If macro-evolution is a fact, then we should find that the precursors
for our organs within our alleged ancestry or within related species and not in
totally unrelated ones. If instead, the species of the various phyla reflect
the hand of an intelligent Designer, we might instead find these traits spread
out among the various living things as unconnected patterns in a patchwork
quilt.
Interestingly, evolutionists have a term for this commonly
found un-associated mosaic of traits - convergent evolution. Paleobiologist and
evolutionist, Simon Conway Morris, reflects on one example:
·
The idea is this: that convergence – the
tendency of very different organisms to evolve similar solutions to biological
problems – is not just part of evolution, but a driving force. To say this is
an unconventional view would be something of an understatement. To start with
an example of convergence (itself an astonishing phenomenon), take the “camera
eye” – an eye comprising a lens suspended between two fluid-filled chambers,
and the kind of eye which you are using to read this feature…If you go to the
octopus and, if you’re not too squeamish, dissect it, you’ll find that it has a
camera eye which is remarkably similar to our own. And yet we know that the
octopus belongs to an invertebrate group called the cephalopod mollusks,
evolutionarily very distant indeed from the chordates to which we belong. Cambridge
Alumni Magazine (#65 Lent, p. 32)
·
The common ancient ancestor of mollusks and
chordates could not possibly have possessed a camera eye, so quite clearly they
have evolved independently. The solution has been arrived at by completely
different routes.
How is it that we and the Octopus share the same eye? Convergent
evolution! How does this explain the existence of this strange relatedness? It
doesn’t – not at all! It merely suggests that there must be some undiscovered
force that causes nature to replicate itself in entirely different species on
many occasions – a “driving force” that directs mindless evolutionary processes
to find the identical adaptive solutions. Sounds like design to me!
Morris concludes that the evidences of “convergent evolution”
require a radical rewriting of evolution. However, he doesn’t see an
intelligent Designer as a necessary ingredient. Perhaps the Designer is just too radical.
Hi Brother Daniel,
ReplyDeleteAble to view blog and post comment. Love your blog and love your courage and honesty! You are a true blessing.
Your Sister in Christ,
Latashia
Latashia,
DeleteThanks so much for your encouraging words. Please let me know if you ever have any questions!
First of all we do not have the same eye as the octopus, there are clear differences. When convergent evolution occurs there are clear signals of ancestry which give the game away.
ReplyDeleteFor example, sharks, dolphins, and ichthyosaurs, have all converged on the same body shape for fast movement through water. Dolphins and icthyosaurs still have/had something which their land ancestors had: lungs. These are an obstacle for living in water, especially when a designer could just give them gills. Instead, what we see is due to constraint. Another constraint can be seen in the way they move through the water. Sharks move their tail fluke from side to side, as do ichthyosaurs; as the latter descend from reptiles which also use this side to side motion to walk on land. Dolphins, as mammals, use the common up-down movement which all mammals use. Despite their convergences, their ancestry is given away.
Convergence always has a clear explanation: it is what works best for the environment. Options are limited, so some solutions appear repeatedly (but remember, we can always spot the ancestry). They are functional convergences, which is why this is not a problem for evolution by natural selection at all; it is to be expected. The only real surprise is its ubiquity, which shows just how constraining nature can be.
You are also displaying a lack of research, as Simon Conway Morris is a devout Christian who believes nature points to God. He simply rejects ID as it is commonly proposed.
To admit convergent evolution – that commonalities need not have a common ancestry - is to invalidate evolution’s only “proof,” that commonalities (whether genetic, morphological…) are evidence of common ancestry.
DeleteYou are ignoring the nature of those commonalities. Please re-read my post.
ReplyDelete