Transitional forms in human evolution

Dear Chris. Thank you for starting this thread it has been very thought provoking and I have enjoyed watching the conversation ‘evolve’ :crazy_face:

In your last post, you said:

Let’s assume something for a moment. 1. Let’s assume that the Hebrew for ‘kinds’ is a technical-scientific word which denotes a biological classification (and that is a big if). 2. Let’s assume that a Pongidae pair was on Ark. 3. Let’s assume that the flood was global.

If we assume that all of those things are true, there is still an astronomical amount of special pleading going in that paragraph. Firstly, there is nothing in the Genesis account to indicate that Africa did not exist, or indeed, that global geography was changed in any way by the flood. Secondly, Genesis 1 is silent about God creating a specific kind called ‘Pongidae’. Thirdly, there is also nothing in the passage to indicate that following the flood these Pongidae moved to Africa.

It strikes me that a YEC cannot conclusively prove that any of this is true anymore than an EC can conclusively prove the role of Tiktaalik as a transitional fossil. However, I am reminded of something that Ken Ham is keen to point out in conversation about evolution. He has been known to say, on several occasions, that 1. That Genesis 1-11 are eye witness accounts of what really happened (literal, word for word, accounts) and 2. True science is based on what one can empirically prove based on sensory experience.

So, I wonder,

  1. Has anyone ever seen one ‘kind’ of animal produce a new species according to its kind? How would one even empirically prove that to have happened?

  2. With regards Pogidae moving to Africa after the flood. How can one know that such a dispersal pattern took place according to the text without first deciding it did and then reading that back into the narrative?

  3. Scripture is (effectively) silent about the existence of the African continent in Genesis 1-11. How then does one prove based on sense experience that Africa did not exist before the flood or that a single geographical feature had been changed in any significant degree? Seems to me, that (as I was fond of saying when I was a YEC) if you weren’t there, how do you know it happened that way at all?

If I have misunderstood anything then please do correct me. However, I hope you can see why I am really struggling to take this line of argument seriously from both a scientific and exegetical perspective.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts. Liam

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