What are your thoughts on evolution?

Congratulations for your A.

Maybe you deserve some more educated friends, but partying is good too. Don't forget to enjoy life.

<< I do believe Darwin >>

There is nothing to "believe in" theory of evolution.

Science is not faith. A scientific theory can be more or less well supported (and evolution is very well supported), you can understand it or not (evolution is easier than general relativity or some other theories), a theory can be refuted by a better theory... but "believe in" a theory is meaningless.

<< Against - Evolution is not happening at this precise moment. >>

Evolution IS happening, evolution is still going on, it never stops:

- next winter you'll need a new shot because flu virus has been evolving since last year...

- 10,000 years ago all humans were lactose intolerant. Nowadays, 50 % of people can digest milk at adulthood. This is one of the last and still ongoing human evolution (only 50 % because this evolution hasn't yet reached Asia).

<< we did not evolve from apes>>

First, we ARE apes, 1 among 7 species of great apes (Hominidae family). None of them evolved from an other. We all evolved from the same 15 million years old archaic hominid (so technically an "ape" too even if it more closely resembled a tailless monkey than a modern ape, and so we did evolve from an extinct ape).

- Orangutans genus first branched out our family (Sivapithecus is close to this split), moved to Asian tropical forests and later evolved into the amazing tree climbers we know.

- Then gorillas evolved into the strongest apes (Ouranopithecus and Dryopithecus are slightly older than this split)

- More recently, remaining apes split into human savanna runner and chimps staying in forest. Hominids nicknamed Orrorin and Toumai are very close to the chimp-Australopithecus split. their discoverers would want them to be on the human (Australopithecus) side but we can't tell that for sure. Ardi is definitely an Australopithecus ancestor, not a chimp's.

<< there are apes around today>>

Of course: Americans came from British (among others) and there are still Brits around today. So what?

<< We cannot see it in front of us that it's happening >>

No we can't. I mean we can't see human evolution because our evolution is too slow.

Without abnormal environmental conditions (fast climate change, cosmic disaster...), we can say it takes about:

- 500 to 1000 generations for an environmental adaptation,

- 5 to 10,000 generations for the speciation of 2 isolated populations.

Humans have a very slow reproduction cycle (20 - 25 years) 10,000 generations of humans take 250,000 years.

You can't see it!

On the other hand, microorganisms like viruses and bacterias split within hours and adapt within a couple of months. That's why we are facing antibiotic resistance, hospital infections etc.

<< My thoughts >>

Evolution should be a normal science, just a part of biology. But unfortunately it contradicts some religions (a couple of religions among hundreds). There are no issues with evolution, but fundamentalist lobbies tend to make it controversial (actually there is only 1 issue, it contradicts Genesis chapter 1, btw so did Genesis chapter 2!)

In countries like Saudi or US, evolution can't be discussed dispassionately because of some bronze age text!

I just want to clear up a little misconception. It's very common, and I hear it all the time. We didn't evolve from apes - at least not any species of ape that is currently alive today. Rather, humans and the various ape species share a common ancestor. That ancestor was ape-like, but biologically speaking, was as different from modern apes as it was from us. That ancestor went extinct a long time ago. That means that chimpanzees, for example, aren't our ancestors - they're more like very distant cousins.

Also, evolution IS happening. It's just not a process that's easily visible. People have this image of a species just morphing into another species, but that's not how it happens. Evolution isn't a process so much as it is a result. With each new generation, there is variation - offspring aren't exactly like their parents, nor are they a perfect blending. Nature selects from this pool of variation. Individuals with beneficial traits have a higher chance of surviving and reproducing, and therefore of passing on those beneficial traits. Repeat the process over many generations, and the tiny changes start to pile up into large changes. Repeat with several traits, and the species will have changed to fit it's environment - it will have evolved.

Because creationism has absolutely no credible evidence supporting it I have to dismiss it as an invalid explanation of how humans came to exist. Technically humans are an ape as are chimps, gorillas and other members of the great ape family.

The theory of evolution has a wealth of supporting evidence & almost all foundations of science are connected to or based on this theory. Geology, biology, chemistry and anthropology are all woven into the evidence supporting evolution and other sciences. To date nobody has offered any credible evidence refuting the theory of evolution... the Nobel proze awaits anyone finding evidence to prove the theory wrong.

Each new discovery tends to support predictions made by the theory of evolution and although some discoveries have produced surprises (finding that bipedalism predates the increase in brain size) none offered any evidence that all apes did not come from a common ancestor at some point in time.

Because unless identical twins (cloning is a form of twinning separated in time) every human is different & has a few mutations. Therefore since we are approaching 7 billion humans on Earth, we are evolving at a rapid rate. Mutated genes will not undergo positive selection unless they offer some advantage to those having them but if a population undergoes a "bottle neck" whereby the people with the mutated genes have a far better chance of surviving & producing offspring then the genes will be "selected" for.

Evolution has no goal & produces more undesirable effects than desirable ones but the undesirable qualities tend to be selected out of the gene pool. Helpful mutations that happen in the time & environment conducive to their selection may be selected by plain old chance.

It may be happening at this precise moment. I imagine you don't look exactly like your parents. Of course, it takes thousands of generations to become a different species.

Humans evolved from apes. Anthropologists, paleontologists and other naturalists all agree this to be fact - not theory. There are still apes because some apes evolve this way and some evolve that way. Some group of apes, maybe 6 or 7 million years ago separated from others in their same species. Maybe they ended up on different sides of a body of water or mountain range. But they were never to meet again as the same species. So some evolved into humans while others evolved into chimpanzees. We didn't evolve from apes around today. But we have common ancestors.

My thoughts on Evolution? The scientific theory of Evolution is pretty solid. The theory that over many generations, Life changes and diverges (evolution) is pretty much proven by the fossil record alone, without even referencing to the many other forms of evidence, such as comparative morphology, embryology, DNA, or to observations under laboratory conditions, or even in the field. Evolution is a fact of biological life. It is Natural History.

What is more open for further debate and research, are the mechanisms that drive Evolution. Darwin kicked it off with his theory of Natural Selection. However, since the new or modern evolutionary synthesis with DNA research, other mechanisms are being looked at and discovered. This does not cast any doubt on Evolution or even on Darwin's work. It's just that we hope one day to be able to understand the mechanics better, at gene level.

Back to your Q.

We are closely related to great apes. Proven in morphology, comparative DNA studies, mtDNA, and the growing hominin fossil record. No doubts about that.

By the way, you stated that Evolution "is not happening". It is! Evolution does not stop until any one lineage finally hits extinction. Evolution is gradual and ongoing. It goes on today and now, but it's so slow, you don't see it move. Scientists fighting viruses see it though. They see it in the lab, as a virus mutates to survive and to spread, jumping hosts, circumnavigating human made defences such as vaccinations.

I am also an atheist. However, I respect any theist that continues to believe in their creator gods, whilst accepting the evidence of Evolution. As one contributor here recently said "in the mosque I believe in creation, in the street I believe in evolution".

Religious fundamentalists (not just Christians) though, will not accept any evidence as "irrefutable proof!". However much hardcore evidence that you present them, they will simply accuse you of "flannel and BS". These hard core of truth deniers are best ignored.

very very very few people received anything like a good education in science

remember this is all less than 150 years old and most of the good information is less than 50 yeras old

My father studied Law in the 20-30sd and at the time the big evolutionary "missing link" was "piltdown man" which turned out to be a total fraud mixing human and animal bones to make and English (fake) scientist look good

the details of human evolution are still being discussed read "the Neanderthal Enigma" written in the late 90s

I have seen the "lucy" skeleton (non human) on display

we are only beginning to understand the universe. in 100 years our current ideas may look "quaint and oldfashioned"

Physics has changed since I got my degree only 50 years ago

this is the age of Biology, DNA was only discovered when I was in high school, back then biology was naming plants

i think of that hermit needs to envision the definition of theory, in terms of technological understanding... that is not any longer a similar by using fact the layman use of the word. In technological understanding, theory is an regular logical hypothesis, per information. Edit: Greg, you're suggesting that that is puzzling to have confidence that species could have discovered to conform to their atmosphere and evolve over Billions of years, in spite of marvelous quantities of documented study to help one in all those theory, yet that that is life like to anticipate some omniscient entity that predates the time-honored universe coming up us and the universe for motives unknown, in spite of no information to signify one in all those component (different than some thoughts written down approximately seven-hundred years later, by way of guys approximately some guy or woman who claimed to be the avatar son of that divine being, over 2,000 years in the past), is life like ? i think of we are going to could desire to comply with disagree on that one... Edit: F W... as I suggested to hermit, a theory is amazingly regular by way of the scientific community as actuality (ie. the theory of relativity), a theory in technological understanding can in basic terms substitute right into a regulation as quickly as there is sufficient information that it won't be able to be argued. ie. Gravity. all of us comprehend Gravity exists, truthfully. Evolution at a similar time as logical and supported by way of the information, isn't shown infallible truthfully.

What's wrong with believing in God :p

I believe in evolution, but I think all creatures are descended from one microbial a-sexual bacterium thingy. I think I read somewhere that we no longer evolve because we have no reason to adapt anymore. As for animals, there are animals evolving because of us, baby elephants no longer growing tusks supposedly because of hunters.

First of all, Molly, I adore your enquiring mind. 'Sensible' people you can debate these subjects with are so few and far between. I know, I've been researching (and debating) them for over 50 years from when I was a young science student.

Evolution, as a theory (scientifically derived or not), is very feasible and is 'faithfully' accepted by the majority of evolutionists as fact, despite there being no 'actual' IRREFUTABLE evidence, so far found, in either the lab or in the fossil field, to support their 'beliefs'. Evolutionism has no more 'positive' (indisputable) evidence to support it than creationism.

Staunch evolutionists will 'preach' (from their bibles viz, a multitude of heavily biased, ambiguous, misleading and information-less websites) all day long about how "factual" evolution is, but none can actually produce one tiny shred of evidence that 'proves', beyond a shadow of doubt, that the 'theory of evolution' is now the 'fact of evolution'. Nor, btw, has any 'official scientific paper' ever been presented, declaring that 'proof' of evolution has now been found.

I set out over 50 years ago, as an evolutionist by education and a very weak 'god-did-it-ist' (that's how it was in those days), in search of the truth. Needless to say, my life's experiences and observations have destroyed all possible beliefs in an omnipotent, caring, loving and perfect, supernatural deity (though I can't rule out supernaturalism all together because I can't comprehend what lies beyond the Universe), but, by the same token,and more surprisingly, despite the fierce opposition I get from the more fanatical evolutionists, there's even less evidence, imo, for evolution than there is for ID creationism.

Basically, for there isn't space here to go too deep into it, but to say that the similarities of DNA in chimps and humans is proof of evolution, is a mistake. ALL living things have, in varying degrees, similar DNA, it's the building blocks of life, and an even bigger error is to 'declare' that humans and apes came from a 'common ancestor' when, not only is there not one iota of evidence of ANY common ancestor, they can't even name one nor explain what type of creature it was, and yet there should be mountains of evidence of them.

Ignore my outlandish 'suggestion' of ancient and super advanced ETs, it's just something I find feasible to fill the massive gaps and flaws in religion and evolutionism. If you really do want to debate the subject(s) then you most certainly will need to know ALL the 'FACTS', as well as the 'faithful', unsupported by 'irrefutable' evidence, imaginations.

SEEK THE 'REAL' TRUTH AND KEEP AN OPEN MIND!

I don't believe in evolution. We are not evolving today, and if we really did come from mutations then why can't such offspring- like a mule- reproduce? Just what I think.