# 109: Creation, Evolution, and Intelligent Design

Even though I have already written on this subject three times in this blog, I am inspired to write again since the news is covering what should be taught in several school districts in different states. Another reason I am writing on this subject is to inform readers of what I believe is a ground-breaking analysis of all three schools of thought before personal decisions are made on what is right, wrong, and best for the majority of Americans.

Biology is the science that deals with the origin, history, physical characteristics, life processes, habits, etc. of living organisms such as plants, animals, and viruses. It is an exact science that has been around for over one hundred years. This biological science cannot be intimidated by the dependency upon religious dogma or even the mere mention of God, and I understand that. However, in the unique case of attempting to explain how the first living organism somehow made itself out of non-living matter, biology has not been able to scrape up scientific evidence or even a logical theory as to how it came into existence. I will talk more on this failure of biology as we get into further paragraphs.

In order to understand creation, we must first remember that the Old Testament was written over three thousand years ago, when knowledge of how the universe worked (science) and information of living organisms (biology) was nonexistent. When Moses wrote the book of Genesis (the first book in the Old Testament), he wrote it according to his knowledge at the time and also, most likely, according to information received from God. Did Moses or anyone else at that time know anything about how the stars are either other solar systems in our Milky Way galaxy or planets in our solar system? What about the infinite size of the universe, evolution, intelligent design, biology, or even our own solar system, or hundreds of other sciences that we now take for granted which help us understand ourselves and the world around us? NO. Could God have revealed all of the above to Moses? He could have, but it would have made no sense and only confused the poor man. Does that make the Bible wrong? No. It is our place to update at least that section to conform with today’s knowledge, without taking away any substance as to belief in God, morals, love of God, and other Biblical absolutes. I don’t mean to actually delete those early chapters, but for informed Christians to realize the writer's limited knowledge and improvise creation's time frame as being much longer than six 24-hour earth days.

God created the universe and man/woman through natural processes (God-guided evolution) which we now study. Since God lives in timelessness (eternity) where time does not exist, He was/is in no hurry to get things done in just six 24-hour days. This is by no means heresy. Just remember that God designed and created all things, and man came along and investigated through science what was created. In some complex areas of life, inquiring people realized that there must be a supernatural creator. And when someone comes along and attempts, in a seminal way, to make creation and science one coherent subject, God is pleased, as all intelligent and seeking Christians and scientists should be.

Here is what I am doing at this time: I am giving you a cutting-edge disclosure. I am mostly referring to the first four chapters of Genesis. In order for the creation of the universe and mankind to make much sense, the first chapter of Genesis (which talks about the six-day creation period) must be expanded into about four and a half, to thirteen billion earth years. Here is another question: Did God create Adam in a single 24-hour day, or was he the product of God-guided evolution? The answer seems clear. God mentioned Adam as the first in line of a people who would represent Him. The only thing is that the evidence seems to indicate that God still created Adam through the natural process of evolution, which took much more than 24 hours. Here is vivid evidence that Adam was not the only person on earth when God introduced him in Genesis: Genesis 4:13-17. “But Cain said to the Lord, ‘My punishment is more than I can bear . . . I will be a restless wanderer on the earth and whoever finds me will kill me.’ But the Lord said to him, ‘Not so; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over.’ Then the Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him . . . .” Verse 17 states, “Cain lay with his wife . . .” I ask this question: Who were these other people, and where did they come from? These facts alone lead me to believe that there were other humans on earth who got there through the evolution process at the time when Adam was first mentioned. Therefore, Christians can still believe the creation story and also continue believing the Bible. I do, and it makes all the sense in the world to smooth (make more understandable) some of the conflicting material. For those who don’t believe the aforementioned, please give me a more logical reason as to where those other humans came from.

Since religion hasn’t done anything about the above paradox, we end up with the controversy of what to teach in our schools, along with misunderstandings in other areas of life and religion. This change may be difficult, if not impossible, for some who believe the complete Bible to be the inerrant, infallible Word of God. If that is true, there could not be one error or contradiction in the Bible. But there are dozens upon dozens of contradictions, like the one above, especially in the four Gospels. If anyone wants to know what some of those dubious verses are, let me know and I will make a list of them. And yet, with all of those mistakes, the Bible is by all means the best source of information in existence that relays to humanity why God exists and what God and life are all about. And I truly believe that holy book was inspired by God; He had it written by fallible men in such a way that men/women could understand with the limited knowledge they had at that time.

Intelligent design is backing up the knowledge that information cannot be the result of natural selection, random variations, or simple chemicals arranging and rearranging themselves until information is formed. The information I am referring to is the double-helix DNA strand, a large molecule consisting of just four chemicals: As, adenine; Ts, thymine; Cs, cytosine; and Gs, Guanine. The encoding of these chemicals in the proper sequence is all the data necessary for the reproduction and maintenance of all living organisms. That DNA strand is the most densely packed, elaborately detailed information assembly in the known universe. Since there is no known natural system that can produce information, intelligent design comes to the rescue and says, “Since biology can’t explain how that information was formed or where that information came from, the only other plausible alternative is that a metaphysical force, energy, mind, being, or benevolent intelligence must be responsible.” Then, of course, biology steps in and says, “Metaphysics (the boogieman) is not science.” Agreed. Neither is biology’s ignorance of that answer. Since neither has a scientific answer, both are on level ground. Therefore, the winner is the one who has the most plausible answer, and is therefore the closest to possibly having the correct answer.

Biology and evolution argue that intelligent design is attempting to sneak God into the biology class and school room through the back door. That must never be allowed. I personally believe that the proponents of intelligent design mainly desire that students and scientists should be allowed to examine all the possibilities for the answer/s to unanswered question/s. Then, once out of the classroom, students and scientists can assess and discuss between themselves what the metaphysical implications—whether God or religion—are to intelligent design.

In 1859, Charles Darwin published his book “The Origin of Species” and therefore got the credit for showing the world what evolution consisted of. As a spiritual man, I believe it was God who designed and created the evolution process and Darwin who explained it, to a large degree. His explanation of natural selection is still to this day a creditable source of biological information. However, one thing he does not mention is how the first living cell created itself out of non-living matter. In Darwin’s time, until the middle of the 20th century, it was believed that the cell was nothing more than a glob of protoplasm. In the last 50 years, our knowledge of the cell exploded. We now know that each cell is a little factory beaming with life. Each cell is basically made up of proteins, and each protein is consists of hundreds of amino acids.

In 1969, Dean Kenyon (an evolutionary biologist) and Gary Steinman published a book titled “Biological Destination” on the theory of chemical evolution. It was widely accepted by the scientific community as gospel truth for some time. They believed that amino acids had the ability to form themselves into the necessary specific sequence to form each desired protein. We must note there are only 20 amino acids that make up about 30,000 different proteins. A few years after the publication of that book, as biologists and others continued to study the structure of proteins and the properties of amino acids, it became evident that in themselves, amino acids did not have the ability to form proteins. In fact, in the early 1980s, Dean Kenyon rejected the theory of chemical evolution which he wrote so adamantly about 20 years earlier.

I wanted to mention that natural selection does work well once an organism already exists, but natural selection cannot be applied before an organism has formed, and an organism cannot form without genetic information from DNA. Natural selection keeps/saves the smallest functional advantages and rejects those that have no advantage. Repeating, the DNA molecule must have come about through a process other than Darwin’s natural selection.

More extremely-convincing evidence for intelligent design comes from a single-cell organism that maneuvers in its surrounding fluid by the use of a whip-like tail that can rotate at 100 rpm. Examining the mechanism that drives these tails, biologists have found a miniaturized outboard motor, called a bacterial flagellin, which has all the parts needed to function. It is made up of 40 different protein parts. Now the question arises: How could this motor have arisen from a population of bacteria without tails, through the process of natural selection? How could it build itself a little bit at a time until it was ready to function? We must remember that natural selection only preserves parts that have a functional advantage. Therefore, these parts would have been eliminated before the motor was completed. And just like a mechanical outboard motor, if parts are missing, it won’t work. That is called irreducible complexity. This motor could not have worked until all its parts were in place. Repeating, natural selection works great once an organism already exists, but it would be useless in forming an organism with a flagellin. The only way that motor could have been formed was if there was genetic information detailing exactly how to build it. Again, there is no natural system that can produce information.

This next paragraph will reveal an embarrassing riddle that cosmologists and physicists have not been able to explain. I will attempt to approach this extremely controversial topic with logic and common sense since empirical evidence is not available. Seeking to have a more complete picture in the creation of the universe, I will also give my version of why the universe was created. This subject must be read with an open mind. The laws of physics dictate that we humans cannot create physical matter out of thin air. That is as basic as the ABCs. Yet cosmologists and astronomers want us to believe that an extremely small object exploded and was the genesis of the Big Bang Theory. The only logical question is this: Where did this extremely densely-packed minute object come from? It could not have made itself. Then some will say that it was the result of some sort of energy and other unknown forces that caused it to form. I ask, where did those forces come from, and what made them form? The experts have not been able to answer this basic question. That is hole #1; as the renown physicist Stephen W. Hawkins frankly admitted, “At this point, the laws of physics break down,” and made no further comments as to the answer. If the universe was the result of a gigantic explosion, it was most likely an intelligent metaphysical force (which I call God) that created that bit of physical matter out of thin air, so to speak. That makes more logical sense than a random unknown force or energy.

Since most important things in life have a reason for their existence, the question remains: What was the reason the universe was created? Answer: All things that have life must reproduce in order to continue in a meaningful way. This intelligent metaphysical force (or mind—the word “mind” implies that it has life)—through that life is invisible through our physical eyes. To keep it simple, the potential physical worlds/planets that would come into existence through this creation (which has taken billions of earth years to create and is still incomplete, since I believe the universe is infinite) would be a perfect medium for intelligent physical beings to evolve. Eventually those who, through their belief and obedience, adhered to the control of this benevolent intelligence, could join its [His] company for eternity.

Putting all the aforementioned thoughts together into one unit, the sum total could be that biology/evolution, creation, and intelligent design could/should easily become one coherent harmonious subject. The nice part of this arrangement is that the atheist can now be an informed atheist; the Christian can now be an enlightened Christian; and those in between can at least be informed and do whatever they desire with their new seminal knowledge. And the best thing about it is that they can all live in harmony in the same classroom. Of course, Christians should never attempt to push their holy ways on others in the classroom, and the atheists must not belittle the Christians for believing and living as they do. I call that a happy ending to a controversy that has been going on for at least 80 years. Am I being naive in proposing this simple solution to a complex situation? Let me hear your opinion.