Infrequently Asked Questions on Creation and Evolution
(that should be asked more frequently)
The following was originally written for SCICHR, the now-defunct Science and Christianity mailing list, moderated by Steven H. Schimmrich, which you might find traces of in a search of the Web.
Isn't there just one issue – which of the two you believe in?
No, there are several different issues, bundled together. It is a
mistake to assume that people fall into just two camps, unbelieving
evolutionist and believing creationist.
What are the issues?
- How old is the cosmos? Many billions of years or a few thousand?
- How old is the Earth? Many billions of years or a few thousand? (Some
people believe in a young Earth and an ancient cosmos.)
- How old is humanity? (Some people believe in a young humanity and an
ancient Earth.)
- How much evolution happens? None, all species produced by special
creation? Evolution of species and maybe genera but larger groups
appearing by special creation? Only very rare special creation? No
special creation?
- Can truly novel features appear in life without special creation?
Which features are "truly novel"?
- Was there a real Noachian Flood? Did it cover the whole planet? (This
question often comes up in creation/evolution discussions, but it might
be better to make it a separate topic.)
Why does it seem to polarize into just two positions?
For the same reasons any issue gets over-simplified – it's satisfyingly
dramatic; the media (including both scientific media and religious
media) are in the business of attracting your attention, and a nice
loud, two-sided fight will do that; and it's always tempting to draw
over-simple caricatures of the opposition (faithless evolutionists,
brain-dead creationists).
Also, in this particular case, there is a conflict of approach between
the people with a scientific background and the people with a scriptural
background. (People with both backgrounds often feel trapped in the
middle, but they get ignored because of the reasons in the previous
paragraph.)
What are the conflicting approaches?
Roughly, one approach is willing to strain the scientific evidence and
the other is willing to strain the scriptures, especially Genesis 1. Of
course, only the other side sees the interpretation as "strain." The
science-oriented side sees the scripture-oriented side as working in a
vacuum of scientific ignorance. The scripture-oriented side sees the
science-oriented side as making unwarranted interpretations of
scripture.
How does scientific ignorance come into it?
Many young-earth creationists recite arguments or evidence against an
old earth, intermediate fossil forms, etc.that are simply inaccurate or
obsolete. Facts that refute these arguments are well-known to people
with a background in geology or biology, but obviously unknown to the
young-earth creationists. Repeated displays of such ignorance make the
science-oriented people (whether Christian or not) unwilling to listen
to sources that have proven valueless so often.
On a more abstract plane, many scripture-oriented people do not know
much about scientific method – the varying degrees of certainty given
to different ideas, the requirements for observational evidence, the way
one idea interrelates with many others, and so on. This means they often
regard evolution as:
-
A disguised, atheistic religion (which does exist but is not science
and is not regarded as science by scientists),
or
-
An isolated, erroneous theory that could be discarded and replaced
like replacing a flat tire (when the theory is intimately connected with
many other fields of science, so that replacing it would seriously
affect them all),
or
-
The exact opposite, a corrupting influence that taints all science
(when, in fact, science existed for centuries without it, and many
fields of science, e.g.chemistry, have little to do with it).
How does scriptural interpretation come into it?
Most of it hinges on the term "day" (Hebrew yom) in Genesis 1. Any
interpretation of Genesis 1 that tries to reconcile it with mainstream
science must interpret the six days of creation as something other than
six consecutive 24-hour periods over which God formed the world.
Many scripture-oriented people object to these other interpretations on
grounds such as:
-
They see no good scriptural reason to turn away from the simple six
consecutive 24-hour-days meaning;
-
Other meanings put more faith in human science than in
divinely-inspired scripture, since it makes the meaning of scripture
hinge on current scientific theory, instead of letting scripture speak
for itself;
-
They strongly feel that the Bible must be taken literally unless there
is clear reason to do otherwise, since any doctrine or heresy could be
argued into or out of existence by taking the right selection of verses
as literal or figurative. (E.g., if the six days are not real, how do we
know John 3:16 is real?)
If Genesis 1 isn't a literal description, what's the point of it?
Laying aside the issue of a literal description of creation, other
lessons found in Genesis 1 include:
-
Monotheism vs. polytheism. In contrast to the creation myths of pagan
cultures, with many gods battling, and with different gods creating or
personifying different parts of the world, Genesis 1 shows the world as
the harmonious and orderly production of a single God, Who is not
Himself a part of that world (unlike, say, a sun-god).
-
Cosmic worth. Genesis 1 declares the creation to be "very good,"
unlike gnosticism, Buddhism, or some forms of Hinduism, where the
creation is an illusion that we should escape; and unlike dualistic
religions such as Zoroastrianism, where part of creation is made by a
good god and part is made by an evil god.
-
Human worth. Genesis 1 declares humanity, in its basic, unfallen
nature, to be made in God's image and to be part of the creation that is
"very good," unlike systems such as gnosticism or Buddhism, where human
nature is something ignoble that we must escape, and unlike those
materialistic systems in which worth of any kind is simply a personal
preference, and humans are objectively nothing but clouds of atoms.
-
Human nature. Genesis declares us to be God's image, and therefore
made in the image of a Maker, set to tend His creation and to do work
that is, like His in miniature, very good.
-
Sabbath sanctification. Genesis 1 establishes the pattern of the
Sabbath cycle, and so shows that both work and rest are, in their basic
nature, holy.
If there are more than two positions, what are they? What are their
leading good and bad points?
Here is a "spectrum" of Judeo-Christian positions on the
creation/evolution issue, from "conservative" to "liberal":
-
Classic Young-Earth Creationism (six days, 6000 years ago):
No theological problems, but incompatible with mainstream science.
-
Appearance of Age (the world is 6000 years old but looks like it is
billions of years old):
Has the theological problem that God looks "deceptive," and the
scientific problem that, if so much evidence has been "faked," we cannot
trust our observations and so can do no science.
-
Gap Theory (after existing for billions of years, Earth became
"without form and void" 6000 years ago, in a catastrophe, and God
RE-created it in six days):
Has the theological problem of putting a very odd meaning on Genesis
1:1 with no scriptural reason; also, presents much the same scientific
problem as Appearance of Age, since there is no evidence for the
catastrophe 6000 years ago.
-
Day-Age Theory (each "day" of Genesis 1 represents an age lasting
perhaps millions or billions of years):
Interprets "day" in a way used elsewhere in the Bible, but with
questionable justification here; also, the ages of this theory may not
line up perfectly with those of mainstream geology (e.g. plants appearing
before the sun and moon appear in the sky).
-
Visionary Day Theory (the days of Genesis 1 are six days during which
God showed visions of the creation to Moses):
No scientific objections, but there is no clear scriptural motive for
interpreting "day" in this way.
-
Proclamation Day Theory (the days of Genesis 1 are not consecutive,
but are days, separated by millions of years, on which God proclaimed
the next phase of creative activity):
No scientific objections, but there is no clear scriptural motive for
skipping days in this way.
-
Rhetorical Day Theory (the days of Genesis 1 are not literal days, but a rhetorical
device for framing the creation account, which is meant to teach the lessons about
God's relation to the world, cosmic and human worth, etc., mentioned above):
No scientific objections, but there is no clear scriptural motive for
interpreting "day" in this way. *
-
Theistic Evolution (God set up the universe so that some degree of
evolution happens naturally, but also intervenes miraculously on
occasion):
No scientific objections, but gives no help in interpreting Genesis1.
-
Providential Evolution (God set up the universe so that it naturally
evolves life and intelligence):
No scientific objections, but gives no help in interpreting Genesis1.
Since 8 and 9 say nothing about Genesis chronology, they can be combined
with any of the previous views that allows for a conventionally ancient
Earth (3 through 6).
* This is my own position, and I justify it by pointing to Genesis 2:4, which speaks of
the single "day" in which God created Heaven and Earth. If it can be six days in one place and
one day a few verses later, this shows that chronology is not the point here.
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Copyright © Earl Wajenberg, 2011