So, this year we’ve had a bunch of frogs. Maybe because of all the rain or something, I don’t know. Has it been that way for you? I’ve heard from a couple of people that there’s a sort of infestation this year.
Well, I’ve got a 5 year old and a 3 year old who love frogs. I taught them how to catch them (by putting your hand in front of them so they jump right into your hand). They don’t like it when the frogs pee on them, but they know the frogs pee as soon as they are picked up, so they can avoid the pee for the most part.
We started catching the frogs and putting them in our aquarium turned terrarium (which used to house a couple of very filthy goldfish). I think we had 10 frogs in there at one time. They were mostly about the size of a donut hole.
Well, frogs have to eat, so I had to go outside and catch at least 10 grasshoppers…every day. Sometimes I would hunt for them twice in one day. This went on for about 3 weeks.
At first, the hoppers were plentiful, and I had my pick of sizes. I developed a strategy and a sort of a “swoop” to get them. I had no problems catching them.
Well, as the weeks went by, I noticed that either the grasshoppers were getting smarter, or they were hiding or something. It was taking me longer to catch them. They were there, so I knew it wasn’t that I had caught all of them. The ones that were available were higher jumpers, and would burrow into the grass, out of my reach.
I got thinking about this situation and how my understanding of Darwinian evolution would explain this by saying that the grasshoppers in my yard had adapted to being hunted by developing the ability to jump higher and burrow quicker.
This is how the theory explains evolution between species, right? A fish needed to move to another pool so he developed lungs and turned his feet into legs that could walk.
I think that’s silly. That’s like a gangster producing offspring that can dodge bullets better. Or a mother on the outskirts of the Sahara producing a child with a hump like a camel.
What I think was happening in my yard is that I was capturing the slow grasshoppers. The ones who jumped right into my hand. The ones that couldn’t burrow quickly enough, and so, those grasshoppers were not reproducing. So the only grasshoppers that were left were the ones that could evade me in the first place. That’s natural selection, not evolution.
I hear this argument stated as fact all the time…that something can learn to be stronger or develop a trait that makes it’s destruction impossible.
Like germs. I keep hearing the crazy notion that germs can somehow become resistant to antibiotics. The fact is, the ones that don’t get killed off by the antibiotics are the ones that were already resistant. They didn’t adapt by somehow eating the poison and then modify their system to actually use what was once able to kill them. That’s impossible.
On the other hand, I do think that it is dangerous to overuse antibiotics because of the fact that the germs that are resistant…will reproduce. That’s dangerous.
Rapid Variation
There were these mosquitoes in England that got their blood meal from birds. Well, when the subway tunnels were being built in London, a bunch of these mosquitoes got stuck underground. There weren’t any birds down there, but there were rats.
The mosquitoes that could feed off rats survived and reproduced. The ones that could not, died.
Some scientists studied these guys and found that the underground mosquitoes could now not easily mate with the mosquitoes above ground. They called them a new species.
Is this evolution like Darwin proposed? I don’t think so. It’s variation. They are still mosquitoes.
It’s just a matter of natural selection, not evolution. The fish that could live in the pool that was running out of food survived there, and are still there. The insect that could not jump high enough to reach the taller branches, ate what he found on the ground. The grasshoppers that were not able to react and jump fast enough were caught by me. At least in my front yard.
Answers in Genesis has a page on Natural Selection that I think is very well done. Here is their definition of Natural Selection:
“…the process by which individuals possessing a set of traits that confer a survival advantage in a given environment tend to leave more offspring on average that survive to reproduce in the next generation.”
Answers in Genesis is a great resource for creationists. Evolutionists might want to take a look at what they are saying. Pretty intriguing.
Have an interesting day.
What do you think?
1. Do you believe in the “molecule to philosopher” model of evolution?
2. What came first?
3. What’s the hardest part of the evolution theory to believe?
Natural selection is a small part of the Evolutionary Process, not all of it. It’s sort of like a catalyst. And speciation takes a very, very long time to happen – you certainly won’t be observing happening with macro-organisms in your backyard.
As for AiG, I advise not listening to anything they say. You know, they’re the big supports behind the Creation Museum which states Humans and Dinosaurs lived, worked and played together despite being no evidence for it (and lots against). AiG is also infamous for misrepresenting information and findings.
If you want a properly researched and fully referenced website about Evolution then I recommend http://www.talkorigins.org
I appreciate your comment, and thanks for the site recommendation. I’ll check it out.
I do in fact realize that “speciation” (if it actually happens) takes a very long time. My point was that Natural Selection is science…not theory.
As far as someone misrepresenting, it seems across the board, including creationists and evolutionists, so that does not sway my thinking. But it is this idea (misrepresentation) that is a major factor to take into consideration.
By the way, I agree with AiG as pertaining to what I have read from them and others…including that dinosaurs and humans walked together.
Sure, they might be stretching things sometimes, but watch “Walking With Dinosaurs” and you’ll hear the narrator stating specific behaviors as fact, when there is no evidence for some of the things stated.
Thanks again for your comment.
A scientific “theory” is not, in any way, the same as the every day use of the word. In an every day sense the word theory is used as an opinion or a hypothesis about some occurrence, but in science a theory is more than a fact. In fact, a scientific theory explains the observable facts, with absolute logic, compared to what is known at the time.
Speciation, cannot be naturally observed, as Matt, mentioned due to the immense amounts of time it takes for it to occur, but there is plenty of evidence to support it. Give two populations of the same animal, geographical separation and millions of generations later they will no longer be the same species, though resemblance will probably still be present.
As far as believing that dinosaurs and humans walked the earth together, well lets look at the evidence. Fossil age is determined by using one of numerous dating methods, that all work on different chemical principles. When a dinosaur fossil is discovered, the rock that formed around the fossil and preserved it, is dated using multiple of the above mentioned methods. Since there isn’t a record of a single dinosaur fossil, that dates any sooner than 65 million years ago, the hypothesis that humans and dinosaurs walked the earth together is conclusively disproved. In fact, if such a fossil were discovered, it would rewrite the textbooks.
In science, evidence is observed, and then a scientific theory or model, is created to explain and define the evidence. Then the model is refined and improved as more is discovered.
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