Creationists benefit directly from the Theory of Evolution

Hi Pink Sasquatch,I appreciate your point but think you may be overstating the case somewhat. After all, "natural philosophers" in the middle ages were using knowledge gained from dissection to understand human anatomy. William Harvey was drawing general conclusions about the circulation of the blood in the seventeenth century by dissecting pigs and dogs, for example, without any clear understanding of evolutionary relationships between pigs, dogs, and other vertebrates.However you are definitely correct to say that the theory of evolution has directly benefited creationists. One of the most important offshoots of evolutionary theory is poulation genetics (or, you might say that evolutionary theory is one of the offshoots of population genetics, of course). Without a theory of evolution, population genetics not only makes no sense, but it is a completely pointless enterprise.If you want a nice cuddly example of how evolution and population genetics have benefitted creationists, you might look at conservation genetics. Understanding the way that genetic diversity is subdivided within populations of species that are of conservation or economic importance is a vital component of modern wildlife management. The Canadian government, for example, carries out widespread sampling of salmon DNA in order to monitor population genetic processes and prevent overfishing of at-risk populations. So if you enjoy eating seafood, you can definitely thank evolutionary theory.Another example is the grizzly bear. Creationist or not, we all want to prevent our grizzlies going extinct. Population genetic analysis of reproductive patterns in such populations is central to working out a useful conservation strategy (see Grizzlybear.org). These approaches are widely used in conservation of wild animals like dingoes, wildcats, the red wolf, etc., which are all at risk because of hybridization with domesticated sister species.If it wasn't for evolutionary theory, we simply wouldn't have the understanding of population genetic processes that will be necessary to maintain these species in the wild. We would be left just praying that animals like these don't go extinct.mick

I thought of another example. As I see it, if you don't believe in evolution, then you don't believe in phylogenies (for those who don't know, these are the "trees" we use to describe evolutionary relationships between species).Evolutionary phylogenetics was directly responsible for our knowledge that the human HIV virus arose by evolutionary processes from the Simian Immunodeficieny Virus, and this knowledge is central to our strategy not only in finding a vaccine but preventing the emergence of new diseases by animal-human infection. If you don't believe in phylogenetics, you might end up thinking all sorts of crazy things about HIV (i.e. it's a punishment from God) that don't help at all in finding a cure.Phylogenetics also proved that the US anthrax attacks in 2001/2 originated from a lab strain developed by US scientists rather than from a lab populated by dark-skinned folk as the media initially (and predictably) claimed. This knowledge played a part in mobilising millions of people against a recent war.Mick