The initial post on the PSSI blog (Science So Called - see below) ended with the following question: Why, with no hard evidence in biology to confirm it, has the hypothesis of Darwinian macroevolution (DME) been retained as the dominant creation story in science and academia? Many other hypotheses have been postulated and discarded in the nearly 150 years since Charles Darwin published On the Origin of Species in 1859. Yet the DME hypothesis, which should have long ago been discarded as untenable, has taken on a life of its own. In fact, it has so pervaded the scientific and academic communities in many countries that those who openly question it pay dearly within their profession. Since DME is not supported by current scientific research, there must be another reason that sustains it. Examining the statements of a few noted DME proponents will make that reason clear.
Professor Richard Dawkins (the Charles Simonyi for the Public Understanding of Science at Oxford University) stated: “Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.” Professor Daniel Dennett, Director of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University states: “Darwinian evolution is a ‘universal acid;’ it eats through just about every traditional concept and leaves in its wake a revolutionized world-view.” Professor Douglas Futuyma, in his biology textbook Evolutionary Biology, states: "By coupling undirected, purposeless variation to the blind, uncaring process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of life processes superfluous." We could quote many other Darwinists, but these should make the point. Their focus in these statements is clearly on religion (atheism). That is an odd approach for scientists who you would think would focus on science, not faith or religion. Dawkins has provided absolute clarity as to what their agenda is, and it is not about science: “Faith is one of the world’s great evils, comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to eradicate.”
So the agenda appears to be to use science (so-called) to eradicate faith of some type. Faith has three components; knowledge, assent and trust and all three of these are required for someone to exercise true faith. Now the above scientists certainly have knowledge of various disciplines of science, they assent to that knowledge as being factual (however imperfect it may be), and they trust in it, so they can’t be trying to eradicate faith in science! Obviously the faith that they are trying to eradicate is a religious faith. Professor William Provine, the Charles A. Alexander Professor of Biological Sciences at Cornell University makes the type of religious faith crystal clear: “One can have a religious view that is compatible with evolution only if the religious view is indistinguishable from atheism.”
As noted, the various quotes above are certainly not scientific, rather they are religious in nature (no pun intended). One of the definitions of religion is man’s belief about his relationship to the powers and principles that govern the universe. It is clear that these gentlemen place their faith in the religion of Darwinism (see Futuyma above), which they believe is confirmed by their science. So their desire is to eradicate faith in all non-atheistic religions, utilizing their disciplines of science as a bully pulpit for that purpose, rather than simply advancing and/or teaching the particular area of science in which they are trained.
Their religion of Darwinism, also known as naturalism (nature is all there is), undergirds secular humanism (Dennett’s revolutionized worldview), which is based on atheism, naturalism, evolution, and ethical relativism. This amazingly unscientific position is underscored by a scientist actually involved in key research in the lab. Let’s go back to 1954, a time when the scientific evidence against DME wasn’t so overwhelming. At that time the late Nobel laureate (Medicine) and Harvard professor George Wald stated: “When it comes to the origin of life on this earth, there are only two possibilities: creation or spontaneous generation (DME). There is no third way. Spontaneous generation was disproved 100 years ago, but that leads us only to one other conclusion: that of supernatural creation. We cannot accept that on philosophical grounds; therefore, we choose to believe the impossible: that life arose spontaneously by chance.”
Wow! So the impossible is embraced by many scientists because the alternative, which fits the evidence much better, has uncomfortable philosophical implications! They find themselves in the conundrum that, after more than 100 years of trumpeting DME as fact, scientists and academia certainly cannot admit to the public that the alternative better fits the evidence. So how can they continue to keep the lack of scientific support for DME from the public? Aha, redefine science so that the distasteful alternative to DME is effectively removed from the discussion! How the public has been misled through this sleight of hand will be demonstrated in the next post.