Frozen Evolution. Or, that’s not the way it is, Mr. Darwin. A Farewell to Selfish Gene.

Although a number of facts demonstrating the correctness of the evolutionary explanation of the origin of species exist, it must be emphasized that none of them proves the existence of evolution when taken alone. Let’s ignore for the moment the already mentioned fact that no scientific theory can be definitively proven and that, in the best case, all the momentarily known alternative theories can be, at most, shown to be false. We would most probably be capable of finding an explanation for any of the above-mentioned facts that did not encompass the fact of evolution. For example, all of Darwin’s finches could have emerged or have been formed in a single moment at a single place and could fly to the Galapagos together purely by chance. It is, of course, possible to calculate how great this chance would have to be; nonetheless, even if we were to obtain quite negligible probability, we could not completely exclude this scenario. The identity of the phylogenetic trees created on the basis of sequences of various genes could also be caused by the fact that the species were created by a Martian, by the “copy and paste” method, i.e. in each case he would create a species from another already existing species. Of course, life on Earth could just as easily have been created by an omnipotent God who, for some unknown reason, wanted us to think, on the basis of our data, that he had nothing to do with it and that the species were formed by natural biological evolution. (However, in this case, wouldn’t it be a good idea to do just this?) However, with the exception of the latter model, all the alternative explanations are post hoc explanations, sometimes not very probable and sometimes rather awkward and, in addition, frequently mutually incompatible or incompatible with the currently accepted explanations of other phenomena. In contrast, the model of biological evolution was established prior to accumulation of most of the data that now confirm its validity. It is a very good explanation for phenomena that we encounter at all levels and in a wide range of disciplines. Fundamentally, it is possible to state that, at the present time, no facts are known that would be contradictory to the model of evolution based on gradual splitting off of individual species from a common ancestor.