Can someone please give solid proof for evolution?

Question

Can you give me solid proof of evolution?

Think about this, and give me the best thing you know that prooves evolution.

Answer 1

You do realise that these things you are describing are unrelated phenomena, I hope?



"Cosmic Evolution" is the Big Bang. Evidence for this can be found in the redshift of distant stellar objects - showing that the universe is expanding. Back-calculations from its current size and its rate of expansion indicate it is around 14 Billion years old: and there are no stars or galaxies which have been calculated to be older than that (providing corroborative evidence). Similarly, calculations of elemental abundances match-up with the projected age of the universe. Finally, we have detected the coamic microwave background which is the "leftovers" of the energy released during the initial expansion of the universe.

(and FWIW, your description of the Big Bang is totally incorrect)



"Chemical Evolution" is the formation of heavier elements in the cores of stars by nuclear fusion. We can replicate this process here on earth, showing that it is possible, and it is the only viable explanation for the energy source "fuelling" stars.



"Stellar and Planetary Evolution" is the gravitational collapse and coalescing of interstellar clouds of matter. This is inevitable, given the attractive force of gravity (or do you have a mechanism to prevent the clouds collapsing under their own gravity?)



"Organic Evolution" is more correctly known as abiogenesis. Obviously, this has happened at least once in the history of the universe - so I'm not sure why you require proof that it has in fact happened?



"Macroevolution" would include speciation events, such as these:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/faq-speciation.html

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/speciation.html



In case you are interested, the only part of this that is covered by the Theory of Evolution is the last one. The rest aren't even biology (they are cosmology, astronomy, physics and chemistry).



And finally, there is no such thing as "proof" in science - only in maths and logic. Science has *evidence*.

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Edit:



> "I'll give you a summery of the textbook evolution. "20 billion years there was a big bang". "4.6 billion years ago the earth cooled down, and it was a hot ball of rock". And then "millions of years of torrential rains created great oceans". And "swirling in the waters of the oceans is a bubbling broth of complex chemicals...Progress from a complex chemical soup to a living organism is really slow". " The first self replicating systems emerged in this organic soup".



Despite what your textbook may (or may not) have said - NONE of what you just quoted is about biological evolution. Evolution ONLY describes how populations of organisms change over time. Not how the universe began, not how the solar system and planets formed, and not how life on earth began.



> "Do we not have elephants? So they did come from a soup?"



We do, and it took elephants about 4 Billion years to evolve from the first life on earth: asking someone to summarise all of that in a forum such as this is futile.



> "All " " came from a text book."



What textbook? Aimed at what level of education?



> "One more thing. I said give me evidence of macro evolution. Not micro evolution. Most of you here already tied those two together."



To a biologist evolution is evolution is evolution: there is no "micro" or "macro" about it. Example: you cannot watch an oak tree grow, but you *can* examine it under a microscope and see cells dividing. We could call the cell division "microgrowth" and the tree increasing in size "macrogrowth" - but the names don't make them a different process. And saying that the one cannot add-up to the other is foolish.



> "There is a Great Dane, and there is a Chawa-wa. This is called micro evolution. They are both still the same kind of animal, they are a dog."



Can a Chihuahua successfully mate with a Great Dane? I doubt it. Admittedly, there are a number of intermediate steps which *can* mate with each other: this makes the common dog a "ring species", well on its way to speciation. If some catastrophe suddenly wiped-out all dogs intermediate in size between Great Danes and Chihuahuas, then they would become separate species.



> "But if I said that a fish turned into a dog... That is macro evolution, the animals changed kinds."



I challenge you to give me a scientifically robust definition of "kind". Are Chihuahuas the same "kind" as a Great Dane? Are either the same kind as a timber wolf? How about a coyote? How about a fox? Is an arctic fox the same kind as a desert fox? etc. etc.

Answer 2

Look, if you eliminate all forms of logical inference that assert the development of the Theory of Evolution--as you just did--there is no possible way you can get a concrete answer. It's not like we can travel back in time, so all we have are the remnants of the past to analyze. Evolution is, in a sense, various mutations throughout the continuous "procreation" of species. As genes were passed through generations, the species with the most successful mutations survived. Listen, if you're trying to argue that life didn't come from a rock, that's a completely different study; it is known as abiogenesis. Evolution only focuses on how different species arise and develop, while others become extinct. Therefore, you are completely misunderstood on this subject, and should probably not be making such firm "convictions" on the matter. Your ignorance is to be expected, as you blindly believe a book known as The Bible which has absolutely no evidence, coherence, or rationality. Please, just stop.

Answer 3

Here is a link to 29 evidences for evolution. But for me, the second link provides the best evidence for our common ancestry with the other apes, that is, the fusion of chromosome 2 from two chromosomes found in apes.

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Answer 4

Yes



The underlying concept of evolution is essentially that genetic variation gives a spread of traits around the normal (think a Bell Curve), and filtering that spread (via natural or artificial selection) so that more organisms towards one end of the Bell Curve reproduce than the other end, so that the next generation has its normal shifted toward that end. Then lather, rinse, repeat until the normal has shifted so far as to qualify as a new trait.



This entire process was experimentally demonstrated by Lenski's E. coli experiment - https://myxo.css.msu.edu/ecoli/



Don't think this is the only example though, there are literally thousands of examples of evolution being directly observed to occur.

Did you know corn does not exist in nature, but instead was created by man through artificially guided evolution?



Evolution is an observed fact, every bit the fact that gravity is. The Theory of Evolution only refers to how we think evolution works. It has nothing to do with whether it happens or not, we know it happens without a doubt. Likewise, we have the Theory of Gravity to explain how gravity works. If the Theory of Gravity is wrong, it's won't change the fact that rocks fall to the ground, it would only mean we don't understand why rocks fall. If the Theory of Evolution is wrong, it won't change the fact that animals (including us) evolve, it would only mean we don't understand why they evolve.



See here:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/evolution-fact.html



And for the Theory of Common Descent by evolution (which has nothing to do with the fact that evolution occurs OR how evolution occurs, but shows the evidence that makes us think all life evolved from a common ancestor) see these:

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/



And use the search button of TalkOrigins for any questions you have, it's a great resource.



edit: I gave you examples, did you even read my damn post? Jeez, trying to reason with a godbotter is a waste of time...



"Cosmic Evolution-the origin of time space and matter from the big bang. Big bang-infinitesimal region that spun around really fast and then broke apart."



I have no idea what you're talking about. No where in the big bang theory does it say anything about a 'infinitesimal region that spun around and broke apart' nor does it say anything about 'the origin of time space and matter'. The only context in which the words 'cosmic evolution' make sense is discussing the evolution of galactic structure. Look up 'Hubble Ultra Deep Field'



"Chemical Evolution-the origin of more complex elements that came from the hydrogen produced by the big bang."



Easy as pie. Look at any nuclear reactor. That's what they do on a daily basis, take one element and form another from it. They do fission reactions - forming lighter elements from heavier ones. If you'd rather see a fusion reaction - forming a heavier element from lighter elements like hydrogen (what you're referring to), look at a particle accelerator, that's what THEY do.

Or, you know, look at that big bright yellow thing in the sky. It's a giant fusion reactor that forms elements up to carbon from hydrogen. They call it the sun. Fuses millions of tons of heavier elements from hydrogen every day, right in front of your eyes. Really! Go out and look, I'll wait!



Did you go look?

Anything heavier than carbon gets fused in supernova explosions, which also serve the purpose of spreading the newly fused heavy elements out to form new stars and systems.



"Stellar and Planetary Evolution- the origin of stars and planets form dust clouds"

It's been directly observed, as well as modeled. See an HR Diagram - http://www.ifa.hawaii.edu/~barnes/ast110_06/tlos/HRDiagram.png



"Organic Evolution-life from non-living things"

First, define life.

When you see how futile that is, then try to get your head around the idea of a continuum where life and non-life and meaningless arbitrary terms. Then look up the Miller-Urey experiment. THEN, if you're REALLY feeling up to the task, search for 'RNA World'.



"Macroevolution-one kind animal changes into another like an ameba slowly becoming an elephant"

I gave you all the relevant links originally. Lenski's experiment proves novel, beneficial traits can be acquired through mutation + selection. The TalkOrigins links give you tons of evidence.

You didn't even look at them, did you? You just decided you must be right and you're happy to stay in ignorance than try and actually learn something.



Besides, NONE of these 5 things you just asked about have ANYTHING to do with your original question, which was to prove evolution, meaning the process, which in itself does not include common descent, abiogenesis, or cosmology.

Answer 5

The peppered moth is usually the example people give to show evolution, except this is just an example of natural selection, ie peppered moths naturally exist with a range of colouration from dark to light. When those moths are present in an environment that means the surfaces they sit on are darkly coloured, predators eat the light coloured moths since they are easier to see. You end up with a population of dark coloured moths.



However these moths already existed, the dark colouration is now just being selected for so they are in a higher proportion now.



To provide evidence of evolution we have to demonstrate an organism in which a complex change has occured. The problem is that these events occur through random chance. eg as climates change, vegetation, habitat, temperatures, food sources etc change. An animal that doesn't have the traits to survive in a given environment must move or die. Evolution occurs when mutations occur giving an individual traits that allow it to survive in an environment that other members of its species can't.



To see those changes in large animals (with very long, very slow breeding cycles) you have to look over tens of thousands - millions of years. Since we can't live that long ourselves the only way of doing this is to look at the fossil record.



There is good evidence of such adaptation in the fossil record. Specific examples are well explained in many books, one example is:



http://www.agiweb.org/news/evolution/



For other examples of large organisms evolving there is a muscle that is present in your fore arm called palmaris longus. Its sole function is to flex the palm. It is thought that this muscle was used when we climbed trees, all tree climbing primates have this muscle. Since we are primates we also have this muscle, but since we no longer climb it is no longer selected for. Individuals have been born that no longer posses this muscle. Since the muscle is not a requirement for our survival any more those individuals without the muscle live to reproduction and have childeren who similarly don't have the muscle.



As a result about 16.7% of the population are missing an entire muscle.



http://www.haydnallbutt.com.au/files/palmaris_longus_paper.pdf



Similarly though it is an example of the evolution of a deleterious trait, periodically there are humans which suffer a genetic mutation that gives them a predisposition to developing an extreme allergic reaction to peanuts.



http://www.haydnallbutt.com.au/files/peanut%20_allergy_paper.pdf



There is no advantage to this, it is just a mutation or series of mutations that occurs due to how our immune systems detect foreign proteins. In the past these individuals would have simply died because our medicine was not able to keep them alive when they suffer an attack. These days however we keep them alive quite easily by a range of measures. As a result these people reach child baring age and reproduce, passing on their susceptibility. So now there are two types of people, those that can survive exposure to peanuts, and those than can not. This is another the example of the formation of a complex trait which would then mean that a subsection of a population, in this case humans, would be selected for in a certain situation.



This is what evolution is.



To see it occurring at a faster rate you need to examine organisms that reproduce much faster so you don't have to wait millions of years to see new strains evolving with the new complex charcteristics. If you look at bacteria there are a number of examples of these organisms evolving under the evolutionary pressure of our medicines. Ordinarily we are teaming with bacteria of all sorts. One sort in particular is called Staphylococcus aureus (golden staph). This bacteria is naturally present on our skin, in our arm pits, in our groin etc. It lives on the surface of our skin without causing any harm. It is also easily passed from one person to another by contact.



If you get a cut on your skin, this bacteria can then enter your body and can cause diseases like meningitis, or abscesses etc.



A golden staph infection is easily treatable with antibiotics, however in some instances some bacteria have a mutation which makes them resistant to the antibiotics. When the person takes antibiotics then all the non-resistant bacteria are removed, leaving only the resistant ones. These then grow and multiply and can be passed onto others.



Because of the number of sick people and the often very strong antibiotics used in hospitals, there are a number of antibiotic resistant strains of bacteria. The so called super bugs. You need very extreme antibiotics to kill them off, and in some cases we can't kill them off.



In other words entire new strains of bacteria arise from mutations that give them an evolutionary advantage. What is relevant to this discussion is that since bacteria reproduce so quickly we can actually watch that evolution happen

Answer 6

Look up Reznick and Endler's guppy experiment and fossils