By David Deming
This year marks the 150th anniversary of the publication of Charles Darwin's book, "Origin of Species." To commemorate the anniversary, the Darwin Project at the University of Oklahoma will conduct a series of lectures, meetings and symposia.
The anniversary of "Origin of Species" offers an opportunity to educate both students and the public, not just about evolution, but also about science as a process of discovery. Unfortunately, that is not what will happen. The Darwin Project at OU has prepared an incestuous propaganda festival. None of the invited speakers or events promises to be in any way critical of Darwin's idea. What should be an educational and scientific event will instead be a celebration of materialism and atheism. It is a breathtaking betrayal of the university's ideals of diversity and inclusiveness.
Scientific knowledge is always provisional and subject to constant revision. In order to make progress, scientists are supposed to concentrate on anomalies, areas in which the facts don't fit our theories. But all of this is thrown out the door when it comes to Darwin and evolution. The National Academy of Science has absurdly claimed that the "theory" of evolution is now a "fact," and therefore cannot be questioned.
In point of fact, Darwin's model of evolution by natural selection has never been consistent with the data. The theory predicts uniform, gradual and continual change. Accordingly, the fossil record should contain innumerable transitional forms. It doesn't. The fossil record shows stasis punctuated by rapid change, with organisms suddenly appearing and disappearing. This was demonstrated by the French paleontologist Georges Cuvier as early as 1812, and remains true today.
Confronted with the fact that the fossil record did not support his theory, Darwin admitted that the absence of transitional forms was a grave difficulty. But rather than modify the theory to account for the facts, he instead tried to explain the evidence away. Darwin devoted an entire chapter of "Origin of Species" to what he called the "imperfection of the geological record," as if his theory were perfect and the data were defective. It is true that the geologic record is fragmentary, but nevertheless the extant sections do not support Darwin's theory. The gradual change predicted by Darwin is simply not present.
Darwin's theory was badly flawed, but it was celebrated because it enabled science to explain everything and dominate the entire world of knowledge. Prior to "Origin of Species," science had no way of explaining the origin of living things. Christian theology was evicted from science, but materialism and atheism crept in the back door. Unlike other scientific theories, Darwinism cannot be replaced, or even criticized, because it provides the foundation for metaphysical and religious concepts.
I am not a creationist, and I'am as skeptical of traditional religion as Hume or Voltaire. But the doctrines of materialism and atheism have no more foundation than revealed religion and probably less. It is impossible to be sure that God does not exist. The most brilliant and original thinkers who ever lived, the Greek philosophers, embraced monotheism long before the Christian era. To assert, as a materialist does, that nothing exists outside of the material world revealed to us by our senses, is equivalent to the oxymoronic claim that one knows the unknown. It is the doctrine of a person that is incapable of critical insight or intellectual reflection.
Naturalism is essential to science, but I'm not sure if it is a good idea for science to lay claim to the entire world of knowledge. Science does not tell us how to order our civilizations. It cannot define morality. If the atheists are right, and God does not exist, then the concepts of good and evil are meaningless. All we are left with is Darwin's struggle for existence, where might makes right and the end justifies the mean.
Science should be a disinterested search for knowledge based on observation and reason, free from any ideological or religious constraint. But instead of freedom from religion, we have simply substituted one faith for another. Christianity has been replaced by the doctrines of materialism and atheism. The zealous followers of these doctrines masquerade as scholars and scientists, but relentlessly seek to stifle all criticism, dissent, and inquiry. They are the enemies of both religion and science.
David Deming is a geologist and associate professor of Arts and Sciences at the University of Oklahoma. His opinions do not necessarily represent those of the university.
