Evolution? How?

mesquite wrote:

Plate tectonics is a big part of the answer. Farmerman will be able to give you a great answer I am sure. In the meantime there is a super animation of the breakup of the sub-continent Gondwana that you can look at.

Gondwana animation

Hi Mesquite,

Yes, I am very familiar with plate tectonics and really have no problem with it. (Some Christians even believe it is referred to in Genesis, which speaks of the earth being divided in the times subsequent to the Flood.)

My point was that the current geographical distribution of species in their various habitats around the globe cannot be seen as an insurmountable problem for only creationists. It is a logistical question that both creationists and evolutionists face since both basically believe that all living creatures would have had to migrate from one spot on the globe to where they are now.

The evolutionist thinks they were changing into different creatures as they migrated, the creationist doesn't. That's the only difference.

Good article on evolution in the Washington Post.

I'll let you folk debate over it.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/25/AR2005092501177.html

When scientists announced last month they had determined the exact order of all 3 billion bits of genetic code that go into making a chimpanzee, it was no surprise that the sequence was more than 96 percent identical to the human genome. Charles Darwin had deduced more than a century ago that chimps were among humans' closest cousins.

But decoding chimpanzees' DNA allowed scientists to do more than just refine their estimates of how similar humans and chimps are. It let them put the very theory of evolution to some tough new tests.

If Darwin was right, for example, then scientists should be able to perform a neat trick. Using a mathematical formula that emerges from evolutionary theory, they should be able to predict the number of harmful mutations in chimpanzee DNA by knowing the number of mutations in a different species' DNA and the two animals' population sizes.

"That's a very specific prediction," said Eric Lander, a geneticist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard in Cambridge, Mass., and a leader in the chimp project.

Sure enough, when Lander and his colleagues tallied the harmful mutations in the chimp genome, the number fit perfectly into the range that evolutionary theory had predicted.

Their analysis was just the latest of many in such disparate fields as genetics, biochemistry, geology and paleontology that in recent years have added new credence to the central tenet of evolutionary theory: That a smidgeon of cells 3.5 billion years ago could -- through mechanisms no more extraordinary than random mutation and natural selection -- give rise to the astonishing tapestry of biological diversity that today thrives on Earth.

In fact, one of the more exciting developments in biology in the past 25 years has been how much DNA alone can teach about the evolutionary history of life on Earth.

For example, genome sequencing projects have shown that human beings, dogs, frogs and flies (and many, many other species) share a huge number of genes in common. These include not only genes for tissues they all share, such as muscle, which is not such a surprise, but also the genes that go into basic body-planning (specifying head and tail, front and back) and appendage-building (making things that stick out from the body, such as antennae, fins, legs and arms).

As scientists have identified the totality of DNA -- the genomes -- of many species, they have unearthed the molecular equivalent of the fossil record.

It is now clear from fossil and molecular evidence that certain patterns of growth in multicellular organisms appeared about 600 million years ago. Those patterns proved so useful that versions of the genes governing them are carried by nearly every species that has arisen since.

These several hundred "tool kit genes," in the words of University of Wisconsin biologist Sean B. Carroll, are molecular evidence of natural selection's ability to hold on to very useful functions that arise.

Research on how and when tool kit genes are turned on and off also has helped explain how evolutionary changes in DNA gave rise to Earth's vast diversity of species. Studies indicate that the determination of an organism's form during embryonic development is largely the result of a small number of genes that are turned on in varying combinations and order. Gene regulation is where the action is.

Consequently, mutations in regulatory portions of a DNA strand can have effects just as dramatic as those prompted by mutations in genes themselves. They can, for example, cancel the development of an appendage -- or add an appendage where one never existed. This discovery refuted assertions by Intelligent Design advocates that gene mutation and natural selection can, at most, explain the fine-tuning of species.

I wonder how Noah got them on the ark?

And how did he do that Momma?

So all of the animals on earth walked, flew, craweled or swam to the ark. I'm trying to picture a tree slough crossing the Atlantic Ocean to meet Noah.

The largest earthworm in the world is the Giant Gippsland Earthworm in Australia. I wonder how that got to the Middle East?

See No 2 and 3 in the site given below.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html#gathering

Bed time; good night.

xingu, You cannot use logic to explain most of the claims in the bible. Only the bible can explain the bible. No other records exist.

xingu wrote:

So all of the animals on earth walked, flew, craweled or swam to the ark. I'm trying to picture a tree slough crossing the Atlantic Ocean to meet Noah.

The largest earthworm in the world is the Giant Gippsland Earthworm in Australia. I wonder how that got to the Middle East?

See No 2 and 3 in the site given below.

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-noahs-ark.html#gathering

Bed time; good night.

Xingu,

At the time of the ark, I have no idea what animals were on the earth and what animals were not. There are so many things that we don't know. The Bible does not mention every single thing that went on.

But, if one believes in God then they believe that God can do anything.

Brandon9000 wrote:

Momma Angel wrote:

Brandon9000 wrote:

Momma Angel wrote:

LMBO! You just can't help yourself can you? Now, it's ludicrous, You can't say the same thing without using these words?

You could have just said you believed they were unworkable and that would have been clear, concise, and courteous.

You appear to want to drag the post off topic. Why? My personal qualities have no bearing in whether the non-scientific methods you use to determine matters of fact are workable.

Brandon9000,

No, I don't want to drag it off topic. I am sorry if it appeared that way. I was just asking why you felt you need to use those words. Just puzzled by it, that's all.

In my opinion, the only way to learn the structure of the universe is by observation, experiment, and logic, and I don't think you're going to end up with God that way.

For how long would you observe? What is the experiment that would be used? What logic process will be put into place?

Brandon9000,

Well, as a Christian, I believe God created everything. So, to me it's not about ending up with God that way, it's about beginning with him.

Oh yeah, anybody seen C.I.? I think he has some 'splaining to do.

Momma Angel wrote:

Brandon9000,

Well, as a Christian, I believe God created everything. So, to me it's not about ending up with God that way, it's about beginning with him.

Oh yeah, anybody seen C.I.? I think he has some 'splaining to do.

Beginning with your conclusion is not a reliable technique for determining truth.