Evolution

[EcceNovaFacioOmni]

[quote name='goldenchild17' post='1075294' date='Sep 26 2006, 01:43 AM']
I don't think I'll get into this debate much because honestly I am so scientifically illiterate it's not funny. But I do have a couple questions to learn more about the theory.

Has there ever been a point that scientists could point to and say that here is an example where y was born from x, and is not the same species as x?
[/quote]
Not that I know of. I am pretty sure it has never been observed (if it was we'd have heard about it), although adaptation has been observed on the microscopic level (super bacteria that become immune to antibiotics, etc.).

[goldenchild17]

[quote name='thedude' post='1075310' date='Sep 26 2006, 01:00 AM']
Not that I know of. I am pretty sure it has never been observed (if it was we'd have heard about it), although adaptation has been observed on the microscopic level (super bacteria that become immune to antibiotics, etc.).
[/quote]

Well that's what I'm wondering. I know micro-evolution seems to be a fact and I accept that no problem. It's obvious that there are many different kinds of people with many different characteristics. But we're all still people. Same with dogs and cats and just about any animal you can think. But I didn't know if there was an actual species jump observation, I am not aware of such so that's why I asked. It just seems to me that if everything came about through these species jumps, that at least one of them would've been discovered... I dunno.

[Aloysius]

it happens once every couple tens-of-thousands of years... according to the archaelogical record and the corresponding dna evidence that traces it all back.

of course you could just say that each of these species was created uniquely in each of these eras and they just happen to look the same and each one's beginning just happens to mark the end of the other one... but it wouldn't account for the dna record nor the fact that it is proven that the slightest variation in a dna sequence could produce a new species by having its formation in the womb read these sequences of dna that would not be read in the rest of its species...

[goldenchild17]

ok but don't we have way more species than could evolve every tens of thousands of years? Or is the earth really that much older than anyone expected?

[Aloysius]

they couldn't have all evolved from one single thing all by chance, I'd say. I'll jump ship as we expand into biology and geology... i'm an anthropologist and i'm tired anyway...

I know we can be fairly certain that the earth is at least 600 million years old

dinosaurs were around 65 million years ago, even in that time there's plenty of tens of thousands of years...

[goldenchild17]

okay yeah that would be getting beyond what I knows scientifically. I accept the young earth theory, so it wouldn't quite work for me I think. One or the other would have to change a bit either I would need to be convinced of an old earth, or evolution I think would need to fit young earth which I'm not sure it can.

But you say all living things couldn't have come from one thing. I'm not familiar with this one. Would you be saying that there were a number of original beings from which different groups of animals evolved from each, and so on and so forth?

[KnightofChrist]

What about this, what if people just looked like apes millions of years ago, yet they had souls as we do.

Can anyone go back in time and ask one of these ape-like humans “are you a ape, or are you a person?”

I do not buy in to evolution I think for the most part its a joke, within 200yrs man will think something completely different. There are many great flaws in the theory of evolution, which is still just a theory anyway... And it is taught as if it were a law, or can be proven, when in fact, it is not a law, and can not and has not been proven.

What I do think is there is adaptation, life always adapts to its environment.

Adam and Eve did not come from “ape-like” beings or even apes, they were our first parents, created by God, which would mean they had no parents. They can not be our first parents if indeed they had parents, even if their parents where a different species, that would not change the parenthood, of the parents. Adam and Eve may well looked like apes, having souls, but had no ape or ape like parents. They where persons, no matter their genetics.

Edited September 26, 2006 by KnightofChrist

[Aloysius]

I am inclined to agree in a sense... I chimed in here as a voice for the plausibility under Catholic doctrine of certain things. one cannot deny the stages the human body went through before its present state nor help but notice that some of our ancestors in that line, if they had souls, had very wicked souls (they did not care for their sick, they did not bury their dead, they actually ate the brains of their dead... compared to the neanderthals who we are not related to who cared for their sick and old, buried their dead and saved flowers even through the winter to use in ritual burials, et cetera)... which is why it seems to indicate that that stage which is so clearly related to us presently may not yet have been endowed with rational human souls.

[homeschoolmom]

[quote name='Aloysius' post='1075284' date='Sep 26 2006, 12:31 AM']
sure. maybe in the very egg and sperm the genetic mutation already began. it's the DNA code that changes... but in every species there are entire strands of code with superfluous information with one thing right before it that says "do not read the following instructions" and another line right after it which says "resume reading instructions"... if the proteins which say "do not read the following" are missing, then that whole line of genetic code becomes part of the being which was procreated.

it is thus possible that someday a pig will be born with wings.
[/quote]
What? No one has used the Wow... slackers...

[Anomaly]

[quote name='homeschoolmom' post='1075414' date='Sep 26 2006, 07:14 AM']
What? No one has used the Wow... slackers...
[/quote]A most appropriate observation.


But seriously. A soul is created by God and bestowed by God alone. God has chosen at what point in evolution He has chosen to bestow humanity with souls. If having a soul was/is merely a function of the presence of certain DNA proteins outside the direct operation of God, then there would be a big theological problem with Evolution and you fall into a humanist logic trap.

We may be monkey's nephews, but whether they had souls or not was up to God. Whether God created 'Adam' as and unique species in an instant, or chose to bestow intelligent monkey Adam with a soul making him unique doesn't matter much to me. Whether God cut out Adam's rib in a medical operation to create Eve, or Adam's interaction with Eve opened her nature to become souled (through God's intervention) making them the first married couple doesn't really matter.

Physical nature can't create a soul without the will of God.

[Thy Geekdom Come]

[quote name='Aloysius' post='1075284' date='Sep 26 2006, 01:31 AM']
sure. maybe in the very egg and sperm the genetic mutation already began.
[/quote]
I'm sorry, but for some reason, I just read that as "the egg and spam."

No one will ever eat spam again.

[Era Might]

[quote name='Anomaly' post='1075420' date='Sep 26 2006, 08:39 AM']Whether God created 'Adam' as and unique species in an instant, or chose to bestow intelligent monkey Adam with a soul making him unique doesn't matter much to me.[/quote]
The problem is that, if Adam was a "monkey", then he already had a soul, although non-rational. For God to infuse a human soul, he would have to kill the monkey, thereby killing his soul (animal souls are not eternal like man), and then infuse a new human soul. He can't just "graduate" a non-rational soul, because a human soul is a completely separate and personal entity.

It doesn't much matter to me either, except insofar as theology is concerned. But non-Christians take this stuff seriously. I was discussing evolution with a co-worker last month, and he basically defined himself by reason and science. His perception was mostly shaped by Evangelical Christians who are absolutely opposed to evolution. I asked him why it even mattered at the end of the day how we came to be, but he just thought it was blasphemy of science and reason to deny evolution.

[Anomaly]

[quote name='Era Might' post='1075514' date='Sep 26 2006, 09:34 AM']
The problem is that, if Adam was a "monkey", then he already had a soul, although non-rational. For God to infuse a human soul, he would have to kill the monkey, thereby killing his soul (animal souls are not eternal like man), and then infuse a new human soul. He can't just "graduate" a non-rational soul, because a human soul is a completely separate and personal entity.

It doesn't much matter to me either, except insofar as theology is concerned. But non-Christians take this stuff seriously. I was discussing evolution with a co-worker last month, and he basically defined himself by reason and science. His perception was mostly shaped by Evangelical Christians who are absolutely opposed to evolution. I asked him why it even mattered at the end of the day how we came to be, but he just thought it was blasphemy of science and reason to deny evolution.
[/quote]Did you think about your response? If intelligent 'monkey's' gave birth to Adam who looked like them but had a soul, how did that kill a monkey soul?

Besides, I don't think God was the founding member of PETA. Monkeys die as food for others. Is it such a horrible thing if a monkey soul had to move out for Adam's soul?

[Era Might]

[quote name='Anomaly' post='1075602' date='Sep 26 2006, 12:21 PM']Did you think about your response? If intelligent 'monkey's' gave birth to Adam who looked like them but had a soul, how did that kill a monkey soul?

Besides, I don't think God was the founding member of PETA. Monkeys die as food for others. Is it such a horrible thing if a monkey soul had to move out for Adam's soul?[/quote]
Monkeys have souls. When a monkey gives birth to another monkey, that new monkey has a soul as well. Hence, there are two possibilities. Either, as Aloysius suggested, some genetic mutation occurs so that the offspring is a completely different species from the moment of conception (human), and thus is immediately infused with a human soul, or, if the offspring is still a "monkey", then God would have to kill it and then reanimate/infuse the matter with a human soul, since it already had a soul, and a creature can only have one soul.

It has nothing to do with being "horrible", but with being rational. The former possibility is reasonable, although it still presents theological questions. The latter, while also possible, would not be reasonable in my estimation, theologically or biologically.

[KnightofChrist]

[quote name='Aloysius' post='1075384' date='Sep 26 2006, 04:15 AM']
I am inclined to agree in a sense... I chimed in here as a voice for the plausibility under Catholic doctrine of certain things. one cannot deny the stages the human body went through before its present state nor help but notice that some of our ancestors in that line, if they had souls, had very wicked souls (they did not care for their sick, they did not bury their dead, they actually ate the brains of their dead... compared to the Neanderthals who we are not related to who cared for their sick and old, buried their dead and saved flowers even through the winter to use in ritual burials, et cetera)... which is why it seems to indicate that that stage which is so clearly related to us presently may not yet have been endowed with rational human souls.
[/quote]

Now see this is the problem with scientists finding artifacts, they find one piece of evidence pointing to that perhaps early man ate the brains of their dead, and then apply this to all early man of that species. All that can be “proven” is that tribe, that one group of early man did those things, not the entire species of that particle early man. Some people of our species today do the same things as not burying the dead, cannibalistic acts, and not caring for the sick, ei Terri Savio (not caring for the sick), abortion (not burying the dead), Jeffrey Demure (cannibalism).

Wicked persons have lived threw out history, that does not apply to all personhood of a species, ape like or not.

And it does not amply that because of a few crazy wicked persons, that a species of personhood had no souls and were not good people, maybe they were stupid people, but not wicked soulless apes.