I believe that in molecular genetics terminology that would put genetic variation as the upstream important event. Block that and any downstream events become insignificant.

Muslims believe that the Earth was already created when Adam was being created (Qur’an 2:30-35). The world was created in six long periods so we have no problem in believing in a 4 billion year old Earth or the Big Bang theory.

One thing to keep in mind is that Muslims have their unique heritage, so I wouldn’t assume them to have the same positions on scientific issues as conservative Christians or any other type of religious group. I don’t think Professors are lying to Muslims on evolution as that requires one to deliberately tell falsehood. Muslims just believe them to be wrong (as said be Indigo Jo). It would be naive for one to believe that Professors are not doing science within a cultural philosophical framework that is outside of science and that informs the conclusions made from data.

Which of these propositions do you dispute the truth of, Regatislam?

Hassan: evolutionists don’t believe “that ultimate creative power is by random mutation “, Isn’t the muslim theory that man was created in Paradise and later put on Earth? That involves two separate creations, surely, which is even more improbable than the creationist chriatians’ doctrine of one creation?

And of course where does evolution fit in with our belief in God.

I notice that one poster above stated that chromosomes were required to exist because of Evolution. I am not sure I find the story in this as I think it was Mendelian genetics that probably pointed towards chromosomes, from what I know on this subject.

The diversity of micro-organisms and their short life cycle coupled with ease of growth - especially on jelly agar plates does indeed result in visible, assayable “micro-organism evolution” from what I understand. They grow so fast that over numerous life cycles new traits can be acquired by selection. Mutations that occur to yield a particular outward trait may not necessarily be “random” but part of the design of God, or for the atheist, part of a “process” – a natural evolutionary process that ticks with the life span of an organism.

Then there is the Darwinian evolution that we cannot observe and for which we are able to find as “evidence”, fossil records and missing links.

As a Muslim, I have always believed in the evolution of microbes in plates but have complete uncertainty on Darwinian evolution. Despite the fact that it is a theory with lots of fossil records and it DOES point towards a pretty easy to believe story that seems to join the dots. But can I believe in the possibility that evolution within species is possible? Can I also believe that evolution between species MAY be possible? Can I also believe that God created humans as a distinct species without racial types? Can I believe in a combination of creationism (from the Islamic perspective) and evolution or will people start banging at my door at 3 am in the morning to say I have to be for or against?

My take on evolution is a bit like the atheists views on belief in God. I guess they feel that with God, there are so many dots that are connected up by the person who is writing the story.

For me the evidence for the existence of God is so clear that it is not even a case of joining the dots - the line is already drawn.

I think that for the atheists the same is true of evolution.

The way I view the dots of evolution is that….yes evolution did occur and possibly resulted in lots of species but Man was created by God.

How man was created by God; I don’t know but as a Muslim I believe that God had a “process” of taking “clay” or mud and converting that to a Human.

Hi there.

I will quote from Darwin’s insufferable fiction “The Origin Of Species”:

That many and grave objections may be advanced against the theory of descent with modification through natural selection, I do not deny. I have endeavoured to give to them their full force. Nothing at first can appear more difficult to believe than that the more complex organs and instincts should have been perfected not by means superior to, though analogous with, human reason, but by the accumulation of innumerable slight variations, each good for the individual possessor. Nevertheless, this difficulty, though appearing to our imagination insuperably great, cannot be considered real if we admit the following propositions, namely, — that gradations in the perfection of any organ or instinct, which we may consider, either do now exist or could have existed, each good of its kind, — that all organs and instincts are, in ever so slight a degree, variable, — and, lastly, that there is a struggle for existence leading to the preservation of each profitable deviation of structure or instinct. The truth of these propositions cannot, I think, be disputed.

Ofcourse, being the author of the book he has been incommensurately kind to himself. But, nevertheless, even he can do little other than admit that his fiction stands upon the infallibility of some of his own propositions; none of which need be assumed, irrespective of what he himself thinks.

Now, if Darwin is an evolutionist then that is what evolutionists do — live in their own little world of fiction, insulated from reality. Ofcourse, if they have disowned Darwin, then it’s another matter altogether.

Affectionately.

Regatislam: To read everything where there is nothing is not science. It is a much better description of religion. Nor is it what evolutionists do.

hassan: Nuh Keller’s bibliography- if that is the term- shows that he has read nothing at all about evolution except a few creationists who are too stupid to be called dishonest.