Hello, people of the BioLogos forum! I hope you guys are doing well. I have a couple of questions about evolutionary creation. 1. do you think that given the faults of Darwinian evolution, is Darwinian evolution is false? if so then what type of macroevolution do evolutionary creationists believe? this is for a project, so it would be of utmost pleasure if you take the time to reply. and in everything, may this glorify God!
Hi Jerushka,
Welcome to the forum! I hope you’re able to get some good answers for your project here. Most of the people here accept the current scientific understanding of evolution, so calling it “Darwinian evolution” doesn’t really add much to it. Maybe you can clarify what you mean by “given the faults of Darwinian evolution,” – which faults did you have in mind?
Question: How do we know that everything in the bible really did happen? Like in Genesis, how do we know that God made the earth in 7 days? How do we know that it was 7 days and more than 7 or less than 7?
RightNow Media if you have rightnow media, this video was recommended by my teacher to watch. if not, it goes something like this: scientists say that evolution is undoubtedly a fact. but this video outlines potential faults found in evolution, such as the miller-urey experiment (they said the the miller urey experiment did not use the correct air of ancient earth, and if the correct air was used, then it would not create amino acids, but something rather toxic) and how the strongest evidence for evolution, according to Darwin id est Haeckel’s Embryo Drawings, were somewhat doctored into fitting evolution (by saying that the intermediate step was actually the first step). i hope that was a somewhat accurate depiction of the video.
i assume it is faith that history somewhat happened the way the bible depicted it. if i am not mistaken, believing the inerrancy of the Bible essential part of Christianity.
I think you will find that many Christians disagree that believing in the inerrancy of the Bible is an essential part of Christianity. (But, inerrancy has lots of definitions, which complicates matters) The essential part of Christianity is that Jesus died for sinners to reconcile them to God.
No, because I think the “faults” have been greatly exaggerated and misrepresented by people (sometimes well-meaning and sometimes intentionally deceptive) who think that science threatens God. I personally do not think we can discover anything about God’s world that threatens him. I don’t think that understanding a natural process that God used to create undermines his power or creativity any more than understanding other natural processes that God uses, like the weather or “knitting babies together” inside the womb.
Most evolutionary creationists don’t think there is a difference between microevolution and macroevolution. It is the same process on different time scales.
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Thanks for the link. Unfortunately, it looks like you have to be a paying member to watch the video. I don’t know much about the Miller-Urey experiment, but it looks like they were investigating abiogenesis – the origins of life, which is not evolution. It’s fascinating to think about whether there’s a natural explanation for the beginning of life, but whether there is or is not, as a Christian I’m content to leave it in God’s hands, as I believe he created the world one way or another. But I would agree with Christy that many speakers and authors I’ve listened to who talk about “faults” in evolution are exaggerating them – many are not even scientists, and yet try to speak with authority about concepts and processes that they don’t have much experience or knowledge of.
Thanks!! that makes sense that some of the faults have been greatly exaggerated, and the video shows Sean McDowell teaching a group of students so I guess some points may have been exaggerated a bit in order to try to prove that evolution is wrong.
and i would like to a another question regarding the age of the earth. since macroevolution is out of the picture (i hope i understood what you were trying to get at) then does evolutionary creation mainly side with yec, or oec (young vs old earth)?
oh, i see. the video kind of jumps around, moving from abiogenesis and how that encourages intelligent design, to the topic of evolution and how they say that it is false.
It’s not that macroevolution is out of the picture. There is evolution. I think labeling evolution over very long periods with very significant changes macroevolution and labeling smaller changes within a species over a relatively short time period microevolution is not a necessary distinction because in both cases it is the same process at work. People who make the distinction usually believe there is some boundary beyond which evolution cannot occur. Like one “kind” cannot evolve into another “kind” according to the Bible, they say. But this is not a scientific view, it’s a view imposed on science by an understanding of the Bible.
Evolutionary creation accepts that the earth is ancient (like OEC). Unlike OEC and YEC they also accept the evolutionary model of common ancestry and descent with modification. They believe that the evolutionary model is a scientific description of God’s means of creating the diversity of life on earth.
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Haeckel’s drawings:
Haeckel's Embryos (from the author of a popular high school Biology textbook… He’s also a devout Catholic)
General responses to similar questions including these:
Miller-Urey is dealing with abiogenesis research, not evolution. Abiogenesis is currently a scientific unknown. There are multiple hypotheses, but no theories yet. Honestly, if they created life in a lab by setting up the right conditions that sparked it, I’d say, “Cool! Maybe that’s how God did it!” Stuff like that should not be a threat to your faith, ever. Don’t rest your faith on proving science/evolution wrong. That’s a really weak foundation.
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On the first question I think that many of the “issues” of evolution are overexaggerated by groups of people hostile to evolution or just don’t know any better. As for me I believe in the common concept of evolution in that life started out as tiny critters in soupy water of the primordial past but over time things evolved and grew and eventually modern humans and other modern creatures have come about. Of course I believe that God in was behind the course of evolution and is leading all things to a good end and ALL things are being reconciled back unto God the Father (1st Corinthians 15:20-28) I do hope that this project you are doing does glorify God in what you are doing and I pray that the Love of God the Heavenly Father and Christ Jesus our Lord be with you always. Amen.
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thanks! In the video that i posted to, they did not say how or if evolution responds to the i guess fake known as haeckle’s drawings and i guess that the reason that abiogenesis made it’s way into the conversation was that the lecturer was asked, what would you do if life in a lab
was possible.
Science doesn’t buy into some authority dictating to them what to believe. It constantly tests and builds upon the work of any scientist with millions more. Flaws are revealed and solutions found along with more evidence and more ways to discover more. In recent years we have been learning how to get information from the genetic code to answer many many more questions than ever before as well as getting the clearest evidence of what happened. Darwin only took the first steps in theoretical biology followed by millions which have demonstrated beyond any possibility of doubt that the species evolved from common ancestors.
I am a scientist. In science it doesn’t matter what you believe. Science has a means of uncovering the truth which does not depend on such things. And thus by shining light most fully on all of God’s creation, science certainly does reveal the glory of God better than anything else I know.
Evolutionary biologists do not hold to Haeckle’s theory of recapitulation, which basically said that embryos go through stages of what their adult ancestors looked like. What we DO see in embryology is that embryos of vertebrates often go through similar stages. But scientists today (and for a very long time) don’t believe those stages are adult forms of ancestors. The similarity of embryos is suggestive of common ancestry, but doesn’t say anything about what the adult ancestors looked like.
Basically, Haeckel’s drawings being used by anti-evolution articles and videos are just a strawman. They’re also a good example of science correcting itself. I don’t think Haeckel’s idea ever had consensus support by the scientific community. Darwin himself didn’t hold to the recapitulation idea.
Biology textbooks today use actual photos of embryos to show the similarities, because embryos do share similarities early in development. Haeckle was right to compare the embryos. His conclusion was wrong, and his drawings were exaggerated. Hence the use of actual photos today.
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oh, ok so it is something like, he was accurate, but not there.
It’s a bit like Ford listing higher horsepower numbers than an engine really puts out, and then using that dishonest horsepower number to argue that cars don’t exist.
The evidence supporting evolution doesn’t go away because one guy drew exaggerated illustrations of embryos.
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[quote=“Jerushka, post:4, topic:43965, full:true”]i assume it is faith that history somewhat happened the way the bible depicted it. if i am not mistaken, believing the inerrancy of the Bible essential part of Christianity.
[/quote]
It is not so! Orthodox and Catholics do not think so.
Vatican II said it best: “The books of Scripture, firmly, faithfully, and without error, teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the sacred Scriptures” ( Dei Verbum , no. 11).
“Errors in the text, it should be said, would not contradict our present understanding that there is no error in “the truth which God . . . wished to see confided” there for the sake of our salvation. Acknowledging such historical or prescientific miscalls is a far cry from saying the Bible is either factually accurate with every word or altogether poppycock.”
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