>>1. Where is the "actual" fossil evidence of creatures in-between species?<<
One of my favorite lines of transition is the whale. A quick search turned up a nice little picture of the lineage at
http://www.origins.tv/darwin/landtosea.htm. There's also a lot of links at
Account Suspended.
It's fascinating that all marine mammals swim with a horizontal tail and an up and down undulating motion. Fishes, on the other hand, have vertical tails and use a left to right motion to propel themselves. I saw an amazing video showing the hip motion of a running greyhound and comparing it to the hip motion of a whale. Did you know that at least one whale still retains it's useless hip bones, attached to nothing.
Of course, one of the more convincing lines of evolution is the human one, going back through Homo erectus, Homo habilis, and the australopithecines. There's a good list of species at
Hominid Species. The convincing part of the chain is the gradual changes from species to species and the species living where you'd expect them to.
3. How did the first components that "created the first cells" get there?
I like the explanation that Richard Dawkins gives in the Blind Watchmaker. While his theory, involving silicates as the first replicators, is not some leading theory, his explanation of the process that could lead to DNA and cells is very understandable. It is fascinating that the twenty amino acids that comprise us are the same twenty amino acids that will cling to clay if you wash water across it. (I've never verified that, but that's what Dawkins said. I found that fascinating.)
4. The evolution of the eye.
When I suggested this argument eleven years ago, Bill Piper's answer is what was one of the biggest things to make a believer out of me. I found out later, he borrowed it straight from Charles Darwin's
Origin of Species. So the answer to this has been around for 150 years for anyone who wants to read it.
You start with cells that are sensitive to light, which can provide guidance for an individual, which is a competitive advantage. The cells form a spot, and the spot gradually becomes a depression. The depression allows some focusing of the light. Over the depression forms a layer of translucent or transparent skin. Small adjustments to the thickness of that skin will help focus light (that's a lens). Add muscles to control the lens, and you have basically the eye we have, functional all along the way.
6. How do you explain the emotions, passions, love of human beings?
There's probably some good evolutionary explanation for this, but that's not how I explain it. I believe we're made in the image of God, and that God has emotions, passions, and love, too.
Now let me address a question you didn't ask.
I've watched lots of people, and tried myself, to disprove evolution in order somehow to defend God. Not only have they been dramatically unsuccessful, but the dishonesty so common in their efforts are one of the strongest arguments for evolution and against God.
Evolution happened. Or if it didn't, the evidence for it is so strong no one's going to contradict it.
Proving evolution didn't happen wouldn't prove the Bible or God, anyway. If someone's going to believe in God, shouldn't it be because there's positive evidence for such a belief, and not because they don't believe in evolution (which would be a really dumb reason to believe in God, anyway).
When you get off the computer, look into your wife's eyes. Look at your mother. Pick up your child. Can you look into their eyes and tell me that they were just some mistake? That the people that you hold dear to you are just random assortments of chance and stuff and it is just from apes to man that they are who they are?
The atheists and agnostics on this forum are going to explain emotions, and they're going to do it pretty well (most likely). Then they are going to ask you why "random assortments of chance and stuff" is a "mistake" in your mind.
However, I think us theists may very well outnumber the atheists and agnostics even among those who believe in evolution. I believe in molecules to man evolution, and the thought of being made of stardust is a total delight to me and makes me love and honor God more than before I knew the role iron plays in supernovas (that's a unique and cool story) and the role supernovas play in making my wife, mother, and children. I certainly don't think evolution was a mistake. I think it was a planned and wonderful way to create the universe.
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