Thank you for your interest and
inquiries regarding IMM's website pages on
evolution and creation. As you have raised
some thoughtful questions, please allow me hereby
to respond.
1) Do you believe that all of
humanity descended from Noah's family?
If so, how do you account for the distinct
races?
It would take much longer than ~ 4,000 years
to adapt to their respective climates.
I
do believe all races descended from Noah's family.
That family consisted of three sons and their
three wives. The blessings and curses he
gave his three sons match very closely to what we
observe globally today: Shem (Jews,
Europeans, "Whites", very blessed
economically and in so many other ways), Japheth
(Asians, Eurasians and original Americans, note
"large territory"), Canaan (African,
Arabic, note curse of slavery). This was
written long before anyone had any idea of what
peoples actually existed in the world and what
their global relationship to each other was going
to be. The Bible record is exceptionally
accurate on this one. This is no
coincidence. (The Bible contains dozens and
dozens of fulfilled prophecies, which are also no
coincidence).
Distinct
races from three couples? It's not too hard
to understand in terms of today's racial mixing.
I'm 100% Chinese and my wife is of European
descent. Our kids have a unique look that
doesn't generally match either Chinese, English,
Italian, Welsh (our mixes) or Central Asian for
that matter. We know many other kids of
similar mix. If they were to "form
their own race" by marrying generally among
themselves, limiting inclusion from say Blacks or
Hispanics (I don't know any Asian mixes with
these, but I know they're VERY different looking),
we could easily come up with a Eurasian race that
would stand out pretty distinctly from all others
(my wife can spot non-Central-Asian mixed
Eurasian children in a blink). Indeed, in
America we do observe this phenomenon on the
physiological level, not on the cultural however
(Eurasians, like expatriate Asians, tend to
assimmilate quickly into the dominant culture).
This outcome we observe with consistency.
Now
let's tackle the harder question: distinct races
from those three couples of Noah's descent, early
on in human history (regardless of how long you
measure human history). This is something
we can't observe, but DNA and heredity is our key
to understanding how this did occur. Based
on DNA studies, even evolutionists have generally
concurred on an "Eve" figure. It
follows then that she had all the DNA information
necessary to produce the diversity now observed
in the human race. This diversity is
getting more diverse as time passes. There
is sometimes amazing diversity in children of the
same parents, not just in personality, but
especially in appearances. You should see
my four kids, they're very diverse.
All
we need then is the mechanism or mechanisms by
which this diversity actually occurred from Noah
onward (or likewise, from Adam and Eve onward).
I would list here language development,
environment and natural selection. Language
development according to the Bible took place
instantaneously, at Babel. Numerous stories
from widely scattered ethnic groups around the
world support not only this event but also the
global flood. But (regardless of how
languages developed), people would naturally
separate themselves into groups in which they
could communicate (this might infer more than one
language or dialect). Geographical
proximity of language groups forced people to
move apart from each other (still happening today),
moving some towards either hotter or colder
climates. In just a few generations,
climate change alone is able to produce changes
in skin color, to either lighter or darker
pigment.
Natural
selection then played the role of narrowing the
gene pool for a given grouping, hence producing
"unique" physical characteristics for
that group. This leads to group
characteristics regarding eye color, hair color,
ear shape, eye shape, height, etc. In this
process, genetic information is generally lost, e.g.
Asians don't have blue eyes, Northern Europeans
don't have dark skin. But all these
characteristics had to have been present in the
earliest ancestors. Again, all the
information was and is already in the human gene
pool to account for all variations and even
aberrations we observe in the human family (this
is what genetic researchers have been forced to
conclude for us). Noah and those before him
had greater genetic diversity than we personally
have today, the decrease being due to natural
selection.
By
the way, if we take evolution theory to task on
this same issue, then it must come to pretty much
the same conclusion. There really isn't any
other explanation unless you want to get into
ancient UFOs or "gaia".
As
for acclimation to environmental change, I think
I'm a fairly good example of the fact that it
takes very little time for human-climate
adaptation to occur. I grew up in Southern
California and lived there 28 years, knowing
little else but sunshine and warm to hot weather
("lucky guy"). "I nearly
died" when I moved to Portland, Oregon and
discovered the sun shines here very little from
September to April (it has improved since I moved
here, either that, or I've just gotten used to
it; I used to wear thermal underwear continuously
all winter, now I even wear shorts on occasion).
My three daughters baffle me. When it's
raining or snowing, they just don't seem to care
if they run outside without any extra clothing on
(this was never true of me as a child).
They can take the colder weather for much longer
than I can. For the most part I have
adapted, but for them cold weather seems almost
to be in their blood. This makes no
sense to me since my wife grew up here and also
can hardly stand this cold weather. I have
no doubt that our grandchildren and beyond will
have widely varying opinions regarding the
weather here. Does it really take more than
a few decades to change ones mind about anything,
even the weather?
2) All science is ever refining
itself. No intelligent scholar would
claim exhaustive knowledge or impeccable
theories; science by definition, changes
constantly to adapt to new information.
As we learn more we in retrospect blush at
our relative ignorance. This is the
strength and beauty of science.
Demonstrating an exception or flaw in a
complex theory such as evolution does not
warrant abandonment out of hand. rather
it calls for conscientious, humble
modification.
More importantly, demonstrating the
imperfections of evolutionary theory all day
long does nothing to support the biblical
story of creation as contained in the book of
Genesis (Even if a design theory was
established.) "Disproving"
does nothing to "prove" the other -
there is no either/ or imperative - no
dichotomy. Even conceding that
evolutionary theory is bunk does nothing to
establish your "alternative."
I
appreciate your call for "conscientious,
humble modification" when errors are found
in our thinking. This is certainly part of
the lifestyle that I was called to live, namely
the Christian life, or, a life of following after
Jesus Christ. In my own experience through
many difficulties, I have been brought to a place
where I am now freely willing to live and think
this way. I simply wish I could see this
trait more in evolutionary scientists. In
my experience, dating from the 1980s when I was
in college (Harvey Mudd, by the way), professors
and researchers seem to be very sure of
themselves and confident even of things which are
not the domain of their specialization or study,
namely evolution theory. It was during this
time of personal confusion that I came to embrace
what the Bible says about origins. I came
to college believing somewhat the billions-of-years
process. I left college seeking for
evidence to support creation. I have found
much since then (through others' research).
I
agree that science is ever refining itself, that
is, its methodologies and means. However,
scientists tend to work within a given paradigm,
usually one they inherited from a teacher or
mentor. That means that if they were to
consistently encounter some empirical data which
doesn't fit their paradigm (and they do), they
inevitably question the data, not the paradigm.
The paradigm tends to be "untouchable",
a sacred cow. One reason for this is that
anyone who would dare think outside the box won't
get funding. As a student, you might try
this as an experiment. Pose yourself as a
creationist | scientist trying to get a grant or
fellowship for a research idea; see what happens.
Is the academic environment a free-thinking and
open-minded one? I think not.
On
the other hand, I admit that in my zeal to
publish this presentation by February 12, "Darwin
Day", I did not give adequate coverage to
the "alternative", creation by God.
I was conscious of this lack, but as such, I was
not really prepared to deliver this. It's
not that there aren't good presentations on this
(there definitely are), it's that I wanted to
focus on Darwin as it was "his day"
coming up. I expect to address this more in
the future, and some of whatever I produce is
sure to make it onto the Web (I've shifted my
focus slightly, so the Web is somewhat on hold
for me right now). Should that happen, I
will make every effort to keep you in mind and
let you know about it. Some of the websites
I link to make a good presentation of this point.
A good starting point is Answers in Genesis (www.answersingenesis.org).
3) Please thoughtfully consider
what you believe and what you know; learn to
distinguish the two.
You
and I are in the same position on this one.
Both of us have limited data to work with, and
neither of us can observe nor prove the process,
especially on or to the macro level, such as what
we claim. We are both stuck with "faith"
as our primary resource for upholding what we
believe. Neither of us really "know"
in observable fact what we "believe".
Even prominent evolutionists have admitted
this (and all leading creationists as well).
We are very naive to say that we know something
unless we absolutely cannot disprove it (Karl
Popper). The problem I see in evolution is
that the mix of funding, public policy and
massive media exposure make it difficult if not
impossible for people to admit that scientific
clues they've discovered either fit both schools
of belief, or they only consistently fit the
creation model. Hence, so much science has
become fantasy, especially in cosmology (the part
having to do with origins) and related higher
math.
Take
a look at people in our society and you find that
very few know what they believe to begin with,
and even fewer know why they believe what they
believe. That would explain to me why kids
who grew up in church would go over to evolution
(this happens), and kids and profs with minimal
church background in college come over to embrace
biblical creation (this happens too). A
thorough examination of known facts makes it more
likely that one will make a conscientious choice.
But, oh, is it ever hard to do that with an open
mind (it was even hard for me back in the 1980s).
How about you?
What
we have to distinguish here is between "known
facts" and "conclusions".
Likely, evolution was taught to you earlier on as
a conclusion supported by known facts (unless
you're somehow much older than I am), whereas it
is in truth a theory that is contested and
contradicted by much of its own evidence.
My own study of "known facts" leads me
to conclude that evolution is much too full of
fatal inconsistencies, whereas my study of
Christian faith (including that of creation)
shows there are inconsistent people (including me),
but the faith itself, God Himself and the written
record are wholly consistent, both with human
logic and the empirical data. The evolution
field is also full of inconsistent people and
outright frauds, but let's not go there.
I
have neither the funding nor the public
persuasion nor even the law on my side, I'm
fighting against this massive current, so it is
very disadvantageous for me (especially
financially) to hold my position on creation (please
also look at my discussion on abortion, a similar
issue that is a direct result of evolutionistic
philosophy). Something greater than funding
or public acceptance must be motivating me, or
else I am a very highly developed fool.
Wouldn't you agree?
—IMM 08/30/2002
