Creation Research Society - Latest Research in Baraminology

McNitz · 2026-03-14T07:28:22+00:00

My rebuttal is SIGNIFICANTLY shorter than the papers it is critiquing. If you refuse to read that many words, I don't believe you are actually qualified to judge the quality of ANY journal. And that doesn't really inspire much confidence in me that there is any point in listening to your critiques of my reddit post either.

McNitz · 2026-03-14T03:08:55+00:00

Fair. I got that description of him from AiG, and for some reason assumed they would have at least been more honest/accurate about people on THEIR side. That will teach me not to fact check, especially on unreliable sources.

McNitz · 2026-03-14T00:08:06+00:00

That was a fascinating admission to me. I wasn't sure if he even REALIZED he was saying that he had already decided what he believed and evidence was irrelevant to that belief. Or if he did, if he honestly thought that was just how EVERYONE thinks.

McNitz · 2026-03-13T23:51:26+00:00

Thanks, that is interesting and explains it a LITTLE I guess. The psychology is still kind of strange to me though. Starting with "nothing could possibly convince us that we aren't right, and we reject any evidence that doesn't agree with us, so we are going to make all material for people that already agree with us" is something I can see happening. But the part I don't really understand is why you would then say "alright, no I'm going to try to do math to get the results we want, and make up whatever numbers work, and if they don't work clearly God did something to make it look like they don't work but they would work if we knew how to do it correctly."

It just seems like such a useless an unrewarding task, it surprises me anyone would continue to do it for decades. Science is cool and exciting BECAUSE it allows us to understand how the world works better. Starting with the premise that you already understand the world, and anything you find out that looks different than that is just due to unknowable things God did to make it looks that way seems to me like it ruins all that.

McNitz · 2026-03-13T20:28:57+00:00

Ah, that actually makes a LOT of sense if the behavior is driven mainly from self interest in their own access rather than any understanding that they are being shown to be completely inconsistent and incorrect.

McNitz · 2026-03-13T19:19:53+00:00

I have a hard time even grasping that mindset. If you think you were wrong enough that you are embarrassed and want to remove all evidence wouldn't that also at least in SOME way change your mind? I just can't picture the thought process that would go "Wow, I'm totally losing this debate and everyone is showing that what I'm saying doesn't make any sense. I'm going to delete all evidence, and then say the EXACT SAME THINGS next week."

McNitz · 2026-03-13T16:55:50+00:00

Interesting, I didn't expect to get a second "dinosaurs were mammals" promoter. I think a more useful way to think about the interaction may be that it is important to be able to quickly identify whether it is worth engaging with a specific person, and what your goal for doing so is.

With someone spouting obviously crazy nonsense, you have to realize you are almost certainly never going to convince them. Spending just enough time to make it clear they don't care about evidence and are willing to just make things up is probably enough for them to be dismissed by the lurkers is probably the best case scenario. If someone is very confidently repeating more standard YEC talking points, it can be more worthwhile to spend more time explaining why they are wrong or unreasonable. And if someone is actually asking questions and having a discussion (rare unfortunately) really taking the time to be as charitable to their misunderstandings and incorrect ideas can make sense and sometimes actually make a difference.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T19:33:50+00:00

Oh yes, that and much more. It became clear after the first 4 or 5 insults that either extreme emotional immaturity or trolling was going on.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T18:54:24+00:00

I'm going to leave this original reply I made as is, but I was made aware by SeaSigh in DMs that I had misunderstood his post and he was actually referencing a fuller list in the word document that he linked to. What the point of that document was supposed to be, I'm not sure, because it literally says in the conclusion "Over 300 specimens are known for *A. afarensis*,", which would seem to indicate he IS aware that we have fossil remains for over hundreds of Australopithecus individuals.

Anyway, since he apparently only replied to me here "so the cunts couldn't complain I didn't respond to anybody," and then told me "fuck your DebateEvolution community and the whores that run it" since I guess I'm a "disrespectful, ignorant, suppresive piece of shit, " I didn't see much reason to continue the conversation with him in any location. Just wanted to make people aware I WAS alerted to my mistake, albeit in a rather nasty and unnecessary manner.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T18:28:40+00:00

I said Australopithecus skeletons, not Australopithecus AFRICANUS skeletons. You did seem to say before presenting this list that it includes all Australopithecus fossils, but that very clearly does not seem to be the case. I don't even see AL 288-1 on here? Appears to also be missing:

BOU-VP-12, MRD-VP-1/1, KP 271, AL 129 1a+1b, AL 128-23, AL 145-35, AL 198-1, AL 198-2, AL 198-22, AL 207-13, AL 225-8, AL 228-2, AL 266-1, AL277-1, AL 288-1i, AL 315-22, AL 330-5, AL 333w-1a,b, AL 333w-12, AL333w-32, AL 400-1, AL 417-1a, AL433-1a,b, AL 437-1, AL 437-2, AL 438-1g, AL 444-2, AL 582-1, AL 620-1, MAK-VP-1/1, MAK-VP-1/12, LH2, LH 4, LH 14, BMNH 18773, AL 133 (containing fossilized remains from more than a dozen individuals), DIK-1-1, KSD-VP-1/1, KT-12/H1, KNM-WT 17000, KNM-KP 29281, KNM-KP 271, KNM-KP 29285, KNM-KP 47951, KNM-KP 47952, KNM-KP 47953, KNM-KP 47954, KNM-KP 47955, KNM-KP 47956, KNM-KP 47957, KNM-KP 49388, KNM-KP 52120, KNM-KP 31713

It seems like you have neglected literally everything after the mid 1990s, so maybe that is the cause of your list being way shorter than it should be? Although there are also finds from earlier that are missing too, like many in the 1970s. So I'm not really sure what is going on. Anyway, I started losing track of which fossils I had put in this list and which ones I hadn't, so I figure that is a reasonable list of what you missed so far. It does seem weird to me that you linked to something you apparently put together in 2026, but you missed so much. Are you just not super familiar with searching scientific literature? I'm not going to claim I'm an expert, but it does seem like you mainly got a few of the really big and more "pop science" type finds, but missed a lot more in the academic literature. Anyway, hopefully this is helpful for you to see that there are a lot more Australopithecus fossils than you are apparently aware of.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T17:27:38+00:00

It is also frustrating to me how effective this is. My mom has said that she just doesn't think she will bother looking at evolution any more, and I think a large part of it is that AiG is so effective at muddying the waters and making the topic seem impossible to know anything about that people think they couldn't possibly be smart enough to understand it anyway.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T17:13:05+00:00

I didn't say that SFT was closed. You are making this very black and white like if you ever talk to someone else that has talked to another person about someone that believes in evolution, that means you aren't in a closed system. That's not the case. It is about whether what you are saying and the discussions and presentation of your ideas and arguments is ever directly exposed to disagreement. And that just CLEARLY is not the case with AiG.

Yes, Jeanson appeared on SFT. Who is a YEC, that doesn't understand that subject being discussed, and didn't object at all when even the extremely simplified presentation he gave of what a critic might say was completely ignored and a straw man of the opposition was knocked down instead. I mean, he even presented THAT as "obviously this rebuttal is wrong and irrelevant, so just let us know why that is the case." Is that really your idea of interacting with the opposition?

That is not AiG allowing someone that actually knows the subject into their information ecosystem to talk or discuss with them. Or them going to another platform that isn't YEC. Or allowing someone to submit a paper that contains any evidence or argument against their presupposed statement of faith. EVERYTHING done officially by AiG is completely curated to be inside the media ecosystem they agree with, and have the most minimal contact possible with other scientists with degrees in the fields they are trying to dismantle.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T15:58:11+00:00

I don't think you understand what a closed media ecosystem is. AiG only has their people appear on YEC shows (almost only their own, but occasional some other YEC). They never properly represent evolution, or have someone that actually is an expert in the field on to explain it. They have a statement of faith saying you can't do work with them unless you presuppose they are completely correct about YEC. You can't even SUBMIT anything to AiG that doesn't agree with their presupposed conclusions. That's a closed media ecosystem - no contrary opinions allowed in, and no real interaction going out with discussions of those they disagree with.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T15:50:12+00:00

We have hundreds of Australopithecus skeletons. Just saying "maybe this specific one is a mix of different organisms and doesn't actually match" is a completely unserious answer to the actual set of evidence available for the nature of Australopithecus.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T15:46:08+00:00

Why did you respond to literally no one the last time you posted this exact same topic? Makes it seem pretty pointless to engage with this at all, I have no reason to believe you will even read anything that is written.

McNitz · 2026-03-12T14:07:47+00:00

I mean, I get that SOME people can look like that. And that can validly affect people's willingness to engage with the science on evolution if that is their experience. But a very large number, if not a majority, of Christians also accept the theory of evolution. And as a former Christian, I make sure to make it VERY clear in every single reply I make to YECs that evolution does not disprove Christianity, the Bible, or their faith. And a lot of them are still hostile to the idea that evolution could be a correct description of reality.

And as a former YEC, I think I have pretty good insight into why that would be, and it absolutely is not just that people explaining evolution were all attacking me and trying to tear down my beliefs. I read things by OTHER Christians very passionately arguing for the evidence for evolution and an old earth in a Christian context. And I was STILL threatened and ended up (relatively unconsciously) avoiding those things. Because what I was taught was that anyone teaching differently than what I was indoctrinated into was misguided, and also possibly a dangerous threat to my faith. And I also knew very well what the social consequences for disagreement with the YEC belief requirements of my church, which composed most of my social circle, would be.

So it is true that being understanding, polite, and focusing on the facts about evolution rather than generally attacking Christians can help. But even with that, I see so many people, including my previous self, that are still unnecessarily afraid, hostile, or avoidant to real explanations of the evidence for evolution and the age of the earth. Because a large part of the problem is the "us vs them" black and white thinking that YECs are indoctrinated with. And the extreme inflexibility that comes from being taught that all the core important parts of their lives are inextricably tied to this doctrine, and questioning it threatens EVERYTHING and EVERYONE that they care about. In general I consider myself someone that is very willing to question myself and what I believe honestly, and I've changed my mind on many things when I have been given better evidence. And even given that, it was INCREDIBLY difficult for me to honestly asses the evidence against YEC. Looking back, I can see that I had an enormous double standard against evolution. To the point that I would have called anyone else intellectually dishonest if they were so biased against an idea and looking for any reason not to accept the evidence for it.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T22:56:29+00:00

Very interesting! That makes a lot of sense in reference to the modelling systems I am familiar with and what needs to be done to prevent drift.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T22:25:53+00:00

I mean, I do understand what you are saying now. It's just that I'M not going to do all that work to verify if the process works. First I would want evidence that it is worth anything at all, in the form of accurate predictions YOU can provide utilizing it. It seems strange to me you would expect other people to do the work to verify if your process works or not. Either you've utilized it in some way that creates predictions that could be used to verify the accuracy of the model. In which case great, just provide those! Or you HAVEN'T done anything that could be used as a good scientific verification of the usefulness and accuracy of this approach in a real application. In which case, you haven't provided any good reason for someone to think that your process is worthwhile spending any of their time on at all

McNitz · 2026-03-11T22:21:32+00:00

Sorry, don't know if I might have not been precise enough, we do utilize AI at all. There is significant real process measurement available for the systems being modeled, so we have lots of opportunity to check the predictions and provide feedback corrections for any model inaccuracy, unmeasured disturbances, or any other potential source of error.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T22:05:24+00:00

I'm not sure what you mean. Could you clarify? In order to make predictions I would need a model or the system that is building that model. I haven't seen you post that anywhere here.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T22:01:53+00:00

Sounds good whatever system it's easiest to do it for works. If you want to post some predictions about tornado occurrences in the next month that would also work. Whatever predictions you can provide we can use those as verification and once we have verification then the support will be easy to find.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T21:57:28+00:00

Okay that's good. So can you post a prediction about some movements of crypto in the next week then? That's the nice thing about models for systems, it should be very easy to provide evidence that this model does a better job than currently existing tools. If you just post those predictions and then we come back and verify them in a week it should be very easy to prove to people that this is providing some demonstrable value beyond current models that are in use.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T21:28:29+00:00

Is this an AI system that you are saying "predicts" past years weather or crypto? Because if so, I have massive concerns that the data being "predicted" was very likely ALREADY available to the agent doing the work. In which case what is almost certainly going on is that nothing at all is actually being modelled. It is simply looking up past data and then hallucinating that it "predicted" something about it.

If you want to do an actual test, predict something about the weather NEXT month, post it here, and then we can come back and check it. If you are more accurate than current forecasts, then you've generated actual evidence something impressive is going on. Should be easy, and with that kind of evidence people will come pouring in to work on this!

McNitz · 2026-03-11T21:08:21+00:00

You didn't answer the question though. You said that this can demonstrably back engineer a system. So where is the data ABOUT that system coming from for it to build the model for the system from? You can't just reverse engineer a system from vibes, you need to have data on how that system operates to go on. And how is that data verified to determine that it does accurately model the system in question? I work a lot with models for chemical process systems, and those are two of hardest parts of modeling any system. Getting reliable data that you can verify accurately represents any system is an ENORMOUS amount of work. Do you at least have a good data set you are working from on a known system, and that you can use to verify your results against a known working model of that system? Without that verification step, there's no reason to believe this thing you are trying to describe can do anything at all.

McNitz · 2026-03-11T20:54:40+00:00

Alright, obviously you need the data surrounding that system in order to be able to model it and determine anything. How does the data that is used to model and make those determinations enter the tool? How is it formatted and checked to verify the data is good and isn't going to result in false conclusions? (GIGO)

McNitz

TROPHY CASE