Evolution
A
critical view
Quotes from leading evolutionists
On the Origin of the Species
by Charles Darwin
Chapter 6
Difficulties on Theory
page 160
"Firstly, why, if species have descended from other
species by insensibly fine gradations, do we
not everywhere see innumerable transitional forms? Why is
not all nature in confusion, instead of
the species being, as we see them, well defined?"
"Secondly, is it possible that an animal having, for
instance, the structure and habits of a bat,
could have been formed by the modification of some animal
with wholly different habits? Can
we believe that natural selection could produce, on the
one hand, organs of trifling importance,
such as the tail of a giraffe, which serves as a
fly-flapper, and, on the other hand, organs of such
wonderful structure, as the eye, of which we hardly as yet
fully understand the inimitable
perfection?"
"Thirdly, can instincts be acquired and modified through
natural selection? What shall we say to
so marvellous an instinct as that which leads the bee to
make cells, which has practically
anticipated the discoveries of profound mathematicians?"
"Fourthly, how can we account for species, when crossed,
being sterile and producing sterile
offspring, whereas, when varieties are crossed, their
fertility is unimpaired?"
page 172
"Organs of extreme perfection and complication.- To
suppose that the eye, with all its unimitable
contrivances for adjusting the focus to different
distances, for admitting different amounts of
light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic
aberration, could have been formed by
natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the
hightest possible degree.