Evil Lotion

Conservative evangelical institutions of higher education get kind of a bad rap. While their curriculum trashes Darwinism, it acknowledges that adaptation within a type (limited evolution) is a proven fact. Evangelicals seldom express this fact outside of academia. Indisputable, empirical facts in evidence trump what may look like biblical evidence to the contrary (see Genesis 30-31).

That which God has created is the ultimate scientific evidence. God created living things to adapt and survive. Bacteria that is destroyed by antibiotics or thwarted by immunity will be replaced by different bacteria. The replacement may have resulted from a genetic mutation. This process occurs among all living things: Survival of the fittest. This is not strictly Darwinism, however.

I am absolutely not an expert on taxonomy, but everyone knows Darwinism asserts that one kind (family?) of animals or plants can change into another over many thousands, perhaps millions of years. This theory may or may not be true. HOWEVER it can never be proven scientifically. Scientists cannot conduct laboratory experiments to show it, or observe it happening in nature. We just don't live long enough, or even if we did there is not much chance we would see it occur. Certainly, no laboratory experiment could ever prove it. Yes, I am fully aware that Darwin never intimated that man evolved from apes. He asserted that we have a common ancestor with apes. Hmmm. Try proving THAT using a controlled, repeatable laboratory experiment!

Darwinism has another problem. To completely follow Darwin, we need to believe that a self replicating cell arose (and thrived) on Earth from inanimate chemicals over a matter of a few million years. Then, within another billion years or so the cell became a complex multi-billion-cell organism. The odds against this are impossibly long, nonetheless it could be true. Now let's see you prove it in a lab. If it cannot be proven, it can never be scientific fact.

On the other side of the issue, evangelical religious belief cannot disprove Darwinism scientifically, and does not even propose an alternate scientific theory. Yes historical geology is fascinating, and offers proof of general concepts (age of the earth, extinction) but the presence or absence of fossil evidence cannot prove or disprove Darwinism, creationism, or "intelligent design."

The two sides of the Darwin debate attack each other blindly. Darwinists claim that creationists/IDers reject the concept of adaptation or survival of the fittest. This is misleading. Equally specious is the religionists' assertion that the lack of an accurate fossil record disproves Darwinism.

Does it really matter whether or not Darwinism is true? One would almost have to wonder in light of the fact that the majority of the people in The Greatest Generation rejected Darwinism.