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Reconciling Darwin's Theory of Natural Selection and Intelligent Design

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Natural selection is an important component of evolution. Natural selection occurs when some members of a population are better fit for survival and reproduction than the others in that population (Phelan 284-85, 2011). The environment in which organisms live plays a part in natural selection as well. Depending on the conditions of the environment, the organisms may pass down selected traits to their offspring. These selected traits will allow for the next generation to better adapt and survive longer. One example of evolution that has occurred in the past ten years is that of hypolimnas bolina, or the blue moon butterfly. The blue moon butterfly evolved through the process of natural selection in order to survive. The male blue moon …show more content…

Over the years, the male population of the blue moon butterfly has increased to nearly forty percent and this is all due to evolution. (Sherriff 2007).
Human beings are still very much evolving. According to recent studies, genetic changes in women over the years have decreased the age at which they birthed their first child. In one study the age decreased as much as four years from age 26 down to age 22 (Allen 2011). Another concurrent study looked at women’s physical appearance in correlation with the number of children they had. The resulting data revealed that, “stout, slightly plump” women had more children. Researchers found that these characteristics are passed on from mothers to their offspring and so forth (Harrell 2009). Therefore, as these traits are passed from generation to generation, the population grows and these characteristics become more prominent in the population. All of these findings confirm that the evolution of human beings is still very much an ongoing process.
Intelligent design is not an alternative theory to evolution. Intelligent design is the belief that organisms or other things did not evolve, but were created just as they are now. In the video, the science teachers of Dover High School refuse to read a one minute statement to their classes explaining that intelligent design is an alternative theory to Darwin’s theory of evolution. Their refuting argument were as follows,

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