Creationism or evolution?
 

Please respond with the selection that most closely matches your thoughts on this subject.

'Deistic evolution' is what I would have picked when I was in my late teens/early twenties. It is the belief that God (whatever that is) threw the ingredients into the pot, turned the burner on and left the kitchen.

EDIT: moderators, I forgot to add the 'other' option. Could you add it for me?

Something Else

I really don't know which option to choose. I wouldn't say I'm an athiest, but I don't do anything religious. I believe evolution happened and what we have are scientific answers to the question of how life came about. It doesn't mean that God didn't or couldn't have played a part in starting it or actively guided each step of the process.

God simply doesn't need to be included when we talk about the mechanism of how life evolved.

McDuffie, you really need a "I don't know" selection which is what many of us believe.

Wish I saw you wanted that option in there before I chose.....I would have chosen other...instead I will just add it to your poll

While I tend more toward evolutionism (Darwinian evolution), tere's always a measure of doubt. The time scale of evolution is so huge.. I'd feel foolish to have hard convictions about it all.

i put down "other" because i think that something had to create the Big Bang, and that Something coerced things into happening the way things have happened. i don't really believe that humans literally came from nothing just by mere evolution. it makes more sense to me that something had to kind of "control" the evolution and made things happen. as for what, or who, did all that stuff, i still haven't decided.

no god whatsoever

Right now, I'm not really sure what I believe. *shrugs*

I am an atheist. I happen to accept the prevailing scientific theory that life arised spontaneously through naturalistic processes and that mutation and natural selection caused the diversity of life we now see on the planet.

I say "I happen to accept..." because atheism does not 'own' evolution. One needn't be an atheist to accept some form of evolution (as this poll demonstrates) and one needn't accept evolution to be an atheist.

I'm going to go with the Great Green Arkelseizure sneezing out the universe proposed by Douglas Adams and warn all of ye that we should all be in great fear of The Coming of the Great White Handkerchief.

But seriously, we're all gonna die at somepoint and worrying about how the universe came to be is kind of pointless compared to try to understand how it works now, once we figure out everything about how it works, then we can waste time wondering about how it came to be.

Now as to what I believe caused the universe to come about, I don't really care, I'm not gonna need to worry about it until I'm dead, and at that point all will be revealed so I won't have to waste my time wondering.

'How the universe came to be' is an entirely different question than 'how life on Earth came to be so diversified'.

You are probably right, but we are curious creatures and it is hard to just let things be. That's why I answered "I don't know", but I sure would like to know more. A wise person would probably stop racking their brain about it at some point.

I beleive that we are created because there is no way that we could have evolved from pond scum. We are way to complicated to have just been an accident. There is no proof of evolution. Both ideas need faith. I choose creation.

Right on. This is exactly what I think too. Something had to start it but then it kind of followed along the evolution circuit. how else can we explain the Neanderthal man and others they find. So much like us yet so different as well. The best adaptation survived. And then are things like the Crocodile which do not have to appear to have evolved much in the last 100,000 yrs.

I voted creationism. No more or less provable than evolution, but a naked chick in a garden gives it an appeal that evolution can't match.

As Steve Martin said in The Man With Two Brains: "I can't fuck a gorilla!"

creationism all the way for me. Not only because I have my faith, but also because carbon dating is only been proven acturate within 100 years. (tell me if I am wrong on that)

I just take everything with a grain of salt.

Actually there is proof, or at least evidence. Granted, evolution is "just" a theory, but it's a theory with a tremendous amount of evidence to back it up. It doesn't require faith, just reason, inference, and healthy skepticism.

Yes, you are wrong on that. Carbon dating is accurate for a hell of a lot longer than 100 years. It is accurate for much more than 10,000 years.

Science call tell us what happened one-billionth of a second after the Big Bang, but it cannot tell us what happened one-billionth of a second BEFORE the Big Bang. I think that's where religious faith comes in.

I really don't see why people can't separate science and religion. To me evolution seems like the practical and likely mechanism to describe the emergence and development of life and the Bible is a non-scientific way to describe the same to people who at the time had absolutely zero understanding of scientific processes.

It just amazes me that critics of evolution try every deceptive way to bring down a solid theory with anecdotal 'evidence' while propping the Old Testament as a bullet-proof description of everything. The Bible constantly contradicts itself and Creationism supporters choose to ignore this.

as noted, quite wrong.

However, evolutionary biology does not rest upon carbon dating. If carbon dating didn't exist, our modern concept of evolution would not change in the very least.

I wonder why my earlier post was deleted. Nothing I said was inflammatory in the least. In fact, the post I was responding to was subtly inflammatory, but that one is still in the thread.

Just wondering.

well ive actually decided to develop my own belief system in what happened.

evolution happened, and is still happenning, but there is a guiding force. This force however is not sentient and has no conscience. Its complicated to explain, once Ive thought it through i might share it with you guys

Well, from what I remember that it was tested on artifacts that were 100 years older or less and the an exponential (SP?) graph was made. And, some think that it is inaccurate.

Is there anything out there that shows more indepth testing of carbon dating?

But, it can make a difference. If it is not accurate then it can go to show that there was nothing made before 10,000 years ago and that creationism has more bearing.

But, IMO how do we know that the dinasuars were cold blooded by their bones. What if they had hair and were warm blooded. I just think that we need someone out there cross testing all this science to make sure that they are correct, because I have seen reports that have disproven some of the basis for random life.

carbon dating is no longer the method used to date things, thats why it doesnt matter anymore

I agree that evolution is a viable explaination for how life emerged and developed on this planet. I can even comprehend how the galaxies, stars and planets may have evolved from coalescing space dust etc..

What I have the most trouble fully accepting is the big bang theory which supposedly happened when something described as a singularity exploded. And even if this is true, what was existing before that? I can't comprehend it if the answer is nothing. And if the answer is something, what was there before that? Where do these singularities come from anyway?

That's why I answered "I don't know". That something may turn out to be what us humans refer to as a god. Or not.

You have trouble grasping the concept because everything that you know has a beginning, and an end. Everything has...boundaries. things are here...or there. My desk starts over here, and ends over there. I had a lunch hour that had a beginning, and an ending. Even our lives have a beginning, and an ending. All of this is based on our extremely limited experience. There is a vast universe out there, that has no beginning, and has no end. We pathetic little people cannot grasp that concept.

I believe in Evolution.

Since others can't seem to let the carbon dating thing go...

Carbon dating currently has an upper limit of around 50,000 years. It also has a lower limit of about 150 years. The lower limit is due to the industrial revolution pumping a lot of depleted carbon into the environment. What it means is that the amount of carbon-14 present in recently dead organisms can also be consistent with the amount of carbon-14 present in things that died a lot longer ago. The exact "apparent age" depends on how much exposure to a depleted carbon source the specimen recieved as it lived and died. In short, carbon dating really is erratic for young things because the traditionally very smooth index of environmental C12:C14 has become erratic.

Carbon dating isn't the only radioisochronological method, though. And while there are recognized problems with all of them and ways to test and control for those problems... it gets pretty hard to claim they're all wrong if multiple methods agree on the age.

Oh, and C-dating, due to its 50Kya upper limit, has very little import on the evolution discussion and no relevance at all to a discussion of fossils.

Yep, that's where I'm at, LOL. I do not truly comprehend the concept of the universe being infinite or finite.

No Gods or Godesses. Just evolution.

:icare:

Bless you, kutulu. I have never understood why people who "interpret" the Bible "literally" (aren't those contradictions in terms?) have trouble believing in an empirically supported theory that explains a heck of a lot about our physical universe.

What I don't understand is why evolutionist and creationist have to be mutually exclusive. Why couldn't God have created the Universe using evolution?

I believe god created everything....then those things evolved given the nature of the planet....ice ages, droughts, floods etc....everything has to either learn to adapt (read: evolve) or die out. I do not, however, believe that we evolved from apes

Or maybe god being created in the evolving mind of humans?

Never have, and never will believe in a god. The whole idea of "poof" the earth was formed, adam and eve, the flood seems ridiculous to me. While creation may have been an adequate explanation years ago, I think people should realize it's simply a fable and treat it as such.

I do not understand how creation by God is less beleivable than the random events that happened to bring about life. How can you be dismissive of one and not the other.

I know my biology, and I still have a strong faith, and beleive that the world was created in 6 days.

Darwin is right though on how birds change when in different enviroments and how animals change over time . There is no arguing the fact there. Theroies are regarded as fact because they can not be proven wrong, same as someones faith. I will always have my faith even if I am wrong and there is noone on the other line when I pray.

Since we're talking about our planet earth, Evolution.

You are wrong, but that doesn't mean God didn't have a hand in what took billions of years to create.

For a really amazing book on how this whole universe came about check out A Short History of Nearly Everything. It's an easy read that'll blow your mind. (Example: In the time it takes to make a sandwich our universe was made.)

Even if you don't believe in God you gotta admit there's something more amazing and powerful out there than us.

Why is it that people assume an atheist has no ability to be held captivated in awe by the beauty ,wonder and mystery of the world? I could not even begin to string words together to express how utterly utterly false this is.
In fact it is this very same sense of awe that inspires me to strive to learn more about the world, rather than accepting the traditional recieved wisdom in the form of a two thousand year old book.

You're right, there is something more amazing and powerful out there than us. And it sure as hell isn't in our image.


(If I have misinterpreted your remark, then I appologise for aiming this post specifically at you. Its content, however, still stands)

I don't understand how anyone could ever believe this to be true especailly when humans have been guiding evolution in plants and animals for thousands of years. For centuries farmers have been taking the seeds from the top 10% of their crop and using those to replant the fields next year. The result of this is that crops grown today are bigger and better than they were a few hundred years ago. Also, dog breeders have been refining animals by breeding the very best to bring out the most features... sometimes they mix the breeds to bring out new and exotic traits.

These are both examples of evolution. Granted these are guided by mankind, it is not hard to believe that the exact same process could happen in nature. I guarantee that a dog with shaggy fur would be more likely to survive in an arctic climate than one with no fur at all.

I think the biggest problem people have with evolution is that they don't understand it. It is not some ultimate answer to the universe, it is simply a natural process that can be used to explain diversity. It does not say where life began, or why we're here, or what we're supposed to do. It just explains why a horse is not a zebra, and why polar bears are not black. To say there is "no proof" of evolution is silly, just look around you, it's there everywhere.

I am a creationist. The "thousands of years" that show in dating is believed to be "created age". I don't know that I believe this. There is one more spin on the creationist theory that I'm curious to learn more of. Basically it says that between the portion of the Bible that recounts creation and the rest of the book there is a gap. It's "The Gap Theory". It's the creationists answer to 'created or evolved age'. As it is I'm not sure about how things were aged or whether I'd be a deist or not. BTW wasn't Ben Franklin a deist? I think it was him that called God, "the Great Clockwinder".


I'm curious about this. I never imagined that an atheist would believe in any other source of the universe other than evolution. What other possibilities are there? I just don't know.

As many have stated before me, there is a lot more evidence to support the theory of evolution, rather than creationism. To the person who claimed they believe that 'the world was created in 6 days', I'm curious as to how this could be measured at all since the concept of a day as we know it could not exist before the world was created in the first place. Anyway how does the story go? On the first day he created the ocean(?)...and so on and so forth...then he goes 'Let there be light?'. So did god create earth in 6 days and then snap his fingers when he wanted light to exist...thus creating the rest of the universe in that second when he said 'Let there be light'...unless you don't agree that the light he called for came from the sun.
I guess my main point is that there can be no real argument against evolution in a creationism vs. evolution discussion regarding amount of evidence, because clearly, evolution has much more evidence supporting it than creationism does.

And as for those who say that evolution does not explain how things were prior to the Big Bang or that it is not logical...well we've only gotten so far in science, I'm sure we will continue to get closer to an explanation as time goes on. I simply refuse to believe that any form of conscious entity created the universe.

Keep the faith, brother.

I'll try to address it as best I can
Evolution doesn't explain the universe. It can't. It isn't meant to. You are thinking of Cosmology, specifically, 'Big Bang' Cosmology. Evolutionary researchers never, ever do any work regarding the origin of the universe or even the origin of life. It is not in their realm of reality.

The second point is that a-theism merely refers to the benign lack of belief in god(s). There is one qualification for atheism: if you possess a positive belief in god(s) you cannot join the club.

Many (not most) atheists believe in all sorts of things: ghosts, bigfoot, UFOs, psychic powers. Some even believe in a sort of afterlife. As long as they do not believe in god(s) they get to call themselves atheists.

When I posted that comment that you responded to, I was specifically thinking of a boss I used to have that said "No god; no creation; no evolution. We were seeded by extraterrestrials."

He believed there is no god, and evolution is a fraud. He thought that green men planted life here millions of years ago.

Thank you, thank you, thank you for this. :thumbsup:

EDIT: - removed stuff that made me look like a dill.

I also don't think that evolution and god are mutually exclusive. I can't believe in creationism, because there is no evidence to back it up.

I ticked the "I don't know" option above. I do not believe in god, but I can't discount for sure that one does not exist. Further, there is enough evidence to support evolution - but what started it all? Even the theory of evolution (as I have it in my mind) does not really cover the question of "how did this all begin?"

I simply don't know.

I've studied science my whole life (such as it is). But in the last ten years or so, I've started to take it less seriously. How often have I heard remarks along the lines of, "That can't happen because it violates the first law of thermodynamics." I simply cannot believe that the world is actually governed by our theories. At that point, I think we have taken it too far.

For me, the world around us is primary. I've seen so many beautiful models for how things came to be. I am particularly fond of the Haida mythology. But I think somehow we must be wired to take ourselves very seriously, because it seems that inevitably, our playful theories take on a primary role, the world becomes secondary, and in no time we are crying to Mom because someone won't follow the rules.

When I look at the world around me, I see a phenomenally complex system which is so much more beautiful than the first law of thermodynamics... It is much too interwoven for ideas like, "I end here; you begin there." It defies definition. When I look at the world around me, I see all the things I don't know; I see tremendous possibility. Now why would I crush all that possibility into one little ball and say it's done with?

Michael

It's not, at least not when you put it that way. The universe makes sense on some level. Laws of science are simply a way of humans saying 'that's the way it goes'.

The way you wrote that makes it sound as if scientists are trying to lock the universe in a box, the fact is that the universe has us locked in a box and we are trying to learn as much as we can about the dimensions of the box.

You are assigning more importance to scientific theories than any scientist would be willing to.

CSflim's post above might be a good starting point. Then read something by Sagan or Asimov. This last paragraph sounds exactly like something Sagan might say. You say you've been studying science most of your life, but you seem to have missed all of the books by the most brilliant thinkers.

Thankyou for trying to explain all that. I think I at least sortof get it now. Never even thought about it that way before. Thanks

Word!

____________________________________

Well, I don't know about god, or higher powers or whatever. I do beileve in evolution. I don't think a higher power had any hand in that.
As to wether something deity-like created the universe in the first place? Well, it's a pretty idea, but I'm not sure I believe it one way or the other.
I chose the dieistic answer, because I do believe in something besides us existing and I can't quite see them sitting on the sidelines in the beginning.

I must think on this some more.

I believe the question was, "What do you believe?" If you want a book report on Sagan and Asimov, I'm afraid you'll have to look elsewhere.

Michael

Yes, the question was 'what do you believe?' The things you believe regarding the aims of science and scientists are clearly wrong. I am not looking for a "book report" on Sagan or Asimov, I am saying that if you have a desire to learn how wrong you are, books by those authors might be a good starting point.

Where did the little green men come from?

I believe that God created life and then let evolution take course. The reason that I see this as how it happened is through some logic. Ok so God created all, everything. That means that God created the laws of quantum physics, and the laws of evolution. People think that science and religion are two different things, but since God created all then he also created science and the two things are the same.

I believe that the human intellect turned out too well to be a matter of dumb luck. The specifics of divine intervention imposed onto evolution escape me.

As a senior anthropology major I beleive in evolution, am not concerned with religion, and want to know whats coming next!

Give me some examples. You have to look at the context the passage is in, and this is something a lot of people forget to do. They'll pull two things out of context then attempt to say that they contradict each other.

If we all evolved from ape ancesters, then why are thier still monkey's?

Unfortunately the possibilities regarding the source of the universe seem to be endless. Us humans just don't have enough knowledge or perhaps the capacity to understand about the nature of things yet and may never have.

Most of us who accept evolution usually don't try to extend the theory to the universes source. We are assuming the universe started somehow (like the big bang theory) and things evolved from there. Many just accept the evolution of life on this planet and don't necessarily include the cosmos in their thinking.

The source of the universe is one big mystery that will probably keep humans creating all kinds of religions to explain it. We seem to have a need to fill that vacuum of unknowing with something. Most of us who are atheists and agnostics have chosen to leave that mystery open for now. Atheists take it one step farther and believe the ultimate answer will not include a god.

How about creavolution?

See, most of you guys have it wrong, every organism has evolved. A random mutation that benefits an organism is the cause of evolution. Evolution is not the creation of humans and other complex organisms from one celled sea creatures. For the ones that believe in the big bang theory, ever heard of the second law of thermodynamics? Yeah, its a law meaning that it has been proven over and over and over and has yet to be proven wrong. It states that order cannot come from disorder and that everything moves towards disorder. So if you believe that a small tennis ball sized object exploded and created the universe then believe that, but know that science proves that such an event is impossible. If I'm gonna believe in anything that is beyond human comprehension (which all senarios are) I'm gonna stick with creationism.

That's a good word for what many folks I have discussed this subject with believe. I think it's selection 3 on the beginning poll.

I'm not knocking your choice, just curious why you limit yourself to creationism. And who or what created the creator? Doesn't it make more sense to just stay open minded about all this unknowable stuff until we learn more.

Both humans and Apes were quite different than they appear today when the evolutionary branching is purported to have occured. It is believed that the common ancestor bore a resemblance to todays lemur but was somewhat larger. Fossil evidence is relatively clear (if sparce) concerning the actual timeframes and physical changes.

One example of a contradiction in the scriptures is the Story of Noah. Even taking into account the possability of far fewer species (unlikely) the ability to build a craft capable of fitting the estimated number of creatures is simply unfathomable to my mind. Let alone the food storage, waste removal, and logistic nightmare put upon those seven humans. The architectural skill required to build a boat, literally miles in dimension without causing collapse would have been exceedingly difficult, and would have required multiple lifetimes (even at 400 yrs.) and destroyed inumerable forests.

I find the chances of this story bieng fact......pretty much Zero.

To say that we evolved from the apes makes little more sense than saying that apes evolved from humans. We (humans) did not evolve from apes. Apes have evolved, alongside of humans, from a common ancestor.

Sorry to say this, but people who use the 2nd Law of Thermo to shoot down evolution or the big bang theory have no clue what the hell they are talking about.

The 2nd Law applies to Chemistry and Physics. It's basic consequence is that there is no physical or chemical process that is 100% efficient. Work is always lost and entropy relates to this lost work. There is a whole lot more to it, but that is a start.

http://www.2ndlaw.com/evolution.html

If you are a creationist and you have an objection to evolution, I would love to hear it.
HOWEVER, I am tired of hearing the same, completely unsubstantiated, objections over and over again. "Why are there still monkeys" and "thermodynamics proves you wrong" count in this category.

So, PLEASE before you post I urge you to look for your objection on <A href="http://talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html">this page</A>, and if your objection is not already countered there, then by all means post it in here for us all to examine. On the other hand, if your objection is on that page, and you feel that it still has merit, despite the rebutal provided, by all means post it in here, but only after first taking into account the rebutal provided, and modifying the objection accordingly.

I am quite happy to enter into discussions on this subject, but I won't respond to objections that have be rebutted time and time before.

I find it hard to understand why people think they know physics better than professional physicists. To be blunt about it, the science presented in popular books and tv is designed solely to make people think "wow, that's cool." Those things do not properly explain very much at all, and make plenty of blatantly wrong statements so that they can be short and understandable. Finding inconsistencies in analogies is rather pointless. To be specific, entropy has little to do with 'disorder' and the big bang is not an explosion in any conventional sense. These concepts are much more complicated than that. They're also too complicated for me to attempt to explain in an online forum.

I'll mention one popular misunderstanding, though: the big bang is not about how the universe was "created" (if it was). It's about what happened "after" that. Every cosmologist admits that physics breaks down and they have no idea what they're talking about beyond a certain point. That point, however, goes very far back in time to very very extreme conditions. The "bang" itself is an extrapolation that is not meant to be taken seriously at this point.

Also, these ideas were not something that some guy just randomly thought up one day to pick on religious people (I don't even see how it really contradicts christianity anyway, but that's another story...). They follow rigorously from the mathematics of general relativity given very minimal assumptions. There is also now a huge amount of evidence for it.

All that said, why do people bring up the big bang in a thread on evolution? They're completely unrelated ideas.

I put down 'other.' I believe that the world was created but I have no idea if it was a god or something else. Generally I lean towards the ultimate cause being a God.

But you are an ape!

Actually, polar bears are black. They have black skin and a transparent outer layer of fur, which appears to us as white.


So true, it's just a story for, and told by, people not yet ready for a scientific explanation. If the Japanese had settled America before the Europeans then the argument would be evolution versus the divine beings Izanagi and Izanami.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanes...#Creation_Myth

evolution.

Evolution. I know that other people have other ideas and beleifs, but i REALLY dont see how people can actually trully fully beleive in there being a god.

OK here I go!
(yelling)
EVERY ONE..... STOP TELLING US WHAT YOU BELEIVE AND TELL US WHAT YOU KNOW!

There is a huge difference between beleif and knowing.

At the moment of the conception of life inthe primordial ooze before anything ever evolved there could have been a GOD involved... then again there could have been an accident that caused life after a God created the cosmos.

WE DO NOT KNOW! (yelling again)

Those who porfess to know are obligated to provide proof!

Evolution is a theory .... (a damn good one but still a theory)
creation is a beleif... we just do not know the truth...

GOD BLESS YOU ALL - ha ha

I dont beleive in any such gods, shit simply happened. We dont need a reason for everything in life, so why make up a relgious one to satisify your needs I do not know. /opinion

Ok, I'll tell you what I know.

It is "only" a theory that the earth is round. It is "only" a theory that the earth orbits the sun. It is "only"
a theory that allows us to pilot airplanes accross the Atlantic. It is "only" a theory that things fall down and not up.

The it's only a theory argument is not even an argument.

<HR>
1 The word "theory," in the context of science, does not imply uncertainty. It means "a coherent group of general propositions used as principles of explanation for a class of phenomena" [Barnhart 1948]. In the case of the theory of evolution, the following are some of the phenomena involved. All are facts:

* That life appeared on earth more than two billion years ago;
* That life forms have changed and diversified over life's history;
* That species are related via common descent from one or a few common ancestors;
* That natural selection is a significant factor affecting how species change.

Many other facts are explained by the theory of evolution as well.

2 The theory of evolution has proved itself in practice. It has useful applications in epidemiology, pest control, drug discovery, and other areas [Bull and Wichman 2001; Eisen and Wu 2002; Searls 2003].

3 Besides the theory, there is the fact of evolution, the observation that life has changed greatly over time. The fact of evolution was recognized even before Darwin's theory. The theory of evolution explains the fact.

4 If "only a theory" were a real objection, creationists would also be issuing disclaimers complaining about the theory of gravity, atomic theory, the germ theory of disease, and the theory of limits (on which calculus is based). The theory of evolution is no less valid than any of these. Even the theory of gravity still receives serious challenges [Milgrom 2002]. Yet the phenomenon of gravity, like evolution, is still a fact.

5 Creationism is neither theory nor fact; it is, at best, only an opinion. Since it explains nothing, it is useless.

http://talkorigins.org/indexcc/CA/CA201.html

I think it is hard for most people to believe that this was all created without a higher power (God) involved in it. I used to be an aethiest, but I've turned out to be a closet Catholic, sarcasm off. Really, I am Catholic now, but I still question many things just because that is the way I learn.

I must also request that this thread stop talking about the universe,

Evolution and the "Big Bang" are not related in any way apart from the fact that both are scientific theories. But to silence the people that talk about how the natural laws keep being broken. these laws were designed by man to help understand things, people like to categorise. Take for example Newtonial Physics, It has long been known to be incorrect but is still used as it is reasonably accurate until the object is moving faster than 300kph. Then General Reletivity is better, but even that is still not perfect. The "Natural Laws" are still being worked out so just because something defies them doesnt mean they are rubbish, it just means they have to be corrected.

Evolution, at least in essence has been proven many times, therefore it is fact that evolution exists, whether humanity was formed through evolution is the theory part.

to answer someones question about why there are still monkeys. Imagine this scenario. Millions of years ago, creatures exist that can live equally well in trees or on the land. They are a peacefull species and everyone has a great time. One day however a new baby is born that for some reason, maybe his classmates mocked him, he liked to hide in the trees. He spent most of his life in the trees. Eventually he met a girl and convinced her to live in the trees as well, they had kids that lived in the trees, who had kids that lived in the trees etc.

After a while this family that lives in the trees develops skills and abilities that are better suited to living in the trees, from experience and practice. now this family is more efficient at collecting food from the trees than their more versatile cousins. Also they forget how to collect food from the ground, so they become protective of the tree food, as its all they have. Thus the original animal is denied access to the trees and needs to rely more on ground food sources. they then develop better skills to gather this food because the loss of tree food means they need to gather more ground food than they used to.

eventually you are left with two different species, they will still look similar, in some ways act similar but will be different in ways that aid their particular environment.

Now I doubt this is what actually happened, but I hope this helps in some peoples understanding of the basic process of evolution.

CSflim: thanks for that site, has some really good info on it.

The original poster brought it into the discussion with the first selection on the original poll. Alternatives to this creation of everything are, well, different ways everything got here.