Straw man. As you can see below, biologists are not saying that natural selection is a creative force. It is a selection of existing traits in a gene pool. It can reshape a population by eliminating some variations but it is not adding new info to the gene pool. Mutation, recombination, and gene flow can add new traits to a population upon which selection/drift can put to the test.
Mechanisms that Decrease Genetic Variation
Natural Selection
Sexual Selection
Genetic Drift
Mechanisms that Increase Genetic Variation
Mutation
Recombination
Gene Flow
(source: Chris Colby, “Introduction to Evolutionary Biology” 1996…http://www.talkorigins.org has a link to this somewhere)
Royal Sampler, if you’re still reading, please take note of the following:
What you have done is generally known here and elsewhere as a “drive-by witnessing.”
While it might make people feel good, dropping in to witness is useless unless you have the strength of faith to stick around. Sticking your head into a room to yell “you’re all wrong!” and then leaving is not going to win anyone to your cause. Quite the opposite, in fact; such behavior will only annoy and anger those whom you are ostensibly trying to win for Christ.
You do yourself, your fellow believers, and your Christ no favors by doing this.
Hello, capacitor. I am sorry that you are having an existentialist crisis. Please do not burden us with your delusions of futility. Thank you.
jmonster
If evolution occurs over millions of years, the amount of evidence should staggering. Yet we can’t find the fossils that show it. Why not?**
Let’s look at it this way; suppose that tomorrow some evidence is found that evolution is indeed false. It’s irrefutably proven to be false.
Now, why should we accept Creationism as the RIGHT theory to explain bio-diversity? Why not accept the Hindu Creation story? Or Shinto? Or Norse? What makes the Christian creation story the right one and the other’s false?
Pro-atheist? I don’t think so. This is more of a “Missouri” board in that, if someone is going to make claims of a fantastic or unusual nature(i.e. flying saucers, faked moon landings, psychic healing or super-powered invisible people that claim responibility for everything) we’re gonna shout out as a group, "Show me!.
No, I don’t think so. It is, however, definitely a pro-science board, and it has always been one.
Science (the best tool we have to investigate the universe around us) overwhelmingly supports the idea that biological evolution has happened (and is happening) on an Earth that is around four billion years old, in a universe that is around 15 to 20 billion years old. Science just as overwhelmingly shows young-earth creationism to be silly.
Some people think this means that science says there is no god, or at least that science says their god doesn’t exist. This isn’t true, as science says essentially nothing about the existence (or lack thereof) of a god.
Science (even the evil evolution part of it) does not equal atheism.
He (walor) was making a joke, Ben. Notwithstanding the face that you phrased your request within the boundaries of a single sentence, you did ask for two pieces of information.
I myself stifled a smartass urge to post right after you with “That’s two questions! :D” But I didn’t think it was that important.
