Here is another analogy that may not be too scientific but shows the point. If our body encounters a new virus, unless the virus itself is adaptive (like HIV), our body knows how to deal with it and sends soldiers to kill those viruses. You consciously do not know what the virus composition is and how to create the antibody. It happens automatically with a preprogrammed adaptive direction. Neither God nor you direct such attack or create the antibody consciously. Similarly, the life forms over millions of years of DNA advancement has built is mutation techniques (not random) that deals with those mutations based on external stimuli. That is how life forms have changed and adapted to the environment. Finding that mechanism is difficult but research is underway. Once we can simulate even a lower life form in a super computer, we may find, how it evolves. Then the theory can become facts.
If there is no God, what started evolution?.... God The Bible is just stories and is a book, so when we read it, our imagination changes everything. It doesn't mean those stories happened exactly that way, they are just written that way to help us understand.
Any of an infinite number of possibilities. What makes you think God is the only (or even the more) plausible explanation? Anyway, "what started" is somewhat of a misguided way to ask the question. Evolution is not an engine you start. It's a process of change, and everything in nature undergoes change. Really, in fact, the entire universe evolves. You might as well be asking, what started the universe. That's true of any book, not just the Bible. It doesn't mean those stories happened at all, or in any way similar to the way they are actually conveyed. Bible is a book of myths, legends and fables. It's by far not the only such creation of human mind in history; nor is it the first, certainly -- or the last.
There is no valid reason to believe that evolution is the explanation for the development of life on this planet. The archaeologists are always searching for the missing link that will connect us with a later date in history, without success. Recently they found the sloped skull of an ape and tried to pawn that off as proof of their theory. Couldn't stand the light of day, though. The fact is, if there was such a connection with the past they would have found at least a fossil by now. That means that the evolutionists are operating on the same belief system as the religionists, only in a different category. So one shouldn't decry the other. If animate life evolved from some primordial mix of ingredients then it would take so long for a single species to develop that the first one would dominate the planet before any other complex life form in it's category could accrue to develop a population. Therefore everything after the first developed lifeform would forever remain as part of the food chain for the first developed species. There is abundant example of this species domination in limited systems. The rabbits and mice in Australia. The killer bees and fire ants in South America and up into the middle of the U.S. The pine beetles in Western North America. And a bunch of others around the world that include plants and birds and even germs. That gives rise to the idea that there is room for another theory, one that says someone had to gather specimens of all the different kinds of life forms, each from their individual planet, and bring them all here and arrange them in an ecological system that would work.
John McNeil I hate to be the bearer of truth, but... Except for all the evidence supporting the theory... Actually fossils representing several sages of human evolution have been found. More information please? 1) Such fossils have been found. 2) This is an awfully large planet. Archaeologists have barely scratched the surface of it. Only this year an entire city was discovered right beside a country of one billion people (referring to the sunken city off the coast of India). Until early this year, nobody knew it was there. To say that all things which might be discovered must have been discovered by now, and no future discoveries are likely, is pure idiocy. See all of the above points. Evolution has supporting evidence. Creationism does not. And you are basing your estimates of the times involved on...? Humanity. Top of the food chain.
Adam, you've done brilliantly (hits himself because he missed the chance) allow only me to add that human species is in no way the only specie on our planet and that the evolution of certain species of disonaurs has been traced quite well
That is exactly my point. There is plenty of evidence for dinosaurs to prove that they were here during that geologic period but there is none for our type of human. If we had been here when life formed out of the primordial mass then we would have been eating dino barbeque and so we would have to have left some of our bones amongst theirs. But there aren't any and there is no evidence of us for tens of million of year after them, either. When you regard the evidence of human life on this planet you find that we have proof of being here for only a short period of time as compared to the actual time that we have proof that life of some kind existed here. That means that what we have to study and base a larger theory on is actually a subset of the larger theory of evolution and thus doesn't prove evolution but merely that natural selection works within the framework of the subset. It is when you use the limited evidence of the subset to state unequivocally that the larger theory of evolution also must be true is where you leave reality and express faith. That is the similarity to operating on a belief system. If you had said that you believe in natural selection because you have scientific evidence of it, then of course no one could dispute that.
Uhhhhh... Once more without all the double talk...? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Am i understanding you correctly? You believe that dinosaurs were here when life began? You're misinformed. Our planet has been around for about 4.5 billion years. Life has been around for about 4 billion years. Dinosaurs only came about 250 *million* years ago. They were not present when life formed. All there was was that one original life form at first. Take a look at this website, it shows the history of the earth, to scale. http://www.aqd.nps.gov/grd/usgsnps/gtime/gtime2.html
but you don't understand that theory of EVOLUTION is only about EVOLUTION not how life beganPlease Register or Log in to view the hidden image! besides we have a lots of fossils of fishes and creatures in between, so it's pretty clear
When I said the dinosaurs were here, I was referring to them being here in the time frame from the period of their extinction and back to the period when they first formed. I didn't mean they were as old as the planet. When I was referring to humans, I meant that for us to be here now because of the process of evolution, then we also would have to have been around when the dinosaurs were around because there wasn't enough time for us to evolve as a species in the time since the dinosaurs went extinct and right now. I said some more about this in Mr. G's thread in the Science & Society section.
hi id just like to point out that we didn't evolve from homo erectus....... plus that number of neurons thing about homo erectus is a guess at how many neurons would fit inside homo erectus's brain cavity in the skull..
homo eructos was one of the leafs in the human evolution tree........some far relatance we've got maybe
That was 65 million years. In that time, mammals evolved from little rat-like creatures, into mammoths, sloths, saber toothed tigers, horses, deer, monkeys, bats, hippos, you get the picture. And all that didnt take the whole time. You seem to be misinformed about how long evolution takes. It takes a long time, but 65 million years is plenty of time for a species to develop. In fact, humans are thought to be one of the fastest species in terms of evolution. Note: No offense meant here, of course. I'm just trying to give you more accurate information so you understand the theory better. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Though I do believe in a creator being of some sort, evolution is proven in my eyes. How else could you explain the monstrosity that is the chiwawa. That used to be a wolf but now it looks like a rat. Natural selective breeding, pure and simple. But I thing whatever creator being exists most likely started the process and just let it go, perhaps with a few occasional tweaks.
"id just like to point out that we didn't evolve from homo erectus....... " Ok im stupid, I remember hearing that one of the homo-creatures (no pun intended) were a branch off that went extinct. I thought it was the homo erectus, but maybe im wrong. In any case IT DOESN'T MATTER. So just disregard me.
If Gods exists then what happened the the literally thousands of gods and goddesses ...Funny isn't it. If you believe then all that is required is faith. In otherwords there is no proof so don't ask. [/B][/QUOTE] i amy be crazy..but all those 'gods' and 'goddessses' were spirits and/or angles..think about, those were some of the most busy times for god..so helpers were instated..if not then there power hungry angles from the endless war between heaven and hell..just a thought...and faith is believeing with out proof..look around you..did you just pop out of thin air? and we can start a whole new line of arguments with this...
i'd like to point out that dinosaurs did exist..see it this way.. 7 days to god is like..say thousand - billion or so years..so if you look at it that way.. the sciencific and the religion run into together and even make a bit of sense..thats all i have to say..
morphological mutations Actually there is no proof that the difference we see in the fossils are due to morphological mutations. In fact science has still failed to demonstrate that morphological mutations can actually change one appendage into something different, I.E fin to limb or even limb to flipper. We can't consider the mis-placement of a wing on a fruitfly as a morphological mutation because the wing was made up of already existing genes and no new genes were required to produce it. We can't consider some sort of virus adaption as a morphological mutation because that would be considered as a chemical mutation and does not deal with the reshaping of a body part. For the most part the Theory of Evolution is based upon circular reasoning. The fossils show evolution happened...we know evolution is true becuse of the fossils. When one studies the fine details of evolution one quickly realizes that it is impossible.