Evolution Test!

[Dr.Trax]

Selam Alaikym!

I am again making this thread for voting about how many of us here are believing or not in Evolution!
And it will be very good if someone can post\explain why is he\she believing or not!
There were before two replies but the forum had a problem and it was all deleted!But if they can post their comments again I'll be very thankfull!
I will be very thankfull again for every vote and comment that you will make!

Thanks!

Wasalam...

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you DR. Trax

I believe in one God the creator of all that is seen and unseen.

I believe that he created each species in a complete way, and each species adapts to its natural and changing environment.

I do not believe that some kind of single cell life can come from no life at all without the help of God.

I cannot see how single cell life could evolve in stages over four billion years to the life we have today.

I still retain these beliefs despite all the arguments I have read to the contrary.

Take care

Eric

[MustafaMc]

From a simplistic point of view, I do believe in evolution as initially defined by Wikipedia, "Evolution is the process of change in the inherited traits of a population of organisms from one generation to the next." This sense of evolution as a means for change over time within a species is in agreement with what I understand Akhi Woodrow has posted previously.

However, I don't believe that evolution without a controlling Director/Designer/Creator is the process through which all existing and extinct species have originated over eons of time from a common unicellular, prokaryotic (no nucleus) ancestor through variation in the genetic constitution of individuals and populations that was created by random mutations, recombination of genes and migration which was then exploited by natural selection (survival of fittest) or just randomly changed over time through genetic drift.

Evolution ultimately relies upon a destructive process (mutation) as the primary source for genetic variation through which new, more complex species originated from a basic common ancestor. How many new and improved species have "evolved" from the genetic variation created by radiation mutations at Hiroshima, Nagasaki, or Chernobyl? In contrast, how many thousands of individuals from various species as a result of this radiation exposure were born less fit than their parents?

If one comes upon three bricks laying on the ground _ _ _ , then he thinks nothing of it. If one comes upon three bricks stacked on top of each other end-to-end

l
l
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then he logically concludes that someone must have stacked them up. If this same person gathers the three bricks and throws them up in the air, how many times will he have to throw them up in the air for them to fall back to earth as he found them stacked end-to-end? Even if the probability is infinitesimally small yet greater than zero, over eons of time it must become a reality. Is not the probability actually zero, just like the probability that humans have evolved from a unicellular organism without the direction of a Creator? I believe that all existing and extinct species were created by Allah and through which means He chose to do so does not remove His ultimate control and guidance from the equation.

[barney]

I beleive in Evolution.
Why? Well on one side you have a scientifically solid theory, that has stood the test of time, has mountains upon mountains of solid real physical evidence that i can see and witness and it has been enough to decimate age old theological sureitys. Its so overwhelmingly in-your-face obvious and undeniable that most theists just jiggle the scriptures interpretaion so that its "consistant" with evolution. Others just dont think about it, because its easier that way.

On the other side you have a talking snake in a very very old book.

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[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you barney;

On the other side you have a talking snake in a very very old book.

If God can create the universe and life from nothing; then he should be able to make a snake talk, and cure the blind and lame.

In the spirit of searching for God

Eric

[barney]

Yes Eric, If God has the properties ascribed to him that the scripture says, then he can make a snake talk, although the snake was actually apparently satan, and it had legs.

Lets say for the sake of arguement that the old "one day in gods time is a hundred thousand years in mans" (which to me is leaping through hoops more than a Police Stuntdog)
Then God made adam and eve and they fathered and mothered mankind, who evolved into cavemen? Correct?

[MustafaMc]

Lets say for the sake of arguement that the old "one day in gods time is a hundred thousand years in mans" (which to me is leaping through hoops more than a Police Stuntdog)

Allah's existence is not limited by our concepts of space and time.

Then God made adam and eve and they fathered and mothered mankind, who evolved into cavemen? Correct?

... and what do you have against cavemen? Do you think that Adam and Eve had the technological ability that we have today and drove around in cars and jet planes, lived in 3 bedroom-2 bath brick homes and cooked their meals with a microwave? Of course not. I doubt that they even had a tractor to plow the land or a razor-sharp steel knife to slaughter animals with. Man's knowledge and capabilities have indeed changed over time, but that does not mean that prior to being human that he was an unicellular organism that evolved without the direction of a Creator.

As far as I can tell, none of us remembers ever being a unicellular zygote from the union of a single egg and a single sperm. Yet it is a certainty that we were. This fertilization led to the "evolution" of each one of us within a period of only 9 months through a natural process from previously existing parents. Without those parents, could any of us ever have been born? Which brings us back to the seminal question, "Which came first - the chicken or the egg?"

[barney]

The reason im agnostic is I beleive a unknown entity or force or energy created the universe, or kickstarted it. That energy, wether sentinent or not, I call God.

My arguement is that scripture dosnt support evolution, and that whilst we can prove beyond reasonable doubt the one, we cannot the other. Indeed it is supported entirely on self-fullifillment.

I have nothing against cavemen or cavewomen. We can see their skeletons even today if we wish. We can observe the changes in bone structure from the first humans to Homo-sapiens.

Adam and Eve within three generations were living in cities,and two after that.... fighting wars.:D

[Keltoi]

I voted yes. I think it is obvious that species evolve over time. As Mustafa mentioned, using the actual definition of "evolution", I believe it to be a sound theory with solid physical evidence to support it.

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you barney

Evolution is not a big deal to me one way or the other. Before evolution has a chance to work the universe has to be created from nothing or have no beginning, and life has to start from no life. I cannot see how this is possible without God.

Man has put rockets on the moon, we have built amazing computers, bridges and whole range of stuff too numerous to mention. Even with all our present intelligence we cannot build a robot in the image of a man that has the same range of movements as the average man.

We have the blueprint, we know how skeletons, muscles, bones, tendons, and ligaments work together, but we cannot put materials together to make a working skeleton, the engineering is beyond us at the moment.

Man is just a heap of chemicals put together in a special way, chemicals always work in the same way and obey laws. If there is no creator, designer God; then I believe it to be impossible for random mutation; and natural selection to blindly make a working skeleton of a man, even over millions of generations.

In the spirit of searching for God

Eric

[MustafaMc]

I sense that we have a dualistic understanding of evolution.

Theistic evolutionists recognize that species are dynamic and change over time through the basic processes of evolution, but they reject as implausible strict naturalistic evolution as the means by which all life forms have evolved from a common ancestor all without the intervention of a Creator.

Naturalistic evolutionists accept as scientific fact the whole evolution "ball of wax" as the process for the origin of all existing and extinct species from a common unicellular ancestor. They reject the involvement of a Creator due to the lack of tangible scientific evidence.

[Science101]

Scientists who understand evolution do not "believe" in it. They "understand" how evolution works.

Please use proper use of language when describing something scientific.

[snakelegs]

i don't see them as mutually exclusive.
i believe in the creator and evolution. so i didn't vote.

[Science101]

Then it looks like Dr.Trax's poll is skewed. The way it's worded I would have to say no, I don't "believe" in evolution. From the facts that describe evolution I understand how it works. But I do "believe" in a Creator even though that requires some level of "belief".

I don't see them as mutually exclusive, either.

[Trumble]

It is not a case of 'belief'. Evolution by natural selection is a scientific theory, just like those of general relativity and quantum mechanics. As such it is generally accepted because it explains the empirical facts better than any other scientific theory or hypothesis, and it will only be generally accepted as long as that remains the case. However, in the continued absence of any remotely credible scientific alternative that is unlikely to change anytime soon.

If people prefer to reject (or 'disbelieve') pretty much the only scientific explanation in favour of religious based or other non-scientific alternatives that is up to them. There is nothing wrong with that, as long as they don't try and pretend those alternatives (the obvious one being creationism) have any scientific relevance. The point has already been made that a creator and evolution are not necessarily mutually exclusive, anyway.

[barney]

Greetings and peace be with you barney

Evolution is not a big deal to me one way or the other. Before evolution has a chance to work the universe has to be created from nothing or have no beginning, and life has to start from no life. I cannot see how this is possible without God.

Man has put rockets on the moon, we have built amazing computers, bridges and whole range of stuff too numerous to mention. Even with all our present intelligence we cannot build a robot in the image of a man that has the same range of movements as the average man.

We have the blueprint, we know how skeletons, muscles, bones, tendons, and ligaments work together, but we cannot put materials together to make a working skeleton, the engineering is beyond us at the moment.

Man is just a heap of chemicals put together in a special way, chemicals always work in the same way and obey laws. If there is no creator, designer God; then I believe it to be impossible for random mutation; and natural selection to blindly make a working skeleton of a man, even over millions of generations.

In the spirit of searching for God

Eric

Peace also with you Eric.

We are singing from the same songsheet as regards the beleif in God.(although my interpretation of it/her/him will differ vastly from yours)
How do you deal with the incompatibility of scripture with evolution. Im thinking genisis mainly.

[Dr.Trax]

Then it looks like Dr.Trax's poll is skewed. The way it's worded I would have to say no, I don't "believe" in evolution. From the facts that describe evolution I understand how it works. But I do "believe" in a Creator even though that requires some level of "belief".

I don't see them as mutually exclusive, either.

First thanks for your comment!
I think you are angry on me,but may I ask you:
How do you like it to be?
Like this: Did the Creator used Evolution to his creatures?

Then Show me your opinion!
Thanks!

[crayon]

NOUN

1 (Biol) a gradual change in the characteristics of a population of animals or plants over successive generations

2 a gradual development, esp. to a more complex form

If that definition is meant, then yes.
If what is meant that life arose when an aerobic prokaryote went into an anaerobic prokaryote or whatever it was and then the mitochondria arrived, etc., and that that eventually made humans, then no.

[crayon]

double post.

[MustafaMc]

Then it looks like Dr.Trax's poll is skewed. The way it's worded I would have to say no, I don't "believe" in evolution. From the facts that describe evolution I understand how it works. But I do "believe" in a Creator even though that requires some level of "belief".

I don't see them as mutually exclusive, either.

I am glad that you believe in a Creator. What role do you see that He played in the "origin of species"?

I agree with Trumble that evolution is the only viable scientific theory to explain the origin of new species. Again according to Wikipedia, "In the 1930s, Darwinian natural selection was combined with Mendelian inheritance to form the modern evolutionary synthesis, in which the connection between the units of evolution (genes) and the mechanism of evolution (natural selection) was made. This powerful explanatory and predictive theory has become the central organizing principle of modern biology, providing a unifying explanation for the diversity of life on Earth."

What is a theory? According to Merriam-Websters Dictionary:

the·o·ry
1: the analysis of a set of facts in their relation to one another
2: abstract thought : speculation
3: the general or abstract principles of a body of fact, a science, or an art
4 a: a belief, policy, or procedure proposed or followed as the basis of action b: an ideal or hypothetical set of facts, principles, or circumstances —often used in the phrase in theory
5: a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena
6 a: a hypothesis assumed for the sake of argument or investigation b: an unproved assumption : conjecture c: a body of theorems presenting a concise systematic view of a subject

Albeit far from proven fact, evolution is still "a plausible or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena". However, evolution does in fact take quite a few "leaps of faith" in explaining: 1) formation in prokaryotic unicellular organisms of nucleus and organelles like mitochondria and chloroplasts in plants, 2) development of bilateral symmetry in higher animals, and 3) development of sexual reproduction with the two sexes - male and female.

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you barney, thanks for your reply.

We are singing from the same songsheet as regards the beleif in God.(although my interpretation of it/her/him will differ vastly from yours)

I am a Catholic and my interpretation of God is different to other Catholics, it is also different to the interpretation of our Muslim friends here. Despite all out interpretations there is one God the creator of all that is seen and unseen.

My interpretations of God and yours are almost irrelevant, we will not change God because we have different beliefs. Simply put God is God.

How do you deal with the incompatibility of scripture with evolution. Im thinking genisis mainly.

When you follow the genealogy in the Bible it puts the age of the Earth at something like six thousand years old. This is in conflict with science that adds a few billion to this number.

The bottom line for me is that the Bible is the inspired word of God written by man. If God has the power to create the universe and life from nothing, then he has the power to edit the Bible in the way he wants.

Despite all the contradictions that people point out; I simply trust that the message in Genesis is there to inspire me in some way, it is for me to search for meaning.

In the spirit of searching for God

Eric

[barney]

Double posted :(

[barney]

Greetings and peace be with you barney, thanks for your reply.


I am a Catholic and my interpretation of God is different to other Catholics, it is also different to the interpretation of our Muslim friends here. Despite all out interpretations there is one God the creator of all that is seen and unseen.

My interpretations of God and yours are almost irrelevant, we will not change God because we have different beliefs. Simply put God is God.

When you follow the genealogy in the Bible it puts the age of the Earth at something like six thousand years old. This is in conflict with science that adds a few billion to this number.

The bottom line for me is that the Bible is the inspired word of God written by man. If God has the power to create the universe and life from nothing, then he has the power to edit the Bible in the way he wants.

Despite all the contradictions that people point out; I simply trust that the message in Genesis is there to inspire me in some way, it is for me to search for meaning.

In the spirit of searching for God

Eric

I would again agree. God is indeed what i call the creating force and no matter what I beleive, wether that it is in fact Ganesh, Rameses, Yahweh,Travesser or Hirohito, God will remain God. That force simply is.

The Bible is, in your beleif, the inspired word of this force. In your construct, this force is sentinent and so can interact. The way it wishes to interact with its creation is by communicating through a Book.
This creator takes the time and trouble to explain many things. It cant possibly be wrong, because it knows everything. It knows how long a day is and it knows how long we call a day. It knows that the sun rises in our east, it knows the earth spins round the sun. Scripture in various religions contradict all this and more.
Three possibilities exist.
1)The bible is the inspired word of God, but the scribes deliberatly wrote it down wrong in order to fullfil some short term goal of their own. In which case, why on earth are we using a book thats telling man-made porkies.

2)The Bible is not the inspired word of God. Its the created word of man. Men who thought about God a lot, but had no actual inspiration from him. If they had inspiration. They would have got everything right and left out the bits with 9.7 million creatures on a boat, Mankind coming from one couple etc etc.
If a bit of it is wrong, then how do we know which bits are right, or indeed if anything in it is right, other than positively secondary sourced infomation....(such as King David's genocidal warmongering).

3)God can communicate , wants to communicate, inspired a book to do this with, but as a bit of a laugh to confuse us all, just Lied.

[Gator]

I voted yes. Evolution seems like a resonable explanation of the diversity of life as we see it. Thanks.

[united]

It is quite amazing how people will believe something such as evolution without understanding what the process entails.
The only people who actually believe this theory are:
1)people who have not understood it and are willing to be lead...
2)those who do understand the theory and having examined it in detail, would rather bow down to "materialism" rather than think of an alternative.

I know the book is long but (harun yahya):
http://api.fmanager.net/api_v1/produ...V&objectId=974

blind faith is the worst kind of malady afflicting the human race.

What I dont understand is that if scientists dont know how life came about, why dont they just say so? instead of pushing this "amazing" theory down out throats.

Evolution is a lie that nobody seems to be willing to investigate. I was taught it at college (3 years ago) and my biology teacher told us about vestigial organs, the peppered moths, etc. Having recently researched these on my own recently, I wonder whether she knew she was teaching us rubbish or was she simply blindly teaching outdated ideas. for example there are no such things as vestigial organs, and this was published in the '90s. So why was she teaching this in 2003?
We now know about the workings of a cell etc so why do we still plead ignorance? primitive organisms? what on earth is the phrase supposed to mean. a cell is a cell, can i have a primitive cell please?

[Dr.Trax]

Salam and Peace be with you United!

I am so impressed about your way of thinking and that you do not support the Evolution Propaganda!
And I also totally agree with you that people are so brainwashed,that they accept it without thinking deeply and searching for the truth!
People are now thinking that only Science has the key to explain the Secrets of the Universe!
If something or some information makes sense to the people they accept it without thinking of it!That is one of the problems!
Every science is not true!


Thanks for your comment...

[Dr.Trax]

Behold! verily to Allah belong all creatures, in the heavens and on earth. What do they follow who worship as His "partners" other than Allah? They follow nothing but conjecture, and they do nothing but lie.
(Qur'an, 10:66)

Different concepts may come to mind when the theory of evolution is mentioned. Some people, mainly materialists who think that it is a scientifically proven fact, fiercely support it and, equally fiercely, reject all ideas opposed to it.
A second group consists of people who are not well-informed about the theory of evolution's claims.
They are not particularly interested in it, since they do not realize the harm that Darwinism has done to humanity over the last century and a half.
They see no problem with how it is imposed on people and fiercely defended, despite its scientific invalidity, for they have closed their eyes to what is going on.
Even if they know that this theory has lost all scientific credibility, they cannot take seriously those who still find it important, because they themselves do not consider it important.
They consider it unnecessary to explain the theory's invalidity or to publish books and hold conferences on the subject, for in their eyes the theory is already "old hat" or passé.
A third group consists of those who, under the influence of materialist suggestion and propaganda, view this theory as scientific fact and look for a "middle way" between it and belief in God.
They accept Darwinism's account of the origin of life word for word, yet try to build a bridge between the theory of evolution and religious belief by maintaining that this account operates under God's control.
In reality, each of these views is mistaken, for the theory of evolution cannot reasonably be portrayed as scientific fact, passed off as unimportant, or adapted to religion.
As we shall see throughout this site, the theory's ideological framework consists of anti-religious thought put forward to strengthen atheism and to give it a firm foundation. Moreover, it is fiercely defended by people who have been persuaded by materialism, for it is constructed on materialist philosophy and offers a materialist commentary on the world. From the time it was first put forward by Charles Darwin and right up to the present day, it has brought humanity nothing but conflict, exploitation, war, and degeneration. Given this, it is essential that we acquire a sound understanding of the subject and launch a serious fight against it on the ideological level.

This site replies from a very different perspective to the errors of those believers who still support the theory of evolution. It offers a response to those Muslims who look for common ground between the theory of evolution and the fact of creation, and who even try to find evidence for the theory in the Qur'an. The purpose is not to criticize Muslim evolutionists, but rather to explain that their attitude is mistaken, to assist them on the level of ideas, and to be a means whereby they can adopt a more correct perspective.

Two other facts will be discussed in this site:
First, that Darwinism is a theory that lacks any scientific foundation, and second, that its real target is religion. Therefore, it will emphasize how wrong it is for Muslims to take the theory lightly or to underestimate it, and to see no need to wage an intellectual struggle against it.

Believers should avoid defending this theory and its ideological meaning, for both contradict the truths of Islam. Some may support the theory because they are unaware of the disasters that it has visited upon humanity, that it is supported by people who hate religion, and that it rejects the fact of creation. That being the case, those Muslims who have only a little information on the subject should avoid going down that road, for as Allah tells the faithful in the Qur'an:

Do not pursue what you have no knowledge of. Hearing, sight and hearts will all be questioned. (Qur'an, 17: 36)

Exemplary Muslims should research the matter in all sincerity and behave according to the realization that:

... Those who have become Muslim are those who sought right guidance. (Qur'an, 72: 14)

As the above verse commands, Muslims who believe in the theory of evolution must consider this theory carefully, carry out wide-ranging research, and make their decision according to their consciences. This site has been prepared to help them do so and to shed some light upon the path that they are following.



The men and women of the believers are friends of one another. They command what is right and forbid what is wrong, and establish prayer and pay welfare and charity, and obey Allah and His Messenger. They are the people on whom Allah will have mercy. Allah is Almighty, All - Wise. (Qur'an, 9: 71)

[Dr.Trax]

Why do some Muslims Support the Theory of Evolution?

Charles Darwin

Throughout history, people have thought about the universe and the origin of life, and have put forward various ideas on the subject. We can divide these into two groups: those who explain the universe from a materialist point of view, and those who see that God made the universe out of nothing, namely, the truth of creation.
In the introduction, we saw that the theory of evolution was constructed upon materialist philosophy. The materialist view claims that the universe consists of matter and that matter is the only thing that exists. Therefore, matter has existed for all time and no other power rules over it. Materialists believe that blind coincidence caused the universe to shape itself and life to come about by gradually evolving from non-living substances. In other words, all living things in the world emerged as the result of natural influences and chance.
Materialist philosophy uses the theory of evolution, both of which complement each other, to account for the emergence of life. This unity, which was born in ancient Greece, once again was made public under the primitive scientific conditions of the nineteenth century and, since the theory allegedly backed up materialism, whether or not it had any scientific validity, it was adopted immediately by materialists.
The fact of creation stands in opposition to the theory of evolution. According to the creationist view, matter has not existed for all time and therefore is controlled. God created matter out of nothing and gave it order. All things, living as well as non-living, came into being by God's creation. The amazing design, calculation, equilibrium, and order seen in the universe and in living things are clear evidence of this.

Religion has taught the truth of creation, which all people can grasp through reason and personal observation, since the beginning of time. All divine religions have taught that God created the universe by commanding "Be!," and that its flawless functioning is proof of His great creative power. Many Qur'anic verses also reveal this truth. For example, Allah reveals how He miraculously created the universe from nothing: "The Originator of the heavens and Earth. When He decides on something, He just says to it, 'Be!' and it is" (Qur'an, 2:117). He also reveals the following:
He created the heavens and Earth with truth. The day He says "Be!" it is. His speech is Truth. The Kingdom will be His on the Day the Trumpet is blown, the Knower of the Unseen and the Visible. He is the All-Wise, the All-Aware. (Qur'an, 6:73)

Modern science demonstrates the invalidity of the materialist-evolutionist claim and confirms creation. Contrary to the theory of evolution, all the proofs of creation that surround us show that chance had no role in the universe's coming into existence. Every detail that emerges as we observe the sky, Earth, and all living things is intended as evidence of God's great power and wisdom.
This fundamental difference between religion and atheism is that the former believes in God, while the latter believes in materialism. When Allah asks those who deny, He draws attention to the claims that they assert in order to reject creation: "Or were they created out of nothing, or are they the creators?" (Qur'an, 52:35). Ever since the dawn of time, those who deny creation have claimed that humanity and the universe were not created and have sought to justify this irrational and illogical claim. Their greatest support came in the nineteenth century, thanks to Darwin's theory.
Muslims cannot seek a compromise on this issue. Of course people can think as they please and can believe in whatever theories they wish. However, there can be no compromise with a theory that denies Allah and His creation, for this would involve compromising on religion's fundamental element. Of course, doing so is totally unacceptable.
Evolutionists, aware of how such a compromise would damage religion, encourage religious people to try and find such a compromise.
Darwinists Encourage the Creation-by-Evolution View
Scientists who blindly support the theory of evolution are being backed further into a corner by new scientific advances that are becoming more frequent and better known to the public. Given that every new discovery works against the theory and attests to creation's truth, demagogy takes pride of place over scientific evidence in evolutionist literature. On the other hand, even the most prominent evolutionist scientific magazines, like Science, Nature, Scientific American or New Scientist are forced to admit that several aspects of Darwin's theory has reached a dead end. Scientists who defend creation win these scientific debates, thereby exposing the evolutionists' baseless claims.
At this point, the view of creation by evolution comes to the materialists' aid. This is one of the tactics used by the evolutionists to appease the supporters of creation (or "Intelligent Design") and to weaken their intellectual position against the dogma of Darwinism. Although evolutionists do not believe in God, for they have made a deity out of chance and totally oppose the fact of creation, they think that their theory will become more acceptable if they remain silent about the religious evolutionists' idea that God created living things through evolution. In fact, they encourage a compromise between the theory and religion so that evolution will become more acceptable and belief in creation will weaken.
Given this, Muslims must understand that it is totally mistaken to believe that Allah created the universe and yet support the theory of evolution despite the lack of hard scientific evidence. Furthermore, it is just as mistaken to claim that evolution is compatible with the Qur'an by ignoring all the warnings in the Holy Book itself. Muslims who adopt such a position must realize that they are supporting an idea designed to help materialist philosophy and that, given this fact, they must withdraw their support at once.

If they come upon you, they will be your enemies and stretch out their hands and tongues against you with evil intent, and they would dearly love you to disbelieve.
(Qur'an, 60: 2)

Rejecting Evolution does not Mean Rejecting Science:
The number of Muslims who believe that all living things emerged by means of evolution should not be underestimated. Their error is based upon a lack of knowledge and mistaken viewpoints, particularly in regard to scientific matters. Heading the list is the idea that evolution is a scientific and proven fact.

"THE THOUGHT OF THE EYE MADE ME COLD ALL OVER!"

Charles Darwin
One of the most insoluble dilemmas for the theory of evolution is the complex structures in living things. For instance, evolutionists claim that the eye, made up of some 40 different parts, came about by chance. Yet they cannot explain how it did so. In fact, it is impossible that blind chance should have "created" such a magnificent structure. The diagram below shows some of the eye's components.

Such people do not realize that science has completely eroded the theory of evolution's credibility. Whether on the molecular level or in biology and paleontology, research has invalidated the claims that living things emerged as the result of an evolutionary process. Darwin's theory continues to survive, despite all scientific facts, only because the evolutionists are doing all they can, including deliberately misleading people, to keep it alive. Their writings and speeches are filled with scientific terms that the average person cannot understand. Yet when their words are analyzed, one can find no evidence to support their theory.
A careful examination of Darwinist publications reveals this fact quite clearly. Their accounts are almost never based upon firm scientific proof. The fundamental areas where the theory collapses are glossed over in a few words, and many fantastic scenarios are written about natural history. They never dwell on such essential questions as how life first emerged from inanimate substances, the fossil record's huge gaps, and the complex systems in living things. They do not do so because whatever they might say or write would contradict their aims and reveal the emptiness of their theory.

When Charles Darwin (1809-82), the founder of this theory, considered one of the complex systems in living things, in this case the eye, he realized the danger that this posed to his theory and even admitted that thinking about the eye made him cold all over. Like Darwin, today's evolutionist scientists know that their theory has no answer for such complex systems. But instead of admitting this, they seek to overcome the lack of scientific evidence by writing imaginary scenarios and imposing the theory on people by giving it a scientific mask.
Such methods become obvious during face-to-face debates between evolutionists and those who believe in creation, as well as in evolutionist writings and documentaries. Actually, evolutionists are not bothered by such things as scientific truth or reason, for their sole goal is to make people believe that evolution is a scientific fact.

In this way, evolutionist Muslims are influenced by the theory's supposed "scientific" image. They are particularly alarmed by such Darwinist slogans as: "Anyone who does not believe in the theory of evolution is being dogmatic or unscientific," and so give ground on their true beliefs. Influenced by outdated information or evolutionist writings and arguments, they believe that only evolution can account for the emergence of life. They then try to reconcile religion and evolution, for they are unaware of the latest scientific developments as well as the theory's own internal contradictions and complete loss of credibility.
However, given that evolution and creation are diametrically opposed, proving one means disproving the other. In other words, disproving evolution means proving creation.
For these reasons, materialists see debates on evolution as a kind of battleground, a direct ideological struggle rather than a scientific matter. Thus they resort to all possible means to obstruct those who believe in creation.

For example, evolutionist Lerry Flank recommends that the truth of creation be opposed by the following methods:
Creationist watchers must keep a close eye on the composition of state education boards. Ideally, people who are interested in quality education and in keeping the fundamentalists from using the public schools for their sermonizing should constitute the majority of these state boards... If this fails, and creationist textbooks are actually adopted and approved, then legal action becomes necessary.1
It is clear from these words that we are not talking about a scientific debate, but a war of ideas waged by evolutionists in a framework of certain strategies. Muslims who defend evolution must be aware of this. Darwinism is not a scientific thesis; rather, it is a system of thought designed to lead people to deny God. As this theory has no scientific foundation, Muslims must not allow themselves to be misled by its arguments and thereby give it any support, no matter how well-intentioned.


The Effects of Evolutionists Being in the Majority:

Prof. Arda Denkel

The evolutionists' most important ploy to gain widespread acceptance for Darwin's theory is to assert that it is widely accepted within the scientific community. In short, they are claiming validity for their theory based upon the supposed majority of its adherents and the supposed correctness of the majority's view in all cases. By employing such logic, as well as their claim that evolution's truth is further proven by its wide acceptance within the universities, they attempt to use psychological pressure on people, including believers in God, to accept it.
Arda Denkel, an evolutionist professor of philosophy at The Bosphorus University, probably the most prestigious one in Turkey, even admitted the erroneous nature of this method:
Does the fact that many respected people or organizations or bodies believe in it prove the theory of evolution to be true? Could the theory be proved by a court verdict? Does the fact that respected and powerful people believe in something make it true? I would like to recall a historical fact. Did not Galileo stand up before all the respected people, lawyers, and particularly scientists of his time and speak the truth on his own, with no support from anyone? Did not the courts of the Inquisition reveal other, similar situations? Gaining the support of respected and influential circles neither creates the truth nor has anything to do with scientific fact.2

As Denkel noted, wide acceptance of a theory does not prove its truth. In fact, the history of science is full of examples of theories that were first accepted by a minority and then only later came to be accepted as true by the majority.
Moreover, evolution is not accepted by the entire scientific community, as its proponents would have people believe. Over the last 20-30 years, the number of scientists rejecting it has risen enormously. Most of them abandon their dogmatic belief in Darwinism after seeing the flawless design in the universe and living things. They have published countless works demonstrating the theory's invalidity. Even more important, they are members of prominent universities all over the world, especially in the United States and Europe, and experts and career academics in biology, biochemistry, microbiology, anatomy, paleontology, and other scientific fields.3 Therefore it would be very wrong to say that the majority of the scientific community believes in evolution.

Prof. Owen Gingerich

Prof. Carl Friedrich von Weizsacker

Prof. Dr. Donald Chittick

Prof.Robert Matthews

Prof.Michael J.Behe

Prof. David Menton

S. Jocelyn Bell Burnell

William Dembski

Many contemporary scientists reject evolution and accept that God, the Lord of Infinite Intelligence and Might, created the universe. Some of the scientists who accept the truth of creation are, from left to right, Owen Gingerich, professor of astronomy and history of science at Harvard University; Carl Friedrich von Weizsacker, professor of physics at Germany's Max-Planck-Gesellschaft University; Donald Chittick, professor of chemistry at Oregon State University; Robert Matthews, professor of physics at Oxford University; Michael J. Behe, professor of biology at Lehigh University; David Menton, professor of anatomy at Washington University; S. Jocelyn Bell Burnell, professor of physics at the Open University in England; and William Dembski, associate professor in the conceptual foundations of science at Baylor University.

It would thus have no meaning, even if evolutionists are genuinely in the majority. No majority view is definitely right just because it is the majority view. Muslims who believe in evolution need to know that the Qur'an discusses this matter when relating the fate of the many historical communities who held a similar view and ended up denying Allah and His religion by allowing themselves to be led away from the true path. Allah warns believers against following such deceitful people, and informs humanity that going along with the majority can lead to terrible mistakes:

If you obeyed most of those on Earth, they would guide you away from Allah's Way. They follow nothing but conjecture. They are only guessing. (Qur'an, 6:116)

He Who created the seven heavens in layers. You will not find any flaw in the creation of the All-Merciful. Look again -do you see any gaps? Then look again and again. Your sight will return to you dazzled and exhausted!
(Qur'an, 67: 3-4)

[Dr.Trax]

Important Truths Ignored By Muslim Evolutionists

In the previous chapter, we discussed how Muslims who have been convinced that evolution is a fact, as opposed to a theory, might be unaware of relevant and recent scientific developments that refute Darwinism. This lack of awareness leads Muslim evolutionists to continue to accept ideas and beliefs disproved by science. Furthermore, they ignore the fact that the underlying foundation of evolution reflects a pagan mentality, ascribes divinity to chance and natural occurrences, and has engendered a great deal of oppression, conflict, war, and other catastrophes.
This chapter will focus on those truths that Muslim evolutionists ignore, and calls upon them to stop supporting the pagan mentality that provides the foundation for materialist-atheist thought.

Evolution Is an Ancient Pagan Greek Idea

A picture showing Thales' (d. 546 bce) idea of a flat Earth floating on water. The picture shows air and fire, two of Earth's four basic elements.

Contrary to what its supporters claim, evolution is not a scientific theory but a pagan belief. The idea of evolution first appeared in such ancient societies as Egypt, Babylon, and Sumer, after which it passed to ancient Greek philosophers. Pagan Sumerian monuments contain statements denying creation and claiming that living things emerged by themselves as part of a gradual process. According to Sumerian belief, life emerged by itself out of the chaos of water.

As part of their own superstitious religions, the ancient Egyptians believed that "snakes, frogs, worms, and mice emerged from the mud of the Nile floodwaters." Just like the Sumerians, the ancient Egyptians denied the existence of a Creator and thought that "living things emerged by chance from mud."
The most important claim of the Greek philosophers Empedocles (fifth century bce), Thales (d. 546 bce), and Anaximander (d. 547 bce) of Miletus was that the first living things were formed from such inanimate substances as air, fire, and water. This theory posited that the first living things suddenly emerged in water and that later on, some of them left the water, adapted to life on land, and began to live there. Thales believed that water was the root of all life, that plants and animals began to develop in water, and that humanity was the end result of this process.4 Anaximander, a younger contemporary of Thales, held that "man arose from the fishes" and the source of life began with a "primordial mass."5

Some philosophers, such as Empedocles (d. fifth century bce), believed that Earth was composed of four elements: earth, air, fire, and water. In this seventeenth-century illustration, the four elements are symbolized as rings around the sun.

Anaximander's verse work On Nature is the first available written work based upon the theory of evolution. In that poem, he wrote that creatures arose from slime that had been dried by the sun. He thought that the first animals were covered with prickly scales and lived in the seas. As these fish-like creatures evolved, they moved onto land, shed their scaly coverings and eventually became human beings.6 (For further details, see The Religion of Darwinism by Harun Yahya, Abu'l Qasim Publishers, Jeddah, 2003) His theory can be considered the first foundation of the present-day theory of evolution, for it has many similarities with Darwinism.
Empedocles brought earlier ideas together and suggested that the fundamental elements (i.e., earth, air, fire, and water) came together to create bodies. He also believed that man had developed from plant life, and that only chance played any role in this process.7 As mentioned earlier, this concept of chance and its role in creation form the principle basis upon which the theory of evolution is built.

Heraclitus (d. fifth century bce) claimed that because the universe was in a process of constant change, there was no point in questioning the mythical account of its beginning and maintained that it had no beginning or end. Rather, it simply existed.8 In short, the materialist belief upon which evolution is based also existed in ancient Greece.

The idea of spontaneous development was supported by many other Greek philosophers, particularly Aristotle (384-22 bce). This idea said that animals, in particular certain worms, insects, and plants, came about by themselves in nature and so did not need to undergo any fertilization process. Maurice Manquat, well known for his studies on Aristotle's ideas on natural history, once said:

Heraclitus

Aristotle was concerned with the origin of life so much that he accepted spontaneous generation (the coming together of inanimate substances to spontaneously form a living thing) in order to explain certain events that could not be accounted for in any other way.9

On careful inspection, one can see considerable similarities between the ideas of past and present evolutionist thinkers. The roots of the materialist idea that the universe has no beginning and no end, as well as the evolutionist view that living things emerged as the result of chance, lie in pagan Sumerian culture and were common among materialist Greek thinkers. The ideas that life emerged from water and a mixture known as "primordial mass," and living things emerge only because of chance, form the bases of these two ideas that are linked despite the passage of so much time.

The Greek philosopher Aristotle

Thus, Muslim evolutionists support a theory whose roots are embedded in ancient ideas that have been shown to have no scientific basis. Moreover, such ideas were first proposed by ancient materialist thinkers and contain pagan meanings.
Actually, evolution is not restricted to ancient Sumerian culture or ancient Greek philosophers, for it forms the essence of such major contemporary belief systems as Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism. In other words, evolution is no more than a theory that is completely opposed to Islamic belief.
Some Muslim evolutionists, despite scientific evidence to the contrary, claim that the Qur'an supports this supposed "creationist theory of evolution" and try to find the source of evolution in the Muslim world. They assert that this idea first emerged from Muslim thinkers and, when their works were translated into foreign languages, evolutionist thought appeared in the West.

However, the few examples given above clearly reveal that evolution is no more than a primitive belief dating back to ancient pagan societies. It would be a great mistake to try and show that evolutionist thought, built upon materialist foundations, can be ascribed to Muslims when there is absolutely no clear scientific and historical basis to support such a claim.

Chance Conflicts with the Truth of Creation:
Those who maintain that there is no contradiction between evolution and creation ignore one important point: Such people believe that Darwinism's main claim is that living species emerged by evolving from each other. However, this is not the case, for evolutionists claim that life emerged as the result of chance, by unconscious mechanisms. In other words, life on Earth came about without a Creator and by itself from inanimate substances.
Such a claim rejects the existence of a Creator right from the start, and thus cannot be accepted by any Muslim. However, some Muslims who are unaware of this truth see no harm in supporting evolution on the assumption that God could have used evolution to create living things.

Prof. Fred Hoyle

Yet they ignore one important danger: Although they are trying to show that evolution is parallel to religion, in reality they are supporting and actually agreeing with an idea that is quite impossible from their own point of view. Meanwhile, evolutionists turn a blind eye to this situation because it furthers their cause of having society accept their ideas.
Looking at the matter as a devout Muslim and thinking about it in the light of the Qur'an, a theory that is fundamentally based upon chance clearly cannot have anything in common with Islam. Evolution sees chance, time, and inanimate matter as divine, and ascribes the title of "creator" to these weak and unconscious concepts. No Muslim can accept such a pagan-based theory, for each Muslim knows that Allah, the sole Creator, created everything from nothing. Therefore, he uses science and reason to oppose all beliefs and ideas that conflict with that fact.
Evolution is a component of materialism and, according to materialism, the universe has no beginning or end, and thus no need for a Creator. This irreligious ideology suggests that the universe, galaxies, stars, planets, sun, and other heavenly bodies, as well as their flawless systems and perfect equilibrium, are the results of chance. In the same way, evolution claims that the first protein and the first cell (the building blocks of life) developed by themselves as the result of a string of blind coincidences. This same ideology claims that the wonders of design in all living things, whether they live on land, in the sea, or in the skies, are the product of chance. Although surrounded on all sides by evidence of creation, starting with the design in their own bodies, evolutionists insist upon ascribing all of that perfection to chance and unconscious processes. In other words, their main characteristic is to see chance as divine in order to deny God's existence. However, such a refusal to accept or to see God's evident existence and greatness changes nothing. God's infinite knowledge and matchless art reveal themselves in everything He creates.
As a matter of fact, recent scientific advances definitively reject the evolutionists' baseless claims that life emerged by itself and by natural processes. The superior design in life shows that a Creator Who has superior wisdom and knowledge created all living things. The fact that even the simplest organisms are irreducibly complex places all evolutionists in an impossible quandary - a fact that they themselves often admit! For example, the world-famous British mathematician and astronomer Fred Hoyle admits that life could not have come about by chance:
Once we see, however, that the probability of life originating at random is so utterly minuscule as to make it absurd�10

Evolutionists claim that the first living cell came about in the conditions of the primitive Earth, from inanimate substances and the chance effects of natural events.

The evolutionist Pierre-Paul Grassé confesses that ascribing a creative force to chance is pure fantasy:
Yet the Darwinian theory is even more demanding: A single plant, a single animal would require thousands and thousands of lucky, appropriate events. Thus, miracles would become the rule: events with an infinitesimal probability could not fail to occur� There is no law against daydreaming, but science must not indulge in it.11
Those words make the evolutionists' ideological dilemma perfectly clear: Even though they see that their theory is untenable and unscientific, they refuse to abandon it because of their ideological obsession. In another statement, Hoyle reveals why evolutionists believe in chance:
Indeed, such a theory (that life was assembled by an intelligence) is so obvious that one wonders why it is not widely accepted as being self-evident. The reasons are psychological rather than scientific.12
What Hoyle describes as a "psychological" reason has conditioned evolutionists to deny creation. All of these reasons are sufficient evidence for Muslim evolutionists to consider evolution as nothing more than a theory designed to deny God.

Evolutionists' claim that life formed by itself by chance from inanimate substances is as irrational and illogical as claiming that America's Statue of Liberty was formed by the coincidental coming together of sand and rocks when lightning struck the sea.

Natural Selection and Mutations Have No Power to Cause Evolution
Muslim evolutionists who ignore the fact that science has disproven evolution face another dilemma as well: the claim that the 1.5 million living species in nature came about as the result of unconscious natural events.
According to evolutionists, the first living cell emerged due to chemical reactions in inanimate matter. (Let's recall here that a considerable amount of scientific evidence shows that this is impossible. In addition, researchers who carried out experiments by bringing together the gases that made up Earth's initial atmosphere, as well as the appropriate atmospheric conditions, have been unable to "produce" even the smallest building block of life, the protein.13) Since they have failed to bring about a living organism despite all of the technology and scientific knowledge available to them, it is naturally irrational and illogical to claim that blind chance could have succeeded.
Evolution also claims that life began with that first cell, grew ever-more complex, and assumed an ever-greater variety until human beings were produced. In brief, the theory goes, unconscious mechanisms in nature must have continuously developed living things. For example, one bacterium contains the genetic code for some 2,000 proteins whereas a human being contains the genetic code for some 200,000 proteins. In other words, an unconscious mechanism "produced" the genetic data for 198,000 new proteins over time.

A CELL'S FLAWLESS CREATION
DISPROVES EVOLUTION

Even a single cell, the building block of life, possesses an enormously complex structure. The above picture shows just some of the parts that go into making up a cell. There is an extraordinarily complex and flawlessly planned organization between all of these components. To claim that all of this could have come about by chance flies in the face of logic and scientific discoveries.

That is what evolution claims. Yet does nature really contain a mechanism that can develop a living thing's genetic data?
The modern theory of evolution - also known as neo-Darwinism, the updated version of Darwin's original theory that takes into account recent discoveries in genetics - proposes two such mechanisms: natural selection and mutation.

The evolutionists' imaginary tree of life

Natural selection means that the strong and those who can adapt to changing natural conditions survive the fight for life, while the rest are eliminated and disappear. For instance, a continual fall in a region's temperature means that certain animal populations that are not resistant to low temperatures are weeded out. Over the long term, only those animals who are resistant to cold temperatures survive and eventually make up the whole population.

There is enough information in one human DNA molecule to fill 1,000 books. This giant encyclopedia has been shown to consist of 3 million letters. The flawless creation in DNA is proof of Allah's infinite power and might.

Alternatively, in the case of rabbits who live with the constant threat of predators, only those who best adapt to the prevailing conditions (e.g., those who can run the fastest), survive and thus pass their features on to subsequent generations. However, careful examination reveals that no new feature actually emerges here, for these rabbits are not turning into a new species or acquiring a new characteristic. Thus one cannot say that natural selection causes evolution.
This being the case, evolutionists are left with mutation. In order for evolution's claim to be acceptable, mutations must be able to develop a living thing's genetic data. Mutations are defined as errors in a living thing's genes that arise either as the result of external influences (e.g., radiation) or copying faults in DNA. Of course mutations may give rise to change, yet such changes are always destructive. To put it another way, mutations cannot develop living things; rather, they always harm living things.

Genetics made major advances during the twentieth century. By examining genetic diseases in living things in the light of rapidly developing science, scientists showed that mutations were not biological changes that could contribute something to evolution. This contradicts the evolutionists' claim. Advances in genetics, in particular, resulted in the acknowledgement that some 4,500 supposedly hereditary genetic diseases actually were caused by mutation.
In order for mutations to become hereditary, they must occur in the reproductive organs (sperm cells in men, ovaries in women). Only this type of genetic change can be transmitted to later generations. Many genetic diseases are caused by such changes in just those very cells. Mutations, on the other hand, form in other bodily organs (e.g., the liver or the brain), and so cannot be transmitted to subsequent generations. Such mutations, called "somatic," cause many cancers through degeneration in the cells' DNA.

According to natural selection, the strong and those able to adapt to their surroundings survive, while the rest disappear. Evolutionists propose that natural selection caused living things to evolve and resulted in new species. However, natural selection has no such effect; all of the supposed "evidence" presented so far confirms this.

Cancer is one of the best examples of the damage caused by mutations. Many carcinogenic factors, such as chemical substances and ultraviolet rays, actually produce mutations. Following the recent discovery of oncogenic and tumor-preventing genes that, when they malfunction, particularly effective in causing cancer, researchers realized how mutations lead to cancer. These two types of genes are necessary in order for cells to multiply and for the body to renew itself. If one of them is damaged by mutation, cells begin to grow in an uncontrolled manner and cancer begins to form. We can compare this situation to a stuck gas pedal or a non-working brake in a car. In both cases, the car will crash. In the same way, the cells' uncontrolled growth rate leads first to cancer and then to death. When mutations damage these genes at birth, as in the case of retinoblastoma, the affected babies soon die.

Chance mutations are always harmful to humans and all other living things. The horrifying results of the 1986 nuclear accident at Chernobyl show the effect of mutations.
http://www.ecn.cz/private/c10/tmi.jpg
http://www.ecn.cz/private/c10/child.jpg
http://www.adiccp.org/imagery/medical-aid.html

The damage done to living things by mutations is not limited to these examples. Almost all mutations observed so far are harmful; only a few are neutral. Despite this, however, evolutionists as well as Muslim evolutionists still try to maintain that mutation is a valid evolutionary mechanism. If species had evolved into one another, as evolutionists claim, millions of advantageous mutations would have had to occur and be present in all reproductive cells.

Just as an earthquake destroys a city instead of developing it, chance mutations lead to sickness, deformity, and handicaps in living things.

Science, as it continues to advance, has discovered millions of harmful mutations and has identified the resulting diseases. However, evolution faces a terrible quandary: Evolutionist scientists can cite no mutations that actually increase genetic data. Pierre Paul Grassé, one of France's best-known zoologists, editor of the 35-volume Traite de Zoologie, and former president of the French Academy of Sciences, has compared mutations to the incorrect letters made while copying a written text. And just like incorrect letters, mutations do not increase information; rather, they damage the already existing data. Grassé states this fact in the following manner:
Mutations, in time, occur incoherently. They are not complimentary to one another, nor are they cumulative in successive generations toward a given direction. They modify what persists, but they do so in disorder, no matter how... As soon as some disorder, even slight, appears in an organized being, sickness, then death follow. There is no possible compromise between the phenomenon of life and anarchy.14
Given this fact, mutations, as Grassé puts it, "no matter how numerous they may be,they do not produce any kind of evolution." We can compare the effects of mutations to an earthquake. Just as an earthquake does not help develop or improve a city but actually tears it down, mutations always have negative effects in exactly the same way. From this point of view, the evolutionists' claims regarding mutations are completely unfounded. (For further details, see The Evolution Deceit by Harun Yahya, Taha Publishers, London, 1999).

"These people of ours have taken gods apart from Him. Why do they not produce a clear authority concerning them? Who could do greater wrong than someone who invents a lie against Allah?"
(Qur'an, 18: 15)

[Dr.Trax]

The Errors of Those Who Use Qur'anic Verses To Prove Evolution!

The fundamental guides for all Muslims who believe in Allah and Islam are the Qur'an and the Sunnah (teachings) of the Prophet, may Allah bless him and grant him peace. The Qur'an contains many verses about the creation of life and the universe. None of these verses gives even the slightest indication of creation through evolution. In other words, the Qur'an does not support the ideas that species evolved from one another or that there is an evolutionary link between them. On the contrary, the Qur'an reveals that Allah created life and the universe miraculously by commanding them to "Be!" When we recall that scientific discoveries also invalidate evolution, we once again see how the Qur'an always runs parallel to science.

Of course, if Allah had so willed, He could have created anything by means of evolution. Yet there is no sign of His doing so in the Qur'an, and not one verse supports the evolutionists' claim that species developed by stages. If creation had taken place in such a way, we would have been able to see its details within the Qur'an. Even though everything is so clear, some Muslims who support Darwinism misinterpret certain verses by ascribing to them meanings that do not agree with the clear and obvious meanings that those verses actually have. In order to defend evolution and provide some Qur'anic evidence for it, the meanings of some verses are distorted, guesswork is relied upon, and prejudiced interpretations are made. About the people in this dangerous situation, Allah says the following:

Among them is a group who distort the Book with their tongues so that you think it is from the Book when it is not from the Book. They say, "It is from Allah," but it is not from Allah. They tell a lie against Allah, and they know it. (Qur'an, 3:78)

Those who know the Qur'an and yet twist its verses' original meaning and deliberately misinterpret them are said to commit falsehoods against Allah. No Muslim would willingly do such a thing, for he or she would be too afraid of the consequences. Thus, all comments based upon guesswork and speculation, especially when made by people who know the Qur'an and what it says on such important matters, are morally unacceptable. Of course it would be mistaken to make such a generalization about everyone who claims that evolution is compatible with religion, because some of them do not think about what such a claim means and others do not realize the underlying dangers. Even so, people must not mislead others on what the Qur'an says by speaking on Allah's behalf and seeking to prove evolution by using its verses. Those who do so must reconsider the seriousness of what they are doing and avoid making any such interpretations or comments, for Allah will hold them accountable for their words. Not only do such people deceive themselves, but they also deceive those who read their words - a heavy responsibility indeed.
At the root of the question is this: Muslims who believe in evolution accept it as a scientific fact and thus approach the Qur'an with the idea that it must confirm evolution. Thus they load every word that might have an evolutionary interpretation with meanings that it cannot possibly bear. When the Qur'an is regarded as a whole, or when the verse in question is read in conjunction with those before and after it, one can seen that the explanations offered are forced and invalid.
In this chapter, we shall consider those verses that Muslims who accept evolution present as evidence for evolution. We shall then respond to their claims, again from the Qur'an, and compare them with the interpretations made by prominent Islamic scholars.
However, we should be aware of the following basic fact: The Qur'an must be read and interpreted in the form that Allah revealed it, with a completely sincere heart and without being influenced by any non-Islamic idea or philosophy. Approaching the Qur'an in this manner will reveal that it contains no information about creation by evolution. On the contrary, it will be seen that Allah created living things and everything else with the single command "Be!" If half-ape half-human creatures really existed before Prophet Adam, Allah would have explained that in a clear and easily understandable manner. The fact that the Qur'an is quite clear and very understandable shows that the claim of evolutionary creation is untrue.

Evolutionist scientists draw their strength from forgeries, distortions, and works of fantasy, and not, as some Muslims think, from scientific evidence. Reconstructions are an example of these distortions.Evolutionists shape features that leave no trace in the fossil record (e.g., the appearance of nose and lips, hair style, the shape of the eyebrows, and body hair) in order to support evolution. They portray these imaginary creatures as walking with their families, hunting, or engaged in some other aspect of daily life. Yet none of these creatures is supported by the existence of even one fossil.

1. THE ERROR THAT MAN WAS CREATED BY EVOLUTIONARY STAGES
What is the matter with you that you do not hope for honor from Allah, when He created you by successive stages? (Qur'an, 71:13-14)
Those who support evolutionary creation interpret the words successive stages as meaning "going through evolutionary stages." However, interpreting the Arabic word atwaran as evolutionary stages, which is no more than a personal opinion, is not unanimously accepted by all Islamic scholars.
Atwar (situation, condition) is the plural of tawru, and appears in that form in no other Qur'anic verse. The Islamic world's interpretations of this verse demonstrate that fact.
In his interpretation, Muhammed Hamdi Yazir of Elmali translated the verse as: "He has created you stage by stage through several conditions." In his commentary, he described these stages as "steps of evolution." However, this description has nothing to do with evolution, which proposes that man's roots lie in other living species. In fact, immediately afterwards he says what these stages are:
According to the explanation given by Ebus Suud43 first come the elements, then nutriments, then mixtures, then sperm, then a piece of flesh, then flesh and bone, and this is finally shaped with a completely different creation. "Blessed be Allah, the Best of Creators!" (Qur'an, 23:14) Is not Allah, the Almighty Creator, worthy of praise and respect? Can He not raise you still further with another form and creation? Or can He not also destroy you and cast you down into sorrowful torment? Why do you not think of these things?
As the above statements show, this verse describes how a person reaches his or her mother's womb as a sperm, develops as an embryo and then as a piece of flesh, and then develops into flesh and bone before emerging into the world as a human being.
In Imam al-Tabari's commentary, Surah Nuh: 14 is translated as "In fact, he created you by stages," and interpreted this as meaning, "You were first in the form of a sperm, then He created you as a blood clot, then a small piece of flesh."44

Omar Nasuhi Bilmen translates the verse as "In fact, He created you through various degrees," and goes on to interpret it as follows:
He (created) you through various degrees. You were first of all a seed, then a drop of blood. You became a piece of flesh and possessed bones, then you were born as a human being. Are not all these assorted and exemplary occurrences and changes shining proofs of the existence, power, and greatness of a Lord of Creation? Why do you not think of your own creation?45
As we see here, Muslim Qur'anic scholars agree that the interpretation of Surah Nuh: 14 refers to the process involved in the development of the human being from the joining of a sperm and an egg. That the verse is to be interpreted in this way is clear from the principle of "interpreting Qur'anic verses in the light of other Qur'anic verses," because in other verses Allah explains the stages of creation as being those inside the mother's womb. That is why atwaran has to be translated in this way. It is not justified to use the word as support for the theory of evolution, which tries to tie the origins of man to another living species.






2. THE ERROR THAT THE QUR'AN CONTAINS SIGNS OF THE EVOLUTIONARY PROCESS
There surely came over man a period of time when he was a thing not worth mentioning. (Qur'an, 76:1)
The same people also use this verse as evidence for evolution. In translations based on personal interpretation, the expression "when he was a thing not worth mentioning" is expressed as a statement of "previous states before man became man." However, this claim is just as far from the truth as the first one.
The Arabic part of the underlined section runs as follows:

lam yakun :he was not

shay'an : a thing

madhkuran : mentioned

Trying to use this expression as evidence for evolution is really forcing the words. In fact, Qur'anic scholars do not interpret this verse as indicating an evolutionary process. For example, Hamdi Yazir of Elmali makes the following comments:
In the beginning were elements and minerals, then vegetable and animal nutrients-"a kind of clay" (Qur'an, 23:12) were created out of them in stages. Then, something emerged very slowly and by stages from the sperm that was filtered from them. But that was not something called a human being. Just as mankind is not eternal, nor is his substance; that emerged later. Man came into being long after the beginning of time and the creation of the universe.46
Omer Nasuhi Bilmen explains the verse in this way:
These verses announce that Allah created man to see and hear out of a drop of water when he was not, and that He has set a test for him.... Mankind did not exist in the beginning, but was created later as a figured body out of a drop of water, soil, and clay. That person was not known at that time, his name and why he had been created were a mystery to the inhabitants of Earth and sky. He then began to be reminded that he has a soul.47
Imam al-Tabari explains the verse as meaning: "Such a long period of time passed since the time of Adam that at that time he was not even a thing that had any worth and superiority. He was nothing but sticky and modified clay."48
For this reason, to see the expression of time in this verse as an evolutionary period is purely subjective.






3. THE ERROR THAT CREATION OUT OF WATER INDICATES EVOLUTIONARY CREATION
We created man from a mingled drop to test him, and We gave him (the gifts) of hearing and sight. (Qur'an, 76:2)
Those who defend evolutionary creation try to show that the statements in many verses that man was created out of water are evidence that all living things emerged from water.
However, such verses are always interpreted by Qur'anic scholars and commentators as referring to creation from the joining of a sperm and an egg. For instance, Muhammed Hamdi Yazir of Elmali comments on the above verse as follows:
... he was created from a nutfah in the form of water. The nutfah is pure water. It also means seminal fluid. Nutfah and seminal fluid traditionally have the same meaning. But at the end of Surat al-Qiyamah it says "a nutfah in the ejected semen" (Qur'an, 75:37), thus stating that the nutfah is part of the semen. As it is reported in Sahih al-Muslim, "Children do not come from the entire fluid." And the hadith, speaking of every little part of the whole, does not say, "Every part of a fluid," but rather speaks of one part of "the whole fluid," and that a child does not come from the entire fluid, but from just one part of it. The nutfah is just one pure part of the semen.49
Ibn al-Tabari interprets it as meaning, "We have created the descendants of Adam out of the mixing of male and female fertilizing fluids."50
Omer Nasuhi Bilmen explains it in this manner:
... (We created man from a mingled drop.) We have formed him out of the male and female fluids that mix together. Yes... Human beings were, for a period of time, a nutfah, in other words, crystal clear, pure water, and then for a certain period of time, an 'alaq, in other words, a clot of blood, and then a mudgha, in other words, a lump of flesh. Later, bones are formed and wrapped around with flesh, and come to life...51
As we have seen from these explanations, there is no connection between man's creation from "a mingled drop" and the theory of evolution's claim that man emerged by stages from a single cell that developed by chance in water. As all great Qur'anic scholars have stated, this verse draws our attention to the fact of creation inside the mother's womb.
When we examine another verse where the stages of human creation are discussed, the fundamental error in these comments is clearly revealed:
Mankind! If you are in any doubt about the Rising, know that We created you from dust, then from a drop of sperm, then from a clot of blood, then from a lump of flesh, formed yet unformed, so We may make things clear to you. We make whatever We will to stay in the womb until a specified time, and then We bring you out as children so that you can reach your full maturity. Some of you die and some of you revert to the lowest form of life so that, after having knowledge, they then know nothing at all. And you see the ground dead and barren; then when We send down water onto it it quivers and swells and sprouts with luxuriant plants of every kind. (Qur'an, 22:5)
In this verse, the stages of the creation of a human being are described. Dust, i.e., substances both organic and inorganic, which are found in their elementary forms on and in the earth, is the raw material that includes the basic minerals and elements in the human body. The second stage is the coming together of these materials in the seminal fluid, which is described in the Qur'an as a mingled drop. This drop contains the sperm that possesses the genetic information and structure necessary to fertilize the egg inside the mother's womb. In short, the raw material for a human being is (dust of) the earth, the essence of which is collected in a drop of seminal fluid in a manner that will bring about a human being. Following the water stage, a human being's developmental stages inside the mother's womb are described in the Qur'an. The theory of evolution, on the other hand, assumes the existence of millions of hypothetical stages (the first cell, single-celled creatures, multi-celled creatures, invertebrates, vertebrates, reptiles, mammals, primates, and countless similar stages) between the origination of life in water to a human being's formation. In the sequence presented by the verse, however, it is clear that there is no such logic or description, for a human being takes on the form of an 'alaq after he or she is in the form of a drop of water.
For this reason, it is clear that the verse is not describing the different evolutionary stages undergone by a human being, but rather the stages of creation from before and inside the mother's womb right up to old age.
Other verses stating that human beings and other living things were created from water also contain no meaning that could be used to support evolution. The following verses are among those that contain such statements:

Do those who disbelieve not see that the heavens and Earth were sewn together and then We unstitched them, and that We made from water every living thing? So will they not believe? (Qur'an, 21:30)
Allah created every animal from water. Some of them go on their bellies, some of them on two legs, and some on four. Allah creates whatever He wills. Allah has power over all things. (Qur'an, 24:45)

The verses below clearly state that the "drop of water" is semen:

He created the two sexes - male and female - out of a sperm-drop when it spurted forth (min nutfatin idha tumna); that He is responsible for the second existence. (Qur'an, 53:45-47)



min:from

nutfatin: nutfah, sperm-drop

idha: when...

tumna: be spurted forth

Was he not a drop of ejaculated sperm? (nutfatan min maniyin yumna) (Qur'an, 75:37)

nutfatan:nutfah, a drop of water

min: from

maniyin: sperm

yumna: being ejaculated

Man has only to look at that from which he was created. He was created from a spurting fluid (Khuliqa min ma'in dafiqin), emerging from between the backbone and the breastbone. (Qur'an, 86:5-7)

khuliqa:was created

min: from

ma'in: water

dafiqin: suddenly erupting, spurting, being caused to flow


Some Qur'anic commentators think that "the creation of living things from water" contains a meaning that parallels the theory of evolution. However, this view is seriously flawed. The verses reveal that water is the raw material for living things by saying that all living things were created from it. In fact, modern biology has revealed that water is the most fundamental component of all living bodies, for the human body is approximately 70 percent water. Water permits movement inside the cell, between cells, and between tissues. Without it, there would be no life.






4. THE ERROR THAT CREATION FIRST FROM DUST AND THEN FROM WATER INDICATES EVOLUTIONARY CREATION

... Do you then disbelieve in Him Who created you from dust, then from a drop of sperm, and then formed you as a man? (Qur'an, 18:37)

Imam al-Tabari comments on this verse as follows:
... Would you deny Allah, Who created your father Adam from dust, then created you from a man and a woman's fluids, then wrapped you in human form? Allah, Who gave you these things and made you what you are, brought you into being to make you another living thing after you die and return to soil.52
Omer Nasuhi Bilmen's commentary on the same verse states:
Do you deny the Almighty Allah Who created the Prophet Adam, the origin of your race and the cause of your creation, (from dust), Who then created you and (formed you as a man after creating you) from a nutfah and a drop of sperm, Who brought you into being as a complete human being as a result of different stages of life? Because denying the afterlife means denying the Almighty Allah, Who gives you the news that it will happen and Who has the power to make it happen.53
As these commentators indicate, using such verses as evidence for evolutionary creation is no more than pure subjectivism, for they in no way bear the meanings that the evolutionists attribute to them. The expression creation from dust describes the creation of Prophet Adam, and creation from water refers to the development of a human being, starting with the sperm. It is indicated in the verse below that Allah created a human being directly from dried clay. This verse, which describes Prophet Adam's creation, does not speak of a stage:

When your Lord said to the angels: "I am creating a human being out of dried clay formed from fetid black mud. When I have formed him and breathed My Spirit into him, fall down in prostration in front of him!" (Qur'an, 15:28-29)

If the Qur'anic account of creation's stages is read carefully, bearing in mind the consecutive processes, it will be realized immediately that such an evolutionary view is incorrect.
The Qur'an contains many verses indicating that Prophet Adam, peace be upon him, was not created through an evolutionary stage. One of them reads:

The likeness of 'Isa in Allah's sight is the same as Adam. He created him from earth and then He said to him, "Be!" and he was. (Qur'an, 3:59)

The above verse states that Allah created Prophets Adam and 'Isa, peace be upon them, in the same way. As we stressed earlier, Prophet Adam was created with no parents, from the earth, at Allah's command "Be!" Prophet Jesus also was created without father, by Allah's Will expressed through the command "Be!" By means of this command, Maryam, peace be upon her, became pregnant with Jesus:

(Maryam) veiled herself from them. Then We sent Our Spirit to her, and it took on for her the form of a handsome, well-built man. She said: "I seek refuge from you with the All-Merciful, if you do your duty." He said: "I am only your Lord's messenger, so that He can give you a pure boy." She asked: "How can I have a boy when no man has touched me and I am not an unchaste woman?" He replied: "It will be so! Your Lord says: 'That is easy for Me. It is so that We can make him a Sign for mankind and a mercy from Us.' It is a matter already decreed." (Qur'an, 19:17-21)

In the other verses that refer to creation from water and earth, it is not man's evolutionary stages that are being described, but the stages of human creation before the womb, during it, and after birth.

Mankind! If you are in any doubt about the Rising, know that We created you from dust, then from a drop of sperm, then from a clot of blood, then from a lump of flesh, formed yet unformed, so We may make things clear to you. We make whatever We will to stay in the womb until a specified time and then We bring you out as children so that you can reach your full maturity. Some of you die and some of you revert to the lowest form of life so that, after having knowledge, they then know nothing at all. And you see the ground dead and barren; then when We send down water onto it it quivers and swells and sprouts with luxuriant plants of every kind. (Qur'an, 22:5)
He created you from earth, then from a drop of sperm, then from a clot of blood, then He brings you out as infants, then so you may achieve full strength, then so you may become old men - though some of you may die before that time - so that you may reach a predetermined age and so that hopefully you will use your intellect. (Qur'an, 40:67)
Out of a sperm-drop when it spurted forth (Qur'an, 53:46)

5. THE ERROR THAT THE FIRST MAN WAS CREATED OVER TIME
Your Lord said to the angels, "I am going to create a human being out of clay." (Qur'an, 38:71)
Another error in evolutionary creation stems from the faulty interpretation of the above verse. Evolutionists claim that the underlined phrase above indicates a slow creation over time. However, the original Arabic makes it clear that this is a purely subjective view and entirely contradictory:
"inni khaliqun basharan min tinin" means "I am He Who created a human being out of clay."
The verse says nothing like "I am creating." In fact, the verse continues, "When I have formed him and breathed My Spirit into him, fall down in prostration to him!" It is clear from this that the verb create here takes place in a single instant.
Indeed, no Qur'anic scholar translates it as "I am creating." For instance, a Turkish Muslim scholar, Suleyman Ates's commentary reads:

The Originator of the heavens and earth. When He decides on something, He just says to it, " Be" and it is.
(Qur'an, 2:117)

Your Lord told the angels "I am going to create a human being out of clay."
Allah told the angels He was going to create a human being out of putrid clay. After giving the clay human form and breathing His Own Spirit into him, he told the angels to prostrate before him. They all did so. Only Satan did not prostrate himself to man's ancestor, saying that he who was created from fire was better than a human being created from clay.
Imam al-Tabari translates the same verse as, "I am going to create a human being out of clay," and provides this commentary:
... The Lord once told the angels, "I am going to create a human being out of clay. When I create him, order his form, and breathe My Spirit into him, you will prostrate before him."54
Those who defend evolutionary creation also cite the following verse to support the thesis that human beings were created through a process:

He Who has created all things in the best possible way. He commenced the creation of man from clay. (Qur'an, 32:7)

According to such peoples' interpretations, the underlined expression refers to a process, in this case an evolutionary process. Yet it does not actually refer to such a thing at all. As we have stressed throughout this book, a great many verses describe in detail Allah's creation from nothing, and none of them can be interpreted to mean an evolutionary process. The following verses stress that Allah is in a constant state of creation.

He Who originates creation and then regenerates it and provides for you from out of heaven and earth. Is there another god besides Allah? Say: "Bring your proof if you are being truthful." (Qur'an, 27:64)

Have they not seen how Allah brings creation out of nothing, then reproduces it? That is easy for Allah. (Qur'an, 29:19)
Allah originates creation, then will regenerate it, and then you will be returned to Him. (Qur'an, 30:11)

Allah's constant creation of every detail in the universe does not imply evolution. Like the other such interpretations, this one is very forced. Moreover, when the Qur'an is taken as a whole, such an assertion is found to have no true basis. Omer Nasuhi Bilmen interprets the verse to mean "... He created the Prophet Adam from earth,"55 and Imam al-Tabari as "He commenced the creation of Adam from clay."56
Evolutionist Muslims cite the verses below, especially the underlined part, to support their case:

O man! What has deluded you in respect of your Noble Lord? He Who created you and formed you and proportioned you and assembled you in whatever way He willed. (Qur'an, 82:6-8)

Yet it would be forcing the verse's meaning to say that it refers to an evolutionary process. In fact, Hamdi Yazir of Elmali interprets the verse as follows:
"The Lord created you. It is clear that creation here means bringing into being prior to ordering the body and the organs, giving measure and form and bringing the parts together. We are also told that existence, the essence of every blessing, is the most important Divine Favor and Kindness.
He then ordered your body and organs. It is stated that "He created you from dust, then from a drop of sperm, then formed you as a man" (Qur'an, 18:37) and, as in many other verses, that man was brought to the stage at which he could have the soul breathed into him in stages; He ordered your body, organs, and powers, and gave you harmony and moderation. There are two interpretations here, one originating from 'adl and the other from ta'dil. Since they both mean "balancing" and "normalizing," several interpretations have been made stating that the "creation in order" has been made perfect.
According to the account by Muqatil, the expression in Surat at-Qiyama: 4 that "We are well able to reshape his fingers," means that the body is well-proportioned and orderly, as the matching and details of the twin organs (e.g., the eyes, ears, hands, and feet) is known from anatomy.57
According to Abu Ali Farisi, the expression "He proportioned you" actually means "He shaped you in the most beautiful form, and with this proportion gave you the capacity to perceive reason, ideas and might, and gave you dominion over plants and other living things. He brought you forth in a state of maturity far exceeding that of the other beings in the world." This is compatible with the meanings of "When I have formed him and breathed My Spirit into him" (Qur'an, 15:29) and "favored them greatly over many We have created" (Qur'an, 17:70). All of these are a blessing and kindness from Allah.58
Omer Nasuhi Bilmen interprets the verse in these terms:
Yes. Your Lord (Who created you) gave you form from nothingness (then shaped you), gave you sound and perfect organs (and proportioned you). He proportioned your organs, with a pleasing beauty and natural disposition.59
Imam al-Tabari states that Surat al-Infitar: 7 refers to man being created within an order:
Oh Man, the Lord Who created you made that creation ordered and produced you in a healthy, ordered and correct form. (In other words he created a complete human being with ordered height, sound dimensions and in the best possible form and appearance.) Allah produced you with the beauty or ugliness He saw fit.60
As can be seen from the above accounts, the statements are very clear; they point to Allah's sound, ordered, and complete creation of the first man. Similar statements are in fact to be found in many other verses. For instance, Surat as-Sajda: 7-9 says:

He Who has created all things in the best possible way. He commenced the creation of man from clay; then produced his seed from an extract of base fluid; then (He) formed him and breathed His Spirit into him and gave you hearing, sight and hearts. What little thanks you show! (Qur'an, 32: 7-9)

The word "creation" was first used in these verses, which then went on to say that He created eyes, ears, and hearts. Thus, we are being told that all of these stages happened at the same time; in other words, that the first man's eyes, ears, and hearts were created together, and that he was created in one moment. It is a grave error to interpret these verses as referring to human evolution. In fact, the great Islamic scholars all agree about this verse's interpretation. For instance, Imam al-Tabari says:
... He then brought forth man as a complete being in an ordered form, then breathed his soul into him, and thus made him a speaking creature ... He gave the ears with which you hear, the eyes with which you see, and the hearts with which you distinguish between right and wrong, and you must give thanks for these gifts ...61
Omer Nasuhi Bilmen's interpretation reads: "The Lord ordered man who started to take form, completed his body while it was still in his mother's womb, and formed it in the appropriate manner (and then breathed His Spirit into it). In other words, He gave him life and inspired the vital force in his soul ... The Lord gave you such beneficial powers (hearing) that thanks to these you hear the words spoken to you, and created your eyes and hearts with which you see what is around you and distinguish between what is beneficial and what is not. Each of these is a great divine blessing."62



6. THE ERROR THAT PROPHET ADAM WAS NOT THE FIRST MAN:
Another claim put forward regarding evolutionary creation is that Prophet Adam, peace be upon him, may not have been the first man and may not even have been a human being. (We absolve Prophet Adam, peace be upon him). The following verse is presented as evidence for this:

When your Lord said to the angels, "I will create a vicegerent on Earth," they said, "Why put on it one who will cause corruption on it and shed blood when we glorify You with praise and proclaim Your purity?" He said, "I know what you do not know." (Qur'an, 2:30)

Those who support this claim say that the Arabic verb ja'ala in the expression "I will create a vicegerent" means "to appoint." In other words, they suggest that Prophet Adam was not the first man, but that he was "appointed" as a vicegerent among many people. However, in the Qur'an, this verb has the following meanings:
To create, invent, translate, make, place and render
Some examples of Qur'anic verses where ja'ala is used are:

He created you from a single self, then produced (ja'ala) its mate from it, and sent down livestock to you - eight kinds in pairs... (Qur'an, 39:6)
Say: "He brought you into being and gave (ja'ala) you hearing, sight and hearts. What little thanks you show! (Qur'an, 67:23)
(Do you not see how He) placed the moon as a light in them and made (ja'la) the sun a blazing lamp? (Qur'an, 71:16)
Allah has spread (ja'la) the ground out as a carpet for you (Qur'an, 71:19)

As can be seen from the above verses, ja'ala has various meanings. Furthermore, several verses state that Prophet Adam, peace be upon him, was created from dust. These verses make it clear that Prophet Adam, peace be upon him, was not just one man among many, but that he possessed a special and different creation.
The Qur'an reveals another important fact about Prophet Adam: his removal from the Garden of Eden. It says in the verses:

Children of Adam! Do not let Satan tempt you into trouble, as He expelled your parents from the Garden, stripping them of their covering, and disclosing to them their private parts. He and his tribe see you from where you do not see them. We have made the demons friends of those who do not believe. (Qur'an, 7:27)
We said: "Adam, live in the Garden, you and your wife, and eat freely from it wherever you will. But do not approach this tree and so become wrongdoers." But Satan made them slip up by means of it, expelling them from where they were. We said: "Go down from here as enemies to each other! You will have residence on Earth and enjoyment for a time." (Qur'an, 2:35-36)

The verses' statements are perfectly clear. Allah created Prophet Adam, peace be upon him, from dust. Prophet Adam is a special creation that emerged first from his existence in heaven and then from his removal from it. Yet evolutionist Muslims ignore this evident truth and maintain that "heaven" here refers not to the Heaven in the hereafter but to a beautiful area on Earth, despite the fact that the Qur'an specifies many features of the heaven in which Prophet Adam was created. For example, that Heaven contains both angels and the devil, and the angels speak with Allah. It is a mistake to produce forced interpretations and seek evidence of evolution when the verses are so clear on this matter.
Many verses state that all people are descended from Prophet Adam, peace be upon him. As the Qur'an tells us:

When your Lord took out all their descendants from the loins of the children of Adam and made them testify against themselves "Am I not your Lord?" they said: "We testify that indeed You are!" Lest you say on the Day of Rising: "We knew nothing of this." Or lest you say: "Our forefathers associated others with Allah before our time, and we are merely descendants coming after them. So are You going to destroy us for what those purveyors of falsehood did?" (Qur'an, 7:172-173)

Prophet Adam, peace be upon him, was the first man and Allah's first messenger. The verses are so clear on this matter that there is no need for any commentary. All that people have to do is read the Qur'an with a sincere heart and listen to their conscience. Allah will reveal the truth to those who read the verses with that intent.






7. THE ERROR THAT THE "FOREFATHERS" MENTIONED IN THE QUR'AN REFER TO EVOLUTIONARY ANCESTORS
Another matter that Muslim evolutionists try to portray as evidence for their claims is the expression our forefathers, which appears in several verses. According to their erroneous interpretation, this expression refers directly to man's primitive ancestors. Their rationale for this is that the word forefathers appears in the plural in the Qur'an. Two of the verses in question read:

He (Musa) said, "Your Lord and the Lord of your forefathers, the previous peoples." (Qur'an, 26:26)
There is no god but Him - He gives life and causes to die - your Lord and the Lord of your forefathers, the previous peoples. (Qur'an, 44:8)

However, this is a forced claim because the use of the word in the plural form is familiar and definitely cannot be used as a basis for an evolutionist interpretation.
This expression occurs in many other verses, among them Surat al-Baqara: 133. Here, "forefathers" does not refer to any evolutionary process, but to preceding generations. In the same way, the term "forefathers, the previous peoples" in the past refers to past generations. The expression carries no evolutionary meaning:

Or were you present when death came to Ya'qub and he said to his sons, "What will you worship when I have gone?" They said, "We will worship your God, the God of your forefathers, Ibrahim, Isma'il and Ishaq - one God. We are Muslims submitted to Him." (Qur'an, 2:133)

8. THE ERROR ABOUT THE FORM OF HUMAN CREATION
Allah caused you to grow from the earth, and then will return you to it and bring you out again. (Qur'an, 71:17-18)
Evolutionist Muslims view this verse as a vital foundation upon which they can base their views. The expression "Allah caused you to grow from the earth" is presented as evidence for inorganic evolution. As is clearly indicated in the verse's interpretation, however, it expresses the creation of the first human being from earth. Hamdi Yazir of Elmali offers the same interpretation:
There are two aspects to the verse. The first is that saying He created you from earth means that He created your father from earth, and began the process of creating your race by creating him from earth. The other is that he created all of you from earth, because Allah creates us from nourishment, from plants, from earth.63
Omer Nasuhi Bilmen offers this interpretation of Surah Nuh 17-18:
O people! Consider this. Allah made you like a plant from earth. In other words, "He has created Adam, your forefather, from earth, or your essential substance (zygote) came into existence from plants and several food stuffs growing in the earth. People then grow and live. (Then) O people, He will return you to it. In other words: When you die, you will return to the earth and become part of the soil. (And) Then He will take you out of the graves and drive you all to the Judgment Day. These are facts.64
Imam al-Tabari's commentary states that: "Allah created you from dust of the earth. He made you from nothing.... He will later return you to your original states, to the earth. You will return to how you were before you were created. He can bring you back from the earth alive when He chooses."65
As we have seen from these interpretations by Qur'anic scholars, this verse cannot serve as a basis for evolutionary creation.
What is more, the claim of inorganic evolution has no scientific basis. The idea that lifeless substances could come together to form life is an unscientific one that has not been confirmed by any experiment or observation. Quite the contrary: French biologist Louis Pasteur (1822-95) showed that life can only come from life. This shows that life was definitely consciously created. In other words, Allah created all living things. (For more detail about the scientific proof and evolutionist deceptions on this subject please refer to The Evolution Deceit by Harun Yahya, Taha Publishers, London, 1999, and Darwinism Refuted by Harun Yahya, Goodword Publishers, New Delhi, 2003)



9. THE ERROR THAT THE QUR'AN POINTS TO NATURAL SELECTION
One of evolution's most fundamental claims is that natural selection is an evolutionary force. As we saw in earlier chapters, natural selection is an evolutionist deception that maintains that the strong survive while the weak are eliminated over time.
However, modern science shows that natural selection has no evolutionary force and cannot cause species to develop or new ones to appear. However, these scientific facts, which Darwinists choose to ignore because of their materialist concerns, also are ignored by Muslim evolutionists. Some Muslim circles support this dogmatic Darwinist view and even try to provide extremely forced Qur'anic evidence for it. For example:

Your Lord creates and chooses whatever He wills. The choice is not theirs. Glory be to Allah! He is exalted above anything they associate with Him! (Qur'an, 28:68)

This verse reveals those to whom Allah will show the true path and those prophets He will announce as messengers. It is a great mistake to say that the verse points toward evolutionary natural selection.
Qur'anic scholars unanimously agree on this interpretation. For instance, Imam al-Tabari offers the following commentary:
Your Lord creates what He wills out of His servants, and selects those He chooses to follow the true path. They have no right of choice in the matter. They have no right to choose to do as they wish...66
The great scholar Omer Nasuhi Bilmen offers this interpretation:
In those holy verses, Allah declares His creative Power, that He favors and chooses whom He wishes, His Wisdom and Might, His Unity, His meriting praise and splendor, His Divine Command, and that all His servants will be summoned to His spiritual Presence. In other words, no one can prevent the Almighty's favoring and choosing in any way. Whatever His servants choose is not effective on their own. With all due respect, Allah is not obliged to create what they favor and prefer. Allah does not send His prophets upon the preference and opinion of the people to whom He has sent His prophets, but only upon His divine Preference. Only He knows how and by which means goodness and prosperity will manifest. He has no partners, nothing may exist against His eternal Will, and no one's will may be against His exalted Determining and Selecting.67
Hamdi Yazir of Elmali interprets the verse as follows:
Your Lord creates and selects what He chooses. In other words, He creates what He wills and chooses those He wills from whom He has created. He imposes upon them such duties as prophethood and intercession. They have no choice in the matter. Apart from those Allah chooses, they have no right to select other partners or intercessors.68
A second verse that evolutionist Muslims offer is:

Praise be to Allah, the Bringer into Being of the heavens and Earth, He who made the angels messengers, with wings - two, three, or four. He adds to creation in any way He wills. Allah has power over all things. (Qur'an, 35:1)

Such Muslims suggest the verse is evidence for evolutionary development. However, they have to twist the verse's true meaning in order to derive such a meaning. It also conflicts with reason and logic, for the verse talks about the creation of the angels. Imam al-Tabari interprets the verse as follows: "He can increase the number of an angel's wings to the extent that He wills. He can carry out the same process in all living things. Creation and command are in His hands."69 Omer Nasuhi Bilmen agrees, "He is so powerful that He decides on angels' wings and powers."70



10. THE ERROR OF SHOWING THE QUR'AN AS EVIDENCE FOR MUTATION
Just as with natural selection, evolutionist Muslims misinterpret and force Qur'anic verses when it comes to mutation.
However, to think that a natural mechanism that has nothing but destructive effects could be evidence for evolution is a terrible error. No evolutionary effect of mutation has ever been observed. (For more detail on the scientific evidence about this subject, please see Darwinism Refuted by Harun Yahya, Goodword Publishers, New Delhi, 2003, Evolution Deceit by Harun Yahya, Taha Publishers, London, 1999) The important thing here is the evidence that evolutionist Muslims who believe that mutation is a mechanism of evolution try to offer from the Qur'an. They completely twist some verses away from their actual meaning. The verses in question read:

If We willed, We could transform them where they stand so they would neither be able to go out nor return. (Qur'an, 36:67)
You are well aware of those of you who broke the Sabbath. We said to them, "Be apes, despised, cast out." (Qur'an, 2:65)
When they were insolent about what they had been forbidden to do, We said to them, "Be apes, despised, cast out!" (Qur'an, 7:166)
Say: "Shall I tell you of a reward with Allah far worse than that: that of those whom Allah has cursed and with whom He is angry - turning some of them into monkeys and into pigs - and who worshipped false gods? Such people are in a worse situation and further from the right way." (Qur'an, 5:60)

So He (Musa) threw down his staff and there it was, unmistakably a snake. (Qur'an, 7:107)

Unless someone believes that it is necessary to twist and force the truth to find some Qur'anic evidence for evolution, it is impossible to see the verses as any kind of evidence for mutation.
The first four verses speak of the miraculous way in which Allah changes living things' bodies. The subject of the fifth verse is not even living, which makes it impossible to suggest it undergoes mutation. Evolutionist Muslims' portrayal of these verses as evidence for evolution shows just how corrupt, forced, and un-Islamic the idea of evolutionary creation truly is.






11. THE ERROR THAT THERE IS A FAMILIAL CONNECTION BETWEEN MAN AND APE IN THE QUR'AN
One verse that is often wrongly interpreted during debates on evolution, and which is interpreted by some individuals as indicating that theory, is the verse regarding Allah's turning a group of Jews into monkeys:

You are well aware of those of you who broke the Sabbath. We said to them, "Be apes, despised, cast out." We made it an exemplary punishment for those there then, and those coming afterwards, and a warning to the heedful. (Qur'an, 2:65-66)

This cannot be construed in a manner parallel to the theory of evolution, for:
1) The punishment mentioned might be in a spiritual sense. In other words, it is possible that the Jews in question were compared to monkeys in the sense of character and not in their actual physical appearance.
2) If the punishment in question did happen physically, that would be a miracle outside the laws of nature. We are talking about a sudden, supernatural miracle by the will of Allah here, a conscious creation. Evolution proposes that different species turned into each other over millions of years, by chance and in stages. For this reason, this Qur'anic account has nothing to do with the scenario put forward by those who support evolution.
In fact, the following verse reads: "We made it an exemplary punishment for those who were living at that time and those who will come later, and a warning to the heedful." This verse indicates that the people in question were turned into apes as a warning to those who will come later.
3) This punishment happened only once and to a limited number of people, whereas the theory of evolution puts forward the illogical and unscientific scenario that apes are related to all people.
4) The verse says that human beings were turned into apes; evolution says that it happened the other way around.

5) Qur'an, 5:60 relates that a deviant community incurred Allah's wrath and was turned into apes and pigs. It reads:

Say: "Shall I tell you of something with Allah far worse than that: that of those whom Allah has cursed and with whom He is angry - turning some of them into monkeys and into pigs - and who worshipped false deities? Such people are in a worse situation and further from the right way." (Qur'an, 5:60)

In this situation, the web of flawed logic that we have been considering throughout this book produces the unrealistic conclusion that the verse contains not only an evolutionary link between human beings and apes, but also between human beings and pigs! Not even the evolutionists claim that there is such a link between humans and pigs.
As we have seen so far, the claim that some verses point toward evolution is an error that contradicts not only the Qur'an but also the theses of the theory of evolution itself.

[Science101]

Dr.Trax

I no longer have any desire to participate in a thread that lies to people.

You do not want to learn what science has found, so I'm wasting my time talking to you.

[ranma1/2]

It is quite amazing how people will reject something as well supported by evidence such as evolution without understanding what the process entails.
The only people who actually reject this theory are:
1)people who have not understood it and are unwilling to learn...
2)those who do understand the theory and having examined it in detail and still reject it do so for no reason other than it goes against their religion
ther

blind faith is the worst kind of malady afflicting the human race.

What I dont understand is why so many creationists dont understand that evolution does not deal with how life began but what happened after life began. It is very common for scientists to say I dont know . Unlike many creationists that just fill in their ignorance with god did id instead of actually critically thinking.

Evolution is supported by tons of evidence and only creationists seem to reject it.

I was taught evolution at highschool and my biology teacher told us about vestigial organs, the peppered moths, etc. Having recently researched these on my own due to curiousity and wanting to learn more, I wonder whether she knew she was sparking an interest in me. Of course there are vestigial organs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vestigialangs
and anyone that believes otherwise is deluding themselves and ignoring reality.

[Science101]

I agree. It is not based on wisdom. And since this is fact that shows how the Creator works, they deny their own Creator by believing what they want to believe and not what has been proven to be fact.

We can only discover what the Creator is. Not force the Creator to be what we want it to be because it suits our ego.


And I must add that even if you don't believe in a "Creator" as an entity like I and others do then natural forces "created" us, but the two are still the same. It's a logical paradox I'm finding true that science seems to be making stronger as we learn more.

[Science101]

Excellent questions MustafaMc! I'll gladly answer your reply. It's Dr.Trax's spamming the forum with propaganda that misrepresents science while ignoring responsibility of answering questions with a mature answer, that has me angry.

I am glad that you believe in a Creator. What role do you see that He played in the "origin of species"?

The most logical conclusion I have been able to find is that the Creator is in the species itself. Exists as a consciousness that directs evolution through us and all that is alive.

The most powerful "natural selection" there is seems to be "mate selection" where we consciously choose a mate based upon what we with our conscious mind find desirable in our species. From that comes evolution guided by intelligent/conscious thought.

In the case of the peacock where their evolution is most striking in the tails of the males, the females consciously direct their destiny. And the only way to know what the peacock can in time evolve into, is to ask them how big of a tail is too big. Maybe it is too big when can no longer fly and have to go back to climbing trees with claws then gliding like they did millions of years ago. Or maybe the females think that is disgusting and would rather a smaller tail than a mate that can no longer fly.

To for sure know where evolution is going, we would have to ask the animals. Even single celled animals have preferences.

There are problems with guiding evolution this way. For example, a flatter face looks nice to us, but our teeth no longer fit in our mouth properly so we now often have buck-teeth. And walking upright causes back problems, feet get sore easily, and other things. But even though we are not perfect, our design works good enough, with our big brains helping to compensate for advantages that were lost like being able to run up a tree like it was flat land.

Problems are solved by very undesirable features resulting in not reproducing because of not living long. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder so we cannot say that any one of us are not what the Creator wanted because we all are what was expected. It's that over long periods of time everything balances out.

If we go extinct then another intelligent creature like us has a chance to fill the space we leave behind. But with us crowding out and destroying other species, we slowed down the evolution of other things.

I agree with Trumble that evolution is the only viable scientific theory to explain the origin of new species.

I agree. No other scientific theories even exist. Evolutionary Theory is the only logical explanation for what has been discovered by science. Saying that there is a competing theory is false, there are none, nowhere.

[johan]

I agree. It is not based on wisdom. And since this is fact that shows how the Creator works, they deny their own Creator by believing what they want to believe and not what has been proven to be fact.

We can only discover what the Creator is. Not force the Creator to be what we want it to be because it suits our ego.


And I must add that even if you don't believe in a "Creator" as an entity like I and others do then natural forces "created" us, but the two are still the same. It's a logical paradox I'm finding true that science seems to be making stronger as we learn more.

Don't be fooled by your so called "facts". It could be merely mirage.
Haven't you learned from history?
Your pass so adored arrays of legendary scientists..
who all of them turned out to have only a slight unclear, biased, picture of a yet unknown huge jigsaw puzzle..

This world is designed with complexity in mind..
It's like you're an ant on top of an extremely huge TV screen (probably the size of the universe) trying to make sense of those randomly generated pixel dots but not trying to look at it from a "bigger" perspective.

The perspective you should seek is the perspective that the Creator had given you.

From a mathematical point of view, you should learn from Godel's theory.
In the end, it's about needing to believe in something to understand the absolute Truth of this world.

Al7amdulillah Allah has given us that exact foundation which we find it in the Quran and Sunnah.

regards,
Johan

[Science101]

Hi Johan! That's an interesting argument but there is a problem I see with it that I'll try to explain.

There are currently millions of fossils that have been found. Scientists have carefully documented 30,000 fossil species, all of them showing transition, with all having something that preceded them to evolve from. Never, once, has there been an exception where something appeared out of nowhere. Cannot deny what was found in paleontology, without becoming another who is in denial of what exists.

Also, scripture does not explain how life was created, it only says it was. Therefore there is no absolute truth of how life was created because the Quran and other texts are not science books that explain atomic theory, contain a periodic table of the elements, explain all existing molecular bonds, how cells works, brains, what evolution found in the fossil evidence is, or any other important science needed to know how life arose.

You are saying you have absolute truth of creation but if that is true then you could scientifically explain how life was created. And what is special about clay? Could it be this?

http://www.islamicboard.com/health-s...y-science.html

Science does not indicate that scriptures are false. It explains things that scripture does not say anything about. And if you say science is wrong then you also say that the science showing clay is special is wrong therefore you are saying that clay has no special properties when it clearly does. So that puts you on the side saying clay is nothing, with me saying it is special and that life can come from it. Which means I become the one saying the Quran is right about clay being able to make a human, while you have to deny the science that is in agreement with what the Quran says. What would Prophet Muhammad think of you after that? He spent his life looking for revelations such as this. And so have I. So which of us do you think Prophet Muhammad would rather do science with, you or I? Think about it.

[barney]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUeoem1gR3s

Worth a watch.

[johan]

..
Also, scripture does not explain how life was created, it only says it was. Therefore there is no absolute truth of how life was created because the Quran and other texts are not science books that explain atomic theory, contain a periodic table of the elements, explain all existing molecular bonds, how cells works, brains, what evolution found in the fossil evidence is, or any other important science needed to know how life arose.
..

Have you understood what's behind Godel's theory?

CMIIW, it says in a simplified way that if you defined an arbitarary language or system of language and using that language you define something that holds as a true statement or as an axiom or a foundation of truth, and you try to use the same system to prove that the axiomatc statement defined earlier is correct, i.e. true... you will then reach a paradoxial statement that the truth in that case is undefinable.

You will need to actually define in the language itself that the axiom is part of the language as an absolute truth.
(now don't argue with me on how that can go about.. you will need to ask Godel on that; but it is mathematically proven)

So in other words, in order for you to determine if a certain thing is absolutely true, you can't just derive it from what you know of the language, cuz you'll never know how powerful the language is until the person who created the language himself tells you that the language boundaries are here..and here..

So those "extra crucial knowledge" is what we take as granted from the creator in order to know truly how he's creation works.

...
You are saying you have absolute truth of creation but if that is true then you could scientifically explain how life was created. And what is special about clay? Could it be this?

http://www.islamicboard.com/health-s...y-science.html

yes we should be able to derive that, it just takes time to get to that point.
until then we are called the submitter(muslim).. or the believer (mu'min)..
we will just believe based on the "good"-ness the Quran and sunnah has been to us in our life.. and the ever so much signs of His existance..

I personally think that clay depicts something that in our world that has the characteristic of "touchable". Probably very much like the characteristics of fermions i suppose..CMIIW.. just a speculation..:D

Science does not indicate that scriptures are false. It explains things that scripture does not say anything about. And if you say science is wrong then you also say that the science showing clay is special is wrong therefore you are saying that clay has no special properties when it clearly does. So that puts you on the side saying clay is nothing, with me saying it is special and that life can come from it. Which means I become the one saying the Quran is right about clay being able to make a human, while you have to deny the science that is in agreement with what the Quran says. What would Prophet Muhammad think of you after that? He spent his life looking for revelations such as this. And so have I. So which of us do you think Prophet Muhammad would rather do science with, you or I? Think about it.

We as a limited agent, can only interpret this magnificent world through our limited senses.
E.g.
How accurate is the current best of breed supercomputer can get?
How accurate is the current optics can get?
How accurate is the current best of breed electroscopic sensors can get?
How big is the biggest explosion can we create?
It's just at such and such..

You're wrong on how to use Quran and the Hadeeth.
You should base you're judgment on them first before moving on to interpreting factual data to your limited mind (current established scientific knowledge base).
Cuz even the slightest precision error could lead to a disastrous conclusion. (remember einstien vs newton? you should learn from their mistakes; that also has signs if you put heed on)

Regards,
Abu 'Ammar

[united]

It is quite amazing how people will reject something as well supported by evidence such as evolution without understanding what the process entails.
The only people who actually reject this theory are:
1)people who have not understood it and are unwilling to learn...
2)those who do understand the theory and having examined it in detail and still reject it do so for no reason other than it goes against their religion
ther

blind faith is the worst kind of malady afflicting the human race.

What I dont understand is why so many creationists dont understand that evolution does not deal with how life began but what happened after life began. It is very common for scientists to say I dont know . Unlike many creationists that just fill in their ignorance with god did id instead of actually critically thinking.

Evolution is supported by tons of evidence and only creationists seem to reject it.

I was taught evolution at highschool and my biology teacher told us about vestigial organs, the peppered moths, etc. Having recently researched these on my own due to curiousity and wanting to learn more, I wonder whether she knew she was sparking an interest in me. Of course there are vestigial organs
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vestigialangs
and anyone that believes otherwise is deluding themselves and ignoring reality.

your link doesnt seem to work. but:
appendix- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermiform_appendix (skip the evolution bit 1st)
coccyx- The coccyx provides an attachment for nine muscles, such as the gluteus maximus, and those necessary for defecation. It also acts as something of a shock absorber when a person sits down, although forceful impact can cause damage and subsequent bodily pains. http://www.harunyahya.net/V2/Lang/en...il/Number/2985 etc

if we dont know the uses we will find out. isnt that what science is all about? not giving up, not making things up...

[ranma1/2]

read about vestigial structures. they are usually reduced functions from past.

[united]

read about vestigial structures. they are usually reduced functions from past.

please name me one.
and if that is so true why on earth do "scientists" keep banging on about the appendix/coccyx etc when it has clearly been shown that they do have a use.
Do i detect these "scientists" clutching at straws...

[root]

your link doesnt seem to work. but:
appendix- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermiform_appendix (skip the evolution bit 1st)
coccyx- The coccyx provides an attachment for nine muscles, such as the gluteus maximus, and those necessary for defecation. It also acts as something of a shock absorber when a person sits down, although forceful impact can cause damage and subsequent bodily pains. http://www.harunyahya.net/V2/Lang/en...il/Number/2985 etc

if we dont know the uses we will find out. isnt that what science is all about? not giving up, not making things up...

You guys show nothing but arrogance by simply amplifying the quote mining technique that has you blinded. In you quote from the lier Harunyayha he quotes the following:

Since it is not possible to unambiguously identify useless structures, and since the structure of the argument used is not scientifically valid, I conclude that 'vestigial organs' provide no special evidence for the theory of evolution.

(Scadding 1981, p 176)

Would it shock you to know that Scadding actually believes the following:

Vestigial organs represent simply a special case of homologous organs. . . . While homologies between animal species suggest a common origin, the argument . . . asserts that vestigial organs provide special additional evidence for evolution.

This is how DESPERATE you creationsist are, your more than happy to qoute a paper of 20+ years ago, where even the author admits he was "wrong"

Source:http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/quot...l#Scadding1982

Why can't you see the clear deception that you stake as evidence against evolution. How can it be you believe a scientist was "right" when the said scientist admits he was "wrong"

[root]

please name me one.
and if that is so true why on earth do "scientists" keep banging on about the appendix/coccyx etc when it has clearly been shown that they do have a use.
Do i detect these "scientists" clutching at straws...

United, all your doing is giving a laymens arguement on a technicality. For example, every scientist agrees that the earth is a sphere. Technically it is not. So the earth is not round, those stupid theories that support the idea of a round earth are simply delusional.

[snakelegs]

i have bred snakes and still keep them.
some boas and pythons have vestigal limbs. i've seen them with my own eyes.
for those not fortunate enough to have a handy dandy python or boa to look at, here is a pic:

[Dr.Trax]

Dr.Trax

I no longer have any desire to participate in a thread that lies to people.

You do not want to learn what science has found, so I'm wasting my time talking to you.

I want to learn but what to learn?A propaganda that is so hard pushed to the word with your so called fossil proofs ???


Answer to me these questions:

1) Have scientists determined what the "first" lifeform was like? If so, what was it's characteristics?

2)When I think of a microbe lifeform which needs very little to survive and reproduce itself (maybe not even needing oxygen), and then look at myself, I can't help but feel that the microbe is much more "adapted" to it's environment, since from a biological respect, I am the "weaker" entity, based on my needs to live and reproduce (love, [this was in fact proven], food, drink, shelter, a female to mate with etc..) compared to said microbe's. Thought?

3)Since that one test (sorry I forget the name) done in the 60's that created amino acids from non-organic elements and sparks, has science been able to produce full protein chains and/or genetic material? (adenine, thynine, etc.. remember "at the golf course?" lol) If not, why does science assume it can be done. I realize the evolutionary theory does not deal with the formation of life, but it leaves a hole in the theory since "god" (which i dont believe in necessarily) could have created the first life, and then "survival of the fittest/micro-evolution" ran it's course? The truth is, "sadly, the origin of DNA is just as elusive as the origin of life itself"

4)Evolution speaks of each organisms fight to survive, and ultimately pass on it's genes. Yet I have not heard what causes this seemingly desire to reproduce one's genes? Surely the first organism would have lacked the brain to "want" to reproduce, so what caused it to? You could argue that the elements composing this organism split on their own due to the natural tendencies of elements, but how does evolution account for this seemingly unique trait? (A sign of intelligent design? you decide). Todays species are much more complex than the first organism, what causes their instinctual desire to reproduce?

5)I realize this is all a matter of perception, but from what I observe, after millions and millions of years of tweaking and perfecting, life is not any more adapted than the first organism. Why did the first organism "want" (if it could want that is) to become more complex? Complexity in my opinion does not always mean better, rather it makes it more unstable. If the first organism had the bare minimum to pass on its genes, why did it need to become so complex? You could argue that very similar genetics is a fundamental weakness in organisms (this is what causes the change from asexual reproduction to sexual by the way) but the fact is the first organisms were so utterly simple and required so little to survive (not even oxygen/nitrogen mind you [science believes at the time of the first organism there was no oxygen in the atmospere!] ), and certainly virii were a long ways from being created, so I fail to see how in this environment a commonality in DNA would be a weakness?

6)Evolution has yet to descibe how insticts (a non-comprehensive form of intillect) came to be. Maybe one bird had the idea to fly south and the others just followed, and then told each succeeding generation of the secret to survival!!.. or not. Ideas?

7)simply.. why do we sleep? I see no fundamental weakness in being awake during the night (since none of today's species hunt at night save for minor predators, arguabally inferring few if any ancient species hunted at night), thus I see no reason why a creature which slept during the night would have had a huge advantage over a night-walker. Rather, i see the opposite. They could have been out there getting their "mac" on!

8)The fundamental idea behind evolution proposes "extremely slow and gradual changes" and Darwin stated that his theory would "die" if any organ could not be formed that way. I cant think of any organ offhand (maybe the eye or brain), but I don't understand how "part" of a organ provides any survival benefit. For example, wings. Darwin never proposed that one day a reptile was born with a perfect set of wings, but rather they were gradually formed over millions of years.. Hmm, how does 1/10000 of a wing provide any benefit AT ALL? it's either all or nothing as far as i would guess.


PLEASE!!!

[Science101]

Have you understood what's behind Godel's theory?

CMIIW, it says in a simplified way that if you defined an arbitarary language or system of language and using that language you define something that holds as a true statement or as an axiom or a foundation of truth, and you try to use the same system to prove that the axiomatc statement defined earlier is correct, i.e. true... you will then reach a paradoxial statement that the truth in that case is undefinable.

You will need to actually define in the language itself that the axiom is part of the language as an absolute truth.
(now don't argue with me on how that can go about.. you will need to ask Godel on that; but it is mathematically proven)

So in other words, in order for you to determine if a certain thing is absolutely true, you can't just derive it from what you know of the language, cuz you'll never know how powerful the language is until the person who created the language himself tells you that the language boundaries are here..and here..

So those "extra crucial knowledge" is what we take as granted from the creator in order to know truly how he's creation works.



yes we should be able to derive that, it just takes time to get to that point.
until then we are called the submitter(muslim).. or the believer (mu'min)..
we will just believe based on the "good"-ness the Quran and sunnah has been to us in our life.. and the ever so much signs of His existance..

I personally think that clay depicts something that in our world that has the characteristic of "touchable". Probably very much like the characteristics of fermions i suppose..CMIIW.. just a speculation..:D



We as a limited agent, can only interpret this magnificent world through our limited senses.
E.g.
How accurate is the current best of breed supercomputer can get?
How accurate is the current optics can get?
How accurate is the current best of breed electroscopic sensors can get?
How big is the biggest explosion can we create?
It's just at such and such..

You're wrong on how to use Quran and the Hadeeth.
You should base you're judgment on them first before moving on to interpreting factual data to your limited mind (current established scientific knowledge base).
Cuz even the slightest precision error could lead to a disastrous conclusion. (remember einstien vs newton? you should learn from their mistakes; that also has signs if you put heed on)

Regards,
Abu 'Ammar

Neither abiogenesis (life from non-life) or evolutionary theory (change over time) is a mathematical or logical formula, therefore all claims that you can disprove the fossil and molecular biology facts with a mathematical/logical construct, is like saying a bird has no wings unless 2+2+Cheese=176.34

I'll try to simplify the problem:

Would you say that we would be unable to understand how the first cell membrane formed? Cell membranes have millions of molecules all in the exact right place. According to Creationists the odds of something so complex to "randomly" coming together is astronomically impossible. Is that true? Can we easily understand such a thing? Or is it impossible to understand their origin?

[Dr.Trax]

United, all your doing is giving a laymens arguement on a technicality. For example, every scientist agrees that the earth is a sphere. Technically it is not. So the earth is not round, those stupid theories that support the idea of a round earth are simply delusional.

- Is it true that Piltdown Man, exhibited for 40 years, was a hoax?

- Yes. A 500-year-old human cranium was joined onto an orangutan jaw and then stained with potassium dichromate to give it an aged appearance.

Piltdown Man, portrayed for 43 years as highly significant evidence confirming evolution, turned out to be a hoax. In 1953, investigations into the skull revealed that Piltdown Man was no fossil, but a forgery produced by combining human and orangutan bones.
Left: Excavations at Piltdown, birthplace of the Piltdown Man scandal




Is it true that Nebraska Man was a fraud based on a single peccary tooth?

- Yes. The reconstructions based on a single molar tooth took their place among evolutionist frauds when it was realized the tooth actually belonged to a peccary.

Nebraska man, and Henry Fairfield Osborn, who named it.




Is it true that Archæoraptor liaoningensis, proposed as a "dino-bird," was a fraud?

- Yes. The fossil, consisting of bone and stone held together using glue and plaster, was made by adding a dinosaur tail to a bird body. The fossil, described in the press as evidence for so-called evolution, was declared to be "dino-bird waffle" two years later.

National Geographic's great hit, the perfect "dino-bird." Archaeoraptor soon turned out to be a hoax. All other "dino-bird" candidates remain speculative.





- Is it true that the Coelacanth, for years depicted as an intermediate form fossil, is a species of fish still living today?

- Yes. Because of the bones in its fins the Coelacanth was depicted as a fish about to progress to the walking stage. However, the capture of many living specimens consigned all fictitious evolutionist scenarios to the waste bin.





Is it true that Archaeopteryx, also put forward as a missing link, was actually a fully flying bird?

- Yes. It has been realized that this extinct bird, a tool for evolutionist claims because of the teeth in its jaws, the claw-like nails on its wings and long tail, actually flew in just the same way as present-day flying birds.





Is it true that the fossil known as Lucy belonged to an extinct type of ape and has been removed from the fictitious tree of human evolution?

- Yes. Lucy, portrayed to the public as a missing link, is today agreed to have been an ape with no place in the human family tree. The magazine Science et Vie announced this in its cover story titled "Adieu Lucy" (Farewell, Lucy) in May 1999.

Scientific findings have proven the evolutionist assumptions regarding Lucy, the best-known example of the genus Australopithecus, to be unfounded. In its February 1999 issue, the well-known French scientific magazine Science et Vie accepted this in an article entitled "Adieu Lucy," and confirmed that Australopithecus cannot be considered an ancestor of man.



[IMG]file:///C:/Users/Edrin/AppData/Local/Temp/moz-screenshot.jpg[/IMG][IMG]file:///C:/Users/Edrin/AppData/Local/Temp/moz-screenshot-1.jpg[/IMG]

Then what do you say?
How still to believe in it?
Do you want some more???
It is not sure anymore .....

[Science101]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUeoem1gR3s

Worth a watch.

Thanks Barney! I didn't know about that one.

I hope all who think Creationist leaders like this are being honest watch the video. See how they purposely skipped over the radiometric dating exhibit that shows how it is done, then lied to the children about it?

How can anyone believe someone who would do something so dishonest? If they had any honesty at all they would have shown what scientists do, not keep them from seeing it.

[Science101]

Also notice how Dr.Trax is doing the same dishonest thing. Anyone see this "Piltdown Man" that Dr.Trax just posted about, again, listed anywhere?

Here is one of many places to find the truth.

From: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/species.html

Prominent Hominid Fossils
Sahelanthropus tchadensis
Ardipithecus ramidus
Australopithecus anamensis
Australopithecus afarensis
Kenyanthropus platyops
Australopithecus africanus
Australopithecus garhi
Australopithecus aethiopicus
Australopithecus robustus Australopithecus boisei
Homo habilis
Homo georgicus
Homo erectus
Homo ergaster
Homo antecessor
Homo heidelbergensis
Homo neanderthalensis
Homo floresiensis
Homo sapiens

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/specimen.html

So Dr.Trax, where is this "Piltdown Man" you are talking about?

[Dr.Trax]

Also notice how Dr.Trax is doing the same dishonest thing. Here is one of many places to find the truth.

How about your BIG CRAPS ABOVE!???
A

[Dr.Trax]

From: http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/timeline.jpg
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/species.html

Prominent Hominid Fossils
Sahelanthropus tchadensis
Ardipithecus ramidus
Australopithecus anamensis
Australopithecus afarensis
Kenyanthropus platyops
Australopithecus africanus
Australopithecus garhi
Australopithecus aethiopicus
Australopithecus robustus Australopithecus boisei
Homo habilis
Homo georgicus
Homo erectus
Homo ergaster
Homo antecessor
Homo heidelbergensis
Homo neanderthalensis
Homo floresiensis
Homo sapiens
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/specimen.html

Again nothing special!

I can also imagine an create these branches!:D

No Proof At ALL
EVOLUTION IS A BIG PROPAGANDA!

[Azy]

I want to learn but what to learn?A propaganda that is so hard pushed to the word with your so called fossil proofs ???


Answer to me these questions:

1) Have scientists determined what the "first" lifeform was like? If so, what was it's characteristics?

2)When I think of a microbe lifeform which needs very little to survive and reproduce itself (maybe not even needing oxygen), and then look at myself, I can't help but feel that the microbe is much more "adapted" to it's environment, since from a biological respect, I am the "weaker" entity, based on my needs to live and reproduce (love, [this was in fact proven], food, drink, shelter, a female to mate with etc..) compared to said microbe's. Thought?

3)Since that one test (sorry I forget the name) done in the 60's that created amino acids from non-organic elements and sparks, has science been able to produce full protein chains and/or genetic material? (adenine, thynine, etc.. remember "at the golf course?" lol) If not, why does science assume it can be done. I realize the evolutionary theory does not deal with the formation of life, but it leaves a hole in the theory since "god" (which i dont believe in necessarily) could have created the first life, and then "survival of the fittest/micro-evolution" ran it's course? The truth is, "sadly, the origin of DNA is just as elusive as the origin of life itself"

4)Evolution speaks of each organisms fight to survive, and ultimately pass on it's genes. Yet I have not heard what causes this seemingly desire to reproduce one's genes? Surely the first organism would have lacked the brain to "want" to reproduce, so what caused it to? You could argue that the elements composing this organism split on their own due to the natural tendencies of elements, but how does evolution account for this seemingly unique trait? (A sign of intelligent design? you decide). Todays species are much more complex than the first organism, what causes their instinctual desire to reproduce?

5)I realize this is all a matter of perception, but from what I observe, after millions and millions of years of tweaking and perfecting, life is not any more adapted than the first organism. Why did the first organism "want" (if it could want that is) to become more complex? Complexity in my opinion does not always mean better, rather it makes it more unstable. If the first organism had the bare minimum to pass on its genes, why did it need to become so complex? You could argue that very similar genetics is a fundamental weakness in organisms (this is what causes the change from asexual reproduction to sexual by the way) but the fact is the first organisms were so utterly simple and required so little to survive (not even oxygen/nitrogen mind you [science believes at the time of the first organism there was no oxygen in the atmospere!] ), and certainly virii were a long ways from being created, so I fail to see how in this environment a commonality in DNA would be a weakness?

6)Evolution has yet to descibe how insticts (a non-comprehensive form of intillect) came to be. Maybe one bird had the idea to fly south and the others just followed, and then told each succeeding generation of the secret to survival!!.. or not. Ideas?

7)simply.. why do we sleep? I see no fundamental weakness in being awake during the night (since none of today's species hunt at night save for minor predators, arguabally inferring few if any ancient species hunted at night), thus I see no reason why a creature which slept during the night would have had a huge advantage over a night-walker. Rather, i see the opposite. They could have been out there getting their "mac" on!

8)The fundamental idea behind evolution proposes "extremely slow and gradual changes" and Darwin stated that his theory would "die" if any organ could not be formed that way. I cant think of any organ offhand (maybe the eye or brain), but I don't understand how "part" of a organ provides any survival benefit. For example, wings. Darwin never proposed that one day a reptile was born with a perfect set of wings, but rather they were gradually formed over millions of years.. Hmm, how does 1/10000 of a wing provide any benefit AT ALL? it's either all or nothing as far as i would guess.


PLEASE!!!

1) For the thousandth time, evolution is not concerned with the origin of life. Define lifeform.

2) Imagine how well a microbe would flourish if it grew a bit bigger than it's neighbours.

3) Can you imagine how hard it would be to generate this in a lab if it required billions of trials and if something approaching a protein ever developed it would be gobbled up by some kind of microbe. If you bothered to look there are plenty of scenarios for the formation of simple organic molecules.

4) Think about it. The simplest organisms would only exist because of the molecule's tendency to copy itself, otherwise you'd never get near to the microbe stage, nevermind anything like people. Obviously those traits would be maintained otherwise life would just die out.

5) Organisms don't 'want' to be more complex or necessarily do become more complex. Your reasoning seems to infer that all current life should be super complex animals who are totally adapted to one environment, and that simple life such as bacteria would have ceased to exist. They just adapt to the situation they're in, and that may change over time. Tell me which one of Adam and Eve was black, and which looked chinese.

6) It has yet to explain them therefore they can't be explained?
7 & 8) Just go and actually read something that isn't creationist nonsense. Try the painful process of being open-minded to something that goes against your closed beliefs.

[Azy]

Again nothing special!

I can also imagine an create these branches!:D

Did someone also imagine digging an 80ft skeleton of a reptile out of the rock in Tanzania?

[Dr.Trax]

Neither abiogenesis (life from non-life) or evolutionary theory (change over time) is a mathematical or logical formula, therefore all claims that you can disprove the fossil and molecular biology facts with a mathematical/logical construct, is like saying a bird has no wings unless 2+2+Cheese=176.34

Here are the true unchanged Fossils:

ATLAS OF CREATION

http://www.harunyahya.com/books/darw...reation_02.php

ATLAS OF CREATION

Volume II


http://harunyahya.com/books/darwinis...tion_II_01.php





ATLAS OF CREATION
Volume III

http://www.harunyahya.com/books/darw...ion_III_01.php

[Azy]

[Dr.Trax]

Differences between humans and chimps

Here are some other interesting differences between the human and chimp genomes which are often not reported:

• The chimp genome is 12% larger than the human genome.
• Only 2.4 billion bases have been aligned between the two genomes, leaving a maximum similarity of 68–77%.
• In many areas of the genome, it appears major rearrangements of DNA sequences have occurred, accounting for another 10–20% dissimilarity.
• Chimps have 46 chromosomes and humans have 44 chromosomes (excluding sex chromosomes for both species).
• To save money and time, the chimp genome was assembled using the human genome as a template (because of the presupposition that humans evolved from the same line as chimps); it is currently unknown if the pieces of the chimp genome “puzzle” were put together properly.

To address these concerns and others, comparisons of the human and chimp genomes will be a part of “GENE” project sponsored by the Institute for Creation Research (ICR).The bioinformatics team (of which I am a part) will be analyzing different aspects of the human genome with special emphasis given to the comparison of human and chimp genomes.

[johan]

Neither abiogenesis (life from non-life) or evolutionary theory (change over time) is a mathematical or logical formula, therefore all claims that you can disprove the fossil and molecular biology facts with a mathematical/logical construct, is like saying a bird has no wings unless 2+2+Cheese=176.34

I think you need to abstract a little bit further my friend.
May be here's a site to give you a little bit of where i'm going with this mathematical thingy wingy..

www.superstringtheory.com

And here's my paraphrasing of this mathemetical thingy wingy.. :
In the scientific field of phyiscs, were currently at a point where our resources are at the limits in terms of "energy creation". This "energy creation" is needed in order to prove or disprove theories associated to the creation of the entire universe. So we needed a way around this disability.

The most promising alternative is through mathematics.
Through mathematics we could "simulate" the physical behavior of the world.
Through mathematics we could explain how at it's basic and most fundamental elements of the world interact with each other forming all this complex components around us and their interactions.

I'll try to simplify the problem:

Would you say that we would be unable to understand how the first cell membrane formed? Cell membranes have millions of molecules all in the exact right place. According to Creationists the odds of something so complex to "randomly" coming together is astronomically impossible. Is that true? Can we easily understand such a thing? Or is it impossible to understand their origin?

How did I come about to say that? please enlighten me. :)
On the contrary, we could derive(come to a better understanding) the way cells interact with each other when we have the right model to simulate the happenings.
By understanding the way each and every agent in the system interact with each other be it at a molecular level or at an atomic level or at a subatomic level and beyond.
Surely the more precision in the model the better it will provide us with feedbacks. And a better way for us to control and manipulate.

regards,
Johan

[Science101]

Great job Azy!

Here are the true unchanged Fossils:

And once again Dr.Trax demonstrates that they are only spamming the forum to sell their Harun junk here.

[Dr.Trax]

1) For the thousandth time, evolution is not concerned with the origin of life. Define lifeform.

1) Have scientists determined what the "first" lifeform was like? If so, what was it's characteristics?

Not Evolutionists..............

[Dr.Trax]

Great job Azy!



And once again Dr.Trax demonstrates that they are only spamming the forum to sell their Harun junk here.

Then what do you denonstrate?
What about your spamms....a?
Aren't you selling your Evolution Junk!

Give Up friendo ......you are cracked!

[Science101]

I think you need to abstract a little bit further my friend.
May be here's a site to give you a little bit of where i'm going with this mathematical thingy wingy..

www.superstringtheory.com

And here's my paraphrasing of this mathemetical thingy wingy.. :
In the scientific field of phyiscs, were currently at a point where our resources are at the limits in terms of "energy creation". This "energy creation" is needed in order to prove or disprove theories associated to the creation of the entire universe. So we needed a way around this disability.

The most promising alternative is through mathematics.
Through mathematics we could "simulate" the physical behavior of the world.
Through mathematics we could explain how at it's basic and most fundamental elements of the world interact with each other forming all this complex components around us and their interactions.


How did I come about to say that? please enlighten me. :)
On the contrary, we could derive(come to a better understanding) the way cells interact with each other when we have the right model to simulate the happenings.
By understanding the way each and every agent in the system interact with each other be it at a molecular level or at an atomic level or at a subatomic level and beyond.
Surely the more precision in the model the better it will provide us with feedbacks. And a better way for us to control and manipulate.

regards,
Johan

We are not discussing superstrings (physics) we are discussing abiogenesis (chemistry) and evolution (biology) which is my point. I'm trying to stay on topic.

All I want to know is: Is it easily possible to understand how cell membranes (empty cells) form? Yes or No?

Creationists have right along been saying it's impossible for us to know that. I need an answer to my question, to see if that was another lie or not.

[Azy]

1) Have scientists determined what the "first" lifeform was like? If so, what was it's characteristics?

Not Evolutionists..............

The thread title says evolution doesn't it? Nobody said they've determined the first lifeform, and you can't tell me what your definition of lifeform is.

We aren't selling anything, we have absolutely nothing to gain from trying to point out that you're just pasting pages of rubbish.

[barney]

Why cant God have just created life to evolve?



(Apart from that this idea would trash all scripture)

:)

[Trumble]

We aren't selling anything, we have absolutely nothing to gain from trying to point out that you're just pasting pages of rubbish.

I've given up. All you can do is politely suggest to Dr Trax that he at least reads around the subject enough to understand both sides of the argument; a necessity for putting up much of a case either way. If he prefers to just cut n' paste endless reams of Yahya-drivel there isn't really much point in trying to engage in debate.

[Dr.Trax]

The thread title says evolution doesn't it? Nobody said they've determined the first lifeform, and you can't tell me what your definition of lifeform is.

We aren't selling anything, we have absolutely nothing to gain from trying to point out that you're just pasting pages of rubbish.

SEE MY SIGNATURE!

[Azy]

Dr. Trax, I'd love for you to take a bit of time out from reading www.isnt-creationism-great.com and try looking at what people who actually study the world have written, you know, in scientific papers and not in christian/muslim sponsored magazines.

Scientists have no reason to try and disprove creation, science is just an attempt to describe what we see, it doesn't have an agenda and doesn't need to make up stories. If what people find contradicts what you believe, you should at least give the options a fair chance. You could even see these fossils and other discoveries if you wanted, not something that you could really do with the garden of eden.

[Azy]

I have a funny feeling he isn't a real doctor either ;)

or even out of school.

[Science101]

SEE MY SIGNATURE!

I can't help but notice the:

www.harunyahya.com

Goes very well with the cut-and-paste junk from his get-rich-quick website.

Do you get paid for spamming forums?

[Dr.Trax]

I have a funny feeling he isn't a real doctor either ;)

or even out of school.

Thank you ignorant man!:?
I am a Doctor and still studying!

[Dr.Trax]

I can't help but notice the:

www.harunyahya.com

Goes very well with the cut-and-paste junk from his get-rich-quick website.

Do you get paid for spamming forums?

It seems you have problem with your eyes!
Maybe I can help you if you want?
Again look there at a big verse?What did you see!?
Don't tell me that you saw a blue line!:D
The firs word goes like this:He is Allah
No spamming here...........aha,another problem:Your Brain!

[johan]

We are not discussing superstrings (physics) we are discussing abiogenesis (chemistry) and evolution (biology) which is my point. I'm trying to stay on topic.

All I want to know is: Is it easily possible to understand how cell membranes (empty cells) form? Yes or No?

Creationists have right along been saying it's impossible for us to know that. I need an answer to my question, to see if that was another lie or not.

That would take time to research..:D
Until then, I would stick to my beliefs.
Good luck with your search.

regards,
Abu 'Ammar

[Science101]

I already had it posted in this forum!
And in the US it's now an experiment performed in public schools.

http://www.islamicboard.com/health-s...xperiment.html

How cell membranes (and other parts of the cell) self-assemble is so simple to understand kids now know how to demonstrate it! But Creationists are still saying this cannot be understood!!!!

Self-Assembly Of Real Cell Membranes Experiment

Experiment by Science101

Description:

When we see a cell membrane in a biology textbook it looks like each of the molecules had to be one by one purposely placed there then somehow bonded into place. But that is not the case.

In this experiment a small amount of egg yolk provides the cell membrane forming molecules so that with a shake we amazingly "self-assemble" real cell membranes around oil and water droplets to demonstrate how easily polar forces construct such an important part of a living thing. These same membrane forming compounds (amphiphiles) can also be found coming from deep sea hydrothermal vents and were found in a meteorite from outer space but an egg is much easier to get them from.

We will with our own eyes witness the fascinating life-giving properties of simple molecules being guided by the forces of nature which make even parts of cells miraculously all come together on their own. This is origin of life science at its best! :happy:

Materials:

125 ml flask with stopper, or suitable jar with lid. A larger volume container is OK, roughly adjust proportions for 2/3 full.
Cooking oil.
1 egg
Egg-dish or other small volume bowl shaped container.
Eyedropper or small spoon
Water

Procedure:

Add 100 ml of water to flask. To that add 25 ml of oil.

Cover then shake for a second or two. Mixture should at first appear milky but quickly start separating.

While waiting for the oil to return to a clear layer on top, crack open the egg then place in small bowl. Notice that the egg yolk is a single giant cell which gravity turns so that the white spot, the nucleus containing the DNA, points upwards. The yellow yolk that (if it were fertilized) feeds the developing chicken contains among other fats and oily compounds, phospholipid molecules that form strong flexible cell membranes.

By now the oil should have formed a clear layer on top. We first shook it to prove that it will do this. Notice that it is pure oil that can be seen through to the other side.

Now squeeze the eyedropper, plunge halfway into the egg yolk like a syringe, get a sample, then add one drop into the flask. If using a spoon then carefully dig out a small amount of yolk, then drip one small drop into flask. Adding too much can cause the oil to form such small droplets that it becomes a colloid, like milk.

The drop of yolk will fall through the oil but float on the water so you can see it stuck in the middle. Shake for a second or two like before.

Now watch what happens to the oil layer this time. It should soon look like a giant piece of tissue, like you're looking at cells under a microscope but in this case you see them with your own eyes! The less dense ones that contain only oil and have a phospholipid monolayer around them, go to the top. The smaller phospholipid bilayer vesicles are even more like living cells and contain water inside. They would be at the bottom of the layer, with some moving in the thermal convection currents of the water. If they picked up particles of something heavy such as from clay or iron then they will sink to the bottom.



How it Works:

Polar forces between water molecules pull them together as if they are attracted like magnets, providing a force which squeezes the nonpolar (hydrophobic, like they are afraid of water) oil out of solution. That is why oil and water do not mix. Oil is less dense so it heads towards the top. If oil were heavier than water then it would form a layer at the bottom.

Phospholipid molecules form membranes due to their having one end called a "head" which is attracted to the polar water, and on the other end are two hydrocarbon "tails" which are attracted to the nonpolar oil. Shown below is a phospholipid molecule. The carbon atoms of the tails are black while the hydrogen atoms are light purple. The head (shown as a single large sphere for clarity) contains phosphorus, nitrogen, oxygen, carbon and hydrogen.

Phospholipids will form a single "monolayer" membrane around an oil droplet due to the nonpolar "hydrophobic" tails being attracted to the oil while the water loving polar "hydrophilic" heads point outward to contact the water. This is what we saw forming in the oil layer of this experiment.

A phospholipid membrane that forms around a small droplet of water (instead of oil) is called a "Vesicle" or "Liposome". Vesicles have a phospholipid "bilayer" where instead of a single membrane with all the tails stuck into an oil droplet there is a second inner membrane where the phospholipid molecules point the other way, with their heads contact the water droplet on the inside. The tails of the inner membrane are strongly attracted to the tails of the outer membrane, squeezing out anything that tries to come between them.

Vesicles are about the size of a red blood cell. And believe it or not under the right natural (or lab) conditions vesicles even grow and divide without the aid of a genome! Vesicles are now in the spotlight of origin of life science due to being easily naturally produced in nature and their already possessing some of the remarkable properties of living cells including growth and division. They do after all start off with a real cell membrane like cells in our body have and will readily attract other molecules into the membrane such as cholesterol that will improve its performance. Since there is cholesterol in egg yolk the vesicles that were formed will contain it too.

Vesicles are also very good at trapping particles and large molecules including RNA and DNA. This might have ended up included inside some of the vesicles in your experiment, especially if you poked through the egg yolk's nucleus when you took the sample or the water you used already contained some.

Vesicles do not possess all of the requirements to be considered "life" but all by themselves they are still surprisingly "life-like". So if by chance you think you saw something very small slowly moving around inside your flask, then maybe you did!

Soap works much the same way. Soap has molecules very similar to phospholipids with only one tail. They do not form bilayer vesicles so they cannot self-assemble into a cell membrane, but the same kind of membrane shown surrounding the oil droplet also forms around sticky dirt so that it will easily go down the drain without resticking to something else. The tails are also attracted to each other. When in water they clump together with their tails inside the mass with their heads pointing outwards. These are called "Micelles". Soap is readily self-assemble into micelles while phospholipids in water readily self-assemble into bilayer vesicles.


More Things To Do:

Flask can be reshaken to attempt making a higher population of smaller membrane enclosed oil droplets and vesicles, in essence, replicate some of the ones that are there. More egg yolk will further decrease size but cloud water.

The contents can be poured into a clear tray-like vessel to spread out the oil layer. More water can be added to make the bottom easier to see. Iron filings or other heavy particles are then sprinkled onto it. As the particles pass through the oil-membrane-water interface (shake a little if they get stuck) they are first coated with oil, then pick up a membrane, and after passing into the water quickly sink to the bottom where they will stay.

Use two flasks or jars, equally shaken, with only one containing egg yolk so that the two results can at the same time be compared.

A 2000 ml flask or fishbowl with aquarium pump and airstone can be used to swirl them around like lipid-cell pets. With luck you will form strong ones and can watch them bump into each other without breaking apart, while new ones will form out of the churning oil.

Container can be left to see how long the membranes stay stable, but in time will likely begin to rot while building up pressure inside vessel so do not cover so tightly air under pressure cannot escape.

[snakelegs]

nobody appreciated my snake vestigal legs!!! i'm going home!!

[Science101]

I liked it! But since I already knew about it, I might not count.

[snakelegs]

i'll count you! thanks.

[MustafaMc]

i have bred snakes and still keep them.
some boas and pythons have vestigal limbs. i've seen them with my own eyes.
for those not fortunate enough to have a handy dandy python or boa to look at, here is a pic:

Well, that explains your user name. Now where oh where have your snake legs gone? Did they confer a selective disadvantage after being initially advantageous to evolve in the first place?

[snakelegs]

don't ask me intelligent questions. i have a reptilian brain.

[MustafaMc]

don't ask me intelligent questions. i have a reptilian brain.

...don't underestimate yourself. Didn't the serpent outwit 2 humans?

[snakelegs]

i don't think the serpent gets the bad rep in the qur'an!!!!

[ranma1/2]

I have a funny feeling he isn't a real doctor either ;)

or even out of school.

i figure hes even less of one than Kent Hovind.

[Azy]

Thank you ignorant man!:?
I am a Doctor and still studying!

Forgive me if I find it difficult to believe, since most PhD students would have a slightly different approach to discussion and research.
What are you a doctor of and where are you studying?


(Oh yeah the snake's legs thing was cool by the way I'd never seen that before)

Did they confer a selective disadvantage after being initially advantageous to evolve in the first place?

I would have suggested it allowed them to take advantage of a particular niche that limbed reptiles couldn't. You can't just say "limbs are better and more advanced", each is an advantage in different situations.

[Dr.Trax]

Forgive me if I find it difficult to believe, since most PhD students would have a slightly different approach to discussion and research.
What are you a doctor of and where are you studying?


(Oh yeah the snake's legs thing was cool by the way I'd never seen that before)

I would have suggested it allowed them to take advantage of a particular niche that limbed reptiles couldn't. You can't just say "limbs are better and more advanced", each is an advantage in different situations.

Azy why don't you tell me about your Job?
What are you?Are you studying or working?What?
I told you enought......if you are a men of understanding!:?

[ranma1/2]

Well its clear that whatever hes a doctor in its not grammar.
Id think perhaps religous studies, anything else id cringe.

[Azy]

Dr. Trax, you might have got so used to avoiding questions that you don't realise you've just done it again.
I asked first.

[Azy]

While it's quiet I might as well make a few points I didn't get chance to yesterday.

1) Why are you still parading the Piltdown man as some kind of killer proof against evolution? We know it was a hoax, science knows it was a hoax, it hasn't been used as evidence for anything for 55 years. Why don't you discredit something that wasn't exposed by evolutionary biologists before you were born.

2) Yes some fossils look like modern day animals. If an animal is suited to it's habitat there isn't as much pressure to change as on other animals. For example crocodiles and sharks exist in forms very similar to the ones around hundreds of millions of years ago, and any biologists will happily admit it. It isn't a flaw in the proposed mechanism of evolution, it just shows you don't really know what you're talking about and are happy to select evidence when it suits you.

3) Harun Yahya's "Atlas of Creation" basically boils down to:

Charles Darwin was a god-hating profiteer who's simple minded theories were developed in a time of primitive science and have only been disproved with improving technology and apparently the whole world now rejects evolution.
No references.
No evidence for the alternatives.
Significant misrepresentation of known facts.

Charles Darwin studied to be a clergyman in the Church of England, and though he did lose faith in Christianity after his daughter died, he never rejected the idea that god was the creator even if he wasn't involved in the day-to-day running of the world.

Finally, if there are all these studies in genetics showing evolution to be false then show me them, it shouldn't be hard to find one if they're so widely accepted.

[johan]

I already had it posted in this forum!
And in the US it's now an experiment performed in public schools.

http://www.islamicboard.com/health-s...xperiment.html

How cell membranes (and other parts of the cell) self-assemble is so simple to understand kids now know how to demonstrate it! But Creationists are still saying this cannot be understood!!!!

Ok, say you have an autonomous cell.
So what? Does it have a will?? Especially a will to evolve??
Will it evolve by mere randomness?? or will it evolve by it's inner feelings to choose from one decision to the other?? where do those feelings exist, if they were ever to exist??

Don't kid me on that..
I say it also is a speculations based on a shaky foundation..
Shaky foundation, cuz your sample is still limited. Your inference can still be miles away from the absolute truth..

regards,
Johan

[Trumble]

Will it evolve by mere randomness?? or will it evolve by it's inner feelings to choose from one decision to the other??

The usual, tedious, creationist strawmen. The theory makes neither claim.

The second choice is obviously ridiculous. The first is based on misunderstanding at best, deliberate distortion at worst. The mechanism that allows genetic change to occur is 'random' mutation (the occurance of which is both well documented and conclusive to any reasonable standard). Which changes perpetuate, though, has nothing to do with 'mere randomness', indeed quite the contrary.

[Azy]

Ok, say you have an autonomous cell.
So what? Does it have a will?? Especially a will to evolve??
Will it evolve by mere randomness?? or will it evolve by it's inner feelings to choose from one decision to the other?? where do those feelings exist, if they were ever to exist??

That's not the point of this experiment, it's obviously not a real cell.
It shows that given a handful of fairly simple molecules you don't need to manipulate them into some kind of order. As a result of their inherent properties they automatically form a simple membrane.

It's just an added bonus that these particular molecules also grow and replicate.

Shaky foundation, cuz your sample is still limited. Your inference can still be miles away from the absolute truth..

What? This isn't some kind of survey, get the stuff and do it at home yourself.

[MustafaMc]

i don't think the serpent gets the bad rep in the qur'an!!!!

My, my, my - pretty good for a reptilian brain!

[aadil77]

Greetings and peace be with you DR. Trax

I believe in one God the creator of all that is seen and unseen.

I believe that he created each species in a complete way, and each species adapts to its natural and changing environment.

I do not believe that some kind of single cell life can come from no life at all without the help of God.

I cannot see how single cell life could evolve in stages over four billion years to the life we have today.

I still retain these beliefs despite all the arguments I have read to the contrary.

Take care

Eric

^ same

[MustafaMc]

Originally Posted by Eric H
Greetings and peace be with you DR. Trax

I believe in one God the creator of all that is seen and unseen.

I believe that he created each species in a complete way, and each species adapts to its natural and changing environment.

I do not believe that some kind of single cell life can come from no life at all without the help of God.

I cannot see how single cell life could evolve in stages over four billion years to the life we have today.

I still retain these beliefs despite all the arguments I have read to the contrary.

Take care

Eric

^ same

I, too, agree. Simple straightforward summation. Funny how naturalistic evolutionists don't put forward equivalent statements and how none of them took a stab at refuting my above posts with logical arguments against evolution.

[Azy]

What you posted was not a fact or statement but a question, and I answered it.

and each species adapts to its natural and changing environment.

That's evolution.

I cannot see how single cell life could evolve in stages over four billion years to the life we have today.

One of my favourites. "I can't see how that could happen so it couldn't possibly have done". I can't completely understand the inner workings of an Intel Core Duo but that doesn't mean it won't work.

I still retain these beliefs despite all the arguments I have read to the contrary.

You only believe in God because of a series of documents copied by generations. The arguments you speak of can be demonstrated to be true here and now. Why has a set of documents written today about repeatable experiments and demonstrable facts any less sound than those documents you speak of. Where is the evidence to show those are correct and all modern research is not?

[Dr.Trax]

I want answer to those questions:


1.According to Darwin, the absence of intermediate fossil forms “is the most obvious and gravest objection which can be urged against my theory.” What new fossil finds, if any, have occurred since Darwin wrote these words nearly 150 years ago? Do they overturn Darwin’s bleak assessment of evolutionary theory? If the absence of intermediate fossil forms holds as much today as it did back then, why should anyone accept evolution?

2. Natural Selection
According to evolutionist Richard Dawkins, the “evidence of evolution reveals a universe without design.” Yet he also states, “Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.” How does Dawkins know that living things only appear to be designed but are not actually designed?

3. Detecting Design
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) is a scientific research program that looks for signs of intelligence from distant space.
Should biologists likewise be looking for signs of intelligence in biological systems?
Why or why not? Could actual intelligent design in biological systems be scientifically detectable?


4. Molecular Machines
Do any structures in the cell resemble highly intricate machines designed by humans?
Evolutionists claim that these structures evolved. But if so, how? Could such machines have features that place them beyond the reach of evolution?

5. Testability
What evidence would convince you that evolution is false?
If no such evidence exists, or indeed could exist, how can evolution be a testable scientific theory?


Thanks!

[Azy]

First off can I say I appreciate the effort you've put into putting forward some clear questions :D Well, cut and pasted some anyway, but still, I like it.

Despite what is said about these questions, noone is hiding from them, there are plenty of answers out there if you look. Scientists probably avoid getting into arguments with creationists about these things because a creationist cannot back down as he would have to reject the firm-rooted beliefs that have been held for a lifetime. As you can see from the forums, it usually just descends into a shouting match with people putting their fingers in their ears.

I want answer to those questions:
[B]1.According to Darwin, the absence of intermediate fossil forms “is the most obvious and gravest objection which can be urged against my theory.” What new fossil finds, if any, have occurred since Darwin wrote these words nearly 150 years ago? Do they overturn Darwin’s bleak assessment of evolutionary theory? If the absence of intermediate fossil forms holds as much today as it did back then, why should anyone accept evolution?

Transitional fossils link - there are a great many and that is only a small section of them.

2. Natural Selection
According to evolutionist Richard Dawkins, the “evidence of evolution reveals a universe without design.” Yet he also states, “Biology is the study of complicated things that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.” How does Dawkins know that living things only appear to be designed but are not actually designed?

He knows this because evolution has been shown to have happened, see question 1. Things appear to be designed for a purpose because the organisms that best fit this purpose survive, and the others don't, or do less well.

3. Detecting Design
The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) is a scientific research program that looks for signs of intelligence from distant space.
Should biologists likewise be looking for signs of intelligence in biological systems?
Why or why not? Could actual intelligent design in biological systems be scientifically detectable?

Biologists shouldn't start out looking for anything, they should make observations and then draw conclusions.

4. Molecular Machines
Do any structures in the cell resemble highly intricate machines designed by humans?
Evolutionists claim that these structures evolved. But if so, how? Could such machines have features that place them beyond the reach of evolution?

They would most likely have evolved by gradual changes caused by errors in replicated, or simple molecules attaching to others. Could they have features beyond the reach of evolution? So far it hasn't been shown that any definitely could not have evolved. Just because we can't explain every minute detail at this point doesn't mean it couldn't or didn't happen.

Spiders build complex webs, does that make spiders intelligent?

Also, while there are some wonderfully effecient machines in nature, there are many horribly unsuitable ones too.

5. Testability
What evidence would convince you that evolution is false?
If no such evidence exists, or indeed could exist, how can evolution be a testable scientific theory?

Well for a start, if all fossils were of animals that existed now.
If genetics showed that DNA replicates exactly every time without fault and that errors would not be propagated.
If new species of bacteria hadn't seen to evolve in laboratories and elsewhere (think MRSA and others that have evolved to resist modern drugs).
Probably others but those are the few that spring to mind.

[johan]

The usual, tedious, creationist strawmen. The theory makes neither claim.

and you are the usual ignorant evolutionist..
one thing for sure, the only way evolutionist will go is down hill..

just because..

genes can change..
small property changes detected to occur through out many apparently 'closely related' 'species' of creatures..

then they induce that creatures seem to be evolving without the interference of a creator..
now that i find it ridiculous..

how could complex stuff such as brain.. gotten away to evolve from an algae without anyone designing it?

i say you're day dreaming..

The second choice is obviously ridiculous.

obviously algae(or the like) don't have (intelligent) feelings do they..?
so can you tell me where in time do they start to have (intelligent) feelings the way humans do?? ;))
don't bother to answer this one.. cuz your answer would probably sound as silly as evolution itself..

The first is based on misunderstanding at best, deliberate distortion at worst. The mechanism that allows genetic change to occur is 'random' mutation (the occurance of which is both well documented and conclusive to any reasonable standard). Which changes perpetuate, though, has nothing to do with 'mere randomness', indeed quite the contrary.

"standard" is a biased term, let's not use that here.

so it is random mutation..
well, i say good luck in reproducing you're "random" based model..
and don't cheat.. you said it yourself "random"..
so no interference of any kind..
no perfect "coincidences"..
hope you can make a brain cell out of algae with your "random" based model..

[johan]

That's not the point of this experiment, it's obviously not a real cell.
It shows that given a handful of fairly simple molecules you don't need to manipulate them into some kind of order. As a result of their inherent properties they automatically form a simple membrane.

It's just an added bonus that these particular molecules also grow and replicate.

That doesn't show that it's part of evolution.
Evolutionist would usually say that intervention of a creator is unnecessary.
But yet you have to make a special condition to do the experiment.

in the url it says:
When we see a cell membrane in a biology textbook it looks like each of the molecules had to be one by one purposely placed there then somehow bonded into place. But that is not the case.

What? This isn't some kind of survey, get the stuff and do it at home yourself.

sorry if i didn't precisely address the context.
I'm criticizing how evolutionists tend to conclude with too much haste.

Just because a billion or so cases we've found in this world that looks like as if evolving without any kind of intervention (which is never the case as far as i know, cuz there's always this special condition, special "coincidence", special "prerequisites") then they come to conclude that evolution needs no creator/designer.

The fact that it requires special condition is a proof of a certain design.
The fact that complexity is "built-in" to the creature is a proof of a certain design and not by "mere chance".

So you tell me, is it still a solid foundation?

[Azy]

That doesn't show that it's part of evolution.
Evolutionist would usually say that intervention of a creator is unnecessary.
But yet you have to make a special condition to do the experiment.

This experiment addresses the claim that simple chemicals in an early earth scenario could not form something like a cell membrane without help.

Yes the chemicals are popped into a container by someone because it would be terribly inconvenient to evacuate the earth and destroy all life, then wait millions of years for organic compounds to form, just to make it more authentic.

What is important, is that once the chemicals are in there, they don't just sit around doing nothing. Their basic physical properties cause them to form groups around droplets in an ordered fashion.

The fact that complexity is "built-in" to the creature is a proof of a certain design and not by "mere chance".

It isn't a matter of chance.

The fact that it requires special condition is a proof of a certain design.

I'm not sure what you mean...
Find me examples of these special conditions and we can discuss them.

[barney]

Genes can change eh?

We call that evolution in these here parts y'all.

[Dr.Trax]

First off can I say I appreciate the effort you've put into putting forward some clear questions :D Well, cut and pasted some anyway, but still, I like it.

There is no cut and paste at all,it is from your ignorance thinking.....
So you are here saying that you are a smart boy,but everyone is stupid!
Remember this: Do not never guess,it is better for you...be sure than say!

Transitional fossils link - there are a great many and that is only a small section of them.

Yes, the fossil record contains organisms that can be placed in a progression suggesting gradual change.
But most of these progressions result from arbitrary picking and choosing among the totality of fossils. With millions of fossils to choose from, it is likely that some gradual progressions will be found.
Also, such progressions invariably come from organisms with the same basic body plan. In the “evolution” of the horse, we are always dealing with horse-like organisms. And even with the “evolution” of reptiles into mammals, we are dealing with land-dwelling vertebrates sharing many common structures.
What we don’t see in the fossil record is animals with fundamentally different body plans evolving from a common ancestor. For instance, there is no fossil evidence whatsoever that insects and vertebrates share a common evolutionary ancestor.
The challenge that here confronts evolution is not isolated but pervasive, and comes up most flagrantly in what’s called the Cambrian Explosion.
In a very brief window of time during the geological period known as the Cambrian, virtually all the basic animal types appeared suddenly in the fossil record with no trace of evolutionary ancestors.
The Cambrian Explosion so flies in the face of evolution
that paleontologist Peter Ward wrote, “If ever there was evidence suggesting Divine Creation, surely the Precambrian and Cambrian transition, known from numerous localities across the face of the earth, is it.”

He knows this because evolution has been shown to have happened, see question 1. Things appear to be designed for a purpose because the organisms that best fit this purpose survive, and the others don't, or do less well.

Wrong!
The great fallacy of evolution is that it claims all the benefits of design without the need for actual design.
In particular, evolution attributes intelligence, the power of choice, to a fundamentally irrational process, namely, natural selection.
But nature has no power to choose. Real choices involve
deliberation, that is, some consideration of future possibilities and consequences.
But natural selection is incapable of looking to the future. Instead, it acts on the spur of the moment, based solely on what the environment right now deems fit.
It cannot plan for the future.
It is incapable of deferring success or gratification.
And yet, so limited a process is supposed to produce marvels of biological complexity and diversity that far exceed the capacities of the best human designers.
There’s no evidence that natural selection is up to the task. Natural selection is fine for explaining certain small-scale changes in organisms, like the beaks of birds adapting to environmental changes.
It can take existing structures and hone them. But it can’t explain how you get complex structures in the first place.
And look what cell biologist Franklin Harold writes, “there are presently no detailed Darwinian accounts of the evolution of any biochemical or cellular system, only a variety of wishful speculations.”

Remember the phrase “wishful speculations” whenever anyone starts touting the wonder-working power of natural selection.

Biologists shouldn't start out looking for anything, they should make observations and then draw conclusions.

WHY?:?Explain...

They would most likely have evolved by gradual changes caused by errors in replicated, or simple molecules attaching to others. Could they have features beyond the reach of evolution? So far it hasn't been shown that any definitely could not have evolved. Just because we can't explain every minute detail at this point doesn't mean it couldn't or didn't happen.

Take, for instance, the bacterial flagellum, which is now referred to as the “Icon of Intelligent Design” by some evolutionists because it has been so effectively used to criticize evolution. The bacterial flagellum is a marvel of nanoengineering.
Biologist Howard Berg at Harvard refers to it as “the most efficient machine in the universe.”
The flagellum is a little bi-directional motor-driven propeller that sits on the backs of certain bacteria and drives them through their watery environment. It spins at 20,000 rpm and can change direction in a quarter turn.
It requires approximately 40 protein parts for its construction. If any of the parts are missing or not available in the right proportions, no functional flagellum will form. So, how did it evolve?

Despite thousands of research articles that have been written about the structure and function of the flagellum, biologists don’t have a clue how it could have evolved.
You have only one straw at which you continually grasp when trying to explain how the flagellum might have evolved, namely, that the flagellum contains within it a structure similar to a microsyringe found in some bacteria.
Having found this sub-structure, evolutionists merrily conclude that the microsyringe must have evolved into the flagellum.

Such pathetic lapses in logic are everywhere in the evolutionary literature. The challenge for evolutionary theory is not to find components of such systems that could be grist of natural selection’s mill.
Rather, it is to provide detailed, testable, step-by-step scenarios whereby such components could reasonably have come together to bring about the marvels of nano-engineering that we find in systems like the flagellum.
What exactly had to happen to that microsyringe to transform it into a flagellum?

To see what’s at stake, consider what exactly has to happen to a motor to transform it into a motorcycle.
Sure, there are a number of steps that can transform a motor into a motorcycle.
And there probably are a number of steps that can transform a microsyringe into a flagellum. But what are those steps?
How gradual is the progression?
And is it reasonable to think that those steps could be taken apart from design?
Not having a clue about how these systems did or might have evolved, evolutionists never answer such questions.

Peace!

[Dr.Trax]

The Fallacy of Vestigial Organs
For a long time, the concept of "vestigial organs" appeared frequently in evolutionist literature as "evidence" of evolution. Eventually, it was silently put to rest when this was proved to be invalid. But some evolutionists still believe in it, and from time to time someone will try to advance "vestigial organs" as important evidence of evolution.
The notion of "vestigial organs" was first put forward a century ago. As evolutionists would have it, there existed in the bodies of some creatures a number of non-functional organs. These had been inherited from progenitors and had gradually become vestigial from lack of use.

All instances of vestigial organs have been disproved in time. For example the semicircular fold in the eye, which was mentioned in the Origins as a vestigial structure, has been shown to be fully functional in our time, though its function was unknown in Darwin's time. This organ lubricates the eyeball.

The whole assumption is quite unscientific, and is based entirely on insufficient knowledge. These "non-functional organs" were in fact organs whose "functions had not yet been discovered". The best indication of this was the gradual yet substantial decrease in evolutionists' long list of vestigial organs. S.R. Scadding, an evolutionist himself, concurred with this fact in his article "Can vestigial organs constitute evidence for evolution?" published in the journal Evolutionary Theory:
Since it is not possible to unambiguously identify useless structures, and since the structure of the argument used is not scientifically valid, I conclude that "vestigial organs" provide no special evidence for the theory of evolution.
The list of vestigial organs that was made by the German Anatomist R. Wiedersheim in 1895 included approximately 100 organs, including the appendix and coccyx. As science progressed, it was discovered that all of the organs in Wiedersheim's list in fact had very important functions. For instance, it was discovered that the appendix, which was supposed to be a "vestigial organ", was in fact a lymphoid organ that fought against infections in the body. This fact was made clear in 1997: "Other bodily organs and tissues-the thymus, liver, spleen, appendix, bone marrow, and small collections of lymphatic tissue such as the tonsils in the throat and Peyer's patch in the small intestine-are also part of the lymphatic system. They too help the body fight infection."
It was also discovered that the tonsils, which were included in the same list of vestigial organs, had a significant role in protecting the throat against infections, particularly until adolescence. It was found that the coccyx at the lower end of the vertebral column supports the bones around the pelvis and is the convergence point of some small muscles and for this reason, it would not be possible to sit comfortably without a coccyx. In the years that followed, it was realised that the thymus triggered the immune system in the human body by activating the T cells, that the pineal gland was in charge of the secretion of some important hormones, that the thyroid gland was effective in providing steady growth in babies and children, and that the pituitary gland controlled the correct functioning of many hormone glands. All of these were once conside-red to be "vestigial organs". Finally, the semi-lunar fold in the eye, which was referred to as a vestigial organ by Darwin, has been found in fact to be in charge of cleansing and lubricating the eyeball.
There was a very important logical error in the evolutionist claim regarding vestigial organs. As we have just seen, this claim was that the vestigial organs in living things were inherited from their ancestors. However, some of the alleged "vestigial" organs are not found in the species alleged to be the ancestors of human beings! For example, the appendix does not exist in some ape species that are said to be ancestors of man. The famous biologist H. Enoch, who challenged the theory of vestigial organs, expressed this logical error as follows:

Apes possess an appendix, whereas their less immediate relatives, the lower apes, do not; but it appears again among the still lower mammals such as the opossum. How can the evolutionists account for this?

Beside all of this, the claim that an organ which is not used atrophies and disappears over time carries a logical inconsistency within it. Darwin was aware of this inconsistency, and made the following confession in The Origin of Species:

There remains, however, this difficulty.

After an organ has ceased being used, and has become in consequence much reduced, how can it be still further reduced in size until the merest vestige is left; and how can it be finally quite obliterated?

It is scarcely possible that disuse can go on producing any further effect after the organ has once been rendered functionless.
Some additional explanation is here requisite which I cannot give.

Simply put, the scenario of vestigial organs put forward by evolutionists contains a number of serious logical flaws, and has in any case been proven to be scientifically untrue. There exists not one inherited vestigial organ in the human body, since human beings did not evolve from other creatures as a result of chance, but were created in their current, complete, and perfect form.

[Azy]

There is no cut and paste at all,it is from your ignorance thinking.....
So you are here saying that you are a smart boy,but everyone is stupid!
Remember this: Do not never guess,it is better for you...be sure than say!

Unless your name is Wiliam Dembski I'm guessing this is a cut and paste job. It's quite a well known article too.

But most of these progressions result from arbitrary picking and choosing among the totality of fossils.

Every fossil found fits in with the timeline as you would expect. You don't find human and dinosaurs together, you don't find mammals before reptiles, etc.
Show me something that indicates what you're suggesting is true, using real examples.

For instance, there is no fossil evidence whatsoever that insects and vertebrates share a common evolutionary ancestor.

Look at the Cambrian fossils. Do you see any horses or insects? These fossils are from a time before there were even any land animals. This suggests that life gets less diverse the further back in time you go.

The challenge that here confronts evolution is not isolated but pervasive, and comes up most flagrantly in what’s called the Cambrian Explosion...

Section cut and pasted from here.
In the pre-Cambrian era the organisms would have been soft bodied simple creatures which do not fossilise very well, but there are examples of simple plants and bacteria from this time. Some here (at the bottom).

In particular, evolution attributes intelligence, the power of choice, to a fundamentally irrational process, namely, natural selection.

It's a perfectly rational process if you actually understand it and noone is attributing intelligence to anything. It is the creationist position that attributes intelligence to the formation of life.

There are no choices, the best organisms live, the others die. The next generation then have the benefit of the best organisms from the previous generation, and so on.

WHY?:?Explain...

Being unbiased and impartial is key to actually discovering the truth. If you go into something looking for god you're automatically excluding other options. People stop looking when they have satisfied their own agenda.

Take, for instance, the bacterial flagellum, which is now referred to as the “Icon of Intelligent Design” by some evolutionists because it has been so effectively used to criticize evolution. The bacterial flagellum is a marvel of nanoengineering.
[B]Despite thousands of research articles that have been written about the structure and function of the flagellum, biologists don’t have a clue how it could have evolved.
You have only one straw at which you continually grasp when trying to explain how the flagellum might have evolved, namely, that the flagellum contains within it a structure similar to a microsyringe found in some bacteria.
Having found this sub-structure, evolutionists merrily conclude that the microsyringe must have evolved into the flagellum.

Link - read the section entitle "The Type -III Secretory Apparatus", it's the bit that Dembski is talking about.

The creationist argument is that the flagellum is 'irreducibly complex', that it's parts could not have developed separately and that if it were not whole it would not function. As shown in the link above, there exists in other bacteria the same structure but without the tail component, and it performs a function. If half of the flagellum can occur in other bacteria, and it can continue to work with several parts missing, how can it be irreducibly complex?

[Trumble]

There is no cut and paste at all,it is from your ignorance thinking.....
So you are here saying that you are a smart boy,but everyone is stupid!
Remember this: Do not never guess,it is better for you...be sure than say!

Don't be a fool. He, and I, can use Google (and come up with Dembski's article) just as well as you can. You have yet to post anything that is your own presentation of others' (credited) work, let alone anything original.

Plagiarism aside, the trouble with parroting without any real understanding is that, because of where you choose to parrot from, you only ever see one side of the argument - the other is simply never presented. I could explain why the Cambrian explosion does not 'fly in the face of evolution'. And how it simply isn't true that those pesky evolutionists "don't have a clue" how certain complex systems might have evolved.. indeed it was precisely because they did ask those questions that Behe's "theory" on irreducable complexity (including that 'iconic' flagellum) was shot down - although Yayha and Co. never mention that, of course. That doesn't mean evolutionists can provide easy answers to all the questions; in many cases they can't. Yet. But neither are they floating in the despair and ignorance the creationist propagandists (I do have a chuckle when a compulsive Yahya quoter uses that word in relation to anyone else :D ) would have you believe. Where the answer is not known they are looking for it and, sooner or later, they come up with it.

"Theory" is in inverted commas above, by the way, because Behe had to redefine the word to include ID as one. He later famously admitted that same re-definition would happily admit astrology as well. Which brings me back to the point you never answer.. can you produce any scientific evidence, any at all, that supports creationism? You asked " What evidence would convince you that evolution is false?" The simple answer is an alternative scientific theory that better fits the empirical evidence. There are no such theories.

Do yourself a favour.. read around the subject from both sides with an open mind. If you still think the same after that, fine.. but at least you will have stopped insulting your own intelligence. :)

[barney]

Trumble is giving some wise advice there.

I am an expert in Aztec history and can quote ream upon ream of facinating facts about them. I wasnt an expert a few seconds ago. But I have Wikipedia and Google. With such mity toolz i can shoot down anyones knowlage based on years of study leaving myself feeling very very smug and all those so-called- professors of Aztec History, looking very foolish.
Hooray me!

[johan]

This experiment addresses the claim that simple chemicals in an early earth scenario could not form something like a cell membrane without help.

Yes the chemicals are popped into a container by someone because it would be terribly inconvenient to evacuate the earth and destroy all life, then wait millions of years for organic compounds to form, just to make it more authentic.

I understand your point that this special interference is to accelerate the process so that we could see the effect. BUT, haven't you noticed?
The fact that it emerges out of nothingness is something astonishing, something that has to be created where by the process of it's creation in normal condition is millions of years; with the human catalyst around, it can be accelerated into a few moments.

What is important, is that once the chemicals are in there, they don't just sit around doing nothing. Their basic physical properties cause them to form groups around droplets in an ordered fashion.

Exactly, when an agent is from nothingness (void / "mere randomnes" / gibrish / etc.) and then out of nowhere turns to have a basic property (something that is defined / constant / consistent ) this then proves that it's been "created" by some mysterious creator, whom Muslims address it as Allah SWT.

It isn't a matter of chance.

You bet!!
This time you're spot on mate.
It's definitely planned.

I'm not sure what you mean...
Find me examples of these special conditions and we can discuss them.

ok, let me see if i can find you an example..ah here it is:

In the url it says:
...
When we see a cell membrane in a biology textbook it looks like each of the molecules had to be one by one purposely placed there then somehow bonded into place. But that is not the case.
...

Ok, wouldn't you consider this statement as a special condition? :
had to be one by one purposely placed there


If you don't consider that as a good example cuz there's human intervention then take this one:
The fact that humans have two gender, men and women, but algae are single gendered (asexual).
Wouldn't you consider that as a special case? why would nature come about to creating that kind of specialization?
Is it really "pure randomness"?
Isn't it a too complex task for something to happen just out of randomness?

If it happened not out of randomness but with the help of those basic properties, then who defined those basic properties?
Can it just go abrakadabra, puff, and it's there without anyone creating it out of nothingness (void / "mere randomnes" / gibrish / etc.) ?

I still believe that there's this notion of creation in everything.

regards,
Johan

[johan]

I sense that we have a dualistic understanding of evolution.

Theistic evolutionists recognize that species are dynamic and change over time through the basic processes of evolution, but they reject as implausible strict naturalistic evolution as the means by which all life forms have evolved from a common ancestor all without the intervention of a Creator.
...

:sl:
Can anyone refer me to a fatwa on this matter?

I feel that as long as there is no aya or hadeeth that contradicts this notion of theistic evolution then we might as well consider it to be safe/beneficial to do research on.

:w:
Regards,
Abu 'Ammar

[Azy]

I understand your point that this special interference is to accelerate the process so that we could see the effect. BUT, haven't you noticed?
The fact that it emerges out of nothingness is something astonishing, something that has to be created where by the process of it's creation in normal condition is millions of years; with the human catalyst around, it can be accelerated into a few moments.

Yeah it's quicker if someone puts them there than if they self assembled, what's your point? I never said life didn't take millions of years to come about did i?

Exactly, when an agent is from nothingness (void / "mere randomnes" / gibrish / etc.) and then out of nowhere turns to have a basic property (something that is defined / constant / consistent ) this then proves that it's been "created" by some mysterious creator, whom Muslims address it as Allah SWT.

Could you tell me exactly why that proves it is created, because I'm not sure I see the logic. In a particle accelerator, when two particles collide and out of nowhere appear subatomic particles with different properties, what is that evidence of?

This time you're spot on mate.
It's definitely planned.

When I say, not by chance I mean that it isn't random. Like when you drop a ball, it won't move randomly and hit just anything, it will be pulled towards the earth and hit the ground. The properties of the objects cause them to act a certain way, they are not guided by an invisible hand, and it is not chance or random.

When we see a cell membrane in a biology textbook it looks like each of the molecules had to be one by one purposely placed there then somehow bonded into place. But that is not the case.
...
Ok, wouldn't you consider this statement as a special condition? :
had to be one by one purposely placed there

You seem to have ignored the bit that says "looks like each of the molecules had to be one by one purposely placed there then somehow bonded into place. But that is not the case."

If you don't consider that as a good example cuz there's human intervention then take this one:
The fact that humans have two gender, men and women, but algae are single gendered (asexual).
Wouldn't you consider that as a special case? why would nature come about to creating that kind of specialization?
Is it really "pure randomness"?
Isn't it a too complex task for something to happen just out of randomness?

Anyone who knows anything about evolution realises that early on, all life would have been asexual. Just because some groups became sexual, and some stayed asexual simply because it better suited the conditions they lived in.
This only strengthens the argument for evolution, and weakens creationism.
e.g.
(Koran 51:49) And of every thing WE have created pairs, that ye may receive instruction.

If it happened not out of randomness but with the help of those basic properties, then who defined those basic properties?
Can it just go abrakadabra, puff, and it's there without anyone creating it out of nothingness (void / "mere randomnes" / gibrish / etc.) ?

See the bit about particle accelerators. Things just puff in and out of existence all the time in the subatomic world. You only ask 'who' because you believe that someone had a hand in it, not because there's any evidence to suggest that they did.

[Azy]

oops, forgot to remove your bit at the bottom, sorry folks :)
(changed it, have edit power now, w00t) :D

[Dr.Trax]

Don't be a fool. He, and I, can use Google (and come up with Dembski's article) just as well as you can. You have yet to post anything that is your own presentation of others' (credited) work, let alone anything original.

Plagiarism aside, the trouble with parroting without any real understanding is that, because of where you choose to parrot from, you only ever see one side of the argument - the other is simply never presented. I could explain why the Cambrian explosion does not 'fly in the face of evolution'. And how it simply isn't true that those pesky evolutionists "don't have a clue" how certain complex systems might have evolved.. indeed it was precisely because they did ask those questions that Behe's "theory" on irreducable complexity (including that 'iconic' flagellum) was shot down - although Yayha and Co. never mention that, of course. That doesn't mean evolutionists can provide easy answers to all the questions; in many cases they can't. Yet. But neither are they floating in the despair and ignorance the creationist propagandists (I do have a chuckle when a compulsive Yahya quoter uses that word in relation to anyone else :D ) would have you believe. Where the answer is not known they are looking for it and, sooner or later, they come up with it.

"Theory" is in inverted commas above, by the way, because Behe had to redefine the word to include ID as one. He later famously admitted that same re-definition would happily admit astrology as well. Which brings me back to the point you never answer.. can you produce any scientific evidence, any at all, that supports creationism? You asked " What evidence would convince you that evolution is false?" The simple answer is an alternative scientific theory that better fits the empirical evidence. There are no such theories.



Do yourself a favour.. read around the subject from both sides with an open mind. If you still think the same after that, fine.. but at least you will have stopped insulting your own intelligence. :)

First, Thanks for your advice!Sorry,I am a little bit late wit my reply,I had some other works to finish!
Second,I wanted to test Azy if he is investigating somewhere my questions and answers.Because every post that he makes contains this: COPY and PASTE!!!Every time he is attacking me with those stupid words...
So he was so boring with his words, that I became so nervous and I wrote to him that: there is no copy and paste!
Third,I AM OPEN MINDED PERSON,but for example:When someone Lies you 10 times,Would you believe in him again??? What do you say?
For ME:NOOOOO,NO,NO!
That is the same with this EVOLUTION PROPAGANDA!
And the most important thing is that I believe 100% just in the Word of GOD(The QURAN)!The Quran does not support Evolution!
One of the things for creationist scientific evidence is the unchanged fossils!(Not a fabricated fossil)!

And you said very good in one of my threads:
[PIE]evolution will remain the accepted scientific theory until somebody comes up with a better one. At present there are not even any candidates.[/PIE]
That means it is not sure 100%,you still are in doubt!
There is a better one,but you do not want to accept it!
Try you also to be an OPEN Minded,and do not accept A big propaganda,that only makes sense to you!Think and Search:)

Thank you again!
Peace be with you...

[Azy]

Second,I wanted to test Azy if he is investigating somewhere my questions and answers.

Well technically they aren't your questions or your answers, I haven't seen you make one decent argument yet using your own words.

Because every post that he makes contains this: COPY and PASTE!!!Every time he is attacking me with those stupid words...

So far I have only added links to material and quoted what you have pasted, the rest are my own words, if you think otherwise please quote the offending paragraph and the source.

So he was so boring with his words, that I became so nervous and I wrote to him that: there is no copy and paste!

Basically you lied to try and fool us like you have done from the start.

Third,I AM OPEN MINDED PERSON,but for example:When someone Lies you 10 times,Would you believe in him again??? What do you say?

1) You're possibly the least open minded person i've come across on this board or anywhere else.
2) Show me where I have lied instead of just making accusations.

That is the same with this EVOLUTION PROPAGANDA!
And the most important thing is that I believe 100% just in the Word of GOD(The QURAN)!The Quran does not support Evolution!

a couple of sentences ago you said you were open minded.

One of the things for creationist scientific evidence is the unchanged fossils!(Not a fabricated fossil)!

Get on a plain to China or USA and watch as people dig skeletons of dinosaurs out of the solid rock.

evolution will remain the accepted scientific theory until somebody comes up with a better one. At present there are not even any candidates.
That means it is not sure 100%,you still are in doubt!
There is a better one,but you do not want to accept it!

Nobody ever said it was 100% except you. Science is never 100% because tomorrow you could find something that you didn't know. So far no evidence (and a surah doesn't count as evidence by the way) has shown evolution to be false, if it had, science would abandon it and find a better solution.
There are no other candidates, because creationism contradicts what people are finding out in the real world. You know, actually testing things and looking for the answers rather than just believing everything you're told.

[Dr.Trax]

Well technically they aren't your questions or your answers, I haven't seen you make one decent argument yet using your own words.

Now I can see that you are the one who is out of school!
You totally don't get it...what I am trying to say.
I won't again explain to you!
Of course they aren't my!Men Wake UP!

So far I have only added links to material and quoted what you have pasted, the rest are my own words, if you think otherwise please quote the offending paragraph and the source.

So again here,you don't get it.
[pie]Well, cut and pasted some anyway, but still, I like it.[/pie]
This is the point!You always say I cut and paste!

Basically you lied to try and fool us like you have done from the start.

I wanted to test you and you proved to be fool!
Most of the members here knows that I only cut and paste!
I rarely use my own words,especially when I ask.
Because it is the same for me when I search and find something and try to post it here,whether I mix my words on it or not!
Better to put it originally,that to try to be a smart boy, like you are doing!:DDon't tell me that you are a Scientist and they are your own thoughts!

1) You're possibly the least open minded person i've come across on this board or anywhere else.
2) Show me where I have lied instead of just making accusations

.
Now you are totally ignorant here!
I never said that you've lied,
I refer to the Scientists(evolutionists),not you!
Hmmmmmm....what can I say now!?

a couple of sentences ago you said you were open minded.

I think,you are the one who is not Open minded!

Nobody ever said it was 100% except you. Science is never 100% because tomorrow you could find something that you didn't know. So far no evidence (and a surah doesn't count as evidence by the way) has shown evolution to be false, if it had, science would abandon it and find a better solution.
There are no other candidates, because creationism contradicts what people are finding out in the real world. You know, actually testing things and looking for the answers rather than just believing everything you're told.

I think every evolutionist says that!
Don't try me to bring you their statements!
There is evidence but you avoid them....sorry ....
There are candidates,but you evolutionists have the power now!
Everyone who tries to bring new claims ,you destroy it,and try to prove your claims to be true!
For example:
Today the Media claims that every terorist is a Muslim,every attack is done by muslims!
But for real it is not true!The reason is that The media or the West has the power to do whatever they want.:D

AND Please let this be the last post you have posted!
I am just wasting my time with you!
Remember:
It is my last post that refers to you!I will never disscus with you anymore!
Thanks!

[barney]

I need that 2 minuites of my life back after reading that.

This could turn out to be the longest "refute someones material with ever increasing hyperbole" thread in existance.

You should have just typed: "No Im Right" and left it at that.

[MustafaMc]

Anyone who knows anything about evolution realises that early on, all life would have been asexual. Just because some groups became sexual, and some stayed asexual simply because it better suited the conditions they lived in.This only strengthens the argument for evolution, and weakens creationism.
e.g.
(Koran 51:49) And of every thing WE have created pairs, that ye may receive instruction.

The "evolution" of sexual reproduction is completely illogical because male and female genitalia would have to evolve simultaneously, but they could neither perpetuate nor confer any selective advantage until they were completely "evolved". The creation of a man and a woman (as well as the male and female of all species) as complete beings is the only logical conclusion.
(Quran 51:49) And of every thing WE have created pairs, that ye may receive instruction.

[Azy]

The "evolution" of sexual reproduction is completely illogical because male and female genitalia would have to evolve simultaneously, but they could neither perpetuate nor confer any selective advantage until they were completely "evolved". The creation of a man and a woman (as well as the male and female of all species) as complete beings is the only logical conclusion.

See this is the problem. You haven't even looked at the evidence and you've dismissed it as illogical, what sort of starting point is that?

Dr Trax, please, do me a favour and read this.
It's an introduction to the scientific method and if you read it carefully, you'll see that there can't actually be a global conspiracy against you. Science isn't just an anti-islamic tool dreamed up by the west, most western nations are christian but science proves that christian beliefs are also false.
I'm not sure what paper you read but I've never seen the media claim all muslims are terrorists, and if they did it doesn't matter because you know they're wrong. They can say what they like but it doesn't make it true, just as you can say what you like and it doesn't make that true either.

Just please promise me that you weren't joking when you said you'd never discuss things with me again.

[MustafaMc]

See this is the problem. You haven't even looked at the evidence and you've dismissed it as illogical, what sort of starting point is that?

OK then the monkey's on your back. Explain to me how sexual reproduction "evolved" all the way from a unicellular asexual organism to human reproduction. Bring forth your evidence so we can discuss it.

Past experience tells me that you will post some link and just say, "Go read it for yourself."

[Keltoi]

The question of sexual evolution is pretty interesting. From I understand of evolution, this change in DNA makeup would begin with one specimen, not the whole of the species. This specimen would have to reproduce in order to share these new traits. Personally, I don't find there to be enough evidence to suggest human reproduction has evolved in any significant way from the beginning of the species. Has it ever been documented that a species reproduced in one way and then that method of reproduction changed? I know it has been theorized...but without documentation it is simply conjecture.

[barney]

http://www.bibleplus.org/creation/reproduction_defs.htm

Some interesting stuff here on it.
The thing is ofc, that even if us armchair scientists and theologians manage to definatly prove such phenomena, we can move on to arguing weather God intended it to be this way or not.

[ranma1/2]

The question of sexual evolution is pretty interesting. From I understand of evolution, this change in DNA makeup would begin with one specimen, not the whole of the species. This specimen would have to reproduce in order to share these new traits. Personally, I don't find there to be enough evidence to suggest human reproduction has evolved in any significant way from the beginning of the species. Has it ever been documented that a species reproduced in one way and then that method of reproduction changed? I know it has been theorized...but without documentation it is simply conjecture.

its a little more complicated than one day a guy was born and had no girls to party with.

Its more along the lines of asexual and then sexual too. (able to reproduce with self and others.) Then sexual specialization.

[Azy]

Past experience tells me that you will post some link and just say, "Go read it for yourself."

Would you prefer I spent a week compiling documents and then post a 100,000 line message for you to read through? There is a lot of material out there, it's better that I point you at it rather than bring it here wholesale, and doing that allows you to see where I'm getting the material and any references therein.

Also, some people just explain it better than I do and it makes sense to keep it in context. I appreciate it takes time out of your busy day to follow these links, but you will always have to invest time and energy if you wish to genuinely learn anything. I probably spend a couple of hours on any given day reading interpretations of different religious texts, because it gives me a better initial standpoint for any opinions I draw. You wouldn't want me quoting the Qur'an inaccurately or out of context, so I do my best to avoid doing that.

OK then the monkey's on your back. Explain to me how sexual reproduction "evolved" all the way from a unicellular asexual organism to human reproduction. Bring forth your evidence so we can discuss it.

I'm sure you're fully aware neither of us can go back in time and prove how our version of life came about.

What matters is that from examining the fossil record going back to the pre-Cambrian era, we can see that it did happen, regardless of the mechanism by which that was achieved.
In the early part of earth's history, fossils show that all life consisted of was simple single celled organisms like bacteria. As life progressed through the pre-cambrian and into the cambrian, more complex multicellular organisms developed and at some point sexual reproduction came about.

See Talk Origins for more info.

[MustafaMc]

In the early part of earth's history, fossils show that all life consisted of was simple single celled organisms like bacteria. As life progressed through the pre-cambrian and into the cambrian, more complex multicellular organisms developed and at some point sexual reproduction came about.

What I want to know is the mechanism through which sexual reproduction "evolved" from asexual. I would rather start with a summary overview than to delve through voluminous books and websites. For example, in a short paragraph I can present a pretty good overview of either Islam or Christianity. Why can't naturalistic evolutionists do the same?:?

[Gator]

Since you seem interested, here's a brief description of the current ideas being thrown around. It does of course come from the living compendium of knowledge known as wikipedia so I won't vouch for its accuracy or its comprehensiveness.

Thanks.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution_of_sex

Origin of sexual reproduction


The most primitive organisms known to undergo meiosis and to reproduce sexually are protists (primitive unicellular eukaryotes) such as those that cause malaria.

Organisms need to replicate their genetic material in an efficient and reliable manner. The necessity to repair genetic damage is one of the leading theories explaining the origin of sexual reproduction. Diploid individuals can repair a mutated section of its DNA via homologous recombination, since there are two copies of the gene in the cell and one copy is presumed to be undamaged. A mutation in an haploid individual, on the other hand, is more likely to become resident, as the DNA repair machinery has no way of knowing what the original undamaged sequence was.[18] The most primitive form of sex may have been one organism with damaged DNA replicating an undamaged strand from a similar organism in order to repair itself.[23]

Another theory is that sexual reproduction originated from selfish parasitic genetic elements that exchange genetic material (that is: copies of their own genome) for their transmission and propagation. In some organisms, sexual reproduction has been shown to enhance the spread of parasitic genetic elements (e.g.: yeast, filamentous fungi).[24] Bacterial conjugation, a form of genetic exchange that some sources describe as sex, is not a form of reproduction. However, it does support the selfish genetic element theory, as it is propagated through such a "selfish gene", the F-plasmid.[23]

A third theory is that sex evolved as a form of cannibalism. One primitive organism ate another one, but rather than completely digesting it, some of the 'eaten' organism's DNA was incorporated into the 'eater' organism.[23]

A theory states that sexual reproduction evolved from ancient haloarchaea through a combination of jumping genes, and swapping plasmids. [25]

A comprehensive 'origin of sex as vaccination' theory proposes that eukaryan sex-as-syngamy (fusion sex) arose from prokaryan unilateral sex-as-infection when infected hosts began swapping nuclearized genomes containing coevolved, vertically transmitted symbionts that provided protection against horizontal superinfection by more virulent symbionts. Sex-as-meiosis (fission sex) then evolved as a host strategy to uncouple (and thereby emasculate) the acquired symbiont genomes.[26]

[johan]

Yeah it's quicker if someone puts them there than if they self assembled, what's your point? I never said life didn't take millions of years to come about did i?

I see an analogy to the chemical catalyst agent but at a larger size and longer time line, a larger scale model of a molecular structure. The human as an intelligent catalyst agent of the universe reaction. :)

Could you tell me exactly why that proves it is created, because I'm not sure I see the logic.

You can't see it? Then look at it with a clearer mindset.
If no creation were ever to happen, and all there is in this world are merely random information, there will never be in anyway repeatable, corellating, artful, wonderfull patterns that could ever evolve.

67:3 He Who created the seven heavens one above another: No want of proportion wilt thou see in the Creation of ((Allah)) Most Gracious. So turn thy vision again: seest thou any flaw?


If these patterns evolved only because of the basic properties in them. These basic properties themselves are again special patterns which are repeatable, corellating, artful, wonderfull special patterns.

67:4 Again turn thy vision a second time: (thy) vision will come back to thee dull and discomfited, in a state worn out.

In a particle accelerator, when two particles collide and out of nowhere appear subatomic particles with different properties, what is that evidence of?

It's an evidence of our very limited sensory capabilities.
Our ability to dig down to the deepest secrets of knowledge using "our physical boundaries" has yet again reached it's limits.

We will need a much "higher level" of understanding to comprehend these disability, to "sense" these secrets.
We will need to abstract using our most precioused resource. The resource is the tool we were equipped to roam this world. The mind.

95:4 We have indeed created man in the best of moulds,

But mind alone can blur our "senses" to a point where we could be worse than animals.

95:5 Then do We abase him (to be) the lowest of the low

But there is another tool we were equipped with but of a higher importance, conscience. This tool will help us to find a way to the righteous path that has been revealed to us since the dawn of time.

95:6 Except such as believe and do righteous deeds: For they shall have a reward unfailing.

When I say, not by chance I mean that it isn't random. Like when you drop a ball, it won't move randomly and hit just anything, it will be pulled towards the earth and hit the ground. The properties of the objects cause them to act a certain way, they are not guided by an invisible hand, and it is not chance or random.

Yes, i agree.
In these seemingly random creation lies ancient rules that was established eons before us.
These rules laid the foundation of these seemingly random behavior, when it's actually a derivative of highly "calculated" chains of "reaction formulas" that are done by the fastest "processors".

You seem to have ignored the bit that says "looks like each of the molecules had to be one by one purposely placed there then somehow bonded into place. But that is not the case."

The writer is anthropomorphizing the process as if the process done one by one with "bare hands".

Anyone who knows anything about evolution realises that early on, all life would have been asexual. Just because some groups became sexual, and some stayed asexual simply because it better suited the conditions they lived in.

Believe what you like, but these creatures never had their own laboratories to enable them to change their gender, literally.

This only strengthens the argument for evolution, and weakens creationism.
e.g.
(Koran 51:49) And of every thing WE have created pairs, that ye may receive instruction.

Glad you've pointed this aya out.
IMHO, this aya is actually explaining of the creation of everything.
Currently we think that everything, theoretically speaking, consist of pairs of matter and anti matter. So it still holds and doesn't contradict.

See the bit about particle accelerators. Things just puff in and out of existence all the time in the subatomic world. You only ask 'who' because you believe that someone had a hand in it, not because there's any evidence to suggest that they did.

The foundation rules is what we need to focus our attention on when were talking about the creation and the creator. Other than that it could just be the derivative process or the aftermath of the creation of the foundation rules process. Intervention in the aftermath of the creation process is very much possible and likely though.

From what i believe in, the derivative process is what we know of eons of history since the "mechanics" of this mortal world starts to tick up to the future point ahead when the world comes to an end.

I belief that this specific and simple yet profound foundation rule is encoded and preserved in the Quran to be uncovered by the current generation for us to ponder and wonder on.

regards,
Abu 'Ammar

[Azy]

What I want to know is the mechanism through which sexual reproduction "evolved" from asexual. I would rather start with a summary overview than to delve through voluminous books and websites. For example, in a short paragraph I can present a pretty good overview of either Islam or Christianity. Why can't naturalistic evolutionists do the same?:?

It's obviously not the case that they "can't", they have but you can't be bothered to look and would prefer to ignore it or have us paste it all here then deny it.

If you had actually read my post you'd notice I said that it is impossible for us tell which particular mechanism was the one that resulted in sexual reproduction. There are a few candidates, as Gator has kindly helped us with, but I'm not sure if it will ever be known with certainty. A bit like buying a ring in a shop then trying to find out exactly which lump of ore it came from.

[MustafaMc]

Since you seem interested, here's a brief description of the current ideas being thrown around. It does of course come from the living compendium of knowledge known as wikipedia so I won't vouch for its accuracy or its comprehensiveness.

I see there are several competing theories for the evolution of sexual reproduction, but not a clear understanding of a single reasonable process. I was hoping to get someone to put forth their personal opinion or understanding as opposed to quoting from someone else verbatim.

[Gator]

oh ok. My personal opinion is that a mutation allowed DNA combination in an early cell and gave it a strategic advantage which was replicated. The mechanism I really don't have an opinion on.
Thanks.

[MustafaMc]

I am a cotton breeder and my job is to develop new varieties of cotton that have significant advantages over currently available ones. The objective is to convince cotton farmers to buy our seed instead of the competitor's seed.

One way of looking at my job is that of a practicing evolutionist. We develop new experimental lines that are higher yielding, have better fiber quality, have resistance to disease and insect pests, etc. I make cross pollinations between lines with varying combinations of traits with the goal of developing superior lines with the best possible combination of genes. We harvest about 10,000 plants a year and look to release a new variety every 2 or 3 years. This year we released a new variety that has superior yield in a broad range of environments, bacterial blight resistance and improvements in 3 of 7 fiber quality traits. God willing, we will release another one in 2010 with resistance to nematode (microscopic worm attacks the root) and that has superior yield in a specific region. A major problem is the number of genes controlling the various desirable traits and the extremely low frequency of individuals with superior combinations of genes. If you look at only 2 genes - 1 for yield (YYff) and 1 for quality (yyFF) - then the frequency of individuals in the F2 generation (2nd after the cross) that are true breeding for both genes (YYFF) is only 1 out of 16. If you consider a line with 10 superior genes for yield and another with 10 superior genes for quality then the frequency is 1 out of a trillion in the F2 that are true breeding for all 20 genes. However, that frequency assumes completely independent assortment and no unfavorable linkages between genes. This is of course an invalid assumption. Since the breaking of genetic linkage is dependent on how closely the genes are on the chromosome, the frequency of individuals with favorable combinations is actually much less than 1 in a trillion.

We work with a university in Europe that has transferred a gene for resistance to a certain nematode pest from a diploid species (2n) of cotton (no fibers) into the allotetraploid (4n) cultivated species. These 2 species of cotton (dd and AADD) are not cross compatible. The university crossed the AADD species with another diploid species (aa) to create a sterile plant (AaD) that was treated with chemical that interferes with meiosis in order to double the chromosomes and get a fertile hexapoid (AAaaDD). This hexaploid was crossed to the diploid (aa) with nematode resistance to give rise to a tri-specific hybrid (AaDd). This AaDd hybrid was male sterile and required repeated cross pollination with cultivated cotton as the male in order to get self-fertile plants. You see, we have transferred genes across species of cotton that otherwise wouldn't happen by chance.

The company that I work for has isolated a gene from a bacteria (Bacillus thuringensis) that is very toxic to a specific family of insect pests (larvae of moths and butterflies). We have rebuilt the gene to make it more plant like by putting in a plant-specific sequence that turns the gene on and another that turns it off. We combined this construct with a second gene that confers resistance to a herbicide (chemical that kills plants) in order to be able to select transformed cells that carry the genetically engineered "transgene". My company used a specific variety of cotton that is conducive to regenerating whole plants from tissue culture and transformed cell cultures to transfer the man-made construct into cotton. We now sell cotton varieties that express a bacterial protein that kills insects that eat part of the plant. You see, we have transferred a gene from a bacteria to a plant that otherwise wouldn't happen by chance.

Another company has genetically engineered cotton to not be affected by a herbicide that kills practically all other plants. Widespread use of this technology has resulted in multiple weed species developing resistance to this herbicide even though initially they were susceptible. The intensive selection pressure selected extremely rare individuals that already carried genes for resistance and these plants cross pollinated with other extremely rare individuals of the same species that carried other genes for resistance that yielded new genetic combinations that had even higher levels of resistance than their parents. So within only 13 years some weeds have evolved resistance that they otherwise would not have.

My point in all of this is that humans are actively creating superior genetic combinations and transferring genes between species that otherwise would not have happened by chance. Likewise, the existing and extinct life-forms must have had a Creator to design, create and sustain them. It didn't all "just happen by chance".

[Azy]

Johan I wrote a fairly long response and my pc froze up, i'll rewrite it in a bit

I am a cotton breeder and my job is to develop new varieties of cotton that have significant advantages over currently available ones.

Surely as someone who works in bioengineering you are aware that beneficial mutations come about in nature, think about MRSA. Yes, human pressure forced selection, but that isn't the same as saying that we forced the mutation in the same way that bioengineers actively splice in genetic sequences to promote resistance.
Most of the time we wouldn't notice these selections if they weren't caused by human pressure, but in some cases, like the nematode worm resistance, they came about naturally.

This argument can't go anywhere on your terms because either
1) Humans were involved in the beneficial mutations because we observed them and somehow we're culpable.
2) The ones we didn't see occur were actually like that from the start as the product of god.

There's no way that your view can allow natural selection because your view of god already has that covered.

[MustafaMc]

Surely as someone who works in bioengineering you are aware that beneficial mutations come about in nature, think about MRSA.

...but surely you realize that nearly all mutations lead to less fit not more fit individuals. We humans carry a heavy genetic load of deleterious mutations in the heterozygous state. What happens when 1st cousins marry? Don't they often bear children that are deformed or express genetic defects. Even the advantageous sickle cell trait (malaria resistance) is deleterious when homozygous > sickle cell anemia.

Yes, human pressure forced selection, but that isn't the same as saying that we forced the mutation in the same way that bioengineers actively splice in genetic sequences to promote resistance.

Yes, the mutation was there all along - its just that selection pressure greatly increased the frequency within the overall population. Yet, absent the selection pressure the mutation goes back to a very low frequency. This is due to the fact that the mutation often renders the individual less fit in normal conditions.

Most of the time we wouldn't notice these selections if they weren't caused by human pressure, but in some cases, like the nematode worm resistance, they came about naturally.

Yes, there is natural selection within hosts to resist pests and simultaneously within the pest to overcome those defenses.

This argument can't go anywhere on your terms because either
1) Humans were involved in the beneficial mutations because we observed them and somehow we're culpable.

We didn't cause the mutations, but rather selected for them. The same can happen in nature when conditions change to select for more favorable genes.

2) The ones we didn't see occur were actually like that from the start as the product of god.

No, I don't think that all mutations or all genetic variability were present in the primal specimens of each species. I allow for changes over time within a species through the processes outlined in evolutionary theory.

There's no way that your view can allow natural selection because your view of god already has that covered.

I have no problem with natural selection for changes within a species; however, I have a major problem with undirected evolution as the means by which all extant and extinct species "evolved" from a common ancestor.

[Azy]

...but surely you realize that nearly all mutations lead to less fit not more fit individuals.

Nearly is good enough.

From the site I link at the bottom you can also see there are beneficial mutations including lactose tolerance and immunity to HIV along with resistance to antibacterials as I mentioned before.

Yet, absent the selection pressure the mutation goes back to a very low frequency. This is due to the fact that the mutation often renders the individual less fit in normal conditions.

Well this is exactly the point. The conditions revert to their previous state and organisms with different traits which are more beneficial in this environment are more prevalent. The beneficial mutations have been selected for in each situation.

I have no problem with natural selection for changes within a species; however, I have a major problem with undirected evolution as the means by which all extant and extinct species "evolved" from a common ancestor.

As you know undirected evolution produces beneficial changes within species, but it has also been observed to create new species.

"Three species of wildflowers called goatsbeards were introduced to the United States from Europe shortly after the turn of the century. Within a few decades their populations expanded and began to encounter one another in the American West. Whenever mixed populations occurred, the specied interbred (hybridizing) producing sterile hybrid offspring. Suddenly, in the late forties two new species of goatsbeard appeared near Pullman, Washington. Although the new species were similar in appearance to the hybrids, they produced fertile offspring. The evolutionary process had created a separate species that could reproduce but not mate with the goatsbeard plants from which it had evolved."
This and other examples here.

[MustafaMc]

Nearly is good enough.

From the site I link at the bottom you can also see there are beneficial mutations including lactose tolerance and immunity to HIV along with resistance to antibacterials as I mentioned before.Well this is exactly the point. The conditions revert to their previous state and organisms with different traits which are more beneficial in this environment are more prevalent. The beneficial mutations have been selected for in each situation.
As you know undirected evolution produces beneficial changes within species, but it has also been observed to create new species.

"Three species of wildflowers called goatsbeards were introduced to the United States from Europe shortly after the turn of the century. Within a few decades their populations expanded and began to encounter one another in the American West. Whenever mixed populations occurred, the specied interbred (hybridizing) producing sterile hybrid offspring. Suddenly, in the late forties two new species of goatsbeard appeared near Pullman, Washington. Although the new species were similar in appearance to the hybrids, they produced fertile offspring. The evolutionary process had created a separate species that could reproduce but not mate with the goatsbeard plants from which it had evolved."
This and other examples here.

Yes, I admit that this was an example of speciation through hybridization of closely related species. By the way cotton, is also an allotetraploid (AADD) species and is thought to have evolved the same way from 2 related diploid species (AA & DD genomes).

From Wikipedia: The occurrence of polyploidy is a mechanism of speciation and is known to have resulted in new species of the plant Salsify (also known as "goatsbeard").

Goatsbeard are one example where hybrid speciation has been observed. In the early 1900s, humans introduced three species of goatsbeard into North America. These species, the Western Salsify (T. dubius), the Meadow Salsify (T. pratensis), and the Oyster Plant (T. porrifolius), are now common weeds in urban wastelands. In the 1950s, botanists found two new species in the regions of Idaho and Washington, where the three already known species overlapped. One new species, Traqopogon miscellus, is a tetraploid hybrid of T. dubius and T. pratensis. The other species, Traqopogon mirus, is also an allopolyploid, but its ancestors were T. dubius and T. porrifolius. These new species are usually referred to as "the Ownbey hybrids" after the botanist who first described them. The T. mirus population grows mainly by reproduction of its own members, but additional episodes of hybridization continue to add to the T. mirus population.

It is not out of the question for 2 cotton (or goatsbeard) species to cross pollinate and to produce a sterile plant (AD). Since cotton is a long-lived perennial plant, it is also not unreasonable that over time a branch would have formed from a non reductive mitosis cellular division (>AADD) that we can artificially induce with Colchicine. I actually did some of this treatment of a haploid plant (AD) about 22 years ago with the USDA.

[جوري]

Yes, I admit that this was an example of speciation through hybridization of closely related species. .

lol.. don't you love how folks talk of 'natural selection' yet can't reconcile trinucleotide repeat expansion disorders such as Huntington’s Disease, SBMA, Friedreich’s Ataxia, Myotonic Dystrophy or Fragile X Syndrome fit into that scheme? further can't use one known and documented mutations, Missense, Nonsense, frameshift, silent, or even DNA break and chromosomal translocations to demonstrate this sort of 'speciation' or anything other than a state of death or disease..there is some 100,000,000 species that exist on this earth each autonomous in its own right, even if I am to give this earth 15 billion years as opposed to the agreed upon 6-7 billion by most 'scholars in the field' with the first living organism appearing and earliest documented 1.1 billion years from earth's 'conception' and having it in the form of asexual reporduction, how often should a mutation be incorporated to allow for this positive change of plan? they read of jumping Genes on wiki and come with that atheist bravado to reference to various links when clearely unable to joint with any sort of dexterity all those seemingly immaculate events, in fact it is very easy through use of retroviruses and liposomes to introduce new genetic material into new host.. that is how folks now a days manufacture Insulin from ECOLI... lamentably with all that progressive brilliance, I haven't seen one lab Ape turn human yet from all these contrived theories documented by 'renowned scholars' such as dawkin et al. whom for some reason seem exalted in their endeavors as if their doctorate is worth more than others, such as Dr. Mullan's ---and what is the point? what is the end result of evo. shouldn't we have stopped at the stage of chiefly nocturnal insects, they seem to be more resilliant and successful a specie than human beings.. at least many 'humans' I have seen? or shouldn't we all be super human by now with a conquest over death-- what is the point of dying?

I wouldn't waste my time on atheists akhi...perhaps they should better invest some of that mcdies monies into some logical research only then can we stand a gasp in face of that 'overwhelming evidence'? Maybe with any luck they can actually learn how the scientific method works rather than cutting and pasting it for various members.. would be so nice if one of them knew how the null hypothesis works, confidence interval, types I and II error before speaking so freely for scientists and of scientific research, so the rest of us can make believe they actually know what you are talking about, the way I see it they make a$$e$ out of themselves on every thread...


Akhi Mous.. I appreciate all you are doing for the Muslim members.. but I wouldn't be aggrieved by this level of moronity.. if anything it is great for a chuckle...

:w:

[Azy]

Eve, for all the intellect you seem to possess you can't help using all these strawman arguments as a crutch.

MustafaMc - You're obviously aware of the mechanics of speciation and natural selection, but do not accept that they are responsible for the diversity of life we see and it's origins.
I would be interested to know how you reconcile your knowledge and beliefs with the changes shown in the fossil record?

[barney]

.there is some 100,000,000 species that exist on this earth :

Thats a lot for Noah to have cleared up after. :D

[جوري]

Thats a lot for Noah to have cleared up after. :D

if you didn't get all your stories from the bible perhaps what Noah took on his ship would make more sense?.. care to read suret al'mo'emnoon? might shed some light on it..
http://www.islamway.com/?iw_s=outdoo...1&rm_size=2.73

I guess I too would feel threatened as a christian trying to afix my beliefs with logic.. but I am not!


cheers

[barney]

if you didn't get all your stories from the bible perhaps what Noah took on his ship would make more sense?.. care to read suret al'mo'emnoon? might shed some light on it..
http://www.islamway.com/?iw_s=outdoo...1&rm_size=2.73

I guess I too would feel threatened as a christian trying to afix my beliefs with logic.. but I am not!


cheers

I know the surah well and that God diddnt kill the animals and they werent in the boat. I was directing it towards the Jews &-Christians.:)

The koran dosnt even state that all humans died. It just seems like a very local flood.

[MustafaMc]

I would be interested to know how you reconcile your knowledge and beliefs with the changes shown in the fossil record?

I haven't thought much about fossils since my senior year in college - 26 years ago. I missed graduating with honors due to making a "B" in that blasted 1 hour geology lab. Anyway, I had fun hunting for fossils in MS and AL. I actually found a prehistoric shark tooth 150 miles from the Gulf of Mexico - so cool. :)

[Azy]

I haven't thought much about fossils since my senior year in college - 26 years ago. I missed graduating with honors due to making a "B" in that blasted 1 hour geology lab. Anyway, I had fun hunting for fossils in MS and AL. I actually found a prehistoric shark tooth 150 miles from the Gulf of Mexico - so cool. :)

I hope one day I'll get to go on a proper excavation. My favourite period is the Jurassic, mainly because the north-east coast of england has a lot of exposed strata from then. I've only been a couple of times but I found half an ammonite once, it was a great feeling.

But yeah, another thing about the Jurassic is that you won't find any mammal fossils. There are plenty of large mammals today that you'd think would fossilise well, but instead you find a great many extinct species, like the dinosaurs, early birds, frogs and the like, but not a single example of a fossilised mammal.

[Gator]

Another company has genetically engineered cotton to not be affected by a herbicide that kills practically all other plants. Widespread use of this technology has resulted in multiple weed species developing resistance to this herbicide even though initially they were susceptible. ...So within only 13 years some weeds have evolved resistance that they otherwise would not have.

My point in all of this is that humans are actively creating superior genetic combinations and transferring genes between species that otherwise would not have happened by chance. Likewise, the existing and extinct life-forms must have had a Creator to design, create and sustain them. It didn't all "just happen by chance".

Very interesting thread. I'm an investment banker and we're working with an Asian company that produces hybrid rice.

I'm confused a little. You say that "all of this is that humans are actively creating superior genetic combinations" but then you site the evolving resistance of the weeds. Are you saying that the other company has genetically engineered the weeds to be resistant to the herbicide along with the resistant wheat? How exactly did the weeds become resistant?

Also, you state that there are mutations and that some could be positive (your use of the word nearly). Why can a "random" process" cause genetic changes. I don't see the supporting arguments for you conclusion.

Thanks.

[MustafaMc]

Very interesting thread. I'm an investment banker and we're working with an Asian company that produces hybrid rice.

I'm confused a little. You say that "all of this is that humans are actively creating superior genetic combinations" but then you site the evolving resistance of the weeds. Are you saying that the other company has genetically engineered the weeds to be resistant to the herbicide along with the resistant wheat? How exactly did the weeds become resistant?

The herbicide inhibits a specific enzyme that is critical to synthesizing a few specific amino acids that are subsequently required in protien synthesis. The genetically engineered plants (cotton, soybean, corn, etc) over-express this particular enzyme such that the herbicide does not interfere with plant health. I don't know the mechanism for how the weeds developed resistance, but I can imagine a selection for highly active promoters to turn the gene on and make more of the enzyme. Perhaps, there was a mutation that altered the structure of the enzyme enough that it was unaffected by the herbicide.

Also, you state that there are mutations and that some could be positive (your use of the word nearly). Why can a "random" process" cause genetic changes.

Well, mutations apparently are randomly caused by many different agents. A mutation can be as simple as sustituting a single nucleic acid, say adenine for a cytosine. This is called a point mutation. To generate a protein, a double-strand of DNA is transcribed into single-strand mRNA (messenger), which is then matched up to rRNA (ribosomal) which carries a single amino acid. The matching sequence is 3 nucleic acids with different sequences matching up with different amino acids. A protein is comprised of many amino acids in a specific sequence attached by peptide bonds end like beads on a string, but then the amino acids interact with each other and form secondary bonds due to positive and negative charges. The substitution of a tyrosine (aromatic) for a glycine (simple) amino acid can dramatically affect the 3D folding of the resulting polypeptide (protein). If this change affects protein function, then it is nearly always less effective than the unmutated "wild-type" - unless the environment changes and the mutation now has a selective advantage.

I don't see the supporting arguments for you conclusion.

Clarify your question and I will try to respond.

[Gator]

I just wanted to know why you believed the process couldn't have been random given, it wasn't clear in your post.

No need to respond, I think I get the gist. Thanks for your reply and appreciated the dialog.

[MustafaMc]

I just wanted to know why you believed the process couldn't have been random given, it wasn't clear in your post.

No need to respond, I think I get the gist. Thanks for your reply and appreciated the dialog.

I have agreed that the evolutionary process can explain the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria, herbicide resistant weeds, insecticide resistant insects, new species of goatsbeard, etc. In these cases, I don't have an issue with evolution as being random, or "undirected by a Higher Being". I can understand this process in those terms, but I can't understand the process by which a unicellular common ancestor gave rise to all plant, animal, fungal, bacterial species that are orders of magnitude more complex.

[Eric H]

Greetings and peace be with you barney;

I know the surah well and that God diddnt kill the animals and they werent in the boat. I was directing it towards the Jews &-Christians.:)

If God can create the universe and all life from nothing, then I simply trust that God can make things happen like an arc and a lot of animals.

Where is the problem if you have faith in a loving God

In the spirit of searching for God.

Eric

[Trumble]

I can understand this process in those terms, but I can't understand the process by which a unicellular common ancestor gave rise to all plant, animal, fungal, bacterial species that are orders of magnitude more complex.

Surely the obvious answer is the difference in timescale?

[Gator]

I have agreed that the evolutionary process can explain the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria, herbicide resistant weeds, insecticide resistant insects, new species of goatsbeard, etc. In these cases, I don't have an issue with evolution as being random, or "undirected by a Higher Being". I can understand this process in those terms, but I can't understand the process by which a unicellular common ancestor gave rise to all plant, animal, fungal, bacterial species that are orders of magnitude more complex.

Well, since were only a couple of hundred years from extensive use of leeches and less than 100 years from E=MC^2, man still has a long way from figuring things out. Somethings may never be. Yeah we made a lot of advances but we're no where near as smart as we think we are.

In my opinion in cases like this we're still close to cavemen discussing the origin of lightening (natural vs thor).

[Of course, implicit in the above example is that I'm right and your wrong.......................just kidding! :)]

[MustafaMc]

Trumble, no it is much more than timescale. It is more that I can't put the pieces together to go from an amoeba to a human. Rather than believe some unknown evolutionary process was responsible, I choose to believe that Allah created the various extant and extinct life-forms.

Well, since were only a couple of hundred years from extensive use of leeches and less than 100 years from E=MC^2, man still has a long way from figuring things out. Somethings may never be. Yeah we made a lot of advances but we're no where near as smart as we think we are.

The industrial revolution has given man the time and energy to advance knowledge and understanding, but, yes, there are things we most likely will never know in this life. For example, do we simply cease to exist when we die, or will we be resurrected from the dead to live for eternity in Heaven or Hell?

In my opinion in cases like this we're still close to cavemen discussing the origin of lightening (natural vs thor).

[Of course, implicit in the above example is that I'm right and your wrong.......................just kidding! :)]

Well, we do have a pretty good understanding of life processes and changes that can occur within species over time and even the origin of tetraploid cotton or goatsbeard from diploid species. Maybe in another 100 years we will understand the whole amoeba to human thing, but until then I will believe that Allah created man from clay then breathed life into Adam's lifeless form. I choose that belief in creation over belief in some unknown evolutionary process.

[Azy]

Maybe in another 100 years we will understand the whole amoeba to human thing, but until then I will believe that Allah created man from clay then breathed life into Adam's lifeless form. I choose that belief in creation over belief in some unknown evolutionary process.

Do you believe that God created the world intact, with false evidence of what seems to be a billion years of gradual change in life on earth preserved in the rocks?

[Dr.Trax]

MEDIA: FERTILE GROUND FOR EVOLUTION

As what we have examined so far has demonstrated, the theory of evolution rests on no scientific basis. However most people around the world are unaware of this and assume that evolution is a scientific fact. The biggest reason for this deception is the systematic indoctrination and propaganda conducted by the media about evolution. For this reason, we also have to mention the particular characteristics of this indoctrination and propaganda.
When we look at the Western media carefully, we frequently come across news dwelling on the theory of evolution. Leading media organisations, and well-known and "respectable" magazines periodically bring this subject up. When their approach is examined, one gets the impression that this theory is an absolutely proven fact leaving no room for discussion.
Ordinary people reading this kind of news naturally start to think that the theory of evolution is a fact as certain as any law of mathematics. News of this sort that appears in the prominent media engines is also picked up by local media. They print headlines in big fonts: "According to Time magazine, a new fossil that completes the gap in the fossil chain has been found"; or "Nature" indicates that scientists have shed light on the final issues of evolutionary theory". The finding of "the last missing link of the evolution chain" means nothing because there is not a single thing proven about evolution. Everything shown as evidence is false as we have described in the previous chapters. In addition to the media, the same holds true for scientific resources, encyclopaedias, and biology books.


EVOLUTIONIST PROPAGANDA

Popular science magazines having taken over the leadership of evolution propaganda, play an important role in encouraging the public to accept the theory of evolution. In short, both the media and academic circles, which are at the disposal of anti-religionist power-centres, maintain an entirely evolutionist view and they impose this on society. This imposition is so effective that it has in time turned evolution into an idea that is never to be rejected. Denying evolution is seen as being contradictory to science and as disregarding fundamental realities. This is why, notwithstanding so many deficiencies that have so far been revealed (especially since the 1950s) and the fact that these have been confessed by evolutionist scientists themselves, today it is all but impossible to find any criticism of evolution in scientific circles or in the media.
Widely accepted as the most "respected" publishing vehicles on biology and nature in the West, magazines such as Scientific American, Nature, Focus, and National Geographic adopt the theory of evolution as an official ideology and try to present this theory as a proven fact.

Wrapped-up Lies
Evolutionists make great use of the advantage given to them by the "brain-washing" program of the media. Many people believe in evolution so unconditionally that they do not even bother to ask "how" and "why". This means that evolutionists can package their lies so as to be easily persuasive.
For instance, even in the most "scientific" evolutionist books the "transition from water to land", which is one of the greatest unaccounted-for phenomena of evolution, is "explained" with ridiculous simplicity. According to evolution, life started in water and the first developed animals were fish. The theory has it that one day these fish started to fling themselves on to the land for some reason or other, (most of the time, drought is said to be the reason), and the fish that chose to live on land, happened to have feet instead of fins, and lungs instead of gills.
Most evolutionist books do not tell the "how" of the subject. Even in the most "scientific" sources, the absurdity of this assertion is concealed behind sentences such as "the transfer from water to land was achieved".

FABLES FROM EVOLUTIONISTS

Evolution is, as once noted by a prominent scientist, a fairy tale for adults. It is a totally irrational and unscientific scenario, which suggests that non-living matter has some sort of a magical power and intelligence to create complex life forms. This long tale has some very interesting fables on some particular subjects. One of these curious evolutionary fables is the one about the "evolution of whale" that was published in National Geographic, widely respected as one of the most scientific and serious publications in the world:
The Whale's ascendancy to sovereign size apparently began sixty million years ago when hairy, four-legged mammals, in search of food or sanctuary, ventured into water. As eons passed, changes slowly occurred. Hind legs disappeared, front legs changed into flippers, hair gave way to a thick smooth blanket of blubber, nostrils moved to the top of the head, the tail broadened into flukes, and in the buoyant water world the body became enormous.1
Besides the fact that there is not a single scientific basis for any of this, such an occurrence is also contrary to the principles of nature. This fable published in National Geographic is noteworthy for being indicative of the extent of the fallacies of seemingly serious evolutionist publications.

1 Victor B. Scheffer, "Exploring the Lives of Whales", National Geographic, vol. 50, December 1976, p. 752

How was this "transfer" achieved? We know that a fish cannot live for more than a few minutes out of water. If we suppose that the alleged drought occurred and the fish had to move towards the land, what would have happened to the fish? The response is evident. All of the fish coming out of the water would die one by one in a few minutes. Even if this process had had lasted for a period of ten million years, the answer would still be the same: fish would die one by one. The reason is that such a complex organ as a complete lung cannot come into being by a sudden "accident", that is, by mutation; but half a lung, on the other hand, is of no use at all.
But this is exactly what the evolutionists propose. "Transfer from water to land", "transfer from land to air" and many more alleged leaps are "explained" in these illogical terms. As for the formation of really complex organs such as the eye and ear, evolutionists prefer not to say anything at all.
It is easy to influence the man on the street with the package of "science". You draw an imaginary picture representing transfer from water to land, you invent Latin words for the animal in the water, its "descendant" on land, and the "transitional intermediary form" (which is an imaginary animal), and then fabricate an elaborate lie: "Eusthenopteron transformed first into Rhipitistian Crossoptergian, then Ichthyostega in a long evolutionary process". If you put these words in the mouth of a scientist with thick glasses and a white coat, you would succeed in convincing many people, because the media, which dedicates itself to promoting evolution, would announce the good news to the world with great enthusiasm.

[Azy]

Trax bro, I really need to invite you round for dinner sometime, you must be a great conversationalist.

[barney]

What just happened. I overdid the Tinfoil and I cant see or hear a darned thing.

[MustafaMc]

Do you believe that God created the world intact, with false evidence of what seems to be a billion years of gradual change in life on earth preserved in the rocks?

No, I don't believe that the universe was created instantly. I got no beef against fossils, but neither do I try to force them to support my beliefs. I look at them as evidence for some Allah's amazing creatures that have become extinct.

I have been to the Grand Canyon in AZ and I had the unforgettable opportunity to see the sun rise over it. It put my extremely short life into perspective to consider how long it must have taken for all of those layers to form and to then erode away to a depth of more than a mile. Wikipedia indicates it took 2 billion years for all of the layers to form and 17 million years for the Colorado River to carve out the canyon. I am sorry, but my mind can't comprehend that great amount of time, yet eternity is unquantifiably longer. That is too much time for me to risk spending it in Hellfire.

[kirk]

.....blind faith is the worst kind of malady afflicting the human race.

As an athiest I have no blind faith. Only religious people have blind faith :D

-

[Dr.Trax]

As an athiest I have no blind faith. Only religious people have blind faith :D

-

Really?
How do you know this!?:?
I think only Atheists have blind Faith...

[Azy]

I think only Atheists have blind Faith...

Is that something you just believe?

[Trumble]

I don't think either have "blind faith", belief either way depends on evidence. The difference is what evidence is most highly weighted and which is, to all intents and purposes, ignored, together with whatever it is that determines which is which.

I suspect both camps would like to claim that, in their case, the "whatever it is" was rationality, or maybe common sense. Personally I suspect at least 80% of it is purely cultural. The same 80% of what is 'obvious' to one will therefore almost inevitably be nothing of the sort to the other.

[Azy]

I am sorry, but my mind can't comprehend that great amount of time, yet eternity is unquantifiably longer. That is too much time for me to risk spending it in Hellfire.

Then I hope for your sake you didn't pick the wrong religion to follow or you'll be joining the rest of us in eternal ****ation.

No, I don't believe that the universe was created instantly. I got no beef against fossils, but neither do I try to force them to support my beliefs. I look at them as evidence for some Allah's amazing creatures that have become extinct.

If only extincts were a factor in the number of species, wouldn't we expect the oldest rocks to contain the most diverse life, instead of the other way around?
From the evidence it seems that it took god a billion years of trial and error, gradually improving upon his design until finally he got it right with the current selection.

Well they do say that he works in mysterious ways.

[MustafaMc]

Then I hope for your sake you didn't pick the wrong religion to follow or you'll be joining the rest of us in eternal ****ation.

Yes, that is true. In the Quran it says something to the effect of the biggest losers on that Day will be those who thought they were doing good in their lives, but were in reality astray from the Straight Way. Guidance comes but from Allah and I trust that He has guided me to the Straight Way.

If only extincts were a factor in the number of species, wouldn't we expect the oldest rocks to contain the most diverse life, instead of the other way around?

That would be true if there was an instantaneous Creation event, but not necessarily so if Creation occured in stages over time.

From the evidence it seems that it took god a billion years of trial and error, gradually improving upon his design until finally he got it right with the current selection.

We don't know the reasons for the extinction of some species and the emergence of others over time. Perhaps, the whole purpose for dinosaur's existence was that you and I would ponder it today.

Well they do say that he works in mysterious ways.

Allah's ways are not man's way and man's way is not Allah's.

[Azy]

Yes, that is true. In the Quran it says something to the effect of the biggest losers on that Day will be those who thought they were doing good in their lives, but were in reality astray from the Straight Way. Guidance comes but from Allah and I trust that He has guided me to the Straight Way.

I doubt you'll find any religion that tells it's followers they should be believing in a different one.

It's right because it says it's right was never a very convincing argument for me.

[barney]

Juche?
Juche sort of fits that bill, because their Deity died, so they have now to beleive in their deitys son.
But theyve fudged it by Kim not actually being dead, he's still ruling physically through his son.
The swallows who tried to accend his body to heaven heard the cries of the people all shouting as one and returned him to them.

I say they couldnt accend him cos he was too freaking fat.

[MustafaMc]

The passage that I had in mind is quoted below:

Qur'an 18:103-108 O Muhammad tell them: "Should we tell you the worst kind of losers relating to their deeds? Those whose all efforts in this worldly life had gone astray from the Right Way, but all along they were under the delusion that they were doing good deeds; they are the ones who are disregarding the revelations of their Rabb and the fact that they will meet Him for accountability of their deeds in the Hereafter, so their deeds will become null and will not carry any weight on the Day of Judgment. Thus the reward of such people will be Hell; because they had no faith and because they took My revelations and My Rasools as a joke. However, those who believe and do good deeds, they will be entertained with the Gardens of Paradise to live therein for ever and they will never desire to go anywhere else.

This passage specifically applies to those who disbelieve in the revelations of Allah and deny that they will be accountable for their lives on that fateful Day. However, we who claim to have True faith would do well to reflect on the passage as well for only Allah knows our hearts and our true intentions for what we say and do.

[i_m_tipu]

As an athiest I have no blind faith. Only religious people have blind faith :D

-

Kirk, Don't b so blind.
Every person in this world including you have blind faith in every day of life..
Let me prove it..

Say you go to a restaurant for dinner. You order lots of stuffs and food comes to your desk. You take all the cooked food blindly. You have faith on the cook that he did not poison your food.

Say you go to doctor for treatment. And the doctor tested your lots of thing and gave you some medicine and instruction than what you will do. You will blindly follow that doctor’s commands. Don’t you? There are so many things like this.

Say you walking on the street, enjoying everything. Suddenly your body rejecting to breathe. Imagine this scenario. Next 1 minute you will give your all strength to believe and pray that your body would regain it breathing power until you die.

There will be uncountable things unanswered if we starting to believe there is no GOD. Believe in GOD is an undeniable faith.

[ranma1/2]

Kirk, Don't b so blind.
Every person in this world including you have blind faith in every day of life..
Let me prove it..

Say you go to a restaurant for dinner. You order lots of stuffs and food comes to your desk. You take all the cooked food blindly. You have faith on the cook that he did not poison your food.

Say you go to doctor for treatment. And the doctor tested your lots of thing and gave you some medicine and instruction than what you will do. You will blindly follow that doctor’s commands. Don’t you? There are so many things like this.

Say you walking on the street, enjoying everything. Suddenly your body rejecting to breathe. Imagine this scenario. Next 1 minute you will give your all strength to believe and pray that your body would regain it breathing power until you die.

There will be uncountable things unanswered if we starting to believe there is no GOD. Believe in GOD is an undeniable faith.

i would disagree, in the case of the cook,
we base that the cook likely didnt poison it on past experience among other things. "he doesnt want to be arrested, hes trying to keep his job, theres no reason to poison you, hes not an assain for the EEC, theres a lack of dead people eating next to you, ect..." If you came into the restraunt and found everyone dead from eating the special "spaceballs" you would be on blind faith thinking if you ate it too you would be fine..

The doctor, "the same" for the most part we have evidence.
"he assumingly is hired due to ahvign a degree, hes trying to keep his degree, ect...

walking? huh?

and jsut assuming god did it answers nothing, we still ahve the same questions unanswered or explained.

[Trumble]

Every person in this world including you have blind faith in every day of life..
Let me prove it..

Say you go to a restaurant for dinner. You order lots of stuffs and food comes to your desk. You take all the cooked food blindly. You have faith on the cook that he did not poison your food.

Say you go to doctor for treatment. And the doctor tested your lots of thing and gave you some medicine and instruction than what you will do. You will blindly follow that doctor’s commands. Don’t you? There are so many things like this.

I disagree also. Neither example has anything to do with 'blind faith'. Both are examples of perfectly rational decisions on the basis of the known facts.

In the first instance your (admittedly subconcious) assessment is likely to be based on the assumption that the chef has no motive to poison your food while he has every motive to keep serving good food to customers and earn his living. You are hungry. If, however, your testimony had put the chef in jail for the last 20 years and he had just got out, you would be unlikely to eat where he was cooking!

As to the doctor, he has spent years studying medicine and you have not. While you cannot be certain his opinion is right you know he is so much more likely to be right than you (unless you happen to be a doctor as well) it would be totally irrational not to follow his advice. It would not be irrational to seek a second opinion, and that's what many people do on occasion.

[MSalman]

I am do not know much about evolution so please pardon my lack of knowledge

the main problem that I have with evolution is have to do with the delay. If we go back to beginning then natural selection could not acquire something that it did not have, which it needed (for selection process) to evolve one thing to another because there is nothing else exist beside what it has; so where did the extra things come from? If it always had what it needed then what took it so long?

For example, If i want to drink sweet water but I only have water and there is no other place to get the sugar from, no matter how many years I try different possibilities I cannot make sweet water. However, If i can make sweet water, it follows I have the gradients which are required to make it; therefore there must not be any delay.

A similar logic can be applied to prove that matter is not eternal.

[ranma1/2]

I am do not know much about evolution so please pardon my lack of knowledge

NP, i would recommend going to a good website for some basic info on evolution.http://evolution.berkeley.edu/
This site is from a well known university and goes about it in a pretty friendly and simple manner.

the main problem that I have with evolution is have to do with the delay. If we go back to beginning then natural selection could not acquire something that it did not have, which it needed (for selection process) to evolve one thing to another because there is nothing else exist beside what it has; so where did the extra things come from? If it always had what it needed then what took it so long?

Im not clear on what your questoin is here. Are you asking how did different traits come about? The site should go into it, howeve to be real breif, we are ruled for the most part by our dna. This dna pretty much creates any traits we have. Due to imperfect replication their can be Positive, negative and neutral mutations. Positivie ones are selected in , neg out, and neutral do neither. Its these positivie mutations that give creatures an advantage and thus the approiapte structures can form naturally.

For example, If i want to drink sweet water but I only have water and there is no other place to get the sugar from, no matter how many years I try different possibilities I cannot make sweet water. However, If i can make sweet water, it follows I have the gradients which are required to make it; therefore there must not be any delay.

Still confused to your question but it seems that maybeyou think evolutoin is guided by desire? Its not. Perhaps a better anaolgy is.
everyone needs water but not everyone can drink sugar. Those that can drink sugar have an advantage and have a better chance of surviving to reproduce.That mutation is then spread throughtthe population.


A similar logic can be applied to prove that matter is not eternal.

ya lost me on that last one.

[Abdul Fattah]

Selam aleykum dr trax, you're poll isn't very good. Some people might believe in some parts of evolution, but not in other parts. Things aren't always that black & white.
(P.S: are you the same docter trax from Idawah forum?)

[i_m_tipu]

Sorry I am not regular. Thanks for your interesting answer. I love intellectual things.
Ok here we go..

"he doesnt want to be arrested, hes trying to keep his job, theres no reason to poison you, hes not an assain for the EEC

In the first instance your (admittedly subconscious) assessment is likely to be based on the assumption that the chef has no motive to poison your food while he has every motive to keep serving good food to customers and earn his living. You are hungry. If, however, your testimony had put the chef in jail for the last 20 years and he had just got out.

So what. What a chef gone a do and what not is totally chef’s part. Do any tell how other gone a lead his life... never. Any unseen and future activities of any individuals are unknown to others.

we base that the cook likely didnt poison it on past experience among other things

You would be unlikely to eat where he was cooking!

A person never thinks also he has no intention to judge whether there is poison on his food or not. Why??? Because it is very much unlikely that why it should be called “I have faith on chef that he may not poison my food”.

I do not find any better logics for not to call it “faith on chef”. More stronger point can be found in case of doctor.

I believe any true logical person surely call it “logical blind faith”. If the reason of faith explain in good understandable logics can be called “logical blind faith”.

Human has limited knowledge on limited subject during his life time. He takes help from others, he has faith on others from whom he is or he suppose to take help, he put his faith on his Creator/hopes/luck/ and thus a Human survives and developed himself in his short period of life.

A person whether he is Muslim or Non Muslim or whatever he should have “logical blind faith”. Not illogical blind faith. He should try at least

If you came into the restraunt and found everyone dead from eating the special "spaceballs" you would be on blind faith thinking if you ate it too you would be fine..

It should be called illogical blind faith.

[ranma1/2]

....

So what. What a chef gone a do and what not is totally chef’s part. Do any tell how other gone a lead his life... never. Any unseen and future activities of any individuals are unknown to others.

The point is that it is not blind faith. Its faith based on evidence (thus not blind) Likewise i have faith that the chair im going to sit on or bought will work. (based on similar evidence)

....
A person never thinks also he has no intention to judge whether there is poison on his food or not. Why??? Because it is very much unlikely that why it should be called “I have faith on chef that he may not poison my food”.

I do not find any better logics for not to call it “faith on chef”. More stronger point can be found in case of doctor.

I believe any true logical person surely call it “logical blind faith”. If the reason of faith explain in good understandable logics can be called “logical blind faith”.

Human has limited knowledge on limited subject during his life time. He takes help from others, he has faith on others from whom he is or he suppose to take help, he put his faith on his Creator/hopes/luck/ and thus a Human survives and developed himself in his short period of life.

A person whether he is Muslim or Non Muslim or whatever he should have “logical blind faith”. Not illogical blind faith. He should try at least

It should be called illogical blind faith.

Ya kind a lost me with that.
Just to clarify. To me blind faith is faith on something without evidence.
I would also consider faith the faith that your food isnt poisoned to be different from the faith that if you pray to some god you will be healed.

Coudl you clarify what ou mean by logical /illogical blind faith?

[i_m_tipu]

The point is that it is not blind faith. Its faith based on evidence (thus not blind) Likewise i have faith that the chair im going to sit on or bought will work. (based on similar evidence )

Just to clarify. To me blind faith is faith on something without evidence .

Let me say it again say you seat on a fast food shop a boy come with burger and you take all the food. Let me clear it to you. The meaning of evidence is differ from meaning of judgment or logics. judgment or logics can be change or can be wrong but evidence mean something real fact.

Come on tell me what evidence you have that the food isn’t poisoned. You do not have any evidence .

Max people usually judge below two things before went a shop for taking food.

1. The shop does not have strange looking or it has reputation. The appearance of the shop must earn your faith in order force you enter the shop.
2. People taking food inside the shop happily. So it will earn your faith on chef/others possible person that he may not poison your food or no harm may not happen to you.

And based on above logics/judgment you take food blindly. Here we found clearly that the reason of this faith explain in good understandable logics.

Coudl you clarify what ou mean by logical /illogical blind faith?

I guess I explain it earlier.

If the reason of faith explain in good understandable logics can be called “logical blind faith”.

If the reason of faith cannot explain in good understandable logics can be called “illogical blind faith”.

I would also consider faith the faith that your food isnt poisoned to be different from the faith that if you pray to some god you will be healed.

Yes I know it. And that is another debate.
Think you believe there is no one creates you. I believe I am created.
I have many logics behind of my faith. And I believe you also have. Now who is correct?

If the reason of faith explain in good understandable logics can be called “logical blind faith”.

I give you one logics/judgment behind my faith. I don’t find anything around me uncreated (not a single tiny thing) and no one could ever claim with evidence that he know something which is uncreated. I see only very few space compare to the world imagine about the whole universe. To believe all the thing come into existence by change is “illogical blind faith” to me.

[ranma1/2]

sounds pretty much like a redefinition project.

[Azy]

I think it was David Hume who essentially killed off all philosophy by realising that we can't know anything about anything except for that which we are personally experiencing at the current moment in time. Even then you can't really extend that to what you can see or feel, as you have to assume that your brain is providing you with an accurate interpretation of reality.

[jyry]

Evolution.

Why the Bible speaks only a time from Adam and Eve who, btw, who was capable of speaking fluently and gave names to every animals and so on.. Where are dinosaurus? What creatures were our ancestors? Some kind of project that went wrong before god found the way to make a nowadays man?

Why is it hard to believe evolution? What about dog with two head? Isn't that enough to prove that mutation is possible? Some mutations have produced a life, some are bad - like cancer. So why is it impossible to believe that everything started from atoms - like we all have been made.

If organism cannot change and grow what about mitose and meiose? Human start to grow from small cell(s), which start to multiply and so on. Isn't this enough to prove that cells and organism can develop?

If we need a god for pregnancy - it's a miracle waiting a baby - does this mean that our scientists, who can create life or dublicating living things in a testtube, are becoming gods themselves?

Or curing diseases, manipulating genes, recognize the malfunctions, bad genes.. Why these all things are possible?

Why our universum is expanding? If god put all stars and planets on the right posession, why universum is changing all the time?

And if god makes miracles nowadays like some people says, why doesn't a god help people who are suffering famine? Or help innocence people who are under attack in a war?

And where dog disappeared? God was among people all those thousends of years and told us how we must live and suddenly disappeared? Why?

[جوري]

No mutation known to man causes 'speciation'
a dog or a person with two heads, is nothing more than maldevelopment during the embryogenesis, what is known as Craniopagus, thoracopagus or omphalopagus depending on where in the body it has occured... The union can be in the frontal, transverse, or in the sagittal plane...most severe mutations end up aborted, those that make it to term, have to undergo extensive surgery to survive, and mostly die shortly thereafter..

I haven't seen in any scientific journal a mutation, be it silent, nonsense, frameshift, even acrocentric break in chromosomes to cause anything short of disease, a malfunction, or death!

To get back as to why it is so hard to believe?
I suppose having such huge leaps of faith in science is even worst than having them in religion!

Beyond that I think this topic has been discussed here Ad nauseam, I recommend you use the search button, before rehashing your oh so learned buddies linear track of reasoning, especially when it has nothing to do with modern science as we know it..

cheers!

[ranma1/2]

looks like PA is under a 3rd name now. oh well.
Yes no 1 mutation causes speciation.

[جوري]

looks like PA is under a 3rd name now. oh well.

yeah.. do you have a problem with that?

Yes no 1 mutation causes speciation.

Glad you are keeping au courant of scientific trends!

cheers

[MustafaMc]

I haven't seen in any scientific journal a mutation, be it silent, nonsense, frameshift, even acrocentric break in chromosomes to cause anything short of disease, a malfunction, or death!

To get back as to why it is so hard to believe?
I suppose having such huge leaps of faith in science is even worst than having them in religion!

Yes, this one fact totally escapes evolutionists. Genetic mutations, the essential process for the creation of genetic diversity for natural selection to exploit, is a destructive process that renders individuals less - not more - fit to survive. Of all of the various species that were exposed to radiation, how many favorable mutations were created as a result of the nuclear disasters at Hiroshima, Nagasaki, or Chernobyl? How many superior species have evolved?

You and I can see the "huge leaps of faith" that evolutionists take, yet they accept the theory in toto because it does not include an unprovable element - the active participation of a Creator.

[Trumble]

You and I can see the "huge leaps of faith" that evolutionists take, yet they accept the theory in toto because it does not include an unprovable element - the active participation of a Creator.

No, 'evolutionists' don't do that. There is no 'leap of faith'. They accept the theory because it is the scientific theory that best fits the facts. You could debate for years (as people have) as to how good or otherwise that fit may be, but the simple fact is that is no other scientific theory that comes close.. or is even remotely plausible. Unless the whole nature of science is redefined God cannot form part of a scientific theory. If evolution is rejected in favour of creationism or ID then science itself is being rejected, at least in relation to that particular question. I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, but it should be recognised that that is what must happen.

[MustafaMc]

No, 'evolutionists' don't do that. There is no 'leap of faith'. They accept the theory because it is the scientific theory that best fits the facts.

I contend, there is a huge leap of faith in Naturalistic Evolution to go from a unicellular prokaryotic common ancestor to a complex higher animal with bilateral symmetry all by an undirected process of natural selection and genetic drift acting upon extremely rare, favorable genetic mutations and genetic recombinations. An analogy is to see a video of man walking on the moon and to compare how he got there to an extension of an infant crawling. One can't say that man used the same basic process as a baby crawling to get to the point where he was walking on the moon - it just took him a really, really long time to do it. As Neil Armstrong once said, "That's one small step for man; one giant leap for mankind".

You could debate for years (as people have) as to how good or otherwise that fit may be, but the simple fact is that is no other scientific theory that comes close.. or is even remotely plausible.

I don't disagree with you that there is no good alternative scientic theory for the origin of the species except to say that macro evolution is more speculation/guestimation than it is a scientifically supportable theory (IMHO).

Unless the whole nature of science is redefined God cannot form part of a scientific theory. If evolution is rejected in favour of creationism or ID then science itself is being rejected, at least in relation to that particular question. I'm not saying that's necessarily a bad thing, but it should be recognised that that is what must happen.

I am not saying that belief in a Creator should be part of a scientifically provable theory for the origin of the species, or even that Creationism per se should be taught in secular schools. However, I have a major problem with taking an unsound, "so-called" scientific theory and presenting it as a well known fact. I have no problem with stating the basic principles of evolution if it is left open-ended admitting that there are gaps, or parts of macro evolution that can't be adequately explained. I also don't see a problem with stating at that time, "Some people believe that a previously existing Higher Power had a hand in this process; however, this can neither be proven nor disproven."

[ranma1/2]

Genetic mutations, the essential process for the creation of genetic diversity for natural selection to exploit, is a destructive process that renders individuals less - not more - fit to survive.

and this is something many creationists dont understand either.
mutations occure many ways not just rhought radiation.
Mutations can be positive, negative or neutral. It can render them more fit (pos) less fit (neg) or be neutral. This is a fact. This has been observed.

[جوري]

Yes, this one fact totally escapes evolutionists. Genetic mutations, the essential process for the creation of genetic diversity for natural selection to exploit, is a destructive process that renders individuals less - not more - fit to survive. Of all of the various species that were exposed to radiation, how many favorable mutations were created as a result of the nuclear disasters at Hiroshima, Nagasaki, or Chernobyl? How many superior species have evolved?

You and I can see the "huge leaps of faith" that evolutionists take, yet they accept the theory in toto because it does not include an unprovable element - the active participation of a Creator.

That is essentially what you get with lay people who browse various google sites, and deem themselves scientists!

When you have a relentless headache, do you ask for help on the net or do you seek professional help?..

Some blogger, can go browse various google sites and read all about GBM's and deem your headache a grade 4 astrocytoma, you'd be a fool to take that with anything other than a grain of salt.

A headache is a very nondescript manifestation of anything from a buzzing bee to blunt head trauma to cancer..

Any craft that requires some thought, whether it be teaching theology to astro-physics will have its savants and skeptics.. what I don't enjoy however is this random quotations or pieces oh so 'authoritatively written' or references to various sites, when one can't tie in its contents to topic, as if to pass along a 'pearl' that seems to convey no meaning whatsoever... It gets dull after a while!

:w:

[MustafaMc]

Mutations can be positive, negative or neutral. It can render them more fit (pos) less fit (neg) or be neutral. This is a fact. This has been observed.

Although I admit that not all mutations are deleterious, I contend that the frequency of favorable mutations are extremely rare with the advantage most often limited to an altered environment that decreases the fitness of the unmutated allele. I further contend that most mutations that are perpetuated over time are recessive - meaning that the unmutated "wild-type" allele is fully functional with only one copy. That is the reason that breeding between closely related humans often yields children born with birth defects.

About 25 years ago I taught genetics lab to undergraduate students. A major aspect of this course was conducting a genetic experiment with Drosophila melangaster, the fruit fly. An example of this experiment, http://bioweb.wku.edu/courses/Biol114/Vfly1.asp Each student was given a wild-type stock and a mutation stock that I, as the teacher, had to maintain over time. The mutation stocks were invariably more difficult to maintain over multiple generations. One can easily imagine that a fly with vestigial or curly wings would not be able to fly around and find the over-ripe banana.

[MustafaMc]

I came upon this excellent website that does a superb job of explaining some of the principles that I have posted. I encourage everyone to read the whole article from which I have quoted excerpts.

http://www.answersingenesis.org/home...-mutations.asp

by Dr. Gary Parker began his teaching career as a non-Christian and evolutionist.

Quotes:
The modern evolutionist believes that new traits come about by chance, by random changes in genes called “mutations,” and not by use and disuse....Mutations are certainly real. They have profound effects on our lives. And, according to the neo-Darwinian evolutionists, mutations are the raw material for evolution...But is that possible? Can mutations produce real evolutionary changes? Don’t make any mistakes here. Mutations are real; they’re something we observe; they do make changes in traits. But the question remains: do they produce evolutionary changes?

The answer seems to be: “Mutations, yes. Evolution, no.” In the last analysis, mutations really don’t help evolutionary theory at all. There are three major problems or limits (and many minor ones) that prevent scientific extrapolation from mutational change to evolutionary change.

(1) Mathematical challenges. Problem number one is the mathematical. ... Fortunately, mutations are very rare. They occur on an average of perhaps once in every ten million duplications of a DNA molecule (10^7, a one followed by seven zeroes)....The mathematical problem for evolution comes when you want a series of related mutations. The odds of getting two mutations that are related to one another is the product of the separate probabilities: one in 10^7 x 10^7, or 10^14....What about trying for four related mutations? One in 10^28. Suddenly, the earth isn’t big enough to hold enough organisms to make that very likely. And we’re talking about only four mutations. It would take many more than that to change a fish into a philosopher, or even a fish into a frog. Four mutations don’t even make a start toward any real evolution....

(2) Upward or downward? Even more serious is the fact that mutations are “going the wrong way” as far as evolution is concerned. Almost every mutation we know is identified by the disease or abnormality that it causes. Creationists use mutations to explain the origin of parasites and disease, the origin of hereditary defects, and the loss of traits. In other words, time, chance, and random changes do just what we normally expect: tear things down and make matters worse. Using mutations to explain the breakdown of existing genetic order (creation-corruption) is quite the opposite of using mutations to explain the build up of genetic order (evolution). Clearly, creation-corruption is the most direct inference from the effects of mutations that scientists actually observe.

...Evolutionists recognize, of course, the problem of trying to explain “onward and upward” evolution on the basis of mutations that are harmful at least 1000 times more often than they are helpful. No evolutionist believes that standing in front of X-ray machines would eventually improve human beings.

(3) Mutations point back to creation. Mathematics and genetic load are huge problems for evolution, but the biggest reason mutations cannot lead to evolution is an extremely simple one. It’s so simple, I’m almost afraid to say it. But really, mutations presuppose creation. After all, mutations are only changes in genes that already exist.

Most mutations are caused by radiation or replication errors. But what do you have to have before you can have a mutation? Obviously, the gene has to be there first, before the radiation can hit it or before it can make a copying mistake. In one sense, it’s as simple as that: the gene has to be there before it can mutate. All you get as a result of mutation is just a varied form of an already-existing gene, i.e., variation within kind.

To make evolution happen—or even to make evolution a scientific theory—evolutionists need some kind of “genetic script writer” (in other words a Creator) to increase the quantity and quality of genetic information. Mutations are just “typographic errors” that occur as genetic script is copied. Mutations have no ability to compose genetic sentences, and thus no ability to make evolution happen at all.

[ranma1/2]

mutations are not rare, as i recall each human shoudl have at between 50-100 or so mutations (somethign neither your parents had).
benefitial mutations are rare, but those get selected in.

also benefitial mutaions have been observed.
nyolnese. (a benefitial mutation allowing bacteria to eat nylong)

nothing point to ID. If you can get it to be even remotely scientific (that pesky evidence thing) ID might have a chance.


http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/mutations.html

[Azy]

MustafaMc, are you now denying that you are aware of speciation events, because it suits the current argument?

I haven't seen in any scientific journal a mutation, be it silent, nonsense, frameshift, even acrocentric break in chromosomes to cause anything short of disease, a malfunction, or death!

Although I admit that not all mutations are deleterious, I contend that the frequency of favorable mutations are extremely rare with the advantage most often limited to an altered environment that decreases the fitness of the unmutated allele.

I have agreed that the evolutionary process can explain the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria, herbicide resistant weeds, insecticide resistant insects, new species of goatsbeard, etc.

You don't want to contradict her, she's always right even if you work in genetics and she cuts people up for a living.

(1) Mathematical challenges... What about trying for four related mutations? One in 10^28.Suddenly, the earth isn’t big enough to hold enough organisms to make that very likely.

There are an estimated 5x10^30 bacteria on earth. E. Coli (for example) only takes 15 minutes to reproduce in a lab, but about 24 hours in the wild, i'll use the latter.
Given these quantities we would expect the number of events involving four related mutations to be about 114,000 each day in the bacterial population.

(2) Upward or downward?

You already answered this one with the inherited resistance mutations and there are plenty of other known examples that we've covered earlier in this thread.

(3) Mutations point back to creation...But what do you have to have before you can have a mutation? Obviously, the gene has to be there first, before the radiation can hit it or before it can make a copying mistake... evolutionists need some kind of “genetic script writer” (in other words a Creator) to increase the quantity and quality of genetic information.

Come on, you know the answer to this already. Chrystanthemums? Most have 18 chromosomes but we find some with greatly varying amounts, as many as 200.


You can increase the numbers of genes.
Not all mutations are damaging, and in the right circumstances a mutation gives a being an advantage over those around it.
It's not nearly as rare as people would have you believe.
Speciation has been observed.

[MustafaMc]

mutations are not rare, as i recall each human shoudl have at between 50-100 or so mutations (somethign neither your parents had).

In the link you provided, I found "The average human being has about 50-100 mutations, of which about 3 matter, i.e., they actually change a protein.", but it did not mention "neither parents had". Yes, we carry a lot of mutations around in recessive form that are expressed only when homozygous. The trick is that the 50-100 mutated alleles that I carry (with only about 3 being significant) are likely to be different from those that my wife carries unless we were closely related.

benefitial mutations are rare, but those get selected in.

also benefitial mutaions have been observed.
nyolnese. (a benefitial mutation allowing bacteria to eat nylong)

Quoting from your site, "Well, no, they don't actually eat nylon; they eat short molecules (nylon oligomers) found in the waste waters of plants that produce nylon. They metabolize short nylon oligomers, breaking the nylon linkages with a couple of related enzymes. Since the bonds involved aren't found in natural products, the enzymes must have arisen since the time nylon was invented (around the 1940s). It would appear this happened by new mutations in that time period."

I don't disagree that there are some mutations that confer a selective advantage in some environments, but most usually convey a selective disadvantage in other environments.

nothing point to ID. If you can get it to be even remotely scientific (that pesky evidence thing) ID might have a chance.

Again, I don't disagree as there is no (and probably never will be) any scientific evidence for ID, or for the existence of Allah (swt). What I have put forward is logical evidence for a Creator that can't be either proven or disproven with scientific evidence. However, strict naturalistic macro evolution completely fails from this logical reasoning approach.

[MustafaMc]

MustafaMc, are you now denying that you are aware of speciation events, because it suits the current argument?

Originally Posted by Skye Ephémérine

I haven't seen in any scientific journal a mutation, be it silent, nonsense, frameshift, even acrocentric break in chromosomes to cause anything short of disease, a malfunction, or death!

Originally Posted by MustafaMc
Although I admit that not all mutations are deleterious, I contend that the frequency of favorable mutations are extremely rare with the advantage most often limited to an altered environment that decreases the fitness of the unmutated allele.

Originally Posted by MustafaMc
I have agreed that the evolutionary process can explain the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria, herbicide resistant weeds, insecticide resistant insects, new species of goatsbeard, etc.

You don't want to contradict her, she's always right even if you work in genetics and she cuts people up for a living.

This dear Sister-in-Faith very rarely mis-speaks on the forum and I don't know enough about her human medical perspective on mutations to contradict that statement.

I am not denying the examples of speciation events such as tetraploid American goatsbeard from 2 diploid European parents much like tetraploid cotton (my crop of interest) is thought to have evolved from 2 diploid species with A or D genomes. However, I don't see that these were mutational events.

Quoting from the talkorigins.org site:
Sometimes one or more chromosomes are duplicated during reproduction; the offspring get extra copies of those chromosomes.

Effects of chromosomal duplication: Duplicating only one chromosome is generally disadvantageous; an example in human beings is Down's syndrome. Having multiple copies of all of the chromosomes is known as polyploidy. Polyploidy is rare in fungi and animals (although it does occur) and is common in plants. It has been estimated that 20-50% of all plant species arise as the result of polyploidy.

Originally Posted by MustafaMc
(1) Mathematical challenges... What about trying for four related mutations? One in 10^28.Suddenly, the earth isn’t big enough to hold enough organisms to make that very likely.

There are an estimated 5x10^30 bacteria on earth. E. Coli (for example) only takes 15 minutes to reproduce in a lab, but about 24 hours in the wild, i'll use the latter.
Given these quantities we would expect the number of events involving four related mutations to be about 114,000 each day in the bacterial population.

Actually, if you did the math properly (Excel) you would find the number is 500. We are talking about total mutation events (in sets of 4 related), not necessarily the favorable ones.

Originally Posted by MustafaMc
(2) Upward or downward?

You already answered this one with the inherited resistance mutations and there are plenty of other known examples that we've covered earlier in this thread.

I don't deny that there are mutated alleles already existing within populations just waiting for favorable selection pressure to increase in frequency. However, since these alleles don't normally confer a selective advantage, their rare occurrence implies a selective disadvantage in "normal environments".

Originally Posted by MustafaMc
(3) Mutations point back to creation...But what do you have to have before you can have a mutation? Obviously, the gene has to be there first, before the radiation can hit it or before it can make a copying mistake... evolutionists need some kind of “genetic script writer” (in other words a Creator) to increase the quantity and quality of genetic information.

Come on, you know the answer to this already. Chrystanthemums? Most have 18 chromosomes but we find some with greatly varying amounts, as many as 200.


You can increase the numbers of genes.
Not all mutations are damaging, and in the right circumstances a mutation gives a being an advantage over those around it.
It's not nearly as rare as people would have you believe.
Speciation has been observed.

Your counter argument does not address the point. The point is the pre-existence of a fully functioning gene for mutation to alter.

[Azy]

Actually, if you did the math properly (Excel) you would find the number is 500. We are talking about total mutation events (in sets of 4 related), not necessarily the favorable ones.

lol, sorry, I did one set of calculations with different figures and didn't update it once I'd done :-[
yeah it's just 5x10^(30-28)

Still, 500 a day is lot considering whoever authored your previous quote doesn't think that 1 in 10^28 is enough to make any difference.
When you consider the part of your post "mutations that are harmful at least 1000 times more often than they are helpful", it would seem that every 2 days a beneficial mutation would occur by that commentator's rules.

What is defined as a 'related' mutation and why would 4 or 3 or 2 or 20 be a significant number?

I don't deny that there are mutated alleles already existing within populations just waiting for favorable selection pressure to increase in frequency. However, since these alleles don't normally confer a selective advantage, their rare occurrence implies a selective disadvantage in "normal environments".

Surely all that depends on is what the mutation actually is. Do mutation events know what the current situation is and only produce a mutation that would be beneficial in another scenario?

Your counter argument does not address the point. The point is the pre-existence of a fully functioning gene for mutation to alter.

Well if you're asking me how you'd create a gene from scratch then I'd have to concede I haven't a clue, but there are people out there who have.
I'd imagine these people know a lot more than we do.

[MustafaMc]

Still, 500 a day is lot considering whoever authored your previous quote doesn't think that 1 in 10^28 is enough to make any difference.
When you consider the part of your post "mutations that are harmful at least 1000 times more often than they are helpful", it would seem that every 2 days a beneficial mutation would occur by that commentator's rules.

What is defined as a 'related' mutation and why would 4 or 3 or 2 or 20 be a significant number?

The issue with several simultaneous mutations being related is in order for them to act in synchrony to confer a new function that would lead to speciation. Yes, there are a few favorable mutation events among the total that would confer a selective advantage in an altered environment.

Surely all that depends on is what the mutation actually is. Do mutation events know what the current situation is and only produce a mutation that would be beneficial in another scenario?

Well, mutations have no self awareness or awareness of the external environment. These mutations are random and just float around in the genome until a selection pressure increases its frequency.

Well if you're asking me how you'd create a gene from scratch then I'd have to concede I haven't a clue, but there are people out there who have.
I'd imagine these people know a lot more than we do.

Aw, come on now, at least you can pull out the highlights like I did.

[MustafaMc]

I am shocked that 38% of respondents on an Islamic forum believe in undirected evolution as the means for the origin of all living and extinct species from a common unicellular ancestor.

[Dr.Trax]

:sl:

Exposing the flaws in the Theory of Evolution

This article will describe and explore the Theory of Evolution. It will attempt to describe the theory, defining its main elements, and also take a brief look at the historical changes to the Theory – a kind of evolution of the Theory of Evolution! In addition, the article will seek to discuss the evidences used by the proponents of this theory and then provide a synopsis of the counter arguments.

Introduction

The Theory of Evolution has become the de facto standard used in the West, and indeed beyond, to explain the existence of creation and life. It is described as rational and scientific; many statements are made to demonstrate the strength of the Theory – such as the number of scientists who have given it their blessings and its widespread acceptance beyond the scientific community. Nonetheless, there is a strong perception existing in our day and age of the credibility of the Theory of Evolution. To some extent, it is discussed and taught in schools and educational establishments and promoted in the mainstream media. In stark contrast, other arguments that explain the existence of life are considered to be irrational, backward and steeped in ignorance borne out of belief in religion. In other words, there are essentially two clear camps: the ‘scientific’ and progressive camp which espouses the virtues of the Theory, and the apparently ‘unscientific’ contingent which clings to outmoded explanations such as the existence of a Creator. In recent times, thanks in no small part to various Christian elements in the U.S., the clashes between these two sides have become more visible and the tempo seems to have been raised. There have been calls for a restructuring to the way in which the Theory is taught to children, or at the very least provision for a balanced approach, so that the young are taught about other explanations as well. Many establishments have insisted on giving religious teaching the priority, leading to conflict with those who believe religion should have no such role in schools.

The Theory of Evolution

The theory of evolution is sometimes described using complex and convoluted language, which can be a significant source of confusion. What adds to the confusion is the fact that aspects of the theory do undergo change and revision. In this article I will try to explain the main points that constitute the theory, on which those who propose this theory are agreed, without getting bogged down in the finer details or indeed the many arguments and assumptions in relation to areas where there may be some difference of opinion and divergence of views. I have also tried to simplify the description so it can be understood without recourse to a dictionary and constant definition of scientific terminology.

To understand the thrust of the theory, it is useful to have an idea of some of the concepts that are used and an appreciation of the context.

Firstly, the definition: biological evolution is defined as descent with modification from a common ancestor. In this context, descent means going down from one generation through to the following generations. Modification alludes to alterations in genetic make-up and changes in gene frequencies. This definition encompasses what is known as small-scale evolution (changes in gene frequency in a population from one generation to the next) and large-scale evolution (the descent of different species from a common ancestor over many generations).

Of course biological evolution is not simply a matter of change over time. Lots of things change over time: trees lose their leaves, mountain ranges rise and erode, but they aren't examples of biological evolution because they don't involve descent through genetic inheritance.

Secondly, a key central idea of biological evolution is that all life on Earth shares a common ancestor, just as our cousins and we share a common grandmother. It is argued that through the process of descent with modification, the common ancestor of life on Earth gave rise to the diversity that we see documented in the fossil record and around us today. Evolution means that we are all distant cousins: humans and oak trees, hummingbirds and whales.

The process of evolution produces a pattern of relationships between species. As lineages evolve and split and modifications are inherited, their evolutionary paths diverge. This produces a branching pattern of evolutionary relationships. These relationships can be reconstructed and represented on a "family tree," called a phylogeny.

As a consequence of this ‘family tree’ understanding, it is important to remember that:

1. Humans did not evolve from chimpanzees. Humans and chimpanzees are evolutionary cousins and share a recent common ancestor that was neither chimpanzee nor human.

2. Humans are not "higher" or "more evolved" than other living lineages. Since these lineages split, humans and chimpanzees have each evolved traits unique to their own lineages.

Thirdly, another important aspect of evolution is the linking of speciation events to time i.e. trying to understand when different species evolved. Using various methods, such as radiometric dating, scientists are able to conclude that life began 3.8 billion years ago, and insects diversified 290 million years ago, but the human and chimpanzee lineages diverged only five million years ago.

To give an analogy for this, imagine squeezing the billions of years of the history of life on Earth into a single minute. Then it would take about 50 seconds for multi-cellular life to evolve, another four seconds for vertebrates to invade the land, and another four seconds for flowers to evolve — and only in the last 0.002 seconds would "modern" humans arise.

So, the claim is made that evolution is the process by which modern organisms have descended from ancient ancestors. Evolution is apparently responsible for both the remarkable similarities we see across all life and the amazing diversity of that life — but exactly how does it work?

Fundamental to the process is genetic variation upon which selective forces can act in order for evolution to occur. Evolution only occurs when there is a change in gene frequency within a population over time. These genetic differences are heritable and can be passed on to the next generation — which is what really matters in evolution: long term change. Therefore, we need to examine the actual mechanisms of evolution.

In essence there are four basic processes, which constitute the mechanisms of evolution. These are mutation, migration, genetic drift and natural selection.

Mutation refers to the actual changes in the DNA within cells. The DNA affects how an organism looks, behaves and so on. Thus a change in the DNA can alter all aspects of its life.

When cells divide the DNA is copied exactly as it is. However, on occasion, it is possible for they’re to be a discrepancy in the copying of the DNA. This difference is considered a mutation. It must be kept in mind that mutations are random – and so do not normally depend on external factors. That said, it is possible for there to be mutation as a result of exposure to radiation or chemicals, causing the DNA to break down. In this case, when the cells repair the DNA, the result is not a perfect repair – and so the resultant DNA is a mutation.

Whether a particular mutation occurs is not related to how useful that mutation would be. The mutation in the genes can yield a beneficial, neutral or harmful change for the organism.

Although mutation can occur with any gene, it is the mutation that affects genes, which can be transmitted from one generation to the next that is of interest, since this is a form of evolution. If genes mutate and cannot be passed to future generations, then these mutations cannot be considered as having any relation to evolution. These are called Somatic Mutations and occur in non-reproductive cells. Hence the genes that are affected by mutation related to biological evolution are the reproductive cells, like eggs and sperm. Any mutations in the sex cells mean that potentially the change (the mutation) can be passed onto following generations. These mutations are labelled Germ Line Mutations.

Migration is the flow of genes from one population to another. This Gene Flow can include various different events, such as pollen being blown to a new destination or people moving to new cities or countries. In a situation where genes are carried to a population where those genes previously did not exist, gene flow becomes a very important source of genetic variation.

Thus, as well as being mechanisms of evolution, Mutation and Migration also constitute sources of genetic variation. Another source of genetic variation is sex, which can introduce new gene combinations into a population.

Genetic drift refers to the situation where, just ‘by chance’, some individuals leave behind a few more descendents and thus genes than other individuals. This happens to all populations since there can be no avoidance of chance. So for example, every time somebody steps on an insect with a certain characteristic, this reduces the number within that particular population and hence means there is one less insect remaining to pass on its genes to a new generation. Conversely, this also means that there are now more insects with different characteristics within the same population, who are able to pass on their genes. Clearly, this shows that genetic drift affects the genetic makeup of a population through entirely random means.

Natural Selection is the fourth cog in the wheel of evolution. This in itself requires three components: variation in traits, differential reproduction and heredity. To understand this, consider a population of beetles. Some beetles are brown and others are green – this is a variation in a trait or a characteristic.

The environment is not able to support unlimited growth of the population and so not all individuals are able to reproduce to their full potential. For example, we could say that green beetles are easily visible on the ground and so tend to get eaten more by birds – so less survive to reproduce compared to brown beetles. In other words, we have differential reproduction.

Finally, the brown beetles have brown baby beetles since this trait has a genetic basis i.e. they pass on a gene that determines the colour to be brown. This is what is meant by heredity. Putting these components together, evolution by natural selection is seen at work. The more advantageous trait of brown colour becomes more common in the population with time and if this process continues, then eventually all the beetles will be brown.

It is claimed that natural selection is also able to shape behaviour. The mating rituals that many birds have, the wiggle dance that bee’s do or the human capacity to learn language, have genetic components.

In some cases, natural selection can be observed directly. Data shows that the shape of finches' beaks on the Galapagos Islands is related to weather patterns: after droughts, the finch population has deeper, stronger beaks that let them eat tougher seeds.

In other cases, human activity has led to environmental changes that have caused populations to evolve through natural selection. A striking example is that of the population of dark moths in the 19th century in England, which rose and fell in parallel to industrial pollution. These changes can often be observed and documented.

‘Fitness’ is a concept used to describe how good a particular organism is at leaving its set of genes in the next generation compared with others with a different set of genes. Going back to the example of beetles, if brown beetles were to consistently leave more off spring than green beetles, then they would be considered to have a higher fitness. Fitness however does depend on the environment in which an organism lives. Also, from this perspective, the fittest individual is not necessarily the strongest, fastest or biggest. What matters is leaving it’s genes in the next generation and so survival ability, finding a mate and producing off spring is more important. This sub-category of natural selection in relation to finding a mate and reproductive behaviour is labelled sexual selection.

Another category of natural selection is artificial selection. This is where, instead of nature, humans consciously select for or against particular features in organisms. For example, the human may allow only organisms with the desired feature to reproduce or may provide more resources to the organisms with the desired feature. Historically, farmers and breeders have used this idea of selection to cause major changes in the features of their plants and animals.

One key aspect of natural selection is known as adaptation. An adaptation is a feature that is common in a population because it seems to provide an improved function. Adaptations can take many forms: a behaviour that allows better evasion of predators, a protein that functions better at body temperature, or an anatomical feature that allows the organism to access a valuable new resource — all of these might be adaptations. For example, mimicry of leaves by insects is an adaptation for evading predators or the use of echolocation by bats to help them catch insects. Similarly, the creosote bush is a desert-dwelling plant that produces toxins that prevent other plants from growing nearby, thus reducing competition for nutrients and water.

To summarise, all of the mechanisms discussed above (mutation, migration, genetic drift and natural selection) can cause changes in the frequencies of genes in populations, and so all of them are mechanisms of evolutionary change. However, it is worth keeping in mind that natural selection and genetic drift cannot operate unless there is genetic variation — that is, unless some individuals are genetically different from others.

A historical perspective

Although Charles Darwin is synonymous with the Theory of Evolution, he was not the first naturalist to propose that species changed over time into new species i.e. that life evolves. In the eighteenth century, a naturalist called Buffon along with others began to introduce the idea that life might not have been fixed since creation. By the end of the 1700s, palaeontologists had swelled the fossil collections of Europe, offering a picture of the past at odds with an unchanging natural world. And in 1801, a French naturalist named Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet; Chevalier de Lamarck took a great conceptual step and proposed a full-blown theory of evolution.

Lamarck was struck by the similarities of many of the animals he studied, and was impressed too by the burgeoning fossil record. It led him to argue that life was not fixed. When environments changed, organisms had to change their behaviour to survive. If they began to use an organ more than they had in the past, it would increase in its lifetime. If a giraffe stretched its neck for leaves, for example, a "nervous fluid" would flow into its neck and make it longer. Its offspring would inherit the longer neck, and continued stretching would make it longer still over several generations. Meanwhile organs that organisms stopped using would shrink (called vestigial structures).

Lamarck was mocked and attacked by many of his contemporary naturalists such as Cuvier. While they questioned him on scientific grounds, many of them were also disturbed by the theological implications of his work. Lamarck was proposing that life took on its current form through natural processes, not through miraculous interventions. For British naturalists in particular, steeped as they were in natural theology, this was appalling. They believed that nature was a reflection of God's benevolent design. To them, it seemed Lamarck was claiming that it was the result of blind primal forces. Shunned by the scientific community, Lamarck died in 1829 in poverty and obscurity.

In many ways, Darwin's central argument was very different from Lamarck's. He argued that complexity evolved simply as a result of life adapting to its local conditions from one generation to the next. He also argued that species could go extinct rather than change into new forms. But Darwin relied on much the same evidence for evolution that Lamarck did and Darwin wrongly accepted that changes acquired during an organism's lifetime could be passed on to its offspring.

Lamarckian inheritance remained popular throughout the 1800s, in large part because scientists did not yet understand how heredity works. With the discovery of genes, it was finally abandoned for the most part. But Lamarck, whom Darwin described as "this justly celebrated naturalist," remains a major figure in the history of biology for envisioning evolutionary change for the first time.

Throughout the nineteenth century, heredity remained a puzzle to scientists. How was it that children ended up looking similar to, but not exactly like, their parents? These questions fascinated and frustrated Charles Darwin deeply. After all, heredity lies at the heart of evolution.

Ironically, it was just as Darwin was publishing the Origin of Species in 1859 that someone got the first real glimpse of the biological machinery behind heredity. In a secluded monastery in what is now the Czech Republic, a monk named Gregor Mendel was studying heredity in a garden of peas. Through his experiments, Mendel discovered what later scientists called "dominant" and "recessive" alleles i.e. part of genetics.

Darwin and a British biologist called Alfred Russel Wallace had independently conceived of a natural, even observable, way for life to change: a process Darwin called natural selection. Within a few decades, most scientists accepted that evolution and the descent of species from common ancestors were real. But natural selection had a harder time finding acceptance.

Even in 1900, whilst many scientists were rediscovering Mendel's insights, they continued to remain opposed to natural selection. After all, Darwin had talked of natural selection gradually altering a species by working on tiny variations. But the Mendelist’s found major differences between traits encoded by alleles. In order to jump from one allele to another, evolution must make giant jumps—an idea that seemed to clash with Darwin.

But in the 1920s geneticists began to recognize that natural selection could indeed act on genes. For one thing, it became clear that any given trait was usually the product of many genes rather than a single one. A mutation to any one of the genes involved could create small changes to the trait rather than some drastic transformation. Just as importantly, several scientists — foremost among them Ronald Fisher, JBS Haldane and Sewall Wright — showed how natural selection could operate in a Mendelian world. They carried out breeding experiments like previous geneticists, but they also did something new: they built sophisticated mathematical models of evolution.

Known as "population genetics," their approach revealed how mutations arise and, if they are favoured by natural selection, can spread through a population. Even a slight advantage can let genes spread rapidly through a group of animals or plants and drive other forms extinct. Evolution, these population geneticists argued, is carried out mainly by small mutations, since drastic mutations would almost always be harmful rather than helpful.

Thus, population genetics became one of the key elements of what would be called the Modern Synthesis.

In 1937, a Soviet-born geneticist named Theodosius Dobzhansky wrote a landmark book called Genetics and the Origin of Species. Dobzhansky's ability to combine genetics and natural history attracted many other biologists to join him in the effort to find a unified explanation of how evolution happens. Their combined work known as "The Modern Synthesis" brought together genetics, palaeontology and many other sciences into one powerful explanation of evolution, showing how mutations and natural selection could produce large-scale evolutionary change.

While evolutionary biologists were fashioning the Modern Synthesis, geneticists around the world searched furiously for the molecules that carried genetic information. They knew that cells contained several different types of molecules, such as proteins and nucleic acids. But which had the capacity to bear information and be copied into new cells?

The answer came through the discovery of DNA by Francis Crick and James Watson, which revolutionized evolutionary biology. Mutations, researchers realized, change the structure of the DNA. A single base pair may change, or a set of genes may be duplicated. Hence, those mutations that confer a selective advantage to an individual become more common over time, and ultimately these mutant genes could drive the older versions out of existence.

Evidences used by the proponents of the Theory

The mechanisms covered thus far are the basic building blocks of the theory of evolution. The next logical step is to look at the evidence that is given to claim these processes are responsible for both micro and macroevolution. In other words, what evidence is there that evolution has occurred and is responsible for the variety of life around us, and also is there evidence that demonstrates the mechanisms discussed in this article are indeed behind all these changes?

Those who support the theory of evolution present proofs that can loosely be gathered into a number of categories. We will examine these in turn.
The primary source of proof for the theory comes from Fossil Evidence. The argument is that fossil records provide excellent snapshots of the past and when assembled they illustrate evolutionary change over many millions of years.

As well as being actual remains of organisms, and thus giving an understanding as to the shape, appearance and skeletal structure, fossils can give additional clues. For example, they can indicate interactions that took place many years previously. A fossil may contain punctures or holes that could be teeth records of various animals, allowing scientists to extrapolate about what kind of organism may have been responsible, the shape of its jaws, and so on.

Fossils can tell us about the growth patterns in ancient animals. For example, examining a cross section of a bone that has been found, it is possible to see the number of blood vessels; this in turn would indicate the speed of growth and so on.

An important section of fossil records are transitional forms. These are fossils or organisms that show the intermediate states between ancient organisms and their descendents. Since scientists have found so many transitional forms, it is claimed there is an abundance of evidence for evolution. An example of this is the case of the beluga whale. The beluga whale has its nostrils at the top of its skull. A fossil record of an animal that is considered to be related to today’s whales and dolphins, called Pakicetus, had its nostrils at the front of its skull. This animal lived about 50 million years ago. So scientists would expect that there might be a transitional form i.e. an animal that had some variation in the position of its nostrils compared to Pakicetus and the beluga whale. In fact, fossil records have been discovered of a skull, about 25 million years old, where the nostrils are in the middle of the skull. This animal has been labelled Aetiocetus.

So Aetiocetus could plausibly be the transitional form, linking Pakicetus to the beluga whale and demonstrating a steady evolution.

The second source of evidence is garnered from studying homologies. Evolutionary theory predicts that organisms that come from the same ancestor will share similarities. These similar characteristics are known as homologies. As mentioned earlier, the logic is essentially that historically every species shares a common ancestor. As we move forward in time, new species evolve, but since they share a number of common ancestors, so we would expect them to share some characteristics that exist or existed in those ancestors. A crude example would be that of humans and apes. At some stage, going back in time, there was a common ancestor from which both species evolved. So humans and chimpanzees would have similar characteristics, based on the fact that they share common ancestors. Another example of homology is that of leaves. If we were to examine the leaves of say the pitcher plant (which has leaves shaped to capture insects), the Venus Flytrap, the Poinsettia (which has bright red leaves) and the cactus plant (where its leaves are essentially spines) then we would see that each type of leave has a different shape and function. Yet they are all derived from a common ancestral form.

Yet another example of homology is the forelimb of tetrapods (vertebrates with legs). Frogs, birds, rabbits and lizards all have different forelimbs, reflecting their different lifestyles. But those different forelimbs all share the same set of bones - the humerus, the radius, and the ulna. These are the same bones seen in fossils of the extinct transitional animal, Eusthenopteron, which demonstrates their common ancestry.

Comparing the anatomies of different living things, looking at cellular similarities and differences and studying embryological development can reveal homologies.

Studying the embryological development of living things (i.e. prior to birth) provides clues to the evolution of present-day organisms. During some stages of development, organisms exhibit ancestral features in whole or incomplete form. For example, some species of living snakes have hind limb-buds as early embryos but rapidly lose the buds and develop into legless adults. The study of developmental stages of snakes, combined with fossil evidence of snakes with hind limbs, supports the hypothesis that snakes evolved from a limbed ancestor.

Similarly, toothed whales have full sets of teeth throughout their lives. Baleen whales, however, only possess teeth in the early foetal stage and lose them before birth. The possession of teeth in foetal baleen whales provides evidence of common ancestry with toothed whales and other mammals. In addition, fossil evidence indicates that the late Oligocene whale Aetiocetus (the same Aetiocetus - our transitional friend with the nostrils in the middle of its skull), which is considered to be the earliest example of baleen whales, also bore a full set of teeth.

From a cellular and molecular level we find fundamental similarities between the cells of living things, which can be explained by the theory of evolution. All organisms are made of cells, which consist of membranes filled with water containing genetic material, proteins, lipids, carbohydrates, salts and other substances. The cells of most living things use sugar for fuel while producing proteins as building blocks and messengers. Comparing a typical animal cell with that of a plant, there are only three structures unique to one or the other (these are the cell wall, the centriole and the chloroplast). All other aspects are similar, such as the nucleus, cytoplasm and the vacuole.

Comparison of genes between species also reveals striking similarities – for example, even roundworms share 25% of their genes with humans. In many ways, DNA is itself a homology for all living things – i.e. everything has DNA and so this is a common trait that must have come from a common ancestor.

In a nutshell, homologies are used as proof for the theory, since the existence of similarities between groups of organisms is an indication of common ancestors and thus evolution.

A third source of evidence for evolution is the fact that there has been sufficient time for this process to have produced the diversity we see. The age of the earth has been determined through both relative dating (i.e. examining the different layers of rocks on the surface of the earth) and numerical dating which relies on the decay of radioactive elements such as uranium and potassium. The conclusion made is that the timescales involved are adequate for evolution to take its course.

Artificial selection, mentioned earlier, is also an evidence for evolution. This is because people have been using selective breeding with plants and animals for many hundreds of years, and this breeding has shown how species can change dramatically. It can be argued that artificial selection has the ability to modify the forms and behaviours of populations to the point they are seemingly very different to their ancestors. So artificial selection is a model that helps with understanding natural selection.

The variation in the environment and ecology is also a proof of sorts. As predicted by evolutionary theory, populations evolve in response to their surroundings. In any ecosystem there are finite opportunities to make a living. Organisms either have the genetic tools to take advantage of those opportunities or they do not.

For example, house sparrows arrived in North America from Europe in the nineteenth century. Since then, genetic variation within the population and selection in various habitats, have allowed them to inhabit most of the continent. House sparrows in the north are larger and darker coloured than those in the south. Darker colours absorb sunlight better than light colours and larger size allows less surface area per unit volume, thus reducing heat loss — both advantages in a cold climate. This is an example of natural selection acting upon a population, producing microevolution on a continental scale.

Finally, experiments also show that populations can evolve. As an example, John Endler of the University of California has conducted experiments with guppies (a type of fish) of Trinidad that clearly show selection at work. The scenario is as follows: female guppies prefer colourful males for mating purposes. Predatory fish also "prefer" colourful males, but for a less complimentary purpose — a source of food that is easy to spot. Some portions of the streams where guppies live have fewer predators than others and in these locations the males are more colourful. Not surprisingly, males in locations where there are more predators tend to be less colourful.

When Dr. Endler transferred predatory fish to the regions with brightly coloured male guppies, selection acted rapidly to produce a population of duller males. So this demonstrates that persistent variation within a population provides the raw material for rapid evolution when environmental conditions change.

Arguments against the Theory of Evolution

The previous section outlined some of the proofs that are presented for the theory of evolution. We will now consider briefly a few of the arguments against the theory.

1. The theory of evolution is usually described as fact, and many people see it like this due to a moulding of public opinion. Yet the trouble is that it is simply a theory. And like many theories it is wont to constantly chop and change. Indeed we can see on numerous occasions how it has changed over time and undergone revisions. For example, according to Darwin himself, "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down”.

Another example is the proposition of a slightly different model in recent times. Called "punctuated equilibrium", this model rejects the Darwinist idea of a cumulative, step-by-step evolution and holds that evolution took place instead in big, discontinuous "jumps". This is because those who ascribe to it believe the fossil record does not support gradual evolution. Sadly for the proponents, Niles Eldredge and Stephen Gould (American palaeontologists) their own theory is bankrupt – since for one thing, it conflicts with the understanding that genes cannot undergo radical mutations.

2. The sources of proof given for the theory essentially rely on retro-fitting the supposed evidence to the theory i.e. the theory states evolution occurred from a common ancestor, and then study of fossils and homologies is used to indicate that indeed the theory is correct and evolution does occur. But equally we could state there is a creator who created the amazing diversity of life and also the similarities between species – in fact this is more plausible. Thus fossils and homologies would just as much, if not more, support this ‘theory’ of a Creator.

3. Fossils are a record of what may have existed. They do not indicate anything more than this. By examining a fossil we could equally state that the organism was created as opposed to evolving from an ancestor. The fossil record is also very much incomplete – there are massive, gaping holes. This presents a staggering problem for proponents of the Theory. The somewhat weak argument is that the bulk of the fossil record may have been destroyed or is yet to be discovered. According to Neville George, a professor of Palaeontology at Glasgow University:

“There is no need to apologise any longer for the poverty of the fossil record. In some ways, it has become almost unmanageably rich and discovery is outpacing integration…” Yet he goes on to say, “The fossil record nevertheless continues to be composed mainly of gaps”.

Contrary to what evolutionists claim, there are only limited (if any) transitional forms. Importantly, for example, we don’t see transitional forms that show the alleged evolution of apes to humans [and to try and explain the many loopholes regarding this, there is a current debate among evolutionists themselves about whether it occurred in steps or smoothly which we alluded to earlier i.e. punctuated equilibrium]. The fossil record back then (and still today) is nearly totally void of transitional species. If species are continually mutating, never constant, why do we find several of the same, certain prehistoric creatures, but never any that appear to be in transition? Why do palaeontologists find lots of dinosaurs but never where dinosaurs come from, nor what they turned into?

In Darwin's own words, 'Why, if species have descended by insensibly fine gradations, do we not everywhere see innumerable transitional forms? Why is not all nature in confusion instead of species being, as we see them, well defined?' It is an excellent question, which he answers himself, 'I can give no satisfactory answer.'

Indeed British evolutionist Derek Ager admits, “The point emerges that if we examine the fossil record in detail, whether at the level of orders or of species, we find - over and over again - not gradual evolution, but the sudden explosion of one group at the expense of another”.

Yet another problem in using the fossil record as evidence for evolution is that under closer examination, it appears to be a proof for exactly the opposite argument – i.e. creation. For example, one of the oldest strata of the earth in which fossils of living creatures have been found is that of the Cambrian, which has an estimated age of 500-550 million years. The living creatures found in the strata belonging to the Cambrian period seemed to emerge all of a sudden in the fossil record – there appeared to be no ancestors, although in relatively recent times palaeontologists believe fossils have been found dating from the preceding Vendian (or Ediacaran) period. The fossils found in the Cambrian rocks belonged to snails, trilobites, sponges, earthworms, jellyfish, sea hedgehogs, and other complex invertebrates. This wide mosaic of living organisms made up of such a great number of complex creatures emerged so suddenly that this miraculous event is referred to as the "Cambrian Explosion" in geological literature.

“A half-billion years ago, the remarkably complex forms of animals we see today suddenly appeared. This moment, right at the start of Earth's Cambrian Period, some 550 million years ago, marks the evolutionary explosion that filled the seas with the world's first complex creatures. The large animal phyla of today were present already in the early Cambrian and they were as distinct from each other as they are today”.

And one of the most vociferous advocates for atheism and evolution in today’s age, Richard Dawkins, comments “the Cambrian strata of rocks, vintage about 600 million years, are the oldest ones in which we find most of the major invertebrate groups. And we find many of them already in an advanced state of evolution, the very first time they appear. It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history. Needless to say, this appearance of sudden planting has delighted creationists”.

4. The basic mechanism for gene variation is mutation. And it is known that mutations are random and limited in their scope. We should note that what is not a point of debate here is the fact that genes undergo mutation; neither is there a point of conflict with the various biological processes within organisms. For example, we know that insects can build up resistance against forms of pesticide over time – in fact, in the same manner humans have long believed that taking poison in small quantities can help survive what would normally be a fatal dose. These observations do not really constitute evolution. However, even if we agreed to define these particular cases as examples of microevolution, the fact is that they can be explained by what we have come to know through scientific study and resulting conclusions. The argument for a Creator also accepts scientific facts and conclusions – it no more denies the laws of biology being created, than it denies the laws of physics being put in place by the Creator. Hence, change within the framework of the laws of biology is possible – and there is sufficient evidence for this. The main problem however is with macroevolution. To even begin to consider macroevolution, mutations would need to be dramatic – trying to get round this, it is claimed that there has been sufficient time for many small scale mutations to eventually yield the different species we see. But frankly this isn’t plausible – we have seen no evidence to support such a claim - and so this is again nothing more than a pure hypothesis.

In addition, there are many other problems with the mutation argument. If mutations occur, they actually cause harmful effects and not beneficial ones. We can witness the effects of mutations caused in humans following radiation poisoning at Hiroshima, Nagasaki and Chernobyl – that is, a litany of death, disability and illness.

According to the evolutionist scientist Warren Weavers commenting in the report prepared by the Committee on Genetic Effects of Atomic Radiation, which had been formed to investigate mutations that may have been caused by the nuclear weapons used in the Second World War:
“Many will be puzzled about the statement that practically all known mutant genes are harmful. For mutations are necessary parts of the process of evolution. How can good effects - evolution to higher forms of life - results from mutations practically all of which are harmful?”

Similarly, another scientist B.G. Ranganathan states in his book ‘Origins?’ that “Mutations are small, random, and harmful. They rarely occur and the best possibility is that they will be ineffectual. These four characteristics of mutations imply that mutations cannot lead to an evolutionary development. A random change in a highly specialised organism is either ineffectual or harmful. A random change in a watch cannot improve the watch. It will most probably harm it or at best be ineffectual. An earthquake does not improve the city, it brings destruction”.

Finally, mutations do not actually add any new information to an organisms DNA. During a mutation, the genetic information is either destroyed or rearranged, but since there is no new information, it is impossible for mutations to cause a new trait or organ within a living organism.

5. Artificial selection (breeding) and sexual selection do produce new combinations but these are limited in their scope. They are restricted to a finite set of possible gene combinations. So breeding cannot introduce a radically new species – it simply gives a result based on the limited pool of combined genes. It cannot give a result outside of this. E.g. Horse plus donkey gives a mule. Or an African married to a Caucasian can result in off spring described as half-cast. The latter cannot produce a human whose skin colour is red or purple, etc.

6. The odds are heavily stacked against evolution. Evolution cannot answer where the first cell came from. The best guess is that came about through a random coincidence. Fred Hoyle, a well-known English mathematician and astronomer, and someone who believes in evolution, made the analogy that the chances of the first cell forming in this manner were comparable with the chance that a tornado sweeping through a junkyard might assemble a Boeing 747 from the materials present. And according to Professor of Applied Mathematics and astronomy from University College (Cardiff, Wales), Chandra Wickramasinghe:

“The likelihood of the spontaneous formation of life from inanimate matter is one to a number with 40,000 noughts after it... It is big enough to bury Darwin and the whole theory of evolution. There was no primeval soup, neither on this planet nor on any other, and if the beginnings of life were not random, they must therefore have been the product of purposeful intelligence”. In other words the random formation of such a first cell is an impossibility.

But still let’s assume we suddenly have a cell. The first cell would then have to self-reproduce otherwise there would only ever be one cell. This becomes problematic for evolutionists so they suggest self-replication – i.e. the first cell has the ability to clone itself. However, organic matter can only self reproduces if it exists as a fully developed cell with existing support structures such as the particular environment and energy. This then requires more leaps of faith – so let’s make another assumption, this time that the cell does have a complex structure and the ability to reproduce. But, for evolution, mutation needs to happen. So firstly, since mutation is random, even given an absolute age, mutation might not occur. And secondly, mutation can only take place if the cell is forced to repair itself or if it makes a copy of itself. Thus, for a handful of cells, to copy and mutate successfully and form different cells and for this process to continue onwards to produce the complexity of life we see is something, which cannot happen. Leaving aside time, and the random nature of mutation, just the series of mutations necessary to produce even the simplest of species are impossible.

7. There is no actual hard evidence for the process of evolution itself. We don’t witness evolution. All that experiments (such as the one involving guppies) or observations in the field (such as the house sparrows example) demonstrate is a form of selection. But this is not real evolution – the fact that a population may change due to various factors (such as environment, predators, etc) or that it may become extinct is not a change from one species to another. So even if we can see natural selection of sorts, this is based on rational factors, and is not evolution.

8. Evolution cannot answer why only the human species has the clear faculty of intelligence, thought and reasoning that has allowed it to progress. It cannot explain the existence of emotions, except through an undefined notion such as chemicals within the body. And it is unable to offer any satisfactory explanation for issues such as the existence of the soul – indeed according to evolutionary theory, there cannot be a soul, rather life itself must be caused by the functioning of cells since after all everything has evolved from a single cell.

9. Adaptation is mentioned as a feature of evolution. That is, the manner in which organisms have evolved beneficial characteristics adapted to their environment, which help them survive. So one example we gave earlier was that of stick insects, where their body itself is a form of camouflage protecting them against predators. However, evolutionists themselves state that mutation is random and can lead to beneficial as well as harmful results. The environment cannot influence the occurrence or form of any mutation. So in this case, the evolutionary argument would have to be that today’s stick insects evolved from ancestors, which did randomly mutate to have this beneficial characteristic of camouflage. Those within the population that didn’t inherit this mutation would have died out due to their inability to survive. But once again, claiming that a series of mutations occurred, that lead to stick insects possessing characteristics that are suited to their environment, is nothing but conjecture. As before, we could equally state that a Creator has created various species and organisms of life with these inherent varying characteristics. So, organisms were in fact created with characteristics that we interpret as beneficial to them, instead of these traits evolving through time. Thus, the fact that many organisms seem well matched to their environments cannot be cited as any kind of proof or indication of evolution.

10. Let’s take a look at another argument that shows the fallacy of evolution. Many organisms and parts of organisms do not appear to have evolved from lesser things because they are 'irreducibly complex' life forms. Irreducible complexity is a concept that has been developed to describe something that is made of interacting parts that all work together. To understand this, take the example of a mousetrap. A mousetrap cannot be assembled through gradual improvement. You cannot start with a wooden base, catching a few mice, then add a hammer, and catch more, then add a spring, improving it further. To even begin catching mice one must assemble all the components completely with design and intent. Furthermore, if one of these parts changes or evolves independently, the entire thing will stop working. The mousetrap, for instance, will become useless if even one part malfunctions.

Likewise, many biological structures are irreducibly complex. Bats are a well-known example. They are said to have evolved from a small rodent whose front toes became wings. This presents a multitude of problems. As the front toes grow skin between them, the creature has limbs that are too long to run, or even walk well, yet too short to help it fly. There is no plausible way that a bat wing can evolve from a rodent's front toes. In fact, the fossil record supports this, because the first time bats are seen in the fossil record, they have completely developed wings and are virtually identical to modern bats.

Consider another example, that of the eye. Suppose that before animals had sight, one species decided it would be advantageous to be able to decrypt light rays. So, what is evolved first? The retina? The iris? The eye is made of many tiny parts, each totally useless without the others. The probability that a genetic mutation that would create each of these at the same time, in the same organism, is zero. If, however, one organism evolved just a retina, then the logic of Darwin suggests that the only solution is to rid oneself of useless traits replacing them with beneficial ones, so the idea of the eye evolving one segment at a time is also bogus.

Conclusion

In a time where the theory of evolution has been catapulted to the level of fact, it is useful for us to have a firm grasp of what this theory is, and with the emerging discussion gaining more and more profile (that between creationism on the one side and evolutionary thought on the other) it is vital that we are able to show the strength of the correct argument.

One big problem of presenting the topic of evolution is finding a reasonable balance: on the one hand, simplifying and leaving out some of the terminology risks not being able to convey the subject matter accurately; on the other, by not revising and simplifying at all, there is a distinct possibility that only those with a solid understanding of biology and science will grasp what is being presented. This article has attempted to run through the basic mechanics of the theory, proofs that are presented for it and some of the arguments against evolution. Many points are too elaborate and wide ranging to touch upon in this discussion. In any event, there is an abundance of material available regarding the theory and surrounding issues that discuss these aspects in much more detail and is worth exploring for those that are interested in doing so. The theory is often cloaked in scientific language and complex terminology, and presented as a solid and viable explanation for the existence of life. Although the focus and objective of the article was not to prove the fallacy of the theory, but rather to be informative with respect to the whole discussion regarding evolution as a concept, nevertheless it has hopefully been shown that evolutionary understanding, far from being fact, is nothing more than speculation and hypothesis.

:thumbs_up:thumbs_up:thumbs_up
:w:

[Azy]

The issue with several simultaneous mutations being related is in order for them to act in synchrony to confer a new function that would lead to speciation.

I suppose ring species would be a good example.
Greenish warblers.

Well, mutations have no self awareness or awareness of the external environment. These mutations are random and just float around in the genome until a selection pressure increases its frequency.

You seemed to be implying that mutations would never confer a benefit in the environment the organism currently is. Yes it may be statistically small but there are mutations which would immediately be selected for under existing conditions.

Aw, come on now, at least you can pull out the highlights like I did.

No way, unless you're paying for it. I was just illustrating that folk aren't as completely stumped by abiogenesis as a lot of creation proponents would have us believe.

[Azy]

Excellent, I just discovered that little orange square in the top right of each post :D
I no longer have to wade through Trax's cut and paste sprees.
I think someone should rescind his doctorate anyway since he's clearly not up to date with his research.

[ranma1/2]

wow cooolllll. thats awesome.

[Dr.Trax]

Look now how these Evolution propagandists are attacking me!:thumbs_up
That means they are some Scientists and do not copy and paste!right?ooooo don't be foolish!
What a smat amigos.............
If the world was going to be left by those evolutionists and atheists we could be dead today and the world would not even exist anymore!
But Alhamdulillah we have a watcher and master over us,that controls us!
And he is ALLAH(SWT)!Glory be to Him!

And once again:
The theory(not fact)of Evolution is a big
PROPAGANDA!!!:skeleton:

[Azy]

Look now how these Evolution propagandists are attacking me!:thumbs_up

Oh aren't you a poor little victim of western evolutionist oppression :cry:
We were having a discussion and you paste in the same tired old rhetoric that creationists have been dishing out since day one despite that it has already been dealt with, just not in your mind.

That means they are some Scientists and do not copy and paste!right?ooooo don't be foolish!

Obviously some people need to bring material here but most (both creationists and evolutionists) do it in a reasonable manner, selecting sections appropriate to the current discussion, not repeated wholesale importing of hundreds of lines.

What a smat amigos.............

Quite.

[ranma1/2]

...
And once again:
The theory(not fact)of Evolution is a big
PROPAGANDA!!!:skeleton:
[/B]

LOL

and the eec stikes... woot.

next up The theory (not fact) of gravity....

and then The (not fact) string theory......

And then.......

[Dr.Trax]

LOL

and the eec stikes... woot.

next up The theory (not fact) of gravity....

and then The (not fact) string theory......

And then.......

What is EEC amigo:??

[ranma1/2]

the evil evolutionists conspiracy, not to be confused with the eac. evil atheists conspiracy..

[Dr.Trax]

Something strange happens with this Azy!
I don't know what and why....
I said to him that I will never discuss with him anymore!
But it seems to be that he is not a men of understanding(don't get it)...:?:?:?
Peace

[ranma1/2]

lol, i give you one hint who is not a man of understanding.
He has a T in his name.

[MustafaMc]

lol, i give you one hint who is not a man of understanding.
He has a T in his name.

Hey, I am no genius, but I think that I understand some things pretty well.

[Dr.Trax]

Hey, I am no genius, but I think that I understand some things pretty well.

Brother I think that he refers to me!
Just Leave him alone with his own.....

[Dr.Trax]

Existance of God

An atheist Professor of philosophy speaks to his class on the problem science has with God, The Almighty.
He asks one of his new students to stand and.....
Professor: So you believe in God?
Student: Absolutely, sir.
Professor: Is God good?
Student: Sure.
Professor: Is God all-powerful?
Student: Yes.
Professor: My brother died of cancer even though he prayed to God to heal him. Most of us would attempt to help others who are ill. But God didn't. How is this God good then? Hmm?
Student: (Student is silent.)
Professor: You can't answer, can you? Let's start again, young fella. Is God good?
Student: Yes.
Professor: Is Satan good?
Student: No.
Professor: Where does Satan come from?
Student: From...God...
Professor: That's right. Tell me son, is there evil in this world?
Student: Yes.
Professor: Evil is everywhere, isn't it? And God did make everything. Correct?
Student: Yes.
Professor: So who created evil?
Student: (Student does not answer.)
Professor: Is there sickness? Immorality? Hatred? Ugliness? All these terrible things exist in the world, don't they?
Student: Yes, sir.
Professor: So, who created them?
Student: (Student has no answer.)
Professor: Science says you have 5 senses you use to identify and observe the world around you. Tell me, son...Have you ever seen God?
Student: No, sir.
Professor: Tell us if you have ever heard your God?
Student: No , sir.
Professor: Have you ever felt your God, tasted your God, smelt your God? Have you ever had any sensory perception of God for that matter?
Student: No, sir. I'm afraid I haven't.
Professor: Yet you still believe in Him?
Student: Yes.
Professor: According to empirical, testable, demonstrable protocol, science says your GOD doesn't exist. What do you say to that, son?
Student: Nothing. I only have my faith.
Professor: Yes. Faith. And that is the problem science has.



Student: Professor, is there such a thing as heat?
Professor: Yes.
Student: And is there such a thing as cold?
Professor: Yes.
Student: No sir. There isn't.
(The lecture theatre becomes very quiet with this turn of events.)
Student: Sir, you can have lots of heat, even more heat, superheat, mega heat, white heat, a little heat or no heat. But we don't have anything called cold. We can hit 458 degrees below zero which is no heat, but we can't go any further after that. There is no such thing as cold. Cold is only a word we use to describe the absence of heat. We cannot measure cold. Heat is energy. Cold is not the opposite of heat, sir, just the absence of it.
(There is pin-drop silence in the lecture theatre.)
Student: What about darkness, Professor? Is there such a thing as darkness?
Professor: Yes. What is night if there isn't darkness?
Student: You're wrong again, sir. Darkness is the absence of something. You can have low light, normal light, bright light, flashing light....But if you have no light constantly, you have nothing and it's called darkness, isn't it? In reality, darkness isn't. If it were, you would be able to make darkness darker, wouldn't you?
Professor: So what is the point you are making, young man?
Student: Sir, my point is your philosophical premise is flawed.

Professor: Flawed? Can you explain how?
Student: Sir, you are working on the premise of duality. You argue there is life and then there is death, a good God and a bad God. You are viewing the concept of God as something finite, something we can measure.
Sir, science can't even explain a thought. It uses electricity and magnetism, but has never seen, much less fully understood either one. To view death as the opposite of life is to be ignorant of the fact that death cannot exist as a substantive thing. Death is not the opposite of life: just the absence of it. Now tell me, Professor. Do you teach your students that they evolved from a monkey?
Professor: If you are referring to the natural evolutionary process, yes, of course, I do.
Student: Have you ever observed evolution with your own eyes, sir?
Professor: (The Professor shakes his head with a smile, beginning to realize where the argument is going.)
Student: Since no one has ever observed the process of evolution at work and cannot even prove that this process is an on-going endeavour, are you not teaching your opinion, sir?
Are you not a scientist but a preacher?
Professor: (The class is in uproar.)
Student: Is there anyone in the class who has ever seen the Professor's brain?
Professor: (The class breaks out into laughter.)>
Student: Is there anyone here who has ever heard the Professor's brain, felt it, touched or smelt it?.....No one appears to have done so. So, according to the established rules of empirical, stable, demonstrable protocol, science says that you have no brain, sir. With all due respect, sir, how do we then trust your lectures, sir?
Professor: (The room is silent. The Professor stares at the student, his face unfathomable.)
Professor: I guess you'll have to take them on faith, son.
Student: That is it sir.. The link between man & God is FAITH. That is all that keeps things moving & alive.
NB: I believe you have enjoyed the conversation...and if so...you'll probably want your friends/colleagues to enjoy the same...won't you?...forward them to increase their knowledge...:D

[جوري]

Hey, I am no genius, but I think that I understand some things pretty well.

When a thread is run by beleaguering two year olds, the best thing to do, is let them have their fit without dignifying them or even investing in a reply akhi!

:w:

[Azy]

I like the descriptive notes (chuckles) as if it was an actual scenario.
Or maybe Trax is thinking of turning it into a play.

If you're insistent on taking everything on faith, then no one viewpoint is more valid than another, all are equally unfounded.

[Mikayeel]

i have bred snakes and still keep them.
some boas and pythons have vestigal limbs. i've seen them with my own eyes.
for those not fortunate enough to have a handy dandy python or boa to look at, here is a pic:

That snake looks like it got teeth from its tail! Nice pic though never noticed that on my snake!

[Akilah Hijara]

I think the concepts of evolution and the belief in Allah are not mutually exclusive ideas, as has been stated several times. To accept Allah or some higher power is to acknowledge the fact that there are somethings in the universe that we just don't understand. Anyone who has seen a snowflake, a sunrise, the milky way on a clear night, a butterflies' wing, or the seemingly random patterns on a leaf should know that nature is beautiful and full of wonder, and that beauty has not always been the same over the millennia. Wouldn't everyone just be happier if they could consider the use of science as a way to explore the world we have been given, rather then turning it into a crusade to throw religion in the dirt?

[Tornado]

Those who don't understand exactly what evolution is or have never taken a course on it are definitely missing out. Darwin was an incredible person to have found this out and his idea was definitely one of the most brilliant ideas of science.

[جوري]

I love how people just come in to drop a couple of pearls long after the ho-hum of the town criers and the janitors have cleared the refuse from the ceremonial procession.. I just need to micturate here in show and substantiation of primitve culture sort of a deal..
Hilarious!

[Faye]

I don't think that a belief in Allah and evolution are mutually exclusive either. Evolution is a natural process of the universe. The fact that evolution happens doesn't mean that creation doesn't also happen.

[Hamayun]

I think the concepts of evolution and the belief in Allah are not mutually exclusive ideas, as has been stated several times. To accept Allah or some higher power is to acknowledge the fact that there are somethings in the universe that we just don't understand. Anyone who has seen a snowflake, a sunrise, the milky way on a clear night, a butterflies' wing, or the seemingly random patterns on a leaf should know that nature is beautiful and full of wonder, and that beauty has not always been the same over the millennia. Wouldn't everyone just be happier if they could consider the use of science as a way to explore the world we have been given, rather then turning it into a crusade to throw religion in the dirt?

Subhan Allah!!! Well said! :thumbs_up

Wish there were more sensible people like you in this world.

[Chuck]

Great scholars of Islam have written about evolution way before Darwin, so I don't understand why muslims should have problem with theory of evolution now. There is a bias both ways: for and against theory of evolution.
(1) Evolution doesn't mean that process is not created by God. Actually, one of the Allah's name is evolver.
(2) It doesn't mean creation doesn't happen. If you are just going by the evidence then evidence points to both.

[Chuck]

Wouldn't everyone just be happier if they could consider the use of science as a way to explore the world we have been given, rather then turning it into a crusade to throw religion in the dirt?

That is the way it is suppose to be, but I don't think some atheist would be happier with that. There are very few greatest scientists in history that were atheists. Most of the greatest scientists in history are theists. In last two centuries, many atheists went into science, I suppose for European experience with science vs religion and they found something to support their worldview with theory of evolution. And I suppose they also found the argument that scientific method is the best way to believe in something, although it is neither practical or useful in all important human situations.

Muslim scholars pioneered the scientific method, and they understood its limitations.

[Dr.Trax]

:sl:

I want to share this with you!:
THE BIGGEST FOOLS IN THE WORLD!!!!

Media Tags are no longer supported

[Tornado]

But that just shows you don't know what evolution is if you seriously think it's an accident. Evolution is nothing magical. I doubt it even contradicts the Quran. It does contradict the Christians who are Young Earth creationists :).If there was a god, I'd expect it to create life through natural processes and evolution would be it.

[Hamayun]

I don't see evolution going against the Quran.

Allah/God has created an ever changing and ever expanding universe. He created living things with the ability to adapt to their surroundings.

Another one of the million miracles of Allah/God.

Edit:
If you are referring to us evolving from Monkeys...

There is a "missing link" between us and the monkeys.

We have found millions of fossils of Pre-historic Dinosaurs but we have found no evidence of this so called "missing link" which is a more recent era.

Humans seem to have appeared on Earth a bit suddenly...

[Dr.Trax]

But that just shows you don't know what evolution is if you seriously think it's an accident. Evolution is nothing magical. I doubt it even contradicts the Quran. It does contradict the Christians who are Young Earth creationists :).If there was a god, I'd expect it to create life through natural processes and evolution would be it.

Really?!

Ok.....Then please describe how do you know the Theory of Evolution!
Explain it......then we can talk about the next step.

Peace.

[roohani.doctor]

i've taken anthropology courses and evolution courses and evolution basically just means the change in the gene frequency in a population over time, can happen by mutations or adaptation to the environment...basically survival of the fittest is natural selection, which eventually leads to evolution of one species to another...

i think both creation and evolution exist, and that Allah controls both.... however, because humans are so much more different intellectually then any other animal ever to have existed, i dont think humans share a common monkey ancestor with bonobos or the chimps... i.e. we dint use to be monkeys millions of yrs ago... Certainly, animals/plants have evolved over time, but did we really all start from a microorganism, a single cell 3 billions yrs ago?? i think not, and i think we will never know the whole truth either, just because we were never meant to know wut life really is...ask a random person on a street on wut they think life is and you'll get some confused answers...

anyhooo... science proves evolution exists but doesnt prove creation doesnt...
:statisfie

[barney]

http://www.harunyahya.com/books/darw...reation_02.php

Above is the link for the download of Atlas of Creation.
It's a massive illustrated book on creationist "debunking" of Evolution.

It might be full of inaccuracies, such as snakes being called eels and pictures of fishing hook-flys passed off as real creatures and the whole basis of some creatures not evolving is actually part of evolution, but it does have some exceptionally nice pictures.

[Linehan.ca]

My English translation of the Quran has passages that seem to prove evolution, it could just be a mistranslations but in my scientific opinion(best class in school) it seems to be a close comparison.

18:38 "'Have you no faith in Him who created you from dust, from a little germ, and fashioned you into a man?'"

Most Evolutionists figure people came from single cell organisms(germs)

24:45 "God created every beast from water. Some creep upon their bellies, others walk on two legs, and others yet on four."

Now according to Darwin's theory of evolution, life started in water.

My friend and I talked about why would God put something like that in the Quran, so I broke it down into questions in which she could only answer yes.

God is all seeing and all knowing, and knows the future? So He then would know that evolution would surpass creationism in common belief? So than He must've foreseen that unbelievers would use evolution to disprove God? So than God know all that, it would only make sense he would put facts about evolution in the Quran because it would only prove that the Quran is true to the disbelievers! It was something along those lines.

[Hamayun]

18:38 "'Have you no faith in Him who created you from dust, from a little germ, and fashioned you into a man?'"

Liking your style there brother :)

Although isn't that 40:67 rather than 18:38?

Yusuf Ali Translation: 40:67:
It is He Who has created you from dust, then from a sperm-drop, then from a leech-like clot; then does He get you out (into the light) as a child: then lets you (grow and) reach your age of full strength; then lets you become old― though of you there are some who die before;― and lets you reach a Term appointed: in order that ye may learn wisdom.

[Linehan.ca]

Liking your style there brother :)

Although isn't that 40:67 rather than 18:38?

No brother, the verse I am referring to is a parable about two men conversing, and one says that quote to the other asking him how he could not believe.

[Silver]

The theory of evolution does not contradict the Quran or the Sunnah since they don't tell us much about the creation of animals and plants.
I refuse to say "natural selection" because I think that it is God not nature that allowed genetic mutations to take place.
I don't believe that man evolved from non-human species though.

[Indigåtor]

As written in my previous post on biological evolution in the Comparative Religion section, if Islam's timeline of prophets supports that of the Bible -- Adam to Muhammad -- then mankind is only four or five thousand years old. Reading Ibn Kathir's Stories of the Prophets I have concluded that Islam's prophetic genealogy is chronologically equal to Christianity's. Unfortunately, there exists zero archaeological evidence to support such a notion, let alone the idea that Adam and Eve were 30 cubits [about 50 feet] tall, according to hadiths. Such fossils have never been discovered - on the contrary the fossils that have been uncovered are millions of years old and bear the semblance of apes. 160,000 years is the age of the most human-like fossil found so far, and its stature is perfectly normal.

[Hamayun]

if Islam's timeline of prophets supports that of the Bible

lol :D

"if" ???

After all the confident posts you made about the prophetic timeline in Islam why the word "if"???

I thought you knew everything? At least thats what the arrogance in all your posts indicates.

Hate to say it but... Peace :peace:

[czgibson]

Greetings,

lol :D

"if" ???

After all the confident posts you made about the prophetic timeline in Islam why the word "if"???

I thought you knew everything? At least thats what the arrogance in all your posts indicates.

Hate to say it but... Peace :peace:

Someone questions your beliefs and you insult them. Why?

Peace

[Hamayun]

Greetings,


Someone questions your beliefs and you insult them. Why?

Peace

Insult? :?

Compared the rude and ignorant posts he has made you find my post insulting? I haven't said anything rude.

You must be joking. Either way I do not intend to take the thread off topic so if you have any issues please feel free to Email me or a Moderator.

Cheers.

[Zafran]

salaam

well its speculation realy saying that if Islam supports the timeline of the bible - when it clearly its too open to even know the time line of Adam pbuh.

[burdenofbeing]

I believe evolution. I believe evolution is not contradictory to islam.

[Tony]

as in blind evolution then no, jst looking at monarch butterflies tells me Allah created all.

[redblackmask]

Who put the first cell on earth?

[Wyatt]

Who put the first cell on earth?

I believe the theorists of evolution generally state that is was most likely a natural bacteria that mutated and mutated for billions of years in the primordial soup.

To me, it sounds perfectly logical seeing that it is an obvious fact that mutations occur, so naturally some sort of evolution has to exist.

I don't preach either side because neither is perfect. However, if I were to choose one, I would go with evolution before any creationist tale.

Therefore, I chose that I believe in it- because denying mutation exists is just silly. :exhausted -... which is basically what evolution is, just over an extended period of time (in this case, an in-cred-ib-ly long time).

4,540,000,000 years- what was Allah doing in the mean time? :rollseyes

[redblackmask]

I believe the theorists of evolution generally state that is was most likely a natural bacteria that mutated and mutated for billions of years in the primordial soup.

To me, it sounds perfectly logical seeing that it is an obvious fact that mutations occur, so naturally some sort of evolution has to exist.

I don't preach either side because neither is perfect. However, if I were to choose one, I would go with evolution before any creationist tale.

Therefore, I chose that I believe in it- because denying mutation exists is just silly. :exhausted -... which is basically what evolution is, just over an extended period of time (in this case, an in-cred-ib-ly long time).

4,540,000,000 years- what was Allah doing in the mean time? :rollseyes

I see you changed your title from 'atheist' to 'agnostic'.

I know you'll hear religionists say over and over again "It's just a theory!" and while we now have concrete evidence to support evolution and mutation, they are still theories. We will never really know how life started here but the theory of evolution is a close as we'll get.

And as for the number of years, well I'm not a Muslim yet so I don't know what Allah was doing. As humans living on Earth, we can't fathom that kind of stuff.

But we still have not dis proven God's role in evolution. In my view, evolution just makes the painting that God drew more beautiful and precise.

Here is some verses from the Quran pertaining to evolution: http://www.parvez-video.com/science.asp

[Wyatt]

Here is some verses from the Quran pertaining to evolution: http://www.parvez-video.com/science.asp

That is an amazing link that I think everyone here who bashes evolution calling it "a silly theory" should look at. :D Thanks!!

[ e d i t ]
I think there should have been options like:

Muslim - Support evolution
Non-Muslim - Support evolution
Muslim - Do not support
Non-Muslim - Do not support

[جوري]

New fellow should educate himself on macro and micro evolution before the braggadocio?

indeed mutations happen...

• Single-base substitutions
  
  • Missense mutations
  • Nonsense
  • Silent mutations
  • Splice-site mutations
  
  
• Insertions and Deletions
  
  • Fragile X Syndrome
  • Huntington's Disease
  • Muscular Dystrophy
  
  
• Duplications
• Translocations

now stick each mutation in a search engine and see if a disease state happens or a form of speciation? ey...

also pls make sure you use the search feature, third from anatomical right, we can't write the same thing over and over just because a newbie came up with an epiphany ... chances are, your earth shattering info has been seen by most not by a mere select few illuminati ..

all the best

[czgibson]

Greetings,

That is an amazing link that I think everyone here who bashes evolution calling it "a silly theory" should look at. :D Thanks!!

The link took me to a page that consisted of the standard Maurice Bucaille line.

Are we looking at the same article? :?

Peace

[redblackmask]

Man! What is wrong? I never said mutations don't occur! Get your eyes examined.

[جوري]

indeed and we haven't argued against whether or they exist, but what role they play on a thread so entitled evolution test..

[redblackmask]

Hmmmmm.... I haven't 'argued' anything with you, I wasn't even aware of your existence before you posted that one post!!!!

Read my post again, please. And then reply. Or maybe you can't speak and read English properly??

[جوري]

I don't see that I have quoted you? do you have a persecution complex?
This is an open thread on a public forum, anyone is free to participate..

all the best

[Yanal]

In what way do you mean evolution?

[redblackmask]

New fellow should educate himself on macro and micro evolution before the braggadocio?

indeed mutations happen...

• Single-base substitutions
  
  • Missense mutations
  • Nonsense
  • Silent mutations
  • Splice-site mutations
  
  
• Insertions and Deletions
  
  • Fragile X Syndrome
  • Huntington's Disease
  • Muscular Dystrophy
  
  
• Duplications
• Translocations

now stick each mutation in a search engine and see if a disease state happens or a form of speciation? ey...

also pls make sure you use the search feature, third from anatomical right, we can't write the same thing over and over just because a newbie came up with an epiphany ... chances are, your earth shattering info has been seen by most not by a mere select few illuminati ..

all the best

I believe you were quoting me there, because after I responded to this, you followed through with your response as well.

And as I have freedom of speech and I will continue to exercise that right!

And no, I don't have a "persecution complex", whatever the hell that means.

[جوري]

I believe you were quoting me there, because after I responded to this, you followed through with your response as well.

And as I have freedom of speech and I will continue to exercise that right!

And no, I don't have a "persecution complex", whatever the hell that means.

quoting you would have looked like as you've done above and I have on this post!
my comments are directed toward anyone thinking mutations lead to macroevolution!
you can continue to exercise your rights, I don't recall anyone asking you to give them up...

Now, I am hopeful we can get back to the thread title instead of the ad-lib comments path...

all the best

[redblackmask]

quoting you would have looked like as you've done above and I have on this post!
my comments are directed toward anyone thinking mutations lead to macroevolution!
you can continue to exercise your rights, I don't recall anyone asking you to give them up...

Now, I am hopeful we can get back to the thread title instead of the ad-lib comments path...

all the best

Stop making excuses. You even insulted me by calling me a 'newcomer'. Read my last posts, please. Or are you having trouble speaking English again??

And yes, even if someone, God himself, asked me to give up my free speech, I would say "no". Nobody, Islamic, Western, or anyone in this Universe will force me give up my rights.

[جوري]

Stop making excuses. You even insulted me by calling me a 'newcomer'. Read my last posts, please. Or are you having trouble speaking English again??

And yes, even if someone, God himself, asked me to give up my free speech, I would say "no". Nobody, Islamic, Western, or anyone in this Universe will force me give up my rights.

You are not the only newcomer newcomer, and I don't need to make excuses at all, if I desired to insult you, nothing is stopping me from doing it it would be quite the easy way out, just reflecting on your less than thoughtful replies..

I have no desire to derange this topic to coax your ego back into good health.. if you can't rise above puerile responses and be in concert with the subject matter then don't participate on this thread, it is that simple, unless you are indeed pushing for this thread to be closed?

all the best

[redblackmask]

Yes, I have a very healthy ego, thank you.

And it doesn't make you big and 'tough' when you claim you can insult someone on an internet forum. My replies are all justified, thank you.

And no, I'm not pushing for this thread to be closed. You started it, so I'm going to finish it now. You'll probably reply here again so you can feel like you're the best. But really, people like you on the internet have the biggest issues mentally and are the most insecure people ever. You're reply will be funny to read, anyways.

I'm going to be the bigger person here, so good bye and see ya later.

Sincerely,

redblackmask

[جوري]

. You're reply will be funny to read,.

bah.. I don't know what 'you are reply' means?..
Isn't it prudent to make sure that your syntax & grammar are correct, before advising others on the ills of their grammar, eye sight, reading comprehension, psychological conditions amongst other things?...

Glad that was your last reply, and I am much obliged you gave me the chance to have the last word-- mighty noble of you indeed! :statisfie

all the best


back to evo.

[Wyatt]

The bigger person isn't the one who ends the debate the earliest,( for that says nothing,) but the one who speaks with the most sense. In this case, Gossamer Skye won out on the funny accusations of not being able to comprehend English- which seemed to me kind of prejudice or racist. Redblackmask, I wouldn't blame someone for not understanding "you are" English.

That was my post that is totally not helping this thread. x)

[Clover]

I could see how Evolution makes sense, but I am not sure.

[Addie]

I beleive in Evolution.
Why? Well on one side you have a scientifically solid theory, that has stood the test of time, has mountains upon mountains of solid real physical evidence that i can see and witness and it has been enough to decimate age old theological sureitys. Its so overwhelmingly in-your-face obvious and undeniable that most theists just jiggle the scriptures interpretaion so that its "consistant" with evolution. Others just dont think about it, because its easier that way.

On the other side you have a talking snake in a very very old book.

May I ask whether you have studied evolution? There isnt as much evidence as you seem to believe. This is why it is still classed as the theory of evolution.

The majority of scientists agree that the biochemistry of individual cells are are so complexed and regimented in their function that alteration on any scale never mind on a grand scale is highly unlikely.

[root]

May I ask whether you have studied evolution? There isnt as much evidence as you seem to believe. This is why it is still classed as the theory of evolution..

Sorry to jump in here, but I have to ask how you reconcile that Gravity is just a theory, so is Biology, computer science, Geology, Physics and all fields of engineering to name but a few. They are all "theories" too!

The majority of scientists agree that the biochemistry of individual cells are are so complexed and regimented in their function that alteration on any scale never mind on a grand scale is highly unlikely.

And still, that majority you just mentioned accept evolution. Further, 99% of "real" scientists accept evolution with every major scientific institute around the world claiming evolution to be factual?

Just wonder how you reconcile this.

[Tony]

^^^^ no they dont, and darwins theory is being disprived dailly, even prominant evolutionists are saying that evo is beyond the realms of possibility almost. There is no way that dna can transmutate and a spescies become of a different species. Its akin to the belief that frogs are made from river mud, this belief is not so long outdated. All darwins theories were based on observations and no proof has ever been bought forward to aid his ideas, since then we have discovered genetics and therefore itis even more damaging to his theory, darwin even wrote a book called the problems with evo, the more that science advances the less likely it looks that his theory could ever work. Eno and the origins of life fall flat with every scientific discovery, life can only come from life, "IT IS HE WHO BRINGS OUT THE LIVING FROM THE DEAD, AND BRINGS OUT THE DEAD FROM THE LIVING." [I] The only reason that evo is still clung to as a belief by ppl is so that they can exclude the possibility of a Creator with at least some semblance of rationality, yet how can matter exist and function alone, consciosness and life has to be of God, ok there is a train of thought that says maybe this is still not right and just coz we exist doesnt point to a Creator, I say it does and that the evidence is so obvious any further conjecture is simply blinding oneself to that evidence. Evo as a theory has only really been so prolonged thru scientific propaganda. False pictures of missing links, Marxs input for material gain and outright lies like piltdowns skull.
Surat al infitar, 6-8 "O man! What has deluded you in respect of your Noble Lord? He who created you and formed you and proportioned you and assembled you in whatever way He willed."