whale sharks

Creation Science and Young Earth Creationism:

Many people believe that the earth was created by God 6,000 years ago, in 6 days. This group of people known as young earth creationists believe that the creation story in the Bible is scientifically accurate. This is an assumption and for the young earth creationist, this assumption is a self evident truth or axiom. No scientific evidence can disprove the young earth axiom, because young earth creationists believe that the scientific evidence should be interpreted using the young earth axiom. This process gives rise to creation science. Creation scientists often interpret the evidence differently than scientists. They assume that the earth was created 6000 years ago and then set about to show that the scientific evidence shows that their assumption is correct.

To summarize: young earth creationism is an axiom. That is it is a self evident truth held by many that the earth was created 6000 years ago. Creation science is a discipline that interprets scientific evidence using the young earth axiom for guidance.

Evolution and Atheism:

Atheists believe that God does not exist. While many scientists believe in God, science itself must assume that He does not exist. Science is based on two axioms: 1) The observable axiom - scientists can accurately observe the universe and everything in it. 2) The naturalistic axiom - everything that happens, has happened and will happen can be described by naturalistic processes. In other words, no help from any supernatural entity like God is required. Science cannot function properly without these two assumptions. For example, suppose a scientist conducts an experiment where he measures how much salt will dissolve in a glass of water. Does the amount of salt depend on God’s mood at the time of the experiment or does it depend on the chemical properties of water and salt? For science to work and be effective, it must assume that the latter explanation is always correct. Thus, science assumes that the atheists are correct. And this assumption is not by choice but rather by necessity. Without this assumption science just does not work.

Most of the time, this naturalistic assumption does not create controversy. That is if the chemistry of water and salt determine how much salt dissolves in water, everyone is happy. This finding does not go against anyone’s religion. So we don’t have any controversy and science works as it should.

But what about evolution and more specifically the origin of life. When science starts to investigate these events, it can and does create controversy. In this case, science is applying the philosophy of atheism to investigate events that most believe can be attributed to God’s handiwork or will. Now we have controversy. And interestingly enough, it is this controversy that forces science to fail. Because of the attention, scientists are no longer allowed to say “we don’t know.” Instead, they often promote a hypothesis with no experimental support to the status of theory (for example, self replicating RNA molecules). And they claim they know how things happened when in reality they don’t have a clue.

Furthermore, many things are just assumed true. For example, science assumes that evolution is true. This assumption arises directly from the naturalistic axiom. So when Darwin proposed his theory, science did not have to test it. Instead it just set about trying to prove it correct.

People often give science more credit than it deserves. The way scientists interpret evidence all relies on two assumptions. So the ability of science to accurately describe any event depends entirely on these two assumptions. One could say it is science’s faith in atheism that allowed it to readily accept evolution and promote Darwin’s theory to the status of proven fact. One could also say, that if God exists, science cannot find Him.

Intelligent Design and Theistic Evolution:

Theistic evolution is the idea that God used evolution as a tool to guide creation. That is the creation story in the Bible is not scientifically accurate. The earth is very old and many different animals and plants have evolved over the earth’s history. This evolution is the result of God’s guidance. There is a continuum of beliefs in the Christian church between young earth creationism and theistic evolution.

Intelligent design can test theistic evolution. If one assumes that God uses evolution as a tool, then we ought to be able to analyze the scientific evidence and find out which things God did and which things just happened by evolution. The criteria is as follows: events that have a reasonable chance of happening in 5 billion years are assigned to evolution, and those that have no chance are assigned to the work of the designer -> hence intelligent design. This is why intelligent design relies so heavily on statistics, probability theory, computer simulations and molecular biology. To a casual observer it looks like science. It is important to remember that intelligent design is not science. It cannot be science because science assumes that the designer does not exist.

Intelligent design differs from both creation science and science in a very important way. Intelligent design does not assume that the axiom on which it rests (theistic evolution) is correct. By using probability theory to calculate the odds of something happening, intelligent design theory can either infer design and no design. Thus, unlike evolution and creation science, intelligent design can be disproven. In other words, if the scientific evidence does not suggest a designer was required to create life, then intelligent design will not infer one. Thus, in my opinion, intelligent design offers a better way to investigate origin of life theories.

This censorship, misinformation and discrimination arises because most people fail to understand the difference between intelligent design and science. The following definitions may help.

Definition of Science: science is the methodology that mankind uses to explore and describe the universe and everything in it. This methodolgy is based on two assumptions: 1) scientists can accurately observe nature (the observable axiom) and 2) everything that happens, will happen, or has happened can be explained without invoking the supernatural (the naturalistic axiom).

In other words, science assumes that God does not exist and then sets about to prove this assumption. Take evolution for example. Shortly after Darwin, science assumed that evolution happened and then set about to prove how it happened. The naturalistic axiom does no allow science to ask if it can happen or why did it happen? Science cannot ask these questions because science assumes that God does not exist.
Thus, science is limited.

Definition of Intelligent Design: intelligent design is a methodology that some scientists use to explore and describe the universe and everything in it. This methodolgy is based on one assumption: 1) scientists can accurately observe nature (the observable axiom).

Because intelligent design does not assume that God does not exists, it is not science. Intelligent design has more flexibility than science in that it can ask questions that science cannot. Take the origin of life for example. Intelligent design can look at science’s inability to explain this event as evidence supporting the existence of a designer. Scientists who use the intelligent design methodology have and continue to identify problems associated with the origin of life that evolution cannot explain and will likely never explain.

So which is better science or intelligent design? This depends on who is deciding. Many scientists are perfectly happy assuming that God does not exists, so they prefer science to intelligent design. These scientists are not upset by the fact that college textbooks say that life began in the primordial soup as a self replicating RNA molecule when the primary scientific literature (articles in journals like Science, Nature, and the Journal of Molecular Evolution) contradict this scenario. These scientists are not interested in the truth.

Others do care about the truth. These scientists want to understand the universe and everything in it. If God had some part to play in creation, then these scientists would rather not assign His part to the role of some yet unidentified and mysterious naturalistic process. It concerns these scientists that college and high school biology text books are not allowed to present the many unsolved issues with the origin of life that are so plentiful in the primary scientific literature. Most of these scientists do not voice their concerns because if they do, evolutionists will label them creationists. They will then be denied tenure, their papers will not get published, they might be fired and their research grants will probably be denied.

This academic censorship is well documented on other web sites, and for the most part I think it is working. So Darwin wins by intimidation and fear. The darwinian fundamentalists are squashing free speech and free thoughts to assert their world view. And the tragedy here is that these fundamentalists do not even understand that their unwavering believe in evolution is based on nothing more than their faith in the naturalistic axiom.

I am going to allow comments on this article so people can add their experiences or questions about the Galapagos here. No comments or questions about intelligent design or evolution will be accepted. To be posted, comments must be related to Galapagos travel or trips reports etc.

Galapagos sea horses at cousins rock

A batfish found at Floreana, A Southern Galapagos island

View from Bartolome, top of the hiking trail

Galapagos Penguins

One more seahorse

The link to the video page is here -

Galapagos Video Clips

Intelligent design can not prove that God exists. But knowing that science does not explain the origin of life may help some to conclude that He does. Thus, intelligent design is a bridge between science and religion. Intelligent design cannot determine which religion is correct. It cannot even prove that a designer exists. All ID theory can do is interpret the scientific evidence with less bias than science. Science is very limited by its axioms. Intelligent design theory enjoys much more freedom.

Click on Image to Enlarge -

Galapagos Videos

The whale shark and the sea lions are the best.

This cartoon shows the flying spaghetti monster (FSM) with his noodles caught in several of Behe’s mousetraps - the idea being that even the great FSM cannot escape from intelligent design and its implications. (In his book, Michael Behe uses a mousetrap to represent a system that cannot work properly without all of its parts, and thus it offers no selective advantage until it is mostly complete. He then makes an analogy to life, which shares many of the same constraints).

Intelligent design can be used to build a bridge between science and religion. But because intelligent design cannot determine which religion is correct, critics have introduced the flying spaghetti monster parody. Intelligent design would perhaps be better served by not letting the question of the designer’s nature unanswered. The fsm did not create anything. Intelligent design implies that Christians are correct when they assert that God created life.

Unfortunately, it is a no win situation. If intelligent design advocates infer design and then conclude that God created life, critics will say that their logic is driven by religion and thus all of their conclusions are flawed. If instead the movement decides not to make such a jump, critics will create fictitious creatures like the flying spaghetti monster and start a mock church to worship him.

Intelligent Design or Evolution? Why the Origin of Life…

Since the ARN price includes shipping, it is very competetive if not cheaper than Amazon.com. ARN has a large selection of intelligent design books listed on their products page. So if my book is too technical try another one. Behe’s book: Darwin’s Black Box is a good place to start.

RNA World and the Origin of Life

The idea behind this new page is that any self replicating RNA molecule that cannot also synthesize activated nucleotides (like ATP or IMPA) will only be able to replicate in a test tube with the help of researchers who supply these nucleotides.

This leads to the conclusion that simple self replicating RNA molecules do not exist and that the RNA world hypothesis should instead be called the myth of the RNA world because it did not exist, and it does not help explain any of the mysteries surrounding the origin of life.