Someone recently expressed interest in my thoughts--as a committed Christian, a former atheist, and a working scientist—about the contentious topic of evolution. For many years I have simply avoided this discussion. I am ready now to address it. I write this to as broad an audience as possible—Christians, atheists, scientists, and non-scientists, and everyone in-between. And I would love to hear your thoughts back at me, whatever they may be. Let me say a couple of things right up front: as when I was as an atheist, I am only interested in Truth, regardless of what that turns out to be—whether God created the world, much as it is now, in six 24-hr days or gradually over millions and even billions of years. I personally have nothing to gain or lose either way.
My Journey
I graduated from Oklahoma State University in the spring of 1976 with a B.S. in wildlife ecology. I got my first real job as a scientist the very next month, collecting field data for various environmental studies. The next sixteen years, including graduate school, were spent as a working scientist, initially in the field of plant ecology, later in plant pathology (plant diseases). After many years as an unabashed atheist, somewhere in all of that, I had a spiritual encounter with God and became a born-again Christian. After my university position was relocated to another city to which I didn’t care to move, I spent eleven years in the landscaping industry. Eventually I found myself as pastor of a small church. Now I am back at the same university again as a research scientist.
During all of my years in science, I've never had a colleague question me about my faith (how can I be a born-again Christian and be a scientist at the same time?) or made to feel second rate as a professional scientist because of my faith (which I freely made known). Never did my faith waiver in the university climate. Never even did the debate about evolution and creation arise on the job—until my job was as pastor of a church. There it was assumed that I agreed that the whole bunk about evolution was just that--bunk. I was teetering now at the very edge of The Great Divide: the false dichotomy that one must believe in God or believe in evolution, but never shall the twain meet. I don’t remember a single Christian admitting to me that they believed in the process of evolution (that doesn’t mean there were no such people in my midst; if so, they simply, like me, kept their mouths shut). I don’t believe this Great Divide of opinion necessarily exists in all parts of the country or in all Christian circles.
During the pastor years, I had successfully evaded the notion to reconcile my belief in God with my steadfast confidence in the “theory” (see below) of evolution as the only plausible explanation for the natural order of things that scientists study on a daily basis. As mentioned before, I never felt any pressure from university colleagues to explain the seeming contradiction, despite a thick cloud of controversy in the air--my adopted state of Arkansas had recently made national news for its part in a contentious legal case, McLean vs. Arkansas Board of Education, involving the teaching of creation science in public schools (ruled unconstitutional by a federal court in 1982 as “religion, not science”). It would be another decade before I felt inclined to tackle the issue.
My time in the landscaping business only fueled my awe of nature and my appreciation of God as its Creator. The how orwhen of creation was--and is--a secondary issue for me. As a theologically conservative Christian, I was considerably torn, being told that we were in a culture war and that believing in evolution was tantamount to siding with the enemy. Because of my science background, I could not let go of the notion that natural selection over a long period of time--whereby individuals with genetic traits that are most compatible with their current circumstances and environment are most likely to live long enough to breed and reproduce those genetic traits--and the genetic interrelatedness of creatures, is the best explanation for the innumerable observations that researchers make on a daily basis. As a pastor, my convictions about evolution by natural selection remained solid. However, such a stance is considered heretical in many conservative circles, so I simply kept my opinions to myself.
An Unprofitable Debate
Here is as good a place as any to make an important point: I truly doubt that Jesus is pleased about the premier role that the evolution-creation debate has taken in the spiritual life of America. This debate has hijacked the more critical issues of faith, love, grace, eternity and the purpose of life. It seems that what one’s stance is on the creation-evolution question often becomes a litmus test for being a Christian or an intellectual—that is, you cannot be a Christian if you believe in Darwin’s theory; you cannot be an intellectual if you are a Christian. This is hooey! And many good people, possibly open to spiritual truth, have needlessly fled as a result. If you believe that there is a Satan (I do), then believe this: he loves the creation-evolution debate!
So Exactly What Do I Think?
During my five years as pastor of an evangelical Christian church, my ideas quietly solidified into the following nine convictions:
(1) Natural Selection.
The natural world that we see today developed gradually over millions of years by the process of speciation (descent) by natural selection (i.e., evolution). I believe that God directed this process, and continues to oversee or observe it, because evolution is, by definition, an on-going process. I believe that, although the process appears to be random from a scientific perspective, it is not. Evolution is God-engineered (the original genetic engineer), perhaps from a distance, so to speak, by creating the process and then letting it run its course; or by close involvement in the various turns that speciation has taken over time. Since He lives eternally, time is something that God has plenty of.
1, 000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 stars like our Sun! (that’s 24 zeroes—a trillion trillion.) God said, “Let there be light”, and buddy, there was light! We can’t look directly at the sun because the intense light (solar radiation) can damage our retina. Think of the total amount of light, and heat energy, coming from a trillion trillion suns. Let there be light indeed!
Scientists have formed a consensus around the Big Bang Theory that is very well documented and reasoned, and yet they don’t hesitate to say that how or why or what existed before is totally out of their purview. By their own admission, it can’t be known. They can explain the physics of everything back to microseconds after the initial bang (13 to 14 billion years ago), but they can’t know what was before—physics does not apply on that side.
(3) God Lit the Fuse. The God described in the Bible (by both Jews and Christians) is responsible for the Big Bang. The Big Bang is not a threat to people of faith or an affront to God in any way. If you cannot believe that God could create such a big bang, then perhaps your own picture of God is not big enough. This applies whether you or secular or religious.
(4) Genesis tells Who, not how. The creation account in chapter one of Genesis, the first book in the Bible, is an allegorical account (symbolic) meant to say Who created what we see and are. It is not meant to be a scientific treatise or literal timeline of the creation. I realize that this part of the discussion—the interpretation of Genesis--is the real sticky point for many Christians, and perhaps many Jews as well. I do not take lightly how we interpret this or any other part of the Bible. Perhaps one could think of the creation account in chapter one as a story, along the lines of the many parables (representative stories that convey important truths) that Jesus told, such as, “There was a man who had two sons. The younger one said to his father …” (the Prodigal Son parable). I believe the creation account in Genesis is meant simply to convey what David summarized in Psalm 24: “The earth is the LORD’s, and everything in it, the world, and all who live in it; for he founded it upon the seas and established it upon the waters.”
Genesis is the cliff note version of creation. The Apostle John said that there are a lot of things left out of the Bible. In the last sentence of his Gospel account of Jesus, John said: “Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.” So the Bible tells the essentials of the story, but not all the details.
(7) Spread of Mankind and Development of Religion. Mankind developed into many cultures and races, beginning in Africa, spreading to the Middle East, Europe and Asia--all with a consciousness of the supernatural realm and a felt need to search for meaning in life. Anthropologists and archaeologists have documented a near universal interest in the supernatural amongst primitive people groups, present and past. By 40,000-60,000 years ago, early humans had island-hopped across stretches of ocean (up to 60 miles at a time) to populate Australia. Around 16,000 years ago, some crossed a frozen land bridge over the Bering Strait, during the most recent of four great ice ages, and “quickly” colonized North, Central, and South America. God had imparted a supernatural or God-consciousness to humans, but had not begun any personal relationships. No human knew God.
.Perhaps around 2000 B.C., God got personal with a fellow named Abram in what is now considered southern Iraq. After a name change to Abraham, he became a central figure in three great world religions: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. You can read about Abraham and his progeny--the patriarchs Isaac and Jacob—beginning in Genesis 11 to the end of that book. Around 1400 B.C., God got personal again with one of Abraham’s descendents, a Hebrew-Egyptian named Moses. God did many incredible, even miraculous, things during Moses’ lifetime. Moses began writing down these and other things that God has done--and why he did them. Moses was the first of many biblical authors, writing the first five books of the Judeo-Christian scriptures, including Genesis. Of course, other people groups throughout the world developed alternative religious beliefs, often based on the natural environment around them. (8) God’s Glory Displayed By Nature. The vast array of plants, animals, microbes, physical elements and physical laws of nature—all—are a part of God’s glory. [go watch a few episodes of Planet Earth if you want to get a sense of this; or just go take a nature hike.] Natural phenomena should bring each of us to a sense of awe in God. The more we observe and learn of the intricacies of His creation, the more awe we should feel. Worship is an appropriate response to this feeling.
There is nothing in science that people of faith should fear or obstruct. God and faith are beyond the purview of science and yet are compatible with it. For me, seeing something new under the microscope and then reading the incredible nature stories that others have uncovered about it, brings me to an attitude of worship to the Creator. I could bore you for hours about the intricate biochemical warfare going on all around us between plants and fungi. The more we peer into the invisible worlds of biochemistry and quantum physics (the “solar system” of atoms), and ecology, the better we can appreciate our powerfully creative and intelligent God. Beauty in nature and the beauty of God are part of the same thing. Science merely pulls back the curtain from the masterpiece and enables us to see it better.
(9) God Is Totally Interested in Me and You. God is intimately familiar with--and interested in--every individual human being, including you. Yes, you! (insert your name here …). He is interested in your well-being and He is interested in what you think about Him. He wants you to know Him. I don’t believe that God simply started the process of evolution and remained aloof ever after, or that Homo sapiens just happened into existence by chance after the ball got rolling. I believe that H. sapiens was always a part of God’s plan in evolution and, in fact, His primary purpose. I also believe that God is intimately involved in forming each individual person.
Even as the ideas presented above began to gel in my mind, I was still not interested in devoting study time to these issues. I felt (and still feel) that way too much time and negative emotional energy has been expended on the creation-evolution debate. Disrespectful, ugly behaviors and haughty attitudes on both sides often kill the conversation. The discussion has been largely unproductive, even destructive. Way too many secular people have fled from faith because of this argument; and way too many believers have fled from science, perhaps in a misguided attempt to somehow defend God, as if that were necessary. And yet, I felt a need to clarify my position in my own mind.
I read several books about the evolution-creation debate, including books by real scientists who are also committed Christians. (Note: not all who write about the science part of this debate are real scientists. Some who write about science in books or popular literature are merely parroting the arguments of someone else who are parroting someone else, very few of whom are practicing scientists. Others “masquerade” as creation-scientists, dabbling outside of the realm of peer-reviewed journals and legitimate scientific institutions, in order to “prove” that the scientific establishment is wrong about its evolution paradigm.) [Note: I will concede--after receiving an email critical of this article, and doing an internet search--that there are a few exceptions within the creation science/intellegent design camp, who indeed have published scientific articles in bonifide, peer-reviewed journals, who work as faculty members of major university science departments, and who are, undoubtably brilliant scientists. The views of some of these scientists are not accepted within their own university departments. I accept the ideal of scientific freedom to advance unpopular theories--Galileo and Einstein had the same problem. However, I stand by my previous statement that many creation-scientists are not ligitimate scientists in the sense of engaging the scientific community within the realm of accepted journals and meetings.] At the end of this paper I’ve listed a few authors that I think understand both science and God.
What Some Others Think
I suppose I am like most other folks in being especially attracted to authors and books that confirm what I already think or who point in the direction I am already inclined to go. What they do is help us to consolidate and order our own ideas and to articulate them for us. One book that details the history of the debate is Saving Darwin—How to Be a Christian and Believe in Evolution by Karl W. Giberson. I hope soon to post his section called A Brief History of Everything , a succinct account of the Big Bang (not to be confused with similarly titled books by Ken Wilber and Bill Bryson).
My favorite book that I read is The Language of God—A Scientist Presents Evidence For Belief by Dr. Francis S. Collins (2006). Collins was head of the Human Genome Project, a worldwide collaborative effort that successfully translated the entire human DNA code. In 2009, he was appointed head of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH), the lead government agency funding health research projects. Collins is a serious scientist, a physician, and a Christian philosopher.
Dr. Collins gives a good summary on the origins of the universe, the expansion of life on planet Earth, and a primer on how genes tell us so much about where we came from. He discusses the biblical description of creation and how Galileo and Darwin unintentionally rankled (irritated) the Church. He then spends a chapter each on atheists and agnostics, on Creation Science, Intelligent Design, and Theistic Evolution --science and faith in harmony. I consider myself in the latter category. Below, I’ve listed six premises that Collins says are common to a theistic evolution stance:
1. The universe came into being out of nothingness, approximately 14 billion years ago.
2. Despite massive improbabilities, the properties of the universe appear to have been precisely tuned for life. [in other words, physical laws, such as the speed of light, the force of gravity, electromagnetic forces between subatomic particles, etc.]
3. While the precise mechanism of the origin of life on earth remains unknown, once life arose, the process of evolution and natural selection permitted the development of biological diversity and complexity over very long periods of time.
4. Once evolution got under way, no special supernatural intervention was required. [I don’t subscribe to this part necessarily ...]
5. Humans are part of this process, sharing a common ancestor with the great apes. [This is not the same as saying that we came from monkeys or chimpanzees, which is not true.]
6. But humans are also unique in ways that defy evolutionary explanation and point to our spiritual nature. This includes the existence of the Moral Law (the knowledge of right and wrong) and the search for God that characterizes all human cultures throughout history.
About Theories and Evolution
A sidebar is in order here. I have purposely avoided using the phrase, The “Theory of Evolution”, for a reason. There is sort of myth that is widespread among non-scientists, particularly those who oppose evolution, about what a “theory” is. It often goes something like this:
“Well, the Theory of Evolution is just that—it is only a theory. Evolution has not been proven.”
Scientists have a different take on this word. Allow Francis Collins to clarify the issue:
My Funk & Wagnall’s dictionary provides the following two alternative definitions for the word “theory”: “(1) a speculative or conjectural view of something; (2) fundamental principles underlying a science, art, etc: music theory, theory of equations.”
It is this second usage that scientists intend when they talk about evolutionary theory, just as when they mention gravitational theory or the germ theory of infectious disease. In this context, the word ‘theory’ is not intended to convey uncertainty; for that purpose a scientist would use the word “hypothesis”. In common, everyday usage, however, “theory” takes on a much more casual context, as reflected in Funk & Wagnall’s option 1: “I have a theory that Bill has a crush on Mary,” or “Linda’s theory is that the butler did it.” It is too bad that our language lacks the necessary subtleties of distinction here, as clearly this simple confusion of the meaning of the word has made things worse in the contentious dialogue between science and faith about how living things are related.
In other words, when scientists and educators talk about evolution as a theory, it is like talking about gravitational theory, electromagnetic theory, or music theory. A major tonic chord in music is made up of the root note, together with the third and fifth tones of that scale. Even though every music professor, teacher or musician in the country could agree on what tones make a tonic chord, we still call it “music theory”, that is, the theoretical aspects of music. Think of this when you hear a scientist talk about evolutionary theory. Evolution is the working paradigm amongst mainstream biologists the world over. They are not arguing over its merits, and haven’t during my lifetime and before.
The uncertainties in evolutionary theory arise over specific questions such as what ecological factors force biochemical changes in a certain group of organisms. But if a person has scriptural or faith issues with the concept of evolution, it is an entirely different debate--one that, like other issues of faith, will not be resolved in peer-reviewed scientific journals.
Is Evolution a Scientifically Sound Idea?
Some people will argue that the Theory of Evolution is based on faulty data (“Carbon14 dating of fossils is not accurate”) or lacks adequate evidence (“No one has ever found the missing links—the intermediate species between major animal groups.”). These are empty claims by well-meaning people who are parroting others who are parroting others who don’t know better. In fact, a great number of what are called variously transitional or intermediate species have been uncovered in fossil form. Clink the link to see a web page with graphics and information (with more links) on these transitional fossils:
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| Ichthyornis, a transitional reptile/bird that retains small teeth. |
In fact, we haven’t even yet discovered all of the species that are living right now on this earth. New species are discovered and described by scientists every week. In just two months of a survey of Papua New Guinea, researchers in 2009 discovered 200 new species of plants and animals, including newly described mammal species.. The Amazon Basin is so diverse that 1,200 new species have been described over the last ten years. That’s 120 new species every year from the Amazon alone. Is it any wonder that we haven’t found all of the ancient, extinct species?
Fortunately, great strides in evolutionary research have been made in recent years without fossils. The field of cladistics utilizes biochemical data of genetic nucleotide sequences and the amino acid sequences from proteins of various organisms to analyze statistically to estimate relatedness of organisms. The “family trees” that are produced by this research corroborate those based on physical, structural relatedness, but are able to go well beyond the limitations of classical morphological study.
Boiling It Down
Much of this debate boils down to faith or no faith. And one cannot muster faith from thin air; I believe it is a gift of God. One can not prove faith or argue one into or out of faith. Everyone must play what I call The Great Cosmic Card Game—we all have to decide one way or another what to do about God and about Jesus. (I’ll try to write a blog on that sometime.) This paper is meant merely to throw out ideas, to start a conversation, not to prove anything, especially something that, by its essence, cannot be proven—which is what faith is about.
This paper is perhaps more challenging or pertinent to Christians who have not settled in their mind the gulf between the creation account in Genesis and accepted science. Or maybe for Christians who ascribe to Creation Science or its twin, Intelligent Design. I do not consider either of these to be good science. You can jumble geologic and genetic evidence all you want in order to force it to fit your stance, but it is still bad science. Humans running around at the same time as dinosaurs may assuage your religious sensibilities but it is bad science in my opinion, and is not necessary. And if a thinking secular person gets the impression that they must swallow the tenets of Creation Science in order to follow Jesus Christ, they may well opt out at worst, or be mightily conflicted at the least.
What If I’m Wrong About Theistic Evolution
Even if I am all wrong about evolution and my notion about God instilling an immortal soul into a couple or a larger group of evolved Homo sapiens—it doesn’t matter! These are all peripheral issues that don’t alter the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which is the only thing in the universe that ultimately matters. Some of my views about the how’s and when’s of the creation may change even yet with time; but the truth of the Gospel does not change. The Gospel is like a scientific physical constant—like the speed of light—but perhaps even more unshakeable than that. Who knows if the speed of light is the same on the other side of the universe or in potential universes in other dimensions of time and space. Still there is one Gospel. … Believe the Gospel or not … it is your call. It is a matter of faith.
The Gospel
There is a God, there is Jesus (one with God), there are angels and demons, and the lead demon is Satan, the devil. Satan opposes God in every way possible as long as he can (the timeline is determined by God). One way that Satan opposes God is to force a wedge between mankind and God. Because God is pure and holy to the nth degree, He cannot be in the presence of impurity and unholiness. That is why God initiated the Gospel: He Himself pays the penalty of sin (rebellion) for His humans, so they are transformed to become as pure as God, Himself, in order to commune with Him. This is through human faith in the sacrificial, final death of Jesus, the Son of God. God Himself provides the solution. There is nothing we can possibly do to earn it.
So what is this sin thing that Satan uses against us? I believe that most sin is simply our human animal nature which God calls us to rise above. When God imparted a spirit into mankind, He provided a connection to Himself. He also revealed Himself and imparted to humans the Moral Law, giving them a sense of right and wrong. He said essentially that you are no longer just an animal, but you will become like Me in order to commune with Me. He said, “I have chosen you as a species and, further, I have chosen you as an individual.”
From an evolutionary perspective, God directed a physical change—an enormous frontal lobe of the brain—in order to enable a spiritual outcome: As scientists have discovered, the oldest parts of our brain, from an evolutionary perspective, control our most primal instincts, such as our sex drive, our reaction to pain, hunger, thirst, cold, danger, etc. This part of our brain is quite similar both in physical shape, makeup and function as that of, say, a lizard, which is much, much older and more primitive in the paradigm of evolution. A frontal lobe, on the other hand, is much more recent, and culminates in Homo sapiens subspecies sapiens. This part of the brain is used for higher thinking, logic, projection of future outcomes of various scenarios, planning, etc.
Using biochemical and electrical impulse studies, researchers can see the real-time struggle going on in the various parts of the brain—the battle between instinct (hard-wired into the old brain) and higher thinking (in the frontal lobe). In other words, it is the weighing of right and wrong. And not only are the physical lobes of the brain important, but more so the complex wiring of the nerve cells--the connections that enable this higher thinking. That is why teenagers often have trouble with higher thinking and weighing outcomes before they act. Our brains are still developing these complex wiring connections even into our early 20’s. This is no joke.
God has given us this ability to know right from wrong (perhaps even this Moral Law is instinctive in us) and has given us the mental ability to rise above instinct in matters of right and wrong, So He holds us responsible for the outcome. And yet He knows that often we will fail. We all fall short of God’s purity and righteous standards. That is why the Gospel of Jesus Christ. That is where Satan works to keep humans and God apart.
A Few Words About Science and Scientists
The vast majority of scientists are not terribly interested in the evolution-creation debate. It is settled for them; they don’t take it seriously as a debate. Contrary to what a large number of conservative Christians believe, most scientists are not part of any agenda or conspiracy to usurp God or belittle Christianity by forcing data or inventing techniques that produce false data. Scientists are truth-seekers at their very core—truth about the natural world. Since supernatural truth is beyond their scope, they do not concern themselves, in their scientific work, with such things. Scientists are also competitive and accountable to each other. If one scientist uses shakey techniques or flawed interpretation, other scientists will call them out on it. In fact, such work would probably never even appear in a respectable peer-reviewed scientific journal where the standards are incredibly high.
Our research group recently helped to host a meeting of scientists working on the genetics and ecology of a particular devastating disease of soybeans (yes, soybeans get sick, too). I was taken with the intelligence and diligence with which these men and women attack this problem. They discussed advanced genetic techniques and hypotheses that left me in a haze of incomprehension. They blew my mind with the agility of their minds. Talking with some of them socially, I could see how much they loved the scientific work they do. And they collaborated so freely with one another, all in the common purpose of finding ways to defeat this threat to world food production. Nearly all scientists are this way. They have a narrow area of expertise in which they focus all of their energy and genius. They are not thinking about how to denigrate God or people of faith.
My Motive
Lest readers get the impression that I am somehow anti-Christian: NO, NO, NO! I am one! I am committed, to the core of my being, to Jesus Christ as LORD and Savior. In fact, my great desire is for secular scientists to experience the joy of seeing a more complete picture of what they are now observing in nature; that is, to couple their appreciation of natural beauty and order with an indelible awe of God . I desire, as well, for Christians who are non-scientists to more fully appreciate God’s incredible universe through the details that scientists are continually uncovering. In other words, I desire that walls come down, the two sides respect each other, and both more fully experience the glory of God.
I have more to say about God in nature, evolution, and the like. Hopefully, I’ll post some of it on future blogs. If you hung in with me this far, perhaps you will go a little further in the future. And I would love to hear your thoughts as well. I feel very sure that many of you disagree with me, in whole or in part: maybe with the God part; maybe the evolution part. That’s okay . . . I invite you to make comments at the bottom of this blog entry. Or write me an email (mandobobholland@yahoo.com). Or write your own blog and send me the link. I would be interested in seeing some discussion develop between readers--friendly, respectful discussion--where we can agree to disagree and still enjoy each other’s company. Remember, we won’t likely argue each other into a completely different stance than we already have. But perhaps we can scatter some seeds for thought in each other’s mental garden that weren’t there before.
Peace on Earth and goodwill towards men,
Bob Holland, December, 2010
P.S. There are probably way too many books on this subject; but if you are interested in looking further into the slant that I have taken, here are a few good ones (I like the first one best):
The Language of God by Dr. Francis Collins (medical doctor and biochemist; 2006)
Saving Darwin by Karl W. Giberson
The Fingerprint of God by Dr. Hugh Ross (an astrophysicist; 1991)
Beyond the Cosmos by Dr. Hugh Ross (an astrophysicist; 1999)
A Biblical Case for An Old Earth by Dr. David Snoke (a physicist and theologian; 2006)
Is God a Creationist? Edited by Roland Mushat Frye (a professor of English and Theology)
