Seeking Help: My Problem with Evolution

Greetings,

Just to set the tone here, I am an atheist, not a creationist. Well, at least not the kind of creationist that we all see around: the bible bashing type which believes in young earth and says that we evolved FROM monkeys and asks how monkeys are still here. I am more of 'I-feel-we-are-created-but-I-have-no-idea-who-the-f*-did-it' type of creationist. I don't believe in intelligent design because our design is not intelligent. But, it's a design. A dumb design if you will. But, I see it as a design. I have a big problem with evolution and I need someone to carefully read my thread and give me an answer. If I had a good answer, I will simply accept evolution as the answer. I really don't have any personal preference. So, whatever works; works.

Here is, briefly, in bold, my understanding of how evolution works, which I will base my question on. If I have this wrong, and there's a good chance I do, please tell me:

We mutate regardless. There's a continuing process of mutation going on and this process is governed by totally random causes. And, basically what happens is NOT that the environment alters our genetic code, but, it's the other way around: we change and mutate regardless, based on random causes, and if we get lucky, this change will be helpful to us. If it's not helpful, at least compared to other mutations that prove to be more helpful in a survival sense, we will all die; which means that among all the mutated species, only those who have better traits, or at least not relatively inferior ones, will survive.

Now, I cannot understand how such process can 'design' us. I can understand how an already created/designed creature evolves into a better or a worse one. But, I can't understand how it reached its current state in the first place evolving from a very simple organism. I think my problem is with Macroevolution and not Microevolution if I understand those terms correctly. For example:

Our eyelid is responsible for covering and protecting our eyes, and yet, they are two different parts of our body that must have had separate and non-deliberately synced evolutionary paths. I mean, the eye can't evolve first without having an eyelid existing in the first place to protect it… it must evolve into it, or else, every time a creature with eyes is born, they will have their eyes damaged. And, the eyelid cannot evolve before the eyes as its existence won't make sense because it has nothing to cover or protect. So, both scenarios don’t make sense to me. And worst of all, the third one, which is that they evolved together… synchronically, and that synchronization was not deliberate. It just happened by luck. Well, I know many will say that this is the outcome of billions of experiments and they all failed… and we only get to observe the one that worked. The synchronization that seems deliberate is actually not deliberate, it's just the only one that worked and you had the chance to observe it and ask your question: how did it all happen?

But, I think this is a crazy idea. I think this is another way of saying: if you get some atoms and randomly organize them in many ways, you will almost always get an object that doesn't make sense. But, every once in a while, you will get something that makes sense… you just have to run the experiment for long enough time. Theoretically, that works. Practically, it's impossible. You will have to wait an amount of time not conceivable by man. Not billions of years. I think it's a number that is out of our imagination… like googol years, or maybe more… googolplex years.

Why do I think it will need all that time? Because the experiment here is not only trying to find a working combination, which is a very low chance by itself, it's multiplied by the chance that this hard-to-obtain combination will also match a given environment! That's beside the fact that the eyes and the eyelids are not the only parts of the body that are made for each other… but, our entire body is nothing but parts depending on other parts collaborating with each other in a way that makes it impossible to be a mere outcome of a dice roll that is approved by natural selection.

Mr. Natural selection does not design us. It gets the design first from Mr. Mutation, and then approves or disapproves it. That's my problem. I think that mutation is by default a destructive process that can't offer a working prototype seeking approval from Mr. Natural selection because it's a random and an unaware process that no one is keeping an eye on. So, 99.999999% of the time, your mutation won't work. It won't even reach the stage of seeking approval by natural selection because it's faulty. And I am not saying that it works on its own but it just doesn't match the environment it evolved in… I am saying: not working… a faulty mutation. This percentage (that you get a faulty mutation) gets exponentially bigger after every potentially beneficial mutation. If something coincidentally worked one time, then what are the chances of it working another time in the same direction constructively in a process that is totally random and self-unaware?

Why do I get the feeling from all the evolution documentaries that mutation is necessarily a constructive process like building a tower? It leaves the impression that all of those mutations follow an invisible timeline that is making sure everything will go according to plan. If we do the math, we will find out that mutation is almost always a destructive process because it doesn't know what it's doing. How come mutation is that destructive, and our body is not full of useless stuff and we are alive just because of the parts that work? I mean, I know our body has 'mistakes' in it and sometimes useless parts. But, they are not all over the place. We had to look for them to find them and figure out they are useless. Given the failure rate, our body should be nothing but useless (not harmful) organs and parts that are nothing but parts in the middle of their own evolution and they just don't make sense right now. On the other hand, the human body seems to be almost complete and clean. It's like someone is making sure that all the horrible stuff that goes wrong gets cut off and we keep the design nice and clean.

Back to my design problem, now, we didn't have an eye in the beginning. We mutated a thingy that detects the existence of light but doesn't actually see anything. It just tells if there's light. Okay? Let's say we have that. Why does this thingy get to evolve all the way into being an eye? Who kept making sure this will happen? Natural Selection? For me that's not enough. Because, as I said, natural selection gets the design first from mutation AFTER it's done, and then if it worked, it will naturally be selected. I have a problem that the whole thing was created in the first place, not that it's created and then survived.

continued in next post...

...continued from last post

There was another example: I saw a documentary that said that there's a good chance that whales, or a specific type of whales, evolved from a wolf like creature because its food at a certain phase and location was only available under the water. So, with time, it changed its skin to better match the water, lost its legs and basically became a fish. Now, isn't that just crazy? According to my understanding of evolution, those whales got lucky they completely evolved into fully functional fishes. I mean, the whale is like "Damn that was risky… thank god everything worked out and my new randomly designed mutation matched the new environment! Sure many died in the process, but, I finally have it all now! The fins, the flippers the new skin… it's all here."

There's a missing ingredient here. And I think the key is in how mutation works. That wolf must be affected by the new environment instead of evolving indifferently not caring what the surrounding environment looks like making it a coincidence that the new mutation matches the new environment. I am sure I do not understand this correctly.

Does anyone understand my problem?

reply to post by TheAlmo


You are an Agnostic. An agnostic admits they don't know. Atheism is a belief system where the adherent claims to know something unknowable. To claim there is no God is to claim all knowledge.

reply to post by Blaine91555


Even though that's off-topic, what you mentioned is also called negative atheist or weak atheist. As in, I believe that all gods known to man don't exist. That's a type of atheism itself. I do claim that a certain group of gods does not exist.

reply to post by TheAlmo


Dear TheAlmo,

I will start by saying that I am a Christian and I don't believe in a young earth nor do I believe in evolution as it is explained. I just want to be fair and put my perspective up front and no I don't want try and convince you that there is a God, I will just respond to your question.

Evolution and we have had it explained to us does not make sense. Your questions are good ones and others have asked similar things. Kurt Vonnegut wrote a book called "Galapagos". Darwin, we are told, came up with his belief in evolution based on what he saw on the Galapagos Islands. There is a problem, the islands have a series of animals on them that do not exist anywhere else in the world and the island is too young for them to have developed. It is also very ironic.

We see species evolve and increase in diversity overtime that is also a fact. Dogs are one of the best examples of diversity and we have been breeding them intentionally for thousands and thousands of years. What we have not seen is dogs evolve into new species. We don't see half cat and half dogs. What I am saying is that you shouldn't through the baby out with the bath water. Evolution makes a lot of sense on a species level and we can see it. Survival of the fittest also occurs to a degree, sometimes a species is wiped out for other reasons such as intentional ones.

There are those who believe (and I am not one of them) that these splits occurred a long time ago and don't happen anymore. There is no science behind it and no evidence; however, it is a possible answer to your question. Genetically there answer does not make a lot of sense; but, I am not a geneticist. I can understand how an individual baby could be born with additional genes; but, when that happens it is usually seriously deformed or sterile. To have two randomly have complimentary mutations and breed more with the same mutation does not really fit in with too many statistical models. By the way, both the theory of evolution and quantum physics keep me a believer.

I will disagree with something you said. I think we are designed magnificently. We are inventive and can be very caring to one another. When I see the things that we have built I am continually amazed by what we are capable of when we work together. By the way, I had a Wiccan and a "Psychic Vampire" that were homeless move in with me, so not all Christians are bible thumpers and I preach on Sundays to people who don't like church.

So I am sending sort of a mixed message. Science is wonderful and we need to question it. I don't believe in blindly accepting what we are told by "experts" and I do believe that many scientists have sold out. I met a man on a plane, he was researching a cure for cancer and was having success. He told me that he couldn't get funding for his research because it didn't involve selling pills to people. This was a university professor at a major University.

Now, I absolutely did not try and prove God exists nor did I say that science was silly. ATS has a motto, "Deny Ignorance" and that is what I am promoting on this post. Be well.

Just because humans evolved from apes and some thing?
does not mean All apes got to evolve.
what ever made the change would not effect all the world.
it could be that it only happened in one small part of earth.
we still have alligators, they never evolved past that.

maybe a ape and some kind of creature that is now extinct!
it could have been a solar flare that mutated us.
that would not effect all of the earth, would it?

I know there is more to it than that...

reply to post by TheAlmo


Sorry but you seemed to be struggling to explain your beliefs. People change the meanings of words so often its hard to even begin to keep up with.

My belief is that there is no chasm between the idea of evolution or creation. The Bible only makes one statement and the rest is all simply discussions and personal beliefs, often between people who just argue to argue.

As I see it if evolution is the natural method and God created us, he also created us using the method we try to understand called evolution. It's not hard to believe in both. There is no conflict in scripture anyway. It's in the interpretation by us imperfect beings the problems exist.

In the end I think science is simply studying the nature of God and at some point they will meet. First you have to get past the hate and bigotry that divides us and have an honest debate so we can move forward, instead of butting heads.

I can't share with you the things that formed my faith any more than you can or could. It was proven to me, but I'd be foolish to try and share it with others who would just use it as a weapon against me.

I understand your dilemma having gone through it at times in my life and asking myself similar questions. In the end only you can find what you are searching for. There is no equation or formula to reach truth as it comes from within on this topic.

Sorry if that's not the conversation you are after. I see the term "weak atheism" as a recent invention in contemporary language to counter the argument that a belief there is no God is not a belief. It's a silly argument in fact, a person either believes, does not believe or does not know.

I'm fully convinced that only a person who believes "they" know all things about the Universe can say there is no God or Creator as how could they know? They cannot know. Truth is easy.

There are quite a few useless mutations left over we don't need to survive anymore. I will link 2 sources at the bottom, one more scientific the other a comedy based on fact type article....I'll summarize for those who are to lazy to click link....I'll start with the eyelid.

1. nictitating membrane (aka third eye lid)under developed in humans, some culture's are more visible.
2. Appendix. Best theory so far is to aid in digestion of cellulose, back when it consisted of most our diet ..not so easy to eat meat all the time when you really have to work to get it.
3. coccyx. what is left of an ever shrinking tail.
4. Darwin's point.(lump some people have in curve of ear) underdeveloped in humans. used to be useful in honing in sounds.
5. Wisdom teeth. used to aid in high cellulose diet. When our diet changed our jaws grew smaller, making them a nuisance.
6. Plantaris Muscle. The muscle that makes an ape's feet work like hands. Has become weaker and more underdeveloped in humans.
7. Auriculares muscles. Why some people can wiggle their ears and some cannot. Once used to hone sound of predators and prey.
8. DNA junk. Mutations that are present but disabled. (this one is a rabbit hole I suggest reading the source or even looking up another source specific to the effect of, to grasp this one..it's kinda a big deal but alot to explain)
9. Vomeronasal organ (aka Jacobson’s Organ) Has dwindled to the point of uselessness, but once served as a pheromone detector...for those..uh..animal desires.
10. Goosebumps. once used to raise fur in response to cold to keep warm. Or for that matter any other time an animal would raise hair to show aggression or awe.
ez read source
scientific source
Hope this is new news to you, and aids in your ultimate decision to except or deny evolution....There is also interesting stuff out there about animals currently evolving in front of us as we speak, and you may be surprised how much a dog has left over from less than domestic days.
PS...your agnostic. You don't believe, but don't deny the chance there is a creator.

reply to post by TheAlmo


Hi The,

As an agnostic, you are the worst - neither believing nor disbelieving. Come on, get a real attitude!

These people hedge their bets - but here is a tip, whoever is up there will not want agnostics.

Originally posted by Blaine91555
reply to post by TheAlmo

 

You are an Agnostic. An agnostic admits they don't know. Atheism is a belief system where the adherent claims to know something unknowable. To claim there is no God is to claim all knowledge.

By that logic, Theism is a belief system where the adherent claims to know something unknowable too.

Agnostic is an adjective. Most atheists are agnostic atheists, saying the don't belief in any deities but don't claim 100% impossibility of their existence.

Most theists are agnostic theists too, acknowledging a chance that their faith may be wrong, even though they believe it may be true. Though, there are many more Gnostic's amongst theists.



Generally, I'd say all Gnostics are claiming to know more than they possibly could, regardless of if it's of any religion or lack there of.

~
Atheism is a single lack of belief in any of the proposed deities. It's not an absolute claim. Just like, most religious groups dismiss god's of different religions, that doesn't mean that claim all knowledge about the unknowable.

Agnostic and Atheist are labels given to you by those with faith and is used often as an abuse by them. The labels can only have meaning if there are people that believe in a god/gods.

Dont worry about living your life according to a label, just live a life where you can justify your actions.

Among all the mutated species, only those who have better traits, or at least not relatively inferior ones, will survive.

Species don’t mutate. Individual cells do. Mutations in sex cells are passed on to the offspring of the mutant. The rest of the species carries on as before. If the mutation is selectively useful, it will spread through the population over generations because those who carry it will tend to have more surviving descendants than those who don’t. If it is neutral, it will spread but have no evolutionary effect. If it is deleterious, its carriers will have fewer surviving descendants than non-mutants do, and the mutation will eventually die out. This may take some time.

That is how such a process ‘designs’ us. Actually, it is the environment that is the designer.

I can't understand how [an organism] reached its current state in the first place evolving from a very simple organism.

That is how. It is a very simple process and it doesn’t just apply to living things. It also applies to ideas, rocks, universes and just about anything else that exists in large numbers.

The eye can't evolve first without having an eyelid existing in the first place to protect it… it must evolve into it, or else, every time a creature with eyes is born, they will have their eyes damaged.

Questions about eyes suggest a religious creationist pretending to be openminded, but I’ll take you at your word. Some visual sense is better than none. Eyes don’t evolve all at once; you start with a bunch of photosensitive cells and go from there. Evidence of all the stages of eye evolution exist in nature; indeed, the eye has evolved independently some twenty-odd times. Fish and insects have eyes but they don’t have eyelids, or nictitating membranes either. Trilobites had eyes made of stone.

You will have to wait an amount of time not conceivable by man. Not billions of years. I think it's a number that is out of our imagination… like googol years, or maybe more… googolplex years.

First, evolution is not random. Mutation is random, but natural selection occurs in a very non-random way. Second, mutations happen over and over again in trillions of living organisms. Every human being will play host to about 150 mutations in his lifetime. The objection that there is not enough time for complex organisms to evolve is a fallacious one.

I also do not believe in any particular god or gods, yet do not fully accept random mutation and natural selection as the main drive behind evolution. I do believe that evolution happens, but on different scales. I do believe there is an intelligence, or a the very least an organizing force behind it. I've thought about this much, and the biggest obstacles to me denying there is any intelligence behind it would be parasitism and symbiosis. The most influential of these would be the parasites which infest the host and secrete hormones which controls the mind of the unfortunate victim, causing it to exhibit behavior which favors the growing larva within. Certain infected spiders will spin cocoons, certain infected caterpillars will viciously defend growing larva....the list goes on.
It is my belief that whatever engineers life has to do so according to the natural laws of this planet. I do not believe that it is perfect in any way, or that it has all knowledge or even a good sense of foreknowledge.
There are many things that we do not know, and very likely many things that we do not currently have the capability of understanding. Although a chimpanzee can understand the difference between an apple and a banana, would it understand the difference between the usage of diesel fuel versus unleaded? I do not believe we have enough data to state anything factual regarding the origin and evolution of life. Between science and religion, I think both camps have right and wrong data - and both are missing something crucial to the understanding. We know very little about this reality we live in, and yet some of us take the knowledge we do possess and make claims regarding that partial knowledge as if it were in full.
So far science has shown us that all we know of the world is what our senses tell us. Every experience we have had has come to us through our senses, translated by our brain into electrical signals. We act in our dreams as we would in our waking hours - and even if the physics of the dream world are off we rarely notice. For the most part, our dreams are as real to us as when we are not asleep....until we wake up. We see, when our eyes are closed, we move when we're not moving, we speak while we're snoring away....how do we even know what is real? For all we know we could be brains in a vat of solution, or a holographic projection from the depths of space, a simulation on a computer from our future, or a "Truman Show"-esque masquerade for some alien (to us) race. We just don't know. I used to concern myself greatly with this, and be troubled by the prospects of not knowing what was out there, or what awaited after death - but no more. It's not that I have any more fulfilling answers than the next guy, it's that the possibilities are nearly endless and there is no way to be 100% certain of anything. Wasn't it Descartes who reasoned that the only thing he could be 100% sure of was his own existence, and that only because he could form the question whether he existed or not?
There are the facts as I see them, comforting or not. I don't think it shameful to state that I have no freaking idea, nor do I think it unwise NOT to jump on the bandwagon with everyone else.

Originally posted by PutAQuarterIn
5. Wisdom teeth. used to aid in high cellulose diet. When our diet changed our jaws grew smaller, making them a nuisance.

Still have all of mine. They're not a nuisance. I use them to eat meals.

I think this point actually supports the OP's premises. A genetic mutation that makes the adult mouth too small for the adult molars that will still grow in is a negative change. It is of no benefit for digestive purpose or mating purpose to have teeth that don't grow in straight or don't have room to grow in. This would be an example of a negative mutation.

reply to post by AQuestion


Mods please remove all the comments about god and religion. Please. This is about evolution only.

Deciding whether we are perfectly/beautifully designed really depends on what you're expecting from it. If all you expect is for it to just work and nothing more, then, yeah - we are perfect. We do work. But, from an engineering point of view, the human body is a joke. It's very inefficient. There are lots of stupid things in our design if it was intended by a designer to be the perfect design.

Thanks for your reply.

reply to post by PutAQuarterIn


You don't seem to understand what I mean. All of this can result from Micro-evolution... which I have no problems with. I am talking here about a crazy amount of useless parts... like 99% of our bodies should be useless and 1% is enough for it to function as a result from the Macro-evolution process. I can't accept that all that is left from Macro-evolution is just this list.

reply to post by catwhoknowsplusone


Off-topic, mate. Please have anything to say about evolution or else don't comment. I mean this in the nicest way possible. And, no, whoever is up there won't necessarily be unhappy with agnostics. You never know. Maybe they're only happy with people who don't claim they know # they can't verify. It's exactly the same chance.

Originally posted by Astyanax

Species don’t mutate. Individual cells do. Mutations in sex cells are passed on to the offspring of the mutant. The rest of the species carries on as before. If the mutation is selectively useful, it will spread through the population over generations because those who carry it will tend to have more surviving descendants than those who don’t. If it is neutral, it will spread but have no evolutionary effect. If it is deleterious, its carriers will have fewer surviving descendants than non-mutants do, and the mutation will eventually die out. This may take some time.

That is how such a process ‘designs’ us. Actually, it is the environment that is the designer.

Yes... I understand that and I think it's not enough to DESIGN us. It's only enough to filter a given design. The environment that you say is responsible for the design is not responsible for the design. It's responsible for APPROVING an already existing design that came about through the process of mutation which I think is not capable of producing anything at all. How did this mutation become what it is in the first place? That's my question.

Questions about eyes suggest a religious creationist pretending to be open minded, but I’ll take you at your word.

No, they suggest questions about the eyes. I don't see the link here.

Some visual sense is better than none. Eyes don’t evolve all at once; you start with a bunch of photosensitive cells and go from there. Evidence of all the stages of eye evolution exist in nature; indeed, the eye has evolved independently some twenty-odd times. Fish and insects have eyes but they don’t have eyelids, or nictitating membranes either. Trilobites had eyes made of stone.

Give me something new, dude. You're not answering my question. I didn't ask: how did the eye evolve? That's the question you're answering. My question is a bit more detailed than that:

Who made sure that the evolutionary path for the eye keeps going ONLY in a cumulative/constructive direction so it will turn from a bunch of photosensitive cells into the complete eye that we have? If mutation is random and not maintained or governed by anyone, then why would the evolution of the eye choose that very cumulative direction every step of the way and not go through the unlimited other directions that ALL don't work?

The amount of time it needs for an eye to evolve is so great that it requires someone to make sure it's going in the right direction all the time. The evolutionary process must be guided or the eye and every other organ will drown in the sea of faulty mutations done by unaware nature.

And you're saying that indeed the eye evolved first. Okay. So you call it a coincidence that this protective layer called eyelid got evolved even though no one is trying to make sure our eyes will be better off when they are protected? Can you see the problem here? As I said... it's not the output of natural selection that is baffling me... it's the INPUT.

First, evolution is not random. Mutation is random, but natural selection occurs in a very non-random way. Second, mutations happen over and over again in trillions of living organisms. Every human being will play host to about 150 mutations in his lifetime. The objection that there is not enough time for complex organisms to evolve is a fallacious one.

Yes... and all it takes for me is mutation randomness. I don't care what happens after that. A random process cannot produce any working prototypes. It just can't... and even if you filter the results with natural selection, it still won't be enough. You have to produce a lot of working prototypes and only those that are accepted by the filtering done by natural selection will be allowed in. And those numbers: trillions - 150 mutations in a lifetime are out of the scale I am talking about. Those are conceivable numbers and they're so small they're irrelevant.

reply to post by xxsomexpersonxx


Right back to the silly word games to divert from the topic. Meaningless drivel. It's the meaning behind the words you use that matters, not changing interpretations.

Do you know for a fact that there is no Creator? If you do, explain exactly how you came by that knowledge when science has not even scratched the surface?

Isn't that the real question?

If you do not know it as a fact, you are acting on faith. Your faith tells you their is no Creator or Higher Power because you cannot know it for a fact as you do not have access to enough knowledge about the Universe to make that claim. When you sit down in a chair without checking it for stability first, it's an act of faith. Faith that the chair will hold you and not collapse.

We who believe also act on Faith. That means that this debate will go on and on and on forever, with the same conversations being had over and over and over again. Word games won't net any answers.

Something happens in our lives that forms what we believe, what we have faith in. Often that something is not a thing that can be shared in way that would be understood by a person who's faith in their own belief won't let them consider it.

Then we have the hate filled crowd who's objective is quite different than those searching for truth. Their belief is based on hate and their goal is to destroy what they hate. The irrational venom that comes from that is meaningless.

If it is true that Atheism is based on facts, then any Atheist could provide those facts that prove it. No such proof exists so it continues as a debate and will probably as long as humans exist. I find it odd that a few of the Atheists deem it so necessary to destroy what they don't agree with and they become transparently irrational. Being honest I also admit many believers in God are taken over by hate and become just as irrational. But then that is another conversation. What is important is that it is wrong to hate simply because someone believes differently.

If everyone on the planet shared my beliefs, there would be no wars, no violence, no hate and it's difficult for me to see the wrongness in that and yet many hate me because of that. Hate comes from fear always. What is it about the idea of loving each other as brothers and sisters on this planet that scares some so much. Even many who falsely claim to believe in something they don't practice engage in hate. Fake Christians may outnumber real ones. Sad the real ones bear the burden of the results of that.

I'm sorry and I'm way off topic.

reply to post by TheAlmo


Hi TheAlmo!
I'll try and reply with how I see it all working. It is indeed a very complicated subject, so I'll try and keep it as simple as possible.

We mutate regardless. There's a continuing process of mutation going on and this process is governed by totally random causes. And, basically what happens is NOT that the environment alters our genetic code, but, it's the other way around: we change and mutate regardless, based on random causes, and if we get lucky, this change will be helpful to us. If it's not helpful, at least compared to other mutations that prove to be more helpful in a survival sense, we will all die; which means that among all the mutated species, only those who have better traits, or at least not relatively inferior ones, will survive.

"We" don't actually mutate. Our cells do. Pretty much all of the time. This process may (or may not be) random. Some mutations may actually arise out of a need to respond to changes in our environment, I'm not sure.

All living things are subject to mutation. Some mutations are not beneficial, but others are.
The ones which benefit us, make us more successful (or at least they DID when we lived more "natural" lives!). Those successful mutations are then passed onto our offspring to survive and spread with future generations.

A successful mutation, would be one which makes us more suited to our environment (More attractive to a mate, better at sensing our environment, giving us an advantage over our rivals (both same-species and other species), better at finding/gathering food etc)
So, in a sense our environment can (and does) affect our mutations, because only those mutations which are beneficial to us, in our current environment are likely to be passed on and thrive.

We will not "all die" as a result of a non-beneficial mutation. Mutations occur, at cellular levels, on an individual basis.
The individuals with the non-beneficial mutations would simply be at a disadvantage, compared to those with mutations "better suited" to their environment.
The less suited the mutation is, the less successful it's "host organism" is likely to be, and the less likely the mutation will be passed on to future generations.

Now, I cannot understand how such process can 'design' us. I can understand how an already created/designed creature evolves into a better or a worse one. But, I can't understand how it reached its current state in the first place evolving from a very simple organism.

I'm not quite sure what you mean here? You seem to be implying that we have been created/designed?
I think that we are quite simply a product of our environment. Successful mutations shape our evolution, to better suit our environment.
A very simple organism (from whatever source) is the subject of cellular mutations, which cause it to evolve as a species, in millions of tiny steps.
Occasionally a mutation (or combination of mutations) is so successful that an evolutionary leap is taken, that gives an individual such an advantage over it's rivals, that it becomes dominant. Examples would be the combination which enabled our own ancestors to develop speech, or birds flight, or gills on fish etc
But the overall pattern of evolution is generally made up of lots of tiny steps with just the occasional leap!

Our eyelid is responsible for covering and protecting our eyes, and yet, they are two different parts of our body that must have had separate and non-deliberately synced evolutionary paths.

hmmm not quite. The eye evolved from very simple photo-sensitive cells, through many thousands of changes, to become what it is today. There are many many variations on the design of eyes in nature. Some have eyelids (like ours) and some do not. In our case, as our eyes evolved, one particular mutation led to a protective lid being present, and this helped keep the eye moist and less likely to be damaged. These advantages would have led to the individuals with this mutation being more successful.... and so on.
Nobody's saying that the eyes and lids must have had deliberately synced evolutionary paths?? (That again implies a creator/designer)
They just worked better for us, in our environment, together. So they were successful, and were passed on.

Running out of space here, but in answer to the "wolf becoming a whale" question.
Once again, it's the same answer - many thousands of tiny steps.
A wolf-like species finds itself in an environment where most of it's food source is located in the water, so it starts spending much of it's time in the water (seeking food). Those individuals better suited to the water will be more successful. Their successful mutations are passed on through the generations, and eventually the survivors of their species evolve to be better suited to the aquatic environment. All it takes is time (and LUCK!)