dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Risky Rat) (08/12/85)
> [Jake O'sHonesty (care of Rod Foist)] > 'ere's a quote: > > To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances > for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting > different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical > and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural > selection, seems, I confess, absurd in the highest degree. > > Guess ew said that? Was he/she an Evolutionknight or a Creationknight? This was on the net a while ago, in a variant reading (the one above differs from the one below by one word: >> THE SCIENTIFIC CASE FOR CREATION: 116 CATEGORIES OF EVIDENCE >> I. (Life Sciences): THE THEORY OF ORGANIC EVOLUTION IS INVALID. >> A. EVOLUTION HAS NEVER BEEN OBSERVED. >> 10. All species appear perfectly developed, not half >> developed. They show design [a]. There are no examples of >> half-developed feathers, eyes [b], skin, tubes (arteries, >> veins, intestines, etc.), or any of thousands of other >> vital organs. For example, if a limb were to evolve into a >> wing, it would become a bad limb long before it became a >> good wing. >> >> a) William Paley, NATURAL THEOLOGY, 1802 (reprinted >> Houston TX: St.Thomas Press, 1972). >> b) ''To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable >> contrivances for adjusting the focus to different >> distances, for admitting different amounts of light, >> and for the correction of spherical and chromatic >> aberration, could have been formed by natural >> selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the >> highest degree.'' [Charles Darwin, THE ORIGIN OF >> SPECIES (The Macmillan Company, 1927), p. 175.] This is no doubt felt by evolutionists to be a classic case of quoting out of context, since Darwin ultimately decided that the supposition referred to in the quotation was not a fatal difficulty. I personally agree that the quotation is out of context (since Darwin was not trying to argue against evolution, er, natural selection, but was trying to bring up the objections that could be raised against it, in order to discuss why he didn't think that they couldn't be handled by his theory.) Even so, he didn't give any convincing explanation for the development of the eye -- he simply talked himself into a feeling of confidence that it could be handled. Therefore, his statement, while he didn't really end up endorsing it, is still a good objection. I recall that when this part of the the Evidences series first hit the net, there were some skirmishes about the development of the eye from simpler forms. The observation that no one had put forth anything remotely resembling a phylogeny of vision remains true. Give us a harder one, Jake. That was fun, but too easy. Quote St. Mivart, or Blyth. (Or maybe Empedocles!) -- | Paul DuBois {allegra,ihnp4,seismo}!uwvax!uwmacc!dubois --+-- | Ritual and Ceremony: Life Itself. |
friesen@psivax.UUCP (Stanley Friesen) (08/15/85)
In article <1394@uwmacc.UUCP> dubois@uwmacc.UUCP (Risky Rat) writes: > >Even so, he didn't give any convincing explanation for the development >of the eye -- he simply talked himself into a feeling of confidence >that it could be handled. Therefore, his statement, while he didn't >really end up endorsing it, is still a good objection. I recall that >when this part of the the Evidences series first hit the net, there >were some skirmishes about the development of the eye from simpler >forms. The observation that no one had put forth anything remotely >resembling a phylogeny of vision remains true. > Well, we seem to have different ideas of what constitutes something "remotely resembling a phylogeny", since I posted an outline of just such a thing during the original discussion. Admittedly it was only an outline, but I do not have the time to spend a week in a library tracing down the references to generate a more complete treatment. Goodness! I still have not managed to finish tracing down all the references I want to on Dr Gentry's Polonium Haloes. -- Sarima (Stanley Friesen) {trwrb|allegra|cbosgd|hplabs|ihnp4|aero!uscvax!akgua}!sdcrdcf!psivax!friesen or {ttdica|quad1|bellcore|scgvaxd}!psivax!friesen