[jpsb]

I have been on the fence on evolution for a long time, but the other day I read about mammals inner ear evolving twice. First 50 million years ago in a dead end line of mammals and then again 15 million years ago in a line that survived. Now that is not a random mutation, something was at work improving mammals. There is a mechanism that creates new life but it is not evolution as I understand evolution.

[shubi]

That was a monotreme fossil discovery (Platypus ancestor).

It in no way refutes evolution.

[jwalsh07]

Unlike dyed in the wool Neo Darwinians I don't rule out other mechanisms. And I don't believe that in a deistic God obviously becasue I am a Christian. I happen to think that God's greatest gift to man is free will and that God does intervene in the affairs of men at various times both through his own intentions and the power or prayer.

What you described would be called, I think, convergent evolution by the darwinists. What is the probability of such convergence? I would expect that it is a very large number against.

I see design all around us. I see genetically designed cotton, wheat and chimeras that fulfill the definition of evolution which can be defined as "any change in the frequency of alleles within a gene pool from one generation to the next." Helena Curtis and N. Sue Barnes, Biology, 5th ed. 1989. So while a preponderance of scientists dismiss design out of hand, I don't since I can observe it with my own two getting old eyes.

Of course I'm not a scientist, I'm a blue collar guy who managed to collect a BS in engineering when I got out of the Army. So, you'll have to take my points with a grain of salt.