Just a few questions...

Hey Enuf, welcome to the boards.You may be able to get your questions answered here, however, since this is an open forum, you'll likely get more questions raised.You should be aware that no everyone here subscribes to the same views. Some believe in science and the Theory of Evolution. Others hold that Intelligent Design explains life on Earth. Still others hold to a strict (Literal) reading of the Bible.I assume you are coming at this open mindedly, and the fact that you are asking questions is a good place to start.

a) digestive system - Which came first food, appetite, ability to eat, digestion, resistance to one's own stomache acid.Well, let's look at each of these.Food - This is kind of broad. Just about everything can be (and is) food for something else. So, food would have existed before anything was actually eating it.Appetite - I have no idea how you would determine if, say a bacteria, has an appetite as we think of it. Seems reasonable that it would have some indicator that it needs to consume. But, seems just as reasonable that it simply consumes anything which is available as it comes across it.Ability to eat - Yeast is a fairly simple organism. It "eats" starches, but it doesn't have a stomache as we would normally think of one.As for digestive juices and our resistance to them, I would think that these kind of go hand in hand. The first thing to develop stomache acid that eats itself probably didn't last long enough to pass it on.b) Drive to reproduce / ability to reproduceAbility to reproduce is observable in even the simpliest of single cell organisms. And, like appetite, I don't know how we would determine if these things have a "drive" to reproduce.c) Lungs / mucus / throat / mixture of gasesWell, gases of course came first, since that's the atmosphere. If our atmosphere had a different make up, then respiration would have to make use of whatever's there.The throat predates lungs and mucus as well, as the throat is part of the digistive system and it observable in many different sea creatures who have no respiratory function whatsoever.As for the mucus lining vs the lungs, that's a toss up. You could argue that certain fish (and other animals) have the ability to fill air bladers which don't serve as part of respiration. Are these primative lungs? You could also suggest that the mucus that lines the lungs is similar to that which lines the gills.d) DNA or RNAWell, RNA is ribonuclaic Acid and DNA is dioxy-ribonuclaic acid. So, I'm pretty sure that RNA is the building block on which DNA expanded.e) Termite vs stomache flagellaI'd say the flagella existed (in one form or another outside the terminte) first. I think that the insects that we see as termites today, may have been more like ants until the flagella took up residence. Then, co-evolution kicks in.Flagella evolves to be better at digesting cellulose, better at living in termites rather than out in the open, etc. Termites evolve to be better at obtaining cellulose to feed the flagella.f) Bees vs PlantsI think NWR posted a great explaination of this above. Primative plants, like ferns, reproduce with spores instead of seeds and therefore don't need pollination. They predate the flowering plants.In fact, the flowering plant "explosion" coincides nicely with the "insect explosion" as both groups rapidly diversified and conquered. (Please note that "rapidly" in geological/evolutionary terms can mean millions of years).g) Immune system or need for itWell, the need arose first. After all, the need for an immune system kicks off as soon as we have something alive which is threatened.I suppose what you are asking is about viruses and such. Our immune system reacts to non-living intruders (ie splinters). But, I couldn't tell you the first thing about the first immune systems to evolve.Do bacteria have immune systems? Does mold?These are great questions. Hopefully someone can answer them for both of us

Seems kinda backwards as a question. I would define life by the ability to reproduce itself, so it's sort of a "right at the start" thing.

I don't think the flagella "knows" anything. How did the flagella start doing what it does? Might be a better question. I think the answer is in the next part of your post. The flagella's predacessor, one which did not consume that particular kind of wood or whatever, didn't suddenly evolve into the version in the termite. Small changes over time. The earlier version probably ate something that was on or in the wood. The flagella which first developed a taste for wood, suddenly had a whole lot more food than anyone else.Unfortunately, we're talking about microscopic little buggers that, even if they were to fossilize, how would you find them?

I doubt that this is completely true. Just like chimps aren't the predecessors to humans, the current, modern lung-fish is the end of another branch on the tree.The predecessor to amphibians was likely related to the predessor to lungfish.Not trying to nitpick, but we all know what happens on these boards when someone "overstates" something

"How did life learn to be life?"This is a question which predates what Theory of Evolution describes.In other words, there are lots of possibilities for how life got started on Earth, and Theory of Evolution couldn't care less which one is right.First thing to do with this question is define "life" and "learn".By "life" I take it you mean a self replicating form which is born, ages and dies. This would cover a wide range of things from raccoons to bacteria. (perhaps even volcanos, I may have cast my net too wide.)As for "learn", I'm going to assume you mean "get started" as learning implies a higher brain function.If abiogenesis is correct, a mixture of chemicals perhaps sparked by lightning, produced basic amino acids and started it all.If Theistic Genesis is right, God came down and got it all started.Either way, once that ball got rolling, Theory of Evolution took over and got us to where we are today.

You're thinking about this wrong.There are two ways to answer this question:1) English letters represent sounds. When you read the letters, you are decoding them into sounds. Chinese characters are also representation of sounds. You could write a book in English letters which when read outloud sounds Chinese and vice versa. The different symbols we use for the sounds aren't important, only the sound.2) Both English letters and Chinese characters are made up of parts. These parts are short lines and curves. Every english letter contains one or more of these pieces in different combinations. The same is true for Chinese characters. The lines and curves are the "DNA" of the writing.

This is a really good point and an interest analogy.For example, Enuf's argument is that the characters are not interchangable.However, as Literalist points out, computer language is compiled on strictly 1s and 0s.Now, you are all reading this on your computer screens, therefore proving that 1s and 0s can certainly be translated into English letters

Actually, we do have a rather large number of plant fossils.If you look at the geological strata, you'll find areas where there are no records of seeds, flowing plants, pollinating insects, etc. But there are tons of huge tree like ferns.As you proceed up the strata the ferns diversify, but still no flowering plants.Until you get to the first seed plants.
Fossil Record of the Seed PlantsFrom there, there's a virtual explosion of biodiversity (again, in geological time thousands of years are a blink) as flowering plants and pollinating insects start to conquire.The ferns, in turn, take a back seat at that point, and while we have ferns today, I don't think there are any giant fern forests.Incidentally, climate change probably played a big roll in flowering plants taking over for the ferns.

Here's another good one. When did the sun learn to do fusion?