Evolution, Part 1

First off, I'd like to say this: I am NOT an expert on the subject of evolution. I am simply someone who is interested enough in life itself to RESEARCH things. I don't like to say things which are false. Therefore, I make sure about my facts.

How most religious people see evolution:
"Evolution in the fictional world of the Pokémon video game franchise refers to a sudden change of form in a Pokémon, usually accompanied by a dramatic increase in statistics. It should be noted that this is not an evolution in a biological sense, but rather the metamorphosis of an individual creature."

How most scientists and intellectuals see evolution:
"In the life sciences, evolution is a change in the traits of living organisms over generations, including the emergence of new species. Since the development of modern genetics in the 1940s, evolution has been defined more specifically as a change in the frequency of alleles in a population from one generation to the next."

So, for those of you who do not take the time to research things, I'll explain evolution as if to a child. It's actually quite brilliant:

This is overly simplified to get a point across.
Take, for example, a squirrel. There are several squirrels. These squirrels run around in trees. Sometimes, a predator may attack them in the tree, and the will try to escape. They will probably do this by jumping out of the tree. The ones, who are better at jumping out of the tree and surviving, will survive. The squirrels who fall to hard and break their backs or get captured by the predator, die. So, obviously, the ones who are best at jumping out of trees survive. These survivors will pass on their genes.

The children of these surviving squirrels will differ slightly from their parents. Some might be better at jumping from large trees, others might not. Recreation is slightly random. Then, these children will go through the process again. At a later stage, the squirrels will have evolved flaps at the side.

Natural Selection does NOT have a goal or a direction in which it moves. It does not require someone (god) to "select" the right species. It can be simply and very easily described by these words:

Survival of the fittest.

Some of you will, at this point, think that I am describing a random event. It is not random. For example, rolling dice is random, but always picking the higher number on two rolled dice is not random.

Life results from the non-random survival of randomly varying replicators.
- Richard Dawkins -

This is evolution in a nutshell. But it is more complicated than that.

Some of you will say that you believe that creatures can adapt and change, but you don't think that a single cell can become a fish, a fish can become a mammal or a dinosaur can become a bird. This is usually called Micro-Evolution (adapting to small changes in the environment) and Macro-Evolution (changing a species completely). This is slightly erronous, because most biologists believe that micro-evolution and macro-evolution are the same thing, with only a difference in scope (time).

Remember, evolution is a process which takes hundreds, thousands, millions of years. And it never stops. Evolution is not the process life has gone through in order to achieve us. It is the process life goes through, because it is the only option. How can the fittest NOT outlast the unfit? And fit, is of course a relative term, because "defects" can have an unexpected advantage in life.

Another Example:

Say, for example, a bird extremely good at catching fish and evading predators, finds itself upon a somewhat deserted island. This island has more than enough fruits to feed the bird. And there is no competition. The bird will survive well, no matter how it lives. Therefore, the descendants who are most economic will survive the best. The descendants, who waste energy and time on unnecessary muscles used for catching fish, will not survive as well as the lazy descendants. Then the bird will evolve into something like the dodo.

Another example: Sharks. Sharks are extremely good at catching fish, birds and seals. They have not really "evolved" (in the common understanding of the word) for the past millions of years. The reason for this is that they have no need to change. They have achieved a perfect adaptability and balance. They can swim extremely fast, detect blood more than a mile away, go for long periods of time without food, catch more than one kind of prey and they heal their teeth by simply replacing them. What more does it require? Intelligence? The smarter the shark is, the more time it will spend deliberating about things, and less time eating and recreating. The shark has achieved optimality. It will not change until it is necessary to do so.

A fish does not simply "turn" into a mammal. A fish that lives close to the shore (because it has evolved to adapt to catching insects living close to the shore, for example) may have trouble living because the waves washes the fish unto the shore. But many of the fish will live. One day, one of the fish might have a slight mutation in genes which allows him to take in more air and less water. (No one is exactly like his parents/ancestors. Everyone changes slightly from their parents.) This fish will have a higher chance of survival than the other fish. The process repeats itself until you get something like the lungfish, which can breathe both water and air. And so forth.

If you think "mutation" is too unlikely a cause for this, read this:
"Genetic variation arises due to random mutations that occur at a certain rate in the genomes of all organisms. Mutations are permanent, transmissible changes to the genetic material (usually DNA or RNA) of a cell, and can be caused by: "copying errors" in the genetic material during cell division; by exposure to radiation, chemicals, or viruses."

I'll stop explaining evolution now. If you don't get it by now, you probably never will. Or I am a bad writer. Either way, I'm moving on. The point is that you should continue reading about evolution and anything else you don't understand. If you are confident that you understand evolution, then you are allowed to talk about it and tell others whether you believe it. If you still don't know anything about it, then please stay quiet until you do.

Proof of evolution?
First off, logical reasoning, but I'll assume you don't have that. (No offence meant)

Fossil Evidence has given us an extensive family tree and history of modern species. Take a look at this photo:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Primate_skull_series_with_legend.png

It compares the modern apes with each other. Note the similar eye-sockets, teeth, sinus cavities, shape of skull, and (even though you can't see it in the photo) the way the backbone connects to the skull. These are all remarkably alike. All mammals, as you should know, have just about the same backbone. It is a very effective system for creating blood cells and safely protecting nerves; therefore, it has not changed much. This is because all mammals are descended from the same ancestor (yes, a single one), and because the backbone is very hard to improve upon, as it is now. The backbone, as an entity in itself, has achieved optimal efficiency.

I'm not going to expand on the proof much more. Go here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution#Evidence_of_evolution

I can talk about evolution all day, because it is a very extensive and subtle theory which all rests on a single concept. It is both very simple and extremely complicated. I love it. I have read several books on the subject (busy with Ancestor's Tale, by Richard Dawkins, as well as Adam's Naval, by Michael Simms) and I will continue to do so. I have also read books in support of Intelligent Design. I really want to read The Naked Ape which ID proponents frequently quote.

I have considered both sides of the argument and I am still open to change. If someone can prove me wrong, I will admit that I am wrong.

Just to clarify: Humans did not evolve from monkeys, apes or gorillas. Humans, monkeys and other primates all evolved from the same distant ancestor. This is what makes the next statement even stupider than it already is.

"Evolution can't be true! I didn't come from monkeys!"
To which I once had the pleasure to respond:
"Even if evolution isn't true, you are still a primate, and, in your case, an ape."

These people do not think about evolution. They do not even know how it works. They simply hear that we come from monkeys, and therefore it must be wrong. They simply attack evolution because it makes them uncomfortable. They barely even try to understand the brilliance of the concept itself. Every time someone tells me that he does not believe in evolution, I ask him if he can explain evolution to me. No one has ever been able to tell me. They ALWAYS misunderstand it. And the people, who take the time and the effort to understand it, are the people who "believe" it.

People accept the theory of gravity, even though the church was against it. (For some reason, gravity was considered an attack on religion) The same can be said about the elliptical orbits and positions of the planetary bodies in the solar system. Why do people accept some facts about science, but "disbelieve" other facts?

And the clencher, of course, is the fact I have already mentioned:
Many churches are completely FOR evolution.

Many (smarter) Christians believe that God "guided" the world and primates to evolve into humans. They believe that God caused the Big Bang and created the perfect, ordered world as we know it. I have no problem with these people, because they don't (directly) cause ignorance. Believing in evolution does NOT make you a bad Christian. But not believing it, does make you ignorant.

I will be taking on the people who "disbelieve" evolution in my next blog.

The reason I use Wikipedia so often, is because it is usually right. It is a very effective and easy to read summation of the facts. Another, very good aspect of Wikipedia is its tendency to list all it's sources, which I sometimes browse through for more extensive writing on a single topic. And, most of the time, I read things in books (written by respected and learned authors) and then search for it on the internet, and find it on Wikipedia. Therefore, I have a bad habit of going straight to Wikipedia when I want a source. I'm too lazy too look things up in a book, and I assume you are too lazy and forgetful to actually find the book, read it and look for the things I quoted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peppered_moth_evolution - an example of evolution in modern times.

http://homepage.eircom.net/~odyssey/Quotes/Life/Science/Ancestors_Tale.html - a page about Ancestor's Tale, a book which traces our ancestors all the way back to the origin of life.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evolution - my main source .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparative_anatomy - the study of comparing the anatomy of various species.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_evolution - another important source. Read it if you doubt that we share a common ancestor with primates.

"Hot on the heels of its magnanimous pardoning of Galileo, the Vatican has now moved with even more lightning speed to recognise the truth of Darwinism."
Richard Dawkins