Naturalistic evolution is the idea that systems, especially biological systems, get more complex by themselves, without the need for some mind or spirit to guide their development. Darwinism proposes that minor changes which give certain biological organisms a survival advantage compound over time to produce major variations and changes, and that ultimately this can explain the origin of species, including man. If this is so, then mankind is nothing more than a more intelligent animal, and God was not really needed for creation (so why not deny his existence altogether, by an application of Occam's razor?)
No informed person doubts that natural selection occurs in biological systems, favoring some kinds of genetic combinations over others in certain environments. But the assertion that fluxes of physical energy and natural selection explains changes from amino acids to DNA, from reptiles into birds, or from apes into humans cannot really be justified scientifically. The reasons for this I outline below.
It is true that Darwinism is the best and possibly the only option available to those who deny the existence of God, the Creator. Some scientists are strongly prejudiced on the subject of God's existence. They feel that to allow God in as an explanation of why some things happen would cause the whole scientific enterprise to be seriously compromised. To them, science is about explaining how every natural thing is in turn the product of natural causes. Because "God's intervention" could in theory explain everything, it therefore explains nothing from a scientific point of view. It is therefore considered desirable to make the assumption that He doesn't exist, to force us to think about what really goes on in natural systems, and how we can predict and control them using tools such as mathematics and the scientific method. But this is not an argument against God's existence, its just a working philosophy. The improbability (or impossibility) of complex specified information appearing out nowhere for no reason at all is conveniently ignored in such thinking. So is the fact that a Christian world view acknowledging the existence of a faithful God who says to His children "Go find out" ( Proverbs 25:2) is not at all harmful to the scientific enterprise - in fact it provided the philosophical foundation for the actual emergence of science in history. The majority of early scientists such as Newton and Pascal were in fact Christian believers.
Now it is true that in times past, mankind believed that spirits were affecting just about everything. Since then, it has been shown that many, if not most things that happen in the physical universe can be well described by mathematical equations of varying degrees of complexity. We don't need to invoke the concept of spirits to explain a lot of natural things that happen. Historically, enlightenment thinkers from the 18th century onwards grabbed hold of this and extended the idea to say that this really means that we'll eventually be able to explain everything in rational, naturalistic terms, and we'll no longer be obliged to acknowledge the existence of a Creator to whom we would presumably owe some kind of allegiance on the basis of the fact that He had created us.
This kind of humanistic thinking got a boost when Darwin published his "Origin of Species". From then on, through people like Thomas Huxley, and later humanistic educators like John Dewey, the theory of evolution entered the cultural mainstream and became perhaps the dominant paradigm in western society in the 20th century.
Despite the fact that many schools are forced by law to teach this theory as fact, it has never been proven. Repeated assertions that it has been proven do not constitute proof. A lot of money is wasted every year vainly trying to prop Darwinism up - money that could have been spent on some more worthwhile areas of scientific and technological enterprise. Some feel that Darwinism doesn't NEED to be proven. For them, it may be assumed to be true. To them, something like evolution must have happened because the alternatives are philosophically unacceptable, politically incorrect and unscientific. See Philip Johnson's articles for elaboration of these ideas.
On the other hand, the reasons for believing in Creation are compelling. When properly understood, even the account in Genesis 1 can make plenty of sense from a scientific point of view. See here.
As a thinking person and a science graduate, I would believe that evolution happened if there was substantial evidence in the fossil record to support it. There isn't. I can't see any really strong reason to believe that any of the fossils that have been found are what may be termed 'transitional'. All the bones of the billions of intermediate forms that "must have existed" seem to have been bio-degradeable. BUT, my friends, we know [read "assume"] that science can give us ALL THE ANSWERS to our existence because, because ... er well, because science has helped us build better toasters, computers and we've even got the technology to put a man on the moon, right? Why should we not simply deny the possibility of the existence of something that is outside the scope of science?
Charles Darwin, who popularised the theory of evolution, was actually trained in theology, not science, and was also known to be a freemason. Truly, he was a blind leader of the blind. But by the time he was ready to die, there is evidence that he actually renounced his own theory and believed in Christ. It was really people like Thomas Huxley though who led a whole generation by the nose so as to deny God and trust in an elite community of scientists. Nowadays popularisers like Richard Dawkins continue this tradition.
Here are just a few of the problems with the theory of evolution:
1. The Big Bang theory is based on solid data and would show that the Universe had a finite beginning in time (about 15 billion years ago) - before that it didn't exist. How did everything come out of something that didn't exist, if there is no God?
2. Some argue that the earth is 4 billion years old. This is not enough time for evolution to have happened. The rate of mutations likely to be helpful is not large enough to explain the development of all things, especially the first cell from non-living chemicals. Some scientists can see this and have therefore postulated that life originated somewhere else (not on earth) and came to earth by something called panspermia. In this way, they put the problem back, but the solution to the problem of life's origin remains still unknown. See Reasons to Believe for more information on Creation and Time and the astronomical evidence for God's existence.
2. No model has ever succesfully been given for the evolution of the first biological cell from random chemical reactions over a long period of time. Just as a mousetrap that misses just one part has no use, so the majority of bio-chemical mechanisms in nature would not work if just one of their component parts were missing (waiting to be evolved). Then how would blind chance ever favor these incredibly improbable PARTIAL inventions? It would surely destroy them.
What we are being asked to believe is that random processes generate real information in the genetic code. Using this logic,
enough nuclear accidents would lead to great improvements in the human race. Even Microsoft Windows 95 with all its faults
was not the result of random events (tho
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