Wow. Randy. What a good thread, and a good moral challenge for all of us.
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I think this depends on the type of person. For most people, I don’t think their profession really requires that they concern themselves with the age of the earth, and most of the time, they can get by without worrying about evolution.
As an educator, I don’t think it should be “our job” to make people accept evolution (note that I don’t say to “believe in” evolution, I say to “accept” evolution). It is important, I think, to teach about evolution and explain clearly what it is and what it isn’t. It would also help if those who do not have a faith (and certainly not the Judeo-Christian faith) would restrain themselves from making evolution into a billy club to beat down the ignorant masses. Evolution is a very difficult subject to understand, taking many years for most people to grasp. Students should understand that science uses evolution to solve a lot of problems because it works and it builds a powerful paradigm that keeps giving.
Nevertheless, perhaps we all need to be humble enough to recognize that we all believe a lot of nonsense, our journey is often one of rooting out bad ideas one smidgeon at a time, and maybe there is no comparing who has the biggest monopoly on nonsense.
That said, to the people who really are in science, particularly people dedicated to sciences like physics/astronomy, paleontology/geology, and biology, YEC is just embarrassing. I would think that these people are driven away from the faith; not only because it really doesn’t measure up, but because some YEC people are extremely rude and their ignorance is utterly appalling. Even if those of us who have accepted evolution meet God at the Pearly Gates and find out that we are wrong, it surely wasn’t for a lack of effort on our part to get to the truth. The picture that we act in some secret cabal to suborn the truth with lies is just a cruel joke and (I think) quite disingenuous.
Science is about evaluating models and methods and building on those models to make more findings. It builds up from a solid foundation that is based on many fields where the top of the pyramid has all the interlocking bricks of the lower layers to support it. The YEC model tends to be a hodgepodge of jury-rigged solutions that cannot build on themselves and cannot make real predictions. It is an inverted pyramid.
There is another side to this too. For the pastors, they don’t see any scientists in the pews. Even more so, few if any actually serve in the church. The pastor cannot help but wonder if the problem is evolution. Some people in the secular world have tried to use evolution as a billy club to demolish the faith, so they have some reason to think that is why. Little do they understand that preaching that “the answer” is to believe in a 6000-year-old earth is exactly what drives many people away.
With the coronavirus, I do think evolution is a concept that would better serve our community, as it is evolving and, whereas it is likely eventually to evolve into something more benign in the future, there is no guarantee. However, evolution, at the level of understanding, is very difficult to teach. It was hard for me to understand too.
We should not be trying to divide each other over the issue of rocks. I know Morris criticized believing in the rock of ages, not the ages of rocks, but I still think he is wrong. Our first call is to look to Jesus. Our call is to reach out to the nations, be compassionate to those who need compassion, and call to account those who need to be called to account. Most of all, we are to set an example of Godly character. These are far hard enough on their own to do, this is what God called us to do, and we need God’s divine help to get them done. Jesus is our guide. These are the things that should matter, not how old the rocks may be, or how God works in the world; be it evolution or by magic.
by Grace we proceed
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There certainly are scientists in the pews. Heck, there are even scientists in the pulpit!
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Ok…Fine. And when social needs of others and the politics that are required to pass legislation and provide funding to meet the needs (personal and corporate infrastructure) where are the “Evangelical Christians” who deny science and deny reading the Biblical texts critically…and fight against educating our public school children “critically”?
Loving one’s neighbors also requires holding them accountable for the effects their beliefs and actions have on the Community at large.
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That might be part of why, even though our church is very conservative, I have yet to hear any mention of YEC views: everyone there (all 40 or so of them) knows that my grandfather (the only founding member who still regularly attends there) and my father are paleontologists, and one of the current ruling elders is a microbiology professor. The closest is my overhearing the same elder talking about his conversion being due to realizations (of a nature-is-more-intricate-than-I-thought nature) during grad school.
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Yes, some churches, very likely churches in large metropolises, or the suburbs surrounding such major hubs. However, I am talking in general. YEC is a kind of parochial view. Rural areas are less likely to have jobs that support scientists. Rural areas also have very knowledgeable people, but not so often in science. It is very easy to spread this YEC thinking where there is no push-back from people who are scientists. It is easy to denounce scientists when they are not in the pews to push back.
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Thanks for your postings, @wkdawson . They made me think.
I also appreciated your discussion about Patrick Marsh. It looks like AiG did indeed give him a good rein and due praise. Unfortunately, it appears he passed away just recently.
In Memoriam: Patrick Marsh | Answers in Genesis
I also appreciated your thoughts on interaction with those of other understanding–that most of all, we are to set an example of Godly character.
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Thank you for letting me know. They occasionally came back to Japan to visit, but I had not seen him or his wife for quite some time now.
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Love it!
This is on point, especially when it comes to Ken Ham. He has had multiple speaking engagements when it comes to racial reconciliation here in the United States.
Something we should all agree with!
I cannot say about staff on AiG, but I know many YECs who are Godly and kind.
Jesus said the world will know we are His followers by our love for one another. Thanks for this thread, brother! 
-Joshua W.
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I also like that it’s one letter off from the abbreviation for Alice in Chains (AiC) so whenever I see it for a second I’m like “Facelift is a great record”
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This is certainly true. However, I’m pretty sure that the ways of thinking that YECism promotes can undermine your ability to do your job properly if you work in any area of science or technology, not just geology or evolutionary biology.
[Personal anecdotal content removed by moderator.]
For my own part, there came a point when I realised that the anti-intellectual, anti-science kind of thinking characteristic of YECism was doing massive damage to my own career prospects. In the years after I graduated from university, I ended up getting into a whole lot of thinking that held that facts are not the truth, that reason is the enemy of faith, that science is something “secular” that is not to be trusted, and so on and so forth – and a whole lot of conspiracy theories into the bargain. At one point I even ended up feeling ashamed of my degree in Natural Sciences from Cambridge University. The result was that I ended up finding that I was still in a minimum wage job ten years after graduation, having to relearn a whole lot of skills that I’d unlearned and to unlearn a whole lot of ways of thinking that I’d picked up that were stopping me from functioning properly in the workplace. The whole process left me constantly worrying in case I was relearning things or unlearning things that I shouldn’t be, and when I realised what had been going on I reached a point where I very nearly lost my faith altogether because of it. But that’s why I have so little patience for young earth nonsense or any other form of science denial in the Church. It demands that I get back into ways of thinking that at one point were making me borderline unemployable. It’s also why I thank God for BioLogos – as well as strengthening my faith, the support I’ve had from these forums has enabled me to progress in my career without feeling guilty and conflicted about it.
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I think you are right. However, I can also see that you can have lots of empathy for folks that struggle in that way. Your first posts in Biologos from a YEC perspective (that you linked) show probing, and evidence of search for truth that looks for an impartial balance. It’s by patient, understanding discussion that we can communicate well. It takes a while to birth that out. Thanks.
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Hi @jammycakes,
Thank you for the very candid testimony. I remember when I first became a Christian (in the university), I was not at all a scientist but I grasped that science was a major issue I needed to consider with my newly discovered faith. I prayed to God, and somehow, his answer was “you don’t have to believe that stuff [i.e. YEC].” I eventually became a scientist because I really wanted to understand science and the issues of science and faith. I never really had a major problem with microevolution, but I did find it difficult to understand macroevolution. I ended up working in biotechnology, so eventually, grasped the concept.
I think the main difference I have is that, as Christians, I believe (note: “believe”, a faith term) that God is the alpha and omega, and that God orders our steps. Given so, why can we not accept that God ordered the steps of the universe? Physical processes, no matter how complex, are a cinch compared to our stubborn lot. There is just no reason to reject evolution, other than our own prejudices. Yet who can tell God, “Hey! what are you doing?”
It is hard for me to imagine functioning normally in most of what I have done with a YEC mindset. The only reason I didn’t say all science is I can imagine someone who is a genius at organic synthesis not really needing to accept evolution to be able to come up with ingenious ways to make organic compounds. … at least as long as he/she doesn’t open the mouth on other matters.
Nevertheless, there is territory like abiogenesis where it is not 100% obvious how someone like that would navigate. It is true that basically, it doesn’t work in any realistic way at this point, but we may not have been clever enough. I have been playing with the idea of clay minerals acting as a catalyst with phosphates to join the sugars. Nothing encouraging yet … but that is what I mean, if I actually find something, it is my duty as a scientist to report it. For me, it would be another reason for me to praise God because God’s creation is so much more ingenious than we are. … and we could probably do some incredible things with it were it true.
I certainly cannot agree with the YEC way of thinking, and I am deeply concerned that it is destructive in other ways. I can tell an alcoholic to get off the bottle, I can tell a shorter to stop gambling on the stock market, but until they decide that quit, my words will go largely unheeded. I think the best I can do is be able to tell people who suddenly realize that YEC stuff really doesn’t work, that God is still there, you can still find God, and Jesus still died for our sins and we need God’s divine help every day. To tell them that it is still worth the pearl of great price to seek the kingdom of God with all our heart. I am very grateful to hear that you didn’t throw away God when you recognized that the YEC stuff wasn’t working for you anymore. God is so much bigger and greater than all that stuff.
by Grace we proceed,
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Thanks Randy. Just to clarify: I wasn’t a YEC by the time I joined the forum. I’d long since realised that the earth is old, but I wasn’t entirely sure at the time how to respond to YECism, especially to the more strident YECs I knew who were starting to insist that all of us as Christians needed to nail our colours to the YEC mast and take a stand on the earth being young and evolution being nothing more than an “atheistic” theory.
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Thanks. I am sorry–I was working at the time I read it (on break) and am sorry I misread it.
Of note, I agree that taken to extremes, insistence on our understanding of spiritual things to the exclusion of obvious weights and measures can really mess up logical thinking. I do have many acquaintances and friends who are very detached from evolutionary biology (physicians, doctorates of divinity, etc) who are smart, but haven’t read enough to realize the cognitive dissonance. It does seem often that it’s in college or soon after, that that becomes more of a problem. Regardless, we can appreciate that there are many more things that we have in common than at odds, that we can admire and relate to in YEC, too–as we were once ourselves. Many are actually more spiritually mature than I am. I have a lot to learn. You, too, have apparently progressed much further in some areas of logic and maths than I. I appreciate your blog/site.
In the spirit of affirming what we appreciate about one another, I think it is also helpful to identify what YEC (young earth creationists), OEC (old earth creationists) and EC (evolutionary creationists/specifically the BioLogos expression) hold in common. Our shared worldview is two-ism/theism . God is the ultimate reality, the Creator, and everything that exists apart from him is his creation. We agree that God directly created the universe, and that he directly created the first life. We all believe that the Bible is God’s Word, that God is our Creator, and that Jesus the Son of God is our Savior. We also believe that Jesus was physically resurrected from the dead. God holds all things together.
In our science, all three groups of creationists agree that we cannot and should not use God as an explanation for what we don’t understand. When we use God to explain what we don’t currently understand (“I don’t understand, so it must be God” or god of the gaps), the need for God becomes increasingly irrelevant as an explanation and the progress of science is impeded. But as Distinguished Oxford Professor John Lennox so aptly states, “God is the God of the whole show: the things we understand and the things we don’t understand.”
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Does it really take years to understand the validity of the evolutionary narrative—that the proof for evolution can be found only by scrabbling around in the weeds (details)? Does it need to be difficult for most people to come to an understanding of the issues?
Here is one tactic I have used. I have read two books with differing views and assessed their arguments. I didn’t realize it at the time, but interestingly enough, both were written by scientists who are Distinguished Professors at Oxford University. John Lennox wrote God’s Undertaker, Has Science Buried God? while Richard Dawkins wrote the best-selling Blind Watchmaker. So I think I have avoided the trap of looking at the weakest arguments from the least qualified proponents.
I found Lennox’s book to be well argued, and absent of logical fallacies. Dawkins’ book was littered with them. Another benefit is that these two people have actually debated each other on the issues, so I can hear them interact with the other’s arguments. Lennox is such a gentleman, and was gently able to dismantle Dawkins’ arguments.
Another way to assess which side of the issue is correct is to examine the foundational thesis. For neo-Darwinian evolution, it is that natural selection working on random variation can account for how all the different kinds of life evolved from the least complex life to the most complex life. In studying that issue, I have concluded that natural selection does not have the explanatory power that is attributed to it.
I have not found this to be the case. I served on the elder board of a large evangelical church in Ann Arbor, Michigan, where many who attended were professors at the University of Michigan. One of the elders was a well respected professor in the natural sciences and a young earth creationist, and later became the head of a science department at Penn State. A second elder, one of the most intelligent people I have known, was a litigation attorney. The elders felt that our best teachers should teach the youth, so he taught our high school class that our children attended. He felt a biblical understanding of origins was critical, and he wrote a 60 page curriculum explaining YEC. Okay, not a “scientist,” but a highly qualified thinker with the critical faculties necessary to assess and communicate the arguments.
And medical doctors. I know several Christian medical doctors, and in my circle of acquaintances, all are YEC. In retirement, one of them lectures at a Christian university on the issue of origins (they “tolerate” him). It seems that an understanding of the human body and how it works would certainly give a foundational understanding by which to assess the validity of evolution.
Thanks. Like a good friend and pastor commented recently, “I know that some of my theology is wrong. I just don’t know where.” It is good to recognize that none of us is right about everything, and anyone who claims to be loses all credibility for me. Here’s an illustration:
In the church I alluded to earlier, they had a 60 page doctrinal statement. On becoming an elder, I didn’t realize that; I has seen only the three page summary. Later, when looking for a new pastor, we had extreme difficulty finding a candidate that could agree with everything that was enshrined as “unchangeable truth” in 1936, at the apogee of the fundamentalist movement. They wrote a new doctrinal statement encapsulating what they felt was most important in less than one page.
This was 25 years ago. There were 300 people in an auditorium that seated 800. Now there are three services in an expanded auditorium in a university town, a testimony to being open hearted.
I appreciate this comment–what about “certainty?” In a previous post in this thread, I commented on what we all hold in common. My certainty level on those issues of faith is about 99.9%. I could be wrong, but I don’t think so. On the issue of evolution, my certainty level (YEC) is 93.7%. On the issue of a young, 6000 year old earth, my certainly level is 85.4%. (Of course, it is not that precise, and varies from time to time.) My certainty level on the age of the earth used to be about 25%. But after reading on OEC, they were able to convince me otherwise, particularly in that their biblical explanations were pretty convoluted. So I looked more closely at YEC on young earth, and found their position to be much more thoughtful than I thought they would be.
I imagine someone will note that John Lennox, whom I highly respect, is an old earth creationist. Yes, and I recommend reading his book, Seven Days that Divide the World, and indeed everything he has written. His understanding avoids many of the theological pitfalls I find in OEC.
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Sounds like you decided in advance between a false choice of militant atheist biologist Dawkins ideas must be right or ID proponent (anti-evolutionist) mathematician and philosopher John Lennox must be right. They could both be wrong. 1) Lennox isn’t a biologist. 2) Dawkin’s hates religion. So you have effectively excluded a very reasonable middle of Christians in the biological sciences who would disagree with both people. Those aren’t the “two sides” and they aren’t even the sides we are discussing here. We are discussing EC and YEC, so you can’t hold up an ID guy and an rabid atheist apologist who happens to be a scientist and then declare a winner between EC and YEC, where the differences are fundamentally theological and rooted in Bible interpretation. ID and atheism don’t do either.
It’s a theme.
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It’s one thing thinking that you “understand the validity of the evolutionary narrative,” Craig. It’s a completely different matter altogether making sure that you understand evolution correctly.
Most YECs have massive misconceptions and misunderstandings about what the theory of evolution even says, and you can’t even start to discuss whether a scientific theory has any validity or not until you have a proper understanding of what it actually says in the first place.
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I was an OEC stuck on irreducible complexity before I learned about neutral drift and the neutral theory of evolution. (Objective evidence of God’s providential M.O. and sovereignty in the timing and placing of mutations in DNA didn’t hurt, either. ; - )
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