- The Religion of Secular Humanism and its Relation to Evolutionary Theory:
“Scientific American”, the premier monthly publication for the intellectual layman,
has become an apologetic arm for the Theory of Evolution. While, this publication
cannot alone claim credit for the social-philosophical tone of the nation, it nevertheless
provides a powerful social force and voice for the scientific justification for the
religion of Secular Humanism.
The Theory of Evolution can be summarized as a theory whose mechanism depends on
chance collisions between atoms that form molecules, integrated structures, interdependent
systems, and self-replicating systems. Heat, the disorganized kinetic energy of
molecules, provides the force for collisions to forge new chemicals which in turn
insert themselves perfectly into the ever-more complex molecular requirements of
evolving life. The random-collision theory is the mechanism underlying the function
and adaptation of all life forms. The theory contends that only sufficient time
need pass before all the required chemicals of life form and assemble in proper order
to initiate and perpetuate cellular life. But in considering the probabilities of
life forming by chance, we note that Fred Hoyle, noted astrophysicist, has calculated
the probability of the formation of one single cell is on the order of 1 chance in
1040,000, which in essence means that life was formed by some other mechanism than
chance collision.
To accept the Theory of Evolution as an adequate and sufficient theory requires a
religious faith to fill in the large gaps between theory and manifestation. The
scientific establishment has embraced this faith, cloaked it in the language of science,
and given the hypothesis of evolution and Godless-creation the aura of fact. This
leaderless cabal has instinctively disguised the gaps which require a true-believer’s
faith to accept, and have rejected the existence of God as a first assumption.
As currently elaborated, the theory underlying modern physics provides no plausible
origin for the existence of particles, nor adequate explanation for the origin of
life. Still, the human heart longs to understand the mystery of life, to know its
purpose, origin and author. But, men will cling to irrational explanation rather
than live in a world without definition or pattern. When no alternative exists,
the possibility that presents itself (even though it is false) will fully occupy
people’s hearts and minds. This is the principle of the Big Lie. Just because everyone
believes it, does not make it true. At one time people commonly believed the Sun
rotated around the Earth. Until truth is introduced, promoted, and a revolution
of possibility takes place, the common thought will remain common.
Current scientific dogma does not consider Godly intervention necessary to explain
the assembly of atoms, molecules, tissues, organs, and systems that lead to life.
No credible alternative explanatory theory is offered except the belief in some
undiscovered, self-organizing, natural force (not God) which has generated the physical
universe. Life is assumed to have arisen naturally through accidental collisions
that formed successively more complex organic molecules, which assembled as cells,
and then eventually expressed itself by mutation and accident in all forms of life.
Other rationales have been proffered more recently that try to bridge the huge gap
between random particle association and the exquisite organization of the machinery
underlying life. Their ultimate purpose and effect is to negate the need for a Creator/God.
Science considers the “God Hypothesis” to be a theory which cannot be validated by
experiment, and thus has relegated God and spiritual forces to a domain outside of
science. In so doing, science has given itself permission to avoid considering any
hypothesis which includes God as one of the parametric forces influencing or composing
the system. Thus by self-imposed definition, science engages in no theoretical or
experimental effort which could logically conclude that God operates with creative
force or as the basis behind the forces seen in the natural world.
Science has assumed the existence only of natural law, and defined itself as requiring
an exclusion from the examination of the origin of natural law as it relates to God.
Thus, there is no attempt by the scientific establishment to examine the hypothesis
of God. No large social force now operates to prove that the “God Theory” is consistent
with experiment, hypothesis, and the chaotic patterns of matter, waves, and natural
forces.
This Godless scientific belief structure has prospered because of the arcane nature
of science, the power that science has to manifest technology and enhance survival,
and the social power to enroll public faith by virtue of its megafunding made available
by government and industry. The lay public cannot develop the arguments that credibly
counter and replace the Godless scientific dogma. The public does not speak the
language of science, nor have ready access to the bully pulpit of scientific publications
and media exposure. Given the foundational nature of particles and space (the two
fields where most of the science funding is spent by physics researchers), the scientific
concepts about this ultramicroscopic and ultramacroscopic world will naturally color
the lay public’s concepts about the meaning of life, eternity, and the origin of
the creation.
To change these widely held Godless scientific concepts to embrace a God-centered
vision of the universe will require the development of a worldview that includes
God in the explanations of the currently accepted theories of science. For the scientific
establishment to adopt such a radical change of focus and direction would require
a credible theory to be presented by a member (or more probably, a strong and numerous
coalition) of the scientific elite. Alternatively, this revolution in theory could
occur when the public generally accepts this new paradigm, and from this reservoir
arises the next generation of scientists.
The power of the leadership of the scientific elite is illustrated by the fact that
the non-scientific public would have never adopted the Theory of Evolution without
it having been given the imprimatur of validity by the scientific intelligentsia.
Until Darwin, the scientific establishment and lay public uniformly recognized God
as the background force behind creation and the laws of nature. Until Darwin, everyone
rejected the intuitively improbable assumptions required to justify mindless evolution
bringing life from the seas to land and air.
But, the skepticism in the power of time and chance collisions has been overcome
because of the trust we place in the scientific establishment. When they gave their
imprimatur to this theory, the leap of faith was made. Over the years, a segment
of the lay public has embraced the theory of evolution just as heartily as they had
previously held a God-based creation. Thus, two antithetical faith systems have
emerged and gathered followers – the Secular Humanist/atheistic-evolutionist and
the God worshiping creationists.
This division of society into these two faith-systems has strong social implications.
The Judeo-Christian ethic has inspired and directed individual human behavior to
overcome its animalistic drives for survival. The Secular Humanist assumptions of
a material-only, evolution-directed, Godless-universe likewise have implications
which affect individual behavior and social-ethical norms. The competition between
these factions to enroll and shape the social fabric to reflect their position in
turn produces the currently seen cultural-political strife and the moral-legal battles.
The scientific establishment claims superiority for its evolution-based theory because
it invokes only the use of natural forces to produce the appearance of life and its
complexity. To the evolutionist, the use of God as the motive force for life’s appearance
and complexity is to invoke unnecessary complication into the story of life’s genesis.
The evolutionist attempts to logically and sequentially validate his belief by arguments
that include the similarities of family, class, genus, and species exhibited by successively
more complex organisms in the tree of speciation.
The evolutionary argument proposes that the motive force of change is the random
development of advantageous traits, the subsequent superior survivability of those
traits, and the ultimate competitive advantage in survivability of that new species.
The male dominant solo-allowed breeder enhances the rate of propagation of this
trait with the greater survival advantage. The evolutionist thus uses a series of
facts to plausibly justify his hypothesis. 1) The fact that small changes are seen
in plants and animal in response to their environment. 2) The fact of the changes
in the species have occurred over the millennia. 3) The fact that nature evidences
a superb interrelationship and adaptation between plant and animal species and their
specific microenvironment. And, 4) The lack of overt evidence of God acting in ongoing
creation. These datapoints give a sense of possibility that support the chance and
time-based scenarios of creation. And despite its flaws, gaps, and improbabilities,
those who embrace the evolutionary model of creation exhibit a true-believer faith.
And, an aspect of this faith in evolution is to oppose as irrational the Creation
theory and faith in a God-based creation, Intelligent Design, and/or a theistic-evolution.
But, the scientific establishment must contend with a large body of Christian-based
scientific thought which confronts the statistics and mechanisms of the Theory of
Evolution. Examples of such works include: “The Case for a Creator” by Lee Strobel,
“The Science of God” by Gerold Schroeder, and many others. These writers have created
a powerful apologetic for a Creation-based theory of Intelligent Design.
One of the most powerful arguments for a creation-based universe is the fact of irreducible
complexity. A cell cannot evolve and adapt to its unique microenvironment if it
has not already formed into a cell. The complexity of the cell is so great that
time and chance provide extremely poor explanatory power and mechanism to account
for the appearance of the first cell.
The Theory of Evolution speculates that the various life-forms have changed randomly
over time, and that only the more well-adapted species have survived. Thus through
a series of mutations, we see successively more complex organisms arising, each more
specialized and capable of dealing with the particular stresses of the local environment.
This segregation of life into the various ecological niches provides for the emergence
of the wide variety of life, each one specifically adapted to survival in the conditions
of their microenvironment. The accidental damage to the genetic code produced by
ionizing radiation (UV rays) provide the raw material for the various species to
adapt to the environmental stressors. The epigenetic coding causes the genetic code
to be able to adapt and express itself in widely different ways depending on the
microenvironment of each cell. Thus, damage to the epigenetic coding likewise can
contribute to the mechanisms which produce the observed plethora of life-expressions.
The bottom line is that improved survivability selects the fittest species to inhabit
each environment, and drives life to express itself as new species over the millennia.
This time-and-chance method of creating species has been given near God-like powers
to manifest extremely complex structures and functions over a few hundred million
to a billion years. The rise of life is attributed to time-chance interactions in
a favorable environment, and the evolution of organism complexity is attributed to
the pressures of the environment, and random beneficial mutations which enhanced
survival and reproduction. The forces and sequences invoked to validate evolution
are presented as though they are unassailable in their logic and evidence for a nature-only
understanding of the processes involved in creating life and its complexity. But
a detailed examination of the sequences, and the probabilities of those assembly
steps, casts doubt on the viability of the Theory of Evolution’s physical-force-only
explanation for the rise of life.
The goal of the Theory of Absolutes is to accurately capture the essence of the foundational
nature of the physical universe and life. To meet this lofty goal, the postulates
must be consistent with experimental evidence, and have foundational explanatory
power in the domains of the inanimate and animate, subatomic and astronomic, and
material and spiritual.
Having provided a foundational God-based theoretical understructure which plausibly
explains the physical processes of the inanimate universe and life, we can then argue
our case in the court of public opinion with as much scientific authority to plausibly
validate Creation, as those who now validate Godless evolution and use the claim
of “science” as their authority and validation for its Truth.
The social and spiritual forces arrayed against God (demonic, secular humanist, atheist,
religion of scientism…) have used the Theory of Evolution, Relativity, and Quantum
Mechanics to give metaphorical validity to the theory of a magical Godless universe.
None of these theories claims to be the foundational or general principle upon which
the universe was built. But, they each in their own way have contributed to the
plausibility that the universe was actually self-assembling, that life arose without
design or purpose, that there is no fundamental law, and that reality cannot be judged
because facts do not hold strong weight.
Evolution takes the most powerful evidence of a Creator, the existence of life and
man, and attributes these miraculous and complex organizations of matter and consciousness
to mere chance. Relativity declares that there is no absolute frame of reference,
that all perspectives are of equal validity, and thus there is no point of accountability
or higher truth than one’s own personal perspective. Quantum Mechanics declares
that reality has no fundamental solidity; that anything can be anywhere, nothing
is solid, and there is no truth.
Darwinistic evolution has recently been challenged by a competitor from the New Age
community called the Conscious Universe theory. This theory posits a universe where
life has arisen as a result of its inherent divine impersonal nature. Such a theory
is not far removed from the Intelligent Design theory, but it finds appeal with those
who wish not to be responsible to a personal God. At this level of distinction,
the individual must decide to choose to worship a personal God or impersonal god.
I believe the evidence falls in favor of the personal God because of the strong
need and power of love that we feel so deeply embedded in the human soul. For such
a powerful guiding force to arise in the human heart from an impersonal energy seems
less likely than to have arisen from the heart of a personal God. The entire battle
between the kingdom of darkness and light can be easily framed as the necessary background
to a universe which has the potential for love, victory, and free will.
A universe birthed from the mind and heart of a loving God must allow for the choice
of rebellion, loss, hurt, and danger. An alternative which provides no plausible
benefit is not a real choice. Therefore, evil must appear attractive on some level.
Choosing to serve the kingdom of darkness or giving one’s soul to the devil must
appear attractive and have benefits. Such service must promise emotional payoffs
in realms such as power, lust, and/or gold. But, the pursuit of these attractive
ends ultimately proves hollow and unsatisfying. The long-term fruit of rebellion
against the moderation and proper engagement in the various passions will produce
the bitter fruit of exhaustion and depletion. Nevertheless, the appearance of benefit
associated with following the siren song of seduction allows for true choice in terms
of whether or not we should express our love toward God by following His ways. If
the universe was built around God’s desire for true relationship and partnership
with man to bring Heaven on Earth, then God must be constrained to operate within
self-imposed laws where He can suffer pain and loss at the hands of man’s disobedience.
Such a universe allows for the transactions of life to constitute an actual meaningful
struggle where the actions of both God and man produce significant and unavoidable
consequences. And while God rules as the sovereign lawgiver and creator of the understructure
of life, humanity’s choices affect the course of history and influence the experience
of pleasure for both God and man. Ultimately God’s way will prevail since the heart
will only find satisfaction by choosing His ways.
- I have constructed this Theory of the Universe from the perspective of my belief
in a personal God, and I shall cite examples throughout the Theory to validate my
opinion.
