DiniM's post is spot on. I simply refuse to beleive we are as great as religion makes out. Whereas, the science arguement pretty much says we are an accident.

I know lots of people that are a lot younger than they're siblings, now they really are accidents :)

I really like the questions that you have posted littleman.  With all these questions that you have in mind how did we become so much more intelligent than every other species alive today, that people have theories of how all of these things take place scientifically.  What made us evolve so far advanced of every other species.  Scientifically none of this can be proven, only througy theory.  Someone replied to you and said that it happened by acciednt, so I guess next time I acciedntly do something then I am going to be a millionairre.  I am a christian minister and I know a couple things.  First, Elohim created man in his image to have dominion over the plants and animals, therefore that's why we are more intelligent than every other species that we know of today.  Also Aristotle wrote a book on Metaphysics and spoke about "the unmoved mover".  It pretty much states that there has to be a primary mover for all things to be put into motion.  For instance while playing pool, the cue ball is moved by the stick, but what moves the stick that moved the cue ball.  The mover of the stick is the primary.  Elohim is the primary as described in Genesis as all things were created by Elohim.  There is so much more that can be said about it, but I will save that for another post.

I find there is much hypocrisy in religion.......  So with that in mind....... I will swear to G-d I'm an atheist......  Uh oh....  I find myself getting sucked in to this already....gulp!

Many religious leaders have done all they can to stifle modern science for fear that their life's work will be proven to be proselytizing a fraud.  So scientists have been routinely punished, imprisoned, tortured, killed, deemed heretics, and so on by religious society since the inception of religious groups.  The only science deemed ok is that which is felt to be proof that whatever retoric being spewed by that particular religion is authentic.   The irony is that the two can actually be very compatible, if the "so called" religious people only had more faith!!!

The difference between religion and science..... is that religion is built on faith, and therefore comforting answers to questions that we don't understand are supplied to us through the liturgy of whatever the religious doctrine it is you are following....  Can't find the answer?  G-d created it.....  "what more you need to know you heathen!"  If you are attempting to deal with the bad things encountered in life..... death, sickness, injustice, and so on...... Don't worry about it..... G-d has a plan.......  if you can never get above a 1400 rating in chess, its ok, accept our G-d and fill our collection plates and you can be assured that you will be in heaven beating CJS Purdy in the afterlife.....

But science on the otherhand is about what can be proven using whatever methods that we have at our disposal.....  nothing is accepted without established proof.....  No faith allowed!  

But when you think about it.....  we are all in this together looking for answers to life's riddles......  The problem for the religious is if they want  their holy scriptures to be science.....  they are not...... They may very well however be a beautiful metaphoric saga regarding mankind's search for knowledge, life's meaning or G-d if you will.  That said, religion can be a wonderful framework for living a wonderful life if used positively as a way to elevate one's consciousness and learn to care about others...... I like to think that science is nourishment for the mind and religion is nourishment for the soul.   To have one without the other can be like playing a chess game and choosing between position and tactics.....instead of using both......  (hey this is a chess site you know!)   

1-7 have nothing to do with the theory of evolution but i will answer them anyway.

1,2,5)

Possibly the big bang but until we have an understanding of what gravity (and hence space) does at really small scales we haven't got much other than educated guess work.

 
3.)

The laws of physics are not things that exist in and of themselves, they are descriptions for how the world we observe behaves.

4.)

One of the most remarkable findings of modern science is that the complexity of the world is a consequence of relatively simple relationships between the building blocks of reality. Protons pull on electrons and push against other protons, electrons push against other electrons and pull on protons, neutrons pull on protons, etc. etc. from these basic relationships springs the macroscopic world we see.

6&7)

Life probably originated about 3.5-4 billion years ago on Earth however there is the possibility it originated else where in the universe and got dumped on Earth by an asteroid.

In terms of how it arose from "dead" matter:

The universe is teaming with different clumps of matter, where each clump interacts in different ways with the other clumps. The number of different permutations is impossibly huge. If you consider a single protein molecule the number of different ways that single protein molecule can be arranged is 10^140, that's 10 with 140 zeros after it. Each different conformation has different chemical properties (i.e. it will pull and push on other clumps of matter in a different way). 10^140 and that's just one protein molecule?! There are zillions upon zillions of different molecules each able to take zillions upon zillions of conformations, this leads to an impossibly inconcievable number of different chemical systems present in the universe. All a consequence of the relatively simple way subatomic particles interact with one another. So what's that got to do with life? Well to answer the question one must first understand what life is. Life is replication and replication is life. Well not just replication - replication but where the replicating process is not perfect, where variation is introduced during the replication process that alters the way the copy interacts with it's environment a little bit.

On a prebiotic Earth (or some place else) the right molecules happened to meet each other such that a chemical system with those key properties formed. Our ancient common ancestor was born.

 
8.)

The evolution of sex is quite a hot topic in research and i don't think we have any definite answers on the topic. In terms of trying to answer question well If a cell can reproduce asexually and sexually then it starts of reproducing asexually because there's no one else to reproduce with but in doing so it creates organisms that it can reproduce sexually with. 

9.)

It's not about what plants or animals "want", it's just that plants or animals that are good at reproducing end up out competing plants or animals that are bad at reproducing. There is no drive for the species, there is simply the truism that good replicators replicate better than bad ones.

10.)

It's easy to see how mutation can create new varieties, take a gene add a mutation, voila new gene. English letters can't produce chinese books but all of life uses nucleic acids as a template, i.e. all of life is written in the same language (or very similar variants).

11.)

The similarities in the structure of organisms and the similarities in the genetic code is exactly what you would expect if evolution were true. As are the kind of progressions documented by the fossil evidence. If a creator made life as it is now in one step (as biblical literalist claim), then he made it look like evolution happened and that he did not make life in one step.

12.)

What do you mean by "genetic information" and "keeps a species stable"?
In terms of complexity evolution does not result in an inevitable rise in complexity, it's just that if adding more and more genes (and hence proteins and and all the other stuff that comes along as a consequence) to a population of organisms makes them better at reproducing then that's what you will see (conversely if taking away more and more stuff makes a population of organisms reproductively fitter that's what you will see.)

13.)

All you need for single celled organisms to become multicelled is for single cells to cooperate with one another, i.e. it turns out that one cell uses something another cell produces and vice versa and then for them to start reproducing at the same time (so that their progeny can also be together). Voila you now have a multicellular organism.

Some organisms even flit between being multiceullar and single cellular -  e.g. yeast and most spectacularly certain species of amoebae http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictyostelid

The differences between say fish and amphibians or reptiles and mammals occur gradually. They look very different today because they have diverged for an extremely long period of time. It's wrong to think of these "intermediates" as if they are a cross between the two modern species. A common ancestor split into two sub populations that gradually became more and more different as the eons passed, millions millions of years have now passed so these two populations now look completely different.

14.)

Too many questions to answer - eyes and ears are easy to understand. Being able to sense your environment is going to be an advantage, an organism that can sense food or predators is clearly going to be a better replicator than one that doesn't.  Likewise claws and fur and things - these have easy to see reproductive advantages, there occurance does not seem particularly mysterious. There are pages upon pages explaining how eyes (and the other examples too) evolved. So i'll leave that for you to google. Whales and sea horses and bats - again no doubt one look that stuff up. I'm not an evolutionary biologists so i don't know off the top of my head.

15.)

 There was always a "digestive system" in the sense that right from the beginning life could replicate meaning it could take material found in it's surroundings and arange that material into a copy of itself. Mutations that meant the organism could cut stuff up would mean that it could make use of a greater variety of material as building blocks. So that would offer a reproductive advantage, over large billions of years more sophisticated digestive systems gradually evolved bit by bit because the mutations involved made the various organisms better at reproducing. The evolution of a complex digestive system would have occured in tandem to the evolution of complicated behavioural mechanisms like being able to find the more complex food stuffs and evolving protective measures so that you don't cut up your own proteins etc.

Reproduction was around from the beginning of life since it is effectively the definition of life.

 Lungs are very complicated but again one can see how they would have evolved. Photosynthesis produced oxygen which started off toxic but after enough millenia organisms managed to adapt to it and start using it (because doing so was an advantage), since oxygen is a gas in the air it would just diffuse into the organisms, mutations that meant more of oxygen could get into to the organism would have been advantageous and so the evolution first of large surface areas (more surface area more oxygen difussing in that's why lungs have such a huge surgace area) and then over zillions upon zillions of cumulative mutation only keeping the ones that make the organism more effective at reproducing you end up with something as complicated as a pair of lungs in a mammal.

Too many other side questions to answer.

16.)

When you say "all the missing links" that doesn't mean very much. If you mean a copy of every single organism from the common ancestor between you and the other species of ape then that's clearly absurd - It's like asking for a fossil of your father and your grandfather and your great grand father.A fossil from every single generation that goes back hundreds of thousands of years. There just aren't that many fossils in the world. But of course you don't need that many fossils it's sufficient to have fossils that show the trend, that show what we would expect if evolution were true - and we have that. I mean it's also crazy to think that all the other organisms evolved but we didn't when our DNA and morphology and biochemistry is just like the the other organsisms.

There is no reason for there to be an abundance of bones - fossils are really rare - only a tiny tiny fraction of organisms that live get fossilised those that happen to be in the right place and the right time to get preserved.
As for why didn't anything evolve to compete with us - well we did have competitors but we have an ace - technology and the cumulative transfer of knowledge. Evolution fashioned an organism that can adapt faster than evolutionary processes, that's why we can beat tigers and bears and other big predators. Evolutionary processes take millions of years, our brains (which of course are products of evolution) mean that we learn and adapt on a time scale orders of magnitude shorter than that.

17.)

We are a social species, it benefits us to work together in groups so it makes a certain amount of sense that we have evolved ways of interacting with one another so that we cooperate. (though it's again a hot area of research).

 There are various mechanisms for the origin of cooperation given small groups that are highly related e.g. kin selection http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kin_selection

Hey littleman,  I have your answers...It's really all very simple to explain...

Answer # 1.  It all happened by Accident. - And therefore, we have no value.

Answer # 2.  It was all planned. - And therefore, we are most valuable.

Take your pick...Hahahahahaha...

Bio-chemistry doesnt actually prove evolution either mate. scientists have to manipulate things to change them (thats creation/designer.) and even then its decreases the DNA info in knowledge not increase and  can happen over short times not nesseserarly long term as evolution explains, not to mention the seemingly complex systems they incorporate, even something like blood blockages, look how complex that is and to say thats evolution is absurd to me. Even in mutations the info always seems to decrease from what little i have learned. Again to me the key is in the fossils really more then anything else to make the claim truly valid in my book. Other wise we could debate on this forever. But even in the fossil records it shows sudden appearance of animals. Not the gradual one u would come to expect from evolutions concepts. Again looks great on paper, but no real sustance or truth in real life, not in bones or in any other means. Believe me it can be very well explained in a creation sense as well. For me if the fossils dont show the  altimate proof for evolution when it comes right down to it, how can we be so sure the rest is valid too? Believe me mate if it held real truth and had decent evidence, that cant be seriously debated and not just the crap they write to tell u its real, i wouldn't have believed in God or creation for this long.....

If you are truly interested I'd suggest you try reading a biochemistry book.

Actually from what i have learned, Darwan lost faith in God because of a niece who died of a terrible sickness and he couldnt understand why a loving God would allow this to happen, why he didnt make her better, and why did he allow all the suffering in the world in the first place. And that started i believe his search for another way to explain how we got here, and thats how his theory came about. Then as u said later in life as he laid on his death bed, he did say he was wrong, because he was very disillusioned about his theory not bringing the evidence he expected it should. Nor is it evident today in the ways in which he describes it....

i am intrigued by many questions. but the main reason evolution does not work, is that time does not make things better but they slowly deteriate to nothing, not the other way around. I too believe in God and his Son Jesus Christ. I think for you litlleman u are not alone in being an atheist or agnostice then realizing there is more support in understanding Christianity. Charles Darwin also was asked to be a missionary so he invented evolution as his way of rebelling against God and then on his death bed admitted he was wrong. So if the founder of evolution does not believe why should anyone else. IF you want to know where my facts are from lee strobel and also there are many other books to support my beliefs

This has nothing to do with chess i admit. But something alot more important. Our beginnings. All theory is hard to define or except as truth, until evidence can truly show its more then creative ideas put in some kind of ratinal way. But have REAL scientific proof. Evolution is not  truly scientifically proveble so i found out and i will explain why.. Lets say for eg:- That we cant prove God made all things because  the Universe is to complex to truly understand/know all the things it contains, so imagine how much more complex God would have to be, to understand also. So all we could do is say He made all things and u either believe thats possible or you dont. The same goes with the Big Bang!, we cant prove something like that came from; no matter and no true imviroments otherwise we would then have to show how the imviroments came about in the first place  and how the matter came from it to cause that reaction. which as we know is not truly possible. And using other things such as all the animals/plants, to prove God exists or evolution is real, is not truly possible either, simply because of the complexity of life and the variety of animals/plants on the earth, so u cant say if they are evolved or created based on that because both can be rationalised well 'For' and 'Against'. So both at this point remain pure theory. So how then can we prove which is most likely? Well through finding Our origins of course!, this basically lowers the chances of inacuracies in the theory's to find where the real proof's might be. Now this is where Evolution lost the battle for me. I have found no evidence at all for our origins through evolution, not one!, and you would think that if we evolved over millions of years (as Evolution sudjests,going from one kind of creature to another kind.) And we have uncovered such a variety of other creaters that are said to be many more millions of years older then us, that we would have had to have at least half a dozen full examples. To show us going from apes or whetever we came from to what we are today. But i didnt find any. Infact i found that 'Scientists' has tried to prove our origins many times over the last 200yrs of this theory(est.) and have even made up false ones to try and prove it, and all have been later shown as wrong and no proof has been found at all. Heres my point!. If we are made ( as Creation sudjests, made of its OWN kind.) Then obviously there wont be any proof we evolved, which is how it is today and its not likely to be ever found from what i can see. All we find is more humans bones; that date later back in time the more we go through this. So if God existing is possible at all, isnt it wiser to follow Him and stop denying Him then it is to egnore the facts and have Gods righteous judgments on us, simply because we dont like the idea of God/Creator  being in charge of us, and face the consequences?......

Time and chance (probability).

As a devout Atheist I have no comment and wonder what this has to do with chess.

As a devout Atheist I have no comment and wonder what this has to do with chess.

as a non  religious person , how about religion just as a theory, after all your supposed to have faith, and not need proof so i`ll keep my theoretic beliefs in science and you keep your theories in christianity and any other religion and we`ll can call it quitz and stay in our parallel universes without debating it , lol

The short answer is God designed all these...  Now for a 2-paragraph answer (subject matter is obviously large)...

You have many questions; I'll try to give my 5 cents worth.  Evolution is a theory, as other theories can be.  It's a theory because it can explain the matter in hand systematically.  You premised your question as if Christians are against the theory.  I'm a Christian and I believe in creation (God made all things) but is it possible that God actually used evolution to "create"?  Pure evolutionists say that all this is "chance", but I believe everything is "designed".  The absence of evidence (missing links, e.g.) does not negate the theory.  "Belief" in evolution does not negate my being a Christian.

There is this other theory--the Big-Bang Theory--everything started as a very dense collection of "stuff", and that exploded beyond our imagination, and such "expansion" is still going on.  Our universe is still expanding very rapidly (of course we can't feel it).  The laws of physics as we know them were nonexistent at that big bang moment.  No physicist can say where that stuff came from, or what happened before that moment when time began.  It's not a scientific proof of God, but believers make that leap of faith because it makes sense (even scientifically).  That is creation!   Faith and Reason go hand in hand. 

lostapiece will say: "as a non  religious person , how about religion just as a theory, after all your supposed to have faith, and not need proof so i`ll keep my theoretic beliefs in science and you keep your theories in christianity and any other religion and we`ll can call it quitz and stay in our parallel universes without debating it , lol"

We can disgree but not become disagreeable (lostapiece, this is not pertaining to you, you're okay).  If you believe in the resurrection of Jesus, that's the start of being a Christian.  For non-believers, that is a high hurdle to leap over.

That answer of cause would only apply If you believed in a Creator/God. If not how would u explain the answers to the questions above?. Thats why i eventually became a Christian myself. I am actually a logical man. So in order for me to believe i had to see some kind of evidence to support such a belief. Fortunatly i found after study, that the bible does indeed hold up and the evidence of a Creator. Certainly alot better then evolution from what i saw. Blind faith to me is foolishness, faith without substance is worthless! You can believe anything if all u did to justify your faith is say its true. Wheres the truth or science in that?.....

As a christian myself im strongly agniast the idea of evoulution and when I usually say this ppl look at me bewilderded and ask me how could i beleive that 2 people (Adam and Eve) populated the world?? Well my response is, how could you beleive that all life came from a one-celled organism from the ocean? And about the only question i can answear is # 4. THE LORD MADE IT THATTA WAY.