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Thursday, December 11, 2008
Molecular Immunopharmacologist Fucktard
As D'Souza says in his debates, "I feel like a mosquito in a nudist colony...where to begin?". I took on the protein calculation first. I told her that this was GIGO math (garbage in, garbage out). The assumption is that the protein must come together all at once-completely at random. This misunderstands Darwinian processes. Second, and just as important, anyone who does bioinformatic analysis of nucleic acid or amino acid sequences knows that the same protein will look different even between closely related individuals. You see, amino acids cluster together based on their chemical characteristics. Some amino acids are hydrophobic, some basic, some acidic. I told her that a protein only has to fold correctly so that it's active site is in the correct geometry. Substitutions for charged amino acids, such as glutamate (E) for aspartate (D) generally have no functional consequences. I told her that this is an area of expertise for me, because I also have a Ph.D., mine being in molecular microbiology. She then became defensive and instead of argue with me, tried to drown me out and used several ad homs. She started shreaking at me, "Name one beneficial mutation, NAME ONE, NAME ONE (at this point, I'm trying to answer her), NAME ONE, NAME ONE (still trying to answer her), NAME ONE!!! I finally said, "Could you please stop interupting me, I'm trying to answer your question. I pointed to mutations in Cis acting elements (gene regulatory regions) that can alter body plans....such as those discovered in the gene bmp-2 which lead to longer digits in mice (and suggested to have been important in both forming bat wings and optimizing length). As I left I thought, "antibiotic resistance". Goddamnit, why didn't I say that??? I chose a much harder example to explain. Next, I informed the audience that transitions do in fact exist for many lineages. I pointed to Basilosaurus-a transition from four limbed tetrapods to modern whales. One of several whale transitions known. We can see the blowhole migrating with time from the snout towards its current position, and at the same time the legs becoming modified until the hind limbs are gone, changes to the skull allowing for hearing underwater, etc. Finally, I asked the audience what sense it makes for some modern whales to have a pelvis??? The "Ph.D" lady blew this all off, telling them it wasn't true.
Finally, she claimed that because of the second law of thermodynamics, evolution can't be true because we couldn't increase order. I interupted her and said, "The earth is an open system". She mocked me saying, "Open system, closed system, who cares????" I shit you not, that is what this bimbo with a title said. I said, "Why do you think we are eating pizza right now??? Carbohydrates, protein and fat are used to increase order and thus decrease our entropy at the expense of the entropy of the environment". I went on, "You don't even understand the second law of thermodynamics!!!" She told the audience this wasn't true. Finally, she refuted Rob's whole premise that science and the Bible don't conflict by stating that evolution couldn't be true because this would mean that "death came before sin". I looked around the room wondering if anyone else even realized this. Rob just stared at her. Rob and Corey have always come across as rather liberal preachers who don't take OT events very literally, and she just came in and might as well have taken a dump on Rob's foot. Finally, she spent about 45 seconds berating "any Ph.D's in the room" that use jargon and can't make concepts in science simply enough for children to understand. She said I was making the people do "mental gymnastics" and because of this, what I was saying MUST NOT BE TRUE!!!! Can any of you stomach this brand of non sequitur???? I couldn't, so I interupted her little diatribe against me and said, "You were the one who introduced entropy without explaining it". She paused and glared at me. Then went on to say that my degree wasn't worth anything. A bunch of Christians came up afterwards and said they couldn't believe how rude and dismissive she was and thanked me for being calm and sticking to the argument. It was fun....but that bitch is still a FUCKTARD!!!!! Can't stick to the argument forever!
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Setting Ray Straight on Sexs
Why did hundreds of thousands of animals, fish, reptiles and birds (over millions of years) evolve a female partner (that coincidentally matured at just the right time) with each species?
Alright Ray, here's how it may well have happened.
The cellular organisms we started out as, like many today, would have been asexual but with the capability to exchange genes with others of their species. This is beneficial to survival: being able to exchange genes allows beneficial traits to spread throughout the population much faster.
Many generations later, this trait would have been amplified to the point where the creatures must exchange genes with another before reproduction. The exchange itself would also become a little more controlled so that the creature can 'choose' which creatures to exchange genes with. This isn't immediately beneficial to it's offspring, but is a neutral mutation. Later, when the creature develops behaviours which cause it to seek out strongor fertile members of it's own species, it becomes an extremely beneficial mutation.
At this point, creatures have both 'male' and 'female' reproductive systems. Keep in mind that these are still small gooey organisms, so it's not quite as weird as it sounds. It simply means that all creatures can lay eggs, and all creatures can fertilise others.
Now, this is inefficient. A creature needs not develop the fertilising organs in order to reproduce if it can lay eggs, and a creature need not lay eggs
if it can fertilise another. So the next step is specialisation: some members of the species become better at fertilising, others get better at producing eggs. Eventually, the one type becomes incapable of doing the other types job.
The end result? Sexual reproduction. Easy.
I hope this helps everyone understand the subject matter a little bit better, Ray.
Posted on Ray's blog.
PS: POST 997.
Monday, December 1, 2008
"But it's just a bird"

She's one of the most talked about ancient creatures today, at least in the public arena, and with good reason: the 7 known Archae fossils (and 1 feather) paint an extremely clear picture of modern bird ancestry, and it most certainly doesn't indicate creation from nothing.
Or does it? Is Archae really a transitional fossil, or is she 'just a bird'?
Well, they're right on one count: Archae is defined as a bird. Despite appearances, she's not a dinosaur, or even a reptile: she's a bird.

But most certainly not 'just a bird'.
You see, Archae is defined as a bird based on having the following avian (bird-like) characteristics:
Feathers
This is the big one, the defining characteristic of birds which Archae has. All modern birds have feathers, and no known dino- oh wait, scratch that! With the discovery of Protoarchaeopteryx robusta and Caudipteryx zoui, we've well and truly established that some dinosaurs had feathers. So, since feathers appeared in dinosaurs before they appeared in birds, you'd expect a transitional to have them.
Opposable Big Toe
Far more obscure, but equally defining, all birds have an large toe facing backwards. __*link*__Take a look for yourself. No known dinosaurs have this (although some have something similar), but Archae does. So this feature is 100% unadulterated bird.
Fused Wishbone
Although all birds have a wishbone, in some it can be so poorly formed that it is not fused in the centre, which would strictly mean it isn't a wishbone at all. In addition, several species of dinosaur have been discovered with a wishbone, and many more with clavicles (the two bones
which fuse to become the wishbone).
Reversed, elongated, Pubic bone
This is also found in several types of dinosaur, although Archae's is more developed than theirs.
So, apart from the oppposable toe, all the other features by which Archae is defined as a bird are shared with dinosaurs! But wait: what about her reptile characteristics?
No bill/beak
All modern birds have a hard mouthpiece, covering their jawbone. Archae completely lacks this feature, like most dinosaurs and all modern reptiles.
Teeth
No modern birds have teeth, although some have deactivated genes which can produce vestigial teeth if reactivated. Archae has natural teeth, like all reptiles.
No Fused Vetebrae
Archae doesn't have these, like all reptiles. All birds do have them.
Neck attaches to skull from the rear
... as in reptiles. In birds, it attaches from below.
Long bony tail with completely free vertebrae
Birds have a short tail with fused vertebrae, often with feathers elongating it into a rudder.
Flexible wrist joint and free hand
Birds have completely fused wrists and hand bones.
Etc. etc. etc... the list continues.
I think it's quite clear, then: Archae, despite being defined as a bird because of a few features, is much more similar to ancient reptiles than modern birds. Why the 'just a bird' claims then? Why wouldn't they try to say it's 'just a reptile with feathers', which would be far easier to argue in a scientific arena?Because the individuals who make the 'just a bird' claims are not interested in arguing in a scientific arena. They want ammunition, not discussion. A glance at Archae's feathers is enough for them to come to a conclusion about her, and that conclusion is appealing to intuition, but not to reasoning or critical thinking. "It looks like a bird, ergo, it is a bird", is not how science works: but it sums up creationism perfectly.
Sunday, November 30, 2008
Chromosome Number 2
It occured to me that we spend a load of time having a go at creationists, but not so much time on the science which they spend so much time attacking, which is why I entered this debate in the first place. So, in an effort to turn this around, I'm going to do the occasional post on some of the more interesting bits of positive evidence I hear about, or have heard about in the past. Feel free to join me.WARNING: SCIENCE CONTENT
Now, we all know about chromosomes: they're the things in our cells which hold our genes. Now, all the great apes have 24 pairs of chomosomes. This is fair enough, but (according to evolution) we are just as closely related to the great apes as they are to each other.
So we should also have 24 pairs of chomosomes, correct?
Now, this isn't a massive deal: chromosome counts differ greatly within genus, and sometimes even within species. The plant genus Clarkia, for example, has species with chromosome counts of n = 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 12, 14, 17, 18, and 26 (Lewis 1993) (referenced from TalkOrigins). But chromosomes don't just disappear: when they do, the victim of the mutation is sterile at best, stillborn at worst. So what happened to the 24th human chomosome?

Upon discovering this, a prediction was made: at some point in our ancestory, two chromosomes must have joined. This isn't a harmful mutation: the gene's themselves are still viable, but they are now part of a single chromosome, not two.
Now, chromosomes have easily recognisable sequences at the ends, called telomeres, and another recognisable type of sequence in the centre called centromeres (0). Centromere's are where the chromosome divides during reproduction.
X----0-----X
So, geneticists realised that if humans really are decended from apes, one of their chromosomes should have two (X's) in the middle of it, with a pair of (0's) flanking them. Keep in mind that if this isn't found, common ancestory is in big trouble: falsified, even.-- Kenneth Miller
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Lucy
Let's take a look at some of the claims made:
ThreeTimesHoly quoted AiG's John Morris:
The features which suggest upright posture to Johanson are primarily the hip and knee joints, but numerous studies on the hip have shown otherwise. Oxnard, in his 1987 book, Fossils, Teeth and Sex (which contains an excellent summary of these various studies), claims that, "These fossils clearly differ more from both humans and African apes than do these living groups from each other. The australopithecines are unique" (p. 227). Evidently they could walk somewhat upright, as pygmy chimps do today, but not in the human manner at all. Furthermore, Johanson seldom reminds us that he found the knee joint—the strongest evidence for upright stance—in a location some two to three kilometers away, and in a layer of rock some 200 feet lower. Clearly, the knee does not belong with the rests, but even if they do go together, the knee is not diagnostically upright, and; points more specifically to tree-climbing abilities, according to Oxnard and other authorities.
Jim Foley (1997) wrote:
Charles Oxnard (1975), in a paper that is widely cited by creationists, claimed, based on his multivariate analyses, that australopithecines are no more closely related, or more similar, to humans than modern apes are. Howell et al.(1978) criticized this conclusion on a number of grounds. Oxnard's results were based on measurements of a few skeletal bones which were usually fragmentary and often poorly preserved. The measurements did not describe the complex shape of some bones, and did not distinguish between aspects which are important for understanding locomotion from those which were not. Finally, there is "an overwhelming body of evidence", based on the work of nearly 30 scientists, which contradicts Oxnard's work. These studies used a variety of techniques, including those used by Oxnard, and were based on many different body parts and joint complexes. They overwhelmingly indicate that australopithecines resemble humans more closely than the living apes.
...
Less controversially, Oxnard also claims that, while probably bipedal, australopithecines did not walk identically to modern humans. Creationists sometimes quote this conclusion in a highly misleading manner, saying Oxnard proved that australopithecines did not walk upright, and then adding, as an afterthought (or in Willis' (1987) case, not at all) "at least, not in the human manner".
Qu Adds:
Note that Jim Foley, unlike John Morris, references actual scientific articles when making his claims.
(Source)
ThreeTimesHoly quoted AiG's John Morris:Several investigators, including Richard Leakey, have now concluded that two or perhaps three species have been wrongly combined in "Lucy." She was not a human ancestor. At best, she was a form of extinct ape; at worst, she was a mosaic, yet she is still touted as the best "evidence" for human evolution.
Jim Foley (1997) wrote:
In 1987, creationist Tom Willis accused Donald Johanson of fraud, claiming that the skeleton known as "Lucy" consisted of bones that had been found at two sites about 2.5 km (1.5 miles) apart. Willis had actually confused two separate finds which belong to the same species. (This was in spite of the fact that a best-selling book (Johanson and Edey 1981) has photos of both fossils: AL 129-1 is a right knee, while Lucy has a right femur and a left tibia.) This was a spectacular error which could hardly have been made by anyone who had done the most elementary research, but that didn't stop many other creationists from picking up the claim and repeating it. For a full history of this claim, read the talk.origins knee-joint FAQ file (Lippard 1997)
Melanie, quoting Dave Scot, wrote:
Another icon of evolution, the world famous fossil “Lucy” was found to not be in the modern human lineage at all. The interesting part of this is that this is extremely newsworthy but because it casts a very unflattering light on so many scientists who, uncritically it seems, placed Lucy in the modern human line of descent, you won’t find it widely reported except in the Darwin-denier blogs and websites.
Judy Siegel-Itzkovich (in the article Dave Scot is responding to) wrote:
Rak and colleagues studied 146 mature primate bone specimens, including those from modern humans, gorillas, chimpanzees and orangutans and found that the “ramus element” of the mandible connecting the lower jaw to the skull is like that of the robust forms, therefore eliminating the possibility that Lucy and her kind are Man’s direct ancestors. They should therefore, the Israeli researchers said, “be placed as the beginning of the branch that evolved in parallel to ours.”
Qu clarifies:
In other words, Lucy is a very close (in evolutionary terms) decendant of the common ancestor between humans and apes, and is an ancestor of Australopithecus robustus.
PS: We're getting close to 1000 posts! Are we going to have some sort of big party when we hit 1000? I vote we invite Ray, get him drunk, and shave off his mustache! MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAGGGGHHH!!!
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Guess who's back...
Among the - it has to be said - really poorly written blog posting (honestly Ray, take a writing course or something), were a couple of Comfort Classics;
Apparently la Galerie de l'Evolution was "...packed full of stuffed animals that God had created" and, "The only "evidence" of evolution was a stuffed image of the discredited “Lucy” and a copy of Origin of Species."
To sum up;
"Believers in the theory have encouraged me to visit museums to see proof of transitional forms. The evidence was less than pathetic."
So there you have it; evolution is bunk and God has a part-time job supplying stuffed animals to French museums.
Ray: we've missed you!
Cheers,
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
A Heartfelt question on biological development...
What the deuce is going on now?
As you may have seen, Ray ' Not-a-science-degree-guy' Comfort posted a series of infantile questions about which came first; blood or the heart. He has asked this before and, quite unsurprisingly, didn't pay attention to the answers or research it for himself. Now he's at it again.
He received, for his troubles, a series of answers ranging from the best, modern scientific understandings of circulatory development:
-
" Irukandji said... Ray, I hate to break it to you, but someone has to: this isn't a head-scratching, hair-tearing, brain-breaking conundrum capable of moving grown evolutionary biologists to tears; it's freshman level biology..."
-
" Froggie said... Ray,
That is a very common tactic of fundies all over the web.
Ask a series of questions that would take two years of formal study to answer. And you expect to answer it in a blog comment.
Get real, Ray."
... along with the predictably dumb responses from his ardent followers...
- "
Wayne Dawg said... Ray - Great questions......but the evolutionist have never explained whether the chicken or the egg came first, so why would you confuse them with hearts and blood?"
The questions then, are; What purpose does this serve? What is his next move? Why should we care? Who will be the first to say 'Great Post Ray!'? Call it if you can...
Points will be awarded for accuracy and graded on the Prophecy Scale:
0 - 3 points - Biblical
4 - 7 points - Pat Robertson
8 - 10 points - Nostradamus
11 - 13 points - Mystic Meg
14 - 16 points - Dani'El
17 + points - if you're that good, you shouldn't have ruined it for everyone else.
Have fun!
Matt
EDIT TO ADD:
Ray has now included the correct answer to his many questions on developmental biology and the synergistic nature of the circulatory system in living organisms:
"The only answer to these questions is that Almighty God supernaturally made the human body (and every other creature) with a heart, lungs (needed for oxygenated blood), kidneys (to get rid of bad blood) vessels, arteries, blood, skin (to hold it all in), etc., all at once. Unthinkable for an atheist, but true. "
Translation:
"Magicmandunnit"
Did you expect any less?
Thursday, October 23, 2008
It's clearly just a bird....
This BBC article describes the discovery of Epidexipteryx; the "pigeon-sized creature shows no sign of the flight feathers seen in other bird-like dinosaurs", according to a report in the journal Nature.
Discovered in China, it apparently "... provides fascinating evidence of evolutionary experiments with feathers that were going on before small dinosaurs finally took to the air and became birds."
So. Freakin'. Cool.
That's one way of looking at it...
The other way;
It is definitely not a transitional form because, well, erm.....aha! I quoth: "...its limbs lacked contour feathers - a feature common to most modern birds." There! See! It's a modern bird! Stupid evilutionists and their scientific theory tale! Piltdown Man! Tiktockalick is just a fish! Darwin was a racist.....and so on and so forth.
I think I'll stick with the first way.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
E. O. Wilson and James D. Watson Discuss Darwin with Charlie Rose
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
To save you the trouble...
"Proof of Evolution
It’s been right under our noses all this time. We have finally found the missing link. The tadpole evolves into the frog in a matter of weeks ("Fish Gets Legs").Of course, a true evolutionist believes that the tadpole isn’t a true fish.
The caterpillar evolves into the butterfly ("Bug Gets Wings"). God speeds up the process from millions of years to just 21 days, so that you can actually see the transition."
The rest has been snipped because it's just evango-speak and is of no use to anyone.
Please, please, please, please don't fall into the trap of feeling like you have to rebut or refute what may seem, at first glance, to be an argument against evolution. It's not. It's bait and it's only meant to keep you posting. Actually, reading it again; it doesn't make any logical sense at all. I mean: "Of course, a true evolutionist believes that the tadpole isn’t a true fish." is a true statement, so is he refuting himself now? He may have totally lost it!
To be crystal clear;
Ray knows that what he has described is not evolution (and he doesn't care)
Ray knows that no 'evolutionist' thinks this is evolution (and he doesn't care)
Ray knows that his flock don't care either way and that it annoys the fuck out of anyone with a functioning brain to read this crap.
Responding to posts like this only feeds Ray's massive ego (this, he does care about)
Perhaps an effective tactic when Ray posts nonsense like this would be to introduce a new topic in one of the first comments and essentially hijack the thread - it'll annoy him and we might get somewhere with some of the more open-minded fundies (there's an oxymoron for you!).
PS. - I say 'we' but I'm still on strike so by 'we' I really mean 'you', and by 'Ray Comfort' I really mean 'Cunt'. Glad to clarify that for y'all.
Cheers,
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Brianb's Lesson on Evolution
So let’s see how evolution works:
fish-fish-fishbird-fishbird-bird-bird
So am I wrong here that we should see evidence of fossils showing:
fish-fish-fish changing to bird-fish changing to bird-bird-bird
What did the fish do lay a egg and out popped a full bird. Or wait, maybe the fish jumped on land and somehow grew lungs, then thought to itself, wow if only I could fly (I think therefore I am) presto wings started growing...
You Evo's say we have been around for billions of years and life has been evolving this whole time. There should be mountains of evidence in the fossil record.
And you guys say we have blind faith...
Who do we have to contact to get this guy the PhD he so clearly deserves? He's convinced me. Evolution is stupid. Why have I wasted my life taking all of these science classes?
See you suckers later, I'm off to the Creation Museum.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Ray Comfort: Master Baiter
Another day, another asinine post at Atheist Central. This time Ray makes it clear that a species-to-species transitional would have to be something like Tiktaalik - a transitional form "between fish and land animals" or Archaeopteryx - a transitional form "between reptiles and birds" as quoted by the scientific journal; The Guardian newspaper (well, at least it's not AIG).
At this point I was wondering when the stupid was going to kick in becuase this almost sounds like he knows what he's talking about...
"Of course, the above claims can’t be substantiated. Archaeopteryx (unlike Archaeoraptor) is not a hoax—-it is a bird, not a "missing link" between birds and reptiles. The missing link is still missing, and I'm still waiting for the first piece of genuine evidence for the theory of evolution." - R. Comfort
Ah, there's the stupid!
So he defines it as something like Tiktaalik, only Tiktaalik doesn't count because, well, erm, you see.... if you see a building, you know it must have had a builder....
Just to be clear; he is definately baiting to try and get us to return, don't fall for it (unless you really want to) my fellow Raytractors, stay strong!
Matt
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Are you reading?
Would people who just read stuff tell me if it is worth doing this much effort to debunk the same all same, already debunked, and re-debunked crap that the likes of Ray post? I know the fundies do not listen, so who does? Does this help you when confronted with fundies in real life? Do you have any experience confronting fundies and got stuck because you did not know how to answer but now you know better? Did your understanding of evolution get better? Do you learn something new because we make these efforts?
So what do you think guys?
G.E.
Friday, July 25, 2008
The way to argue with an evolution denier
Dan,
I really don't feel like explaining evolution to you, others already have for the nth time. What I want to pose is this: even if evolution were unfounded, debunked, etc...how does that make the jesus story true? Obviously you are trying to debunk science because it threatens your faith...but even if evolution is false..doesn't make Christianity true. If you really want to demonstrate that we are wrong, provide evidence that would justify your claim...you haven't done this.
As I understand it, blood came first, then blood vessels, then the heart..."