Darwin Online

[Ishtar]

why don't we have a little wager?

I'll hold the money until one of you wins.

Nice little earner there Min, eh?

[Digit]

Yep Ish the west was well behind. What seems to have ruined the Asiatics as scientists etc is religion, it's awful to think what has been lost in both east west due to dogma.

[Ishtar]

Yes, Dig. Well, I think I'll have to go to bed now as I'm flagging fast and in danger of falling into my computer.

Have a good night!

[Digit]

Night! Just opened a bottle of good Port so I will probably end up face down on the keyboard as well!

[Ishtar]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4201666.stm

from BBC News, 31 August 2005

The only chimpanzee fossils known to science have been unearthed in Kenya, the journal Nature reports.

The three 545,000-year-old chimp teeth were dug up in the country's Tugen Hills and probably belonged to the same individual, the US discoverers say.

I have a question:

Given that carbon 14 dating doesn't work very well on substances that are more than 50,000 years old, does anyone know how the 500,000 plus years fossils were dated that the DNA was taken from for the common ancestor research?

[Beagle]

There are other methods, including the artifacts position in the strata. There is Thermolumenescence, Uranium, and and other isotopic methods. C14 is actually pretty unreliable.

[Ishtar]

There are other methods, including the artifacts position in the strata. There is Thermolumenescence, Uranium, and and other isotopic methods. C14 is actually pretty unreliable.

Thanks, Beags, but what do mean by 'position in the strata'?

[Beagle]

If the soil/sediment has not been terribly disrupted by tectonic forces, earthquake, or volcanism, etc., it's often possible to determine the age of the level that the artifact came from.

The Berekhat Ram figurine, found in the Golan Heights of Israel, was dated due to the fact that it lay just below a level of volcanic ash, which was known to be 250,000 yrs. old. Ergo, it has to be a little older than 250kya.

[Ishtar]

That sounds a reliable method in the case of the Golan Heights, but quite rare, I should think, to get those fortuitious circumstances.

Did you mean than C14 dating is unreliable generally speaking - or just in the dating of fossils because of its short half life?

Also, how reliable do you think radiometric dating is?

[Beagle]

Radiometric is the most commonly used today and is considered very reliable. Here's more:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiometric_dating

[Minimalist]

why don't we have a little wager?

I'll hold the money until one of you wins.

Nice little earner there Min, eh?

As a pensioner I have to look for opportunities.

[Ishtar]

I'll hold the money until one of you wins.

Nice little earner there Min, eh?

As a pensioner I have to look for opportunities.

Sadly, Min, I don't think there's going to be any money for you to hold. Despite my offer to Beags that he could come back with his own counter offer, there has so far been silence on that front. "Could he be afraid to put his money where his mouth is?", asks Glenda Slagg, gossip columnist to the stars!

Anyway, onwards and well ...onwards ....

As we know, man believing that he has a common ancestor with the apes is another way of saying that he and the apes are part of the same species. But how would you define species? How did Darwin – who, remember, only had a degree in theology and not in any of the sciences – define species? And how can we even talk about specific types when the theory of evolution decrees that we all come from the same cell?

As anti-creationist scientist Stephen Gould points out, if all life forms have been produced by an incrementally gradual expansion through selected mutations from a small beginning gene pool, organisms really should just grade into one another without distinct boundaries.

He says, “For an evolutionist, why should there be species at all?”

Another scientist agree:

In his book, Evolution – A Theory in Crisis, molecular biologist Michael Denton says:

http://www.forananswer.org/Top_Ath/Michael%20Denton.pdf

“Molecular biology has shown that the basic design of the cell system is essentially the same for all living systems on earth, from bacteria to mammals. In all organisms, the role of DNA and mRNA and protein are identical. The meaning of the genetic code is also virtually identical in all cells. The size, structure and component design of the protein synthetic machinery is practically the same in all cells. In terms of the basic biochemical design, therefore, no living system can be thought of as primitive or ancestral with respect to any other system. Nor is there the slightest empirical hint of an evolutionary sequence among all the incredibly diverse cells on the earth.”

I’m not saying that I believe that there are no species. I’m just saying that the two belief systems – evolution and the common ancestor – are, in these terms, incompatible.

[Digit]

A couple of points there Ish, Darwin could not have obtained a more suitable degree as he founded that particular science. Theology was route that most 'natural scientists' took in those days, equally Wallace was similarly unqualified, as was James Watt, George Stevenson et al.
This surely makes their achievements all the greater, not diminishes them.
Also of course Darwin held the same view as Gould on the gradual change idea. That is what kick started the search for the 'missing link'.

[Ishtar]

A couple of points there Ish, Darwin could not have obtained a more suitable degree as he founded that particular science. Theology was route that most 'natural scientists' took in those days, equally Wallace was similarly unqualified, as was James Watt, George Stevenson et al.
This surely makes their achievements all the greater, not diminishes them.
Also of course Darwin held the same view as Gould on the gradual change idea. That is what kick started the search for the 'missing link'.

Yes agreed Digit. I'm in no way diminishing Darwin's achievement for his time....just re-examining in the light of modern day understandings and also seeing where the science comes in about 'species'.

[Minimalist]

Despite my offer to Beags that he could come back with his own counter offer

Most likely he very wisely does not trust the stakes-holder!