Happy Darwin Day? [Excerpts]
According to many of his modern followers, Darwin is the world's greatest scientist, and his theory is the cornerstone of modern biology - if not the whole of modern science.
What, exactly, is Darwin's theory? It is not just "evolution." Evolution can mean "change over time," which no sane person denies. Or it can mean life on Earth has a long history, documented by the fossil record. Yet the general outlines of the fossil record were established before "The Origin of Species" appeared in 1859. And biblical chronology did not play a major role in the 19th-century Darwinian controversies, because by 1859 most educated Christians had accepted geological evidence for an old Earth.
Darwin's theory is that all living things are descendants of a common ancestor, modified by unguided processes such as random variation and natural selection. Although nobody doubts that variation and selection can produce minor changes within existing species ("microevolution"), Darwin claimed that microevolution leads to the origin of new species, organs and body plans ("macroevolution").
Eighty years after "The Origin of Species," evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky acknowledged there was still no hard evidence connecting microevolution and macroevolution. Unfortunately, since only microevolution can be observed within a human lifetime, Mr. Dobzhansky wrote, "We are compelled at the present level of knowledge reluctantly to put a sign of equality between the mechanisms of macro- and microevolution, and proceeding on this assumption, to push our investigations as far ahead as this working hypothesis will permit."
This assumption is still an assumption. No one has ever observed the origin of a new species by variation and selection - much less the origin of new organs and body plans. Not even modern genetics has solved the problem. No matter what we do to the DNA of a fruit fly embryo, there are only three possible outcomes: a normal fruit fly, a defective fruit fly or a dead fruit fly. Although Darwin's modern followers claim there is "overwhelming evidence" for his theory, nothing could be further from the truth.
Nor is Darwin's theory the cornerstone of modern biology. Most of the basic disciplines in biology were founded before Darwin's birth - including anatomy, physiology, botany, zoology, microbiology, systematics, embryology and paleontology. During Darwin's lifetime, Gregor Mendel founded genetics and Louis Agassiz and Richard Owen pioneered comparative biology. But none of these scientists accepted Darwinism.
Actually, Darwinism has always been more philosophy than science. Darwin called "The Origin of Species" "one long argument," and it took the following form: The features of living things are "inexplicable on the theory of creation" but fully explicable as products of unguided natural forces. Darwin lacked sufficient evidence for the latter, however, so he ruled out the former by simply declaring that only natural explanations are "scientific."
[Some] atheists want to establish Darwin Day as a secular alternative to Christmas.
Unfortunately, once in power Darwinism (like Marxism) tolerates no dissent. As the 2008 movie "Expelled" documented, scientists and teachers who criticize Darwinism risk ostracism, character assassination and termination of their employment. School boards that encourage students to learn the "strengths and weaknesses" of evolutionary theory are besieged by militant atheists who do not want students to question Darwinism.
(Happy Darwin Day, The Washington Times Online, 2/12/09).
