Evolution, DNA and God, page 1

Originally posted by Jakko
1. Where does life come from.

On our planet we have (if you have not noticed) quite a large amount of life. All kinds of different species walk around, acting as if they have always been here, including us.
Most likely we have not always been here, and this topic is about how everything started.
The big bang theory is nice and all, but explosions usually destroy life. They surely don't affect life in a positive way, let stand create life.
Fish turning into apes turning into humans sounds very cool as well, but recent theories have showed that there is enough proof against that as well.

DNA
According to a lot of folks on this planet, life started by DNA improving itself. In fact the whole idea of evolution is based on the idea of DNA changing and improving over time. This is the first and most important thing in the whole evolution theory that does not make sense.
The problem is that DNA does not change at all.

A child is a copy (a mix of 2 DNA's) of the parents.
We are all unique because DNA contains so much info that a random mix between 2 DNA's will always lead to a unique result. But nothing new is added to it.
This means we do not improve at all, but it goes further then that.

Sometimes something goes wrong. Because of various reasons, DNA can be damaged. And it does not take a nuclear disaster for DNA to become damaged.
In this case, the child (copy of dna's) will also copy this small error, and after a few thousands of years quite a lot of people might walk around having this error.
What people assume, is that these "errors" (new dna) is what changed and improved several species, leading to the life that we have today, including us.

And this is where stuff goes wrong.
Small errors in your DNA generally do not improve you at all.
Just like everything else in this world, DNA slowly decays over time as more errors creep in.
The life that eventually survives, are the ones with the least errors, not the ones with the most.
A fish can not turn into an ape, and an ape can not turn into a human just by errors in the DNA.
If by mistake in DNA, a dog would be born with 7 legs, we do not call it evolution either.
Having 7 legs is not cool for the dog, neither is it the start of an evolution to a new species, it's just plain stupid.

Now what does God have to do with this you might be wondering...
Well the above theory does not prove that there is a God, but it sure makes the existence of such a being more likely.
The maximum speed in the universe, the small insects that look like leaves to fool birds.
It almost looks as if some thought went into the creation of the universe and everything that's in it.
Not some random chain of chaos, explosions and apes.

OK - I'd like to start by saying I am not a biologist or anything, so this is opinion - if someone knows me to be wrong, feel free to correct me.

The Big Bang was the creation of our universe, and as such, there would have been no life before this for it to destroy. In fact, the earth was around for a very long time before any life was even present here, having been here in a volcanic state for a huge amount of time before there was any water or atmosphere.

DNA can change, as in mutate, and although this it is more commonly bad then good, it can lead to desirable atributes for it's offspring.

However, I do not believe it is these changes in DNA that cause evolution. It is more (to my knowladge) that single genes become more common because they allow for better survival. Take marothon runners - the best ones are almost allways from Kenya. This is because of the extreme altitude they live at. This has shown it's self in their people, as they have extremely good lungs to account for the thin air.

Another example - Eskimos. They have a layer of fat over their eye lids. This is to prevent their eyes from freezing in the cold. You will not find this layer of fat any where else in the world.

More examples - most people (who are not of mixed ethnicity and have stayed in their homeland) from very cold places are very stocky. This stocky build allows for heat to be kept in the body by having a small exposed skin to size ratio. Like wise, many people from hot climates are thin and tall, thus giving them a very high skin area to size ratio. This is so they can more quickly cool their body.

Now, if you are looking at the evolution of humans, you have to say - what is our most important trait? Thats easy - our brain. We are so much smarter then other animals it defies logic. But why? Well, humans are physically ungifted. We have hands, which is about our only physical plus. unlike four legged animals, if one of our legs is injured beyond hope, we will not be able to walk. We stand up right - this is usefull to us so we may use our hands, but assuming we had no hands, it would be another flaw. It exposes our whole body to attack. Instead of exposing just our head in a confrontation, we expose our vital organs and neck. A very serious flaw indeed. Over all - the human body is frail. We do not deal with pain very well, and cannot deal with extreme heat/cold without help.

This is where are brain comes in. Somewhere way back when, our genes developed the tendency for intellegence as our main survival tool. As it worked better and better, our body adapted to suit our brains needs. We stood upright, thus giving our arms the ability to perform another function. We developed a thumb, which allowed us to grasp. The rest is history.

Any way - I am not saying there is no God or anything like that, but I believe in a mixture of both. And looking at the world, evolution seems quite likely to me.