Bugger!

halucigenia wrote:

campermon wrote:
Are they laden or unladen swallows?

African or European?

I had to look up that reference.

ElDiablo wrote:

halucigenia wrote:

campermon wrote:
Are they laden or unladen swallows?

African or European?

I had to look up that reference.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFylQ6_1bgQ[/youtube]

asyncritus wrote:

Most certainly. What alternatives do I have?

You could try being honest with yourself and say I don't know.

I really, really, really don't understand why ''I don't know'' is not considered a viable alternative. That's like thinking you must have an answer for absolutely everything. How is that even possible?

Fallible wrote:I really, really, really don't understand why ''I don't know'' is not considered a viable alternative.

Because creationists think they do know: "Goddidit."

I know that, but the comment which specifically led me to make my post was ''what alternatives do I have?'' obvious one being ''I don't know''. The impression given was that it must be God because the poster couldn't think of another alternative.

I haven't logged on for ages but this is a strangely familiar thread...

Satellite tracking is teaching us lots about where, when and how birds migrate, and it's quite wrong to suppose that all birds of the same species carry an identical and detailed 'flight plan', to which they must rigidly adhere. All that is needed for a bird to migrate for the first time is an instinctive trigger or triggers to start the journey (primarily day-length), a trigger or triggers to stop (productive habitat, and also day-length again) and a compass direction in which to head. Then it can make decisions about the fine details as it goes along, based on its previous life experience - where would be good to stop off and feed, when should it take a break to avoid bad weather, etc.

Within one population of the same species there can be huge variation in timing, route and destination. Several Ospreys (a large, fish-eating bird of prey) that breed in the UK are tracked on their migration to and from west Africa, where they spend the winter. Some cross to France and then go south overland, following the coast, others do a sea crossing over the Bay of Biscay and make landfall in northern Spain. Some winter in Senegal, some in Mauretania, some much further north. One youngster last year only went as far as southern Spain and overwintered there, while her sister in the same nest went to Mauretania.

What's also striking is the capacity for learning. The routes followed by experienced adults (this is a species that can live well into its twenties) are much more efficient than those used by young Ospreys making their first migration. The latter occasionally screw it up completely and end up too far from land and drown, or too far from feeding grounds and starve, but the majority do complete their first migration. A mental map of a learned route obviously can't be inherited, but the capacity to learn and the stamina and tenacity to get through a difficult situation can be.

Here's some stuff about one of the Osprey satellite tracking projects: http://www.roydennis.org/animals/raptors/osprey/satellite-tracking/The trackers are too large and heavy to be fitted to small birds like swallows at present but smaller models are being developed, and over the last couple of years Cuckoos (closer to swallow-size than Osprey-size) have been tracked successfully: http://www.bto.org/science/migration/tracking-studies/cuckoo-tracking

I think I've posted this before, but there's evidence that a genetic change in the compass direction that birds follow on migration is driving a possible speciation event in the Blackcap, a common Eurasian passerine bird: http://migration.wordpress.com/2009/12/09/incipient-speciation-in-european-blackcaps/

^Thanks aiki

Of course, actually trying to find out what happens in real life takes lots of effort by lots of people. Then, it takes mental effort for the reader to comprehend the fruits of that hard work.

Much easier to stick to simple answers i.e. goddidit!

halucigenia wrote:Welcome back asyncritus. I am beginning to see a pattern here - Is April a particularly free month in your calendar or something?

Thanks Halucigenia. I hope you mean that, and are not being sardonic.

I've been rather taken up with various preaching duties in South Africa and elsewhere, and things have eased up a bit now. You might be interested to know that audiences are usually more than a little startled to hear about the swallows, and I haven't had a contrary comment from any of the evolutionists in the audiences (there were some).

But thanks again for the welcome.

asyncritus, may I ask, are you into old-earth or new-earth creationism?

theropod wrote:asyncritus,

If you're arguing that gawd placed these migration patterns into swallows show your work. All you are doing is just bitching about how you can't see how evolution could have "done it" You know you can't do this. We know you can't do this. All this is about is how much a problem it is for you to accept observational reality because it fails to kiss your god's stinking, but imaginary, ass.

Oh, and explain why there are no bird fossils found in Cambrian deposits? I thought gawd "done it" in 6 days.

RS

A scientific approach seeks to first observe the facts, then second attempt an explanation of those facts.

In this case the facts are exceedingly clear and very well documented. It certainly did happen, but the tourists have ruined it, and the birds apparently don't return to Capistrano any more, but land in the neighbourhood somewhere.

The article I'm reading in (http://www.skepticblog.org/2012/03/28/w ... trano-not/)says so, but admits:

Amazingly, they fly 6000 miles from their winter nesting grounds near Goya in Corrientes, Argentina, which is one of the longest migrations known and even more remarkable when you realize the bird is smaller than the size of your fist.

Here's another article which confirms the fact that they did come there: http://www.voanews.com/content/plan-hat ... 47159.html

Given the facts, we now have to 'evolve' a theory which explains those facts. (BTW, if anybody can gainsay those facts, I'd like to be corrected, with sources, please).

What have we got?

1 God did it

2 Mutations and natural selection did it.

Common sense and the facts about mutations and the damage they do (see the wiki quote in the OP) argues powerfully against no.2

Which by elimination leaves no.1

I try to approach the matter intelligently (and you are at liberty to doubt this!) and it seems that there isn't a better theory available than no.1.

There's nothing 'random' about a mechanism which permits a 7,500 mile flight ending at precisely the same point and with an arrival date of plus or minus one or two days . To put the matter simply, if an ICBM is fired in Goya and hits Capistrano every year for hundreds of years, then I would be hard put to say that the ICBM was a random production of Raytheon's factory.

I am forced to the conclusion that there's nothing random about it.

That missile has a guidance system built in, which had to be put together by someone who knew
a. where it was going and
b. the way to get there.

If the missile only hit Capistrano once, and then hit any number of other places, then the idea of 'random' plausibly enters the scenario. But that's not what happens as we all should know by now. They hit Capistrano every year, and would still be doing so, if not for the tourists - or so it seems.

So I'm left with alternative no.1

I simply can't do better, given the facts before me. What about you?

asyncritus wrote:

Common sense and the facts about mutations and the damage they do (see the wiki quote in the OP) argues powerfully against no.2

You didn't comment on my sheep:

http://www.rationalskepticism.org/creat ... l#p1678143

Should modern sheep not exist because of the 'damage' that mutations do?

LucidFlight wrote:asyncritus, may I ask, are you into old-earth or new-earth creationism?

I'm an old earth creationist. There is no avoiding the geological and astronomical facts pointing that way, in my opinion.

And I regret the excesses of the YEC people, though they do have some evidence on their side, which gives me pause.

Just to mention one:

The percentage of carbon dioxide in the air has to be just so, or plants could not photosynthesise - there's a lower limit.

That percentage is maintained in an equilibrium by animals' respiration.

Therefore plants and animals had to appear within a reasonably short time frame. Or the whole thing couldn't work.

There's also the question of the bees and the flowers. Which came first?

But that's just me thinking out loud. You guys may have other valid ideas, which I'd like to hear.

Also, playing the wiki game:
It is believed that the overwhelming majority of mutations have no significant effect on an organism's fitness.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mutation

Do you see the double-edged sword you're playing with?

If mutations 'have no significant effect on an organism's fitness' then that works both ways.

1 There's little improvement possible or likely. Evolution is therefore at a standstill.

2 There's little damage possible or likely.

How this could then produce 2 precisely executed flights of 7,500 miles year after year, is, in my view, a very wide open question.

Your sheep: as Darwin powerfully pointed out, the breeders have done extraordinary things - but there are limits to the variation possible, so sheep remain sheep, and cows remain cows, and peas remain peas. I have no problem with that.

asyncritus wrote:

LucidFlight wrote:asyncritus, may I ask, are you into old-earth or new-earth creationism?

I'm an old earth creationist. There is no avoiding the geological and astronomical facts pointing that way, in my opinion.

And I regret the excesses of the YEC people, though they do have some evidence on their side, which gives me pause.

Just to mention one:

The percentage of carbon dioxide in the air has to be just so, or plants could not photosynthesise - there's a lower limit.

That percentage is maintained in an equilibrium by animals' respiration.

Therefore plants and animals had to appear within a reasonably short time frame. Or the whole thing couldn't work.

There's also the question of the bees and the flowers. Which came first?

But that's just me thinking out loud. You guys may have other valid ideas, which I'd like to hear.

I see. Yes, it is interesting how environments seem to be balanced just right for organisms to flourish within them. This, of course, points to God as the regulator of such finely-tuned systems, I'm sure you'll agree. I thank you for your kind answer and look forward to your continuing discussions with the evolutionists of these fora.

asyncritus wrote:

theropod wrote:asyncritus,

If you're arguing that gawd placed these migration patterns into swallows show your work. All you are doing is just bitching about how you can't see how evolution could have "done it" You know you can't do this. We know you can't do this. All this is about is how much a problem it is for you to accept observational reality because it fails to kiss your god's stinking, but imaginary, ass.

Oh, and explain why there are no bird fossils found in Cambrian deposits? I thought gawd "done it" in 6 days.

RS

A scientific approach seeks to first observe the facts, then second attempt an explanation of those facts.

Do these "explanations" depend on tests of the observations that return consistent results?

In this case the facts are exceedingly clear and very well documented. It certainly did happen, but the tourists have ruined it, and the birds apparently don't return to Capistrano any more, but land in the neighbourhood somewhere.

The article I'm reading in (http://www.skepticblog.org/2012/03/28/w ... trano-not/)says so, but admits:

Amazingly, they fly 6000 miles from their winter nesting grounds near Goya in Corrientes, Argentina, which is one of the longest migrations known and even more remarkable when you realize the bird is smaller than the size of your fist.

Here's another article which confirms the fact that they did come there: http://www.voanews.com/content/plan-hat ... 47159.html

Given the facts, we now have to 'evolve' a theory which explains those facts. (BTW, if anybody can gainsay those facts, I'd like to be corrected, with sources, please).

What have we got?

1 God did it

2 Mutations and natural selection did it.

Common sense and the facts about mutations and the damage they do (see the wiki quote in the OP) argues powerfully against no.2

Common sense isn't repeatable or scientific.

Except for those mutations which provide an organism with a reproductive advantage. Don't be dishonest, as mutations which provide a reproductive benefit have been well documented. Facts eh? Sounds more like creationist bullshit to me.

Which by elimination leaves no.1

Except you haven't eliminated anything. This is pure weapons grade bullshit, since #2 isn't accurate, and some could see that as intentional misrepresentation of observational reality.

I try to approach the matter intelligently (and you are at liberty to doubt this!) and it seems that there isn't a better theory available than no.1.

That isn't a theory. That's an unsupported assertion.

There's nothing 'random' about a mechanism which permits a 7,500 mile flight ending at precisely the same point and with an arrival date of plus or minus one or two days . To put the matter simply, if an ICBM is fired in Goya and hits Capistrano every year for hundreds of years, then I would be hard put to say that the ICBM was a random production of Raytheon's factory.

Trouble is you don't get ICBM's, or swallows, in one go. Only after a multitude of iterations do you get either. Unless you can show direct repeatable evidence for swallows being created with migration patterns in place can you use this example. You can't, and you won't.

I am forced to the conclusion that there's nothing random about it.

Because you say so, or because you fail to accept observational reality? There is something random about it, but natural selection isn't it.

That missile has a guidance system built in, which had to be put together by someone who knew
a. where it was going and
b. the way to get there.

The target can be reprogrammed in the ICBM by altering the codes that drive the guidance. Swallows can also be reprogrammed as environmental forces are altered, as in the human impact on their habitat you cite. Is your gawd altering his perfect creation, and by what means is he doing so?

If the missile only hit Capistrano once, and then hit any number of other places, then the idea of 'random' plausibly enters the scenario. But that's not what happens as we all should know by now. They hit Capistrano every year, and would still be doing so, if not for the tourists - or so it seems.

So I'm left with alternative no.1

I simply can't do better, given the facts before me. What about you?

Are you sure you know what the word FACT means? It doesn't appear to be the case

I have some facts too. One of them, which you conveniently ignored with your waffling, is why there are no bird fossils in the rocks from the Cambrian epoch. Why is it that when we do start finding fossil birds we see feathered dinosaurs and they are one in the same? Were migration patterns present in those early dino/birds? If not why not? Since these early birds couldn't have migrated the vast distances of the swallow, mainly because they couldn't fly very well (if at all), one must ask ones self how such a thing arose at all. Did your gawd need to fine tune his creation over several million years so the end result would be the swallow? Oh, and were these swallows migrating to this spot during the last ice age? Careful with that one.

I suggest you make up better bullshit stories.

RS

Where is this God of whom you speak, asyncritus?

What does she look like? Does he have a belly button?

Aren't you worried that by defining the "proof" of your god in the "gap" of yet another as-yet-incomplete explanation of science, that later sometime science will complete the explanation and your god will be left homeless - AGAIN, like so many times in the past?

So far, nobody has been able to establish anything like a lasting, consistent version of a god with solid supporting evidence that cannot be explained by other causes. Common sense suggests that something so hard to provide evidence for as a god is almost certainly not real.

asyncritus wrote:Given the facts, we now have to 'evolve' a theory which explains those facts. (BTW, if anybody can gainsay those facts, I'd like to be corrected, with sources, please).

What have we got?

1 God did it

2 Mutations and natural selection did it.

Common sense and the facts about mutations and the damage they do (see the wiki quote in the OP) argues powerfully against no.2

Umm, no. If deleterious mutations did not exist, or if beneficial mutations were very common, then that might cause a problem. But, as you admit, those conditions do not exist Just the opposite, in fact.

Have you managed to learn what natural selection is yet? If you're going to argue against it, it's kinda important that you do that.

There's nothing 'random' about a mechanism which permits a 7,500 mile flight ending at precisely the same point and with an arrival date of plus or minus one or two days . To put the matter simply, if an ICBM is fired in Goya and hits Capistrano every year for hundreds of years, then I would be hard put to say that the ICBM was a random production of Raytheon's factory.

How does natural selection figure in this argument? You''ve forgotten it, again.

I am forced to the conclusion that there's nothing random about it.

That's right!

Hey! Have I mentioned natural selection yet? Is it a random process, or not? What do you think?

That missile has a guidance system built in, which had to be put together by someone who knew
a. where it was going and
b. the way to get there.

If the missile only hit Capistrano once, and then hit any number of other places, then the idea of 'random' plausibly enters the scenario. But that's not what happens as we all should know by now. They hit Capistrano every year, and would still be doing so, if not for the tourists - or so it seems.

So I'm left with alternative no.1

I simply can't do better, given the facts before me. What about you?

I didn't know missiles reproduce. Are they born alive, or do they hatch from eggs?

Shrunk wrote:

I didn't know missiles reproduece. Are they born alive, or do they hatch from eggs?

Spores, like mushrooms. In the case of ICBM's the similarity with fungal shaped clouds might have a common sense connection.

RS