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Darwinian Tensions.

By Anthony O’Hear

All Evolutionists Now

darwincardIN A BROAD SENSE, I suppose, we all accept evolution, if by ‘we’ we mean anyone likely to be reading this. Of course, if ‘we’ includes the whole world, we all don’t; and many who do accept the theory of evolution probably have only the vaguest notion of why they should. How much this matters is another question, but quite clearly to anyone who looks at the evidence without any preconceptions it is hard not to think that life on earth has come about through evolutionary processes. In particular, all that we know of geology and its related disciplines tells us that the earth is very old, and has itself been subject to a process of continuous development. From the fossil record we can also conclude that life itself is very old, and that its earliest forms were very simple compared to much of what we see around us to-day. We also see evidence of species long since extinct. Then, from biology and from the remains of older, now extinct forms of life, we see remarkable similarities among natural forms and their embryos, which strongly suggest common ancestries. We know from experiments and observations that a process very similar to what is described in evolutionary theory (to put it no stronger) actually does occur in the world to-day. From genetics and micro-biology we know a great deal about the mechanisms of hereditary transmission and about the relationships between genes and behaviour, and between genes and morphology. And no doubt there is much more and in very great detail which contributes most impressively to filling out the evolutionary picture and to its broad credibility.

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Bob Puharic
Bob Puharic
14 years ago

Well, I was disappointed in the article. It tries to take the objections of ID, reject them, but keep them while mapping them into some amorphous ‘morphogenetic analysis.’ I’m a chemist, not a biologist, but I know non-science when I see it. While he talks about ‘survival’, he forgets evolution doesn’t care about survival. It cares about reproduction. He talks about ‘truth’ and ‘beauty’ as if these have scientific meanings. And he forgot that there IS a feedback mechanism in biology which takes the world into account. Darwin discovered it; it’s called ‘natural selection.’ It’s too much to hope for,… Read more »

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