Why do some people have a hard time grasping the difference between adaptation and evolution?

Question

Everyone will admit to adaptation, that is a scientific fact.

Evolution has proven itself to be a flawed subject because, despite several years of archeological study, no link between current species and previous ones has been successfully found. Several distinct and different species have been found, but none that are truly links between one stage and the next.

I have some that are about to prove me wrong it would seem....... maybe they have something to show me that will make me change my mind on the subject.

The sites listed are informative and explain what I already knew. The possibility exists for their to have been evolutionary jumps, but the evidence does not support it. The article about the evolutionary aspect of HIV, is not evolution, it is adaptation. The virus is still very much the same virus, it is just adapting to become a much more efficent virus.

Funny thing is, I am not a chrisitan, or a man of any extreme faith. I am not a creationist either, the making of the world by an imaginary father figure that doesn't interact with society is also moronic in my book. I am just saying that both sides of the argument are incorrect in my book.

To the guy that wants adaptation as proof:

Differnes in races are examples of adaptation to survive in the different habitats that humans live in, but it doesn't make us a different species, now does it?

Answer 1

Because they have been brainwashed !!

And there is much that is wrong with the fossil record. If ALL current life forms come from a single source, then THERE SHOULD HAVE BEEN MILLIONS OF TRANSITION FORMS showing these changes. I don't need to discuss the matter further. I rest my case.

Edit:

In response to Owlwings below: that's philosophy not science!!

And for these who do not like my answer, supply me with evidence of millions of transition forms.

Answer 2

Other people have explained the difference between these two terms, so I'll address how Creationists tend to use them. Your question is also related to the difference between "microevolution" (adaptation) and "macroevolution" (speciation, or big evolution). Do you know the example of the light and dark moths? In England, there was a species of moth that had some individuals with lighter color and some with dark. The light ones used to outnumber the dark. However, during the Industrial Revolution, pollution made the tree trunks darker. Therefore, dark moths had better camouflage. After this change occurred, dark moths of this species were more common than light ones because the light ones were spotted and eaten by birds more often. Creationists like the ones in your question understand this example and see it as just a small adaptation. They don't think that new species can develop from this sort of tiny difference, so they don't think that it proves evolution. Actually, tiny changes like that over hundreds of thousands of years or millions of years add up in a population and it ends up slowly becoming a new species. I am a graduate student in physical anthropology and have studied human evolution extensively.

Answer 3

It's not an airtight theory - but in the SCIENTIFIC community (which should never be mixed with religion) there is enough evidence that it can be assumed to be at least mostly correct. You can't ask for foolproof evidence when your own perspective has NO evidence whatsoever.
If God created Adam and Eve and the whole universe in a week, then why do we have bones of people who were more primitive than we are? If you read any anthropology text, you can see a pretty steady progression of bones that lead to what we look like now. Yes, there are some missing. But we're talking about millions of years here - how can you reasonably expect them to have a sample of EVERY ONE???

Answer 4

An atheist that rejects evolution? Could it be? Thats like a theist that rejects creation!!!

You are very keen in your observation of the facts. The argument for naturalistic evolution (not caused by God, just nature) simply involves taking cases of adaptation (micro-evolution) and expanding it to the belief that it formed all complex life on earth given enough time and proper conditions.

You see things like viral adapatation and mankind building skyscrapers as already existing things building on what they have and in the end, are just going to become existed things 2.0 simply to survive, not to become something else. Without adaptation, all life would die off gradually.

However, atheists given their worldview are forced to take the belief that not only does the single celled organism become 2.0, deluxe, or enhanced, that it eventually breaks a threshold and becomes something multi-cellular and something completely different.

With that being said, what about Gods creation or general non-interaction with society do you find "moronic?" God created everything, gave his creation a mind of its own, we offended God, and now he takes up his dwelling somewhere else but reveals himself piece by piece to humanity so that some who dont wish to offend him may have dwelling with him again.

Its certianly more plausible then "we are just accidents of chance and the elements."

Answer 5

Some people want adaptation = evolution because we have plenty of evidence for adaptation, but 0 evidence for evolution (and possibly evidence against it). If they can make the two terms synonymous in people's minds, then they won't have to prove evolution, just adaptation. Some people want evolution to be true because it's their job, they make money off it. Others want it to be true because they are afraid of God, afraid of any concept of a Creator. That is why they scream bloody murder at Intelligent Design, even though ID generally accepts a lot of evolution's timeline, so it's not like it's undoing a lot of their work. They simply don't want the concept of "Creator as mutation agent"; they must have impersonal, random chance as the mutating agent, or else they can't rant about how religion is against science. I really don't see what their problem is--maybe one day i will. For now, i think i'll just keep puzzling on and on about this.

Answer 6

500 years ago, there was only 1 type of cabbage, most closely resembling kale. The Portuguese and Scots liked the curls, so they bred the cabbage to become more curly. The Italians liked the flowers, so they bred it to create rapini, broccoli, and cauliflower. The Germans liked it with thick, meaty, compact leaves, so they bred it to create heads of cabbage.

All these things came from the same ancestor, yet no evolution occurred (granted, humans intervened, but it could have happened on its own). IMO, "adaptation" is a result of LOSS OF GENETIC DIVERSITY, not more genetic diversity.

Answer 7

One reason is that they get their scientific information from newspapers and magazines that sensationalize scientific findings - like articles about a "new" frog or "new" butterfly species. They don't know there is a difference between speciation and evolution.

Answer 8

Adaptation is no more "scientific fact" than evolution or any other theory. Anything that is fact can be proven. So prove that adaptation is fact. I can provide you one piece of evidence supporting evolution for each piece of evidence you can provide supporting adaptation. But can you provide any evidence at all supporting creation?

Answer 9

Adaption is the precursor (or tool) of evolution.

When the adaptions differs from the original critter then a new animal has evolved.

.

Answer 10

This is true, evolution means evolving into something els, adaptation is to adapt to your environment, ever go to museums where they have period clothes and we were so much smaller than we are now as a whole, but we have not changed into some other species. This is just a very basic example.

Answer 11

There is in fact a lot of evidence supporting evolution. In fact there is zero evidence against it, if there were a new theory would emerge.
Of course religion has zero evidence supporting it. Can't even consider it to be a valid explanation for anything.