OK. Take two herds of horses. Keep one on the plains. Put the other one in an environment where the land rises one inch per centry. 1 foot in 1200 years, 1000 feet in 1.2 million years. Let's let it go on for say, 5 million years.
I'm sure the actual biologists here can do better, but I'd predict that the 'horses' on the higher, more mountainous area will resemble (at least in behavior, I don't know about appearence) present-day donkeys or burros more than the original horses. (eg, they'd be more sure-footed than their ancestors)
When you've invented time travel, let's conduct the experiment. Until then, we have to work with what's available, namely fossils and DNA.
Can some creationist/IDer give me pointers on how to set up an experiment where we can observe 'special creation'?
Until then, I remain a skeptic and a heretic ( at least reading from the invective hurled by the dogmatic in the evolution camp ). And statements from people like that Fortey fellow continue to show that evolution is more of a religious creed to its proponents rather than something to be subjected to scientific inquiry.
I don't discount evolution, but I do have a problem with giving such a theory the status of a Natural Law.
Don't get me wrong -- creationism is pure bunk, and it betrays an uneasiness with religious faith if one has to contoct some scientific argument to support it.
If the result was exactly as you predict, it would scarcely qualify as proof of evolution. Evolution is where species A turns into species B by the addition of some new characteristics or capabilities that were completely absent in A, such as a new organ or limb or wings or something. Increasing complexity. Everything is supposed to have evolved from a single cell organism. That's what transmutation of species is (Darwinian evolution). That's why mosquitoes becoming immune to a pesticide isn't evolution.
It always interests me what evolution supporters don't understand the theory of evolution. My minister recently said that people who think all life evolved from some muck being hit by lightning millions of years ago are overeducated for their intelligence. I have to agree.
I can't do that, I think you have to die first to see it. However, we could set up some experiments to see some species transform themselves into another genus. We could for example take some short lived, fast reproducing species and alter its environment, bombard it with all kinds of chemicals and stuff and see if it transforms itself into a more complex species.
We could for example take a virus, or better, many different viruses, put thousands of scientists to do the above for a few dozen years and see if one of the viruses turns itself into a self replicating bacterium. We could take scientists from schools, from drug companies and from as many different disciplines as possible. Of course this would take billions and billions of dollars, lots of equipment and the minds of many smart people to think up of new ways to test these viruses. I am not sure you and I could set up such a test.
But wait! All is not lost! This has already been done! And what is even better, it continues to be done! We don't have to go through all that work and expense! And never in that multitude of tests has a virus been transformed into a bacterium.