Problems with Evolution

-Nate Archer

Support of Evolution

The scientific establishment, museums, public schools, and much of the general population has assumed that evolution has been proved to be true. It is fact and not merely theory. We are told that missing links between apes and men have been found. We are told that the fossil record supports evolution with out question. We are also told that evolution has even been observed.

Has Evolution Occurred? The answer is yes! However, what kind of evolution are you talking about? Evolutionists are quick to say that actual cases of evolution have been documented. However, what they don't tell you is that these are only examples of microevolution, and not macroevolution. Macroevolution, change from one species to another, is what we usually think of when someone talks about evolution. However the only proven forms of evolution are actually examples of microevolution, changes within a species. For example, in 1977 there was a drought in the Galapagos islands causing a shortage of the small seeds on which finches feed. Because of this, the only food left was larger seeds. After one generation, it was noted that the average beak size of the finches had increased. Evolutionists give this as an example of animals adapting to their environment. Yes, this was survival of the fittest, the birds with the larger beaks could feed better on the large seeds, and most of the birds with small beaks starved. However there had always been some birds with larger beaks and there had always been some birds with smaller beaks. During the drought, more of the larger-beaked birds lived and reproduced. After the drought was over, more of the smaller-beaked birds survived and reproduced. This is hardly a change from one species to another. Mutation did not even need to occur for this to happen. The famous peppered moth is another example. When trees became darkened by industrial smoke, darker colored moths became abundant because it was harder for birds to see them and eat them. However when there was less pollution and the trees became lighter, the lighter moths had the advantage and out numbered the darker moths. Again the key thing is that at all times there was a supply of both dark and light colored moths. This is a famous example of microevolution. However, this is usually simply referred to as "evolution" to create the image that any type of evolution is possible. The truth is, there have been NO documented cased of macroevolution. Macroevolution would require a long series of mutations, each making it more likely for the animal to survive and reproduce. In reality, almost all mutations are a disadvantage.

Does the Fossil Record Support Evolution?

It is commonly, but incorrectly, assumed that the fossil record confirms evolution. When Darwin developed the theory of evolution, there was not much of a fossil record. However Darwin was confident that when more fossils were found, that they would show the gradual changes from one species to another that his theory required. Darwin acknowledged that his theory implied that "the number of intermediate and transitional links, between all living and extinct species, must have been inconceivably great."

If evolution were true, there should be no problem finding hundreds of clear examples of in between species. In fact, the variety of species should blur one into another. However this is NOT what we see. For example Colin Patterson, a committed evolutionist and the senior paleontologist at the British Museum of Natural History which houses sixty million fossils, the world's largest collection confessed, "If I had known of any [evolutionary transitions], fossil or living, I would certainly have included them [in my book Evolution.]" Harvard paleontologist Stephen Jay Gould, a highly respected fossil expert and evolutionist, described "the extreme rarity of transitory forms in the fossil record" as "the trade secret of paleontology." In the words of Gould,

The history of most fossil species includes two features particularly inconsistent with gradualism:

1. Stasis. Most species exhibit no directional change during their tenure on earth. They appear in the fossil record looking pretty much the same as when they disappeared; morphological change is usually limited and directionless.
2. Sudden appearance. In any local area, a species does not arise gradually by the same steady transformation of its ancestors; it appears all at once and "fully formed."

To most, this should seem to be evidence that the theory of evolution is false. Gould however is not able to accept that and so he has proposed a new theory called punctuated equilibrium. In this theory, a small number of a species become isolated from the main population and rapidly evolve into a new species. Although there is no evidence for this, Gould is forced to take this unlikely position because he is so aware of the problem with the fossil record.

One animal often claimed to be a "link" between lizards and birds in the archaeopteryx, whose fossils seem much like a bird except that they have claws and teeth. The archaeopteryx was discovered soon after Darwin's The Origin of Species and was widely used to support that view. However, now scientists have found fossils of birds that they say are older than the archaeopteryx. The archaeopteryx is now considered to be a true bird, and Gould admits that it does not count as a transitional form.

The single greatest problem in the fossil record is the "Cambrian explosion" dates around 600 million years ago. Nearly all the animal phyla appear in the rocks of this period without any trace of evolutionary history. Even zealous evolutionist Richard Dawkins has to admit, "It is as though they were just planted there, without any evolutionary history."

Ape-Men: The Missing Links? It is commonly taught as fact that mankind evolved from apes. It is common to see diagrams and displays showing the gradual change from monkey to man. It is claimed that the "missing links" are no longer missing. However it is not told that the evidence for these transitions is slim to none and that many of them have been outright frauds. Nebraska man was constructed from a single tooth. This tooth was later discovered to have been the tooth of a wild pig. Java Man, Pithecanthropus erectus, is highly regarded as proof of evolution. What is not well known is that was "reconstructed" from only a skullcap, a femur (thigh bone) and three teeth. The femur was found fifty feet from the skullcap and a full year later. It was also downplayed for almost thirty years that two human skulls were found close to the original finds. Piltdown Man, used for forty years as proof of evolution, has been formally declared to be a fake. Piltdown man was found to have actually been the jaw of an ape which had been stained, doctored, and attached to a human skull. Peking Man was originally based on the discovery of a single tooth. Later fourteen skulls, bashed at the base, and a collection of tools and teeth were discovered. However it is likely that while the tools were human, the skulls were actually from the heads of monkeys that were bashed to eat their brains as a delicacy. Neanderthal Man is considered to be within our own species. Cro-Magnon Man is simply modern man.

Is the Earth Old Enough for Evolution?

Many Christians believe that the earth is only six to ten thousand years old, which is clearly not enough time for evolution to have taken place. However, even if the earth is four and a half billion years old, as is commonly accepted by most scientists, it not nearly old enough for evolution to have taken place. In addition, the more scientists learn about the complexity of life, the more they realize that the earth is only a fraction of the needed age for life to develop into what it is today. For example, evolutionist Francis Crick, the co-discoverer of the structure of DNA is completely aware of the complexity of cellular life and the extreme difficulty of explaining how life could have evolved in the short time of four and a half billion years. Because of this problem he actually proposed that the first life was sent to earth by aliens.

In earlier times, cells were thought to be very simple, for all purposes little more than a microscopic blob of gelatin.  However we know today that a single fertilized human egg contains about 3 billion characters of ordered information, the equivalent of a 2.3 million-page term-paper, or about 7 ½ times the books in my office.

The smallest theoretical life requires 239 protein molecules as its building blocks. However according to statistical probability expert James Coppedge, even if we gave evolutionists every possible concession, a primordial sea using every atom on earth with every single necessary component, and speed up the rate of bonding a trillion times, it would take 10^119,841 years on average to get the needed set of proteins to make life possible. That is 10^119,831 times the assumed age of the earth. (That is a figure with 119,831 zeroes.) To illustrate how long a time this is, Coppedge gives the following illustration: Imagine that an ameba is given the task of moving the entire universe over the width of the universe (thirty billion light-years.) The ameba is to do this moving one atom at a time, moving at a speed of one angstrom unit (the width of a hydrogen atom) every fifteen billion years, the supposed age of the universe. In all the time it would take the ameba to complete this task, we would not get remotely close to forming one protein molecule by blind chance.

Darwin's Black Box

The nail in the coffin of evolution is provided by Michael Behe in his book Darwin's Black Box. According to Behe, a professor of biochemistry, the world of microbiology was a "black box" in Darwin's time, because they didn't understand how complex it was. They thought microscopic life was simple. With recent discoveries, the "box" has been opened and we see how complex life really is.

The problem with evolution according to Behe is irreducible complexity. This means that even the most elementary parts of life are made up of many parts. For these things to function, many parts would need to evolve all at one, which is impossible. However, if only one part evolves at a time, it would be as useless.

As an illustration, Behe gives a mousetrap. A mousetrap is made of five parts, a hammer, spring, catch, platform, and holding bar. For the mousetrap to work, all of these must be present. A "partly evolved" mousetrap consisting of only a platform and a spring is useless. Behe then goes on to demonstrate that even something as simple as the flagellum on a bacteria (the little "hair" that the bacteria wiggles in order to swim) is so complex, that it could not possible have evolved. Even a flagella contains at least three parts which would have needed to evolve independently. However, each of these parts would be useless without the other parts.

Behe compares evolution to a neighbor claiming to have jumped across a ditch. It is possible to jump across a ditch, but not of the ditch is a canyon 100 feet wide. Because the neighbor knows that it is impossible to jump across a ditch 100 feet wide, he now says that he jumped across the ditch with many small jumps rather than one big jump. Obviously though, it is impossible to jump across a canyon with many small jumps; one would fall into the canyon.

Conclusion

In conclusion, the theory of evolution is not merely improbable but impossible. The more we learn about the complexity of life, the more it seems that we are the not the product of chance, but of intelligent design. Unfortunately, the scientific establishment is biased against this and unwilling to recognize the Designer.

Recommended Reading

Michael Behe, Darwin's Black Box (New York: Touchstone, 1996) One of the most important books on the impossibility of evolution.  Behe focuses on irreducible complexity at the microbiological level.  This book is extremely detailed.  It is not easy reading.