TWO KINDS OF SCIENCE

Richard Dawkins

Today on CNN, on his "GPS" show, Fareed Zakaria interviewed Richard Dawkins on the subject of the current Republican candidates for president and the fact that none has publicly espoused a belief in the theory of evolution.  Dawkins says that this is "disgraceful", since evolution "is a fact".  Zakaria virtually fawned over Dawkins, who is a vociferous atheist.

When I compare Dawkins with his philosophical nemesis, Stephen Meyer, I experience emotional reactions. I can't put a finger on what distinguishes these two men from each other, but I would gladly go on a two-week vacation with Meyer, and I wish Dawkins would disappear.

Evolutionists like to re-classify Intelligent Design proponents as "creationists" so as to demean their ideas as being religious dogma.  Dawkins is a professor of evolutionary biology at Oxford.  He goes to and fro in the world preaching that evolution is not a theory but a fact of science.  98% of professional scientists agree with Dawkins.

Stephen C. Meyer

In his book Signature in the Cell Stephen Meyer (a philosopher of science) reminds us that there are two types of science. To paraphrase Meyer, here they are:

     1.  Empirical, testable science
     2.  Historical, evidentiary science

The first type involves scientific principles that can be demonstrated through experimentation.  If I start a fire under a pot of water, it will usually cause the water to boil.  You can't argue with this tested outcome because the evidence is incontrovertible.  If I let go of my glass of milk, gravity will pull it to the floor (pretty much every time).

The second type of science is the type practiced by forensic homicide detectives, paleontologists, archaeologists, and cosmologists.  They look at current situations and make inferences based on the the best available historical evidence.  When there is a bloody shoe print on the ground outside a house - matching the size-13 Bruno Magli shoes owned solely by O.J. Simpson, it is reasonable to conclude that O.J. stepped in the blood.  No one saw the murder (or the dinosaur).  No (living) person saw the birth of our galaxy or the arrival of the trilobytes on earth.

Cosmologists observe that there are radio waves pervasively distributed throughout our universe.  Many of them now speculate that the radio waves are a by-product of a "Big Bang". Some disagree.  None of us can go back in time to observe whether our universe was started by an immense momentary explosion or by the act of a benevolent God (or Gods) or by BOTH.  We are confined to examining the currently available data and evidence, and theorizing about what could have caused it to come about.  Dawkins is no exception.

Richard Dawkins insists that there is evidence of evolution so compelling that the only conclusion that sensible, sane people can come to is that we living creatures developed gradually over millions of years through slow microscopic genetic changes.  Problem is - Dawkins and his fellow believers have never produced "scientific" evidence OF EITHER KIND that shows that this is true.  Now, Stephen Meyer and I will be the first to admit that neither has the Intelligent Design community produced any evidence that God designed all the many living creatures slithering about our planet.  So perhaps it is a tie! 

We can't "test" the existence of God, and we can't "test" evolutionary change (especially if it takes as long as Dawkins insists).  All we can do is look at the information, data, material, evidence and conditions that are observable today and come up with the best scientific inference based on the available historical evidence.

If I go outside and notice that my neighbor's driveway is wet, I might conclude that it recently rained.  Yet if my own driveway is not wet, I might posit that he hosed his driveway instead.  If I happen upon a poem, I can conclude nothing but that someone penned it.  Poems don't write themselves.

If I get a microscope and look inside the external membrane of a living cell, I find numerous functioning organelles and departments - sanitation, reproduction, transportation, alimentation, defense, repair, and more.  This vast, microscopic biological universe is so complex that I find it hard to believe that it came about by chance or by gradual, undirected metamorphosis.

Without direction or intervention, EVERYTHING in the universe tends toward chaos, entropy.  Richard Dawkins knows this, but still he goes about preaching that the immeasurable complexities of life on this earth sprang into existence by the collision of organic compounds in the pre-biotic soup and then waxed ever more complex without direction or purpose. 

Scientists recently performed experiments on fruit flies by interfering a little with the early reproductive process.  They found that even slight disturbances in the DNA coding resulted in horrific mutations - legs growing out of heads, and worse.  Dawkins knows that if you tamper with genetic data, the resulting offspring are distorted and sterile.  Successful genetic changes cannot come about EXCEPT through the ADDITION of new DNA code - new information, new script.  New data cannot come about unless it is written.  New computer programs don't arise unless someone codes them.  House plans don't design themselves.  DNA blueprints and epigenetic data don't poof into existence spontaneously, and we have no evidence ANYWHERE that shows how one species of critter suddenly OR GRADUALLY morphed into a different critter.

I am reminded of Korihor and Nehor (look them up!) in the Book of Mormon, and how they went about preaching that people who believed in God were deceived by fantastical myths.  Korihor was eventually forced to admit that the devil had persuaded him to preach lies to the people, and he knew the truth.

I believe that Richard Dawkins is a modern-day Korihor.  There is surely a hidden reason why he goes about so smugly mocking believers in God, and insisting that his ideas about evolution are somehow "science".  When you challenge Darwinian evolutionists, they speak about evolutionary change in terms of, "We think it happened like this", "It may have happened like this", and so on.  Their speculation is bereft of proof and bereft of conviction.  They have to force themselves to believe and parrot it because their careers or guilt depend on it.

I recently read both of Stephen Meyer's books, and for me it is hard not to believe in a loving God after reading them.  Meyer doesn't preach religion, but he proves convincingly that life on this earth could not have come about accidentally and arbitrarily.  If you want a brief glimpse of Meyer's inspiration and brilliance, watch this YOUTUBE video of one of his lectures:

Centre for Intelligent Design Lecture 2011 by Stephen Meyer on 'Signature in the Cell'.

Intelligent

You know I have a fascination with the argument over the validity of Darwinian evolution.  Recently I have been reading a (2004) volume by William Dembski, Uncommon Dissent.  The book is a compilation of essays by fifteen intellectuals who challenge Darwinism.

One essay discusses the battle in the U.S. over whether ideas that contrast with Darwinism ought to be included in public school curricula.  This post will be brief.  I just want to echo one point made by one of the contributors to Uncommon Dissent.

Proponents of the Darwinian theory of evolution do not want Intelligent Design (ID) taught in schools.  They view ID proponents as religious fanatics.  They see religion as mere myth and fantasy.  Surely educators should not be propounding unscientific fantasies in the classroom.

Darwinists see the evolution theory as a purely scientific theory - scientific in that it is naturalistic.  The naturalistic view of the cosmos is that stuff happened naturally and randomly - without direction and purpose.  It insists on a universe devoid of God or a creator - devoid of intelligent organization or design.

Darwinists argue that evolutionary theory MUST be taught to our children because it IS SCIENCE, whereas the view that there may have been a purposeful designer is religious fanaticism.  Problem is - there are many smart scientists who don't believe Darwinism has been proved as unquestioned scientific fact either.

Einstein taught us (Second Law of Thermodynamics) that, if left to its own devices, everything in the universe will tend towards chaos, disorder, entropy.  Why then, are evolutionists so comfortable with the idea that, without intervention, biology naturally and gradually tends towards the beautiful, ordered complexity we see now in ourselves and in the world around us?

The way in which proponents of Darwinism successfully drown out the millions of adherents to the Intelligent Design theory is wickedly simple.  They re-frame the argument.  Darwinism itself is a system of beliefs.  No scientist has EVER successfully demonstrated (or even explained) how one species can morph into a different one, or even how the eye organ went from not existing to now allowing us all to see.  They say, "Well, it might have happened like this," or, "Scientists believe it probably evolved gradually over a long span of time."  Still, there is NO science in these assertions, they are just beliefs, faith in a idea.

By re-framing the argument and saying that evolution is science, and that the ubiquitous evidence of purposeful, intelligent design is fantasy, the evolutionists persuade Americans and their governments that only "science", not "religion" deserves a place in the classroom.  No other cosmic or contrasting view can be discussed - even those of scientists who are not proponents of "creationism".

The ardent evolutionist is likely always an avowed atheist who desperately wants God not to be there.  Why?  Why do they want also to control your children's minds?

Maybe you SHOULD home-school your kids.

They came to their senses !!! Or did they?

Well, I don't know who was responsible for bringing the court or its clerks to their senses but, lo and behold, the Utah Supreme Court has re-scheduled the Warren Jeffs appeal hearing, and now it won't be at the Happy Valley Law School. Now all we have to do is make sure that Justices Durrant, Nehring, Wilkins and Parrish don't come within a mile of the pending decision. After all, they are the ones who said that Rodney Holm should be found guilty of felony bigamy because his third wife wore a white dress to their informal marriage ceremony, thus inflicting great harm on the venerable institution of Holy Legal Matrimony. Durrant confessed that he didn't dare go against the current tide of public opinion. Perhaps the legal system in Utah should be conducted like American Idol, and guilt or innocence can be established through a popularity contest and a tally of viewer phone calls. I think that's what nailed Jesus in the end.

Today I am feeling sympathy for atheists. Just think - they will never have the satisfaction of finally knowing that they were right. I think a lot about atheism and Darwinian evolution theories. I watched that Ben Stein movie about evolution, and I confess that I experienced some wicked pleasure watching Ben Stein make Richard Dawkins look silly. Richard Dawkins is the Oxford University professor who serves as the academic poster-child of the atheist/Darwinian movement. He delights in mocking Christians and religious believers. Like other evolutionists, he wishes that governments would step in and prevent parents from teaching religion to their children. He reminds me of Korihor and Nehor (of Book of Mormon fame). In the movie he muses about the possibility that "space aliens" seeded the earth with living creatures and then left. He is comfortable with the concept of space aliens, just not with the concept of a benevolent God.

I recently read a book called Darwin's Black Box by Michael Behe, professor of biochemistry at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania. The message of the book is that, in living organisms, there are biochemical processes and mechanisms which are extraordinarily complex; including sight, immunity and blood-clotting, to name a few. Without ever satisfactorily explaining how life showed up on this planet, Charles Darwin proposed that evolutionary changes in living species occurred very gradually over billions of years. Behe's challenge to Darwin's claims is that some of the mechanisms of life are "irreducibly complex". Some functions of life rely on the complex collaboration of many sophisticated protein molecules and cellular components, the absence of any of which would cause the system to fail and the organism to die. If these complex mechanisms came about only gradually, then the creature could not have lived and thrived while waiting around for eons until all of the indispensable elements were in place.

Darwin had no answer for this problem because, in his day, the complexities of the cell were not known. Behe uses the clever example of the common mousetrap. If you were walking about in the rain forest and stumbled across an intact mousetrap, you would automatically assume that someone designed and assembled it. Moreover, no one would accuse you of being a religious fanatic for concluding that some intelligent design process had been involved. Behe explains that the mousetrap cannot work if even one of the components is missing. Take away the spring, and the mouse is safe. It couldn't just emerge through a gradual chain of microscopic improvements.

Thus, the mousetrap is an example of an irreducibly complex machine. Likewise, the mechanism of blood clotting depends on over twenty critical factors and events. If one is missing, like vitamin K or the Christmas factor, then the system fails, and the creature bleeds to death or solidifies and becomes a solid blood clot. The amazing checks and balances of the blood clotting process rely on many critical interactions and perpetual feedback. In my opinion, Behe proves masterfully that no gradual, microscopic, evolutionary steps could have arrived at this brilliant biochemical system, and that we would all have died long ago while waiting for all the pieces to finally be in place. 

It is generally a waste of time arguing with atheists and evolutionists. They embrace Darwinian evolution with blind, (almost religiously) unshakeable faith, even though there is so incredibly little scientific evidence to support it. They take as true, incontrovertible fact the assertions of other modern scientists that all living creatures have a common ancestor, and that life was generated spontaneously from inanimate substances. Truth is - they don't just believe in evolution - they desperately need it to be true. They don't want there to be a God. They prefer Hammurabi's Law - which says that there are no absolutes in the universe, and all that matters is what makes one feel good.

There is a trend in today's world towards greater polarization. Obama wants to take over the private sector and everything else you hold dear. People are lining up on opposing sides of important issues. I don't think it is merely godless liberal secular materialism versus godly conservatism. I think there are just two kinds of people - those who would starve rather than kill their neighbor for food, and those who would rather kill their neighbor than starve or share food. Soon we'll get to see which group each of us falls into. You watch!

P.S. Just for more giggles - I am reproducing a graphic here from the cover of Behe's book. This little diagram shows a mechanism which is part of a SINGLE CELL (a bacterium). The mechanism is called a "flagellum" (Latin = 'whip'). Actually, it is like a propeller and rudder all-in-one. This whip or tail protrudes through the cell's outer membrane and rotates and paddles to provide propulsion so that the cell can travel. It would be tempting to think that this flipper thingy has muscles, but this is all part of just one cell. The energy consumption is achieved through the transfer of acids. The movement is accomplished by chemical reactions between PROTEINS !!! When one side of the whip needs to contract, the molecules become more "sticky".  The big question is - how do the molecules "know" how to do that?  Don't try to convince me that this all developed through some random Darwinian ACCIDENT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A salmonella bacterium with an immobile whip cannot self-propel.  It cannot reproduce or even survive.  The only explanation for its current, viable existence on earth is that someone (or some thing) designed it here, or someone designed it elsewhere and then brought it here.  When you look at an automobile, you have no doubt that someone designed and then created (assembled) it.  When you look at a human being (or a cat, for that matter) how do you think it came about?
------------------------------------------------------