#FRUIT FLY #Goniurelia tridens #MIMICRY #CHRISTIAN #CREATION SCIENCE #ANSWERS IN GENESIS #INSTITUTE FOR CREATION RESEARCH # FOCUS ON THE FAMILY #HOMESCHOOL CO-OPS #MAX LUCADO #LIBERTY UNIVERSITY #JOYCE MEYERS #CATHOLIC SCIENCE #BULLY GRAHM #TED DEKKER #ONE MILLION MOMS

Courtesy of creation.com Photo by Peter Roosenschoon

CAN “ART” IN NATURE EVOLVE?

Greetings all my fine friends out there!

What has happened to you this week? Anything interesting? I am continuing to read “The Forgotten Way” by Ted Dekker and drawing closer to Yeshua, otherwise known as Jesus, just by realizing and accepting that I am a beloved daughter of the King Most High. I never really believed that before, but now I do and what a change in my heart! I recommend that book to any who will listen.

Speaking of listening, did you know that in nature there are some amazing designs that can only be called art work. The most fascinating is a little fruit fly. Not the ones that we are all so familiar with that bug us, but several species in the family Tephritidae. And in particular Goniurelia tridens. This little fly, only about 3mm (⅛ of an inch) long, is native to the United

Note the sand grains for size comparison

Arab Emirates, and has a detailed picture of an ant-like insect on each of it’s wings so life like it looks like it was photo-shopped. The ‘picture’ is so life-like it’s complete with six legs, two antennae, a head, thorax and abdomen that is tapered. So why do these little flies have pictures on their wings? Scientist are puzzled over the precise function of these images. “Some think they could be used as part of the fly’s courtship (attracting a mate), others that they may be for defense; that when threatened, the fly exposes the images on its wings, and the appearance of tiny ants seemingly walking back and forth may confuse a potential predator… it seems rather unlikely that a jumping spider (the fly’s predator) would be deterred by these minuscule ‘creatures’. Many will agree with the fly specialists that the wing images are ‘absolutely perfect’ depictions of ant-like insects.”¹ They are calling it “evolutionary art”.

What? What does evolution have to do with art? According to dictionary.com, the definition of evolution is: Biology; change in the gene pool of a population from generation to generation by such processes as mutation, natural selection, and genetic drift.² Again, what does that have to do with art? Mutation it random, natural selection does not select for something pretty unless it will help them survive and according to the scientists they don’t know what the function of these pictures are, and genetic drift does not create art. So I think evolution can logically be ruled out that it had anything to do with these tiny creatures.

Contrary to this, the Bible testifies that the natural world everywhere reveals overwhelming evidence for the Creator, Romans 1:20. Complex design implies an intelligent designer. Architecture requires an architect. Surely, then, the artful miniatures on the wings of this tiny fruit fly are testimony to the Divine Artist? Within the creation model and timeframe, if one day it was demonstrated that the images had indeed arisen after Creation Week, there’s a more likely explanation—that the Creator pre-designed these fruit flies with the in-built capacity to produce ant images on their wings. If so,

Orchid mimicking a beetle

it would be an example of the plasticity of a creature’s outward appearance being brought about by the execution of pre-programmed ‘sub routines’ in the DNA. This seems to be the case with the many varieties of orchids with intricate reproductive systems. In other words, if natural selection cannot explain what we see, there are two options. Either, God painted ant-like creatures on the wings of G. tridens from the start, or else He designed their genetic system with the capacity to produce the images in response to some later environmental cue, whether related to mimicry or not. Whether the artwork existed from Creation week or was acquired later via pre-programmed variability, or even natural

selection, there is nothing here that is incompatible with biblical creation. Flies changing into the same kind of flies, albeit with different wing patterning, does not demonstrate how flies could evolve into something basically different. Moreover, God not only created but continually upholds all

Orchid mimicking a wasp

things Colossians 1:17, Hebrews 1:3. This speaks of His intimate ongoing interest in all that He has made, these humble fruit flies included.Add to this God’s sovereignty and foreknowledge, and we must surely credit the Divine Artist. ‘Evolutionary art’ it cannot be, for such an ideology makes no allowance for intelligent design or artists.”³

^{Isn’t the ant design on the wings of the fruit fly just spectacular...}

Until Next time, God bless and take care,

Willow Dressel