I am only using your own definition.
Nope. You're just ignoring all the evidence.
A scientific theory is an explanation of an aspect of the natural world that can be repeatedly tested, in accordance with the scientific method, using a predefined protocol of observation and experiment. Established scientific theories have withstood rigorous scrutiny and embody scientific knowledge.
Where is the evidence that what we see now evolved from what went extinct?
The first great advance wasn't even done by a scientist who knew about evolution. It was Linnaeus, who first showed that all living things fit nicely into a family tree. Such nested hierarchies only occur in nature where there is common descent. Linnaeus was puzzled when non-living things, such as minerals, wouldn't fit into such a family tree.
The next great advance was Darwin's observation that variation and natural selection account for the directional path of evolution. Fitness tends to increase in a population.
1. More are born than can live. (directly observed)
2. Every organism is slightly different from all the others. (directly observed)
3. Some of these differences affect the likelihood of living long enough to reproduce (directly observed)
4. Favorable differences tend to persist and spread in the population. (directly observed)
5. Changes accumulate, often resulting in new species (directly observed)
Darwin then explained the fuzzy nature of species as being caused by this process, and predicted that there must have been transitional forms between higher taxa as the process produced increasingly different organisms, such as tetrapods from fish, birds and mammals from reptiles and so on.
There wasn't much evidence for his in Darwin's lifetime; when Huxley used anatomical data to predict that birds evolved from dinosaurs, there wasn't any evidence for it. In the years since, the predicted transitionals have become extremely numerous, to the point that there are few gaps left between major groups. These transitional forms were admitted by creationist Kurt Wise to be "strong evidence" for macroevolution.
Even more convincing, we never see a transitional form where evolutionary theory says there shouldn't be one. No mammals with feathers. No insects with bones.
The rediscovery of Mendel's work led to predictions that gene would be sorted out in a family tree similar to that of Linnaeus. And over time, DNA and genetic data have confirmed that prediction. Genes produce the same family tree as Linnaeus prepared, to a high degree of precision. And we know it works, because we can check it with organisms of known descent.
A similar result can be shown from conserved organic molecules. Recently, a small amount of heme was found in the fossil of a T-rex. When checked, it was more closely similar to that of birds than of other reptiles, which is exactly what evolutionary theory predicted.
Evolution goes on every day.
Yep. Documented constantly. Even macroevolution; there's a good number of speciation events in the literature. Even the observed evolution of new enzyme systems and digestive organs.
NO! The evidence show there were sudden cessations. and then a sudden appearing of new lifeforms.
Let's test your belief. Name any two major groups, said to be evolutionarily connected, and I'll see if there's a transitional. If you want, name more than one case. Let's see how that works out.
Barbarian is lost in his inability to grasp things that require grace to understand.
Rather, I lack your presuppositions, necessary for one to believe your unscriptural ideas.
