Today Feb 12th is Darwins 200 Birthday Ladies and Gentlemen. He began with a simple premise, "Gee I know can artificially breed out certain characteristics of my Rock Pigeons" Later in his legendary voyages of the HMS Beagle to the Galapagos Islands he noticed that certain finches had different characterics(different beak sizes etc), and he observed that different animals evolved in different ways independent of each other according to the islands that they were native to...He posited that species adapt or change naturally to give themselves a comptetive advantage for survival...This led his earthshattering theory of evolution by natural selection. This was 100 hundred years before Watson and Crick decoded the DNA strand. Genetic mutation is happening in every species all the time. Evolution is a stunningly elegant explanation for so much.....Happy Birthday Darwin!!!!!!!!
14 comments:
Garrett, you have become a completely different person. Where has that Windshiels selling, Italian Cottage eating GNR gone? You are now a Obama supporting liberal, you look different, you are anti-God, pro-Darwin, pro-pot smoking fishpeople and pro-NHL toooooo!!! What is happening to you. I love the blog, but if you started lifting up Nascar next I may be forced to tune out. Just kidding.
micro evolution (within species) is fine. Macro evolution (between species) is hooey. Darwin gave us a lot to think about, but counting fish, lizards, and monkeys as relatives is not an enduring (or validated) one.
Mike I was laughing out loud when I read your comment (at Staples Center watching the Kings!!)
Mark.......we are linked with all species through DNA, that doesn't mean a lizard is my Uncle Billy
What do you think happens with micro evolution given enough time? It becomes macro!
Over time speciation occurs and scientists classify new species.....like when a wolf (canis lupus) mutates so much over a span of 20 thousand years that scientists classify it as a dog (canis familiaris) That's just one simple example......the macro micro thing doesn't even make sense, and is a tired non rebutal to evolution created by evangelical apologists such as Josh McDowell
Species mutate and given enough TIME they are classified as other species....how do you think it works?
Ahh forget it I now believe a magical unicorn created us..anything else is hooey!
Garrett, a wolf changing to a dog over thousands of years is completely different than a fish becoming a bird. I understand your argument, but the major linchpin in the evolutionists' argument is missing: the fossil record. For any animal to change into another animal over thousands of years, there will be skeletons left behind. Ergo, there should be millions of trillions of fossils of these "transition" animals scattered all over the place. But, amazingly, they have not been found. Sure, people can point to a few things that seem like transition animals, but if all you have is a handful of skeletons, the pressure is on you to prove they are not their own species, and not a transitional animal. I'm sorry, but macro evolution is not proven, and as such is a theory on the origin of species.
Why is it harder to believe that God, or an "intelligent designer" made each creature specifically and individually, rather than randomly coming into existence through "time". The amazing precision of our DNA dictates that our genetic code must be precisely composed to function properly. If you can tell me how the brain and nervous system, with all it's synapses and ability to process vision and memory and thought, evolved to it's precise state, and then happened again and again in the millions of species that are on our planet, then I might listen. And, then to combine it with our cardiovascular system, endocrine system, musculoskeletal system, and to have all these systems work in perfect concert together, I'm sorry but to me all that begs the answer of having a Creator God.
How bout this experiment: How about you go over to a Ford assembly plant, and set off a bomb. And then come back in 10,000 years. Are you willing to bet there will be not just 1 Focus, but 100 of each model car sitting there, ready to drive, working perfectly? Evolution is man's way of denying the existence of God, and the implications thereof.
I have to truncate this response cause I could write another book on it.......
1. Species mutate and over time they lose the ability to mate with each other...another simple dog example is a Great Dane and a Chihuahua...over a multitude of generations these two doggies have the potential to become different species, or become extinct.
2. Scientists are discovering new fossils all the time and not one discovery has ever falsified evolution. That doesn't matter to a creationist because if there is a B discovery that bridges a gap between A and C, you will say there is a gap between A1 and A5, and if we discover A3, you will say there is still a gap and it is A2, therefore God exists, and on and on ad infinitum
3. As to the "perfect" way our bodies work...I have a few questions for you..Why do we have an appendix...why do we have wisdom teeth....why are our eyes so bad and God gave better eyes to squids and eagles...why can't we hear very well...why do dogs have better hearing and better senses of smell....Why do we have a prostate that surrounds our urethras? Why are people born with Down Syndrome?
4. I think I sat next to your for the "car" example at an RHCC camp......Here is the classic rebuttal...any entity that is intelligent enough to create such complex and diverse lifeforms must have been created by a being infinitely more complex than itself...and on and on and we have an infinite regress...God is the ultimate example of your Ford Motor Story Mark
5..So we can do one of two things..we can seek to understand and bridge our gaps in human understanding through discovery and science....or we can cling to primitive superstitiions about talking snakes and devils and participlate in sacred cannibal blood drinking rituals. (I believe that one is called communion)
Whoops i forgot to add that a Great Dane can't mate with a chihuaha
In response:
1) All you have proven is a dog may become another kind of dog. There is no proof a dog will become a cat.
2) Having a few supposed fossils still does not satisfy the requirement. Again, there should be millions of trillions of fossils of these transitional species, seeing as how there are millions of species out there. I should be able to go to a random mile square area of land and find at least a hundred fossils if I dig deep enough. And people have dug, and they haven't found.
3)I don't disagree that we have a couple of parts of our bodies that seem to be "extra." There are two possibilities: either they serve no purpose (now), or we don't know the purpose. Their mere presence doesn't validate the theory of evolution.
However, explain this to me: in the nucleus of an electron, how is that multiple negative ions can remain bonded together, as they are circled by protons? Particles of the same substance should repel each other, but they don't? What holds them together? And how is it that these particles make up the building blocks of life, into larger particles like oxygen, hydrogen, etc.? And then in different mixes we get H20, CO2, etc which make up the larger parts of cells, and matter. And why is that the larger nervous system works the way for every species? You have defended that different species have different strengths of their senses. That's fine. But you haven't explained how those systems came to work in the first place. Why was there a differentiation between a nerve and a muscle spindle? And the example of Down Syndrome proves my point. If there is a small twist in the DNA, then significant changes will result. And if the changes are even slightly larger, death is likely. So how can we have such large scale changes, even over millions of years? The species will die before it gets a chance to change.
4) The presence of a designer does not beg the need for there to have been someone to "design" the designer. And your rebuttal is not a rebuttal at all. You haven't disallowed my argument, you have taken a rabbit trail. The second (I believe) law of thermodynamics is the concept of entropy: things left to themselves over time will devolve, break down to their simplest parts. (i.e. decomposition, rust, look at the great temples of Greece from 2000 years ago). Things do not evolve, they devolve.
5) So, I choose not to look at superstitions, but to critically look at the evidence around me. Science tells us a lot of things, though it doesn't tell us everything. It's all a piece of the puzzle.
PS- not a pleasant word picture with the GD and chihuahua.
1. You are mischaracterizing evolution and setting up a strawman...nobody ever said that a fish can spontaneously become a bird, or that a cow can become a horse...in fact if that occurs it would disprove evolution
2. Once again the fossil record validates and not falsify evolution..maybe satan has hid them in the earth to confuse us?
3. You are focusing on areas where there are certain gaps in understanding about how the world works...All you are doing is finding gaps and "inserting your favorite god here" 100 years ago we didn't know what created lightining, therefore it must be god right? Or a magic turtle or whatever diety in your particulal cultural zeitgeist....
3a. Your 1st possibility is correct..as in the case of appendix, we have evolved past the need to have it, but it did serve a purpose in our ancestors
4.
Creationists have cited the second the 2nd law as a falsification of evolution, saying that all things progress from order to disorder...However they mischaracterize the 2nd law, because the law states "The entropy of a closed system cannot decrease" However life is not a closed system!!!!!!!
4a. OK sorry if I mischaracterized you...I thought that by citing your ford example you were saying that since it is impossible for parts of a car to assemble themselves without an intelligent designer...therefore humans also need an intelligent designer....I don't get why I can't ask the question who designed the designer? Did he assemble himself? It is a rabbit hole as you said or an "infinite regress" as I said...and precisely the point...You need an explanation.....You can't just tell me something is impossible and then say it is possible.....(or to put it another way you can't say, there are no uncaused causes...and then say that there is an uncaused cause named Yahew)
5...Religion is a superstition by definition
Didn't they mate a elephant with a pot bellied pig on South Park once? Or was that a failure?
I was wondering where you guys get your sources and cross check your evidence?
By the way, I also do not like the comparing a ford to human design way of thinking. or a camera with an eyeball or whatever.
Maybe once we have a man who can make a ford that is able to make baby fords, which would really hurt the auto manufacturing industry.
Well Mike I can't speak for Mark but since I used to believe every one of his arguments that he puts forth...and some he hasn't yet...I can deduce that his sources are Michael behe....Josh McDowell, Lee Strobel...Ben Stein...his pastor...and so on and so forth....
My sources are renowned Oxford biologist Richard Dawkins, Charles Darwin, Stephen Gould, Christopher Hitchens, Oh and every peer reviewed scientific journal every published on the subject, oh and just one more source.....every college Biology, Chemistry, and Science department in the world
I have seen the Ben Stein movie, but never have read anything from those other "christians". I like Ben Steins movie but it was just a documentary like anything Michael Moore would put out. BTW, I like Moores work even though I completely dissagree with him. "Roger and Me" in particular was a movie that gave me a love for documentaries.
A real documentary is very rare, meaning one that is just trying to document what happened. Most all of them are more like propaganda, which I am fine with. But they are falsely promoted as a documentary. Stein, Moore, the Super Size guy and others now adays go into it with their conclusion alreay drawn and just try to take snipets of truth and put together a puzzle to their liking. But I still like to see where they are coming from.
I also dont agree with Richard Dawkins much But, I like the guy. I have had a chance to correspond with him in the past and he is the most polite, willing to talk to a nobody like me, guy I have come accross in the athiest world. (excluding you of course). In general I have found athiests to be very arrogant and abrasive people around, who seem to think they have been wronged and damaged by their parents and want to take it out on all who dissagree with them. Dawkins was not that way.
As long as I am saying good things about those whose beliefs drive me crazy. The head of PETA, which I cannot remember his name is also pretty cool. I got to have discussion with him during the World Series when PETA issued a statement about Shane Victorino. I emailed him in dissagreement with what ever it was and he called me and he was very cool, he has wacky ideas on things, but he seemed to really have a respect for opposing views even if their is distain for the view itself.
darn it, I wish I could go back and fix spelling, grammar and sentence structure errors!
I look like a Fundementalist, uneducated, backwoods baptist.
Oh wait, I am.
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