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From	Message
mo-oneandmore 27-Oct-21, 14:00	Fly brains 200,000 neurons and a few million synapse connections, huh? Hm-mm? I wonder if they could teach us something new about flying?
bobspringett 27-Oct-21, 14:45	Riaan 4:24 <I believe this thread is about having a great laugh at the expense of a fanatic who doesn't have the faintest clue about biology, physics, geology, astrophysics, mathematical principals and many more subjects-> No doubt it appears that way. But that is not my purpose. I'm in this because Coram's childish ravings are bringing the Bible into disrepute. He says 'The Bible teaches this...." when the Bible teaches no such thing. He is asking a question, and then grabbing a text AS THOUGH that is the answer to his question, when it is actually the answer to a completely different question that Coram can't even imagine. Just look at my outline of Genesis 1 above, and Coram's response to it. Unlike Coram, I DO love the Holy Bible enough to try to protect it from such sabotage. It traces the insights of some of the most profound thinkers in the Abrahamic traditions, while Coram thinks it is a blunt instrument for beating godless atheists into submission. In the meantime, I'll continue trying to bat away some of his more dangerous ravings.
stalhandske 27-Oct-21, 19:58	Bob <In the meantime, I'll continue trying to bat away some of his more dangerous ravings. > The Club is grateful to you for that. This is not a club for atheists, it is a chess club for Members who also want to exchange opinions and thoughts about other things, including matters of society, politics, religion, science, etc. Many of our Members are religious Christians, for whom the Christian faith is fundamentally important. I'll be the first to honour that. So, the constant accusation of this club being atheist is yeat another lie. But, as I hope has become evident from the exchanges on evolution theory, I cannot stand lies and false information, such as denying the sheer facts that the biochemistry and biophysics of humans is virtually the same as that of the apes. Or that there is an extremely high chromosomal sequence correspondence between humans and chimpanzees. This is an area of science that I happen to actually know pretty well after a lifelong career in the area. What I know very little about in comparison is the Bible. Yet, I was brought up in a Christian home, baptised and confirmed, and left the Church only at the age of 25. Therefore, I am indebted to Bob, who has taken the task of correcting the also to me very strange views of the Bible by coram. To me, they are strange already when realising that they are not shared by the major Christian churches, who see no reason for conflict between evolution theory and Christian faith. With this I will abstain from commenting coram any further, however much he may again make fun of this.
riaannieman 28-Oct-21, 00:37	@bobspringett Just to clarify- I have a lot of respect for almost all the sacred texts. Almost all of them teach morals, socially acceptable rules, a goal to live better. I think much of history has been captured in sacred texts. I see no fault in reading these sacred texts and learning from it. As stalhandske said above, I also was born and bred into a Protestant household, baptized, confirmed and married in the Christian faith. I see that we both formally left the Christian faith at the same age, although by the age of 25 I was already firmly set on my life course for at least three or four years. I do, however, fiercely dispute the interpretations which coram brings to the table. I know that what he says is nonsense, and that your explanations are more reasonable, commonly accepted widely by all communities involved in these kind of discussions, and I accept all of what your argued in this thread. I dispute the claims by coram that you are lying, saying that he is a liar, that you are not a true Christian, and all of that which we have seen these last months. I question the Bible specifically in another context altogether, which is not applicable to this discussion. I have made mention of my queries before, I believe in other threads. In this thread, I agree with your views. And I disagree with most of that which coram alleges! As do we all- atheists, Christians, Catholics and all other contributors here seem to do unanimously. I have spent a little more time reading some of what coram said recently. I note that he mixes in just enough of the truth to make his arguments seem valid to the mind which does not inquire into the validity of his statements. To the critical, open mind, it is easy to tear apart the fallacies and fables he weaves, seemingly so effortlessly. @stalhandske, you don't need to abstain from the dialogue with coram; I still find nuggets of knowledge there which I appreciate a lot. But I must say this, unless it is pertinent to understand his latest ravings I am not going to waste my time reading his crap. I'll rely on the excerpts you copy from his 'club' as the truth and read from there. BTW- a club: according to my dictionary (Funk & Wagnalls Standard Dictionary of the English Language, International Edition, 1964 [Library of Congress Card Number 58-11577]) is explained as follows: CLUB (klub) n 1 An organization of persons for social intercourse or other common object; 2 A house or room reserved for the meetings of such an organization. - v. clubbed, clubbing v.t. To contribute for a common purpose; make common stock of: to club resources. -v.i. To combine with a common object; form a club: often with together. - adj. Of, pertaining to, or belonging to a club. (Sorry, I can't type in Italics or bold font here- please forgive that.) I am not sure that the solo effort should or could be called a club. It could be called many other things: a diatribe, a monologue, a soliloquies...... not a club. As seen above, a club means the involvement of more than one party or entity, and consistently throughout the explanation such a club must have common goals. That thing has none of these characteristics.
zorroloco 28-Oct-21, 05:04	Riaan He really has a martyr complex. And he’s not too smart. But he won’t be contributing to the gene pool... women are smart
zorroloco 28-Oct-21, 05:10	Riaan And you’re right... it isn’t a club. It’s just a blog where he can snip at real clubs without the trouble of actually having to interact with people. Sad, pathetic and an incredible lack of self awareness.
zorroloco 28-Oct-21, 05:56	Riaan “maybe I should weep that the process of natural selection have not yet eliminated this person from the gene pool;“ Just wait. Natural selection will eliminate all of us
zorroloco 28-Oct-21, 07:05	Deleted by zorroloco on 28-Oct-21, 07:17.
bobspringett 28-Oct-21, 15:24	Zorro 5:04 "He (Coram) really has a martyr complex. And he’s not too smart." He's certainly not too smart. I see that as the core problem. He shows repeatedly that he knows that, too. He relies totally on cut-and-paste for his 'argument', not confident enough to add any explanations or segue from his own thinking (except for a few insults because that's what he thinks is the core of showing defiance). He simply passes on what his trusted sources tell him. But I wouldn't say 'martyr complex'. That implies that he is seeking harm to himself. I think it more accurate to say that he mistakes stubbornness for courage. In fact, his stubbornness is not courage, but a symptom of his fear. He is afraid of losing the favour of God, whom he imagines requires assent and obedience to a set of propositions and behavioural norms. Despite their proclamations of 'sola fide' and 'sola gratia', Fundamentalists tend to be just as legalistic as any Orthodox Jew. This deep-seated fear is clear from his transferences, such as saying scientists are afraid of being ridiculed by their Godless Atheistic colleagues, or that I am afraid of being rejected by the Godless Atheistic members of this Club. He is projecting his own fear of rejection onto his opponents.
stalhandske 28-Oct-21, 20:21	Bob and Zorro Just for the record, I don't agree with you regarding the above assessments of Flux. I think he is quite smart (if by smart we mean intelligent). I also don't think he has any fear of being wrong - he knows very well that he has the favour of God. That's (in my humble assessment) what his activities are based on. It is what he is most sure of, of all things. I am just eternally sorry that such devotion must clash with science. And coram doesn't seem to realise that his negative view of evolution theory is ACTUALLY in contrast to the beliefs of the major Christian churches in the world. He refers to the Christians around him, or in his country, but he ignores the full picture. With this I don't say that 'the majority thinks this way so they must be right'! I don't think issues like this can be solved by democratic majority rules. But I think it would be good for coram to realise that he is within a very small minority among Christians of this world. No, I won't comment any longer on the issues of metabolic identity between apes and humans (or pigs and humans, for that matter  ), nor on the obvious DNA sequence similarities among mammals and primates. The 'studies' coram quoted were 'nicely' doctored trash, and 100% more garbage than what he thinks of evolution theory.
riaannieman 29-Oct-21, 02:36	To tell the truth- I would much rather be family of the Bonobo's than some humans around myself. We can learn a lot from them about diffusing tensions.....
lord_shiva 29-Oct-21, 06:27	That Christians will be in Heaven is not nearly the selling point for the place that they imagine.
zorroloco 29-Oct-21, 06:31	Heaven Count me out... “For instance, take this sample: he has imagined a heaven, and has left entirely out of it the supremest of all his delights, the one ecstasy that stands first and foremost in the heart of every individual of his race -- and of ours -- sexual intercourse! It is as if a lost and perishing person in a roasting desert should be told by a rescuer he might choose and have all longed-for things but one, and he should elect to leave out water!” Mark Twain
zorroloco 29-Oct-21, 06:32	“Man is a Religious Animal. He is the only Religious Animal. He is the only animal that has the True Religion--several of them. He is the only animal that loves his neighbor as himself and cuts his throat if his theology isn't straight. He has made a graveyard of the globe in trying his honest best to smooth his brother's path to happiness and heaven....The higher animals have no religion. And we are told that they are going to be left out in the Hereafter. I wonder why? It seems questionable taste.” Mark Twain
zorroloco 29-Oct-21, 06:34	“Go to Heaven for the climate...Hell for the company” Mark Twain
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 07:05	Human and ape genomes Flux continues with his rant about this issue. I KNOW that I said I won't discuss this any longer, but please read this Nature article by Svante Pääbo et al. www.nature.com I have myself an article with Svante about mtDNA (mitochondrial DNA) comparisons between H. sapens and H. neandertaliensis, which also makes comparisons to some of the ape species. The similarities are extensive here, too. www.cell.com Anyone who has done work in this area KNOWS that Flux is wrong about this. And when I say KNOW I mean KNOW. Let's see if he catches this throw....
zorroloco 29-Oct-21, 07:08	Stal He is fact proofed
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 07:09	Zorro Sorry mate, but I don't understand that saying.
hogfysshe 29-Oct-21, 07:31	"factproof" is like "waterproof." needed a hyphen or no space. it's a special coating that prevent facts from penetrating, ...I believe is what Z means.
lord_shiva 29-Oct-21, 07:32	Child Proof A child proof home is one in which the cabinets cannot be opened by children, like child proof medicine bottles. A fact proof person is one not susceptible to poisoning by a bottle of facts inadvertently left out of the medicine cabinet.
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 07:34	OK thanks - I got it now!
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 07:43	Flux further response <• The chimp genome is 3.231 billion base pairs, while the human genome is 3.097 billion base pairs, meaning the chimp genome is 134 million base pairs (4.3 percent) larger than the human genome. • Was 25 percent of human genetic material and 18 percent of chimp genetic material excluded when scientists arrived at the 98 percent similarity figure? A *secular* website that *adheres to the theory of evolution* made that claim. I think those are important questions which should be answered. Could you answer them or let me know if the articles you provided links for answer them?> I actually don't know precisely the details of the comparison he refers to (it is not precisely my field). I assume that one takes the shorter genome (human) and sees in how many instances it matches the longer one (chimp). My main field is proteins, and those are coded for by genes. Chimp (and pig etc) proteins are virtually identical to the corresponding human ones! Both in amino acid sequence and in 3D structure. It is really stupid to claim otherwise because it is denial of fact! But I don't expect Flux to admit he is wrong, because he never does!
zorroloco 29-Oct-21, 08:02	Stal He can’t be wrong because the Bible. Obviously
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 08:09	Coram <• Was 25 percent of human genetic material and 18 percent of chimp genetic material excluded when scientists arrived at the 98 percent similarity figure? > I have no idea. As I already explained I told you how I think they arrived at '98%'. I also told you that I know the proteins and their comparison, and those are the crucial ones. The DNA is just the blueprint. Why don't you read Svante Pääbo's article for info on the DNA?
zorroloco 29-Oct-21, 08:27	Stal “Why don’t you read....?’ The Bible says it. He believes it. That settles it.
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 21:06	Human-chimp DNA comparison Here is an article (published in the journal Science) actually referred to in the article cited by Coram. It explains pretty well the difficulties in 'counting' the similarity/difference in DNA sequences between species, and what they mean. academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu I also note that a key reference in the article cited by Coram is to a paper in the journal 'Answers Research Journal' (vol 11 (2018) pp. 205-209. I had not heard of this journal and looked it up....It is described as 'cutting edge creation research' answersresearchjournal.org
brigadecommander 29-Oct-21, 21:43	The Rorsehach There are many reason why people believe in Mystical things. Like Gods and Devils. Often they can be seen around us.. To an untrained mind they can seem mystical and even frightening Here's a Devil representation.apod.nasa.gov. Explanation: If you see this as a monster's face, don't panic. It's only pareidolia, often experienced as the tendency to see faces in patterns of light and shadow. In fact, the startling visual scene is actually a 180 degree panorama of Northern Lights, digitally mirrored like inkblots on a folded piece of paper. Frames used to construct it were captured on a September night from the middle of a waterfall-crossing suspension bridge in Jamtland, Sweden. With geomagnetic storms triggered by recent solar activity, auroral displays could be very active at planet Earth's high latitudes in the coming days. But if you see a monster's face in your own neighborhood tomorrow night, it might just be Halloween. NASA
bobspringett 29-Oct-21, 22:17	DNA comparison I'm unimpressed by both sides of this argument. As the item quoted by Coram quite rightly says, is a duplication of a whole slab of DNA a single difference, or should each of thousands of additional bases be counted? Simply quoting numbers means nothing unless their context and significance is considered. For a parallel, consider two home-made bombs built by terrorists from internet instructions. One is almost exactly the same as the 'ideal', excerpt it has only 90 bolts instead of a hundred in the shrapnel layer. The other is also almost exactly the same, but it has only one difference; no explosive charge. Which of these two bombs will perform most like the prototype? The one with only one mistake, or the one with ten mistakes? But Coram's reference then lets itself down. After arguing that numbers mean nothing, it then goes on to quote numbers as if they prove his own case. In particular, his base-for-base detailed comparison is absurd. No two humans (except perhaps for identical twins) will have exact correspondence. So how many changes are the threshold for no longer being 'human'? A thousand? A million? A billion? Any answer is obviously wrong! One too many and you're 'sub-human', but one short of that magic number means that you are supposedly the same 'kind' as every other human on the planet. In a test where a spread of perhaps millions from the arbitrary norm is allowable, a difference of two between specific individuals puts them into different species! And what does this mean for people with genetic irregularities? Are Down Syndrome kids sub-human because this count puts them over the allowable limit? But let's suppose that an answer is given. In that case, stating how many changes are permissible FROM WHICH 'STANDARD' GENOME first demands which genome is considered 'most human'. I suppose the one belonging to the tall, blond, blue-eyed Aryan male would demand this honour. Yeah, the one with an admixture of Neanderthal genes that the Zulu doesn't have, even though the Zulu is closer to the original H. Sapiens Sapiens. Nah! This whole effort to reduce 'being human' to a matter of counting DNA base pairs is Reductionism gone mad. On both sides.
stalhandske 29-Oct-21, 22:23	Bob <On both sides. > May be I misunderstood you, but on the side of science we are only talking about how closely species are related to one another, and by what intermediaries ('family trees'). To my understanding, we don't try to find where there is 'a limit to humans'.
bobspringett 29-Oct-21, 22:40	Stal 22:23 I understand that, Stal. My point was that numbers of similar genes, etc by themselves mean virtually nothing. Two reasons for this:- 1. How you count 'differences' is rubbery in the extreme. If one species has a duplication or deletion of a million bases, does that count as one difference or as a million. The count depends entirely on arbitrary criteria. 2. It is not the number of genes that matters, even if criteria for the count could be agreed. It is the function of the genes, and their interactions, that is important. Show 'closeness' all you like in terms of structure, function, metabolism, etc, but stating simple numbers is overly simple. As Einstein is reported to have said, "Everything should be made as simple as possible, but no simpler." You did precisely the right thing when you said the critical thing is that chimp, human, pig proteins are coded effectively the same. That functional, structural, chemical similarity is what matters, not playing around with mere numbers. The fact that the author of Coram's quoted article got so hung up on numbers proves that he doesn't understand the underlying chemistry and biology. He is just bedazzled by numerical over-simplifications.
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