I am looking for evidence of evolution!!?

Question

Of course I would believe in the theory of evolution, if there was evidence for it taking place. However, most believers in the theory are confused between what is called "micro-evolution" (changes within "kinds"--differing types of dogs and cats, etc., which isn't evolution at all), and Darwinian evolution, for which there is no undisputed empirical evidence.

When I ask for scientific evidence, I usually get three main answers:

1. "Fossils! Although I'm not an expert; I really don't know the details."

2. A list of bones with unpronounceable names, that are believed to be millions of years old. I don't have the necessary sort of blind faith to believe such things. I want observable evidence.

And 3. There's the citing of bacteria sprouting into bacteria, which has nothing to do with the theory of evolution.

So, give me the real solid evidence, and I will become a believer.

When it comes to creationism, all I need is to see creation. That's the solid observable and undeniable evidence for me.

If you want to call creation "nature," and believe that nature made itself, go ahead. But don't ask me to believe something so obviously unscientific and foolish.

Answer 1

"So, give me the real solid evidence, and I will become a believer"

Boolshit... there is so much evidence about but you and the rest of the cretinsist just shuffle it about in ignorant word play and sophistry to make it fit with the Goat Herders' Guide to the Galaxy.



As in "When science and the Bible differ, science has obviously misinterpreted its data."

Henry Morris (Founder, Institute for Creation Research, died 2006)

http://adultthought.ucsd.edu/Culture_War/The_American_Taliban.html





Instead of looking at cretinist websites check out http://www.talkorigins.org/





Scientific method: Make observation; develop or modify a hypothesis to explain observation; make predictions based on hypothesis; perform experiments to test predictions; analyse results; if FAIL, go back and develop another hypothesis; if PASS, submit results to be repeatedly tested in peer review.



Creation ‘science’ method: Assume conclusion; affirm conclusion.





Intelligent design is not a scientific matter; it is a free speculation based on a fiction.



There is NO "theory of creation".

There is belief in supernatural creation, but there is no "theory", no mechanism, no predictions, no observability, no falsifiability, nothing to give creationism (or intelligent design, or creation science) the label of "theory".







AronRa: "It is a fact that evolution happens; that biodiversity and complexity does increase, that both occur naturally only by evolutionary means.



It is a fact that alleles vary with increasing distinction in reproductive populations and that these are accelerated in genetically isolated groups.



It is a fact that natural selection, sexual selection, and genetic drift have all been proven to have predictable effect in guiding this variance.



It is a fact that significant beneficial mutations do occur and are inherited by descendant groups, and that multiple independent sets of biological markers exist to trace these lineages backwards over many generations.



It is a fact that birds are a subset of dinosaurs the same way humans are a subset of apes, primates, eutherian mammals, and vertebrate deuterostome animals.



It is a fact that the collective genome of all animals has been traced to its most basal form, and that those forms are also indicated by comparative morphology, physiology, and embryological development.



It is a fact that everything on earth has definite relatives either living nearby or evident in the fossil record.



It is a fact that the fossil record holds hundreds of definitely transitional species even according to it’s strictest definition, and that both microevolution and macroevolution have been directly-observed.



Evolution is a fact!"

http://darwinwasright.homestead.com/15thFFoCPt2.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eGmLDKQp_Qc&feature=related



How could creationism not be dishonest?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpeHrkbx9LU





What have you people got... anything you'd be willing to go to court with?

I didn't think so.



Are you comparing modern scientific work with magically changing water into wine?

Or maybe a talking snake or donkey... how about a virginal birth?



Oh, I love you guys... it's almost as if we pay you to say silly stuff.

~

Answer 2

Interesting that a short while ago creationists called micro-evolution the process that bacteria goes through and nothing above that. Now you have moved to dogs and cats. You don't "see" evidence of evolution, but even on a bacterial level it takes 1000-3000 generations for the evolutionary process. At a human level that takes a couple of hundred thousand years. Since you are so simple minded I'll walk you through this. You live to maybe 100 years and the science in this area is only 150 years old. Now if you do a little math you will have to ask your question again in the year 5000. Then you might have an answer. You "see" creaton because that is the conclusion you have begun with. And "bacteria sprouting into bacteria," is evolution, so you quite obviously have no idea about which you speak and have no level of intelligence to even ask intelligent questions.

Answer 3

>However, most believers in the theory are confused between what is called "micro-evolution" (changes within "kinds"--differing types of dogs and cats, etc., which isn't evolution at all), and Darwinian evolution, for which there is no undisputed empirical evidence.



This is what we call lying for Jesus.

Microevolution and macroevolution are different things, but they involve mostly the same processes. Microevolution is defined as the change of allele frequencies (that is, genetic variation due to processes such as selection, mutation, genetic drift, or even migration) within a population. There is no argument that microevolution happens (although some creationists, such as Wallace, deny that mutations happen). Macroevolution is defined as evolutionary change at the species level or higher, that is, the formation of new species, new genera, and so forth. Speciation has also been observed.



Creationists have created another category for which they use the word "macroevolution." They have no technical definition of it, but in practice they use it to mean evolution to an extent great enough that it has not been observed yet. (Some creationists talk about macroevolution being the emergence of new features, but it is not clear what they mean by this. Taking it literally, gradually changing a feature from fish fin to tetrapod limb to bird wing would not be macroevolution, but a mole on your skin which neither of your parents have would be.) I will call this category supermacroevolution to avoid confusing it with real macroevolution.



Speciation is distinct from microevolution in that speciation usually requires an isolating factor to keep the new species distinct. The isolating factor need not be biological; a new mountain range or the changed course of a river can qualify. Other than that, speciation requires no processes other than microevolution. Some processes such as disruptive selection (natural selection that drives two states of the same feature further apart) and polyploidy (a mutation that creates copies of the entire genome), may be involved more often in speciation, but they are not substantively different from microevolution.



Supermacroevolution is harder to observe directly. However, there is not the slightest bit of evidence that it requires anything but microevolution. Sudden large changes probably do occur rarely, but they are not the only source of large change. There is no reason to think that small changes over time cannot add up to large changes, and every reason to believe they can. Creationists claim that microevolution and supermacroevolution are distinct, but they have never provided an iota of evidence to support their claim.



Also see:



http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/CB/CB910.html

Answer 4

"changes within "kinds"--differing types of dogs and cats, etc., which isn't evolution at all"=>Fail, any shown changes that make the animals live well is a product of evolution.

"There's the citing of bacteria sprouting into bacteria, which has nothing to do with the theory of evolution."

Try to get flu, use some drugs

Get that flu some several times again, that kind of drugs don't work anymore. That's proof! Why? Because they've changed! From easily get killed by sth they are now stronger, that's evolution!

"All I need is to see creation", yeah, so you call them creations, I call them the result of big bang and evolution, that's solid observable and undeniable evidence for me.

Unscientific and foolish? What? Evolution? At least it sounds more believable than talking snakes :P

I can't believe you ppl sometimes... You're just ridiculously ...No I'm not you, I won't offend ppl even for their ignorance

Answer 5

First of all your creationist is showing. There's no distinction between micro evolution and so-called "macro evolution". In fact changes within "kinds" (whatever those might be) is the only kind of evolution there is.



If you want evidence for evolution how does math and logic work for you? Look into Markov chains. A brief summary goes like this. A Markov chain is a statistical model which satisfies the Markov property, and the Markov property is simply that the information about the next state of the system is contained directly in the current state of the system. Does this sound familiar? It should sound like a defining characteristic of mendelian inheritance. Interesting. The natural consequence of this definition is that Markov chains generate branched nested sets. The nesting is a consequence of the fact that you can't go 2 or 3 generations up the chain to get a contribution for the next state. The branching comes from one generation generating more than one node in the next generation of the chain. I don't know if you noticed this but the taxonomic system created by the creationist Linnaeus before Darwin posited the theory of evolution is a nested hierarchy like one would expect to see from a Markov chain. Interesting.



What does this have to do with speciation? you might ask. That's a good question, but first let's get rid of the sloppy term speciation. The taxonomic system is inherently incompatible with evolution since it was created under the implicit assumption that the chain had reached its end. Then there's the fact that evolution is a totally nested process. As a result any new species is really a specialized member of the parent population's species. Speciation as a term seems to imply what creationists usually think of when they say "one kind turning into another", for instance dogs evolving from cats (which never happened). In reality the only clear distinction between a species and a kind is that kinds aren't supposed to be interfertile. Under this understanding evolutionary processes can result in a divergence of anew kind but it's still not one kind turning into another exactly. But I digress.



Let's examine a few simple concepts. Gene flow is the level of exchange of genes between populations of a species (or genus, or family). Genetic drift is a random process involving the random changes of the distributions of alleles (versions of genes) in a population. The law of large numbers is simply a mathematical law which essentially says that in any random system if there is a sufficiently large sample size we shall see the outcomes tend toward the average probability distributions. Genetic drift works similarly to throwing 5 6-sided dice say 100 times, you should try it and record the results. The probabilities of all of the possible outcomes are easy enough to figure out but in only 100 samples of a random event we should not expect to see the real outcomes very closely match the probability distribution. The consequence for evolution is that in a population with little gene flow, and a small population in which the law of large numbers does not come into play we should expect to see rapid divergence from the larger parent population. Over several generations the accumulation of enough differences coupled with novel mutations will easily result in divergence. Look into ring species, for instance, and there's a sub species of italian wall lizard which is very interesting reading as well. Nylonase, The E. Coli Long Term Evolution Experiment, Radiotropic fungi...



Now when it comes to creation I see no evidence of such a thing. Literally none. It's foolish to assume that complexity implies design. The assumption is arrogant at best. It derives from the fact that in our every day experience we think of really intelligent people as being able to comprehend really complex things. The fact is the most complex things our most intelligent people can understand are extremely simple compared to the mildly complex things the universe contains. Then there's the fact that it does not follow, though the leap is made, that intelligence must then generate complexity. Stability is an automatic selector for complex systems. Components come together, physics and chemistry are highly deterministic, if the resulting system is stable it doesn't matter how complex it is it will persist.

Answer 6

"However, most believers in the theory are confused" No, you are the one who is genuinely confused. If you have conceded micro-evolution, you have conceded natural "Darwinism" (Darwin's theories are scientifically outdated, but I am assuming you are talking about natural selection theory in general). You have conceded genetic changes based on environment, you have conceded natural selection, how exactly do you think you can do that without contradicting your assertions about evolution in general. You have agreed that evolution happens, you just think it has some bizarre and arbitrary 'type' distinction by which it is bound.



"for which there is no undisputed empirical evidence" A person can 'dispute' even things that are necessarily true. If I say "1+1=2" and you say "No it doesn't", that has not hurt my case or made yours in the slightest. If you are actually looking at serious scientific dispute in this area (as to whether or not evolution and natural selection are factual in general, not specific controversies about details of the process by those who also hold these to be factual), there is none. There is no serious scientific dispute here at all. Evolution and natural selection are settled law in science.



Now, onto your list:



1 and 2 are really the same thing, aren't they? Except you want evidence that ancient species existed and yet somehow their bones are not observable evidence? " that are believed to be millions of years old. I don't have the necessary sort of blind faith to believe such things. " You don't have to have blind faith, the dating of fossils is done using well established forensics and physics, as well as geology. If you want the basis for those scientific works, they are readily available. Go find the nearest credible university and talk to the physics professors.



3. Bacteria are organisms, which evolve. In fact, given that evolution holds that more complex organism came from simpler organisms, the behaviors and evolution of simple organisms is massively relevant. How exactly do living organisms evolving not be relevant to evolution? The thing is that evolution works in terms of species and works via reproduction, so it can't move faster than species can reproduce. Evolution can be observed more quickly when stressors are applied to organisms with short life expectancy and quick reproduction than it can in those with long lives and slow reproduction. For example, you can look at thousands of generations of bacteria reproduction before you can look at one of elephants. If you want to study in a lab what happens to a species over 100 generations, you are likely to use bacteria, fruit flies, or other quickly reproducing organism. You wouldn't use dogs, elephants, etc., because you would die long before you could ever finish your tests. This means that whey you are looking for scientific data on evolution, you are going to find a ton of data talking about bacteria and flies. One experiment using e coli has observed evolutionary changes over more than 50,000 generations, a task that would be impossible using mice, let alone dogs. http://myxo.css.msu.edu/ecoli/



"When it comes to creationism, all I need is to see creation. " This is a logical fallacy. It is flat out circular reasoning. How do you know that you are seeing creation? Because you believe in creationism. How do you know that creationism is true? Because you are seeing creation. This is not only deniable, it is a formal logical fallacy.



"so obviously unscientific " Your statements make if extremely clear you know absolutely nothing about science of any sort, so you should STFU about the quality of scientific reasoning in the opinions of others.

Answer 7

If you were really interested in a scientific answer, you wouldn't ask this question in R&S but in Biology.



And no-one wants you to be a 'believer'. The idea is to understand the concepts and evidence and accept them. This is science, not religion.



Being able to perceive the world and feel wonder is great. But it's not an explanation of how things come to be as they are. If you think evolution is 'unscientific and foolish' you only prove that you don't understand the first thing about science.

Answer 8

The fact is that you don't give a damn about evidence. Regardless of how substantial any evidence is that might be provided to you, you will reject it. You would rather believe the lies you find in lying creationist web sites and books, just as one of your responders does.



In any case, here's one example.



About fifty years ago, when it was first noted that apes have 24 pairs of chromosomes, but humans have 23, the creationists subsequently pounced upon that as evidence against the evolution of humans from a common ancestor with the apes. The evolutionary scientists, however, using evolutionary theory and an understanding of genetic modification, proposed that two of the chromosomes must have joined together in the line that led to man from the common ancestor, thus reducing the chromosome number.



That prediction has been verified with the results of the recent human and chimp genome projects. It was found that human chromosome 2 is the result of the joining of two chromosomes that have homologues in the chimp. The decoding of the genomes revealed that human chromosome 2 has a stretch of non-functioning telomere coding in the exact place it should be if the two chromosomes had joined in the human line from the common ancestor with the apes, and there is also non-functioning coding for a centromere in the exact location where the extra centromere would be as it occurs in one of the homologous chimp chromosomes, as well as a functioning centromere in the same location as in the other homologous chimp chromosome.



Long before the genome projects verified it, this article contained an example of the proposition that two of the ancestral chromosomes joined together to form human chromosome 2. (The link is to an abstract of the article. The full article is available for a fee. Sorry)

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/215/4539/1525



The following site (which is an NIH human genome site), however, does have this statement: "Humans have 23 pairs of chromosomes - one less pair than chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans and other great apes. For more than two decades, researchers have thought human chromosome 2 was produced as the result of the fusion of two mid-sized ape chromosomes and a Seattle group located the fusion site in 2002."



http://www.genome.gov/13514624



These sites explain the finding of the genome projects.

http://www.evolutionpages.com/chromosome_2.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_chromosome_2



No creationist pseudo-scientist could make a before-the-fact prediction like that. All they can do is to make up pseudo-explanations after the fact of the finding.





As for your myth-based beliefs, take a look at my answers to these questions.



https://answersrip.com/question/index?qid=20100903105814AALfu91&show=7#profile-info-Y787LJaEaa





Added:



And we have someone else who doesn't know a damn thing about the evidence for evolution and believes the lies they find in creationist web sites.



>>"Well there is plenty of evidence against evolution. Like the facts concerning the Cambrian explosion or how there were way more phyla in existence when life first appears in the fossil record than there are today. That there should be enough evidence against evolution since their claim is that life gradually got more and more complex. If that were true then why does the fossil record show the exact opposite?"



In the earliest part of the pre-Cambrian there were only single-celled life forms, and in the latter part of the pre-Cambrian primitive, simple multi-celled organisms appeared. During Cambrian, most likely because of improvements in genetic modifications of body plans, those early multi-cellular life forms radiated into several new body plans, which we call phyla.



But all of the representatives of the phyla that existed in the Cambrian were very primitive forms that were not as complex as the later members of those phyla that appeared millions of years later, and most of them were quite unlike anything existing today. There were no mammals, reptiles, birds, amphibians, or teleost fish, nor any other advanced life forms anywhere to be found in the Cambrian.



The Cambrian actually proves macro-evolution, for the radiation of the life forms at that time involved macro-evolution.



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambrian_explosion

http://evolution.berkeley.edu/evolibrary/article/_0_0/cambrian_01



When will you creationists learn that what you find in creationist web sites are nothing but a bunch of lies?

Answer 9

Well there is plenty of evidence against evolution. Like the facts concerning the Cambrian explosion or how there were way more phyla in existence when life first appears in the fossil record than there are today. That there should be enough evidence against evolution since their claim is that life gradually got more and more complex. If that were true then why does the fossil record show the exact opposite? Don't believe everything you read in books. Holy books and textbooks. Peace be unto you all.

Answer 10

This is what happens when it's mandatory to learn the Theory of Evolution in schools...

All you Evlutionists should retake your science classes... What needs to happen in order for a Theory to become a FACT??? You need substantial evidence... all the evidence that has been shown to us over the years have all been proven FRAUDS because they are all fakes! Evolutionists will do whatever they can to try to get people to believe in their foolishness.

TRy to mate a dog with a cat... a bird with a squirrel... a gorilla with a man... you will get nothing!

Just like mankind comes in different sizes and colors... so do animals, within their species.

How many different horses are there? Alot... but guess what... they are all horses. Not horse pigs... or horse birds.



Creation should be taught in schools... that way more people will realize how ridiculous Evolution is and it will finally go away! almost 200 years and still no evidence... what a waste... even Darwin gave up on his own theory.

Answer 11

fossils is very solid evidence its not blind faith if i can place it into your hands, go and visit a museum and see for yourself. Also the way carbon dating works is a pretty accurate way to figure out how long something has been around. Learn about the geological column google these things if you are still confused afterward go to a library and seek answers there.

Answer 12

i take it your a creationist because your too lazy to bother learning and too close-minded to listen to when people have tried to explain it to you. and im guessing you're only asking this question to get an angry reaction out of atheists and you are trying to gloat how much happier and contended you are for being deluded enough to comply with an outdated and illogical religion.



in any case, let me sum up the very very basics of natural selection, and see if you can go away still so sure of your creationist theory:



in the sea, which is blue, there are red fish and blue fish. the red fish, which stand out more than the blue ones, are more visible, and therefore more likely to be found and caught by sharks and eaten. therefore, making the numbers diminish. as there are less and less red fish in the sea, less reproduction occurs and they die out over time. whereas the blue fish thrive, because they are ADAPTED to their environment.



this same principle can be applied to all creatures; plants, bacteria, animals etc. and not just colours, it can be heights, speed, beak size.



with regards to your solid and undeniable creationist theory: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSxgnu3Hww8

Answer 13

Lets see. Get a library card. Go to the science section and, I don't know, start reading. Read why Evolution Is True by Jerry Coyne, for starters. Then read. Why Fossils Matter and What They Tell Us, by Donald Prothero, then read Your Inner Fish, by Neil Shubin. Come back and tell us what you learned.

Answer 14

Since it's impossible for any observer to sit and watch for the necessary time to see a species offshoot to the point it can no longer interbreed with the original strain (which is basically when 'micro' become 'macro'), I don't see how it's possible to satisfy your conditions for evidence.

Answer 15

Fossils are observable evidence.

Bones are observable evidence.

And it's bacteria developing a completely new trait and becoming a new species of bacteria. This has everything to do with evolution.



What is a "kind"? Can you give a working definition?

Answer 16

First give me Evidence that there is a god above us, watching over us. It seems to me, and anyone else with a brain, that the theory of evolution is MUUUCCCHHH more practical than the thought of us being put together by a god.

Answer 17

You are not in the slightest bit interested in evidence of evolution. If you ever become interested take a biology class. Until then go to your church to make yourself feel better.

Answer 18

1. If you are looking for evidence, I wouldnt look at your family tree. You will only be disappointed.



2. No one really cares what you believe. With your intellect, you probably wont make a significant contribution to society anyhow. (The world will always have a need for fast food workers)

Answer 19

I'll give one example, Archaeopteryx, Dinosaur to bird evolution. Do your home work son.

Answer 20

Your inability to comprehend or understand evolutionary theory does not make it invalid ... read a book ...

Answer 21

Take a biology class dear.

Answer 22

Viruses, specifically viruses with RNA.

They get you sick and there's no vaccines, since they undergo frequent and significant mutations.

Answer 23

I'm with skittles...there is plenty of material out there that will answer your questions and more.

Answer 24

Why evolution is true:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1m4mATYoig





Evolution explained:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpNeGuuuvTY&feature=fvw





Mankind explained. (First 8 minutes)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7diwQ5dHZ0U&feature=player_embedded

Answer 25

skinks

dolphin feotus's

human teeth

I could go on .. but I doubt you really want to know

Answer 26

"Give me evidence of evolution, but even if you do, I won't pay attention to it!"

Answer 27

Go to a museum.

Answer 28

Start by looking at old photos of family members and see if any look like monkeys.

Answer 29

DNA