It is very common for certain religious people to refer to the Theory of Evolution as "Darwinism." But as you have probably learned, although Darwin may have provided the foundational elements, the theory today is much more than Darwin ever imagined. For example, basic genetics was unknown in Darwin's day. We also didn't have the collection of fossils that we have today, or the ability to date rocks. Darwin know nothing about punctuated equilibrium or what causes mutation. Calling the TOE "Darwinism" is like calling Physics "Newtonianism."
I have no idea how much you have learned about the subject. Perhaps you even know more than me. However, if you want a summary of the basics, this would be a good post for you to read:
Let me introduce myself. I am a nobody in an online forum. LOL Because I was a credentialed teacher, I not only took many science courses in pursuit of my Liberal Studies degree, but I also passed a competency exam in science. I do not have a degree in science. I certainly don't have a PhD...
www.religiousforums.com
Basically, I was learning about Darwin as a person. And I stopped learning about when I read that Darwin's daughter passed away.
Then I learned the word gap else where.
Elsewhere (not here in this forum), people were enjoying a conversation and were writing their humor about this word gap.
I join their conversation, thinking I could join in their humor about this word gap.
Basically, their humor about the gap was about cars and how the gap was in the area of missing years. So for example, a 1934 Ford (GAP) 1970 car. This was humor to them.
This is how I learned the word gap from this humor. Because what the gap was about was there's no cars to be shown, yet people knew there were cars in those years., as they saw the 1934 Ford and the 1970 car side by side. This was shown as humor for all to laugh about. That was my first time learning this word gap with Evolution because this forum was about Evolution. That didn't happen in this forum that happen else where.
There will be times when the environment changes rapidly, and so evolution speeds up. Scientists call this "punctuated equilibrium." That's a good term to memorize.
That's interesting word "punctuated equilibrium" so that would mean evolution speeds up.
But as is common among humans when discussing any spectrum, we divide it up into pieces and label the pieces. So for example, visual light really doesn't have any natural barriers between red and orange -- that division of the spectrum is culturally defined (in fact, in some cultures, red, orange, and yellow are all considered the same color).
This is interesting because it shows that not all situations have enough vocabulary to describe. As described, some cultures have red, orange, and yellow as the same color.
And interesting how visual light really doesn't have any natural barriers between red and orange.
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