Page 730 - Atlas of Creation Volume 2

chloroplasts. But the chloroplasts' own DNA is not enough to synthesize these proteins. The greater part of the

proteins are synthesized using the parent DNA in the cell nucleus. 298
While the situation envisioned by the endosymbiosis hypothesis is occurring through a process of trial and
error, what effects would this have on the DNA of the parent cell? As we have seen, any change in a DNA mol-
ecule definitely does not result in a gain for that organism; on the contrary, any such mutation would certainly
be harmful. In his book The Roots of Life, Mahlon B. Hoagland explains the situation:

You'll recall we learned that almost always a change in an organism's DNA is detrimental to it; that is, it leads to a

reduced capacity to survive. By way of analogy, random additions of sentences to the plays of Shakespeare are not
likely to improve them! …The principle that DNA changes are harmful by virtue of reducing survival chances ap-
plies whether a change in DNA is caused by a mutation or by some foreign genes we deliberately add to it. 299

The claims put forward by evolutionists are not based on scientific experiments, because no such thing as
one bacterium swallowing another one has ever been observed. In his review of a later book by Margulis,
Symbiosis in Cell Evolution, molecular biologist P. Whitfield describes the situation:

Prokaryotic endocytosis is the cellular mechanism on which the whole of S.E.T. (Serial Endosymbiotic Theory) pre-
sumably rests. If one prokaryote could not engulf another it is difficult to imagine how endosymbioses could be set

up. Unfortunately for Margulis and S.E.T., no modern examples of prokaryotic endocytosis or endosymbiosis
exist… 300

The Origin of Photosynthesis

Another matter regarding the origin of plants which puts the theory of evolution into a terrible quandary
is the question of how plant cells began to carry out photosynthesis.

Photosynthesis is one of the fundamental processes of life on earth. Thanks to the chloroplasts inside them,
plant cells produce starch by using water, carbon dioxide and sunlight. Animals are unable to produce their
own nutrients and must use the starch from plants for food instead. For this reason, photosynthesis is a basic
condition for complex life. An even more interesting side of the matter is the fact that this complex process of
photosynthesis has not yet been fully understood. Modern technology has not yet been able to reveal all of its

details, let alone reproduce it.
How is it that evolutionists believe such a complex process as photosynthesis is the product of natural and
random processes?
According to the evolution scenario, in order to carry out photosynthesis, plant cells swallowed bacterial
cells which could photosynthesize and turned them into chloroplasts. So, how did bacteria learn to carry out
such a complex process as photosynthesis? And why had they not begun to carry out such a process before

then? As with other questions, the scenario has no scientific answer to give. Have a look at how an evolutionist
publication answers the question:

The heterotroph hypothesis suggests that the earliest organisms were heterotrophs that fed on a soup of organic
molecules in the primitive ocean. As these first heterotrophs consumed the available amino acids, proteins, fats, and
sugars, the nutrient soup became depleted and could no longer support a growing population of heterotrophs.
…Organisms that could use an alternate source of energy would have had a great advantage. Consider that Earth

was (and continues to be) flooded with solar energy that actually consists of different forms of radiation. Ultraviolet
radiation is destructive, but visible light is energy-rich and undestructive. Thus, as organic compounds became in-
creasingly rare, an already-present ability to use visible light as an alternate source of energy might have enabled
such organisms and their descendents to survive. 301

The book Life on Earth, another evolutionist source, tries to explain the emergence of photosynthesis:

The bacteria fed initially on the various carbon compounds that had taken so many millions of years to accumulate
in the primordial seas. But as they flourished, so this food must have become scarcer. Any bacterium that could tap
a different source of food would obviously be very successful and eventually some did. Instead of taking ready-

made food from their surroundings, they began to manufacture their own within their cell walls, drawing the nec-
essary energy from the sun. 302

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