http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20050717/sc_afp/chinaanimalselephant_050717075953

BEIJING, July 17 (AFP) - A recent study has predicted that more male Asian elephants in China will be born without tusks because poaching of tusked elephants is reducing the gene pool, the China Daily reported Sunday.
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The study, conducted in the Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture in southwest China's Yunnan province, where two-thirds of China's Asian elephants live, found that the tuskless phenomenon is spreading, the report said.

The tusk-free gene, which is found in between two and five percent of male Asian elephants, has increased to between five percent and 10 percent in elephants in China, according to Zhang Li, an associate professor of zoology at Beijing Normal University.

"This decrease in the number of elephants born with tusks shows the poaching pressure for ivory on the animal," said Zhang, whose research team has been studying elephants since 1999 at a reserve in Xishuangbanna.

Only male elephants have tusks, which are said to be a symbol of masculinity and a weapon to fight for territory. However, due to poaching for ivory, the elephants' pride has become a death sentence, the report said.

"The larger tusks the male elephant has, the more likely it will be shot by poachers," said Zhang. "Therefore, the ones without tusks survive, preserving the tuskless gene in the species."

A similar decline in elephants with tusks has been seen in Uganda, which experienced heavy poaching in the 1970s and '80s, the report said.

However, Zhang's findings of the spread of the tuskless gene due to poaching must be tested, according to some academics.

"This is, of course, a possibility, but till now there is no clear genetic proof that it can occur," Vivek Menon, executive director of the Wildlife Trust of India, was quoted as saying.

Rampant poaching of male elephants for tusks has also caused the female-to-male ratio to rise from the ideal 2:1 to 4:1 in China and 100:1 in India, the report said.

There are between 45,000 and 50,000 Asian elephants in 13 countries, including China and India. China only has about 250, according to the report.

China is among 160 nations which signed an international treaty administered since 1989 banning the trade in ivory and products of other endangered animals.

Nonetheless, four Asian elephants were found shot dead in China last year.

In addition to poaching, human activity that causes a loss of habitat also threatens the animals.

----

cliff notes:
Elephants will evolve to not have tusks in order to avoid extinction.

quote:

I spelled humyn as I always spell it. I do it b/c I view the inclusion of the word "man" in words like humyn and womyn as bad.

That freaks me out even without an explanation. I hope you're not some extreme feminist who thinks the term "human" is a direct result of male chauvinism, or something of the sort. In any case, your usage confuses me. Would mankind thus be "mynkind?" And would I be a "myn?"

quote:

Originally posted by dunadaine:
I'm not saying you have to have an encyclopedia-like knowledge of calculus to understand science, I'm saying that if you fail basic mathematics (like Darwin did) you can't comprehend many basic aspects of science. Since Darwin failed math he could not comprehend the probability of mere mutations changing animals into different animals.

You clearly don't understand the geologic time scale. And your ad hominem attacks on Darwin simply show the desperate illogic of your position.

quote:

Forgive my miswording. However, do you know why they call it evidence? Because there is no proof. I hope that got through.

There's no "proof" of gravity. That's why it's still called a "theory". To steal a phrase from the Onion, are you going to start promoting the theory of "intelligent falling"?

quote:

But, for the sake of debate, let's reexamine it. First whale elovlution, because though we don't have many fossils talkorigins insists on it being evidence.

Dog=carnivor, in water uses legs for thrust
Whale=some carnivor some not, uses tail for thrust but hardly uses fins at all

To go from an animal that uses its legs to swim to an animal that has lost its legs because it doesn't use them to swim or walk? Naah

Evolution as a whole?

ooze turns into invertebrate turns into fish turns into amphibian turns into reptile turns into birds and mammals? right...

Again, you demonstrate your total ignorance of the geologic time scale. British pepper moths? Hallooo? If a species can change colour inside 100 years, how much change can occur over hundreds of millions?

quote:

quote:

Saying a higher being did everything is simple and requires very little thought.

That's called logic, sweetie.

Actually, grasping the solution that requires the least thought is about the antithesis of logic. "Stupid" would be an accurate descriptor, I think.

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The Bible... I know, I know... My coclusion to believe in the Bible is the result of a lot of scientific study, which I cannot explain properly here. But in the stead, I will quote Sir Issaac Newton, who I think said it best.

quote:

Can it be by accident that all birds, beasts, and men have their right side and left side alike shaped (exept in their bowels); and just two eyes, and no more,on either side of the face; and just two ears on either side [of] the head; and a nose with two holes; and either two forlegs or two wings or two arms on the shoulders, and two legs on the hips, and no more? Whence arises this uniformity in all their outward shapes but from the counsel and contrivance of an Author? Whence is it that the eyes of all sorts of living creatures are transparent to the very bottom, and the only transparent members in the body, having on the outside a hard transparent skin and within transparent humors, with a crystalline lense in the middle and a pupil before the lens, all of them so finely shaped and fitted for vision that no artist can mend them? Did blind chance know that there was light and what was its refraction, and fit the eyes of all creatures after the most curious manner to make use of it? These and suchlike considerations always have and ever will prevail with mankind to believe that there is a Being who made all things, and has all things in His power, and Who is therefore to be feared.

quote:

Uh-huh - Sir I was also wrong about relativity. And eyes that are "so finely shaped and fitted for vision that no artist can mend them?" We can do that now.

[QUOTE]It's the only book from ancient times saying that the earth is round and rotates on it's axis, and that it is suspended in space.

Read this carefully:

[QUOTE]God... looketh to the ends of the earth, and seeth under the whole heaven; to make the weight for the winds; and He weigheth the waters by measure.

(emphasis mine)

The was from the book of Job.

Now a word from Matthew Maury:

quote:

When the pumpmaker came to ask Galileo to explain how it was that his pump woul not lift water higher that thirty-two feet, the philosopher thought, but was afraid to say, it was owing to "the weight of the winds"; and thought the fact the the air has weight is here so distinctly announced, philosophers never recognized the fact until within comparatively a recent period, and then it was proclaimed by them as a great discovery. Nevertheless, the fact was set forth as distinctly in the book of nature as it is in the Book of Revelation [the Bible]

I've got more, if you want them.

Wow - you can just read anything into that book, can't you? The only thing you've proven here is that you're delusional.

yeah I love them I didn't like the last one Mostly Harmless though

ok fine... you're right, I misquoted it, but in the end it's still funny, whatev word I choose. There's nothing you can do about it!!! Tee Hee

Anyway, have you read the rest of that series? I love those books, I am writing a report on the HH guide right now actually for my english free reading project. I think the books are awesome, the movie was crap tho.

well it has no standing in the orginal sides miracles are the result of faith and a validation of faith in God not evidence there of cause most miracles can be results of internal strength or drugs

I changed the quote so people wouldn't ask what a bable fish was... it ultimately means the same thing. I know I changed one word... but it was for the sake of the audiance as I assumed people hadn't read the book... I'm sorry for those that have.

As for spelling, I spelled humyn as I always spell it. I do it b/c I view the inclusion of the word "man" in words like humyn and womyn as bad. I could go on about this if you really really want, but whenever I try and explain this it causes people to become freaked out. So I'm just going to leave it at that for now.

Finally, I will get really hott abs from hell, pushing rocks up hills is way good for the body. Tee Hee

bad fool, bad you misqouted that! that whole thing is about a fish called the Babel Fish you just replaced it with miracle so I call upon the wrath of Phil ruler of heck to darn you to heck. You who can't quote a novel properly and can't spell "humans" right

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy tell us..

"God says 'I refuse to prove that I exist, for proof denies faith and without faith I am nothing'
Humyns say 'But the existance of miracles is a dead give away, I mean, we couldn't have evolved by chance, so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't'
'Oh dear' says god, 'I hadn't thought of that," and promply vanishes in a puff of logic.
'Oh that was easy, says humyns, and for an encore goes on to prove that black is white..."

TeeHee... somehow, I think that probably ends the debate about science and religon right there.

quote:

Couldn't evolution and ID be combined together to get the best of both worlds?

NO. NO!!! The entire point of evolution is to scientifically eplain the origin of the diversity of life on the planet, totally without god. Keep your religion out of my science and I'll keep my science out of your religion.

I believe in God and all that. However I think that He is responsible for evolution. There is just too much scientific evidence for evolution to not be true.

Couldn't evolution and ID be combined together to get the best of both worlds? For example, I believe that there is a God and He created this world and everything in it. But I also think that we all evolved from something and this kind of thing intrigues me in science class. Always has and probably always will. So, I have combined both of these ideas and created something that is entirely my own.

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Since Darwin failed math he could not comprehend the probability of mere mutations changing animals into different animals. And as for Einstien, stop trying to say that he was a flunkie all his life.

Dude, Einstein was terrible with basic math. He could do everything else in math but basic math was hard for him. Sort of like me, my mind blanks when doing simple subtraction, but I could breeze through a complex chemical equation with no calculator and no problems.

Besides, Darwin may have been bad at math, but mordern scientists aren't. They're the ones that have modified his theory and brought up the probabilities of mutations.

And just for your info, mutations always occur, in every creature. No one is perfect.

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However, do you know why they call it evidence? Because there is no proof.

Evidence: something that furnishes proof.

So when they used evidence to put Jeffrey Dahmer in jail, they were wrong?

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ooze turns into invertebrate turns into fish turns into amphibian turns into reptile turns into birds and mammals? right...

What the fuck?

Somebody can't seem to read. We're right back where we fucking started. That is NOT Evolution. Evolution is 1,000,000 time more complicated than that. What your problem is, is that you keep looking at Evolution from a large scale. You need to look beyond DNA, beyond Amino Acids and beyond the elements. Besides, it seems silly that you'll believe in a God that is "all-powerful", that can do anything, like make people live for 900 years, but your God making a fish "grow" legs is completely impossible and ridiculous. And all the science in the world that supports the bible is 100% correct to you, while any scientific fact that doesn't was manipulated, fraudulent, wrong. You're really becoming transparent.

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Wrong. First of all, you used to call yourself a Christian, but you were never were I'm at now so you can't possibly know were I'm coming from.

Wow. I did not call myself a Christian. I was baptized, went to church twice a week. I went to bible school on saturdays. I was just like you. I wanted the bible to be right. I knew it in my heart that it had to be right. I told all my friends who didn't follow the bible that they were wrong. I read the bible every night and prayed. And I was like this for the first 12 years of my life.

quote:

but in despair you chose to forsake God, while I chose to grow out of the despair and find real Christianity. There's the difference.

Forsake God? There is no God to forsake. When I grew up and became smarter and stopped thinking the way my preacher told me too, I realized that. If you want to keep up your false hopes, go for it.

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That's called logic, sweetie.

No. That's called faith. Faith and logic don't mix well.

quote:

But I get your point, that it takes a special sort of mind to imagine that a physics-defying chemical reaction produced the entire universe.

Yep. A mind that thinks outside the box. Like Stephen Hawking.

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Factual Evidence... That's a new one.

No it's not. A human being's pelvis is facutal evidence that humans are bipedal.

quote:

What you mean is "if you'd hammered pieces of different puzzles together 'cause you couldn't get the right ones to fit, you might get evolution.

Wow, you're not very smart. I've made connections between Astronomy, Chemistry, Biology, etc. Study these subjects thoroughly, and you'd see what I mean. I'd explain it myself, but I don't feel like typing for nine hours.

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Ahh, sweet learning channel, with chief shows who have titles like "trading spaces" and and "monster house" and Discovery, with shows about wanna-be cyclists. What would we do without you?!

I said since I was a toddler, genius. They didn't have those shows 15 years ago. Besides, I don't even watch them. I watch the more science-y shows like MythBusters, Trauma: Life in the ER, Shark Week, etc. Plus, I watch Discovery Health constantly now.

quote:

Again, any source who's "29+evidences" depend on themselves to be right... is a FRAUD.

Wow... You are definitely retarded. I told you they have several sources and links. I gave you the site to look at. It's obvious you didn't. They do not rely on themselves. They rely on logic and science that has already been observed.

quote:

I understand talkorigins very well, enough to see through their myriad masquerades.

You keep claiming how you can see their false claims, but your not explaining yourself at all. I asked this twenty times before and I'll ask you again: how is TalkOrigins manipulating scientific facts?

And I'm sorry but you don't understand that site at all. If you did we wouldn't be having this conversation. Quick question: How old do you think the Universe is and why?

quote:

And airbags break their noses. What's your point?

See? I told you. You're not a logical thinker. That's my point. I said figure it out, as in figure out why. Seatbelts kill people because, people who buy cars with more and better safety features are more likely to get into car accidents. This is so, because people who feel safer in their cars drive more boldly.

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No, it doesn't. But don't try to use it against me as evidence, if it isn't documented well.

I didn't. You brought it up.

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And bear skeletons with human-like qualities and pig teeth with ape-like qualities, and "yeti hair" with goat like qualities

So science can never ever ever ever ever eveeerrrr make mistakes can they? Science makes one mistake and it's automatically untrustworthy. This is so hypocrictical its not even funny.

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My coclusion to believe in the Bible is the result of a lot of scientific study

HAH!

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But in the stead, I will quote Sir Issaac Newton, who I think said it best.

Ironically, that quote explains exactly why every animal can come from an original organism and it supports Evolution beautifully. It explains why every animal including humans are so similiar. Because we all evolved from the same ancestor. On another planet, an original organism would probably be different and all the animals might have 6 arms, 9 eyes, 4 hearts, etc.

Ugh. You're really annoying.

quote:

So while atoms always existed, it was not a universally recognized scientific fact untill it was proven within reasonable doubt.

That's what I'm saying. Science, for a very long time, could not validate the existence of atoms, even though they were there. So, like many early chemists, I think there are things in the world that cannot yet be tested by science...

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Sure it's symbolic and philosophic. But so is Plato, and Nostradamus.

I said it was symbolic and prophetic. And I was adressing one of EG's rants, I wasn't using it as evidence.

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You want to give a synopsis of evidence for basically half of modern science??

Half of mondern science is still in theory stage?? Leaves alot of room for improvement... don't you think?

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So I'll post it in bold Evolution DOES NOT REQUIRE, NOR IS IT DEPENDENT ON the big bang theory or spontaneous generation. The geologic sciences have even LESS to do with these subjects.

I get them thrown at me as a group, so I take them down as a group. when they are shoved in my face, they all shoved in my face to make up a godless logic-lacking pseudo-science mix, so I am attacking them all, as they are usually accessories to one another.

quote:

Firstly, I've failed Calc 2 and Chem 2 in college.

I'm not saying you have to have an encyclopedia-like knowledge of calculus to understand science, I'm saying that if you fail basic mathematics (like Darwin did) you can't comprehend many basic aspects of science. Since Darwin failed math he could not comprehend the probability of mere mutations changing animals into different animals. And as for Einstien, stop trying to say that he was a flunkie all his life. He wasn't or he coundn't have comprehended the things he was saying.

quote:

So when new information presents itself, the theory changes to fit the facts. This is not "painting a target around an arrow".

Oh, I'm sorry, my mistake. It's pulling the arrow out of the wall and sticking it in the bullseye. I should have known.

quote:

A creationist, however, uses a non-scientific book, the Bible, to determine how things work.

Things in the spiritual world, yes.

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Revalation has NO place in science, unfortuntely that is the core of ID and creationist thought.

Yet again, though I have explained this, you misinterpret the word "revalation". Keep reading and you will see the meaning.

quote:

Not proof. Evidence.

Forgive my miswording. However, do you know why they call it evidence? Because there is no proof. I hope that got through.

quote:

However, if you consider the ENTIRE body of evidence, the Big Picture, Evolution becomes logical, and well supported. The doubts are largely lifted by corraborating evidence from other proofs.

When I gave the "big picture" EG freaked, because it wasn't logical. When I gave the synopsis she said somthing like "says you" altough I can't remember exactly.
But, for the sake of debate, let's reexamine it. First whale elovlution, because though we don't have many fossils talkorigins insists on it being evidence.

Dog=carnivor, in water uses legs for thrust
Whale=some carnivor some not, uses tail for thrust but hardly uses fins at all

To go from an animal that uses its legs to swim to an animal that has lost its legs because it doesn't use them to swim or walk? Naah

Evolution as a whole?

ooze turns into invertebrate turns into fish turns into amphibian turns into reptile turns into birds and mammals? right...

quote:

First of all, I used to be Christian I know exactly where you're coming from.

Wrong. First of all, you used to call yourself a Christian, but you were never were I'm at now so you can't possibly know were I'm coming from. We were at the same place, in a nothingness falsely called Christianity, but in despair you chose to forsake God, while I chose to grow out of the despair and find real Christianity. There's the difference.

quote:

Saying a higher being did everything is simple and requires very little thought.

That's called logic, sweetie. But I get your point, that it takes a special sort of mind to imagine that a physics-defying chemical reaction produced the entire universe.

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You discredited nothing.

EG, any source who's "evidences" are, in DSL's own words, "reliant on evolution as a whole", is a FRAUD. Just thought I'd clear that up for you.

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It's not garbage, sweetheart. It's factual Sciencific Evidence.

Factual Evidence... That's a new one.

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If you were a deep logical thinker who could make connections between scientific evidences, you'd see that.

What you mean is "if you'd hammered pieces of different puzzles together 'cause you couldn't get the right ones to fit, you might get evolution.

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I've been watching Nova, the Discovery Channel, and The Learning Channel since I was a toddler.

Ahh, sweet learning channel, with chief shows who have titles like "trading spaces" and and "monster house" and Discovery, with shows about wanna-be cyclists. What would we do without you?!

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It is the absolute best online source of Evolution info I've found.

Again, any source who's "29+evidences" depend on themselves to be right... is a FRAUD.

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If you don't understand professional level science, chances are, you won't understand TalkOrigins.

I understand talkorigins very well, enough to see through their myriad masquerades. That's why I was able to use their so-called evidences against them.

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Seat belts kill people.

And airbags break their noses. What's your point?

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Like I said, the lack of documentation in whale evolution doesn't discredit Evolution as a whole.

No, it doesn't. But don't try to use it against me as evidence, if it isn't documented well.

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But they have definitely found human bones with ape-like qualities and and ape bones with human-like qualities.

And bear skeletons with human-like qualities and pig teeth with ape-like qualities, and "yeti hair" with goat like qualities, and "space ship" remnants with "other-worldy" properties, and alloys with detrimental properties, and small animals with large brain capacities, and turtles with tortoise like qualities, and uranium in very small quantities... get real

quote:

How exactly, from looking at our world alone, can you get the idea that Jesus was divine and a messiah? How do you know there's supposed to be a Messiah at all? How do you know that there is sin and that God gives a damn what you do?

The Bible... I know, I know... My coclusion to believe in the Bible is the result of a lot of scientific study, which I cannot explain properly here. But in the stead, I will quote Sir Issaac Newton, who I think said it best.

quote:

Can it be by accident that all birds, beasts, and men have their right side and left side alike shaped (exept in their bowels); and just two eyes, and no more,on either side of the face; and just two ears on either side [of] the head; and a nose with two holes; and either two forlegs or two wings or two arms on the shoulders, and two legs on the hips, and no more? Whence arises this uniformity in all their outward shapes but from the counsel and contrivance of an Author? Whence is it that the eyes of all sorts of living creatures are transparent to the very bottom, and the only transparent members in the body, having on the outside a hard transparent skin and within transparent humors, with a crystalline lense in the middle and a pupil before the lens, all of them so finely shaped and fitted for vision that no artist can mend them? Did blind chance know that there was light and what was its refraction, and fit the eyes of all creatures after the most curious manner to make use of it? These and suchlike considerations always have and ever will prevail with mankind to believe that there is a Being who made all things, and has all things in His power, and Who is therefore to be feared.

quote:

All these things come from the Bible or other "revelated" source.

The sun is not alive, the earth is not held up by four enormous elephants, or Atlas, Oden has never helped me win a fight, Thor has never thrown lightning, cu` Chalainn has never visited me, Ra has never blessed me, Raven has never woken me up, Polyphemus has never cursed me, syrenes have never called to me, satyres have never danced in my backyard, minotuars have never slung axes at me, centuars have never let me ride on their backs, Hades has never summoned me, Allah has never tuanted me, the banshee did not wail at the death of my best friend, the white buffulo never fed me. Those "revelated" sources are false. The Bible is revelated. Still don't believe me?

It's the only book from ancient times saying that the earth is round and rotates on it's axis, and that it is suspended in space.

Read this carefully:

quote:

God... looketh to the ends of the earth, and seeth under the whole heaven; to make the weight for the winds; and He weigheth the waters by measure.

(emphasis mine)

The was from the book of Job.

Now a word from Matthew Maury:

quote:

When the pumpmaker came to ask Galileo to explain how it was that his pump woul not lift water higher that thirty-two feet, the philosopher thought, but was afraid to say, it was owing to "the weight of the winds"; and thought the fact the the air has weight is here so distinctly announced, philosophers never recognized the fact until within comparatively a recent period, and then it was proclaimed by them as a great discovery. Nevertheless, the fact was set forth as distinctly in the book of nature as it is in the Book of Revelation [the Bible]

I've got more, if you want them.

yeah thats very true it's when you bring in the exactitudes of religous dogma that things get complicated

The problem with that Amp is that they're still taking Catholic dogma and trying to fit it around science. In vauge enough terms, anything can fit. How exactly, from looking at our world alone, can you get the idea that Jesus was divine and a messiah? How do you know there's supposed to be a Messiah at all? How do you know that there is sin and that God gives a damn what you do? All these things come from the Bible or other "revelated" source. They're not science, which is why science and Christianity, and religion in general, is seperate. Science and spirituality, on the other hand, can fit well as there is no dogma or ritual required.