Evolution is a process, based on unclear initial conditions. It has not been proven because we can't completely simulate it or "redo" it from scratch.

To prove it would require nothing less than the evolution of a new sentient race. By this I mean we would have to, from scratch in an isolated system, evolve a race of creates of intelligence equivalent to human intelligence, with absolutely no direction from humans, and it would have to be explicable in its entirety. This is impractical if not impossible at this point in time.

"Seeing is believing" and it cannot be seen from start to finish because in practice the process of evolving takes longer than any one person's lifetime. Adaptation and mutation are short term and can be viewed by an individual, but those are only aspects of the larger process, which is the topic of conversation.

> Once you impinge on certain civil rights it opens doors to open others and it will be masked with a "national security" claim.

This is factually correct, and accurately describes the use of the Patriot Act and wiretapping against US citizens. The Patriot Act opened up Civil Liberties holes to expedite the capture of terrorists, but it has been repurposed by law enforcement officials to trap run-of-the-mill criminals who are US citizens and are not suspected of any direct forms of terrorism.

It is unacceptable to impinge on "certain" civil liberties because there is no limit to what "certain" means. You can make an innocuous sacrifice of liberty and find that it has blossomed. See the illegal wire-tapping issue for reference. US citizens said it was OK to tap the TERRORISTS cells, but they didn't realize that to find the terrorists ALL our phones would be tapped and monitored by computers.

That's just an example, of course; but it is proof of the supposition that "loss of civil liberties is a slippery slope".

Problems voiding your argument.

1. "terrorists do not have any American rights". Some terrorists are American. Some are not. For the sake of this debate, this is irrelevant, but that fact is worth noting. It's not a question of whether it's OK to impinge on the terrorists rights, it's the rights of all of us that are in question.

2. Listing what "civil liberties we've actually lost" directly because of one issue is not the point of the debate. If you want to go down that track, here is an ACTUAL list of lost liberties that you can examine (because yours if incorrect in stating only 2 items): http://www.historycommons.org/project.jsp?project=lossofcivilliberties The question isn't "are the rights we've lost been worth it", the question is "are the lost of ANY rights worth it". This being a slippery slope, if you give up ANY rights and say YES, then you must be prepared to give up ANY AND ALL rights. We're not after specifics, we're after the general argument that can be applied to anything.

3. Your list of 2 items is factually incorrect. See above link, but also note that the government is/was not monitoring only the terrorists lines, but they monitored everyone's lines. They are tapping your call regardless of it you called Iraq. Whether anyone chooses to look at it is an irrelevant issue.

I think this has very little to do with increases in processing power and more to do with misuse of and atrophy of the human mind. Reliance on machines and various other factors (from government control to religion to consumer culture) will eventually render us as "dumb" as modern day computing machine. You could call this argument "dystopian", but I think you will also call it "true" sooner than you think.