Does convergent evolution make Evolution seem ridiculous to anyone else besides me??

Question

In 9th grade, they say, "Hey, homologous characteristics, evolution must be true" then in college they say, "well, actually the new field of molecular genetics is rearranging the trees. now the homologous characteristics are actually just analagous." So... despite the fact that the odds of getting a four-chambered heart from a three-chambered heart are bad enough for it happening once (seeing as how you have to get enough random mutations in the DNA that just HAPPEN to translate into another whole heart chamber)... now they're asking me to believe it happened twice, in two different evolutionary branches???? Do those odds seem silly to anyone else?? And that's just one example. This crazy phenomenon of 'convergent evolution' has happened hundreds of times. Evolution doesn't even make sense to me anymore!!

Answer 1

I personally think that evolutionists will stop at nothing trying to prove their theory is true.Which they will never be able to do.The Bible and creation has stood firm,never changing for thousands of years.I don't think evolution can make the same claim!

Answer 2

I do not understand a lot of the terminology you are using. But I think I get the gist of what you are saying.
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What I would contribute is to say that whenever mankind forms a theory about the complex issue of life creation he immediately finds abberations and anomalies or exceptions to the theories rules to which the theorists have varying attitudes. Some outright dismiss what is heard until it is shouted loudly enough that it is indeed heard. Then the task begins to explain the exceptions to the theory. By the time some brilliant scientist or theorist has figured out why, the scientific community at large has agreed on the formation of a new, improved theory.
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For me personally I think the Chaos theory has a lot to offer in this subject. Life will always find a way. It is simplistic I know but just maybe when all the theories are looked back on, all they were were stepping stones in the search for our understanding and that we needed to make the issue complex before we could understand that it was inherently simple. Life will triumph, no matter. So the different discriptive terms are simply the search for the truth. Just like children trying out new words for the first time. They eventually find better and bigger words. But as adults often go back to those first simple words they learnt because they now know that they explain the subject matter equally well as the larger more technical words. Just could be.

Answer 3

>>>>>>(seeing as how you have to get enough random mutations in the DNA that just HAPPEN to translate into another whole heart chamber)..<<<<<<

Well that isn't strictly true. The genes don't code for the chamber itself but the instructions for making a chamber and its building blocks. It is a vital distinction. The actual building blocks for building the chamber are already there (the genes for heart connective tissue proteins and so on) it is just how it all goes together that is different. You may have heard of single gene mutations in fruit flies that make legs grow in place of attentae. It may be that the transition is less complicated than you think.

Besides most multicellular animal have very similar genes (in some cases virtually identical genes) to work with and so I don't find it that surprising.

Also remember that mutations are only random in the sense that they don't necessarily cause good/bad things to happen. However they aren't random in the sense that not all places on chromosomes are equally likely to mutate. This narrows down the amount of mutations that are actually possible. Then add to that millions of years, generations and individual organisms and it you end up with lots of opportunities for evolution.

>>>>Do those odds seem silly to anyone else?? <<<,

Intuitively it may seem silly but inuitition isn't LOGIC. Intuition only deal with things we are familar with, it basically pattern recognition. Humans are not used to time scales longer than a few decades or the molecular world of genetics. If we could live for millions of years maybe we wouldn't find it so hard to believe that such seemingly unlikely changes could happen.
It seems to make sense that evolution would lead to very similar solutions if only certain solutions work.

Answer 4

Your basic argument is this. Something like a four chambered heart can either evolve once, very early in a branching tree of species, and be passed to all or can evolve independently in separate species. You assert that the latter is statistically unlikely, but this assertion is clearly nonsense.

You assertion assumes that there are multiple good or best survival strategies, and so each should evolve with some statistical likelihood. But if a particular feature - like a four chambered heart - is statistically better for survival then it is statistically inevitable that it will evolve multiple times.

Thankfully you do not invoke god as an alternative explanation, though there are plenty of ignorant bigots who have added that in the answers. Maybe they should actually go out and learn something rather than trying to dismiss the canon of science on the basis of a single page of a book written 2,000 years ago. Nutters.

Answer 5

Hmm it makes sense to me. Now, take the caterpillar and the butterfly how on earth does a non flying creature change into a flying one. I meant how on earth can it. It envolues (sp) wings and has a total change from the form it was a caterpillar. The caterpillar turns into a butterfly that then lays eggs that latch into caterpillars. Now what if that butterfly or something like if many millions of years ago had a mutation that when the eggs latch they were already butterflys or what ever species they were. Now how could you prove it will you can't as there be no prove of it around. So how do I know that the same didn't happen to monkeys that turned into humans, did thoose monkey have a transfomation stage then they reach a set stage. Did one of thoose humans genes mutated so then the human gave birth if gave birth to a thing in human form and not the pre-human monkey form ?

Answer 6

You must keep in mind that evolution keeps what works and throws out what doesn't. Many of these advances benifit many animals along many ecological niches.
In your example, a four chamber heart is far more efficient and results in higher endurance, better blood flow, and so forth. This would benifit a wide range of creatures. So animals that evolved the four chambered heart would survive better and pass on their genes more often than those three chambered low endurance slugs.

Answer 7

There are sound reasons for preferring the theory of evolution, and it is high time that you learned what they are.
1. The theory of evolution is established science: this means that it makes predictions which workers in the field find useful because they are correct. Even if there were not overwhelming evidence showing that the theory is correct, and why (which, of course there is), the fact that it makes correct predictions is sufficient grounds for accepting it.
2. Every theory which posits divine intervention to achieve a result is irrefutable: there is no means whatsoever of showing that such a theory is false (because it could, in fact, be true, with no difference in observable results). It is provable that the predictive power of any theory obtains strictly from its refutability. Hence, no theory involving divine intervention can predict anything: all such theories are useless.

Answer 8

There is a theory that genes can drift from one species to another via viruses, making the tree more of a cloud

Answer 9

Mutations are happening all the time, but they happen over squillions of years and squillions of individuals! So, NO, it doesn't seem ridiculous to me. (But no-one says YOU have to believe it)
"Sparky," the whole point of evolution is that it doesn't "stand firm and unchanging"!! Evolution = How things evolve from one form to another, adapt to survive!!

Answer 10

religious beliefs of all types take faith!