Creation 5

CREATION #5

stics – environment causes changes. 6.2.5. Charles Darwin – natural selection (survival of the fittest). 6.2.6. Hugo DeVries (1900) – called attention to Mendel’s work and added mutations. 6.2.7. Neo-Darwinism – natural selection is the key element, and mutation is the natural random process that produces a gradual change from one species to another. This is one of the most widely accepted views today. 6.2.8. Punctuated equilibrium (“Hopeful Monster”) – long periods of equilibrium of a species are interrupted by sudden and major changes in the species. From a small beginning 40 years ago, this view has gained major acceptance. Although no possible mechanism is offered, this view does fit the fossil record better. 6.3. There are some common factors in all evolutionary arguments. 6.3.1. They offer an alternative to God’s creative acts; God and evolution are mutually exclusive. It is not uncommon for someone to hold an idea because special creation is the only other option. 6.3.2. All require spontaneous generation, the idea that life sprang from non-life through random “natural process”. 6.3.2.1. Spontaneous generation has been completely discredited. 6.3.2.2. The idea of a self changing/self duplicating molecule arising from random molecules acted upon by random forces is not established in any portion. Assumptions about the state of the pre-life earth’s physical conditions are based entirely on what spontaneous generation would demand, and then the ideas still don’t work. Miller and Fox did not duplicate any possible natural condition and what they developed was nowhere near life from non-life. With clones, DNA, genetic engineering or viruses, only life reproduces life. 6.3.2.3. The Pan-spermia idea (life from outer space) only postpones the ultimate origin question. 6.3.3. All call upon “natural pro