Posted on 05/10/2009 1:43:12 PM PDT by GodGunsGuts
This year evolutionists are celebrating Charles Darwin's 200th birthday and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his book The Origin of Species. In preparation for this celebration, last December ICR sent Dr. Steve Austin to the Santa Cruz River Valley in southern Argentina to follow up on Darwin's trip on the Beagle. On board, Darwin read Charles Lyell's new book on uniformitarianism, advocating that today's "uniform" processes had dramatically sculptured the earth over long ages, accomplishing much geologic work.
The Santa Cruz River was the Beagle's first major stop, and thus Darwin's first chance to apply Lyell's ideas. Dr. Austin discovered Darwin had made numerous errors in Argentina as he attempted to interpret the river valley according to uniformity, and mistook major Ice Age flooding for great ages of minor processes.
Darwin's voyage continued, sailing around to the west of South America where the ship encountered the Galapagos Islands, straddling the equator. Here Darwin applied uniformitarianism to living systems, and eventually proposed slow-acting evolution as the source of life's diversity. ICR was certain he was equally as wrong on Galapagos as he was in Argentina, and desired to demonstrate it.
This became a reality when Doug Phillips and Vision Forum asked me to accompany them to the Galapagos during the week of March 9-15. They were shooting a Christian family film about a Christian father teaching his son about creation and the dangers of evolution. The film featured interviews with several experts, including me. The project's leading question was: Is Galapagos a living laboratory for evolution or a showcase for creation?
As has been pointed out in these pages, the one thing that Darwin didn't mention in his book The Origin of Species was the origin of species. He discussed at length variety within a species (i.e., pigeons or finches), and merely assumed that these minor, observed changes (microevolution) add up to large changes (macroevolution). This is the unsupported "faith" of the evolutionist. ICR's previous investigations on the Galapagos Islands had convinced us that no evolution is going on there.
The islands abound with unusual life. Going there was a wonderful "animal experience" for all of us, for the animals show little fear of humans. The rather barren volcanic islands afford unencumbered visibility of giant Galapagos turtles, sea lions, land and marine iguanas, Darwin's finches, "booby" birds, flightless cormorants, flamingos, frigate birds, etc., along with sea creatures accessible by snorkeling.
Evolutionists make much of the adaptation of land-based iguanas to ocean life. But is this evolution? No! The two rather different "species" freely interbreed in the wild. Evolution is about the origin of new species from existing species, but here we see the amalgamation of species, the opposite of evolution.
Evolutionists trumpet the several Galapagos finch "species" as arising by adaptation from one species. Creationists agree, but this did not happen through evolution. Normally the finch types segregate by lifestyle according to their beak shape, but in times of stress they interbreed and combine. No evolution here. The flightless cormorants are recognizably related to other species of cormorant on other continents, but these have lost the use of their wings. Since when is the loss of a useful structure an evolutionary development? The real question is how animals acquire wings in the first place, not how they lose them.
No, there is no evolution happening on the Galapagos Islands. They really are a showcase for creation. On display is God's wise creative design in preparing robust gene pools in each created "kind" that enable all of God's creatures to adapt and survive varying conditions.
Darwin got it wrong at the Galapagos Islands. The Genesis account stands.
*Dr. Morris is President of the Institute for Creation Research.
Ping!
thanks!
I am so sick of this Jeanine Galapagos and her views.
“but here we see the amalgamation of species, the opposite of evolution.”
Better word than amalgamation : reduction
My pleasure. What a great idea. Demonstrate that Darwin got it wrong in the Galapagos, and then point to the Galapagos for what they really are...A SHOWCASE FOR CREATION!
true, there is no evidence to support evolution, only a motive
Again an article that is all talk without one shred of support for it’s conclusions.
==Great. A geotechnical engineer wants to talk about biology.
As opposed to Darwin the med school dropout, turned clergyman, turned clergyman dropout, turned amateur naturalist...who had the audacity to reinterpret the entire history of biology based on a few minor variations within species. LOL!
Why is the Creation account to be accepted as literal and inerrant?
The author is quite correct. Darwood saw some minor variations with species and simply assumed that said minor variations explained the diversity of all life. Talk about a leap of faith!
Less of a leap than you prefer to take, my friend.
lol
Tell us the story about Darwin again daddy. I like fairy tales.
Pray for America
How did those big slow moving turtles, after the flood, from Mount Ararat walk all the way across Asia (including over the Himalayas) then swim across the Pacific to the Galapagos Islands?
==Less of a leap than you prefer to take, my friend.
I beg to differ. The Evos tell us life appears to be designed, but the appearance of design is really just an illusion. Whereas Creation/IDers say life appears to be designed because it really is designed.
==The proof is in the pudding; 150 years after presenting Origins, the principles laid out in it continue to represent the foundation of modern biological sciences.
Yes, the proof is in the pudding. Darwin just got his tree cut down by his fellow Evos for his birthday...just as the creationsts predicted. The neo-Darwinian prediction that 97% of the genome is “junk”/fossil DNA turned out to be completely the opposite. Now we know that DNA is at least 93% functional, and will probably climb to 100% functionality with further research...just as Creation/ID scientists predicted. And speaking of the Genome, they have found that Evo phylogenetic trees can’t predict “know evolutionary histories,” even when they use complete genome sequences. The list goes on and on and on and on and on... LOL!!!
“How did those big slow moving turtles, after the flood, from Mount Ararat walk all the way across Asia (including over the Himalayas) then swim across the Pacific to the Galapagos Islands?
Wrong question.
The right question is:
How did those big slow moving turtles move from/to Aldabra atoll in the Indian Ocean off Africa and the Galapagos in the Pacific Ocean off South America?
Why did they refus to settle elsewhere?
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