Evolution Versus Creation Science
Parts one and two of this essay covered some historical highlights of the rise of evolutionary thought in the US and the conflict between evolution and special creation. They also touched upon charges by evolutionists that creation scientists are not real scientists and listed several organizations promoting one position or the other.
In this third and final installment we will explore what constitutes real science and why competent scientists disagree about how evidence should be interpreted. We will also touch on the roll of worldview and why there isn’t more open debate on the subject of evolution. Finally, there are comments on why it all matters and what Christians can and should be doing about it.
IS CREATION SCIENCE REAL SCIENCE?
A persistent criticism lodged by evolutionists against creationists is that they have no real science to back up their claims. As noted earlier, mainstream evolutionists and educators routinely refer to creationist ideas as pseudo-scientific. So are those calling themselves creation scientists real scientists or not?
It is not the purpose of this article to evaluate scientific arguments or claims of expertise. That is left for the reader to research independently. It is important to note here, however, that creationist organizations, despite lacking taxpayer support and having limited resources, do perform actual scientific research, publish real scientific papers and employ genuine scientists, some of whom have very impressive credentials. For example, the aforementioned CRS was organized by scientists and bills itself as a professional organization of trained scientists with members from all parts of the world.
AiG, like other creationist organizations, employs a number of science professionals. From their web site, here is a list of just some of the scientists among their employees:
Dr. Danny R. Faulkner, Astronomer (Ph.D. in Astronomy from Indiana University)
Dr. Fabriela Haynes, Paleontologist (Ph.D. in Geology/Paleontology)
Dr. Nathaniel T. Jeanson, Research Biologist (Ph.D. from Harvard University)
Dr. Georgia Purdom, Molecular Geneticist (Ph.D. from Ohio State)
Dr. Andrew Snelling, Geologist (Ph.D. from the University of Sydney, Australia)
The claims of these people and their organizations to expertise in their respective fields are every bit as credible as the claims of their critics. Without the benefit of public (taxpayer) funding, they have conducted considerable independent research and have produced an impressive number of scientific papers supporting the biblical account of Creation.
In addition, but without any direct evidence, I suggest that there may be many more “closet creationists” in the scientific and academic communities. If I am right, these are scientists and educators who are sympathetic to creationist views but who are unwilling to make their true opinions known. This is because they fear ridicule, personal attacks and they shrink from making enemies of those who could do damage to their careers (or destroy them altogether). These are the unfortunate consequences of what many call “cancel culture,” the growing atmosphere of intolerance toward unpopular viewpoints that is widespread in the US today.
SAME EVIDENCE, DIFFERENT CAUSES
How can competent evolutionary scientists and equally competent creation scientists study the same evidence and yet arrive at such different conclusions? Part of the reason is that it is possible for two or more different causes to produce exactly the same results and leave behind precisely the same evidence. To illustrate, assume that the grass is wet and you want to know why. The evidence (wet grass) supports the theory that it is raining outside. Rain, however, is not the only plausible explanation for wet grass. Lawn sprinklers and morning dew, among many other things, can also produce wet grass. More evidence is needed to arrive at the theory that best explains the presence of the wet grass. More evidence might take the form of eyewitnesses to falling rain or the sprinkler system being on. Whatever form it takes, more information is needed to determine with certainty what made the grass wet.
But what do you do if you don’t have more evidence? This is the problem faced by evolutionary scientists and creation scientists alike. Much of the evidence from the distant past has been damaged or destroyed. A lot of it still remains to be discovered and probably most importantly, there are no eyewitnesses or records to tell modern scientists how ancient evidence was produced in the first place. Scientists gather as much evidence as they can, but in cases where sufficient evidence is lacking, they have no choice but to make assumptions about how the evidence they do have got there.
WORLDVIEW AND ASSUMPTIONS ABOUT THE PAST
Assumptions about the distant past are largely a function of worldview. For example, evolutionists, who generally believe that the Bible is full of myths and fairy tales, do not believe the Genesis account of a worldwide, cataclysmic flood. They say such a flood was impossible. Accordingly, an evolutionary scientist will automatically reject out of prior belief any explanation of the past that involves a worldwide flood. Creationists, on the other hand, believe that the Bible is true and that the flood account found there is historically accurate. Creation scientists will, therefore, consider reasonable explanations of past events that involve a worldwide flood as well as reasonable explanations that don’t.
When scientists investigate phenomena from the distant past, they examine evidence produced by means that cannot be known with certainty. This is because direct observation is impossible, records do not exist and eyewitnesses, if there were any, are deceased. The big difference between examining recent evidence and ancient evidence is that we know so much more about how recent evidence was produced than we do about how ancient evidence was produced. Faced with this problem, as we have already established, scientists are forced to make assumptions about the past and those assumptions are influenced by their worldviews. It follows that any conclusions they reach will be profoundly affected by those worldviews, as summarized below:
The creationist worldview:
- There is a supernatural God
- God created all things
- The earth is about 6,000 years old
- The Bible is true and accurate
- Creation took place over a period of six days
- A catastrophic deluge reshaped the earth suddenly about 4,000 years ago
The evolutionist worldview:
- There is no God
- All things were created by the uniform, natural processes that are still in operation today
- The earth is billions and billions of years old
- The Bible is nonsense, filled with myths and fairy tales
- Creation took place very slowly, over billions of years
- There was no Deluge; changes in the earth were mostly slow and uniform
HOW DIFFERENT WORLDVIEWS AFFECT THE ANALYSIS OF RECENT EVIDENCE
Scientific inquiry into present-day phenomena is much more straightforward than explaining events in the distant past. When it comes to analyzing evidence produced by present-day events, worldview may have no bearing at all. This is because the causes of evidence produced today can be observed directly, eliminating debate about those causes. For example, a flash flood or a dam failure may produce a flow of fast-moving water that causes rapid erosion. If scientists are there to observe this for themselves, there is no disagreement about what caused the water to appear, how fast it was moving, how long it was present, how deep it was and so forth. Both creation scientists and evolutionary scientists witnessing the event would agree on what caused the evidence and how long it took to be produced. No assumptions about causes would be necessary and no beliefs about the ancient past would matter. Worldview would be largely irrelevant. The story is similar for events occurring in the recent past because definite causes can be established through eyewitness accounts and modern record keeping. It is very different, however, for events that occurred in the distant past.
HOW DIFFERENT WORLDVIEWS AFFECT THE ANALYSIS OF ANCIENT EVIDENCE
Worldview can have a profound impact upon the way scientists interpret ancient evidence. This is because of the assumptions they bring to the task. Creation scientists approach ancient evidence believing in a young earth, a worldwide flood, cataclysmic changes and a Creator God. Evolutionary scientists approach the same evidence believing in an old earth, no worldwide flood, gradual changes and no God. Because their beliefs about the past are so radically different, it is no wonder that creation scientists and evolutionary scientists reach radically different conclusions based upon the same evidence.
To illustrate why this is so, let’s briefly consider hypothetical evidence of ancient water erosion. Remember that there are no eyewitnesses or records of what took place to cause this erosion. All there is to go by is the erosion itself. The evolutionist, believing in an old earth and no worldwide flood, concludes that it was the result of slow-moving water over a long period of time. The creationist, having the same information and seeing the same evidence, but believing in a young earth and a worldwide flood, concludes that it was the result of fast-moving water over a short period of time. Although admittedly over simplified, this example illustrates how worldview can affect the evaluation of evidence. Note that sometimes evidence can support either the evolutionist view or the creationist view, depending upon how it is understood and presented.
RECONCILING DIFFERENCES
So far, there is nothing terribly wrong with the situation just described. We simply have two different explanations of what caused the phenomenon. The physical evidence, depending upon how it is interpreted, can support either of them. The next question should be, “Which explanation accounts for the phenomenon better?” Creation scientists, of course, say their model is a better fit than the evolutionary one, while evolutionists say theirs is the only model that is possible. This is the point at which things go downhill. Instead of open debate between opposing camps, which is what should happen, evolutionists seek to silence their opposition and stifle debate. They resort to ridicule and dismiss creation science as pseudo-science. They seek to dominate public discourse, public school education and university education. In this latter endeavor, they have been spectacularly successful, banning creation science from the classroom and indoctrinating the young in evolutionary theory at taxpayer expense.
SUPPRESSING DEBATE
Typical of anti-creationist sentiment is an article by Dan Arel with the title Why Bill Nye Shouldn’t Debate Ken Ham. This article is dated January 16, 2014 and it appears on the website of the Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason & Science, https://richarddawkins.net. Bill Nye is an evolutionist well known for his PBS television series, Bill Nye The Science Guy. Ken Ham is the founder and head of Answers in Genesis, one of the best-known creationist organizations in the country. The article by Arel was written in response to a debate that had been scheduled between Mr. Nye and Mr. Ham. Here are some excerpts from that article:
“Scientists should not debate creationists. Period.”
“Debating creationists offers their position credibility. When you accept a debate, you are accepting that there is something worth debating.”
“Creationism vs. evolution however is not worth debating. Why? Simply, there is nothing to debate. Evolution is a scientific fact . . .” [emphasis added]
“Creationism is a debunked mythology . . .”
“Creationists have no rules, their dishonesty stops nowhere.”
“Ham is a snake oil salesman and Nye just offered him up an infomercial to sell his product.”
"Creationism is a worthless and uneducated position to hold in our modern society and Nye is about to treat it as an equal, debatable “controversy.”
There is a lot more in this article to reveal the genuinely nasty, arrogant, intolerant and insulting attitude of its author. For example, he refers to Mr. Ham as a “conman” and he calls those who take Mr. Ham seriously as “brain-dead creationist zombies.”
Name calling aside, as you read the article it is hard to avoid the impression that the author fears the prospect of large audiences hearing creationist ideas. Evolutionists, for the most part, do not want to debate creationists. They prefer to be the only voice on origins that the public gets to hear. If evolutionists were really as confident in their science as they claim, you would think they would welcome every opportunity to out-gun and embarrass a creationist in debate, especially in front of a large audience. My guess is that they are not as confident in their positions as they claim to be.
EVOLUTION AS A RELIGION
While creation scientists are very open about their assumptions and worldview, evolutionists are not. They claim to be led solely by evidence. They rarely admit to interpreting evidence in the light of their own worldview, claiming instead to have no biases or preconceived ideas. The fact is, however, that evolutionists reject out of hand any possibility of a worldwide flood or the existence of a supernatural God. Yet they would have others believe that their worldview does not influence them and that they simply go wherever the evidence takes them. They would have us ignore the facts that (1) it is impossible to evaluate ancient evidence without making assumptions about what produced that evidence and (2) evolutionist assumptions are a function of evolutionist worldview.
The fact is, like creation scientists, evolutionary scientists do have a worldview and they cling to it tenaciously. They have a belief system and they view evidence through the lens of that belief system. If their belief system is wrong, a possibility to which they will not admit, their assumptions about ancient evidence will be wrong and their conclusions about what that evidence signifies will also be wrong.
Just as creationists have faith in the truth claims of the Bible, evolutionists have faith in the truth claims of evolution. If you ask an evolutionist, “Do you believe in evolution?” the answer will be, “Yes.” If you follow up with the question, “Do you have faith in the validity of the theory of evolution?” the answer would be, “Of course!” Like creationists, evolutionists believe and have faith. They simply don’t believe and have faith in the same things as creationists. Here is a table of key differences between the beliefs of six-day creationists and evolutionists:
It is plain to see that both evolutionary scientists and creation scientists have belief systems. In many respects, the evolutionary belief system is merely the flip side of the creationist belief system. One might argue that if creation science is a religion, as an Arkansas court of law ruled in 1981, evolutionary science should be considered a religion as well.
[Aside: If a court of law were ever to rule that evolution is a religion as well as a scientific theory, the ramifications could be enormous! It would place evolutionism and creationism on equal footing in the classroom. More importantly, the teaching of evolution in public schools to the exclusion of all other explanations of origins might then constitute the establishment of a state religion, which is explicitly forbidden by the First Amendment to the US Constitution. Will the lawyer willing to test this theory please stand up?]
In a very real sense, evolutionists have established a religion in which their god is the natural world. Elevating evolution to the status of a religion and replacing God with natural processes is a form of idolatry. It is worshipping the creation instead of the Creator.
The Bible talks about people who suppress the knowledge of God the Creator. In Romans 1:20-22 of the King James Version, for example, we read these words:
“For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were they thankful; but became vain in their imaginations and their foolish heart was darkened. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.”
In this portion of his letter to the Romans, the apostle Paul is discussing the guilt of mankind. He explains that among other things, men reject clear, physical evidence all around them that God created the earth. He also says that these same men, men who have no excuse for their behavior, are ungrateful and refuse to honor God. They become conceited in their foolish beliefs and count themselves wise when they are not. This is an accurate portrait of many present-day evolutionists.
Paul goes on a little later in Romans 1:25 to explain that those men worshipped the creation instead of the Creator:
“Who changed the truth of God into a lie and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. A’-men.”
In Romans 1:25, we can understand the word, “more” to mean “instead of.” Paul is not saying that the men in view worshipped the creation more than they worshipped God. No! He is saying that they worshipped the creation instead of God. This is precisely what we see in the so-called “green” movement and the reverence people have for “Mother Nature” and “Mother Earth” today.
Evolutionists have traditionally been reluctant to admit that their belief system constitutes a religion, although a few, surprisingly, actually have done so. Whether they admit it or not, evolutionism does bear the characteristics of a religion.
When evolution is viewed as religion instead of science, it is easier to understand why some evolutionary scientists are so rabidly anti-Christian and anti-creation science. They are not having a scholarly discussion with other scientists who happen to have a different point of view. They are defending their faith! Ultimately, they are at war with God. Consequently, because both Christians and creation scientists defend God, evolutionists view them as enemy combatants that must be destroyed.
WHY ALL THIS MATTERS
If you can’t believe Genesis, why should you believe anything else in the Bible? Virtually every doctrine of Christianity has roots in Genesis. Atheists know that if Genesis falls, all of Christianity falls with it. Genesis, the rest of the Bible and Christianity all stand or fall together. There is no separating them.
Evolution is essentially atheistic and hostile to Christianity. Evolution strikes at the very heart of Genesis, substituting nature for God. Evolution plants seeds of doubt that can grow into total rejection of God, the Bible and consequently, of salvation itself. The young, even those raised in Christian homes, are understandably confused by conflicting messages about creation from educators and other authority figures. Most get at least twelve years of indoctrination in evolutionary thought before they even leave school. Then they face enormous pressure to “follow the science” in a culture that is saturated with evolutionary doctrine and science by consensus.
People can only form opinions based upon the information available to them. Evolutionists make sure that children only get to hear the evolutionary side of the argument about origins in school. That means that the young are very likely to form evolutionary opinions. And once they form opinions, confirmation bias may prevent them from ever changing their minds. By this mechanism, evolutionists have persuaded generations of Americans to embrace evolutionary theory.
Evolutionists undermine faith in God in many ways. This is not accidental or coincidental. At its core, the theory of evolution is at odds with God and the Bible. It dismisses God and instead, encourages faith in nature and the theories of men. The theory of evolution constitutes a very powerful and destructive tool in the hands of Christ’s enemies.
What Christians Should Be Doing
Too many Christians, including their churches and pastors, fail to fully appreciate the importance of Genesis and the threat posed by evolutionary theory. Every book of the Bible including Genesis is important and God does not expect His people to stand silently by while others question the truthfulness of what He has said. Science and the Bible have always been compatible and Christians should stand ready to point that out.
The word science literally means knowledge and historically, theology was considered to be one of the sciences. During the middle ages, in fact, theology was considered to be the queen of sciences. The gulf between Christianity and mainstream science is relatively new, very counterproductive and entirely unnecessary. Real scientists can also be real Christians at the same time.
When giving a reason for their belief in special creation, it is tempting for Christians to retreat to faith alone saying, “God said it and that settles it.” For non-believers, however, faith in God and faith in the Bible are not good reasons. That’s not because non-believers lack faith. It is because non-believers place their faith in other things, like the forces of nature and the theory of evolution. They even personify the natural world and call it, “Mother Earth.” When called upon to defend their beliefs, Christians should be prepared to do so with more than simple faith. This means becoming aware of and familiar with science-based reasoning that supports their beliefs.
Contrary to what we are told by evolutionary scientists, science has never disproved anything found in the Bible. All the physical evidence pertaining to origins and the age of the earth is either inconclusive or supportive of biblical accounts. Moreover, special creation does not violate any of the laws of logic. Modern science, on the other hand, has adopted theories that absolutely do. For proof, contemplate the laws of causality and non-contradiction and apply them to the “Big Bang” theory, which is supposed to explain the origin of the universe. You will run into a logical brick wall.
Christians are called upon to stand ready to defend and explain their faith with patience and respect. In 1 Peter 3:15, the King James Version, we read:
“But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:”
Note that 1 Peter 3:15 is a command. It is not a suggestion or a recommendation. It is not optional. The words, “be ready” constitute a direct order from God to Christians. That order is to become informed and be prepared to answer questions about their faith. By extension, this includes questions about the truth and reliability of Genesis, which lays the groundwork for all of Christianity.
To “give an answer” sometimes means more than merely providing information. Sometimes it means mounting a defense against hostile attack. In this context, it means that ordinary Christians without formal scientific training must not shrink from critical discussions involving scientific theories that contradict the Bible. Scientists, for their part, should be willing and able to explain the fundamentals of their theories clearly so that non-scientists can understand the basics of those theories. Moreover, their explanations should not violate the rules of logic. God gave all men, including non-scientists, the gift of logic and the freedom to apply that logic to all propositions, including scientific ones. Accordingly, scientists should not only be able to explain the fundamentals of their theories clearly, but they should also be able to justify their positions with arguments that pass basic tests of logic. What’s more, evolutionary scientists should be willing, even anxious, to debate creation scientists in the public square.
There are many resources available to Christians who wish to learn more about why creation science makes more sense than evolutionary science. We have listed some of them in this essay. Christians should become familiar with those resources if for no other reason than to cite them when facing attacks on Genesis and by extension, attacks upon God Himself.
For Christians, answering attacks on Genesis is not optional. We owe it to our God to defend the faith and we owe it to future generations to train them in the knowledge of God, as He has commanded:
“And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” – Ephesians 6:4
“Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.” – Proverbs 22:6
For these and many other reasons, we have a duty to become informed and to give Christian answers, supported by science whenever possible, to the errors of evolutionary thinking.