Found this, and I just had to share.

It is, frankly, perplexing that many people frame their thoughts about evolution in terms of whether they “believe†or “don’t believe†in evolution. You may as well ask someone if they “believe†in atoms, if the Earth goes around the Sun, or if the force of gravity is still in effect. That populations evolve is not a matter of opinion: it’s a matter of observational fact.​

I really like that.

 

Adaptation is a form of evolution though. It's called Lamarckian evolution, the idea of which is that organisms change themselves and over time that affects their offspring. For example, this theory basically says that giraffes one day needed to reach higher leaves, so they stretched their necks. Then their offspring were born with longer necks and stretched them more.

Pretty mad theory, eh?

Personally, I believe in Oakian evolution.

 

The basic principle behind it is impossible to deny. The most adept species will reproduce effectively while less adept species die out. This will eventually lead to ever more adept species. The real question is one of where we started from. That is what humans choose to argue about.

 

In the beginning, there was a bunch of dust and lava and magma and other stuff, and some of that dust and other stuff eventually reacted with other dust and other stuff to form special dust and other stuff. The special dust and other stuff sort of clumped together and became a very small thing that contained some other stuff, and it all worked together. Then something happened to it and it started to make more of itself. And thus the first life form was made.

Darwin 1:1-10

This is why I prefer Oakian evolution.

That's why it's so ridiculous.

I thought you were referring strictly to biological adaptation. My mistake.

 

I once had an experience like this. I was walking along and stuff happened, then I was in a volcano, at which point I reacted with the lava(special lave), and something happened. Next thing I know I'm dust, something else happens, and I'm British. That's how the first pizza was made.

Spoiler

 

*insert Southpark Evolution explanation here*

 

Actually, I read an article not too long ago that had evidence supporting Lamarckian evolution. They found cells or perhaps small animals, I cannot recall, that developed changes in their reproduction over their lifetime, such that their offspring would have the immunities that the parent cells developed in their lifetime. I will search my wall for the article, but wish me luck; I can only hope that I shared it.

... Nope, I cannot find it, even going back a full year. Fiddlesticks.

Darwin ignored first cause like everyone else. Please define Oakian evolution for us.

 

I couldn't remember the name of the guy who came up with the first cause theory that I used for that. So I defaulted to Darwin.

 

Fixed. *shot*

 

I have never heard a satisfactory first cause theory, either deterministic or creationist, so I would be interested to hear what it was if it was worth my time.

I should have known.

 

It does remind me the Miller experiment.

 

The theory is really based solely on what is necessary for the simplest form of life as we know it to exist. That being:

Membranes (to hold everything together, usually made of lipids)
Amino Acids (to form proteins)
Nucleotides (to form nucleic acids which form DNA/RNA)
Something to hold it all inside the membrane. (cytoplasm)

The idea is that all of this developed at various points, then at some point came together by pure coincidence. Then something, probably a surge of natural electricity (think lightning or less powerful static electricity) went through it and everything just sort of "turned on" and began working together. It's a very loose theory, but the only room it leaves for debate is why everything began working together the way it did.

 

Ah, yes. I understand the entire process of how life would come to be if matter and energy existed. My question, however, is this: in the line of causality, what set the first domino in motion? Where did energy and motion come from? Because all things tends towards nonexistence and a complete stop, what, for instance, set the energy in motion that caused the universe to expand?

If the first domino was gravity, then what pushed gravity? It must have been another domino that fell before gravity did. If the domino that came before gravity was a god, then what came before him? The line of dominoes will never stop regressing. This is called the infinite regress principle. I have yet to hear of a model that explains it while holding that causality is valid.

 

Well that's sort of where one of Aquinas' five proofs of God comes in. He claims that, logically speaking, there cannot have been an infinite chain of things that moved or caused one another. The chain has to begin somewhere, and his thought is that this beginning, this "unmoved mover" and "uncaused cause" are God. I have my own problems with it, such as the fact that God is illogical and thus cannot be proven by logic, but you get the idea. God or not, there must have been something to begin the chain that moves other things without being moved by anything else. Everything always existed (law of conservation of matter/energy), and so it was a matter of time before something moved without having been caused to move by something else.

 

I get the idea. This is what you told me. I will break it down.

He claims that, logically speaking, there cannot have been an infinite chain of things that moved or caused one another.​

Okay, so he admits that causality is inherently flawed.

The chain has to begin somewhere,​

Wait, didn't he just say that causality was not valid? Why is he still trying to argue that it has to start somewhere?

and his thought is that this beginning, this "unmoved mover" and "uncaused cause" are God.​

... and now you say, "It was God." Allow me to rephrase.

1. An infinite regress results from causality. [Axiomatic]
2. Causality is logically unsound. [From 1]
3. Due to some unknown reason, we must search for a cause regardless of the first premise. [From ?]
4. There must be a first cause, so a first cause exists. [From 2, 3 (unfounded)]
5. A god did it. [From ?]

... Apologies, but I have a lot of trouble buying into that.

 

Aquinas' argument is that it was God. My argument is merely that it was something.

 

Call it what you want, it still looks like a Deus Ex Machina to me. I think Makaze is rather saying that causality is either infinite or invalid, but even if it' s infinite you' re still left wondering what caused an infinite link, or if the idea of an infinite link can even be valid (for instance I think he hates the perspective of a looping causality).

 

One would only need a satisfactory first cause theory if one was trying to justify determinism. But what about indeterminism?