Tag: evolution

Some of you will recall that I thoroughly, and in some detail, demonstrated the way in which, according to the present scientific understanding of astrophysics, genetic biology, and mathematics, the modern Neo-Darwinian synthesis of the theory of evolution by (mostly) natural selection is impossible, caught as it is between the Scylla of a fixed amount of time and the Charybdis of the number of fixed mutations required to take place in the evolution between one historical species and a present species.

To put it in the most simple terms that even a biologist should be able to follow, if we are told that a football team has gained 1,500 yards on the ground while averaging three yards per rushing play, and we know that the maximum number of offensive plays per team per game is 84, then we know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the yards reported were not gained in a single 60-minute game. They could not have been. It is impossible.

The math is inexorable. The maximum number of yards that could have been gained on the ground in a single game, given a three yards-per-carry average, is 252. It does not matter if a desperate proponent of Neo-Schembechlerism proposes the idea that perhaps the team ran a hurry-up wishbone offense, or that the quarterback was a dual-threat as a runner, or that the team played in a league known for its terrible run defenses, or that one of the halfbacks is known to have one ripped off a 99-yard gain, or that NCAA teams have been known to play up to seven overtime periods, or that up to five different players touched the ball on the same play. The math is inexorable. The assertion that a football team which averages three yards per carry gained 1,500 yards on the ground in a single game is flat-out impossible. We can say with absolute certainty that it never happened without knowing any details whatsoever about the team or the game.

In like manner, the number of fixed mutations that are presently observed to distinguish two species, whether we contemplate modern Man and the Chimpanzee–Human last common ancestor (CHLCA) or the dog and one of the therapsids, are considerably – CONSIDERABLY – in excess of the maximum amount of time that could have passed since the speciation process is believed to have begun. There is only one defense against this straightforward mathematical observation, and that is the idea that enough parallel mutations happened very, very quickly to significantly reduce the average time per fixed mutation to permit it to happen in the intervening time period.

The problem here, of course, is that the numerical gap that needs to be filled is so large that if that were the case, then these mutations would be have to be happening so rapidly, and fixing in parallel so quickly, that we could observe evolution by natural selection happening in real time all the time.

But we don’t.

And, as predicted, the new advances in genetic science combined with new archeobiological discoveries are methodically reducing the already insufficient time in which evolution had to go from point A to point Z.

• Peştera Muierii woman is related to Europeans, but she is not a direct ancestor
• Reduced diversity in Europe caused by Last Glaciation, not out-of-Africa bottleneck
• Genetic load appears indifferent across 40,000 years of European history
• New DNA extraction approach recovers up to 33 times more DNA from ancient remains

Summary

Few complete human genomes from the European Early Upper Palaeolithic (EUP) have been sequenced. Using novel sampling and DNA extraction approaches, we sequenced the genome of a woman from “Peştera Muierii,” Romania who lived ∼34,000 years ago to 13.5× coverage. The genome shows similarities to modern-day Europeans, but she is not a direct ancestor. Although her cranium exhibits both modern human and Neanderthal features, the genome shows similar levels of Neanderthal admixture (∼3.1{cc08d85cfa54367952ab9c6bd910a003a6c2c0c101231e44cdffb103f39b73a6}) to most EUP humans but only half compared to the ∼40,000-year-old Peştera Oase 1. All EUP European hunter-gatherers display high genetic diversity, demonstrating that the severe loss of diversity occurred during and after the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) rather than just during the out-of-Africa migration. The prevalence of genetic diseases is expected to increase with low diversity; however, pathogenic variant load was relatively constant from EUP to modern times, despite post-LGM hunter-gatherers having the lowest diversity ever observed among Europeans.

Translation: there was even more genetic diversity among early humans than previously believed, which further increases the required rate of time per fixed mutation. 

Or to put the point in even more simple terms, it is mathematically more credible to claim that you drove from New York to Los Angeles in a 1976 Cadillac Eldorado in one hour on a single tank of gas than to claim that any modern mammal evolved from the first crown group mammal in the amounts of time currently estimated.

The Salk Institute determines that the spike proteins used in the Pfizer/Moderna not-vaccines damage the lungs and arteries without any help from the virus itself:

An explosive new study by researchers at the prestigious Salk Institute casts doubt on the current crop of gene-based vaccines that may pose a grave risk to public health. The article, which is titled “The novel coronavirus’ spike protein plays additional key role in illness”, shows that SARS-CoV-2’s “distinctive ‘spike’ protein”..”damages cells, confirming COVID-19 as a primarily vascular disease.” While the paper focuses strictly on Covid-related issues, it unavoidably raises questions about the new vaccines that contain billions of spike proteins that could greatly increase the chances of severe illness or death. Here’s an excerpt from the article dated April 30, 2021:

“In the new study, the researchers created a “pseudovirus” that was surrounded by SARS-CoV-2 classic crown of spike proteins, but did not contain any actual virus. Exposure to this pseudovirus resulted in damage to the lungs and arteries of an animal model—proving that the spike protein alone was enough to cause disease. Tissue samples showed inflammation in endothelial cells lining the pulmonary artery walls. (Note– “Vascular endothelial cells line the entire circulatory system, from the heart to the smallest capillaries.”)

The team then replicated this process in the lab, exposing healthy endothelial cells (which line arteries) to the spike protein. They showed that the spike protein damaged the cells by binding ACE2. This binding disrupted ACE2’s molecular signaling to mitochondria (organelles that generate energy for cells), causing the mitochondria to become damaged and fragmented.

Previous studies have shown a similar effect when cells were exposed to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, but this is the first study to show that the damage occurs when cells are exposed to the spike protein on its own.” (“The novel coronavirus’ spike protein plays additional key role in illness”, Salk.edu)

The new research paper is the equivalent of a hydrogen bomb. It changes everything by confirming what vaccine critics have been theorizing for months but were unable to prove.

Now there is solid evidence that:

1. Covid-19 is primarily a disease of the vascular system (The vascular system, also called the circulatory system, is made up of the vessels that carry blood and lymph through the body.) and not the respiratory system.
2. The main culprit is the spike protein. (Spike protein–“a glycoprotein that protrudes from the envelope of some viruses” Merriam-Webster “Like a key in a lock, these spike proteins fuse to receptors on the surface of cells, allowing the virus’s genetic code to invade the host cell, take over its machinery and replicate.” Bruce Lieberman)

Incidentally, this also tends to support the hypothesis that Covid-19 is a manufactured form of the flu. Read the whole thing there, as there is also an explanation of what the study suggests about the potential consequences of the vascular poisoning being mass-distributed in the form of pseudo-vaccines around the globe.

It is becoming ever more clear that getting a Covid not-vaccine is failing the Darwin test. And just in case you don’t understand why we describe it as a not-vaccine:

Critics believe compensation requests should go through a decades-old program within the same agency called the Vaccine Injury Compensation Program, known informally as the “vaccine court.” However, the CDC insists that COVID-19 vaccinations aren’t eligible to be heard by the court.

The CDC is correct. A genetic modification is not a vaccination and therefore isn’t eligible to be heard by a court empowered to hold vaccination-related hearings. 

What was actually proved here is that evolutionary biologists a) don’t understand scientody and b) are extraordinarily stupid:

Scientists from Cambridge University, in the U.K., analyzed the relationships between the two, calculating how the number of species per genus and the number of subspecies per species for a number of different animal groups.

Laura van Holstein and Robert Foley used information collected by naturalists to determine the “age” of different species and subspecies to see how they closely they were connected.

They noted a correlation between species variation and subspecies variation. Genera with a higher number of species tended to have species with a higher number of subspecies. This relationship was particularly strong among flying mammals like bats. In comparison, land-based animals showed a positive correlation between species richness and subspecies richness—but this correlation was weaker.

It is often observed, correctly, that correlation is not causation. It is remarkable that Cambridge University scientists don’t understand that correlation is also not conclusive proof. If you’ve paid any attention to the non-science of Neo-Darwinian evolution over the years, you will have noticed that every observation that correlates with the revised theory is a proof of it, while every observation that falsifies it is merely an indication that the revised theory requires further revision.

And while one can’t blame the scientists for the way the media portrays their work, the headline is even more embarrassing.

Scientists ‘prove Darwin’s survival of the fittest theory’

Reading the Z-man can be mildly frustrating at times, because he not infrequently starts off on the right path, but then fails to make the vital distinctions that are necessary in order to reach the correct conclusions.

Whenever the subject of Intelligent Design turns up, it is always in the context of believers in ID attacking evolutionary biology. The ID’ers have a list of claims about “Darwinism” that they insist make evolution impossible. A popular one now, for example, is that there is not enough time for natural selection to produce enough gene mutations to explain the fossil record. 

This is incorrect on two levels. First, the popular idea is something that I first articulated some time ago before more recently making my case in detail concerning the time required to account for the fixed genetic mutations that have been observed, and it is not necessarily related to the fossil record. In fact, the fossil record is now almost entirely irrelevant to the TENS debate, in which genetic science is rapidly demolishing the last credible vestiges of Neo-Darwinism.

Second, this specific event-based criticism of Neo-Darwinism is not Intelligent Design and has nothing whatsoever to do with Intelligent Design. I pay no attention to Creationists or Intelligent Design advocates. Their meanderings are of little interest to me. I am but a humble game designer with an educational background in economics, which combination tends to alert me to various statistical anomalies and mathematical improbabilities and impossibilities when I happen to come across them for one reason or another.

Since scientists and political commentators alike seem to struggle with the basic concept, I will attempt to put it into terms simple enough for even a sportsball player to follow.

If we are told that a sportsball team has gained 1,500 yards on the ground and that it averages three yards per rushing play, and we know that the maximum number of offensive plays per game is 84, then we know, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the yards reported were not gained in a single 60-minute game. They could not have been. It is impossible.

The math is inexorable. The maximum number of yards that could have been gained on the ground in a single game is 252. It does not matter if a desperate proponent of Neo-Schembechlerism proposes the idea that perhaps the team ran a hurry-up wishbone offense, or that the quarterback was a dual-threat as a runner, or that the team played in a league known for its terrible run defenses, or that one of the halfbacks once ripped off a 99-yard gain, or that NCAA teams have been known to play up to seven overtime periods, or that perhaps five different players touched the ball on the same play. The math is inexorable. The assertion that a sportsball team which averages three yards per carry gained 1,500 yards on the ground in a single game is flat-out impossible. We can say with certainty that it never happened.

In like manner, the number of fixed mutations that are presently observed to distinguish two species, whether we contemplate Man and the Chimpanzee–Human last common ancestor (CHLCA) or the dog and one of the therapsids, are considerably – CONSIDERABLY – in excess of the maximum amount of time that could have passed since the speciation process is believed to have begun. There is only one defense against this straightforward mathematical observation, and that is the idea that enough parallel mutations happened very, very quickly to significantly reduce the average time per fixed mutation to permit it to happen in the intervening time period.

The problem here, of course, is that the numerical gap that needs to be filled is so large that if that were the case, then these mutations would be have to be happening so rapidly, and fixing in parallel so quickly, that we could observe evolution by natural selection happening in real time all the time. Except we don’t, so the Neo-Darwinian is forced to retreat to the absurd scientific equivalent of claiming that he does too have a girlfriend, it’s just that she lives in Canada, and you wouldn’t know her anyhow.

This is not a defense of intelligent design. It is a defense of math and logic, both of which have to be abandoned if one is still to take Neo-Darwinism or the theory of evolution by natural selection seriously.

Yes. Next question…. I’ve demonstrated the mathematical impossibility of evolution by natural selection and others are now hitting it increasingly hard from a variety of other angles:

Has Darwinism really failed? Peter Robinson discusses it with David Berlinski, David Gelernter, and Stephen Meyer, who have raised doubts about Darwin’s theory in their two books and essay, respectively The Deniable Darwin, Darwin’s Doubt, and “Giving Up Darwin” (published in the Claremont Review of Books).

Robinson asks them to convince him that the term “species” has not been defined by the authors to Darwin’s disadvantage. Gelernter replies to this and explains, as he expressed in his essay, that he sees Darwin’s theory as beautiful (which made it difficult for him to give it up): “Beauty is often a telltale sign of truth. Beauty is our guide to the intellectual universe—walking beside us through the uncharted wilderness, pointing us in the right direction, keeping us on track—most of the time.” Gelernter notes that there’s no reason to doubt that Darwin successfully explained the small adjustments by which an organism adapts to local circumstances: changes to fur density or wing style or beak shape. Yet there are many reasons to doubt whether Darwin can answer the hard questions and explain the big picture—not the fine-tuning of existing species but the emergence of new ones. Meyer explains Darwinism as a comprehensive synthesis, which gained popularity for its appeal. Meyer also mentions that one cannot disregard that Darwin’s book was based on the facts present in the 19th century.

Robinson then asks the panel whether Darwin’s theory of gradual evolution is contradicted by the explosion of fossil records in the Cambrian period, when there was a sudden occurrence of many species over the span of approximately seventy million years (Meyer’s noted that the date range for the Cambrian period is actually narrowing). Meyer replies that even population genetics, the mathematical branch of Darwinian theory, has not been able to support the explosion of fossil records during the Cambrian period, biologically or geologically.

Robinson than asks about Darwin’s main problem, molecular biology, to which Meyer explains, comparing it to digital world, that building a new biological function is similar to building a new code, which Darwin could not understand in his era. Berlinski does not second this and states that the cell represents very complex machinery, with complexities increasing over time, which is difficult to explain by a theory. Gelernter throws light on this by giving an example of a necklace on which the positioning of different beads can lead to different permutations and combinations; it is really tough to choose the best possible combination, more difficult than finding a needle in a haystack. He seconds Meyer’s statement that it was impossible for Darwin to understand that in his era, since the math is easy but he did not have the facts. Meyer further explains how difficult it is to know what a protein can do to a cell, the vast combinations it can produce, and how rare is the possibility of finding a functional protein. He then talks about the formation of brand-new organisms, for which mutation must affect genes early in the life form’s development in order to control the expression of other genes as the organism grows.

Perhaps the most important thing to keep in mind is that TENS is not even remotely scientific. It’s never been more than an unfalsifiable hypothesis. All of the science related to it is circular. Darwinism is not merely outdated and incorrect, it is completely useless for biological engineering and wildly misleading when it is utilized to help interpret the past. (See: evolutionary psychology)

I discussed this a bit on last night’s Darkstream, but because my grasp of the technicalities of how genetics work is close to nonexistent, I didn’t even try to delve into the details. It’s much better to simply read the linked articles; I leave it to those more versed in the subject to determine how valid the reports of the massive gap between the oft-reported 98 percent estimated similarity between the chimp and human genomes and what genetic scientists are actually seeing now as their ability to analyze the various genomes improves.

The first exhibit is an interview with a creationist geneticist, which will no doubt be improperly dismissed by scientistry fetishists with an appeal to the genetic fallacy.

Dr. Tomkins: My motivation started when I arrived here and was given the task of researching the human-chimpanzee similarity issue because people ask about this in churches. They hear the claim that humans and chimps are 98 to 99{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} similar. People want to know if that’s true. Before working here, I’d not investigated that issue. I ran a genome center for over five years and investigated various plants and animals but never the human-chimpanzee comparison. I went into it with an open mind and began reading all the literature on the subject—this started about eight years ago. I looked at the top six scientific publications that proposed a 98 to 99{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} DNA similarity between modern humans and modern chimpanzees.

Brian: A 98 to 99{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} genetic similarity between modern humans and modern chimps—why is that important?

Dr. Tomkins: It’s very important to theoretical evolutionists. The 98 to 99{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} claim is a theory—it’s speculative. They need a similarity that close to have humans and chimps evolve in the alleged three- to six-million-year timespan from a supposed human-chimpanzee common ancestor. Their statistical models need that 98 to 99{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} similarity.

Brian: What did you find in the literature?

Dr. Tomkins: The first thing I noticed when I began reading these articles was that researchers were throwing out a lot of data. They were cherry-picking the areas of DNA between humans and chimps that were highly similar and throwing out areas, including areas that would not line up properly. Areas that don’t line up are dissimilar. When I researched the data, I was coming up with DNA similarities between 81 to 86{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} when I included the dissimilar data. I published a paper on this.1 This is way outside the realm of theoretical evolution.

Brian: What should the evolutionary community say about this?

Dr. Tomkins: They have reacted to a lot of my research since that first paper. There’s a lot of DNA sequence data that is publicly available in databases. I began working with the data myself, and over a number of years I refined my techniques. I used an algorithm developed by evolutionists that turned out to be a bad algorithm—so there’s been a lot of trial and error. But I finally got to the point where I published a paper in 2016.2 It was the most comprehensive study I’ve done yet, and I looked at all 101 data sets that went into originally building the chimpanzee genome.

I sampled 25,000 sequences at random from each of the data sets and then began analyzing and comparing them to human. Over half of the data sets were extremely similar to human, and the other half were extremely dissimilar to human. It appeared the initial chimpanzee genome was contaminated with human DNA, which is a huge problem in genomics.

There’s a number of studies by secular researchers showing that many public DNA databases, from bacteria to fish, have significant levels of human contamination. Human DNA literally gets into the samples. Contamination is a major issue. Human DNA comes from researchers’ fingers, coughing, sneezing, etc., and it gets into the samples. Now researchers are taking greater steps to alleviate that problem. This was especially prevalent back in the earliest phases of genome projects, when the chimpanzee was sequenced.

Brian: Wouldn’t some of the human DNA that made it into the raw data affect the results of any comparison analyses?

Dr. Tomkins: It has a huge effect because the chimpanzee genome is stitched together using the human genome as a scaffold. It’s like a puzzle—researchers used the human DNA “picture on the box” to assemble the chimp genome. The chimp DNA sequences used were all about 750 bases long. Not only was the chimp genome built using the human genome as a guide, it also has human DNA contamination in it, so it showed a lot of similarity from the contamination.

Brian: Even with those factors in place that skewed the data to a more human genome, is it closer to the 98{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} or the 86{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} maximum you observed?

Dr. Tomkins: It’s difficult to determine because it is a flawed product. I based my research on human-chimp similarity on the half of the data sets that appear to have much less human DNA. Based on my work, I’m seeing not more than an 85{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} DNA similarity of chimpanzee to human, and that’s a maximum. It’s probably less than that.

The second exhibit is even more interesting, because an evolutionary biologist who is the Professor of Evolutionary Genomics at the University of London has been seeing much the same thing in his review of the various chimp-human genomic studies:

When assessing the total similarity of the human genome to the chimp genome, we also need to bear in mind that roughly 5{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} of the human genome has not been fully assembled yet, so the best we can do for that 5{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} is predict how similar it will be to the chimpanzee genome. We do not yet know for sure. The chimpanzee genome assembly is less well assembled, so in future we may assemble parts of the chimpanzee genome that are similar to the human genome – this is another source of uncertainty to keep in mind.

To come up with the most accurate current assessment that I could of the similarity of the human and chimpanzee genome, I downloaded from the UCSC genomics website the latest alignments (made using the LASTZ software) between the human and chimpanzee genome assemblies, hg38 and pantro6. See discussion post #35 for details. This gave the following for the human genome:

4.06{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} had no alignment to the chimp assembly
5.18{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} was in CNVs relative to chimp
1.12{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} differed due to SNPs in the one-to-one best aligned regions
0.28{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} differed due to indels within the one-to-one best aligned regions

The percentage of nucleotides in the human genome that had one-to-one exact matches in the chimpanzee genome was 84.38{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b}

In order to assess how improvements in genome assemblies can change these figures, I did the same analyses on the alignment of the older PanTro4 assembly against Hg38 (see discussion post #40). The Pantro4 assembly was based on a much smaller amount of sequencing than the Pantro6 assembly (see discussion post #39). In this Pantro4 alignment:

6.29{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} had no alignment to the chimp assembly
5.01{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} was in CNVs relative to chimp
1.11{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} differed due to SNPs in the one-to-one best aligned regions
0.28{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} differed due to indels within the one-to-one best aligned regions

The percentage of nucleotides in the human genome that had one-to-one exact matches in the chimpanzee genome was 82.34{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b}.

Thus the large improvement in the chimpanzee genome assembly between PanTro4 and PanTro6 has led to an increase in CNVs detected, and a decrease in the non-aligning regions. It has only increased the one-to-one exact matches from 82.34{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} to 84.38{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} even though the chimpanzee genome assembly is at least 8{e5873ef35c49232e29b64cdfe957a2c94da2fd9855660473ec610b770b20216b} more complete (I think) in PanTro6.

I have already shown that it is highly improbable that the speed of mutational fixation is sufficient to account for the estimated 98 percent similar relationship which needs to account for 30 million fixed mutations since the Last Chimp-Human Common Ancestor, so this massive increase in the observed difference between the two genomes, which is presently calculated to end up somewhere between 84.38 to 93.43 percent, is enough to not only drive the final nail in the Neo-Darwinian coffin, but wrap it in iron bands, encase it in concrete, and drop it into the Marianas Trench.

Because what we’re seeing here is inept statistical wizardry that involves everything from contaminated evidence to cherry-picked data and the ridiculous assumption that literally ALL of the remaining unknown areas will, in the future, be found to perfectly align with orthodox Neo-Darwinian theory. And the priests of TENS are still desperately clinging to that improbable assumption even though it was only proved to be correct for 25.5 percent of the area that was filled in over the course of the seven years that passed between the publications of PanTro4 and PanTro6.

Of course, no one here will be even remotely surprised to observe that Prof. Buggs’s original 2008 prediction was too low because, in the 2005 paper upon which he relied, the biologists got the math wrong.

Upon further reflection, I can make the concept even easier to grasp than I did in last night’s Darkstream. The theory of evolution by natural selection can be easily and completely falsified if geneticists are unable to find the GENETIC missing links that, by the very definition of the theory, MUST be there within the 450 years that DNA remains sufficiently viable to map the entire genome.

That’s enough time to establish an average of 495 base pairs that are a) no longer part of the current human gene pool and b) are shared with the Chimp Human Last Common Ancestor. Moreover, the same holds true of modern chimpanzees, assuming that 450-year old chimpanzee DNA can be located.

Essentially, what I’ve done is to observe that evolutionists are now facing the very same problem of the various missing links with genetics that they previously faced with the fossil record, only now they can no longer appeal to the difficulty of finding those fossils. While it is theoretically possible that the Darwinian hypothesis will hold, it is very highly improbable. The important thing is that the theory no longer remains practically unfalsifiable.

Torin was trying to cover JF’s intellectual surrender and his retreat from math, science, and logic in our debate earlier this week:

You seem quick to dismiss JF but what he said made perfect sense to me. If you want to create your own model OK. But if he is not comfortable with your assumptions also fine. I am confused a bit by the attacks but I guess this is just play. Yet the attribution of “fleeing” and “don’t call it science” are things I would not say unless I was damn sure. And since I have expertise in some fields I know how hard it is to be damn sure

Sir Hamster was having none of it:

“seem” – I watched the debate, and I saw JF making objections to the model that were already accounted for in the model. I knew it the moment he said it in the debate, and Vox confirmed it in tonight’s Darkstream. 

“comfortable” – JF’s feelings as a biologist are not very interesting or relevant when we can demonstrate his objections are irrelevant.  Having watched the debate, JF fled the moment he retreated to rhetorical plays, like when he claimed he was crushing Vox’s dreams. 

Vox was stepping through the construction of a model using generous assumptions favorable to TENS. That’s not a dream, nor was it crushed. TENS advocates should have built their own model. They haven’t, nor do they want to. At this point, the reasonable conclusion is that they don’t want to deal with the questions such a model would bring. 

If you want to call what I said, “attacks”, you should recognize that JF resorted to rhetorical attacks in the debate. It was intellectual surrender. 

Torin tried to maintain a fighting withdrawal:

I saw two different models because of a disagreement on assumptions. Sure there was some rhetoric. But a lot of rhetoric is going on here. This is why I stopped playing team sports. Have a good one.

But Owen Benjamin had the last word in his analogical description of the debate:

Vox: We can measure how tall the trees are. And we know how old they are. So, what is the annual rate of growth?

JFG: No, no, it is time for me to crush your dreams. Can you not see all zee seeds zat are scattered around zee forest? Zere are so many of zem! Meellions and beellions! Now look at zis picture, do you not see how zee acorns, zey have zee different sizes? Zoot alors! Croissant!

The amusing thing is some of JF’s fans are demanding that I debate him again, not 12 hours after insisting that he crushed me.

The reason you don’t want a second debate is clearly because you are a terrible loser and dishonest intellectual. You really think that biologists haven’t gone over these theories of yours before? If you are so certain that all of this is satanic gamma talk perpetuated by 110 IQ mid wits then why not destroy JF and the rest of us in a second debate. Because you are afraid of losing even more face, nobody is fooled by your stammering retort in this video. Man up and put your ideas to the test or admit defeat!

Of course I’m not going to debate him again. As I observed in the Darkstream last night, there is no point, since he’s either too dumb to understand the issue or too dishonest to address it directly. I gave him the chance to refute my case, he whiffed more completely than his followers are even able to understand, and I was able to learn what I needed to learn. Let’s not forget, this was the second time I’ve spoken to him about something that wasn’t his book, and the second time he has completely failed to understand a perfectly straightforward argument.

I’m beginning to wonder if Downe’s Syndrome might be sexually transmitted.