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The Law of Evolution

Evolutionary Biology is a hot topic these days... especially
with ideas of "intelligent design" being thrown around. I think
there's a lot of myths about "evolution" that need to be addressed.
So, in my humble effort to set things straight and defend Science
and Truth... I decided to write an article on "Evolution".
I'm also going to debunk "intelligent design".

What is Evolution? Evolution is just a word that describes
how things change over time. One of the constants in our
Universe, is change. All things change over time. This includes
matter, energy, plants, animals, rocks, trees, air... everything!
Get the picture? When we discuss "Evolutionary Biology" we are
talking specifically about how all life-forms change (or evolve)
over time. So why do life-forms change over time? Well again,
this Universe is a Universe of change... and to survive, sometimes
you have to change, adapt, to the changing times. For example,
the earth's temperature has gone through cycles of change through
Geologic times.I'm talking about millions of years here.
I'm not saying that if the weather tomorrow changes to -10°C
that all life will grow a fur coat :) If you believe that the earth
has been the same since it's creation... well, you're delusional.
Things change, buddy! Get used to it. Think about it, you're not
even the same person as when you were a baby. You went through
changes from fetus,baby, adulthood ( hopefully :)


Scientific Method:

The term "Evolutionary Theory" has been thrown around by
a lot of people. Now, if you have some understanding of the
"Scientific Method", it is a procedure that scientists use
to prove or disprove ideas. It's also the way scientists separate
the facts from un-proven ideas. Basically, the process starts out
with someone having an idea. Many experiments are done to
try to test the validity of the idea. At this stage, it is just a
Hypothesis. And even if the experiments are successful, the hard
data (evidence) still has to be reviewed and validated by other
scientists AND has to be reproduceable or verifiable by another
person. This is called a "peer review". When
there is enough evidence to prove a Hypothesis, and the data
can be reproduced and verified, AND the majority of the scientific
community agrees that the Hypothesis explains a certain
phenomenon, then it becomes a Theory. So a "Theory" in
science does not mean a guess or un-proven idea. A
Theory in science is more like a "fact" until proven "incorrect".
Now, this doesn't mean that a Theory explains everything about
a particular phenomenon. It's basically all the facts and evidence
that we currently have on a subject and believe to be currently
true. Now, the beauty is that as more data and evidence is
acquired to support the "Theory", it simply just adds to the truths
and previous evidence and proves that the Theory is indeed a
"fact", within the realm of our scientific knowledge. But the
great thing about science is that it keeps an open mind.
If in the future, there is a better "Theory" that has enough
supporting evidence, is verifiable with hard data,
can be proven by successful reproduction of experiments
and validated by other scientists... then it can be accepted by
scientists as the new "Theory" to explain a specific phenomenon.
This is why "Intelligent Design" is not considered a Theory. It
doesn't have enough evidence and hard data to be considered
a "Theory". It's only an "idea" at this stage... not even a
"Hypothesis". And since it doesn't use the "scientific method"
as the procedure for investigation, it's not even "science" and
only conjecture. Sorry folks, if you don't follow the
rules of science, then it's not science. Just like "Science" isn't
religion because we need hard data and facts to support our
ideas. Now, this doesn't mean that there is no truth in
"intelligent design" or "religion"... it just means there is no
way for us prove it scientifically... yet. Maybe one day science
will somehow be able to prove that there is a soul and that
god exists... and that she's really a woman :)

The Facts and Evidence:

It's utterly absurd that people out there still think that
there is no evidence to back up evolution. First of all, if there
were no hard evidence and data to back it up... it would've
never became a "Theory" to begin with. If you don't
understand, read the previous paragraph again. Second,
since "evolutionary theory" was accepted, it has been
continuing to accumulate evidence to support it. That's
why it's still around. There's no other explaination or
"Theory" that has proven it wrong. Now, I'm not saying
that I understand all the aspects of evolutionary
biology... and in fact, no one does. Scientists are Scientists
because of their thirst for knowledge. So in this humble article,
I will try to go over all the facts and evidence that I understand
about "evolutionary theory"... as a scientifically minded college
graduate.


Fossil Evidence:

Contrary to what "Creationists" believe about evolution, there
is an abundance of fossil evidence that illustrates the truth of
"evolution". To explore this, we have to define what a "fossil" is.
A fossil is simply a trace or mineralized remain of a life-form.
When a plant or animal dies, it's remains usually decay, get
eaten, are recycled by bacteria and other life-forms. The organic
matter (like flesh and bone) don't usually get preserved but
instead are transformed into their base elements. However, in
very rare cases and circumstances they are "preserved" or in
other words, fossilized. For example if the animal or plant was
covered by a mudflow quickly following it's death, the mud creates
a situation where the flesh and bone may be mineralized and
fossilized. In essence, some of the minerals in the mud are
absorbed by the organic matter and the "form"
of the animal is preserved. This means that in this case, the flesh
becomes rock over millions of years. It is important to understand
that most animals or plants that die do not become fossils.
It's a very rare occurance and is contingent on circumstances.
Also, rock fossils do not retain DNA because it is not organic
matter but only mineralized forms... aka "Rock Fossils". This
also explains why we do not have fossil evidence of every
creature that ever lived and every single "transitory" fossil.
Fossils are very, very rare and need very specific circumstances
to occur. Now, does this mean that there are only a few hundred
fossils in existence? No! There are millions of fossils out there
and probably millions more to be discovered because there is
an abundance of life on the planet and the earth has existed
for a very long time. Also, it is fair to say that there have
been many creatures that existed and gone extinct before
any of them were "fossilized" so we may never even know
of their existence. And still, against the odds... there are still
many transitional fossils found. And in fact, every living
organism is a living transitional fossil. Remember, evolutionary
theory is about organisms constantly changing through time...
therefore, every living thing is still going through
change (evolution). It's just that the rate of evolutionary
change is different. Also, evolution doesn't necessarily mean
that the organism is changing into a more "complex" form.
It is merely changing to survive better in it's current environment.
So animals that are already almost perfectly adapted to their
environment evolve very slowly because they don't need to.
For example, Sharks and Alligators have existed for millions
of years and some have changed very little according to the
fossil record. However, I'd like to note that there were many
different sharks and alligator species that went extinct. We
know this because there are fossils of sharks and alligators
that don't exist today. The sharks and alligators that exist
today are the "designs" that were highly adaptable enough
to survive... while the others were'nt able to "evolve" fast
enough to cut it in these modern times :) If you want to do
more research, do a search on extinct sharks and
you will find some bizarre looking sharks that no longer exist.

Archaeopteryx: early bird transitional fossil with
both reptilian and bird features

Organic Fossil Evidence:

Rock fossils are only one type of fossil evidence. If Rock
fossils are rare, then organic fossils are even more rare.
sometimes extraodinary circumstances can preserve some
organic matter from organisms. For example, an insect
gets trapped in tree sap. The sap mineralized into what
we call "amber" but sometimes this form of fossilization
can preserve some of the tissue and DNA. From the
amber fossils, we have evidence that there were many
ants, bees, and other insects that existed before but are
extinct now. But not only insects are preserved in amber.
Pollen and plant matter that are trapped and preserved in
amber also give us evidence of many ancient plant species
that existed before... but not anymore. And because we
can get DNA from some of these fossils, we can actually
do scientific tests to see what modern species of plants,
animals, insects, it was closely related to... or perhaps
even evolved into. For example, they can look at genetic
information and see if a certain bee is closely related to
the modern bumble-bee or if it's closer to the honey-bee.

This extinct "stingless" bee was trapped in
amber for 40 million years. Independent scientists
were able to get DNA from it... Bee-lieve it!

Pollen found on the bee was identified as being
from an extinct ancient orchid

Another way that organic matter can be preserved is
through freezing. A good example is the wolly mammoth.
There aren't any wooly mammoths left living in the world
but there have been many frozen fossils found. The freezing
process can preserve some of the DNA as well. Using the DNA
evidence, scientists are not only able to verify that Mammoths
are related to modern elephants... but they have been able to
trace which elephant species they are most closely related to...
the Asian elephant. Now, it's important to note that there was
more than one species of mammoth... even a species of dwarf
mammoth. It just so happens that all of them became extinct.
And why are there more than one species of mammoth,
elephant, insects... yada yada yada? Because some of them
evolved into different sub-species, living in different
environments, eating different things... etc.
Organisms change through time and if you separate groups
of the same animal and put them in different places, they
change to be better suited for their environment. This
explains why there are many different "races" of people.
All humans are 99.999999 (probably a thousand more 9's)
percent the same, but because we lived in different
environments and climates, we have changed
and evolved... most notably, different skin tones,
hair and eye color, etc. Now, are any of these
changes better than another? No! They're just
different, so don't be a racist prick! :)

Baby Mammoth: Frozen but not Forgotten

DNA, mutation, and Natural Selection:

A friend of mine told me "we're not related to apes
just because 99% of our DNA is the same, We share
some of our DNA with Bananas, does this mean
we are related to bananas". Wow! This statement shows
the complete misunderstanding of evolution. My reply
is "YES!!" Of course we are related to Bananas.
I'm not joking, man! All life on this planet is related
because "evolutionary theory" or more specifically the
"origin of species" means that we all sprung from one
form of life. So all life that we see shares a common
ancestry if you go far enough back. We all share a
common ancestry to the first living organism which
science thinks was a single celled lifeform that evolved
into muti-celled life froms over time... evolution baby!
I say "think" because science doesn't know everything
and doesn't presume to know everything... but based
on the evidence and information we have. Plus, that
was a really long time ago. Now, this doesn't discount
the fact that an almightly god may have given the
first spark of life... I'm just saying there's no scientific
evidence here. Besides, I'm not trying to prove that God
doesn't exist, I'm just trying to discribe evolution. I still
firmly believe that you can believe in both God and
Evolution. Maybe "evolution" is just God's guiding hand
helping along his creations by changing them. Again,
this is just an idea and not science. But it's an idea
that you can happily believe in if you'd like to. Just
don't turn a blind eye to the facts that we know about
"evolution". For example, some people still think or
choose to believe that the "Dinosaurs" are fiction and
never existed because they weren't in the Bible. How
can you discount the physical fossil evidence just
because it doesn't fit into your belief system? That's
basically the point to why I decided to write this article.
And if I open just one mind and give someone a better
understanding of what "evolution" means, then it was
worth it.

Okay back to DNA... DNA is like a blueprint or programming
code for cells. It tells them how they should develop, grow,
make friends, etc... okay, the last one was a joke, loosen
up already! Now, DNA like everything else, can change
over time. I know I keep saying that but some of you
still haven't got it. Sometimes things can prompt
DNA to change or mutate... these things include
environment, food, radiation (you know heat and
light are forms of radiation right?). Mutation can change
the function and growth of cells. Sometimes
these changes are good and sometimes they're bad.
They can be minute changes or big ones. Natural
selection is just the word to describe that when there
are "good" changes that help the organism survive, then
it is more likely that these changes are passed to later
generations. Example: A bunny who lives in a snowy
environment is gray... however one day there is a bunny
that is born that is white. That bunny survives and passes
on his "white coat" genes and soon there are
a few more white bunnies. Because his offspring are
more suited to blend in with the snow and thus
more likely to survive... they perpetuate that trait and
millions of years later, you have a separate
species of "white rabbit". Now, the gray bunnies that
lived where there was no snow were more likely
to survive in warmer climates that are devoid of snow...
so they stayed gray. Are either of them better?
No, didn't I tell you to not be a racist prick? :) Now...
fast forward even millions of years later
and the white bunny population now lives in a place
where there is no more snow. Now, imagine
one of the white rabbits was born with it's ancient
recessive "gray coat" gene active. It survives,
passes on it's active gray coat gene and millions of
years later, we have gray rabbits again... but not exactly
the same ones. Now, even though the rabbits are gray again,
their DNA still has the recessive "white coat gene"...
it's just not active. That's the way that scientists can
track and see how an organism has
changed over time or even see how related two
organisms are. It still retains some of the information
of it's ancestry. And that's why they are doing "genome
mapping" of species. To gain insight into
the specifics of the "origin of species". And it's also how
we can prove that we are indeed very, very
distant relatives of the banana. (but did you know that
we're closer related to mushrooms than plants?) Okay,
fast forward millions of more years and the bunny has
changed so much that it is now a deer. (I'm just using
this as example, I don't think rabbits evolved into deer...
unless you believe in Jackalopes). But with DNA evidence,
we can prove or disprove if they are closely related
or not. I say "closely" related because as mentioned before,
everything is distantly related... unless you're an alien.
So, we can use science to look at DNA to see if something
really is an Alien from another planet or just another
creature from earth. If we share absolutely zero DNA with
another life-form.. it means it's an Alien. See how cool
Science is? How would Religion define an Alien??
"It looks different... it must be an Alien, burn it, burn!"
just kidding.


Living Fossils, Vestigal Organs, A Blast from the Past:

So you're still not convinced huh? Well, earlier I said that
every animal is in essence a "living fossil". what I mean
is that every living thing still has DNA evidence of it's past,
and also physical evidence too. So every organism is
currently in a state of change, so with that in mind, every
living thing is a transitory living fossil.

Take a bat for example. A bat is a transitory living fossil.
Bats are related to rodents but at some point evolved their
limbs into wings. How do we know this? Well, genetically
we can prove that they are related to rodents and if we
look at a Bat skeleton we can see that what we see
as "wings" are really specialized "limbs". They still have
five "finger bones" which make up the wings. Here's the
thing, this is not an isolated case. Mammals that
we believed once evolved from land dwelling creatures
with five fingered limbs retain their finger bones even after
they have evolved. This includes whales, dolphins, and
manatees. They all still have five finger bones, air breathing
lungs, hair (not a lot), and are warm blooded because their
ancestors were land dwelling mammals. Another good
example of a transitional living fossil is the "sea lion" or
Seal (no, not the singer). They are still in the process of
"evolving" to their life in water and have "flippers" and a
streamlined body for swimming. However, they still live on
land as well... so they haven't lost all of their land dwelling
traits. But if you've ever seen a seal move on land,
you can see that they are probably more adapted to
swimming. Their flippers still have "five fingers",
just like us. Which is also evidence that we are distantly
related. (give me five!)

Another form of physical evidence of evolution in organisms
are structures called "Vestigial Ograns". A vestigial organ
is an organ or structure that currently serves no purpose
and considered a evolutionary remnant. A example of one
in Human anatomy is the tail bone. Why have a tail
bone if humans have no tails? Because our ancient
ancestors had tails! Sometimes those genes are activated and
there are babies born with tails. Sorry, but we are primates like
monkeys... if you follow DNA evidence. And what's
wrong with that? Monkeys are cute and cuddly.
Anyway... moving on... other evidence of Vestigial
organs are many cave dwelling creatures who are blind.
There's a rat called a "blind mole rat" that's blind too.
They no longer need the use of their eyes in the dark, so
that organ's function was discarded.

Other examples of Vestigial organs are underdeveloped
hind leg bones in whales, and a structure called a "pelvic
girdle" in snakes and legless lizards... because they used
to have legs. Some snakes even have vestigial limbs or "spurs"
(little useless legs) Do you need more examples? Okay,
take the Ostrich or any other flightless bird. The wings of
these birds are "vestigial" because they no longer can
serve the function of flight. However, I think penguins
are an exception because they have evolved their wings
into flippers for better swimming. Since the wings have
a new purpose... they are no longer "vestigial". The term
only applies if the organ is completely useless. Did God
create wings for Ostriches just so they could "wish" they
could fly? I think not! There was a
time when Ostriches flew baby, yeah!

Humpback Whale Skeleton showing finger-bones and
vestigial legs... see how tiny it is? And its buried under flesh.
Them legs aren't made for walkin... anymore" :)

Bat skeleton with finger bones/wings

Manatee Skeleton showing finger bones hidden inside flipper

Even the Plesiosaur, an early aquatic reptile
had five fingers... High five!

The Vestigial legs on some snakes are sometimes
referred to as spurs. "she got legs... but she don't
know how to use them..."

Domestication of animals:

So what's so hard to understand about animals
changing over time, man? What's the big deal?
Why is it so hard to believe? It's not rocket science...
it's just the way things are. Get used to it or you may go
extinct. Another piece of evidence of this "change" and
"evolution" is the process of Domestication of animals.
If you have a pet dog or cat, then you are reaping the
work of evolution. Humans, by keeping animals on
farms and in homes, over thousands of years have made
the animals change... become more docile, because
angry farm animals weren't cool and were the first to
be killed by us. The cute and friendly ones were what
us humans wanted to keep around... so naturally the
animals changed because instead of "natural selection",
Humans were doing "un-natural selection" by keeping
the animals that we saw or judged as having "good traits".
Pigs are domesticated "wild pigs", chickens are
domesticated "wild chickens", and dogs are domesticated
"wolves". I'm sorry to say there were no wild "poodles"
running around in the wild before man. They were made
through selective breeding... which is why the "pure breeds"
have so many genetic problems due to "in-breeding". If
you don't believe me, ask a vet. For example,
Dalmatians are prone to being deaf... and it's the fault of
humans, not God. But hey, if they ever find a million year
old "poodle" fossil, I'll change my mind :)

My ancestors were a proud and noble race of wolves...
and then the humans came :)

The problem with Intelligent Design:

The problem I have with Intelligent Design is that it
pretends to be grounded in Science. The ideas and
statements are not really backed up with scientific
facts or evidence. It tries to mask religion as a science.
It does not use the "Scientific Method" as protocol,
which is the check and balance system in science.
Worst, it only tries to explain things from a "Christian"
point of view and Christianity is not the only religion
or view of God in the world. This "tunnel vision" in
trying to explain things based on the bible is very l
imiting and in-effective. This also means that they
only try to find evidence to support their ideas and
any ideas that do not support it are never mentioned
or discarded. For example, they try to find evidence
for the "Great Flood"... okay, that's fine but the
possibility that a "Great Flood" never happened never
crosses their minds. Or the possibility that "Noah's Arc"
never existed doesn't cross their minds either. They
are only after evidence to prove... not disprove.
And that is where the big problem is... tunnel vision.
If "intelligent design" were a real open-minded idea
and science, it would explore how it pertains to other
religions and spiritual beliefs and explore hard data
evidence. It really should be called the "Christian
Idea of Intelligent Design".

Intelligent Design?

Conclusion: Evolution is not just an idea, it's a law
of nature... the law of change. I think humans have
been on earth long enough to at least understand
that basic principle. If you're still struggling... you
need to evolve! Don't let you brain end up being a
"vestigial organ"...use it or lose it. And for the record,
I do believe there is an almighty omnipotent power
out there. I don't think it's an old guy sitting in a chair
in heaven judging us... but I know there's something
more than what us humans can currently understand
and I believe there is a "spiritual" aspect to life.
And if we never strive to understand more, to grow,
evolve, pursue our God-given thirst for knowledge...
then we'd be letting God down. But we got to be
grounded in hard facts, data, and proven evidence.
Evolution doesn't mean that we believe that God's
creatures are flawed... it just means that they
have the ability to change with the times and to be even
better than they were... to strive towards perfection.
Isn't that what we humans are striving for too?
Isn't it even more miraculous to know that creatures
can and do evolve and change? My point is that Evolution
and Science in general does not contradict or discount
the possibility of God... unless your idea of God is way
too rigid and literal :P

The Few and the Proud

So I recently had the great honor to play a Marine
for a movie called "Brothers". I was only a background
extra, but the experience was very memorable.
When they called about casting me, they said they only
needed me for one day of shooting. I hesitated at first...
should I cut my hair for a one day film shoot? It had
been about 6 months since my last movie gig, so I
decided to go for it. I asked my friends what I should
do and everyone gave me their full support. Besides,
playing a Marine sounded pretty cool...
even if only for a day.


The day of the shoot: The call time was really early...
5:00am and it was in Glorieta, which was over an
hour away from Albuquerque. Once I got there,
it took a while for all of us to get into costume. There
were about 50 other extras and many were actually
military or were in the military at one time. I was
one of the few that wasn't... but nobody really knew
that since we all looked like Marines :) Then it was time
to wait. Being an extra really isn't very glamorous, 95%
of the time is just spent waiting and the ones that have
done a lot of movies are the ones that come prepared
with books, video games, mp3 players... whatever will
keep boredom at bay. Needless to say, talking is a
good way to pass the time too... but nobody wants to
talk 8 hours non-stop either. Around 8:00pm
everyone was "camera ready" and in costume.
They didn't call us to the set to shoot until around
2:00pm. The scene they were shooting was a military
base so they had the extras walking in the background
with army vehicles driving around. It was cool to see
the Army Humvees... which were authentic of course.
They always use the real thing when they can. Even
our uniforms were real military issue. They even had
names of soldiers on them... probably the ones that
didn't quite cut it as a Marine. They shot the scenes
until the sun went down... and that was it. I did
get to see Toby Mcguire on set while he was doing
his scene in the parking lot. He was short and skinny,
and I heard he lost like 20 pounds for the role.
I'm not the kind that gets "star struck", but I guess
it was pretty cool to see "Spiderman" up close :) I
didn't get to see Jake Gyllenhaal or Natalie Portman,
the other stars of the film.


So that was the end of my career as a Marine... or so
I thought. One week later, I was called back to do
more scenes as a Marine. It was a wonderful
surprise, because "call backs" can be pretty rare.

The day of the shoot #2: I was called back to do
scenes as a Marine for the same movie, but the
location was different. This time, it was in Santa Fe...
uh outskirts of Santa Fe. Also, this time the scene only
called for 8 Marines, so I really was lucky to be one of
the 8. The call time was 8:30am... so this time I
actually got a bit of sleep the night before. Base camp
was at a creepy abandoned prison... yeah, it was even
creepy during the day. Going through the long, dark
corridors to the extras holding area gave me the chills.
Knowing the history of the place, that over 30
prisoners had been murdered here didn't help. It
was very much like being in a haunted house. Once in
the extras holding area, it didn't take long to get into
costume since there was only 8 of us. However, we
waited, took naps, played video games, and talked
until about 4:00pm until we were called to set. This
time, it was well worth the wait. Before driving to
the set, we got upgraded additions to our
uniforms including flak jacket, a rifle, hand gun,
camelbak, helmet, grenades, and googles. But
since we geared up right before driving to the
shoot, I didn't have time to take a photo of myself
with all the new gear. Cameras and photos are
not allowed on set. Once on set, we found out
what the scene entailed. We were to be part of
a convoy driving through the desert. So me and
the other 7 marines got to ride through the desert
in military vehicles. I got to ride shotgun in a real
Humvee! It was awesome! We did a few takes
driving back and forth with the windows down.
I don't know if I will even be on camera because
the passenger side window was pretty heavily
covered with dirt and dust, but I really don't care.
The fun ride through the desert in an Army
Humvee was worth it. They filmed a few takes
until the sun went down. A van took us back to
base camp and we got ready to turn in our gear.
My career as a Marine was complete... or so I
thought.

I was in for a few more surprises. They
needed 4 marines to stay late for another shoot...
so of course I volunteered. I cut my hair to do this,
what was a couple more hours pretending to be a
Marine. So the lucky 4 of us stuck around to await
our fate. We heard our scene was a helicopter
scene... hell yeah! I envisioned a cool fake cockpit
with green screen behind it. And when we entered
the studio, there it was... just as I imagined it.
They were shooting a different scene with Toby
in a helicopter... at least I think it was him. I was
too far away to see. But sometimes things don't
go as you envision them. Our scene wasn't to be
shot in the fake helicopter with green screen.
Nope, it was in a little corner of the studio with us
"pretending" to be in a helicopter. And when I say
"pretend" I mean in the same way we pretended
as kids :) Yup, we sat in regular fold-up chairs and
passed around a map while they shot over our
shoulder. I don't know if any of our faces were
in the shot but I'm pretty sure my hand and
knees were. So it wasn't as cool as I had
imagined but if the scene goes into the final cut,
I can at least say that those beautiful hands and
knees were mine :) Yup, life is good as an extra.