Could Poison Frogs Poison Themselves?

Ecclesiastes 3:21
“Who knoweth the spirit of man that goeth upward, and the spirit of the beast that goeth downward to the earth?”

Why are poison frogs poisonous? Clearly their toxins are very harmful indeed to predators. For this reason, evolutionists would assume that those frogs which produce toxins are likely to be fitter to survive in the process of natural selection.

“Being toxic can be good for your survival – it gives you an edge over predators,” comments one of the scientists in a new research report published by the University of Texas at Austin. The researcher continues: “Why aren’t more animals toxic? Our work is showing that a big constraint is whether organisms can evolve resistance to their own toxins. We found evolution has hit upon this same exact change in three different groups of frogs, and that, to me, is quite beautiful.”

The problem, simply stated, is this: a poisonous frog could easily poison itself, so would be unlikely to have descendants. So the study suggests that a mechanism evolves that prevents the frogs poisoning themselves. However, the research article does not address why such a mechanism would evolve. What evolutionary advantage would a non-poisonous frog have in developing resistance to a toxin, the production of which has not itself evolved?

Of course, the article ignores this seemingly obvious problem by the logical fallacy known as reification – the personification of an abstract concept. The researcher stated that “evolution has hit upon” the answer, but evolution is an abstract concept and cannot be said to hit upon anything. The whole point about a belief in evolution is that it is impersonal and unguided. Evolutionists are inconsistent when they ascribe attributes of design to evolution, while ignoring the obvious evidence for the design of animals by God.

All of creation points to You, Lord – but does not convince those who have refused to acknowledge You as God. Please open the spiritually dead eyes of those who follow the blindness known as evolution. Amen.

Author: Paul F. Taylor

Ref: University of Texas at Austin. (2017, September 21). Why poison frogs don’t poison themselves. ScienceDaily. Retrieved October 2, 2017 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/09/170921141238.htm. Image: license: Creative Commons Attribution, Share-Alike 3.0 Unported.