Science And The Bible - Introduction

[lukec]

Can 'evolution' be reversed, in the case of an experiment (model on a computer perhaps?) to show life being stripped back to simpler and simpler forms to see if we can find the initial living thing?

Evolution cannot be reversed in life with an experiment, and frankly on a computer would be impossible too right now with the tech we have, and because evolution is based on changes in DNA. Theoretically if you had a computer which "read" DNA you could project whatever organism coded for. But if we could project this back in time....? Not by any way I can think of. You see, the DNA molecule does not fossilize all that well, and without an actual genetic map stretching back from organisms today to the dawn of life, we cannot "look" at every creature there has ever been. And it's not like we can just take, say, a piece of your DNA and take off bits, and that is a more primitive animal, then take a bit of that animal's DNA off and so on, because that's not how evolution works. If you're interested in a looking at increasingly older organisms, you'll get it when you read The Ancestor's Tale. But it's impossible to "strip back" as you say to simpler forms- this kind of assumes that organisms now are much more advanced genetically speaking- which is not necessarily the case. A variety of wheat has around 120 chromosomes. A kind of small, rat-like animal is not a diploid animal- the mutation in this organism caused it to have 2 pairs of each chromosome. Mutations such as these cannot simply be reduced, in the hopes of reaching a more "primitive" ancestor.

As far as I know, I'm trying to say, no. You cannot.

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I've heard on several occasions that the new evidence shows that the big bang is thought to actually expanding still rather than shrinking as it was thought before. AND the speed of the expansion is increasing at an exponential rate.
And apparently this means that in not too long a time (I'm not sure how long but this is what was said, paraphrased by me) there will be no evidence that the big bang ever occurred and nothing to measure anymore.

Yes- the idea is that the stars are moving away from each other so fast that soon the distances will be too great or the speed in the opposite direction too fast for light to reach anywhere else... which would get rid of the evidence for the Big Bang. I'm not sure if the expansion could still be increasing exponentially though, I'm not sure if that meshes with the theory that the fastest expansion of all was within the first second. Of course, I know next to nothing about physics.