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tkster
Skeptic Friend
USA
193 Posts |
 Posted - 11/28/2004 : 15:21:04 [Permalink]
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quote:
Originally posted by Dave W.
quote:
Originally posted by tkster
quote:
I fail to see the strawman in this. Would you please explain?
Edit:
If you interpret "daddy" as strictly litteral instead of meaning "ancestor", then yes it is a strawman. When I originally read it, I thought that meaning was implied.
I took it literal, I mean if verlch takes the Bible that literal I think I should be able to take his statements as such. 
Well, even with a liberal interpretation of the word 'daddy', it's a strawman due to the fact that current evolutionary theory only claims that great apes and humans had a common ancestor, not that we evolved from any of the living ape species, which is implied by the original comment.
That too. Last time I had heard we shared a common ancestor.
tk |
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Ricky
SFN Die Hard
USA
4907 Posts |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
Posted - 11/28/2004 : 22:48:16 [Permalink]
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Ricky, the original comment - in all its ignorant glory - implies that evolution says that humans are descendants of a chimp, bonobo, gorilla, gibbon or organutan. But, what the theory and data actually tell us is that five million years ago (or so), the human-chimpanzee last common ancestor (HCLCA) roamed the Earth. It was neither a human nor a chimp. A million years before that, the last common ancestor of the HCLCA and today's gorillas walked around. It was not a human, chimp, HCLCA or a gorilla.
Of course, if the definition of 'ape' is "a primate with neither a tail nor cheek pouches," humans definitely are apes, and so were all our ancestors back several millions of years. But the comment is just a familiar knee-jerk reaction to the idea that humans are animals like the rest. It seeks special status for Homo sapiens outside the group "primates" entirely.
And, actually, that's a much better way to categorize it than just label it a strawman (though it is, still). |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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