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Santosh Helekar said: SH> I have to say that your understanding of the article SH> is completely off. What you state above refers only to SH> the first couple of paragraphs of that article with SH> quite revealing title of "Evolution and the Population SH> Problem". If you read the entire article, you will SH> find that Morris makes an argument for a Biblically SH> mandated recent origin of man based on a constant SH> population growth rate.
When I said: "I don't think Mr. Morris was making a case for a 2% population growth rate" I meant that his thesis was not to push a 2% growth theory, i.e. he wasn't making that his primary case, rather (you're right in this) his argument is for a biblical creation time line based on population growth rate. You are incorrect in stating that he assumed a _constant_ growth rate. In fact, this is what he did say: "although it is obvious that the present rate of growth (2%) could not have prevailed for very long in the past, it does seem unlikely that the long-time growth rate could have averaged significantly less than (1/2)%."
SH> He gives a formula to SH> calculate the number of years that have elapsed since SH> the origin of man assuming that the entire human SH> population emerged from one human couple created by SH> God given whatever the actual value of the population SH> of the world was around 1800 A.D. When he plugs in a SH> population growth rate of 1/3% (not 2%) in the SH> formula he gets a value of 6300 years for the origin SH> of man. He says that this is consistent with what is SH> inferred from the Biblical account.
Correct. He is quite consistent in assuming the population growth rate to have been between 1/2% (an assumed low) and 2% (current).
SH> Here are some of SH> the relevant quotes from his article that you seem to SH> have missed somehow:
Morris> "In that case, the length of time required for the Morris> population to grow from 2 people to one billion [...] Morris> Thus, the most probable date of human origin, based on Morris> the known data from population statistics, is about Morris> 6,300 years ago.
The "in that case" was referring to the estimated population growth rate--based on the actual populations--between 1650 and 1800, which he uses to bolster his case. No, I didn't miss this. Again, he is not making up the 2% figure and also accommodates a growth rate as low as 1/3%.
SH> Please ask your friend where he got his fallacious SH> argument for linking the population growth rate with SH> the origin of man. I am willing to bet that it is from SH> Henry Morris?s writings or their derivations.
My friend would be very reluctant to say that man actually originated 6,300 years ago. He probably has a good explanation..."perhaps there was a cataclysmic event which left just two people on the planet 6,300 or 10,000 years ago" is what he is likely to say. (I don't really discuss this issue very much with him, we're both committed to our separate beliefs.) Like you, he believes the x million-year theories that have been floating around for the last century. He seems to believe that one man or couple might have been in existence 8,000/10,000/6,300 years ago and that such a man's contemporaries were destroyed. This seems rational, given his mindset. I'm surprised that you wouldn't agree but choose to dispute population growth rate instead.
| >Ergo, the extrapolation is based purely on | >demographic trends and recorded natural events which | >might have skewed the patterns of population growth.
SH> Henry Morris?s (and your friend?s) argument is SH> completely wrong for the following reasons: SH> 1. It is well known that the rate and direction of SH> population change has not remained constant throughout SH> [...] SH> increased growth rate of up to 2% occurred only in the SH> last century.
No one has disputed that. See my statement that you'd quoted above. Also see Henry Morris' paper.
SH> last century. One does not have to be Harvard educated SH> or a friend of Stephen Jay Gould to realize any of SH> this.
Correct. I don't see where we disagree on this point.
SH> this. Here are the real scientific estimates of world
I would not use the words "real" and "estimates" in the same sentence.
SH> http://www.census.gov/ipc/www/worldhis.html SH> Please note that the table showing these estimates SH> says that there were anywhere from 1 ? 10 million SH> people in the world in 10,000 B.C. The original
The same table says that the world population grew at 0% (zero percent) and stayed at exactly 5 million for a period of 3,000 (three whopping thousand) years. Are these guys serious? This was before the condom was invented.
SH> 2. It should be obvious to most people today that SH> there is an overwhelming amount of physical evidence SH> such as fossilized human skeletal parts, which has SH> been dated with high accuracy to being at least 80,000 SH> years old.
"Radiocarbon dating, which depends on the steady decay of carbon-14, becomes less and less reliable once the artefact under study gets older than about 16,000 years." is what Dr. Chris Stringer, Natural History Museum, London, says. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1413024.stm
SH> 3. There are well preserved human mummies that are SH> much more than 8000 years old, e.g. ninety six 9000 SH> year-old Chinchorro mummies from Chile and the 9400 SH> year-old Spirit Cave Man from Nevada covered with SH> leather moccasins, rabbit-skin blanket, and burial SH> mats.
A couple of thousand years is hardly a topic for dispute. Biblical genealogies sometimes leave out a few generations, such as those presented in Matthew chapter 1. They aren't always trying to portray a complete genealogical line, but rather a certain heritage which may be linked to a person (Abraham and David in the case of Jesus) or tribe of Israel (Benjamin in the case of the apostle Paul). So 6,300 or 10,000 years is not something I debate.
SH> It is hard to believe that any scientist would propose SH> or take seriously such a patently flawed extrapolation SH> based on erroneous assumptions about population growth SH> rate.
Science--or rather the opinion of scientists--changes from one day to another. With each new discovery some of them "recalibrate" their numbers. Another extract from the article I cited above says: "modern humans in Europe seem to vanish for about 5,000 years from many parts of the continent between 30,000 and 40,000 years ago based on radiocarbon dating. Well, it might turn out that they didn't vanish at all when we recalibrate."
SH> I submit to you that Stephen Jay Gould has never SH> endorsed such an argument. He has certainly not SH> written about it. I think this is simply a case of SH> name-dropping.
You could be right, but you may be wrong. Elsewhere in this post I have explained the seeming consistency in an evolutionist's belief that man might have existed for millions of years and yet might have been reduced to a population of 2 (two) as of about 6,000-10,000 years ago. My point in mentioning my friend and his luminary mentor shows that you can be a committed evolutionist and hold on to population growth estimates of between 1/3% and 2%. I didn't know Stephen Jay Gould. Your defensiveness on the population growth issue makes it seem like you want all your other beliefs to line up with your beliefs in evolution, and you don't want to be distracted by facts.
Sincerely, Peter - -- References in this thread, in reverse chronological order: http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.culture.region.india.goa/26124 http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.culture.region.india.goa/26108 http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.culture.region.india.goa/26099 http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.culture.region.india.goa/26088 http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.culture.region.india.goa/26075 http://permalink.gmane.org/gmane.culture.region.india.goa/26037
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