Dog Breeds as Evidence of Evolution?

Evidence of evolution? Image courtesy of Mikael Gustafsson, Wikipedia.



Joel Kontinen

Scientific American is a monthly popular science magazine that has often been a flagship for Darwinian evolution. During Charles Darwin’s anniversary the magazine has remembered to remind its readers that there are good evidences of evolution – such as dog breeds.

In the June issue, columnist Steve Mirsky confuses creationists with advocates of intelligent design. Enumerating the evidences for evolution, he mentions fossils, intermediate forms, comparative anatomy, genomic homologies and - dog breeds.

Mirsky does not write about fossils, not even about assumed intermediate forms, which might be wise, given the recent scandal featuring the Ida fossil. Instead, he discusses dog breeds in an attempt to show that Dr. Jonathan Wells of Discovery Institute erred in saying that there is no evidence for repeated speciation without which Darwinian evolution would be impossible.

Speciation as such is not a problem in the creation model since it takes into account an animal's in-built capacity for change and adaptability. Moreover, the term created kind (baramin) in Genesis differs considerably from the modern biological concept of species.

According to Mirsky, a 180-pound (80 kg) English Mastiff differs so much from a two-pound (1 kg) Chihuahua that they should be regarded as two distinct species although they both belong to the subspecies Canis lupus familiaris. But if they were to be declared separate species, the kind of speciation required by Darwinian evolution would have occurred.

Actually, it wouldn't.

Evolutionists have often a priori given a new species name to a fossil although the animal might have belonged to an already known species. Thus, there are far more dinosaur species on paper than there ever were in real life.

Dog breeds are evidence of the great adaptability of the subspecies Canis lupus familiaris. Contrary to what evolutionists like Mirsky insist, artificial selection that produces new dog breeds does not have anything to do with evolution. It always involves a loss of genetic information. While we could breed a Chihuahua from a wolf we could not breed a wolf from a Chihuahua.

It no longer has the required genetic information.

Source:

Mirsky, Steve. 2009. Are Dog Breeds Actually Different Species? Scientific American. (June 2009)
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=an-immodest-proposal.
In the magazine's paper version the column had the title An Immodest Proposal

Evolution in Action?

The cichlids of Lake Victoria found their way to the cover of Nature.

Joel Kontinen

Since the time of Charles Darwin, scientists have pondered how new species come into being. According to the Darwinian great story, all living beings are descendants of a single unicellular being that was not created but was formed accidentally.

Evolution needs changes and new species, otherwise it will stop.

Recently, the journal Nature published a study on the speciation of cichlids in Lake Victoria. A research team led by Ole Seehausen of the University of Bern observed the life of these East African fish. They noticed that in the murky waters of the lake, red light penetrates deeper than blue light. Thus, in shallow water the male cichlids were mostly green or blue whereas in deeper water they were bright red.

Karen Carleton of the University of Maryland explained that the fish specialise to different microhabitats or life at different depths. As reported by Physorg.com she went on to say, “The visual system then specialized to the light environment at these depths and the mating colors shifted to match. Once this happened, these two groups no longer interbred and so became new species."

There is no shortage of species in the world of evolutionists. For instance, Lake Victoria holds an estimated 500 species of cichlids.

Many evolutionists suppose that rapid speciation refutes creation. However, this is by no means true. The kinds of Genesis do not correspond to the biological concept "species". For instance, the dog kind (dog, wolf, dingo, coyote) belong to the same biblical baramin or created kind. Likewise, the horse, donkey and zebra belong to the same created kind.

Thus Noah did not have to take as many animals on board the ark as skeptics suppose. God created an enormous potential for change in each kind. But there is absolutely no proof of any created kind ever changing into a different kind. Thus all the cichlids of Lake Victoria belong to the same biblical kind.

The credibility of Nature’s cover story is weakened by the fact that the researchers did not observe the birth of a new species. As doctor Jonathan Wells explains, they merely examined existing species and drew conclusions that are rather misleading.

The recent article in Nature is a typical example of Darwinian storytelling, It is based on the assumption that evolution is a fact and that it happens all the time.

Sources:

Blake, Kelly. 2008. The Color of Evolution: How One Fish Became Two Fish. Physorg. Com. http://www.physorg.com/printnews.php?newsid=142615133

Seehausen, Ole, Yohey Terai, Isabel S. Magalhaes, Karen L. Carleton, Hillary D. J. Mrosso, Ryutaro Miyagi, Inke van der Sluijs, Maria V. Schneider, Martine E. Maan, Hidenori Tachida, Hiroo Imai & Norihiro Okada.. 2008. Speciation through sensory drive in cichlid fish. Nature 455, 620-626 (2 October 2008).

Wells, Jonathan. 2008. One Long Bluff. Evolution News & Views. http://www.evolutionnews.org/2008/10/one_long_bluff.html#more