Hox Genes

"Genetic processes were not simple in early aquatic vertebrates only to become more complex as the animals adapted to terrestrial living. They were complex from the outset,"

I read a much more detailed story about these diverse genes in National Geographic a year or two ago. Honestly the whole concept is mind blowing. Why does a "simple" single celled organism need all the genetic templates to go on to form, in the future, heads, eyes, limbs, etc. There is a wasteful genetic excess in these complex, simple organisms that suggests to me a designer, at the very least of the Deist sort.

My background is Biochemistry, and I find it much easier to accept evolutionary processes in the development of the current diversity of life from single cellular organisms. The key problem not yet solved, however is how those first cells got there, relatively quickly (almost immediately!!) after the earth was cool enough to support life. With our current knowledge of thermodynamics, the process is impossible without some sort of life catalyst.

Currently scientists are toying seriously with the idea of life developing on comets extraterrestrially and being delivered to earth, the so called panspermia theory, to get around the time problem involved in inorganic to cellular evolution.

I can only stand back in awe and say that we are fearfully and wonderfully made. The dust of stars flows in our blood! Indeed every element heavier than Helium was synthesized in a star. We certainly don't understand all the hows at this point, not by a long shot.