[MMM]

Originally Posted by FeyOberon

1) I'm not entirely sure how this point relates to anything that has been said recently. Of course all things living on the earth are the offspring of their predecessors -- that really goes without saying, I would hope. If you are alluding to the absolute origin of life, however, then the first "parents" had to have come from somewhere. You will not find a person anywhere who claims to be a scientist and believes that life on earth has always existed.

I am not referring to the origin of life but the fact that all life come from life. Me from my parents, my parents from their parents, etc. Each generation different from the last. There is no evidence to suggest that every individual species existing on the planet today came straight through history each on an individual straight line, untouched by other creatures. They must have COME from somewhere. And that somewhere is a simple organism. You have to squeeze your eyes shut pretty tight not to see the connections.

Also the fact that man did not exist when the dinosaurs did means that man had to come from somewhere AFTER the dinosaurs went extinct. Since you agree all life comes from life, where did man come from then?

Originally Posted by FeyOberon

2) Yes, monkeys and dogs and whales all have spines and hair, are mammals, are bilaterally symmetric, and share numerous other traits. And, yes, the animal world is categorized by Kingdom, Phylum, Class, Order, Family, Genus, and Species based on similar trates among different species. But your point is overly simplistic in that there are irreconcilable differences between different species on a cellular and DNA level. I took biology also, so please don't patronize me.

Was I patronizing you? If you took biology then you already know how different animals are connected to each other.

I am surprised you chose to bring up DNA because DNA supports evolution more than debunks it, though certain folks think they have found evidence that it does...

Looking at DNA the human it is almost identical to a gorilla's, but even closer to the DNA of prehistoric human beings...our ancestors. As a biology student you are surely familiar with homology. This is the similarity between different creatures due to shared ancestry. Homology explains things like why certain modern whales have hip bones when they don't have any purpose for a creature that doesn't walk.

Originally Posted by FeyOberon

My point with the viruses was not that two different strains of virus (or viruses compared with bacteria or anything else not viral) are so different from one another. Rather, my point was that, no matter how small the difference between two different organizims, one will never change into the other. My point was that your example of viral "evolution" is not evolution at all.

My example of viral evolution absolutely is an example of evolution on a small scale.

And no, creature do not change into other creatures, it's a much slower process than that. So slow it's impossible to visualize without seeming fantastic. The reason modern whales have hipbones is because their ancestor was a creature called Pakicetus who had more developed rear legs, and probably was a land-dweller. Why can't whales breathe underwater when other fish can? That's the line of ancestry that they came from.

Originally Posted by FeyOberon

3) The age of fossils, and, by extension, the plants and animals you refer to, is determined by radiocarbon dating -- an imperfect dating method that cannot provide an accurate age without knowledge of unknowable variables from the past. Also, even today, simple plants and animals are much more likely to encounter circumstances that would lead to fossilization than are complex life forms.

I would really like to continue this discussion! I'll try to check back this weekend (I can't tomorrow).

Radiocarbon dating is only one way of determining a fossil's age, and indeed it is not perfect, but not nearly as inaccurate as certain factions would like you to believe.

The theory of evolution will never be proven as absolute fact. This is true of most things in science. But it also hasn't been disproved, despite legitimate and continuing efforts. And the longer evolution cannot be disproved, the more likely it is that it is true.