Ok, so i don't deny microevolution like the beaks on Darwins finches
My skepticism is with common ancestry and macroevolution, natural selection through random mutation
Do you believe microevolution stops at some point? Like say if a species has been "microevolving" for 10 million years, would it know to stop before it got to a point where it "macroevolved"?
With the cell, for me, falsifiable evidence would be to show how one cell can spawn another cell, a different new cell. Cos there are heaps of different types of cells that make up an animal, right.
Then, when there are heaps of different cells how did they arrange themselves to create all the organs, bones and the countless other parts of an animal.
And then how would of those body parts come together to create an animal.
From one cell to the animal is such a massive leap.
What is the falsifiable evidence for it? An observable lab exercise or maths would be ideal.
Then we get multiple animals and plants from this common ancestor by natural selection through random mutation.
So basically you're asking me to explain the entire evolutionary history of multicellular organisms....that's all. ;)
We have seen unicellular organisms evolve into multi-cellular organisms in lab experiments. Some of the cells even became specialized, like you mentioned. I can give you a paper in a scientific journal to read on that if you'd like.
But if you're looking for a 100% complete narrative of evolutionary history from the first cells all the way through animals like we have today, that's not going to happen. Keep in mind, life has been evolving on earth for ~4 billion years with the majority of that time being solely devoted to cellular evolution (so that cells are complex is hardly surprising).
Ok, so they know the genome of animals like flies, mice and such, right. And they've been at work trying to create a mutation that is superior in some way to the original.
So from an engineers perspective i would like to see something like a fly with un upgrade in its propulsion system, maybe bigger wings so its faster or something, u know.
We see mutations that improve an organism all the time. We even fight it when we have to keep developing increasingly powerful antibiotics because the bacteria keep acquiring mutations that improve their ability to resist them.
Remember, mutations happen with every reproduction event. You and I have between 70 and 100 mutations (depending on how you count). So beneficial mutations are inevitable. They're also well documented and studied.
News Feature: Genetic mutations you want
But even that would only demonstrate microevolution. To demonstrate macro evolution then we would need to do several mutations in order to show the fly evolve into something else like a wasp. And that evolve into a different type of species all together (phyla is it) like a fish or mammal
It looks like you should brush up on your taxonomy. Been a while since school, eh? ;)
Remember the classification system?
To use your examples, "fly" and "wasp" are both different Orders (Diptera and Hymenoptera), which means they are as far apart taxonomically as an aardvark and a whale. So to expect one order to evolve into another right before our eyes is kinda silly. It's certainly not how evolution works.
Evolution proceeds via the production of new species. So a species of vinegar flies (genus drosophila) would give rise to a new species of....vinegar flies (still in the genus drosophila). Eventually one of those species (either the new one or its ancestor) would give rise to another new species of vinegar fly. But at no point does a fly give birth to something in a completely different family or order. That would actually be something other than evolution.
Of course there's a lot more to this, but I really don't have the time or ambition to go over it all.
From what I understand every mutation has resulted in a deficient creature
Without testable or mathematical evidence its hard for me to believe it.
Well, you can believe it. :)
Im guessing u will talk about fossils.
How can u tell if its a transitional species or a different species?
Do fossils show us how plants and animals diverged?
What are the best fossil evidence for transition of species? Is it that archaeopteryx still?
It might be evidence, but it might not be as well
Is there an adequate explanation for the Cambrian explosion of new life forms?
Are fossils falsifiable? How? They can be interpreted differently by different people
That's a lot of questions that are probably best put aside for now. We can come back to them later, but let's make sure we have the basics right first.
One thing i find as being deceitful are the clay sculptures and illustrations of apes that look like men. Lucy is our best example right.
"Lucy" is one specimen of
Australopithecus afarensis. We actually have lots of fossils of them.
Australopithecus afarensis
From memory it is said that the final evolutionary development for man was the ability to walk on two legs. If that was the case then why doesn't Lucy look like a human, why does she still look like an ape in these clay sculptures?
Actually it's looking like bigger brains came after bipedalism. And Lucy is depicted as "ape like" because
A. afarensis is very much an organism with a mixture of human and primitive ape characteristics (see link above).
But the my biggest skepticism comes from the fact that so very few bones were even found. No feet bones. So the hypothesis that she walked on two legs comes down to speculation again, i think the hips or something. There is such a massive difference between our feet and that of an apes which is more like a hand.
Again, see the link above. Just for
A. afarensis there are over 300 specimens, including feet. One is even named "little foot"
Would that have evolved in the one mutation or several? And the hips and legs?
Several.
Another thing that makes me suspect is the motive, the war between creationists and Darwinist's has been going on since day one. Hoaxes have been presented like piltdown man.
Hoaxes and frauds exist in just about every human institution, including Christianity. Certainly we don't evaluate the validity of an entire concept based solely on the existence of a few hoaxes over the course of hundreds of years.
Characters like Richard Dawkins always made me scratch my head. Here we have a biologist that never talks about biology. Instead he talks about the one thing that shouldn't be spoken about in science, religion. There is a clear motive there
It all makes me question the motivation.
We must follow the facts but they create a hypothesis and then look for evidence to support it while ignoring anything that contradicts it, there is a term for this method of inquiry and im not a fan of it.
Dawkins is both a scientist and an atheist activist. He's most famous for his atheism though, and IMO he sometimes inappropriate mixes the two.
Are you aware of prominent Christian evolutionary scientists like
Dr. Francis Collins? Have you ever heard of
Biologos, an organization that works to show how science and religion can be compatible?
Or the Clergy Letter Project?
Just because Dawkins gets a lot of media attention doesn't mean that evolution equals atheism.
The way that Darwinism is presented appears to be ideologically driven as well. I see it as they best hypothesis science has atm. But it's presented as unquestionable fact.
I guess that depends on what you mean by "Darwinism".
Their some of the points that im skeptical about anyway
Sorry for writing a book, i hope its not boring and makes sense
No worries. :)
