Evolution is the best theory for the diversity of life.

1. Vestiges A Vestigial structure is "a structure in an organism that has lost all or most of its original function in the course of evolution, such as human appendixes" (https://www.google.com...). I am giving the definition for those that may not be familiar with it. Robert Wiedersheim happened to be an anatomist who claimed to have identified 186 vestigial structures in the human body. Ironically, functions for all of the things that he claimed to be vestigial structures were found. So whenever people claim that they found some vestigial structure, that doesn't prove anything except that humans are ignorant beings that don't know everything. Simply because we our ignorant of a function of a specific structure does not mean that the evolutionary theory is supported. My opponent then sites a website that supposedly talks about ostriches (link only leads to a home page by the way). I don't see how this example helps my opponent's argument. My opponent's source even mentioned several functions that the ostrich wings do. They are used for balance in running, courtship displays, and etc...So the wings do not actually count as vestigial. Besides, if the wings were completely useless, why are the muscles functional, allowing these birds to move their wings? My opponent then states that "as evolution continues to whittle down the size of the wings (or, as is the case in our world, ostriches begin using their wings for other purposes)." The problem is that this is all speculation (literally no evidence provided) on my opponent's part. Functions for the wings have been thought of. The speculation comes in when we assume that the bird used to be able to fly. It is possible that the creature was always that way. Or it may also be possible that the bird used to be able to fly but lost the ability due to whatever reason. But I don't see how this loss of genetic information would be evidence for macroevolution anyway. 2. Predictions I was actually surprised to read what my opponent wrote about transitional forms. That is a main problem for evolutionists considering that there is no way that transitional forms would have never survived anyway. For example, evolutionists claim that birds were once reptiles. This means that the animals had to have had scales and then lost them and got feathers. So how would a creature with no scales and not quite having functional feathers survive? It couldn't. So this this part of my opponent's argument isn't going to help them much. As for the Tiktaalik roseae, I am not sure where my opponent is going with this. I don't see how some fossil discovery helps prove that evolution is the best explanation for the diversity of life. My opponent then states that none of this is part of his argument anyway. Guess what I have written in point two doesn't do much then. 3. Nested Hierarchies I was hoping that my opponent would bring this up. Yes, this evidence could support evolution, but the nested hierarchical tree can also easily give evidence for a common designer. The "clear, organized arrangement of living things into groups and sub-groups is evidence for intentional forethought. For instance, man-made vehicles are obviously intelligently designed, and yet we can organize them into a clear tree structure, with groups inside groups. For instance, we have the main groups: airplanes, buses, trains, ships, and automobiles. Inside of automobiles we have cars, trucks, minivans, SUVs, jeeps, etc" (http://www.christcreated.com...). So my opponent asserts that "under other theories, like creationism, there's no reason that an animal like a pegasus couldn't exist. However, evolution says that the common conception of a pegasus absolutely will not exist, because it has bird wings on an animal that is too far removed from birds." This is not even close to being true. In the intelligent design theory, birds and the other animal would have been created very different and hence there would never be a pegasus. 4. Yes, I am a creationist. But there are a lot of misconceptions about creationism. That said, I believe that a creator created life in the beginning of time and then the creatures he created naturally reproduced and etc...New breeds of animals formed due to adaption and due to mating. The only main difference between the intelligent design theory and the evolution theory is that we creationists do not believe in a common ancestor. As for what creationism does better, well, evolution doesn't offer an explanation for how life began and it can't explain the existence of morality and etc...Creationism does do these things and I think it also does a better job accounting for the complexity of living organisms. 5. There is a huge difference between microevolution and macroevolution. Microevolution is an "evolutionary change within a species or small group of organisms, especially over a short period" (https://www.google.com...). Macroevolution is "evolution on a scale of separated gene pools. Macroevolutionary studies focus on change that occurs at or above the level of species, in contrast with microevolution, which refers to smaller evolutionary changes (typically described as changes in allele frequencies) within a species or population" (https://www.google.com...). In other words, micro focuses on small changes within specific kinds of animals (Example: Darwin's finches) and macro focuses in on organisms changing into new organisms. I thank my opponent for a good round. Lets have another one!