Darwinism: The Clever Chameleon

By Anita K. Millen, M.D., M.P.H., M.A.
Edited by Jon A. Covey, B.A., MT (ASCP)

What do we have once a proposition gets to the point where no matter what new, contradictory information is discovered the proposition is not considered falsified but supported? Is it truly a scientific theory or is it a chameleon changing its colors to blend in with whatever the background of the moment happens to be? This appears to be the case with Darwinism and the various theories of evolution.

Each theory of evolution depends upon long ages for the earth, never mind that we are using dating methods, based on faulty assumptions, which tell us rocks known to be 200 years old (found in Hawaiian pillow basalts) are 22 million years old. Never mind that the amount of sodium in the sea, the earth's magnetic field and the amount of helium in the atmosphere speak for a young earth, or that the velocities of galaxies in galactic clusters are so great that the clusters should have flown apart billions of years ago, or that the spiral anus of galaxies should have been entirely disrupted a few hundred million years ago. Never mind that the data gotten from disasters such as the eruption of Mount St. Helens show us that millions of years are unnecessary to form the geologic structures we observe around us, they can be created within days or even hours if the circumstances are right.

The latest rage on the origin of life is the RNA World theory, which states that ribonucleic acid was the original molecule in the prebiotic soup and caused the first living cell. Never mind that the composition of the supposed prebiotic soup is a matter of conjecture. Never mind that life could not have arisen in an atmosphere with oxygen (oxidation would have destroyed the essential precursor molecules) or without oxygen (there would have been no ozone to protect the prebiotic molecules from the destructive ultraviolet light). Never mind that RNA is too complicated and unstable to be an original molecule and that outside of a laboratory environment no reasonable way has been found to form two of the four bases (cytosine and uracil) integral to the structure of RNA. This problem is so sticky that more than one scientist has hypothesized that life could not have arisen here so it must have been brought in by aliens (Michael Denton, I.L. Cohen) or comets (Carl Sagan, Sir Fred Hoyle, Francis Crick), not solving the problem, but diverting it to another untestable location.

Life is obviously here, so how to account for the diversity? Darwin required long ages, slow changes with natural selection and survival of the fittest to achieve this. Darwin expected to find millions of transition forms in the fossil record. Those forms are not there, that is why we have not found them. Lacking transition forms they theorize that the changes happened too slowly. Don't like that explanation? They then state changes occurred too rapidly in small, isolated populations on the periphery of the main population (punctuated equilibrium).

Molecular biology, the study of the structure of molecules which was born in the 50's when Watson and Crick showed the structure of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) does not confirm the expected progression from fish to amphibian to reptile to mammal. Instead, it shows that analogous proteins in yeasts, insects, fish and mammals are all equally divergent from bacteria. Changes in the structure of molecules have been found to occur at the same rate in all living creatures despite dramatic differences in their life span and environment, forcing biologists to scramble for explanations. Some, such as Allan Wilson from Berkeley, have concluded that larger brain size increases the "power of the species to evolve biologically." (Sci Am Oct '85)

There are several books available which discuss the biological evidence against Darwinism and evolution:

Evolution: A Theory in Crisis by Michael Denton, which should be required reading for every professional biologist (Adler and Adler Publishers, Inc. 4556 Montgomery Ave., Bethesda, MD 20814, 1985)

The Neck of the Giraffe-Where Darwin Went Wrong by Francis Hitching (Ticknor and Fields, 393 Orange St., New Haven, Conn. 06511, 1982)

Darwin on Trial by Philip E. Johnson (Regnery Gateway, 11 30 17th St. NW, Washington DC 20036, 1991).

Michael Denton is a physician and geneticist from Australia. Philip Johnson is a law professor at Berkeley, and Francis Hitching a freelance writer. While Denton and Hitching do not consider creation even an option to solve their problems with Darwin, Johnson describes himself as a "philosophical theist and a Christian," but not "a defender of creation-science." His choice is to examine evolution and the validity of its claims to be science. Of the three, if we were to recommend just one, it would be Johnson's book. Although his definition of creation, as implying design and purpose is surely reasonable, he is willing to allow the Creator much more latitude about how this was done than a literal interpretation of Genesis would support. He used Denton's book as part of his source material and has abridged and explained some complex observations in a way that should be easier for the person without an extensive scientific background to understand. The chapters: "Darwinist Religion," and "Science and Pseudoscience" are especially good. In "Darwinist Religion," Johnson shows very well that, although some -scientists continue to deny that science and religion overlap, many not only recognize the philosophical implications of evolution very well, but applaud their destructive repercussions on Biblical teaching.

Johnson includes a lengthy discussion about the American Scientific Affiliation (ASA) an organization of evangelical Christian science teachers and others "and the problems resulting from trying to harmonize current geological and biological teaching with the Bible." [Note: I applaud Dr. Robert Hermann, once vice president of ASA, for rejecting and renouncing the ASA beliefs in favor a special creation] This chapter also includes some discussion of the Humanist Manifesto and the teachings of Pierre Teilhard de Chardin. The conclusion is that evolution is a religion and those who deny this have not thoroughly thought through the implications of its teachings.

The last chapter, "Science or Pseudoscience," is based on a 1963 essay by Karl Popper "Science: Conjectures and Refutations. "Popper found that once a theory becomes so broad that it encompasses everything and cannot be falsified, it finishes explaining nothing. This is what has happened with evolution which has become like an amoeba, changing its shape to fit the current landscape. Everything evolves from fashion to politics, it is just a fancy word for change, but clothes are still clothes and politics is still politics. Good theory should make predictions and be confirmable or deniable by those predictions. Darwinism and other evolutionary theories have not done this. Every new discovery, no matter how apparently opposed to what has been previously published, has been manipulated into looking like confirmation. Those who have refused to bow at the altar of evolution have been branded fanatics and zealots while evolutionists have refused to acknowledge their own fanaticism.

Denton’s book goes into the most scientific detail of all three and while this is positively a strength, it may be more difficult for a layman to follow, although his writing style is very captivating. He does include a good selection of drawings, charts, diagrams and graphs (Johnson is strictly text) helpful in explaining the text. His text is also well footnoted and those notes immediately follow each chapter.

Although Denton believes that the problems with the Darwinian model are too overwhelming for it to survive, he dismisses the Biblical account of Genesis in chapter one. He bases this in part on geological observations which apparently support an old earth and species extinctions which seem incompatible with the statement in Genesis that representatives of every species were preserved through the flood (Note: the Bible refers to kinds, not species). His conclusion that life was brought to this planet from somewhere in space simply transfers the same problems elsewhere and explains nothing (except perhaps the extent which men will go to avoid acknowledging a creator).

Francis Hitching believes that Darwinism as originally presented is no longer viable but that evolution as a concept is alive and well and a better explanation of how it occurred will soon be formulated. Hitching interviewed Dr. Duane Gish from the Institute of Creation Research, however he states he cannot accept creationism because fitting all the facts within the Biblical framework allows no other possibilities and thus by definition is unscientific.

If the Bible is true, how can it be unscientific? Yet, the attitude among many scientists is that divine creation cannot be a valid scientific explanation for the origin of life. Although they are willing to admit that the complex computer system, programs, and peripheral hardware we are using to make breathtakingly beautiful color slides implies a computer maker, they disallow that when it comes to a far more complex machine often called the "simple cell."

Hitching accepts the concept of an old earth and discards the Biblical account because it does not explain every last detail such as extinction of the dinosaurs to his satisfaction (This begs the question. The Bible does not even try to deal with the multitudinous details of biology.). This type of reasoning is simply a smoke screen.

Hitching also dismissed the concept of the miraculous as more of a "copout" than a real explanation. This is the attitude of many who condemn the idea of a creator God as non-science while accepting the secular miracle of life coming from non-life when the mathematical and biological evidence say it could not happen. However, for those who want an easily readable book, which gives a nice overview of many biological arguments against Darwinism, this is not a bad book. The knottier questions such as "Is Archaeopteryx intermediate?" and "How did the whale get its tail?" are interspersed within, but are separated from the rest of the text as 29 panels throughout the book. This method of presentation might be distracting and maybe a separate chapter or chapters might have worked better. On the other hand, one could conceivably scan only the panels without reading the rest of the text and come away with a nice overview.

All three books are indexed. In addition, Hitching includes an alphabetical listing of all books cited in the text and another separate section on introductory reading which annotates some references for each chapter. If you had to choose only one book, Darwinism on Trial (Johnson) might be the best choice. For those with the time and energy all three have something to offer with Denton's being the most difficult and most fascinating.