If evolution is true, then it should seem at least reasonably possible that DNA could have come about by means of a series of chance events. If the Bible is true, then DNA should provide strong evidence that it is the product of an orderly, intelligent mind.
āOne gram of DNA, which when dry would occupy a volume of approximately one cubic centimeter, can store as much information as approximately one trillion CDs [compact discs].ā
20
āThe genome is a very clever book, because in the right conditions it can both photocopy itself and read itself.ā
22
One science book calls this efficient packaging system āan extraordinary feat of engineering.ā
18 Does the suggestion that there was no engineer behind this feat sound credible to you? If this museum had a huge store with millions of items for sale and they were all so tidily arranged that you could easily find any item you needed, would you assume that no one had organized the place? Of course not! But such order would be a simple feat by comparison.
In 1999 biologist Malcolm S. Gordon wrote: āLife appears to have had many origins. The base of the universal tree of life appears not to have been a single root.ā Is there evidence that all the major branches of life are connected to a single trunk, as Darwin believed? Gordon continues: āThe traditional version of the theory of common descent apparently does not apply to kingdoms as presently recognized. It probably does not apply to many, if not all, phyla, and possibly also not to many classes within the phyla.ā
29 *
In reality, the vast majority of fossils show stability among types of creatures over extensive amounts of time. The evidence does not show them evolving from one type into another. Unique body plans appear suddenly. New features appear suddenly. For example, bats with sonar and echolocation systems appear with no obvious link to a more primitive ancestor.
In fact, more than half of all the major divisions of animal life seem to have appeared in a relatively short period of time. Because many new and distinct life forms appear so suddenly in the fossil record, paleontologists refer to this period as āthe Cambrian explosion.ā When was the Cambrian period?
Let us assume that the estimates of researchers are accurate. In that case, the history of the earth could be represented by a time line that stretches the length of a soccer field
(1). At that scale, you would have to walk about seven eighths of the way down the field before you would come to what paleontologists call the Cambrian period
(2). During a small segment of that period, the major divisions of animal life show up in the fossil record. How suddenly do they appear? As you walk down the soccer field, all those different creatures pop up in the space of less than one step!
The relatively sudden appearance of these diverse life forms is causing some evolutionary researchers to question the traditional version of Darwinās theory. For example, in an interview in 2008, evolutionary biologist Stuart Newman discussed the need for a new theory of evolution that could explain the sudden appearance of novel forms of life. He said: āThe Darwinian mechanism thatās used to explain all evolutionary change will be relegated, I believe, to being just one of several mechanismsāmaybe not even the most important when it comes to understanding macroevolution, the evolution of major transitions in body type.ā
33
Regarding the time spans that separate many of these fossils, zoologist Henry Gee says: āThe intervals of time that separate the fossils are so huge that we cannot say anything definite about their possible connection through ancestry and descent.ā
34 *
Commenting on the fossils of fish and amphibians, biologist Malcolm S. Gordon states that the fossils found represent only a small, āpossibly quite unrepresentative, sample of the biodiversity that existed in these groups at those times.ā He further says: āThere is no way of knowing to what extent, if at all, those specific organisms were relevant to later developments, or what their relationships might have been to each other.ā
35 *
Consider the statement made in 2008 in
Scientific American Mind: āScientists have failed to find a correlation between absolute or relative brain size and acumen among humans and other animal species. Neither have they been able to discern a parallel between wits and the size or existence of specific regions of the brain, excepting perhaps Brocaās area, which governs speech in people.ā
49
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