Nice link, but it reads like a lot of people arguing with eachother. If I was interested in that, I'll handle my affairs personally, and argue the points myself.
Tell you what -- since you admit that "Genetic Mutation TENDS to create more problems than it solves, yes", howzabout you intrigue me with some example which conform to the following criteria:
Best, OP
Thus, this famous argument by the evolutionists actually supports the anti-evolutionists' position--which is that mutations are deleterious. The evolutionists need to think through their position a lot more carefully. The doctrine of natural selection actually supports the creationists' case.
By the way, the notion that microevolutionary changes (variation) can ever add up to macroevolutionary changes (speciation) has not been thought through very well at all by the evolutionists.
To illustrate: A person looking at bats and rats might be tempted to say that a bat is a rat with wings. That person might very well ask how this presuppositional rat (actually, just a bat, not a rat in any sense whatsoever, even if it looks "ratty") acquired these wings.
Since we know that microevolution (variation) occurs, he might very well assume that it just took a lot of microevolutionary changes to produce the wing. But this is impossible for the very reasons of natural selection. (The mainstream evolutionists are sure that this is not the case, because they doggedly refuse to question their presupposition! But they need to start facing the scientific issues more honestly, more objectively. See below.)
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If we look at the bat's wing, it has the simplistic appearance of a flap of skin on a long, thin bone which reaches out from an upper body appendage somewhat like a rat's foreleg. But the question is, How did the "thumb" of the rat's foreleg develop this elongation and skin covering?
Or maybe I should say that this is the typical evolutionists' question. A better scientist would have asked, Did the "thumb" of the rat's foreleg develop this elongation and skin covering?
Anyway, if we assume that it did happen, and if we go on to ask ourselves how it did, we should notice that it didn't. But the diehard evolutionists don't notice this. They just invoke the presuppositional notion that a macroevolutionary change (i.e., yielding wing formation) took place through a summation of microevolutionary changes. This is their answer to the "How did it happen?" question. But it's no answer, really, because it is not at all scientific. It's just presuppositional. Unfortunately for them, it doesn't work. Their presupposition is demonstrably false.
So, we have our answer to the "Did it happen?" question. The answer is, It didn't.
(Why do I say that? It's because a half-formed wing is useful neither for flying nor running. This is devastating to the "gradual evolutionary change" theory. Natural selection will destroy the critter ever time it tries to cross species. In other words, every time it even tries to form a transition form, it will be destroyed by natural selection. This is why there are no incontrovertible transition forms in the fossil record.
To put it all in perspective, the concept of natural selection actually supports the anti-evolutionists. It explains that there are thermodynamic barriers between species.
Even S.J. Gould noticed the problem posed by the lack of transition forms in the record--which is precisely why he invoked his "hopeful monster" theory." He noticed that one can't gradually add up micro changes to get a macro change. The micro changes would have to happen all at once. [This was also his basic explanation as to why there are no transition forms in the fossil record. I have to give him credit for noticing what the creationists have been saying about that all along!] There has to be a quantum jump from one species to another. Somehow, one species has to "jump" over the thermodynamic barrier to form a new species.
Unfortunately, Gould's theory is even more patently absurd than classical theory. It is statistically preposterous. [It's like saying an alligator lays an egg which hatches a chicken.] And because it is statistically preposterous, it is thermodynamically disallowed. One does not jump over thermodynamic barriers. These barriers are by the very nature of thermodynamics infinitely high.)
- If the first place, I want to see an absolute expansion of the Species survivability-quotient in question. If the Control Group (the Normative Species) can survive in Biomes A, B, C, and D, and the Test Group (the Mutant Variant) can survive in Biomes C, D, and E -- you may have isolated a Variant which can survive in Biome E, but you have reduced the overall survivability of the Species (from 4 Biomes to 3 Biomes).
No, you've increased the survivability. If the mutants are a new subspecies, then the species as a whole has now gone from 4 to 5 different environments. If they're a new species altogether, then you went from 1 species in 4 environments to 2 species in 5 environments. But in another sense you've actually gone from 4 to 7! You've gone from (1 species in 4 environments) to (1 species in 4 environments plus 1 new species in 3 environments). No matter how you measure it, the end result for the original population's offspring as a whole is increased biodiversity.
Same thing with the sickle-cell anemia carriers. Taken as a whole, the human species is more robust because of them.
- Secondly, if at all possible, let's see some examples other than Viruses and Bacteria. Remember, the "Fall in Eden" Model predicts that Diseases are with you always, so (alleged) adaptability on the part of Viral Plagues is not a huge surprise to the Genesis Creationist. Can we have some higher animal examples, please? If you have any to offer?
As an adult human who likes her milk, cheese, & ice cream, I really appreciate my lactose-tolerance gene - a beneficial mutation that was probably first enjoyed by my European ancestors. And though I have lost weight, I am still resolutely multicellular. :-)
Also see this T.O. article that examines the Apo-AIM mutation in humans. This mutation gives the person more-efficient HDL cholesterol particles so they scavenge arterial plaques better than the standard type, and it also helps suppress arterial inflammations. The article explains how this mutation represents an increase in information (by all the popular creationist measures).