From Christian Courier;
Evaluating Evolution in Plain English
By Jason Jackson
Little children are taught about evolution from an early age, and the media continues to propagate it unabashedly. The following quotation is typical.
“The virtually infinite variations of life are the fruit of the evolutionary process. All living creatures are related by descent from common ancestors. Humans and other mammals are descended from shrewlike creatures that lived more than 150,000,000 years ago; mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fishes share as ancestors aquatic worms that lived 600,000,000 years ago; all plants and animals are derived from bacteria-like microorganisms that originated more than 3,000,000,000 years ago. Biological evolution is a process of descent with modification. Lineages of organisms change through generations; diversity arises because the lineages that descend from common ancestors diverge through time” (“Evolution,” Britannica 2003 Deluxe Edition CD-ROM).
“Educated people” believe in evolution, we’re reminded, and nearly all “serious scientists” accept it as well. Generalizations of these kinds may intimidate many, but many others are not swayed by such propaganda.
In scrutinizing evolution, we will briefly survey five pillars that allegedly support the theory of natural origins. The five pillars are: spontaneous generation, mutations, natural selection, fossils, and time.
Spontaneous Generation
Spontaneous generation is the belief that life came from the nonliving. It just happened. Where did the nonliving matter come from? We’re not told. Just accept the fact that matter was there, and then life happened. That is where the evolutionist wants to begin — life just magically appeared, and then it evolved.
Wait just a minute! Is this really scientific? What evidence is there that life just happened? Robert Jastrow, renowned astronomer and evolutionist, wrote:
Mutations
Mutations supposedly provide “the raw material for evolution,” according to one prominent spokesman for evolution, Sir Julian Huxley (Evolution in Action as quoted by Marshall and Sandra Hall in The Truth: God or Evolution?, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1974, p. 23). A mutation is a scrambled genetic code, accounting for a variation in a living organism.
After decades of research, there is one conclusion about mutations that is indisputable — you don’t want one! Mutations are most often harmful. They have a negative effect and typically cause the death of the mutant, or sterility of the organism that results.
Mutations rarely occur. Geneticists learned that by X-raying drosophila melanogaster, the fruit fly, they could increase the rate of mutations. Since the fruit fly produces a new generation every twelve days, scientists could alter the fly’s genetic code to study scores of generations. No new species were ever created by the mutations.“What happened? Two things. One, the mutant flies either died over a period of generations, or, they came back to their original, normal conditions. They could not be changed! Drosophila melanogaster, frozen, steamed, blinded by light and darkness, and fried with X-rays, remained drosophila melanogaster” (Marshall and Sandra Hall, The Truth: God or Evolution? p. 142).
Natural Selection
Natural selection allegedly is “nature’s way” of passing on traits for species to survive. It is claimed that the fittest survive, passing on their survival skills genetically, and this somehow accounts for the development of new species.
Hugo DeVries, the late evolutionary botanist, quipped: “Natural selection may explain the survival of the fittest, but not the arrival of the fittest.”
For this reason, even a number of evolutionists have abandoned “natural selection” as the “only effective agency of evolution.”
Fossils
Do fossils prove evolution? Absolutely not. In fact, far from proving organic evolution, the existence of millions of fossils, nearly all in sedimentary rock (i.e., water-laid rock), cannot be explained by the evolutionary doctrine of uniformitarianism (i.e., slow, constant processes over long periods of time that supposedly explain the earth’s geological features and fossil creatures).
Let’s say you are driving to work one day, and you observe a dead opossum, killed on the roadside. Months go by. Will you see that hideous sight fossilize over time. No way! If the buzzards have their way, it won’t last a week. The point? Fossils must be buried quickly to escape decay. Since nearly all fossils are found in sedimentary rock, the presence of most fossils must be considered the result of some grand water catastrophe that affected the entire globe; sound familiar?
The great fossils graveyards that are found all over the world manifest great numbers and varieties of organisms that were buried together. Fossils, like trees, are found in many layers of strata, which layers would be dated millions of years apart according to evolutionary chronology. Footprints of hoofed animals and dinosaurs are found together in Uzbekistan and Virginia, yet mammals and reptiles supposedly are separated by millions of evolutionary years. In coal beds that allegedly predate the beginning of life, plants and human tools have been found together (In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood - 25.** Out-of-Sequence Fossils).
Neither geology nor paleontology prove evolution. The assumed sequence of evolution, from simple life-forms, to fish, to amphibians, to reptiles, to birds, to mammals, to man — the supposed cause of the infinite varieties of plants and animals — is nowhere in fossil record. There is not merely a missing link. There are missing chains.
Although most life-forms that we know today are represented in the fossil record, conspicuously absent are many millions of fossils that should represent the transitional forms of life between the major “kinds.” Rather than being in some kind of ascending order, according to the theory of evolution, many are out-of-place, signifying that we are dealing with a mixed-up theory.
Time
But what about these rocks that supposedly are “millions of years old.” Is this not scientific data that proves evolution? With reference to the rocks and dating techniques, one hears plenty of conclusions but little proof. The dating methods of these so-called scientists are based upon evolutionary presuppositions. Their methods make unfounded assumptions about the nature of rocks and the rate of decay. These methods have found living mollusks to be 2,300 years old (for numerous examples of documented dating blunders, see, Creation, Evolution, and the Age of the Earth by Wayne Jackson).
Something suspicious is going on.
R.H. Rastall wrote some years ago:
“It cannot be denied that from a strict philosophical standpoint geologists are here arguing in a circle” (“Geology,” Encyclopedia Britannica, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956, Vol. 10, p. 168).
Evolution is baseless and senseless. So why do people believe in it? Read, “Why People Believe in Evolution,” found elsewhere on this web site. The theory doesn’t have a pillar to stand on. In addition to the materials we have referenced in this article, consider these concise, nontechnical treatments of the subject: The Twilight of Evolution by Henry M. Morris, and The Mythology of Modern Geology by Wayne Jackson, and note the many related articles listed below.
Evaluating Evolution in Plain English
By Jason Jackson
Little children are taught about evolution from an early age, and the media continues to propagate it unabashedly. The following quotation is typical.
“The virtually infinite variations of life are the fruit of the evolutionary process. All living creatures are related by descent from common ancestors. Humans and other mammals are descended from shrewlike creatures that lived more than 150,000,000 years ago; mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fishes share as ancestors aquatic worms that lived 600,000,000 years ago; all plants and animals are derived from bacteria-like microorganisms that originated more than 3,000,000,000 years ago. Biological evolution is a process of descent with modification. Lineages of organisms change through generations; diversity arises because the lineages that descend from common ancestors diverge through time” (“Evolution,” Britannica 2003 Deluxe Edition CD-ROM).
In scrutinizing evolution, we will briefly survey five pillars that allegedly support the theory of natural origins. The five pillars are: spontaneous generation, mutations, natural selection, fossils, and time.
Spontaneous Generation
Spontaneous generation is the belief that life came from the nonliving. It just happened. Where did the nonliving matter come from? We’re not told. Just accept the fact that matter was there, and then life happened. That is where the evolutionist wants to begin — life just magically appeared, and then it evolved.
Wait just a minute! Is this really scientific? What evidence is there that life just happened? Robert Jastrow, renowned astronomer and evolutionist, wrote:
“Perhaps the appearance of life on the earth is a miracle. Scientists are reluctant to accept that view, but their choices are limited: either life was created on the earth by the will of a being outside the grasp of scientific understanding, or it evolved on our planet spontaneously, through chemical reactions occurring in nonliving matter lying on the surface of the planet. The first theory places the question of the origin of life beyond the reach of scientific inquiry. It is a statement of faith in the power of a Supreme Being not subject to the laws of science. The second theory is also an act of faith. The act of faith consists in assuming that the scientific view of the origin of life is correct, without having concrete evidence to support that belief” (Until the Sun Dies, New York: Norton, 1977, p. 62-63).
Without “concrete evidence,” yet they believe it anyway, and represent it as a “fact of science.” They have “refused to have God in their knowledge” (Romans 1:28), so they accept what to them is more palatable — something came from nothing; there is nothing to support that idea.
Mutations
Mutations supposedly provide “the raw material for evolution,” according to one prominent spokesman for evolution, Sir Julian Huxley (Evolution in Action as quoted by Marshall and Sandra Hall in The Truth: God or Evolution?, Grand Rapids: Baker, 1974, p. 23). A mutation is a scrambled genetic code, accounting for a variation in a living organism.
After decades of research, there is one conclusion about mutations that is indisputable — you don’t want one! Mutations are most often harmful. They have a negative effect and typically cause the death of the mutant, or sterility of the organism that results.
Mutations rarely occur. Geneticists learned that by X-raying drosophila melanogaster, the fruit fly, they could increase the rate of mutations. Since the fruit fly produces a new generation every twelve days, scientists could alter the fly’s genetic code to study scores of generations. No new species were ever created by the mutations.“What happened? Two things. One, the mutant flies either died over a period of generations, or, they came back to their original, normal conditions. They could not be changed! Drosophila melanogaster, frozen, steamed, blinded by light and darkness, and fried with X-rays, remained drosophila melanogaster” (Marshall and Sandra Hall, The Truth: God or Evolution? p. 142).
Natural selection allegedly is “nature’s way” of passing on traits for species to survive. It is claimed that the fittest survive, passing on their survival skills genetically, and this somehow accounts for the development of new species.
Hugo DeVries, the late evolutionary botanist, quipped: “Natural selection may explain the survival of the fittest, but not the arrival of the fittest.”
For this reason, even a number of evolutionists have abandoned “natural selection” as the “only effective agency of evolution.”
Fossils
Do fossils prove evolution? Absolutely not. In fact, far from proving organic evolution, the existence of millions of fossils, nearly all in sedimentary rock (i.e., water-laid rock), cannot be explained by the evolutionary doctrine of uniformitarianism (i.e., slow, constant processes over long periods of time that supposedly explain the earth’s geological features and fossil creatures).
Let’s say you are driving to work one day, and you observe a dead opossum, killed on the roadside. Months go by. Will you see that hideous sight fossilize over time. No way! If the buzzards have their way, it won’t last a week. The point? Fossils must be buried quickly to escape decay. Since nearly all fossils are found in sedimentary rock, the presence of most fossils must be considered the result of some grand water catastrophe that affected the entire globe; sound familiar?
The great fossils graveyards that are found all over the world manifest great numbers and varieties of organisms that were buried together. Fossils, like trees, are found in many layers of strata, which layers would be dated millions of years apart according to evolutionary chronology. Footprints of hoofed animals and dinosaurs are found together in Uzbekistan and Virginia, yet mammals and reptiles supposedly are separated by millions of evolutionary years. In coal beds that allegedly predate the beginning of life, plants and human tools have been found together (In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood - 25.** Out-of-Sequence Fossils).
Neither geology nor paleontology prove evolution. The assumed sequence of evolution, from simple life-forms, to fish, to amphibians, to reptiles, to birds, to mammals, to man — the supposed cause of the infinite varieties of plants and animals — is nowhere in fossil record. There is not merely a missing link. There are missing chains.
Although most life-forms that we know today are represented in the fossil record, conspicuously absent are many millions of fossils that should represent the transitional forms of life between the major “kinds.” Rather than being in some kind of ascending order, according to the theory of evolution, many are out-of-place, signifying that we are dealing with a mixed-up theory.
Time
But what about these rocks that supposedly are “millions of years old.” Is this not scientific data that proves evolution? With reference to the rocks and dating techniques, one hears plenty of conclusions but little proof. The dating methods of these so-called scientists are based upon evolutionary presuppositions. Their methods make unfounded assumptions about the nature of rocks and the rate of decay. These methods have found living mollusks to be 2,300 years old (for numerous examples of documented dating blunders, see, Creation, Evolution, and the Age of the Earth by Wayne Jackson).
Something suspicious is going on.
Evolutionist says: “This fossil is 70,000,000 years old because it is in this rock that is 70,000,000 years old.”
Student: “And how do you know the age of that rock?”
Evolutionist: “Because it contains a 70,000,000 year old fossil.”
Student: “And how do you know the age of that rock?”
Evolutionist: “Because it contains a 70,000,000 year old fossil.”
R.H. Rastall wrote some years ago:
“It cannot be denied that from a strict philosophical standpoint geologists are here arguing in a circle” (“Geology,” Encyclopedia Britannica, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956, Vol. 10, p. 168).
Evolution is baseless and senseless. So why do people believe in it? Read, “Why People Believe in Evolution,” found elsewhere on this web site. The theory doesn’t have a pillar to stand on. In addition to the materials we have referenced in this article, consider these concise, nontechnical treatments of the subject: The Twilight of Evolution by Henry M. Morris, and The Mythology of Modern Geology by Wayne Jackson, and note the many related articles listed below.
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