Creation vs. Evolution: The Other Side of the Story
By Jerry Williams ('Hat Zair')
Edited by Nick Ligouri and Eric Schmidt
Printable version (.pdf)
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Introduction
In 1859, Charles Darwin's book The Origin of Species was published, being well timed enough and eloquent enough to convince much of this society that evolution was a reality. Others had proposed similar theories, but Darwin's explanation was "the right thing at the right time" which, within a few decades, caused evolution to become the view accepted by the majority of the scientific community.
The irony of this situation is that much of what Darwin wrote is no longer believed even by authorities in evolutionary circles. Ernst Mayr, a rather well known biologist, for example, wrote that Darwin was "hopelessly confused."[1] Indeed, later editions of the Origin became increasingly contradictory, as Darwin sought to answer the numerous arguments being leveled at his theory.[2] It may be said, then, that the very statements which originally caused evolution to be so widely accepted have since been found to be either incorrect or irrelevant.[3]
Today, of course, it is commonly held that Darwin solved many of the questions related to our origins, and that since then all evidence has been in favor of evolution. Moreover, the general trend is for people to take for granted that no scientist believes in a literal six-day creation by God, nor doubts that the earth is millions and billions of years old. These last two assumptions are easily refuted, since one organization in the US alone, the Creation Research Society, has several hundred members, each one having at least one post graduate degree in some scientific discipline.[4] There are literally thousands of scientists around the world that have no use for evolutionary theory; they are creationists. As for which way the evidence points, hopefully the following will be helpful.
Can Life Arise from Chemicals by Natural Processes?
The Question of the Origin of Life on EarthIn the last century, Louis Pasteur went to great lengths to convince the scientific community, through ample experimental proof, that life only comes from life. Then, in the 1920s, A.I. Oparin put forth a theory that life arose spontaneously form inorganic chemicals, and, astonishingly, it has been readily accepted by many without any evidence to back it up. Darwinists have referred to the first life on earth as some sort of "simple cell," which is undoubtedly one of the most outrageous misnomers in the history of modern science. Advances in molecular biology within the last several decades have uncovered a vast array of amazingly complex cellular components, the integrated efforts of which are critical for the life functions of any cell. Thus, no kind of living entity could ever have existed which could be labeled "simple" by any objective analysis.[5]
In order to better appreciate the wonder of living things, imagine a cell enlarged to the size of a large modern city, such as New York. If we could behold this, we would have before us a world of ultimate technology. Virtually every type of advanced machinery used by man would have some kind of analogy in this city of engineering marvels: computerized information storage and retrieval systems, robots, assembling and processing equipment, quality control systems, etc. The difference would be that in every case, the parts of the cell are far beyond human engineering capabilities.
For example, DNA, contained in every self-replicating cell, is a coded message that carries very large amounts of information in an almost incomprehensibly compact form. The smallest kind of self-replicating cell, like a typical bacterium, holds in its DNA message the equivalent of about 500 pages of an encyclopedia.* The genetic information found in humans, though, is considerably more than this, being equal to the amount contained inside the nucleus of every one of the trillions of self-replicating cells in the human body. Since a human cell is microscopic in size, while its nucleus contains about six feet of this DNA information, it is evidence that modern technology's micro-chips are rather simple in comparison. In fact, DNA is about 45 trillion times more efficient in information storage per unit volume that a micro-chip.[6] To believe that all this is the work of random events is simply an affront to reason.
Nevertheless, many have accepted this theory of life arising accidentally from a "prebiotic soup," believing that somehow a mixture of chemicals in the ocean (or some other aquatic environment) joined to form organic compounds (in proper quantities and qualities), which in turn organized into the diverse components of a living entity, which then eventually came together to begin functioning as the first self-replicating organism. An article in New Scientist in 1985 briefly went over a popular version of this theory, and then asked, "But how much of this neat tale is firmly established, and how much remains hopeful speculation? In truth, the mechanism of almost every major step, from chemical precursors up to the fist recognizable cells, is the subject of either controversy or complete bewilderment."[7]
The cause of this bewilderment is readily apparent when one honestly begins to think about some of the facts that oppose this idea. Consider, for example, the geologic evidence. The theory requires enormous amounts of prebiotic soup to have existed for vast periods of time (on the order of many millions of years). If this had actually been the case, there would be some indication of its presence in the geologic record. Though some speak confidently of the prebiotic soup as a documented fact, no positive evidence for its existence has ever been found.[8]
As for observational evidence, it is true that certain experiments have produced small concentrations of amino acids, which are what make up functional proteins (important working parts of cells). Yet success has only been obtained in environments that have no freed oxygen. If there is any appreciable amount of oxygen, not only do organic compounds (like amino acids) cease to form, but those that are formed quickly degrade and perish.[9] For this reason, many believe that the early earth had little or no free oxygen. However, there is no evidence to support this belief.[10] Further, if the early earth had had no free oxygen, it would also have lacked an ozone layer (since ozone is made up of oxygen), and so the amino acids being formed would have been destroyed by lethal doses of ultraviolet radiation form the sun.[11] Thus we have here a catch-22 situation: with oxygen present, organic compounds could not have formed; and without oxygen present they could not have formed either. This is known as the "oxygen-ultraviolet conundrum," and it has yet to be solved.[12]
With all the boasting of how amino acids can form spontaneously, and remarks like, "Amino acids are the building blocks of life," some have neglected to consider that building blocks do not simply join together by themselves. It takes directed energy to bind amino acids together to form functional proteins.[13] Those proteins which function in living cells are only known to be formed by a very elaborate process involving many different pre-existing parts in a living cell. Therefore to say that amino acids organized spontaneously to form functional proteins is just as ridiculous as saying that bricks can jump together to form elaborate mansions all by themselves.
It is well known, in fact, that in an environment of water it is thermodynamically impossible for amino acids to join spontaneously.[14] Even small amounts of water are enough to inhibit the joining together of amino acids in any prebiotic situation, at all temperatures.[15] This being the case, it is incomprehensible that nearly all naturalistic theories of the origin of life are thought to have occurred in some sort of aquatic environment; for a prebiotic ocean, lake or pond would have effectively thwarted the spontaneous assembly of functional proteins.
In the experiments, devices called "traps" are used to catch and protect the organic compounds that are being formed, since the same processes that can produce the compounds are in fact even more efficient at destroying them.[16] Yet in the theorized prebiotic earth, obviously no one would have been present to strain out and protect the amino acids and other organic compounds. Thus there would have been no accumulation of organic molecules, since physical processes such as heat, lightning and ultraviolet light would have destroyed them as quickly as they could have produced them. Moreover, chemicals floating freely in water would have interacted with each other in ways which would also destroy organic compounds or prevent their formation altogether. It is not chemically possible for the necessary parts of a cell to have formed in a "prebiotic soup' consisting of so many different substances.[17]
It must be kept in mind that the origin of a living cell would not consist of merely separate problems that could be overcome one at a time; but rather no cell could function until all the necessary components were present and functioning simultaneously. For example, the life of any cell depends on many hundreds of proteins of various types, and yet proteins cannot reproduce themselves. They depend on the cell's DNA to supply the information necessary to build proteins. And of course the DNA cannot itself construct the proteins upon which it depends; it only holds the blueprints for making them. Moreover, the DNA does not carry this information to the construction sites; that job requires another highly complex type of molecular machinery known as RNA. Certainly all of this activity uses up energy, and this energy is supplied in the cell by other advanced cellular components, without which the building of proteins and other necessary life functions could not continue. These are only a few of the systems which are all interdependent in a living cell, and it should also be pointed out that they must be held together by a highly complex membrane, which in a living cell consists of fatty acids and proteins.
Misleading and sometimes contradictory statements have been made about the assumed evolutionary development of the first self-replicating entity, such as the belief that such a system did not appear all at once fully operative, but rather was produced over long periods of time. Presumably this is meant to imply that the first fully functional cell evolved over many generations; yet of course not even one generation can occur without a functional replicatory system. For any origin-of-life scenario to state that the cell's ability to reproduce came into existence gradually over many generations is therefore an absurd contradiction in terms.
Other statements have been made to the effect that the first living cell was very primitive and "barely able to reproduce itself," but this phrase as well makes very little sense. What is being said is that the first cell was "barely highly sophisticated," or barely extremely complex." Pause to consider the fact that automatic reproduction is something far beyond modern technology and in all probability will never be realized by human engineering capabilities. A cell unable to properly reproduce itself would quickly bring on its own self-destruction through copying, construction and maintenance errors. A cell able to build something like itself which also has the ability to reproduce itself requires a number of highly complex systems, all dependent upon each other: DNA, RNA, functional proteins, ribosomes (construction sites of proteins) and a power supply, all contained within a specifically designed membrane. Plus there is the need for systems of cleanup, maintenance and quality control (enzymes regularly double check the construction of proteins and monitor the DNA chain for copying mistakes,[18] a system to bring in necessary materials and export waste, as well as packaging and storage centers for getting the waste together until it can be sent out.[19] There are also "chaperone molecules" which ensure that newly formed proteins fold properly, as well as systems for transporting new proteins from construction sites to their necessary locations. Is it accurate to call such an immensely complex network of systems a "simple" cell?
These are some of the objections to the "abiogenesis" theory, that life arose spontaneously from non-life. In opposition to this is the law of biogenesis, which states that life only comes from life. (There are no known exceptions to the law of biogenesis). Space does not permit a thorough review of all the problems faced by abiogenesis, but the simple answer is that living beings do not and cannot arise spontaneously from chemicals mixing randomly in any "prebiotic soup."[20] The geological evidence is missing; the experimental and observational evidence is unconvincing, and theoretical considerations are actually hostile. In fact, the theories of an evolutionary origin of life have encountered so many obstacles that some have advocated the idea that life was brought here from another planet, a hypothesis referred to as "panspermia."[21] As one author commented, "Nothing illustrates more clearly just how intractable a problem the origin of life has become than the fact that world authorities can seriously toy with the idea of panspermia."[22]
Don't Fossils Support Evolution?
Concerning Paleontology, the Study of the Fossil RecordMany are of the attitude that the very existence of fossils is evidence for evolution. Perhaps this is due to the popular belief that fossils and fossil fuels (like coal and oil) require millions of years to form. It may therefore come to some as a bit of a shock to learn how quickly fossilization can actually occur, as has recently been discovered. Under certain conditions, it had been demonstrated that fossils can form within a few weeks,[23] and instances are known of fossilization being observed to occur within a period of several years or decades. As for fossil fuels, it has been known since the materials can be converted into coal within weeks or hours;[24] and using a slightly different process, the same materials can be made into good grade petroleum in twenty minutes.[25]
But what does the fossil record itself actually show? It reveals in fact a consistent pattern of unbridged gaps between major groups of living organisms. Volumes could be written about this subject alone. We are not talking about the "missing links" between just ape and man, but rather the general trend between all major plant and animal groups.[26] There are no "in-between species," for example, either living or fossilized, to bridge the gap between fish and amphibians, showing the pelvis and leg forming to be able to support the weight of their body.[27] Some blunt statements made by dedicated evolutionists indicate this fact, that transitional forms are lacking. "Evolution requires intermediate forms between species and paleontology does not provide them," wrote David B. Kitts of the U. of Oklahoma (School of Geology and Geophysics), in the periodical Evolution.[28] E.J.H. Corner, after discussing plant fossils, stated, "But I still think that to the unprejudiced, the fossil record of plants is in favor of special creation."[29] Then there is Stephen Gould of Harvard, who wrote that smooth intermediates between basically different types of organisms are "almost impossible to construct, even in thought experiments; there is certainly no evidence for them in the fossil record...."[30]
This lack of transitional forms is very important to this subject because Darwin's theory depended on the discovery of them. He himself wrote, "Why then is not every geological formation and every stratum full of such intermediate links? Geology assuredly does not reveal any such finely graduated organic chain; and this, perhaps, is the most obvious and serious objection which can be urged against the theory."[31] Darwin's answer was "the extreme imperfection of the fossil record," and he comforted himself with the hope that future search would indeed fill the gaps. Nevertheless, after 140 years, billions of fossils, and some 250,000 fossil species, the situation remains the same. In fact, some evolutionist authors have themselves admitted that there may be even less support for gradual change in the fossil record than there was in Darwin's time, because examples which once were used to support the theory later "have had to be discarded or modified as a result of more detailed information."[32] If therefore the state of the fossil record in Darwin's time was "the most obvious and serious objection" capable of being urged against evolution, and if in our time it is no better (and may in fact be worse) for the theory, it would seem rather dishonest to state that fossils are strong evidence in favor of evolution.
The full significance of this lack of intermediate forms may be better appreciated if one bears in mind a few points. First, the major groups of organisms are quite distinct. This can be illustrated by considering groups with which we are familiar, like the terrestrial vertebrates (land animals having a backbone). This includes birds, reptiles, amphibians and most mammals, and has been divided into 56 living orders. Examples from various orders reveal how diverse each one is from the other. Few would have trouble distinguishing an elephant from a lion, a mouse from a kangaroo or an ape from a bat. The same could be said for the various orders of birds or reptiles. Ostriches and ducks are readily distinguished, as are storks and kiwis, or turkeys and eagles. Likewise, turtles, alligators and snakes are fairly simple to tell apart. Thus each of these orders are separated from the others by differences that are both numerous and obvious.
Second, if evolution has occurred, the transitional forms between each major group should be expected to be rather numerous. Unless one believes that, for instance, a female wolf gave birth to a healthy baby whale (and of course few would entertain such a notion), then the only evolutionary alternative is to suggest that wolves transformed into whales through a series of many steps.* If one begins to estimate how many transitional forms would be needed to link up all the major groups, it quickly becomes apparent that the total would indeed be great. In fact, intermediates should easily have outnumbered the major groups that are known by a ratio of at least three or four to one. (Those who doubt this may tabulate on paper themselves some reasonable estimates of the number of links necessary to join the orders of terrestrial vertebrates.)
Thirdly, it has been pointed out for years that the fossil record cannot any longer be called inadequate.[33] Indeed, for all practical purposes, it can be argued that the record is very nearly complete. Of the above mentioned 56 orders of living terrestrial vertebrates, well over 90% have been found as fossils. Orders are divided up into families; and of the approximately 390 families of living terrestrial vertebrates, well over 70% have been discovered as fossils.[34] Moreover, the fossils which have been found have yielded a consistent pattern: they are either similar to forms already known, or are so different from anything known that they need to be classified into new major groups which are equally unconnected by transitional forms.
Thus, if evolution has occurred, there ought to be several times more transitional forms than major groups that are known; yet while nearly all known major groups have now been discovered as fossils, the intermediates remain absent. The family trees we were shown in school "demonstrating" the theorized line of descent from a one-celled organism through invertebrates to fish, then to amphibians, next to reptiles, and finally via mammals to humans, are not in fact founded upon paleontological evidence. Rather, they are based largely on the assumption that evolution has happened, which turns out to be an unsupported statement of faith if none of the "connecting links' have been found as fossils. One would never guess, looking at these trees of descent, that there is no fossil evidence to support them, as glibly as they are set forth in the textbooks. Yet Colin Patterson, a senior paleontologist for the British Museum of Natural History, stated, "If you ask, 'What is the evidence of continuity?' you would have to say, 'There isn't any in the fossils of animals and man. The connection between them is in the mind.'"[35]
Footnotes
[1] Mayr, Animal Species and Evolution, 1963, p. 484.[2] See Lovtrup, Darwinism: The Refutation of a Myth, 1987.
[3] One authority in the evolutionary community, Derek Ager (former president of the Geological Association of Great Britain), wrote in the Proceedings of the Geological Association (Britain) 87, p. 132, that practically every evolutionary story he had learned as a student has now been debunked.
[4] Similar organizations exist worldwide. For instance, the Korean Association of Creation Research, begun in 1980, now has approximately 1000 members, including several hundred with doctorates in science. Other creation science organizations exist in the US and Canada, as well as England, Germany, Japan, and Australia, and other places.
[5] Denton, Evolution: A Theory in Crisis, 1986, pp. 328ff.
* Viruses have much less genetic information than this. However, viruses are not self-replicating, since they do not have the necessary machinery. They depend on the machinery of the cells they invade to replicate themselves, supplying their own viral genes, and using the replicatory system of the cell they invade to make more viruses.
[6] DNA has a volumetric information storage density of about 1.88 x 1018 bits/mm3, whereas that of a mega-DRAM micro-chip is about 42,000 bits/mm3. The knowledge contained in the libraries of the whole world is estimated to be about 1018 bits of information. To store all this information in DNA form would require an amount of DNA that would easily fit on the head of a pin; while to store it in micro-chips would require a stack of chips that would reach from the earth to beyond the moon.
[7] Scott, New Scientist 106 (May 2, 1985), p. 30.
[8] Denton, 1986, p. 261; Dose, Origin of Life & Evolutionary Biochemistry, 1974, p. 85; Brooks in Origin & Development of Living Systems, 1973, p. 359.
[9] Fox & Dose, Molecular Evolution & the Origin of Life, 1972, pp. 44-45.
[10] Dimroth & Kimberly, Canadian Journal of Earth Science 13 (1976), pp. 1161-85, see p. 1161: "In general, we find no evidence...that an oxygen-free atmosphere has existed at any time during the span of geological history recorded in well-preserved sedimentary rock." Also, New Scientist 87 (July 10, 1980), p. 112; Geology 10 (Mar. 1982), p. 141. Kerr cites geochemists as saying that "No geological or geochemical evidence collected in the past 30 years favors strongly reducing primitive atmosphere" in Science 210 (Oct. 3, 1980), p. 42. Also Scientific American 250 (Apr. 1984), pp. 30,31.
[11] Denton, op. cit., pp. 261-2. See also Thaxton, Bradley & Olsen, The Mystery of Life's Origin, 1984, and their discussion of ultraviolet radiation.
[12] Hitching, The Neck of the Giraffe, 1982, pp. 64,65.
[13] Morowitz in Energy Flow, 1968, p. 66, estimated the increase in the chemical bonding of energy as one forms the bacterium E. coli from simply precursors to be of a value thermodynamically equivalent to having water in a bathtub spontaneously heat up to 360°C, i.e., 680°F (Thaxton et. al., 1984, pp. 120-121).
[14] H.P. Yockey, Journal of Theoretical Biology, 91 #1 (July 7, 1981), p. 14.
[15] Miller & Bada, Nature 334 (Aug. 18, 1988), p. 610.
[16] Thaxton et. al, 1984, pp. 102-104 and references.
[17] Phosphate is an essential ingredient of nucleic acids, yet no soluble phosphates are known that could plausibly have existed in the primitive ocean: Nature 204 (Dec. 26, 1964), pp. 1248-49. Fatty acids, necessary for synthesis of cell membranes, would have precipitated out of the "soup" by forming insoluble salts with magnesium and calcium ions (Abelson, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science U.S. 55 (1966), p. 1365; Thaxton et al, 1984, pp. 56, 104-106). Hydrolysis and other chemical reactions would also destroy organic compounds. Robert Shapiro (Prof. Of Chemistry, NYU), in Origins: A Skeptic's Guide to the Creation of Life on Earth, 1986, pp. 112-113, refers to the "Myth of the Prebiotic Soup." Also, Nissenbaum et al, Journal of Molecular Evolution 6 (1975), pp. 253ff.
[18] See Chemical and Engineering News 57 (Aug. 20, 1979), p. 6, on the proofreading process of protein construction.
[19] A discussion of some of these systems can be found in Michael Behe's Darwin's Black Box, 1996.
[20] Dose, in Interdisciplinary Science Reviews 13 #4 (1988), p. 348: "More than 30 years of experimentation on the origin of life in the fields of chemical and molecular evolution have led to a better perception of the immensity of the problem of the origin of life on Earth rather than to its solution. At present all discussions on principle theories and experiments in the field end in stalemate or in a confession of ignorance."
[21] Crick & Orgel, "Directed Panspermia," Icarus 19 (1973), pp. 341-346; see also Hoyle and Wickramisinghe, Evolution from Space, 1981.
[22] Denton, op. cit., p. 271.
[23] New Scientist 141 (Mar 19, 1994), p. 17.
[24] Chem Tech 2 (May, 1972), p. 92; Research & Development Feb., 1984, p. 92.
[25] Chem. & Eng. News 50 (May 29, 1972), p. 14; Science Digest 74 (July 1973), p. 77.
[26] Of the approximately 35 phyla of the animal kingdom, none are connected to others by known transition forms, nor are there any known common ancestors for any two (Bergtson, Nature 345 [Jun. 28, 1990], p. 765; and S.C. Morris, Nature 361 [Oct. 21, 1993], pp. 219-225). The origins of the various major groups of living things (phyla, classes, orders and even families) are still obscure, and often disputed among evolutionists, since the connecting links between these groups are so consistently missing.
[27] Schultze & Trueb, Origins of the Higher Groups of Tetrapods, 1991, pp. 59-62.
[28] Kitts, Evolution 28 (1974), p. 467.
[29] Corner, "Evolution," in Contemporary Botanical Thought, A.M. Macleod and L.S. Cobley eds., 1961, p. 97.
[30] Paleobiology 3 (1977), p. 147. Also Woodruff, in Science 208 (May 16, 1980), p. 716, states that "the record fails to contain a single example of a significant transition."
[31] Darwin, Origin of Species, 1859, ch. 10.
[32] David M. Raup (Curator of Geology at Chicago's Field Museum), in Field Bulletin (Jan. 1979), pp. 23-25; also Valentine, Bioscience 32 (1982), p. 516.
* Some believe whales evolved instead into hoofed animals; however, the same reasoning applies in either case.
[33] Science 208 (May 16, 1980), p. 717. Geology 14 (1986), p. 534.
[34] A.S. Romer, Vertebrate Paleontology, 3rd ed. 1966, pp. 347-396. Denton, op. cit., 1986, pp. 189-191. Robert Carrol, Vertebrate Paleontology, 1988, pp. 612-648.
[35] Colin Patterson interview, ERIC microfliche ED 228 056, p. 6.