Four Main Sets of Evidence in which Scientific Naturalism Fails to Explain How Life Could Have Developed:
It is commonly taught that the first primitive versions of microscopic life began on Earth some four billion years ago, when the right arrangement of chemicals happened, by random chance, to come together in just the right way. However, even among the most hardened atheists in the scientific community, the odds against this happening are acknowledged to be so astronomical as to lead them to call it a ‘miracle’: “An honest man, armed with all the knowledge available to us now, could only state that…the origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle.” – Francis Crick
- Even the simplest living things require vast amounts of ordered organic data, each set of which have their own specified complexity of arrangement in order to permit life:
- Amino acids, which for life require a selective left-handed orientation
- Proteins/enzymes, which must be exactly ordered and folded in the right way
- DNA and/or RNA, which is coded to a mind-boggling level of complexity. “Each nucleus…contains a digitally coded database larger, in information content, than all 30 volumes of the Encyclopedia Britannica put together.” – Richard Dawkins
- Membranes, specified to various kinds and structures
- No modern experiment, despite all our knowledge and our ability to rig the exact conditions, has ever come close to creating a living cell from nonliving chemicals. Even the most famous attempt, the Stanley Miller experiment of 1953, is now widely discredited
- Noted scientist Fred Hoyle’s assessment of the likelihood of life emerging from nonliving chemicals on its own: It is about as likely as a tornado whirling through a junkyard and successfully assembling a working 747 airplane.
2) Irreducible Complexity in Biological Systems
In Darwin’s day, it was assumed that lower levels of life—such as a single cell—were not very complex, thus the natural production of one seemed like no great feat. Today, however, we know otherwise. Not only is a single living cell filled with immense amounts of complex, ordered data, but even its most basic structures are highly complex.
- “Simple” structures, like a bacterial flagellum, are apparently built from irreducible parts—their component parts would need to come into being at the same time, fully-formed and in conjunction with one another in order to perform a task necessary for survival.
- When one considers the macro-cellular level of highly-specified bodily organs, the problem of irreducible complexity only magnifies: a natural development over many generations would include a vast majority of time in which they were essentially functionless.
- Writing of cellular systems, scientist Franklin Harold writes, “We must concede that there are presently no detailed Darwinian accounts of the evolution of any biochemical system, only a variety of wishful speculations.”
3) The Challenge of Speciation
Darwinian evolution suggests that natural pressures alone can make use of random mutations that eventually compound to develop into whole new families and genera. While the routine adaptations of micro-evolution have been observed in the natural world, this kind of macro-evolution has not.
- Random mutations are almost universally harmful and have not been observed to add substantial information to an existing genome, which is precisely what would be needed.
- Natural selection allows for micro-evolutionary adaptations within a certain scope, but to aggregate those changes into producing whole new genera appears immensely difficult. Consider the failure of intense selective breeding over thousands of years to produce a single new species—a dog is still a dog, and even the most exclusive breeds, when returned to natural settings for several generations, return quickly to the normal features of their species.
- Observed patterns of natural selection tend to favor the stability of the statistical mean of a species’ traits rather than pressing change at the fringes; thus we have evidence of many current species remaining unchanged from their first appearance at the lowest fossil levels.
4) Inconsistencies in the Fossil Record
Despite more than two centuries of combing the fossil record for evidence of Darwinian evolution, that record has posed at least as many problems as confirmations. The essential difficulty is that species tend to appear all at once in the fossil record, without a clear trail of transitional forms leading to their development.
- The Cambrian Explosion—in this famous example, all the major body types of animal phyla appear together in a geological blink of the eye, without clear connections to previous forms.
- There is also a significant lack of transitional forms in models of human origins. A large and unexplained gap remains between austrolopithicenes and the Homo genus, and some scientists have made the case that the variety of early “species” of humans in the Homo genus, like Neanderthals, are essentially the same species as modern humans, with regional variations.
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Supplement Materials
An Introduction to Christian Views on the Creation/Evolution Debate
In regard to Genesis 1-2, there have been multiple angles of Christian interpretation from the very beginning of church history. Similarly, there have also been different Christian views on Darwin’s evolutionary theory since it was proposed in the mid-19th century. Understanding each of these models, regardless of which one we may adhere to, is valuable in increasing our breadth of understanding and knowledge when we are in dialogue with other Christians and with the unbelieving world.
The Two Major Positions: Non-Christian and Christian
From the outset, it’s important to note that there are really only two major positions: either (1) all nature is the product of purely blind and random naturalistic chance (a position we’ll call “Darwinian evolution,” underscored by the philosophy of “scientific materialism”), or (2) God is responsible for the creation of all nature. The main thrust of our focus on creation/evolution in this apologetics series will be to take the orthodox Christian position represented by #2, and to rebut the scientific and philosophical assumptions of #1. In order to understand the shape of the debate, though, it’s important to note that the Christian position, #2, is a diverse one.
Three Main Varieties of the Christian Position
The three main categories of Christian positions—Young-Earth Creationism, Old-Earth Creationism, and Theistic Evolution (see diagram on the reverse side)—are distinguished from each other by their answers to questions regarding biblical interpretation, the age of the universe, and the possibility of evolution as a means of creation.
1.) Biblical interpretation - What is the literal meaning of the Genesis creation story? This is the starting-point for all Christian perspectives on creation. In other words, how were the creation accounts of Genesis 1-2 intended to be read?
a. As a scientific history of earth’s beginning (Young-Earth Creationism)
b. As theological allegories (Theistic Evolution)
c. As possibly containing elements of both (Old-Earth Creationism)
2.) Scientific questions of cosmological and geological age
a. To what degree should Christians accept the current scientific consensus which posits very long time-frames (on the order of billions of years) for both the universe and the earth itself?
Either (1) evidence from cosmological measurements (such as light from originating billions of light-years away nonetheless reaching us) and evidence from geology (such as decay-rates of isotopes in rocks indicating time-frames of millions or billions of years) is correct, in which case the universe really is that old, or (2) the evidence is inconclusive, possibly by errors in measurement or scientific assumptions, or by God creating the earth and the universe in a mature state; that is, with apparent old-age factors already in place (for example, the movement of light created as if already in progress)
3.) Scientific questions of the emergence of life and speciation
a. To what degree should Christians accept the possibility of macroevolution (considered as a divinely-ordained process) as a means of creation?
Either (1) macroevolution plays no role at all, and each individual species is the result of an act of direct and instantaneous creation by God, either within six days or over a long course of time, or (2) God actively planned, directed, and assisted in the process of evolution over the course of Earth’s history in order to create all living things by the active and participatory means of evolution.
Resources for Further Study on the Christian Positions:
1) Young-Earth Creationism
a. The most widely held evangelical position since the 1960s, popularized by the work of Henry Morris and Duane Gish, and now represented by Ken Ham (Answers in Genesis, the Creation Museum), John D. Morris (Institute for Creation Research), Walt Brown (Center for Scientific Creation), among others.
b. Historical perspective: this position has some roots in the early church, tended to be assumed in Western Christianity in the Middle Ages, and was favored by some (though not all) early fundamentalists in the 20th century.
2) Old-Earth Creationism
a. Also a popular evangelical position, it seeks to take the scientific consensus seriously while insisting on the historicity of the main elements of the Genesis account. It is represented by Hugh Ross (Reason to Believe), Stephen Meyer (Discovery Institute), and many apologetics scholars, including Douglas Groothuis (author of Christian Apologetics). It is sometimes referred to as “day-age creationism.”
b. Historical perspective: because this position requires the information of evidence from geology and cosmology, it developed as that information became available (19th century onward), but its broad methods of biblical interpretation can be seen to run very deep in the early Christian tradition.
3) Theistic Evolution
a. This position leans on a classic Christian model of interpreting Genesis 1, so it is sometimes favored among denominations with roots in the early church traditions, such as the Eastern Orthodox. As scientific arguments for evolution have come out in the past 150 years, it has also gained adherents among some evangelicals, and is represented by Francis Collins (BioLogos Foundation), Kenneth Miller, and Christopher Southgate.
b. Historical perspective: it has roots in the early church and was also accepted by many Christians after evolutionary theories were proposed, including some early fundamentalists in the 20th century and noted apologists like C. S. Lewis.
See also: Intelligent Design
Intelligent Design is not a position on creation in the same way that the others above are, though it is often mistaken for that. Rather, it is a scientific theory proposing an evidence-based argument for design (rather than random chance) within natural systems. Intelligent Design deals with scientific evidence, not biblical texts, so it takes no particular position on the question of how to interpret Genesis. As such, proponents of Intelligent Design theory can be found in each of the above positions. Major works representing this theory have been written by William Dembski, Phillip Johnson, and Michael Behe. Lee Strobel’s The Case for a Creator also deals mostly with the intelligent design argument.
2.) Scientific questions of cosmological and geological age
a. To what degree should Christians accept the current scientific consensus which posits very long time-frames (on the order of billions of years) for both the universe and the earth itself?
Either (1) evidence from cosmological measurements (such as light from originating billions of light-years away nonetheless reaching us) and evidence from geology (such as decay-rates of isotopes in rocks indicating time-frames of millions or billions of years) is correct, in which case the universe really is that old, or (2) the evidence is inconclusive, possibly by errors in measurement or scientific assumptions, or by God creating the earth and the universe in a mature state; that is, with apparent old-age factors already in place (for example, the movement of light created as if already in progress)
3.) Scientific questions of the emergence of life and speciation
a. To what degree should Christians accept the possibility of macroevolution (considered as a divinely-ordained process) as a means of creation?
Either (1) macroevolution plays no role at all, and each individual species is the result of an act of direct and instantaneous creation by God, either within six days or over a long course of time, or (2) God actively planned, directed, and assisted in the process of evolution over the course of Earth’s history in order to create all living things by the active and participatory means of evolution.
Resources for Further Study on the Christian Positions:
1) Young-Earth Creationism
a. The most widely held evangelical position since the 1960s, popularized by the work of Henry Morris and Duane Gish, and now represented by Ken Ham (Answers in Genesis, the Creation Museum), John D. Morris (Institute for Creation Research), Walt Brown (Center for Scientific Creation), among others.
b. Historical perspective: this position has some roots in the early church, tended to be assumed in Western Christianity in the Middle Ages, and was favored by some (though not all) early fundamentalists in the 20th century.
2) Old-Earth Creationism
a. Also a popular evangelical position, it seeks to take the scientific consensus seriously while insisting on the historicity of the main elements of the Genesis account. It is represented by Hugh Ross (Reason to Believe), Stephen Meyer (Discovery Institute), and many apologetics scholars, including Douglas Groothuis (author of Christian Apologetics). It is sometimes referred to as “day-age creationism.”
b. Historical perspective: because this position requires the information of evidence from geology and cosmology, it developed as that information became available (19th century onward), but its broad methods of biblical interpretation can be seen to run very deep in the early Christian tradition.
3) Theistic Evolution
a. This position leans on a classic Christian model of interpreting Genesis 1, so it is sometimes favored among denominations with roots in the early church traditions, such as the Eastern Orthodox. As scientific arguments for evolution have come out in the past 150 years, it has also gained adherents among some evangelicals, and is represented by Francis Collins (BioLogos Foundation), Kenneth Miller, and Christopher Southgate.
b. Historical perspective: it has roots in the early church and was also accepted by many Christians after evolutionary theories were proposed, including some early fundamentalists in the 20th century and noted apologists like C. S. Lewis.
See also: Intelligent Design
Intelligent Design is not a position on creation in the same way that the others above are, though it is often mistaken for that. Rather, it is a scientific theory proposing an evidence-based argument for design (rather than random chance) within natural systems. Intelligent Design deals with scientific evidence, not biblical texts, so it takes no particular position on the question of how to interpret Genesis. As such, proponents of Intelligent Design theory can be found in each of the above positions. Major works representing this theory have been written by William Dembski, Phillip Johnson, and Michael Behe. Lee Strobel’s The Case for a Creator also deals mostly with the intelligent design argument.