Viva la evolution

Not A Darwin Monkey

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

Dear Denis

If you are evolved from a Monkey as you claim, how can I trust your article and thoughts to be true? After all as the great man said, 'who would trust the conviction of a monkey's mind.' (and unlike you he expressed doubt.)

brian gale

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

What a tragic delusion D.A. is under! Clearly he is happy to swallow all the athistic scientific insights, whilst ignoring the very real arguments for special creation. In a sense he is helping to do the Devil's work for him, without realising it. More scientists than ever before are moving away from the theory of ev. on purely scientific grounds, and this on a global scale.
The damage done esp. to young people falling away from Christ is incalculable. The creationist's war for God is not just against atheism, but against compromise in the Church. The latter has manipulated the bible, which is the absolute expression of God's truth. DA will have one day have to confess why he disbelieves Jesus' own words, 'If you do not believe Moses, why would you believe what I say?' Many other quotes underline Jesus authority as Creator.
Evolution is the author of untold misery in the world. Our God is superior to all that.

Geoff Chapman

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

Denis Alexander bemoans the fact that some Christians are going around trying to persuade people to disbelieve evolution. He wrote "In a world where people are dying to hear the good news about Jesus for the first time, where thousands are made homeless in cyclones and where millions still live without clean water supplies. Trying to persuade Christians to disbelieve Darwinism soaks up huge resources that could be better spent elsewhere."
As an active creationist for the past 27 years I found his comments highly objectionable, since it inferred that people like me don't care about world poverty or evangelism. I actively support Christian relief agencies and evangelism, and I am sure that other creationists do also. Furthermore, since creation ministries around the world are making people more open to the Gospel,and resulting in true conversions, in the long run this means there will be more people who care about the problems of the world. Evolution, with its "survival of the fittest" mentality hardly encourages people to care for others" Indeed, it has spawned horrific ideas such as eugenics, not to mention Hitler's "master race" heresy.
Is Denis really saying that evolution should be immune from any criticism, and treated as some kind of "sacred cow"? If so, I find this strange, since Darwin's theory is now being criticised more than ever before on scientific grounds. See www.dissentfromdarwin.org for a list of more than 500 scientists (including 150+ biologists) who are unconvinced.
The book "God's Undertaker" by John C Lennox is one of the latest well-wounded critiques of Darwinism, and especially the religion of naturalism which springs directly from it, and is espoused by Dawkins and Co. There is no doubt that evolution has undermined and destroyed the faith of countless people, especially young Christians who go to university to be brainwashed with the notion that "evolution is fact"
Denis Alexander mentions the names of well-know theologians of the past who supported Darwin. But would they do so if they were alive today, and were aware of the massive amount of contrary evidence? It is worth noting that well-known theologian R. C. Sproul has recently announced that he now accepts a literal six-day creation. He writes: ‘For most of my teaching career, I considered the framework hypothesis to be a possibility. But I have now changed my mind. I now hold to a literal six-day creation … . Genesis says that God created the universe and everything in it in six twenty-four–hour periods.’
I can assure Denis that I and other creationists have no intention whatsoever of giving up our efforts to refute evolution, and warmly welcome the great opportunity offered by the Darwin bi-centennial to challenge evolution and encourage a healthy, informed debate on this vital issue. If Denis is really worried about this, then he must be feeling somewhat insecure in his evolutionary faith!
Geoff Chapman (Director, Creation Resources Trust)

Claire Askell

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

i was saved through creationism, and think it is a fantastic evangelical tool.
I'm not a scientist, but i was studying A level biology and didnt like the way my tutor was forcing me to write about evolution as 'fact'. I started researching the evidence and decided it should be taught as a theory. He didnt like that, so i dropped the course in protest.
Since then i've spent time looking at websites, reading pro and anti views and guess what? each time it's strengthened my faith.
I believe it is the ULTIMATE way to get Gods message to young people!

David Anderson

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

I actually live somewhere where (to use Dr. Alexander's words) "people are dying to hear the good news about Jesus for the first time" and teach a weekly Bible study in a slum where people "still live without clean water supplies", and find his attitude to those who don't swallow Darwinism whole to be rather patronising and naive. Darwinism teaches that life developed through undirected random mutations; if Dr. Alexander can't even begin to understand why Christian teachers might spend time going round churches explaining why this teaching is wrong, them he really isn't qualified to be speaking on this issue.

David Anderson

Andrew Halloway

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

I find it very sad that someone of immense ability like Denis Alexander should be so blind that he cannot see the wood for the trees.
Evolution is not the 'fact' that atheists espouse nor even a well-founded theory, and that is why Christians should not support it, before we even start to talk about its theological implications.
Perhaps the most celebrated example of 'evolution in action' is the experiments on four-winged fruit flies, where government funded research tortured perfectly healthy fruit flies with radiation to induce mutations. After decades of such experiments, we now know that the results fall into three categories:

1. Normal fruit flies,

2. Handicapped fruit flies (gross deformities and non-functional extra wings, etc.), and

3. Dead fruit flies.

To take another example, the University of Michigan has been cultivating E. Coli bacteria for 20 years or so - a reported 30,000 generations (which translates into about half a million years of human generations).
What do the researchers have to show for all that? An E. Coli strain (i.e. still E. Coli) that can metabolise citrate. This was recently trumpeted as final proof of evolution. But what they are reporting is clearly micro-evolution. E. Coli remains E. Coli. These changes within a species using existing genetic information cannot be extrapolated to imply large morphological changes into new species requiring new genetic information!
Micro-evolution is observable. It is expressed in such things as hair colour or body shapes of different breeds of dogs, colours of pigeons (Darwin's favourite), or the sizes of Galapagos Island finch beaks. This is all simple variation within species, built into the genius of the DNA code. It does not explain the origin of the finch beak or in a larger sense, the finches themselves, dogs, pigeons or the DNA coded information itself.
Macro-evolution (e.g. fish to land mammals), is not simply more micro-evolution over longer time periods, but requires new and radically different information.
This fact is never accepted by evolutionists, yet it is the crux of the matter. Read Michael Behe's new book, 'The Edge of Evolution' to find out many more scientific experiments that should have 'proved' macro-evolution, but that have failed.

Andrew Halloway

Andy McIntosh

on Tuesday, 1 July 2008

"On a planet of light and darkness you need eyes, so eyes are what you'll get, and indeed compound and camera eyes have evolved independently more than 20 times"

Come come Denis - where is the evidence? Your thesis is immediately disproved by the hard scientific facts of double calcite (image correcting) lenses in many of the Trilobites of the Cambrian explosion and Ordovician - even if you do accept the timescales, there are no precursors in any of the rocks of the precambrian. The reason an increasing number of scientists disagree strongly with your thesis is precisely because the detailed scientific evidence does not support the neo Darwinian synthesis. We strongly disagree with you because of the science itself. It is not polemic which will win your case, but credible sceintific evidence.

Your appeal to Genomics is robustly challenged by John Sanford of Cornell ('Genetic Entropy and the mystery of the genome'). He has shown that the real experimental evidence is of genetic decay - there is no new information from genetic mutations. Even if there were some mutations which were beneficial, they would get swamped by the deleterious ones of the well known Kimura sitribution. The best inference from the scientific data is that information (like software in a computer) is non material and not defined by the the matter it sits on or the energy used in the information retrieval system. There is no scientific backing for the claim that information (e.g. for eyes evolving 20 fold...) could arise by random mutations + natural selection, not least because the thermodynamics of the molecular machinery involved is against such a notion.

Frankly the obvious inference from the evidence (whether it be eyes - the so called 20 fold convergence idea in neo Darwinian interpretation - feathers, the bird lung, the brain of humans and so on) is straightforward intricate design. The more evidence that is studied in detail, the more the Darwinian stories of in between structures (half eyes for instance)are shown to be non existent. This is the reason why many scientists are realising that the science has outgrown the philosophy of evolution, and that a paradigm shift to a straightforward design thesis is urgently needed.

On the Biblical side, Denis is wrong here as well. Creation was by the spoken Word of God (John 1:3, Heb 1:3) through Christ who shows the same power in the miracles of his ministry. There was no process - the waters were stilled, the lame walked, the deaf heard - all this was immediately. The theology of redemption in Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15 is predicated upon a real Adam who brought death into the world following the Fall, and not before it. The whole evolutionary thinking of death being integral to the created Adam is denied by the Scripture. If there is not a real Adam in a real garden of Eden, then by the same token we have no assurance of a real Christ and a real Resurrection to come.

Professor Andy McIntosh

Dr Jon Orrell

on Wednesday, 2 July 2008

Thank you a thoughtful and informative article.
I too have found it more helpful to hold both the bible and science together , as different perspectives on the same process. One offering the why, the other the how.

The danger of forgetting the evangelical tradition of working inside evolution is that we entrench in fixed camps. Each speaking a different language and using different measures of truth. This leaves Dawkins a clear way to hijack science, when many of the best scientists down the ages have been christians, discovering God's thoughts after him.

Then the church has nothing to say on science and the barnacles of racial darwinism ( nazis) , class darwinism ( stalin ) or social darwinism ( capitalist exploitation ) hold sway on the public stage. Christians need to challenge all these evils with biblical truth , but spoken with scientific literacy, if we are to be credible in the debates out there in the lost world.

Paul Taylor

on Thursday, 3 July 2008

My good friends Geoff Chapman and Professor Andy McIntosh and others have answered the scientific nonsenses in Dr Alexander's extraordinarily peurile article aptly.
I will confine myself to the issue of why organisations like my own (Answers in Genesis) spend time going "round churches trying to persuade another set of Christians to disbelieve the theory of evolution". Although I do want to do precisely that, it is a secondary aim. A more important positive aim is that I want Christians actually to believe what God Himself said, rather than the twisted version of what Dr Alexander claims that God said. After all, Jesus made clear that He believed in a real person called Adam, a real person called Abel, a real person called Noah, a real worldwide global Flood etc. etc. The problem that those like Dr Alexander have to cope with is that their views are diametrically opposed to those of our Lord and Saviour. One has to ask - are we going to believe the words of Christ or not?

Lydia Davies

on Thursday, 3 July 2008

I see the lunatics have broken out of the asylum. How many of you are Third Way subscribers, out of interest, and how many of you have come here as the result of the quick organization of a barmy pressure group?

I suppose the point I'd like to make to casual readers is that most of the above is from a very extreme US-based theology, and that the only reason there are lots of them is because part of what they do is shout very loudly, and together.

In practice they're a tiny minority among Christians. Almost non-existent in the UK, I'd say.

Howard Taylor

on Thursday, 3 July 2008

C.S.Lewis gives his reasons for rejecting evolution. One of his main points is that evolution is a physical theory and 'how do we arrive at physical theories?' We use REASON. But reason cannot be physical he says, thus any theory which says how reason developed must contain non-physsical elements. Evolution does not, and therefore it fails completely. Why is reason non-physical?
When water boils at 100˚C at sea level, it is not correct or incorrect behaviour for water �
– it is just the way things are. That is true for all physical phenomena. Just as water does not consciously know anything –(such as its own boiling state), no combination of physical phenomena is conscious. Advances in the study of the brain may be impressive but they only show how physical effects have other physical effects. They may show where, in the brain, reasoning (or morality or religion) have their affect, but they don't show what the reasoning actually is about!

However, my thoughts can be correct or incorrect. I plausibly may think that the square root of 1000 is 35. However, that thought is incorrect. The square root of 1000 is actually approximately 31.62. By doing the calculation I can consciously correct my thought.

Now if the mind is just a complex combination of physical causes and effects it would be inappropriate to describe any of its operations (in producing thoughts) as true or false, just as it would be inappropriate to describe the boiling of water as true or false. Only conscious thoughts can be true or false.

Bertrand Russell:
If we imagine a world of mere matter, there would be no room for falsehood in such a world, and although it would contain what may be called ‘facts’, it would not contain any truths, in the sense in which truths are things of the same kind as falsehoods. In fact, truth and falsehood are properties of beliefs and statements: hence a world of mere matter, since it would contain no beliefs or statements, would also contain no truth or falsehood.

Howard Taylor.

Stuart Donnan

on Thursday, 3 July 2008

Those of us who try to take the Bible seriously are, I think, badly let down by fellow-Christians who seem not to be willing to read what the Bible actually says - for example to see that there are 2 creation stories at the beginning of Genesis which cannot be mapped logically onto each other. We can only make sense of the texts by acknowledging that this is not a historical account, but a profound story about God's relationship with humankind.
I find Denis Alexander's 3 models of anthropology vs Genesis to be challenging but helpful, and I presume that he would be willing - even pleased - to discuss and debate them with me; I think I prefer a different model but we would no doubt discuss them on the basis of evidence of various sorts.
The good news from Jesus seems to be that God loves the world which God made, and that it was made for us to live and walk in, in ways which please him. Living and thinking and loving and being good neighbours, following Jesus's way, to my mind is stimulated by openness to facts and investigation in the world around us, not by rejecting (or even accepting) scientific work and thinking on entrenched dogmatic grounds.
Thank God for Denis and his co-workers!

Geoff Chapman

on Thursday, 3 July 2008

I'm sad to see that Lydia Davies has taken the coward's way and, rather than engage in rational argument about FACTS, resorted to verbal abuse (rather like Richard Dawkins does.) She wrote : "I see the lunatics have broken out of the asylum. How many of you are Third Way subscribers, out of interest, and how many of you have come here as the result of the quick organization of a barmy pressure group?" This is not the way to engage in debate about such a serious subject as the origin of life.
Lydia suggests that creationists are "almost non-existent in the UK." As someone who is closely involved, I can assure her that this is certainly not the case - there are thousands of us out there! And labelling us "lunatics" and "barmy" won't deter us in the slightest! Incidentally, if it's "extreme" to believe God means what He says in the Bible, then I'll happily own up to being an extremist!
Geoff Chapman (Creation Resources Trust)

Paul Taylor

on Friday, 4 July 2008

Lydia Davies refers to creationism as "very extreme US-based theology". Who mentioned the US? We are debating the Bible, not how people's nationality affects their beliefs. Ms Davies, your racist anti-Americanism does you no credit.

Lydia Davies

on Friday, 4 July 2008

I mentioned the US because Third Way is a British magazine, speaking to and about British Christianity. 'Creationism' (a word I have to say I resent you hijacking) is a minority interest here, and the debate on this page is skewed by an American audience that I imagine Third Way does not attempt to address.

David Anderson

on Friday, 4 July 2008

Linda,

Contrary to what you have been told, the creationist position is embedded in many British church confessions from the time of the Reformation onwards. The 1654 Westminster Confession of faith, still used today by Presbyterian churches worldwide, explicitly endorses six-day creationism, as does the 1689 London Baptist Confession that best describes my own understanding. James Ussher (he of the famous 4004 BC calculation for the creation of the world, though in fact he was just one of many chronologists producing dates in this range) was a 17th century Irish bishop, not a modern American. We could go on and on with this kind of example.
I was born in England, am typing this from England, and read "Third Way" magazine in my college library when I was a theological student. You are badly misinformed.

Kind regards,
David Anderson

Antony Latham

on Friday, 4 July 2008

Denis Alexander says that it is a deep mystery as to why Christians try to persuade other Christians to disbelieve the theory of evolution and that as a theory it has no ideological implications.

It has idelogical implications because it outrules any divine input into the development of life. The 3 main foundations of Darwinism are 1/genetic variation through entirely random, directionless mutations, 2/ selection of the fittest and 3/the inheritance of aquired characteristics with common descent. It is very hard to see how God could have anything to do with this in any theistic sense. He may have set it all up (deism) and left it alone, that is all.

Denis betrays his own deist stance by his own words (I know he would strongly deny this but it is absolutely evident). He says, and I quote "taken overall it (evolution) is far from being a chance process." Now read him carefully.. what he describes as "not a chance process" turns out to be .."..design space repeatedly filling up with organisms living within the constraints of particular ecological niches." In other words - the driving force is once again entirely physical and contingent upon available ecology. We see no chance of God having anything to do with it. This is pure deism and we need to be very careful as Christians not to be taken in by such dangerous theology.

This stance of so-called 'theistic evolutionists' such as Denis Alexander is comfortable to those who wish to stay within the established scientific paradigm. It is exactly what Dawkins et al rejoice in. And Dawkins is right about something (and Darwin himself entirely felt the same): - there are indeed ideological implications in evolution.

Andrew Sibley

on Saturday, 5 July 2008

What I find so disappointing about this article is that it misrepresents the facts and leads to division amongst Christians on the basis of intellectual pride. The first stage of honest, respectful dialogue is to accurately represent the argument and position of one's opponent.

Bruce Budd

on Tuesday, 8 July 2008

This is all very confusing. Lydia Davies seems to use the words 'tiny minority' in a sense with which I am unfamiliar. I would have thought that it meant a very small number of people yet this hardly correlates with the packed-out creationist conferences and meetings which regularly occur throughout this country. In my own personal experience of speaking on creationism in the very large church of which I'm a member there is an overwhelming interest in creationism. It is worth pointing out that a great many of these people are inhibited by the teaching of evolution as fact, which it isn't, throughout the education system and mass media.
The other source of confusion arises when people seem to think that they can re-interpret the Bible. Please friends, the Word of God is either right or it's wrong. There can surely be no middle ground. If it's wrong then Christianity should cease to exist. If it is right, then none of us have the right or qualification to question it or try to interpret it to suit our own interests and presuppositions. It's not fanatical fundamentalism to completely believe what God has said. It's common sense!
Man's interpretations of the Bible are man's words, not God's, and should be treated as such. Possibly informative, possibly illuminating but not acceptable when they contradict His word.

Mike Frandsen

on Wednesday, 9 July 2008

If this magazine is supposed to be based on facts, then who's job is it to check them? If this is a fiction magazine then please notate that in the title of your publication. The "facts" of evolution are not facts at all. It is just an unproven theory. Dr. Kent Hovind will pay 250,000 for factual evidence of the this theory. To date he has not had to pay out, because there is no proof. See www.drdino.com for more info on that.

Paige Burr

on Wednesday, 9 July 2008

Another one of the deep mysteries of the early 21st century is why one set of Christians go round churches trying to persuade another set of Christians to BELIEVE the theory of evolution. This is in a world where people are dying to hear the good news about Jesus for the first time, where thousands are made homeless in cyclones and where millions still live without clean water supplies. Trying to persuade Christians to disbelieve the biblical account soaks up huge resources that could be better spent elsewhere.

Harvey Edser

on Wednesday, 9 July 2008

It saddens me greatly to read many of the comments above - are fellow Christians unable to engage in debate on this issue without resorting to unedifying vitriol and insult ('puerile', 'coward's way', 'lunatics', etc)?

If this kind of exchange is the best that we can come up with within the church, what hope do we have of engaging with those outside?

Mike Frandsen

on Friday, 11 July 2008

In response to Harvey E. And everybody else that has the be nice opinion, It is clearly stated In the Bible that those who would teach false doctrine are to be rebuked, then booted out of the church if the practice continues. I agree that name calling is wrong. However, Mr. ALEXANDER, has done this in the past and will continue, he has been taught that evolution and God don't mix, they are polar opposites. If I am wrong please correct me.

Harvey Edser

on Friday, 11 July 2008

As demonstrated by the exchanges above, the creation-evolution issue divides Christians in a sad and strange way. Those who hold strongly to either creationism or evolution apparently see those who represent the other position as opponents (enemies even) to be defeated or ridiculed. Debate becomes divisive polemic with neither side even trying to listen to the other. Intelligent argument is reduced to point-scoring, soundbites and mud-slinging: 'why can't you unbelieving evolutionists just accept God's Word?' or 'why do I have to listen to you if you’re a monkey’s great-grandson?' on one side, and 'why can't you crazy creationists just accept the scientific facts?' on the other.

Each side believes they are representing Truth against Error, or Fact against Ignorance, and so there is no room for dialogue. If you know you are right why listen to your opponents’ dangerous ideas? But from this kind of polarised right-vs-wrong thinking spring Holy Wars, factions, schisms and all manner of evils perpertrated in the name of God and of Truth.

The stakes are high here. After all, how can you argue with God’s own perfect Word? It’s hard for creationists to see that their fellow Christians who accept evolution really do not believe themselves to be undermining the truth of the Bible. I know that Denis Alexander sees himself as a straightforward Bible-believing conservative evangelical. Roger Forster, author of several books defending the theory of evolution from a Christian perspective, is also the founder of the Ichthus Christian Fellowship and honorary vice-president of the Evangelical Alliance and TEAR Fund.

To people like these, the theory of evolution does not in any way contradict the Biblical account but complements it. They see Gen 1-2 as divinely-inspired poetic polemic against polytheism, or as a Truth-bearing story with legitimate symbolic elements (such as the Tree of Life, see also Revelation 2 and 22), or as a framework for a process which took millions of years.

This is hard for biblical literalists to accept, because to their way of thinking there is only one way to read and interpret the Bible: to accept it as plain, simple, historical and scientific fact as we would expect from a modern textbook.

NB I’m not here trying to defend one side over the other. I have several problems both with the theory of evolution as it stands and also with the 6-day creationist position, and I am not theologian or scientist enough to decide between the two. But I can live with this uncertainty and not feel that my faith in Christ is undermined by it.

There are good people, good scientists, good Christian brothers and sisters on both sides of this debate. We may believe other Christians to be wrong or misguided on this issue (or on any other issue), but labelling them ignorant or crazy, or questioning their Christianity, serves no constructive purpose.

(By the way, I didn't say 'be nice'. Christ never commanded us to be nice. But we are called to love one another, and as far as it lies with us to live at peace with one another. It seems to me that Christ is far more likely to rebuke those who are not able to abide by these commands than to those who hold to what WE - not he - label 'false doctrine'.)

Willem de Vries

on Friday, 11 July 2008

Personally I can't understand how someone who believes that the bible is God's word, can believe in evolution. To me, it's very clear that you can't believe both. At least I couldn't and I almost lost my faith in God because I was almost convinced that science had proven that evolution is true. But thanks to the people at Answers in Genesis, I now see why the evolution theory exists. That it is built on atheistic preassumptions, not on facts. And that science doesn't contradict the bible at all, it actually confirms it. If you try to fit evolution in the bible, you lose everything. Because evolution is about death, desease, pain and suffering, but God teaches us that we are to blame for all that. People like Denis Alexander teach us that God is the creator of those bad things. I think that's the same as calling God a liar and I fail to see why christians should celebrate that.

Karl Priest

on Sunday, 13 July 2008

1. Evolution was invented by Anaximander 2,500 years ago as an extension of the Gaea, Mother Earth, religion.
2. The entire universe, viable and nonviable alike, has always devolved, the exact opposite and excluder of evolved.
3. Every event in this universe is a devolutional event because some of the converted energy is lost to future events.

Biology eliminates evolution.

See: http://www.josephmastropaolo.com/.

Harvey Edser

on Monday, 14 July 2008

Let’s be clear. Evangelical creationists and evolutionists both believe in God’s sovereignty, Christ’s divinity, human sinfulness and need for atonement, the uniqueness and efficacy of Christ’s sacrifice, God’s inspiration of Scripture, etc. Both believe in the same obligations of morality and Christian practice.

All they disagree over are (1) the mechanism by which God brought about biodiversity (2) the interpretation of certain Biblical passages, chiefly Gen 1-2.

Evolutionist Christians believe that God alone created and sustains the universe and all biological life. However, they believe he carried out the process of creation through what appear (from within the natural order) to be ‘natural’ processes, which he nonetheless ordained and guided. These two are not exclusive.

To illustrate this, I believe that when our children were conceived, on a biological level the child was forming and developing by completely natural processes in which a scientific observer would detect no trace of divine intervention. Yet at the same time, I also believe that God was overseeing and directing the process and that our children were ‘made’ by God and ‘knitted together in the womb’. There is no contradiction between the natural and the divine elements; both are woven together seamlessly.

Thus Gen 1-2 can be seen as a ‘God’s-eye’ view of creation rather than what it looked like from within nature.

Dawkins and creationists both assume that evolution necessarily excludes God. But Christian evolutionists utterly reject the atheistic notion of ‘naturalistic’ evolution (i.e. a process separate from God’s activity and based on a presupposition that physical nature is all that there is). In their view, the biblical account of creation and the biological account of evolution are saying parallel things on different levels about the same process – one on the divine/supernatural level, one on the physical/natural.

We may not like the implications of evolution being God’s agency in creation – that it involves death, suffering, struggle and waste. But our dislike is not disproof. I don’t like the divinely-ordered slaughter of women and children in the Old Testament and I’m not keen on the concept of hell, but ultimately God doesn’t have to act how I would like him to.

Of course, he’s also free to create the universe in 6 days and then make it look like it took billions of years.

Denis Alexander

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

I'm glad I've at least stirred up some vigorous discussion! My book 'Creation or Evolution - Do We Have to Choose?' is now out and it addresses many of the points raised in the discussion so far in much greater detail than a brief article allows. You can buy a copy from the Faraday Institute web-site for only £6 plus p&p (go to www.faraday-institute.org).

Simon

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

The thing that worries me as both a Christian and a professional scientist is the damage that the 6-day/ID creationist camps do to the general intellectual and indeed practical standing of Christianity as a world view. Regardless of people like AiG or the discovery institute claiming some sort of conspiracy theory, the scientific community is one that thrives on anomalies and people disproving each others theories. It is also populated by some of the most intelligent and creative thinkers. The reason why creationist ideas are not held by scientists is because they do not fit with the evidence. Claims that many scientists are "leaving Darwinism" simply does not agree with the evidence.

I think it is time for certain wings of the Christian church to begin to understand that this world is a complex place and thus simplistic understandings of the relationship between theology and science simply do not work anymore. The sooner they appreciate this the sooner people of influence will actually listen to what they have to say.

Rodney Holder

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

This is all very sad. One thing I notice, however, is that no one has answered the question about the 2 very different, and if taken literally, contradictory, creation stories in Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. Indeed the main problem with creationism is lack of attention to the Biblical text and lack of background knowledge rather than disbelieving the science.

I do not know anyone who really takes the text literally. For example who believes in a literal firmament (Gen 1:6)? The Hebrew word means a metal dome which separates the waters above from those below (just look up the word raqia in Brown, Driver and Briggs, the standard Hebrew lexicon). In the flood story we read about the windows in the firmament being opened for the waters above to come down. In Job we read about the firmament being hard as a molten mirror (Job 37:18).

I also do not understand why creationists are Copernicans. Why do they believe the earth moves round the sun? After all there are many verses which seem to indicate that the earth does not move (eg Ps 93:1).

The message is surely that Biblical cosmology is primitive and is accommodated, as Calvin believed, to the original readership. In contrast Biblical theology is utterly profound, revolutionary and completely different from that of the surrounding pagan mythologies. The aim of the Bible is surely, as Galileo put it, 'to teach us how to go to heaven, not how the heavens go'. The great thing about placing the theological truths in poetic and allegorical frameworks, utilising existing cosmological ideas, is that they are timeless, and can be understood by readers across the millennia. If they had written in modern scientific terms how would readers before the modern period have understood them at all?

One of the saddest things is how this kind of debate obscures the real, healthy and vibrant dialogue going on at the present time between science and theology at the academic level, and hands an easy target to the likes of Dawkins.

Bob Carling

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

I wanted to say that I was very pleased to see Denis Alexander's article in Third Way. But, predictably perhaps, it has indeed stirred up some 'vigorous discussion'. But, as is quite common with articles by scientists who are Christians who broadly accept evolution, the 'creationists' feel uncomfortable and do not contribute to a real debate - instead they call for the writer to be excoriated. But there are many of us who wholeheartedly support and agree with Denis.

From most of the postings so far, one might feel that Denis is nothing short of a devil in disguise! (I can personally vouchsafe that he isn't.) There are many Christians who are quite comfortable with evolution as a mechanism for creation and would not therefore label themselves as 'creationists' (although, being Christians, they believe that God is indeed Creator). And that is no doubt one of the reasons why Denis wrote the article for Third Way (and his book).

Let's have some real debate, not just a mudslinging contest! What I think would be useful is a real engagement by 'creationists' of the question as to why their point of view is not held by many people who are bible believing Christians, including many church leaders (Roger Forster has already been mentioned, but there are many, many more).

Jessie

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

Thank God for the voice of reason- Harvey- I commend you.

I personally think it is wonderful that in the church there can be diversity and in parts good debate. That the evolutionist and the creationist can both hold their opinions and yet more importantly know it is Jesus who brings new life. As it is, there are many parts, but one body.

Michael Roberts

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

I cannot see what the relevance of calcite eyes are to refuting evolution. However before making any other charges against us wicked evolutionists perhaps Andy Maciintsoh could correct a few glaring scientific howlers in his book.

I am sorry if this is a long post, but it cannot be done briefly

THE GEOLOGY OF GENESIS FOR TODAY

In Genesis for Today McIntosh gives three scientific appendices. I could either go through and nit-pick his geological errors or consider them under main headings. I have chosen the latter.

ASSUMPTION OF GRADUAL DEPOSITION

McIntosh claims that “Uniformitarian geologists” assume that all strata were deposited slowly, and makes this claim on p185-6, p186, line 17-8; p195 lines16-20 (citing Andrews); p198 line 16 ff (largely citing Austin), p199-201 on fossilized tree trunks.

This is simply a false claim as geologists make no such assumption and for centuries have been aware of varying rates of deposition.

On p186 the allegation of “this assumption of gradual deposition” is false, negating what he says about the working out of geological history aka the geological column. A familiarity of the history of geology (see MJS Rudwick, Bursting the Limits of Time, 2005aka BLT) and any other work on the history of geology will refute this claim. In fact the contrary is true as most early geologists before 1830 were Catastrophists and had no clear idea of geological time and varied from young, middle or old earth in perspective! In the 1790s Smith was young earth but accepted an old earth from the evidence he found soon after 1800.

P193 gives Andrews misrepresentation of geologists “supposed evolutionary slow rate of formation of rock strata”. When someone, even with a D.Sc makes such elementary errors they can be safely ignored.

P197-199 deals with mudflows. McIntosh gives the impression that catastrophic events and deposition have long been denied by geologists. That is simply not the case, even by Lyell, though it must be said that from 1840 to 1970 many geologists had an aversion to catastrophe. However geologists have long known that erosion can occur very rapidly despite what Austin is quoted as saying on p 198.

The section of Fossilized Tree Trunks p199-201 is similarly flawed. Taking the example of “polystrate fossils” or tree trunks, no geologist has ever said that these were exposed for millions of years. Further they were in swamps not at “the bottom of the ocean” The quote from Morris is risible. The main paragraph on p200 contains much error. No geologist says trunks were exposed for “at least a million years”. Further if mudflows carried the tree trunks to their positions (and cleverly deposited them mostly vertically!) how can one explain that fossil trees are in sandstones and are now of sandstone and not in mudstone, shale or siltstone? The quotes referring to millions of years from J D Morris are simply misrepresentation as no geologist says that.

One needs to explain how all the mud from the postulated mudflows has disappeared without trace!

In reference to Austin and Nevins’ comments on the coal measures (which are the same person as Austin used the name Nevins when working for his Ph D at Penn State) the standard interpretations of coal deposition do not eliminate an element of catastrophism. Fred Broadhurst of Manchester argued with evidence that the deposition of coal seams individually took tens of thousands of years whereas the much thicker intervening sandstones were deposited rapidly. No geologist would say otherwise that sands are deposited speedily and muds and silts slowly. There have been many careful sedimentological studies on this type of question. Finally geology has advanced a little since the days of Lyell, excellent geologist though he was!

CIRCULAR ARGUMENT IN GEOLOGICAL DATING

On p 187 McIntosh writes, “The cyclical nature of the reasoning now becomes apparent….” And then cites J D Morris, who basically reiterates the accusations made by his father in his many books. (The Genesis Flood p130-6, Scientific Creationism p 94ff,) and repeated by many other writers.

This is false for several reasons. First, much of the geological column was worked out without the use of fossils as it was by workers before 1810 or so and by Sedgwick on the Cambrian in the 1830s. Secondly the Geological Column was worked out in considerable detail well before 1859 by geologists who rejected evolution. (To take the Palaeozoic –Cambrian, Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Carboniferous and Permian, the main workers were Sedgwick, Murchison and Conybeare who rejected evolution, and worked out the historical order from a combination of superposition (i.e. the order of strata) and the use of fossils interpreted in an anti-evolutionary way). Sedgwick and Conybeare were evangelical Anglican clergy as well; Sedgwick both taught Darwin geology and opposed The Origin.

The use of fossils in stratigraphy is derivative from the Principle of Superposition, which is an extension of the law of gravity; i.e. the stuff at the bottom of a pile got their first (unless someone/something squeezed it in later) and was first put forward by Steno in the 1660s. During the 18th this was applied by various “geologists” e.g. Strachey, and Michell, who produced a geological column from the coal beds to the chalk, now known as Carboniferous to Cretaceous. Work exploded in the late 18th century over all of Europe and Hutton was only one of many. The use of fossils to “date” was developed by Smith and Cuvier in particular (both anti-evolution) because they were empirically found to come in the same order wherever you went. This was in Europe first and then further afield. This is well explained in Rudwick’s Bursting the Limits of Time.

The pen-ultimate sentence at the end of the section on p187 is meaningless. The last sentence is simply wrong, “Even indirect dating of sedimentary rock is impossible when it contains no fossils.” as all Pre-Cambrian strata have been put in historical order WITHOUT the use of any fossils. I did this personally in South Africa where I mapped a large area of late Precambrian strata in the NW Cape, without any fossils to help except a lone stromatolite. I worked out my own geological column, as I was only the third geologist to map this area in 1970 for a mining company when Alfred Kroner was also doing it for Univ of Cape Town. (The previous geologists were Rogers in the 1910s and de Villiers and Sohnge in the 40s, who basically agreed with my re-writing of the local column and is what is now accepted for the whole area.) So much for it being impossible! Also Sedgwick mapped much of North Wales without fossils and all historical geology is in principle possible without fossils, but they do make life easier.

The order of fossils in historical sequence has been worked out by sheer observation e.g. trilobites only in the Palaeozoic and then particular trilobites in certain strata. This information, since 1859 has been used as evidence for evolution (or more strictly in Darwin’s notebooks from 1838). Some geologists do put this in terms of circular reasoning e.g. R H Rastall, but have failed to understand the way that the Geological Column and the fossil succession was elucidated. There is no circular argument as its basis. However if you found a fossil dinosaur you can be fairly sure that you are in Jurassic or Cretaceous sediments.

ERRORS ON RADIOMETRIC AGE-DATING

A good summary of radiometric age dating by a Christian is to be found at http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/Wiens.html. So I will not deal with general issues. McIntosh raises the usual objections, which have been dealt with by Wiens and Talkorigins. However I will note some other errors.
P186 line 11. “Radioisotope techniques … can only be used on igneous rock… . He is false when he says that methods can only be used on igneous rock. They are widely used on metamorphic rock of all kinds and accessional on sedimentary rocks. He clearly has not grasped how radiometric methods are used to give dates. E.g. lavas and other igneous rocks give dates, so if a lava is dated at say 320my then the strata adjacent are about the same age etc. He gets more confused on p190 l3 on K/Ar dating and only mentions volcanic rock, overlooking plutonic and metamorphic rocks and the occasional sediments.

On p 195 he discusses an 1801 eruption in Hawaii, and fails to record what the papers cited which gave such a wide range of dates were about. One was to test how accurate the method was and the other giving results of billions was not on lava, but on ultramafic inclusions within the lava, whereas the host lava gave young ages with acceptable limits of error. I will respond by saying of McIntosh’s unintentional misrepresentation, “This hardly inspires confidence.” Sadly the quote from Andrews on page 195 does not inspire confidence either, and he also misrepresents radiometric age-dating both in print and in public lectures. Having read the original papers from the 60s on these determinations I am appalled by the way that for 30years they have been misquoted, even though Brent Dalrymple exposed all this misquotation in 1982. It beggars belief.

As for the Cardenas Basalt of the Grand Canyon, I refer readers to the talkorigins site as this explains better than I can.

CONCLUSION

McIntosh has clearly misunderstood the principles of geology and his arguments are usually fallacious. This may be due to the fact that he relies on unreliable sources like Henry and John Morris, Edgar Andrews and other YEC writers. It is tragic that he has not applied his scientific skills to geology and thus opens himself up to charges of incompetence and misrepresentation. What would he say if I claimed that a mixture of 2 parts of hydrogen to one of oxygen was non-inflammable?

Michael Roberts

Iain Strachan

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

I would like to add my voice to those in support of Denis and his excellently written article.

I lament the tone of some of the comments that have appeared in here. The person who described Denis's article as "puerile" should try taking a look at some of the comments instead.

In order to pursue science, one must adopt the highest standards of integrity and honesty. Often this involves critical and seemingly harsh examination of theories.

After extensive looking into this kind of thing, I find that there are NO creationist theories that I have found that stand up to such critical analysis.

Geoff Chapman should note that Denis explicitly said that evolution was NOT a sacred cow and that anyone who came up with evidence against it would be instantly famous.

Just how Geoff can suggest from this that Denis is saying that evolution is a sacred cow that is immune from criticism is quite beyond me, because he said exactly the opposite. I'm wondering if Geoff actually read the article. Or perhaps he just missed that bit.

It is saddening when one Christian so blatantly misrepresents another Christian.

Roger Steer

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

I was pleased to read Denis Alexander’s article and am grateful to Third Way for publishing it. Like Denis, I am a committed Christian but not a so-called “creationist”. I happily accept that evolution by natural selection is a good description of the process which produces biological diversity. I wrote an open letter to Richard Dawkins because he claims too much for evolutionary mechanisms. He tries to make them into a theory of “life, the universe and everything”, and a biological theory – even such a major insight as this – isn’t up to such Herculean tasks. It’s an abuse of science to take a good theory out of its scientific context and use it for ideological purposes.

In my open letter to him, which he lists in the bibliography at the end of “The God Delusion”, I argue that Dawkins’ books distort his readers’ thinking in at least six ways. First, despite the striking and assured tone of his famous sentence, Dawkins does not actually believe that Darwin and Wallace “solved the mystery of our existence” as from time to time he honestly admits. Second, Dawkins misleads people by suggesting that Darwin and Wallace set out to solve the mystery of our existence: the truth is that the puzzle they sought to unravel was more modest. Third, by repeatedly linking the two men’s names in the way he does, Dawkins implies that they drew from the theory of natural selection the same philosophical conclusions as he does: in fact they did not agree in their estimates of the explanatory power of natural selection and neither man agreed with Dawkins. Fourth, Dawkins does not acknowledge how controversial the wider conclusions he draws from the theory of evolution by natural selection are among his own colleagues within the scientific community. Fifth, in vigorously proclaiming his view that the theory of evolution has made atheism intellectually respectable Dawkins misrepresents the story of Darwin’s alleged “loss of faith” and totally ignores Wallace’s insistence on the universe’s essential spiritual dimension. And finally, Dawkins either misunderstands or deliberately caricatures the nature of Christian faith.

In correcting Dawkins’ flawed history, and in discussing the complexity of the human mind, human possession of consciousness, our life in an orderly universe, and the Christian understanding of creation, I tried to present a compelling case for belief in God.

Steven Carr

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

Why shouldn't God create human beings by having diseases wipe out human beings with defective genomes, and then having the rest breed with each other?

God can create by any mechanism he wants, and if he uses death and disease, then why should only Satan be allowed to use those methods?

Kevin

on Tuesday, 15 July 2008

The key here is what type of God does the Bible present to us? And, if it were true what would evolution tell us about the God who created it? For the Bible tells us we can understand what God is like through what he has made. Are these two presentations compatible? I do not believe the gracious and compassionate God descibed in the Bible could be behind the disease ridden, death and struggle soaked process that is evolution. That is not an 'osterich in the sand' approach as descirbed above, you would have to be a osterich to ignore the glaring contradiction that trying to reconcile the God of the Bible with Evolution creates. I must be clear, this has nothing to do with whether Genesis is science or theology, it strikes at the heart of who you are worshipping as a Christian, of God's nature, and consequently how we as Christians should live out our lives.

Andrew Sibley

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

In response to Simon and Rodney Holder I would like to comment further. As a Christian who has examined the creation evolution debate in depth, I have concluded that there are no good reasons to reject a literal reading of Genesis 1-11 for the simple reason that the Darwinists have failed to establish their case with anything like sufficient rigour. In fact there is a fallacy in many Christian's minds where science is considered as another word for truth. It is not - that is to turn science into scientism. My own study of science has taught me to appreciate the profound mystery in the universe where uncertainty is fundamental to our knowledge of the world. Whether in chaos theory, in quantum mechanics, in general relativity or probabalistic inferential reasoning.

Many creationists find TE to be an intellectually weak position because it fails to appreciate the deeper philosophy in science where initial starting assumptions determine the outcome of science. Naturalistic assumptions in science will lead to natural explanations whether naturalism is true or not. Thomas Torrance was very critical of what he saw as damaging Laplacian reductionism in biological science.

I also find the compromise with scripture to be a weakness. Rodney Holder notes that scripture's cosmology 'is primitive', but that 'Biblical theology is utterly profound.' Indeed it is utterly profound, even to great depths that escape the best theologians, but why would God speak such deep mysteries in theology, but then give a primitive cosmology to simple people? The position Rodney sets out is untenable. I find this also creates a false dualism between physical events and theological implications. The Bible is full of events that have theological significance, i.e. in John's Gospel. Real events have prophetic significance throughout scripture, which makes theology so rewarding. The fullment of scriptural prophecies are also its stamp of authenticity - in a scientific sense.

I felt great pressure when growing up to believe that Darwinism was true, mainly through Darwinian iconography, but I found this to be its greatest weakness and a category mistake. Why are people asked to 'believe' that Darwinism is true through such icons if it could be objectively demonstratable as science? What creationists accept can be demonstrated is natural selection working on pre existing genetic material, but that does not mean the wider neo-Darwinian claims are demonstratable in science.

I hope we can all have greater respect for each other as Christians. Creationists are not from the stupid side of Christianity, but understand the limits of science at a deeper level than many Christians who believe in Darwinism. Many creationists are concerned that there is both atheism and a latent pantheism in Darwinism that has given Christianity a deistic spirit and has led to its decline in the west.

Rodney Holder

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

Andrew, I appreciate what you say but you haven't actually answered any of my questions. How do you square a literal interpretation with 2 quite different creation stories in Genesis 1 & 2? Do you really believe literally in a solid firmament (again, I refer you to the Hebrew lexicon), with windows in it? Do you really literally believe the earth is stationary? Of course that doesn't mean that literal physical events don't occur as described in the Bible, eg in John's gospel. It's just a question of discerning different kinds of literature within the Biblical corpus and the way theological truth is expressed through many different literary forms.

I don't have time to go into more philosophical questions, but just to say I am in total agreement with Torrance about reductionism, having written a book about the subject (Nothing But Atoms and Molecules? Probing the Limits of Science, being reprinted right now). But that doesn't mean we have to deny that evolution happened, and I have no doubt Torrance believed it did.

Chris Alexander

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

The present is a wonderful place to be, with all the challenges, callings, needs and opportunities that God gives us. So what is with a certain segment of Evangelicals that makes them so utterly obsessed with either end times or creation? Let's stop sniping about the beginning and the end and who follows what strand of what doctrine and focus on what God wants of us right here and right now.

John Ling

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

As a school teacher, Christian and a parent it is a concern that discussions on the theme of evolution and Creationism are often unnecessarily vitriolic and unbalanced.
Children, for example, are very quick to pick up on the subtext in such debates and may well be torn by loyalty to teachers, church etc. They may, in some cases, also be poorly equipped to understand some of the subtler aspects of detail.
Many Christians surely must be aware, by now, that unthoughtful criticism of the evolutionary theory provides a political weapon to militant secular humanists. It can be used to attempt to undermine Christianity and Christian education more generally.
Education that for many centuries has equipped the poor and marginalized, as well as other parts of diverse communities.
Surely it is essential that we address differences with understanding and respect, encouraging by example, our young to consider the nuances of literature, theology and scientific endeavour.

Andrew Sibley

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

Rodney in response to your comments: I have never had a problem with these two accounts Gen 1 and 2. When I first read them as a child (in the KJV) it seemed clear that the second was merely an elaboration of the first and I don’t see any reason to change my view. Textual criticism often fails to understand that there is a coherence of the theology of the whole of Genesis (and BIble) in terms of God’s blessings and the constraint that God has placed on the earth, on man and woman and the devil, followed by promised restoration through Abraham’s seed; that is Christ.

Galileo was seeking to challenge the Aristotelian influence in Catholic theology that led to acceptance of geocentricism. For various reasons Aristotle had become central to Catholic theology. So Galileo wasn’t simply attacking Biblical literalism, but Aristotle’s influence in the interpretation of scripture. (Newton in fact argued that the ancient people had an understanding of heliocentricism from the Egyptian temples with their central fire and symmetrical structure, which he thought were models of the solar system). Galileo was educated at the university of Padau, that was influenced by the Platonism of Averroes, and this had a strong dualism between spirit and matter, and therefore a dualism between physical science and theology which explains Galileo’s beliefs.

What I am arguing for is not that there is only a literal interpretation, but that the various levels of scriptural interpretation are interrelated and have coherence from above with the literal physical reality being foundational to the other interpretations.

As for a firmament it is not entirely clear what the word means and it may have various meanings, but I don’t have time to offer a view at present, but Peter noted that everything was created out of water, and the waters were separated. The biggest problem for a literal reading of Genesis is the star light problem and whether the word ‘day’ really means 24 hours as we know it before the creation of the sun. Although there are very imaginative ways around these problems in science and theology, I can respect Christians who hold to different views. (A ‘day’ is in fact related to the spin of the earth independent of the sun).

I suspect that Torrance would have agreed with Michael Polanyi, who argued that the mechanical structure in biology was not reducible to laws of physics and chemistry and that this should be accepted as foundational for the fruitful advance of biological science. Torrance quoted often from Polanyi. Theistic evolutionists do indeed accept the irreducibility of mind to matter, and irreducibility of physics and chemistry to nothing as you note, but why not accept the irreducibility of machine-like order in biology as well? As Torrance noted, nature is stratified, but with coherence from above. Knowledge in science and theology too is stratified with different levels of interpretation, but with interrelatedness and with coherence from above.

Gavin Merrifield

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

I would echo Chris Alexander's comment that there are better things to be spending our time and resources on in the present world rather than dwelling on the past.

It's time some sectors of the church simply grow up and learnt to deal with reality the way it is, not how they would like it to be. Both Denis' article here and his mentioned book are good steps towards that.

Rodney Holder

on Wednesday, 16 July 2008

I have never entered a blog before precisely for the reason that one is likely to get into a lengthy correspondence, and indeed I have to stop this soon! Anyway, I think, Andrew, that there is quite a bit we can agree on, eg about reductionism, Polanyi and Torrance, and about the multiple layers of Scripture as well as science. But that seems to be straying from the original debate which is about taking the Bible creation stories literally and denying that evolution happened. The problem with Genesis 2 is the completely different order of creation from Genesis 1: Man, Garden & Trees, Animals, and finally Woman. There are more detailed differences too, eg that Genesis 1 starts with water and Genesis 2 with no water. Genesis 2 and Genesis 1 are theologically coherent, yes, but simply cannot both be taken literally without contradiction. And your lengthy excursus on Galileo does not answer the problem, for a literal interpretation, that the Bible says that the earth does not move. And I stand by Brown, Driver and Briggs on the firmament. Raqia means, and I quote: 'extended surface, (solid) expanse (as if beaten out); the vault of heaven or "firmament", regarded by the Hebrews as solid, and supporting "waters" above it'.

Justin Brierley

on Thursday, 17 July 2008

If anyone wants to listen to a debate between Prof Keith Ward arguing for Theistic evolution and Atheist scientist Robert Stovold arguing for atheistic Darwinism then check out www.premier.org.uk.unbelievable and look for the show of 21 June.

Clare Parkinson

on Thursday, 17 July 2008

If anyone is striving to understand more of the possible mechanisms of creation, I think it’s worth looking at the resources page on the Christians in Science website (www.cis.org.uk) where there are many articles related to creation, including theistic evolution, intelligent design and young earth creationism.

I would like to echo the above comments that it is very saddening this discussion has included insult-throwing from both sides. A passer-by viewing these comments would not see love for fellow Christians shining through. We need to have these discussions in a respectful and considerate fashion.

It’s clear that both pro- and anti-evolutionists feel they have rigorous scientific evidence to back up their claims and a strong love for God, so neither side can be rightfully accused of deliberately ignoring the scientific evidence or trying to belittle God.

I feel it is of the utmost importance that people do not dismiss Christianity because they think it clashes with science. I have heard several people say that they would be interested in learning more about Christianity, but didn’t think it was worth pursuing because they accept the theory of evolution and therefore could never be a Christian.

My ideal would be that we could all work together to promote the idea that God created the world. We may have radically different views on the method that God used, but the most important part is that God did it! Perhaps we need to put across the message that your view of the mechanisms of creation should not be a barrier to you becoming a Christian.

Andrew Sibley

on Thursday, 17 July 2008

Rodney I will try and answer your questions: I would suggest that Genesis 2 is elaborating on the creation of the garden of Eden as the home for Adam and Eve that took place on day six, not another account of the whole creation of the earth and heaven. God planted seeds in the garden and caused them to grow, bringing beasts for Adam to name etc.

Firmament: A quick search on wiki and the blueletterbible web site reveals the word raqiya is formed from the verb raqa and can mean to 'spread out' or 'stetech' Ps.136:6, Isa. 42:5, 44:24, not necessarily associated with metal, but a watery separating barrier between the heavens.

As noted before, creationists reject neo-Darwinism involving random mutations and natural selection because mathematical modelling shows it to be deeply flawed. See for instance the excellent book by John Lennox, 'God's Undertaker'; or Cornell professor John Sandford's book 'Genetic Entropy and the mystery of the genome.' Haldane for instance noted a paradox, that for neo-Darwinian theory to work in higher vertebrates it would require at the same time the benefit of very large populations to find sufficient beneficial mutations, and the benefit of very small populations for mutations to spread through the whole population. Higher vertebrates simply cannot pay the cost of evolving. Sandford further argues that the genome is undergoing gradual entropic destruction because near neutral mutations are accumulating at an alarming rate as natural selection cannot 'weed' them out because they are invisible at the level of the phenotype. Creationists do however accept natural selection acting on pre existing genetic material.

As for a stationary earth. I am not sure where you find this assertion, and even if some later people believed in geocentricism, that doesn't mean that was the intention of the author. A literal reading of the Bible is not about taking every genre such as poetry, alegory, metaphor etc. and reducing it to literalism, but it seeks to read the Bible as intended by the original authors. Textual studies show that Genesis (including 1-11) is consistent with plain Biblical narrative with the theology deeply interwoven with real historical events.

Rodney Holder

on Thursday, 17 July 2008

Andrew, this is my final word because I have to get back to what I meant to be doing! Clearly there is some convergence between us if you think 'A literal reading of the Bible is not about taking every genre such as poetry, allegory, metaphor etc. and reducing it to literalism, but it seeks to read the Bible as intended by the original authors'. Yes! It's just what you take to be the genre in question in those early chapters of Genesis, and that, I guess, is where we differ.

Again, if you really take both Genesis 2 and Genesis 1 literally you are committed to a contradiction. This is what the text of Genesis 2:18-19 actually says: 'Then the Lord God said, "It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper fit for him". So out of the ground the Lord God formed every beast of the field and every bird of the air, and brought them to the man to see what he would call them ....' It is quite plainly saying that the animals were created after the man, the reverse order to Genesis 1:21, 25-26. That is what I mean by saying that creationists don't pay enough attention to the text.

Regarding the firmament, I prefer the lexicon to Wikipedia but here is a quote from Gerhard von Rad's commentary on Genesis 1:6: 'The second day brings the creation of the firmament, which the ancients imagined as a gigantic hemispherical and ponderous bell (Ps 19:1; Job 37:18). Raqia' means that which is firmly hammered, stamped (a word of the same root in Phoenician means "tin dish"!). The meaning of the verb rq' concerns the hammering of the vault of heaven into firmness (Isa. 42:5; Ps 136:6). The Vulgate translates raqia' with firmamentum, and that remains the best rendering. This heavenly bell, which is brought into the waters of chaos, forms first of all a separating wall between the waters beneath and above.' Thus, according to von Rad (and the lexicon), the stretching out is a 'beating out'. The same verb is used in Isa. 40:19 for what a goldsmith does in making an idol.

Regarding the science, I am not a biologist but an astrophysicist. However, certainly some of the mathematical arguments about the probability of things coming together to create functioning biological structures being absurdly tiny have been refuted many times, since that is not how evolution works but cumulatively with small changes. But all I will say here is that Denis deals with the science comprehensively in his book and you might also like to read 'The Language of God' by Francis Collins, an evangelical Christian who is arguably the world's top biologist, being head of the human genome project. The evidence from genetics uncovered in just the last decade (including, especially perhaps, that of non-functional DNA) has provided overwhelming confirmation of the story of evolution already believed on quite different grounds.

A few verses for a stationary earth: Ps 93:1; Ps 96:10; Ps 104:5. The last verse talks about 'foundations' and elsewhere the Bible talks about the earth resting on pillars. But that takes us into new territory, so I'll stop at that point. But I think my original claim that the Biblical cosmology is primitive but the theology utterly profound stands. And it is of course the theology that it is the aim of the original authors to convey (not, for example, geocentrism even though that is in the text) and they do it through the use of differing stories of creation expressed with differing literary symbolism.

Andrew Sibley

on Friday, 18 July 2008

Rodney - I do appreciate you taking time to discuss these issues, and that you wish to get on with other things. Which I guess gives me the last word ;o) I am not convinced there is a problem with Gen 2:18-19, you seem to quote from the ESV, but the NIV puts the creation of beasts of the field in the past tense, the KJV is seemingly a non time dependent statement.

I thought mention of wikipedia and 'blueletterbible' would allow you a response based on quality of authority. I don't have Strong's dictionary, and my Vine's dictionary doesn't have the word for firmament. But even if I agree with you that raqa or raqiya must imply a beaten solid like a metal, I would suggest that the author is simply using metaphor and we shouldn't read literalism into it. If some later ancient people read it literally we shouldn't necessarily assume that literalism was the intention of the author. The same is the case for the pillars of the earth. As noted Newton thought the ancient temples of Jews and pagans were models of a heliocentric universe, and the sun cult of Mithras/Helios is common to ancient pagans. The idea of the firmament being like a beaten metal bowl is in fact merely comparative design language - even dare I say anthropomorphic.

You state that mathematical arguments about probability of functioning biological structures have been refuted many times - presumably though not refuted by mathematics. This sounds to me like an argument of 'don't think' - 'just believe' in Darwinism. This seems to me a very unsatisfactory argument for something that is claimed to be science. Neo-Darwinism makes specific claims that must be modelled mathematically if evolutionists want people such as myself to accept it as science; Denis Alexander, and Francis Collins who I have read, cannot ignore this. Why should I or anyone reject God's Word on the basis of a perceived pseudo science like neo-Darwinism? Dawkins mathematical model was flawed as it was goal directed when he claimed there was no goal in reality. I suspect that there is too much vested in Darwinism by some leading scientists for them to abandon the paradigm on the basis of mere maths.

Here is a very brief synopsis of the mathematical challenges to neo-Darwinism. For instance if we want to turn an ape like ancestor into a human in 2 million years we can assume 100,000 generations based on a 20 year generation period. If we assume out of 3 billion nucleotides 10 percent funcationality we have 300 million to work on - and if we assume a 5% genetic difference between apes and man then we need to find 15 million beneficial mutations in 100,000 generations; or we would need to find and fix in a population 150 beneficial mutations per generation. Now if we then consider some of the problems that Haldane and others identified, then to find sufficient beneficial mutations we need very large populations, to get those mutations to spread through a population we need very small groups. To weed out the far more numerous harmful mutations and avoid error catastrophe we need evolution to procede very slowly. Haldane argued that only 1 beneficial mutation could be fixed in 1667 years, whereas the current model requires 150 beneficial mutations fixed per 20 years. Even Steve Jones has said the current human population is not evolving for these types of reasons.

I would suggest there is a problem with neo-Darwinism that cannot be overlooked.

Thanks for taking the time to debate this issue Rodney. I have long called for Christians to debate these issues through respectful dialogue and forums as Christians should not be divided (and even tried to plan events).

Dr Stephen Hayes

on Monday, 21 July 2008

I would like to address the suggestion that Christians who seek to persuade fellow Christians and others of the falsehood of evolutionism (call us creationists if you must) divert resources away from preaching the Gospel, relieving famine and poverty, providing clean drinking water for the poor in Christ's name, etc. I believe this charge to be both incorrect and irrelevant.

Do those who raise funds for the Leprosy Mission work against the goals of Mission Aviation Fellowship? An active creationist, I have given to both those and other charities.

I have just given a talk to a group in Northampton, presenting rarely heard scientific evidence against evolution. During that talk, as I showed what scientific nonsense it is to suppose that the wonders of the human body came into being through random mutations after life 'arose' from dirty water and sparks 'just like that!', I stressed the need for all Christians to be involved in issues such as poverty and famine relief, ending the vile traffic in human flesh, etc, mentioning that when we accept God as creator, lawgiver and judge, we will find new motivation to do so.

In the context of answering Denis Alexander's charge, I am willing to 'lose my reward' by mentioning also that I am a long standing donor by monthly direct debit to TEAR fund and the Bible society. I support my local chutch, foreign mission and faminerelief/development, was involved in setting up an HIV/AIDS charity, and am arranging a musical fundraising event this Christmas which will raise money for either Farm Africa or Water aid (non-Christian development charities deliberately chosen to make the event more inclusive and attractive to the non-Christians we hope will come).

These actions (forgive me for 'boasting') are inspired by my high view of scripture and sincere concern about my forthcoming appearance before Christ's judgment seat. And so is my creation activism.

The point is, when Genesis is downgraded to a fable (and make no mistake, that was the primary goal of Lyell, Huxley, Spencer, Haeckel and the others who foisted Darwinism on the world, and of men like Dawkins, Jones, Attenborough who ram it down our throats today) our view of ALL scripture is weakened. When we have lost the Creator, we lose the lawgiver and judge.

Thomas Hardy, the noted English writer and poet, lost his Christian faith after reading Darwin. He writes in his poem 'The respectable burgher on the Higher Criticism' that since ministers of religion 'doubt that Adam ever were..count the flood a local scare...etc' that there is similarly no point believing in the resurrection or going to church at all. Hardy was one of many Victorian intellectuals who abandoned Christianity after accepting evolution.

As our Lord said of false prophets' By their fruits shall ye know them. The fruit of Darwinism is the abandonment or watering down of Christian faith. The fruit of creationism is a lively, fearful, faith and a desire to reach men and women for Christ.

Of course, if Darwinistic evolution were scientifically valid, that would be a different matter entirely and we would have to adapt our faith (Dawkins says abandon it)or abandon rational scientific integrity. But this issue does not arise. There is abundant, hard scientific evidence against evolution, it is routinely suppressed. Entropy, harmful mutations, lack of intermediate kinds, effective fixity of species, irreducible complexity, all these are powerful evidences against evolutionism. The association of evolution with atheism and demonstrably evil philosophies such as Marxism and Nazism should also say something to Christian believers. 'You can tell a fellow by the company he keeps.'

Finally, every hymn book is full of songs praising God for creation. If He created by the process set out by Darwin, by chaos, struggle, disease, chance, mutation, death and survival of the most ruthless over billions of years, where are the hymns and worship songs praising God for this? What woudl such songs look like, and who would want to sing them?

Mark Raggett

on Friday, 25 July 2008

I'd also like to thank Rodney Holder for his contribution and strongly recommend his book 'Nothing but Atoms and Molecules'. Whilst it doesn't devote much time to the evolution vs. creation issue it does a great job of knocking off some of the barnacles and refuting the position of Dawkins and the 'scientific atheists'. It successfully showed me how I can accept Christianity, not just inspite of modern science, but to some extent because of modern science.

I'd like to address your comment on Genesis 2: 18-19 Andrew. The NIV, being a dynamic equivalent translation, seems to take some liberties with the Hebrew in this section. The ESV is a more literal translation but seems to agree with the NIV here (though it includes "Or And out of the ground the LORD God formed" in the footnotes). The NASB (generally regarded as the MOST literal) agrees with Rev Dr Holder's translation (whatever that is).

From a bit of reading it seems in the hebrew the 'wayyiqtol' form is used three times in these verses: "said", "formed" and "brought". The NIV has translated two of these verbs in the English simple past tense which seems to be the most accurate rendering. However, it translates "formed" in the past perfect tense as "had formed". To me this seems inconsistent and suspiciously convenient as it resolves the conflict between Genesis 1 and 2.

As all three verbs are in the same form a plain reading of the text would suggest the order said -> formed -> brought.

Andrew Sibley

on Monday, 28 July 2008

Mark - from my understanding the tense in Hebrew is determined by the context. I am not therefore convinced that the statement should be read in the past tense.

Geoff Chapman

on Tuesday, 29 July 2008

In reply to Iain Strachan. True, Denis Alexander did not expressly say that evolution is a "sacred cow". However, he did bemoan the fact that creationists are visiting churches presenting an alternative to evolution. So he clearly thinks it wrong for people to criticise it. Those of us who dispute Darwinism welcome the opportunity that "Darwin Day" gives us to publicly debate the issue. Darwin would have approved, too, since in the introduction to "The Origin of Species" he noted that it was necessary to consider the facts and arguments on both sides of the question. We are looking forward to a friendly, healthy debate. What we won't do is keep quiet!
Geoff Chapman, Creation Resources Trust.

Simon

on Thursday, 31 July 2008

Due to a fit of experimental blues I have had the opportunity to read most of the comments posted above and wonder how I can contribute something "new" to this debate without getting into the usual arguments. About the only thing I can think of is this:

We ALL need to be careful when using the term Darwinism as its definition seems to change depending on the writer. Some people on this blog seem to use it interchangeably with the term evolution, whilst others seem to use it to mean materialism or naturalism. In actual fact I think the debate is more over whether a mechanical philosophy is sufficient to explain creation or whether (much as Newton thought) we have to leave room for "active principles" in order to explain nature. I would guess the young earth creationists here have their targets more on the anti-mechanical thesis then Darwinism per se.

This being the case I think it is actually getting off the point to argue about the insufficiency of Darwinism. For example it is quite easy for someone such as myself (of the professional biologist camp) to agree that there are problems with Darwinism such as the evidence raised by the fields of epigenetics and RNAi. However such arguments do not does not support a rejection of the mechanistic philosophy as the YECS might hope. Instead they merely points to the existence of equally mechanical non-Darwinian evolutionary mechanisms. If this is the case, then I think people of the Young Earth Creationist or ID camps need to be very careful just critiquing Darwinism, simply because I am not certain such arguments make the point that they are trying to make.

Simon

on Saturday, 2 August 2008

After further thought and a bit of research since writing my post above it seems that the term "Darwinism" is quite commonly used by creationists in a pejorative rather than technical sense. Thus the argument gets quite muddled because evolutionary theory has in fact moved on quite a lot from technical Darwinism. Thus to reiterate my point above, criticism of Darwinism by scientists (so readily jumped on by creationists) do not necessarily relate to criticisms of evolutionary, and indeed mechanical, explanations of creation.

Two further points in response to problems with Andrew Sibley's arguments above:

1) Supposed "mathematical" problems with the amount of variation necessary within the genome to account for functioning biological macromolecules tends to focus mainly upon random mutation rather than take into account transposons, retroviruses and even recombination. I have personally taken this up with John Lennox a number of times and am convinced that he has not really appreciated quite how much genetic sequence originated by such mechanisms (I have seen estimates of up to 60% in some species). Secondly, and more specific to Sibley's comment above, it is somewhat problematic to allege that a 5% difference in sequence between humans and apes is "the target" that human evolution has to reach. Surely apes have also evolved in this period? Thus rather than "don't think - just believe" as Sibley alleges, the actual problem is one of simplistic mathematical models (and yes I have read Dembski).

2) Sibley writes: "But even if I agree with you that raqa or raqiya must imply a beaten solid like a metal, I would suggest that the author is simply using metaphor and we shouldn't read literalism into it. If some later ancient people read it literally we shouldn't necessarily assume that literalism was the intention of the author. The same is the case for the pillars of the earth."

This seems rather inconsistent regarding the position taken earlier because it is pick and choose literalism. It is suspiciously convenient to hold onto certain literalist interpretations but reject the bits that you think are not necessary for your philosophy.

Andrew Sibley

on Monday, 4 August 2008

In response to Simon. Undoubtedly it is difficult using terms correctly when different people use words differently. Evolution on its own is a poor word to use as well because creationists accept micro-evolution and reject macro-evolution, even though I know many do not like those terms either. But to answer the points briefly.

1) Indeed the genome is extremely complicated as you note and any attempt at modelling it is difficult, but that doesn’t mean the task can be side stepped. ‘Simplistic’ mathematical models should be replaced with more complex ones, not the suggestion that the problems can avoid the mathematical rigour. Creationists perceive that evolutionists avoid the complex maths and merely replace it with ‘just so’ stories asking people to ‘believe’ it happened. In other words, evolution is ‘believed’ to have occurred and then all evidence must be fitted into the paradigm. Evolution then is framed in the same way as belief in divine creation, thus searching for evidence in support of a faith position, (except creationists recognise the faith commitment, while evolutionists don't). Homologies don't count as evidence either as they can be equally explained in terms of common design as common descent. I don’t have time to go into further depth, but there is much about genetics that is yet unknown, and change from whatever source doesn’t equate to a grand evolutionary progression. Behe’s latest book ‘The Edge of Evolution’ is a good attempt at finding the limits of evolution. Another book worth reading is ex Cornell professor John Sandford’s, ‘Genetic Entropy…’ or Walter ReMine’s ‘The Biotic Message.’

2) Literalism - why do you find this inconsistent I wonder? Any piece of literature, even historical narrative, contains different levels of meaning with use of metaphor and allegory adding colour to a factual account. I find there is a tendency to dismiss creationists as naive literalists without thinking too deeply about the nature of texts in general. Genesis can be read in the same way as any other piece of historical narrative. Of course we all make personal judgements about whether stories are true or not.

Crawford Revie

on Tuesday, 5 August 2008

Thank you, Lydia Davies, for pointing out the unbalanced (in all senses of that word!) nature of many of the comments to Dennis' article - often by scientists originating from the USA.

For those interested in serious debate on the issue I would recommend you take a look at Stephen Matheson’s blog, “Quintessence of Dust”. In particular his recent interactions with members of the Intelligent Design movement are telling – see the posting noted below for a summary of how things ended up (with him being banned for asking a few ‘direct’ questions – and this is from the ID crowd, who I always imagined were more tolerant than the Creationists)

http://sfmatheson.blogspot.com/2008/07/why-one-should-wash-thoroughly-after.html

I think this shows that taking the “coward's way” (Chapman’s accusation to Lydia) is often as much as can be done, as there is a inherent dishonesty in the kind of ‘agenda-based science’ espoused by many criticising Alexander’s article here…

Simon

on Tuesday, 5 August 2008

Hi Andrew,

Yes I think I would prefer to stick to the word evolution as then the discussion just comes down to one of extent rather than including historical positions (such as Darwinism).

A quick couple responses to point 1:

There is an entire field called "Bioinformatics" which, amongst other areas, deals with mathematical models for DNA function and transmission. It is simply not correct to say only people like Dembski or Lennox have looked at the mathematics. There is a real field that exists, produces data and models, and does deal rigorously with the issues that you raised here. You only have to look at the literature.

Secondly "common design" arguments are problematic from a theological position because they suggest God is being deliberately misleading. For instance the trail of retrovirus fragments is so elegant and beautiful that God would have to be almost pernicious to leave it there if he created through common design.

Following on from point 2:

I find the issue inconsistent because the whole creationist position is driven by the literal interpretation of scripture. Claims that it is based upon "scientific problems" is a smoke-screen based upon right-wing expediency within American politics. The majority of Christians who work in science do not think there are problems with the overall theme of evolution. There is no anti-Christian conspiracy! Furthermore, the vast majority of academic biblical scholars view the Genesis account as theological truth emphasizing creation by the monotheist Judeo-Christian God. This is the genre and purpose of the literature. There is no better reason to claim some kind of literal 6-day creation account than there is to claim that the earth is build on pillars and the stars are wedged into a firmament! Hence my allegation of inconsistency.

simon

on Thursday, 7 August 2008

Hi Andrew,

Yes I think I would prefer to stick to the word evolution as then the discussion just comes down to one of extent rather than including historical positions (such as Darwinism).

A quick couple responses to point 1:

There is an entire field called "Bioinformatics" which, amongst other areas, deals with mathematical models for DNA function and transmission. It is simply not correct to say only people like Dembski or Lennox have looked at the mathematics. There is a real field that exists, produces data and models, and does deal rigorously with the issues that you raised here. You only have to look at the literature.

Secondly "common design" arguments are problematic from a theological position because they suggest God is being deliberately misleading. For instance the trail of retrovirus fragments is so elegant and beautiful that God would have to be almost pernicious to leave it there if he created through common design.

Following on from point 2:

I find the issue inconsistent because the whole creationist position is driven by the literal interpretation of scripture. Claims that it is based upon "scientific problems" is a smoke-screen based upon right-wing expediency within American politics. The majority of Christians who work in science do not think there are problems with the overall theme of evolution. There is no anti-Christian conspiracy! Furthermore, the vast majority of academic biblical scholars view the Genesis account as theological truth emphasizing creation by the monotheist Judeo-Christian God. This is the genre and purpose of the literature. There is no better reason to claim some kind of literal 6-day creation account than there is to claim that the earth is build on pillars and the stars are wedged into a firmament! Hence my allegation of inconsistency.

Andrew Sibley

on Thursday, 7 August 2008

Hi Simon. You said that; " "common design" arguments are problematic from a theological position because they suggest God is being deliberately misleading.” I find such an argument to, in effect, place the word of science above the word of God, and the argument is a category mistake. Instead scientific explanations are only true if one’s foundational assumptions are true, but such assumptions often cannot be tested, or are based on other assumptions that are untestable, and it is impossible to investigate an infinite regress of assumptions in science.

You will forgive me I hope for being sceptical of the retrovirus evidence. Viruses can transfer genetic material laterally, across the species barrier, and an evolutionary explanation is I believe unnecessary – I will need to read up more on this area, and on pseudogenes, but I predict that a non-evolutionary explanation will be more satisfying in the long run. The history of evolution shows that time and again claimed ‘proofs’ of evolution are found to be in error and ‘evolution of the gaps’ has faced a steady retreat in light of the evidence. (1) Haeckel praised Huxley in ‘Nature’ for the Bathybius find (it was merely calcium sulphate) noting that ‘the Evolution Theory received from Prof. Huxley a complete demonstration of its immense importance…and its spread among the general public has been largely due to his well-known popular writings. In these he has accomplished the difficult task of rendering most fully and clearly intelligible, to an educated public of very various ranks, the highest problems of philosophical Biology. From the lowest to the highest organisms, from Bathybius up to man, he has elucidated the connecting law of development.’ (2) Andrew Dixon White changed the history of science to cast Christianity in a bad light. (3) Regarding a pigs tooth from Nebraska, Henry Osborn said ‘Certainly we shall not banish this bit of Truth because it does not fit in with our preconceived notions and because at present it constitutes infinitesimal but irrefutable evidence that the man-apes wandered over from Asia into North America.’ (4) Piltdown man etc. (5) Microraptor gui was made up of two fossils glued together. Microraptor zhorianus (the back part) was also found in layers above the fully formed bird Confuciusornis sanctus and the thropod sinosauropteryx prima. The front part was the bird Yanornis martini (any time and place, anywhere ;o)) The rock layers (Jehol Group) in which Confuciusornis was found were initially dated to the Jurassic, but later reclassified as early Cretaceous despite containing fauna previously known from the Triassic to the late Cretaceous.

You will I hope forgive me as well for believing that the above evidence represents a systematic pattern that could be seen as a conspiracy to deceive by an elite few. At the least it represents a pattern of extreme over interpretation due to an almost religious fervour for evolution – blinded by belief. You can trace Lyell’s geology back through Scrope and Playfair to James Hutton. Darwin’s evolution traces back to Erasmus Darwin and David Hume. Hume’s character Philo in part VII of Dialogues argues for a metaphorical reading of Plato’s Timaeus where the world possesses a soul and Erasmus Darwin praised Hume’s Platonism in Zoonomia, Hutton also toyed with a world soul in his Edinburgh address. Darwin and Lyell were careful to take the paganism out of evolution and deep time, in the name of ‘science’, but paganism is I believe the inspiration for both. Lyell, in his letters, stated he was working to a 30 year plan to undermine Christianity, a plan that Darwin knew about because it was Lyell who suggested to Darwin that he start a secret notebook that was to become Origins, and Darwin wrote to his son George that Lyell was engaged in a silent attack on Christianity, noting also that this was Voltaire’s aim – a ‘slow silent’ attack to undermine Christianity. I hope to publish something along these lines soon.

Long ages and deep time go back to the pre-Christian era where pagan societies exaggerated their history for political prestige in a ‘my history is longer than your history’ type of argument. Ideas of evolution were also known in the nations around Israel. So the Old Testament was written and accepted by the Israelites when deep time and evolution were widely believed in surrounding nations. There was no need for God to ‘accommodate’ the text found in Genesis.

So that brings us to the ‘days’ of creation. I think the question should be addressed on its own merit apart from what ‘science’ says or pagan history. I do respect those who believe the days are long periods of time, but throughout the Bible they seem to me to have been taken as 24 hour days as we know them.

Andrew Sibley

on Saturday, 9 August 2008

Hi Simon - in response to your comments "...the trail of retrovirus fragments is so elegant and beautiful that God would have to be almost pernicious to leave it there if he created through common design." If scientists have an incomplete understanding of genetics, as I believe we do, then how can you jump to such a conclusion before all the facts are in?

Also if Genesis is considered historical narrative then the usual convention in history is to assume that a day is 24 hours long. Metaphorical readings may assume longer periods of time, but that would not be a historical reading.

Antony Latham

on Tuesday, 19 August 2008

I suspect this thread has become extinct - but I have come across it again and feel the need to ask a few questions of theistic evolutionists such as Denis. In my other post somewhere in the more ancient strata of this blog, I tried to show that Denis' position is not actually theistic. This is because he wholeheartedly accepts all of neo-darwinism as sufficient (random mutations, selection and common descent - to put it crudely). In no sense are any of these 3 pillars more than 'natural'. IE. they are processes that do not require any on-going divine input at all. By definition they do not have divine input. Darwin insisted on this. Granted - Denis believes that God upholds everything/every atom. I know he is a sincere Christian theist in this sense...and I have spent considerable time discussing it with him. However - in WHAT sense has God actually had anything to do with our appearance as humans in the scenario of those 3 pillars of current evolutionary theory? You see, as soon as you say God has had some 'creative' input along the line of common descent (as I believe all theists, as opposed to deists, must say) then you are no longer a Darwinist because then we have to accept that our genome did not come about purely by the 'natural' processes of mutations, selection, and CD. If we are theists we must believe that God is continually active in 'evolution' - so we have to accept that our genome did not appear by neo-darwinist mechanisms. Most thinking lay people realise this and many lose faith in God as a result - this is very common, and I was one of them for many years. It is not a neutral theory. I personally do not have a problem with either selection or common descent, nor an ancient earth - but I have serious problems with the concept of random mutations being the only source of the complexity and information needed. Science supports my view - not least Michael Behe's analysis of mutations in his excellent book 'The Edge of Evolution'. Here he painstakingly demonstrates the inadequacy of mutations to produce the novelty in genomes that is required.
Theistic evolutionists please respond. What exactly is wrong with finding evidence for design in biology? Why is design such a dirty word to theistic evolutionists? Help me to be an intellectually fullfilled theist.

simon

on Wednesday, 20 August 2008

Hi again Andrew,

I think we have an epistemic disagreement hinted at by your comment about "place(ing) the word of science above the word of God". I'm guessing that you hold some sort of opinion whereby God has supernaturally enabled you to interpret the bible in the "intended" way. I do not agree with this because I hold all of man's knowledge as being fallible (including this belief itself!). I'm not saying that we cannot know "absolute truth", but rather that it is impossible to know for certain the "truthfulness" of our beliefs. As such the best we can do is to try and rank our beliefs based upon correspondence, coherence, pragmatism etc. i.e. we need to look at as much evidence as possible (or practical) when formulating our beliefs, but similarly hold all beliefs as provisional based upon the possibility of new evidence coming to light. People sometimes argue that such a position is contradictory, however this shows a misunderstanding. I am arguing for a probabilistic theory rather than a black and white, either or type understanding of truth: "Given the available evidence is my interpretation of Genesis likely to be more correct than yours..."

continued below...

simon

on Wednesday, 20 August 2008

...continued from other post today...

With the above paragraph in mind, I would want to suggest that evidence from science is not only equal to evidence from scripture, but is actually the same sort of knowledge. How we understand God, and our relationship with him, is actually based upon our experiences of life (science?). This being the case we cannot really talk about science and scripture as separate things because they are both intrinsically linked - one informs the other. Questioning the "foundations" of science equally questions the "foundations" of scripture.

...continued below (for some reason I cannot post more than a paragraph at a time?)...

Simon

on Wednesday, 20 August 2008

...continued (part 3)...

So the argumnt now comes down to evidence. Is there more evidence in the world to argue for an evolutionary mechanism or one provided by YEC/ID? You mention a whole paragraph of "time and again" evolution being shown as false. I would counter that you are cherry picking small incidences that are inconsistent, or in some cases straight fraud (quite normal in the pursuit of any knowledge). However by cherry picking you miss the vast majority of evidence for evolution that i