Irreducible Complexity.

[CoxRox]

Ok Leo. I'll quit bugging you on that. I must be easily pleased, but nevertheless thank the designer for my beautiful eyes.

I'm probably going to show how ignorant I am about evolution now. You mentioned snakes and lungfish earlier. I've been scouring the web for info and am not too clear at the minute. I take it the lungfish preceded the snake? Are we indirectly evolved from both?

[Darwinian]

All back boned animals are directly evolved from very early fish, including of course, todays fish. The lungfish, or rather something like it, would have preceded snakes as a snake is basically a lizard that has lost it's limbs.

We can trace our ancestry back through mammals, mammal like reptiles, reptiles, fish and so on.. The snake took the same route as us until it got to reptiles and that's when we went out different ways.

[leo-rcc]

Ok Leo. I'll quit bugging you on that. I must be easily pleased, but nevertheless thank the designer for my beautiful eyes.

Beautiful to who? Aesthetics are very arbitrary. A spider could find having 'just' two eyes very ugly, perhaps even scary. First you talk about the design, then about the beauty of it. If all humans had the retina the right way round, we wouldn't find the eye any more beautiful or hideous, because it would be the norm.

I'm probably going to show how ignorant I am about evolution now. You mentioned snakes and lungfish earlier. I've been scouring the web for info and am not too clear at the minute. I take it the lungfish preceded the snake? Are we indirectly evolved from both?

Reptiles, including snakes, evolved from fish. We have not evolved from snakes, but both snakes and humans have evolved from earlier reptiles and fish . Evolution is not linear, just like a family tree it branches out. We are not desendents from our cousins, but both our cousins and ourselves can be traced back to a common ancestor (in this case our grandfather). the 'grandfather' of snakes and humans lived over 250 million years ago, one of which is that Lungfish or its relative.

All modern mammals evolved from a group of reptiles that lived more than 200 million years ago. Over time these reptiles developed the various adaptations that define mammals today: the skull and jaw bones were rearranged, they developed different types of teeth, they brought the limbs underneath the body rather than sprawling out to the sides, and they developed a diaphragm and palate to help them breathe efficiently. At some point during their development, the mammals also started to regulate their own body temperature through internal heat production and started to feed their young with milk. Since these are features which don't fossilise it is impossible to say exactly when these changes occurred.

The world of these early mammals was very different from the world today. There was only one continent on Earth, and the climate was much warmer. The other animals around at the time were the first dinosaurs, and many other reptilian groups. Invertebrates had been around for a very long time and were very diverse, as were the fish. There were no flowers, but plenty of non-flowering plants.

The first mammals were small, and probably nocturnal since their internal heat production allowed them to stay active even when the temperatures dropped at night. They used their sense of smell to find prey and each other.

By about 100 million years ago there were several types of mammal. We are familiar with the monotremes (mammals that lay eggs), marsupials ( mammals that carry their young through early infancy in a pouch) and placentals (who give birth as humans do) of today, but there were also other kinds, such as multituberculates, which are now extinct. The world was changing, though. The one mass of land began to break up, and the separating continents took with them living cargoes of animals.

The first split was a north-south divide. North America and Eurasia broke away from South America, Africa, Australia and Antarctica. Then Africa broke away from the Southern continent, and India too went adrift. Placental mammals were divided and started to develop in four different ways.

In Africa, a group developed known as the Afrotheres. Today these are represented by the elephants, the sea cows, the elephant shrews, the golden moles, the tenrecs and the aardvark. In South America, a group known as the Xenarthrans developed, today represented by the anteaters, sloths and armadillos. Across North America and Eurasia lived the Laurasiatherians, a large group containing the carnivores, hoofed animals, whales, bats and other animals. Also in the north lived the fourth group known as the Euarchontaglires: the rodents and primates.

The marsupials were not confined to the Southern hemisphere as they are today. Opossums lived in Europe and North America and even invaded Africa when it finally came into contact with Europe around 30 million years ago. The monotremes have a much poorer fossil record, and so it is not known how diverse and widespread they might once have been.

Having split apart, the continents eventually started to collide with each other, and their different groups of mammals started to mix. First Africa collided with Europe. Primates, hoofed animals and carnivores flooded in, while elephants and other Afrotheres spread north. Then South America and North America touched, allowing Xenarthrans like the giant ground sloths and armadillos to move north, whilst hoofed animals and carnivores moved into South America.

Today there is such a mix of animals throughout the globe that it is only recently, with the help of molecular analysis, that we have begun to piece together their complicated past. The formation of this haphazard jigsaw has helped us realize just how distantly related some very similar-looking animals are.

[Tiberius]

In order to have an image right side up on our retina we would need another lens to flip it around, requiring another part, needless and inefficient when you consider that the brain can quite easily work within this image that is upside down.

Not true. It could either be done by another lens or by flipping the retina the other way up. The whole argument about "oh, but the brain has to interpret it anyway" is not a good argument at all. In terms of operations the brain has to execute, there are many many more.

Consider a program had to read in data and then write it to a file. There are two elements to the "design" of the program, the reader and the writer. If the reader is programmed upside-down, the information given to the writer is also upside-down, and needs extra code to reverse the data. A much better solution would be to simply program the reader the correct way up.

In both instances the writer has to process the data, but only in the first instance does the writer have to do extra operations in order to process it.

So, here is what the evolutionists are proposing for a superior breathing apparatus. Our trachea would continue up to our nose, requiring our necks to be at least 1 inch wider. We would have huge noses with nose lips and a tongue protruding out. Of course, our faces would have to be much longer to accommodate the additional structures. Now, we would really be ugly! On second thought, it might be interesting trying to kiss with two sets of lips - nah, constantly expelling liquid out our nose would make it kind of gross. Aren't you glad you weren't designed by an evolutionist!'

http://www.godandscience.org/evolution/d...nebad.html

I also found this quote, and like all quotes from these creationist websites, it greatly exaggerates the idea. Why would the neck need to be 1 inch wider? We currently breath very well through our nose, and the tubes that take that air to the trachea are very small indeed. In fact, the trachea is only the size it is to process food. Thus we could simply have a small breathing tube. Why we would need larger noses, lips, and a tongue that protrudes bewilders me. Like I said, our nose already enables us to breathe perfectly fine with our mouths closed, and in the new system our lips / tongue would have nothing to do with our respiratory system, so no changes are needed. As for the longer faces, two lips (where did we get them from), and the constantly expelling liquid from our noses...WTF??? This entire scenario is the creationist equivalent of claiming a politician is a communist because he used the words "share the wealth around" and they were taken entirely out of context.

I think we've found the source of our problem, and I'm going to attempt a way to rectify it.

Catherine,

You seem to be reading a load of creationist websites and then using their articles, whilst we seem to be reading a load of scientific websites and using their articles. My proposal:

You list a few articles (say 3-4) that you think are convincing, and we will read them. At the same time, we will list 3-4 articles from a website like talkorigins.org and you will read them. This way we each get to see the other viewpoint and ask questions about it, rather than defending our views.

What do you think?

[CoxRox]

Adrian, that is a fair proposal. To be honest, I need to 'test' evolution for myself. I haven't really read about it, only articles which are by Christians as you note. When I bought The God Delusion, I also bought The Selfish Gene and The Ancestor's Tale. Do you recommend The Ancestor's Tale for someone like myself with limited knowledge of biology and no knowledge of chemistry or should I go for something like 'Evolution for Dummies' if there is such a book? Once I have the 'full picture' so to speak we can discuss these topics (unless of course I 'see the light'.....). If it's ok, I can ask you guys for any clarification as I go along.

[leo-rcc]

I would recommend Climbing mount improbable and the blind watchmaker from Richard Dawkins. On his website there are also some links where you can download and watch his Christmas Lectures, Growing up in the universe, that is a good starter I think.

[lukec]

Before you read Selfish Gene or Ancestor's Tale, please please please read The Blind Watchmaker. It is a very well put together book which explains a lot about evolution, then I would say read Selfish Gene after that. But other than Dawkins there is one book that I think you need to read along with Watchmaker- It's called "Evolution" by Donald R. Prothero and it is chock full of evidence. It also provides counter-arguments to creationist ideas, but the nice thing about the book is that Prothero is impartial- he has been an archeologist in the field for many years, and presents only the evidence and the conclusions, and is not quite so... abrasive... as Dawkins can be. Really a good read, with supporting figures and documentation.

[CoxRox]

Hi Leo and Lukec, I'm going right next to Borders this morning when I get my son from work, so I'll pop in and get The Blind Watchmaker and see if they have 'Evolution' by Prothero. Prothero's book sounds just up my street. Thanks for your advice.

[lukec]

Good to hear, CoxRox. And I would be open as well to any suggestions!

[CoxRox]

Thanks Lukec. I love reading and can spend up to an hour in the bath reading, so I'l enjoy getting stuck in. I've wanted to 'test' evolution so to speak, for a number of years now, but keep putting it off, so now I have the opportunity (I don't work at the minute) and the motivation to do it. It's good to know you guys will give me your feedback and help.



Watch this space.....................................