Reply #266: My thoughts

[Brentos]

I believe in evolution as the scientific process that evolved all life on earth. I believe God set up the rules to allow this to happen and probably "monkeyed" with some choices here and there. So, do I believe a designer had an influence and end-game in this, yes. Do I subscribe to ID as a science...no. It is no more science then a psychic claiming that my day is influenced by Pluto entering Uranus (which, by the way is what the psychic told Mikey Mouse).

"Darwinism is the explanation of life on this planet, but I believe that all life, all intelligence, all creativity and all ‘design’ anywhere in the universe, is the direct or indirect product of Darwinian natural selection. It follows that design comes late in the universe, after a period of Darwinian evolution. Design cannot precede evolution and therefore cannot underlie the universe."
- Richard Dawkins

compare this to
'a theory that the various types of animals and plants have their origin in other preexisting types and that the distinguishable differences are due to modifications in successive generations'
- source: Merriam-Webster's Medical Dictionary.

Not the same thing.

Wait a minute, re-compare taking out opinion:

"Darwinism is the explanation of life on this planet"

"a theory that the various types of animals and plants have their origin in other preexisting types and that the distinguishable differences are due to modifications in successive generations'"

Those seem the same to me, excluding Dawkins opinions on the matter. Myself, I believe that most evolution is during periods of punctuated equilibrium, being a big Stephen J. Gould fan, myself. This does explain nicely why you don't see long periods of slow change in the fossil record, in general. If you haven't read his books, you should check them out, there's also a lot of cool statistical discussion relating to Baseball and other fun stuff.