Evolution for dummies - I highly suggest you all read this

Hi everybody. Please take the time to read the following. It will be well worth your while

THE TYPES OF BELIEFS

There are four types of beliefs:

1. a) Young Earth creationism- the Bible is completely literal and the Earth was made in seven days etc.
b) Old Earth creationsim- the Bible is mainly literal apart from the word day which means a long time ("a day is like a thousand years to thee oh lord" or something along those lines

2. Intelligent Design - this belief relies mainly of a "God of the Gaps" theory, that is, science is right, but is has gaps (for example, the evolution of wings and eyes, which as I will explain latter are not even gaps). God fills in these gaps. So God aids creatures to evolve wings and eyes. As the chaplain pointed out to us, this is rather primitive as man has been using the gaps theory for millenia. "What is lightning?" man says. "It must be God because we can't explain it". Then when science explains lightning the gap is filled and god is removed from the picture. In this way people who believe in a "God of the gaps" are gradually painting themselves into a corner.

3. Theistic evolution - God created the universe (or whatever universe broke apart to create the universe, or the four dimensional branes that collided to create the universe etc), but evolution effectively created the diverse forms of life on Earth.

IMO, these are in order of sophistication (Old Earth creationsim obviously being the most primitive).

I will now explain to all those willing to listen, that evolution is very easy to understand.

THE CONCEPT OF EVOLUTION

The concept of evolution (please don't read this if you understand FULLY the concept of evolution). Darwinian evolution relies on two simple facts:

1 Offspring have slight variations from their parents
2 Those with more favourable variations are more likely to survive and live to be able to reproduce

I'm sure this should be enough for some, but I will give examples anyway:

The peppered moth has wings that look like they are covered in moss. They blend in well with mossy trees, which are more commonly found in less poluted areas. Some moths are born with dark wings. They do not blend with mossy trees and so are easier to see and therefore more likely to be eaten. HOWEVER, in polluted cities, where there are more trees without moss, the dark moths are less likely to be seen and eaten, and so many live to reproduce. Whilst the light coloured peppered moths are more likely to be seen and eaten, and so only a few live to reproduce. Therefore, the ratio of dark moths to light moths is far greater in cities than in the country.

If you still don't get it, heres another example. Some bacteria are bron with a mutant gene that makes them resistant to antibiotics. If a colony of bacteria are bombarded with antibiotics, the ones not resistant will die, and the ones resistant will live and effectively clone themselves (that's how they reproduce, BTW). So the bacteria in the colony are now resistant to antibiotics. They didn't develop the resistance, they already had it. Note that variation still occurs in organisms that reproduce by binary fission (duplication).

SOME KEY POINTS IN THE DEBATE AGAINST EVOLUTION:

Eyes. A key point in the evolution argument is the evolution of eyes. People say that a half eye doesn't work, so therfore a full eye could not have evolved. This is wrong. The eye of a snail picks up only changes in light. Now, surely this is better than no eyes? With these eyes, snails can avoid drying up in the sun. So if a creature is born with the worst of eyes, while his siblings have none, he will be more likely so survive. And so it goes on.

Wings. I too, was confused about wings, thinking that surely a half wing doesn't work. I soon found out that it doesn't BUT a creature born with tiny stumps of wings can jump just the slightest bit higher away from predators than one that doesn't. While this change is so small, it is still an improvement. And so it goes on. The offspring of this creature will have stumps of wings of various lengths. Some will have shorter ones, some longer. The creatures with longer "wings" will jump higher than those that don't etc.

I HOPE that you better understand evolution now, and the argument surrounding it. If you have any questions, comments or queries, feel free to post them here and I will answer them as best as I can.