Bryan Melugin
The video above will sum up the key points of this chapter- Which is actually a summary of the entire case against evolution as presented in previous chapters. The full chapter, which features Rent-A-Friend and his fellow Nacho-eating arm chair philosophers, can be read below. Enjoy! #JesusLovesYou
To read other parts of this series click here
Another Thursday had arrived, but the story actually begins the night before. What does a Rent-A-Friend do on a Wednesday night? The answer to that mystery can vary from week to week, depending if there is a new Duck Dynasty to watch, but this particular Wednesday night was spent making a holistic, fully encompassing, clip art-saturated Power Point Slide Show Presentation!
Calling on all of my mad office skills and the one semester of graphic design I took in college, I compiled the complete and total summation of information which we had shared on the many Thursdays past and created the Epic Evolution FAIL slideshow, Subtitled, “If you Understand Evolution, You Know Why Its Wrong,” and then sub sub titled “Chuck D and the New Monkey Band.”
When my friends arrived at Danny’s Bar, Grill, and House of Rabblerousing the following night, I was prepared to slide show present their argyle socks off. And I did. Metaphorically. Although in full disclosure, I did not check the state of their socks at the end, so it remains possible that I mean that literally. But I digress.
When my friends filed in from their nine to fives that night, I had the table ready with fresh root beers and a big flat screen monitor with which to pitch a model of science that would change the world.
“Greetings my friends and welcome to the first, and sure to be remembered as Historic, presentation of the Epic Evolution FAIL slideshow, Subtitled, “If you Understand Evolution, You Know Why Its Wrong,” and then sub sub titled “Chuck D and the New Monkey Band.”
“Its should be it’s, with an apostrophe,” interrupted Carl. “It’s a conjunction for “It is,” not the possessive.”
I looked at my title screen. “Yes. Yes it should. Look, as with all of my presentations, I think it would be best if we just ignore the majority of my grammatical errors and focus on the point I’m making.”
“Yeah,” said Blue Beard. “If we get to picking at his spelling and punctuation, we’ll be here all night.”
“Thank you Blue Beard,” I said with only a slight hint of irony. “As I was saying. Just remember that it was your friend at a very reasonable hourly rate, Rent-A-Friend 2000, who brought to you “the world’s first very useful definition of Darwinian Evolution.”
“Are you really going to go through the entire thing?” asked Carl.
“Yes, Carl, I am,” I replied. “But while we have spent many weeks delving into the details, tonight I shall summarize the big picture and conclude before the Nachos arrive!”
“Well, get to it, lad!” shouted Blue Beard. And so I did.
“The definition of Evolution is created by coming to a clear understanding of what Evolution is, and what story it intends to tell. We start with the Darwinian Tree of life. The tree of life is the history of life on earth according to Darwinian Evolution.
In order to grow this tree, Darwinian evolution must be four things:
1. Evolution is something to do with living things.
2. Evolution is something about life changing over time.
3. Evolution is something which is intended to explain the origin of different kinds of plants and animals.
4. Evolution tells a story where in all living things arose through past common ancestors until, far enough back in time, we reach a first universal common ancestor, making the history of life on earth a big tree of life. Or going forward in time, it explains how simple things like bacteria became worms which became fish which became lizards which became rodents which became primates which became humans.”
In order to give rise to and grow the Darwinian tree of life, thus accounting for all the plant and animal kinds which live now and which have lived in the past,
Evolution is an unguided, Natural process which increases the genetic information in an organism; Creating new Genes which did not previously exist.
These new genes then cause an increase in physical complexity and associated behavior, Both of which increase the organism’s ability to survive and pass on these traits to offspring.
“You shall recall,” I continued, “that we discussed the definition in detail and found that no serious argument was made to its premises. This definition takes into consideration the Darwinian Tree of life and the basic story which Evolution is intending to tell. Then, we took this understanding of the Evolutionary Model and examined the proposed Mechanisms of Evolution to see if any of them could cause the tree of life to grow, and new kinds of plants and animals to come into being.
First, with consideration to the title of Darwin’s book, we looked at Natural Selection. However, Natural Selection cannot be the Origin of any species, because it only removes variations from a species. It does not add any. Darwin said as much in his book, and so this rejection of Natural Selection as a mechanism of Evolution comes from Darwin’s own writings, as well as a clear understanding of what it is and what evolution is claiming to do.
Next we looked at Genetic Drift/Migration. But this mechanism is literally just moving existing things from one place to another. Migration cannot be a mechanism of evolution because it cannot cause a new species, gene, feature or behavior to arise.
Because it is such a popular definition of and proposed mechanism of evolution, we looked at Changes in Allele Frequency. However, Changes in Allele Frequency cannot be evolution, as they cannot create new genes, variations, or species. They would in fact be a result of such evolution, were it to occur, thus making it not a viable CAUSE of evolution, as nothing can be the cause and the effect at the same time in the same way. Also, Changes in Allele Frequency can occur because of something as simple as migrations, births, or deaths, and cannot be made synonymous with Evolution. The ultimate failure of this proposed mechanism is that it is a statistical change, not a genetic one. This is mere census information, and cannot be evolution, nor even a mechanism of evolution.
We looked at Descent with Modification. This was rejected because it is so ambiguous that it has no meaning. All this term can mean is “Change over time,” which doesn’t say enough to separate the origin of a species from the extinction of a species, and thus can’t be said to be evolution. Furthermore, we acknowledged that many changes from one generation to the next can result from shuffling existing genes, or losing existing genes, neither of which are evolutionary changes because they do not grow that Darwinian Tree of Life.
We looked at Vestigial Organs and Structures and found that, while they are listed on most textbooks and web sites intending to promote Evolution, these are literally the evidence of the LOSS of structures and functions, which is the exact opposite of what Darwinian Evolution is intending to explain.
We spent considerable time looking at the favorite mechanism for making, not only new kinds of plants and animals, but comic book super heroes: Mutations. Mutations are so unlikely to create new genetic information, and so much more likely to cause damage to existing genes that the creation of a new gene by mutations is essentially impossible. We’ve never seen a beneficial mutation which adds information to a genome, and have only seen MANY examples of mutations causing harm to existing genes. The odds of mutations making a new functional gene is far less than the odds of flipping a coin heads up a thousand times in a row. Information requires a mind, and genetics, DNA, and the machines of every cell are packed full of information, thus evolution cannot be the cause, but rather, in the beginning, God created.
After we’d examined all of the proposed mechanisms of evolution we looked at more alleged evidence for evolution, starting with Fossils. The problem, we discovered, is that the fossils are not found in the Darwinian order, and have to be arranged that way according to Evolutionary Theory. The ages of the rocks and the fossils are based on circular reasoning, where in the rocks date the fossils and the fossils date the rocks, and the entire enterprise once again requires you to accept evolutionary theory as fact before you begin the process, so that evolution can be used as evidence for evolution. Even worse, the fossils show NO transitional forms, thus showing no evolution happening, even if the deep time, evolutionary dates are accepted. They also show stasis, meaning things staying the same for long periods of time unchanged, which again is evidence of no evolution happening. Finally, the existence of plants and animals called “Living Fossils” prove that even if you accept the evolutionary dates, you cannot construct an evolutionary sequence from the fossils because we can’t know, from the fossils, when an animal was on earth or not, since, if you accept the evolutionary dates, they can be living on earth for millions of years without leaving a fossil.
The next bit of alleged evidence for Evolution was Molecular Clocks. Some people try to claim that DNA changes at a constant and predictable rate, but this was shown to be false for several reasons. First, because DNA decays so quickly, we have to extrapolate FAR into the past where no evidence exists, thus making the entire concept speculation with no possibility of evidence. Next, there is no agreement between clocks and the same species can yield different dates depending on what you date and what assumptions you bring to the table. The biggest objection, in my humble opinion, is the fossil record. Evolutionary theory states that the fossil record shows species living on earth, unchanged, for hundreds of millions of years, but clearly if that were possible, it would prove that DNA does not change at a regular and predictable rate.
Finally, we looked at a textbook classic piece of support for evolutionary theory, Homologous Features. These are features believed to be shared by different species because that feature was passed down from a common evolutionary ancestor which had that feature. But again we learned the double edged sword which is evolution, as we saw that a common feature could not be called Homologous unless we already believed that the species in question had a common ancestor with that feature. Thus, far from being evidence for evolution, we see that evolution and a particular evolutionary sequence must already be accepted before the common feature can even be called homologous.
Thus, at the end of the road we learn that the Evidence and Mechanisms of Darwinian evolution cannot cause evolution to happen. When properly understood, evolution is seen to be intellectually bankrupt- a collection of logical fallacies and wishful thinking. It has no observable evidence to support it, it must be used as evidence for itself, and regardless of whatever other beliefs you may have, evolution, when understood properly, fails on its on merits.
It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
I was hoping for applause but got a couple of grunts of “Huh,” and the sound of root beer being slurped. But then Blue Beard clapped. And then he clapped again.
And then Bill Joined him in clapping. And then Tom did, but not with full enthusiasm. But that was ok.
And then Carl said, “Now can we pick apart his spelling and grammar?” But it was too late, for Wendy had arrived with our plate of Nachos. “Hold on,” Carl said to her. “Before you put those Nachos down, I think I should point out that you haven’t done anything to prove that God exists, let alone that he made the world in six days.”
“I wasn’t trying to,” I said. “I was merely attempting to show that Darwinian Evolution fails on its own merits. You don’t have to be a creationist or even a theist in order to see that evolution is false. You can reject it merely by understanding it properly, where as Evolution is based on a foundation of rejecting the Bible as true history.”
“I know it’s been a long time,” Bill added, “but the conversation wasn’t about Creation verses Evolution. It was just about Evolution. Whether it’s true or false.”
“But since he’s brought it up,” said Tom, “I would like to hear a defense of the opposing side. We’ve looked at Evolution according to its merits. How about we do the same with Creation?”
“You guys can do what you like,” said Wendy, “but I’m putting these Nachos down. They weigh a ton.”
Standing on my toes to see over our Nacho dinner, I said to them, “Challenge accepted! On Thursday next, I shall have another Power Point Presentation of scientific education and clip art!” I took their munching on handfuls of Nacho to mean they were in agreement, and began making mental preparations. I do enjoy the study of Creation Science, or, as I call it, “Science.” But I secretly was also excited to make another Power Point Slide Show.
Happy Nachos! And thanks for letting me be your Rent A Friend
