This issue has a problem. Namely, the problem that there is simultaneously “virtually unanimous consensus among all real scientists” that the earth is 4.5 billion years old, we are descended from animals that were essentially apes, and going back even further–bacteria, et blah; and “a great deal of practically conclusive evidence that God created the Earth 6,000 years ago”, depending on who you ask.
Prior posts on this topic: A scientific solution to this controversy
And before I go on to the problem I’d better put down the standard preface.
Dictionary definition of evolution: change in the gene pool of a population from generation to generation by such processes as mutation, natural selection, and genetic drift.
As that is defined, yes it happens. It’s been proven. What is not going to be tolerated is the pulling of a switcheroo, discussing evidence that evolution happens as defined by the dictionary definition, and then suddenly leaping to the idea that this proves we all evolved from bacteria.
The history of the ancient world as it pertains to biology, according to the creationist perspective:
c. 4000 BC: The earth is created over the course of six days. All created life is at this point genetically perfect.
c. 2500 BC: The Flood happens. A pair of every animal, seven of ‘clean’(edible) animals (the text is unclear whether it means seven animals or seven pairs) is taken into the Ark. This is not a sampling of every species as modern taxonomists define it. The ‘kinds’ of animals is most likely somewhere around the level of genus or family, and yes, there was plenty of room on the Ark for the number of animals required at this level (around 15 to 20 thousand), and the food required to feed them while they were on board.
This is a major genetic bottleneck. All the mutations that occurred up to this point remained mostly hidden, as the deteriorated versions of genes would be recessive to the dominant perfect versions of genes, and the population had grown large enough to keep everything mixed up. After the bottleneck, of course, the accumulated mutations would be expressed relatively suddenly as the animals were forced to inbreed. Even then, their genomes were solid enough to withstand the amount of inbreeding that happened before there were large enough populations to stabilize the gene pool, but the result of the bottleneck was the differentiation of species as we recognize them today. As the various animal populations spread out, some species, and occasionally whole kinds of animals, became concentrated in certain geographic regions, and the geologic aftereffects of the Flood may have included an accelerated rate of continental drift, so that explains Australia.
c. 2300 BC: The Tower of Babel (Babylon) is erected and God scatters its builders across the world. The Tower was pyramidal in shape, and the diaspora Babylonians plant the seeds of all the pyramid-building civilizations across the world. The older apparent ages of various ancient civilizations is caused by a combination of inflated history on the part of the ancients (trying to add legitimacy to their own culture by saying it is older, appealing to the ancient principle of ‘I was here first’) and coming up with stories of its past, and error on the part of modern archaeologists. The most accurate way to measure the age of a civilization would be to look at the records of its neighbors. This does in fact bring the time frame down to within the range expected by creationists.
After 2300 BC. History as commonly accepted.
That this is implausible according to naturalists is not the point; this description is mainly to point out the extent to which biological evolution is accepted by creationists, so that time is not wasted arguing over points that are not disputed.
Specifically, the problem is the role of the ACLU in establishing evolutionism in the public education system. It did not really use science to achieve its goal, but the Constitutional requirement that the government not teach religious doctrine. That’s really quite fair, except for the part that government schools now have the implicit authority to dictate what is and is not a religious belief, which means the schools get away with implicitly condemning any religious belief that conflicts with a nonreligious belief without having to actually back up their position. I don’t mean just evolution here, but the PC crap as well.
The problem is also the evangelical Christians who think the solution is to scientifically prove creationism until it can be forced into the public schools. That is unlikely to happen. They have made some interesting discoveries in such areas as the RATE project, but anyone with a healthy level of skepticism isn’t going to change sides just because the other guys also have evidence.
The real question ought to be what business the government has in running our schools in the first place, if they indeed are legally crippled from delivering a proper education.
Now, implicit in this suggestion is that parents be allowed to indoctrinate their own children, which will send people like Richard bloody “Teaching kids creationism is child abuse” Dawkins up in arms. Tough. Children have to be raised to be wary of the government in order to ensure that government be kept in check, in order to prevent totalitarian regimes from arising. In order to achieve that, children cannot be raised by the government, and government cannot have a say to any significant extent in how a child is raised, beyond the scope of general crime prevention. That means kids are going to be taught weird things that not all of us will agree with, which will either be crushed by the real world or (gasp) defended successfully, or some combination of the two which can be difficult to figure out.
Competition has a certain place in science, which is sometimes obstructed when the academic mob develops a strong adherence to one position. When that happens the only way to preserve competition is to build a parallel system of education, research, and funding. It won’t be until the competitive nature of this issue is embraced by both sides, when they start setting common goals and see who can get to them first, that real scientific progress will occur. It’s easier to just expunge the heretics and force each side into its own echo chamber, but that achieves nothing.
