All life is related and has descended from a common ancestor That is, complex creatures evolve from more simplistic ancestors naturally over time.
In a nutshell, as random genetic mutations occur within an organism's genetic code, the beneficial mutations are preserved because they aid survival -- a process known as "natural selection." These beneficial mutations are passed on to the next generation.
Over time, beneficial mutations accumulate and the result is an entirely different organism (not just a variation of the original, but an entirely different creature).
The Big Bang theory is an effort to explain what happened at the very beginning of our universe. Our universe started with the Big Bang - an explosion/expansion of a dense collection of subatomic particles and radiation The universe continues to expand and cool to this day
The age of the earth is about 4.6 billion years The age of the universe is 9-16 billion years
1. The fossil record 2. Geographic distribution of living species 3. Comparative anatomy 4. Similarities in embryology
Fossils are the remains, moulds, or traces of organisms that died a long time ago and were preserved in sedimentary rocks such as sandstones, shale or limestone. Includes plant remains (leaves, wood, & sap) shells or skeletons from vertebrates such as dinosaurs, birds & mammals.
About 250000 different fossil species have been identified to date. Fossil records provide evidence that living things have evolved Fossils show the history of life on earth and how different groups of organisms have changed over time
All organisms are adapted to their environment to a greater or lesser extent. If a habitat is capable of supporting one particular species in one geographic area, then we can assume that the same species would be found in a similar habitat in a similar geographic area, e.g. in Africa & South America.
This is not the case. Africa has short-tailed (Old World) monkeys, elephants, lions and giraffes. South America has long-tailed monkeys, cougars, jaguars and llamas.
We must also consider Australia Although it occupies the same latitude as much of South America and Africa, Australia has marsupials like the kangaroo, the wallaby, and the wombat.
Marsupials are totally absent from Africa. There is only the Opossum in South America & the Virginia Opossum in North America The echidna and platypus can be found only in Australia and are totally absent in the rest of the world.
Although all animals came from a single organism they have adapted and evolved over time to look very unique
The skeletons of turtles, horses, humans, birds, and bats are strikingly similar, in spite of the different ways of life of these animals. That means that a turtle swims, a horse runs, a person writes, and a bird or a bat flies with forelimb structures built of the same bones. An engineer could design better limbs in each case.
But if it is accepted that all of these skeletons inherited their structures from a common ancestor and became modified only as they adapted to different ways of life, the similarity of their structures makes sense.
All the forelimbs of these animals (turtles, horses, humans, birds, and bats) are less than perfectly adapted because they are modified from an inherited structure rather than designed from completely raw materials for a specific purpose. The imperfection of structures is evidence for evolution and against anti-evolutionist arguments that invoke intelligent design (intelligent design).
Embryology - the science that investigates the development of organisms from fertilized egg to the time of birth or hatching. Vertebrates - from fishes through lizards to humans, develop in ways that are remarkably similar during early stages, but they become more and more differentiated as the embryos approach maturity.
The similarities persist longer between organisms that are more closely related (e.g., humans and monkeys) than between those less closely related (humans and sharks). These common developmental patterns reflect evolutionary kinship.
The embryos of humans and other nonaquatic vertebrates exhibit gill slits even though they never breathe through gills. These slits are found in the embryos of all vertebrates because they share a common ancestor - the fish, in which these structures first evolved.
Human embryos also exhibit by the fourth week of development a well-defined tail, which reaches maximum length at six weeks. Similar embryonic tails are found in other mammals, such as dogs, horses, and monkeys; in humans, however, the tail eventually shortens, persisting only as a rudiment in the adult coccyx.
The theory that God created the universe
We are going to look at three main bible stories which account for the birth of earth, the universe and man God created the world in 6 days The Garden of Eden Adam & Eve Noah s Ark
In the beginning, God created the universe. At first the earth was shapeless and covered in darkness, and God's spirit hovered over the waters. God said, "Let there be light". And there was light. God divided the day from the night, naming them ' day' and 'night'. This was the first day and God saw that it was good.
On the second day God made the heavens to separate the water from the earth And on the third day he raised the dry land up from the waters below the heavens and commanded the earth to bring forth all plants. God saw that it was good.
God then made the greater light for the day and the lesser light for the night, and he saw that it was good. This was the fourth day. On the fifth day God commanded the waters to fill with living creatures and the air to fill with birds. And he was pleased with what he saw.
On the sixth day God commanded the earth to bring forth all kinds of living creatures and he saw that it was good. God then said " Let us make man in our own image". So God created man and woman in his own likeness and gave them authority over all living things. God looked at everything he had made and was very pleased. On the seventh day, God rested.
The Garden of Eden is described in the Bible as a wonderful and beautiful place and the original home of man. The book of Genesis says in chapter 2 beginning with verse 8: 8 Now the LORD God had planted a garden in the east, in Eden; and there he put the man he had formed. 9 And the LORD God made all kinds of trees grow out of the ground--trees that were pleasing to the eye and good for food. In the middle of the garden were the tree of life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
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Now the first man, Adam, was created by God out of soil and given life by God's breath. Adam named all the animals and birds that God had made, But Adam had no companion of his own so God caused him to fall into a deep sleep and created woman Eve - from one of Adam's ribs.
God told them that together they could live in the Garden of Eden eating whatever they wished except the fruit from the tree of knowledge of good and evil. But the most cunning animal, which God had made -the serpent -, tempted Eve to eat the forbidden fruit. So Adam and Eve both ate and suddenly saw what they had done and that they were naked. By eating this fruit, they had decided to choose for themselves what is right and what is wrong
Covering themselves with fig leaves they tried to hide from God. But God knew of their sin and called out to them. Then he cursed the serpent and Adam and Eve, and in shame they were driven from the beautiful Garden. God told Adam he would now have to toil and sweat to work the very soil from which he had been created. Then God blocked the entrance to the Garden with a great fiery sword so that no one could enter in.
God became displeased with the increasing wickedness of man and decided to destroy mankind with a great flood. According to Genesis chapter 7 and 8, only Noah and his family were saved from the flood by entering a great 450 foot long boat called an ark that God had them construct. The book of Genesis tells us that God sent great rains on the earth for 40 days and 40 nights and that the springs of the earth opened up to cover the whole land with a flood of water. This ark floated on the water for some 150 days before coming back to rest upon the land.
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Theory that living things show signs of having been designed. ID supporters argue that living creatures and their biological systems are too complex to be accounted for by the Darwinian theory of evolution, and that a designer or a higher intelligence may be responsible for their complexity.
ID supporters argue that for these complex systems to arise via a gradual series of mutations is statistically impossible, which implies that a designer may have guided the process. Intelligent design does not agree that the universe was created in six days. ID also does not challenge the idea that humans developed over time as a result of evolution.
ID supporters cannot explain who the intelligence is. ID supporters cannot explain how many animals were intelligently designed. Of those animals which were intelligently designed, ID supporters can t identify exactly how they were designed.
Basically there seems to be three choices: God exists and He created us There is no God, so natural processes must explain how we got here Intelligent design assisted with evolution You must decide for yourself what you believe!