What is your understanding of biological evolution?

reply to post by Mike_A


Yes. That does make sense.

reply to post by Conclusion

The idea came to me when I thought about all the information that is not just in our dna, but in our thoughts. From one single cell organism to evolve in the first place to the next step, what would have to happen?

How did life originate?

It's a very good question, one we can't answer yet although people are working towards discovering how it can happen and may be coming close to an answer eventually.

A lot of speculation is involved in the theory of evolution. I know it is needed to further the agenda, but speculation none the less.

Everything we think about say, gravity for example is based on pure speculation only because we haven't discovered what makes gravity work. It's the same basis for the Evolutionary Theory, it's all speculation to explain an observation occurring that we see in nature.

Now I know you have to agree that our bodies are more complicated than this type of multicellular organism. Say a billion times more complicated.

I can't speculate on how much more complex our genetic code is considering we have the same genetic coding in our own DNA, as does all life, today.

Since we have frame of reference for the time it takes something to evolve, then we can clearly see, from facts found by evolutionist , that there would be not enough time for it to be what it is today.

We can't make an accurate 'guess' at how fast or slow something can evolve, it's a process that occurs every time something reproduces. We also have to take in a huge amount of external factors that can either speed up or slow down that rate of change.

What I mean is that species have been here on earth far longer than us that are still here.

The point of the analogy I was trying to make is, the earliest life forms on Earth, the very first one's are the 'youngest'. They are like the three month old babies and we are like the ninety year old man who grew from that three month old baby. At our old age, we appear much more different in form, we're capable of more complex task, we're more intelligent.

The man with the survivalist show seems to do quiet will in harsh environments alone. If we can't adapt on our own how did the very first of our kind adapt then?

I don't believe he did it on his own. There was no 'first' of our kind. This demands the magical appearance of humans from something similar to it but nothing like it. Even today our current modern humans are remarkably different than our ancestors of even thirty thousand years ago. We are all constantly changing and evolving accordingly to our environment, there never is a 'first kind', but instead a continuous transition of form.

reply to post by sirnex


That makes sense also.

Good back and forth here, guys. And, I'm glad our convo has taken a more civil turn.

To answer one of your question before, sirnex:

I'm more surprised that people still think little green aliens from mars made humans. How do you figure this happened? What evidence is there? Are you basing this off the religious mythologies of ancient man that don't actually describe any of this stuff in reality?

And, I'm more surprised people DON'T - especially here, at ATS.

Let's look at the options for life on this planet.

Creationism - all life created by God - not subscribing to this one - religion is a joke, as far as I'm concerned. There are varying degrees here, but I - as I think most here do - dismiss every single one of them as inconceivable and quite foolish, actually.

Evolution / Darwinism - used to be a strong advocate - The work of Lloyd Pye and others has shown that this model is simply preposterous - evolution requires subtle transitions within and across species over time - our fossil record DOES NOT reflect this, whatsoever, rather it shows complete transformations overnight (figuratively and quite literally).

Intelligent Design - Intervention Threory - basically the same, just replace the 'intelligent entity', God w/Aliens

Given that the ONLY given in all of this is the existence of aliens (at least to me) then this is the only logical conclusion for me.

Beyond that, I would highly recommend studying the works of Lloyd Pye (lloydpye.com...), and as someone mentioned above, Zacheria Sitchin - now, a lot of his work has been refuted, and justifiably so, but his overall posit that we are periodically visited by a superior race of beings does deserve some serious consideration when you, in turn, start to follow the body of works by Erick von Daniken & Girgio Tsoukalos in regards to the worlds megalithic structures...

THIS is the strongest indicator that not only a superior race exists, but they have visited us here on earth, from time to time - structures like the pyramids (and MUCH more) could NOT have been built by our ancestors of antiquity, given the tooling, know-how, and populations of the time - matter of fact, we would have a hard time building them TODAY, and certainly not in the timeframe being relayed by 'scholars' - no way, no how!

reply to post by SquirrelNutz

Given that the ONLY given in all of this is the existence of aliens (at least to me) then this is the only logical conclusion for me.

I fail to see how you draw a logical conclusion based on a pure and utter speculation without physical evidence or testability.

Beyond that, I would highly recommend studying the works of Lloyd Pye (lloydpye.com...), and as someone mentioned above, Zacheria Sitchin - now, a lot of his work has been refuted, and justifiably so, but his overall posit that we are periodically visited by a superior race of beings does deserve some serious consideration when you, in turn, start to follow the body of works by Erick von Daniken & Girgio Tsoukalos in regards to the worlds megalithic structures...

I have read some of the works by these people, I even own a few of the books myself. They certainly do make excellent stories to read, but at the same time they down play the ability of our people 12,000 years ago to conduct any intelligent thought of their own. Our ancestors weren't inherently more 'stupid' than we are today. They were just as intelligent, they just lacked the same modern knowledge we acquired today.

THIS is the strongest indicator that not only a superior race exists, but they have visited us here on earth, from time to time - structures like the pyramids (and MUCH more) could NOT have been built by our ancestors of antiquity, given the tooling, know-how, and populations of the time - matter of fact, we would have a hard time building them TODAY, and certainly not in the timeframe being relayed by 'scholars' - no way, no how!

Personally, I call BS on that theory. Man certainly has the capacity to build large structures in short periods of time while moving stone weighing many tonnes. LINK

First off, your link is busted. I'll be happy to check out, whatever you got.
[edit - nevermind - I see that it is YouTube - blocked here, I'll have to check at home]

Next, spend some time studying the lesser known of the megalithic structures - nevermind the famous Stonehenge, Easter Island, and the Pyramids: they have been shown over and over again that what is being taught as fact in regards to construction, is not even sound in theory, but, I digress.

You know what? Screw that, we can't just ignore the most well known of all these structures, let's go right after it.

Re: the Pyramids: Three Numbers to Remember:
3 Great Pyramids and Sphinx
100 years (lifetimes of 3 pharaohs)
6 million stones estimated

That means that 24-hours-a-day, every day for 100 years, a stone averaging 3.5 tons needs to be set in place every 8.5 minutes!

Yeah! Riiiiiight!

The fact that people accept this as gospel, still to this day, is absolutely absurd.

Moving on:

Note the weights of the objects below - before doing doing, observe that THIS CRANE is only capable of moving 175Tons: lloydpye.com...

- Isolated Stone in Baalbek, Lebanon - 800 to 2,000 TONS [T-O-N-S]
www.nowlebanon.com...

- 1,170 Ton Unfinished Obelisk in Aswan Quarry
www.coffinman.co.uk...

And, here we have a 1,000 Ton crane (still not big enough, btw)
lloydpye.com...

But wait... there's more...

- 10 Ton “Sun Gate” in Tiahuanaco, Bolivia
www.crystalinks.com...

- and the coup de grâce: The strewn blocks around Puma Punku - The stones are argued to have been transported up a steep incline from a quarry near Lake Titicaca roughly 20 miles away. Some of the blocks are said to weigh in the range of 100–130 tons - not only that but the tooling marks on them were made by objects and with engineering precision not available at the time (there was no writing), but MOST importantly, these blocks (100 tons each, remember) locked in to one another like a puzzle, forming load-bearing joints without the use of mortar.

upload.wikimedia.org...

I actually found a discussion already going on here on ATS : www.abovetopsecret.com...

Also, not be ignored, is the significance of the placement of most of the structures, specifically the pyramids. Not only do they 1) have very specific alignments to other earthly features, but also 2) exist all over the planet with similar geometries (some EXACT) between cultures that would have never had ANY contact with one another - that is on every single continent, besides Antarctica (Or, is there?!).

Ever heard of the Piri Reis map? May want to check it out.

[edit on 10/28/2009 by SquirrelNutz]

Squirrel, your solution doesn’t answer the question it just pushes it back. How did the aliens develop?

reply to post by SquirrelNutz

Next, spend some time studying the lesser known of the megalithic structures - nevermind the famous Stonehenge, Easter Island, and the Pyramids: they have been shown over and over again that what is being taught as fact in regards to construction, is not even sound in theory, but, I digress.

I disagree, the link I provided show's a man who figured out how to move stone blocks weighing in at nine tonnes by himself without exerting a lot of effort. Whereas the pyramid stones only weigh in at what, two tonnes? He has even moved an entire barn by himself without help.

That means that 24-hours-a-day, every day for 100 years, a stone averaging 3.5 tons needs to be set in place every 8.5 minutes!

By current assumption, we don't honestly know how they built it as they didn't leave any records indicating an exact method for building. What they did leave was records indicating that they alone built it themselves, even to the point of recording how the workers were cared for, how many, what their wages were and what holidays they had off and when they were allowed to work so as not to impact the rest of Egyptian economy.

Note the weights of the objects below - before doing doing, observe that THIS CRANE is only capable of moving 175Tons: lloydpye.com...

Look at Coral Castle, one man managed to move and construct together over 1,000 tonnes of stone on his own without the aid of modern machinery. The largest stone weighing in at thirty tonnes.

Ever heard of the Piri Reis map? May want to check it out.

Proven hoax.

Now, I haven't bothered touching up on the rest of the examples simply because it is all based on pure speculation without evidence. We have living proof in our modern day and age that man is capable of moving and placing blocks of stone weighing in at many tonnes on their own without help and without advanced technology and without being scientifically minded themselves.

All of these alien did it theories are based on pure speculation without evidence and do nothing more than attempt to say that man was stupid four thousand years ago despite man four thousand years ago being no different than man today. We have no evidence of aliens building or helping to build these structure's, no records from any of these cultures indicating that the 'Gods' had a hand it in. Nothing left behind by aliens in any point in history at all, period.

How do we explain that? How do we explain that something so miraculous as an alien race came to our planet to build large stone structures without leaving anything behind and then just suddenly leaving without any reason and without ever being recorded. Ancient man kept meticulous records of nearly everything, right down to inventory of how many loaves of bread were in the store house.

Originally posted by Mike_A
Squirrel, your solution doesn’t answer the question it just pushes it back. How did the aliens develop?

that wsn't the original issue - the original issue is evolution - of man - here on earth.

If we want to discuss who made the aliens, we can certainly do that - elsewhere.

Certainly chance/luck/macro-evolution played a role at some point in creating other (the first) intelligent beings.

Just, not here on earth.

reply to post by SquirrelNutz


It seems so ridiculous and devoid of logic to assume evolution was capable of creating intelligent life on another planet but is incapable of doing it on our own. Why would an alien race spend all the time and effort in developing an interstellar spaceship only to come here, create us, then create some stone monuments and then leave without leaving any evidence it came to begin with? Why stone monuments when they are capable of building immense metal sky scrapers, or why create us when they could have had an entire new planet to colonize and develop their own societies on?

reply to post by sirnex



I've seen Coral Castle and other projects like it (there was a guy, once, that manipulated a Stonehenge-esque block in place), and while impressive they took WAaaaaaayyyy too long [took Edward 28 YEARS!!]* and were way too bulky (took up too much space) to possibly be an effective and efficient method for the shear speed and volume we're talking about.

Impressive? Hell yes. Explanation? Not for me.

Please provide a Piri Reis fraud link - the only 'debunker' link I remember seeing was itself debunked.



[edit on 10/28/2009 by SquirrelNutz]

Originally posted by sirnex
reply to post by SquirrelNutz

 

Why would an alien race spend all the time and effort in developing an interstellar spaceship only to come here, create us, then create some stone monuments and then leave without leaving any evidence it came to begin with?

1) This is where knowledge/projects of the other folks I mentioned comes into play - it explains why they came and left (and will be back), and even suggests 'why'.

I understand the argument of 'why would a clearly superior race waste time with little ol' us'; it would be the equivalent of us wasting time training a colony of ants - only one problem - ants were not 'made in our image' - that is given our abilities or intelligence - humans, on the other hand, were at least derived from their creator, whether you accept the god or Alien theory - but I suspect you accept neither since you are clearly a proponent of Darwinian Evolution (reminder: Darwin, himself, said this was unprovable and untestable on a Marco level) - and perhaps (it has been suggested, with interesting supporting arguments) we were put here for a purpose, and that purpose was not glamorous - slaves to retrieve valuable minerals/resources found here on our planet.

2) You're assuming they left, for good

3) The megaliths ARE the evidence.


[edit on 10/28/2009 by SquirrelNutz]

reply to post by SquirrelNutz


Didn't take the guy in the video very long to move and place his stone block, mind you that was only one man. Imagine the amount of people recorded by the Egyptians moving stones that weighed less using either the same or similar methods.

Read the wiki article on it: LINK If you see anything wrong with the information, let me know what you have a problem with and we can look further into it.

reply to post by SquirrelNutz

1) This is where knowledge/projects of the other folks I mentioned comes into play - it explains why they came and left (and will be back), and even suggests 'why'.

I don't see any evidence for this other than pure speculation and the assumption that our ancestors were too stupid to do it themselves.

I understand the argument of 'why would a clearly superior race waste time with little ol' us'; it would be the equivalent of us wasting time training a colony of ants - only one problem - ants were not 'made in our image' - that is given our abilities or intelligence - humans, on the other hand, were at least derived from their creator, whether you accept the god or Alien theory

The probability of another planet developing life through evolution looking exactly or close to life on our own planet and creating an intelligent species from a more primitive one that just happens to look 'close enough' to the aliens is just ridiculous. It doesn't explain why evolution would favor an intelligence off world but not on our own world.

but I suspect you accept neither since you are clearly a proponent of Darwinian Evolution (reminder: Darwin, himself, said this was unprovable and untestable on a Marco level)

Untestable by his early theories of the theory, but has been proven now as occurring for a fact. The only aspect of evolution that remains theory is the exact processes involved that bring about evolutionary changes within a species.

and perhaps (it has been suggested, with interesting supporting arguments) we were put here for a purpose, and that purpose was not glamorous - slaves to retrieve valuable minerals/resources found here on our planet.

And yet, no evidence of ancient mines that do not coincide with the various stages of human civilization. Slaves to mine what? Copper during the copper age, iron during the iron age? There are no mines in existence for anything we haven't used ourselves.

2) You're assuming they left, for good

Your assuming they came without any evidence for this.

3) The megaliths ARE the evidence.

Your assuming our ancestors were too stupid to move stones because they lacked modern knowledge and technology. There is simply no evidence that these megaliths were built using advanced technologies, nor do we find an records depicting beings from other worlds building these while we idly sat by and mined some mythical thing we never used ourselves and can't find the mines for.

reply to post by SquirrelNutz

I've seen Coral Castle and other projects like it (there was a guy, once, that manipulated a Stonehenge-esque block in place), and while impressive they took WAaaaaaayyyy too long [took Edward 28 YEARS!!]* and were way too bulky (took up too much space) to possibly be an effective and efficient method for the shear speed and volume we're talking about.

Twenty-eight years by *ONE* man. That in itself is an *amazing* feat without modern technology.

reply to post by SquirrelNutz

that wsn't the original issue - the original issue is evolution - of man - here on earth.

Well no if you want to get picky the original issue was about peoples understanding of evolution in general. Frankly this whole line of conversation is completely off topic.

Perhaps you should take this debate elsewhere.

Well, it is your thread.

As you wish.

[sirnex and I aren't getting anywhere, anyway]


[edit on 10/28/2009 by SquirrelNutz]

reply to post by sirnex


So the answer seems to be that more choices were given to the evolutionary process by the exponential growth of life. Does that sound about right?

As someone who has struggled with the evolutionary theory for years and has been on both sides of the evolution argument, (thus having done alot of research) I have a firm understanding of what biological evolution is to me.

It is the changing of the genetic structure of an organism in such a way as to be inheritable, and eventually leading to the formation of a new species as these changes accumulate.

Evolution is a term thrown around very loosely (even by the scientific community) and thus quite often misunderstood and misinterpreted. (understandably so).

And often used to intentionally mislead people.

Originally posted by sirnex
reply to post by SquirrelNutz

 

I've seen Coral Castle and other projects like it (there was a guy, once, that manipulated a Stonehenge-esque block in place), and while impressive they took WAaaaaaayyyy too long [took Edward 28 YEARS!!]* and were way too bulky (took up too much space) to possibly be an effective and efficient method for the shear speed and volume we're talking about.

Twenty-eight years by *ONE* man. That in itself is an *amazing* feat without modern technology.

Ineresting - I find this entirely UNspectacular! I guess it's all perspective.