Kansas, Where "Ignorant" is the New "Educated

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As someone who does not subscribe to evolution, I would have no problem with schools teaching evolution as a theory of origins. The fact is that it is still the dominant paradigm in biology research, and many people adhere to it. However, evolution is not the only theory of origins out there. I am not a believer in evolution as a theory, because I have looked at the scientific evidence and it has been found wanting. Of course, microevolution and natural selection are scientific facts, but they do not prove macroevolution. For example, a bird species can evolve into another bird species, but not into a "higher" animal form. Just because there is a 94% genetic similarity between humans and chimpanzees does not prove evolution. The reason why I have trouble with evolution from a scientific viewpoint is:

1) The fossil record: The fossil record does not show transitional forms between animals or plants, and definitely not between apes and humans. Artists' renderings of what transitional forms might have looked like is no scientific evidence that they actually existed.

2) Second Law of Thermodynamics: This teaches that systems go from more orderly to more chaotic. It applies to both inanimate and animate objects. Cars, machines, people, animals, plants all deteriorate over time. The earth is like that too. The theory of evolution contradicts this.

3) Enormous complexity of life: Cells, the building block of life, or enormously complex things--they are probably more intricate than a computer chip. The structure of DNA is enormously complex, where the amino acid sequence has to be just right. For me, it is an enormous leap of faith to believe that all of this just fell into place through long drawn-out evolutionary processes.

4) Unreliable dating methods: The present chronological dating methods (especially carbon dating) has been shown to be highly unreliable--it does not yield consistent measurements.

5) Genetics: Genetic structures are different between life forms, and one type of gene cannot evolve into another. Mutations tend to be degenerative--this even goes against natural selection.

The idea of older forms of life evolving into newer forms of life over millions of years as a result of a process of mutations and natural selection is a theory that is contradicted by much scientific evidence, and it represents a leap of faith that I cannot accept. The scientific evidence seems more to indicate some form of intelligent design. I believe that both intelligent design and evolution should be taught, and let students come to their own conclusions based on the scientific evidence.

In the second law of thermodynamics, entropy can decrease in one subsystem as long as it increases in another subsystem for a net positive or zero entropy change in the sum of the interacting components. Were this not true, freezers would not work. Since energy is being pumped into the Earth by the Sun everyday, it can serve as fuel for the freezers of life, where the life forms keep their own entropy low for a lifespan while dumping waste products into their environment.