There are many arguments against evolution. These are often propounded by people of a number of religions, proponents of the pretending-to-be-unreligious Intelligent Design movement, people who do not understand evolution and have not been properly taught about it and, no doubt, people who pick up arguments against evolution from people who give them the idea that evolution is something to be against and the anti-evolution arguments themselves have scientific merit.
Evolution is a theory. Richard Dawkins wants to call it a fact. It is a fact. Dawkins proposes the word theorum for evolution. I like the phrase 'body of fact' or 'megafact' which is a word I now coin.
Evolution has much evidence to support it. But it is an origins-theory. It explains the origins of species. The realm of Bibles and religions came about before Darwin and his Theory of Evolution by Natural Selection and seemed to claim originofspecies-explanation as its own. Origins-explanations are dear to people simply by being origins-explanations. They are even dearer if they are ruled by a beloved omnipotent omniphilic religious entity such as a god.
Thus the ungodguided appearance of evolution offended those who knew the godguided creation stories. Since then, offended people have been, offendedly, ejaculating many arguments against evolution. Some stray into the scientific as opposed to religious realm, perhaps since the offendeds first noticed sciences inability to build explanation and scientific theory out of supernaturalism.
Arguments against evolution include:
The Bible says that God created life, and separately (in six days).
Evolution violates the second law of thermodynamics.
If humans evolved from apes, why are there still apes?
Life cannot evolve from 'pond-scum'.
There is not a single transitional form.
Earth is too young to support the theorised lengthy periods of evolution.
Evolution is 'just a theory'.
Evolution leads to Atheism, immorality, suicide, misery..... Just look at atheists like Hitler.
Evolution is a religion as it must be 'believed' in.
To my knowledge, many religious people, fundamentalists who believe literally that everything was created in 6 days are so religious, so convicted that they won't even listen to scientists or even a more (to them) harmless passer-by who happens to have read something about evolution. They go near nothing that remotely challenges creationism or suggests a godlessness for the Universe.
They may be interested in science, but their knowledge can only be peripheral and basic as they (if they exclude evolution from consideration) often reject continental drift, old-earth geology (which is all of geology), abiogenesis, the existence of dinosaurs and other pre-Modern organisms and the big bang standard model of the origin of the Universe. Perhaps some even refuse to consider stellar processes such as nucleosynthesis. How can this lead to a full appreciation of what science has and can work out about the Universe. What sort of science-knowledge is this?
Richard Dawkins points out that denouncing of evolution may not come directly from thinking evolution is unlogical but from a moral-holding (god-ruled morals no doubt) opinion of 'ungodguidedness is immoral'. Still, science finds supernaturalism (as said above) untenable and so these offended fundamentalists, creationists or religionists have to attack evolution with science. All their anti-evolution arguments are untenable, useless and invalid. Is it their peripheral appreciation and knowledge of all of science that makes this so?
Below is an explanation of why all the arguments I listed above are invalid.
The Bible does say that God created all life. To a comparative religion studier, this would be referred to a creation myth. Science rejects God because he is undetectable and supernatural and needs faith to think he exists, possibly a concession that such an object does not exist on the part of the religious. Also, the lengthy time-periods of geology and the fossil record do not support a 6 day creation.
The violation of the second law of thermodynamics is not so. If biological processes that involved reproduction and growth and generation-progression violated this law then no organism would ever get beyond the zygote stage.
Humans did not evolve FROM today's apes, nor specifically from chimpanzees (closest relative to humans). Humans evolved WITH chimpanzees. Life evolves by common ancestry. There was a Chimpanzee-Human common ancestor and further back in time a Gorilla-Chimpanzee-Human common ancestor and further back in time an Orangutan-Gorilla-Chimpanzee-Human common ancestor. Humans evolved from a single twig of the ape branch of the tree of life. Evolution does not proceed as a complete transformation of one species into another (like all chimpanzees suddenly becoming humans or giving birth to humans) leaving a disappearance of the 'parent' species behind.
'Pond-scum' or Kent Hovind's disparaging 'lightening on mud' or (with regards to the big bang) 'all the dirt in the Universe) are statements of absolute unscientificness. There is no such thing as scum or dirt in science. Science talks about elements and gives them names (such as oxygen and carbon and nitrogen and silicon). Life is formed from elements. Cells are formed from elements. Life can evolve once a nucleic acid is enclosed/delimited/contained in a membrane. That is all that needed to happen.
There are indeed transitional forms like Archaeopteryx. There are lineages alive today that give clues as to transitions, like hoatzins, platypuses, lungfish and coelocanths, hippopotamuses, Australopithecus and welwitschias (which give clues as to the origins of angiosperms).
Earth-age is a matter of geology. But evolution theory needs it since evolutionary processes take a long time. Earth is not 6000 years old as the Bible-literalists claim. Earth is 4 600 million years old. The uranium dating mechanism that was used to measure this is no doubt inaccurate by a few hundred million years. This is about 1% of the total magnitude of the age and is thus negligable. Earth is very very old. The way of measuring Earth as 6000 years old was done by examining ages of humans in the Old Testament. This presumes that humans have existed for the entireness of Earth's history. However to measure something's age it is better to measure the age of what that something is made of (rock in Earth's case). One cannot measure something peripheral (like human-age, humans just being on the surface). If measuring age were done like this, the age of a wad of cheese would be measured by the age of the mould growing on that cheese or a person's age would be measured by measuring the length of time they'd been wearing that morning's shirt.
The 'just a theory' argument shows lack of understanding of 'theory'. Theories are all-incorporating explanations that tie together many facts. Hypotheses are promoted to theories only when confirmed by convincing evidence. It is appropriate to say 'just a hypothesis' of something of course. And of course that would be inappropriate for evolution, which is a theory and not a hypothesis. Hypothesis is almost synonymous with guess. Theory is almost synonymous with fact.
Evolution suggests ungodguidedness perhaps. I admit that religion exists as a comfort for humans in a frightening universe. However, if evolution is the truth we must not shy away from it obviously. Then we have a true explanation of the biological world's diversity! To think there is a god is faith and so regardless of what science you accept god can still be imagined for comfort. To the thinking person and the common sensical person, atheism may well abound in their thoughts and knowledge of the universe anyway, regardless of Darwin's theory of evolution.
Is evolution depressing? Mindless mutations locked into existence nonrandomly by selection or eliminated? Look at the beauty of life's biodiversity. One must not fail in the imagination just because a process is mindless. Evolution has great power. Theodosius Dobzhansky said 'Nothing in evolution makes sense except in the light of evolution'. The 'Origin of Species' has the words 'Out of the war of Nature' and out of this emerges Darwin's evolved 'forms most beautiful'. There is constant action and colour and wonder in the world of life, of animals, plants, genetics, ecosystems and the beautiful biosphere as a whole. Why would anyone be sad about that. All life has a life-force just like you, selected by Natural Selection. Can all life appreciate life as much as we do?
Does evolution (as the Theory of Evolution) lead to Hitler-persons and their vicious killings of fellow humans? I'm sure many people will agree that Hitler was a horrible git (we could always be ruder and about Hitler is the place to be so) no matter how you slice it. Hitler's horribleness surely has nothing to do with evolution. Evolution is an innocent description of life-adaptation and change and diversification. If Hitler produced atrocities after having heard of evolution, it must be remembered that Hitler was horrible and ghastly no matter how you slice it. Maybe the Hitler argument is simply used by serious anti-evolutionists trying to incite moral outrage. Notice that it is not against the mechanisms of gene frequencies and mutation and Natural Selection and species diversification. It is just against a theory which says nothing of God and morality and Bible-said statements and thus regards it as immoral/ungodly.
Finally, evolution is not a religion. It is a science. When it is said 'Scientists BELIEVE that Earth is 4 600 million years old' or 'Scientists believe that endosymbiosis took place' or 'It is believed that all life has a common ancestor', that word BELIEVED means 'thought sensible and logical' and 'is thought a good account of what occurs in reality', 'is thought a good description of the world'. It is not religious at all as it is based on evidence and logic and common sense and knowledge and not faith.
All arguments against evolution arise from faith-based contempt for nonfaithful, nonreligious science-explanation. All of them are completely invalid.
Evolution remains a perfect fully-supported theory, which explains the origins and diversifications of 'Darwin's forms most beautiful', the beauty of life....
There is no evidence that refutes the theory of evolution by natural selection. Critiques and arguments by creationist and ID advocates are always poorly thought out and easily shown to be wrong by even undergraduates. The arguments use straw men and other fallacies plus they have been refuted so many times that to bring one of these arguments up is to self parody.
The bible...sooo basically nothing. It all boils down to humans believing we are special when we aren't, such as someone saying "I didn't decent from no monkey" (most likely a southern redneck retard) which we didn't decend from a monkey they are just a distant cousin.
Because they feel it disagrees with a literal interpretation of Genesis......they will say that evolution has no scientific evidence to support it and try to come up with arguments against it, but the bottom line is they just don't WANT to believe it, and so reject it at face value.
A discovery that shows species appearing suddenly in the fossil record without any preceding ancestors would provide evidence against the theory of evolution. This would contradict the gradual changes in species predicted by evolution.
No. Evolution is accepted as legitimate evidence-supported science by virtually 100% of professional biologists, by 95% of scientists in general, and almost every National or International Academy of Science on the planet has issued one or more statements confirming evolution is legitimate science well supported by all available evidence.
"The evidence for evolution countervails over the arguments against it." THis means that evidence for evolution counteracts the arguments against it.
Every argument against evolution falls into several categories. 1.) It could disprove something if it were true, but that something would not be evolution. 2.) There are no arguments for Intelligent design, all they have are arguments against evolution (and sometime plate tectonics, cosmology, mathematics's, or oceanography). 3.) Every single argument made against evolution or any other natural science in defence of intelligent design (also known as creationism as determined by a conservative Christian judge) has been used as an argument against intelligent design and backing up the science that the creationists are trying to ignore. Summary: Take any creationist claim, summarize it, and take the reverse of that and you get the scientific arguments against intelligent design and for evolution.
There is no evidence that refutes the theory of evolution by natural selection. Critiques and arguments by creationist and ID advocates are always poorly thought out and easily shown to be wrong by even undergraduates. The arguments use straw men and other fallacies plus they have been refuted so many times that to bring one of these arguments up is to self parody.
Arguments against economic integration world leader command?
There are no real, good arguments against planning. Having a plan is important in many cases.
are you for or against voluntary work
There are many arguments for and against DNA evidence. One argument is that it cannot be disproved as deciding evidence.
Celibacy is abstinence from sex or sexual relations. There are arguments for it to protect people from unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases and religious purity. There are arguments against it saying that it is restrictive and that it goes against following the laws of nature.
The arguments against declaring independence were that the declaration of independance would lead to war and the colonist would not be faithful
paradise
8===================D
to babble