Crystal you seem educated and intellectually honest. I have a degree in chemical engineering and have an open mind for any civil discussion. I believe wholeheartedly in evolution. I would love to have a private discussion with you.

Ardipithicus

the survival of the fittest not being correct is actually from Berkeley has it's merits...even tho I disagree, they are saying that the reproduction rate is more important than strength,speed or intelligence...but the way I see it is if an animal has a hundred babies a day, and they aren't genetically smart enough to survive, then they are just food for something else that is...they wanna change it to survival of the fit enough...

Yes, I was taught this lie in school. Louis Pasteur was a far superior scientist compared to Darwin. Information theory blows evolution out of the water. Scientists have used the principles of SETI to study the DNA code and the only conclusion can be that life was designed by intelligence. (search Wow signal of terrestrial genetic code) Scientists have given up trying to create an environment in which life could arise and are now seeking to create life through intelligent design by synthesizing DNA.

Little science takes you away from God but more of it takes you to Him. --Louis Pasteur

I have been looking for spontaneous generation for twenty years without discovering it. No, I do not judge it impossible. But what allows you to make it the origin of life? You place matter before life and you decide that matter has existed for all eternity. How do you know that the incessant progress of science will not compel scientists to consider that life has existed during eternity, and not matter? You pass from matter to life because your intelligence of today cannot conceive things otherwise. How do you know that in ten thousand years, one will not consider it more likely that matter has emerged from life? You move from matter to life because your current intelligence, so limited compared to what will be the future intelligence of the naturalist, tells you that things cannot be understood otherwise. If you want to be among the scientific minds, what only counts is that you will have to get rid of a priori reasoning and ideas, and you will have to do necessary deductions not giving more confidence than we should to deductions from wild speculation. --Louis Pasteur

I actually had an extremely good biology teacher.... he taught us to think critically...... he taught Darwinism , but told us to come to our own conclusions

Yes I was taught Darwinism and evolution in school. This was in Catholic school.

Although evolution is factual and Darwinism is a "theory", they are very similar in the understanding of how new species come to being.

I think there is confusion in how people think of evolution.
Evolution has nothing to do with creating life.
Its more of a process of living mutation than how life initiated.

Intelligent Design looks more at how life initiated than what happens after life exists.
It implies something caused life to occur on purpose.
It's opposite would be Spontaneous Generation of life.

Spontaneous Generation means that the elements that cause life happened by accident, randomly.

In school, we also studied Panspermia.
Panspermia is the theory that life on the earth originated from microorganisms or chemical precursors of life present in outer space and able to initiate life on reaching a suitable environment.
It implies that the elements that cause life are abundant in this part of the galaxy, in this star system and Earth has the right conditions to allow life to arise when exposed to those conditions.

Evolution is something that happens to life as it changes while being exposed to changing conditions.
Darwin explained by observation that evolution causes life to specialize in an attempt to be eternal.
He noticed how organisms that are similar have subtle differences that give a particular organism a better chance to survive by specialism.
Evolution shows that different specialized organisms have certain baseline similarities that can be traced back to common ancestors.

No matter if life is intelligently designed or panspermia generated, evolution occurs.
It occurs over time both in the current organism as it adapts to changing conditions and generational as its offspring changes to adapt to changing conditions.

The argument of evolution or intelligent design is the wrong comparison.
The argument should be intelligent design vs panspermia.

I really don't have a problem with intelligent design, but the only question in my mind is how were the designers created then? Everything has a beginning, I think except for maybe the universe itself, so it would seem something would have to have evolved first...

I personally wouldn't say "evolved".
A better word would be "initiated".
Life doesn't "evolve" into life.
Evolution is something that happens after life exists.

It boils down to Spontaneous Generation.
Intelligent Design implies that the spontaneous generation of life was initiated by; God or the elements of life on their own.
It implies that conscious intent exists beyond life.

As far as our species knowledge understands the Universe, that isn't true.
No chemicals act with intent.
This leaves only spontaneous generation by random action as the initiator of life.
For the religious, it implies that God, the creator of life, came to be by spontaneous generation and set the conditions for life to occur on purpose.
With God existing without matter or form it implies that God is not life but a force of conscious intent existing outside the material Universe.
Since mankind cannot look outside the Universe, we don't know if there is a force of conscious intent of its own.
The only conscious intent we have witnessed occurs in lifeforms.
Our AI systems are an attempt to create conscious intent in synthetics.
We can't just point a ray gun at something and give it conscious intent.
You can't put it in a box and sell it.

God may very well be the product of a civilization that discovered how to release conscious intent like a force. That force purposely caused a state change that created matter from intent somehow. It may be the initial spark that spontaneously caused life to initiate.

I don't think Darwin ever talked about the creation of life, but was talking about how animals adapt to live and reproduce. The Galapagos islands seem to have speed up the adaption of certain animals, both mentally and physically, to survive in harsh conditions..the the only iguana in the world that eats underwater sea plants, even developed a way to get rid of the extra salt from it's body from eating salt water plants, numbers of different kinds of finches that can be found nowhere else in the world, one even changing the shape of it's beak to drink blood from other animals...Darwin's fascination was with adaptations, not the creation of life itself...

I never mentioned creation. Just how new species come to being. So I agree with you. There are many isolated islands where seals, birds and other animals have "evolved" into their own new species.
Madagascar is another place with its own unique creatures.

I read it wrong, my bad

For anything to 'evolve' it must first 'exist'.
Evolution exists beyond the aspect of life.
It exists in evolved thinking, evolved patterns, evolved technology.
A thought must first exist for it to evolve.
A pattern must first exist for it to evolve.
Technology must first exist for it to evolve.
Life must first exist for it to evolve.

Evolution creates a new version.

A zygote is a new version of its parents.
Each parent is a zygote of its parents and so on.
In people, each zygote is a mutation of the genetic combination of material.
That combination causes an evolution of the base material into something new.
The changes are subtle but not always.
Deformities arise and if those deformities are life sustaining, the are included in the next zygote.
Its how inter-species become differentiated.
As that differential is evolved thru reproduction the differences become more pronounced.
Evolutionary dead-ends occur when the deformity (mutation) evolves to a point that ends the line before it can reproduce. That is the idea behind the term Darwin Awards. Someone dies before their genetic code can reproduce.

Its all good

What many people don't realize is that evolution doesn't need isolation for it to occur.
Everything alive, that reproduces, evolves.
Sometimes we evolve a lot (lose our tails, appendix shrinks), sometimes a little (able to breathe polluted air, drink polluted water, lose our fur covering).
Sometimes, we evolve intellectually or our instincts evolve.
Sometimes our bodies evolve in severe changes (down syndrome, handicapped deformities, savants, extreme athletic abilities).
Isolation allows us the ability to see the evolution easier but everything alive evolves not only by reproduction but also during existence.
Our bodies change as we age, that change is evolution.
Ever see a cigar smoker who's lip is deformed to accept the cigar?
Ever see a person that wears earrings have longer than normal ear lobes?
Do you squat down on your haunches to watch tv or sit in a chair?
We have evolved to be comfortable sitting in chairs.
Evolution is everywhere if you look.

I agree and disagree
You are right everything evolves including us. We are much taller than a few hundred years ago, less colorblindness etc.
where I disagree with you is a cigar smoker etc. These changes are a disintegration of a life form not a "evolution" passed on to the next generation.

The example was meant to show how evolution is not limited to species progression but happens in real-time as well.
Evolution in and of itself is change due to environmental conditions.
The deformed lip would not occur without real-time evolution.
You expose someone to sun for 40 years, they build up a resistance to getting sunburned.
That is another example of non-progeny evolution.
That real-time evolution changes the body and if the parents have that nature, it progesses in their offspring.
If the mother and father have deformed lips from smoking cigars, then the children and their reproductive partners smoke cigars and their lips deform, eventually, thru evolution, children of these people will be born with deformed lips.
If you have two parents that are constantly exposed to sunlight, and their children are also constantly exposed to sunlight, eventually, the children will be born with the ability to withstand sunlight.
Likewise, if you live in a pitch black cave you might lose the ability to see with your eyes. You will still have eyes, but they will stop working like they did. children born may have eyes that don't quite develop right and eventually a child will be born without eyes. This is evident in the world around us because we have discovered cave dwellers both with non-working eyes and lack of eyes.

Well you sort of contradicted your self here...

If I cut off my arm, that is not "real-time evolution" as understood by its intended definition.


You correct this this here...


meaning over time and generations.
This of course assumes that the offspring will also smoke cigars which is not a given.

And of course I agree that environmental changes like your example with sunlight(just look at Africans and their ability to endure high UV rays) is legit.

That is the essence of why these animals on isolated islands evolve into new species, not solely because of isolation but also their environment.

It's in the syllabus, but it's not an explicit title.

Hi, I understand what you are saying but

It is in a sense.

I'll try to explain...
If you cut off your arm it is a bloody stump, it bleeds until it heals and then its a stump but no longer bloody.
The healing process caused the condition of the stump to evolve into a closed wound that eventually evolves to become just a stump.
It doesn't remain a bloody stump for life unless the blood loss ends your life. It however, also does not grow back into an arm. It evolves to be a stump.
Hence, Real-time Evolution.

Stephen Hawking was an atheist, and believed that "the universe is governed by the laws of science". He stated: "There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, [and] science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works." In an interview published in The Guardian, Hawking regarded "the brain as a computer which will stop working when its components fail", and the concept of an afterlife as a "fairy story for people afraid of the dark". Can anyone remember what life was like before they were born? I think not.