Creation Ministries International has launched a new initiative, which seems a lot like all the other creationists blitzkriegs before it. With the wonderfully creative tagline of "Question Evolution", CMI intends to challenge "evolutionists" and their "indoctrination" of high school students with the supposed dogma of evolution. They also aim to cut the population of atheists by half, presumably by challenging the "faith" that every atheist (and only atheists, no "real Christians") is supposed to hold in Darwin's great idea.
The main thrust of this is a tract with fifteen "unanswerable" questions for evolutionists. I'm done putting quotation marks around the word, evolutionists; from here on out I ask my readers to recognize that it is a creationist term that is about as silly as calling someone a general relativist (accepts general relativity) or germist (for accepting germ theory). Regardless, CMI seems just as interested in money as it is creationism, because you can buy tracts at a good price, for use in churches, naturally, and t shirts and coffee mugs with a choice of logo emblazoned on it.
Call me a sucker, but I'm going to attempt to answer these supposed "unanswerable" objections to evolution. There's nothing new here, no blinding flashes of insight from the creationists. It seems that they are only capable of mouthing the tired old objections to evolution, ones that have been answered endless times only to reappear like the slasher in bad horror films. No matter how many times you shoot him, he keeps popping back up. It's just that they either don't realize they've been answered or they don't like the answers they get as they conflict with their preconceived notions of the world. Regardless of all that, here it goes...
Q1: How did life begin?
Simple question, simple answer. We don't know for sure, and, for the record, evolution does not deal with the origin of life itself (a different field entirely). In fact creationists should know that evolution isn't involved with the origin of life because they also think evolution hasn't progressed since Darwin. His book was, after all, called The Origin of Species not The Origin of Life. If a person is truly interested in what science has to say about the beginning of life, or as creationists like to say, how life arose from non-life, then perhaps they would be interested in the book Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life's Origins by Robert Hazen, detailing the competing hypotheses in science about how life arose. Creationists will object at this point that I "dodged the question", but I'm not responsible for the fact that they can't seem to distinguish between evolution of life and origin of life (abiogenesis). That's their problem, not mine.
Q2: How did the DNA code originate?
This is the question that creationists use to reveal to us that they cannot imagine "design without a designer", when what we see in nature is more properly called, as Dawkins so eloquently writes, the illusion of design rather than design. DNA, according to current science, arose from RNA, a related code. So thus the question becomes where did RNA come from? Thomas Cech, upon review of the science, asserted that RNA itself was proceeded by several other codes. For a fuller explanation of the scientific discussion of the origin of DNA, the interested person may view Nick Lane's Life Ascending.
To those who would assert that I haven't answered the questions at all, merely dodged and pointed to books, well that's just tough, isn't it? Unlike creationist thought, real science doesn't always lend itself easily to a paragraph answer. I make no claims to being a scientist, just an educated layperson with a great interest in science. I myself don't have the expertise to answer every objection--but I can point you in the direction of information by competent scientists who can. I suspect though that creationists, thinking that they have all the answers already, aren't interested in anything science has to say to them. They just ask for show, to make a pretense that they're "showing up" scientists who accept evolution for the fools creationists think they are.
The next several questions will be addressed soon. In the meantime, I have my response to the recent "Question Evolution" and "Teach the Truth" creationist slogans. I think that "Reason is the answer" should be the rallying cry of those interested in, and defending, science against its pseudoscientific and deluded detractors.
The main thrust of this is a tract with fifteen "unanswerable" questions for evolutionists. I'm done putting quotation marks around the word, evolutionists; from here on out I ask my readers to recognize that it is a creationist term that is about as silly as calling someone a general relativist (accepts general relativity) or germist (for accepting germ theory). Regardless, CMI seems just as interested in money as it is creationism, because you can buy tracts at a good price, for use in churches, naturally, and t shirts and coffee mugs with a choice of logo emblazoned on it.
Call me a sucker, but I'm going to attempt to answer these supposed "unanswerable" objections to evolution. There's nothing new here, no blinding flashes of insight from the creationists. It seems that they are only capable of mouthing the tired old objections to evolution, ones that have been answered endless times only to reappear like the slasher in bad horror films. No matter how many times you shoot him, he keeps popping back up. It's just that they either don't realize they've been answered or they don't like the answers they get as they conflict with their preconceived notions of the world. Regardless of all that, here it goes...
Q1: How did life begin?
Simple question, simple answer. We don't know for sure, and, for the record, evolution does not deal with the origin of life itself (a different field entirely). In fact creationists should know that evolution isn't involved with the origin of life because they also think evolution hasn't progressed since Darwin. His book was, after all, called The Origin of Species not The Origin of Life. If a person is truly interested in what science has to say about the beginning of life, or as creationists like to say, how life arose from non-life, then perhaps they would be interested in the book Genesis: The Scientific Quest for Life's Origins by Robert Hazen, detailing the competing hypotheses in science about how life arose. Creationists will object at this point that I "dodged the question", but I'm not responsible for the fact that they can't seem to distinguish between evolution of life and origin of life (abiogenesis). That's their problem, not mine.
Q2: How did the DNA code originate?
This is the question that creationists use to reveal to us that they cannot imagine "design without a designer", when what we see in nature is more properly called, as Dawkins so eloquently writes, the illusion of design rather than design. DNA, according to current science, arose from RNA, a related code. So thus the question becomes where did RNA come from? Thomas Cech, upon review of the science, asserted that RNA itself was proceeded by several other codes. For a fuller explanation of the scientific discussion of the origin of DNA, the interested person may view Nick Lane's Life Ascending.
To those who would assert that I haven't answered the questions at all, merely dodged and pointed to books, well that's just tough, isn't it? Unlike creationist thought, real science doesn't always lend itself easily to a paragraph answer. I make no claims to being a scientist, just an educated layperson with a great interest in science. I myself don't have the expertise to answer every objection--but I can point you in the direction of information by competent scientists who can. I suspect though that creationists, thinking that they have all the answers already, aren't interested in anything science has to say to them. They just ask for show, to make a pretense that they're "showing up" scientists who accept evolution for the fools creationists think they are.
The next several questions will be addressed soon. In the meantime, I have my response to the recent "Question Evolution" and "Teach the Truth" creationist slogans. I think that "Reason is the answer" should be the rallying cry of those interested in, and defending, science against its pseudoscientific and deluded detractors.
Comments
Post a Comment