Evidence for Evolution

[AndersonD]

Touché…

No attacking necessary.

It’s simple when someone demands proof of your beliefs or they won’t believe, then the intent I share is helping them look in the mirror. Personally for me, when I actually got serious into looking for any proof for evolution as an atheist and found I was lied to because there is zero scientific evidence for evolution it was instrumental for me finding God. So I get excited if someone is dogmatic about evolution - I see myself and therefore have hope for them.

I'm not dogmatic about evolution. It is just one unit out of about 20 that I teach in regular biology classes along with all the other topics: Ecology, biochemistry, cell biology, photosynthesis, respiration, cellular reproduction, mendelian genetics, molecular genetics, history of life on earth, biological classification, etc.

But to say that there is zero scientific evidence for evolution is beyond absurd. There are vast amounts of evidence all around us. Evolution simply means change. And there is endless amounts of evidence that life on earth is constantly changing. The environment and habitats on earth are constantly changing. And plant, animal, protist, fungi, and bacterial species are constantly changing along with them. We cycle from ice ages to warm periods and have experienced mass extinction events in the past. Yet life continues to survive, thrive, and yes, evolve.

People understood that we lived in a changing world long before Darwin. All he really did was propose the mechanism driving this change and titled it the theory of evolution by natural selection. Darwin as a naturalist focused primarily on observations and the fossil record. Since then we have acquired vast amounts of evidence in other areas of science such as molecular genetics that did not exist in Darwin's day. But that continue to confirm Darwin's basic observations about the mechanisms of change on earth.

Theories in science aren't about facts or common sense proofs, or ironclad natural laws. They are explanations that allow us to relate and connect seemingly unconnected phenomenon. Take gravity, for example. Humans have always known about gravity since the dawn of time. It is observable. If you pick up something and drop it, it will fall. If you jump out of a tree or off a cliff you will fall. If you throw a rock upwards it will come back down. This is all common sense. But it took Newton to come up with a universal theory of gravitation that was able to connect an apple falling from a tree to the ebb and flow of the tides, the changing of the seasons, the flow of rivers, and orbits of celestial bodies. All of these seemingly unrelated observations are connected through Newton's Universal Theory of Gravitation which explains that bodies with mass attract each other with a force that varies directly as the product of their masses and inversely as the square of the distance between them.

Evolution is no different. People have observed change in our biosphere for centuries. We can see it happening in human time scales as well as vast periods of time in the fossil record. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection simply provided an explanation of the mechanism driving the change that we see all around us. And explains seemingly unconnected phenomena such as how disease develop resistance to drugs, why penguins have wings but cannot fly, why there are so many varieties of finches in the Galapagos, and why whales have hipbones despite lacking hind legs or feet. As science advances and new areas of study emerge such as molecular genetics and genome sequencing, they only provide more and more evidence for natural selection and more powerful explanations of how it works. And we also observe how humans can produce the same exact types of change through artificial selection (selective breeding). Which is how we now have over 450 different breeds of dogs from the Chihuahua to the St. Bernard, all descended from Pleistocene-era wolves. Or how we have hundreds of different varieties of apples and how ancient Mesoamerican peoples developed modern corn from its grass-like ancestor teosinte.

"I am not dogmatic about evolution."

Would you consider discussing Creationism when teaching that one chapter?

[Ken]

Touché…

No attacking necessary.

It’s simple when someone demands proof of your beliefs or they won’t believe, then the intent I share is helping them look in the mirror. Personally for me, when I actually got serious into looking for any proof for evolution as an atheist and found I was lied to because there is zero scientific evidence for evolution it was instrumental for me finding God. So I get excited if someone is dogmatic about evolution - I see myself and therefore have hope for them.

I'm not dogmatic about evolution. It is just one unit out of about 20 that I teach in regular biology classes along with all the other topics: Ecology, biochemistry, cell biology, photosynthesis, respiration, cellular reproduction, mendelian genetics, molecular genetics, history of life on earth, biological classification, etc.

But to say that there is zero scientific evidence for evolution is beyond absurd. There are vast amounts of evidence all around us. Evolution simply means change. And there is endless amounts of evidence that life on earth is constantly changing. The environment and habitats on earth are constantly changing. And plant, animal, protist, fungi, and bacterial species are constantly changing along with them. We cycle from ice ages to warm periods and have experienced mass extinction events in the past. Yet life continues to survive, thrive, and yes, evolve.

People understood that we lived in a changing world long before Darwin. All he really did was propose the mechanism driving this change and titled it the theory of evolution by natural selection. Darwin as a naturalist focused primarily on observations and the fossil record. Since then we have acquired vast amounts of evidence in other areas of science such as molecular genetics that did not exist in Darwin's day. But that continue to confirm Darwin's basic observations about the mechanisms of change on earth.

Theories in science aren't about facts or common sense proofs, or ironclad natural laws. They are explanations that allow us to relate and connect seemingly unconnected phenomenon. Take gravity, for example. Humans have always known about gravity since the dawn of time. It is observable. If you pick up something and drop it, it will fall. If you jump out of a tree or off a cliff you will fall. If you throw a rock upwards it will come back down. This is all common sense. But it took Newton to come up with a universal theory of gravitation that was able to connect an apple falling from a tree to the ebb and flow of the tides, the changing of the seasons, the flow of rivers, and orbits of celestial bodies. All of these seemingly unrelated observations are connected through Newton's Universal Theory of Gravitation which explains that bodies with mass attract each other with a force that varies directly as the product of their masses and inversely as the square of the distance between them.

Evolution is no different. People have observed change in our biosphere for centuries. We can see it happening in human time scales as well as vast periods of time in the fossil record. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection simply provided an explanation of the mechanism driving the change that we see all around us. And explains seemingly unconnected phenomena such as how disease develop resistance to drugs, why penguins have wings but cannot fly, why there are so many varieties of finches in the Galapagos, and why whales have hipbones despite lacking hind legs or feet. As science advances and new areas of study emerge such as molecular genetics and genome sequencing, they only provide more and more evidence for natural selection and more powerful explanations of how it works. And we also observe how humans can produce the same exact types of change through artificial selection (selective breeding). Which is how we now have over 450 different breeds of dogs from the Chihuahua to the St. Bernard, all descended from Pleistocene-era wolves. Or how we have hundreds of different varieties of apples and how ancient Mesoamerican peoples developed modern corn from its grass-like ancestor teosinte.

"I am not dogmatic about evolution."

Would you consider discussing Creationism when teaching that one chapter?

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

And in any event, which creation story would you want taught in class? There are hundreds of them. In addition to the Hebrew one there is the Navajo creation story, the Chinook creation story of the northwest tribes here where I teach (I have students with both Navajo and Chinook roots), the Hindu creation story (I have Hindu students). The Muslim creation story (I have Muslim students), the Agganna Sutta (I have Buddhist students) and so forth.

[Josh]

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

Evolution also isn't science, isn't coherent, and its advocates can't really agree on what it is. Is it punctuated evolution? Is there any evidence of macroevolution? (No.)

And in any event, which creation story would you want taught in class? There are hundreds of them. In addition to the Hebrew one there is the Navajo creation story, the Chinook creation story of the northwest tribes here where I teach (I have students with both Navajo and Chinook roots), the Hindu creation story (I have Hindu students). The Muslim creation story (I have Muslim students), the Agganna Sutta (I have Buddhist students) and so forth.

Obviously, the creation story that is true, which is found in Genesis 1. There is no need to bother with pagan myths and falsehoods.

[Ken]

The problem that evolutionary biology has is that gradualism and the mutations it depends on has never been shown to result in speciation. Too many different changes would have to have occurred at the same time. The systems are just far too complex. Most mutations are harmful to the organism that they occur within, at least for multicellular life.

Of course it has. Speciation is all around us. The evidence is overwhelming. The most common mechanism is geographic isolation. When two populations are separated geographically and the adaptive pressures push them in different directions the gene pools diverge. Scientists and HS biology students measure this using the Hardy Weinberg Equilibrium equation. And yes, we have directly observed how geographic isolation has resulted in speciation within human timescales. For example, a wildflower known as goatsbeards was introduced from Europe into the US in the early 1900s and has since evolved into three separate species as it has expanded across North America. Three different varieties have evolved in North America that are incapable of reproducing with each other, which is the classic definition of a species.

But, alas, it is still a flower. Has the chromosome number/morphology changed? Attempted to find out the cause? You do know that a Chihuahua cannot breed with a Great Dane. Some tomato will not hybridize . Are you suggesting they are now separate species?

If Chihuahuas and Great Danes were wild populations then yes, they would very likely be considered different species of the same genus. Or at a minimum different subspecies. I'm not a taxonomist so I couldn't tell you exactly what criteria they would use. But the inability to successfully interbreed is a common one. And over time, without interbreeding the two separate populations would be expected to continue to diverge.

[Ken]

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

Evolution also isn't science, isn't coherent, and its advocates can't really agree on what it is. Is it punctuated evolution? Is there any evidence of macroevolution? (No.)

Evolution just means change. And there is absolutely overwhelming evidence that we live in a changing world. A world that is changing geologically, physically, and yes, biologically. We see it all around us.

And yes, there are examples of gradual evolution and examples of punctuated equilibrium caused by specific events. Life is complex as is the planet. And yes, there is also overwhelming evidence to support what you are calling macro evolution. Evidence from the fossil record, evidence from comparative anatomy, evidence from molecular genetics and genome sequencing, evidence from comparative embryology, evidence from biogeography, and so forth. And every time we discover new forms evidence such as genome sequencing it tends to support and be consistent with older categories of evidence.

And in any event, which creation story would you want taught in class? There are hundreds of them. In addition to the Hebrew one there is the Navajo creation story, the Chinook creation story of the northwest tribes here where I teach (I have students with both Navajo and Chinook roots), the Hindu creation story (I have Hindu students). The Muslim creation story (I have Muslim students), the Agganna Sutta (I have Buddhist students) and so forth.

Obviously, the creation story that is true, which is found in Genesis 1. There is no need to bother with pagan myths and falsehoods.

There are actually two separate creation stories in Genesis that are different and contradictory.

And scientifically speaking, how do you know which one is true? If any of them?

[AndersonD]

I'm not dogmatic about evolution. It is just one unit out of about 20 that I teach in regular biology classes along with all the other topics: Ecology, biochemistry, cell biology, photosynthesis, respiration, cellular reproduction, mendelian genetics, molecular genetics, history of life on earth, biological classification, etc.

But to say that there is zero scientific evidence for evolution is beyond absurd. There are vast amounts of evidence all around us. Evolution simply means change. And there is endless amounts of evidence that life on earth is constantly changing. The environment and habitats on earth are constantly changing. And plant, animal, protist, fungi, and bacterial species are constantly changing along with them. We cycle from ice ages to warm periods and have experienced mass extinction events in the past. Yet life continues to survive, thrive, and yes, evolve.

People understood that we lived in a changing world long before Darwin. All he really did was propose the mechanism driving this change and titled it the theory of evolution by natural selection. Darwin as a naturalist focused primarily on observations and the fossil record. Since then we have acquired vast amounts of evidence in other areas of science such as molecular genetics that did not exist in Darwin's day. But that continue to confirm Darwin's basic observations about the mechanisms of change on earth.

Theories in science aren't about facts or common sense proofs, or ironclad natural laws. They are explanations that allow us to relate and connect seemingly unconnected phenomenon. Take gravity, for example. Humans have always known about gravity since the dawn of time. It is observable. If you pick up something and drop it, it will fall. If you jump out of a tree or off a cliff you will fall. If you throw a rock upwards it will come back down. This is all common sense. But it took Newton to come up with a universal theory of gravitation that was able to connect an apple falling from a tree to the ebb and flow of the tides, the changing of the seasons, the flow of rivers, and orbits of celestial bodies. All of these seemingly unrelated observations are connected through Newton's Universal Theory of Gravitation which explains that bodies with mass attract each other with a force that varies directly as the product of their masses and inversely as the square of the distance between them.

Evolution is no different. People have observed change in our biosphere for centuries. We can see it happening in human time scales as well as vast periods of time in the fossil record. Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection simply provided an explanation of the mechanism driving the change that we see all around us. And explains seemingly unconnected phenomena such as how disease develop resistance to drugs, why penguins have wings but cannot fly, why there are so many varieties of finches in the Galapagos, and why whales have hipbones despite lacking hind legs or feet. As science advances and new areas of study emerge such as molecular genetics and genome sequencing, they only provide more and more evidence for natural selection and more powerful explanations of how it works. And we also observe how humans can produce the same exact types of change through artificial selection (selective breeding). Which is how we now have over 450 different breeds of dogs from the Chihuahua to the St. Bernard, all descended from Pleistocene-era wolves. Or how we have hundreds of different varieties of apples and how ancient Mesoamerican peoples developed modern corn from its grass-like ancestor teosinte.

"I am not dogmatic about evolution."

Would you consider discussing Creationism when teaching that one chapter?

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

And in any event, which creation story would you want taught in class? There are hundreds of them. In addition to the Hebrew one there is the Navajo creation story, the Chinook creation story of the northwest tribes here where I teach (I have students with both Navajo and Chinook roots), the Hindu creation story (I have Hindu students). The Muslim creation story (I have Muslim students), the Agganna Sutta (I have Buddhist students) and so forth.

Then please teach some of the other Creation accounts for the sake of fairness.

[Ken]

"I am not dogmatic about evolution."

Would you consider discussing Creationism when teaching that one chapter?

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

And in any event, which creation story would you want taught in class? There are hundreds of them. In addition to the Hebrew one there is the Navajo creation story, the Chinook creation story of the northwest tribes here where I teach (I have students with both Navajo and Chinook roots), the Hindu creation story (I have Hindu students). The Muslim creation story (I have Muslim students), the Agganna Sutta (I have Buddhist students) and so forth.

Then please teach some of the other Creation accounts for the sake of fairness.

It isn't my call. Every state has curriculum standards for science as well as every other subject. And creation mythology is not a part of any state's curriculum standards for biology. It might come up in certain social studies classes, I don't know. In any event, teachers are not actually free to teach whatever they want. Not in biology, not in history, not in literature, not in health class. And that is actually a good thing. It means that there is consistency from school to school and from teacher to teacher within each school. There are state boards of education that go through long processes involving lots of experts and public testimony to determine what those curriculum standards should be as well as both the breadth and depth that you should cover. Here they are for Washington: https://www.nextgenscience.org/sites/de ... .13.13.pdf All curriculum materials (textbooks, labs, online resources, etc.) is supposed to adhere to those standards.

In any event, creation myths are not science. Likewise, we don't teach astrology in astronomy class. We don't teach alchemy in chemistry class. We also don't teach things like crystal healing or magnet therapy in biology class. In fact we teach our students how to distinguish between science and pseudoscience. That actually is in the curriculum standards under the subject of scientific literacy.

And how do you want science teachers to teach creationism anyway? Do you want them to teach: "On the other hand, some people believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old and unchanging. Which is, of course, a pack of nonsense because of all these myriad of reasons and evidence that we just discussed"?

[AndersonD]

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

And in any event, which creation story would you want taught in class? There are hundreds of them. In addition to the Hebrew one there is the Navajo creation story, the Chinook creation story of the northwest tribes here where I teach (I have students with both Navajo and Chinook roots), the Hindu creation story (I have Hindu students). The Muslim creation story (I have Muslim students), the Agganna Sutta (I have Buddhist students) and so forth.

Then please teach some of the other Creation accounts for the sake of fairness.

It isn't my call. Every state has curriculum standards for science as well as every other subject. And creation mythology is not a part of any state's curriculum standards for biology. It might come up in certain social studies classes, I don't know. In any event, teachers are not actually free to teach whatever they want. Not in biology, not in history, not in literature, not in health class. And that is actually a good thing. It means that there is consistency from school to school and from teacher to teacher within each school. There are state boards of education that go through long processes involving lots of experts and public testimony to determine what those curriculum standards should be as well as both the breadth and depth that you should cover. Here they are for Washington: https://www.nextgenscience.org/sites/de ... .13.13.pdf All curriculum materials (textbooks, labs, online resources, etc.) is supposed to adhere to those standards.

In any event, creation myths are not science. Likewise, we don't teach astrology in astronomy class. We don't teach alchemy in chemistry class. We also don't teach things like crystal healing or magnet therapy in biology class. In fact we teach our students how to distinguish between science and pseudoscience. That actually is in the curriculum standards under the subject of scientific literacy.

And how do you want science teachers to teach creationism anyway? Do you want them to teach: "On the other hand, some people believe that the earth is only 6,000 years old and unchanging. Which is, of course, a pack of nonsense because of all these myriad of reasons and evidence that we just discussed"?

I am aware it's not your call. So just keep teaching the evolution myth.

Any advice Ken on how to handle my atheist colleague who is constantly after me about my creationist beliefs? I ask questions: how are there supple blood vessels...organic material in 500 million year old dinosaur bone? Scientists have found carbon 14 which has a half life of 5700 years in sandstone. I love scientific inquiry. Instead, I am told I believe in psuedoscience, I am simplistic...which I don't deny, why do I want to go against the grain, to believe in a god is a cop out for scientific inquiry...and I bring up Isaac Newton who believed in God. I am ready to go to HR and complain but the head in HR is agnostic. I have never dealt w such hostility, and keep my beliefs close to my heart. My atheist colleague is the one who's probing. It really sucks.

[Josh]

Creationism isn't science. It isn't even coherent. People who advocate creationism don't even agree on what it means.

Evolution also isn't science, isn't coherent, and its advocates can't really agree on what it is. Is it punctuated evolution? Is there any evidence of macroevolution? (No.)

Evolution just means change. And there is absolutely overwhelming evidence that we live in a changing world. A world that is changing geologically, physically, and yes, biologically. We see it all around us.

In this context, that's not what evolution means. "Evolution" in this context means "believing that humans evolved from an amoeba".

And yes, there are examples of gradual evolution and examples of punctuated equilibrium caused by specific events. Life is complex as is the planet. And yes, there is also overwhelming evidence to support what you are calling macro evolution. Evidence from the fossil record, evidence from comparative anatomy, evidence from molecular genetics and genome sequencing, evidence from comparative embryology, evidence from biogeography, and so forth. And every time we discover new forms evidence such as genome sequencing it tends to support and be consistent with older categories of evidence.

No, there is no evidence of macroevolution, Ken. Can you point to any scientific, repeatable, observable evidence that, for example, lizards turn into chickens?

There are actually two separate creation stories in Genesis that are different and contradictory.

And scientifically speaking, how do you know which one is true? If any of them?

No, they aren't. They complement each other. The Bible and Genesis in particular are true and contain the true account of how the world came to be. Anything else is falsehood.

[Ken]

Any advice Ken on how to handle my atheist colleague who is constantly after me about my creationist beliefs? I ask questions: how are there supple blood vessels...organic material in 500 million year old dinosaur bone? Scientists have found carbon 14 which has a half life of 5700 years in sandstone. I love scientific inquiry. Instead, I am told I believe in psuedoscience, I am simplistic...which I don't deny, why do I want to go against the grain, to believe in a god is a cop out for scientific inquiry...and I bring up Isaac Newton who believed in God. I am ready to go to HR and complain but the head in HR is agnostic. I have never dealt w such hostility, and keep my beliefs close to my heart. My atheist colleague is the one who's probing. It really sucks.

Start with the question of whether there is change happening on earth. Geological change (erosion, plate tectonics, etc.) physical changes (climate cycles, sea level rise and fall, ice ages, etc.) and biological change (habitats changing over time, biological communities changing over time, and individual species changing over time).

And then for each category of change we can then investigate what are the current theories that explain the changes we are seeing.

So for continental drift, subduction zones, volcanoes, fault-block and fold mountains the current theory that explains those changes is plate tectonics.

For habitat changes, ice ages, sea level rise and fall, etc. we can look at theories that affect global climate such as CO2 concentrations.

And for biological changes such as population concentrations, speciation, etc. we can then look at what best explain those changes. Competition, natural selection, mutations, etc.

I'm not sure where Genesis comes in at all. If you want to start with a premise such as that the earth is only 6,000 years old then that isn't science. that is the opposite of science because you are starting with your conclusion than searching for evidence that might support it. A scientific question would be to ask: How old is the earth? And then you look at all the different pieces of scientific evidence that might answer that question. We can look at radiometric dating of rocks from earth as well as rocks form elsewhere in the solar system. We can look at fossil layers and sedimentation. We can look at plate tectonics. I'm not a geologist so I don't know all the science that goes into dating the earth and other planets but it is substantial.

Same thing with biology. We start with the question. Is life on earth static or is it constantly changing? if you want to argue that life on earth is static and that we have the same habitats, species, and biological populations today as we had during the Pleistocene (ice ages) or Mesozoic or Cambrian then fine. What scientific evidence exists to support the idea? Because the counterpoint to evolution is that we live on an unchanging earth. And if that is your hypothesis then the next question is, what evidence do we have to support the hypothesis that the earth is static and unchanging?