Why or why not do you believe in Evolution?

Question

I would like to know how others feel about this subject. Thanks!

Answer 1

I do believe in evolution. When one looks at various species and compares them, there are too many similarities to be coincidental. That species adapt slowly over time is a fact disputed by few people. It just makes sense that evolution would occur - it's adaptation over a very long course of time. We see it with plants; some freak accident allows two dissimilar flowers to cross-pollenate and suddenly we have a new species. That's what evolution is.

Answer 2

This is an interesting question because it shows a distinct difference between religious and scientific thought. Scientists do not "believe" in evolution like Christians believe in God. There is overwhelming data that supports the evolution of life over the past 3.5 billion years or so. And no evidence for creation or intelligent design. So scientists work with evolution.

Not because they have faith in it. But because the data supports it. And it makes predictions that can be tested. And they can use it to plan and do their experiments.

If someone comes up with a better model AND as much data as there is to support evolution, then scientists would willingly abandon evolution. And believe me, most scientists would give their right arm to be that somebody. The scientist who comes up with a better model will be famous.

Evolution happened and continues to happen. One of my favorite examples is the humble yeast that give us beer and bread.

Scientists and nature evolve new species of these little guys all the time. A powerful definition of a new species is one where the kids can no longer have kids with the same species. In other words, a chromosomal change has happened that causes the progeny to no longer produce viable offspring with the species it came from. This happens in yeast frequently and is relatively easy to do in the lab (see http://www.thetech.org/genetics/ask.php?id=143 for the details).

Answer 3

I believe in Evolution, the concept that existing animals and plants developed by a process of gradual, continuous change.
I believe that Evolution and the theory of Evolution are accurate. Why? Well, there are relatively simple experiments and observations that lead to more complex experiments and observations that prove that evolution is believable. All you have to do is type evolution in Yahoo's search box and hit enter to learn more and review all the major discoveries of scientists over the years.

Here's a simple scenario to back up a belief in Evolution: a scientist discovers that by breeding plants with certain characteristics, those characteristics can be increased and/or changed in some way, and can create hybrids. This includes, color, size, size and quality of grain or fruit as well as others characteristics. Now, when you place those plants in the wild, in nature, let nature run its course, and add the dimension of time, a scientist studying these plants realizes that the plant will change over the years according to the environment it lives in. The plant and how plentiful it is will be affected by warmer seasons and colder seasons. Stronger plants will survive and change and , well, EVOLVE. Given enough time, plants eventually can become radically different sizes and ultimately, different species from the original plant, a plant that could continue or cease to exist. This process is known as natural selection. Scientists have also discovered that this process is not limited to plants but also includes all living things, animals, birds, fish, insects, amphibians, reptiles, bacteria, viruses, ect... When living things evolve like this, it is called EVOLUTION.

It is as simple as that, and that is why I believe in Evolution.

Ironically, I also believe in God and His miracles. I also believe that there are a lot of things that we don't know or understand yet. That being said, it is possible that, at some point, Religion and Science shall be reconciled to each other.

Answer 4

I believe in it. Most people look at primates or large animals to argue whether evolution should be believed or not. I tend to look at smaller creatures where evolution is readily apparent and cannot really be argued. Organisms such as bacteria can mutate and change and evolve easily within our own lifetimes. Those new strains of bacteria you hear about on the news that are resistant to current antibiotics or vaccines have evolved to become resistant.

Is it that hard to expand that same principle to other living organisms? Life has been on this planet for millions of years so it would almost be silly to say that evolution cannot possibly exist in humans just because most of us believe in God. I will agree it is hard to fathom at times that apes are our ancestors, but the fossil evidence is pretty substantial, at least in showing that humans have evolved in some ways.
You can't pretend this evidence does not exist just because you believe in God. Afterall, humans wrote the Bible in a time where they thought the world was flat and believed in spontaneous generation. There is no way EVERYTHING in the bible is 100% accurate so why should we think the parts of the bible dealing with creation are perfectly known and recorded? Adam and Eve were the first 2 humans so who took notes on all that was happening? Not to get a big religous debate going but you can't just slap a "GOD did it" label on everything. There is usually more to it than that.

Answer 5

Evolution is a belief system about the past. It is not scientific fact. Why I don't believe in Evolution is

a) because I'm a Christian and the Bible tells us that Death and Suffering entered the world through Adam and Eve's sin. Evolution states that death and suffering has been happening for millions of years.

b) There is no scientific proof that genetic mutations have added new beneficial genetic information to DNA. Any mutations that you hear of, the DNA is actually losing information and being damaged. For evolution to be true, new information needs to be added to the DNA.

Here is a site that is interesting:

http://www.answersingenesis.org/creation/v20/i1/superbugs.asp

This link is about "superbugs". You sometimes hear about viruses becoming resistant etc. That's what this above link is about. It clearly shows that these superbugs are not evolving and shows clearly how they become resistant.

Here are also some good videos you might be interested in:

http://answersingenesis.org/video/ondemand/answersWithKen.asp
http://answersingenesis.org/video/ondemand/default.asp

Answer 6

Interesting how many people disbelieve in Evolution because of a few basic points:

1. They take Genesis literally- pretty much because they were told to (the Bible itself only claims inspiration or inerrancy for the laws and the prophets, not every word).

2. They use the 'if man evolved from apes, why are there still apes' bit- ignoring that what the 'evolved from apes' bit REALLY means is that modern apes and humans evolved from the same stock.

3. They use the development of human intelligence without really knowing the biology behind that. We are not so much 'smarter' than other species, but better at communication, which is the key to so much of our civilization and apparent 'IQ'.

Now- if you look at the apes of Africa-
- Small groups that live close have almost no communications. They know who the Alpha male is, etc. at all times, and they can easily track their social relationship to the troop's leader and location of all members.
- As groups get bigger and more spread out (as you change species), they have more and more troubles tracking where everyone is, and what their relationship to the troop's leadership is. This is a vital point- as troops get bigger and more spread out, you need to know who is in tight with the troop's leadership, and who is on the outs so you know where YOU stand.
- Baboons have HUGE troops spread over BIG areas, and they have lots of forms of communication- calls, vocalizations, postures, gestures, etc. their communications are so complicated that we only understand a fraction of them.

The difference between us and a troop of baboons, culturally, is that we are even more spread out and have a more complicated language to accomodate our bigger needs.

It is actually pretty easy to track the development of human intelligence, and it does not require a maker to do so.

I do not think any of this disproves the existance of God in any way- I just think He 'wound things up' and let them go according ot the rules He built in.

Answer 7

I believe in micro evolution, but after reading about scientific research I found that there is not as much evidence to support evolution as the average person thinks. There is actually a lot of scientific evidence to support creation. A great book to read is "The Case for A Creator" by Lee Strobel, a former investigative reporter and atheist who set out to prove that Christianity was all a farce. He found so much irrefutable evidence to the contrary that he became a Christian who believes in creation. This book gives factual evidence of a Creator through biochemistry, astronomy, physics, and DNA research.

Many experts say that the theory of evolution actually requires more blind faith that believing in creation. There's another book called "Darwin's Black Box: the Biochemical Challenge to Evolution" by Michael Behe. It outlines scientific findings that were not known in Darwin's time that make the theory of evolution questionable.

Answer 8

look here sonny, seems like your a darkseed , let me shed some light on your subject take the good ole book and read Gensis 1;27 and Genesis2;1 and you will find your answer. yea yea all the books state evolution is the way to beleive but dont be misinformed this good ole book has been around forever and if you have any questions take a look inside and find all your answers, i strongly beleive that some men are a result of evolution, they do act like monkeys sometimes. well your question is very interesting

Answer 9

I believe in Evolution because everthing has to evolve.
I donot believe in Evolution thinking that gould could have not waited so long waiting some stupids to evolve who will pray them!

Answer 10

Don't buy it for several reasons: (1) The theory of evolution still cannot explain the jump from the primates that we are supposedly related to and the exponentially more intelligent human beings, (2) It also cannot explain why primates are still around if we supposedly evolved from them, (3) It cannot explain the failure of non-chordates like sharks and reptiles like crocodiles not evolving over the last 10 million years, (4) It cannot adequately explain how life began, nor can it account for the fact that the odds against any type of life ever appearing on this Earth or any planet are so astronomically high that life in any form is a stastical impossibility, and (5) Charles Darwin, the father of the theory of evolution himself, recanted his theory in favor of creationism just before he died after a crusade of over a decade trying to disprove creationism.