Cat Puzzles 1000
A Question of Evolution
A
Question
Of
Evolution
A Question Of Evolution
by Howard Robinson Copyright © 01 July 2010
CONTENTS:
INTRODUCTION
THE BASIC THEORY
Section 1 What does Evolution say and what does that mean
Section 2 What does Evolution explain?
Section 3 What does Evolution not explain, then?
SCIENCE AND EVOLUTION Questions from science
Section 4 Hasn't science disproved creation?
Section 5 Where does it all start with a single cell?
Section 6 What about natural selection?
Section 7 Genetics - why did this use to cause the evolutionists such problems?
Section 8 Genetic feedback.
Section 9 Bacteria and viruses
BASIC QUESTIONS? Questions from nature
Section 10 If evolution is true why are there still ‘un-evolved' single-celled creatures?
What is Nature?
Section 11 What came first - the woodpecker or the oak? What about the grubs it eats:
Section 12 Why so many diverse species?
Section 13What about air breathing water dwellers like whales and dolphins?
Section 14 What evolutionary good does fruit do the plant?
Section,15 Why is everything subject to disease, death and decay?
Section 16 Why doesn't Evolution explain instinct?
Section 17 Does Evolution explain ‘fail safes'?
FOR THE RECORD Questions from the fossil record
Section 18 What really caused the fossil record?
Section 19 Why is there coal at the south pole?
HUMAN EVOLUTION?
Section 20 Could a single cell become a human?
Section 21 Why did we evolve emotions?
Section 22Why are we here?
Section 23 Why do different ethnic groups have the same blood types?
Section 24 Why religion?
Section 25 Why morals?
Section 26 Why do we age?
CONCLUSION
INTRODUCTION
My first question is simply this: Is evolution true?
My second question is similar to this: Is it true science?
In writing this, I realise that many other people have already had a great deal to say.
However, I found myself coming up with what I thought to be original ideas, without reference to the work of others, and I have tried to continue in this way and not re-iterate what I have read and heard on the subject already. All my references and quotations are from my reading of the Penguin publication "On Natural Selection".
If the theory of evolution is true then it must fit the facts and should stand up to questioning by them. So, what are the facts and how am I questioning evolution about them?
Well, in brief, the facts are the complexity of life, the great diversity of life forms and the fossil record. My question, simply put is, "How does evolution explain these?"
The trouble with most evolutionists is they seem to start with the way things are, assume it must have evolved to that, work backwards and somehow replay it forwards again as though it was fact.
I only ask the reader to honestly weigh my questions and try to match my answers with the facts they know of and to be fair and impartial in weighing my answers and observations.
Evolution, as a theory, has a lot of gaps, not just missing links, which are woefully absent, I may add!
Finally, I don't claim a monopoly on the truth. I do have a lot of questions, though, as you'll see and I've done my best to look for answers.
THE BASIC THEORY
Section 1
What does Evolution say and what does that mean?
On the front cover of the book, ‘On Natural Selection', we read:
"From so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved."
This is the essence of the theory. It's rather ‘dreamy' don't you think? You almost expect the book to end something like, ‘and they all evolved happily ever after'.
The definition of natural selection: (Page 20 - 21 of On Natural Selection) is:
The ‘preservation of favourable variations and the rejection of injurious variations'.
There is here the basic assumption that there are many favourable variations which little by little over millions of generations produce a new and improved species. There is no evidence given for this, nor can any of the evolutionists come up with any, it seems. The observable facts are plain that there are adaptations but there are very few favourable variations (mutations). 999 out of every 1000 mutations are very "injurious" and the other one is pretty harmful. The most common mutations are genetic defects and none of these is ever favourable.
As an interesting aside, Darwin quotes the calculations of Linnaeus. These tell him that ‘if an annual plant produced only two seeds' - and there is no plant so unproductive as this – ‘and their seedlings next year produced two, and so on, then in twenty years there would be a million plants'. What Darwin doesn't seem to see, is that Linnaeus's calculations and any population growth calculations make his theories of tens of thousands of generations over millions of years (for even minor evolution) extremely improbable because of the vast numbers of offspring that would be generated, even with predatory and food source limitations.
So what about natural selection? This does not evidence or prove evolution. It is clear that natural selection does occur but this does not change a species, it only improves a species by adaptation within a range of possibilities pre-programmed into its DNA code. As all DNA codes are vast, so there are a large number of possible variations for a species. Some of these are available from human breeding and cross breeding. Examples of variations of a species range from apples to human beings.
Section 2
What does Evolution explain?
The theory explains natural selection and nothing else. The survival of the fittest is seen in nature, though fortunately not seen in human morality.
Evolution attempts to explain the diversity of life and the fossil record but these are assumptions and not explanations.
However, to take the premise that evolutionis the explanation for how things are, the theory needs to address the facts and be questioned on them.
Rather, what explanations does evolution propose? It puts forward some rather fanciful explanations and despite some very strong and assertive claims, no real evidence can be found. For instance, it claims that all mammals descended from an extinct reptile ancestor. Where is the fossil evidence of this ancestor? No transitional fossils can be found.
Section 3
What does Evolution not explain, then?
It does not explain why life began and how it survived. If the proposed first, single-celled, organism is the missing ancestor to everything, Evolution does not explain or even consider how it lived at all.
My point here is, that all Food Chains, we are told, begin with plants. Since this organism was the supposed ancestor of plants and animals, how did it live? What gave it the food to survive and breed?
Maybe it fed on itself for a few billion years until it evolved? Like Pizza the Hut in Spaceballs it ate itself? I'm sorry. I'm being facetious.
The problem of spontaneous generation of life from dead things is hard enough to believe but would it survive? Remember, just because it is a single celled organism it does not mean simplicity. To survive and reproduce a great deal is needed. It needs a ‘skin' a membrane. It needs a way to eat – a mouth, and a double DNA helix so it can divide and multiply. These things are not probable even with the vast time scales that have been brought into the theory and remember these timescales are far from proved. Even carbon dating can be erroneous because it depends on the amount of carbon 14 in the world staying absolutely constant.
Evolution does not explain why about half of the fossils found are of animals living today and virtually the same now as when fossilised.
Evolution doesn't explain why it takes millions of years to make fossils, when we now know that it only took about 50 years after a flood at a river delta.
It doesn't explain why the remains of whole animals are intact. In normal deaths, animals decay to bones, other animals eat or chew or move the bones or the wind and weather move things. Fossils are more consistent with rapid burial and are found in sedimentary rock, so a sudden catastrophe such as a flood is a likely cause. Also, in a flood the simpler marine animals would be buried lower down and the higher animals would be able to swim and survive longer so we would see the sort of stratification of so called ‘lower' and ‘higher' animals which, if this were the cause, has been falsely assumed and taught to be millions of years of evolution, rather than a brief large scale flood or catastrophe.
It doesn't explain the diversity of life - if around for so long then the most advanced and durable would be in vast numbers and would naturally overwhelm everything else, so we would only see the few most advanced species.
Biologists will tell us of Food Chains or Food Cycles. These mean that all the organisms in the food chain had to evolve andappear simultaneously. This is extremely unlikely.
Food chains work so well. What happened before? Evolution doesn't explain food chains or interdependence of species very well. They would all have to dovetail perfectly, at once by accident and by co-incidence! I'm not a statistician, but the odds must be near or at impossible, no matter how long you give it. Take, for example, the humble bee and red clover given by Darwin (pg 14 of On Natural Selection). In Darwin's opinion, they are so dependant that red clover or heartease, would disappear or become very rare without the bees. These bees, in turn, are affected by mice that destroy their nests. The mice are dependant on the number of cats that destroy the mice. So, the number of cats, mice and bees in an area could affect the wild flowers! (Darwin On Natural Selection pg 14 again).
Flowers on plants and insects would have to evolve at the same time: 1) to pollinate the flowers; 2) to feed the insects with nectar from flowers.
I suppose that insects such as moths and butterflies could have eaten other things before there were flowers, but if they follow the same pattern of other insects this is unlikely. This coincidence or confluence of flowers and insects could have come about by accident, but this is not evolution. It is highly improbable though. Insects could have evolved over thousands of years to eat nectar but this has two problems. First the flowers would not be pollinated so the plants would die out. Second, without the equipment to reach and harvest nectar how would they know it was there for them to eat so why would they evolve this way?
Flowers pollinated by insects implies intelligence, planning and design that plants and insects clearly don't have. Clearly, there are some genetic advantages in being pollinated by other plants, but would a plant evolve to be dependant on insects? We know that certain fruits and other plants are self-fertile, why aren't all flowers self-pollinating? Are self-pollinating species less evolved or more evolved, if evolution is true?. We still have the quandary that the choice to be pollinated by an insect is way beyond the intelligence of a plant.
Evolution does not explain the Bumble bee. According to science it should not be able to fly. It is thus highly improbable that it would evolve to be this way.
Evolution does not explain how animals such as penguins and walrus survived until they ‘evolved' their fat layers and tolerance to extreme cold. It does not explain why they would choose a cold climate in the first place. If it is a question of finding themselves trapped in an arctic environment which forced them to "evolve" then they would have died before this could have happened.
Evolution doesn't explain plant or animal hibernation and autumn events. Take plants and trees in winter. How did they develop dormancy and how did they survive until they did?
Evolution doesn't explain ageing. Surely organisms would evolve to live longer and longer so they can pass on their genes to a greater extent.
Evolution would expect that we genetically pass on knowledge and wisdom. We don't. History repeats itself even when it has been written down first!! We don't pass on information although this is a mainstay of evolution theory and explanations for eg instinct. It takes less actual "faith" to believe that instincts are programmed in rather than they just happened to be just right by sheer chance.
Evolution does not explain how characteristics and changes are inherited. Darwin clearly had no knowledge of genetics and the constrictions which that places upon the inheritance of organisms.
SCIENCE AND EVOLUTION
Section 4
Hasn't science disproved creation?
While many biologists would present evolution as a scientific fact, this is merely bad science because it goes against the scientific method. A theory must fit the facts but there is no evidence for the theory of evolution. There are no fossils between species and no transitions in the fossil record. Distinct, separate species are all that are found.
Science can not disprove creation just as much as science can not prove evolution.
What about dinosaurs? What does evolution say? We are expected to believe that a minute single celled organism over vast time periods became huge creatures containing millions of cells.
Science can not tell us accurately how life began. Even our best science has been unable after many attempts to create life or anything even near it. A few amino acids are all they have got. This has been done in a highly reducing atmosphere with no oxygen because oxygen would break down the desired products. There is no evidence or actual science to say this sort of atmosphere ever existed. Furthermore, if it was so, where has all the oxygen come from? Our present atmosphere is in equilibrium maintaining the same ratio of gases. This is adequate reason to expect that this has always been the case with 19% oxygen.If the so called first living things were a factory with walls and stairs and floors containing furniture, machines and people operating them, the best we have ever done would be equivalent to a few empty cardboard boxes. Also, the chemistry of DNA is against formation in water from amino acids. Amino acids will not form DNA in water because DNA formation requires condensation (loss of water) not hydration (the opposite, gaining molecules from water).
How can we think this all happened by accident? Life, even in a single cell, is highly organised and things don't get organised without intelligent intervention. Take your kitchen or bedroom as an example. Without determined effort and intelligent intervention (you) it will become more and more messed and untidy.
Another thing, the proposed early earth environment of ammonia, lightning, carbon dioxide and sulphur dioxide would be toxic to most life forms, so would ‘it' have a chance to survive even if it did the impossible to become alive?
But hasn't science disproved creation? Isn't creation unscientific? No! True science is concerned with the how. Creation is concerned with the why. The two things are quite different and mutually exclusive so we can't compare one against the other.
Science can't begin to search for the answers to ‘why'? Creation isn't concerned with how at all. To say that the universe and all life was designed by a powerful being can't be proved or disproved but if even put forward as a theory it does fit what we observe, unlike evolution with its missing links and ridiculous time periods.
What about the Big Bang? The Big Bang theory can not tell us what happened initially. Creation helps to answer the question of ‘where did all the matter in the universe come from'? It would take energy against gravitational forces to explode the matter apart. Where did that energy come from? The best theory at the moment is that there was a singularity at the beginning of the universe, where none of the laws of physics apply. For the amount of matter in our universe to be condensed in a small volume, gravitation would produce a black hole singularity. Since black holes don't explode, then there can be no Big Bang. I'm not saying there was not a Big Bang, but it does not look very probable for this and other reasons. I will say that the Big Bang theory does not exclude God, because there is room for God to set the initial conditions and provide the required energy and matter. We do need to be more careful how we use science. To set science up as some sort of god, arbiter, do-it-all for life and the universe is to take it out of context and out of the bounds where it naturally and quite properly fits.
Section 5
Where does it all start with a single cell?
A single cell organism's DNA is as complex as multi-celled organism's.
Development of single celled creatures is amazing as growth hormones switch on and off etc and then aging etc starts happening. Wouldn't it make more sense evolutionarily if a life form evolved and kept on evolving? But this doesn't happen. At present we still see a great many very simple organisms; organisms that stay as they are and don't become more complex.
If the first living thing was a single cell, what did it feed on? Where did bacteria and viruses come from? Where did plants come from? Developing chlorophyll is a very complex thing to expect by accident. If the first single cell was so effective or even able to survive reasonably well why did it need to develop further into plants and animals? What could be the ‘evolutionary pressure' or driver?
Single-celled creatures have the same number of genes as humans. CHK Apparently frogs have more genes than humans.
Evolutionary biologists are well aware of the high improbability of what they are proposing, which is why they cloud the issue with the smoke screen of incredibly long time periods. But if a thing is statistically impossible, giving it a huge amount of time to happen doesn't make it any more probable.
Evolution goes against a fundamental law of physics. The Second Law of Thermodynamics tells us that the disorder of the universe is increasing. How can evolution expect us to believe that the order of life forms increases by accident?
Section 6
What about natural selection?
"Natural Selection" like "Nature" is apparently given the intelligence and influence of a person. It is clear from Darwin's accurate and extensive observations that even the slightest aspect of an organism can have a big impact on its life and survival. For example smooth or hairy skin on fruit. To assume, then, that life forms exist, survive and even thrive by accident or by random chance is both naïve and unscientific. As in all evolution theory, the conclusions are arrived at first.
For fish scales, fish gills, ears, eyes and how the brain interprets signals from them there is no way they could develop by random events and mutations i.e. evolution. Therefore they have to say that Nature influenced orcaused it. But what is this other than a mystic made up smoke screen to obscure the need for God? In other words, it is giving "Nature" god like wisdom and powers.
One of the main causes of evolution is said to be mutation. Why, when exposed to radiation or mutagens (carcinogens) don't we see amazing steps forward in evolution or small steps in natural selection? We don't. We see weakening, sickness, cancer and often death.
We see some awful mutations. Thalidomide, Downs Syndrome and Spina Bifida to name a few.
I saw a programme on TV about a whole family that had a genetic defect. Even slight exposure to sunlight caused terrible burns. The whole family was prone to cancers. It was found that they all inherited a turned off ‘repair gene'. So UV light caused cell damage and mutations resulting in bad burns and even cancer. If mutation caused improvement, some of them - there were about 20 or more of them - would surely have evolved to some better form. They did not, quite the reverse.
For Evolution to work then the majority of mutations must make favourable variations. In fact 999 out of 1000 are unfavourable and the one in 1000 is pretty awful. This is not enough to make evolution viable.
Why do presumably highly evolved animals become extinct? Surely, their fittest would survive and evolve to exist. (Extinction is part of natural selection theory).
Darwin reckons that due to natural disasters (pg 5-6 of ‘On Natural Selection, edited by Penguin) and the inability to re-populate organisms die out.
What is this ‘Nature' that Darwin seems to speak of it as some kind of god or power? He presumes that it intelligently puts in all the necessary and complicated checks and balances to keep all the species in equilibrium (CHK).
Darwin observed (last Para, pg 6 On Natural Selection) each species is something so complex even scientists (and hence mankind) are ignorant and this even applies to ourselves. ‘Nature' must indeed be something! Life and species are hardly a happy accident. What Darwin calls ‘Nature' fits exactly with the descriptions of God in the Bible.
Darwin describes all life as a struggle. If there is such a struggle for existence, why did some less robust species survive at all? Wouldn't it be a good idea to evolve our own fur coats if we were Eskimos or if we live in a cold country?
A more scientific approach to organisms and life might be to consider the option that DNA is encoded with so much information and potential for diversity that it each organism is able to adapt to many of the situations and conditions it is likely to come across, not evolve.
In ‘On Natural Selection' there are lots of subjective ideas and suppositions with no factual evidence. Darwin's observations, as recorded in ‘On Natural Selection' are very far reaching, but his conclusions are far from scientific. They are coloured by his worldview of the power and intelligence of Nature and natural processes, which he pre-judges to be in control of and planning for life forms.
It is not science to have a made up mind with set conclusions and then seek to fit your observations to these. To quote from page 26, paragraph 2, "natural selection will be enabled to act on and modify organic beings at any age". Where is the evidence for this? Darwin is just theorizing and using his imagination.
Section 7
Genetics - why did this cause the evolutionists such problems?
Maybe because we don't get mutation or evolution of genes? At least for normal reproduction that results in healthy progeny.
Genetics tells us that the offspring will always have the genes of their parents. I.e. a green pea crossed with a yellow pea gives green, yellow/green and yellow peas in proportion of 1: 2: 1. Some of the peas may have changed colour but they are still peas, not a new organism.
Genetics tells us that the Genesis description that animals reproduce "according to their kind" is accurate. Genetics gives no room whatsoever for evolution from one species to another even by a very gradual process.
Section 8
Genetic Feedback
For Evolution to happen then some sort of genetic feed back must have occurred where the needs of the creature, once it decided how it was going to develop, are fed back to its genes to be passed on to the next generation. This supposes an intelligence and an adaptive ability that no creature on earth has ever demonstrated, not even man.
Section 9
BACTERIA AND VIRUSES
Evolution doesn't explain bacteria and viruses. It's not sufficient to say they just evolved. Bacteria and viruses are smaller than single celled creatures. So how did the first single celled organism become a virus or a bacteria? It would have to split or rupture into several smaller parts. This is extremely unlikely.
BASIC QUESTIONS / Questions from nature
Section 10
If evolution is true why are there still ‘un-evolved' single-celled creatures?
If single celled creatures have been around for many millions of years then why haven't they evolved? Instead we see many single celled organisms which are very successful with no need to evolve. It could be said that the first single celled creatures evolved into successful single celled creatures and that's why they are around now. The only problem with this is that such success would make it extremely unlikely for these successes to evolve further into higher animals and eventually you and me.
Section 11
What came first - the woodpecker or the oak? What about the grubs it eats?
What could possibly induce this bird to look inside a tree for grubs? It would have no way of knowing they were there. Its development of a stronger skull and beak would have required a significant change in its DNA program. Before it evolved a stronger beak and skull it would have knocked itself out looking for grubs. What would be the driving force to change so radically anyway – it must have had other food or it would have starved. There is no obvious reason for its evolution.
The woodpecker's strong, pointed beak acts as both a chisel and a crowbar to remove bark and find hiding insects. It has a very long tongue - up to four inches in some species - with a glue-like substance on the tip for catching insects. While most birds have one toe pointing back and three pointing forward on each foot, woodpeckers have two sharply clawed toes pointing in each direction to help them grasp the sides of trees and balance while they hammer. Many woodpecker species also have stiffened tail feathers, which they press against a tree surface to help support their weight. Again, these attributes would require a significant change in DNA code.
The largest species, the imperial woodpecker of Mexico, is about 22 inches long. It has been listed under the US. Fish and Wildlife Services' Endangered Species Act since 1970 and may be extinct. The Kogera woodpecker, found in Japan, is the smallest species at six inches in length. Woodpeckers live an average of four to 11 years
Woodpeckers can be found in wooded areas and forests all over the world, except in Australia. Some woodpecker species require very specific conditions for their home. For example, the red-cockaded woodpecker can only live in mature pine forests in the south-eastern United States. Again unlikely from evolution.
Woodpeckers eat a diet of insects, fruit, acorns and nuts.
Woodpeckers are known for tapping on tree trunks in order to find insects living in crevices in the bark and to excavate nest cavities. Some species drum on trees to communicate to other woodpeckers and as a part of their courtship behaviour. Woodpeckers tap an estimated 8,000 to 12,000 times per day. Without the right equipment the woodpecker would simply knock itself out. All this points to design rather than evolution. To say that Nature did this is to give a hypothetical entity god like power and wisdom.
Section 12
Why so many diverse species?
There are about 28 thousand species of fish according to Buzzle.com.
Georgia-Pacific - Educational in Nature says there are more than 4 thousand different types of mammal species live on our planet. The Wikipedia says that there are about 900 thousand different types of insects in the world and that scientists have found approximately 250 thousand different types of plants.
If evolution is true we shouldn't expect such diversity because there should only be the main highly evolved species. Over the vast time periods quoted by evolutionists there should have been ample opportunity for evolution from lower to higher species, if evolution happens, so there should not be any ‘lower' species.
Section 13
What about air breathing water dwellers like whales and dolphins?
What happened to their gills? Why would they evolve lungs? There is no advantage for it. Wouldn't they all drown on the way? Where are the remains of their gills?
What about amphibians? If these evolved into land dwellers why are there so many of them today? It's not good enough to say there was an amphibian ancestor that split two ways – one land dweller and one amphibian. Why would it do this? If there was evolution, surely the higher form would be preferred so there should not be any unevolved amphibians left.
Section 14
What evolutionary good does fruit do the plant?
Why are there bananas and otherfruits? What evolutionary good does it do the plant? In fact producing fruit is a significant drain on top of seed production. Of course some fruits are taken by animals and so spread the seeds. But can we realistically believe that the plants are intelligent enough to know this will happen? This points again to design not evolution.
Section 15
Why is everything subject to disease, death and decay?
Teeth and fruit decay to name but two.
I saw a programme on TV that had an incidental part containing a museum where they photographed the decay of dead reptiles etc. by time lapse. It was fascinating. Disease, death and decay are always with us. Evolution doesn't explain these. The Bible does.
Section 16
Doesn't Evolution explain instinct?
Instinct may well be learned by the young. I know of no evidence it is evolutionary, passed on genetically, or from some ‘race consciousness'. However, if an animal is the result of a wise, caring Creator, then it would be given instincts for survival etc.
Why don't we genetically pass on experience, knowledge and wisdom to our progeny? Clearly, we don't because history repeats itself even when it's been written down! This means if we don't pass on information we know is important, the mainstay of evolution theory and their explanation for instincts has failed.
Section 17
Does Evolution explain ‘fail safes'?
Two eyes, ears, nostrils, lungs and kidneys. We can breathe through mouth and nose. We ourselves are not aware most of the time of the need for fail-safes. How could this get programmed in? Why don't we see creatures with one eye, one ear, one lung, one nostril etc? Again we see design, not evolution.
I
FOR THE RECORD! Questions from the record
Section 18
What really caused the fossil record?
Evolution will tell us that the fossil record was laid down naturally over many millions of years and that the earlier evolved species are to be found in the lower strata. It has been found at a river delta that the same strata have been formed over 50 years. The rock in which we see fossils is sedimentary. These rocks could have been formed over millions of years. They could also have been formed by a river or the sea or even a flood. A rapid flood is far more likely since we find whole animals such as have been overcome and buried swiftly.
There is also a case, I am told, that the classical fossil record does not occur widely but the strata are not always in the proposed order in certain parts of the world.
What about the missing evolutionary links? Where are they? Darwin was concerned by this but he believed that when the fossil record was further explored that these missing links would be found. Well we have thoroughly explored the fossil record and the missing links have not been found. This is a serious blow for evolution because the necessary evidence for it is completely missing.
Section 19
Why is there coal at the South Pole?
The coal at the South Pole could be due to a tectonic plate shift. If so, there would need to have been a much milder climate near the South Pole at some time in the past. Mammoths at one time lived at the North Pole. Why have woolly mammoths been found frozen with food still in their mouths as though eating? This implies almost instantaneous freezing.
What are the likely causes of producing coal? We're talking about large amounts of horizontal dead trees and the absence of air. One possible scenario is that similar to the flood in Genesis. The whole subject of fossil fuels: gas, oil, coal etc is fraught with the difficulties of how they were produced by slow natural processes. There are vast quantities of Natural Gas and Oil. Just look at petrol consumption. Thousands of barrels of oil are recovered from the depths of the earth each day. These are not being replaced by natural processes. All these things need rapid air free burial under pressure to form.
HUMAN EVOLUTION?
Section 20
Could a single cell become a human?
The idea is that something as complex chemically, organ wise etc as a human being could develop by accident out of the constituent chemicals of a single cell is absurd even if we factor in vast time periods. Why do only humans make love face to face? This is indicative of design for a relationship. What about communication and the five senses? E.g. Body language, verbal and nonverbal communication.
Are humans really ‘highly evolved'? If so, why do we need clothes? Why do we need to cook our foods? Why do we have vulnerable, helpless babies?
Section 21
Why did we evolve emotions?
Why did we evolve emotions? Pain, pleasure, happiness etc are not helpful in an empirical sense for an organism, its reproduction and survival. To survive it would make sense to have little or no emotions so that we could reproduce prolifically. As it is we do have emotions and we have a conscience. There is no evolutionary need or reason for these.
Section 22
Why are we here?
The Anthropic principle says because the situation is right we are here. I.e. we wouldn't be here if it wasn't right. This infers it could have happened by chance. True. The whole universe must have happened by chance or by design of a higher power such as God. The case for chance is not entirely scientific although it obviously appeals to those who don't want to believe in God. It is unscientific, basically because our expanding universe is ordered and we observe eg gas clouds becoming more ordered star systems. According to physics disorder (entropy) increases with time. Therefore the disorder produced by a big bang should have caused disorder and subject to the laws of physics should never have produced ordered star systems without intelligent intervention. Have you ever seen the results of an explosion? Terribly disordered! Of course according to big bang theory there are other factors such as large masses and gravity effects etc. But it's still a bit puzzling. The only thing which holds back chaos is intelligent intervention.
Section 23
Why do different ethnic groups have the same blood types?
This is unlikely if they evolved separately or independently. They can also interbreed.
This infers the same origin and ancestry.
Maybe at Babel God confused the races as well as language or created diversity within genes. Mitochondrial DNA suggests all humans have the same female ancestor.
Section 24
Why religion?
Why religion? Some evolutionists think this occurs because it has good social and stress relieving benefits. How does a person know this and get their DNA to program this in? Could it be that we are designed to worship?
Section 25
Why morals?
Why, if the goal of species and organisms is to spread their genes as widely as possible is it clearly wrong to do so for humans? To take evolution at face value would be to condone adulterous behaviour and maybe even rape.
People like Hitler and the Japanese in the Second World War practiced their own version of natural selection. Indeed, because the Japanese had less facial hair they thought they were more evolved than westerners and treated them as sub-humans. Evolution fuels racism and prejudice.
Section 26
Why do we age
If evolution really happens, surely it would result in the benefit of organisms living longer and longer so they could store up more modifications , pass them on and pass on their genes longer. We don't see this. As it is, organisms don't improve with time, they all age and die.
Aging seems pre-programmed into every organisms DNA.
We are told that ‘Nature' has programmed in our instinct to survive with first priority and the instinct to reproduce second. Why then did ‘Nature' not make us evolve so we would not age? Perhaps so we would not over populate the planet. The problem is we are now getting to the point that this ‘Nature' is more intelligent and far seeing than man. We must either believe this just happened or Nature has influenced it etc. If we are honest, this takes much more faith than a belief in God.
But why do people still believe in evolution and Nature? As at the initial rebellion told in Genesis, man wants to be his own god and wants to pretend there is no God or use all his means to rationalise God out of the picture.
CONCLUSIONS
To believe Evolution is to have a similar faith to believing in God, except believing in a theory. Theories are not fact because they can't be proved. They are only good provided they explain the facts and until a better theory comes along.
As I hope you have seen, Evolution is part of a belief system, not a science, so it is really a faith religion. This is where it fails to be science, because the answers are already believed and any observations are coloured by this and squeezed into the mould in an attempt to substantiate pre-conceived beliefs.
It disturbs me that this theory is taught widely as fact, without a shred of factual evidence. On the contrary, there are many questions that deserve an answer.
I hope these questions and arguments have given you cause to think seriously about the claims of evolution. People are loathe to change but I hope you will think about these things with an open mind.
Evolution is a flight of fancy, a self-delusion of those who will not honestly face the facts, those who on grounds of belief and philosophy will not believe in God.
To believe in God, they realise, is to be accountable. They think that by pretending they can avoid that. We are all accountable to God and will face His judgment. God, however, being a redeemer, loving and merciful, as well as just, has revealed Himself in many ways and ultimately in His Son, Jesus. Like Evolution He can't empirically be proved. However, God can be known by faith in Jesus. Millions around the world today testify to that relationship. So who is deluded? The Christians of the Evolutionists? I leave you to choose.
About the Author
I am interested in science and also Christianity. I like science fiction and fantasy novels. Reading is one of my favourite hobbies.
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