The recent opening of Ken Ham's Creation Museum has unleashed a torrent of criticism of Christians and Creationists. But it's atheist evolutionists who deserve criticism.
Ken Ham’s Creation Museum opened its doors to the public last month and the howls of protest are still echoing. One atheist physics professor called the museum “anti-science.” Another critic said Ham and his followers are “dragging us back to the Middle Ages.”
This has all been heard before, of course. Creationist Christians have been ridiculed since the Scopes “Monkey” Trial in Dayton, Tennessee that pitted Christianity against Darwinian-inspired modernism.
The shame in all this is that modernists and postmodernists, for all their talk of reason and education, have learned very little about Christianity and Creationism. Their ridicule displays a staggering ignorance (willful or subconscious – that’s for you, the reader, to decide) at the nature of this debate.
Understanding Evolution
According to “Understanding Evolution,” a website of the University of California’s Museum of Paleontology and the National Center for Science Education, evolution is “descent with modification.”
The website explains that this basic definition of evolution “encompasses small-scale evolution (changes in gene frequency in a population from one generation to the next) and large-scale evolution (the descent of different species from a common ancestor over many generations).”
This distinction between small-scale evolution and large-scale evolution has been raised by U.S. Senator Sam Brownback (R-KS). The Republican presidential candidate felt compelled to explain why he raised his hand against evolution in a recent GOP presidential candidates’ debate. In a June 2007 New York Times op-ed, Brownback writes:
If belief in evolution means simply assenting to microevolution, small changes over time within a species, I am happy to say, as I have in the past, that I believe it to be true. If, on the other hand, it means assenting to an exclusively materialistic, deterministic vision of the world that holds no place for a guiding intelligence, then I reject it.
The problem is that this distinction is not made enough. There is considerable evidence for small-scale (“micro”) evolution, but very little for large-scale (“macro”) evolution. It is laughable to deny micro-evolution, and those that do can justly be categorized with those who believe in Santa Claus or the Tooth Fairy.
This, however, is NOT the case with people who raise questions against macro-evolution.
Atheist Assumptions
Darwinian macro-evolution (for lack of a better term) rests on the atheist assumption known as naturalism. According to this assumption or presumption, there are no supernatural forces acting in the universe. If there are, they are (according to the “naturalist” mindset) unknowable and therefore irrelevant or inconsequential.
Austin Cline, a regional director for the Council for Secular Humanism and the About.com Guide for Atheism, acknowledges and defends this assumption:
The focus on natural causes….is a conclusion developed over a long period of time during which science developed. People learned that if you make predictions, test those predictions, refine your hypotheses, and test them some more, you learn how to predict and control the world around you with a great deal of reliability and accuracy. Prediction and repeatability, however, only work in a natural context - supernatural creators cannot be predicted and cannot be tested in the manner in which science works.
Therefore, in a naturalistic world, scientists see evidence for small-scale evolution and then, based on similarities between various species, they assume the same must have occurred at the macro-level.
The leading alternative to the macro-evolution assumption is Intelligent Design (broadly speaking) or biblical Creationism (a sub-set of ID, but one widely accepted in Christian circles and by a large portion of the North American population). Atheist and agnostic scientists, however, rule these alternatives out of consideration immediately.
What’s more, they use the evolutionary theory itself to demolish the Intelligent Design alternative. Consider this quote from Richard Dawkins, bestselling author of The God Delusion:
A creator who created the universe or set up the laws of physics so that life would evolve or who actually supervised the evolution of life, or anything like that, would have to be some sort of super-intelligence, some sort of mega-mind. That mega-mind would have had to be present right at the start of the universe. The whole message of evolution is that complexity and intelligence and all the things that would go with being a creative force come late, they come as a consequence of hundreds of millions of years of natural selection. There was no intelligence early on in the universe.
Did you see that? Dawkins assumes evolution to be true, and then – based on that assumption – rules out the possibility that a highly intelligent or complex life force could be present at the universe’s origins.
What should society’s attitude be toward Ken Ham’s museum?
A fair and accurate rendering of Creationism would be that it’s a religious interpretation of a valid hypothesis – the hypothesis being Intelligent Design.
Intelligent Design is too often relegated to the sidelines and merged with Creationism. In fact, ID is not Creationism. It is a hypothesis that stops short of any religious interpretations. It involves an examination of the data and a deduction that conscious, intelligent design is more plausible and likely than natural, unsupervised evolution in explaining the universe.
Creationism accepts (more or less) the biblical understanding of that cosmic force. As such, it steps outside the purview of science – but NOT outside the boundary of reason or rational thought. While it doesn’t warrant a place in a secular science classroom, it also does not warrant the ridicule it too often receives.
*The preceding article represents a commentary from the Suite101 Protestantism author. While no apologies are made for its content, readers are welcome to disagree and provide counter-arguments in the discussion area. Dissent is welcome.
The copyright of the article Audacity of Evolution in Protestantism is owned by Brian Tubbs. Permission to republish Audacity of Evolution must be granted by the author in writing.
Comments
Jun 18, 2007 7:59 AM
Pink
:
. I got a kick out of your hyperbolic article on evolution. .
Jun 19, 2007 2:30 AM
Kim Jeremy Sheil
:
I thought it was well written.:)
Jun 19, 2007 7:44 AM
Brian Tubbs
:
Can you be more specific? The fact that you categorize and dismiss the whole article leads me to think that you're unable to dispute its specific content.
Jun 19, 2007 8:09 AM
Pink
:
. As far as I am concerned, your article was loaded with hyperbole. . Use of these words, unleash, torrent, howls of protest, pitted, staggering ignorance, and so on are all instances of the hyperbolic. Sounds like mad dogs thrown into a hole in the ground where they are forced to turn on each other with snarls and froth. . I think you overdid it and I got a kick out of it. .
Jun 19, 2007 9:03 AM
Migisi
:
. <i>Use of these words, unleash, torrent, howls of protest, pitted, staggering ignorance,</i> . I noticed the inflamatories right off too. Yes, overdone. And to quote Brownback - a <b>politician</b> - as if his beliefs were a deciding factor. . Brian wrote: <i>Creationism accepts (more or less) the biblical understanding of that cosmic force. As such, it steps outside the purview of science - but NOT outside the boundary of reason or rational thought.</i> . IMO, biblical Creationism doesn't fit within the boundary of <b>reason</b> and <b>rational thought</b> - any more than these legends do: <i>Creation Stories from around the World</i> http://www.gly.uga.edu/railsback/CS/CSIndex.html . Creationism is a tenet of a faith. What is 'faith'? It's defined as a body of dogma of a <b>religion</b>. It's belief that does NOT rest on logical proof or material evidence. . The synonym for 'rational' is 'logical'. Belief in supernatural powers and gods isn't 'logical'. . 'Reason' is defined as an underlying fact or cause that provides logical sense for a premise or occurrence. There's that pesky word 'logical' again. And the word 'fact' - which biblical Creationism can not provide or prove. . The only idea that fits 'reason' and 'rational thought' is this: NOBODY can know how the universe and life came to be, and ~every~ idea is merely a theory - an opinion, a speculation.
Jun 19, 2007 1:09 PM
Brian Tubbs
:
Okay, but I like adjectives and adverbs. :)
Jun 20, 2007 6:06 AM
Pink
:
. Brian quips, <i>I like adjectives and adverbs.</i> . So--now--there's a clue, Brian. . I always thought apple pie with ice cream was like adjectives and adverbs. . They seem to add weight to the situation. . <b>:~)</b> .
Jun 21, 2007 9:18 AM
Brian Tubbs
:
Apple pie w/ ice cream? NOW yer talkin'! One of my favorite desserts!
I have been accused before (many times) of over-using adjectives and adverbs in my writing. It's a bad habit, I guess.
Jun 21, 2007 9:26 AM
Brian Tubbs
:
Migisi,
Let's separate out the BIG Picture from the details for a moment. If we jump straight to the six-day 6,000 years ago Genesis story, then I can understand YOUR point in categorizing that with other religious legends. (The caveat to that is that there is SOME evidence of a young earth - but we'll put that aside for now. For this post and for the sake of argument, I'll grant you your point).
HOWEVER...I completely and totally (I love adverbs) disagree with you when it comes to Genesis 1:1.
For Moses to write: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth" - is not merely a religious fable or myth to be chalked up with the other religions.
Moses' assertion in Genesis 1:1 warrants attention in its own right, even if one dismisses his elaboration in subsequent verses.
Genesis 1:1 is a plausible, logical, rational belief. Not a fable. How can I say that?
I've written several articles on this, but to sum up...
We KNOW that the universe had a beginning. Modern science confirms this, the objections of the late Carl Sagan notwithstanding. Modern science estimates that the universe began about 14-15 billion years ago with a "big bang" type event. While THAT (the timeline and the 'big bang') can be described as theory, science is certain that the universe DID begin at a point in time.
Well, LOGIC dictates that whatever BEGINS to exist MUST have a cause. And....that cause must be CAPABLE of causing the thing which began to exist. It is logical and rational to conclude that the cause was divine, for only a divine cause could be capable of creating space and time.
You may not AGREE with that, but it's ludicrous (and I'll stick to that word) to say that such a belief is no more than a fable or legend. It's much more than that.
Jun 21, 2007 9:49 AM
Pink
:
. Among other comments, Brian writes, <i>"...only a divine cause could be capable of creating space and time."</i> . I suppose there are some people who suffer from such depression that they are unable to consider their existence in space and time as being wonderful beyond human measure. . A comprehensive definition for the meanings of the word, divine, can be summed up as something that is "wonderful beyond human measure". . I agree that existence is created by divine inspiration. It is dumb foundingly amazing. . It raises our curiosity and makes us want to explore its extremities that we believe are never ending. Who can fathom the wonders of creation? . Evolution--itself--is an example of the divine work of creation. . Genesis 1:1 is as much an understatement as anything can be and it points to the limited imaginations of the ancients. . We have come to a place so far beyond their meager abilities that we should be ashamed to fall into the trap of believing their fables and myths. This is not to say that their stories don't hold value for us today. They do hold value--great value--and we owe it to ourselves to explore their deepest meanings. But, to buy into them by some ideological compunction is way to childish for our nature. . Why can't we just marvel at the creation and allow those with the energies to explore it for our mutual edification rather than to use some story to see if others belong to our club or not? . http://my.homewithgod.com/heavenlymidis2/howgreat.html .
