Posted by giveawayboy on October 30, 2004 at 01:25:54:
In Reply to: Re: local legends... posted by cav on October 29, 2004 at 21:03:50:
Cav: I've often thought that many legends that we call supernatural may be based in reality and only take on the magic quality after years of telling. Things like dragons, little people, unicorns, even elves...in the real context-as in the legends that Tolkien based his descriptions on, could all be possible in a biological respect. Giant squids and sea monsters were proven to exist, as well as moas.
Bill: So true, just as gorillas were once thought to be legends of local peoples. Also, the Coelocanth was thought to be extinct.
Cav: And recently, imprints were found that prove that lesser tyranosaurs (not rex) had feathers. This has caused biologists to change the opinion of all Tyranosaurs. Apparently they were not cold blooded, and even rex probably had feathers until it got too large to support them, like elephants shedding body hair...it traps too much heat in large warm blooded animals in warm climates.
Bill: I just read about that too. They have also thought that some smaller dinosaurs may have been mammalian.
Cav: As a Christian and a scientist, this is interesting to me, because it closes the whole evolutionary debate a little. If truth is really truth, then all facts will add up when given the whole picture. So there should be no debate on how humans came to be if we understand the whole picture. In scientific circles, the issue isn't whether species change over time...that is proven, but whether they can change from one class or order across the spectrum of life. As in: can a single celled organism evolve into lizards, and then birds, and then mammals. By proving that some "giant lizards" were actually birds in the Age of Lizards, we must rethink the chain of events.
Bill: I believe in the whole picture. Let me apply this to the origins of man. As a youth fundamentalist creationists were telling me that man was formed 6000 years + ago and that his origin was the Fertile Crescent, somewhere in Iraq. My uncle taught me about the theory of evolution and showed me the famous Carl Sagan video production, COSMOS. Now we are told that man's origins may lie in Africa. Comparing this to those who interpret the creation account of scripture with a literal geographical statement about man's origins, Africa seems a rival source. However, if we have the big picture then all the pieces of this puzzle will eventually fit. Whether man came from the Tigris River or the Nile River, the Congo River or heck, even the Yangtze River, it should do no harm to pure science of good biblical scholarship. All this can fit.
I don't know if I believe in evolution across class or order lines. I definitely believe what has been observed and proven. No problems there. I never sat too easily with 'evolutionary tree' diagrams, though I did enjoy looking at them and contemplating their mysteries. On one hand they had a sort of kabbalistic feel, but with a sort of scientismic presumption about them. I came to believe, not in the literal branches of all those contradictory trees, but instead I started to see what I came to call the 'order of forms', which is almost a playful way of approaching the idea of evolution. If indeed large scale evolutionary leaps were being made across class and order lines, then there must be some kind of chain or succession going on. Still, without proof, we had to be honest and keep all our controls in place and look at our theories as theories. It would do no harm to note that a seal barked like a dog and had whiskers, or that his flippers suggested in some logical way, the paws of a canine. However, it would be presumptuous to run ahead and make bold declarations without some kind of proof. Personally, I think dogs and seals are related in the order of forms although I don't know if they are genetically responsible for each other.
