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The neo-Darwinist model, which we shall
take as the "mainstream" theory of evolution today, argues that life has evolved
through two naturalistic mechanisms: "natural selection" and
"mutation". The basic assertion of the theory is as follows: Natural selection
and mutation are two complementary mechanisms. The origin of evolutionary modifications is
random mutations that take place in the genetic structure of living things. The traits
brought about by the mutations are selected by the mechanism of natural selection and
therefore the living things evolve. When we further probe into this theory, we
find that there is no such evolutionary mechanism at all, because neither natural
selection nor mutations make any contribution to the claim that different species have
evolved and transformed into one another. As process of nature, natural selection
was familiar to biologists before Darwin, who defined it as a "mechanism that keeps
species unchanging without being corrupted". Darwin was the first person to put
forward the assertion that this process had evolutionary power and he then erected his
entire theory on the foundation of this assertion. The name he gave to his book indicates
that natural selection was the basis of Darwin’s theory: The Origin of Species, by
means of Natural Selection... However since Darwin’s time, there
has not been a single shred of evidence put forward to show that natural selection causes
living beings to evolve. Colin Patterson, the senior paleontologist of the Museum of
Natural History in England, who is also a prominent evolutionist by the way, stresses that
natural selection has never been observed to have the power to cause things to evolve: No one has ever produced a species by
mechanisms of natural selection. No one has ever got near it and most of the current
argument in neo-Darwinism is about this question. (11) Natural selection holds that those living
things that are more suited to the natural conditions of their habitats will prevail by
having offspring that will survive, whereas those that are unfit will disappear. For
example, in a deer herd under the threat of wild animals, naturally those that can run
faster will survive. That is true. But no matter how long this process goes on, it will
not transform those deer into another living species. The deer will always remain deer. When we look at the few incidents the
evolutionists have put forth as observed examples of natural selection, we see that these
are nothing but a simple attempt to hoodwink.
Butterflies of the Industrial
Revolution In 1986 Douglas Futuyma published a book,
The Biology of Evolution, which is accepted as one of the sources explaining the theory of
evolution by natural selection in the most explicit way. The most famous of his examples
on this subject is about the colour of the butterfly population, which appeared to darken
during the Industrial Revolution in England. According to the account, around the outset
of the Industrial Revolution in England, the colour of the tree barks around Manchester
was quite light. Because of this, dark-coloured butterflies resting on those trees could
easily be noticed by the birds that fed on them and therefore they had very little chance
of survival. Fifty years later, as a result of pollution, the barks of the trees had
darkened, and this time the light-coloured butterflies became the most hunted. As a
result, the number of light-coloured butterflies decreased whereas that of the
dark-coloured ones increased since the latter were not easily noticed. Evolutionists use
this as a great evidence to their theory. Evolutionists, on the other hand, take refuge
and solace in window-dressing by showing how light-coloured butterflies
"evolved" into dark-coloured ones.
The example of the butterflies of the
Industrial Revolution is advanced as the greatest evidence for evolution by natural
selection. However, evolution is out of the question in this example, as no new butterfly
species is formed. On the left are trees and butterflies of the pre-Industrial Revolution
era, and on the right are those of the post-Industrial Revolution era. However, it should be quite clear that
this situation can in no way be used as evidence for the theory of evolution, for natural
selection did not give rise to a new form that had not existed before. Dark coloured
butterflies existed in the butterfly population before the Industrial Revolution. Only the
relative proportions of the existing butterfly species in the population changed. The
butterflies had not acquired a new trait or an organ, which would cause a "change in
species". In order to have a butterfly turn into another living species, a bird for
example, new additions would have had to be made to the genes. That is, an entirely
separate genetic program would have had to be loaded so as to include information about
the physical traits of the bird. Briefly, natural selection does not have
the capability to add a new organ to a living organism, remove one, or change the organism
into another species-quite contrary to the image that evolutionists conjure up. The
"greatest" evidence put forward since Darwin has been able to go no further than
butterflies in England.
Can Natural Selection Explain
Complexity?
There is nothing that natural selection
contributes to the theory of evolution, because this mechanism can never increase or
improve the genetic information of a species. Neither can it transform one species into
another: a starfish into a fish, a fish into a frog, a frog into a crocodile, or a
crocodile into a bird. The biggest defender of punctuated equilibrium, Gould, refers to
this deadlock of natural selection as follows; The essence of Darwism lies in a single
phrase: natural selection is the creative force of evolutionary change. No one denies that
natural selection will play a negative role in eliminating the unfit. Darwinian theories
require that it create the fit as well. (12) Another of the misleading methods that
evolutionists employ on the issue of natural selection is their effort to present this
mechanism as a conscious designer. However, natural selection has no consciousness. It
does not possess a will that can decide what is good and what is bad for living beings. As
a result, natural selection cannot explain biological systems and organs that have the
feature of "irreducible complexity". These systems and organs are composed of
the co-operation of a great number of parts and they are of no use if even one of these
parts is missing or defective. (For example, human eye does not function unless it exists
with all its details). Therefore, the will that brings all these parts together should be
able to figure the future in advance and aim directly for the benefit that is to be
acquired at the last stage. Since natural mechanism has no consciousness or will, it can
do no such thing. This fact which also demolishes the foundations of the theory of
evolution, also worried Darwin: "If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ
existed, which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight
modifications, my theory would absolutely break down." (13) Natural selection only selects out the
disfigured, weak, or unfit individuals of a species. It cannot produce new species, new
genetic information, or new organs. That is, it cannot make anything evolve. Darwin
accepted this reality by saying: "Natural selection can do nothing until favourable
variations chance to occur". (14) This is why neo-Darwinism has had to elevate mutations next to
natural selection as the "cause of beneficial changes". However as we shall see,
mutations can only be "the cause for harmful changes". Mutations are defined as breaks or
replacements taking place in the DNA molecule, which is found in the nucleus of the cell
of a living organism and which holds all the genetic information. These breaks or
replacements are the result of external effects such as radiation or chemical action.
Every mutation is an "accident" and either damages the nucleotides making up the
DNA or changes their locations. Most of the time, they cause so much damage and
modification that the cell cannot repair them. Mutation, which evolutionists frequently
hide behind, is not a magic wand that transforms living organisms into a more advanced and
perfect form. The direct effect of mutations is harmful. The changes effected by mutations
can only be like those experienced by the people in Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Chernobyl:
that is, death, disability, and freaks of nature... The reason for this is very simple: DNA
has a very complex structure and random effects can only cause harm to this structure.
B.G. Ranganathan states: Mutations are small, random, and harmful.
They rarely occur and the best possibility is that they will be ineffectual. These four
characteristics of mutations imply that mutations cannot lead to an evolutionary
development. A random change in a highly specialised organism is either ineffectual or
harmful. A random change in a watch cannot improve the watch. It will most probably harm
it or at best be ineffectual. An earthquake does not improve the city, it brings
destruction. (15) Not surprisingly, no useful mutation has
been observed so far. All mutations have proved to be harmful. The evolutionist scientist
Warren Weaver comments on the report prepared by the Committee on Genetic Effects of
Atomic Radiation, which had been formed to investigate mutations that may have been caused
by the nuclear weapons used in the Second World War: Many will be puzzled about the statement
that practically all known mutant genes are harmful. For mutations are a necessary part of
the process of evolution. How can a good effect - evolution to higher forms of life -
results from mutations practically all of which are harmful? (16) Every effort put into "generating a
useful mutation" has resulted in failure. For decades, evolutionists carried out many
experiments to produce mutations in fruit flies as these insects reproduce very rapidly
and so mutations would show up quickly. Generation upon generation of these flies were
mutated, yet no useful mutation was ever observed. Evolutionist geneticist Gordon Taylor
writes thus: In all the thousands of fly-breeding
experiments carried out all over the world for more than fifty years, a distinct new
species has never been seen to emerge... or even a new enzyme. (17) Another researcher, Michael Pitman,
comments on the failure of the experiments carried out on fruit flies: Morgan, Goldschmidt, Muller, and other
geneticists have subjected generations of fruit flies to extreme conditions of heat, cold,
light, dark, and treatment by chemicals and radiation. All sorts of mutations, practically
all trivial or positively deleterious, have been produced. Man-made evolution? Not really:
Few of the geneticists' monsters could have survived outside the bottles they were bred
in. In practice mutants die, are sterile, or tend to revert to the wild type. (18) The same holds true for man. All mutations
that have been observed in human beings have deleterious results. On this issue,
evolutionists throw up a smokescreen and try to show even examples of such deleterious
mutation as "evidence for evolution". All mutations that take place in humans
result in physical deformities, in infirmities such as mongolism, Down syndrome, albinism,
or dwarfism. These mutations are presented in evolutionist textbooks as examples of
"the evolutionary mechanism at work". Needless to say, a process that leaves
people disabled or sick cannot be "an evolutionary mechanism"-evolution is
supposed to produce better forms that are more fit to survive. To summarise, there are three main reasons
why mutations cannot be pressed into the service of supporting evolutionists’
assertions: The direct effect of mutations is harmful:
Since they occur randomly, they almost always damage the living organism that undergoes
them. Reason tells us that unconscious intervention in a perfect and complex structure
will not improve that structure but impair it. Indeed, no "useful mutation" has
ever been observed. Mutations add no new information to an
organism’s DNA: The particles making up the genetic information are either torn from
their places, destroyed, or carried off to different places. Mutations cannot make a
living thing acquire a new organ or a new trait. They only cause abnormalities like a leg
sticking out of the back, or an ear from the abdomen. In order for a mutation to be transferred
to the subsequent generation, it has to have taken place in the reproductive cells of the
organism: A random change that occurs in a casual cell or organ of the body cannot be
transferred to the next generation. For example, a human eye altered by the effects of
radiation or by other causes will not be passed on to subsequent generations. Briefly, it is impossible for living
beings to have evolved, because there exists no mechanism in nature that can cause them to
evolve. This agrees with the evidence of the fossil record, which demonstrates that this
scenario is far removed from reality. A fruit fly (drosophila) with its legs
jutting from its head: a mutation induced by radiation. Mutations do not improve an organism, but
rather harm it. Above, the effects of mutation on a human eye.
