Evolution theory make sense?

Question

I asked a boy in school does evolution make sense to you? he said its all Greek to me.
Than I asked a Greek and he said nonsense why talk about it.
Im so confused about evolution?

Answer 1

I submit that this question in and of itself is answer enough. How slippery and clever of you to ask it in such fashion. Very well done.

Answer 2

Back in 1776, monarchists argued against democracy as a form of government. They said it was absurd to believe that "All men are created equal" because anyone could see men came in different heights, weights and colors. Women did too, they said. Case closed.

My point is not about democracy. It is about debate. Before you argue about something, you should understand it. If you don't understand it, you'll look foolish. Gilda Radner, on the original "Saturday Night Live" TV Show, used to do a sketch every couple of weeks in which she made completely ridiculous arguments. One night she argued vehemently against the "Deaf Penalty", instead of the "Death Penalty". She looked absurd, which was the point, and we all laughed until the beer came out our noses, which was what she wanted. You don't want people to laugh at you.

In a serious debate, you should understand the other side. Note that I didn't say "Believe". Understanding is not the same as believing. If you were to study 20th century European Political history, you would have to understand several forms of government: communism (the UUSR), fascism (Germany, Italy), socialism (Lots of countries), socialist democracy, capitalistic democracy and constitutional monarchy. You would not believe in all of them; you could not believe in all of them at once. If you tried, your head would explode. You would, however, have to understand their basic concepts.

If you were to study comparative religion, you would have to understand what Jews, Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs, Taoists and Confucians believe. You would not have to convert to a new religion every week, but you would have to understand the other ones. You would not get very far in your studies if you dismissed all the other ones as "wrong". They believe their path is the right one just as strongly as you believe your path is the right one.

99% of the biologists alive today believe that species evolve, and that the theory of evolution is the best explanation we have for the diversity of life. Christian biologists, Jewish biologists, Muslim biologists, Hindu biologists, Buddhist biologists; Australian, Bolivian and Chinese biologists; 99% of them believe it is the best explanation. Yes, it is only a theory. Planetary motion - the theory that the earth went around the sun, not vice versa - was only a theory for a long time. Some people still don't believe it. Their eyes tell them differently.

Species don't evolve at the same rate and they don't all have to evolve. Alligators, to take one example, haven't changed much for 40 million years. The ones that were 50 feet long have become extinct, but the normal 14-footers are still there in the swamps, hoping men don't shoot them to use their hides for shoes. They didn't have to worry about that 3 million years ago. We humans are at the top of the heap today, either because we evolved or God liked us better than He did the alligators. Either way, we can make tools better than any other species.

Your question has been answered, hundreds of times, by people more versed in biology than I. It gets answered ever week here at YA.

If you are truly curious, ask your minister to give you a short, reasoned explanation of evolution. If he says he can't because it is wrong, he is as ignorant as those monarchists I mentioned in my opening paragraph.

Answer 3

Darwin’s Origin of Species offers a straightforward theory regarding speciation (i.e. a scientific explanation for the diversity of species) called the theory of natural selection. This is not a theory regarding the origin of life. Natural selection does not address the origin of the universe. It is not a cosmological concept. It is not the same as the philosophy of naturalism, which proclaims the physical to be the totality of existence. The Theory of Natural Selection in its present form accounts for the origination of new species from common ancestral forms by the repeated process of “genetic mutation, natural selection (with regard to Malthusian principles), and hereditary transmission, whereby the frequencies of newly altered, repeated, and old genes in a given lineage can cross ecological, structural, and behavioral thresholds that radically separate one species from another” (Gould, S.J., Wonderful Life, 1989). (Evolution=observed fact/Natural Selection=explanatory theory) In one sense, this can be summed up in a syllogism, which must be true if we make the basic and essential act of faith that logic itself is true: survivors survive. Given enough time, variation among the genes of individuals, variations in habitat in space and time, the process by which genes translate into proteins, tissues, and organs, and the thresholds that define biological species, all of which can be observationally verified, the principle of the “survivors survive” syllogism must bring about a huge branching of different kinds of life. Evolution is the physical phenomena that the theory on Natural Selection is attempting to explain.

Answer 4

the theory of evolution was basically conducted by Charles Darwin
a good website for evolution in my oppinion is: http://www.mala.bc.ca/~johnstoi/essays/courtenay1.htm

im christian, but i feel theres no reason not to have ideas about other possibilities, and evolution has some good facts that has no reason not to believe

Answer 5

Well I suppose it is a pesonal thing and it might to some and it may not to others . I believe that you should look into to it more to confirm your beliefs, which are that you are beginning to question. That you might discover more than what you already have !

Answer 6

well, theoratically, yes. but you have to remember that it kind of clashes with one's religion. unless you're an atheist,(who doesn't believe in any religion)it's really hard to understand it completely