Why> Series # 5
Why> the Conflict: Science and the Bible
Psalm 19
Scripture Reading: Psalm 19:1-6
INTRODUCTION: FISH WARS power point and comments.
1. Science and Faith are not Enemies
Hebrews 11:1 says Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see. This scripture does not mean that faith is without evidence to support it. Some people seem to think you have to turn your mind off before you can turn your faith on. They seem to agree with what Mark Twain’s once said: “Faith is believin’ what you know ain’t true.”
When people claim that Science and Faith are at odds often point out that back in the Middle Ages the Catholic Church refused to accept Galileo’s theory that the earth revolved around the sun. (rather than the other way around.) That is true --- but the Church did not reject this theory based on the Bible. It was the teachings of Greek philosophy which held that the sun revolved around the earth, not teaching that came from scripture.1
Besides that, the Church was not alone in rejecting scientific theories back in the Middle Ages. Listen to what Galileo Galilei said about the University Professors of his day. In a letter to fellow-scientist, Johanas Keplar, Galileo said, “I wish, my dear Kepler, that we could have a good laugh together at the extraordinary stupidity of the mob. What do you think of the foremost philosophers of this University? In spite of my oft-repeated efforts and invitations, they have refused, with the obstinacy of a glutted adder, to look at the planets or Moon or even at my telescope.”2
Like Galileo, Johanas Keplar was a Mathematician, Astronomer, and also a Christian. In 1595, he wrote this to a friend: “I wanted to be a theologian; for a long time I was unhappy. Now, behold, God is praised by my work even in astronomy”3
On another occasion, Keplar said that to practice science was “to try to think God’s thoughts after him.”
We could pull similar quotes from early scientists like Albert Magnus, the grandfather of Geology, or Newton who founded Calculus, or Robert Bown who founded modern Chemistry, or Copernicus, the Astronomer. In large part, those who launched the Scientific Revolution believed in the God of Creation.
And you might be surprised to know that many scientists today believe in a Creator. Physicist Paul Davies, wrote a book called The Mind of God where he talks about how the study of Physics pointed him to a Creator … to Someone beyond.
Physicists have recently uncovered sub-atomic layers of reality which they have given names like quark. These quarks are so tightly bound within protons and neutrons that they are completely invisible even with the most powerful microscope. We may never be able to see one.
An award-winning Physicist named John Polkinghorne said this: “You know what? I believe in quarks. Do you know why? Because it makes sense of all the other evidence that’s available.”
Then he continued along the same line of reasoning, “I also believe in God. Why? Even though I’ve never seen Him, it makes sense of all the evidence I see out there ---- of the incredible complex nature of the world, of the multi-faceted levels of reality, of the fact that people long for worship and hope, the fact that there is a phenomenon of Jesus throughout the world.”
The Apostle Paul made a similar point in Romans 1:20: "Since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse." That is as true today as when Paul wrote it. The more we learn about the complexity of the world, the more reason there is to believe in God.4
2. The Theory of Evolution is a Theory
If we see a clash between science and scripture today, it usually has something to do with the Theory of Evolution. Now, this is a big subject and can be confusing, so I want to make it clear that we are talking about MACRO evolution, not MICRO evolution.
MICRO evolution is simply small changes within a species --- not to be confused with the kind of Evolution that would cause one species to change into another species.
We see evidence of MICRO evolution all around us. The complexity of various breeds of dogs and cats would be a good example of MICRO evolution. But when cats breed they still produce cats, and when dogs breed they still produce dogs. As far as I know, no one has ever come up with a dat or a cog.
MACRO evolution is where the clash between Science and Religion comes up. Evolution is often defined as random change over billions of years, by which life came from non-life and complexity came from simplicity. There are some who believe in both Evolution and Creation. They would say that Evolution tells the HOW --- and God tells the WHO. That is called Theistic Evolution.
But Evolution is usually taught the way this quote from a High School Biology Text Book puts it: “There has never been any kind of plan to evolution because evolution works without plan or purpose. It’s important to keep this concept in mind. Evolution is random and undirected.” There is not much room for God in that statement.
Just last week, I ran across an article in the Express News about a school board decision in Michigan. It said that the State Board of Education had “approved school curriculum guidelines that support the teaching of evolution in science classes --- but not intelligent design.”
Now, here’s the sentence in the article that astounded me. It said that some people “…want science teachers to teach that Darwin’s theory of evolution is not a fact...”5 Well, you’d think it would go without saying, but a theory is NOT a fact. The Theory of Evolution IS … a theory. Unfortunately some people seem to believe that Darwin’s Theory of Evolution has “evolved” from theory into fact.
In 2001 PBS put out an 8-hour Television series called Evolution. The series concluded that virtually all reputable scientists in the world support Darwin’s theory. Some Scientists evidently thought the show went too far. In fact, they felt strongly enough to take out a 2-page Ad in a national magazine under the title Scientific Descent from Darwinism.
The Ad featured this statement: “We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged." 100 scientists signed their names to that statement. I discovered that since that time the list of signatures has grown from 100 to 607 … as of June of 2006.6
The scientists and professors whose named appear on this list teach at places like Rice, Yale, Emery and MIT. They included people like Nobel Prize nominee Henry Schaefer --- who is the third most cited Chemist in the world.7 These scientists and professors put their reputations on the line by saying that they question Darwin’s Theory of Evolution …. not from the standpoint of Scripture … not as believers in the God of Creation … but purely from the stand-point of scientific evidence.
3. Design points to a Designer
Now, personally, I find this whole topic fascinating … and I’ve done some study on it --- but I don’t pretend to be an expert. All I’m hoping to do this morning is to show you that there are a lot of scientists who believe that DESIGN POINTS TO A DESIGNER. Here are a few of the many questions Scientists are asking of the Evolutionists. For one thing, they are asking:
· How does life come from non-life?
A molecular biologist named Michael Behe came to believe in Intelligent Design through his study of life at the Cellular level. He wrote a book about it called Darwin’s Black Box. Behe says that it’s only in the last 10 to 15 years that we have learned about fundamental proteins, DNA structure, and the most elemental parts of life. He said, “What we are finding is the more we learn about cells and the more we learn about DNA, the more complexity we actually find. It’s nothing Darwin would have ever conceived or even been able to fathom.”
Now, again, I’m not a scientist … I’m a pastor. So I have a bias toward belief in God as the Creator of all we see. But the truth is, everyone has a bias … including Scientists. Personally, it takes more faith than I can muster to believe life could emerge from random change.
Another challenge that Evolutionists are confronting is this one:
· What about the fossil record?
When Darwin presented his theory, the expectation was that the Fossil Record would show gradual development in stages that would match the kind of drawings you’ve probably seen in Biology Text books. (Author Frank Peretti summed Evolution up this way: from goo to you by way of the zoo.) If this is accurate, Fossils should give us millions of examples of gradual change from species to species.
The problem for Evolutionists is that the Fossil Record does NOT show gradual development. Instead it shows what is known as the Cambrian Explosion. This is the sudden appearance of animal life, fully formed and unchanged up to the present --- with no record of fossil ancestors prior to them.
An article by geophysicist, Stephen C. Myer sums it up this way, “starting in the 1970s, many biologists began questioning (Darwin’s) adequacy in explaining evolution. Genetics might be adequate for explaining microevolution, but micro evolutionary changes in gene frequency were not seen as able to turn a reptile into a mammal or to convert a fish into an amphibian. Microevolution looks at adaptations that concern the survival of the fittest, not the arrival of the fittest.”8
I hope all of you to realize that there is plenty of information out there if you are interested in the debate between Evolution and Intelligent Design. (You’ll notice there are some websites listed in your bulletin that you could check out if you want to.)
My problem for this sermon was NOT finding enough information --- it was trying to narrow it down so we could learn some things but still beat the Baptists to lunch!
Another challenge to the Evolution Theory is this:
· How can time + random change produce complexity?
Let’s take an example that’s about as small and specific as you can get. Let’s just look at one kind of bacteria … in fact, let’s just look at one little PART of one kind of bacteria… the flagellum of an e-coli bacterium.
Let’s make it even smaller and look at just one PART of the flagellum. The illustration on the screen is of the “motor mechanism of the flagellum of the e-coli bacteria” 9
This mechanism is found at the base of the flagellum. The flagellum is a swimming device for certain microscopic bacteria. It includes a biological motor which spins at ten-thousand rpm’s. Besides that, this motor can stop on a quarter turn and spin immediately the other direction at ten-thousand rpm’s. There is not a mechanical engine in the universe that can do that.
In his book, Darwin’s Black Box, Michael Behe says the flagellum of bacteria illustrates that even at a Cellular level we see irreducibly complex systems which could not have arisen by a gradual Darwinian process.10
Examples like this are endless. At the most basic cellular level, we find incredible complexity. Take DNA for example. DNA is pretty amazing. There are one hundred trillion cells with coiled strands of DNA in our bodies. Each strand of DNA in your body contains a four-character-chemical alphabet that gives the exact assembly instructions of all the proteins that make up your body.
Now, imagine this: One teaspoon of pure DNA can hold the assembly instructions for every protein in all of the one-thousand-million species of animals that have ever existed on the planet --- with enough room left over to hold the information from every book that has ever been written on earth! Wow!
My question is, how does that kind of complexity get wired into something so compact? Where do those assembly instructions originate? How could DNA possibly come about by some sort of random mutation controlled by blind chance?
Fredrick Crick won the Nobel Prize in 1962 for discovering DNA. He was once asked, “What are the probabilities of a single molecule of DNA coming into existence by chance?” (not multiple molecules, not the hundreds of trillions of cells that exist … none of that.) What is the probability of one molecule of DNA coming into existence by chance?
Crick’s conclusion: Zero point zero percent.
(Now, Fredrick Crick is not a Christian. In fact, he believes some kind of idea about aliens sending viruses that started things up on earth.) But the point is, Crick realized that there is no way DNA came into existence through evolutionary chance.
When it comes to the Theory of Evolution, there are many different perspectives out there. We should respect people whose opinions differ from ours, but we also need to remember that Evolution IS a Theory … and that it is being seriously questioned within the Scientific Community.
CONCLUSION:
Our faith in the God of Creation is NOT blind or without reason. As Believers we don’t need to fear looking at the evidence around us. Allan Rex Sandage is the leading Observation Cosmologist in the world by pretty much all accounts. He spent his career quantifying the expanse of the universe, finding quasars and solar systems, looking at what can be seen through the most powerful telescopes on our planet.
When he was about 60 years old, he spoke at a conference in Dallas, Texas on Science and Faith. Everyone thought they knew which side of the argument he would be on because Sandage was known to be an atheist. But in a talk on the Big Bang Theory, Sandage said that at 50 years of age, he had come to believe in God, and had since become a Christian. (Now, this produced a big bang all across that auditorium!)
Sandage was asked, “Can a person be a scientist and a Christian?" Here’s how he answered that question. "Yes. As I said before, the world is too complicated in all its parts and interconnections to be due to chance alone…”11
The leading Observational Cosmologist in the world … a Scientist who spent most of his life studying the vast expanse of the Universe … can attest to the truth of our TEXT today: The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge. There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard… Psalm 19:1-2
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1 (the philosophy of Palome who based his ideas on Aristotle.)
2 [Through which the satellites of Jupiter were visible -- seen first in January 1610]
3 (Letter to Michael Maestlin, October 1595. KGW 13, 40. Johannes Kepler was a German mathematician and astronomer who postulated that the Earth and planets travel about the sun in elliptical orbits. He gave three fundamental laws of planetary motion. He also did important work in optics and geometry.)
4- Polkinghorne follows what he calls the “bottom-up” approach in both science and religion. By “bottom-up” he means looking at evidence and going where it leads. That is the basis of the scientific approach. Applying this approach to the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Polkinghorne concludes that the resurrection is believable, based on the evidence, and ultimately satisfying in the way it helps make sense of a world that many find pointless and absurd. (Giberson, “”Bottom-up Apologist,” Christianity Today posted 5/24/2002) Dr. Polkinghorne says that in his perspective, science and faith “are intellectual cousins under the same skin.” They many come at things from different angles and perspectives, but they are both in a search for truth.
5 (San Antonio Express News 10-12-06 Associated Press)
6 www.dissentfromdarwin.org
7 These were respected scientists who held degrees from places like Berkley, Princeton, Cambridge, Duke, and Michigan University. They included scientists like Nobel Prize nominee Henry Schaefer, who is the third most cited chemist in the world. The statement was signed by people like Fred Figworth who is a physicist at Yale graduate school and by Professors who taught at Rice, Emery, MIT, Washington, Georgia, Utah, Texas, Florida, New Mexico
8 (Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington November 30, 2005 volume 117, no. 2, pp. 213-239).
9 http://www.veritas-ucsb.org/library/origins/GRAPHICS-CAPTIONS/Flagellum.html
10 “Because the bacterial flagellum is necessarily composed of at least three parts -- a paddle, a rotor, and a motor -- it is irreducibly complex. Gradual evolution of the flagellum, like the cilium, therefore faces mammoth hurdles.” (p. 72)
11 (Truth Journal © 1995-2006 Leadership U)
