The Good Word
Left to themselves, things pretty well run down. No matter how much I clean and organize my office, a few days, a few projects and a bit of carelessness make the place look like a cyclone hit it. But then, you knew that. It's common sense: left to themselves, things pretty well run down and fall apart.
But this is not just about messy offices, and kids that don't put their toys away. Tires wear out, the house needs painting, carpeting must be replaced. Concrete and steel don't last forever. Even the Sphinx of Egypt recently required major restoration work.
TIME'S ARROW
So inexorable is the process of disintegration and deterioration
that Sir Eddington described it as "times arrow." This means that
if you have two photos of the exact same object taken at two different
points in time, even if they are not labeled or dated, you can tell which
one was taken last. It is the one in which the object is more worn
and deteriorated. Hence, the increasing wear indicates the direction
of time --- time's arrow.
Scientists call this time's arrow principle the second law of thermodynamics: the total entropy, or amount of disorder, in a closed system is always increasing. And yet, millions of people, led by prominent scientists, accept the theory of evolution, the idea that things have gotten better, less disordered and more organized over the past many millions of years. This is in direct contradiction of common sense and the law of thermodynamics.
My old professor explained this odd situation by saying, "I believe in evolution because I can't accept the alternative." This honest admission of faith (anti-faith?) makes more sense than the bold claims of surety by evolutionary partisans. But it is a statement of faith, not science, nonetheless. Two other common sense principles challenge the evolutionist.
FITTEST MAY NOT BE BEST
To account for his anti-common sense, anti-second law
theory, Darwin suggested that the increased neatness and organization that
life exhibits (as opposed to non-life) was due to adaptability and "survival
of the fittest." After all, living things do adapt to their environments.
Most children only need to touch a hot stove once to avoid it in the future:
once burned, twice cautious. The child has adapted to his environment.
But survival of the fittest is another matter, as far as leading to improvements or "evolution". Once, when discussing survival of the fittest in the context of various employees at a large company, a colleague commented that cream is not the only thing that floats. And someone has noted that in the event of a nuclear holocaust, cockroaches might be the only life that survives. This survival would be an advance? Not hardly. Survival of the fittest doesn't necessarily lead to the improvements evolutionary theory expects.
YOU CAN'T GET THERE FROM HERE
Living things are incredibly complex. The theory
of evolution suggest that this complexity came about with many tiny improvements,
added over a long period of time. Step by step the living human being
supposedly slowly evolved.
The eye with its focusing lens, muscles and delicate retina and nerve structure are a real problem here. The problem? There is no series of simple steps to go from a light sensitive cell (possibly evolved) to a focusing eye. Either the whole thing works, as in a finished eye, or it has no advantages whatsoever. Natural selection would not lead to preservation of intermediate steps from generation to generation, without advantages along the way. There are no imaginable incremental steps, tiny improvements, that lead to a finished eye.
These are three common sense principles, grounded in scientific law and logic, that discredit the theory of evolution.
Time's arrow: things naturally deteriorate or run down.
The fittest may be the worst, simplest, least "evolved.
You can't get to a complex eye by simple evolutionary
steps.
I have experienced and observed the "evolution vs. creation"
controversy for fifty years. I have listened to Nobel prize winners
passionately promote evolution and Bible college graduates passionately
promote creationism.
In general, the evolutionists have a better education
with more facts and disciplined logic at their disposal. But with
a virtual hammerlock on the American educational establishment for the
better part of a century, the evolutionists are losing the argument with
the American public. Reasons for this include:
Faith in creation can have a positive impact on the believer's life. The theory of evolution is personally reactionary, and doesn't provide positive motivation.
The theory requires assumptions and reasoning that are counterintuitive. Common sense creates skepticism about a theory ardently promoted by antireligious zealots.
Not all scientists are evolutionists. It isn't necessary to be an intellectual troglodyte to be a creationist.
Creationists have perhaps done significant harm to their cause by believing more about creation than the Scriptures and Biblical tradition warrant. To claim too much, in too much detail, may expose the claimant to justified ridicule.
THE BIBLICAL ACCOUNT
(Continued in Create.)
There is a substantial amount of information on the subject of creativity and creation, in the Bible. It didn't seem feasible to deal with this in adequate detail in this current issue of The Good Word. Next month we will deal with the problem of origins, the explosion in the print shop, Maxwell's little demon and the tremendous insights to these matters that can be found in the Bible. We will also position Jesus as the true creator. May he keep you safe till then.
Your friend, Herb Sorensen