It’s amazing how you can write that much about mutation, and how it cannot contribute to evolution, without making any mention of Natural Selection. It seems to me you do not have an understanding of it. A mutation is not necessarily beneficial or harmful in itself, the deciding factor is the environment that it has occurred in, and whether that particular mutation may provide some small survival advantage or disadvantage in that environment. In a species, hundreds, even thousands of different mutations may take place, but only a couple need actually provide an advantage and these will become the norm, while all the others will disappear. A particular mutation may be beneficial in one environment, but a hindrance in another.
Mutation, which evolutionists frequently hide behind, is not a magic wand that transforms living organisms into a more advanced and perfect form.
I don’t think any evolutionists would claim that it is a magic wand. It is just something that happens randomly, and occasionally it gives an organism an advantage over others in particular environmental circumstances.
Secondly, most mutations are harmful
Most? And what of the remainder?
Not surprisingly, no useful mutation has been so far observed. All mutations have proved to be harmful.
It's not very easy to observe a beneficial mutation, because the environment which it occurs in must somehow present an opportunity for it to be beneficial. Does that prove it can never happen? Of course not.
Every effort put into "generating a useful mutation" has resulted in failure. For decades, evolutionists carried out many experiments to produce mutations in fruit flies, as these insects reproduce very rapidly and so mutations would show up quickly.
And mutations do show up quickly. These experiments show us that mutation can and does occur, and that it can cause significant changes to an organism. Growing legs out of a head is pretty significant I’d say! But yes, they didn’t turn out to be beneficial, because there were no environmental circumstances that gave them cause to be beneficial. Maybe if those flies lived in zero-gravity or something like that, having legs growing out of their head might be useful.
The only instance evolutionary biologists give of "useful mutation" is the disease known as sickle cell anemia. In this, the hemoglobin molecule, which serves to carry oxygen in the blood, is damaged as a result of mutation, and undergoes a structural change. As a result of this, the hemoglobin molecule's ability to carry oxygen is seriously impaired. People with sickle cell anemia suffer increasing respiratory difficulties for this reason. However, this example of mutation, which is discussed under blood disorders in medical textbooks, is strangelyevaluated by some evolutionary biologists as a "useful mutation."
The shape and functions of red corpuscles are compromised in sickle-cell anemia. For this reason, their oxygen-carrying capacities are weakened.
They say that the partial immunity to malaria by those with the illness is a "gift" of evolution.
Well, it can be. In an environment that is infested with malaria, imagine someone with sickle cell anemia and one without. The one without the condition, even though they have better circulation of oxygen and all that, will most likely catch the disease and die the first time they are bitten by a mosquito. The one with the condition, even though they suffer other problems such as respiration difficulties, still have a better chance of survival in this environment because they have resistance to the malaria. Their mutation is beneficial because it provides an particular advantage in the specific environment, notwithstanding other problems.
Using the same logic, one could say that, since people born with genetic leg paralysis are unable to walk and so are saved from being killed in traffic accidents, therefore genetic leg paralysis is a "useful genetic feature." This logic is clearly totally unfounded.
That is not a valid comparison to make. Only a very small number of the population actually die in traffic accidents, so it is not a major threat to survival of the population. In the malaria example, if a population of people are living in an area infested with malarial mosquitoes, then most people will likely be exposed to it and it is a major threat. It has a reasonable chance of killing most, maybe even all, people who don’t have resistance of some kind. All that said, how do you know that at some time in the future, for some reason or another, having leg paralysis won’t be useful in some way?
Mutations, in time, occur incoherently.
Correct
They are not complementary to one another, nor are they cumulative in successive generations toward a given direction.
but when a mutation is naturally selected it eventually becomes a ‘standard feature’. Further mutations can happen after this, and again most of them will not give any advantage and will die off, but a few will stick around.
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