Creationist article is beyond me

[Frankly7]

Hi, I'm a believer in theistic evolution, and I was talking with a creationist online who linked me this article:
http://kolbecenter.org/fossil-record-and-fall-of-darwins-last-icon/

There is a lot of detailed and referenced information in it and I was wondering if anyone here who is more familiar with the topic of hominid evolution might have thoughts on it.

[iNow]

If it’s creationist it’s bullshit. You’re welcome 

[Frankly7]

Just now, iNow said:

If it’s creationist it’s bullshit. You’re welcome 

Fair enough but I'm not going to tell him that. I'm interested to see exactly where the article goes wrong.

[iNow]

I don’t feel like opening your link. Which specific claim within do you find hardest to refute?

[Frankly7]

4 minutes ago, iNow said:

I don’t feel like opening your link. Which specific claim within do you find hardest to refute?

There are a lot of places but probably most of all where it talks about A. afarensis/africanus fossils being apes and not intermediate links. The paper uses many references so I imagine evaluating it would involve finding any ways in which it misinterprets evidence, leaves out evidence, or jumps to conclusions based on insufficient evidence. I'm just not equipped to do that as a non-biologist.

[iNow]

So, they claim evolution is untrue because one set of fossils found one time by one individual survey team in one specific place might not be the exact classification assigned or a perfect linkage between two other classifications. Am I understanding correctly?

If so, that’s a bit like saying maps don’t work because I said turn right at the gas station but someone else said, “that’s a convenience store, not a gas station.” It’s pretty dumb. 

[Frankly7]

7 minutes ago, iNow said:

So, they claim evolution is untrue because one set of fossils found one time by one individual survey team in one specific place might not be the exact classification assigned or a perfect linkage between two other classifications. Am I understanding correctly?

If so, that’s a bit like saying maps don’t work because I said turn right at the gas station but someone else said, “that’s a convenience store, not a gas station.” It’s pretty dumb. 

Sort of. I think the goal of the article is to show that members of Homo are basically humans and members of Australopithecus are basically apes, and that they aren't similar enough to be linked. There is a significant amount of criticizing classifications like you're saying (among other things) but I think that's the further point it's supposed to support.

[iNow]

Here’s the funny part. Humans ARE apes. 

[Frankly7]

2 minutes ago, iNow said:

Here’s the funny part. Humans ARE apes. 

Well of course but I'm looking for an answer to the claim and/or evidence that Australopithecus and Homo are not genetically similar enough to be connected.

[iNow]

Australopithecus is so old that we don’t have DNA available from their fossils to test, and we’re probably not descended from them anyway. There’s been some genetic mixing through the years, but they’re mostly not our ancestors. Go back farther, however, and we absolutely share similar heritage. 

[Sensei]

If a modern scientist takes a person's DNA and compares it to that of a parent, he/she will detect whether they are the biological parents of that person (with some degree of certainty). It is a tool often used in courts today to reject father's parentage.

Now if a modern scientist compares the DNA of a currently living human with that of a modern ape, monkey, pig, dog, cat, mouse, rat, etc., this will show how closely a human is related to a given animal (percentage of genes shared in two or more species).

It does need any fossil remains, just genetics.

I wonder why some creationist accepts the genetic test as a reliable way to find parentage in civil court, detect the identity of a dead body by the police, detect genetic diseases, detect a murderer in criminal cases... and when the same test is done between human and animal, they reject final conclusions...

 

[Halc]

6 hours ago, Frankly7 said:

Well of course but I'm looking for an answer to the claim and/or evidence that Australopithecus and Homo are not genetically similar enough to be connected.

Dandelions and Homo are genetically similar enough to be connected, but that doesn't mean that either is descended from the other. It just means we share a common ancestor at some point. The more recent that common ancestor, the closer we are related to a thing.

[swansont]

Finding comparisons isn’t hard

https://www2.palomar.edu/anthro/hominid/australo_2.htm

https://www2.palomar.edu/anthro/homo/homo_1.htm

Look at the pelvis, cranium and jaw. africanus has distinct differences with both modern humans and other modern ape

[studiot]

54 minutes ago, Halc said:

Dandelions and Homo are genetically similar enough to be connected, but that doesn't mean that either is descended from the other. It just means we share a common ancestor at some point. The more recent that common ancestor, the closer we are related to a thing.

Nicely put.

Short and to the point. +1

Edited September 26, 2020 by studiot

[Bufofrog]

On 9/25/2020 at 10:22 PM, Frankly7 said:

There is a lot of detailed and referenced information in it and I was wondering if anyone here who is more familiar with the topic of hominid evolution might have thoughts on it.

I looked at the article and it concludes (rather bizarrely) that every extinct hominid of the genus Homo was modern man and every other hominid genus was simian.  That means, they are claiming that Homo Erectus was actually Homo Sapiens.  See what there trying to do?  Homo Erectus did not evolve into modern man he was modern man, therefore no evolution was required.  The exact path from Australopithecus to Homo is not clear, so they say nope, no evolution, it never happened, they are just extinct simians end of story.  

Just for fun the article also stated that 'Darwinism' was the cause of:

1.  WW1

2.  WW2

3.  Communism

4.  Destruction of the education system

5.  Legal abortions

6.  A culture of death (whatever that means?)

7.  Bad judges

8.  Attacks on the family

They conclude that 'Darwinism' is the worst thing to happen to mankind since Adam and Eve got kicked out of the garden.  Yikes!  That's pretty bad!

Spoiler

Nothing here just can't delete the spoiler thing.....  Guess im more of the Erectus kinda guy

 

Edited September 27, 2020 by Bufofrog

[Area54]

1 hour ago, Bufofrog said:

Just for fun the article also stated that 'Darwinism' was the cause of:

1.  WW1

2.  WW2

3.  Communism

4.  Destruction of the education system

5.  Legal abortions

6.  A culture of death (whatever that means?)

7.  Bad judges

8.  Attacks on the family

And on top of all that he figured out how coral atolls form. What a guy!

[CharonY]

On 9/27/2020 at 10:43 AM, Bufofrog said:

I looked at the article and it concludes (rather bizarrely) that every extinct hominid of the genus Homo was modern man and every other hominid genus was simian.  That means, they are claiming that Homo Erectus was actually Homo Sapiens.  See what there trying to do?  Homo Erectus did not evolve into modern man he was modern man, therefore no evolution was required.  The exact path from Australopithecus to Homo is not clear, so they say nope, no evolution, it never happened, they are just extinct simians end of story.  

Just for fun the article also stated that 'Darwinism' was the cause of:

1.  WW1

2.  WW2

3.  Communism

4.  Destruction of the education system

5.  Legal abortions

6.  A culture of death (whatever that means?)

7.  Bad judges

8.  Attacks on the family

They conclude that 'Darwinism' is the worst thing to happen to mankind since Adam and Eve got kicked out of the garden.  Yikes!  That's pretty bad!

  Reveal hidden contents

Nothing here just can't delete the spoiler thing.....  Guess im more of the Erectus kinda guy

 

Thank you for sacrificing your neurons so that others do not have to.

[joigus]

On 9/26/2020 at 12:52 PM, Halc said:

Dandelions and Homo are genetically similar enough to be connected, but that doesn't mean that either is descended from the other. It just means we share a common ancestor at some point. The more recent that common ancestor, the closer we are related to a thing.

Among other excellent points here, I think this puts the finger on the most likely misunderstanding of such creationist pseudo-arguments. Chimpanzees and orangutan, e.g., evolved from other apes as we did. But they did in a different direction. They are not an accurate picture of our ancestors by any means.

The march-of-progress picture, as the one depicted in this creationist site:

https://answersingenesis.org/human-evolution/lucy/a-look-at-lucys-legacy/

Is very naive and known to be wrong. They (creationists) keep obsessing with Lucy as the grand mother of all human kind. When, in fact, we know now there was no linear progression. They (creationists) are looking for Adam and Eve, as we all know.

Apparently upright apes were very common 3 million years ago. Human evolution is more like a huge jigsaw puzzle, changing with time.

https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/overview-of-hominin-evolution-89010983/

It would be interesting to see how they explain Homo floresiensis, probably not a Homo at all, but an autralopithecine offshoot.

Remember that about 6 million years ago savannas expanded into a huge range that got to cover an enormous uninterrupted area from northern Africa to the eastern coasts of Asia. It is believed that upright apes flourished back then like never before.

And yes, we are apes.

 

Edited November 19, 2020 by joigus