What has creationism ever done for us?

[MagusYanam]

My question is simply this: in light of the fact that Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics and has advanced beyond question the fields of agriculture, medicine, environmental ecology, palaeontology and thus geology, what has the creation model done to further man's more noble pursuits? Exactly what purpose is it serving? In other words, where is the utility in creationism and how is it supposed to better our lot in the universe?

[Rob]

My question is simply this: in light of the fact that Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics and has advanced beyond question the fields of agriculture, medicine, environmental ecology, palaeontology and thus geology, what has the creation model done to further man's more noble pursuits? Exactly what purpose is it serving? In other words, where is the utility in creationism and how is it supposed to better our lot in the universe?

Interesting question my friend. I'll try not to just give the flip answer -- nada -- and to be a little more generous (to creationists) in answering your question.

But first, I would like to suggest a slight change. It seems to me that your statement, "Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics," is actually reversed. Genetics actually contributed vastly to our understanding of "Darwin's model" of biological evolution. And molecular biology is continuing to unocover new insights even today that are likely to further deepen our understanding of the mechanisms of evolution on levels that go beyond natural selection.

Darwin proposed his theory of evolution at a time when the genetic basis of heredity was not fully understood; it was the combination of genetics, particularly "population genetics," which lead to the so-called "synthesis" of genetics and Darwin's theory of decent wtih modification via natural selection that lead to what is now called the neo-Darwinian Synthesis. At least, that is my understanding at this point in my studies.

So, on to your question, "What has the creation model done to further man's more noble pursuits?," and "Where is the utility in creationism and how is it supposed to better our lot in the universe?"

Perhaps the following quote from John Haught might show the more generous view towards our creationist brothers:

In spite of these problems, however, we can still entertain a certain degree of empathy with the phenomena of creationism. Creationism is one unfortunate symptom of a much wider effort by traditionally religious people to cope with modernity. At heart creationists and other fundamentalists are sincerely and understandably troubled by all shortcomings of the post-Enlightenment world.

(....) Moreover, we are convinced that the phenomena of creationism also points to serious flaws in the way science has bee presented to students and to the general public by some of our most prominent scientific writers. Many scientists--and this point is usually ignored--indulge in a conflation of their own. They too fuse science with belief. In the case of many scientists and philosophers today, to be more specific, the conflation consists of commingling evolutionary theory with materialism, a belief which is indeed antithetical to religion. Scientists of the stature of Carl Sagan, Stephen Jay Gould, E. O. Wilson, and Richard Dawkins, just to name a few, offer the theory of evolution to us already snugly wrapped up in the alternative "faith" of scientific materialism. So in a sense "scientific creationism" is not simply a rejection of pure science, as scientific skeptics usually accuse it of being. It is also an understandable, though ineffective, reaction to an alternative brand of conflation, one that unfortunately makes science appear antithetical to all forms of religious understanding.

Scientific materialists generally write about evolution as though it were inherently anti-theistic. In doing so, however, they are uncritically espousing the assumptions of a secularistic [philosophical materialism and reductionism vs. methodological materialism and reductionism] intellectual culture. Their species of conflation may be called simply “evolutionism,” an often subtle bonding of Darwinian ideas with hidden premises of secularism, naturalism, and the belief system we have been calling scientific materialism.

One prominent devotee of evolutionism, Stephen Jay Gould, however is not as subtle as are many others. For he has stated quite openly the reason so many people cannot accept Darwin’s ideas is that, in his opinion, evolution is inseparable from a “philosophical” message, namely, materialism. He says,

… I believe that the stumbling block to [the acceptance of Darwin’s theory] does not lie in any scientific difficulty, but rather in the philosophical content of Darwin’s message—in its challenge to a set of entrenched Western attitudes that we are not yet ready to abandon. First, Darwin argues that evolution has no purpose. Individuals struggle to increase the representation of their genes in future generations, and that is all…. Second, Darwin maintained that evolution has no direction; it does not lead inevitably to higher things. Organisms become better adapted to their local environments and that is all. The “degeneracy” of a parasite is as perfect as the gait of a gazelle. Third, Darwin applied a consistent philosophy of materialism to his interpretations of nature. Matter is the ground of all existence; mind, spirit and God as well, are just words that express the wondrous results of neuronal complexity.

[Stephen Jay Gould, Ever Since Darwin (New York: W.W. Norton, 1977), pp. 12-13.]

If one is to accept evolution, Gould explicitly claims here and elsewhere, one must first embrace materialism and all of its consequences, e.g. that religion has no basis in reality and that there is no purpose in the universe. Like many of his fellow scientists today, he is clearly approves of what we would call a nakedly conflationist alliance of materialist assumptions with evolutionary science.

(….) However, in our view Gould’s fusion of science and ideology is no less acceptable than is the scientific creationism he rightly repudiates. Both the evolutionary materialist and fundamentalist “creation scientist” are quite alike in their contaminating aspects of pure science with large doses of doctrine, though the beliefs are different in each case. And it is just this (con)fusion that, in our opinion, paves the way to conflict. Therefore, it is in order to avoid this kind of conflation and the ever ensuing conflict that we must consistently and rigorously distinguish science from all belief systems, whether religious or materialist.

-- Haught, John F. () Science & Religion: From Conflict to Conversation. Paulist Press. Pp. 55-56.

There is ample evidence, from scientists and evolutionists themselves, pointing out this kind of a prior set of materialist assumptions in the literature. It is a recognized and well known phenomenon, especially in the field of the history of science, where critical historical and rigorous philosophical analysis is the norm in examining the history of ideas and theories and their changes over time due to new facts, insights, and understandings.

As we can see, it is very easy to refute the simple minded claims of the creationists, but it takes far more intellectual effort and philosophical skill to refute the a prior set of materialist assumptions underlying the claims of some materialists who make claims in the name of science that amount to a form of scientism, which in reality is simply a philosophical position no more warranted by true science than is so-called “scientific creationism.”

[QED]

There is ample evidence, from scientists and evolutionists themselves, pointing out this kind of a prior set of materialist assumptions in the literature.

Except, when we read this extract from your quote above...

First, Darwin argues that evolution has no purpose. Individuals struggle to increase the representation of their genes in future generations, and that is all…. Second, Darwin maintained that evolution has no direction; it does not lead inevitably to higher things. Organisms become better adapted to their local environments and that is all. The “degeneracy” of a parasite is as perfect as the gait of a gazelle.

...we are reminded of one inescapable conclusion drawn from evolution: that all species are contingent. Conventional theistic notions of "purpose" and "meaning" are lost in a world where there is nothing inevitable about the variety of life at any given time.

As we can see, it is very easy to refute the simple minded claims of the creationists, but it takes far more intellectual effort and philosophical skill to refute the a prior set of materialist assumptions underlying the claims of some materialists who make claims in the name of science that amount to a form of scientism, which in reality is simply a philosophical position no more warranted by true science than is so-called “scientific creationism.”

In your view then, is it only an assumption that contingency lies at the very heart of evolution?

[1John2_26]

Within the contingency of "all things" there comes a point when mere chance becomes absurd. Sooner or later the concpet of origin has to be reached.

There "seems" as much "design" in all things as any idea of "random chance" bringing us all to these keyboards LCD screens.

Why is it so blaspemous to suppose things don't come about by accidents?

Luck or chance just do not seem rational.

[micatala]

Why is it so blaspemous to suppose things don't come about by accidents?

I would not say it is blasphemous at all. I simply don't buy into the idea that mischaracterizing evolution as nothing more than 'an accident' has any merit.

At any rate, the thread is not about the nature or truth of evolution, but whether creationism has contributed in any meaningful way to society. There are many other threads where the other issues you raise can be debated.

[Lotan]

...what has the creation model done to further man's more noble pursuits? Exactly what purpose is it serving? In other words, where is the utility in creationism and how is it supposed to better our lot in the universe?

The answer is diddley-squat.
Don't take my word for it. Listen to Dr. Dino, Kent Hovind as he is completely stumped by this question on a call-in radio program when a working molecular geneticist from Belfast asks him what practical applications have resulted from creation 'science'. Hovind hasn't a clue!
You can find the interview here...

Kent Hovind vs Infidel Guy (scroll down a bit)

This particular call comes late in the program and begins around 92:52.
DON'T MISS THIS! Especially you creationists!

[Bart007]

My question is simply this: in light of the fact that Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics and has advanced beyond question the fields of agriculture, medicine, environmental ecology, palaeontology and thus geology, what has the creation model done to further man's more noble pursuits? Exactly what purpose is it serving? In other words, where is the utility in creationism and how is it supposed to better our lot in the universe?

I seriously question your declaration that Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics etc.

Darwin knew didley about genetics. He had no clue what causes the observed micro changes he observed in creatures from generation to generation. Darwin crossed two varieties of snapdragon and saw that the first generation produced only one type of snapdragon (for those familiar with snapdragons, it was the assymetrical form, the less comon is the symmetrical, also called peloric, form). Then he interbred these offsrping again and got 88 symmetrical and 37 peloric. darwin was baffled. Darwin was baffled. He crosses mixed plants and gets only one type. He mixes that one type and gets a mix. Darwin concluded that the peloric was latent and gained strength by intermission in the second generation.

Darwin waited 21 years to publish his book on natural selection, and would have taken longer if it weren't for Wallace. What held Darwin up was that the fossil record looked nothing like his theory predicted it sould look, and he had no idea what causes variation, he only knew variation occurred.

Finally, Darwin, his hand forced to publish his and Wallace's Theory, settled on Pangenesis, an idea developed by famed physician Hippocrates. Pangenesis is the assumption that all parts of the body release minute particules (Gemmules) which make their way to the genitalia and into the sex cells where they will direct the embryo to make organs and tissue corresponding to the organisms and tissues of the parents where each trait would be the result of blending of similar traits of each parent. Aristotle rejected this idea because each sometimes the offspring look more like their distant relatives than there parents. Darwin conjectured that occasionally a gemmule would introduce a new beneficial trait, a small change in the offspring that would make the offspring a better survivor by producing more offfspring.

8 years after the initial publication of the 'Origin of the Species ... Favored Races" an engineer named Fleeming Jenkin pointed out that if a new favored trait from one parent would blend with the old trait of the other parent, which would become even more diluted by further blending with the old trait from the next generation, and in a few generations, the new trait will be blended completely out of the lineage. This shook Darwin up, Darwin had no effective answer to Jenkin's article and no alternative to pangenesis. To counter this problem in later editions of his book (beginning with the 5th edition in 1869), Darwin emphasized small variations occurring on a large scale and saltation through macro-mutations which totally contradicted Darwin's commitment to uniformitarian gradualism.

In his words to AR Wallace on February 2nd. 1869, Darwin wrote:

"I must have expressed myself atrociously; I meant to say exactly the reverse of what you have understood. F. Jenkin argued in the 'North British Review' against single variations ever being perpetuated, and has convinced me, though not in quite so broad a manner as here put. I always thought individual differences more important; but I was blind and thought that single variations might be preserved much oftener than I now see is possible or probable. I mentioned this in my former note merely because I believed that you had come to a similar conclusion, and I like much to be in accord with you. I believe I was mainly deceived by single variations offering such simple illustrations, as when man selects."

Charles Darwin was clueless when it came to genetics and his theory contributed nothing to genetics.

It's a bit late and I need to get some rest. Hopefully I will get around to answering your question tomorrow.

[QED]

I seriously question your declaration that Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics etc...

Isn't that a bit harsh? Darwin identified a general principle operating in nature that he could see would be capable of producing self-organized "design". The search for the actual mechanism in biological systems was only completed much later, however it still had Darwin's original template to match. Obviously for the sake of argument it is not necessary for findings in genetics to match this template, but while they continue to do so we have a compelling reason to believe that biology gets it's "design" from natural logic.

[Bart007]

[deletion unsubstantiated claim about Darwin’s alleged contribution to science]

What has the creation model done to further man's more noble pursuits? Exactly what purpose is it serving? In other words, where is the utility in creationism and how is it supposed to better our lot in the universe?

When journalists, educators, material and atheist evolutionists attack creationary Christians, they are biting the hand that established science as we know it today.

Alfred North Whitehead (1861-1947) was not a Christian, yet he gave a presentation at the Harvard University Lowell Lectures entitled "Science and the Modern World." Whitehead said that Christianity is the mother of science because "of the medieval insistence on the rationality of God." He noted that because of this belief, the founders of science had an "inexpugnable belief that every detailed occurrence can be correlated with its antecedents in a perfectly definite manner, exemplifying general principles. Without this belief the incredible labors of scientists would be without hope." As Whitehead noted, the Christian thought form of the early scientists gave them "the faith in the possibility of science."

Paul Davies is a theoretical physicist who is also not a Christian. But he too has spoken about the essential role of Christianity. Davies notes that modern science was born as the result of a symbiosis between Greek philosophy and Judeo-Christian thinking. Davies notes that it was from the merging of these two thought streams that modern science emerged. Greek thinking contributed the emphasis on mathematical principles and Judeo-Christian thinking contributed an emphasis on the contingent, linear, and rational nature of creation.

Davies said:

"All the early scientists, like Newton, were religious in one way or another. They saw their science as a means of uncovering traces of God's handiwork in the universe. What we now call the laws of physics they regarded as God's abstract creation: thoughts, so to speak, in the mind of God. So in doing science, they supposed, one might be able to glimpse the mind of God - an exhilarating and audacious claim."

Clue #1. The founders/fathers of modern science were shaped by a culture that was predominantly Christian.

The founders of modern science were all bunched into a particular geographical location dominated by a Judeo-Christian world view. I'm thinking of men like Louis Aggasiz (founder of glacial science and perhaps paleontology); Charles Babbage (often said to be the creator of the computer); Francis Bacon (father of the scientific method); Sir Charles Bell (first to extensively map the brain and nervous system); Robert Boyle (father of modern chemistry); Georges Cuvier (founder of comparative anatomy and perhaps paleontology); John Dalton (father of modern atomic theory); Jean Henri Fabre (chief founder of modern entomology); John Ambrose Fleming (some call him the founder of modern electronics/inventor of the diode); James Joule (discoverer of the first law of thermodynamics); William Thomson Kelvin (perhaps the first to clearly state the second law of thermodynamics); Johannes Kepler (discoverer of the laws of planetary motion); Carolus Linnaeus (father of modern taxonomy); James Clerk Maxwell (formulator of the electromagnetic theory of light); Gregor Mendel (father of genetics); Isaac Newton (discoverer of the universal laws of gravitation); Blaise Pascal (major contributor to probability studies and hydrostatics); Louis Pasteur (formulator of the germ theory).

Clue #2: Science was not born in any nonchristian culture.

Yet it's not just the bunching of these founders in a Christian culture alone that is significant. Perhaps even more significant is the complete lack of analogs for these men from other cultures. Where is the Greek version of Newton? Where is the Muslim version of Kepler? Where is the Hindu version of Boyle? Where is the Buddhist version of Mendel? Such questions are all the more powerful when you pause to consider that science studies truths that are universally true. How is it that so many other cultures, some existing for thousands of years, failed to discover, or even anticipate, Newton's first law of motion of Kepler's laws of planetary motion? So it's not just that the Christian religion is associated with the birth of modern science, it's also the fact that modern science was not birthed in cultures which lacked the Christian religion.

Clue #3. Since most of the founders of science were Christians, it is reasonable to suppose their perspectives were shaped by their Christian world view. And this world view was in turn shaped by Christian theology.

For a more detailed account, you may read it at: http://www.ldolphin.org/bumbulis/#anchor5343749

Before Darwin, The concept of `natural selection' was formulated by and developed by Creationists.

Stephen Jay Gould Knew this and points out in his article 'Darwinism and the Expansion of the Evolution Theory' (Science, 216, April 13, 1982, page 380):

"Darwinians cannot simply claim that natural selection operates since everyone, including Paley and the natural theologians, advocated selection as a device for removing unfit individuals at both extremes and preserving intact and forever, the created type. ... The Reverend William Paley's classic work 'Natural Theology', published in 1803, also contain many references to selective elimination."

Creationist William Paley published argument for selection processes as a natural conservative force by which nature removes unfit individuals from populations, thereby preserving the integrity of a species by limiting any sustained drift toward increasingly inferior offspring (William Paley, 'Natural Theology', 1803). Darwin had read Paley's book and was very impressed by it. Others made mention of natural selection also (two papers before the Royal Society in 1813, and another one in 1831).

Creationist Edward Blyth (1810 - 1873) He was a well respected naturalist/biologist and museum curator. He developed the concept of natural selection 25 yrs. before Darwin wrote the Origin of Species and regarded it as a conservative process. Darwin took the idea from Blythe without ever giving credit to Blyth.

Edward Blyth wrote several articles on natural selection ('Magazine of Natural History', 1835-37), a periodical to which Darwin subscribed and read Blythe’s science papers on both intelligent and natural selection, a year or two before Darwin allegedly 'thought' of the idea of natural selection.

Blythe wrote:

“It is a general law of nature for all creatures to propagate the like of themselves: and this extends even to the most trivial minutiae, to the slightest individual peculiarities; and thus, among ourselves, we see a family likeness transmitted from generation to generation.

“When two animals are matched together, each remarkable for a certain given peculiarity, no matter how trivial, there is also a decided tendency in nature for that peculiarity to increase; and if the produce of these animals be set apart, and only those in which the same peculiarity is most apparent, be selected to breed from, the next generation will possess it in a still more remarkable degree; and so on, till at length the variety I designate a Breed; is formed, which may be very unlike the original type.

“The examples of this class of varieties must be too obvious to need specification: many of the varieties of cattle, and, in all probability, the greater number of those of domestic pigeons, have been generally brought about in this manner. It is worthy of remark, however, that the original and typical form of an animal is in great measure kept up by the same identical means by which a true breed is produced.

“The original form of a species is unquestionable better adapted to its natural habits than any modification of that form; and, as the sexual passions excite to rivalry and conflict, and the stronger must always prevail over the weaker, the latter, in a state of nature, is allowed but few opportunities of continuing its race. In a large herd of cattle, the strongest bull drives from him all the younger and weaker individuals of his own sex, and remains sole master of the herd; so that all the young which are produced must have had their origin from one which possessed the maximum of power and physical strength; and which, consequently, in the struggle for existence, was the best able to maintain his ground, and defend himself from every enemy.

“In like manner, among animals which procure their food by means of their agility, strength, or delicacy of sense, the one best organized must always obtain the greatest quantity; and must, therefore, become physically the strongest, and be thus enabled, by routing its opponents, to transmit its superior qualities to a greater number of offspring. The same law, therefore, which was intended by Providence to keep up the typical qualities of a species, can be easily converted by man into a means of raising different varieties; but it is also clear that, if man did not keep up these breeds by regulating the sexual intercourse, they would all naturally soon revert to the original type. Farther, it is only on this principle that we can satisfactorily account for the degenerating effects said to be produced by the much censured practice of "breeding in and in."”

The Blythe quote is from: http://www.bradburyac.mistral.co.uk/blyth1.html

Famed Darwin biographer, and evolutionists, Loren Eisely, has stated that Darwin failed to give Blyth the credit due him for his ideas on natural selection.

Darwin rose to great heights after the publication of his book, and without a clue as to what caused variation from generation to generation. his initial offering of Hippocrates Theory of Pangenesis which I describe in my post above.

After Pangenesis was demolished by Fleeming Jenkins in June 1867, Darwin was backtracking from his initial offering of Pangenesis to a Lamarckian type concept that nature was somehow providing feedback directing the production of new novel characteristics, plus, maybe macro-mutations may played a role (However the public did not take notice the serious of this problem).

Meanwhile, a monk had worked laboriously on plants and in a brilliant moment of inspiration, Johann Gregor Mendel, uncovered the true scientific genetic laws of heredity, and pubkished it in 1866.

Before Mendel’s great work was discovered, Christians & scientists: Matthias Schleiden, Theodore Schwann, and Rudolph Virchow developed Cell Theory and determined:
1. All living things are composed of cells.
2. All cells are similar in the structure and function.
3. All cells originate by cell division from preexisting cells.
4. The structure and functioning of an organism is produced by the organization and actions of all its cells.

August Weismann, a Christian, was still a creationist when he developed his germ plasm theory after careful study of the cell. His theory was that chemicals in the cells were the mode by which genetic information was transmitted from generation, and that the chemicals themselves were not as important as the actual arrangement of the chemicals, much like Morse code. He also showed most cells arising from an embryo became the various organs and tissues of the individual, and ultimately died, replaced by new cells that will contain copies of the inherited information. He therefore demonstrated that use and disuse by the parent did not affect the form of the offspring, just the genetic information already contained in the cell.

In the late 1880’s and early 1890’s Weismann got into debates with evolutionists and he himself became an evolutionist, but for a very wrong reason. Weismann thought he had found the real mechanism of evolution that so eluded Darwin, he theorized that since the male and female contributed genetic information to the offspring consisting of a string of determinants, correlated with characters in the organism. Each determinant consisted of a number of material particles called biophores, inherited from both parents. These biophores compete with each other and some prevail, which then determines the character of the determinant, which in turn determines the character of the organism. In this struggle for survival, only the fittest biophores will survive to pass on their genetic material on to the next generation.

With Blythe’s natural selection as a conservative force preserving the species by selecting variants to providing adaptability of a members of a species across a wide range of enironmental conditions, and Mendellian Genetics providing the method of faithfully passing on inheridited information from parent to offspring with an enormous storage of variants that natural selection can choose to select from. It is this creationists model that of adaption by natural selection that has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics and has advanced beyond question the fields of agriculture, medicine, environmental ecology, palaeontology and thus geology.

This is what creationary science has done to make our place in the universe. Plus Creation also provides a means you can have eternal life through the Messiah Jesus Christ. Evolutionism merely guarantees death.

Bart007

Carl Sagan: "How long will I have to be down here,"

St. Peter: "For Billions and Billions of years."

[Bart007]

I seriously question your declaration that Darwin's model of biological evolution has contributed vastly to our understanding of genetics etc...

Isn't that a bit harsh? Darwin identified a general principle operating in nature that he could see would be capable of producing self-organized "design". The search for the actual mechanism in biological systems was only completed much later, however it still had Darwin's original template to match. Obviously for the sake of argument it is not necessary for findings in genetics to match this template, but while they continue to do so we have a compelling reason to believe that biology gets it's "design" from natural logic.

No!