The majority of the response was simply a continuation of previous unsubstantiated claims so I'll just fast forward to the meat...
It is taught as "fact" when that is intellectually dishonest.
You say this while obviously accepting adaptation and micro-evolution. You agree then, that adaptation and micro-evolution are facts, correct? And that stating and teaching how and why adapatation works is an honest endeavor based on solid science, right?
At what point does the science break down for you and suddenly become dishonest? At what point does the factual honest thing which you agree with get branded a belief system based on theory and full of lies?
It seems to me that you accept something only to the point that it begins to threaten your previously held presuppositions.
That is what you cannot provide evidence for. You have micro-evolution occurring right now....but there are boundaries that prevent one "kind" from becoming another entirely different "kind" altogether. These are the boundaries that the Bible speaks about....you cannot prove that those words are false.
Please, madam, show us how and why those boundaries exist. You can claim that they exist simply because of the wording using in the Bible, but for that to carry any credibility whatsoever, you have to biologically express how and why they are there. What are they? What physical limitations exist to speciation?
Science knows all kinds of boundaries to reproduction - but almost none to speciation.
Those handful of images that I provided are little more than a 10 second google search. There are hundreds more examples but finer specimens aren't necessary in order to make the point. You claim that the tea cup chihuahua is still "just a dog". But is a dog a wolf? We know, almost to the letter, the evolution of canines. From the gray wolf down to the teapcups, are you seriously going to make the argument that those animals are the same?
I understand that you see a 4 legged creature. But what in your line of reasoning then separates one species from another?
You've states that evolution cannot produce an entirely new creature, but that's precisely what selective breeding in dogs has accomplished. We haven't altered anything to their genetic make-up. The changes in dog breeds and species all comes through natural reproductive processes. If it's possible to take a wild gray wolf and have them biologically change themselves into a chihuahua through the exact same biological process that produces babies in all mammals, what's to stop them from changing even further?
Don't forget, that Chihuahua is fully grown.
Where are the transitional animals that prove there was a "chain" linking one "kind" to another?
All over the place, on every continent, in almost every museum, and cataloged in the scientific journals that you refuse to read yet have no problem attempting to debunk.
You've been shown several transitional fossils, or told about transitional species, over the course of this thread and your immediate response to all of those examples is
"All I see are perfectly formed animals already prepared for their environment." If that's your response to examples of transitional forms, then how are you ever going to see one? For every speices in transition there are going to be several very closely related species, by nature. You're not your grandmother. And your daughter won't be your mother. But both you and your mother are transitions from one generation to the next, right?
Take the wolves and chihuahua example since it should be easy for you to follow.
Is a gray wolf a chihuahua? Is a chihuahua a gray wolf? Of course not. You then have to admit that there are dozens of dog breeds between the chihuahua and the gray wolf, right? Aren't those functioning organisms transitional forms between the gray wolf and the chihuahua? Each of them had their own set of physical characteristics and specific habits and mating patterns and what have you, but they were all each somehow directly required in order to achieve the transition from gray wolf to tea cup chihuahua.
Invariably you're going to argue that these are still just dogs. But the point is that what they have created are two entirely different animals. They cannot mate. They cannot share genetic information. If the only two types of "dog" left on the planet were gray wolves and chihuahuas, then their subsequent offspring would also not be able to mate.... this is speciation.
Your pics serve to illustrate my point perfectly......the dog, regardless of its size or shape is still a dog and always was.
Again, is it honest to say that the chihuahua is a wolf? If the wolf a chihuahua?
While they are similar, they are not the same thing. The same is true of every other animal and organism on the planet. There are some incredibly similarities, but one species is not the same as the other. Just as the Great Dane or the Gold Retriever serve as transitional forms between the wolf and chihuahua, so too your parents and your grandparents serve as transitional forms between you and your first ancestors who walked out of Africa, or between you and your ape-like ancestor a few million years ago.
We are lucky enough to have even discovered the individual species which link us to those ancestors...
I have read quite a bit about evolution but not from scientific journals because I would never understand the jargon.
I think you could read the Bible too but never understand it. Like the conclusions reached by scientists, it too is interpretive.
You say that plainly, yet seem offended that I call you on your ignorance? How can you know anything about evolutionary biology without actually studying the biology?
And you admit that the Biblical narrative is interpretive, but you don't seem to like people attempting to explain to you that scientific understanding of evolutionary biology is not? There's no interpretation. Biology only functions, essentially, one way. Evolution is bound by the biological laws of reproduction. There's not much interpreting to it.
Again, and please try to answer this question at least:
Would you think it wise of me to attempt to discredit Jehova's Witness' theology after reading a handful of books written by people who dislike the theology? Would that be the best way to go about discrediting your faith? Would that be the best way for me to ascertain knowledge?
Clearly, I think not. And you must see the parallels between that analogy and what you're doing here with evolutionary understandings.
Evolution is an infant masquerading as an adult.
