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Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Cornelius Hunter Says Evolution Is Not a Fact

 
Cornelius Hunter blogs at Darwin's God. He has a Ph.D. in Biophysics and Computational Biology and currently teaches at Biola University. He is a Fellow of the Discovery Institute and the author of several books that I have not read.

Hunter has devoted most of his blogging efforts to attacks on science. This seems to be the most popular strategy of the Intelligent Design Creationists in spite of their claims to the contrary.

His latest posting is Why Evolutionists Say Evolution is a Fact.
Evolutionists say evolution is a fact, every bit as much as gravity is a fact. That is remarkable. We see and even feel gravity everyday. Evolution, on the other hand, entails rather dramatic, one-time, events that were supposed to have occurred long ago, when no one was around to witness them. How could we be sure of such a theory? There must be some extremely powerful and compelling scientific evidence for evolution to make it a fact as gravity is a fact. That is what one would think. But, surprisingly, there is no such evidence. When evolutionists try to explain why evolution is a fact, it is a tremendous anticlimax.
Hunter has not been paying attention. Many of us have written on the subject of evolution as a fact [Evolution Is a Fact and a Theory]. Evidence for the "factness" of evolution is overwhelming. It ranges from evidence that chimps and humans descend from a common ancestor to evidence that the frequencies of alleles are changing in populations as we speak.

That last point is important. Evolution is defined as a change in the frequency of alleles in a population over time and as long as we can demonstrate that change, the fact of evolution can't be disputed. I wonder how Cornelius Hunter explains the differences between the Japanese and the Masai of Kenya and Tanzania? I wonder how he explains the fact that native North Americans are practically homogeneous for O blood type? I wonder how he explains the many studies that have directly tracked heritable change over many generations?

Why are the IDiots so stubborn and so ignorant? Why couldn't Cornelius Hunter demonstrate that he understands why evolution is a fact while disputing some forms of macroevolution? That would be a sensible position. Instead, he comes off looking like an IDiot.


24 comments :

Nescio said...

"Why are the IDiots so stubborn and so ignorant? Why couldn't Cornelius Hunter demonstrate that he understands why evolution is a fact while disputing some forms of macroevolution? That would be a sensible position."

Could it be delusional personality disorder? See: http://contusio-cordis.blogspot.com/2010/03/delusional-disorder-part-ii.html

Anonymous said...

I'm surprised that Hunter hasn't already commented here to accuse you of some metaphysical religious predisposition.

I read his web site, mostly for entertainment. I love his whole schtick about "religion drives science and it matters" and that fact that Cornelius Hunter is the Only True Scientist in the world, and everybody else is contaminated by religion (except him of course, even though he is overtly religious).

But I guess then that's why he is an adjunct professor at an obscure fundie Bible college...I guess he must have a lot of time on his hands to write this drivel.

MRS said...

I´m still not sure, who the biggest IDiot is. But no doubt Hunter is a favorite since he posts almost every day utter nonsense about evolution
(-theorie).

ivy privy said...

Next time you see Cornelius Hunter, ask him how we are supposed to find the black obelisks.

Anonymous said...

"We see and even feel gravity everyday."

No we don't. What we see is things that fall to the ground. Aristotle could see them just as well. He designed a "common-sense physics" that has nothing in common with the correct theory of gravitation.

So Mr Hunter shouldn't use the analogy with gravitation the way he does. But he clearly is an ignorant.

shonny said...

. . . and the author of several books that I have not red.

Ahem!

386sx said...

Shonny my eyes must be going bad because at first I read your comment as, ". . . and the author of several books that I have not read. Amen!"

Anonymous said...

"Next time you see Cornelius Hunter, ask him how we are supposed to find the black obelisks."

or beter yet - ask him if he has a picture of a thylacine you can borrow...

Anonymous said...

Moran: " Evolution is defined as a change in the frequency of alleles in a population over time and as long as we can demonstrate that change, the fact of evolution can't be disputed."

So if you and I generate some new alleles during our lifetime as a result of an interaction with the environment, then "evolution" happened? What happened to the requirement of random mutation/natural selection? Moving the goalposts, are we?

Michael said...

So if you and I generate some new alleles during our lifetime as a result of an interaction with the environment, then "evolution" happened?

How is that different from mutation?

What happened to the requirement of random mutation/natural selection?

There is no requirement for natural selection to occur for evolution to occur.

All that needs to be present is a source of variation and differential reproduction variants.

Moving the goalposts, are we?

Asking a leading question, aren't you?

Anonymous said...

To Michael, who says natural selection is not a requirement for evolution:

futuyma:

http://www.actionbioscience.org/evolution/futuyma.html

"The reason that natural selection is important is that it’s the central idea, stemming from Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace, that explains design in nature. It is the one process that is responsible for the evolution of adaptations of organisms to their environment"


So Michael....you don't even know the basics of your dumb theory.

Anonymous said...

"So far as we know . . natural selection . . is the only effective agency of evolution." *Sir Julian Huxley, Evolution in Action, p. 36.

"Natural selection allows the successes, but 'rubs out' the failures. Thus, selection creates complex order, without the need for a designing mind. All of the fancy arguments about a number of improbabilities, having to be swallowed at one gulp, are irrelevant. Selection makes the improbable, actual. "*Michael Ruse, Darwinism Defended (1982), p. 308.

Larry Moran said...

Anonymous asks,

So if you and I generate some new alleles during our lifetime as a result of an interaction with the environment, then "evolution" happened?

Oooooo! That sounds like fun. When can we start generating some new alleles. You go first.

Larry Moran said...

Anonymous says,

So Michael....you don't even know the basics of your dumb theory.

Do you know why we call you IDiots?

Michael said...

Anonymous-

Not one of your quotes say that natural selection is a requirement for evolution.

386sx said...

Anonymous, you have to remember that there is a Creationist version of evolution that looks a lot like Creationism, where miraculous things like "goo turns into you" and junkyards turn into 747's, and the Cambrian explosion actually literally freakin "explodes" with a big "poof", and words disappear from paragraphs and are replaces with three little dots for some reason, and evolution is a "religion", etc...

I'm not sure why Creationists don't like their version of evolution because it really looks pretty much the same as Creationism.

And then there is the non-kook version of evolution for normal type people. Try and stay away from the Creationist version it makes you look very silly!!

Anonymous said...

Why couldn't Cornelius Hunter demonstrate that he understands why evolution is a fact while disputing some forms of macroevolution? That would be a sensible position.

Did you mean to say it would be a more sensible position, or did you really mean it would be a sensible position? Cuz the latter it ain't.

Sam C said...

Biola - surely that's an organic yogurt, not a university? OK, I see the connection, Biola "university" offers "Biblically Centred Education" - so it manufactures yogurt inside its students heads, using the starter cultures festering inside its staff's heads.

Anonymous said...

okay, first of all my name is nick. I will not lie that I am a christian who believes in creationism. And my friend, you are mistaken about the biggest hole in the evolutionary theory. Thats right a theory. Not a fact. The reason for this is that according to even darwin himself, his theory would be impossible to prove unless there was a kind of super matter formed that could do all the things his theory said. Currently we tried to find this atom or matter, sorry itzs been awhile i dont remember which it is, but we tried it and the project costed millions of dollars. And it failed. Miserably. And not only that, but also accoriding to evolution everything came by chance. This means thatvif his theory was true there would be no species at all. And especially in not such a large number. Take the regular oak tree. There are so many oak trees in the world and according to the evolutionary theory, it would be impossible.

peace and love towards you my friend
Nick

Anonymous said...

larry, you're a scientist, look at the incomprehensibly complex
self replicating living cell and tell me this is all just random
chance. Not credible. The creation story makes more sense. Give it
some thought and all the best. pierre

Monte's Blog said...

I. D has nothing to do with creationism. Why are they constantly being confused with each other? See this quote directly from the beginning of this article :"This seems to be the most popular strategy of the Intelligent Design Creationists in spite of their claims to the contrary. "
We will never have a civil discussion until we get the definitions of our Terms correct.

William Lilly said...

Notice how desperate are evolutionists to debunk hunter that they resort to ad hominem arguments,when,in fact, the number of highly experienced,credentialed scientists realizing Darwinian Evolution has been debunked is growing exponentially.Hunter has debunked Darwinian Evolution from fields as diverse as molecular genetics to computational physics.Only the ill-informed still cling to the debunked notion of Natural Selection and Darwinian Evolution.And the well informed apologists for Evolution are continually guilty of denial of the antecedent and affirming the consequent through their repeated pathetic arguments which only serve to further debunk their delusions.The greatest "evidence" for evolution is the a priori assumption that it happened....lol..lol.....lol...Its a religious belief.It is pure Scientism....lol

Ed Vaessen said...

The imminent demise of evolution...
Where have we heard that before?

Unknown said...

Was googling this guy because my christian parents left a book of his on my bed and looks like this will be a book rife with inaccuracy. . . how great.