Evolution: The biodiversity present on Earth is explained by the process of natural selection over a very long period of time.
Where is the problem?
Sorry, I suppose I worded that in an agressive manner. I did not mean it agressively, I am merely curious what others think . . . because I’m so confused.
i cannot possibly think of any aspect or argument slightly or even seemingly linked to evolution that hasn’t been overly thoroughly, twice backwards, triple ricochet carambol flipping from left to right-top-down-the-middle discussed
no offense of course 
i understand where you’re coming from
I can’t either. However, in the Dinosaur thread, it was (rightly) argued that I was hijacking the thread with my talk about evolution. So, I figured I’d make a seperate thread.
dude your confuseing me. i thought you were a devout evolutionist.
now you need reassurance that evolution is true?
I don’t need reassurance. There is nothing ‘devout’ about one’s accepting the theory of evolution. I’m asking why/how people can have a problem with Evolution. It truly boggles my mind.
the most common complaint is that its hard to imagine that the individual mutations that lead to a complex structure like the eye could either happen all at once, or happen in steps such that each step is beneficial to the creature. like in order to evolve an eye, you need to have a structure that connects the outside world to the brain, and all the connections need to line up just right or else that primitive eye is actually just a tumor.
eyes arent so bad, i think the most interesting thing ive seen is a certain parasite that lives in cows. the parasite lays eggs that come out in the poop. snails eat that poop and the eggs. the eggs lay dormant until the snail is eaten by ants. then, soon, the eggs control the ants brain so that the ants climb up the nearest purple flower and just stay there. then the cows eat the flowers with infected ants on them.
theres no way that that parasite evolved all of those traits at the same time, so each step must have been independently succesfull in order for this full process to exist today.
then theres the japanese giant hornets and the japanese honeybee. when european honeybees were brought to japan, the hornets massacred them and ate their children all the time, its some of the coolest nature footage ive ever seen, piles of thousands of twitching, severed bee torsos. well the japanese honeybees usually dont have a problem with the hornets thanks to what appears to be divine intervention.
when a hornet scout comes to their nest, they all go inside, luring the hornet inside with them, i guess because he wants to make sure its really a honeybee nest before he goes back and tells his friends. when he gets in there, the honeybees wait for him to be all the way in and then they pile on him. then they start dancing until the friction causes the temperature to rise. the bees can stay alive up to 118 degrees fahrenheit, and the hornets can stay alive only up until 116 degrees. so they dance until its 117 degrees and the scout is never able to tell his friends to come.
sure its possible those things were naturally selected step by step. my problem is comprehending the unimaginable improbability of a genetic defect being beneficial. i still believe in evolution, because why would god create all this stuff from scratch off the top of his head? shouldnt the world be much simpler if it was all created by god like he was drawing a picture?
if i want to believe in something more interesting than the laws of physics, ill believe that when people die, they have the chance to evolve unintelligent life a little bit, whatever they think might be cool. maybe there are dead souls in charge of giraffes and other ones in charge of the trees giraffes eat, and they spend their time in the afterlife perfecting the genetic code of each, trying to find ways to make each taller. that would be a really fun way to pass the time.
The problem is it threatens peoples beliefs. As long as it stays put within the realm of science its fine, but Darwinism has become the “universial acid”, and it is threatening any if not all beliefs in the meaning of life, for a human being that does not incorporate it. The funny thing is that the threat is not explicit. Scientists haven’t been getting up on pulpits, and preaching that there is no god, they’ve been doing what they’ve always done which is just uncovering facts. Its not the science that people are having a problem with, its the facts it uncovers. People are scared of the actuality, because the science is becoming so concrete that people can’t make the imagination jumps to incorporate it into their philosophy. They just can’t except some part of it, and merge it with a theory of diety any more, or at least its not that easy to. So now its an all or nothing, either the belief has to go, or the theory has to be wrong, people are too dependant on their beliefs because its been part of their intertemporal bargaining process for so long that it has become one of the most solid foundations for their psychological operations, their belief has become the glue that holds them together. So naturally the opposition is fierce, its fuming, its a no prisoners assault, because its getter closer and closer to Either The Belief, or the Science, the isthmus is vanishing, people have to jump on one island or another, and for those who have lived on the island of belief for their entire lives, they’d rather not pack up, and leave. We all know what a pain in the ass moving is 
But . . . shouldn’t any sane religious belief try and model itself on science? Shouldn’t any sane religious belief view science as a re-affermation rather than a refutation? I mean, that’s how natural philosophy (the forerunner of modern science) got started in Europe: People were trying to understand the Divine by examining the physical works left behind. The luddite attitude of many Christians simply baffels me.
well before they try to scientifically validate their religion, they want to religiously validate their hate and desire for a facade of moral superiority. the best way to do that is to believe the bible is true verbatim, and that splash of water and those crackers really do imbue you with special forgiveness power. and the fact that you are not a poor person means that your free will chose to be better with some help from your magical sidekick, and the fact that their free will chose wrong and god wont care about them when the apocalypse comes (soon) means that you dont have to either. believing the bible is the word of god is the best way to believe all of those comforting things, and why would god bother with that artsy fartsy symbolism crap anyway?
besides, “god is trying to fool you scientists into not believing in creationism because he is testing your free will to see if its holy enough to believe the bible without any evidence simply for the sake of believing the bible” is a completely valid possibility. why god would do that is irrelevant, because you arent supposed to understand why all of the stuff in the bible happened, just that it happened. thats what makes you holy, shutting your mouth and doing what the master says.
Shouldn’t Smokers stop smoking?? Shouldn’t anorectic’s start eating? I agree with you any sane religious belief should try to model itself on science. The problem I think is that most have been taught that there is a diety. I mean that is the core of most religion, is it not? This is a mind first view. There had to be a mind first, and thats exactly what natural selection threatens. So in order for their beliefs to survive, then natural selection cannot.
ITs sooo ingrained in people. Belief is a tool used in intertemporal bargaining. People put a stake in a belief, and if they find something that justifies belief it strengthens it.
Its like this, you want to quit smoking, so you create the belief that you will quit smoking, if you fail in five minutes, say it again the next day, and fail, and keep failing, then you won’t have much faith in the belief “Ohh, I’ll never quit, I have too much of an addictive personality”… your very prediction that you will fail, makes the belief worthless. Hence smokers repeat this pattern over and over again. They usually create the belief when their appetit is satiated, but when the hunger strikes to have another smoke, the belief is not strong enough to overcome the impulse. The belief that you will quit smoking becomes a weak tool in your intertemporal bargaining.
Now look at a belief like god. ITs soo arbitrary, that people can easily incorporate it into their stakes and make it concrete. I always hear religious people say god did that, or I prayed for this and it happened. An act of god is such an easy thing to come by, that the belief is made more, and more concrete. I will pray to god, and stop smoking, is most likely a strong stake for most, and thus religon is a really useful tool for most, and it is no surprise that they incorporate it into most of their bargaining skills. I will act morally, because god wants me to. The fear of hellfire, and the reward of heaven are bigtime stakes(More then Brunson, or Gus hansen would be willing to gamble with). So such an arbitrary belief becomes a great bargaining tool in some ways, and thus becomes a strong foundation for a self. People are rightly afraid that their belief in god will falter, because if it does what will happen??? Will their morals then falter?? IF the smoker doesn’t have much evidence to believe that he will quit, the prophecy usually becomes self fufilling. Religous people use their belief in the majority of their intertemporal bargains, if this belief is weakened it ceases to be a good stake, and they can’t hedge their bets. They’re afraid the whole foundation will fail.
I thought I gave this one a good shot at explaining the incremental steps already! In a fact very credible explanation if I remember.
Just been through the link stuff…
There is no individual link in the chain that is impossible. The ant biochemistry seems strange at first, because it looks ridiculously long odds as a mutatable possibility…
But its not as bad as it seems, the change can be broken down into some easier steps 1.Reduce fear of light (more likely to remain exposed) 2.Increase like fondness of heights(cows eat top of grass, could manipulate the ‘scout’ instincts here) 3. Reduce sensitivity of olfactory receptors (so less likely to respond to scents that guide ant behaviour otherwise).
If you want another interesting critter check out toxoplasm grudii (sp?), a cat parasite that manages to manipulate mammalian brains - a far more complex process.