Should evolution be taught in schools?

You're in a perfect position to start lecturing Joe on introns and exons, redundant genes, non coding regions and all the other things that make it ridiculous that early DNA sequences were designed

An eye has no bones. How do you fossilise it?

ha ha ha and on the very site you quoted:

Oh dear.

you're not a very good scientist andy.

I've never questioned microevolution?

I'm asking how the eye evolved... when it appeared almost immidiatly in the fossil record.

Stop getting confused.

A trilobite eye is nothing whatsoever like a human eye.

Fossilisation of soft tissues like eyes is a vanishingly rare event. I'd expect not to see a perfect layed out table of it, because it's so rare!

So, either this vanishingly rare event did not occur whilst the evolution process I've described proceeded to form these eyes, OR we haven't found the necessary fossils yet OR the Lord made a bit of a cock up and gave a creature an eye that subsequently evolved it out when it moved to water presumably against His wishes.

Which is the worst theory there?

why do you avoid the issue?

why do perfectly formed eyes appear in the fossil record near the dawn of life?

Your explanation of evolution would suggest the evolution of a light patch over millions of year... the fossil record tells us this isn't the case.

It doesn't tell us anything of the sort, because fossilisation of a soft tissue only happens in the most fantastically rare circumstances, so I absolutely would not expect to see a perfect record of development. Lack of record does not mean it did not happen.

As I said, this isn't evidence against evolution, it's just lack of evidence for - maybe there are the fossils which haven't been discovered yet.

The question is, COULD this eye have arisen through natural selection and the answer is absolutely yes.

If these are the best arguments you've got then my confidence in evolution is even better placed than I thought.

Fossilisation of ANYTHING is fantastically rare.

Quite right, and bones are much more likely to be, as they withstand the pressures better (if memory serves). For an eye to be preserved is astonishing if thats what really happened.

fossil records aren't complete... snapshots they are

I would be more inclined to think that some divinity had been at work if there WAS perfect fossil record

so you're suggesting that the animals of Ediacaran era had less evolved eyes?

I am saying that antecedents of trilobytes had less well developed light sensing mechanisms yes.

I'm happy to provide you with an Ediacaran animal that had eyes: Platynereis dumerilii.

And BJO is a highly reputable journal, so it is reliable

http://bjo.bmj.com/cgi/content/full/89/7/795

In fact, read this article: it tells you loads about the evolution of eye!

So, animals that came before your trilobyte DID have less well developed eyes! It's exactly what I told you you should expect!

Any other points you wanted to raise?

What a pity you edited you post Just as well I quoted in time.

are you sure that the Platynereis dumerilii has been found in the Ediacaran fossil record?

I missed out a word?

Thye're cerainly precambian - they came before trilobytes.

From the article:

if eyes did not evolve where did they come from?

nucastle.co.uk resolves yet another debate of crucial importance to humanity

I'm off to the gym, see ya!