Need some help regarding human macro evolution

[PaulB007]

Hello, it's good to meet all of you. I appreciate you taking the time to look at this thread and hopefully lead me in the right direction. First, I want to thank you for defending your faith and helping others. During these hard, trying times we need more like you. Even though my faith is meager and weak at best, it means a lot to me that there are those who are there to help people.

Anyways, my question is this: Are there any materials out there to date that are credible, well thought out with good reason that debate the evolutionary theory that humans came about from neanderthals, homonids, ect? My knowledge in this area is that of a layman at best so I am very ignorant regarding the science of it. With the lack of sources I find, and any that I can find seem to have knowledgable refutations and contradicting views that nullify the articles/books arguements, ie. Darwins Black Box by Michael Behe.

It's come to the point where if I can't find someone who can give me a hope that the macro-evolution theory has some holes or isnt completely true, that I will have to conclude we are a result of random chance. I don't want it to come to that but my belief hinges on this one factor.

Thank you so much for your help, I look forward to your answers on this issue.

[Gabrielman]

Did you ever read any work by Lee Strobel? I was once like that and I struggled in my faith when it came to science. His book, The Case For a Creator (that link will take you to a page that shows it) Was my first read on the subject and then I found this site, try the articles on the main site, they are very very helpful and also try Darwin's Black Box, another book I read that helped me. But so far as macro evolution, lol it has more holes than Swiss cheese!!! Let me get some articles from the main site for you and I will post them okay? But look at all the materials out there, and also ask yourself this, how can we as a bunch of atoms (nothing more than protons neutrons and electrons) be alive? Why did life arise from non life? I will leave it at that for now

[Gabrielman]

Here is one of my favorite articles that Rich posted The Scientific Case Against Evolution This is just one of many articles on the main site that can be of much use!

[PaulB007]

Not to be disrespectful and I thank you for your response, but Strobel is naturally going to be biased in his book, and so will the people he interviews be. I have read The Case for Christ and the Case for Faith, both good books. But on this issue, I am looking for a more neutral scientific opinion that shows holes in the macro-evolutionary theory of chimps to humans and have found it to be impossible, because elite evolutionists may taint the facts to support their argument, and elite creationists may omit certain things.

Do you, or anyone else know of a neutral article or book ect where the author has no agenda behind their research or findings? Because lets face it, anything we may think about religion or God or Jesus falls apart if macro evolution is proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That's what I want to find, the doubters.

Michael Behe's book is almost 15 years old and has been refuted and answered all over the place, so I do not find that source to be reliable. I am not concerned with molecular evolution or any of that stuff, but arguments against *chimp to human* theory. I have not heard a whole lot about this lately, is it because we are in a losing battle regarding chimps evolving into humans?

[August]

The theory does not state that humans evolved form chimps. The theory states that humans and chimps share a common ape-like ancestor. The strongest evidence for that is genetic similarity between humans and chimps.

However, the last common ancestor remains unidentified. There are also more and more research that shows that even if we share much of the genetic code, the DNA codes very differently between similar genomes, i.e. the physiological and anatomical effects are not the same. The other piece of evidence, the strongest in my opinion, are endogenous retrovirus remnants on both human and chimp DNA, in the same locations, that was supposedly inherited from the common ancestor. Recent evidence has put a lot of cold water on that theory. For example, viral insertions are in the non-coding (junk) DNA, and that decays over time. With the movement back of the last common ancestor by several million years, it is harder to justify the viral insertion theory. Also, there is some debate as to whether these viral insertions are actually that at all.

I would recommend you look for articles that discuss the genetic similarities. I will poke around and see what I can find.

[August]

Michael Behe's book is almost 15 years old and has been refuted and answered all over the place, so I do not find that source to be reliable. I am not concerned with molecular evolution or any of that stuff, but arguments against *chimp to human* theory. I have not heard a whole lot about this lately, is it because we are in a losing battle regarding chimps evolving into humans?

Did you know he had another book, The Edge of Evolution? Pretty technical, but demonstrates quite nicely that current evolutionary mechanisms cannot account for macroevolution.

[PaulB007]

I did see that one, I might check it out Behe's most recently book to see what its about. And yeah I didnt mean chimps directly to humans, because I know that the way they say it, that it was a gradual evolution and then break off of the species or something like that. I haven't studied it in a long time so I am not the most savvy regarding evolutionary theory.

Thanks for your time in looking up these things, I appreciate it. It's so hard to sift through extremely biased material that I don't know where to start.

[August]

Thanks for your time in looking up these things, I appreciate it. It's so hard to sift through extremely biased material that I don't know where to start.

The problem is that most papers assume the conclusion they are trying to prove. Very few have the courage to go where the evidence leads. Behe, by the way, is not opposed to common descent.

[PaulB007]

Christians tell me a lot that there are a lot of holes in the macro-evolution theory, but nobody has ever really given me what those hole really are.

[Gman]

Christians tell me a lot that there are a lot of holes in the macro-evolution theory, but nobody has ever really given me what those hole really are.

Likewise I would like to see the proofs of macro-evolution...

Many say that the chimps blueprint is 99% identical to ours. Humans are much more identical to a chimp than a rat, that is true. It sounds close, only 1%, but you also have to remember that our genome is 3 billion base pairs long. So one 1% of 3 billion we are still talking about millions of letters that are different. It's still a big difference. There are also considerable differences involved in the development of the brain, also our diet and how we digest food are really different. Speech is another area. A sequence called FOXP2 may help give humans the delicate muscle control in their face to produce words far more complex than animal sounds. And the difference from leathery paws to sensitive hands that build computers maybe the result of another sequence dubbed R2.

[Gman]

Do you, or anyone else know of a neutral article or book ect where the author has no agenda behind their research or findings? Because lets face it, anything we may think about religion or God or Jesus falls apart if macro evolution is proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That's what I want to find, the doubters.

There is no such thing as a neutral article because there is no such thing as philosophy free science..

[Gabrielman]

Do you, or anyone else know of a neutral article or book ect where the author has no agenda behind their research or findings? Because lets face it, anything we may think about religion or God or Jesus falls apart if macro evolution is proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That's what I want to find, the doubters.

That article I gave you is the best that you can get when it come to unbiased. How ever even if evolution were true, that doesn't prove that God and Jesus are not real nor does it mean that the Bible if false, so no it doesn't fall apart. If it were proven true then I would be a Theistic Evolutionist, there are many stances on how to interpret the creation account keep that in mind.

[PaulB007]

Do you, or anyone else know of a neutral article or book ect where the author has no agenda behind their research or findings? Because lets face it, anything we may think about religion or God or Jesus falls apart if macro evolution is proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That's what I want to find, the doubters.

That article I gave you is the best that you can get when it come to unbiased. How ever even if evolution were true, that doesn't prove that God and Jesus are not real nor does it mean that the Bible if false, so no it doesn't fall apart. If it were proven true then I would be a Theistic Evolutionist, there are many stances on how to interpret the creation account keep that in mind.

While Genesis can be interpreted in so many different ways, to accept evolution as a man evolving from many chimp like ancestors, you'd have to say that when God created man in his image, God himself is then a chimp? That's how I'd look at that. It personally wouldn't make sense to me. I know I may seem like I am criticizing and giving a hard time but believe me, I am trying to connect to God and Christ. I have been agnostic at best for about 10ish years, I am 22 now. One day I just felt a sudden urge to look back into Christianity and give it another chance. Since im older, smarter, and more mature now I hope that this time around I am able to get on the right path and stay there.

I do believe Jesus was definitely a real person, or God for that matter. Infact, looking at it on that basis alone is the best way to do it I think. Because you have to wonder why so many early eye witnesses would die for a lie, and know they were going to hell for it for worshiping a false God (Christ) if he were not who he said he was. Jewish tradition was very strict back then and the Christian revolution was a far cry from Jewish customs.

[PaulB007]

Do you, or anyone else know of a neutral article or book ect where the author has no agenda behind their research or findings? Because lets face it, anything we may think about religion or God or Jesus falls apart if macro evolution is proven beyond a reasonable doubt. That's what I want to find, the doubters.

There is no such thing as a neutral article because there is no such thing as philosophy free science..

This is probably true, but I figured there'd be some sort of scientist out there that says we know this this and this, but these things aren't proven or cause problems with the theory. I haven't barely found anything out there on that. I am going to look at that article and read it, the one provided here. I might check out Behe's two books even though they have a lot of negative reviews and refutations on amazon.

[Gman]

This is probably true, but I figured there'd be some sort of scientist out there that says we know this this and this, but these things aren't proven or cause problems with the theory. I haven't barely found anything out there on that. I am going to look at that article and read it, the one provided here. I might check out Behe's two books even though they have a lot of negative reviews and refutations on amazon.

Well all scientists do that in some respect.. But they will always fall into some philosophical viewpoint. Who would want to read a science book that ends in a question mark for a conclusion? It would if it was philosophical and not science. But people call it science. They mix their philosophy into their science anyway..

If you want some newer stuff, try looking at some of the newer pages we post at our site..

http://www.godandscience.org/new.html#gqiL5nlB1LRU