For a long time I have followed the debate between science and religion. I never took part in it until mid 2007, when I picked up an anti-evolutionary tract on George St, Sydney. Although it was being distributed by an Australian group based in Pyrmont, it was published in the USA. The arguments in it were puerile, as you will be able to deduce from the following reply. However, my main problem with it stemmed less from its attacks on science than its insistence that the Bible was entirely free from mistakes. I have always believed that the best ammunition against any religion is to be found in its teachings. Sit back, read on and enjoy!

Re: EVOLUTION
The Evidence: For and Against

Dear Sir/Madam,
I recently picked up a copy of the aforementioned pamphlet on George Street, Sydney. The debate between science and religion holds a special interest for me. For more than ten years I have listened, but after reading your publication I feel it is time to speak.

I do not wish to cause offence, but I think your arguments are weak and your methods are dishonest. The first paragraph of your pamphlet rightly states that the Piltdown skull was a hoax. However, every scientist is willing to admit as much. No scientific paper, school textbook or news article published in the last five decades refers to the Piltdown skull as proof of evolution.

Scientists are not infallible, but they can learn from their mistakes. When new discoveries are made, an old theory may be disproved and another will have to be formulated. These theories are never presented as facts, but are held as the most likely explanations for the nature of the world. They, in turn, may one day change in light of new evidence.

Compare this to the religious standpoint. Unlike an empirical researcher, the Biblical literalist refuses to accept anything that challenges his beliefs - hence the rejection of evolution, which contradicts the literal truth of the Book of Genesis. While your pamphlet is quick to point out the mistakes some scientists have made, it never mentions the fossils that support evolutionary theory - Australopithecus Africanus, Homo Habilis, Homo Erectus, Cro-Magnon Man, and many others I could name but you have chosen to ignore. This body of evidence grows every year, and your failure to mention it is as intellectually dishonest as any scientific hoax.

Your third paragraph quotes three scientists who reject the theory of evolution. The first makes the contentious claim that it “has helped nothing in the process of science.” Evolutionary theory is linked to genetics, which is the discipline you refer to when stating that Neanderthal Man is not our direct ancestor. Although you claim that science is flawed, you are happy to quote it when it suits you. This is pure hypocrisy. I would like you to name all the scientists who support evolution in your next pamphlet, but I suspect you would run out of paper.

There are many excellent books that offer proof of evolution. “The Blind Watchmaker,” by leading authority Richard Dawkins, is one I highly recommend. I suspect your Dr. Kent Hovind (an “authority” I had never heard of) has his own religious agenda, and is as unlikely to be swayed by evidence as I would be to give away $250,000.

If you can provide me with proof that evolutionary theory is wrong, I will happily abandon it. I have read a lot of Creationist literature and find its claims more dubious than any I have encountered in science. You say that you can prove God’s existence. There are plenty of others who say that you can’t. You say a building needs a builder and a painting needs a painter. While every effect has a cause, not all phenomena require a sentient planner. Fire creates smoke, wind creates waves, the sun emits light and clouds release rain. These and other processes combine to create all sorts of weather, but none require conscious thought. While some people may see the need to give them quasi-human attributes (eg. saying spirits live in fire or storms are caused by warring gods) we have no need to do so today. So it is with life on earth. While there is a lot that we don’t know, and there may be a lot that we never will, we can explain its origins without recourse to a creator.

Your pamphlet goes on to claim that “the Bible is God’s supernatural revelation to man.” I have a copy in front of me now. The five pieces of “irrefutable evidence” you mention are hardly remarkable prophecies. In Matthew 24, Jesus predicts that the buildings around the Temple in Jerusalem will be destroyed at some non-specified time in the future. This is an easy prediction to make, and after nearly two millennia it is hardly surprising to see it fulfilled. If I predicted that your home would not be standing in two thousand years, and two thousand years later it was not, would that make my words infallible or prove I was the Son of God?

Luke 21 simply repeats this prediction. 2 Timothy 3 informs us that there will be difficult times ahead; people will be, among other things, selfish, greedy, immoral and proud. These traits have plagued humanity for several thousand years at least and are not about to disappear. Again, it is no more remarkable than a vague prediction that “there will be wars” or “people will get sick and die.” Regrettably these problems have been with us for millennia.

Ezekiel predicts that a great multinational force will attempt to invade Israel and fail. Unfortunately I have found no non-Biblical records of Gog and Magog. Perhaps this prophecy has been fulfilled; perhaps it is yet to happen. I would expect more clarity from a supposedly infallible source.

Joel states that a plague of locusts will herald the Last Days and goes on to speak of judgement. There have been countless locust plagues since then, but no Judgement Day as yet. Perhaps we should wait for a plague of locusts with human faces, women’s hair, lions’ teeth and golden crowns, like the one described in Revelation 9:7. When that day comes I will believe!

You claim there are no mistakes in the Bible, but in twenty years of reading it I have found a lot of them. In fact, the Bible has done more to undermine my faith in God than any other book in existence. 2 Chronicles 4:2 informs us that pi has an exact value of 3. This mistake is repeated in 1 Kings 7:23. Chinese, Greek and Arab mathematicians made more accurate calculations; if the Bible was truly divinely inspired, I would expect the reverse to be true.

Leviticus 11: 13-19 describes bats as birds, 11:23 says insects have four feet, and 11: 5-6 claims that rabbits chew the cud. This is manifestly false. Not even God manages to escape this tangle of lies and contradictions. In Genesis 22:1 God tempts Abraham, but James 1: 13 informs us that God never tempts any man. God forbids killing in Exodus 20:13 but commands it in 32:27. The New Testament is no better. Surely you are aware that the Gospels contradict each other? To use just one example, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John give different versions of Jesus’ last words. Inconsistencies of this sort have no place in an infallible text.

Your pamphlet also states that God has always existed. Despite a lack of evidence, I actually have no problem with this claim. I only have a problem with the kind of God you believe in. If the Bible is to be trusted, he is a jealous, bigoted, wrathful monster who condones slavery, the oppression of women, mob killings and acts of genocide. It is hardly surprising that so many Christians have practised such atrocities when they have such a role model.

Human suffering does not make scripture true either. Your pamphlet implies that all suffering stems from people disobeying God, but not all human suffering stems from human agency. What about the children who are born with congenital illnesses? What of the unlucky people killed by floods and hurricanes? I once saw a Christian neighbour die of multiple sclerosis while unbelievers led long healthy lives. If suffering stems from disobeying God I would expect the opposite. You even say the U.S. has a disproportionately high rate of cancer because its people are immoral and lawless, but the Church has far more influence there than it does in Northern Europe. Countries like Norway and Sweden are predominantly secular, and their citizens enjoy better health, a lower incidence of crime, and a longer life expectancy than those in more religious lands. Does God allow this to test our faith, or could our faith in him be misplaced?

You very correctly observe that “each species brings forth after its own kind.” No scientist seriously suggests that apes once gave birth to human babies. Evolutionary theory maintains it takes many thousands or millions of years for new species to emerge. This process happens gradually, and every living thing on earth represents another stage, barely discernable from the last. To use an analogy, imagine yourself on a long hiking trip. Each step represents a year, and the scenery around you represents the natural world. Any individual step will not change your view very much, but it will be different after several hundred thousand steps!

You say no order could come from a “big bang.” I have to disagree again. Explosions obey the laws of physics, as every arms manufacturer knows. A thermonuclear explosion will give off a measurable amount of sound, light and heat as well as invisible radiation. It will also create a mushroom cloud, never a rabbit or heart-shaped one. According to the Big Bang theory, the universe that we inhabit is simply the “mushroom cloud” of an infinitely larger blast with far more complex repercussions.

Science has never claimed that a Mercedes can evolve out of nothing, but this is the sort of miracle you might expect to find in the Bible. Here’s an interesting experiment for you to try. Empty your garage of everything, as your pamphlet instructed me to do. Then pray every day for the rest of your life and see if a Mercedes appears. I’m serious. Try it. You get the idea.

I should point out the obvious fact that inventions like cars, electric lights, the printing press you use for your leaflets and countless other appliances you probably take for granted were made in direct accordance with science. Try seeing if your faith alone will let you keep up with the traffic, let you see in a dark room, or produce hundreds of identical pamphlets. I can guarantee that it won’t, but I doubt that this will dissuade you from further attacks on science.

Long before the sexes evolved, humbler forms of life than we exchanged genetic information. The appearance of males and females was a natural outgrowth of this occurance. The fact that evolution “changed its mind” (which suggests the process is self-aware, something no scientist would claim) evinces that it is a blind process, not one with a conscious designer.
Your claim that the first fish would have died as soon as they crawled onto land is equally naive. Siamese fighting fish, among others, can gulp air from the surface in poorly oxygenated water. Others have both lungs and gills. Still others, such as mudskippers, can survive out of water for a short time as long as their gills are wet. It’s reasonable to assume that some can last for longer than others, which would give them an advantage which would be passed on to their offspring. If the land was free of predators, they would also have more reason to spend as much time there as possible. Eventually they would not need to return to the water at all.

If these claims still seem far-fetched, remember that the Bible says that Eve was made from Adam’s rib. This sounds ridiculous to me, but you rightly go on to say that some people reject the Bible on moral, not scientific grounds. I happen to be one of them. Even if you could disprove the findings of science, I would still be wary of your claim that the Bible provides a strong moral foundation. While it has many worthwhile things to say, it also contains a lot that offends me. For instance, Deuteronomy 20:28 says that any man caught raping a woman who is not married or engaged should pay her father a fine and then marry her. The physical, mental and emotional wellbeing of the victim does not even rate a mention. Deuteronomy 23:1 states that no man who has been castrated may live among the Lord’s people, but for hundreds of years the Catholic church was castrating choirboys to preserve their singing voices. Deuteronomy 20:16 sanctions genocide, instructing God’s people to kill everyone - men, women and children - in the cities they capture. In Joshua 10, under God’s direction, the Israelites even kill all the livestock.

Is the New Testament any better? Matthew 8:21-22 encourages disrespect for parents, which in the Old Testament is punishable by death. Luke 14:26 implores Christians to hate their brothers, but 1 John 3:15 says that any man who hates his brother cannot have eternal life. What are these inconsistencies doing in a supposedly infallible text?

Like every other human being who is likely to read your pamphlet, I am fully aware of the terms and conditions the Bible sets down for salvation. You may be intrigued to know that I had a Christian upbringing, and bereft of any other world view, I believed that I was inherently sinful and could only gain redemption through Christ. I did not renounce my faith because I preferred to believe in evolution or found God’s laws too stifling. I did so out of dissatisfaction with Christian theology. If only Christ can bring salvation, where does that leave the millions who were born before him and could have never accepted him as their saviour? Have they been condemned to Hell? What of the many millions who are born in non-Christian cultures? They have exactly the same reasons for being Hindus, Muslims, Buddhists, Jainists, etc. as I once did for being Christian - namely, they were raised that way. None of us are born believers. We inherit our beliefs from our parents, or other influential figures such as teachers, priests or missionaries.

If you have been open-minded enough to have read this far I congratulate you. I did not write this reply to your pamphlet because I wanted to sound clever or make you feel miserable. I wrote it because I care. Since I renounced my childhood faith, this world has become a more beautiful place, in spite of all its pain and strife (which can often be blamed on religion). The majority of people are not going to Hell any more, and death is no longer better than life. I have become more tolerant of other races and cultures. Science has greatly increased my appreciation of everything you call “Creation.” I find an endless universe that is billions of years old more impressive than one slapped together in six days a mere six thousand years ago. I hope one day you have the maturity, insight and wisdom to admit that the Bible is flawed and abandon your archaic views. You may be surprised by the difference it makes.

Yours sincerely,
J.F.