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A few weeks ago my email box was full of gloating messages from creationists claiming that the latest discovery of complex eyes in the Cambrian “proved” creationism and “refuted” evolution. As usual, creationists demonstrate a remarkable ability to completely misunderstand and misinterpret real science, and get the message of the paper ass-backward. The article to which they referred is an excellent new paper on the appearance in the Early Cambrian of compound eyes, slightly earlier than they were known previously. But creationists doesn’t know enough science to understand the paper—all they do is read “complex eyes” and “Early Cambrian” in the title, and to them, “Darwinism is falsified.” It never ceases to amaze me how they can mangle legitimate research to mean just the opposite of what was written, but so strong are their belief filters that they hear only what they want to hear, and completely miss the point of most of the world of science that doesn’t fit their preconceived notions.

The discovery itself is quite remarkable, and good discussions are given here and here. From the Lower Cambrian Emu Bay Shale of Kangaroo Island, South Australia, are nicely preserved elements (ommatidia) of compound eyes, which are larger and more complex than any others known from the Early Cambrian (although similarly complex but smaller compound eyes are found in trilobites of the Atdabanian Stage of the Cambrian, just  a few million years later). The eyes themselves are individual molts and not attached to bodies, but they were once part of some large arthropod. Some ommatidia have over 3000 lenses, equal to many of the compound eyes found since the Cambrian. Although it forces us to revise our treatment of the history of eyes a bit, it it not “the end of Darwinism” as creationists claim. The molecular data have long predicted that complex compound eyes should have appeared long before we see them in the fossil record, but were simply not preserved because they had no hard parts yet (probably because conditions in the Precambrian and Early Cambrian oceans only gradually reached a threshold that allowed mineralization of soft tissues). This discovery simply extends the range of compound eyes back a few million years earlier than we had known previously.

Yet if you read the creationist accounts of this discovery, it was as if this one paper had caused all of evolutionary biology to crumble! The main thread of their argument is the same, tired old “Cambrian explosion” misconception they’ve been beating for decades. Somehow, the appearance of one more complex fossil in the Early Cambrian makes the “Cambrian explosion” completely inexplicable by evolution. In the words of creationist IDiot David Buckna, “The Cambrian explosion is affirmed; complexity appears suddenly without transitions; Darwinism is falsified; the inference to the best explanation is intelligent design. Let the world know.”

That is pure garbage, and shows once again that creationists cannot read, or if they do read, they don’t understand anything. The truth of the matter was outlined in Chapter 7 of my 2007 book Evolution: What the Fossils Say and Why it Matters, and I will summarize the major points below:

1. Contrary to creationist lies, there is an excellent sequence of fossils that show the logical stepwise transition from the earliest single-celled bacteria at 3.5 billion years ago, to the first eukaryotic cell at 1.8 billion years ago, to the multicellular (but soft-bodied) Ediacara biota 610 million years ago, and finally in the first two stages of the Cambrian (545-520 million years ago), the “little shellies”, which are small bit of armor of the first skeletonized organisms. Only in the third stage of the Cambrian (the Atdabanian) do the hard-shelled trilobites and other complex organisms first appear. This is exactly as would be predicted by evolution: single-celled prokaryotes, then eukaryotes, then soft-bodied multicellular creatures, then the first tiny bits of skeletonization, and finally large skeletonized fossils.

When I read the creationist versions of this reality, they always ignore all the evidence of anything prior to trilobites, despite the fact that the Ediacara biota has been known for 70 years, and the rest documented over the past few decades. They act as if no fossils existed before the trilobites (as it was in Darwin’s day) and none of the discoveries of the past 70 years existed. When Michael Shermer and I debated and beat creationists Stephen Meyer and Richard Sternberg in Beverly Hills in 2009, I attacked them on this very point—and they dodged it by focusing on the trilobites, and completely ignoring all the less complex organisms that preceded them.

2. The term “Cambrian explosion” is a complete misnomer. These events took place between 610 and 520 million years ago (spanning 90 million years), or even if you just restrict it to the Early Cambrian, 25 million years. Ninety million or even 25 million years is hardly a rapid “explosion” by any stretch of the imagination. I’ve urged geologists to use the more appropriate “Cambrian slow fuse” to reflect reality and not give the creationists fuel for their lies, but it’s hard to change old habits. The archaic term “Cambrian explosion” dates back to the early days of geology, when the events of the Precambrian-Cambrian transition, lasting 25 to 90 million years, seemed abrupt on the scale of the 520 million years that followed, or the 3 billion years that preceded it. That’s a geologist’s perspective, where millions of years are nothing when you’re used to billions of years of time.

Whatever caused the “Cambrian slow fuse”, and however it occurred, is is most certainly not an “abrupt explosion” that is too fast for evolution to explain. Even 25 million years is almost half of the Cenozoic, or the “Age of Mammals” that we are still a part of! There is plenty of time for events to unfold at normal rates of evolution, and the discovery of earlier compound eye fossils does not change the overall pattern.

Ironically, the creationists themselves cite articles showing the “Cambrian explosion” took tens of millions of years (clearly labeled through the paper) yet they don’t believe in a time scale longer than 6000 years for all of creation! That’s their usual tactic: cherry-pick a few things out of context, quote-mine whatever seems to support their position, and then ignore everything else that completely contradicts and falsifies what they have asserted. That may serve their purposes, but it’s not science and it’s dishonest. But as I documented in my 2007 Evolution book, they don’t care about honesty as long as they can distort and misquote science and scientists to serve their purposes of evangelism and suppression of science they don’t like.

I realize that most of us are tired of creationist lies and propaganda and political interference, and want to get on with our lives doing science and true scholarship, or just earning a living. But garbage like this latest event are evidence that the fight must go on. We must keep vigilant that they don’t threaten our schools or scientific institutions any more than they do already.

Each year, the Ontario Library Association showcases selected titles for its Forest of Reading® program — a heavily-promoted recreational reading initiative, widely supported throughout Ontario’s public schools and public libraries. Among the 250,000 participating young readers, kids who read a minimum of five of the 10 books in their reading category will become eligible to vote for the award in that category.

The Forest of Reading program runs throughout the Spring, culminating with award ceremonies in front of an audience of several thousand at Canada’s largest literary event for younger readers: the Festival of Trees™ at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto (May 11 and 12, 2011).

Last year’s Silver Birch Fiction Award winner describes the experience:

I’ve never seen anything like it. More to the point, I’ve never seen thousands of kids screaming — like really screaming – about books.

Which is not to say I wasn’t warned beforehand. The organizers, as well as other writers who had attended the ceremony in the past, all told me what to expect. The massive stage. The lights. The screaming (did I mention the screaming?) children. “It’s like being a rock star for a day,” they told me.

Nomination is the Victory

Also competing for the Silver Birch: this skeptical book from my kids' science colleagues at Yes Mag

Also competing for the Silver Birch: a book written by veteran author Valerie Wyatt — my esteemed editor on Evolution!

For my own part, I’ve been walking around in a sort of daze this weekend — not because Evolution could perhaps win (competition in my category is stiff, including two other books from my own publisher, Kids Can Press) but because it’s already achieved more than I could have hoped. This nomination means that the topic of evolution will be massively promoted to grade school kids throughout Canada’s largest public school system.

Thanks to my colleagues at the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, my related Portuguese-language book Evolução was distributed for free to thousands of public school students in Portugal in 2009. But despite recommendations from the (US) National Science Teachers Association, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and National Center for Science Education, the nomination to Ontario’s Forest of Reading program is Evolution’s first major breakthrough into English-speaking schools.

This matters, in outreach terms. Ontario’s educational system in particular has struggled (and sometimes failed) to give any reasonable coverage to the topic of evolution. As recently as 2000, Ontario curricula omitted evolution entirely. Even today, the central organizing principle of biology is taught only as a component of Biology 11. That seems insufficient for a province where only 59% of adults agree that “Human beings evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years” (Angus Reid 2008 — PDF).

More to the point, biological evolution is not mentioned at all in Grades 1 through 10! (See the current Grade 1 – 8 Science and Technology curriculum PDF and current Grade 9 – 10 Science curriculum PDF.)

No matter how I think about this, it only becomes more humbling and incredible: this Spring, for many thousands of grade school kids, my book will be the only class-supported exposure to the subject of evolution.

Postscript

This project was a long road: years of nights-and-weekends work, out of pocket expense (for me, and for producer Pat Linse), and knocking on the doors of publishers who found fundamental biology too controversial.

I knew all that had paid off in the deepest possible way the moment parents started writing to tell me, “another month has passed, and she’s still having me read the book to her in the tub.” That’s what this is all about. The book has reached a lot of youngsters, and it ain’t done yet. (A Slovenian translation is on sale now, and a Korean edition is on its way.)

Looking at this project as a science outreach success, I’m reminded of the heat it took from hardline atheists. At issue was my brief passage explaining, “Science is our most reliable method for sorting out how the natural world functions, but it can’’t tell us what those discoveries mean in a spiritual sense.” (See long comment threads at this post and this followup post). Critics argued that my children’s book about the history of life should either have attacked theism, or else ignored one of the most common student questions about evolution.

That tiny subsection remains my honest answer. I would not, with the benefit of hindsight, do more than tweak it today. Still, in light of the criticism and the book’s success, it’s interesting to reflect: would Evolution have reached so many kids if I’d approached that topic in some other way? I suppose we’ll never know.

The "PoTo" Artifact

Some readers may be familiar with the “Coso Artifact”, a 1920-era Champion spark plug found inside a chunk of rock. Young Earth Creationists have pointed to this as evidence against evolution. Skeptics, however, find no such proof in the artifact. When ferrous metals are buried in earth, they often rapidly form iron oxide concretions incorporating the surrounding sediment.

This is a chunk of pipe that my son found in Port Townsend, Washington last week. I presume it’s steel. Note how parts of it are completely eaten away, while other parts have ballooned to the point of filling the center of the pipe completely with just such a concretion.

Uber cool… it’s like our very own Coso Artifact. As it’s from Port Townsend, I’m calling it the “PoTo” Artifact.

A quickie visual inspection by me does not spot any obvious marine shells or fossils embedded within the concretion, as were said to be found in the Coso Artifact (the actual artifact is lost to time and its owner long dead). However, such items are certainly found in the much about Port Townsend, and I would have every expectation of finding them if a thorough examination were done under a microscope.

Strangely, the Creationist claim to the Coso Artifact as evidence against evolution is not what you’d expect. I figured the reason was that it proves mineral formations can form in only a few decades, thus everything we see on Earth is consistent with a young age. But no, that’s not what was said at all. The Institute for Creation Research’s Donald Chittick mischaracterized it as a geode, then went on to say that the Coso Artifact proves ancient civilizations had advanced technology, which is inconsistent with “evolution”.

Will someone please slap me on the forehead, and give me a list of how many things are wrong with that?

The battle represents the latest strategy of creationists to either hamper the teaching of evolution or introduce creationist ideas into the science classroom under the banner of “academic freedom.” The basic concept is that teachers, students, and school systems should have the academic freedom to: teach both the strengths and weaknesses of scientific theories, use outside (unapproved) material in teaching their classes, and believe whatever they wish without penalty.

Academic Freedom

The academic freedom strategy is getting some traction. Americans are generally for freedom, and the bills and language used to promote their agenda with “academic freedom” may appear innocuous on the surface. This strategy is specifically designed to skirt the constitutional barriers to teaching creationism in public schools, and has yet to be tested on constitutional grounds.

The claims of creationists (and for practical purposes I will use the term “creationist” to refer to anyone denying evolution to a significant degree, from young-earth creationists to intelligent design proponents who accept common descent) is that “Darwinists” are dogmatic, they wish to censor critical discussion of evolution and shield it from criticism.  They are, of course, completely wrong.

There are two major flaws with the academic freedom claim. The first is that it ignores the need for quality control in academia. School systems at every level have the right and responsibility to ensure quality education. This means that the teaching of science should acurately reflect the consensus of scientific opinion, should be based upon legitimate scientific methods, evidence, and thinking, and should teach how to think scientifically and critically. Schools have a right to demand that teachers teach approved curricula and that they do not teach their personal beliefs as science.

The second major flaw in the academic freedom concept is that it is unnecessary. It is already part of teaching science to teach the strengths and weakness of theories, reflect genuine controversies, and discuss alternative theories when legitimate ones exist. Science educators do not want to pretend that controversies do not exist, or to shield evolution or any other theory from legitimate criticism. That is a completely false charge – and it is the major premise of the academic freedom movement.

Promoters of academic freedom tend to be creationists who want to introduce false criticisms and controversies into science classroom – arguments that have not passed scientific muster or have been long rejected on logical or factual grounds. Having lost the scientific battle they wish to change the venue to the political arena and use politics to have their bad arguments introduced into science class. Their agenda is entirely transparent.

Christian’s Bill

Representative Wayne Christian has introduced bill HB 4224 in Texas, which will do two things. It will replace the “strengths and weaknesses” language in the Texas science standards, and Christian also decided to up the ante a bit. He also would include language that protects students and teachers who profess belief that is not in accord with accepted science.

Here is the specific change to the “strengths and weaknesses” language that was made a few months ago:

Old Language: “Analyze, review, and critique scientific explanations, including hypotheses and theories, as to their strengths and weaknesses using scientific evidence and information…”

New Language: “Analyze and evaluate scientific explanations using empirical evidence, logical reasoning, and experimental and observational testing.”

Creationists argue that the new language would enforce teaching only the positives of evolution and would ban teaching any weaknesses. That is absurd, and reflects a misunderstanding of science. “Analyze and evaluate” requires addressing any evidence for or against a theory, and also any competing theories. What creationists don’t get is that there are no legitimate alternatives to evolution, and the arguments they put forward as weaknesses are psudoscientific rubbish.

However, they make the same claim back at scientists, saying that the “strengths and weaknesses” language, that has been in the Texas science standards for 20 years, has not resulted in the introduction of religious beliefs into the science classroom or hurt science education.  I do not know of any data from Texas itself, but surveys show that as many as 25% of high school science teachers devote class time to teaching creationism. Only 40% think that creationism has no place in science class – which means that perhaps the number would be as high as 60% if science standards and the law did not prohibit it. In other words – standards matter.

The second proposition of the bill – protecting students and teachers from being penalized for their beliefs – is a more complex issue. It all depends on how such a provision is construed and enforced. Christian claims that:

“They can be lazy if they want to . . . but teachers are still in charge of the grading system,”

That is cold comfort if teachers are also protected, meaning that teachers could decide that if a student gives a creationist answer on a test they may be graded as correct. Steven Schafersman, president of Texas Citizens for Science says:

“Students could claim they believe anything they wanted in anything in science and if that’s what they say, the teacher would be forced to give that student an A.  That’s how bad this bill is written.”

I have not seen the language of the bill itself (if anyone can find a link to the text, please put it in the comments). The details matter, in my opinion. I think such a provision is unnecessary, like the strengths and weaknesses language, and so such a bill would either be redundant or harmful, but not helpful.

I do think that students should be graded on what they know, not what they believe. So, for example, they should be required to demonstrate that they understand the course material on evolution. They do not have to state, however, that they in fact “believe” in evolution. But this is the way science class works now. I don’t remember ever being quizzed as to my beliefs.

Schafersman’s fear, shared by many scientists, is that the language will be applied in such a way that a student could give the answer “Godidit” to any science question and the teacher would be forced to give them an A. Or, a teacher could teach their personal religious beliefs as science and be protected from any mechanism of quality control. If the law does not do this – then what does it do? Why is it necessary?

There have been individual science teachers (at the college level, I am not aware of any at the high school level) who used “belief” as a measure of understanding – if a student truly understands the science then they will accept the conclusions, they argue. The consensus, however, appears to be against these few exceptions. I think the scientific and educational communities should be clear on this point – teachers impart knowledge and understanding, they don’t demand belief.

Conclusion

Clearly we are seeing the battleground on evolution and creationism over the next decade or so – “academic freedom” and its many incarnations. Once again the creationists are using false arguments to push their transparently religious agenda. Our job is to point this out clearly to the public, while highlighting the risks to quality science education.

TEN MAJOR FLAWS OF EVOLUTION – REVISED
by Randy Alcorn (with additional editing by Jim Darnall). I wrote the following article many years ago, but it needed to be thoroughly revised and updated. Thanks to Jim Darnall for adding some important new information.

1) The complexity of living systems could never evolve by chance—they had to be designed and created. A system that is irreducibly complex has precise components working together to perform the basic function of the system. (A mousetrap is a simple example.) If any part of that system were missing, the system would cease to function. Gradual additions could not account for the origin of such a system. It would have to come together fully formed and integrated. Many living systems exhibit this (vision, blood-clotting, etc.). When you look at a watch, you assume there was a watchmaker. A watch is too complex to “happen” by chance. Yet such living systems are almost infinitely more complex than a watch. They could not be random—they simply had to be designed and created.

This statement is not an argument at all, but merely an assertion. It is simply asserting what appears to be the point of this list of supposed arguments – that evolution through natural forces is impossible. But it contains many implied claims. It refers to irreducible complexity and gives the examples of vision and blood clotting. It does not address the century and a half old refutation of this argument – that biological systems could have evolved from simpler systems that were functional but served a different purpose from their current one. Further, all the examples (stated here and elsewhere) of supposed irreducibly complex systems have been shown to have simpler antecedents.

The statement also implies that evolution is “random.” This is false. Mutations are random, and variation may be random, but natural selection is decidedly not random, and therefore evolution is not random. Evolution is the non-random survival of those traits that provide an advantage to survival and reproduction in the current environment. Evolution is a designing force.

The watch analogy is not valid because a watch is an inanimate object. Biological evolution occurs within systems that are self-reproducing and contain variation and differential survival and reproduction. Life can use energy to grow, reproduce, and therefore evolve. Watches do not.

2) The high information content of DNA could only have come from intelligence. Information science teaches that in all known cases, complex information requires an intelligent message sender. This is at the core of the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI). DNA is by far the most compact information storage/retrieval system known. A pinhead of DNA has a billion times more information capacity than a 4-gigabit hard drive. Ironically, evolutionists scan the heavens using massive radio telescopes hoping for relatively simple signal patterns that might have originated in outer space, all the while ignoring the incredibly complex evidence of superior intelligence built into every human’s DNA. While we’re waiting to hear signs of intelligence behind interstellar communication, we’re ignoring those built into us.

Information science does NOT say that all complex information has an intelligent source. In fact, it has been shown that complex information can emerge spontaneously out of blind and natural processes following relatively simple rules. Creationists abuse information theory by making claims about information without ever defining the term. They then drift as needed from one definition to another in order to make false analogies – like the one here about SETI.

Here is a detailed refutation by Jeffrey Shallit of information claims by ID proponents. Here I deal with the SETI false analogy.

3) No mutation that increases genetic information has ever been discovered. Mutations which increase genetic information would be the raw material necessary for evolution. To get from “amoeba” to “man” would require a massive net increase in information. There are many examples of supposed evolution given by proponents. Variation within a species (finch beak, for example), bacteria which acquire antibiotic resistance, people born with an extra chromosome, etc. However, none of the examples demonstrate the development of new information. Instead, they demonstrate either preprogrammed variation, multiple copies of existing information, or even loss of information (natural selection and adaptation involve loss of information). The total lack of any such evidence refutes evolutionary theory.

All mutations increase genetic information (again we see the misuse without proper operational definition of the term “information”). If you start with one version of a gene and then it mutates in one offspring but not in another – now you have two versions of that gene. That represents an increase in information. Also, entire genes may be duplicated in the reproductive process. If you start with one copy of a gene and end up with two copies – that is an increase in information. This is especially pertinent to evolution, because one copy can continue to perform its original function while the redundant copy is free to mutate and evolve a new function.

The statement that such increases in the raw amount of information actually represent “preprogrammed variation” is nonsensical. This is a meaningless statement that has no bearing on information. How, exactly, are new mutations “preprogrammed.” If this statement is meant to refer to recombination – the formation of new combinations of genes without mutations – that absolutely increases information by increasing variation, which is the raw material for natural selection.

The idea that natural selection removes variation from the gene pool is true but a non sequitur. Mutations, duplication, and recombination increase information and increase variation and then natural selection causes differential survival of that variation which is better adapted to its niche.

Here is an article by me further discussing the abuse of information theory by creationists.

4) Evolution flies directly in the face of entropy, the second law of thermodynamics. This law of physics states that all systems, whether open or closed, have a tendency to disorder (or “the least energetic state”). There are some special cases where local order can increase, but this is at the expense of greater disorder elsewhere. Raw energy cannot generate the complex systems in living things, or the information required to build them. Undirected energy just speeds up destruction. Yet, evolution is a building-up process, suggesting that things tend to become more complex and advanced over time. This is directly opposed to the law of entropy.

I can see by the above paragraph that at least the author is making the attempt to account for prior criticisms of the “violates the second law of thermodynamics” argument, but in so doing he has simply included more misconceptions, factual errors, and logical fallacies. In this extremely confused statement, however, are the kernels of truth where the correct analysis lies. The author admits that “local order can increase, but at the expense of greater disorder elsewhere.” If I set aside the fact that the author is grossly oversimplifying thermodynamics and falsely equating entropy with disorder, the statement is essentially correct. What this means is that the biosphere of the Earth can experience a local increase in order because it is being more than offset by a decrease in thermodynamic order (an increase in entropy) in the sun. The sun is burning through its fuel and spewing energy at the earth. The entropy of the sun-earth system (and the universe as a whole) IS increasing, but there is nothing in thermodynamics that states that the Earth cannot use energy from the sun to create a local decrease in entropy.

The author has a glimmer of awareness of this fallacy, which is why he anticipates and tries to refute this argument by stating that “Raw energy cannot generate the complex systems in living things, or the information required to build them. Undirected energy just speeds up destruction.” This is a gross misdirection. Biological systems on the Earth are not just being cooked by “raw” (whatever that means) energy. Biological systems use solar and other energy in a very directed and purposeful way. They use energy to grow, reproduce, and evolve. Energy by itself may not be able to generate information, but a biological system that can use energy in the processes of life can.

An acorn can grow into an oak tree. According to the author, energy could only cook an acorn.

Here is a longer article by me on the second law of thermodynamics.

5) There is a total lack of undisputed examples (fossilized or living) of the millions of transitional forms (“missing links”) required for evolution to be true. Evolution does not require a single missing link but innumerable ones. We should be surrounded by a zoo of transitional forms that cannot be categorized as one particular life form. But we don’t see this—there are different kinds of dogs, but all are clearly dogs. The fossils show different sizes of horses, but all are clearly horses. None is on the verge of being some other life form. The fossil record shows complex fossilized life suddenly appearing, and there are major gaps between the fossilized “kinds.” Darwin acknowledged that if his theory were true, it would require millions of transitional forms. He believed they would be found in fossil records. They haven’t been.

The “there are no transitional forms” argument is a simple lie – and a lie that is getting more bold and desperate as more and more fossils are discovered. In reality – all species are transitional. Transitional does not mean some impossible monster or bizarre hybrid (like Kirk Cameron’s ridiculous crockoduck). Transitional just means that one species can be seen to bridge two other species (morphologically, genetically). All the transitional species can both be extant, or the transitional species can be ancestral to the other two, or three species may lie in a temporal sequence.

The notion that the categories of living things can be cleanly divided into “kinds” (without, by the way, ever defining what a “kind” is) is patently wrong. The categories of life are frustratingly fuzzy – precisely because evolution is a chaotic process. Are duck-billed platypus mammals? What about fish with lungs, are they fish or terrestrial vertebrates. The notion that dogs are dogs is nonsensical, because there is no objective demarcation line. What about wolves, coyotes, hyenas, foxes, etc.? There is no objective place to draw a line and proclaim that you have a “kind.” There is rather a branching order of relatedness.

The fossil record has served to fill in the morphological gaps between extant species, as evolutionary theory predicts. We have discovered early mammals that are part reptile and part mammal, early birds that are still half theropod dinosaur, early terrestrial vertebrates that are still part fish (Tiktalik). We have discovered walking whales (Ambulocetus) that are only half-way adapted to aquatic life. We have even discovered numerous hominid species that are a mixture of modern human and ape ancestor features. Only the willfully blind can deny the transitional nature of these fossil species.

6) Pictures of ape-to-human “missing links” are extremely subjective and based on evolutionists’ already-formed assumptions. Often they are simply contrived. The series of pictures or models that show progressive development from a little monkey to modern man are an insult to scientific research. These are often based on fragmentary remains that can be “reconstructed” a hundred different ways. The fact is, many supposed “ape-men” are very clearly apes. Evolutionists now admit that other so-called “ape-men” would be able to have children by modern humans, which makes them the same species as humans. The main species said to bridge this gap, Homo habilis, is thought by many to be a mixture of ape and human fossils. In other words, the “missing link” (in reality there would have to be millions of them) is still missing. The body hair and the blank expressions of sub-humans in these models doesn’t come from the bones, but the assumptions of the artist. Virtually nothing can be determined about hair and the look in someone’s eyes based on a few old bones.

This is a monster straw man. The evidence for the transitional status of hominid species is not dependent upon the artists’ reconstruction or interpretation of what these species may have looked like. That is a monumental bit of scientific illiteracy. Paleontologists have published countless careful and detailed anatomical analyses of the fossils. They clearly show transitional ape-human species. The species that have been clearly established are not based upon mixed ape and human fossils, but multiple specimens collected and documented in such a way as to prove they are one species.

What creationists do with any such sequence is simply take the first half and declare them members of the ancestral group (in this case apes) and the second half and declare them members of the derived group (in this case humans). They have done the same for dinosaurs and birds. But this is just misdirection through labeling. Calling a Homo erectus a human will not change the fact that it has features not seen in any modern human, and has a brain capacity for its size that is comfortably between that of modern humans and modern apes. That is the very definition of transitional.

7) The dating methods that evolutionists rely upon to assign millions and billions of years to rocks are very inconsistent and based on unproven (and questionable) assumptions. Dating methods that use radioactive decay to determine age assume that radioactive decay rates have always been constant. Yet, research has shown that decay rates can change according to the chemical environment of the material being tested. In fact, decay rates have been increased in the laboratory by a factor of a billion. All such dating methods also assume a closed system—that no isotopes were gained or lost by the rock since it formed. It’s common knowledge that hydrothermal waters, at temperatures of only a few hundred degrees Centigrade, can create an open system where chemicals move easily from one rock system to another. In fact, this process is one of the excuses used by evolutionists to reject dates that don’t fit their expectations. What’s not commonly known is that the majority of dates are not even consistent for the same rock. Furthermore, 20th century lava flows often register dates in the millions to billions of years. There are many different ways of dating the earth, and many of them point to an earth much too young for evolution to have had a chance. All age-dating methods rely on unprovable assumptions.

This is nothing more than a collection of unreferenced false assertions. The reality is that dating methods are very accurate and reliable. There are error bars, like everything in science, but multiple methods can be used on multiple samples and an average can be taken to make a very accurate estimate of the ages of various rocks, strata, and fossils. Dating methods are generally in very good agreement. Typically what creationists do is say that because one dating method yields a result of 3 billion years and another of 2.5 billion years – the two dates do not agree (again, without defining what that means - agree to what degree?) and therefore argue that the true age could be thousands of years. That there may be problems with some samples does not invalidate the dating of all samples. For example, moon rocks taken from the highlands (which geologically likely represented the oldest lunar crust) have been dated to about 4.6 billion years old, and none of the processes discussed above have been present during that time on the moon.

Also, much more than our dating methods for rocks points to an ancient Earth and universe. All of cosmology, astronomy, stellar science, physics, etc. points to the same timescale for the age of the Earth, the solar system, and the universe.

More information of dating methods.; And here.

8) Uses continue to be found for supposedly “leftover” body structures. Evolutionists point to useless and vestigial (leftover) body structures as evidence of evolution. However, it’s impossible to prove that an organ is useless, because there’s always the possibility that a use may be discovered in the future. That’s been the case for over 100 supposedly useless organs which are now known to be essential. Scientists continue to discover uses for such organs. It’s worth noting that even if an organ were no longer needed ( e.g., eyes of blind creatures in caves), it would prove devolution not evolution. The evolutionary hypothesis needs to find examples of developing organs—those that are increasing in complexity.

The existence of vestigial organs is not an essential line of evidence for the fact of evolution, but it is further evidence for evolution. It is true that conclusions about the lack of utility of an organ are always tentative and can be overturned if a use is discovered. It is probable that few organs or structures will be found to be totally useless, for such structures tend to be quickly selected against and removed.

It is funny that the author brought up the subject of blind cave species that still have vestigial and useless eyes. (Eventually such species lose their eyes entirely, but species recently adapted to the dark environment of caves still retain vestigial eyes.) In a laughable non sequitur the author admits such structures are vestigial (even though his premise was that there are no vestigial organs) but then changes criteria mid-stream to say that vestigial organs are only evidence of “devolution” not evolution. What is “devolution?” This is based on a misconception of evolution – that it must produce greater complexity. Evolution only adapts creatures to their local environment, and there is nothing that states that such evolution cannot produce a simplification or elimination of structures if that is what is advantageous.

So the author admits vestigial organs exist, and that they are evidence of evolution, but then dodges the whole issue with an ignorant misconception about the nature of evolution.

I will also point out that genetic analysis has given us another window on vestigial parts -namely vestigial genes. For example, chickens, who do not have teeth at any part of their life cycle, still retain the vestigial genes for teeth that can be reactivated. Chickens with inactivated genes for teeth – it doesn’t get more vestigial than that.

9) Evolution is said to have begun by spontaneous generation—a concept ridiculed by biology. When I was a sophomore in high school, and a brand new Christian, my biology class spent the first semester discussing how ignorant people used to believe that garbage gave rise to rats, and raw meat produced maggots. This now disproven concept was called “spontaneous generation.” Louis Pasteur proved that life only comes from life—this is the law of biogenesis. The next semester we studied evolution, where we learned that the first living cell came from a freak combination of nonliving material (where that nonliving material came from we were not told). “Chemical Evolution” is just another way of saying “spontaneous generation”—life comes from nonlife. Evolution is therefore built on a fallacy science long ago proved to be impossible.

This paragraph proves that no argument is so bad or often disputed to be discarded by creationists. Evolution is NOT about the origin of life but the subsequent change in life over time. It is not even dependent upon the naturalistic origin of life. They are completely separate scientific questions.

But that non sequitur aside, it is also ridiculous to compare the quaint notion of “spontaneous generation” with the science of life origins. It is true that we do not yet have a complete model of how life arose (lack of knowledge does not render something impossible – that’s the unknown equals unknowable logical fallacy). But we have figured out many interesting pieces to the puzzle – amino acids are readily made and are abundant, for example. The raw material of life was abundant on the early Earth, as was energy for organic chemical reactions.

The only thing that really would have had to happen spontaneously is the formation of a molecule that could make crude copies of itself. That’s it – that is enough to get a foothold in evolution. The rest is not random, but the very non-random accumulation of improvements by evolutionary processes.

10) Evolutionists admit that the chances of evolutionary progress are extremely low. Yet, they believe that given enough time, the apparently impossible becomes possible. If I flip a coin, I have a 50/50 chance of getting heads. To get five “heads” in a row is unlikely but possible. If I flipped the coin long enough, I would eventually get five in a row. If I flipped it for years nonstop, I might get 50 or even 100 in a row. But this is only because getting heads is an inherent possibility. What are the chances of me flipping a coin, and then seeing it sprout arms and legs, and go sit in a corner and read a magazine? No chance. Given billions of years, the chances would never increase. Great periods of time make the possible likely but never make the impossible possible. No matter how long it’s given, non-life will not become alive.

The author – like all prominent creationists – has proven himself to be a master of the non sequitur. The pattern should be entirely clear, now. Start with one criterion then subtly shift to another. The paragraph starts out talking about probability, and then after essentially proving the case for evolution by acknowledging that time (and multiple opportunities, I would add) does render low probability events probable, he then shifts to another point entirely. So then we discover that his real premise is that evolutionary change is inherently impossible (a point that has nothing to do with probability). But this is just asserting his premise – the point he is allegedly trying to prove. Evolution does not require coins to sprout legs.

11) The scientific method can only test existing data—it cannot draw conclusions about origins. Micro-evolution, changes within a species on a small scale, is observable. But evidence for macro-evolution, changes transcending species, is conspicuous by its absence. To prove the possibility of anything, science must be able to reproduce exact original conditions. Even when it proves something is possible, it doesn’t mean it therefore happened. Since no man was there to record or even witness the beginning, conclusions must be made only on the basis of interpreting presently available information. If I put on rose-colored glasses, I will always see red. I accept the Bible’s teaching on creation, and see the evidence as being consistently supportive of that belief. When dealing with origins, everyone who believes anything does so by faith, whether faith in God, the Bible, himself, modern science, or the dependability of his own subjective interpretations of existing data. I would rather put my faith in God’s revealed Word.
by Randy Alcorn, Eternal Perspective Ministries, 2229 E. Burnside #23, Gresham, OR 97030, 503-663-6481, http://www.epm.org

Ah – the last refuge of the truly desperate. Unable to provide a single cogent argument against evolution the author tries to do away with all historical sciences. Since no one was around millions of years ago, the lame argument goes, we can never scientifically explore the past, and so we must rely upon faith. This is the ultimate moving back of the goalpost.

But science is not limited to direct observation. We can scientifically infer what happened in the past by the traces it has left in the present. Life itself is a record of its own history. The past is recorded in our genes, in our anatomy, and our development, and in our physiology. It is recorded in the fossils that our ancestors left behind.

But to get more directly to the point – the core quality of science is that it makes testable predictions. Evolutionary theory makes many testable predictions about what we should find when we look at the world – and so far it has passed every predictive test with flying colors.

What does creationism predict? It depends on how you formulate it, but in practice, it predicts nothing because any possible observation can be interpreted as the unfathomable and unlimited will of the creator. What we can say about an alleged creator by looking at life is that, of all the possible designs and patterns for life a creator might have chosen, they appear to have chosen to create life to look exactly as if it had evolved.

So the ten (really 11) major flaws in evolution turn out to be major flaws in the understanding of evolution, the logic, and the intellectual integrity of creationists. And this is really the best they have.

Happy Darwin Day, everyone.

This one issue nicely illustrates many of the points I made in Part I of this series any may even provide a road map forward for some of our other issues.

A Brief History of Creationism

The various forms of creationism, including its most recent incarnation in so-called Intelligent Design, are really just evolution denial. The theory of evolution has been culturally controversial since it was formally proposed by Darwin and Wallace in 1859. it is not hard to imagine why, it shattered one of the pillars of the human ego – that we are something more than animals, than the accidental products of nature.

Evolution also flew in the face of religious dogma, at a time when the institutions of science were very much in the ascendancy. While some religious sects accommodated the advance of science, others did not. In the US, certain fundamentalist Christian sects chose to draw their line in the sand at evolution. Evolution became “evilution” – the enemy, the cause of all evil in the world.

Meanwhile, the scientific controversy over evolution was rather brief, lasting a few decades at most. The fossil, genetic, developmental, geological and biological evidence quickly piled up in favor of the various aspects of Darwin’s theory: common descent, change over time, and natural selection acting on variation as the dominant mechanism (I will heretofore refer to these collectively simply as evolution).

But while scientists were quickly convinced by the evidence, the public was not. This disconnect continues to the present day. Greater than 98% of working scientists accept evolution as established fact, while less than 50% of the public does. Scientific understanding of the processes and history of evolution has advanced incredibly, and the modern synthesis of evolution is a rich, subtle, elegant, and beautiful theory. Meanwhile the public understanding of evolution is stuck on the 150 year-old basic concepts of survival of the fittest and branching descent. I doubt any significant portion of the public can give a cogent definition of punctuated equilibrium, coaptation, homology, or mechanisms of speciation.

Legal Strategies

Most skeptics are familiar with the litany of creationist assaults on the teaching of evolution in public schools – the primary battleground of this particular issue. The evolution-creationism conflict is all about what gets taught to students in school, and what goes into their textbooks.

The bad news for the US is that creationism has been a bigger problem here than in any other Western country. The good news, however, is that we also have a powerful weapon against it – the First Amendment to the Constitution, guaranteeing the separation of church and state.

It began with laws that flat-out banned the teaching of evolution and favored the teaching of biblical creationism. Creationists tried to simply legislate a victory that they could not have scientifically. Tennessee’s version of this law was the Butler Bill, which stated:

“unlawful for any teacher in any of the. . . public schools. . .to teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals.”

This law was challenged in the famous Scopes trial of 1926. John Scopes was found guilty of teaching evolution, but his conviction was thrown out on appeal on a technicality. This was a defeat, however, for the defenders of evolution because it meant that the law would not be challenged at the state or federal Supreme Court level.

Anti-evolution laws remained on the books for the next several decades, and generations of Americans were simply not taught about the central theory of biology. Anti-evolution laws were eventually declared unconstitutional by the US Supreme Court in the Epperson vs Arkansas case of 1962.

This led to the “creation science” movement. Creationism could not be taught in public schools because it is religious faith, so proponents simply renamed it “creation science” and lobbied for laws demanding equal time for creation science alongside evolution. They got 25 years out of this strategy, but then in 1987 equal time laws for creation science were declared unconstitutional in the Edwards vs Aguillard decision.

Time for another rebranding. “Creation science” became “Intelligent Design” with a literal cut and paste of these terms in creationist texts. Creationists wanted another go at the “equal time” argument, but this time with the words “God” and “creation” purged from their text. They also changed “equal time” to “teach the controversy.”

This strategy failed its first legal test in 2005 in the Kitzmiller vs Dover case. Judge John E. Jones III essentially concluded that the ID proponents were not fooling anyone. Even though their rhetoric may be more subtle and sophisticated than the blatant Butler Bill, their intent was exactly the same.

Now we are into the next phase of this apparently never-ending game. Creationists are now claiming that they are really for academic freedom – which is just another way of saying they want equal time to teach the controversy. It’s ironic that the creationist movement began by banning the teaching of an accepted scientific theory, and now are whining about being oppressed and all they ever really wanted was academic freedom. Right.

It also appears that the next phase will take the battle beyond evolution itself. ID proponents in particular have identified the enemy not just as evolution, but as materialism – the philosophical underpinnings of science itself (the stakes are indeed high). Next on the hit list of materialist science is neuroscience – the study of mind and consciousness.

The Battlegrounds

There are several battlegrounds in this debate. One is the textbook industry. After the Scopes trial, evolution became too controversial for science textbook publishers, so they removed the “E” word from their books. This battle was lost for almost the rest of the 20th century. While evolution started to creep back into textbooks after 1962, the quality was abysmal. It is only recently, perhaps the last 20 years, that most biology textbooks approach a decent treatment of evolution (at least compared to their treatment of science in general, which in my opinion is unacceptably poor).

Another battleground is the legislature. This battleground has seen one tactical loss in the Scope trial, but ever since then we have had a string of unmitigated victories. Whenever laws meddling in the teaching of science come before the higher courts, the First Amendment has prevailed.

It is for this reason, in fact, that creationists have tried to change the battleground to the local level. They started fighting at the level of the school board and at the state level with the science standards. In this arena there has been a mix of victory and defeat. Creationists can pack a school board or department of education committee, and get their anti-evolution agendas passed. Sometimes public attention reverses the trend and rational standards are reinstated. But this continues to be a raging battle with no definitive victory on either side. We are seeing this play out now in Texas over the state science standards.

And finally, perhaps the most important battleground – the mind of the public. The consensus of various surveys indicates that we are not doing well here. Less than half the public accepts evolution as an established scientific fact, and this number has not changed much over the last half century. It’s not clear exactly what to make of this. Perhaps this is a battle we cannot win – to the faithful, faith will always trump science. As long as fundamentalists are preaching lies about evolution from the pulpit, it may not matter what gets taught in the science classroom.

Or, perhaps there has simply not been enough time. Improved evolution teaching may take generations to have a significant effect, and we have not achieved that goal yet. Evolution is still not being taught adequately, if at all, in many school districts. Meanwhile, the science of evolution is steadily advancing. In the long run I think that will count for something.

The Evolution of Evolution Defenders

The story behind this story is that the skeptical movement had played, and continues to play, a central role in defending evolution from its deniers. The mainstream scientific community correctly perceived the threat from creationism, but they did not have the tools necessary to fight it.

This is perhaps best encapsulated by Duane Gish, a “creation scientist” who made a career going around the country debating biologists and evolutionary scientists in public. Most of the scientists who squared off against Gish got their clocks cleaned. They naively believed that because they were right – because they had science on their side – that they could easily win. They actually thought that being right was enough.

They were not sufficiently familiar with the specific claims of the creationists, the ways in which they distort science, the half-truths they tell about the findings of science, and the subtle (and not-so-subtle) logical fallacies they commit to throw doubt upon science. They also did not understand the nature and pitfalls of public debate itself. They got blind-sided. They became stooges for Gish’s traveling show.

(As a side note, many of you likely know that our own Michael Shermer debated Gish. He did as well as can be expected, but even he learned a few lessons from the experience – mainly that open debate is an inherently disadvantageous setting for the side of science. It falls victim to the infamous “Gish Gallop” – in which lies and misconceptions are thrown out in such great number that you can never deal with them all.)

Who came to the rescue and truly held the front lines of this battle, were skeptics and science popularizers. Those who spent their time explaining science to the public understood best how creationists were manipulating the public perception of evolution. Stephen J. Gould, for example, was key to the 1987 Edwards vs Aguillard victory. Since then other science popularizers, like Kenneth Miller, have played a central role. The most popular science blog is Pharyngula by PZ Myers – a developmental biologist who takes on the creationists at every opportunity.

And of course Eugenie Scott took up the banner of evolution full time with the National Center for Science Education. She has been an effective watch dog on creationist shenanigans – she is like a general, sending in troops whenever skirmishes break out at the local level. The NCSE performed a Herculean task, organizing the expert testimony for evolution during the Kitzmiller vs Dover trial.

It is important to recognize that these people and institutions are not simply extensions of mainstream science. They are skeptics, either all-purpose or specialists in the creation-evolution issue.

What’s more is that the skeptical community has done an outstanding job of dissecting every last creationist argument and pointing out in detail all misstatements of fact and logical fallacies. They have not only understood the tactics used by creationists, but even started anticipating their next moves.

Skeptics have also done a great job of educating mainstream scientists about creationism. I recently interviewed Steven Schafersman of Texans for Science and Reason for the Skeptics’s Guide podcast. He has been on the front line for decades, and he reports that 20 years ago he was the lone skeptical voice fighting in Texas. When scientists were called upon to give testimony before the school board, they generally did not understand the arguments of creationists, they often argued past them, and basically didn’t get it.

At the recent hearings for the Texas science standards, however, his experience has been totally different. Scientists and even students are making cogent on-target arguments. They have the creationist arguments nailed. And they understand how to explain this to non-scientists.

Perhaps the skeptical community has actually managed to educate the mainstream scientific community about creationism, how to combat it, and the importance of defending science in the public arena. Maybe that’s partly why ID proponents are shifting their efforts to neuroscience – they want a naïve specialty to go after.

Conclusion

At the beginning of this post I characterized creationism as perhaps our greatest victory. And yet I also described that we have had a mixture of victories and defeats on the various battlegrounds of this issue, and have made little progress in the ultimate goal of changing public opinion.

Yet I maintain my former claim because on this issue the skeptical movement has discovered how to be successful. We have formed dedicated watchdog organizations, we have websites and books to serve as detailed references, and we have learned the tactics of our opponents and actually try to counter them, rather than just naively playing into them. We have clearly defined the relevant battle lines, and have strategies to deal with them. We can mobilize the troops at a moments notice.

Even more importantly, we have fully partnered with the mainstream scientific community and have even trained them how to be good skeptics and science popularizers on this issue – or at least they understand their value. And within academia, otherwise ivory-tower academics know exactly what you mean when you bring up the issue of creationist incursions into science education.

There is much work ahead – but we are winning.

Next week I will discuss what is currently our greatest failure.