Once again I make an attempt to open the question of created kinds, or baramins, or whatever you want to call them: groups within which there is common descent but between which there is not. This is an opportunity for the creationists who frequent TSZ to school me on the subject.
I ask one simple question to begin the discussion: how many different kinds of birds are there? (It should be obvious why I chose birds, but the choice was, from a scientific standpoint, arbitrary.) As a followup, how can you tell? If there are indeed separately created kinds, I would think the divisions would be obvious. Would you agree, and why or why not? In any case, I’m not asking for precision; an answer within an order of magnitude will do.
Here’s my answer: 1; all birds belong to the same kind. In fact they form an infinitesimal fraction of a kind, since all life on earth is related. We have discussed the evidence many times here: nested hierarchy, etc. There are no joints at which kinds can easily be carved. How about you?
If you understand this higher reality, why can’t you answer the simplest of questions? You can’t even explain how you know about this higher reality. When pushed, you make it seem as if you’re just talking about inference from observations, i.e. just what scientists do. But I assure you, so far you have shown no evidence of doing anything like what scientists do.
That smug little assertion of superiority does nothing to help your case.
John, I too would like some clarity. I take it you believe that there is an unbroken line of descent from primordial life to homo sapiens. Can you give me the name of at least one linking species in this line?
No. That’s not the nature of the evidence, which is all about nested hierarchy.
Now that I’ve given a clear answer to your question, please do me the same courtesy. I take it you don’t believe that there is an unbroken line of descent from primordial life to Homo sapiens. Where is the break? What species are humans related to (by actual common descent, not by any mystical bonds of similarity or whatever). And how do you know?
I sure am. And you can “smell” this new reality too, through your inner thinking of transdimensional squirrels
ROFL. Exactly the same faulty reasoning that theists like Bill Cole exhibit. “I base my beliefs on evidence!1!!1! the evidence is [enter list of random observations with no logical connection to their “pseudo-theory”]”
Theories, theories. All God’s chillun’s got theories. And they got such luminaries as Goethe and Aquinas and Steiner and even Jesus Christ behind them! They may not agree with each other any more than they do with contemporary science, but they’re all completely correct anyhow. Inner thought and revelation guarantees that result.
As I said, bless their hearts, every one.
The same nested hierarchy which would be apparent if all animals were a limited expression of the archetype.
There is in reality no break because the archetype is a unity. But for our physical observation there are breaks otherwise we would not be able to distinguish between the different ranks and classifications within the animal kingdom. You have used your thinking to close the apparent gaps and decide that the unity lies in a succession of fortuitous changes due to heredity. I see the unity in the common plan (by plan I mean something which is dynamic, not static). To give an analogy from the human form, I see the unity between arms and legs not because our arms developed from legs but because they both share the same plan. Our upper limbs have developed further than our legs and can be put to a much higher creative use. But this would not be possible if the legs had not curtailed their potential in order to provide a much needed, but lower, function.
Humans are related to all animals, only IMO the descent is 180 degrees opposite to the direction which is taught by the present day education system. Humans did not descend from any lower primates, the lower primates descended into gross matter and rigidified earlier than the human. (I won’t say solidified as our bodies are composed of more liquid substance than solid).
Well, there’s the first problem. You seem not to know what a nested hierarchy is. No, “limited expression of the archetype” does not explain the nested hierarchy. Your leaves are not a nested hierarchy.
So there are no breaks, but there are breaks. Got it.
What you describe is serial homology. The reasons for it are known: the same patterning genes expressed at the same times in different locations. Nothing weirder than that.
Let’s restrict our discussion for the moment to gross matter. Are the physical bodies of the “lower primates” related by ordinary bodily descent (the kind we can observe happening — sex, pregnancy, children) to the physical bodies of humans? Are any other species so related? And how about birds: are the physical bodies of any species of bird related by descent to the physical bodies of any other species of bird?
You understand that none of what you have said answers any of my questions, right? You truly do seem incapable of any clear statement.
You are a very patient man, Dr. Harshman. This really is the best of all possible worlds!
And what plan is that? Fish fins? Bird wings? Whale fins?
Maybe it’s fins, because once the “archetype” produced the fish fin. Since the fin became forelimbs, then in some animals went back to ichthyosaur or dolphin fins, it seems like they must have a propensity toward returning to being fins.
Or one could just note that something like a forelimb simply evolves to fit new situations.
Above all, why would anyone use a terrestrial forelimb in order to make a wing? For birds, this involves a good deal of fusion of bones, an unnecessarily complex and somewhat wasteful process. I would think the airfoil would be the real archetype, but apparently not. And I really don’t doubt that archetypes can all be saved by strong confirmation biases.
Glen Davidson
And they are not meant to show a nested hierarchy. The arrangement of leaves demonstrate a sequence which can be looked at from both directions, clockwise and anti (counter) clockwise. They are like snapshots in a continuum. We can imagine an infinite series of forms filling in the gaps in the series. Each leaf, seen in a moment in time is just a frozen frame of the dynamic reality. We see the partial reality with our eyes, we see the full reality with our minds.
A nested hierarchy only becomes evident when the leaves are looked at in context with the whole plant and beyond in one direction and the cells and beyond in the other direction. And obviously all the leaves as organs of the plant are on the same level.
Picture a 2 dimensional being living, moving and perceiving only in 2 dimensions. Imagine the surface of a stretch of water to be this 2 dimensional world. If you were to dip your fingers in the water they would appear as separate, independent entities to this being. But you know that in reality they are part of a greater whole, your hand. What appears as breaks at a lower level is actually unified at a higher level.
CharlieM,
It seems even more apparent, from this, that you don’t know what a nested hierarchy is. And your little hand/water analogy tells me nothing about the supposed topic of this thread. Are you truly incapable of communicating?
I don’t know. All animals are related but I do not believe that humans are the direct descendants of any species that are alive today. (just as the flowers of a buttercup have not developed directly from any of the leaves on the plant but they do originate from the same source). It is not just life that is in the process of evolving, the earth too is evolving, they evolve together.
All life is related. In reality it is a unity.
I don’t know. I do know that there is quite a bit of hybridization happens between duck and between geese, so the stability of species boundaries is difficult to determine.
It is one thing using morphology and genetics to determine the relationship between extant animals, it is another thing to determine their evolutionary history without starting off with preconceived assumptions.
Remember my point that you are incapable of clearly answering any question? This is a fine example. What do you mean by “related”? I have no idea. And nobody, ever, has believed that humans are the direct descendants of any species alive today. Why would you even toss that in?
In what way is all life related that’s relevant to the subject of this thread? You may want to reread the original post to familiarize yourself with that subject.
Why is hybridization relevant? What does the stability of species boundaries have to do with it? If “relationship” doesn’t refer to evolutionary history, whatever do you mean by the word, and why are you persisting in using it in a way contradictory to the original subject?
You don’t understand what I mean by archetype. The archetype is a mobile dynamic entity that encompasses all these various expressions of it. The archetype is not something which you can see with your eyes.
Birds in general express the archetype as wings because of their desire to escape the earth, to fly.
That penguin is in rebellion against the archetype. Just as the bible predicted he believes he’s an orca
Curiouser and curiouser
Presumably, flightless birds have lost this desire. It seems as if birds on oceanic islands commonly lose their desires. Who can say why?
Lucky it was where there were few ground predators–until humans found the islands, anyway.
Just an archetypal coincidence, no doubt.
Glen Davidson
I don’t find anything in the Bible about penguins, but there must be some sacred text that mentions them, because I did see a sports headline “Penguins cooled off by Devils”.
Cool story bro.
Why don’t they express the archetype as rockets?
Glen Davidson
I assume you didn’t chicken out of the challenge and you are going to continue to propagate your unfounded speculations… you and Lynch of course… after all your speculations are as good as experimental proof for many believers… so, do your best with you unsupported fitness thing…
I’ll bet the caterpillar would know, or maybe the walrus and the carpenter.
Not all penguins.
A Wish For Wings That Work
🙂
We need to end the war on punctuation.
I would say that my example is a nested hierarchy in the same way that a set of Russian dolls are a nested hierarchy. Am I wrong? And if so, why?
Yes. You are very bad at analogy. A set of Russian dolls is nested, but it isn’t a nested hierarchy. And your fingers in the water are neither nested nor a hierarchy, so they aren’t like the Russian dolls. Neither is a nested hierarchy, but each fails in a different way. Nested hierarchies are groups of sets, each with a particular relationship to each of the other sets: either one is part of the other or the two are disjunct. Felidae and Canidae are disjunct, and both are part of Carnivora. Carnivora and Perissodactyla are disjunct, and both are part of Laurasiatheria. That’s a nested hierarchy.
Now back to the subject. Kinds are groups within which there is common descent but between which there is not. How does that relate to anything you have said so far?
Well here are my thoughts. The realm of the archetypes lies above the world of the senses All animals are related because they descend from this realm, from the one archetypal animal. Those that have descended earliest are the first to be fossilized. The whole of the earth including its life forms has condensed from a more refined state. The animals that retain a refined condition for longer do not fossilize until later times.
So do you believe that any animal species around us are the direct descendants of other species which are alive today?
Well if nothing else it’s a point of agreement between us. You did write, “all life on earth is related”.
All animals? Like, sea stars, jellyfish, insects and vertebrates all descend from a single archetype? Sponges are expressions of this archetypal animal as well? Also, how many archetypes for other life forms?
You were trying to have a discussion with creationists who believe that “kinds” are put on this earth, created by God fully formed. You believe in evolution as a purely physical phenomenon. I was just trying to put forward an alternative process to both of these. Your attempt to discuss this with creationists didn’t seem to be getting very far.
Why do you think I included the words, “in general”?
In order to avoid the facts that go against your “general” claim.
Glen Davidson
How do you think we recognize penguins as birds? Our physical senses alone cannot tell us this. It is only through thinking that we gain the concept, “bird”. It is not us who invent the concept. The concept is objectively real. Our senses do not give us this reality. It is our apprehending the concept which gives us the reality. The archetype is the reality obtained in the same way as we obtain these concepts.
Curiosity is a good thing don’t you think?.
Mmmm, not sure. Are you saying penguins don’t express the archetype as wings or that they have no “desire to fly”? If they have no desire to fly then why do they express the archetype as something that looks an awful lot like a bird?
Here is a fine example of your inability to be clear. You are using the word “descended” in a completely different way from the way I’m using it, and you seem to think they’re the same. But I can try to work with that. Has each species “descended” or “condensed” separately? How does that work? Does a population of the species just suddenly appear in the material world, like “poof”? Or something else? And how do you know any of this?
There probably are some, for some definitions of “species”, though it’s hard to tell. Why did you bring that up in connection with humans?
No, it isn’t a point of agreement. As I have mentioned above, we mean completely different things by “related”.
That’s a ridiculous characterization. There are no archetypes. What you’re seeing are clades, related by common descent. (And I mean “descent” in the ordinary, physical sense.) Penguins share some of the characteristics we commonly associate with birds not because of some mystical archetype but because they inherited those characteristics from avian ancestors.
My attempt to discuss this with you isn’t getting far either. Let’s accept for the moment that a “kind” is a group that has independently congealed into physical form from the archetype, with physical, genetic common descent within but not between kinds. If so, how do we recognize a kind? Why? And how many kinds of birds are there?
Obviously there is a range between the multiple species of birds that there are. Everything from ostriches to wandering albatrosses. Albatrosses show a greater desire to be free from the earth than ostriches. Why do you want to paint everything black and white?
All birds do wish to free themselves from the earth in that they are bipedal. Crocodiles and birds are closely related but compare how they move about on earth. which do you think has remained more connected with the earth?
Buttercup leaves and buttercup flowers are disjunct, and both are part of the parent plant.
Yes. All the following attributes are just some of what it is to be human: Single cellular, multi-cellular, unconscious, conscious, self-conscious, capable of rational thought, sessile, motile, no senses, sight, hearing, sense of touch, sense of smell, sense of taste, does not produce any sound, vocal, able to express feelings through sound, temperature dictated by environment, advanced thermoregulation, aquatic, terrestrial, no true tissues or organs, complex organs, no circulatory system, advanced circulatory system, no respiratory system, advanced respiratory system, no nervous system, advanced central nervous system, no excretory system, advanced excretory system, can use tools, sexual reproduction, limbs with uses other than locomotion.
Compare the jellyfish to the gastrula that you once were.
Wings, feathers, skeletal structure. No teeth, at least in modern birds.
Only our physical senses tell us this. Otherwise there’d be no sound understanding of birds as existing in one clade.
No, the differences are objectively real. The concept comes from generalizing from the observed characters.
Yeah, we get it, you have beliefs that have nothing to do with the facts.
Well, too bad we don’t get the concept like you claim, rather by generalizing from the facts that you so badly understand.
Glen Davidson
Your analogies are all either opaque or incorrect. I’d advise skipping the analogies and just trying to say what you mean instead. I think you’re trying to come across as a cryptic guru, but you just manage to come across as nonsensical.
I don’t. I’m just pointing out that your whole “desire” thing makes no sense. This desire to be free from the earth is not evident in the data, and flight doesn’t even unite birds.
Nonsensical question incapable of a sensible answer. If being bipedal is being free from the earth, then you have to look way beyond birds for this so-called freedom. Most dinosaurs, for example. Would you consider a tyrannosaur more free from the earth than a cheetah? Do snakes have a desire to be unfree? All this nonsense about desire explains nothing.
Of course it’s us. Archetypes & concepts are human constructs
You left out the kitchen sink. So this list does what? Specify the animal archetype? Not really specific to animals, I would say. Or did you mean there is a single archetype for all cellular life?
Comparing. Hmmmm. No, not the same. I don’t think I ever had any cnidocytes.
Clearly, jellyfish had a desire to sting. I have a desire to be immortal, and Charlie must be right because it’s working so far.
Darn it, John. You beat me to it. 😀