zulumoose wrote:Why answer him with language more complicated than his own, that's just escalating the misunderstanding.
The simple answer is that new species are not created when two different species combine to make a third, this is not a claim made by those who understand how evolution works.
Part of the problem, however, is that the typical creationist dupe has been lied to on this matter by duplicitous pedlars of apologetics, and has swallowed the lies in question wholesale. Getting past the "my pastor is a man of god and wouldn't lie to me" stupidity is, unfortunately, a major hurdle with some of the dupes, because they've swallowed an even more insidious lie beforehand. Namely, the lie that only adherents of mythology-based doctrine can be trusted. Selling that lie is, of course, standard operating procedure for the pedlars of the doctrine in question, along with other insidious, pervasive lies, such as the lie that being part of the narrowly prescribed doctrinal pale magically confers an exalted status upon the adherent. The whole "us versus them" dichotomy arising as a result, is then weaponised.
Cutting your way through the bramble thicket of psychological manipulation, frequently requires asking when the precision secateurs approach will work, and when it won't, whereupon you have to swap the secateurs for a Caterpillar D9 bulldozer. Or, in the severest cases, a Castle Bravo level physics package.
zulumoose wrote:This can be illustrated clearly with national identity:-
White Americans did not arise when Europeans interbred with native Americans, and White Australians did not arise when Europeans interbred with native Australians
Indeed. All that happened was that the Europeans that hopped across the oceans, stopped breeding with the Europeans they left behind. In some cases, that created some bottlenecks with, er,
interesting end results.
zulumoose wrote:they both drifted apart from their native national identities until they had completely separate national identities (but with common ancestral national identity).
Of course, there's the little problem that being
geographically coupled to a given location, and being
directly genetically coupled via recent matings to the population of that location, are two separate entities with their own nuances. But nuance is something that the creationist dupes are programmed to avoid with visceral loathing.
zulumoose wrote:Similarly if someone asks why there are still monkeys if we descended from them, just ask them why there are still Europeans, if white Americans descended from them. The answer explains evolution perfectly - common ancestry.
Trouble is, the dupes will either refuse to make the connection point blank, or if they do, reboot quickly to avoid exiting the doctrinal pale that's been their security blanket for so long. The latter constituting a powerful influence, when the consequences of said exit involves personal safety issues.
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