Naturally Selecting a Dead Horse
My wife and I watched Ben Stein’s documentary “Expelled” a few days ago. It is a conversation-starter, for sure. After the [often manipulative and partisan] movie was over, my wife and I had our first discussion in 15 years about religion. It was good to have a discussion about “how did life start,” and to not confuse that with “how did life evolve.”
Natural Selection is an all-but-indisputable fact, but it does not adequately answer “how did life start.” The world would be a better place if we could all get this through our thick skulls.
Natural Selection fully describes and predicts variations within species, as well as the emergence of new species over time. Period. The end. My favorite two examples of how ’selection’ matters:
"You don’t have to be faster than the bear; you just have to be faster than the other guy."
–and–
“The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.”
September 6th, 2009 at 11:41 am
There is no example in any form of transitional species. Sorry. Even the optic nerve is irreducably complex. The first mouse also knows this as the mouse trap itself is at it’s simplest, too complex to have “originated” spontaneously. By the way, dragonflies “appeared” in the fossil record fully intact and as big as crows. Here are some stats: 1. 30,000 prewired facets per eye, designed to enable 360* vision 2. Ability to camouflage itself from prey using simultaneous response to movement of said prey-perspective of non movement 3. Wings can beat in unison or independently 4. Ability to travel up to 30 miles per hour (while navigating, hunting, evading predators, assessing landing facilities). You go ahead and shake rocks in a box for a trillion years to build everything in the world that designed and executed that many solutions to our environment. Evolutionists have more faith than any religious person I know.
September 8th, 2009 at 2:24 pm
To be honest, I hesitated even replying to your comment for fear that this thread might somehow degrade into a contest of idiologies. Still I must provide a counterpoint to your comment.
I take issue with the claims that there are no transitional species, and that the optic nerve is irreducibly complex. I also think that the the ‘mouse trap,’ the ’shaking a box of rocks,’ and the ‘pocket watch in the desert’ examples all detract from the discussion; None of those objects exhibit properties of life.
This debate is being executed on both sides by people much smarter and more knowledgable than myself. I thank you very much for your comments, and I appreciate your views on the subject. People on both sides of this discussion have much to offer each other.