Random Mutations and the Heroics of Evolution

A child once informed his friends his toy bulldozer could dig all the way through the Earth. But wasn’t the Earth too big? No, look at the Grand Canyon—it is proof of what such small shovels can do. Such childish logic, amazingly, shows up repeatedly in evolutionary “theory.” It is a treasure trove of bizarre and silly claims and justifications which rises to the surface, as with the child’s reasoning, when the evolutionist is questioned about his convictions. Consider, for example, the oft heard evolutionary mechanism of random mutation followed by natural selection which, like the toy bulldozer, apparently can do just about anything. When queried about this most amazing idea, the underlying evolutionary logic is revealed.

One response evolutionists give when confronted with their own extraordinary claims about random mutation and natural selection is to complain that mutations aren’t really random, and any such notion is clearly erroneous. They don’t just happen willy-nilly but in fact reveal non random patterns both across the genome and across time.

But this is an equivocation on the word “random,” which is used with reference to something. When evolutionists speak of random mutations, they mean that the mutations are random with respect to the need of the organism. There is no plan or intelligence behind mutations—evolution has no final causes.

When questioned about their bizarre claim that the entire field of biology is a consequence of such Lucretian bloopers, their rebuttal that mutations actually aren’t random after all reveals how shallow is their thinking.

Evolutionists are the ones who claimed mutations are random (with respect to the need) and the fact that mutations are not random over space and time does not change that Epicurean claim. (By the way, this is yet another evolutionary expectation that turned out to be false. That became clear when the empirical evidence caught up with evolutionary speculation.)

Another response evolutionists give when questioned about their startling ideas of the power of random mutation and natural selection is to focus on the latter. Mutations may be random but evolution certainly is not, for selection pressure brings out the winners.

Of course this is false. Selection “pressure” is another evolutionary euphemism. The only thing Darwin’s natural selection can do is kill off the faulty or inferior designs—it does not induce helpful mutations to magically arise. All evolutionary creations must arise from those random mutations.

Yet another revealing response evolutionists give when queried about their heroic claims of random mutation and natural selection is to complain that such a query is nothing more than a strawman rendition of evolution.

Random mutations, after all, are only one of a great many evolutionary mechanisms. One professor has listed almost fifty different so-called “engines of variation” that work together to build biology’s wonders. How silly to think random mutation was the sole artist in Darwin’s montage.

For example, biological variation can arise from changes in the expression levels of genes, which in turn can arise from changes to sequences that control such expression levels, or changes to the protein machines that bind to those sequences. And there are far more involved examples, such as the various forms of symbiotic mechanisms. The professor concludes:

So, next time you hear or read a creationist or IDer cite "RM & NS" as the sole explanation for evolutionary change, point out to them and everyone else that there are at least 47 different sources of variation

But does this really rescue random mutation from its overachiever status? No. Once again the evolutionary logic has bubbled up to the surface for all to see. The most obvious problem here is simply that biology’s various engines of variation are, according to evolutionary mandate, ultimately the product of, yes, random mutation.

Of course RM/NS is the ultimate explanation for evolutionary change. The fact that biology reveals incredibly complex adaptive and physiological changes does not give evolutionists license to invoke them as evolutionary starting points, without reference to their own origin.

Indeed, with evolution what we must believe is that its blind mutations just happened to create phenomenal mechanisms which, themselves, not only are astonishingly complex but become crucial agents of evolutionary change. The heroics continue to mount at an astronomical pace as evolution, we must believe, creates evolution. If a toy bulldozer can dig through the Earth, then why not?