My Photo
Name:
Location: Para, Brazil

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

Mice can Fly! Scientists have PROOF.

This item is available on the Apologetics Press web site at: http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/3592

AP Content :: Sensible Science

Mice “Evolution” Turns Batty
by Kyle Butt, M.A.


According to evolutionists, mice, or some type of mouse ancestor, evolved into bats over millions of years of random genetic mutations acted upon by natural selection. In truth, this scenario defies the known facts of biology. But scientists reporting recent research in Science magazine suggest that they have proof that mice evolved into bats.

In a small, three-paragraph article titled, “Mice: Ready for Takeoff,” Science reports on research done by Richard Behringer of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston (2008). The researchers removed a portion of several mice’s DNA and replaced it with a portion from bats’ DNA. The switched DNA resulted in mice that had 6% longer forelimbs than regular mice. This increase was considered “important” by biologist Clifford Tabin from Harvard Medical School. Behringer commented: “If you play this through with lots and lots of genes, maybe ultimately we could make that mouse fly out of the cage” (2008).

Supposedly, then, a longer forelimb shows that mice evolved or can evolve into bats. The author of the article said that the researchers “have nudged mice a tiny step along the evolutionary path to bat-hood” (2008). Does the research actual prove this? Absolutely not. The research proves that scientists can “nudge” mice to have a 6% longer forelimb. That is all it shows.

Notice what is completely absent from this research. Did the scientists notice any new genetic information (not added by them) that would help the mice evolve the amazingly complex navigational system for bat echolocation? Did the researchers observe any half-fur/half-skin membrane forming on the forelimb of the mice? Did the researchers detect a genetic alteration that would allow the lengthened forelimb to transform into a wing? A resounding “no” answers all of these questions.

A small increase in an animal’s dimensions does not prove evolution. This is the same feeble tactic used with Darwin’s finches and their beak size (which we have discussed in other places, see Butt, 2006). In truth, this ploy simply fails to recognize biologically imposed limits that nature cannot cross. Bats are a different kind of animal than mice. Small changes in mouse physiology will never change them into a different kind of creature. To illustrate, suppose a weight lifter decides to train hard and lift more weight. The first week he can lift 150 pounds. After training for another week he is able to lift 175 pounds. After a third week of training he is lifting 200 pounds. In two years (104 weeks) how much will he be lifting? According to the evolutionary way of thinking, he will be lifting 2,600 pounds (104 weeks times 25 pounds a week). But we know that would be impossible for him, because eventually the lifter reaches a weight limit he cannot lift. In a similar way, a changing mouse forelimb will eventually reach a limit that it cannot cross. It will never turn into a bat wing, human arm, or elephant trunk.

What do these genetically altered mice really prove? They prove that mice stay mice, and the only documented kind of “evolution” is that of small changes within the same kind of organism. Scientific observation has never produced a single shred of evidence that proves even the possibility of “huge genetic changes turning one kind of animal into another.” In fact, all observable evidence proves that every living organism multiplies “according to its kind” exactly as stated in Genesis 1:24, small changes in forelimb size notwithstanding. To extrapolate evolution from a 6% change in mice forelimbs is nothing short of batty.

REFERENCES
Butt, Kyle (2006), “What Do The Finches Prove?,” Reason & Revelation, [On-line], URL: http://www.apologeticspress.org/articles/3051.

“Mice: Ready for Takeoff,” (2008), Science, [On-line], URL: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/vol319/issue5861/r-samples.dtl# 319/5861/263c.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home