In response to this letter to the editor, published on June 20 in The Anderson Independent-Mail, I submitted the below letter for possible publication.
Among the myriad “apologist” letters that were subsequently published in relation to the debate, I only found one from a skeptic. Here is the main link to the letters if you want to skim through the various responses on matters of faith.
Following is the text from the letter to which I responded. I took issue with the writer’s point about evolution (He is apparently responding to a previous submission that I didn’t read). Notice in the last paragraph the writer’s absolute certainly that the Bible is the “only reasonable explanation” for how we got here:
The first affirmation of the Humanist Manifesto states: “Religious humanists regard…”
The second affirmation states: “Humanism believes….”
These are affirmations of religious faith.
The authors of the Humanist Manifesto acknowledge that humanism is a religion. It is sad that modern-day humanists are not that intellectually honest.
To claim that humankind, if created by a creator, was created as a caveman or worse, is an a priori assumption based on the religious belief that evolution is true. The laws of thermodynamics prove that evolution is impossible, and that there must be a supernatural intelligence behind the origin of all matter and energy.
Furthermore, a previous writer misconstrued the general tenor of the Old Testament (his BJU training notwithstanding) when describing the warfare in Old Testament times. And further, he did not differentiate between the beliefs and practices of true Christianity versus apostate Christianity.
To reply to another writer, true Christianity is about freedom of choice, not control.
To another writer I would agree that reason shines light on many things. But if your reason is biased by the false assumptions of pseudo-science, it leads only to more darkness.
For years, I have asked for one piece of irrefutable, scientifically verifiable proof that evolution is true. I have also asked for one similar piece of evidence that the supernatural does not exist.
We must use science to explain the operation of the universe, but science cannot explain the origin of the universe. The Bible has the most reasonable explanation.
I could have well written 1,000 words or more in response to each of his points but as letters go, I was a bit limited. Here was the reply:
Evolution’s basis as firm as gravity’s
A June 20 letter titled, “Still waiting for evidence,” tries to prove too much on proclaiming:
“The laws of thermodynamics prove that evolution is impossible,” as if the world’s greatest scientific minds somehow missed that glaring point.
The second law of thermodynamics does state that in a closed system, entropy, or disorder, increases with the passage of time. But the environment in which evolution and natural selection occur is an open system. That environment is our universe.
On the letter’s other points, evolution is, itself as “irrefutable” as gravity, and to say otherwise is to misunderstand the scientific meaning of the word “theory,” so much so that if we throw out evolution, we have to toss out gravity with it.
Science has made enormous inroads into explaining how complexity can, over time, come from simpler forms. To interpose God and the Bible into the equation, as the writer seeks to do, exponentially magnifies the problem because we would then have the insurmountable task of explaining how simpler beings come from an incredibly complex one. That he just creates them is not an acceptable answer on this planet or any other.
Finally, as the writer seems to demand, I offer three transitional fossils that point to evolution. An early, four-legged cetacean fossil known as Ambulocetus, or walking whale, was discovered by Johannes Thewissin in 1996. The Archaeopteryx, found in 1861, is a transitional form between dinosaurs and birds, and the Eupodophis fossil, the specimen of which was found in Lebanon and identified in 2000, shows an intermediary form between lizards and snakes.
And speaking of snakes, the Bible, with its differing accounts of man’s creation in the Garden, the variant steps by which the universe was made and contradictory details about Noah’s Ark, the Ten Commandments, Christ and, indeed, the very nature of God, the good book does a fine job of disproving itself and provides not even the hint of a “reasonable explanation.”