Mutations, bad not good (Introduction)

by dhw, Monday, July 11, 2011, 22:44 (4862 days ago) @ DragonsHeart

DragonsHeart: I can certainly see how certain adaptations of a species can be beneficial, but adaptations do not necessarily alter the genetic make-up of an individual or a species altogether.-First of all, may I echo Tony (Balance_Maintained) in welcoming you to the forum. I've been away for a few days and am only just catching up.-The above comment of yours is crucial to the argument over evolution and, especially, speciation currently taking place on the "Kent Hovind" thread. I'd like to link it to Tony's response: "I would challenge evolutionary theorists to show the 'benefit' of each and every small mutation, while also proving that said mutation did not preclude reproduction in the species."-If you believe, as I do, that humans were relatively late arrivals on the planet, and if you acknowledge the astonishing range of similarities between us and other mammals (two eyes, a nose, a mouth, ears, reproductive and digestive systems etc.) it's not hard to accept the idea of common ancestry. But every item on the list in my parenthesis must in its time have been an innovation. I don't believe that such innovations took place in creatures that suddenly sprang to life out of nowhere. It seems more logical to me that they came about within existing creatures, thereby changing them ultimately into new species. -And so regardless of what we mean by species, this scenario entails changes, and that after all is the meaning of "mutations". We tend to link these with "genetic", which we have to if we are to account for the changes being passed on, but this is where atheists and theists part company, and I part company with both. An atheist evolutionary theorist will argue that the mutations without which evolution would have been impossible are the consequence either of chance changes within the DNA, or adaptations to a changing environment. Like yourself, I don't accept that adaptation necessarily leads to new species. Darwin's finches remained finches. I want to know how a bacterium (or whatever) "evolved" into a human, and that requires millions of innovations/mutations.-However, I see no reason at all why a theist should not accept that humans were indeed latecomers, and that there are links to earlier forms of life, and that these can be traced to mutations. But the theist will then argue that the mutations were the work of an intelligent power deliberately experimenting, or possibly even executing a plan. -The point I'm making, then, is that beneficial mutations (changes) which led from earlier forms of life to ourselves took place, no matter what your beliefs. Your only alternative as I see it is to believe in special creation, with God making each species including ourselves from scratch. -The choices then are 1) atheist: that the changes or mutations which created new organs and organisms were the chance products of a mechanism which itself was created by chance; 2) the changes were the deliberate act of a conscious intelligence; 3) the same conscious intelligence created each species from scratch.
 
Or, of course, you can join me on the agnostic fence, and argue that the evidence for and against the creative genius of chance and for and against the existence of a conscious intelligence is not conclusive enough to justify belief (see Matt/xeno's comment under "Killing the Watchmaker").