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Techno2000
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Right , and where’s the fossils that should be showing all this, they should be easy to find for all the many different animals we have on earth .
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stavros388
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Just because you can’t imagine how it can work doesn’t mean it doesn’t work. Use your imagination. If a change in a species’ indivuals doesn’t help them survive and make offspring, the individuals with the change tend to die off quicker and/or don’t make as many babies. If it proves beneficial to survival, the recipients of the change live longer and procreate more. A light sensing organ is better than no eye at all. Being able to float from the tree tops is better than having no wings at all if it helps a creature escape predators. We don’t know how every little change looks in action because we weren’t there. But the overall economy of evolution can be easily demonstrated.
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rossum
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As I said before, “You do not understand evolution.” This post just confirms it. If you want to discuss evolution, then you need to know what evolution is and what is actually says. “An intelligent mind acquires knowledge, and the ear of the wise seeks knowledge.” - Proverbs 18:15.
Here you are correct, and those are exactly the reasons why evolution does not say what you wrongly attributed to it one paragraph earlier.
Correct. A system merely has to function well enough. It does not have to work better than the equivalent functions in other species.
The second option is correct.
Here you are wrong. It is functional enough for the organism it is in. Just as your sense of smell is functional enough for you. The fact that it is not as sensitive as a dog’s is not important to you. All your ancestors had systems that were functional enough. Agreed, some of them were less functional than our current versions, but – as with the dog – that is not important. Our fish ancestors were better able to swim underwater than we are. They were less able to breathe air than we are. Different organisms at different stages of evolution need different systems. Natural selection will weed out any insufficiently functional organisms. The rest survive to reproduce.
Here is some video of a Coelacanth swimming. Have a close look at its front fins. They are unlike the fins on most fish; they are fins-on-stumps. They work perfectly well as a fin but those stumps are what evolved into our legs. A fin-on-a-stump can function both as a fin and as a leg. There was no sudden jump from fin only to leg only. There was an intermediate fin-on-a-stump stage between the two. Yes, we are descended from some very close relatives of Coelacanths, which is why there was quite a lot of excitement when they were found not to be extinct.
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stavros388
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Read “The Red Queen” by Matt Ridley for a thorough examination of the evolution of sexuality.
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rossum
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Very easily. We can see some today. A Lungfish is (big surprise) a fish with lungs as well as gills. It can survive underwater indefinitely and it can survive out of water for months on end. Like the Coelacanth it is a close relative of our ancestors: a group of fish with both lungs and stumpy fins. Very close to our amphibian ancestors.
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Aloysium
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I want to make the point that there are no evolutionary processes outside of God in relation to His beloved creation. The Theory of Evolution, as it is understood, proposes that the series of steps which constitute the appearance of living organisms and the changes they have exhibited in time are the result of the properties inherent in matter alone. However, the reality of any such processes must include God’s purpose in their creation. In other words, the purpose of the existence of life is not inherent in the fundamental processes that govern the physical universe. They in themselves do not determine that life, including we who can contemplate such things, necessary must exist. It is God’s will that determines every level of creation. Any evolutionary processes which represent changes in species in time, can only take place once they exist, after they have been created from what was. If things are not, there is nothing to change. And, persons are a new creation from what was before them, however it is that God moulded our physical form. That new creation began with Adam.
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Rau
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If all life that has ever existed on earth was created 5778 years ago, then I believe it entirely unlikely that scientific enquiry would find entirely otherwise. [There’s not just a lack of evidence supporting the claim of 5778 years, but a plethora of it contradicting the claim.]
Evolutionary (and other) processes over billions of years look to be the reality. I don’t doubt that God is able to establish the relationship of man and God if that reality is accepted. In the same way that you don’t doubt that God could spend 144 hours (5778 years ago) creating the universe and all life on earth that has ever existed and then spending 24 hours “resting”. If either of us is “waving arms”, we both are.
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Rau
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Be that as it may, evolutionary processes may be quite indistinguishable (by us) from random change.
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Bradskii
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So if you were to find an example of a fish that used its fins to walk, and an example of a fish that could live on land and an example of a fish that could breathe air and one that could, I dunno…climb trees, then you might think: hey, maybe they’re right.
But I think that even if you were shown examples of fish living on land, mammals living in the sea, birds that can’t fly and and animals that can, you’d find a way to discount them.
Maybe if you were shown examples of reptilian scales evolving into feathers you’d deny it could happen. Perhaps the only chickens you have seen (which have both) have come from KFC.
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Glark
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Ya got that right. One of my favorite super-heroes, Evolution Man (aka Richard Dawkins), wrote this about the evo-infidel - “that person is ignorant, stupid or insane (or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that).”
Yes, evo-infidels are possibly “wicked”! My thoughts exactly - except I would go a bit further than that and say they are almost certainly wicked.
Mr. Dawkins is not only one of the finest writers of science-fiction since Charles Darwin, but he is a zoologist, which means he works at a zoo, where animals are made. So he knows stuff. Respect.
In order to claim that something is “simply not true”, you must be able to disprove it with a demonstrable fact. Only in the kingdom of Fake Science can an untestable theory miraculously morph into a fact.
Before a Christian can accept billions of years of evolution, he needs to reconcile it following two verses:
“But from the beginning of creation, God created them male and female” - Mark 10:6.
“Behold behemoth, whom I made with thee, he eaterh grass like an ox” - Job 40:15.
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Glark
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- The alternative is incest, that’s true; so incest must have been lawful at that time.
- Being “open to life” is not the only consideration. There exist human hybrids … the mermaid, the minotaur, the centaurs, the satyr and others. But that doesn’t mean these creatures are all fine and dandy with the Boss upstairs.
- I doubt if the Church has ever had to consider the spiritual implications of a human with a soul mating with a human without a soul. I would say that God would not allow a human with a soul to mate with a human without a soul. And perhaps there is Catholic teaching that says a human cannot exist without a soul.
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So evolution produced human beings and then God grabbed one them - Adam - and injected him with a soul. But Eve wasn’t a result of evolution, but was created from Adam’s rib. What an inconsistent story - Adam was the result of billions of years of evolution, yet Eve was created in an instant.
Why would God, after waiting out billions of years of evolution, then decide to make Eve an exception and create her in a instant? The good Lord must have got a bit fed up with the waiting game. Or maybe he forgot he could actually create things instantly.
How do you know Eve had a soul?
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rossum
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Humans have always been “male and female”. Simple. And they were not made “at the beginning” but at the very least hours after the beginning. There is obvious flexibility round the word “beginning”. “In the beginning God made the heavens and the earth and Adam and Eve.” Your Bible obviously differs from the one I have on my shelf.
Your Bible interpretation is wrong here. Large animals can be, and often are, herbivores: elephants, mammoths, Apatosaurs, hippos, rhinos and others for example.
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Glark
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In that case, you should change your name from “niceatheist” to “niceatheist-sometimes”.
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Glark
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You doubt that atheist scientists use the general theory of evolution as their starting point? If so, that’s amazingly naive.
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Glark
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Fair point. But why does Miller oppose the concept of Intelligent Design?
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Glark
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You underestimate the vivid imaginations of atheistic Darwinists - evolution can explain everything - it has to, since there is no alternative explanation.
Using the genealogies, etc described in the Bible, it can be calculated that humans have existed for about 5887 years (I use this figure because it appears on the front page of some Jewish publications. The Catholic Church as come up with a similar figure). Do you doubt these calculations?
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Glark
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Oh, okay, thanks. Never heard of “organisms” before but it sounds very impressive and sciencey. And “bug” has only about four letters (I think), whereas “organisms” has so many letters I can’t even count that high!
What does “sophisicated” mean?
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Glark
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I see. So observing small changes means that massive changes are possible.
Well, let’s apply that logic to the real world … Humans are running 100 meters faster today that we could 50 years ago. So in a thousand years time, humans might be running it in one second! This is nonsense of coruse. Why? Because there are LIMITS to what an organism can do.
For this reason, one cannot assume that small changes automatically mean massive changes are possible - to do so is make an unreasonable extrapolation. Making unreasonable extrapolations are not conducive to good science. So your theory of evolution is built on unreasonable extrapolations - aka wishful thinking and rank speculation, which add up to junk science. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.
Another simple example: In the wild, 99.9999% of budgerigars are green and yellow. But human breeders have managed to exploit variations in budgie colours to produce white, yellow, green, purple, blue and pied birds. Does this means red or black budgies are possible? No, because there are GENETIC LIMITS that are set in stone. No matter what breeders do, red or black budgies cannot be produced.
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