Session 4 – “Evidence” For EvolutionIn this session we will be jumping around

quite a bit to different topics

There are many “Evidences” used to support the evolutionary view, and we want to

address as many as possible in this session

Topics range from mutations (another example) to comparative anatomy, to junk

DNA, to fossils and missing links!

New Trait with Lenski?

In 1988 Richard Lenski, an evolutionary biologist at Michigan State University, began culturing 12 identical lines of E. coli. There

were over 44,000 generations, and 25 years for the experiment

They were grown in the presence of glucose (carbon source for E.Coli) and citrate (carbon source they don’t utilize) they took samples

of bacteria every 500 generations for records

Since being in the lab, Lenski has seen changes and adaptation within the bacteria

They can better survive in the lab setting than they could when they started

But there were some costs:

“All the lines have lost the ability to catabolize ribose (a sugar). Some lines have

lost the ability to repair DNA.” Georgia Purdom

If you were to put these bacteria back into the normal environment, they wouldn’t

stand a chance and would die out quickly

What was the big support for evolution?

Lenski’s lab discovered that at generation 31,500, one line of E. coli could utilize citrate

(Cit+) which isn’t usually possible

This has been hailed as a new function created by evolution, which is far from reality

This ability that was gained is already seen in wild E. Coli when oxygen levels get low (It’s

used in a fermentation pathway)

The gene (citT) in E. coli encode a citrate transporter (a protein which transports

citrate into the cell to be used)

Most think that when oxygen levels are high this citT isn’t produced, even though they

still possess the enzymes necessary to utilize citrate

Lenski states, “A more likely possibility, in our view, is that an existing transporter has

been coopted [sic] for citrate transport under oxic [high oxygen levels] conditions.”

It turns out there was a mutation that caused a duplication of the gene that

regulates the production of citT, it’s not a new function but an editing of the function

that is already present in the bacteria

Lenski even agrees with this:

Similarities One argument used for evolution is

similarities between different animals

This comes in two flavors

The first is comparative anatomy, where we look at the structure of different organisms

and see the similarities

The second is genetic similarities between different organisms

The most cited example

of the first (comparative anatomy) is

forearm structure

Is this evidence for evolution?

Yes it is, don’t feel like you have to argue every single point. We may not agree that it

happened but it fits the theory

It’s evidence for evolution, but it’s not evidence against Creation. We can explain it

just fine without evolution

God created a design that worked well, and he

used it multiple times. We could argue common

design from these features just as they can argue common ancestor

What about Genetic Similarities?

We were told for a long time that the human and chimpanzee genomes were 99% similar

to each other, which made sense in the evolutionary theory (because we are very

closely related in evolution)

Many studies have been done recently that cast extreme doubt on those numbers we

are given (98-99%) even before these studies though the numbers jumped around

Today we have sequenced both the human and chimp genome, and we know that the

99% number was taking only a small sample, and turns out to be wrong

But even with the sequencing of the genomes of both humans and chimps, it’s

difficult to tell how similar they are, it’s not just a direct comparison, there are many theories on how you should compare the

genomes, which leads to multiple answers (and more debate on how similar they are)

Dr. Todd Wood, an expert in genome comparison and former Director of

Bioinformatics at the Clemson University Genomics Institute, did a BLAST analysis (type

of comparison) that indicated human and chimp DNA are roughly 95% similar

That may sound very similar, but that is a large genetic gap between the two

Other studies were done the same way, and came up with very different results

Dr. Richard Buggs, a geneticist at Queen Mary,

University of London. Back in 2008 concluded:

“Therefore the total similarity of the genomes

could be below 70%.”

Dr. Jeffrey P. Tomkins, former director of the Clemson University Genomics Institute, did a

different BLAST analysis and concluded humans and chimps were 86-89% similar

Dr. Jeffrey P. Tomkins did a more detailed study and came to another conclusion:

“Genome-wide, only 70% of the chimpanzee DNA was similar to human under the most optimal sequence-slice conditions. While

chimpanzees and humans share many localized protein-coding regions of high

similarity, the overall extreme discontinuity between the two genomes defies

evolutionary timescales and dogmatic presuppositions about a common ancestor.”

Vestigial Organs & Junk DNA

According to The Evolution of Life defines a vestigial organ as one ‘which has lost its

function in the course of evolution, and is usually much reduced in size’.

The popular idea is that humans (and other organisms) are walking museums with

evidence from their past ancestors on the tree of life

There are many or organs in humans (and other creatures) that are claimed to be

vestigial, but we don’t have time to address them all in detail (here is a snapshot)

The human appendix

“The appendix is part of the immune system, strategically located at the entrance of the almost sterile ileum from the colon with its

normally high bacterial content.” Dr. Jerry Bergman

The tonsils have a similar function in the entrance to the pharynx.

Wisdom Teeth

This is one of the most cited examples

There are many ways to answer this question, the first being that some people get their

wisdom teeth and use them just fine, it just depends on the size of your jaw and if your

mouth has room for them

Now keep in mind, the loss of function or the reduction of function or certain features is not a problem for creationists, we believe

since the fall things have been degrading

35% of people do not develop wisdom teeth to begin with, which would be an example of

a loss of information (not the gain)

There are many factors that allow wisdom teeth to fit into the original creation, different diets, environments, etc.

“Hip bones” in whales is another

popular example

These bones are different in males and females and turn out to be part of the

reproductive system

You need these bones to help get baby whales, which makes them far from useless

The revised the definition of vestigial from the original “without function” to something that has reduced function from it’s supposed

evolutionary ancestor

Flightless birds would be an example

Their wings still have many uses (cooling being a large one) but it’s reduced from the

original which could fly

Goose bumps are another example

“The number of organs that once were believed to be functional in the evolutionary past of humans but are non-functional today

has been steadily reduced as the fields of anatomy and physiology have progressed.

Few examples of vestigial organs in humans are now offered, and the ones that are have been shown by more recent research to be

completely functional” – Dr. Bergman

Many evolutionists now acknowledge these supposed vestigial organs have functions

Junk DNA (Pseudogenes)

It was thought for a long time that sections of DNA were junk because they did not code

for the production of proteins

The idea was this was left over from our evolution, sections of DNA we don’t use now

This whole notion has been turned upside down in recent years, not just by creationists

but by evolutionists

Dr. Daniel Criswell (Ph.D. in Molecular Biology): “It is not necessary to assume that

pseudogenes are remnants of once functioning genes that have been lost and

now clutter the genome like junk in a rubbish heap. It is possible that these

regions of DNA do have a role in human and animal genomes and this role has not been

discovered yet.”

It seems whenever we examine “junk DNA” in detail we find a function, it’s not useless

Missing LinksMany have heard of supposed discoveries of

missing links proving evolution

We will look at some broader missing links in the evolutionary tree, and then focus on human “missing links” that are popular

Understand that many of these “missing links” in evolution can easily be seen as

extinct species since the creation, so while they use them as evidence for evolution,

they’re not evidence against creation usually

Dinosaur to Bird link

According to evolution birds evolved from

dinosaurs millions of years ago

Archaeopteryx is the most common cited intermediate fossil

from dinosaur to bird

Archaeopteryx is not a single fossil, but a group of fossils that are similar

The most well preserved of these eleven fossils is the Thermopolis specimen, which is

pictured above

According to Alan Feduccia (an Evolutionist), Professor Emeritus at the University of North Carolina and a world authority on fossil birds:

“Paleontologists have tried to turn Archaeopteryx into an earth-bound,

feathered dinosaur. But it’s not. It is a bird, a perching bird. And no amount of

‘paleobabble’ is going to change that.”

We would hold he same view, this is a bird that went extinct, that’s all

Now we must admit that while it has the developed characteristics of a bird, and is

therefore classified that way without problem, there are also features of reptiles

like a long tail and teeth (although other species of birds have had teeth)

There is no question that this bird would be unique, sharing some characteristics with other organisms, but we see that already

today with bats and duckbill platypus

The ‘dating’ of Archaeopteryx by evolutionists’ own methods puts it millions

of years after the creatures it supposed to be ancestor to! As Feduccia likes to say, “You

can’t be older than your grandfather.”

Dr. James Jensen of Brigham Young University. The article also quotes Prof. John

Ostrom of Yale: ‘… we must now look for the ancestors of flying birds in a period of

time much older than that in which archaeopteryx lived.’

There are also no fossil links between Archaeopteryx and birds or dinosaurs, the

fossil stands alone in the gap

Tiktaalik roseae

This newer fossil is supposed to provide evidence for the link between fish and land

vertebrates in evolution

This fossil is “Evidence” that fish came out of water and began walking on land

Here are the arguments for it being intermediate (and not just a fish as we

would see it)

1. The bony gill cover has disappeared (which they say means less water movement)

2. The skull has a longer snout which is seen as evidence for snatching instead of sucking

This is nothing unique to Tiktaalik, aquatic only fish have these still today

The big claim is the evolving ability to walk

It is true that Tiktaalik bone structures were a little different than most fish, with an

increase in endochondral bone (found in tetrapods) and a decrease in dermal bone

(which is found in fish bones)

They claim other bones (cleithrum ) are detached from the skull and resemble the position of the scapula (shoulder blades)

of a tetrapod

Is this evidence that he walked on land? Or was evolving into a tetrapod?

“Not only are the pelvic fins of all fish small, but they’re not even attached to the axial skeleton (vertebral column) and thus can’t

bear weight on land.” Dr. David Menton

It’s been shown that Tiktaalik could not walk on land because of his bone structure

As Dr. Menton points out, Tiktaalik is no exception to this rule

There is a bigger (more recent) problem

Footprints were found in Poland that greatly resemble

those of large lizards

Thousands of fossil tracks have been found though,

why is this impressive?

These tracks are dated (not by creationists) to 397 million years ago… which is 18 million

years older than Tiktaalik

Here was the reaction from evolutionists

Tiktaalik can’t be a transition

“We thought we’d pinned down the origin of limbed tetrapods. We have to rethink the

whole thing.” Palaeontologist Jenifer Clack, University of Cambridge

“These results force us to reconsider our whole picture of the transition from fish to land animals.” Palaentologist Per Ahlberg of

Uppsala University, Sweden

How about missing links closer to humans?

Lucy (and australopithecines)

Lucy had an opposable thumb-like big toe, shoulders and arms that indicated she spent a lot of

time hanging in trees, and a consistent ape-like scull. The

bone that was used to determine that she walked upright, the

femur, was completely crushed

According to Richard Leakey (Evolutionist), Lucy’s skull is so incomplete that most of it is

‘imagination made of plaster of paris’.

The skull was in horrible condition

Understand much of what we are shown of these

fossils is an artists interpretation of the bones

that were found (often times just a few bones)

Dr Charles Oxnard, Professor of Anatomy and Human Biology at the University of

Western Australia, said: “The various australopithecines are, indeed, more different from both African apes and

humans in most features than these latter are from each other. Part of the basis of this

acceptance has been the fact that even opposing investigators have found these…

There is no reason to believe Lucy was in between human and apes

large differences as they too, used techniques and research designs that were less biased by prior notions as to what the

fossils might have been’.

His conclusion is that ‘The australopithecines are unique.” (not a missing link)

Fossil Ida

This fossil was much more intact than Lucy was, and is claimed as another example of a

missing link near humans

While it may look big it’s the size of a raccoon

What is this creature? Not a missing link

It strongly resembles the skeleton of a lemur (a small, tailed, tree-climbing primate). It

looks nothing like a human

It’s claimed opposable thumbs once again show evolution to human, but lemurs

today have those

And the talus bone was described as “the same shape as in humans,” despite the other

differences in the ankle structure

The small differences with lemurs today is part of it’s claw and some teeth (the teeth

match closer to monkeys)

Those small differences are easily explained with variation within a created kind, this

isn’t a problem for creationists

Neaderthals (Cave men)

Much debate has surrounded this group of

people, even within creationist camps you have those who believe they are fully human, and those who

believe they’re soulless

There are also different opinions in the evolutionary camps as to what they are

From a Biblical perspectives, Neaderthals fit right in with the rest of humans

They buried their dead, their brains were bigger than ours are today, they’re genome is

very similar to modern day humans, etc.

We take the stance that the Neaderthals lived immediately after the flood, before and

during the time of the patriarchs. The features that are different can be account for

with long life spans (and fathers being old)

A few other ones (very quickly)

Homo sapiens neanderthalensis (Neandertal man) originally Neandertal reconstructions were stooped over like an “ape-man’. We now know that the supposedly stooped

posture was due to disease and that Neandertal was a human

Ramapithecus – claimed to be human ancestor, turns out to be an extinct type or

orangutan (ape)

Hesperopithecus (Nebraska man)- He was based on a single tooth of a type of pig now

only living in Paraguay.

Homo erectus (Java man, Peking man) is very much like humans today, a little smaller in

size and a smaller head, but still well within the range of human size around the world

They’re found in strata very close to modern day humans, and could easily be

contemporaries living after the flood

Memory VerseGenesis 2:7: “And the LORD God formed

man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man

became a living being.”