Chance or Design (Evolution or Creation)

[Hobie]

John 1:3-4 King James Version (KJV)
"3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men."

To most scientists in the world today, the theory of evolution is no longer just a theory but is regarded as a fact. There are differences of opinion regarding the tempo, mode, and mechanisms of evolution, but the basic concepts of the theory have become an established philosophy. Even the educational systems of the world teach evolution by natural selection and the big bang as the only feasible theory of origin, to the exclusion of anything else especially creative design.

Now natural selection in itself is not a scientific principle, as it is based on circular reasoning. By natural selection, the weaker are eliminated and the stronger survive to propagate the species. It is all started by chance, the idea of the big bang was that a tiny point of nothing started the universe and somehow life started by chance.

The evidence for evolution is based largely on interpretation and a rationale for the long ages required for the evolutionary events to have taken place. However, each of these parameters is open to alternative explanations which also happen to be in harmony with the biblical account.

Evolutionary scientists argue that creationism is not science, that it is based on a preconceived ideology, which excludes it from the realms of science. However, if the facts fit the biblical creation account, is it excluded?

So is there evidence for Creation by design, was the DNA by purpose, and the form of mankind and domain made by a Creator?

 

[The Barbarian]

Darwin's great discovery was that it doesn't work by chance. Except in the sense you see in Ecclesiastes:

Ecclesiastes 9:11 I returned, and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

Still, the smart money is on the swift, strong, and wise, even if time and chance are involved. And as Aquinas points out, God can use contingency as easily as He can use necessity to effect divine providence.

 

[Hobie]

Well the problem evolutionist are finding is the fossil record does not show creatures gradually changing into others, there is nothing from the sea crawling out on land and all the way to man. Now look at the idea of natural selection as the very name “selection” implies that you’re choosing between two or more variants. So that means that the end result is extinction of one in favor of the other. Natural selection never increases the number of variants; it only decreases them. So the problem is how does a mechanism that makes less and less end up making more and more”?

Then you have the built-in ability of some animals to adapt to changing conditions, much too rapidly to have anything to do with any proposed evolutionary mechanisms or millions of years. For example, island deer have been seen to respond to a scarcity of resources by decreasing their body size, by as much as two-thirds.

So the evolutionist are coming up with new ideas to try to allow for Creation yet hold on to Evolution. The Gap Theory proposes two cycles of Creation. In the first cycle, there is an initial six-day Creation. Everything is then destroyed by God, and a gap or period of time occurs. Then, the Creation described in Genesis occurs.

This interpretation allows for long time periods. However, there is no evidence of a gap in the fossil record and this model raises more questions than answers.

Progressive Creation suggests that God created numerous times, and that these Creation episodes were spread over long ages. Scripture does not support this theory.

Theistic Evolution says that God directs the process of evolution and helps it along when it comes to the difficult barriers. This is just not what the Bible says, and its just a way to get around Creation and basically the Creator Himself...

 

[ioy1273]

John 1:3-4 King James Version (KJV)
"3 All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.
4 In him was life; and the life was the light of men."

To most scientists in the world today, the theory of evolution is no longer just a theory but is regarded as a fact. There are differences of opinion regarding the tempo, mode, and mechanisms of evolution, but the basic concepts of the theory have become an established philosophy. Even the educational systems of the world teach evolution by natural selection and the big bang as the only feasible theory of origin, to the exclusion of anything else especially creative design.

Now natural selection in itself is not a scientific principle, as it is based on circular reasoning. By natural selection, the weaker are eliminated and the stronger survive to propagate the species. It is all started by chance, the idea of the big bang was that a tiny point of nothing started the universe and somehow life started by chance.

The evidence for evolution is based largely on interpretation and a rationale for the long ages required for the evolutionary events to have taken place. However, each of these parameters is open to alternative explanations which also happen to be in harmony with the biblical account.

Evolutionary scientists argue that creationism is not science, that it is based on a preconceived ideology, which excludes it from the realms of science. However, if the facts fit the biblical creation account, is it excluded?

So is there evidence for Creation by design, was the DNA by purpose, and the form of mankind and domain made by a Creator?

Do you believe that God made evil?

 

[The Barbarian]

Well the problem evolutionist are finding is the fossil record does not show creatures gradually changing into others,

There's a great deal of that. Your fellow creationist, Kurt Wise, writes:

Evidences for Darwin’s second expectation - of stratomorphic intermediate species - include such species as Baragwanathia27 (between rhyniophytes and lycopods), Pikaia28 (between echinoderms and chordates), Purgatorius29 (between the tree shrews and the primates), and Proconsul30 (between the non-hominoid primates and the hominoids). Darwin’s third expectation - of higher-taxon stratomorphic intermediates - has been confirmed by such examples as the mammal-like reptile groups31 between the reptiles and the mammals, and the phenacdontids32 between the horses and their presumed ancestors. Darwin’s fourth expectation - of stratomorphic series - has been confirmed by such examples as the early bird series,33 the tetrapod series,34,35 the whale series,36 the various mammal series of the Cenozoic37 (for example, the horse series, the camel series, the elephant series, the pig series, the titanothere series, etc.), the Cantius and Plesiadapus primate series,38 and the hominid series.39 Evidence for not just one but for all three of the species level and above types of stratomorphic intermediates expected by macroevolutionary theory is surely strong evidence for macroevolutionary theory. Creationists therefore need to accept this fact. It certainly CANNOT said that traditional creation theory expected (predicted) any of these fossil finds.
Kurt Wise, Toward a Creationist Understanding of Transitional Forms (emphasis mine)

there is nothing from the sea crawling out on land and all the way to man.

Wise admits that there are many of these.

Now look at the idea of natural selection as the very name “selection” implies that you’re choosing between two or more variants. So that means that the end result is extinction of one in favor of the other.

No. For example, disruptive selection tends to favor two or more populations evolving from one. Good example are Darwin's finches. Or flies in Hawaii, numerous species having evolved from two separate species that somehow made it there.

Natural selection never increases the number of variants; it only decreases them.

No, that's obviously wrong. And it's not just by disruptive selection. A hint was that unusual species tend to be found in isolated areas. Founder effect and a new environment tends to produce a new species, while the old species continues.

So the problem is how does a mechanism that makes less and less end up making more and more”?

And now you know.

Then you have the built-in ability of some animals to adapt to changing conditions, much too rapidly to have anything to do with any proposed evolutionary mechanisms or millions of years.

You're confusing homeostasis with evolution. One is merely the ability of the organism to alter body processes under stress. The other is a change in the allele frequency of the population. You are limited to the genes with which you were born; your body has the capacity to adapt to a degree, but not as much as a population can change by allele frequencies changing.

For example, island deer have been seen to respond to a scarcity of resources by decreasing their body size, by as much as two-thirds.

Happens to humans, too. Starve kids, even a little, and they will grow up smaller. But that's not evolution.

So the evolutionist are coming up with new ideas to try to allow for Creation yet hold on to Evolution.

See above. There's a lot going on that you don't understand very well.

Theistic Evolution says that God directs the process of evolution and helps it along when it comes to the difficult barriers.

No, that's Michael Behe's story. He doesn't think God can make evolution work without tinkering with it from time to time. In the real world, that's not necessary.

While evolution is completely consistent with scripture, there are also some forms of creationism that are not ruled out by the Bible. The "life ex nihilo" doctrine of classic YE creationism is ruled out by Genesis, however.

 

[The Barbarian]

And most professional creationists now tell us that new species evolved rapidly after the flood from a relatively few basic "kinds."

So even creationists understand that evolution tends to produce more species, not less.

 

[Stripe]

And most professional creationists now tell us that new species evolved rapidly after the flood from a relatively few basic "kinds."

So even creationists understand that evolution tends to produce more species, not less.

Nope.

Evolution doesn't happen.

 

[Right Divider]

And most professional creationists now tell us that new species evolved rapidly after the flood from a relatively few basic "kinds."

So even creationists understand that evolution tends to produce more species, not less.

Yes, multiple created kinds at the beginning branching out into what we see today.

Not some "matter came alive on its own" and "everything is descended from a single first life form".

 

[Hobie]

Do you believe that God made evil?

Do you believe He gave us freewill or made us robots, I think the answer is clear.

 

[Guyver]

Do you believe He gave us freewill or made us robots, I think the answer is clear.

You didn’t answer the question. Did God make evil or not?

 

[The Barbarian]

Yes, multiple created kinds at the beginning branching out into what we see today.

Precisely what you just told me couldn't be.

Not some "matter came alive on its own"

More properly, the earth brought forth living things, as God intended. But as you learned earlier, that has nothing whatsoever to do with evolution, which is about the way living things change over time.

and "everything is descended from a single first life form".

It comes down to evidence. As you saw before, the evidence is compelling. Even your fellow YE creationist, Kurt Wise admits that we have "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory."

Would you like me to show you some of it, again?

 

[Arthur Brain]

Do you believe He gave us freewill or made us robots, I think the answer is clear.

How much "freewill" do you think you have exactly? It certainly isn't absolute.

 

[Lon]

There's a great deal of that. Your fellow creationist, Kurt Wise, writes:

Evidences for Darwin’s second expectation - of stratomorphic intermediate species - include such species as Baragwanathia27 (between rhyniophytes and lycopods), Pikaia28 (between echinoderms and chordates), Purgatorius29 (between the tree shrews and the primates), and Proconsul30 (between the non-hominoid primates and the hominoids). ... Creationists therefore need to accept this fact. It certainly CANNOT said that traditional creation theory expected (predicted) any of these fossil finds.
Kurt Wise, Toward a Creationist Understanding of Transitional Forms

A bit awkward in sentence structure, but Kurt Wise doesn't mean to imply that the fossils support Macroevolution.

No. For example, disruptive selection tends to favor two or more populations evolving from one. Good example are Darwin's finches. Or flies in Hawaii, numerous species having evolved from two separate species that somehow made it there.

"After their kind" Genesis 1:11,21,24,26

Genesis 1:31 "it was good" contrasted with Romans 8:18-23 that suggests creation is under struggle and suffering. Yet evolution suggest millions of years where man is not present. It creates theological problems and inconsistencies.

 

[Stripe]

Evolution ... is about the way living things change over time.

Nope.

Evolution is the idea that all living things are descended from a universal common ancestor by means of random mutations and natural selection.

Darwinists want to be imprecise, using "change" as the definition. After all, who in their right mind would deny that things change?

They want to define the discussion out of existence.

It comes down to evidence.

Which is why you follow up with:

YE creationist, Kurt Wise admits that we have "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory."

Darwinists think that opinions are evidence.

Would you like me to show you actual evidence again?

 

[Stripe]

YEC denies all aspects of Darwinism as significant, necessary or possible descriptions of reality.

There cannot be a universal common ancestor.

Random mutations can never improve information.

Natural selection might play a minor role in limited situations, but they are so rare and insignificant as to be next to worthless in a sensible discussion over how today's variety arose.

Darwinists here have been told these things over and over, but continue to insist that the discussion be conducted on the assumption that their idea is correct.

They are religious devotees, not inquirers into science.

 

[The Barbarian]

A bit awkward in sentence structure, but Kurt Wise doesn't mean to imply that the fossils support Macroevolution.

That's exactly what he wrote. You linked to someone who simply denied what Wise documented to exist; numerous series of transitional forms that are "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory." But simple denial won't make the fact go away. That was Wise's point. He thinks there must be a creationist answer, somehow, but he's honest enough to admit that there isn't one now.

Very large number of insect species documented to have evolved from two original kinds.

"After their kind" Genesis 1:11,21,24,26

There is more genetic variation among these different kinds of insects than there is among primates. God merely says the earth brought forth different kinds, but doesn't say how it happened. As Wise admits, the fact of many, many transitional series is very good evidence that it happened by macroevolution.

Genesis 1:31 "it was good" contrasted with Romans 8:18-23 that suggests creation is under struggle and suffering.

If creation seems to not be good, by man's accounting, is God wrong, or is man's accounting wrong?

Yet evolution suggest millions of years where man is not present.

As does physics, astronomy, geology, biology...

It creates theological problems and inconsistencies.

Perhaps that's not God's fault, either.

 

[Right Divider]

Precisely what you just told me couldn't be.

You're confused or lying (or both). Please QUOTE me saying that.

More properly, the earth brought forth living things, as God intended. But as you learned earlier, that has nothing whatsoever to do with evolution, which is about the way living things change over time.

The Bible says that God created the kinds and NOT that there was a SINGLE magical kind that created itself.

Creationists have no issue with "living things changing over time".

It comes down to evidence. As you saw before, the evidence is compelling. Even your fellow YE creationist, Kurt Wise admits that we have "very good evidence for macroevolutionary theory."

The types of changes that living things exhibit, via the evidence, show that this change is NOT the unlimited free-for-all that Darwinian or Neo-Darwinian evolutionists claim that it is. From the actual evidence, we see that these changes have significant limits.

Would you like me to show you some of it, again?

Do whatever you want. You're not proving that matter came to life by natural means or that all life has a single common ancestor. Those are myths that you seem to have to "prove" regardless of the actual evidence.

 

[The Barbarian]

You're confused or lying (or both). Please QUOTE me saying that.

You're right. Hobie said that. My apologies. You're right; he's wrong. As even professional creationists admit, new taxa evolve from old ones, and do indeed produce more species, not less.

The Bible says that God created the kinds and NOT that there was a SINGLE magical kind that created itself.

Neither does evolutionary theory. The earth produced living things, which diversified according to kind. God didn't tell us how; He just said it happened.

Creationists have no issue with "living things changing over time".

Many don't today. Creationism has evolved over time. :BRAVO: Most major creationist organizations acknowledge the evolution of new species, genera and families of organisms. Don't know of any yet willing to acknowledge the evolution of new classes, but it's progress. Again, my apologizing with confusing you with a paleo YE.

And yes, I know that evolved creationists don't like to use the "E" word. Which is fine. Darwin didn't either. He called it "descent with modification." So you're good with that, too.

The types of changes that living things exhibit, via the evidence, show that this change is NOT the unlimited free-for-all that Darwinian or Neo-Darwinian evolutionists claim that it is.

Actually they don't claim it's an "unlimited free-for-all", either. All living things are constrained by the development of organisms that came before. So, for example, while it might be useful for birds to have dentine in beaks to make them harder and more durable, they can't just evolve that; there's no viable transition that would work. Likewise, humans would be greatly enhanced by a second pair of hands. But there's no way to evolve it that would have viable transitional forms.

The greatly improved hearing of mammals could have been engineered more simply than by borrowing some jaw bones (which gather sound in reptiles) and miniaturizing them.

But that had feasible transitional forms, and therefore could evolve. This is an important part of evolutionary theory, one people often miss.

From the actual evidence, we see that these changes have significant limits.

Yep. You're a thoughtful person. That can be dangerous to your creationist beliefs.

Do whatever you want. You're not proving that matter came to life by natural means

You do realize that the origin of life isn't part of evolutionary theory, right? Even Darwin just supposed God created the first living things.

or that all life has a single common ancestor.

Comes down to evidence. And that indicates a common ancestor. And we know the evidence works, because we can check it with the genes of organisms of known descent.

Those are myths

More like misconceptions. Many creationists think evolutionary theory is about the origin of life. And many don't know anything about the genetic and fossil evidence for common descent.

 

[Lon]

That's exactly what he wrote. You linked to someone who simply denied what Wise documented to exist; .

:noway: :nono: Did you read his response????

 

[The Barbarian]

:noway: :nono: Did you read his response????

Yep. It's merely denial, with nothing to show that Wise didn't mean exactly what he said:

Evidences for Darwin’s second expectation - of stratomorphic intermediate species - include such species as Baragwanathia27 (between rhyniophytes and lycopods), Pikaia28 (between echinoderms and chordates), Purgatorius29 (between the tree shrews and the primates), and Proconsul30 (between the non-hominoid primates and the hominoids). Darwin’s third expectation - of higher-taxon stratomorphic intermediates - has been confirmed by such examples as the mammal-like reptile groups31 between the reptiles and the mammals, and the phenacdontids32 between the horses and their presumed ancestors. Darwin’s fourth expectation - of stratomorphic series - has been confirmed by such examples as the early bird series,33 the tetrapod series,34,35 the whale series,36 the various mammal series of the Cenozoic37 (for example, the horse series, the camel series, the elephant series, the pig series, the titanothere series, etc.), the Cantius and Plesiadapus primate series,38 and the hominid series.39 Evidence for not just one but for all three of the species level and above types of stratomorphic intermediates expected by macroevolutionary theory is surely strong evidence for macroevolutionary theory. Creationists therefore need to accept this fact. It certainly CANNOT said that traditional creation theory expected (predicted) any of these fossil finds.
https://creation.com/images/pdfs/tj/j09_2/j09_2_216-222.pdf

Your guy just denied what Wise carefully documented. Here's his denial:

I have to disagree with Dr Kurt Wise when he suggests that creationists should not be concerned with the issue of 'transitional forms'.1 It has long been recognised that in any battle one should attack the enemy at his weakest point. The creahttp://theologyonline.com/editpost.php?p=5343726&do=editposttion-evolution issue is a battle, and the lack of transitional forms in the fossil record has long been recognised as evolution's biggest weakness.

Notice that Wise demonstrated that there are many, many entire series of transitional forms in the fossil record.

It's true that almost none were known in Darwin's time, which makes Darwin's prediction that they would be found all the more compelling. And Wise notes that, admitting that all these predicted transitional series are very good evidence for Darwin's theory.

Another misconstrues Michael Denton's position. Although an IDer, Denton repeatedly recognizes the fact of evolution:

It is important to emphasize at the outset that the argument presented here is entirely consistent with the basic naturalistic assumption of modern science--that the cosmos is a seamless unity which can be comprehended in its entirety by human reason and in which all phenomena, including life and evolution and the origin of man, are ultimately explicable in terms of natural processes. This is an assumption which is entirely opposed to that of the so-called "special creationist school." According to special creationism, living organisms are not natural forms, whose origin and design were built into the laws of nature from the beginning, but rather contingent forms analogous in essence to human artifacts, the result of a series of supernatural acts, involving God's direct intervention in the course of nature, each of which involved the suspension of natural law. Contrary to the creationist position, the whole argument presented here is critically dependent on the presumption of the unbroken continuity of the organic world--that is, on the reality of organic evolution and on the presumption that all living organisms on earth are natural forms in the profoundest sense of the word, no less natural than salt crystals, atoms, waterfalls, or galaxies.

In large measure, therefore, the teleological argument presented here and the special creationist worldview are mutually exclusive accounts of the world. In the last analysis, evidence for one is evidence against the other. Put simply, the more convincing is the evidence for believing that the world is prefabricated to the end of life, that the design is built into the laws of nature, the less credible becomes the special creationist worldview.
Michael Denton, Nature's Destiny

(emphasis mine)

And Wise nicely picks apart their faulty reasoning. While he remains convinced of YE creationism because of "my understanding of scripture", he quite honestly admits the the large number of transitional series is evidence for macroevolution.