Lucy stayed with Minion over the weekend and his mother-in-law bathed and groomed her and cleaned her teeth and cut her nails. Sweet! Although I'm now a little embarrassed about my apparently ghetto dog.

In her defense, she returned the favor by apparently teaching Minion's new six-month pup to sit at intersections when they went on walks.

If he keeps going at this rate he's not going to have any teeth left.

Oh yeah, my friend C's cat had all her teeth pulled some years ago. (She's also on the juice, like more and more cats I know.) She still happily munches her chow, even though she does get wet food too.

Yes; from a quick google it appears to be the thing they will ask for as evidence of evolution but will never receive.

Yep, I've seen it used before as an ID catchphrase (not tagline!). It's one of their slicker rhetorical tricks at a casual glance, because, as has already been mentioned by all of everyone, they can always ask for more detail -- but also in that it glosses over the fact that paths of all kinds can have breaks in them and still indicate a way to get where they're going.

Insisting on the complete and unbroken chain is a bit like saying "we don't know what Napoleon ate for breakfast on July 23 1811, so you can't prove that he got his sustenance from food." It's an unreasonable standard of proof, and a red herring. (Jumping from the supposed lack of a chain to "so this other theory must be the correct one" is like inferring that he must have lived by photosynthesis, but I'm not even looking at the conclusions ID draws right now, just at the ways the existing evidence is misread or misrepresented.)

The other evidence for evolution-- like replicating it in the lab-- goes unmentioned.

And it's not only that it goes unmentioned -- 10 or so years ago, "but you can't replicate it in a lab!" was one of the most common objections you'd hear from the ID/CS crowd. Once it was demonstrated, they just moved on to the next target and dropped the matter.

Again, getting back to the whole what-science-is -- it's true that everything (not just in evolution, but in all of science) can be proven wrong. But that also implies that when your theory of whatever is proven wrong, you have to either change your theory or come up with an equally good response to the disproof. This is more like plugging your ears and saying "lalalalaICan'tHearYou" -- not good rhetoric, nor good science, and it's a very common tactic when you look back at how ID arguments have evolved.

And that (see how sneaky!) comes back to the buzzwordy status of "Darwinian" -- arguments evolve, and so do a number of other things, by exactly the same mechanisms that affect species. But the idea that, say, all human languages have been fixed and immutable since Babel (which was once common) is now thoroughly loony-fringe, and you can't appear scientific and reasonable while saying that abstract evolutionary processes don't happen anywhere. Shifting the language to "Darwinian" has the advantage of isolating species evolution from all that stuff we really can't deny, while also allowing ID proponents a bogeyman with a name, a face, and a big ol' beard rather than talking about something that's both ubiquitous and vague. It's the same kind of rhetorical framing that we've talked about before wrt political issues -- "poor people" vs. "welfare queens".

(And Cindy, I'm really sorry if this is starting to feel like a pile-on, which I think it may after I look at how much I just wrote. The original question hit while I couldn't answer, and it's an issue that I've had a pretty major interest in for many years now. So I'm probably doomed to go on and on about it, but my target is crappy arguments rather than anything personal.)

You know, I love the looks on people's faces when you disclose you have a diabetic cat. That gets shots. There's a fair amount of increduality and often a side of is she mental?!

I think the cat maybe ate a bug or something, not hairballs. But we'll see. And Lee, if he doesn't remember you precisely, he definitely wishes there were more daytime people around this joint.

There's a fair amount of increduality and often a side of is she mental?!

Sadly, there's a fair chunk of population that thinks dressing up pets in silly costumes and referring to them as children is totally sane but managing their long-term health is whackaloony.

(Not that this is necessarily the case with whoever you're thinking of. It's just a button of mine.)

There's a fair amount of increduality and often a side of is she mental?!

sarameg, I worked at a vet's office for years. We had one client who had 2 beautiful Goldens. She would bring them in every other week for baths and insist on taking them home wet. In her Rolls Royce with leather interior. Now that's sorta mental!

(And Cindy, I'm really sorry if this is starting to feel like a pile-on, which I think it may after I look at how much I just wrote. The original question hit while I couldn't answer, and it's an issue that I've had a pretty major interest in for many years now. So I'm probably doomed to go on and on about it, but my target is crappy arguments rather than anything personal.)

I don't want there to be a pile-on, but I think it's not easy to get up to speed on all the permutations of the so-called debate, so I'd love to hear you go on and on.

amych, I know exactly what you mean. It's basically easily treatable, but does require a fair amount of commitment. Plus, I suspect there's the whole issue of your cat lets you give him shots!?

Lee, if he doesn't remember you precisely, he definitely wishes there were more daytime people around this joint

Mine too. Especially with the heat not working, which it currently isn't.