Problems with evolution

Why does everything in nature give the appearance of being designed?  Richard Dawkins claims he sees no design in nature, I assume because the word design implies a designer.  Okay, let’s take the word design out.  Why is nature so ordered and complex?  If you argue that life isn’t so I suggest you take an hour and read about DNA.

Still on the subject of design, why would I be considered insane and put in a straight jacket if I repeatedly asserted that the house I live in appeared completely by itself but not if I claimed the earth appeared by accident?

If Watson, the supercomputer that competed on Jeopardy required intelligent minds to conceive, design and build what can be said about our infinitely more complicated brains?

Evolution is supposedly the progression of life moving to higher and more sophisticated forms.  Once these forms appear the lesser or weaker ones are supposed to die out.  If this is the case then why are these primitive life forms still around?  Being the highest life form shouldn’t we wipe out all apes, since only the fittest survive?

If life began in the sea, what made it decide life on land was better?  How could it know it needed to breath and be able to walk?  If this life in the sea became an amphibian, what made it decide life as a reptile would be better?  If life became a reptile what made it decide life as a bird would be better?  How did it know flight was even possible?  If life became a bird what made it decide life as a mammal would be better?  If life became a mammal what made it decide life as a human would be better? 

If humans are the top rung of the evolutionary ladder why do many of the animals below us have superior strength, stronger eyesight, more acute hearing, more sensitive noses, and senses we don’t have at all (such as sharks?)

Scientists have pegged the chances of life appearing by itself on earth as one in 10^40,000 to one in 10^1,000,000.   That is the number 10 followed by one million zeros.  If printed in a book that book would be 300 pages long. 

Scientists have found millions of fossils and fossil fragments.  Considering that life supposedly evolved over billions of years there should be abundant evidence of missing links and transitional life forms.  Surely these would appear in museums around the world.  They do not.  Why does the fossil record contain complete life forms but seems so barren of all the rest?

Evolutionists claim apes are mankind’s closest ancestors.  Why is there such a massive gulf between us and them?  Why are we here and why are they here but why did no intermediate creatures survive? 

If we did evolve why did we bother to invent God in the first place?

All the animals that supposedly came before us are equipped with exactly what they need to survive.  Why has our brain evolved so far beyond what we can do with it in our lifespan?

Where does the ability to appreciate art fit into evolution?  What about the ability to imagine?  How does a sense of humor help us survive?  Why do we appreciate music?  Why do we seek to better ourselves, to fill our head with knowledge, to reach beyond the basic animal instincts?

What role does the conscience play in evolution?  Wouldn’t a feeling of guilt be a hindrance to the “survival of the fittest” mentality?  Why does every person have a conscience?  Why does the conscience consistently condemn the same basic wrongs (murder, incest, personal property) even in cultures that have had no contact with the rest of the world?

Think of some of the things that had to happen for life to begin here by accident:

-The earth had to be the correct distance from the sun to prevent life from either freezing or burning

-The earth needed the correct tilt

-The earth needed the correct rotational speed and a proportionately larger than average moon to keep it stable

-The earth needed to be in the correct place in the galaxy to avoid over exposure to life killing radiation

-The earth needed to be in orbit around a stable star

-The earth needed to be the correct size to maintain an atmosphere

-The atmosphere needed to provide breathable air, be a filter for harmful UV radiation, and form an insulating blanket from the cold of space

-The earth needed a magnetic field to protect it from cosmic radiation, particularly from our own sun

-For life to begin the earth needed to happen to have the correct enzymes and building blocks of life in the correct quantities and in the correct locations

-The earth needed to evolve plant life first (and nobody can explain how plant life came about by accident) to provide convenient oxygen for the upcoming animal life

-The earth needed to have self-contained cycles, such as the water, oxygen, and nitrogen cycles to sustain life

-The earth needed to have water and water needed to expand when it froze to prevent all life in the oceans from freezing into one block of ice

Does a well stocked home appear by chance?  How did the earth?

Science vs Atheism

Science has given us wonderful things.  Man’s study of the earth and our own bodies has led to great discoveries, amazing technologies and life-saving medical procedures and medicines.  We can travel to the moon, understand how we work and generally improve our life.

Perhaps because of the power science holds in the minds of some they have almost come to view it as a god themselves.  “It’s not a mystery, it’s science.”  Many atheists hold science as the replacement for religion, substituting faith for reason, fiction for fact.  While science has given religion a bloody nose in the past (see Galileo), it has not always been the beacon of truth some say it is.

The scientific method is to observe something, make a hypothesis about why something is so, gather evidence through experiments and observation and come to a conclusion based on facts.  Never should emotion or bias skew a scientific result.  This is how many scientists work, but not all.

A large portion of the scientific community profess no belief in God, therefore they’ve accepted evolution as the basis for all life on earth.  This is a theory which needs evidence to be proven correct.  What is needed are fossils, particularly fossils that would be considered missing links, the steps between ape and man for example.  These missing links have been extremely difficult to find.

In some cases scientists have manufactured evidence to support their theory.  Look up the Piltdown man if you don’t believe me.  Now I realize the vast majority of scientists don’t do this, but what kind of a scientific method is this?

Based on the way scientists and atheists talk it is implied that the entire scientific community is in agreement about evolution.  That is not so.  Not only do they disagree about the general understanding of evolution but there are many scientists who believe in God but can’t or won’t talk about it because of fear of being shunned by their colleagues.  Of course there are some scientists who are vocal about their belief in God, one of these being Alistar McGrath.  Mr. McGrath has decided to take on Richard Dawkins, not only for his disbelief in God but for his rudeness towards those who do believe in God.  And there are many more scientists out there.

In 1916 a psychologist names James Leuba asked 1000 scientists if they believed in God.  Of these 42% expressed a belief in God.  In 1996 this survey was repeated by Edward Larson of the University of Georgia.  It was expected that the number believing in God would have declined significantly as scientific knowledge increased but it hardly moved as 40% professed a belief in God. 

Consider these scientists who do not rule out the possibility of Intelligent Design:

Ulrich J. Becker, Professor of physics at MIT:  “How can I exist without a creator? I am not aware of any compelling answer ever given.  If you discovered how one wheel in the ‘clock’ turns—you may speculate how the rest move, but you are not entitled to call this scientific and better leave alone the question of who wound up the spring.”

John E. Fornaess, Professor of mathematics at Princeton:  “I believe that there is a God and that God brings structure to the universe on all levels from elementary particles to living beings to superclusters of galaxies.”

William Knobloch, Natural Scientist: “I believe in God because to me His Divine existence is the only logical explanation for things as they are.”

Marlin Books Kreider, Physiologist: “Both as an ordinary human being, and also as a man devoting his life to scientific study and research, I have no doubt at all about the existence of God.”

Sir Bernard Lovell, British scientist: “The probability of . . . a chance occurrence leading to the formation of one of the smallest protein molecules is unimaginably small. Within the boundary conditions of time and space which we are considering it is effectively zero.”

Fred Hoyle, Astronomer: “The entire structure of orthodox biology still holds that life arose at random. Yet as biochemists discover more and more about the awesome complexity of life, it is apparent that the chances of it originating by accident are so minute that they can be completely ruled out. Life cannot have arisen by chance.”  “The origin of the Universe, like the solution of the Rubik cube, requires an intelligence.”

Robert Jastrow: “Now we see how the astronomical evidence leads to a biblical view of the origin of the world.” “For the scientist who has lived by his faith in the power of reason, the story ends like a bad dream. He has scaled the mountains of ignorance; he is about to conquer the highest peak; as he pulls himself over the final rock, he is greeted by a band of theologians who have been sitting there for centuries.”

Isaac Newton: “This most beautiful system of the sun, planets, and comets could only proceed from the counsel and dominion of an intelligent and powerful Being.”

At the risk of boring you I’ll stop here but I have a list over 40 names long of scientists who belief in some kind of intelligence behind creation. 

Do all scientists believe in evolution?  No.

Of those who do is there agreement about how it happened?  No.

Is dogmatically asserting “evolution is a fact” good scientific method?  No.

Science vs Religion

The title of this post illustrates the fundamental flaw in this subject.  Like a court case, or more appropriately a fight, the title implies two sides.  It implies that one side is right and one is wrong and a victor will eventually emerge.  In reality there is no conflict.

At least there shouldn’t be.  Let’s use an example from the Catholic Church.

It was the Greek philosopher Aristotle who popularized the idea of the earth as the center of the universe.  That was over 2,300 years ago and he was heavily influenced by the philosopher and mathematician Pythagoras, who lived about 200 years earlier.  His view seemed to agree with the understanding of the time and was eventually adopted by the Church.  Thomas Aquinas was the one who succeeded in fusing this geocentric view of the universe with Church dogma.

In 1543 Copernicus published a work wherein he replaced the geocentric view with a heliocentric one, or belief that the sun was the center of the solar system.  Initially this new idea caused little distress because Copernicus had been discreet in sharing it but the scientist to follow wasn’t quite so diplomatic.

Using telescopes of his own construction Galileo had an unprecedented view of the universe and the sun.  He agreed with Copernicus’ view of the sun as the center of the solar system and vociferously argued his point, angering the Church who had by that time grown hostile to any who opposed their earth centered view.  It wasn’t until 1992 that the Church admitted their error in dealing with Galileo.

Some view this as a victory of science over religion but it should be noted, and not lightly so, that Galileo did not have a problem with the Bible but with the Church.  Church authorities used philosophy as the basis for their belief of the earth as the center of everything, not the Bible.  These same authorities were so full of their own power they were unwilling to accept the idea the earth could not be the center of it all.  Men were imprisoned and killed for daring to stand up to the Church.  Lest you think I’m picking on the Catholic Church, the leaders of the Protestant Reformation (Martin Luther, Philipp Melanchthon and John Calvin) also thought Copernicus was wrong.

While Galileo’s problem was with the Church and not the Bible, can the same be said about science in general?  Yes.  It is not science versus religion, it is science and religion.  Below are a few examples of the Bible agreeing with science long before actual science caught up.

1) Is the earth round or flat?  Does it rest on anything?  It wasn’t until humans went into space in the 1960’s that they could see the earth in its entirety and absolutely confirm by direct observation it was indeed round and occupied space all by itself.  Nearly three millennia earlier the Bible talked about “the circle [or sphere] of the earth”.  Seven hundred years before that it refers to God “hanging the earth upon nothing.”  This very modern sounding description flew in the face of prevailing views for 35 centuries.

2) A true understanding of what causes disease didn’t come about until relatively recently.  Before then doctors would walk from the morgue where they were examining dead bodies directly into the maternity ward to deliver a baby without washing their hands.  It’s no wonder diseases like the Spanish Flu and Black Plague spread the way they did.  Nearly four thousand years ago the Bible directed the ancient Jews to bury their human waste outside the camp; to wash their hands and avoid skin to skin contact with other humans for a time after touching a dead body; and to quarantine anyone suffering from a contagious disease.  Very modern sounding practices long before their time.

3) The rain pours from the sky and yet the seas never overflow.  Where does the water come from and where does it go?  That was the exact question asked by a Bible writer three thousand years ago.  He answered his own question when he said the rivers that flow to the sea return to where they came from.  Another writer said the water is filtered and drawn up into the clouds to fall as rain.  Combine them together and you get the water cycle.  It is interesting that even today scientists still aren’t sure exactly how water forms together in clouds into water droplets.

The Bible is not a science manual and it does not touch on scientific subjects in the vernacular of today because it wouldn’t have been understandable to those of its time but when it does speak on scientific matters it is accurate.  There is however, one more contentious subject in this matter: the six creative days.

Creationists and Christian Fundamentalists claim the Bible teaches the earth and the rest of the universe was created in six 24-hour days about 10,000 years ago.  This it does not do.  When questioned on this creationists will say we just need to have faith.  As discussed earlier though, this isn’t faith.  Faith is believing in something we can’t see because of evidence, not denying something right in front of us because it contradicts what we once thought.

First of all the laws of physics tell us the universe is much older than 10,000 years.  Based in part on our knowledge of the speed of light scientists estimate the age of the universe at approximately 13 to 15 billion years old.   This does not contradict the Bible.

The creation account begins with words nearly everybody can quote: “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”  Bible scholars have spoken about this verse, indicating it is separate from the rest of the creation account.  According to this the earth and the universe were in existence for untold years before the creative days began. 

On to these creative days.  Were they 24 hours long?  The evidence would indicate they were not.  The word “day” in Hebrew can be translated to mean various lengths of time.  "Day" can mean the 24 hour cycle but during the creation account itself the word “day” means a creative day (Genesis 1:5), it means the sunny part of each twenty four hour cycle (Genesis 1:14-19), and it means the entire six day creative period (Genesis 2:4).  The same word has different meanings.

At the very least the word “day” is a relative term, but there’s another point.  On the seventh day God rested.  Four thousand years later in the Bible book of Hebrews the writer indicated that seventh day was still going on.  We are still within that seventh day which That seventh day has continued until today, therefore being around six thousand years long (Genesis 2:2 and Hebrews 4:4-10).  If that is the case for the final creative day couldn’t the six preceding ones be many thousands of years long each?