Question about how God created

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Toasty

Puritan Board Sophomore
Did God create all of the species of deer out of nothing or did He create a deer that produced all of the species of deer that we see today? Do all species of deer descend from a common deer or did all of the species of deer come into existence without having an ancestor?
 
I don't know if the text is specific enough to answer the question? At the least, "species" carries a specific scientific meaning that "kinds" does not necessarily have. Interestingly enough, I seem to recall that the immutability of species was argued on theological grounds (e.g., God is perfect and immutable, so what God creates is perfect. More species appearing would be an imperfect creation because the extra species suggests incompleteness, etc.) then later rejected on scientific grounds, and supposedly, it was only recently that YECs started denying it too. I don't know if that's entirely true though since I heard it from a professor looking in from the outside of Christianity.

We can say that the original creatures were made after their kinds, so species of deer either share a common ancestor or they are their own "kind." Just throwing stuff out there...
 
I think that young-earth creationists—the evolutionary ones in the closet, anyway—would say that God created the original deer "kind" (is that even defined yet?), preserved through the global flood of Noah, which evolved through mutation and natural selection into all the historical and current deer species. [1] That original deer "kind" is probably long extinct and no one knows what it looked like.

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Footnotes:

Georgia Purdom and Bodie Hodge, "What Are 'Kinds' in Genesis?" Ken Ham (ed.), New Answers Book 3 (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2011), pp. 39–48.
 
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Apply the question to a toy poodle. I'm fairly confident that this breed was not present at creation. Of course, some might place it in the dog species, but I'm a bit skeptical.
 
Deer Toasty......the questions you ask, my deer!!

If you read the "Origin of Species" it was Darwin who cleverly ( and cunningly) elaborated his theory from the examples of limited ability to develop that God had placed within the created types.

You might as well ask "Did God create all sorts of men at once - black, white, brown, red, yellow?" and "What did Adam look like?"

Sent from my HTC Wildfire using Tapatalk 2
 
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I think that young-earth creationists—the evolutionary ones in the closet, anyway—would say that God created the original deer "kind" (is that even defined yet?), preserved through the global flood of Noah, which evolved through mutation and natural selection into all the historical and current deer species. [1] That original deer "kind" is probably long extinct and no one knows what it looked like.

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Footnotes:

Georgia Purdom and Bodie Hodge, "What Are 'Kinds' in Genesis?" Ken Ham (ed.), New Answers Book 3 (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2011), pp. 39–48.

They would say that this type of change is not evolution because the deer remained a deer. It was not like a non-deer becoming a deer.
 
Apply the question to a toy poodle. I'm fairly confident that this breed was not present at creation.

Thank you for brining up dog breeds. I remember learning that the vast majority of present-day dog breeds did not exist until the 19th century. It is amazing the speed with which genetic diversity can occur. Of course, as it pertains to dogs, there was much human involvement in the breeding process, but I believe it still illustrates the point that it does not require vast eons of time in order for a relatively few breeds to become many.
 
Its amazing how many of the dog breeds man has made happen are full of problems. Breathing problems, hip displacements, spinal problems, skin problems, eye problems and so on. Funny that the majority of sound dogs are amongst the mongrel varieties. :lol:
 
We know of three "kinds" which were on the ark: man, ravens and doves. Each has formed recognisably subgroups since. I think pigeons form some 50 species and ravens some 20 species or so.

I do know that in the providence of God animals can divide the chromosomes to increase the number of playing cards so to speak. The sika deer and red deer have a different chromosome number yet are still compatible for breeding purposes. This has led to restrictions on moving red deer to preserve the genetic integrity of stock.
 
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