(This is from Lubab's thread "are we getting closer to Torah?")
All living creatures have DNA and genes which are capable of undergoing mutations for the better or for the worst. Some genes and behaviors have allowed certain family of species to survive and continue creating the same progeny which eventually resulted in a new species. This doesn't take over night..takes millions of years possibly.
Listen, Gd created us from dust...What is dust made out of? Carbon, Water, Nitrogen, Oxygen Hydrogen. You add some electricity and methane gas to that, you can pretty much create the building blocks of life: protein, nucleic acids etc...and that's the beginning ..bacteria ->single celled eucaryotes --> etc. over billions of years that's how humans came to be..that may be Gd's magical way of creating life and all animals and plants...IF Gd wanted to just go zap here and zap there, it wouldn't seem as special to you and me. However, the magical way to start with one cell without a nucleus until it gets to things that look like what we have today and humans which can create big tall buildings and make machines move on their own..and wow! the things we humans have done! Now that's more amazing...a miracle...a huge huge huge huge..that Gd isn't just all powerful...that He's clever...the way He build's things. And the fact that He can give humans the ability to create beautiful music and beautiful art and beautiful poetry...love...etc...i mean from a single cell prokaryote you get us..WOW. I mean if we understood Gd to just create life as Zap here and Zap there...we has humans would never undertand patience. Gd was patient in the way He created us...as we all should be patient in waiting for the Moshiach.