[world-vedic] FW: Frequently Encountered Criticisms in Evolution vs. Creationism Revised and Expa

[Guest guest]

Hare krishna:

Yes let me congratulate to you, is very important inform to people the reality

about evolution speculations. But this concept is found n very ancient

mythologies, N.e.: The poets Greeks wrote there are women that coming from

monkeys. In the Maya mythology book, call Popolvuh also, appeared in one era,

the men become monkeys. The Aztecs also said: In one era, the men evolutions to

fish, and other become monkeys. etc. The innovation of Darwin theory had been

the purport of cloud and supplanted the Cracionist cosmogonies from the

religious scriptures, in the name of be naturalist and reject any supernatural

dualistic explanation. But they

invented is own myth.

Hare Krishna Das, University student of Education and Humanities Faculty, U A de C..

De: Dheeraj <dheerajverma (AT) ricoauto (DOT) com>Para:

Vediculture (AT) Egroups (DOT) Com <vediculture >CC: Neeraj Verma

<drneerajv (AT) hotmail (DOT) com>; Rajan Malik <rajanm (AT) bharatpetroleum (DOT) com>Fecha: Martes

22 de Febrero de 2000 10:52 PMAsunto: [world-vedic] FW: Frequently Encountered

Criticisms in Evolution vs. Creationism Revised and Expa

Hare Krishna,

 

While surfing thru the web, I found very elaborate and well compiled articles

on the present theories of Evolution. All the modern theories like Darwinism,

Big Bang theory etc have been taken for a ride.

 

And it strongly establishes the presence of Creator.

 

Your servant,

Dheeraj

Dheeraj [dheerajverma (AT) ricoauto (DOT) com]Sent:

20 February 2000 15:20DheerajFrequently Encountered Criticisms in

Evolution vs. Creationism Revised and Expa

 

 

Frequently Encountered Criticisms in Evolution vs. Creationism: Revised and Expanded

Compiled by Mark I. Vuletic [send feedback]

Last updated August 26, 1999. New Scientist's "Planet Science" Site of the Day,

7 April 1996 This list is intended to serve as an elementary introduction to

some of the claims various creationists make against what they call

"evolution." Note that, as far as some creationists are concerned, "evolution"

includes much more than just evolutionary biology - creationist criticisms can

extend to much of geology, paleontology, physics, cosmology, astronomy, and

numerous other areas of scientific inquiry. This list is not nearly as complete

or rigorous as it could be, but I hope it will help as a useful initiation for

beginners, and perhaps a reference for more experienced participants. For more

rigorous refutations of creationist arguments and assertions, consult the

talk.origins archive and the references at the end of this list.

Index

Click on the number next to the creationist argument/assertion to jump to the

corresponding evolutionist reply.

Section 1: Cosmology, Astronomy, Planetary Geology1.1: The sun contains most of

the mass, but only 2% of the angular momentum of the solar system. If the solar

system had condensed from a gas cloud, most of its angular momentum would be in

the sun.1.2: Most sets of fundamental constants would lead to a universe in

which life could not exist. Therefore, the fundamental constants of the

universe must have been fine-tuned by a creator who wished to bring man into

existence.1.3: At the present rate of influx of meteoritic dust from space, the

earth and moon after 5 billion years should each be covered with a meteoritic

dust layer more than 180 feet thick.1.4: The 1st law of thermodynamics states

that the energy in the universe is constant. The Big Bang theory states that

the universe came out of nothing, so it violates this thermodynamic law.1.5:

The 2nd law of thermodynamics states that disorder in the universe always

increases. This means that the universe could not have started in an ordered

state unless it was "wound up" by a Creator.1.6: The rotation of the Earth has

been slowing at a rate of 30 seconds per century. If the Earth were billions of

years old, the rotation rate at the outset would have been so great that the

planet could not have held together, much less support life.1.7: Quantum

mechanics proves the existence of a creator, since there must have been some

entity external to the universe to observe it and thus collapse it into a

determinate state.1.8: Big Bang theory says the universe came from nothing. But

something cannot come from nothing, so God must have created the universe.

Section 2: Terrestrial Geology, Radioisotope Dating2.1: Many test using 14C

give dates that are obviously wrong or conflict with dates given by other

radioisotope tests. For instance, a living mollusk was once shown by 14C dating

to be dead for 3,000 years.2.2: The ages of rocks are determined by the kinds of

fossils they contain, but the dating of the fossils depends upon evolutionary

assumptions. The use of the old age of rocks to support evolution is thus a

circular argument.2.3: The rate of decay in the geomagnetic field sets an

outside limit of 10,000 years for the age of the earth.2.4: If the earth were

as old as geologists say, uranium decay would have put into the atmosphere more

helium than we currently find there.2.5: There are places where "older" rock

strata lie above "younger" rock strata.2.6: Radiometric dating is extremely

inaccurate, as is shown by the fact that such experiments frequently have error

factors of a few million years.2.7: Many radiometric dating tests have yielded

false results. Evolutionists discard all those that are inconsistent with their

prior assumptions and keep those that "verify" their theory.2.8: Radiometric

dating reports the earth to be old only because the cataclysmic action of

Noah's Flood changed the radioisotope concentrations in the young earth.2.9:

Noah's flood was caused by the condensing of a vapor canopy that contained the

waters of the flood. Prior to the flood, the vapor canopy also extended

people's lifespans to the huge ages listed in Genesis, because it blocked out

harmful UV rays.2.10: Niagara Falls is moving upstream at a known rate each

year. Its current location allows only about 5,000 years since the time it

started eroding. Section 3: Origin of Life3.1: The law of biogenesis states

that life comes only from previous life. Therefore prebiotic synthesis - which

states that life first developed from nonliving molecules - contradicts a major

law of science.3.2: Amino acids in living organisms are all left-handed, but in

nature, equal amounts of left-handed and right-handed amino acids form, so one

would expect them to occur in equal proportions in living organisms if

abiogenesis were true.3.3: Nucleic acids cannot replicate without the help of

proteins. Proteins, however, cannot form unless specified by nucleic a cid

sequences. Thus, genetic systems could not have started naturally.3.4: There

are n! ways of an enzyme or DNA strand of n parts forming prebiotically. Since

the smallest proteins have at least 100 amino acids, the chance of forming a

particular enzyme prebiotically is at most 1/100!, which is small enough to be

disregarded.3.5: Even though the Earth is an open system, the second law of

thermodynamics still poses an insuperable barrier to abiogenesis, since order

in an open system will increase only when there is a complex system (such as a

host of enzymes or a supernatural creator) to influence the reactions. An

increase in order in the absence of such a complex system would be like

sunshine causing loose parts in a junkyard to assemble itself into a pickup

truck. Section 4: Biological Evolution, Mutations, Speciation4.1: Chromosome

numbers cannot change without producing very harmful effects.4.2: The

perfection of the structures of the various life forms on earth clearly reveal

themselves as the work of an intelligent designer. Nowhere is this more evident

than in the unbelievably complex human eye.4.3: Evolutionists cannot tell us

exactly how most organisms arose. For instance, no one can explain what series

of mutations could have given caterpillars the ability to metamorphose into

butterflies.4.4: The genetic variation in populations that allows them to adapt

to environmental change through microevolution (as revealed in industrial

melanism and bacterial antibiotic resistance) was deliberately put in place by

the creator.4.5: Homologous features do not prove any ancestral relationship

between organisms, because all classifications above the species level are

man-made and arbitrary.4.6: Industrial melanism does not demonstrate evolution

at all because no speciation occurs.4.7: Mutations are universally deleterious,

and thus cannot be a driving factor in evolution.4.8: There are plenty of

records of mutations causing birth defects, but none of mutations causing

"birth improvements."4.9: The rate of mutation is so small that it could never

serve as a source of variation.4.10: Macroevolution remains unproved because no

one has observed it. In fact, macroevolution is in principle unobservable, so

evolution must be unscientific.4.11: No one has ever seen one species arise

from another.4.12: If evolution were true, then fish would have evolved into

amphibians and land animals more than once.4.13: Sexual reproduction could not

have come about through evolution.4.14: There is no evidence for the rapid

development of new species.4.15: Natural selection is tautological: the fittest

survive, and those who survive are the fittest.4.16: Organisms feature numerous

"irreducibly complex" structures and processes, which could not have developed

via small evolutionary steps. Evolutionists have not even tried to explain how

such structures and processes could evolve.4.17 Given uniform population growth

rates, we can extrapolate backwards from today's population to prove that there

could not have been humans before 10,000 years ago.4.18 Haldane's Dilemma

proves that humans could not have evolved over the time span evolutionists say

they did. Section 5: Paleontology, Fossils, Transitional Forms5.1: The feather

impressions in fossils of Archaeopteryx are forgeries.5.2: Archaeopteryx is not

a transitional form but a full-fledged bird. Any reptilian characteristics it

displays are mirrored in modern birds such as the hoatzin.5.3: Protoavis

precedes Archaeopteryx in the fossil record, so Archaeopteryx cannot possibly

be a transitional form.5.4: The Cambrian explosion is a sure sign of the

activity of the Creator, suddenly creating a multitude of complex forms out of

nothing. There are no fossils before the explosion.5.5: All of the explanations

of gaps in the fossil record, such as the invocation of punctuated equilibrium

and the low probability of fossilization, render the evolutionary prediction of

transitional forms unfalsifiable.5.6: Fossils are the remains of the living

organisms that perished in Noah's Flood.5.7: In their search for transitional

forms, the evolutionary community has been taken in by outright fraud, as in

the case of Piltdown Man, which was accepted as a valid specimen for 40 years,

and by unfounded speculation, as in the construction of Nebraska Man from what

later turned out to be a pig tooth. This shows how unobjective evolutionists

are.5.8: There are no adequate transitional forms between fish and

amphibians.5.9: There are no adequate transitional forms between reptiles and

mammals.5.10: There are no adequate transitional forms between early hominids

and Homo sapiens. Section 6: Philosophy of Science, Educational Issues6.1: It

is likely that many structures in the universe were created with the mere

appearance of old age.6.2: Evolution teaches that there are no such things as

souls, that the Bible is fraudulent, and that God does not exist.6.3: Great

scientists such as Newton and Kepler believed in a literal Genesis.6.4:

Evolutionists are trying to take over the school system and force their beliefs

upon the students.6.5: Natural processes cannot be the cause of qualities seen

in humans like love. For instance, the cause of love must be something

loving.6.6: There are many theories of evolution, each of which "conclusively

disproves" the other.6.7: Evolution is unfalsifiable, and thus

unscientific.6.8: Electrons are materially inconceivable, but physicists

largely accept them as real entities. So what is to keep one from accepting the

reality of an inconceivable Creator?6.9: The exclusive teaching of evolution in

the science classroom violates the teaching of multiculturalism, because many

different cultures have creation myths which contradict evolution.6.10:

Evolution predicts that natural law should be constantly evolving, as opposed

to the creation model, which states that law should stay fixed.6.11: Nothing

can be proven, particularly events in the past. Therefore, creationism must be

just as reasonable as evolution.6.12: There is nothing wrong with invoking

supernatural explanations.6.13: There are many unanswered questions in science,

such as the details of the origin of the universe and of prebiotic synthesis.

Thus we require a supernatural God for explanation.6.14: Evolution is just a

theory.6.15: Evolution and creationism are the only two possible models of

origins. There are many serious problems with evolution, so creationism is the

correct model by default.6.16: Evolution is the basis for Naziism,

laissez-faire capitalism, slavery, etc.

Main Text

The creationist claims are in bold print, and are immediately followed by evolutionist responses.

Cosmology, Astronomy, Planetary Geology

1.1: The sun contains most of the mass, but only 2% of the angular momentum of

the solar system. If the solar system had condensed from a gas cloud, most of

its angular momentum would be in the sun. The sun transferred most of its

momentum to the planets via a process known as "magnetic braking." In the early

stages of the solar system, the magnetic field of the sun dragged ionized atoms

in the solar nebula with it, thereby transferring energy that accelerated the

atoms but slowed the sun's rotation. (Wagner, 1991, 436)

1.2: Most sets of fundamental constants would lead to a universe in which life

could not exist. Therefore, the fundamental constants of our universe must have

been fine-tuned by a creator who wished to bring man into existence. A large

number of (presently) unfounded assumptions go into this new version of the

argument from design: (1) That any creator that made a universe like ours must

have done so for the sake of producing human life, (2) that our universe was

not generated by a natural process that is capable of generating multiple

universes, (3) that the actual range in which fundamental constants can vary is

extremely high, and (4) that the number of universes in which any type of life

can exist is an extremely small fraction of the number of possible universes.

Let us assume hypothetically that the fundamental constants of our universe were

in fact deliberately set by an intelligent entity. This, by itself, does not

guarantee that the entity in question wished to create man specifically -

physicist and astronomer Victor J. Stenger (1997), for instance, wonders why no

one believes the creator's goal was to make cockroaches. In fact, since the

universes in which life can exist are the only types of universes in which

various stars and planets can form, an entity that fine-tuned the universe

could have done so for the express purpose of creating certain inanimate

objects, and life arose as a (perhaps unforseen) side-effect. An entity capable

of setting the fundamental constants of the universe may even have generated

multiple universes, setting the constants randomly, until an interesting effect

arose in one or more of them. So the specific theological thesis the

creationists aim for extends beyond the data, even if most of their assumptions

about fine-tuning are granted.

If our universe came into existence via a natural process that is capable of

producing multiple universes with varying sets of fundamental constants (the

naturalistic analogue of the supernatural tinkerer at the end of point 1), then

it may in fact be inevitable that a universe such as ours would eventually come

into existence (how probable it would be depends in part upon the number of

universes the process can generate). The more universes the process generates,

the higher the probability that one of the ones generated will be like ours.

Examples of possible sources of multiple universes with varying constants

include (1) black holes in other universes, and singularities created by the

collapse of other universes (Smolin, 1997; Gribbin, 1993, 243-254 - such

mechanisms, of course, assume that there is at least one universe "outside" of

ours), (2) a primordial space-time "foam" (Dickson, 1997), or (3) absolutely

nothing (on the flip side of the question "How can anything come from nothing?"

is the question "If there is nothing at all, how can there be a restriction on

something coming into being?").

In the absence of a satisfactory theory of quantum gravity, we can't determine

how flexible the fundamental constants are. There may be an underlying fact

about nature that forces the constants to assume the values we have found. A

speculative theory of quantum gravity due to Stephen Hawking, for instance,

does precisely that - if Hawking's theory is true, then the universe must have

the constants it does, and there could never have been a time when the

constants could have been "chosen" by a creator. In Hawking's oft-quoted words:

There would be no singularities at which the laws of science broke down and no

edge of space-time at which one would have to appeal to God or some new law to

set the boundary conditions for space-time...The universe would be completely

self-contained and not affected by anything outside itself. It would neither be

created nor destroyed. It would just BE. (Hawking, 1988,136).

In order to be sure that the "fine-tuning" of the universe is in fact "fine," we

must be able to determine that an extremely large number of alternate universes,

inhospitable to life, are equiprobable with ours. Such a hypothesis outruns the

present state of cosmology.

The creationists must be able to demonstrate (within reason) that the constants

must indeed be fine-tuned in order for any kind of intelligent life to exist.

Victor Stenger (1997) has argued that many more possible universes admit the

potential of intelligent life than is generally thought. And we must factor in

the possibility of lifeforms that are very different from carbon-based ones,

when we seek such a demonstration.

Carl Sagan brings together most of these points:

[D]educing that the laws of Nature and the values of the physical constants were

established (don't ask how or by Whom) so that humans would eventually come to

be...sounds like playing my first hand of bridge, winning, knowing that there

are 54 billion billion billion [5.4 x 1028] possible other hands that I was

equally likely to have been dealt...and then foolishly concluding that a god of

bridge exists and favors me, a god who arranged the cards and the shuffle with

my victory foreordained from The Beginning. We do not know how many other hands

there are in the cosmic deck, how many other kinds of universes, laws of Nature,

and physical constants that could also lead to life and intelligence and perhaps

even delusions of self-importance...Clearly we have not a glimmering of how to

determine which laws of Nature are "possible" and which are not. Nor do we have

more than the most rudimentary notion of what correlations of natural laws are

"permitted." (Sagan, 1994, 34-35)

So the universe may not be fine-tuned at all, it may not require fine-tuning to

generate intelligent life, or it may be fine-tuned as a matter of statistical

necessity. These possibilities need to be ruled out (sufficiently) for

fundamental constants to provide evidence for divine creation - and even then,

the theology of creation is still up in the air.

More resources:

Can God Be Found in Physics? Cosmythology - Is the Universe Fine-Tuned to

Produce Us? Intelligent Design - Humans, Cockroaches, and the Laws of Physics

(Talk.origins)

1.3: "...at the present rate of influx of meteoritic dust from space, the earth

and moon after 5 billion years should each be covered with a meteoritic dust

layer more than 180 feet thick. This calculation is based on a long outdated,

speculative estimate by Hans Pettersson (1960). The ICR seems unaware of data

since derived from space technology that reveals a much lower rate of dust

influx - a rate that causes the creationist argument to collapse." (Ecker,

1990, 183)

More resources:

Meteorite Dust and the Age of the Earth (Talk.origins) The Age of the Earth

(Talk.origins) James Meritt's General Anti-Creationism FAQ (Talk.origins)

1.4: The lst law of thermodynamics states that the energy in the universe is

constant. The Big Bang theory states that the universe came out of nothing, so

it violates this thermodynamic law. Even in the earliest days of the Big Bang

theory, cosmologists recognized that one could not be sure whether conservation

of energy applied prior to the Planck time (the first 1x10-43 seconds of the

universe) for two reasons: (1) the conditions prior to the Planck time were so

extreme that Big Bang theory itself, and indeed, all of classical physics,

breaks down in that time period; (2) because of the small size of the universe

prior to Planck time, quantum mechanical effects would become relevant, so in

the absence of a fully developed theory of quantum gravity (a fusion of quantum

mechanics and relativity) one could not know what happened in that time period.

Therefore, for the conventional Big Bang theorists, all bets were off before

Planck time.

The suggestion that the lst law of thermodynamics may not apply to the

pre-Planck-time universe is not quite as outlandish as it may seem at first,

since science has progressively uncovered hitherto unexpected and

counterintuitive aspects of the universe under conditions that deviate from

those we are accustomed to in our everday lives (for instance, the breakdown of

classical dynamics at very high speeds and very small lengths). The origin of

the universe, combining extremely high energy with very small length could

legitimately be expected to give rise to new effects, pointing to a gap at what

seems to be an exceptionless law at "normal" temperatures and sizes. Indeed, the

existence of quantum vacuum fluctuations, verified through the detecion of the

Casimir-Polder force (Crabb, 1994, 102) and the measurement of the Lamb shift

in hydrogen (Barrow, 1983, 65-66), have demonstrated a loophole by which matter

(and perhaps even universes embedded within a larger spacetime) can exist in

violation of classical conservation of energy for some time (the energy level

ultimately balances, but need not do so immediately).

But let's leave aside this pre-quantum gravity speculation and look at the

possible scenarios described by Lee Smolin for the outcome of any developed

theory of quantum gravity: [A] There is still a first moment in time, even when

quantum mechanics is taken into consideration. The singularity is eliminated

by some quantum mechanical effect. As a result, when we run the clock back, the

universe does not reach a state of infinite density. Something else happens when

the universe reaches some very high density that allows time to continue

indefinitely into the past.[C] Something new and strange and quantum mechanical

happens to time, which is neither possibility A or B. For example, perhaps we

reach a state where it is no longer appropriate to think that reality is

composed of a series of moments that follow each other in a progression, one

after another. In this case there is perhaps no singularity, but it may also

not make sense to ask what happened before the universe was extremely

dense.(Smolin, 1997, 82)

What implications do these alternatives have for the application of the 1st law

of thermodynamics to the origin of the universe? In case A, the problem of the

possible breakdown of physical law at the singularity arises once again, so it

is unclear whether conservation of energy would apply in this case. If it does

not, then conservation of energy obviously is no barrier to a naturalistic

origin of the universe. However, if conservation of energy does hold in case A,

this still does not pose a problem, since (by this hypothesis) the universe

always contained the same amount of energy, and (because of the fact that case

A has the universe starting from a singularity) there is no such thing as time

"prior to the Big Bang," and therefore no time at which there was ever less

energy than we find today.

Case B is obviously compatible with conservation of energy, since the universe

always existed, and therefore may always have contained the same amount of

energy it contains now.

In case C, for all I can tell, the notion of energy may not even make sense at

early times, so if this case were instantiated, it would show that the 1st law

of thermodynamics, just like Newton's laws, has its limits, and breaks down

under conditions far more extreme than any we have ever experienced.

Finally, one might notice that if, as the creationists allege, creation ex

nihilo (which modern cosmology does not postulate -- see 1.8) truly does

violate the 1st law of thermodynamics, then creationism obviously violates the

law, since it posits that the universe was brought into existence out of

nothing by supernatural processes - "supernatural" meaning (in this case) "in

violation of natural law." Creationists often hold a double-standard, claiming

that evolution would be invalid if it violated natural law (which it does not),

while at the same time claiming that creationism would not be invalid if it

violated natural law (which it does). Nor would creationism better "explain"

any violation of natural law than naturalism - even if we were hypothetically

to concede that the universe did come into existence through a process that

violates natural law, "God did it" is no more informative an explanation than

"it just happened." The creationist claim is that the universe came into

existence through unknown processes that are no longer in effect, yet were

guided by an intelligent power. How is this superior even to the position that

the universe came into existence through unknown processes that are no longer

in effect, yet were not guided by an intelligent power (a position which, of

course, naturalists do not have to take, since they rely on modern cosmology to

render "known" the processes governing the universe)? Once one allows for

processes that have nothing to do with the universe as we know it (in contrast

to the way modern cosmology operates), then anything goes. To say that it is

alright to have different laws "before" the origin of the universe if you are a

supernaturalist, but not alright if you are a naturalist (as if the conditions

at the beginning of the universe were not different than they are now), is

definitely to hold a double-standard.

More resources:

Creation ex nihilo - Without God

1.5: The 2nd law of thermodynamics states that disorder in the universe always

increases. This means that the universe could not have started in an ordered

state unless it was "wound up" by a Creator.The laws of physics are void before

the first 1 x 10-43 seconds of the universe, so there is no reason to suspect

that the universe could not have "wound itself up" without the aid of a

creator. Moreover, "[t]o talk about causation or creation implicitly assumes

there was a time before the big bang singularity. We have known for twenty-five

years that Einstein's general theory of relativity predicts that time must have

had a beginning in a singularity fifteen billion years ago" (Hawking, 1993,

46). There was no "before" in which a creator could have started the universe.

It makes no sense to retort that the creator exists outside of time, because, by

definition, there can be no displacement or action unless there is time - thus,

the creator could never start creating. Finally, if order can never arise

spontaneously, where did this well-ordered creator come from? If the creator

"always was" ordered, what is to keep the initial state of the universe from

"always having been" ordered?

On a related note, some creationists take the 2nd law of thermodynamics as

precluding the generation of "ordered" galaxies from a "disordered explosion"

(i.e. the Big Bang). However, systems like galaxies formed as a means of

dissipating gravitational energy, thereby increasing universal entropy. The

formation of a tight arrangement of matter is not necessarily a shift from high

entropy to low.

More resources:

Intelligent Design - Humans, Cockroaches, and the Laws of Physics (Talk.origins)

1.6: The rotation of the Earth has been slowing at a rate of 30 seconds per

century. If the Earth were billions of years old, the rotation rate at the

outset would have been so great that the planet could not have held together,

much less support life. Chris Stassen writes in response:

Whoever wrote this has the slowing rate very much wrong. The currently measured

rate is about 0.00002 seconds per day per year. (That is, today the Earth

completed its rotation about 0.00002 seconds slower than it did on this same

day last year.)

If you multiply 2 x 10-5 seconds (per day) times 4 x 108 years (approximately

the Devonian period), you get about 2.2 hours. The result would be about (365 *

24 / 21.8 ~= 400) days per year (since the length of the year hasn't changed).

Devonian corals show about 400 daily growth layers per year (judged counting

the daily layers in groups marked by larger fluctuations caused by seasonal

change). In fact, this evidence is an excellent independent confirmation of the

great antiquity of the Earth, and the accuracy of isotopic dating methods.

Note that these long extrapolations are necessarily somewhat rough, and get much

less accurate with increasing time (particularly back to near the origin of the

Earth). There are still arguments over the forces which dominate the slowing,

and how much stronger or weaker they would have been when integrating backwards

in time. (Stassen, 1997)

Mr. Stassen also recommends as resources Thwaites, Awbrey, 1982; Cazenave, 1982;

Bursa, 1982; and Mignard, 1982.

1.7: Quantum mechanics proves the existence of a creator, since there must have

been some entity external to the universe to observe it and thus collapse it

into a determinate state. According to some interpretations of quantum

mechanics, the wave function of a system will not collapse into a determinate

state unless it is measured. However, when a measuring device is used to

measure a system, the measuring device itself becomes entangled in the system's

superposition. The only way out of this, say the creationists, is to posit a God

who somehow stands outside of the universe and can measure it (thereby bringing

it into a determinate state), without himself becoming entangled with the wave

function of the universe. The problem with such an argument is that it takes

for granted a specific interpretation of quantum mechanics when in fact it is a

very contentious issue exactly what the correct interpretation is - some

formulations of quantum mechanics do away with collapses altogether (e.g. pilot

wave theories, "bare" theory, consistent histories), so there would be nothing

for an "outside" observer to do. And even if we knew that there were collapses,

some formulations of quantum mechanics dictate that interaction with a device of

sufficient size is enough to cause a collapse (e.g. GRW) - there need be no

"intelligent" observation. Finally, of the interpretations that do give special

status to intelligent observers (such as Wigner's interpretation), the bulk

presume that, at the very least humans have that status. Given this

proliferation of interpretations of quantum mechanics, it is an outrageous move

to seize upon an interpretation that posits some mysterious action of God as the

reason why the universe appears to be in a determinate state, and declare it to

be proof of the existence of God.

See Albert, 1992, for a survey of quantum mechanical theories.

1.8: Big Bang theory says the universe came from nothing. But something cannot

come from nothing, so God must have created the universe. According to

conventional Big Bang theory, space and time themselves originated with the Big

Bang. If this is so, then there was no moment of time prior to the initial

singularity predicted by the Big Bang (i.e. the very idea of "prior to the Big

Bang" meaningless), and it would thus be inappropriate to talk about the

universe "coming" from nothing. Instead, at the first instant of time, the

universe already existed, so there is no problem about "where the universe came

from" on the conventional view.

The Big Bang theory, however, does not provide a complete account of the origin

of the universe, so one should not draw any metaphysical conclusions (whether

theistic or atheistic) from it. Because the early universe combined small size

with high energy, one cannot understand it in the absence of a theory of

quantum gravity - a synthesis of quantum mechanics and relativity. No theory of

quantum gravity has yet been fully developed, but according to Lee Smolin, a

full theory of quantum gravity will have one of three consequences:

[A] There is still a first moment in time, even when quantum mechanics is taken

into consideration. The singularity is eliminated by some quantum mechanical

effect. As a result, when we run the clock back, the universe does not reach a

state of infinite density. Something else happens when the universe reaches

some very high density that allows time to continue indefinitely into the

past.[C] Something new and strange and quantum mechanical happens to time,

which is neither possibility A or B. For example, perhaps we reach a state

where it is no longer appropriate to think that reality is composed of a series

of moments that follow each other in a progression, one after another. In this

case there is perhaps no singularity, but it may also not make sense to ask

what happened before the universe was extremely dense.(Smolin, 1997, 82)

If Smolin's category A turns out to be the case, then we have the same thing as

that predicted by conventional Big Bang theory -- a universe which exists at

every instant of time, and hence does not "come" from nothing.

If Smolin's category B turns out to be the case, then the universe always was,

and hence the supposed problems raised by the universe coming from nothing do

not arise.

If Smolin's category C turns out to be the case (this is the kind of scenario

proposed, for instance, by Stephen Hawking, 1988), then once again, the

universe does not "come" from nothing -- since the very notion of time-ordering

ceases to have meaning in the early universe, it is senseless to talk about

cause and effect relationships.

Creationism, then, finds no help from standard or quantum cosmology.

More resources:

Theological Misinterpretations of Current Physical Cosmology (Secular Web)

Terrestrial Geology, Radioisotope Dating

2.1: Many tests using 14C give dates that are obviously wrong or conflict with

dates given by other radioisotope tests. For instance, a living mollusk was

once shown by 14C dating to be dead for 3,000 years. The limit on accurate 14C

dating is around 50,000 years, owing to the short half-life (5,730 years) of

14C. "Creationists attempt to discredit 14C dating by applying it to fossils

older than 50,000 years, or in other inappropriate ways, and then showing that

it yields obviously wrong dates" (Berra, 1990, 38).

The fictitious mollusk ages are described fully in Keith, 1963. The error arises

because of the unusual environment in which the mollusk lives, and does not

apply to organisms in normal environments. Furthermore, even for the mollusks,

the maximum error is a few thousand years. Since the experimental limit on 14C

is 50,000 years, the error at its worst still does not leave room for a young

earth.

2.2: The ages of rocks are determined by the kinds of fossils they contain, but

the dating of the fossils depends on evolutionary assumptions. The use of the

old age of rocks to support evolution is thus a circular argument. The absolute

age of rocks is accurately determined by the use of radioisotope dating. It is

true that the relative ages of strata were determined prior to radiometric

dating, partially by fossil content, but radiometric dating has shown these

relative dates to be correct. The absolute dating by radioisotopes have yielded

the long time span necessary for evolution. (Brush, 1983, 64)

2.3: The rate of decay in the geomagnetic field sets an outside limit of 10,000

years for the age of the earth. "...only the dipole-field strength has been

'decaying' for a century and a half... the strength of the nondipole field

(about 15 percent of the total field) has increased over the same time span, so

that the total field has remained almost constant. [Creationist physicist]

Barnes' assumption of a steady decrease in the field's strength throughout

history is also irreconcilable, of course, with the paleomagnetic evidence of

fluctuations and reversals [in the geomagnetic field]"(Ecker, 1990, 105).

Evidence of the reversals have been found in the magnetic orientation of rock

on the sea floor.

More resources:

On Creation Science and the Alleged Decay of the Earth's Magnetic Field (Talk.origins)

2.4: If the earth were as old as geologists say, uranium decay would have put

more helium into the atmosphere than we currently find there.The extra helium,

like normal helium and hydrogen, is terribly light and escapes the earth's

atmosphere into space. Thus, helium quantities in the earth give no evidence at

all for the age of the earth, and we must look elsewhere - to sediment

deposition rates or radiometric dating, for instance - to establish this age.

(Berra, 1990, 127)

More resources

The Age of the Earth (Talk.origins) A talk.origins Age of the Earth Debate

(Talk.origins) James Meritt's General Anti-Creationism FAQ (Talk.origins)

2.5: There are places where "older" rock strata lie above "younger" rock strata.

Normal geological processes thrust older layers on top of younger layers in

certain regions. These processes leave discernible effects which geologists can

detect. Creationists seek to repudiate overthrusting by hiding the evidence for

it from their audiences (Eldredge, 1982, 105-108).

2.6: Radiometric dating is extremely inaccurate, as is shown by the fact that

such experiments frequently have error factors of a few million years. "A few

million years sounds like a huge error, but a couple of million years one way

or the other is a small error compared with the huge age calculated. Saying

'380 million years plus or minus two million' is like thinking back to April

from December and saying you can't remember whether something happened on the

19th, 20th, or 21st" (Eldredge, 1982, 103). Note that even with an error factor

of a few million years, radioisotopes consistently show that the earth is

billions of years older than the young-earth creationists assert.

2.7: Many radiometric dating tests have yielded false results. Evolutionists

discard all those that are inconsistent with their prior assumptions and keep

those that "verify" their theory. There have been thousands of dating tests

performed by independent laboratories with a wide variety of radioisotopes.

Virtually all of the results correlate with evolutionary expectations. The few

anomalies in radiometric dating disappear when the samples are reanalyzed

(Eldredge, 1982, 103).

2.8: Radiometric dating reports the earth to be old only because the cataclysmic

action of Noah's Flood changed the radioisotope concentrations in the young

earth. If a worldwide cataclysmic flood had changed the radioisotope

concentrations in terrestrial rock, one would expect radiometric dating to

yield a completely haphazard distribution of ages as one tested rock strata

progressively deeper in the earth. However, in actuality, lower strata

consistently date older than higher strata (except where overthrust has

occurred). A second line of evidence against creationist speculation about the

Flood's action on radioisotopes comes from the dating of meteorites and

moonrock. Unless the waters of the Flood somehow engulfed the entire solar

system, meteorites and moonrock would surely have been untouched by the Flood,

so their radioisotope concentrations could not have been affected by this

alleged catastrophe, even if the Flood had actually occurred. Yet moonrock and

many meteorites yield radiometric dates of around 4.5 billion years. So

independent of the fact that there is no evidence for a worldwide Biblical

Flood, and much evidence against such an event, the creationist claim that

radioisotope concentrations were distorted by the Flood has been falsified.

2.9: Noah's flood was caused by the condensing of a vapor canopy that contained

the waters of the flood. Prior to the flood, the vapor canopy also extended

people's lifespans to the huge ages listed in Genesis, because it blocked out

harmful UV rays. Consult my companion work Letter to a Korean Missionary for a

response to these claims.

2.10: Niagara Falls is moving upstream at a known rate each year. Its current

location allows only about 5,000 years since the time it started eroding. This

criticism is puzzling: even if the figures it offers are correct, it does

nothing to establish a young Earth unless one buys into the obviously unfounded

assumption that the Earth cannot be older than Niagara Falls.

Origin of Life

3.1: The law of biogenesis states that life comes only from previous life.

Therefore prebiotic synthesis - which states that life first developed from

nonliving molecules - contradicts a major law of science. Creationists

represent biogenesis as a rigid law with universal scope, when, in reality, it

is merely a guideline that amounts to saying that spontaneous generation (the

assembly of fully formed organisms out of inanimate material in short periods

of time by purely natural processes) does not occur. The slow, stepwise process

of prebiotic synthesis and the all-at-once process of spontaneous generation are

not comparable. The creationist claim that the "law" of biogenesis precludes

prebiotic synthesis is analogous to the obviously false assertion that quantum

mechanics and the theory of relativity are invalid because they "violate"

Newton's physical laws.

3.2: Amino acids in living organisms are all left-handed, but in nature, equal

amounts of left-handed and right-handed amino acids form, so one would expect

them to occur in equal proportions in living organisms if abiogenesis were

true. Ian Stewart claims that the violation of mirror symmetry by the weak

nuclear force can account for the specific handedness of amino acids. He

writes:

One remarkable consequence of [the violation of mirror symmetry by the weak

force] is the fact that the energy levels of molecules and that of their mirror

images are not exactly equal. The effect is extremely small: the difference in

energy levels between one particular amino acid and its mirror image is roughly

one part in 1 x 1017. This may seem very tiny, but...symmetry breaking requires

only a very tiny disturbance. In general, lower-energy forms of molecules

should be favored in nature. For this amino acid, it can be calculated that

with 98% probability the lower energy form will become dominant within a period

of about a hundred thousand years. And indeed, the version of this amino acid

which is found in living organisms is the lower-energy one. (Stewart, 1995, 90)

3.3: Nucleic acids cannot replicate without the help of proteins. Proteins,

however, cannot form unless specified by nucleic acid sequences. Thus, genetic

systems could not have started naturally. RNA sequences are capable of forming

and replicating without the assistance of proteins. These RNA sequences may

also catalyze protein formation. As Martin Olomucki notes:

There is nothing to contradict the notion that the primordial RNAs may have

promoted the polymerization of...the amino acids...nucleic acids may, by a

reaction similar to the one leading to RNA polymerization, have been able to

facilitate the polymerization of amino acids by supplying a suitable catalytic

center and sacrificing one phosphodiester bond to permit the formation of a

peptide bond (Olomucki, 1993, 74-75).

3.4: There are n! (n-factorial: n x n-1 x n-2 x...x 1) ways of an enzyme or DNA

strand of n parts forming prebiotically. Since the smallest proteins have at

least 100 amino acids, the chance of forming a particular enzyme prebiotically

is at most 1/100!, which is small enough to be disregarded. The two main flaws

with this argument are that (1) enzymes of many different configurations can

have identical or very similar effects (we do not need to form any particular

enzyme), and that (2) enzymes in prebiotic situations are not the product of

haphazard collisions of compounds, but are gradually built up over time by

selective forces, and sometimes created in the first place by nonrandom

processes (Fox, 1988). These two points demonstrate that the chance of forming

a useful enzyme is certainly not n!.

3.5: Even though the Earth is an open system, the second law of thermodynamics

still poses an insuperable barrier to abiogenesis, since order in an open

system will increase only when there is a complex system (such as a host of

enzymes or a supernatural creator) to influence the reactions. An increase in

order in the absence of such a complex system would be like sunshine causing

loose parts in a junkyard to assemble itself into a pickup truck. Chemicals and

biomolecules function much differently in the presence of energy than do pieces

of scrap metal in a junkyard. Many atoms and molecules spontaneously and

non-randomly join together to form larger molecules, especially in the presence

of added energy. At high temperatures, mixtures of amino acid monomers

spontaneously polymerize and form primitive cell-like structures called

protocells, the microfossil remains of which may have been found in Precambrian

rock (Fox, 1989).

Many important biochemicals including amino acids and nucleotides have been

produced in experiments and found on meteoritic material. Spectroscopic data

even reveals the existence of organic molecules in interstellar gas clouds;

concerning these chemicals, Martin Olomucki notes that

....in many of the organic interstellar molecules we find compounds which are

precursors of biological molecules: hydrogen cyanide, which can generate amino

acids and nucleic bases; formaldehyde, the precursor of sugars; cyanoacetylene,

an important condensation agent, etc. These molecules are able to form even

under extreme conditions of temperature and high concentration of interstellar

media. Apparently ubiquitous in the Universe, they must certainly have existed

on the surface of the primitive Earth, as well as on other planets: traces of

amino acids, which are already more complex chemicals, have been identified in

lunar dust and meteorites. (Olomucki, 1993,47; see also Miller, 1992, 17-20).

Research has yielded a host of autocatalytic molecules, some of which present

characteristics like imperfect replication (no one wants perfect replication

from reproducing molecules - otherwise diversity could not be generated) and

even recombination (Rebek, 1994).

The 2nd law of thermodynamics is thus shown by experiment to be no barrier to

the natural emergence of complex structures from simple ones. It should be

noted that, in the first place, the 2nd law of thermodynamics says nothing

about open systems requiring catalysis by an already complex system to become

complex themselves - this is a concoction of the creationists misleadingly

presented by them as an original part of the real scientific law.

Biological Evolution, Mutations, Speciation

4.1: Chromosome numbers cannot change without producing very harmful effects.

Although changes in chromosome numbers can produce harmful effects, they do not

universally do so. As William Klug and Michael Cummings write,

While the chromosome number is commonly regarded as invariant for a given

species, the arrangement of chromosomal material is often polymorphic through

chromosomal inversions and translocations. These chromosomal aberrations

usually have little direct effect on the phenotype because gene content is

rearranged but not altered." (Klug, Cummings, 1983, 528)

4.2: The perfection of the structures of the various life forms on earth clearly

reveal themselves as the work of an intelligent designer. Nowhere is this more

evident than in the unbelievably complex human eye. The human eye is actually

quite flawed. The photoreceptors in the eye are upside down, with their blood

vessels and neurons in front, effectively causing deficiencies in human vision,

including a "blind spot" caused by the hole where the neurons exit the eye. The

squid's eye, on the other hand, has none of these problems. Are we to believe

that a designer whose "crowning creation" was man made such an incredible error

in the construction of the human eye, and not in that of the squid? (Diamond,

1985)

Imperfect engineering is apparent in far more than the human eye. Useless and

inefficient structures abound in the natural world - flightless birds with

hollow bones, as if adapted for flight; blind animals with useless lenses and

retinas; the clumsy "thumb" of the giant Panda; introns; the vestigial pelvis

of pythons and whales (Futuyma, 1983, 198-200). If these structures did not

arise through evolution, they could only have been the work of a deranged or

clumsy creator.

But could any complex structure - even an imperfect one - arise through

evolution? Certainly no one has documented the gradual development of the eye

or the feather, but we can look to the gradations in the present world for

clues. In fact, nature displays progressions of simple to complex visual

structures (Ecker, 1990, 65-66), and a scale-to-feather progression (McGowan,

1984, 116-121), such that one can see how the gradual development of complex

structures could be possible. Ian Stewart notes that a computer simulation by

biologists Dan Nilsson and Susanne Pelger has bolstered the case for the

natural evolution of the eye by small steps:

[Nilsson and Pelger's 1994 computer analysis] starts with a mathematical model

of a flat region of cells, and permits various types of "mutation." Some cells

may become more sensitive to light, for example, and the shape of cells may

bend. The mathematical model is set up as a computer program that makes tiny

random changes of this kind, calculates how good the resulting structure is at

detecting light and resolving the patterns it "sees," and selects any change

that improves these abilities. During a simulation that corresponds to a period

of about four hundred years - the blink of an eye, in evolutionary terms - the

region of cells folds itself up into a deep, spherical cavity with a tiny

irislike opening, and, most dramatically, a lens. Moreover, like the lenses of

our own eyes, it is a lens whose refractive index - the amount by which it

bends light - varies from place to place. In fact, the pattern of variation of

refractive index that is produced in the computer simulation is very like our

own. So here mathematics shows that eyes definitely can evolve gradually and

naturally, offering increased survival value at every stage. More than that:

Nilsson and Pelger's work demonstrates that given certain key biological

faculties (such as cellular receptivity to light, and cellular mobility),

structures remarkable similar to eyes will form - all in line with Darwin's

principle of natural selection (Stewart, 1995, 22).

Richard Dawkins adds that Nilsson and Pelger used conservative assumptions about

the amount of variability in populations and the heritability of new traits when

setting up their simulation (Dawkins, 1996, 165). Nevertheless, the simulation

showed that "it would take only about 364,000 generations to evolve a good fish

eye with a lens"(Dawkins, 1996, 166), where 364,000 generations translates to

less than half a million years in time (Dawkins, 1996, 166) - a geological

instant which would be difficult to detect in the fossil record.

More resources:

The Evolution of Color Vision (Talk.origins)

4.3: Evolutionists cannot tell us exactly how most organisms/structures arose.

For instance, no one can explain what series of mutations could have given

caterpillars the ability to metamorphose into butterflies. Certainly no one

knows all of the tiniest details of evolutionary history (exactly which genes

mutated at exactly what times to cause morphological change). But the validity

of the general process of evolution is established well enough to assure one

that every organism has gained its qualities through evolution as long as a

general account can be made of how those qualities arose, even if the minutiae

are unknown.

This response may not be satisfying to creationists at first, but one might ask

such a creationist whether she can describe the exact spatial location of every

footstep of Jesus as he presumably carried his cross at Calvary? Of course, no

one can. Can we conclude (on these grounds alone) that the story of Jesus's

crucifixion is false? Obviously not. We do not need to know the exact stepwise

details of a process to know that the process is valid.

Evolutionists can account for many, many structures with considerable ease, as

long as they are not held to the unreasonable criterion of absolutely exact

knowledge. As Douglas J. Futuyma writes, "[o]ne of the most amazing aspects of

evolution is how easy it is to account for major transformations through rather

simple changes in developmental processes. Most of the differences among

different kinds of mammals are quite simply accounted for by changes in the

relative rates of growth of different parts of the body. Speed up the

elongation of fingers to get a bat wing; slow down the development of teeth or

legs to reduce or eliminate them in whales; slow down the growth of the lateral

toes and increase that of the middle one to get a horse's hoof" (Futuyma, 1982,

63-64).

The evolution of butterfly metamorphosis specifically is not very well

understood, but this is hardly damning evidence against evolution. Since

evolution accounts so well for other processes and structures, creationists

would have to show that butterfly metamorphosis is evolutionarily impossible,

and this they cannot do. Even creationists admit that the metamorphosis of the

butterfly is a natural process, not requiring the direct intervention of God to

work. If, as creationists generally assume, evolution would have to first

produce a halfway metamorphosis before it can produce a full metamorphosis,

then evolution is in trouble. However, evolution does not need to produce a

halfway metamorphosis. All it has to do is produce a slightly less

sophisticated metamorphosis and gradually move on to more complex ones. If the

creationist admits that a metamorphosis to x is a natural process, why not a

metamorphosis to something slightly less x-like? (Domning, 1994, 11)

4.4: The genetic variation in populations that allows them to adapt to

environmental change through microevolution (as revealed in industrial melanism

and bacterial antibiotic resistance) was deliberately put in place by the

creator. This creationist assertion contradicts the story of Noah's Flood,

which creationists also hold to. Presumably, only a single male and female of

all the "kinds" on earth (except for the birds and the "cud-chewing" kinds)

were taken into Noah's boat, and the rest perished. Given that each organism

has at most two alleles for each gene locus, that would yield a maximum total

of four alleles per gene locus per kind. We know for certain that there are far

more than four alleles per locus for many loci in modern populations. These

extra alleles must have emerged through mutation, as they could not have been

set in place in a Genesis-style creation. An example of allele number that

directly contradicts Genesis 1 and 2, is locus HLA-DRB1 - one gene in the human

leukocyte antigen (HLA) complex - which has 59 alleles (Ayala, et al., 1993,

78). If all humans descended from Adam and Eve, and no new alleles ever arose

though mutation, the current human population would have at most only 4 alleles

at this locus (two from Adam, two from Eve).

Experimentation with bacteria has also shown that antibiotic resistance can and

does arise from beneficial mutation, rather than being already present in the

bacteria. "For example, Joshua Lederberg did an experiment in which he grew

thousands of colonies of genetically identical bacteria from a single bacterial

cell that was unable to survive in the presence of streptomycin. He divided each

colony of cells in two, and grew one half with and one half without

streptomycin. A few of the colonies survived on streptomycin, because they

carried new mutations for streptomycin resistance" (Futuyma, 1982, 137). Since

the bacterium from which the resistant colonies evolved was not itself

streptomycin resistant, Lederberg's experiment proves that resistance is

generated by a mutation, and is not a quality that needs to be present in

bacteria from the start.

4.5: Homologous features do not prove any ancestral relationships between

organisms, because all classifications above the species level are man-made and

arbitrary. Where taxa with fine differences are concerned, the classification of

a species may be a bit contrived (as is the case with transitional forms), but

there are clear major differences between most taxa from genus to kingdom

level. Still, the homologies persist throughout all taxa, so either they were

made by a deceitful creator, or else they constitute real evidence that all

taxa share ancestry. Classification may be a human endeavor, but the

similarities and differences between various organisms because of their degree

of relatedeness constitute a reality independent of however we choose to make

our classification system. (Ruse, 1982, 309-310).

4.6: Industrial melanism does not demonstrate evolution at all because no

speciation occurs. Industrial melanism was never intended as an example of

speciation, but rather as an example of changes in gene frequency through

natural selection. However, changes in gene frequency do constitute evolution,

albeit not macroevolution. Textbooks are not fraudulent in claiming that

industrial melanism, antibiotic resistance, and pesticide tolerance are

examples of evolution.

4.7: Mutations are universally deleterious, and thus cannot be a driving factor

in evolution. On the contrary, some mutations have been shown to be incredibly

beneficial. For instance, as George Bakken reports:

Microorganisms have acquired new enzymes that allow them to metabolize toxic

industrial wastes never occurring in nature (e.g. chlorinated and flourinated

hydrocarbons), and are an increasingly important method of pollution control

(Ghosal et al., Science 228: 135-142, 1985). Susumi Ohno (Proc. Natl. Acad.

Sci. 81:2421-2425, 1984) found that one such new enzyme, nylon linear oligomer

hydrolase, resulted from a frame-shift mutation. Frame-shift mutations scramble

the entire structure of a protein, and so the enzyme is a random construct! As

would be expected, this new enzyme is imperfect and has only 1% the efficiency

of typical enzymes, but the important thing is that it works (Bakken, n.d.).

Since the mutation documented by Ohno permits the microorganisms in question to

consume short nylon oligomers as a primary food source, it certainly qualifies

as a beneficial mutation. Interestingly, this mutation has been duplicated in

the laboratory. Richard Harter reports:

In the experiments, non-nylon-metabolizing strains of Pseudomonas were grown in

media with nylon oligomers available as the primary food source. Within a

relatively small number of generations, they developed these enzyme activities.

(Harter, 1999)

Another example comes from researchers working with the nematode Caenorhabditis

elegans, who have identified "four genes that, when mutatated, can make these

worms use energy more efficiently, feed and swim at a slower pace - and live

many times their normal life-span. Some of the experimental nematodes lived for

almost 2 months, far longer than their expected 9 days" (Pennisi, 1996, 949; see

also Lakowski, 1996, 1010-1013).

Yet another recent example, pertaining to humans:

Population geneticist Stephen O'Brien of the National Cancer Institute, his NCI

colleagues Michael Dean and Mary Carrington, and their collaborators provide

strong confirmatory evidence that people who have two mutant copies of the gene

for CCRS (also known as CKRS), the chemokine receptor that HIV uses when it

initially infects infects white cells, are highly resistant to HIV infection.

Another, entirely new, finding is that people who get infected with HIV, but

have one mutant copy of the CCRS gene, progress to AIDS more slowly than do

people without the mutation. (Cohen, 1996, 1797)

Even some of the most seemingly deleterious mutations can have great adaptive

value in certain environments. For instance, mutations that cause stunted wing

growth in Drosophila increase the fly's ability to survive on islands where

high winds are present (Ruse, 1982, 92). This demonstrates a critical point,

and explains why decades of irradiating Drosophila in the laboratory produced

only less fit mutants: in a population's normal environment, all possible

beneficial mutations will have long since spread through its gene pool.

Thereafter, in the same environment, virtually all mutations must be

deleterious, because the population is already extremely well adapted to its

environment (Moore, 1983, 11-13). Mutations are almost universally deleterious

in a population's normal environment. But the same mutations that are

deleterious in the "normal" environment may be beneficial on the geographical

fringes of a population, or in the event of a massive environmental change

throughout the entire geographical range of the population.

Even certain classes of macromutations can have adaptive value. Richard Dawkins

presents an example with snake vertebrae:

The number of vertebrae in different species of snakes varies from about 200 to

350. Since all snakes are cousins of each other, and since vertebrae cannot

come in halves or quarters, this must mean that, from time to time, a snake is

born with at least one more, or one fewer, vertebra than its parents. These

mutations deserve to be called macro-mutations, and they have evidently been

incorporated in evolution because all these snakes exist. (Dawkins, 1996, 103)

More resources:

Are Mutations Harmful? (Talk.origins) The Evolution of Improved Fitness by

Random Mutation Plus Selection (Talk.origins)

4.8: There are plenty of records of mutations causing birth defects, but none of

mutations causing "birth improvements." As Edward E. Max writes:

Does the fact that we know many human detrimental mutations but essentially no

clear beneficial ones mean that there are have been no beneficial mutations in

human history? Not at all, since there is a clear bias in what medical

scientists have studied. The human mutations we know most about are detrimental

because medical scientists preferentially study illnesses that cause significant

morbidity and mortality. Consider the theoretical possibility that a beneficial

mutation has occurred in a particular human gene; even if this mutation were

identified by a comparison of the mutated gene in a child versus the unmutated

version of the same gene in both parents, there is no way that this mutation

could ever be recognized as beneficial. If the mutation increased intelligence,

strength, longevity or specific disease resistance, this would never be apparent

without long-term breeding experiments that could obviously never be done on

humans. Therefore, since such beneficial mutations in humans could never be

recognized in humans, our ignorance of examples cannot be taken as evidence

that they don't exist. However, the experiments necessary to demonstrate a

beneficial mutation can be done with laboratory organisms that multiply

rapidly, and indeed such experiments have shown that rare beneficial mutations

can occur. (Max, 1999)

The situation is actually better than Max describes. As described in 4.7 one

mutation in the gene for CCRS causes one to progress slower from HIV to AIDS,

and two mutations in the same gene increases ones resistance to infection by

HIV in the first place (Cohen, 1996, 1797).

More resources:

Are Mutations Harmful? (Talk.origins) The Evolution of Improved Fitness by

Random Mutation Plus Selection (Talk.origins)

4.9:The rate of mutation is so small that it could never serve as a source of

variation. According to Philip Kitcher:

The charge that mutations are rare depends on confusing the mutation rate per

locus (on the order of 1 mutation per 100,000 loci) with the rate per zygote

(of the order of 1 mutation per zygote) or the rate per population (of the

order of 1 billion per population). From an evolutionary perspective, it is the

last of these rates that is important. Hence, although [it] is right to claim

that mutations are rare (in one sense), [it] is quite wrong to think that this

spells trouble for evolutionary theory. Indeed, neo-Darwinian evolutionary

theory insists on the rarity of mutation at any individual locus, claiming, for

this reason, that natural selection is a more powerful evolutionary force than

mutation (if mutation were extremely frequent, then selection would play a less

crucial role). (Kitcher, 1982, 97)

Although mutation without natural selection cannot transform a population,

natural selection causes beneficial mutations to spread quickly through a

population. Moreover, if a mutant allele is only detrimental in homozygous

form, it will take many generations to eliminate it from the gene pool, even if

the homozygous form is lethal (Ruse, 1982, 79-84). This fact and heterozygote

fitness (cases in which the heterozygote has an advantage that neither

homozygote has - a case example is the sickle-cell allele, which protects

against malaria in heterozygous form), which may perhaps be the norm, help to

keep populations supplied with a reservoir of mutant genes, some of which will

have an advantage over the "normal" alleles in the event of environmental

change. Populations do not have to wait around for lucky mutations after

environmental change - the mutants are already in the gene pool.

4.10: Macroevolution remains unproved because no one has observed it. In fact,

macroevolution is in principle unobservable, so evolution must be unscientific.

Although information in experimental science is gained through observation, the

observation of a great amount of indirect evidence of a process makes as good a

scientific case as the direct observation of a process. As Michael Ruse says,

"[t]he evidence that I have a heart is all indirect, neither I nor anyone else

has ever seen it, but does anyone really believe that it is not a fact that I

have a heart? Of course it is a fact..." (Ruse, 1982, 58). In the same way,

there is so much indirect evidence for macroevolution that it can safely be

considered a fact without direct observation of the process occurring in our

time.

4.11: No one has ever seen one species arise from another. In 1964, Dr. D.J.

Reish removed 5 or 6 polychaetes (Nereis acuminata) from Los Angeles/Long Beach

harbor, and grew his sample to a size of thousands. In 1986, four pairs from

this group were brought to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution; the population

at Woods Hole thus had gone through two bottlenecks, which are supposed to help

drive evolution through genetic drift. In 1977-1978, two new cultures of N.

acuminata were gathered from nearby Long Beach and Newport Beach, and grown

under the same conditions as the Woods Hole sample. The three populations were

later crossed, and it was found that the only crosses that would not produce

viable offspring were the crosses involving Woods Hole and the two new

cultures. This signifies nothing less than speciation, and all in the

laboratory - all observed directly (Weinberg et al., 1992).

More resources:

Observed Instances of Speciation (Talk.origins) Some More Observed Speciation Events (Talk.origins)

4.12: If evolution were true, then fish would have evolved into amphibians and

land animals more than once. Fish are, in fact, continuing to evolve. One

should not, however, properly expect them to evolve fully into amphibians

again, because the niche they would be exploiting is already occupied by the

first amphibian lineage. D.H. Patent explains:

Many animals of today appear to be in transition between life in the water and

life on land. These organisms can survive at least for limited periods of time

in either environment. But we cannot say what the future holds for them. We do

not know if they are "on the way" to a terrestrial existence. The chances are,

in fact, that they are not really evolving away from an acquatic existence. A

species cannot take over a niche that is already occupied by another unless it

is in some way better adapted to that niche. Since present land animals have

been evolving for millions of years, they have become about as well adapted to

land living as possible; a newcomer which is trying to "fit in" is not likely

to displace them."(Patent, 1977, 58-59)

4.13: Sexual reproduction could not have come about through evolution. Howard

Hershey has the following to say about the evolution of sex (he warns that he

is stating all of this from memory, but believes it is a simple task to check

his statements in any genetics or developmental biology textbook):

Recombination (a key element of meiosis that differs from mitosis significantly

enough to warrant new activities) also occurs in bacteria (which don't have sex

as we eucaryotes know it). The bacterial enzymes involved are called the RecA,

RecB enzymes. These are enzymes that are also involved in DNA repair. he RecA

enzyme in particular is involved in repair of UV damage. Almost any molecular

biology or genetics book will talk about the Rec system. Recombination in

eucaryotes is very similar but the enzymes are not as well studied. But

topoisomerases (enzymes that break and reseal DNA) are clearly involved and

these enzymes have a long evolutionary history.

But the key thing to remember is that sex (in the biological sense) is simply

the passage from the diploid (2N) state to the haploid (1N) state and back

again by fusion. Undoubtedly what these creationists mean is "How can we create

two sexes that are so different from one another?" An interesting question when

posed by a three-year old but one that ignores the fact that some creatures

have an even more dramatic differentiation between the sexes than humans do and

some have much less.

The passage of the sexual cycle does NOT require two highly differentiated sexes

producing specialized gamete cells. Yeast, for example, are sexual animals just

as much as humans and it is hard to distinguish haploid cells from diploid and

the difference between the mating types (when the haploid gametic cells are

visually indistinguishable from each other they are called mating types; when

one is differentiated to hold most of the cytoplasm it is an egg and the other

less endowed cell is a sperm with males being sperm carriers and females being

egg carriers). There [are] all kinds of variations in nature between the yeast

and mammals (although fish carry sexual dimorphism to an extreme unseen in

mammals).

Even within humans, sex is not a case of being different from the moment of

conception. The early human embryo (XY male or XX female) is sexually dimorphic

(has both embryonic male and female parts). Normally a single gene (on the Y)

sets in motion a cascade of events that leads to the emphasis of the male

internal parts (Wolfian ducts) and degeneration of the female parts (Mullerian

tract). Absent that gene, the male parts degenerate and a female develops. Most

of what we call male and female traits are purely hormonally caused and

depending on the hormonal environment you can get interesting events. I have a

lovely picture of a busty young woman who is XY (she has a defect that makes

her cells unable to respond to androgens). Internally, she is sterile because

the genes that determine the degradation of the Mullerian tract are different.

She also has no pubic hair (because that requires a cellular response to

androgens). There are also XX individuals with various levels of penis and

(empty) scrotum formation because of in utero exposure to androgens (the

mothers had a tumor or took certain steroidal drugs). The external genitalia

equivalents are very simple scrotum = labia and penis = clitoris. There are all

kinds of intermediate situations since this is a question of different

differentiation of organs rather than de novo creation of different organs. All

this (and much more) can be found in most textbooks of development or genetics.

But, amazingly, most creationists seem completely ignorant of these basic facts

and somehow think that male and female were created separately. (Hershey, 1996)

4.14: There is no evidence for the rapid development of new species in nature.

3,500 years ago, a small lake was separated from Lake Victoria by a sandbar.

There are now five species endemic to the new lake; they have evolved from the

original species in a geological instant (McGowan, 1984, 29). A population of

Nereis acuminata that was isolated in 1964 was no longer able to interbreed

with its ancestors by 1992 (Weinberg et al., 1992). New species certainly can

emerge quickly.

More resources:

Observed Instances of Speciation (Talk.origins) Some More Observed Speciation Events (Talk.origins)

4.15: Natural selection is tautological: the fittest survive, and those who

survive are the fittest. Robert Pennock reveals the fallacy in this objection

with a pentetrating analogy:

Consider the formula: May the best team win. It seems harmless, but the

creationist now points out that we determine which team is best by seeing which

wins. If that is what it means to be "best," then the expressed wish seems to

reduce to "May the team that wins be the team that wins." It is thus vacuous

dogma, objects the creationist, to subsequently claim to explain who won in

terms of one team's being "better" than the other. However, we sports fans are

not fooled into abandoning the game by such arguments. Of course we do

determine which is the best team by looking at its record of wins, and we would

certainly explain why it won the trophy by noting its superior record over its

rivals. But we understand that this is not the end of the story...even though

we do judge on the basis of record, we do not doubt that it is the physical

traits of a team, its superior characteristics and playing ability, that make

it better than the others. Understanding this, we also understand that it is

possible that the best team might not win...This parallels the distinction that

biologists make between evolution by natural selection and evolution by natural

drift, and the mere fact that we recognize such distinctions is by itself

sufficient to show that the tautology objection does not hold in either sports

or evolutionary theory. (Pennock, 1999, 101)

One can predict in advance what characteristics will be beneficial for an

organism living in certain environments (Kitcher, 1982). For instance, it is

quite apparent before selection occurs that the melanic peppered moth will have

better chances of survival than its mottled grey counterpart when they compete

in polluted areas, where the white lichens normally on the trees have been

killed, leaving a black bark surface. This is readily apparent, but not

tautological. Mere survival does not define fitness - alleles that increase in

frequency in a population do not necessarily do so because they confer greater

fitness upon their hosts; some alleles increase in frequency because of genetic

drift and bottleneck effects. Organisms that outlive their peers due to sheer

luck and happenstance are not automatically fitter, even though they are the

survivors.

Michael Ruse lists three testable assumptions to which every Darwinian must

commit: (1) that there is a struggle for reproduction, (2) that success in the

struggle depends upon the characteristics of organisms (rather than being

random), and (3) that selection will favor the same characteristics under the

same circumstances (Ruse, 1982, 140).

4.16: Organisms feature numerous "irreducibly complex" structures and processes,

which could not have developed via small evolutionary steps. Evolutionists have

not even tried to explain how such structures and processes could evolve.

According to Michael Behe, an irreducibly complex system is "a single system

which is composed of several interacting parts that contribute to the basic

function, and where the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to

effectively cease functioning"(Behe, 1997). However, there is no reason why

such systems could not evolve. Allen Orr explains, somewhat abstractly at

first:

An irreducibly complex system can be built gradually by adding parts that, while

initially just advantageous, become--because of later changes--essential. The

logic is very simple. Some part (A) initially does some job (not very well,

perhaps). Another part (B) later gets added because it helps A. This new part

isn't essential, it merely improves things. But later on, A (or something else)

may change in such a way that B now becomes indispensable. (Orr, 1998)

As Orr notes, gene duplication often provides the route by which irreducibly

complex processes arise:

Molecular evolutionists have shown that some genes are duplications of others.

In other words, at some point in time an extra copy of a gene got made. The

copy wasn't essential--the organism obviously got along fine without it. But

through time this copy changed, picking up a new, and often related, function.

After further evolution, this duplicate gene will have become essential. (Orr,

1998)

Not only are there mechanisms whereby irreducibly complex systems can be

gradually evolved, but Russell Doolittle (who was very unfairly criticized in

Behe's book) also describes experimental proof that one of Behe's favorite

examples of an irreducibly complex system (the blood-clotting process) is not

even irreducibly complex to begin with:

Recently the gene for plasminogen was knocked out of mice, and, predictably,

those mice had thrombotic complications because fibrin clots could not be

cleared away. Not long after that, the same workers knocked out the gene for

fibrinogen in another line of mice. Again, predictably, these mice were ailing,

although in this case hemorrhage was the problem. And what do you think happened

when these two lines of mice were crossed? For all practical purposes, the mice

lacking both genes were normal![a footnote here refers to Bugge et al., "Loss

of Fibrinogen Rescues Mice from the Pleiotropic Effects of Plasminogen

Deficiency," Cell 87 (1996): 709-19.] Contrary to claims about irreducible

complexity, the entire ensemble of proteins is not needed. (Doolittle, 1998)

As for the claim that evolutionists have not even tried to posit and research

mechanisms whereby allegedly irreducibly complex systems could have evolved,

John Catalano gives short shrift to that claim with a huge (and expanding)

catalog of articles presenting precisely such research.

For extensive links to articles by and on Michael Behe and his cavalcade of

irreducible complexity, see John Catalano's Behe's Empty Box . For a

beautifully illustrated critique of Behe along the same lines as Orr, see Keith

Robison's Darwin's Black Box: Irreducible Complexity or Irreproducible

Irreducibility?

4.17: Given uniform population growth rates, we can extrapolate backwards from

today's population to prove that there could not have been humans before 10,000

years ago. According to Robert Pennock:

While application of the principle of uniformity makes good sense when speaking

of radioactive decay or random mutation, it does not work so simply given what

we know of the history of human population size...Data on other animal species

in nature reveal that population size is typically highly variable, with cycles

of increase and decrease that average to a growth rate of zero, which is what

scientists believe held for most of the early history of the human species as

well. It was only the advent of agricultural production, the development of

permanent settlements and cities, and the introduction of mechanization that

allowed the rate of human population growth to depart significantly from this

norm to achieve exponential increase. (Pennock, 1999, 225)

4.18 Haldane's Dilemma proves that humans could not have evolved over the time

span evolutionists say they did. I actually have not been able to assess this

claim myself yet, but since quite a few people have written to me about it, I

will list some other web sites which discuss it:

Robert William's very technical response. Mark L. Bakke's comparatively non-technical response.

Paleontology, Fossils, Transitional Forms

5.1: The feather impressions in fossils of Archaeopteryx are forgeries. Modern

feathers were pressed into a thin layer of artificial cement to give the

impression that a dinosaur fossil had feathers. After astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle

made these accusations, a team of scientists applied a battery of tests to the

holotype of Archaeopteryx lithographica to prove the authenticity of its

feather impressions (Charig et al., 1986). They found absolutely no evidence of

artificial cement on the fossils. One test involved the comparison of hairline

cracks running through the impressions on both the slab and counterslab; the

negative of a photograph of the counterslab superimposed on a photograph of the

slab revealed a perfect correlation between the hairline cracks. The comparison

"shows that the block was cracked through vertically before it was split

horizontally into two slabs, thus indicating the unquestionable absence of any

added cement layer on either surface" (Charig et al.,1986, 624). Detailed

examination of the feather impressions through scanning electron microscopy

revealed "a degree of minute detail that we believe would be impossible to

carve, even today, and a total absence of any chisel marks"(Charig et al.,

1986, 624).

It is worth noting that Hoyle claimed that the fossil was actually that of a

reptile with fake feather impressions around it (Charig et al., 1986, 623),

underscoring just how reptilian Archaeopteryx is, in contrast to the

creationist assertion that Archaeopteryx is "just a bird." With the feather

impressions proven authentic, one of Archaeopteryx's prime avian qualities is

also reaffirmed, so the fossil remains solidly established as a transitional

form.

5.2: Archaeopteryx is not a transitional form but a full-fledged bird. Any

reptilian characteristics it displays are mirrored in modern birds such as the

hoatzin. Archaeopteryx lithographica is indeed a transitional form. It has been

classified as a bird almost arbitrarily because it has feathers, not because it

is "truly" a bird. The avian features Archaeopteryx possesses are

a wishbone feathers a bony sternum in one of the latest specimens (Svitil, 1994).

Archaeopteryx has many more reptilian characteristics, such as

a pubic peduncle a long, bony tail no pygostyle three well-developed fingers

(with the same number of bones as in most dinosaurs) three well-developed

metacarpal bones unfused metacarpal bones separate metatarsal bones no

hypotarsus abdominal ribs (list from McGowan, 1984, 117).

Archaeopteryx has many more reptilian characteristics than the hoatzin. Even

Fred Hoyle, who erroneously claimed that Archaeopteryx was a forgery, claimed

that it was a reptilian fossil with fake feather impressions. But the objection

by analogy to the hoatzin is entirely off track anyways. Archaeopteryx is not a

transitional form merely because of its remarkable blend of reptilian and avian

characteristics - Archaeopteryx also existed at the same time as the theropod

reptiles and resembled them very highly (Futuyma, 1982, 188). Given its

temporal and physical correlations to reptiles, plus its less numerous - yet

distinct - avian qualities, Archaeopteryx lithographica stands immune to any

creationist attack.

5.3: Protoavis precedes Archaeopteryx in the fossil record, so Archaeopteryx

cannot possibly be a transitional form. This creationist challenge falsely

presupposes that only one lineage of reptiles evolved into birds or bird-like

reptiles, when, in fact, there is more than one such lineage. Given this fact,

Archaeopteryx will continue to demonstrate how the alleged "boundary" between

reptiles and birds can be bridged, even if Protoavis turns out to be an earlier

avian life form than Archaeopteryx (which is not yet certain). The validity of

Protoavis is simply irrelevant to the validity of Archaeopteryx as a

transitional form. (Wheeler, 1993)

5.4: The Cambrian explosion is a sure sign of the activity of the Creator,

suddenly creating a multitude of complex forms out of nothing. There are no

fossils before the explosion. There are plenty of fossils of organisms that

lived in the Precambrian, such as jellyfish, coelenterates, annelids, and even

cyanobacteria that date back as far as 3.4 billion years (McGowan, 1984, 103).

The Cambrian period marks the advent of shelled organisms like trilobites and

brachiopods. The ancestors of the organisms appearing in the Cambrian explosion

were soft-bodied and did not leave fossils as easily as the shelled Cambrian

organisms. Precambrian rocks are also subjected to a disproportionately large

amount of deformation, which destroys fossils. It is for these reasons, not

creation, that the fossil record seems to display a sudden "explosion" of

shelled organisms at the base of the Cambrian. Moreover, the "explosion" took

around 15 million years, so it is not quite the instantaneous event

creationists would expect, and is definitely inconsistent with young-earth

creationism (Ecker, 1990,46-48), since young-earth creationists hold that the

earth is no more than several thousand years old - far less than the time

involved in the Cambrian explosion.

5.5: All of the explanations of gaps in the fossil record, such as the

invocation of punctuated equilibrium and the low probability of fossilization,

render the evolutionary prediction of transitional forms unfalsifiable.

Punctuated equilibrium and the low probability of fossilization are both

scientific explanations for the scarcity of transitional forms, and are not

characterized by the contrived nature so evident in the creationist's use of

the "appearance of age" and "test of faith" ploys. The evolutionist's

explanations for gaps in the fossil record are derived from experimental data

and an understanding of natural processes, and must be reasonable to become

accepted by the scientific community. The fact that there is much debate about

punctuated equilibrium clearly shows that the scientific community is not

desperately clutching at straws. Note also that all evolutionists still predict

the existence of at least some transitional forms, as opposed to the

creationist's predictions of none. If we still did not know of any transitional

forms today, after more than a century of paleontological research, the idea of

transitional forms would be adequately falsified. But given the numerous

transitional forms that have indeed been found, all falsifiable forms of

creationism find themselves falsified.

5.6: Fossils are the remains of the living organisms that perished in Noah's

Flood. The fossil record thus lends no testimony to evolution or an old earth.

R.J. Schadewald lists six arguments that cast great doubt upon the validity of

the flood:

the Karoo Formation contains the remains of some 800 billion vertebrate animals.

If one conservatively estimates that the Karoo Formation contains a mere 1% of

all of the vertebrate fossils on earth, this means that before the flood the

earth would have held 2100 vertebrates of varying sizes per acre. If marine

fossils comprise 0.1% of the volume of sedimentary rock, this means that before

the Flood these organisms would have covered the earth to a depth of at least

1.5 feet. The varves of the Green River formation would, by the standard

interpretation, take 20 million years to form. For the varves to have been

formed during the Flood by shallow flows of mud-laden water (as the

creationists conjecture), would have necessitated a sequence of 40 million

flows covering tens of thousands of square miles every two-thirds of a second.

Noah, his wife, his three sons, and their wives - being the only human

occupants on the Ark (Genesis 6:18, 7:13) - must have carried all of the

diseases specific to man in their bodies, were the disease organisms to survive

the Flood. Given that only two of most of the animals of each kind were on

board, some of the specific disease organisms known today would have been wiped

out by the eventual immunity of the two. Hydraulic sorting during the Flood

would have caused large trilobites to have always been found in lower strata

than small trilobites, because of hydrodynamic drag properties. This is not

what is actually found. Victim habitat and mobility arguments are similarly

shown to be wrong by the fact that fossils of flowering plants - despite their

relative immobility and their existence at all elevations - never appear before

the Cretaceous era. There are overturned strata, explainable by conventional

geology, but impossible to explain by the working of the Flood. How could the

Flood cause upside down raindrop craters and brachiopod burrows? (Schadewald,

1983, 448-453)

5.7: In their search for transitional forms, the evolutionary community has been

taken in by outright fraud, as in the case of Piltdown Man, which was accepted

as a valid specimen for 40 years, and by unfounded speculation, as in the

construction of Nebraska Man from what later turned out to be a pig tooth. This

shows how unobjective evolutionists are. Regarding Piltdown Man, W.L. Strauss

reports: "It may be wondered why 40 years elapsed before the hoax was

discovered. Two factors enter here: first, there was no reason at all to

suspect the perpetration of a fraud, at least, not until fluorine analysis

indicated the relative recency of the specimens, thus making the association of

a human cranium and an anthropoid-ape jaw, either anatomically or geologically,

hardly credible; and, second, methods for conclusively determining whether the

specimens were actual fossils or faked ones short of their wholesale

destruction, were developed only in recent years" (Strauss, 1954, 580). There

is no gap in the charts of human ancestry were Piltdown Man used to be.

Numerous australopithecine finds have firmly established Australopithecus where

the single Piltdown specimen once stood.

The creationists, too, have had their share of frauds, and have foisted them

upon the public with apparently deceitful intentions. A good example are the

Paluxy River tracks - a smattering of presumably human footprints among

dinosaur tracks, intended to prove that man and dinosaurs were contemporaneous.

All of the "human tracks," displayed in deliberately poor quality photographs by

creationists (to make it more difficult to tell what the tracks really are), can

be shown to be one of three things:

parts of dinosaur tracks erosion holes contemporary human carvings (Scott, n.d.).

The Paluxy "man-tracks" have been denounced even by some creationists, but

continue to be exhibited in creationist literature.

The "construction" of Nebraska Man may be conceded as a serious mistake on the

part of a single, overzealous scientist. Countless other hominid fossils,

however, have stood the test of time, and supply ample evidence for human

evolution. And at least no evolutionist today cites Nebraska Man as evidence

for evolution, unlike the creationists, who continue to cite the "Paluxy

footprints" long after their real nature has been exposed. One might also note

that the creationists, too, have fallen prey to wild speculation in the

reconstruction of hominids. For instance,

[Reverend Carl] Baugh and his associates appeared on an area television

station's evening news claiming that a Cretaceous fossil tooth found at

Dinosaur Valley State Park was human and thus invalidated the standard

geological column. They later recanted when microscopic examination

demonstrated that the item in question was a fossil fish tooth...(Eve, 1991,

129) [emphasis added]

5.8: There are no adequate transitional forms between fish and amphibians. The

crossopterygian fish Eusthenopteron is linked to the early amphibian

Icthyostega by a number of characteristics:

same pattern of skull bones as Icthyostega internal nostrils (found only in land

animals and sarcopterygians --a greater taxonomic group encompassing lungfish

and crossopterygians) teeth like amphibians a two-part cranium (icthyostegids

are the only other vertebrates that have this characteristic) same vertebral

structure (list from McGowan, 1984, 152-153)

Moreover, studies of the skeletal characteristics of Acanthostega, the most

primitive tetrapod known (at 360 million years of age) reveal that "tetrapod

anatomy evolved while our ancestors lived exclusively underwater - and it

evolved for life underwater. The first vertebrate that walked onto land didn't

crawl on fish fins; it had evolved well-tuned legs millions of years

beforehand" (Zimmer, 1995, 120). Acanthostega has arms "poorly designed for

support" (Zimmer, 1995, p. 124) yet functional enough in water, allowing the

creature to pull itself along the bottom of plant-rich coastal lagoons, and

also making the creature superior at ambushing prey compared to fish, which

must remain afloat by keeping their fins "in constant motion, kicking up easily

detected waves" (Zimmer, 1995, 126). Additionally, Acanthostega, despite being a

tetrapod, has a hearing system more similar to fish than to land-going

creatures, and breathed like a fish (Zimmer, 1995, 125). Paleontologists have

also "found fragments from five more tetrapods, all of which were roughly

contemporaries of Acanthostega and some of which were more advanced and thus

closer to a terrestrial life" (Zimmer, 1995, 126).

See the Transitional Vertebrate Fossil FAQ for more information.

5.9: There are no adequate transitional forms between reptiles and mammals. Two

genera (Probelesodon and Massetognathus) of the cynodonts, a small subdivision

of the synapsids, display characteristics of both reptiles and mammals, as well

as qualities that are ambiguous. The reptilian features are:

lower jaw comprises several bones jaw joint formed between articular and

quadrate bones small cranium ribs in neck region number of bones in fingers and

toes exceeds 2,3,3,3.

The mammalian features are:

teeth specialized for different functions lower jaw with prominent coronoid

process double condyle at back of skull for neck articulation axis with

odontoid process ilium slopes forward

The ambiguous characteristics are:

cheek teeth have simple cusps jaw joint formed between hollow in the lower jaw

and flat surface in the skull prominent ribs confined to chest region, but

there are short ribs in front of the pelvis legs not splayed, but not

vertically beneath body either (list from McGowan, 1984, 138).

Probainognathus, another genus of the cynodonts, has both reptilian and

mammalian jaw joints, and shows the first step in the change of the reptilian

jaw joints into the mammalian ear ossicles. This does away with the creationist

charge that a reptile-mammal transitional form could not have chewed its food

while its jaw was being unhinged and repositioned for hearing (McGowan,1984,

139). Also, Probainognathus would have had no trouble hearing during

rearticulation, as reptiles exploit the transmission of sound from the ground

through their jawbones (Kitcher, 1982, 111).

See the Transitional Vertebrate Fossil FAQ for more information.

5.10: There are no adequate transitional forms between early hominids and Homo

sapiens. I defer this criticism to Jim Foley's definitive Fossil Hominids FAQ.

Philosophy of Science, Educational Issues

6.1: It is likely that many structures in the universe were created with the

appearance of old age. This is in accordance with the way God created things in

Genesis - even man was created in adult form, so why not the rest of the

universe? The first notable appeal to "appearance of age" was made in the

Victorian era by Philip Gosse in his book Omphalos. But, as John Barrow and

Joseph Silk report, "Not surprisingly, even the Victorians were not eager to

embrace Gosse's idea of a Creator who performed such sleight of hand" (Barrow,

1993, 4). The morality of a creator who makes the world appear old in every

respect, yet expects us to believe that it is actually young, is uncomfortably

suspect.

Moreover, if one regards as plausible the notion that everything was made with

the mere appearance of age, there is little to stop one from accepting that

everything - the Bible included, of course - was brought into existence only a

few hundred years ago by Satan, or even that the universe came into existence a

few hours ago complete with us and our memories (Abell, 1983, 34). Old-earth

creationist Hugh Ross concurs with this analysis:

Taken to its logical conclusion, the appearance-of-age hypothesis would imply

that we cannot establish the actuality of our own or others' past existence. We

could have been created just a few hours ago with the Creator implanting scars,

memory, progeny, photographs, material possessions, liver spots, and hardening

of the arteries to make us appear and feel older than we really are. Also, if

God built into the universe natural testimony of events which never took place,

how can we claim the Bible is free of written testimony of events which never

took place? (Ross, 1994, 40)

Creationists would no doubt be dismayed to have such scenarios on equal standing

with their Biblical account of creation. However, since there is no way to test

the world for appearance of age, and the idea has no explanatory power, real

scientists rightfully pay little attention to it. (Abell, 1983, 34).

Creationists might object that the actuality of the old age of the universe is

as unfalsifiable as the "appearance of age" concept, on the ground that a

reliance upon empirical data is as much a matter of taste as a reliance upon

the authority of a book. However, science is by definition based in empiricism,

and a simple application of Occam's razor eliminates the unnecessary ontological

load of "appearance of age."

6.2: Evolution teaches that there are no such things as souls, that the Bible is

fraudulent, and that God does not exist. These charges, even if they were true,

have nothing to do with the scientific validity of evolution. Such accusations

reveal the true religious motivations of the creationists, and their eagerness

to confuse scientific issues by the inappropriate discussion of metaphysics

when a religious audience is around.

In any case, however, the charges are false. Science, by definition, is unable

to reveal anything about the supernatural. While the historical sciences do

contradict a naively literal interpretation of Genesis, it is ridiculous to

assert that this makes them anti-Bible, anti-religion, or anti-Christianity.

Carl Sagan reports that

Modern Roman Catholicism has no quarrel with the Big Bang, with a Universe 15

billion years or so old, with the first living things arising from

prebiological molecules, or with humans evolving from apelike ancestors -

although it has special opinions on "ensoulment." Most mainstream Protestant

and Jewish faiths take the same sturdy position. (Sagan, 1995, 278)

Pope John Paul II's Message to Pontifical Academy of Sciences, October 22, 1996,

supports Sagan's claim.

Chris McGowan emphasizes that "The majority of Christians regard the book of

Genesis as a collection of parables which illustrate the point that there is a

God, a God who has dominion over the world... The issue is not one between

Christians and evolutionists, but between a vociferous Christian minority - the

creationists - and evolutionists" (McGowan, 1984, 1-2). Exemplifying this, in

McLean v Arkansas, "officials of the United Methodist, Episcopal, Roman

Catholic, African Methodist Episcopal, and Presbyterian Churches, the American

Jewish Congress, and many other clergy and religious groups" (Bakken, n.d.)

opposed the "balanced treatment" law that would have given creationism equal

time with evolution in Arkansas science classes. Clearly evolution is quite

compatible with many religions, Christian and otherwise. Given the evidence for

evolution and certain biblical peculiarities - particularly the incompatibility

of the two Genesis accounts - there is good reason to believe that Genesis 1

and 2 are allegories rather than factual accounts, and that God is an

irresponsible or wicked deceiver if one of the two stories is a factual

account. This makes any evolutionist - even an atheistic one - a more righteous

upholder of God than the creationists.

6.3: Great scientists such as Newton and Kepler believed in a literal Genesis.

Newton died in 1727 - 132 years before Darwin published his On the Origin of

Species, and 17 years before Lamarck was even born. Kepler died 12 years before

the birth of Newton. Clearly, Kepler and Newton had no exposure to a solid

theory of evolution. It is wrong - but typical - for the creationists to judge

modern scientists on the basis of the incomplete knowledge of those long

deceased.

6.4: Evolutionists are trying to take over the school system and force their

beliefs upon the students. "There is no law that mandates the teaching of

evolution, and there should not be, yet it is practically universally taught in

universities and colleges around the world. The theory of evolution is what is

taught because it is what best explains the data in a rational manner." (Berra,

1990, 139-140) Creationists, however, have visibly used legal channels to try to

force their beliefs into the school system. Two of many examples are:

The Tennessee Anti-Evolution Act (1925): this Act made it unlawful to teach in

public school "any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man

as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a

lower order of animals" (Zetterberg, 1983, 386). It was repealed in 1967. The

Tennessee Creationism Act (1973): this Act prohibited biology textbooks from

representing evolution as "scientific fact" as opposed to "theory," and

demanded that all textbooks that do discuss evolution give equal emphasis to

other "theories" including the Genesis account. It was declared

unconstitutional in 1975. (Zetterberg, 1983, 387)

6.5: Natural processes cannot be the cause of qualities seen in humans like

love. For instance, the cause of love must be something loving.If it were a

rule that the cause of x must be x-like, that would imply that manure, one

cause of the growth of "tasty and nutritious" rhubarb, must itself be tasty and

nutritious (Ruse, 1982, 305). Michael Shermer asks "If [the cause of x must be

x-like], should not nature then have a natural cause, not a supernatural

cause?!" (Shermer, n.d., 4) Furthermore, there is every reason to believe that

even our most sacred, poetized behavioral qualities can be reduced to natural

processes. For instance, researchers have demonstrated a strong connection

between natural amphetamines and the emotion of love (Toufexis, 1993, 50).

6.6: There are many theories of evolution, each of which "conclusively

disproves" the other. Ernst Mayr lists the five major elements of Darwinian

theory as:

the notion that organisms are transformed over time the common descent of all

organisms the multiplication of species through speciation gradual as opposed

to saltationary change of populations natural selection as the driving force

behind change (Mayr, 1991, 36-37).

All evolutionary theorists - whether gradualists, punctuationalists, or whatever

- understand and accept (1), (2), and (3). There is indeed disagreement about

(4) and (5), but all sides recognize that there is conclusive evidence for (1),

(2), and (3) no matter what tempo or mechanism of evolution one supports. As it

turns out, article (2) is the central issue in the creationism vs. evolution

debate, so the debate over (4) and (5) does not help the creationists at all,

and is not a sign of weakness in evolutionary theory.

With respect to the alleged conflict between punctuationalism and Darwinism

specifically, it is helpful to note that

[w]ith time, the controversy was diffused. Population geneticists showed that

even gradual selection within populations could produce evolutionary change

that would appear virtually instantaneous on a geological time-scale, such as

that defined by the fossil record. [Punctuationist Stephen Jay] Gould backed

awar from some of his flirtations with non-Darwinian evolution. The main people

who felt that something big had really happened were the editors who put

together cover stories for popular magazines, as well as the rabble of

anti-Darwinians, including creationists, who are often happy to celebrate

confusion among the Darwinians.

The consensus now is pretty much where Darwin was. We expect evolution to be

sedate in biological time, but its results can be fairly abrupt and disjointed

in the fossil record. (Rose, 1998, 88-89)

If a multiplicity of mechanistic theories poses a problem for a greater

theoretical framework, then the creationists are in worse trouble than the

evolutionists, as there are more creationist theories than evolutionary

theories. To name a few, there are:

Day/age creationists such as the Jehovah's Witnesses, who believe each "day" in

Genesis 1 represents millenia.

Gap theorists as found in the Worldwide Church of God, who believe that there

were two creations-the first involving all extinct life found in the fossil

record, and the second involving all life still around today (Edwords, 1983,

304)

Progressive creationists who believe in "a series of numerous separate

creations, each interrupted by a gap in the fossil record" (Edwords, 1983, 305)

Special Creationists who hold that all life was created in six 24-hour periods

around 6,000 years ago, and that the Noachian Flood is responsible for

everything from the fossil record to radiometric dates.

And these are only a sample of the Christian "theories" of creation - there are

other religions with other creation theories.

6.7: Evolution is unfalsifiable, and thus unscientific. A haphazard

chronological distribution of fossils of varying complexity in the fossil

record, or a non-DNA based genetic code for advanced organisms, are just two

examples of findings that could falsify evolution. Creationism, on the other

hand is completely unfalsifiable by practicing creationists, as they assume

from the beginning that their interpretation of the Bible is completely

factual, and readily twist around in the most absurd fashion any evidence that

contradicts their hypothesis. Their stance is not surprising, however, seeing

that those unhindered by a belief in Biblical infallibility find countless

disproofs of creationism. In short, then, creationism in any falsifiable form

has already been falsified, so the creationists choose to keep it in an

unfalsifiable, unscientific form by adding shoddy theological articles to their

premises.

6.8: Electrons are materially inconceivable, but physicists largely accept them

as real entities. So what is to keep one from accepting the reality of an

inconceivable Creator? Though "materially inconceivable", electrons have

specific qualities from which one can predict their existence and behavior. A

creator, on the other hand, can act as arbitrarily as it wants, so it cannot be

understood even in the mathematically rigorous manner of the electron. This

makes hypotheses involving electrons falsifiable, but hypotheses involving a

mysterious "Creator" unfalsifiable and therefore unscientific.

6.9: The exclusive teaching of evolution in the science classroom violates the

teaching of multiculturalism, because many different cultures have creation

myths which contradict evolution. The teaching of mutliculturalism is fulfilled

in humanities and social science classes, in which creation myths can be taught

as the cultural/historical elements they are. Myths of any sort do not belong

in the science classroom, where only science is to be taught.

Creationists, of course, are not really interested in multiculturalism, anyways

- they do not push for equal time for all creation myths, but only for their

own Biblical myth. Neither do they attempt to advance multiculturalism in their

own Christian schools by giving equal time to the myths of other religions.

6.10: Evolution predicts that natural law should be constantly evolving, as

opposed to the creation model, which states that law should stay fixed. This is

entirely untrue. Evolution is a theory that itself fits only into a framework of

fixed natural law. Creationists, of course, contradict themselves when they make

this claim, since they are willing to distort the natural rates of processes

like radioactivity and sedimentation to save their young-earth concept (Ruse,

1982, 305).

6.11: Nothing can be proven, particularly events in the past. Therefore,

creationism must be just as reasonable as evolution. Although absolute proof of

just about anything is impossible, there are certainly things that are more

reasonable and better supported than others. For instance, given that there is

no absolute proof that you will fall if you jump off a cliff (who knows when

the force of gravity might reverse itself for reasons unknown to mere

mortals?), is it reasonable to jump? Past events are no less susceptible to

support than anything else - if someone claimed that one thousand years ago

people who jumped off cliffs never fell, would it be reasonable to believe him?

It is possible, of course, that gravity did not function 1,000 years ago, and

that all of our records to the contrary are just a fraud designed by a

malicious creator, but how plausible does this sound? By no means does the

impossibility of absolute proof of evolution or creationism make the two equal

in plausibility. The indirect evidence for an evolutionary past far outweighs

in its plausibility the creationists' collection of arbitrary assumptions.

6.12: There is nothing wrong with invoking supernatural explanations. In

Methodological Naturalism and the Supernatural, I argue that it is in principle

possible for certain supernatural explanations to be consistent with the

scientific enterprise. However, it is worth noting that this is emphatically

not to say that the supernatural explanations creationists tend to offer are

good ones, or that they are even necessarily consistent with the scientific

enterprise - appealing to divine agency simply to square one's theory with

contradictory data, as the creationists do, is not legitimate scientific use of

the supernatural - if a creationist advances supernatural explanations just to

patch up holes in her "theory" of creation, an evolutionist could equally

easily advance supernatural explanations for evolution (i.e. "in the past, all

mutations were beneficial, but the laws that made this so are no longer in

effect"). Both types of appeals would ultimately end up halting the scientific

enterprise.

6.13: There are many unanswered questions in science, such as the details of the

origin of the universe and of prebiotic synthesis. Thus we require a

supernatural God for explanation. This argument is entirely antithetical to the

nature of science. Just because a question is currently unanswered does not mean

that it cannot be answered, and that we should shrug our shoulders and embrace

the supernatural on faith. History has shown us time and time again that

science eventually finds solutions to its problems. If we concoct a

supernatural explanation every time we run into a problem, science, and

probably civilization, will be completely corrupted. In any case, if we were to

accept the supernatural, then anything would be tenable - we would not be forced

to accept a particular creation theory. In the realm of the supernatural, there

is as much reason to believe in creator-pixies, or in a universe that

supernaturally came into existence all on its own, as there is to believe in

any Genesis-style creation.

6.14: Evolution is just a theory. The colloquial use of the word "theory"

corresponds more or less to the scientific word "hypothesis." A hypothesis is a

proposition or explanation that is not at all certain, and demands evidence

prior to acceptance. In scientific circles, the word "theory" is much more than

a hypothesis. "A scientific theory is the endpoint of the scientific method,

often the foundation of an entire field of knowledge..." (Berra, 1990, 4).

Calling evolution "just a theory" is an attempt to discredit the obvious by

confusing colloquial and scientific terminology. Evolution is a theory in the

same sense as Copernican theory (the theory that the earth goes around the

sun), the theory of gravity, electromagnetic theory, quantum theory, and the

theory of relativity. One cannot say of evolution that it is just a theory any

more than one can say it of these other theories.

6.15: Evolution and creationism are the only two possible models of origins.

There are many serious problems with evolution, so creationism is the correct

model by default. Certainly evolution is either true or false, and creationism

is likewise either true or false, but it does not follow from these two

premises that "either evolution is true or creationism is true." There are, in

fact, always an infinite number of "models" that can account for any scientific

data.

Examples of alternatives to both creationism and evolution include:

Illusory scenarios: The notion that you are the only person in this apparent

world that really exists, and that the rest of the "reality" you perceive is

really just an illusion generated by you (solipsism), a higher power (Cartesian

"evil genius" scenarios), or some complicated machine your real brain is

directly wired into ("brain-in-the-vat" scenarios). Under such scenarios, your

experiences are like what they would be like if you had been attached to some

sophisticated virtual reality machine since birth - they seem to correspond to

a real world, but do not really correspond to the real world. Such scenarios

are consistent with all of the empirical data one can (even in principle)

encounter in the world.

Wait-and-see proposals: Michael Denton believes that neither creationism nor

evolutionary biology can account for the data we currently possess about

organisms and their history. Denton believes that science must wait for some

entirely new theory to be developed, which may be as revolutionary to biology

as quantum mechanics was to physics (Denton, 1985).

All-but-the-soul accounts: Richard Swinburne, one of the top Christian

apologists in the world, believes that "[a]lthough there is much uncertainty

about the exact stages and mechanisms involved, the fact of evolution is

evident"(Swinburne, 1986, 1). Swinburne believes that evolution accounts for

everything except for the human soul, which was created by God a few thousand

years ago. Pope John Paul II, in his Message to Pontifical Academy of Sciences,

October 22, 1996, seems to agree with Swinburne's assessment.

Alternative naturalistic accounts: John Davison has developed a theory he

believes serves as an alternative to both Darwinian evolution and creationism,

which he calls the semi-meiotic hypothesis.

Clearly, one must not make a choice between evolution and creationism - there

are many proposals that serve as an alternative to both.

Also, even if creationism and evolution were the only two alternatives, it is

not sound scientific practice to rely upon fault-finding as a means of

advancing one's own hypothesis. The creationists point to many alleged problems

with evolution, but even if these problems were real (most of them, as I have

already shown, are not), that would not be sufficient to prove creationism true

- creationism has its own difficulties, so unless the creationists can amass as

much positive evidence for their proposal as evolutionists have for theirs,

creationism will remain less plausible.

The creationists rely upon rhetoric and obscurantism so much because they can

never come up with good evidence for creationism - so far, not one of the few

creationist research papers ever submitted to a scientific journal has merited

publishing. Note that creationists have, incidentally, submitted very few

papers to scientific journals in the first place, so there is absolutely no

evidence that their papers are rejected for discriminatory reasons.

6.16: Evolution is the basis for Naziism, laissez-faire capitalism, slavery,

etc. As a scientific theory, evolution is morally neutral. It tells how the

world is, not how it ought to be. As such, attempts to draw moral doctrines

from evolutionary theory typically misunderstand the capabilities of science,

and more often than not end up abusing rather than using evolution. As Philip

Kitcher notes:

Various people have appealed to the theory of evolution to lend respectability

to their appalling moral views...But this fact says very little about

evolutionary theory itself. Virtually any morally neutral, or even morally

good, doctrine can be misused for evil purposes. (Kitcher, 1982, 196).

Creationists, most of whom are Christians, should be able to understand the

point by considering some of the moral doctrines for which Christianty was the

"basis," and asking whether this means Christianity is evil or incorrect:

The most popular doctrine for use in rationalizing evil and immoral actions has

surely been Christianity. There is a long record of brutalities and atrocities

perpetrated in the name of Christ: the Crusades, the persecution of the

Huguenots, periodic waves of anti-Semitism, sporadic witch burnings, the

Inquisition, 300 years of Irish "troubles"; the list could go on and on. Add to

this the explicit racism of some contemporary Christian sects, the repressive

moral doctrines imposed by the Church at many times in the past, the denials of

justice and human rights in the name of the 'divine right of Christian princes."

Yet although the Christian Church has a checkered history, it is evident that

Christians can claim--quite justifiably--that the evils result from perversions

of religious doctrine: Evil or misguided men have twisted the Gospel to evil

ends...But if charity ought to be extended to the Christian doctrine, then it

is equally appropriate for evolutionary theory. Both the Bible and evolutionary

theory can be misread and their principles abused. (Kitcher, 1989, 197-198)

Turning to some of the specific charges, Carl Sagan, taking up laissez-faire

capitalism and Naziism, correctly notes that

Voracious robber barons may explain their cutthroat practices by an appeal to

Social Darwinism; Nazis and other racists may call on "survival of the fittest"

to justify genocide. But Darwin did not make John D. Rockefeller or Adolf

Hitler. Greed, the Industrial Revolution, the free enterprise system, and

corruption of government by the monied are adequate to explain

nineteenth-century capitalism. Ethnocentrism, xenophobia, social hierarchies,

the long history of anti-Semitism in Germany, the Versailles Treaty, German

child-rearing practices, inflation, and the Depression seem adequate to explain

Hitler's rise to power. Very likely these or similar events would have

transpired with or without Darwin. And modern Darwinism makes it abundantly

clear that many less ruthless traits, some not always admired by robber barns

and Führers - altruism, general intelligence, compassion - may be the key to

survival. (Sagan, 1995, 260).

Extending Kitcher's point above, it may pay to note the causal impact that

doctrine derived from the Bible had on the Holocaust:

"For century after century, the Christian church had designated the people to be

despised: religious believers called Jews, the "Christ-killers," the "enemies of

God." All the religious massacres [of Jews] of 900 years - by Crusaders pursuing

infidels, by inquisitors hunting backsliders, by superstitious mobs fearing

tales of child-sacrificing, host-nailing, and well-poisoning - branded Jews as

accursed. When popes ordered Jews to wear badges and live in ghettos - or when

they were expelled entirely - it told the populace that these pariahs were

unfit to live among decent folk. Passion plays depicting Jews as cruel mockers

of Christ, and cathedral paintings of the evil non-Christians, fanned hatred of

those the church called "the perfidious Jews."

Thus, when Adolf Hitler needed a scapegoat group to rally the discontented

majority to his cause and catapult himself to power, natural victims clearly

marked by the church were at his disposal. The Christian public, not only in

Germany, but also throughout Europe, was predisposed to receive the Nazi

message of hatred." (Haught, 1990, 157-158)

"The Holocaust was, of course, the bitter fruit of long centuries of Christian

teaching about the Jewish people." (Dr. Franklin Little, chairman of the

Department of Religion at Temple University, as quoted in Haught, 1990, 158)

"[The Holocaust] could not have been done had not the name of God been used for

centuries to preach hatred of the Other, the Jews." (A.M. Rosenthal, editor of

the New York Times, as quoted in Haught, 1990, 158)

"[The Nazis] are inconceivable apart from this Christian tradition [namely, the

tradition of hostility to the Jews]. Hitler's pogrom, for all its

distinctiveness, is the zenith of a long Christian heritage of teaching and

practice against Jews." (Clark Williamson, theologian of Christian Theological

Seminary, Indianapolis, as quoted in Haught, 1990, 159)

"[The Nazis] did not invent a new villain...They took over the 2,000-year-old

Christian tradition of the Jew as villain...The roots of the death camps must

be sought in the mythic structure of Christianity." (Richard Reubenstein,

theologian, as quoted in Haught, 1990, 160)

"Everything Hitler did to the Jews, all the horrible, unspeakable misdeeds, had

already been done to the smitten people before by the Christian churches...The

isolation of Jews into ghetto camps, the wearing of the yellow spot, the

burning of Jewish books, and finally the burning of the people - Hitler learned

it all from the church. However, the church burned Jewish women and children

alive, while Hitler granted them a quicker death, choking them first with gas."

(Dagobert Runes, historian, as quoted in Haught, 1990, 163).

"The Holocaust was made possible by the continued denigration of Jews over many

centuries, by professed Christians of Central Europe." (Christian philosopher

Richard Swinburne, in Swinburne, 1998, 107).

As for slavery, Robert Pennock points out that:

The evil of slavery was perpetrated long before the theory of evolution ever

arose. Certainly evolutionary theory itself does not justify slavery, and

Darwin himself was an adamant abolitionist who wrote "How weak are the

arguments of those who maintain that slavery is a tolerable evil!" Sadly, among

the most common proslavery arguments were those made by Christians who quoted

Leviticus (25:44-46), 1 Timothy (6:1), and a variety of other scriptural

passages to show that slavery was endorsed by the Bible. Indeed, creationists

should know that it was once common to cite Genesis (9:27), in which the

righteous Noah curses his son Ham and his descendants to be slaves, as the

"creation story" of slavery. (Pennock, 1999, 315-316)

Does the fact that doctrine derived from the Bible was used for evil purposes

indicate that Christianity is actually evil or false? Then how do similar facts

indicate that evolution is evil or false? In fact, the situation is worse for

Christianity than it is for evolution, because while the Bible does contain

explicit moral commands, evolution is, once again, a purely descriptive theory.

And how can it be, as Pennock points out above, that evolutionary theory "led"

to effects which existed before evolutionary theory was developed?

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Acknowledgements

Special, albeit belated, thanks goes out to Douglas J. Futuyma, the appendix to

whose outstanding book, Science on Trial, provided the initial inspiration for

this document.

I would like to express heartfelt appreciation to the many people who have

written letters of thanks, encouragement, and advice, and to those who have

given me pointers to new information or personal research. In particular, I

would like to thank William B. Provine, Anthonie Muller, Nigel Arnot, John

Davison, Chris Stassen, and Larry Taylor for their input. I would also like to

thank Brett Vickers and the many affiliates of talk.origins for permitting me

to link extensively to their archive from this list.

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