I seem to recall reading somewhere that we would also need breastbones sticking out about three feet in order for our muscles to have the leverage to operate those gigantic wings. Overall, I think the answer is that if we could fly, we couldn’t do much else… unless, as other posters have said, we were a lot smaller and lighter.
How about these?
That’s what genetic engineering is for.
Lots of birds that didn’t need to fly have seemed to lose the ability to do so. I’ve heard it said that powered flight has a high evolutionary cost, which I took to mean that there are many trade offs to be able to fly and unless you really need to it’s better staying on the ground or in the water.
Yes. Among other places, you may have heard it way back in post 18 of this very thread.
Exactly.
Plane assisted flight is much easier and more efficient for us than personal flight would be. Having wings would probably have to cost us almost every other awesome thing we can do, putting us behind the smarter species of birds, who would then rule the world. We’d end up as their clunky mammalian bird-slaves, and it would suck.
It’s certainly proof that your understanding of evolution is a crock, but I don’t think that you would get much disagreement on that.
We just got started. Let’s see how this all plays out.
Might as well ask why we can’t teleport or breathe fire.
Just because a feature might be advantageous, doesn’t mean it hast to arise via evolution, or that it’s even possible.
And when it comes to evidence they have massive, massive amounts of evidence for it. At this point disproving evolution would pretty much require proving that the universe is an illusion. You’d have an easier time disproving gravity.
Evolution already won, long ago. The “controversy” is driven by politics and religion; the question is settled, scientifically.
No solid proof, except that the Lady Hope story claims that Darwin said "I was a young man with unformed ideas. I threw out queries, suggestions, wondering all the time over everything. And to my astonishment the ideas took like wildfire. People made a religion of them.” Since Darwin was 45 years old when he first published the Origin of Species (and was reluctant to do it then - he’d have preferred to have spent more time polishing the work), it’s obviously a lie that he was young when he spread his idea. Also Darwin’s daughter, who was there when Darwin died, says that Lady Hope wasn’t there.
I wish you luck in the afterlife; personally, I’d rather face God as a Christian who accepts evolution, than as a creationist who passes along accusations before making even a cursory attempt to establish whether they are true.
Pilot’s lament: “If God had meant us to fly, He’d have given us more money.”
We can fly. Check out Human powered flight on google. Gossamer Condor anyone?? We can harness our muscles and takeoff, fly, turn, and land. It’s a mechanical apparatus but it’s all human power.
My medical certificate isn’t current. Also i need a biennial flight review.
And what Elvis said.
It really shocks me that this flat-out lie continues to be promulgated.
[Moderator Note]
Bosstrain, general questions is for factual information. If you want to discuss your religious opinions, open a new thread in Great Debates. The information you posted about Darwin is patently false.
Everyone else, please let’s get back to the more specific question in the OP. There is no need to engage in a general debate about evolution here.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
We drifted the way we drifted. Evolution doesn’t have “reasons” for things. It’s a rock rolling down a hill. It lands where it lands. There isn’t any purpose or goal behind it. Asking why we don’t have wings is like asking why we don’t have polka dots. Because we never drifted that way. We have common ancestors with every species that did evolve wings, though. Most closely with bats.
Or, to put it another way: Evolution doesn’t cause changes. Random mutations and recombinations cause changes. Evolution is just the process that determines which changes stick around, out of the set of changes which have randomly happened.
And for that matter, also with every species that didn’t evolve wings. Though you have to go back rather further for that.
I’m puzzled by this. Reasons can be assigned for a great many of the adaptions various species have evolved.
Woodpeckers have evolved tough bills and long tongues because these allow them to exploit a fruitful food resource (insects in trees). Coloration allows certain species to blend with their environment, or mimic other species, or advertise their presence, etc., etc. Thousands of other examples can readily be cited.
They retain mutations because they are incidentally beneficial, but there is no “reason” for getting the mutation in the first place. Evolution is not guided toward any goal. Evolution is a result, not a cause.