Hello Carissa, Interesting post. I'm curious - why are creationists so convinced of intelligent design? There are very few publications concerning intelligent design at the molecular or biochemical level. Most ID folks (if not all) seem baffled at how such incredibly complex mechanisms and structures arose in a step-by-step creation process by God. Those that adhere strictly to Genesis claim that God created life in 6 days (boy did he need that 7th day to rest if that was the case!) - but HOW did God do this? If belief in God is based on faith, Creation Science (and Intelligent Design) must be based on the 'nitty gritty' details of creation as "science is in the details" right? Unfortunately, there aren't fossils and genes that support ID or any evidence at all for that matter. So I remain unconvinced of Intelligent Design for the origins of life. Fortunately for me, this does not affect my academic pursuits. Evolution does not try to explain the origin of life - just how said life changes through time. You included a great example of dog species. Dogs are a nifty model system for demonstrating the effects of selection on organismal diversity. Select two very different phenotypes for breeding and presto chango - we have a new dog breed! Selection is a pretty powerful mechanism. There is some great literature on Drosophila demonstrating rapid changes in phenotype if you're curious about scientific studies 'documenting evolution'. We can all continue to ponder how life began, grasping at different hypotheses that attempt to explain this phenomena, but in the meantime, we have a good functioning model (evolution) to help us explain the extraordinary diversity in organisms and help us predict what changes may lie ahead.
Best of luck in your quest to learn more about evolution. Cheers, Christine Quoting Carissa Shipman <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > I am a biology student at Temple University and I have > conducted an NSF funded systematics project for the order > Hymenoptera at the American Museum of Natural History. My > question is why is the scientific community so convinced of > evolution? There are very few publications concerning > evolution at the molecular or biochemical level. Most > scientists are baffled at how such molecular systems such > as blood clotting actual evolved in a step by step manner. > It looks to me like many of the molecular inter workings all > needed to be there simultaneously for the end product to > function properly. The biosynthesis of AMP is just as > baffling. How could that have happened in a step by step > fashion? You can speculate, but no evolutionist has the > answer. So if you can not explain how the most nitty gritty > machines of life "molecules" learned to function in the > intricate ways that they do why are you so certain that > everything evolved? Science is looking at the details. All > science textbooks I have read have relayed very little > evidence of evolution at the molecular level. They just say > it happened. Since Darwinian evolution has published very > few papers concerning molecular evolution it should perish. > Systematics addresses genetic similarities between species, > but it does not address exactly how those genetic > differences and similarities came to be. There maybe fossils > and genes, but you need more than this. I am not convinced > of evolution, but still choose to educate myself in what it > teaches and believes. How do scientists explain how even the > slightest mutation in the human genome is highly detrimental > most of the time? If even the slightest change occurs in our > genome it is oftentimes fatal. Believing that this mechanism > lead to all the species we see today takes a great deal of > faith.For instance if even one step of the blood clotting > process were disturbed the effects would be disastrous. > Also, why does evolution leave out mathematical statistics > of how each mutation arose. TPA a component of blood > clotting has 4 domains. If we attempted to shuffle the genes > for these four domains the odds of getting all four domains > together is 30,000 to the fourth power, and that is just for > TPA! Calculating mutation rates and the odds of getting > certain genes to match up perfectly for the ultimate > function shows us that it takes more faith to believe that > we evolved from primordial slime. The earth has had > thousands of lightning bolts hit it every year and we have > not seen life spawn from molecules. If evolution happened we > would see it reoccuring time and time again from the bottom. > Why have we not seen it, because conditions have not been > perfect? I do not deny adaptation within species, but this > is far different than the assumptions of macro evolution. If > an evolutionist can challenge my arguments I would gladly > like to hear your rebuttal. Publications for molecular > evolution use many words such as "unleashed". How was it > unleashed, what were the step by step mechanisms that you > can say for certain occurred, leaving macro leapages out of > the picture? You see fossils, but you have no detailed > explanations as to how one may have turned into the other at > the molecular level. If you can not explain it at the > molecular level you have nothing to base your assumptions > on. Also all the breeds of dogs are very different from one > another and some of their skeletal structures look > unrelated. The different types of dogs that you see arrived > through intelligent interaction, not evolutionary processes. > Change occurs in nature to a limited extent. That is all. > Sincerely, Carissa Shipman >
