Why does it look as though evolution is moving in the wrong direction?
816543
always moves in the opposite of entropy...to a more complicated state not toward caos.  That's the wonder of life..it defies normal physics on a level we can observe.
111774
we evolved from one specific species of apes. evolution is a constant, dynamic process, that cen be seen even now as you look around. you have to be intelligent and have common sense and pay attention, and not beleive everything that is written. for proof, just look at the weather forecasters - almost everything they say is wrong, or they just flat out lie. I think they lie - nobody could screw up that much and keep a job.
1096462
A is incorrect because this statement is usually attributed to Malthus however, Darwin was aware of this and it is one of the driving forces of natural selection-- that there are more organisms (not just humans) that can be supported by available resources.  \n\nB is incorrect because the adaptations that are favorable are not always biased towards being swift and aggressive.  There are passive, defensive adaptations that are effective.  \n\nC is incorrect because evolution is not directional.  There is no such thing as devolution.  A trait that is advantageous under one set of conditions may be a liability under different environmental conditions.  The most successful organisms on this planet are bacteria.  Also, individuals do not evolve.  Populations evolve.\n\nD is correct.  It is even right there in the title of Darwin's book on natural selection.  Look it up and read it.
1099264
you seem to be so smug in your belief of evolution.  there is no proof whatsoever of it happening.  adaptation is different.  bacteria becoming immune to antibodies is adaptation.  humans do this all the time.  the bacteria aren't changing into anything different, they are still bacteria.  \nthere is no evidence in the fossil record either to support your idea.  in fact, all evidence in the fossils says otherwise.  there is no common ancestor of humans and primates.  nowhere.  lucy was an oversized chimp.  neanderthal man is equivalent to modern man in brain capacity, body structure, and everything else, what's the difference?  you can't use the tooth of a pig to create an entire skeleton of a human, that is called fraud (piltdown man).\n\ntry these FACTS: dr. frederick hoyle did a study on the probablility of a single-celled lifeform through means of random process from the beginning of time.  the likelihood of this happening is 1 in 10 to the 40,000 power.  (anything over 1 in 1050 is considered scientifically impossible).  hoyle stated, "evolution is nonsense in the highest degree"\nthe co-discoverer of DNA, francis crick; did a similar study on the chance of one single strand of DNA happening by random chance, but the results came that the chance is so small that it is nonexistant (so close to zero it's actually there)\n\nthe alternative? intelligent design.  all evidence points to a young earth.  if the earth is millions of years old: why hasn't it stopped spinning yet?  it slows down every year?  why hasn't the sahara desert taken over the plant yet?  it's growing by the day?  why have we never seen a single star form?  why hasn't the moon left us yet?  it gets farther and farther away every year?  \n\nother science would ask: why do some heavenly bodies rotate counter-clockwise if they all resulted from the big bang?  (according to the LAW of angular conservation, they should all be spinning the same way)  why isn't there a huge vacuum (present after any explosion); but the universe is instead expanding?  (refer to newton's LAWs of relativity)  why would the population curve put the start of humanity at about 4500 years ago, if we've been around for millions?  why is the oldest tree (also the oldest living organism) only 4500 years old?  \n\nuse evolution to explain morality, emotions, intelligence, abstract thought, love, etc.  you can't.  the only plausible answer is intelligent design.  \n\nanthony flue, once the greatest known and most highly revered atheist; writing over 30 books on the subject is an oxford double-doctorate with numerous other degrees and awards.  now a theist.  the clincher?  intelligent design.  unless you think that you're smarter than this guy (and it doesn't look like it from your grammar, spelling, and theology)  study a bit more before you go bashing theists.  \n\n"when science finally comes to the top of this mountain of truth, it will see that religion has been there all along."
1014228
Sometimes the line between evolution and christianity is blurred. Evolution is not just the theory that we came from apes. Evolution is just the theory that all creatures can evolve over time its like is a bear is mainly living in one environment and then moves to another that is evolution. The theory that man came from apes should not be taught nor the theory that man was made by God. That way nobody is offended. But Evolution should be taught.
614441
Evolution happens to populations of organisms not individuals, and populations of humans across the globe are continually evolving. Evolution is a change in gene frequency in a breeding population over time - that's it. Of course you need a $100,000 lab to show most of it but it happens all the time. Many people see evolution only as 'speciation' - that's just one possible end point. Speciation might occur, for example, if enough gene frequencies change in a population so that the individuals look different or smell different from most, or a catastrophe geographically isolates one group - something divides them from others. The isolated group no longer breeds with once similar populations, the differences in gene frequencies between them accumulate. Over eons of time, at some point, this population may become a new species, no longer capable of breeding with its parent species; or it may become a subspecies - related but biologically isolated; or a sister species; or part of a circle species - there are many levels of relatedness. And then it happens again and again - populations continually dividing and changing - driven by an individual organism’s success at parenting fertile young. The genes that made a parent a success where they lived and who they lived with are passed on to the next generation. Genetically, we are what worked, when and where our parents made us. \n\nEvolution does not mean we are improving or getting better. Evolution has no bias about good or bad, and no direction; you either fit your environment well, move with it, change when it changes, or you die out. So evolution works quicker for organisms with short generation times and large populations (like insects or bacteria). It's no wonder that the insect and bacterial world is chock full of subspecies and sister species. Human evolution is a very ponderous affair because of our 25 year generational time. Ordinarily, it may take hundreds or thousands of generations to see some significant changes - there are many exception of course - but don't expect to see any differences between humans unless you look on a scale of millennia or more.
971103
You've got a few misconceptions there.  I'm going to assume you are really asking a question and not just fishing for agreement, so I'll try and straighten them out.\n\nFirst of all, IF man evolved from other primates, it would be more proper to say that mankind arose from -A- primate.  To draw an analogy, if you build a house out of lumber from trees, it doesn't mean there are no trees left in the world... only the trees you used to make your house are gone.  So it is perfectly plausible for monkeys to still be around even though something else might have evolved from them.  Populations become isolated and develop different traits all the time - try comparing someone from China, Iceland, and Africa some time.\n\nSecondly, I don't suspect any evolutionist would say that man evolved from monkeys.  Instead they would suggest that they had a common ancestor, and both man AND monkeys are different from that ancestor, just in different ways.\n\nAnd last is the question of transition.  And transition implies you're going somewhere.  Since none of us know what life will be like a hundred million years from now, it may very well be appropriate to say that EVERYTHING now is in a state of transition from what it used to be from what it will be.  Looking for 'half-fins' and the like is a straw-man argument, though there is certainly no dearth of vestigal organs and DNA around in most species, if you only look for it.\n\nI respect your desire to dispute the validity of evolution.  Most true scientists WELCOME having their theories challenged - it can only make them stronger and get rid of bad ones.  But if you're going to tilt at a windmill, make sure your lance is pointed in the right direction!
683440
There isn't a purpose to evolution.  It's simply what happens when you get imperfect replicators competing for limited resources.  It's like asking to purpose of current traveling through the path of least resistance.  There's no purpose there, it's just what the laws of nature dictate must happen in that circumstance.
161432
The problem isn't evolution. The problem is the 'science' they use to 'prove' it.\n\nFirst, they started with an unsupported assumption (that the earth is millions / billions) of years old, then they used circular reasoning between varying fields of science to support that precept as fact, then they assumed without any evidence (in fact, in the face of their own evidence to the contrary) that one species can evolve into another.  Fact:  DNA strands of different lengths or different RNA locations cannot combine.  That means in order to produce say, a human, from say, gorillas, a male and a female gorilla would have to have identically mutated genes at exactly the same time at exactly the same place, find each other and successfully mate.  The probability of that happening one time (ape to man) exceeds the most liberal mathematical calculations of probability.  To happen thousands or hundreds of thousands of times to evolve from a single cell organism to any mammal way exceeds ANY mathematical concept of possibility.  What science has done is said "This is what we are going to prove, don't confuse us with the facts."
1130770
So, what's your problem?\n\nThe text you pasted supports evolutionary science.  Every year more discoveries by archaeologists and paleontologists add more content to support the principles of evolution.\n\nA "theory" is a proposition put to test by empirical study.  In science, very little is considered hard and fact TRUTH - today's truth is usually tomorrow's error.  Evolution is in this sense theoretical, but the evidence all supports it.  And the quote you delivered says that the writer strongly endorses evoltionary science.\n\nThere is NO evidence for alternative concepts, especially that mythology out of some "holy book."\n\nWork on your reading and critical understanding.  You're trying, but you aren't there yet.
919231
its a complex question with a simple answer.. life just easier than you are giving it credit for.. if life were more difficult, then perhaps such evolutionary developments like you are suggesting would be necesary
206627
Human nature as a result from evolution suggests that we learn too quickly. Sometimes it maybe a survival techinque to categories things into threats and non threats. Yes it sucks that humans are like this, but when your life is at stake, people tend to act differently.
389680
Hey, iloveicecream103, why don't YOU read a book about science, then talk to us about Genesis, if you still can.\n\nFossil layers show change over time.  The lowest layers have species the least like modern species.  As you progress up the fossil record, each layer is consistently more and more like modern organisms.  Creationists have no explanation for this.  They haven't even bothered trying.\n\nComing up the fossil record, you see forms changing over time.  Clams are preceded by animals like clams, but with their shells united.  Before mammals, mammal-like reptiles.  Before reptiles, reptile-like amphibians.  Before amphibians, amphibian-like fish.  Creationists have no explanation for this either, but they have made a few wasted efforts.\n\nThe transitions evolution expects occur.  Creationists can pretend they aren't *really* transitions, they just *look* like transitions, but that's just like a child yelling "DOES NOT" to win an argument.\n\nCreationists especially need to pretend that no transitions between humans and other apes appear.  They claim that all fossils are obviously human or obviously ape.  However, if you examine the claims of multiple creationists, you'll find they disagree on which are "obviously" which.  If it was so freaking obvious, shouldn't they be able to agree?  At least a little?  Here's a chart:\n\nhttp://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/homs/compare.html\n\nThe only thing obvious about it is that the skulls obviously cannot be considered one or the other and must be seen as transitions by any open-minded person.\n\nThe transitions that evolution doesn't want do not occur.  At no point in the fossil record do we find mammal/birds.  At no point do we find any direct transitions between amphibians and mammals.  We don't find any cat/humans either.  Any of these things, if discovered, would scrap evolutionary theory overnight.  Creationists have yet to explain why God made only species that look like they could have evolved.\n\nEven without any notion of progress or change over time in the fossil record, it's sorting would be an embarrassment to creationists.\n\nScientists respect the fossil record and accept it on its own terms.  If oak trees appear on top of tree ferns, oak trees came after tree ferns.  Creationists need to impose explanations to account for their claims that everything existed together at once, but these do not flow naturally from the evidence.  For instance, they have no explanation for why oak trees are found above tree ferns.\n\nCreationists have three explanations for fossil sorting, none of them works at all.\n\n1.  They like to claim that fossils are sorted by which species could outrun the rising floodwaters (they blame Noah’s' flood for everything they can't explain).  This would mean that moles and sloths can run faster than velociraptors, Oak trees and mangroves can run faster than velociraptors as well.  Velociraptors run at the same speed as tree ferns.  It is also useless for explaining why ichthyosaurs and dolphins are never found together.\n\n2.  They claim that different species occur in different ecological zones, thus would form in different layers.  This fails again.  Mangroves are found in the lowest ecological zone of any flowering plants, but the highest levels of the fossil record.  Oak trees are found high with mangroves, instead of low in the plains.  Tree ferns should be found with oaks.  Moles should be beneath velociraptors again, and ichthyosaurs should, again, be found with dolphins.\n\n3.  They claim that the mechanical action of the flood should sort things.  Well, it should.  Too bad such sorting doesn't look at all like what is seen.  Mangroves sink, for example.  So do waterlogged oaks.  Moles are bullet shaped and would sink faster than light-boned velociraptors.  Dolphins and ichthyosaurs should, again, be found together.\n\nCreationists have lots of explanations for fossil so
829191
Society is evolving, some generations are getting better, some worse.\n\nOver time natural selection will take over, the people who do "better"  will continue, those who do not will fade away.
1087671
MicroEVOLUTION isn't evolution huh?\n\nWhat sort of bizzare nonsense is this? \n\nNext you'll be teling us that microeconomics isn't economics and that microsurgery isn't surgery.
458284
Monkeys now aren't the same as the monkeys we evolved from, our common ancestor. They didn't evolve in the same way because of different accidents in the genetic replication, and because they are well adapted enough to reproduce in their environment... Natural selection does *not* lead to the optimal genetic material, simply to one that is *good enough* to reproduce better than the competition.
524032
Nature is inadequate with symmetry. Look about yourself and you might notice that one finger is longer on one hand than the other, one eyebrow is further left, or a vein is bigger on one side than the other. Truth is a perfectly symmetrical organism, including all organisms and objects (even snowflakes are not perfect), is nearly impossible to develop because the source (the energy putting forth the development) must depart with a goal/direction/plans (an architecture) and keep this information intact as much as possible. Unfortunately, some of that information is lost along the way due to chaos.\n\nFor example: Two cars are departing to their destinations. They intend to go the opposite ways, but in a mirror image. Their route would be in the shape of a W. They head out, but half way there, one car has to drive a little to the right to avoid a boulder in the road. In the end, their course was about the same, but there is a little difference (the unexpected boulder was the chaos).\n\nAs the body develops, the symmetry is intended to be perfect, but if you look where the heart is and all the other organs that have to be arranged as neat and tidy as possible, there will be inevitable variations.\n\nEDIT (in response to a later reply): The brain does NOT decide breast shape and size. Endocrine system versus Nervous system.