Evolution Creation Controversy - part 1
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- Part 1 - Preface
- Part 2 - What the Bible says about creation:
- Part 3 - Evolution - is it true ? Is it fact or faith?
- Part 4 - Appendices
- Evolution and the Christian. God is Sovereign over Chance and History (2000)
Update
My story: After becoming a Christian in 1973 while studying physics at university, I heard a lecture by Malcolm Bowden, a young earther in 1975. He stimulated my thinking on creation, I bought every book I could find, in those days American books were very cheap. After about five years research I came to the conclusion that the answer to the creation evolution is a philosophical one. Atheists will believe in evolution and deists will believe in creation. Unfortunately much modern science is Atheist in methodology and in its philosophy, ie. naturalism. Basically you believe in what you want to believe. The facts do not force you one way or the other. I do not think that God will force anyone to believe in Him, however to the seeker he will offer sufficient evidence, and to the skeptic sufficient evidence to leave him without excuse. As a Christian the argument from design is a good one and is biblical, and it leaves one without excuse according to the bible. But either way faith is required to some extent, faith in evolution to produce the appearance of design out of matter and the natural laws and faith to believe that the eternal, invisible, God created the world and the universe.
Heb 11:3 By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God's command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.
Rom 1:20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.
I was always agnostic regarding the young earth position although I have heard all the arguments. That position changed in June 98 when I read two books by creationists which refuted the usual young earth arguments, both books were printed in 1985 (A New Look at an Old Earth and Creation and Evolution). I also read Hugh Ross's book 'Creation and Time' 1994 which basically gave the same view. I am also well aware of the ridicule heaped upon 'Creation Science' not because of the faith of those involved but because of bad science. Most people will accept that religious faith is a personal thing, but to use bad science to substantiate your belief is not acceptable. The creation science lobby are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge.
The problem that I have with the scientific elite is that they dismiss creation as unscientific and outside of the boundary of scientific debate. Therefore any explanation of origins must be naturalistic, i.e.. based on existing laws. Therefore they will accept the miracle of abiogenesis without a murmur. The problem is that the God who created the scientific laws is automatically exclude - how silly. We spend millions on the SETI project but nothing on the existence of God - how foolish. We would rather be made in the image of apes but not in the image of God, therefore the scientific elite reduce us to second best - God has something better for us if we desire it - eternal life as sons of God. Do you want the best or just second best, the choice is yours. God rewards those who diligently search after him, the search may be difficult but the rewards are worth the effort.
I believe that the universe shows the works of God and the bible His words. I also believe that the two (works and word) will agree. I think it was Einstein who said that 'God may be subtle but he does not lie'. I do believe that God is subtle, he is subtle so that no one is forced to believe in him - he does not want robots but a people who choose to love him freely, albeit because He has chosen them.
I also do not want to put an unnecessary burden on those who might come to the faith, especially to scientists and other thinkers.
"Claiming that the Bible teaches a young universe only adds an unnecessary stumbling block to those who are skeptical about the faith." - Matt Perman
The big lie: I think that it is also necessary to add a comment on a fundamental lie that is usually implicit in this debate. The lie is that if evolution is true then there is no need for God or that he does not exist. This is simply not true, suppose that evolution was true, does that mean that there is no Creator? If evolution does turn out to be true then it simply means that God gifted his creation with the means to produce diverse life. Evolution does not answer the question about the origin of the scientific laws that allow life to exist or even the origin of the big bang. Now this view would commonly be called theistic evolution, which I would not espouse, simply because we have not found a mechanism to produce complex life from simple molecules and I would certainly reject chance plus natural selection as a mechanism for the formation of the first living cell. If such a mechanism is found then it will be one of the greatest scientific discoveries this century, but once again it does not make God redundant. In fact it should give us more reason to praise God as Creator. While science is naturalistic, it has nothing to say about the origin of the 'natural' laws which it investigates. Genesis 1:1 simply says 'In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth' it is implicit that God also created the laws that sustain the universe and which scientists seek to discover and understand, that is, thinking God's thoughts after him. Science is the study of God's works whether we acknowledge him or not. To the atheist we should ask: who created the laws that gave rise to such an intricate universe? I would suggest that the choice is between happenstance or God. While many of us would reject the theistic evolution view we should note that it still belongs to creedal Christianity, which acknowledges God as Creator. We should be aware of the false dichotomy between choosing between God or evolution, at a fundamental level evolution does not do away with God, it is this lie that has done so much damage.
Most of us do not like the theory of evolution because it makes us humans the product of chance rather than designed by God. However, I would suggest that God is sovereign over chance (Prov 16:33). God is sovereign now, he uphold the universe by his word, and scientists can investigate God's laws by which he usually governs the universe. The bible is clear that we do not inhabit the globe just by chance, but that God determined the times set for us and the exact places where we should live (Acts 17:26). Even the acts of wicked men in crucifying Jesus Christ, were by "God's set purpose and foreknowledge" (Acts 2:23). God not only plays dice but he determines the outcome. For more on this, see my article Evolution and the Christian. The most powerful people on earth are Christians on their knees, a praying Grandmother or Aunt. Augustine, one of the most influential Christians in God's kingdom, was the product of a praying mother.
Preface
This essay is the result of a number of years investigation into the evolution creation controversy. My own scientific discipline is Physics. They are written from a Christian perspective, however the conclusion I came to was: that ones belief would be governed by ones own starting definitions or axioms i.e. if one believed in the God of the bible one would tend to believe in a Creator God while an atheist or agnostic would believe in evolution. My main concern though is for those who because they assume that evolution is true disregard the possibility of God, this is very sad because there is a wealth of evidence to demonstrate that evolution (in its fullest meaning) is untrue or at the very least it stretches credibility. I hope that I have demonstrated that those who believe in a Creator God are not flying in the face of a wealth of scientific evidence. Those who believe in creation do not have to sacrifice their intellectual integrity, the bible says we are to love God with our mind as well as our heart. Any god who demands that we lose our integrity is not worthy of the name. The God who created the laws of science is, I would suggest, clearly worthy of respect if not honour.
Isa 55:9 "As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts".
Such a God as described by Isaiah is worth searching for and knowing.
Heb 11:6 And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him.
Introduction:
Our origins are important because they affect our attitude about ourselves and the world we live in. As individuals we all want to know how did we get here and what are we here for. If we believe that we are the meaningless result of impersonal natural laws then our lives will lack meaning, after all who cares. It means we have to make the best of what we have, 'eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die'. If we are the product of the survival of the fittest then why not fight to survive. However if we are the creation of a wise and personal God then there is meaning, purpose and responsibility to life, we did not get here by accident.
The theory of evolution has probably done more to poison men's mind against the existence of God than any other idea in the western world. It gives men an excuse not believe in God while their own consciences tell them that there is a Creator, it allows men to suppress the truth of God. Evolution is commonly believed to be true by most ordinary men and women. It has affected many parts of society particularly in the field of education and the media, hence its widespread and subtle influence. Evolution is taught as true in text books despite the fact that the evidence does not support it and in fact the evidence supports creation better than it does the theory of evolution. The theory of evolution ignores the existence of God and is believed to be true despite the fact that it is unproved and there is remarkably little if any evidence for it being true. This was true in Darwin's day and is still true now.
It is important to establish that the debate between evolution and creation is not a weary battle between Christians and proven scientific facts. That would be foolish, the God of the bible is the God of science because God is the creator and sustainer of the laws which run the universe. There have to be laws in order to keep the universe running in an orderly fashion. God is above the laws of nature which He created, many people do not have a big enough concept of God which is why some people do not believe in miracles. A scientist is thinking God's thoughts after him, many of the great scientists were believers in God. In fact the debate is between creation and an evolutionary dogma that is unprovable and unsupported by known facts. It is also important to distinguish between laboratory science that can be applied to everyday life and the study of origins which involves investigating event that occurred many years ago when there were no observers, apart from God. This involves studying the current state of the earth and life and using the laws of science to propose how we could have arrived to this state.
What is evolution? It is a theory of the origin of the universe, solar system, the earth, plant, animal life and man, it is all these not just one because it must be able to explain our origins from the very beginning of time. It assumes that through the operation of the current natural laws of physics, chemistry and biochemistry that over a very long time span life evolved out of matter through a long series of very small changes to its current state. Despite the very tiny chance of life evolving from the chemicals in the universe time is the key, since given enough time then life could evolve out of chemical compounds. It is axiomatic to the theory of evolution that there is not a Creator, therefore life has to have evolved out of matter. Its very premise ignores the possibility of divine creation.
In Darwinian evolution all current forms of life must have a common ancestor from which they evolved. It explicitly denies the existence of a creator and assumes that the natural scientific laws and plenty of time are sufficient to explain our origin. Evolution is a gradual naturalistic process. The modern theory of evolution, neo-Darwinism assumes that new species are formed by a series of genetic mutations that produce a new variety which is better adapted to its environment than the old variety and therefore reproduces more offspring - survival of the fittest. In fact most mutations are detrimental to an organism.
Darwin's book 'The Origin of Species by means of natural selection' published in 1859 is only concerned with the evolution of animal and plant life, it does not concern itself with the other aspects of origins. Up until that time the vast majority of scientists held to the creationist view on origins. The 'Origin of Species' deals with only some aspects of evolution, evolution must account for the origin of everything, i.e. the origin of single celled creatures, the origin of the solar system etc.
We also have to distinguish between micro-evolution which is observable and macro-evolution, leading to the formation of new species, which is not. There is within any particular species population a large pool of genetic matter leading to variation with a species. Domestication and breeding of cattle or the dog illustrate just how much genetic variation there is within a species population.
What is divine creation? This assumes that we are created by an intelligent creator who designed the universe, earth, life on earth and man. It is axiomatic that there is a Creator God who created the universe and life on earth. In the case of biblical creation God created the universe (matter) out of nothing, Hebrew bara=create , rather than making something from something else. The bible speak boldly in the first verse the fact of a creator God.
Gen 1:1 (NIV) In the beginning God (elohiym) created (bara) the heavens and the earth.
Then God created the various plants and creatures each after its kind. The definition of kind is difficult but it refers to a group or kind of animal. For example the horse kind, the dog kind etc. There is however variety within a kind, but it has limits, there may be many varieties of cat but they are still cats and do not change into a dog. In the early nineteenth century the prevailing creationist dogma was the fixity of species which did not allow for any variation within a kind. This is patently untrue and tragically this was one of the reasons for rise of evolutionary theory.
A central part of biblical creation is the great flood which is responsible for the geological strata as we now find it as well as the stratification of fossils. In order to form a fossil the dead animal has to be buried quickly before it decays. Creation, including the flood, is a sudden or catastrophic process, evolution is a gradual process. Under the theory of evolution the fossilised geological strata were formed gradually over many million of years.
The nature of science.
In any discussion of origins we need to talk about the nature of science. We have laboratory based empirical science which has the characteristic of being repeatable. This includes most of physics and chemistry and much of biology and biochemistry. A researcher makes a discovery in the laboratory and publishes his findings and then another researcher seeks to reproduce his findings and coroborates his findings by publishing another paper. Then we have forensic science in which we are studying the case of a one off incident that is not repeatable. We are all well aware of the forensic science that can result in the conviction of a criminal. Another example is cosmology or astrophysics, the study of the cosmos is rather unique in that because of the finite speed of light we can see into the past. We can see stars and galaxies as they were at different times in the past according to how far they are away from us. We can see different types of stars and form a sequence which gives the life cycle of the stars. However we should note that this life cycle is assumed, because no one can actually see the life cycle of a particular star, it takes billions of years. Now in the same way that we distinguish between laboratory science, which is repeatable, from forensic science, which is not. We must also distinguish between microevolution, which is observable and repeatable, and macroevolution which is not.
Philosophical considerations:
The two interpretations of origins involve mutually exclusive axioms, one assumes no creator, the other assumes a creator. This is at the heart of the evolution creation debate. Whichever axiom you chose will determine which model of origins you apply. What is important to establish is that if you choose the creation model of origins is that it is not unscientific to do so and neither does the evidence contradict this model.
There are only two ways in which the world as we know it could have originated, either we were created by a creator or we evolved from matter over a long time period based on the laws of the universe. Other theories such as theistic evolution is a compromise between evolution and creation and is discussed in appendix 1. Panspermia, the belief that life arose on another planet simply removes the problem of life from matter to another place and does not help us. If God does not exist, as the evolutionists implicitly assume, then we must have evolved to our current state. If God does exist then creation is much easier to believe in, because the universe shows much evidence of design which implies a designer. Evolution has to explain how natural laws could produce complex organisms that show clear evidence of design, e.g. the eye, the mind, instinct etc.
The study of origins is not empirical science as such in that it only happened once, it cannot occur again and no human was there to observe it, all that man can do is look at current state of the universe and using known scientific laws extrapolate backwards in time to see what looks plausible, it is forensic science. Because the processes that cause macro-evolution are so slow they are not observable in our lifetime because evolution requires millions of years. A scientific experiment is repeatable in the laboratory which of course origins is not. Micro-evolution can be studied in the laboratory using bacteria and some change can be observed, the question is whether we are justified in extrapolating our results to macro-evolution. The study of origins will always involve speculation and should not be confused with empirical science, therefore the evolution creation debate is not a debate between science and creation, it is between one hypothesis and another. In effect evolution is unprovable because it is an historic event, it can only therefore be a hypothesis used to explain origins, evolution is not in fact even a theory. Which hypothesis therefore best explains our origin, is it evolution or creation?
The biblical account of creation starts with the fact of God creating the universe (matter) and everything in it. It is God telling man how we got here, it is revelation as man was not there at the time but God was. Our concept of God has to include the fact of God being the designer and sustainer of the scientific laws of physics, chemistry and biology (sustaining all things by his powerful word, Heb 1:3). God is not subject to the scientific laws which He himself created, therefore miracles are possible to God. When God created Eve, for example, she would have had an apparent age, she would have an apparent age of perhaps twenty! When Jesus turned the water into wine, the wine would have an apparent age of some few years, yet it was created in a very short time.
Evolution is the only alternative theory to creation, if it is true and God does not exist then we are no longer responsible to him and mankind can get on and do its own thing. The theory of evolution was greeted by parts of the establishment with some pleasure as here was a way of explaining our origins without reference to God. This of course makes man the master of his own fate which pleased the secular humanist philosophers at the time.
A major difference between evolution and creation is that in evolution matter becomes a living cell which then evolves to become higher forms of life, evolution goes from simple to complex. In creation, life was created perfect, and it has being decaying or becoming less perfect gradually ever since. The second law of thermodynamics indicates that order tends to become more disordered over time, evolution claims that order comes out of chaos or disorder.
Which model of origins a person believes in depends on his personal views, if he believes in God then creation is by far the easiest model to believe in, particularly as there is very little real evidence that we did actually evolve to our current state. If a person does not believe in God then evolution is the only alternative but because there is so little evidence for it, it is actually based on faith. Even Darwin was aware that there was very little evidence in the fossil record, particularly the absence of transitional forms, for the theory of evolution to be true, very little supporting evidence has come to light since. There is much more evidence in nature of a designer at work, the sudden appearance of species in the fossils is actually supportive of creation. But neither evolution or special creation can be proved so in the end the proponents of both theories hold them by faith.
Psa 19:1 (NIV). The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
As a Christian we believe that all people know internally that God exists, the evidence of design in the universe is sufficient evidence of the existence of God, but that people suppress this truth because they also know that they are a sinner and do not want to face up to their moral responsibility to God.
Rom 1:18-20 (NIV) "The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, 19 since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. 20 For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities--his eternal power and divine nature--have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse."
The theory of evolution is used to suppress the truth about God in men's minds, because it gives people an alternative explanation of origins. However the theory is lacking in substantive supporting evidence. Men have gone so far as to propose that the universe has an anthropological principle in that the very laws of nature have within themselves a propensity to produce intelligent life. This merely illustrates man's determinism to eliminate any thought of God out of his life. "Light has come into the world, but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil", John, 3:19).
A leading biologist Paul Ehrlich writes in Evolutionary History and Population Biology: "Our theory of evolution has become... one which cannot be refuted by any possible observation. It is thus 'outside of empirical science,' but not necessarily false. No one can think of ways to test it...[evolutionary ideas] have become part of an evolutionary dogma accepted by most of us as part of our training." Nature 214 p352.
Clearly any hypothesis which cannot be tested is not scientific by definition.
'According to the generally accepted requirements of a theory in science, could Charles Darwin's theory qualify as a truly scientific theory? Dr Patterson did not think so. In his book, Evolution, he wrote,
"If we accept Popper's distinction between science and non-science, we must ask first whether the theory of evolution by natural selection is scientific or pseudo-scientific (metaphysical).... Taking the first part of the theory, that evolution has occurred, it says that the history of life is a single process of species-splitting and progression. This process must be unique and unrepeatable, like the history of England. This part of the theory is therefore a historical theory, about unique events, and unique events are, by definition, not part of science, for they are unrepeatable and so not subject to test"' Darwin's Enigma, Luther D Sunderland, Master book publishers, 1988.
Dr N Heribert-Nilsson, Director of the Botanical Institute at Lund University, Sweden, has said,
"My attempt to demonstrate evolution by an experiment carried on for more than 40 years has completely failed...The idea of an evolution rests on pure belief." Synthetische Artbildung, 1953.
The importance of the evolution creation debate is shown by the following quotation from the atheist G Richard Bozarth who realised the issues at stake.
"Christianity has fought, still fights, and will fight science to the desperate end over evolution, because evolution destroys utterly and finally the very reason Jesus' earthly life was supposedly necessary. Destroy Adam and Eve and the original sin, and in the rubble you will find the sorry remains of the son of god (sic). Take away the meaning of his death. If Jesus was not the redeemer who died for our sins, and this is what evolution means, then Christianity is nothing!" Bozarth, The meaning of evolution, p28.
The theory of evolution directly challenges the authority of the word of God, both the scriptures and Jesus himself claim that God created the heavens and the earth. Who do we believe? If people assume that science has explained away our origin and therefore has explained away God then who needs a saviour from sin. Sin is the invention of a god who does not exist.
Personal info:
For my personal and professional info go here. I am an old earth creationist. This essay originally written in 1983. My latest essay on 'Evolution and the Christian' can be found here (added in 2000).
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