Evolution Vs. Creationism
Essay by 24 • October 25, 2010 • 989 Words (4 Pages) • 2,745 Views
Evolution vs. Creationism
The Evolution vs. Creationism controversy goes all the way back to the Publishing of Origin of Species in 1859 by Darwin laying the foundation for the evolution of life to be understood. Scientists are continuously finding more evidence to support Darwin's conclusion; that organisms descended from a common ancestor modified by the mechanism of natural selection resulting in the evolution of species adapting to their environment. The following are the main geological topics concerning creationism: radiometric dating, transitional forms and the Cambrian explosion. Creationism is nothing more than a child's fairytale that lacks any scientific proof.
The aspect of radiometric dating is controversial to most creationists on the grounds that it is unreliable and has error factors. One creationist points out: "a living mollusk was once shown by carbon-14 dating to be dead for 3,000 years" (Geology). There are several things wrong with this idea. Creationists who determined this value used carbon 14 dating which is useful for determining the age of organism 50,000 years old. It is not suitable to be used for such a young organism, so the creationists make it seem as if there is something incorrect with the technique which leads to incorrect dates. Even the biggest errors, found in Carbon 14 dating, do not correspond to the 6000 year old earth that the Bible suggests. It's almost as if they are trying to 'create' problems on the purpose so they can prove scientists incorrect. Creationists also point out that radiometric dating has errors of millions of years, but in the geological time scale this is irrelevant. Plus or minus a couple million years has a negligible effect on the results attempting to be obtained. Radiometric dating consistently prove from analysis of bolide fragments that the earth is about 4.6 billion years old and once again disproving the Bible's 6,000 years. The problem for creationism is that they can't prove there 'fairytale' correct because it's based on little fact, so they attempt to make the other valid ideas sound ridiculous. Therefore, creationism attempts to prove radiometric dating incorrect and is nothing more than a feeble attempt to bring credibility to there own ideas and beliefs.
Secondly, a once thought problem with evolution was the lack of transitional phases in the fossil record. For example it was once thought there were no transitional phases between birds and reptiles; this has now been proven false by paleontologists. Archaeopteryx has distinctive avian characteristics including a wishbone, a bony sternum and feathers (Geology). Several of its reptilian characteristics include unfused metacarpal bones, a long bony tail and three well developed fingers. What is also interesting is that archaeopteryx lived at the same time as the dinosaurs. Again, it seems as if creationists randomly start making assumptions in an attempt to slander other valid theories rather than proving there's correct (even thought that's impossible). "If evolution were true, there would be more transitional forms". Evolution doesn't account for the probability of fossilization because certain conditions are required for even shelled organisms like brachiopods (Geology). As a result, some transitional phases are lost because of this problem. Soft bodied organisms are extremely rare; one particularly extraordinary find is the Burgess Shale in Field BC. Thousands of invertebrates
...
...