hua@cmu-cs-edu1.ARPA (Ernest Hua) (05/07/85)
___________________________________________________________________________ > > { from: Ken Arndt in a previous article } > > > > Look, EVOLUTION IS A THEORY ABOUT A PROCESS > > THAT HAPPENED LONG, LONG AGO AND FAR, FAR AWAY AND NOBODY EVER SAW IT, AND > > IT HAPPENED, WE SPECULATE, UNDER PROCESSES NOT NOW HAPPENING - 'life' > > arising from non-live in the great cosmic Cambell's soup kitchen. I claimed that this statement is irresponsibly inaccurate, to say the least. > { from: Ken Arndt in response } > > If you READ what I wrote you will see that I am refering to 'life arising > from non-live', A PROCESS THAT NO ONE SAYS IS HAPPINING TODAY!!!!!! And > that everyone (except you evidently) says happened under processes that > were the result of conditions that DO NOT exist today because the earth > was a different place physically. I was NOT, clearly, talking about the > claim that species, etc., evolution does not happen today although we could > indeed talk about that. > > WHO doesn't understand evolution???? Obviously YOU. Please read your quote which you provided a second time, and which I took the liberty of requoting just for your eyes. You said that "evolution is a theory about a process that happened long, long ago and far, far away and nobody ever saw it, and it happened, we speculate, under processes not now happening". No, I did not misunderstand you; you have no idea what you are writing. Evolution is not a theory about a process "that happened long, long ago and far, far away ... (repeat the quote again here)". Evolution is a view of the natural flow of things, which is assumed to always have happened and always will. Thus no silly divine intervention could ever be accounted for. Gandalf might have created the universe yesterday and made it look like it was billions of years old. But if that was the case, science would still have to say that the universe was billions of years old, even though it was created yesterday. By the way, where did I say that the evolution of life forms did not occur under different sets of conditions than today? Me thinks you have reading problems and then some. > I accept your humble apology for misreading, misunderstanding, and not > knowing what you were talking about. "I f**t in your general direction..." - Monty Python, "Holy Grail" ___________________________________________________________________________ Live long and prosper. Keebler { hua@cmu-cs-gandalf.arpa }
garys@bunker.UUCP (Gary M. Samuelson) (05/08/85)
Reluctant as I am to leap into discussions such as occur in this group, I want to ask Keebler (aka Ernest Hua) to explain himself. Excerpted from Keebler: > ... Evolution is a view of the natural flow of things, > which is assumed to always have happened and always will... Clearly, this *assumption* is one of the main, if not the main, sources of disagreement in this group. Why do you make this assumption? Exactly what does it mean? Why does it upset you that others do not choose to make this assumption? Later, in the same paragraph: > ... By the way, where did I say that the evolution of life forms > did not occur under different sets of conditions than today? This question is one reason I don't understand what your assumption means. If the "natural flow of things" is "assumed to always have happened and always will" then it sounds to me like you are saying that the evolution of life forms occurred under the same conditions as exist today. If the "natural flow of things" is always the same, then the conditions are not different. (Maybe that's not what you meant, but that's what it sounds like.) So what *do* you say about the origin of life (if anything) ? If you say that life arose from nonlife, under conditions radically different from those of today, then the statement that the "natural flow of things" has always happened doesn't mean much; the "natural flow of things" is broad enough to allow anything. If you say that life arose from nonlife, under conditions substantially the same as those of today, then I should expect, that, with a little tweaking, someone should be able to create the conditions under which life could arise from nonlife. If you say that life did not arise from nonlife, but has always existed, in a form we would recognize as life, then I will eagerly await your explanation of your reasoning. If you say that life did not arise from nonlife, but existed in a form we would not recognize as life, including the concept that life and nonlife are two regions of the same continuum, then I will have to find a different term and pose the same questions, because I think it is clear that there is something substantially different between a rock and man. (Besides, if you really think that life had no "origin," why are you posting to net.origins ? Gary Samuelson ittvax!bunker!garys
ward@hao.UUCP (Mike Ward) (05/11/85)
> If you say that life arose from nonlife, under conditions > radically different from those of today, then the statement that > the "natural flow of things" has always happened doesn't mean much; > the "natural flow of things" is broad enough to allow anything. It is generally accepted (sorry, no references) that life arose in an environment lacking in free oxygen. This is radically different from the conditions that exist today. If biological activity were to cease on the Earth, then very soon (on the geological time scale) there would be no free oxygen on the Earth. The early anaerobic life forms secreted oxygen as waste matter, thereby fouling their nest on a grand scale (sort of like we're doing now). This changed the conditions that exist on the face of the Earth, making any natural genesis of life virtually impossible. This is not to be taken as a defense of the term "natural flow of things", which I don't understand.