Intelligent Decision
cross-posted from Dome-icile
I actually have a bunch of stuff to get done today, but I just saw this and wanted to put it out there for everybody. According to CNN.com, a federal judge in Pennsylvania has ruled that "Intelligent design" cannot be mentioned in biology classes, ruling in "one of the biggest courtroom clashes on evolution since the 1925 Scopes trial".
"We find that the secular purposes claimed by the Board amount to a pretext for the Board's real purpose, which was to promote religion in the public school classroom," he wrote in his 139-page opinion.The Dover policy required students to hear a statement about intelligent design before ninth-grade biology lessons on evolution. The statement said Charles Darwin's theory is "not a fact" and has inexplicable "gaps." It refers students to an intelligent-design textbook, "Of Pandas and People," for more information.
Jones wrote that he wasn't saying the intelligent design concept shouldn't be studied and discussed, saying its advocates "have bona fide and deeply held beliefs which drive their scholarly endeavors."
But, he wrote, "our conclusion today is that it is unconstitutional to teach ID as an alternative to evolution in a public school science classroom."
30 comments:
Must be a proud day for you and your fellow Democrats, John.
Not a partisan issue nor a proud day. In fact, I have no objection to the teaching of Intelligent Design. I think I agree with the finding of the court that it is a theory that can be taught and discussed, but that it does not belong in biology class being taught as an alternative to evolution.
Representative:
Where, then, do you propose it be taught and discussed?
And I must say I am saddened by your decision to use that picture in conjunction with your post. Are you implying that the only people who would want to teach intelligent design are somehow more ignorant than apes?
Not exactly the kind of high minded rhetoric I expect from one of our state's leaders.
Dittos to GOPartisan, John.
Do you want to debate "Intelligent Design" with some one intelligent, or just post attacks?
The Judge is simply doing the bidding of America's Established Religion (Secular Humanism), and making sure that this religion; now being foisted upon us through the schools; gets no competition or alternative theories.
Thou shalt have no other Gods, indeed.
The Court - and the Schools - are merely acting toward intelligent design as the Church did toward Galileo.
Like the Church of the 1600s, their belief in "Scientism" is blinding them to actual science.
You know, the Right in this country gets more and more absurd and stupid.
But, of course, by saying that, I invite all sorts of criticisms that I'm not being "high-minded" or that it's an "ad hominem" attack.
But accusing the Left in this case of being dirty or not arguing respectively ignores one key fact: People who support I.D. as a scientific theory ARE stupid and absurd.
*Especially those who cast aspersions on the Judge in this case. Judge Jones is a Bush appointee who works in the same division of the U.S. Court system that spawned Samuel Alito.
That's one of the underlying fallacies in the Blogosphere these days. Too many people assume that all opinions are equal. But they're not. Some people are in fact more right than others.
When a conservative, NON-activist judge appointed by Bush himself exposes your viewpoint in this case as total hokum, maybe you should shut up and realize your argument isn't particularly deserving of high-minded debate.
GOP,
It can be taught in numerous ways, just not as a possible counter to evolution. You're right about the picture though. It's gone.
To see a orthodox Jewish perspective on "Intelligent Design" specifically from a Hassidic/Chabad point of view check out:
www.askmoses.com
or
www.meaningfullife.com
The last Lubavitcher Rebbe was a Sarbonnes trained scientist and a believer in a literal account of Creation.
The conclusion that so called "Intelligent Design" is the dumbing down of science is ludicrous. If kids learn Intelligent Design it is not as if they will be less likely to be engineers and scientists.
Many a student from religious institutions in grade school from Lutheran Missouri Synod to Jewish Yeshivas have learned the Genesis narrative as literal truth and have had very successful careers.
There has been a resurgence in traditional religions and no regression in scientific discovery.
There is allegorical and spiritual aspects to Genesis in Kabbalah that is not universally known and deals with spiritual truths that may not be reflected in biology concerning Creation (ex nilhio).
Check out
www.inner.org
We don't teach French in Spanish class, so there's no reason to teach religion in science class. They are, in fact, two different disciplines.
In case you missed it, the Kansas Board of Education had to rewrite the definition of science in order to allow the teaching of intelligent design. But since since science, under the new definition, would not be limited to natural phenomena, anything from astrology to tarot cards could be taught in science class.
And the other thing that irks me to no end is this notion that evolution is only a theory. Well, so is gravity. So is relativity. And yet, without them, we couldn't fly rocket ships or microwave dinner. These theories are bedrock science. They're called "theories" because they can be proven wrong. Newton was right about relativity, but only to a point. That's why his theory has been supplanted. And there are problems with Einstein's Theory of Relativity and, hopefully, one day, physicists will come up with a more encompassing theory that explains why his, too, doesn't quite get it all.
That is the difference between science and religion. Science is limited to observable and testable phenomena. Those phenomena must be replicable. How do you test intelligent design? How do you ascribe cause and effect in a "theory" that has no observable element? Not even Jesus succumbed to Satan's test in the desert demanding to prove His divinity! How would a poor scientist?
This is not about secular humanism taking over America. This is about teaching kids what science is all about.
I happen to believe that God was behind evolution (I also happen to believe you can't have a "day and a night" at the dawn of time before the light and dark were separated that corresponds exactly to an Earthly day now), but that doesn't mean I want to lie to my kids about what science is to make me feel better.
I am NOT against Evolution. The official Catholic position is that Evolution does NOT contradict the Catholic faith.
In fact in speculative theology in Catholic circles Evolution was discussed in some aspect before there was any proof of Darwinian evolution or it was articulated by Darwin.
Augustine in the 4th Century stated that Genesis is meant as an allegory, a story to teach theology but not necessarily biology. This is where more Protestant and so called fundamentalists (unfortunately many times viewed as a pejorative) differ with Catholicism (Roman) as being to Hellenicized in thought.
The Evangelical Christian especially more Puritanical/Calvinistic views do not agree with the position of Saint Justin Martyr (writing about pagan philosophy primarily Greek) that all truth is God's truth. There is a syncretic approach in Scholastic (the dominant approach) Catholic theology and philosophy because of the high view the Catholic Church officially holds for Aristotle (logic/classification) and to a much lesser extent Plato. The influence of Greek philosophy allowed for the possibility of evolution in Catholicism and the rejection of Greek philosophy (or any other pagan worldview even if logically derived pre the modern world) does not readily allow for evolution.
The Catholic Church and reiterated by Pope John Paul II teaches that God created the universe ex-nilhio out of nothing and that the material worlds (and potential non "material" worlds) are creations of the Creator and not per se part of the Creator. It differs from pantheism. While God is present in the world and he breathes life (the difference between essence and actual being) God is also apart from Creation as a Creator similiar to an artist painting a canvass.
Thus God could of put a process in motion of millions of years that including mutations, random selection (although a religious person would not say it is random), and evolution.
Pope John Paul the II stated that Evolution is MORE than a theory.
But that Catholics must believe that:
1. God is the Creator of the Universe
and
2. Man even if evolved from other creatures specifically ape like or pre homo sapiens that at some point there was a unique soul.
3. That humankind (man and woman) are unique with unique souls and were individually in some mysterious way even in tragedy and early death Created by God and have special meaning.
Augustine in the 4th Century said that Genesis is NOT literally 7 days. Some Old Testament stories are clearly stories and not meant as history nor biology. While there is historical and possibly scientific benefit, the Bible is a book of theology, a sacred history of Salvation and Covenant and while more than myth, it is possible to have stories that are not historical fact or to have literary techniques of comparison (comapring a human to a mountain or an eagle is not to taken literally).
The problem with the anti Intelligent Design people is that they reveal there anti-religious bias and make religious people look stupid and ridiculous.
It seems reasonable, to teach even in a science class, that people (a majority) believe that God created humankind and that we are special and unique and not just evolved from ape like creatures.
The idea that you do not teach French in Spanish class is not a good analogy. Most of life and education are interdisciplinary.
In fact in your analogy French and Spanish are both Romance languages founded in Latin and have the same and similar words and could be taught together once there was a foundation.
Science should not be viewed in a vacuum without religous or moral components. That is what happened in Hitler's Germany which was very scientifically advanced and accepted a more secular and pagan pre Christian German influence that rejected the Christian roots of Europe and Germany. The Germans under Hitler put a great deal of money into Eugenics (some analogies potentially to stem cell research, cloning and other advances today) and military science (V2 rockets). Hitler believed in Evolution and the consequent Social Darwinism.
If man evolved from apes and the survival of the fittest applies (understanding this is put in simple rhetorical terms) than a Malthus (a Reverend) and Darwin (also a seminary student) have a society that was written about better by Dickens in Oliver Twist which is a dog eat dog society without meaning.
The idea that the Universe created itself randomly is mathematically not probable. It is like a tornado whipping through a junk yard and creating a 747.
There are interesting scientific arguments to at least demonstrate flaws in almost religious Darwinian thinking and issues such as eyeballs, and why we have not found a missing link, and what are current trajectories of evolution--are at least interesting and can be discussed in science class. It will not make the children and students less informed.
Copernicus was the nephew of a Bishop and was very religious and never rejected Catholicism. The helio centric v. geocentric world views were not based on religion at the time but prevailing scientific dogma based on Aritotelian and Ptolemy logic.
The issue of Galileo has always been blown out of proportion and made more dramatic even though most people do not study it and use it as an example (usually incorrectly) of the excesses of the Catholic church or the interpretation of Old Testament Biblical verses of the Sun moving and holding. Galileo similary was a Catholic and never rejected his religion. In fact both of these men were aided by the Church and encouraged to scientific discovery and made these discoveries without knowledge of Darwinian evolution (understanding it is not Biology)
Gregor Mendel was a monk who found Punnets squares and modern genetics.
The scientific method was found by religious men who did not have the benefits of Darwins theories.
So the theorie of Darwin have not been necessary for a good scientific education or societal advances.
Louis Pasteur was a devout Catholic who prayed the Rosary every day and believed in a Creator God who became incarnate as man and saved mankind yet none of this religious belief stopped him from his scientific discoveries.
The idea of Science vs. Religion does not meet up with historical or logical scrutiny. It is an ideological tool dating back to the French Revolution (pre Darwin) to decrease the role of religion in society. Many of the anti-ID people are anti God and religion and there comments and philosophy reveal itself.
On a practical level many scientists even in the biological sciences are devout religious people specifically evangelical Christians or Roman Catholics and others who believed that God created the universe or even in a more literal interpretation of the Creation narrative in the book of Genesis. The idea that a belief in a Creator God or a Salvific incarnate God/Man means that you do not have a brain or cannot do science or anything in modernity is just not true.
For a conservative Catholic point of view read conservative Catholic writer Stanley Jaki.
Evolution may be more than a theory and a probable explanation for some of the variety and development of life but there are many schools of evolution and differences and flaws in some of the schools. Evolution is a theory to the extent it is not one coherent school of thought and a model (somewhat unprovable) about the origins and development of life.
The scientists at least some or the people claiming to be on the side of science mock the possible existence of God or that there is more meaning than random selection, survivial, adaptation and mutation. It is dangerous to teach people in mass that there is no meaning outside science which gives so little to the complexities and stresses of modern life.
The existential questions of WHY AM I HERE? WHO MADE ME? IS THERE A GOD? IS THERE MEANING IN LIFE?
Cannot be answered by science alone even though science through neuro-science, psychiatry, anatomy and physiology can help answer some of these questions but ultimately there is something more.
Many of the people who don't want to discuss anything else in science class are also the people who allowed people to be viewed as commodities and the testing of African Americans in medical experiments by dehumazing them through race but is not a completely illogical conclusion of Darwin on a social level. Or the science that produced the Atom Bombs or chemical weapons. We are going into an age of cloning and a criticism of religion as keeping science back and that religion or history nor philosophy have anything to say about Darwinian theory, evolution, or biological developments in cloning, stem cell research, DNA experimentation.
There are great dangers here that have been touched upon in silly movies like Gremlins to more profound books like the Brave New World by Adols Huxley.
The deification of Science and the exclusion of God and philosophy from our classrooms may lead us down a very dangerous road.
What we never see is an actual discussion of any of the details of Intelligent Design but only ad hominem attacks on the proponets and a conclusion that is not science and that is backward and regressive.
Where is there an engagement in the actual substance beyond conclusions and personal attacks.
Hey John-
What the hey? Your insightful post on the Blago-Stroger conflict draws just one comment, and your toss off on ID generates dozens of column inches. Methinks you're working too hard!
Daley is g-d and he created the universe to go against him is a trangression.
No one should assume that scientists uniformly agree that there is no God and that the world around us is the product of a mindless evolutionary process. Consider what some scientists have to say about creation and evolution:
"For I am well aware that scarcely a single point is discussed in this volume [Origin of Species] on which facts cannot be adduced, often apparently leading to conclusions directly opposite to those at which I arrived."
- Charles Darwin (1809-1882), British naturalist who popularized the theory of evolution through natural selection
"The more I study nature, the more I stand amazed at the work of the Creator. Into his tiniest creatures, God has placed extraordinary properties that turn them into agents of destruction of dead matter."
"A bit of science distances one from God, but much science nears one to Him."
- Louis Pasteur (1822-1895), French scientist, developer of pasteurization process for milk and vaccines for anthrax, chicken cholera and rabies, dean of the faculty of sciences at Lille University
"Manned space flight is an amazing achievement, but it has opened for mankind thus far only a tiny door for viewing the awesome reaches of space. An outlook through this peephole at the vast mysteries of the universe should only confirm our belief in the certainty of its Creator."
"It is in scientific honesty that I endorse the presentation of alternative theories for the origin of the universe, life and man in the science classroom. It would be an error to overlook the possibility that the universe was planned rather than happening by chance."
"Atheists all over the world have . . . called upon science as their crown witness against the existence of God. But as they try, with arrogant abuse of scientific reasoning, to render proof there is no God, the simple and enlightening truth is that their arguments boomerang. For one of the most fundamental laws of natural science is that nothing in the physical world ever happens without a cause.
"There simply cannot be a creation without some kind of Spiritual Creator . . . In the world around us we can behold the obvious manifestations of the Divine plan of the Creator"
- Dr. Wernher von Braun (1912-1977), NASA director and "father of the American Space Program"
"The theories of evolution, with which our studious youth have been deceived, constitute actually a dogma that all the world continues to teach: but each, in his specialty, the zoologist or the botanist, ascertains that none of the explanations furnished is adequate."
"The theory of evolution is impossible. At base, in spite of appearances, no one any longer believes in it . . . Evolution is a kind of dogma which the priests no longer believe, but which they maintain for their people."
- Paul Lemoine (1878-1940), director of the Paris Natural History Museum, president of the Geological Society of France and editor of Encyclopedie Francaise
"To postulate that the development and survival of the fittest is entirely a consequence of chance mutations seems to me a hypothesis based on no evidence and irreconcilable with the facts. These classical evolutionary theories are a gross over-simplification of an immensely complex and intricate mass of facts, and it amazes me that they are swallowed so uncritically and readily, and for such a long time, by so many scientists without a murmur of protest."
- Sir Ernst Chain (1906-1979), co-holder of the 1945 Nobel Prize for isolating and purifying penicillin, director of Rome's International Research Center for Chemical Microbiology, professor of biochemistry at Imperial College, University of London
David,
Personally, I love the intellectual discourse on the issue. As far as the number of comments is concerned, once again, God trumps Rod. Seriously though, this is a great example of an issue upon which extremely intelligent people can passionately disagree. What's more important is that there be a mutual respect by conflicting opinion holders.
So for 'supporters' of intelligent design--name some testable hypotheses that haven't been falsified already that support the supposed theory of intelligent design....crickets chirping.
All Christians believe in small i small d Intelligent Design. The difference between those that refuse to accept the physical world as it is and those that accept biological evolution is that the latter group doesn't limit the wonders of God to their imagination.
What is really fun though is to corner Behe with a bunch of creationists and ask him whether he accepts common descent. He does, they don't, but they think he's got a great idea, even though it contradicts their beliefs.
What is wrong with intelligent design??? i dont think its unreasonable we were created by some unknown power.. It could be God, alien lifeforms.. etc.. Its definately a possibility.. Anyone ever heard about the 'missing link'??
Biology a science easily hijacked for some reason by people with odd theories about race. The 20th century littered with the catastrophes of what happens when this science gets preverted.
Drudge posted the latest one with a story about Stalin working on breeding a super race.
I've always felt a nice solution for this issue is for Biology students to spend a little time reading William Jennings Bryan. He was a great American and a great Progressive Democrat. His opposition to Darwin feuled his progressivism.
Read his thoughts on it and read Andrew Varnon's Fundamentally Progressive and you realize a little lesson on Bryanism might be good for kids studying Biology because we have the tools to do some bizarre stuff harking back to Stalin's wish for super human soldiers. Science gives us some awfull tools. You don't want to drive God out of the classroom and impose secularism mostly because Biology has such a poor trackrecord for getting hijacked.
You need some liberal progressives in there precisly for that reason... we need some William Jennings Bryans.
Bill - Sorry to bust your bubble but there is still no proof we actually came from apes.. Obviously there is evidence of evolution.. But many holes exist between humans and apes.. There is even evidence within last couple of years that shows a few groups co-existing at same time when previously they were thought to have evolved from each other.. Scientists can't even cure cancer and aids... The last thing i'm going to do is believe every single theory from a 'ape'.. ;)
Anon, check Lifson today in American Thinker on bubbles.
Eisenhower said (I think) the best way to solve problems sometimes is to enlarge them.
The ID and Darwin debate is much ado about Politics and not so much about Science (or religion I suspect).
So maybe best way to solve it is bring some politics into the classroom and a great American Politican is William Jennings Bryan.
Read what motivated him and why he found Darwin so bad. It was more politics than relgion.
Because Biology is giving us some scarey tools for the not so distant future and it's not the ape we descend from but the half-ape / half-human Comrade Stalin sought to Engineer.
I fear that future and thing a good dose of Bryan's ethics and the history here a good grounding for our future Genetic Engineers.
One needn't be a theocrat fundamentalist to think like that, but a pledging Unitarian Universalist to think like that.
Thanks, Representative, you're truly a class act.
But I am disappointed by your non-specific answer to my question of where else it could be taught in public schools other than biology class as an alternative to evolution. I’d be interesting in hearing SPECIFICALLY where you might attempt to place it in our public schools’ curriculums?
evolution never claimed humans descended from apes. The theory claims that humans and apes descended from the same point. pretty basic stuff here.
My head hurts. You know, the reason why that judge threw out the ID suit is because he found that ID is just creationism masquerading as science. And reading through these comments here offer plenty of more evidence of just that point.
There is nothing inherently wrong or immoral or even objectionable about the theory behind Intelligent Design. It's just not science.
The beautiful thing about science is that it can change when confronted with new evidence. So, yes, there are gaps and questions about evolution. That's what's exciting about science! That's why scientists continue to ask questions and continue to look for explanations that take into account new evidence. But make no mistake about it. Biology is rooted firmly in the theory of evolution.
I think the basic premise of science that most of the supporters of ID miss completely is the part of the scientific theory where you start with a hypothesis that CAN BE PROVEN WRONG. There is no way to prove Intelligent Design wrong, so, therefore, it's not science.
That doesn't make Intelligent Design wrong. But it does mean that it doesn't belong in science classes.
And, because it reflects a very narrow interpretation of religious beliefs, public schools cannot promote it any more than they can promote Christianity, Islam or witchcraft.
And everyone seems to wonder why enrollments in private schools continues to rise!
What is the torah's opinion on the Theory of Evolution?
Mikayla Wexler wrote:
Hi,
my name is Mikayla and i go to a Jewish day school, called Herzlia, in South Africa. I am 15 years old and am in grade 9.
I have been set a project by my Jewish studies teacher, I have to ask a question and have a chat with one of the scholars on this site. Unfortunately my computer is not capable of having live chats, so i was wondering if you could help me and just answer one question for me.
I chose you because i noticed that in the knowlegebase, your name came up quite often in the topic i have chosen.
My question is: What is the Torah's opinion on the theory of evolution, and how are we supposed to believe both? We learn both theories in school and as a scholar it is confusing.
Please can you help me!!?? I am stressing because I am unable to complete the project because of my computer.
Thank you
Mikayla
Dear Mikayla,
I apologize for the delay in my response and hope that this correspondence reaches you before your school deadline.
You asked how we reconcile the Torah description of genesis with modern scientific theory. There is a discrepancy of several billion years between the two.
I will respond to the question on two levels. First I would like to qualify the question then I would like to offer a number of possible answers. Please bear with me and read it through to the end.
I am happy to respond to any questions that may occur to you in the course of reading my letter.
I begin by touching on the Jewish approach to the general question of scientific findings in contra distinction to Torah truths. It is common to speak of scientific truth versus Torah claims but I deliberately chose the terms scientific findings versus Torah truths because science can do no more than find or discover information as Scientists come across it.
There is no question that the information we know is less than the information we don't. As we continue to discover newer and newer secrets (otherwise known as findings) our ideas take on new dimensions and our picture of the universe takes on greater shape. At every point in the process we must remember that we are still on the road to discovery. We still don't have all the information, our scientific picture is still incomplete, and as we gather more information and newer discoveries, our understanding of the universe will change again.
Scientific knowledge has evolved a great deal from the early days of Galileo, to the days of Sir Isaac Newton, and even since the era of Albert Einstein. Truths we held sacred in Galileo's day were found to be false in Newton's day. Truths held sacred in Newton's day were debunked in Einstein's day. Some of what we did not understand in Einstein's day is now much better understood. Science is continuously evolving and there is no telling when and where it will end.
What does the Torah say about evolution?
On a very fundamental level, evolution is a Torah idea. The whole idea that there is a progression to the cosmos, that it is not a static situation—there is plenty to suggest that this was an idea introduced to the world by the Torah. The world was made to get from point A to point B, and everything occurring in between can be seen as part of that progression. But when we talk about Darwin’s concept of origins and the cosmologist’s history of time, there we find some serious points of contention:
The basic mechanism of both these paradigms is nothing other than chance and mathematics. The story of Genesis in the Torah tells of deliberate action on the part of the Creator.
They are entirely materialistic representations of the universe. The Kabbala describes the material universe as only the outer layer of an infinitely deep hierarchy of higher and higher levels of being, with the ultimate source being something that is pure nothingness relative to our world.
Rabbi Tzvi Freeman
Related Categories:
Philosophy » Creation
Philosophy » Torah vs. Science
Post Your Comment
Just say it... Date Posted: May 22, 2005
Why does Rabbi Freeman see the need to in any way rationalize a viewpoint that is for all practical purposes "irrational". Evolutionists point at the Bible and state that it is irrational to believe that a "higher power" created the world. However, in the same breath they will extrapolate on evolution - an idea that is at least as "wild" as the creator view, if not "wilder".
Let's call a spade a spade and say it as it is: the world of science, for whatever reason, hates religion and despises the religious.
Posted By Arthur Abrahamian, Atlanta, GA
Not really so different Date Posted: May 22, 2005
Evolution and the Torah have a lot in common. Both state that life was not all at once, but rather it was gradual. Both state that less complex water creatures existed before more complex land creators, and then finally Man. However, the difference is that the Torah credits G-d for this, while Evolution says that it just all happened by accident, as if bloches of paint just randomly aligned themselves to make a perfect Mona Lisa or bricks just went by themselves randomly and created a scyscraper.
Posted By Yerachmiel ben Azriel, Cleveland, Ohio, USA
Rav Avigdor Miller ZT"L Date Posted: May 22, 2005
BS"D
Rav Avigdor Miller ZT"L in his sefer "Awake My Glory" (i hope i am not misquoting or perverting his holy words) explains how evolution is an anti-Torah concept and that it doesnt even make sense! he brings in many proofs for his arguments and explains that evolution is a silly concept and even goes against some fossils and evidence that was found! i highly reccomend Rav Miller's zt'l seforim!
Posted By ZH
Evolution and creationism. Date Posted: Jun 03, 2005
I'm ashamed of you people.
Have any of you ever even read a real college biology text?
Do you understand the concept of the Prometheus tale?
Do you know the meaning of the term theory? As in the theory of gravity, cell theory, the theory of relativity, thermodynamic theory, sliding filament theory, atomic theory, etc?
People who have not read the Tanakh should not discuss it. So it is the same for biological evolution.
Posted By Anonymous, Santa Rosa, CA
Editor's Comment
There are many Jewish religious scientists who have no problem believing that the world is less than 6000 years old. The Lubavitcher Rebbe, who completely rejected the notion of evolution, was himself a Sorbonne educated scientist. See http://www.chabad.org/therebbe/timeline.asp?AID=62153.
Who wrote Sefer Yetzirah (the Book of Creation)?
The Torah says the world is only 5764 years old. What about the dinosaur fossils?
Why did G-d create the world?
How can we reconcile Judaism's claim that the world is over 5,700 years old with modern science?
Torah and science can never contradict each other, because two truths cannot be contradictory. When we find an apparent contradiction between the two, it is generally due to a misunderstanding regarding what one is saying.
Science cannot really prove the age of the universe. All that scientists can do is speculate about the age of the universe by extrapolating from observed phenomena. No scientist alive today can say that he or she has first-hand information regarding the beginning of the universe.
The Torah tells us how old the universe is.
Science tells us how old the universe seems to be.
To give a simple example: how old was Adam when he was first created? Was he a baby? Young man? Old man?
Our sages tell us that he had the body and maturity of a 20-year-old man. Now, let us imagine Adam going for a medical exam a day after he was created. The receptionist asks for his age and he answers: “one day”. “You must be kidding me,” she would reply. “You seem to be at least 20 years old!”
They are both right. Adam is saying how old he really is, while the receptionist is estimating his age based on “scientific proof.”
The scientist that does not believe in G-d has no reason to assume that the age of the world is different than what it appears to be. The one who believes in G-d, however, can perfectly accept the fact that the world was created in a mature state and therefore does not contradict the fact that it is really younger than it seems to be.
Mrs. Sarah Levi
Related Categories:
Philosophy » Creation
Philosophy » Torah vs. Science
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Now showing 10 of 16 comments. next »
Really Nice Date Posted: Jan 21, 2005
Thanks a lot for this answer, it is very clever.....and very practical. You really answered a question which I was thinking about a lot....but with no answer...
Posted By Shady Yousef
Torah & the science of the universe Date Posted: Jan 27, 2005
This was an interesting post, but I wonder about the statement that no one has any actual first hand proof of the creation of the universe. This is a true statement which does imply that, while science may extrapolate the age of the universe and the world from its observations, it cannot proove the observations correct. However, this is a double-edged sword, as the statement can just as easily be applied to the Torah. No Rabbi in the world can claim to have first hand knowledge of the Creation of the Torah or of the Creation of the world by G-d. Yet we accept it as fact. It is interesting to me that we choose to see only one side of the coin. The real issue (my opinion) is not whether or not G-d "created" the universe (many cosmologists and mathimaticians believe that the numbers support the existance of a "higher power") or how old the world is, for one will believe what one believes. The REAL issue is what are we, as Jews, doing to honor that belief? Todah and Shalom.
Posted By J.T. Hunter, Dallas, TX
Editor's Comment
The giving of the Torah by Mount Sinai is part of chronicled history; it was seen by an entire nation. The scientific theories are just that -- theories.
age of universe, Date Posted: Apr 19, 2005
Torah 5765 timeline only account 100% consistent with factual science. To view free book the "recent complex creation.." with adequate proof and sources go to www.pearlmancta.com go to about us page and click link the complex creation.
Be Well,
Happy Pesach,
10 Nissan, 5765
Posted By Roger M. Pearlman CTA, Temp. Los Angeles, CA
Great Explanation Date Posted: May 08, 2005
Wonderful analogy between Adam's apparent age and creation's! Science at its best merely discovers G-d's truths. Just because one thinks that man's finite understanding of the universe contradicts the Word of G-d doesn't change the reality set in motion by its infinite Creator. Shalom!
Posted By Travis, Savannah, GA, 31419
Creation time vs scientific time Date Posted: Jun 03, 2005
While an adequate treatise on the two, it dances around the issue. So G-d placed fossils that appear to be millions of years old and formed light that takes millions of years to reach us, already on its way? He teaches us that uranium has a halflife of billions of years? These and so much more...
Why did He place all this evidence that the world is older than 6000 years? To test us? To see if we would hold to our faith? That seems rather frivolous.
Some accept the two creation stories (yes, there are two) as "Prometheus" tales. How man acquired knowledge; a good thing but none the less, mythological. Remember, truth and fact need not be the same thing. A fictional tale may have lots of truth to it but it is fiction, not factual.
Posted By Anonymous
How Science Proves Torah Date Posted: Jun 15, 2005
I think science and Torah do not contradict each other.
The Torah says the universe is 5764 years old Plus six days. Dr. Schroeder, in his essay 'The Age of the Universe' (http://www.aish.com/societyWork/sciencenature/Age_of_the_Universe.asp), uses Einstein's theory of relativity, which states that the perception of time is relative to your position, to show that the universe is simultaneously 5764 years old and 15 billion years old.
He explains the universe is 15 bilion years old from our perception of time at t=15 bilion 'years', looking back. The Torah gives us the age of the universe from the beginning of time, looking forward - bet is only open forward (time was not 'always there', according to Torah and science). According to scientific theories, one 24 hr period starting at t=0 years, when viewed from our perspective, would appear to be 8 billion years, the next 4 billion etc. He then adds the relative times of all six 24 hr periods and comes up with 15.75 billion years.
Posted By Sharon
Editor's Comment
Once again, we have an apologetic explanation which is predicated on the assumption that the Torah need not be taken literally. I guess G-d must have a great sense of humor, hood-winking millions of people who trusted His Torah to be the absolute truth, while only the erudite scientist can understand its real meaning (which itself is based on subjective science).
How does traditional Judaism's claim that the world is 5,764 years old coincide with modern science? Date Posted: Jun 26, 2005
It is interesting that the only way science has to scientifically measure time without guessing is by measuring the decay rate of carbon 14 (a radioactive isotope). When a creature or plant dies, it stops consuming carbon 14. Since the decay rate of carbon 14 is known, it can be measured to determine the number of years since the creature or plant in question died. What is so interesting and amusing is that the decay rate of carbon 14’s half life is 5,700 years. It is impossible the measure carbon 14 beyond its half life of 5,700 years, so it is impossible for science to date anything as being older than HaSHEM says it is in the Tanach. So much for pseudo-science, I’ll keep the Tanach.
P.S. Please fell free to add to or amend this and post it for all to see. HaSHEM’s truth must be known.
Posted By Berechjah Mainz, Miami, Fl
How does traditional Judaism's claim that the world is 5,764 years old coincide with modern science? Date Posted: Jun 29, 2005
The above comment Mr Mainz provides to the question being discussed is incorrect. Just because the half-life of Carbon-14 is 5,700 years, doesn't mean that the method can only predict 5,700 years back. It just means that it takes 5,700 years for half the material to decay. The carbon-14 method can accurately predict age up to about 50000-60000 years I think (there comes a point when the level of Carbon-14 is highly diminished). Other materials with higher half-life's could predict farther back. Please refer to the following website for more info: . I think to call carbon dating a “pseudoscience” is mistaken. The original answer provided above establishes that there doesn’t have to be a conflict between the Torah and carbon dating. There’s no reason to purposely ignore scientific findings.
Posted By Anonymous, Tarzana, CA
What is a day Date Posted: Jul 01, 2005
Two things bother me about the dating of ages. One is that God seems to be held to a time division based on the rotation of the Earth around the Sun, defined as a day, and the other is that the term 'Day' is used to define the creation of Earth before the definition was defined by the earth's ratio of dividing the day and night by its rotation, after the 4th "Day".
The word ‘day’ here can not refer to a literal 24 hour day because its definition was not realized until after the creation of the Sun after the 4th "Day". Isn't it more correctly translated as an Era or stage of the creation process rather than what we know as a 24 hour day? Time is a ratio of speed and distance and in itself does not exist.
Posted By Terry L. Falls, King George, VA, USA
Editor's Comment
Darkness and light were created on the 1st day, and afterwards the Torah says: And it was evening and it was morning, one day... And it was evening, and it was morning, a second day... etc.
Creation Date Posted: Aug 27, 2005
interesting answer, but i have a problem with it. why should god make the world seem older then it is? there seems no reason. and please dont respond that we cant understand the workings of god, because i believe that to be a superficial answer. try and answer the question first....
Posted By Anonymous
Editor's Comment
1. I think that it would have been quite impossible for G-d to have created a "new world" (at least from the human perspective -- from G-d's standpoint, nothing is impossible). There would have been no existing vegetation, for that would have taken time to grow. But how would vegetation have grown? After all, anyone who saw a plant would assume that it came from a seed which was derived from previous vegetation! And how about wildlife? As the famous question goes, "what came first, the chicken or the egg?" Well, no matter which one would have come first, we would have assumed that the other must have been in existence beforehand. 2. What would Adam and Eve have eaten or how would they have dressed themselves if it would have been a "new world"? It takes time for trees to bear fruit and for grains to grow. It takes time for sheep to grow wool and for cotton to grow. 3. G-d wanted a world wherein there would be people who would have an option to deny His existence. If it would have been completely apparent that the world suddenly came into existence at a certain time, that would make life difficult for the atheists and agnostics. G-d wanted us to choose to believe in Him, not to be compelled.
Evolution and the Magisterium
By Jimmy Akin
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Creation and Genesis
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Three and a half centuries ago, the Galileo incident happened. In the public, mind the Church was seen as a hidebound oppressor of intellectual freedom, while Galileo was portrayed as a martyr for the cause of science.
This incident helped shape the split between faith and science, and it provided a pretext for those attached to the scientific worldview to fault the Church with all manner of intellectual villainy. The fact that the Church’s actions in the Galileo episode weren’t as they are often portrayed is beside the point. The Church suffered a horrible public relations disaster, and it isn’t anxious to have one happen again.
Thus when evolution—the next big worldview-affecting science issue—came up, the Church was determined not to get burned in the same way again and proceeded quite cautiously.
As the Church recognized, certain theories evolution are incompatible with the Catholic faith, as are the materialistic ideas often associated with them. That evolution would operate apart from God’s sovereignty, for example, or that it produced the soul of the first man, or that man has no soul—all of these are incompatible with the faith and unprovable as matters of science.
On the other hand, it is not clear that every possible theory of evolution is incompatible with the faith. Though the majority interpretation of Genesis 1–3 in Christian history had been quite literal, there was also a strain of less insistence on the literal. In fact, the greatest of the Church Fathers, Augustine, speculated in ways that were congruent with certain aspects of modern cosmology and evolutionary thought (see his work The Literal Meaning of Genesis).
In view of this—and the Galileo incident—the Church took its time before weighing in on the new evolutionary thought that became popular in the nineteenth century. By the mid-twentieth century it was ready to do so.
Pius XII
Though there had been lesser interventions on the subject before, Pius XII issued in 1950 the encyclical Humani Generis, which pronounced against certain philosophical and evolutionary ideas, particularly some associated with Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.
At the same time, he gave the most authoritative statement to that date regarding the possibility of Catholics holding certain versions of evolutionary theory. He wrote:
"The magisterium of the Church does not forbid that, in conformity with the present state of human sciences and sacred theology, research and discussions, on the part of men experienced in both fields, take place with regard to the doctrine of evolution, in as far as it inquires into the origin of the human body as coming from pre-existent and living matter—for the Catholic faith obliges us to hold that souls are immediately created by God. However, this must be done in such a way that the reasons for both opinions, that is, those favorable and those unfavorable to evolution, be weighed and judged with the necessary seriousness, moderation, and measure, and provided that all are prepared to submit to the judgment of the Church, to whom Christ has given the mission of interpreting authentically sacred Scripture and of defending the dogmas of faith" (HG 36).
Reading this passage, one notes how tentative Pope Pius is. He speaks of "research and discussions" being conducted regarding human evolution by experts in the fields of science and theology. He warns that we must regard the soul as created by God. He warns not to bias the discussions in favor of evolutionism. And he warns that the magisterium could in the future decide that the authentic meaning of Scripture precludes the possibility of human evolution.
After Humani Generis
Following the release of the Humani Generis, many Catholics—including high-ranking churchmen—gradually got more comfortable with the idea of human evolution. This parallels the growing ease that was gained with heliocentrism following the Galileo affair.
There are certain passages of Scripture that make it sound like the earth stands still while the sun rotates about it (e.g., Josh. 10:13; Ps. 93:1; 104:5; 19, 22; Eccles. 1:5). This is understandable, since the biblical writers—like people in every land—spoke and wrote as things appeared to them, and it does appear from the earth that the earth is stationary while the sun moves.
Before the Copernican Revolution, the Church had taken these passages at face value and had not considered the literary nature of these statements—that they were written in the language of appearances (what is sometimes called phenomenological language) and did not express a God’s eye view of cosmology.
Following Copernicus and Galileo, theologians rethought these passages, saw that they could be taken in a phenomenological sense, and gradually got comfortable with the idea. The same thing happened after Humani Generis. Taken at face value, Genesis 2:7 seems to say that God created the first man directly from the dust of the ground, and that is how most folks took it. There had always been a strand in both Christian and Jewish interpretation—even before the rise of modern science—that recognized that the early chapters of Genesis contain non-literal elements, that they present the mysterious, unseen-by-human-eye work of the Creator in a stylized manner. But the majority had tended to take these passages literally.
After the discoveries of modern biology and Humani Generis, it took a while for many Catholics to get comfortable taking these passages in a less literal sense. But, just as they grew at ease taking the geocentric-sounding passages in a heliocentric manner, they also began to take passages like Genesis 2:7 in a manner compatible with human evolutionism.
By the time of John Paul II, one would be hard pressed to find a high-ranking churchman who did not approve of such a reading. In fact, anxious not to have a repeat of the public relations fiasco that happened with Galileo, many Church officials went out of their way to make positive comments about modern science, including the idea of human evolution, as long as it was proposed in a way compatible with the Catholic faith.
John Paul II
In 1996, Pope John Paul II gave an address to the Pontifical Academy of the Sciences on the subject of evolution, which set off a controversy regarding the subject.
Much of the controversy was fueled by rash press reports that distorted what the Pope said and made it sound as if evolution was something in which Catholics were obliged to believe. Those who do not believe in evolution—Catholic and non-Catholic alike—were taken aback by the reports.
Also fueling the controversy were claims that John Paul’s remarks (which had originally been given in French) had been mistranslated. These reports proved to be exaggerated, though there was enough of a basis to them that a slightly emended translation was issued.
We cannot conduct a full analysis of what the Pope said, but the general tone of the address was positive but cautious. He said nice things about science but also stressed the limits of science to tell us about human origins. He also discussed the varieties of human evolutionism that would not be compatible with the Catholic faith.
In the most controversial passage of the address, the Holy Father stated: "Today, almost half a century after the publication of the encyclical [Humani Generis], new knowledge has led to the recognition in the theory of evolution of more than a hypothesis. It is indeed remarkable that this theory has been progressively accepted by researchers, following a series of discoveries in various fields of knowledge. The convergence, neither sought nor fabricated, of the results of work that was conducted independently is in itself a significant argument in favor of this theory" (Message to the Pontifical Academy of the Sciences [Oct. 22, 1996] 4).
This passage was controversial because it was taken as a statement of Catholic doctrine. It is not. John Paul is summarizing the attitude of mainstream science regarding evolution, and recognizing that, in the prior fifty years, evolution had become regarded in mainstream science as more than a hypothesis.
The note that the convergence of scientific discoveries bearing on evolution was "neither sought nor fabricated" struck many non-evolutionists as naive, but in this case the Pope was expressing a personal assessment and not a matter of Catholic doctrine. It is also undeniable that this convergence constitutes an argument in favor of evolution; whether it is a good argument or a bad argument is a separate question.
The Holy Father went on to note that "a theory’s validity depends on whether or not it can be verified; it is constantly tested against the facts; whenever it can no longer explain the latter, it shows its limitations and unsuitability. It must then be rethought" (ibid.). He means here that, although mainstream science has elevated evolution from a hypothesis to a theory, it still must be open to the fact that further data may require the whole thing to be rethought.
He also noted: "And to tell the truth, rather than the theory of evolution, we should speak of several theories of evolution" (ibid.). Thus, all theories of evolution cannot be true.
The Catechism
The Catechism touches briefly on the subject of evolution. It says: "The question about the origins of the world and of man has been the object of many scientific studies that have splendidly enriched our knowledge of the age and dimensions of the cosmos, the development of life-forms and the appearance of man. These discoveries invite us to even greater admiration for the greatness of the Creator, prompting us to give him thanks for all his works and for the understanding and wisdom he gives to scholars and researchers" (CCC 283).
When the Catechism speaks of "many scientific studies" splendidly enriching our knowledge of "the development of life-forms and the appearance of man," it is thinking of mainstream science. It is not thinking of studies done by the Institute for Creation Research or similar places.
If the Catechism did have such groups in mind, it would be pastorally irresponsible to speak in such a manner, for the average reader of the Catechism would be certain to think that mainstream science was being referred to. In fact, one would be certain to regard this as some kind of positive comment regarding the theory of evolution—which it is.
The question is: Does that make it a matter of Catholic doctrine?
The Catechism is certainly among the most authoritative ecclesiastical documents there is. It is the product of a collaboration among the world’s bishops, issued by the authority of the Pope, who declared it to be "a sure norm for teaching the faith" (Fidei Depositum 3). Given this, the only thing comparable to it among non-papal Church documents would be the decrees of an ecumenical council.
Unfortunately, there have been too few such Church-wide catechisms to determine their exact role in the scheme of ecclesiastical documents. (There have been only two of them.) But it remains clear that this is a weighty document.
It also is much more guarded in what it says than the Pope’s message to the Pontifical Academy of the Sciences. The fathers of the Catechism (if one may so term them) willed that there be a remark gesturing toward evolution in a favorable manner, but they are far less specific than the Pope was in his address.
This is, no doubt, because of the weight and the prominence of the Catechism itself. Whatever it said was more likely to be regarded by the public as Catholic doctrine. So, does the Catechism’s positive but general statement regarding evolutionism make this a matter of Catholic doctrine?
Actually, it doesn’t.
Evolution and the Deposit of Faith
The fact is that at this juncture it does not look like evolution can be a subject of Catholic teaching. The reason has to do with its relationship to the deposit of faith (Scripture and Tradition).
Basically, a scientific claim can have one of three basic relations with the sources of faith: (1) It can be required by them, (2) It can be precluded by them, or (w) It can be free with respect to them.
A scientific claim can be required by the sources of faith because (a) it is directly taught in them or (b) it is needed to protect a truth that is taught in the deposit of faith. An example is that the world has a beginning, that it does not go back forever in time.
Similarly, a scientific claim also can be precluded by the sources of faith because (a) they directly teach it to be false or (b) its falsity must be recognized to protect something else they teach. An example would be the idea that the universe extends back infinitely in time.
Matters that do not fall into either of the above categories are free with respect to the sources of faith, and they must stand or fall on their own scientific merits. As the Pope pointed out in his address, new data accumulates with time, so such claims may seem to stand at one time, fall at another, then get up and stumble again later.
However that plays out, Catholic doctrine is unconcerned because the sources of faith neither require nor preclude them. They are apart from the faith and the Church’s ability to pronounce on them.
It is possible for it to be unclear which of the three relationships a scientific idea has, but doctrinal development can clarify this. Initially, it looked to many as if the idea of geocentrism was required by Scripture and that therefore heliocentrism was precluded. Over time, it was recognized that this was not the case. This matter is free with respect to the sources of faith.
The process of coming to that conclusion was so painful that the Church was determined not to get burned that way again, and so it is entirely natural that Church author would want to say positive sounding things about evolution, but that doesn’t make it a teaching of the faith.
Initially it looked to many like the theory of human evolution was precluded by the sources of faith. In the mid-twentieth century, Pius XII issued a tentative finding that this was not the case. In the remainder of the century, this conviction strengthened.
But nobody has gone to the extent of saying that it is required by the sources of faith. That hasn’t been remotely suggested.
Until such time as the magisterium would either reverse its twentieth-century finding that human evolution is not precluded by the deposit of faith or would make a new finding that it is required by the deposit, human evolution as a matter that is free with respect to the sources. It is a matter that must stand or fall on its own scientific merits; it is not a matter of Catholic teaching.
The sooner both sides in the evolution debate within the Catholic Church recognize this, the better for all concerned.
Confronting Creation’s Complexities
Darwinism Isn’t Fit to Survive
By Robin Bernhoft
This Rock
Volume 14, Number 7
September 2003
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By Karl Keating
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Darwinism Isn’t Fit to Survive
By Robin Bernhoft
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Is the Mass a True Sacrifice?
By Kenneth J. Howell
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Mary, Full of Grace
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The Limits of Forgiveness
By Jimmy Akin
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Why should it matter to Catholics whether Darwinism survives or fades away? Hasn’t the Church tolerated evolution quite happily since it was first discussed at a Church Council seventeen hundred years ago? Didn’t the Holy Father all but endorse Darwinism in a 1996 address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences? Why should Catholics who are not six-day Genesis fundamentalists even bother to read this article?
For one very big reason, the same reason implied by John Paul II in his somewhat ambiguous 1996 address: Darwinism denies that God played a role in the creation of human beings.
This is a serious problem, because without God’s creation of the first two humans, there is no Fall, and, if no Fall, no original sin and therefore no need for a Redeemer. If no Redeemer, then no redemption and hence no sacraments, no faith, no Church.
As the Holy Father mentioned in his 1996 address, there are several theories of evolution. This is an important point to remember, because not all theories of evolution are hostile to the Catholic beliefs. Over the centuries, the Church has taught that:
In the beginning God created everything out of nothing;
He created the first man and woman specially and in some way;
The soul is created by God, not produced by the parents;
The first parents were tested, sinned, and fell from original innocence into original sin, which they passed on with all its painful consequences to their descendants.
There are a number of "theistic" theories of evolution that could be potentially compatible with these propositions. Such theories generally agree that God created matter, then set in motion laws of nature that allowed evolutionary change to occur. Some theistic evolutionists permit God to intervene from time to time to keep things moving in the right direction.
Most theistic evolution theories are tolerant of, or compatible with, the special creation of man. Some even interpret the molecular complexities of life as reflecting the designs of an intelligent being. Intelligent design theories of evolution can easily be harmonized with the Catholic faith.
But Darwinism cannot, for it assumes from the outset that God plays no role in biological existence. Darwinism assumes that the tendency towards evolutionary progress is an inherent feature of the universe and requires no divine involvement. God’s exclusion from nature is not a scientific observation, as Darwinians sometimes claim. It is an arbitrary philosophical starting point chosen before any biological data are even collected. Darwinism takes as given that evolution is a purely materialistic process that proceeds by random chance toward no particular goal. Since neither survival nor fitness matters to the empty Darwinian universe, "survival of the fittest" has no deeper meaning.
Dogma Disguised As Science
Darwinist apologists often stress data that support their philosophy and ignore data that do not. Hence it appears that, for many Darwinians, protecting atheistic philosophy is more important than preserving scientific objectivity. Darwinism is precisely the sort of materialist-origins philosophy the Holy Father warned us against in his oft-quoted address: "theories of evolution which, in accordance with the philosophies inspiring them, consider the spirit as emerging from the forces of living matter or as a mere epiphenomenon of this matter are incompatible with the truth about man. Nor are they able to ground the dignity of the person" (Address to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, October 22, 1996).
Darwinism, with its modern genetic refinements (such as Neo-Darwinism), dominates mainstream evolutionary thinking and dictates the content of school textbooks. Children are taught as scientific facts that the universe exists by accident, that life arose spontaneously from non-life, that all species arose from a common primitive ancestor, and that all biological diversity can be accounted for by random genetic changes (usually, but not always, in small increments) chosen over billions of years by the process of natural selection.
Some Darwinian evolutionists who go so far as to assert that qualities of soul like love, altruism, or piety are merely extensions of animal instincts are bold enough to claim the status of "scientific fact" for such speculations.
But are any of those assertions scientific facts, or are they just materialist philosophical dogmas masquerading as science? Does biology support Darwinism, as so many journalists and scientific authorities assure us? Or is the Darwinist version of evolution less an established fact than a tax-supported official ideology with some of the trappings of an established religion?
Let us begin where biology is presumed to begin, by considering the possibility that non-living matter could spontaneously generate life. Harold Urey, who won the Nobel Prize in 1934 for trying (unsuccessfully) to create life in the lab, wrote, "All of us who study the origin of life find that the more we look into it, the more we feel that it is too complex to have evolved anywhere. We all believe, as an article of faith [emphasis added], that life evolved from dead matter on this planet. It’s just that its complexity is so great, that it’s hard for us to imagine that it did" (Christian Science Monitor, January 4, 1962, p. 4).
Swamp Thing
To help understand Urey’s point, imagine a lifeless swamp a few billion years ago that "wishes" to generate life. It will have to build some proteins, the building blocks of life. Proteins are chains of amino acids. Assume that by some unknown process your swamp is able to generate amino acids. By natural generation, half of the amino acids will be left-handed, the other half right-handed.
But right-handed amino acids damage protein structure, so your swamp will have to find a way to get rid of them. Most biological proteins are strings of one hundred or so left-handed amino acids, assembled in exactly the right sequence. The sequence has to be exact, or the protein’s shape changes; change the shape significantly and you destroy the protein’s biological value.
As your swamp lines up its amino acids just so, it has to keep them from reacting with each other and with water, oxygen, calcium, magnesium, and a host of other chemicals—even though amino acids are highly reactive with many substances. Your swamp must also protect its amino acids from ultraviolet light, because UV light denatures protein. Since the sun is above the horizon roughly half the time, UV light is present roughly half the time.
All these factors make it hard for a swamp to produce a protein. Even if it did, one protein would not be enough. It would take about two thousand different proteins to make the simplest imaginable one-celled organism, and it would have to make all two thousand in virtually the same instant. Why? Because proteins and amino acids get rancid within hours of exposure to oxygen and/or ultraviolet light.
The chemical odds of two thousand proteins arising spontaneously in this way have been estimated by Darwinians at approximately one chance in ten with forty thousand zeroes after it. That is about as close to statistically impossible as can be, no matter how many billion years you wait for it to happen.
And to make matters worse, for spontaneous generation no help can be expected from evolution, because chemicals don’t evolve. Neo-Darwinism requires DNA to pass on information to descendants. But your swamp is nowhere near ready to produce DNA. Small biological proteins don’t have descendants for natural selection to choose between.
Your swamp also needs to create sugars and fats—but again, as with amino acids, not just any sugar or fat will do. Biological sugars must be right-handed, since left-handed ones sabotage biological structures. Statistically, right- and left-handed sugars form naturally in equal quantities. And biological fats must be the cis form, even though the mirror image trans form is the chemically stable type preferred by nature. Your swamp needs cis fats to make cell membranes, but trans fats—the type nature prefers—damage or destroy cell membranes. And as you might expect, cis and trans are found in equal amounts. So your swamp has to find a way to get rid of the left-handed sugars and the trans fats.
It also needs to produce a genetics system. It is probably impossible to assemble the components of DNA in the lab, even with high-priced technicians and modern equipment. Indeed, some parts of the DNA molecule have never been synthesized by human chemists. Is it reasonable to think these parts could be synthesized in a lifeless swamp?
Other parts of the DNA molecule cannot be synthesized in water. They must be synthesized dry, then somehow introduced into a water-based living creature without being destroyed on contact with water. No mere human scientist knows how to do that.
To make matters more complicated, DNA does not function unless it has several dozen regulatory proteins present. These are produced by DNA, but must be present before DNA can actually produce them. You need the whole genetic system all at once. There is no value in having just part of it. Asking the genetics system to produce itself and its autoregulatory proteins simultaneously is like asking your neighbor to become her own grandmother.
The need for the whole genetics system all at once (and not by small increments accumulating over time, as demanded by Darwinian theory) led a biological probability conference some years ago at the University of Paris to conclude, "We believe there is a considerable gap in the Neo-Darwinian theory of evolution. We believe this gap to be of such a nature [that] it cannot be bridged with the current conceptions of biology" (Schutzenberger in Mathematical Challenges to the Neo-Darwinian Interpretation of Evolution, pp. 73, 75).
Darwinians are not deterred. In the words of George Wald, my old biology professor at Harvard University, "The reasonable view was to believe in spontaneous generation; the only alternative [was] to believe in a single primary act of supernatural creation. There is no third position. For this reason, many scientists a century ago chose to regard the belief in spontaneous generation as a ‘philosophical necessity.’ . . . Most modern biologists, having reviewed with satisfaction the downfall of the spontaneous generation hypothesis, yet unwilling to accept the alternative belief in special creation, are left with nothing.
"I think a scientist has no choice but to approach the origin of life though a hypothesis of spontaneous generation" ("The Origin of Life," Scientific American, August 1954, p. 46).
It would seem "scientific facts" have been replaced by "articles of faith" and "philosophical necessities." But let us get back to science.
Of Genes and Embryos and Five-Digited Beasts
Everyone agrees that many species have extremities that end in five digits. Humans have five fingers on each hand and five toes on each foot. Whale flippers, bird wings, and mammalian paws all end in five digits. The Penguin Dictionary of Biology assures us that this sharing of five-digited extremities is strong evidence that all life shares a common ancestor and is a major proof of the truth of Darwin’s theory.
Maybe when Darwin wrote, a century and a half ago ago, it seemed obvious that the sharing of five-digited extremities suggested descent from a common ancestor. But if human hands and animal extremities are variations on a theme pioneered by a common ancestor, it would be reasonable to expect that the genes of that common ancestor ought to be the baseline from which human hands, dog paws, bird wings, and whale flippers branch off as variations on a common theme. They are not.
Similarly, if these digits descended from a common ancestor, one would expect them to begin in roughly the same place embryologically, then branch off as they develop into hands, flippers, or wings. They do not.
The genes controlling the formation of five-digited extremities are completely different in each of these species. Embryologically, each of these structures begins in a different place, and develops through radically different routes into hands, flippers, or wings. Different genes produce different patterns of development, yet arrive at similar (five-digited) structural outcomes.
In other words, modern genetics and embryology show us that these similarities are not signs of divergent evolution from a common ancestor. The scientific data suggests that five-digited extremities might offer mechanically superior engineering. Whether this implies intelligent design or suggests convergent evolution is a matter of philosophical interpretation, not scientific fact.
A Theory with No Fossil Fuel
The fossil record is equally hostile to Darwin. His basic theory stated that evolution progresses by slow, cumulative changes over time. According to Darwin, individual species change gradually through series of intermediate forms into different species. Very few fossils had been discovered when Darwin formed this hypothesis. He expected that many fossils would be found of species intermediate between ancestral organisms and their descendants and admitted that if such fossils could not be found it would disprove his theory.
By Darwin’s own criterion his theory has been disproved. In the past one hundred fifty years, the fossil record has become nearly complete, yet there are still no intermediate fossils. Scientists have found fossils of 97.7 percent of land vertebrates worldwide, and almost one hundred percent in North America, and still they have not found the intermediate fossils Darwin said had to be there in order for his theory to be true.
No less an authority than the late Stephen Jay Gould called the absence of fossil support for evolution the "trade secret" of paleontology. (Gould, of course, did his part to keep it a secret in his years of evolutionary commentary on PBS, although he wrote quite honestly about these problems in the scientific literature.)
What you find in the fossil record is the sudden appearance, 600 million years ago in the "Cambrian Explosion," of a wide range of mature fossils. Some of these lasted for a while, then died out. Others have survived into the present. None changed into anything else.
Later, other fossils appeared abruptly in their mature forms, persisted, then either died out or survived to the present. None changed into anything else. There are no intermediate forms. The predominant fossil theme is stasis: species appear, stay the same, and either die out or persist into the present. The fossil record provides no evidence that any species was ancestral to any other species and no evidence of intermediate forms showing ancestral relationship.
One of the Darwinist hopes of the 1960s was that chemical traces could be found of ancestral relationships in the amino acid sequences of proteins common to various species. Literally dozens of proteins have been sequenced, in dozens of different species, but the data show isolated species, or families of species, chemically clustered in the same way Linnaeus clustered creatures by physical appearance over two hundred years ago, with no intermediates to suggest ancestral relationships. Once again, there is no reason to connect the dots.
Darwinists have defended their turf by postulating that a "biochemical clock" created the spaces between species. Their critics point out that it would be an odd clock that evolved at the same rate in mice and elephants, despite the huge difference between their generation times, yet ran at radically different speeds for different proteins.
Irreducible Complexity
On the whole, biochemistry has proven as depressing for Darwinists as the fossil record.
Worst of all for Darwin—and the final death knell for his theory—is the modern subject of irreducible complexity.
To be "irreducibly complex," a system must not only be very complicated but also must need every one of its many parts to function. An irreducibly complex system cannot function if any one of its parts is taken away. We saw an instance of irreducible complexity with the genetics system in our hypothetical swamp.
Such a system could not be created by a Darwinist approach, because Darwinism requires that complicated systems or organs be built up one piece at a time. In Darwinism, each piece must ordinarily confer a survival advantage, one chosen by natural selection.
Pieces that do not confer a survival advantage might be tolerated from time to time, but only as exceptions to the rule that natural selection results in changes that make survival more likely. Scientists assume that natural selection does not like to waste energy on useless items.
Irreducibly complex systems like the genetics system, the immune system, the blood-clotting system and the retina of the eye (to mention only a few) contain many elements that are of no value on their own. Some—particularly in the clotting and immune systems—contain dozens of elements, some of which would be fatal on their own without the balance provided by the rest of the system. Others would uselessly consume energy on their own and therefore might be a survival disadvantage, to be rejected by natural selection.
There is no way to develop irreducibly complex structures in a Darwinian way, as the theory currently exists.
Finally, there is no scientific evidence that microevolution—the adaptation of species to environmental change—can generate macroevolution—the development of new species.
Here is the bottom line: Darwin’s philosophical materialism is every bit as outmoded and sterile as was Marx’s. Perhaps we can look for a day when the Berlin Wall of textbook Darwinism collapses, and students will at last be free to study biology without Harold Urey’s encrusted atheistic "articles of faith" or George Wald’s godless "philosophical necessities."
Scientists outside the English-speaking world, particularly in France and China, are already far more skeptical about Darwinism than biologists in this country. Perhaps in the future a less ideologically driven biology will develop theories that explain the diversity of life in ways that provide a better fit with the biological data. In the meantime, Darwinism is not fit to survive.
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Robin Bernhoft, M.D., is co-author with Fr. Robert Spitzer, S.J., and Camille deBlasi of Healing the Culture (Ignatius) and with Peg Luksik of Is Evolution Fit to Survive? (Family Life Institute). He is chairman of the National Parents Commission, a Catholic educational apostolate that produces the show Welcome Home on radio (nationalparents.com) and television (familylifetv.com) plus books and tapes on topics of interest to Catholics and others.
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