Tuesday we went on a field trip to the San Diego Wild Animal Park. At the beginning of the tram tour the guide told us that the cheetahs were "elegantly designed for speed." I appreciated the nod to the Designer; but, alas, it was to be short lived. In the next 20 minutes we must have heard the word adaptation at least 100 times. Giraffes adapted long necks due to the intense competition for grasses as a primary food source.
I do understand that there is a certain amount of resident "variability" in the genetic information of all living things. But I think the tour guide was either tacitly or intentionally teaching Lamarckism - the inheritance of novel traits acquired through use or disuse of body parts. Giraffes stretched for leaves, and little by little their necks grew longer, and their offspring inherited the new genetic information for longer necks. A cat gets his tail slammed in a door, and her kittens are born with crooked tails - an oversimplification to illustrate that Lamarckism is a failed theory. This stuff just does not happen. Charles Darwin promoted his own version of Lamarckism called pangenesis which was also proven false with later experimentation. He even proposed a feedback loop from the environment to somatic cells to sex cells to offspring - all false.
While the zoo folks have repeated this nonsense to one another so often that they believe it in spite of the evidence, it is - at the very least - annoying to those of us who would just like to enjoy our visit, without all the brain-washing.
On the other hand, Sunday we had a wonderful lunch at church - smoked brisket, sweet and spicy beans, and cole slaw. Our amazing God has filled the earth with plants and animals according to His ingenious design that every living thing should reproduce "according to its kind" as stated 10 times in Genesis chapter one and proven by billions of experiments each year. (Ask any farmer.)
They even taste good when you cook them. It did not have to be that way. And it did not happen by chance or by accident. We should praise Him for it. "Yet he did not leave himself without witness, for he did good by giving you rains from heaven and fruitful seasons, satisfying your hearts with food and gladness." Acts 14:17 (ESV)
