Evolution???

[c659smith]

Find a picture of a chimpanzee. Observe its eyes. The eyes of a chimpanzee are extremely similar to human eyes, the major difference being that chimpanzee eyes are almost always brown, while human eyes are mostly brown but can be other colours.

The human eye and the chimpanzee eye both evolved from our common ancestor with the chimpanzees - an extinct African ape from about five million years ago. That would also have had similar eyes, very probably brown.

The colour differences in human eyes are probably associated with some humans evolving lighter colouration (fair skin for instance) to help with vitamin D production in higher latitudes.

rossum

Humans are also the only primates for whom the outline of the eye and the position of the iris are clearly visible. In addition, our eyes are more horizontally elongated and disproportionately large for our body size compared to most apes. Gorillas, for example, have massive bodies but relatively small eyes.

we also communicate with our eyes and apes do not.

Come on now where is this evolutionary process there must be some link – this did not occurr over night.

 

[buffalo]

Darwin’s explanation of evolution was *approximately *correct, but required refinement. The modern evolutionary synthesis (as it is called) is a refinement of Darwin’s explanation of evolution.

See my post on theroy vs fact.

the latest is a refinement? it jumps to self assembly!

 

[greggy53]

No, it is a combination of the two.Did God create unstable elements that undergo radioactive decay? Can we predict when any specific atom in a mass of atoms will decay?So your position is that there is no such thing as random. Is there a possibility that there are things that are truly random to our human minds?No, you claimed that the theory of evolution claims that life pops into existence. That is silly and not part of the theory, contrary to your claims.

Peace

Tim

I don’t understand your assertion that life could somehow be accidental and yet be created at the same time?? are you saying that God intentionally created life accidentally?.???.. I certainly believe in randomness, and don’t know what I may have said that led you to think otherwise…Because I don’t believe that life was a random event doesn’t mean that I don’t understand or believe the possibility that something can randomly occur. There is a certain amount of randomness built into the physical laws of our universe but our presence here is not one of them. It is obvious that you are not an atheist, and have found a way to embrace a theory that atheists espouse. It seems to me that in order to embrace Darwinian evolution one has to adapt a skewed view of science, and religion to do it.

 

[c659smith]

Darwin’s explanation of evolution was *approximately *correct, but required refinement. The modern evolutionary synthesis (as it is called) is a refinement of Darwin’s explanation of evolution.

See my post on theroy vs fact.

what refinements?

It is more diffulcult for you to accept evolution than creationism

Science has gone no where here.

Science explains different breeds changing

wolf,wild dog, german sheperd, poodle

but that is refinement in breeding not evolution

not fish to man

or lizard to dog

 

[Orogeny]

I don’t understand your assertion that life could somehow be accidental and yet be created at the same time?? are you saying that God intentionally created life accidentally?.???..

You are the sole person in this discussion that has EVER used the term accidental. So, no, I am not saying that God has ever done anything accidentally.

I certainly believe in randomness, and don’t know what I may have said that led you to think otherwise…

You said that if God is involved, something cannot be random. How can there be randomness if God created everything?

Because I don’t believe that life was a random event doesn’t mean that I don’t understand or believe the possibility that something can randomly occur.

Well, again, if God created everything, how can there be randomness?

There is a certain amount of randomness built into the physical laws of our universe but our presence here is not one of them.

Really? Is that random to God? Did God create those laws are did they come from somewhere else?

It is obvious that you are not an atheist, and have found a way to embrace a theory that atheists espouse. It seems to me that in order to embrace Darwinian evolution one has to adapt a skewed view of science, and religion to do it.

No, in order to reject evolution, one must not understand science or religion.

By the way, atheists espouse germ theory too. Should we, as Catholics therefore reject the theory that germs cause disease?

Peace

Tim

 

[Orogeny]

It is more diffulcult for you to accept evolution than creationism

Especially if one doesn’t understand the first thing about evolution.

Science explains different breeds changing

wolf,wild dog, german sheperd, poodle

but that is refinement in breeding not evolution

not fish to man

or lizard to dog

How about fish to amphibian?
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiktaalik

Peace

Tim

 

[rossum]

Humans are also the only primates

I note that you accept that humans are primates.

for whom the outline of the eye and the position of the iris are clearly visible. In addition, our eyes are more horizontally elongated and disproportionately large for our body size compared to most apes. Gorillas, for example, have massive bodies but relatively small eyes.

Relative eye size among primates varies a lot; Tarsier eyes are relatively far larger than ours. I suspect that the effects you mention are due to our being somewhat neotenous (more like a child) compared to the other living hominidae. Primate babies have relatively large eyes for their size. Since we needed to see further on relatively open plains than in forests a larger eye would be an advantage. A small eye imposes physical limitations on the optical resolution and light gathering capacity of an eye. Compare the eye of a chicken with the eye of a hawk relative to their heads. The relatively small iris is probably just a side effect of this larger eye.

we also communicate with our eyes and apes do not.

Source please for (non-human) apes not doing so.

Come on now where is this evolutionary process there must be some link – this did not occurr over night.

Correct, it happened over many many generations. Neoteny resulted in a relatively larger brain and relatively larger eyes. Both were retained because they were advantageous on open plains firstly to see predators coming from a greater distance and then to outwit them when seen.

rossum

 

[brkn1]

What if science actually succeeds in creating a primitive form of life? Will you abandon your faith because of it?
Peace

Tim

My faith does not depend on anything of this world. It is completely of God, with the Lord Jesus Christ as the One and only Way.
Science will never succeed in creating any form of life. That is God’s role. We do not even understand what that life force is.
Scientists can not even explain what forces keep an atom together, if they do not accept God. They can only test, observe and speculate.
Evolution violates one of the scientific theories or rules about everything tending towards entropy, which is another way of saying: everything eventually degrades to formlessness or even chaos. The Bible describes the world being chaos before God did His work of creation.
The idea of evolution and entropy existing side by side makes no sense to me.

 

[dianaiad]

Can a Christian (Anglican, Arminian, Baptist, Catholic, Calvinist, Episcopalian, Jehovah’s Witness, Lutheran, Methodist, Mormon, Orthodox, Pentecostal, Presbyterian, Reformed, Seventh–day Adventist, Wesleyan) accept the theory of evolution as fact without compromising his or her Christian faith?

Curiously,
Mick

yep.

God gave us two books to learn of His creation; one was given to prophets to write down, concerning His dealings with us and the way He wants us to live. The other ‘book’ was written directly by Him, in the rocks and the oceans of the earth.

To hold to one to the exclusion of the other is to dictate to God–and that seems to be a little arrogant. I will let Him tell ME how He accomplished creation, and we are at the point now that we can, perhaps, begin to understand some of the processes involved.

Does the miracle of creation diminish, or disappear, because we can see a little closer into those processes? Not for me they don’t. I just become more awestruck at what He has accomplished.

Diana

 

[Orogeny]

Science will never succeed in creating any form of life. That is God’s role.

Well, that is clearly a statement of faith. What if they do? Your faith will have been found to be wrong.

Scientists can not even explain what forces keep an atom together, if they do not accept God.

What about the scientists that do accept God? Are they in line for the Nobel prize in physics?

Evolution violates one of the scientific theories or rules about everything tending towards entropy, which is another way of saying: everything eventually degrades to formlessness or even chaos.

Just like snowflakes, right? Perhaps you shouldn’t use this as an arguement.

The idea of evolution and entropy existing side by side makes no sense to me.

My guess is that neither evolution nor entropy make sense to you, for get the existing side by side stuff.

Peace

Tim

 

[dianaiad]

I did not mean to imply that you were a secular atheist. I merely stated that that is what they are looking for. the whole premise of Darwinian Evolution is that life is accidental. If life happened accidently in the past, then there must be the possibility of it happening now, and in the future. Science could demonstrate this by observing it (life)coming into existence. Isn’t observation an integral part of the scientific method?. Indeed, with the billions of life forms on this planet I would think that life would be “popping” into existence quite frequently??

May I point out that ‘evolution’ and ‘biogenesis’ are two entirely different things? It doesn’t matter how hard pure science looks at things, nobody is going to be able to prove that life was an accident…and it takes faith and information from other sources to ‘prove’ that it was not accidental.

The most science can do is follow the process…and the process is pretty obviously evolutionary, whether it was guided by God or accidental. Now me, I see God in everything.

 

[Bear_Claw]

what refinements?

It is more diffulcult for you to accept evolution than creationism

Science has gone no where here.

Science explains different breeds changing

wolf,wild dog, german sheperd, poodle

but that is refinement in breeding not evolution

not fish to man

or lizard to dog

…I found this interesting and concise answer posted online. It may lay some groundwork to understanding this.

1. Evolution reproduced in the lab or documented in nature:

a. Two strains of fruit flies lost the ability to interbreed and produce fertile offspring in the lab over a 4-year span … i.e. they became two new species. (Easily repeated experiment.)

b. A new plant species (a type of firewood), created by a doubling of the chromosome count from the original stock (Mosquin, 1967).

c. Multiple species of the house mouse unique to the Faeroe Islands occurred within 250 years of introduction of a foundation species on the island.

d. Formation of 5 new species of cichlid fishes that have formed in a single lake within 4,000 years of introduction of a parent species.

1. Fossil evidence - (So much to list). The way fossils appear in the layers of rock always corresponds to relative development … more primitive creatures in lower (older) layers. Absolute dating of fossils using radiometry. Constant discovery of new transitional forms. E.g. reptile-birds, reptile-mammals, legged whales, legged sea cows.

1. Genetic evidence - E.g. the fact that humans have a huge number of genes (as much as 96%) in common with other great apes … and (as much as 50%) with wheat plants. The pattern of genetic evidence follows the tell-tale patterns of ancestral relationships (more genes in common between recently related species, and fading the further back in time).

1. Molecular evidence - These are commonalities in DNA … which is separate from genetic commonalities … much of our DNA does not code for genes at all. But random mutations (basically ‘typos’) enter into DNA at a known rate over the centuries. This is called the ‘molecular clock’ and again gives excellent evidence of when humans diverged from other apes (about 6 million years ago, according to this molecular clock), and this corresponds perfectly with when these fossils first appear in the fossil record (using radiometric dating).

1. Evidence from proteins - Proteins - E.g., things like blood proteins (the things that give us our A, B, O blood typing and the Rh factor (the plus/minus thing) which incidentally stands for ‘rhesus monkey’); the exact structure of the insulin molecule; and my favorite, the proteins responsible for color vision. The specific proteins found in human color vision are exactly the same as those found in Old World primates (the great apes and the monkeys found in Africa and Asia). These proteins are absent in New World primates (the Central and South American monkeys), and from all other mammals. In fact among the New World primates, only the howler monkey has color vision … but these use slightly different proteins, coded on different locations and chromosomes, than humans and the OW primates. This is yet more evidence of a closer link between humans and the OW primates.

1. Vestigial and atavistic organs - E.g. Leg and pelvic bones in whales, dolphins, and some snakes; unused eyes in blind cave fish, unused wings in flightless birds and insects; flowers in non-fertilizing plants (like dandelions); in humans, wisdom teeth, tailbones, appendix, the plantaris muscle in the calf (useless in humans, used for grasping with the feet in primates).

1. Embryology - E.g. Legs on dolphin embryos; tails and gill folds on human embryos; snake embryos with legs; marsupial eggshell and carnuncle.

1. Biogeography - The current and past distribution of species on the planet. E.g. almost all marsupials and almost no placental mammals are native to Australia … the result of speciation in a geographically isolated area.

1. Homology - E.g. the same bones in the same relative positions in primate hands, bat wings, bird wings, mammals, whale and penguin flippers, pterosaur wings, horse legs, the forelimbs of moles, and webbed amphibian legs.

1. Bacteriology, virology, immunology, pest-control - I.e. the way that bacteria evolve in response to antibiotics (we can compare strains of tuberculosis today, with samples of older epidemics and can see the specific structures), or viruses (like HIV) respond to antivirals, or insects evolving in response to pesticides.

 

[greggy53]

You are the sole person in this discussion that has EVER used the term accidental. So, no, I am not saying that God has ever done anything accidentally.You said that if God is involved, something cannot be random. How can there be randomness if God created everything?Well, again, if God created everything, how can there be randomness?Really? Is that random to God? Did God create those laws are did they come from somewhere else?No, in order to reject evolution, one must not understand science or religion.

By the way, atheists espouse germ theory too. Should we, as Catholics therefore reject the theory that germs cause disease?

Peace

Tim

Tim, I said that if God or anyone else interferes with a process it can no longer be considered random. Doesn’t that make sense?
Your saying that God “Made Randomness” is like saying God made sickness and death. It is True in the sense that he allows it to exist and penetrate our universe. This came about because of our free will. In the same manner randomness is part of the same flawed universe. So I would say that no, God did not intend for randomness ( or sickness and death) to happen in our world, But, because Adam and Eve’s sin brought evil and destruction into the world we experience the result of it and much more.
If one believes in the biblical account of creation they know that the universe is not as is should be; not as it once was. Something is rotten in Denmark, so to speak. The world is beautiful, and yet randomly deadly!
I’m sorry I made the crack about people having a skewed perspective. It was uncalled for. Please accept my apology

 

[Orogeny]

Tim, I said that if God or anyone else interferes with a process it can no longer be considered random. Doesn’t that make sense?

It does, but I don’t agree with it. God can be directing something and it will appear to be random to us. The example I gave was radioactive decay. Clearly God created those elements that undergo radioactive decay. We can take a gram of that material and measure the rate that it is decaying and, based on those measurements, know how long it will take half of that gram to decay. BUT, we cannot predict when any one particular atom will decay. It is random. That tells me that even though God is involved with a process, it can still be random to us.

Your saying that God “Made Randomness” is like saying God made sickness and death.

I’m not sure how you equate one with the other.

In the same manner randomness is part of the same flawed universe.

How so? If Adam hadn’t sinned, would we be able to predict when a particular atom in my example would decay?

So I would say that no, God did not intend for randomness ( or sickness and death) to happen in our world, But, because Adam and Eve’s sin brought evil and destruction into the world we experience the result of it and much more.

I just don’t follow your logic here. Randomness is in no way related to our fall.

I’m sorry I made the crack about people having a skewed perspective. It was uncalled for. Please accept my apology

No apology needed. I didn’t take it in a negative way.

Peace

Tim

 

[JRKH]

…I found this interesting and concise answer posted online. It may lay some groundwork to understanding this.

I like it - Could you post alink to the source please?

Peace
James

 

[rossum]

Evolution violates one of the scientific theories or rules about everything tending towards entropy, which is another way of saying: everything eventually degrades to formlessness or even chaos.

I would like to quote from a creationist who has a little more understanding of the Second Law of Thermodynamics (the one relating to entropy) than you do:“One of the most basic laws in the universe is the Second Law of Thermodynamics. This states that as time goes by, entropy in an environment will increase. Evolution argues differently against a law that is accepted EVERYWHERE BY EVERYONE. Evolution says that we started out simple, and over time became more complex. That just isn’t possible: UNLESS there is a giant outside source of energy supplying the Earth with huge amounts of energy. If there were such a source, scientists would certainly know about it.”
Unfortunately that creationist just didn’t quite make that last step to realising what that “giant outside source of energy” might be. I can assure you that the creationist I quoted is perfectly correct, there is such a “giant outside source of energy” and scientists do indeed know about it.

You are correct to say “everything eventually degrades”. In the long term entropy will indeed win out - in biological terms it is called death. In the short term we can decrease entropy locally, provided we have an external energy source. Your refrigerator can decrease entropy by cooling things inside itself, as long as it is plugged into the power supply. If the power fails then entropy takes over and your ice cream melts. The increase in entropy at the power station is greater than the decrease in entropy in your fridge so overall entropy still increases.

rossum

 

[greggy53]

It does, but I don’t agree with it. God can be directing something and it will appear to be random to us. The example I gave was radioactive decay. Clearly God created those elements that undergo radioactive decay. We can take a gram of that material and measure the rate that it is decaying and, based on those measurements, know how long it will take half of that gram to decay. BUT, we cannot predict when any one particular atom will decay. It is random. That tells me that even though God is involved with a process, it can still be random to us.I’m not sure how you equate one with the other.How so? If Adam hadn’t sinned, would we be able to predict when a particular atom in my example would decay?I just don’t follow your logic here. Randomness is in no way related to our fall.No apology needed. I didn’t take it in a negative way.

Peace

Tim

Well I am going to sign off on this discussion because I don’t think we are communicating very well. I will say that because I believe in the biblical creation as opposed to Darwinian evolution that the process as well as the results are flawed, and there is no way we can know what the physical world would be like if Adam had not sinned. You are saying that because we have limited knowledge a process may appear to be random when in fact it is not. I can certainly see that possibility in our flawed, imperfect universe… Nice talking to you.

 

[Bear_Claw]

I like it - Could you post alink to the source please?

Peace
James

Sure.

It’s here
answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090123061645AAYUrdJ

It’s on Yahoo Answers, and it’s answer #8. the poster is Unknown as far as I can tell.

 

[Orogeny]

Sure.

It’s here
answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090123061645AAYUrdJ

It’s on Yahoo Answers, and it’s answer #8. the poster is Unknown as far as I can tell.

Another, more detailed explanation can be found here:

toarchive.org/faqs/comdesc/

Note that there is a link to a creationists critique of this article and also a link to the author’s response to the critique.

Peace

Tim

 

[Bear_Claw]

Another, more detailed explanation can be found here:

toarchive.org/faqs/comdesc/

Note that there is a link to a creationists critique of this article and also a link to the author’s response to the critique.

Peace

Tim

Awesome! Thanks!