ICs2Xist said:
PROVEN. IT'S NOT FREAKIN PROVEN TILL YOU GO BACK TO THE BEGINNING OF THE WORLD AND SEE IT FOR YOURSELF (not even then, really).
Why not? We see cells evolve, since they have such short lifespans. We see 'species' of cells turn into other species; such as mutations of diseases into something that can outright screw us over. We are merely a colony of cells, so why can't they evolve too?
Also, what about creatures that can mate, but the offspring are infertile? Ligers, the offspring of tiger and lion, are able to breed but the offspring is always flawed; only one has been able to successfully mate (and the resulting offspring from that creature was born sterile, for some reason) and some of the males have a fault in their testis meaning that the release of a hormone which stops growth after a certain age is restricted, meaning the animals can grow horrifically large and die quite early as a result.
The fact that these two animals from different parts of the world can mate shows they were once the same species, the fact that the offspring is sterile shows us they are drifting further apart. Most types of lemurs can breed quite happily, which would indicate that they started drifting apart in terms of genetics comparatively recently compared to the aforementioned big cats; this is also indicated in the fact that some lemurs can meet and mate in the wild; they are closer, they were not pulled into different continents by the shifting of the planet, and so they are going to continue to be genetically similar since they are in roughly the same area.
We don't have to go back in time to see evolution; we know for a fact that the appendix is a useless organ now that has the properties to help digest grass, similar to the many stomachs of a cow. However, the organ is so small and disused it has become completely without function now, except to randomly flaw and kill you.
I understand before you made the arguement that all primates should have evolved into humans if it was so beneficial, but it is simply the fact that it may not be in all locations. One theory of why humans are the way we are which holds a lot of interesting ideas is that, around the time pre-humans began to evolve, there was areas of large flooding where it is known 'humans' were residing. We know this from carbon-dating fossils. We know that such flooding would have brought in a rich new food that was previously a rare find for us; fish, crustaceans, and other ocean-dwelling nom-noms. To get these creatures, we needed to wade into areas full of water. We did this often to eat the new readily available food, learning to walk on our back legs. This experiment has been repeated in several zoos, where chimps were forced to wade out to a boat to obtain food. The chimpanzees held their hands above their head and walked out to the boat on their hind legs, sometimes carrying their offspring in a cradled position in their arms.
As a result of this new lifestyle of wading out to areas of flood, we no-longer needed hair on our bodies; it does not insulate you from the cold under the water. The hair on our faces, however, mostly remains since we had our heads out of the water. Fish and crustaceans have a lot of protein, omega-oils, and all the things that can help develop a brain. With such an excess of protein and such oils we never previous had, it needed to go somewhere. It went north, to our brains, making a more complex mind and brain. From then on, we can all work ou the rest.
This particular theory, if it holds any truth, would have occurred in only certain areas. The primates which were not subjected to such conditions did not have the extra protein for brain development, and even if they did have it they live in an environment where muscle is of much more use than a brain. While we were wading in the water, we no-longer had to climbs trees to obtain our food; we just went to the flooded floor and groped around.
The fact is, we have fossils showing a gradual change over time that is evolution. We
can become separate species. Our oldest ancestors simply could not mate with our living relatives of this time; the genetic differences would be simply too much. Even if it did occur, the child would be flawed and it would be incredibly rare to have one that could produce offspring of it's own.
Evolution simply is fact. Trying to find flaw in it whilst arguing from a standpoint which has only survived because of a lack of fact strikes me as trying to have your cake and eat it. I have full faith that religion is a pile of horseshit therefore, to me, it is. Like I said, I'm not trying to convert anyone. I'm just spreading my opinion to other people because I'm pretentious.
