gormley, you know that I didn't say that creationists are irrational. I said that evolution is a fact. If some creationists insist that evolution is a façade, then they are living in some bygone world of the 19th century. Please read the links that I posted, and then get back to me with your objections.

Even many creationists now admit that the evidence for evolution is overwhelming. The origins of life are more speculative.

by John R Moffett (89 articles, 18 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 697 comments [14 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:38:44 PM

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Not your exact words.... but you got the message across.

I'll check out your links.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:50:22 PM

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Ok...

    I scanned one of the scientific commentaries on the sponge structure,etc.

Not my field of study John... so some of the scientific terms were vaguely

familiar. I can't really comment on the article, because I don't really

understand it.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 6:01:33 PM

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They're not scientific arguments, but more intuition.  I could not have said it better myself.  This is why your side does not need to be taught in school.  Also you state that if I see a rolex watch I will not think about random process but will know something made it.  I have seen watches being made by people.  I have never seen a god or something make a planet or star.  And we are created by something its called evolution.  I have talked to many creationist and what I come away with is a desire to be special.  I did not evole from an ape because I am a special creation of god.  If your belief is true  we all are creations of god and one is not better than the other.

by mike (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 92 comments) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:24:02 PM

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If we are created by God, then one being is not better than another.

True.... God holds each of us as a special creation.

I always get this "wanting to be superior hogwash". I guess people's minds

are wired differently and we perceive things differently. When I say I believe

in creation I'm not trying to be superior, I'm just saying I believe in a Creator.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:37:37 PM

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Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it isn't true.

People (scientists too)once thought the world was flat, but that wasn't true

was it? I can look at things both scientifically and spiritually, while evolutionists tend only to look at things scientifically.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:44:45 PM

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John: In his meandering around the universe in "Thought Experiments" Einstein noted/theorized that the quantum consisted of/carried or created "Quanta." Quanta are packets of light which were considered self-contained and of a Gestalt which was irreducible.

In my Ford Foundation Fellowship year, (one of my several years of Agnosticism, while studying Anthro), done under the supervision of my mentor the great Guru of Traveling Museum exhibitions, Lothar Witteborg, then at Field Museum, we examined a number of exceptions to strict Darwinian evolution. Darwin was, for the record, especially I aim this at Fundamentalist's and Creationist's , Darwin WAS, like Einstein quite definitely, not an atheist!

DARWIN, "There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone circling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved."

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:39:20 PM

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Darwin was a great writer. He knew how to turn a phrase better than most.

 I love that passage. 

by John R Moffett (89 articles, 18 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 697 comments [14 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 5:46:15 PM

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Being among other things, a cultural/physical Anthropologist and, if there is one thing I learned about "science," it is that there are NO final answers, as Omar Khay'yam, so eloquently pointed out in his Rubaiy'yat. What was the gospel for several generations, is nothing more than a, "nice-try" several later.

I studied Anthro as a guest for almost two years at Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, with cart'e blanche by Virtue of my Fellowship to do and ask and discuss and research without restriction, and so I did and NO ONE, of the scientists, there, ever spoke of the THEORY of evolution as anything other than, The Theory of Evolution and it will, for the most part, do for me, until a cleaner explanation comes along and I have no doubt one will, one always has and always will until we know everything, which is a long way off. Did things on earth evolove, certainly looks that way, but the Theory has exceptions, notable and not "Exceptions that prove the Rule," which is another stupid idead, bytheway, exceptions do not prove the rule, they merely take into account the laws of "chance."

The "Irreducible Complexity" of the human eye is unmatched in the animal kingdom as it is currently composed and tied to the brain, and as it stands is reality. However, such "Irreducible Complexity" does NOT rule out MUTATION. Mutation can make quantum leaps at times.

I am open to whatever comes along, because to close one's mind is unscientific, but what I am fairly clear about that in the final analysis, the Creator is, and was, the Master Scientist, Physicist/Mathematician and created all by a set of Laws of Physics. Does that mean I rule out ironies, certainly not. Do I accept Creationism? I do not, it is unscientific, and makes little sense as it is outlined by those who beleive the earth is onlt 4400 years old-That idea is maddeningly, Head-in-the-sandish, and highly unintellectual, and if the Creator has shown us anything, it is that He is The Scientist.

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 6:03:59 PM

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Why is creationism so maddeningly unscientific?

If God is all powerful why do we believe he cannot create in a moments

notice?. Are all the miracles in the new testament to be disbelieved? Were

the eyewitnesses of these miracles just foolish, ignorant men who couldn't

write a coherent sentence? If Jesus could raise a person from the dead could he not create something in a second? What about the conversion of

a few loaves of bread that fed thousands? All old wives tales, not to believed?

     The God I believe in is the creator of science, He can do what He wills.

Stop limiting God and his power!

    I know, I know..... the Bible is not scientific, heavy sigh.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 6:26:14 PM

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What the scientists were saying was complicated in detail, but simple in concept.

The molecules that make up bacteria, bivalves, bison and bipeds are all related. This molecular similarity shows that all life is connected by inheritance. What got life started on its course is one issue... the details of evolution are another issue.

You can believe in a creator, and still strive to understand what exactly was created.

by John R Moffett (89 articles, 18 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 697 comments [14 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 6:43:05 PM

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I get what your saying. OK... I definitely believe in the connectiveness of

all life, similar molecules,etc.  Where we differ is how this process started.

I'm no expert on evoluttion (big surprise).

    Here's an observation I've made. Let's look at man 2000 years ago.

Can we agree that little has changed in the physical make-up of man in

those 2000 years? Let's extrapolate and assume that if man did evolve from

lower life forms then it would take tens of thousands of years for men to

make  significant changes. With this assumption wouldn't intelligent

man have to have existed at least 10 thousand years from this present time? Where are the written records of his existence? Where is the archaelogical evidence?

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 7:09:30 PM

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Well, there is one thing going for you (actually two things).

1)- Not that I place myself in their company but Einsten, Darwin, Gödel, I and most of my Profs, all accepted the existence of a Creator.

2)- The question which led to My FFF, concerning Homo-sapiens (HS), was never answered to my satisfaction and was the springboard to my winning the FFF. In the interim between the failure of Homo-erectus, the advent of Neanderthal, and the coming of HS, there was not time for evolution or mutation of an organism of the size and complexity of man, and we do not have the DNA of Neanderthal, though there was some evidence of cohabitation of Neanderthal and HS in one or two cave burials, that was mush after the fact, and gave some evidence of sexual intercourse between HS and Neanderthal's, I doubt that there were any offspring, but if there were we have no such evidence thereof.

Finally, the line of evolution seems to have run out at Neanderthal. Hence my FFF winning question, Quo Vadis Neanderthal?, or better still, transi hinc et vade, Neanderthal? And autem cum venerit nemo scit unde sit, Homo-sapiens? (my Latin is a bit rusty, perhaps, but I think that was how I put it).

So, then, how did HS get here, whence came he? No one knows, everyone either avoids the subject, sweeps it under the rug, or shrugs palms up on that issue. I mean, we still don't know what causes certain water turbulance, in rivers.

Fortunately there are remaining at least, some mysteries. The "explanations" of the arrival or appearance of HS are about as lame as Creationism.

So, he represents the last great white hope of direct creation of one subspecies, but I very much doubt it because even Neanderthal displayed at the Cave in Shanidar-Iraq, definite belief in immortality in the burial of a Neanderthal, with buring him around and facing and near the campfire, and the rising sun, feasting at his funeral, (small animal bones picked clean throw haphazardly in the grave), flowers surrounding him, (seeds and pollen) covering him with red ochre, the sign of life, warmth and blood, andin the birth position (fetal).

So, it is fairly apparent that Neanderthal was a believer, perhaps the Creator made himself known to early man as well, as I say in my STBP book, THE QUEST FOR GNOSIS.

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 8:00:59 PM

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Interesting info. Pete.

      Someday I hope the complete puzzle comes together.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 8:05:09 PM

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BUT, ALAS, PROBABLY NOT IN OUR LIFETIME. INTERESTING THERE WAS AN ARTICLE ON ANOTHER LOST CAUSE OF EINSTEIN, THE UNIFIED FIELD THEORY HAS NEW HOPE. I DID MNOT HAVE TIME TO READ IT, BUT I SKIMMED AND IS SOUNDED PROMISING, PROBLEM IS THAT UNLESS A SCIENTIST WROTE THE ARTICLE I AM SKEPTICAL. WRITERS SANS SUCH BACKGROUND USUALLY DON'T GET IT RIGHT. UNIFIED FIELD THEORY IS THE BASIS OF EINSTEIN'S CLAIM THAT THE QUANTUM IS NOT A SHAKE OF THE DICE-CHAOS AS BOHR INSISTED, AS EINSTEIN SAID, "GOD DOES NOT SHOOT DICE WITH THE UNIVERSE."

DESPITE THAT COMMENT BY EINSTEIN., GOD COULD AND MIGHT SHOOT DICE WITH THE UNIVERSE, BUT NOT ULTIMATELY. I THINK THE QUANTUM WILL SHOW ORDER, BUT THE STRING OF IT'S MAGNITUDE IS BEYOND OUR EXISTENCE TO DISCOVER THE PATTERN OF REPETITION. UNTIL THAT CAN BE DISCOVERED, IT IS UP IN THE AIR, AND FINDING IT MAY TAKE BILLIONS OF YEARS, FOR IT MAY BE THAT LONG A STRING, EVEN AT LIGHT SPEED.

HOWEVER, IF Gödel is correct, we could trace it down through the quantum via the elusive Tachyon.

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Friday, Jun 29, 2007 at 8:40:13 PM

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take the crystal off the Rolex and break the hand. Then break your hand. See which one takes longer to heal.

That's the difference between a dead watch and a life form -- the latter is an active process. They are two different things entirely, and can't be compared in that way. Once chemicals combine in such a way as to constitute a self-organizing process -- call it life -- it tends keep on going and diversifying.

Forget about complexity -- it's irrelevant; it's the differences at the most simple levels which must be looked at. Consider a prion as one example -- reproducing and self-organizing, and yet not generally considered to be alive, such as a virus is, but more like the way salt crystals form by manipulating the NaCl molecules in close proximity in the solution. They aren't alive -- but they are self-organizing. Other minerals can crystalize into very complex shapes, and with various molecular configurations. That's one part of what would happen for something to become 'alive'. This is the sort of thinking one should engage in to understand evolution. Think "RNA".

by Blue Pilgrim (0 articles, 3 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 997 comments) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 7:38:21 AM

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Hi Pilgrim,

Prions are a very interesting example. Research has shown that they are not entirely unlike “ice-nine” from Kurt Vonnegut’s novel Cat’s cradle. Ice nine was said to be a strange form of ice that was self perpetuating… when a normal molecule of water came in contact with a molecule of ice-nine, the water would convert to ice-nine.

Vonnegut was prescient. Prions are mis-folded proteins found in the brain. The normally folded versions work just fine, and don’t have any negative effects. But if one of the protein molecules mis-folds in just the right way, it becomes both inactive at it’s normal job, and also becomes a catalyst for the mis-folding of more of the same type of protein. It acts like a template that makes other copies of the protein mis-fold and stop functioning. It sets off a cascade of protein mis-folding, which leads to the disease (mad cow disease, CJD, etc.).

So it is not life per se, it is a self-replicating protein denaturing process. Very odd stuff, and not a mistake you would expect a perfect, all-powerful creator would make.

by John R Moffett (89 articles, 18 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 697 comments [14 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 9:39:55 AM

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John, interesting article as usual and Gormly, God lives, but the blind and those lacking the gift of Enlightenment cannot see him, though the evidence of His existence is everywhere and He made the minds of those who made the Irrelevant and expensive watches created by Blind Watchmakers, about which the adroitly, supercillious, and bellicose, Ricard Dawkins, rants on in his inamicable, and inconsistent, God hatred, in which in one moment he says there is no God and in the next curses the heretofore non-existent Creator for the Holocaust. He needs to make up his tortured mind if he doesn't believe or is following the accursed ailment of the afflcited, which hate the existence of the Creator, wrongly blaming Him for man's own stupidity. In one breath he denigrates the non-existent and in the other, while cursing the Holocaust he wants to do to Christians and other benign believers, what the Nazi's did to the Jews and many others. I applaud his Noble Prize, but his NoGod argument is based upon, Swiftboating God and all who believe, indluding the intelligent believers and he is Naïvely pursuing the childish game of "the worst insult is to pretend one does not exist." Boy, that is a brilliant ploy, I am certain he fools us all and God with that one!

Gentlemen, I don't know about you but I have had a belly full of Wikapedic pronouncements in patronization of others with academic credential beyond reproach, and expertise gleaned in 5 minutes from the hallowed and often erroneous halls of Wickapedia.

I prefer, if smoke is to be blown up my trousers, that Paris Hilton, Monica Bellucci, Naomi Watts and Laura Harring do the blowing of smoke there-up. So I am passing to go watch the Cubs and Milwaukee pound lumps on each other.

I am going to refrain from bringing my academic credentials into such discussions in future because I am tired of the knowitallism of the adherents of the Wickapedic University of irrelevance.

Pete

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 10:13:21 AM

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Yeah...

    It's time for a breather.

Red Sox/ Rangers tonight.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 10:33:38 AM

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Sammy Sosa, has been in my prayers since 2004, for a comeback, now 13 HRS, 62 RBI's! Not a bad start!

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 10:39:46 AM

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That's OK,

     as long as he has an off day when he plays the red sox.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 12:37:06 PM

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But we do not agree that little has changed in man in the past 2000 years. For one thing, science has proved that the average height of a man in Christ's time was about five feet tall; now days it is around 5-9 and growing.

We can attribute that to the dominant and recessive genes all of us have. Genes for tall or big are dominant, so the odds of an offspring being taller or bigger than a parent is 3 to 1. Dark is dominant, so the chance of having dark hair as opposed to light hair is also 3 to 1, as is having a ruddy complexion as opposed to a light complexion. That is how evolution works; over extended periods of time organisms change.

When one species diverted from another species had to be well in the past when common ancestors were much less developed than they are now.

The Bible does not discount evolution; in fact, if you read the stories correctly, the Bible tells us that evolution is true.

Will explain in a to-come article.

by tabonsell (33 articles, 0 quicklinks, 39 diaries, 318 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 8:02:17 PM

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Why don't you jump in the lake bonsell?

Just another God hater.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 8:07:30 PM

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 As the article below shows:

Ancient armies had no trouble filling the ranks with tall men, typically

6 feet or greater. Average height of 5 feet, I don't think so.

Of course, you'll discredit this article as not being scientifically accurate.

THEIR SIZE

We find the ancients very fond of procuring the tallest men they could for the service, since the standard for the cavalry of the wings and for the infantry of the first legionary cohorts was fixed at six feet, or at least five feet ten inches. These requirements might easily be kept up in those times when such numbers followed the profession of arms and before it was the fashion for the flower of Roman youth to devote themselves to the civil offices of state. But when necessity requires it, the height of a man is not to be regarded so much as his strength; and for this we have the authority of Homer, who tells us that the deficiency of stature in Tydeus was amply compensated by his vigor and courage.

SIGNS OF DESIRABLE QUALITIES

Those employed to superintend new levies should be particularly careful in examining the features of their faces, their eyes, and the make of their limbs, to enable them to form a true judgment and choose such as are most likely to prove good soldiers. For experience assures us that there are in men, as well as in horses and dogs, certain signs by which their virtues may be discovered. The young soldier, therefore, ought to have a lively eye, should carry his head erect, his chest should be broad, his shoulders muscular and brawny, his fingers long, his arms strong, his waist small, his shape easy, his legs and feet rather nervous than fleshy. When all these marks are found in a recruit, a little height may be dispensed with, since it is of much more importance that a soldier should be strong than tall.

TRADES PROPER FOR NEW LEVIES

In choosing recruits regard should be given to their

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 8:24:04 PM

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From another article:

1.71 meters equals 5' 6", and that is the average height.

Your declaration of 5' even is 6" off.

They weren't developing any webbed feet were they?

Research has shown that the average height of an adult ancient Egyptian male would have been 1.71 metres. The lengths of discovered bed frames support these data, as they were designed and manufactured to meet the anthropometric need of the user. An Early Dynastic bed frame with bovine shaped legs discovered by Petrie at Tarkhan is preserved in the Manchester University Museum (5429) and has a length of 1.76 metres. The bed frame of Queen Hetepheres has a length of 1.77 metres, while those discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamun ranged between 1.75 and 1.845 metres. Children used shorter bed frames and some may have been mistakenly identified as bed frames but in fact were simple seats on which the individual would kneel.

by Bob Gormley (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 1094 comments [65 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Saturday, Jun 30, 2007 at 8:35:25 PM

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I don't particularly want to draw a red herring of any comparative reality across this exchange of 'views', but -

Have you guys never considered that the real nature of Universe evidences itself, and we are just trying to guess at it? 

Cause and effect, action and reaction? Haul off and look at the Universe from outside and you will see that - however it is - it is a single action, already complete.  It is formed of one ingredient, which we have nominated 'space'.  'Space' is a structure, implicit distortions in which give the effect of energy which can interact in discrete levels to give the effect of 'material' sub-atomic particles, which interact to form what we nominate atoms and molecules, together with the effect of consequent interacting forces of binding energy, weak repulsion, gravity and galactic repulsion also evidencing space extension, and all combining to give animate material the impression or effect of 'time' and 'action'. We and our wonderings are just an integral part of the process of the completion of an already complete Universe.

Well now, if you can accept that, then where's the problem? There is a Universe which originates, 'creates', forms, motivates, sustains us and our every moment and inspires our every idea, no matter how false. 

If an aspect of our development from A to B across a period of what we experience as 'time' is seen as 'evolution', the most appropriate form being  practically favoured over the less appropriate, or that the prescription of Universe as a whole designates that this or that individual will not be under this or that arriving asteroid - where's the difference? - There is no difference. You are simply looking at and arguing over different aspects of the same single whole.

Isn't what some call 'Universe' also what others call 'God'?  'Intelligent Design' is an abstract concept.  Surely you should be looking at the reality rather than simply arguing about ideas to try to prove one limited view or another. There's still a lot we don't know, so let's have enough of half-baked and inaccurately-aligned terminology, eh?

I've told you lads before and I'm telling you again, the Universe is an absolutely simple place, so let's not complicate it with the limitations of human notional 'ideas'.  Please.

by Geraldo (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 105 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Jul 1, 2007 at 5:20:01 AM

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I am a professor Of Cultural Anthropology, and I am sorry, you are incorrect. There is NO scientific evidence of Homo-sapiens being of average height of 5'0" tall.

If you are speaking of Pre-sapiens going back 500,000-5,000,000 and more years, of those attempts at man such as Australopithecus Afarensis, or Africanus, began at just above 4'-O'' tall, but were long before the DNA of homo-sapiens, about 160,000-120,000 BP. Are there cultures where men were on average shorter? Yes, there are even now, just as there were and are, cultures where the average height is well over 6'-0". The Watusi had a good many over 6'-8" to 7'0"+ and still do.

It is beginning to gall me that people with no scientific background other than the highly error ridden an dubious Wicki-Folks speak and mal-interpret and misrepresent science in the same way as Fundamentalist speak and mal-interpret and misrepresent sacred texts, including the most sacred texts ever written, our Constitution and our Once Bill of Rights, prior to the Patriot Act and the MCA of 2006.

Stop pretending to be scientists, and conjuring up Bullshit "scientific-faux Facts," that is contributing to the DUMBING down of America.

by Professor Emeritus Peter Bagnolo (144 articles, 1 quicklinks, 95 diaries, 1317 comments [5 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Sunday, Jul 1, 2007 at 9:32:35 AM

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Gosh! - Am I really speaking with an authentic scientist?  Whee!  Can I have you autograph?

But you chaps are full of the micro and rather evasive on the macro, aren't you.  Not very sure of your absolutes unless some aspect of its terminology has been pinned down on a microscope slide, almost exclusively by others.

By the way, Pete, I had polio, too, though it was only diagnosed as such ten or twelve years later, having been declared 'flu by another authentic doctor. Only, mine left my sense of modesty and proportion unimpaired.

And before you clamber up on your high horse, I was studying cosmology before it was called cosmology, i.e. before any of you chaps were born, and I have hardly stopped thinking constructively about it since, so I trust you were not including me or my observations in your shotgun blast at any pseudos.

by Geraldo (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 105 comments [2 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Jul 2, 2007 at 7:10:28 AM

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Well, "professor"; there was a PBS series a while back about great battles in British history hosted by a PhD British professor and his PhD British professor son. In one of the episodes, the son related how the king's army forged a certain river. He stated that he being 6-4 had trouble carrying his weapon above his head while crossing the water and asked to imagine how a soldier in medieval times would fare when the "average height of a solder was 5-3." Guess these Britons wouldn't know anything about their history would they?

by tabonsell (33 articles, 0 quicklinks, 39 diaries, 318 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Monday, Jul 2, 2007 at 1:17:36 PM

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Am visiting this article for the second time. Love it. I assume you know who Michael Behe is. A young friend of mine who graduated from a fundamentalist school (Bob Jones University) here in Greenville, SC, and I had a spirited debate in person via email on ID and irreducible complexity and flagella. Paul, my friend, thinks Michael Behe's treatise on flagella is irrefutable and he cannot be convinced otherwise. I am no biologist and cannot debate the finer points of that or any other science. But, I can certainly understand the logic of the evolution of simpler forms into more complex forms. My friend is now in Miami, having been accepted for the Masters Program in International Affairs at the University there. With your permission, I may cut and paste and send your article on to him. Thank you for your defense of my diary entry, "Is the Constitution a Walking Dead Document?" Sheila Jackson

by Sheila Jackson (16 articles, 0 quicklinks, 2 diaries, 133 comments) on Sunday, Jul 15, 2007 at 4:35:24 PM

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