Of species and kinds

[Blog of Reason]

Discussion thread for the blog entry "Of species and kinds" by he_who_is_nobody.

Permalink: http://blog.leagueofreason.org.uk/reason/of-species-and-kinds/

 

[Inferno]

A good post, though a bit terse. I pointed to a few problems with the definition of "kind" here. I think you could've gone into creationists attempts to define "kind", but maybe you've saved that for a later post?

 

[he_who_is_nobody]

I think you could've gone into creationists attempts to define "kind", but maybe you've saved that for a later post?

No, I have no plans on talking about the attempts, because once a creationist had defined kind, the game is over. It is quite simple to show evidence that whatever they defined as a kind is related to other organism that would be attributed to another kind. The point of this post is to point out the flaw in the creationists' argument and not be deterred by it.

 

[IBSpify]

The problem as i see it is that the Creationist claim is that all things produce after their own kind. thus cat produce cats, dogs produce dogs, humans produce humans, etc. and this is actually correct. To Clearify my point chordates produce chordates, primates produce primates, and humans produce humans, however humans fit into all three of those kinds, thus it could be said that kinds split and diversify but you do not grow out of your kinds, and this is why it is a useless term.

The main problem is that Creationists don't understand that dogs and wolves are both members of of the canine kind in the exact same way that humans and chimps are both members of the primate kind.

and now i'm going to stop using the word kind because it is a vacuous term and makes me feel stupid.

 

[he_who_is_nobody]

The problem as i see it is that the Creationist claim is that all things produce after their own kind. thus cat produce cats, dogs produce dogs, humans produce humans, etc. and this is actually correct. To Clearify my point chordates produce chordates, primates produce primates, and humans produce humans, however humans fit into all three of those kinds, thus it could be said that kinds split and diversify but you do not grow out of your kinds, and this is why it is a useless term.

The main problem is that Creationists don't understand that dogs and wolves are both members of of the canine kind in the exact same way that humans and chimps are both members of the primate kind.

and now i'm going to stop using the word kind because it is a vacuous term and makes me feel stupid.

This is pretty much the point I was trying to make in this blog. Perhaps I failed.

 

[Laurens]

The word 'kind' was probably very non-specific in the first instance due to the ignorance of the people who wrote the Bible. Now the non-specific nature of the term is abused by equally ignorant people to mean whatever they want it to mean in any given context. I doubt any creationist would dare give a taxonomically satisfying definition of the term because that would fully demonstrate their equivocation.

A creationist might in one instance refer to lions and tigers as two separate kinds, yet in another instance refer to 'cats' being a single kind.... A term that can be used to mean anything means nothing... Kinda like 'God' really...

Good post

 

[Frenger]

A speaketh to a Christian friend of mine on Sunday about the Bible and her belief. I asked how she could trust the bible when it is full of obvious inaccuracies, such as Noah’s raft.

“How is that not accurate?” She asketh.

I said, for a start there are (estimated) 5 million species on the planet (not including plant life) and while a cubit is truly a remarkable form of measurement, a single one is only 17.5 inches long, making the ark less than 500ft in length. How do you propose Noah managed to fit 10 million animals aboard, plus enough food and water to last 40 days and nights, while having enough space to create the many different ecological conditions, from tropical to arctic and everything in between?

She said that “Noah didn’t do that. He took only a selection of animals which then evolved”.

In short, she went on to define “kind” as whatever made the story work with what we know now. Ignored completely the fact the God told Noah to bring two of EVERY living creature, not twice but SEVEN times (if they had bathed beforehand)

The LORD then said to Noah, “Go into the ark, you and your whole family, because I have found you righteous in this generation. 2 Take with you seven pairs of every kind of clean animal, a male and its mate, and one pair of every kind of unclean animal, a male and its mate

I was happy she was convinced by Biological evolution, even though I’m fairly sure she didn’t understand what it really meant.