The Problem
For Christians who are set on reading the first three chapters of Genesis as absolutely literal, then it is difficult to reconcile the Theory of Evolution with what is described there. If you haven’t read my post on Genesis, I hope you will. I believe the first chapters of Genesis make up a beautiful message from our Lord that was intended to convey deep spiritual truths, but I personally do not believe it was ever intended to be literal. I think it was our Lord speaking in a parable, if you will, much like He did while on Earth. Taken this way, I have absolutely no issue reconciling scientific findings with the truths of Genesis. Unfortunately, the very word “evolution” now raises the hackles of many Christians and sets me up for being shut out by my students.
The disagreement isn’t anything new. Ever since Darwin proposed evolution, groups have lauded it, hated it, said it conflicted with religion, said it could be reconciled with religion. Darwin never directly addressed human evolution, though some of his early critics realized that he considered humans no exception to the idea of evolution, and were uncomfortable with this thought. All the same, by 1865, evolution was accepted by the majority of the scientific community and even by some Christian organizations. Cambridge University, run by the Church of England, instructed its students to assume “"the truth ... that the existing species of plants and animals have been derived by generation from others widely different.”
It didn’t take long for the critics to gain the spotlight, though. One of the first people to gain fame for denouncing evolution was Charles Hodge, a Presbyterian theologian at Princeton College’s seminary. In 1871, he published What is Darwinism? , in which he insisted that it amounted to atheism, as it did not seem to allow for the recognition of God’s design in nature. This was a source of conflict between Hodge and the president of the College, James McCosh, who believed the science could be reconciled with faith. In 1929, the remainder of Hodge’s supporters were ousted, and the Presbyterian-founded College became a leader in the then-new field of evolutionary biology.
Also in the 1920s, William Jennings Bryan began his anti-evolution crusade. I mentioned the Fundamentalist movement in my previous post. The Fundamentalists, as I mentioned before, sought to affirm basic tenets of conservative Christianity, but left the issues of evolution and age of the Earth quite open-ended. Bryan is credited with beginning to elicit a shift in thinking amongst Fundamentalists. Like Hodge, Bryan took issue with evolution because he felt that it did not allow for belief in design by God. Additionally, Bryan associated evolution with Social Darwinism and fought to keep it from being taught in schools and churches (more on that in a second). He famously took the stand during the Scopes Monkey Trial, only to have his ignorance of science and religion brought painfully to light. All the same, a grassroots movement spurred by Bryan’s crusade led to anti-evolution bills being passed in six southern states, forbidding the teaching of evolution in public schools. These laws would be struck down by the United States Supreme Court in 1968.
Then there was Pope Pius XII: in 1950, he made major strides towards reconciliation of the Catholic faith and evolution when he published Humani gereris, addressing evolution and human origins. In it, he calls evolution a serious hypothesis worthy of in-depth study, and allows a pathway for the faithful to accept even human evolution. Meanwhile, we have pushback coming from evangelical Protestant Christians in the 1960s (remember Henry Morris and George Whitcomb?), and in 1972 Henry Morris becomes founder of the Institute for Creation Research. One group pushing against another, while anti-evolution rhetoric gradually becomes less of a fringe occurrence and more of a mainstream component of the Christian faith in America.
It has been propagated for too long that this theory is a scientific attempt to disprove God or the Bible. It is not. It is nothing more than a description of the process by which life has diversified since its origins. To repeat what I have said throughout this series of science and religion posts, it baffles me that Christians have such an issue with this theory. We believe that God is still the one bringing day and night, even while understanding that the Earth rotates on its axis. We believe God blesses us with rain or snow, even while accepting the science behind meteorology and the fact that the “Heavenly storehouses laden with snow” are probably a metaphor. Why, then, is it so hard to believe that God brings forth beautiful diversity in our world and the development of new types of plants and animals through a process called evolution?
The Theory of Evolution
Just for a minute, forget everything you may have been told about evolution. Let’s start from the beginning with no preconceived ideas. Because evolution is not an alternative to God, it is not an effort to discredit religion, and it is not evil. It is simply a fact of nature.
To evolve means to change. Merriam Webster defines “evolution” as
It is simple to see some types of evolution at small scales and over relatively short time periods. In October of 2013, National Geographic published a story called The Changing Face of America. At first glance, this looks like an article and photo essay about the outdated attempt to categorize Americans based on their skin color and that of their ancestors. Really, it’s addressing much more than that: it is about the American population changing in our physical appearance, as compared to our ancestors. In other words, it is about the evolution of the American population.
Why are we changing? Quite simply, people now feel more comfortable interbreeding (as callous and science-y as that sounds) with people who look vastly different from them than our ancestors did. (Ever seen Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?) The set of genes that gives one person fair skin, freckles, and curly red hair mixes with the set of genes that gives another person dark skin, black hair and brown eyes to produce a child with a fantastic gumbo of physical features! That child will then grow up and, more likely than not, mix up her genetic grab box with that of someone else, and produce a child with his very own mix of genes. With every generation, the population as a whole looks slightly more diverse. In other words, slightly different.
This phenomenon is not unique to humans. We see it with all living things. Populations change with time. With plants and animals, social norms are typically not a driving force behind this change. In nature, environmental factors make it more likely for certain individuals to interbreed with others, thus making it more likely for some genetic packages to be passed on and mixed with others. No matter how closely related a population is, the genes are still different from one individual to the next. This is why we don’t look identical to the rest of our immediate family. It’s why puppies within the same litter look different from one another. In our human society, every effort is generally made to make sure all individuals survive to adulthood. In the wild of nature, this isn’t the case. Certain physical features quite simply make it more likely that some of the young will survive their youth, become adults, and interbreed than others. The ones that survive pass on their genes to the next generation, and the game repeats itself.
What I just described is called “natural selection”. Within every generation, some individuals survive to adulthood, reproduce, and pass on genetic material, and others don’t. If you look at the population as a whole, many of the individuals will have those characteristics that are “favorable”. It could be fur color, antler size, burrowing ability, anything. You will likely find only a small percentage of the population that lacks the “favorable” traits. Contrary to popular belief, it is not “survival of the fittest”. Natural selection does not mean that the biggest, fastest, or smartest survive. It means that the individuals with the traits best suited for their specific environment survive. As the environment around them changes, the traits that were preferred two generations ago may very well become the unfavorable ones. At that point, you’ll see the population as a whole change in appearance as different traits become “favorable”. This is exactly why it’s so important for populations to be diverse. Individuals can’t change with their environment; you’re born with what you’ve got. But survival of the population as a whole may be determined by the presence of different genes for natural selection to work on over time. Populations without diversity often lack the ability to change with their environment, and are more likely to face decimation.
Macroevolution
Most people are good with what I just described. It’s called microevolution: change within a species. The discomfort sets in when I start describing macroevolution: the origin of new species from pre-existing ones. Consider this, though: the whole concept of “species” is something humans invented. A species is a group of closely-related organisms who can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. In certain situations, you may have members of different species who interbreed and produce offspring, but the offspring is typically sterile. We as humans invented this definition because we like order; we like to categorize things. All around us, nature is moving forward and populations of plants and animals are changing, and nature couldn’t care less about our attempts to put it into categorical boxes. But, we want to be able to quickly refer to a group of similar plants or animals if needed, and so we call groups of very similar ones “species”.
When I introduce this topic in my classes, I begin by talking about dog breeding. The St. John’s Water Dog was an intelligent, capable retriever used in the early 20th century in Newfoundland to retrieve broken fishing nets. In the 19th and 20th centuries, some of these dogs were imported to Europe and bred. Breeders wanted to keep the “favorable” traits of a water-resistant coat, love of water and balanced body, and through artificial selection those traits were passed on to future generations. Over time, however, people who loved the newly discovered breed started wishing for dogs with those same favorable traits, but different appearances. So, breeders took the descendants of the St. John’s Water Dog and began artificially selecting for traits like a curly coat, a long coat, short coat, or light-colored coat. Now, its descendants are called Labrador Retrievers, Chesapeake Bay Retrievers, Flat-coat Retrievers, and Golden Retrievers. Vastly different-looking offspring, all from one common ancestral group of dogs.
What’s the point of this? Three things: first, here’s an example of several very different-looking groups of dogs coming from a common ancestral group. Second, all of the diversity I just described was introduced over a time span of about 100 years. Labs, chessies, flatcoats, goldens… these breeds did not exist in the late 1800s. All of this variation was introduced by artificial selection working on minor physical traits: a coat length here, a coat texture there. Imagine, now, that those minor changes continue for another hundred years. What would those dogs look like? What if those changes continued for 1,000 years? Millions of years? At some point, the descendants of the St. John’s Water Dog are going to be so different from the original ancestor that they don’t even look like dogs anymore. They will likely not be able to even interbreed successfully with members of the ancestral group. This is where biologists jump in and say “Look! A new species!” and rejoicing ensues.
That’s why I bore my students with dog breeding. The scenario I just described taking place over thousands or millions of years and producing a group of descendants that couldn’t even be called dogs anymore is macroevolution. It happens without us realizing it, and without the consent of humans or nature. The only difference from what is happening in nature is…usually…the interference of humans. Remember, with breeding we are the ones selecting for certain traits, and so we call it artificial selection. In nature, it’s the environment that selects for the favorable traits, and thus we call it natural selection.
I said there were three points I like to make with the dog breeding example. The third is this: when one group descends from another, it does not necessarily mean that the descendants replace the ancestors. I still hear the argument “If evolution is real, how come there are still monkeys around?” That question is a reflection of the complete and utter ignorance of everything about the topic it attempts to discuss. It also makes me want to beat my head against the wall. Descendants commonly live on Earth at the same time as the ancestral groups. The St. John’s Water Dog did go extinct as a breed in the 1980s, but for decades the breed lived alongside its descendant breeds. The end result of evolution is a more diverse body of organisms than what we originally had, as the variation within populations radiates out and produces many different-looking descendant groups.
Common Ancestors
I think where most people have a problem with evolution is when you start going far enough back in time, and realize that if this is true, it must mean that we as humans are somehow intimately connected with the animals around us. Well, scientifically, we are. Huge strides have been made in the field of genetics, and mapping the genetic code of humans and various animals. We’re strikingly similar. Some more so than others, of course. We as humans actually did not evolve from monkeys or apes, for example, but they are our closest relatives. This is based on our genotypes and our physical characteristics. From a Biblical point of view, I don’t see the problem here. As I mentioned in my post about the first chapters of the book of Genesis, even in the ancient creation story, humans and animals were all created at the same time: the fifth and sixth days of creation. Though I personally don’t believe they were literal 24-hour periods, and I read the creation story as an allegory inspired by God, I believe it was described that way for a reason. We do share similarities with our fellow creations in the animal kingdom. We were told to rule them, but that doesn’t mean devalue them. They were created by God just as we were. Studying the process behind our creation does not make it less divine, any more than understanding the natural process of reproduction makes the birth of a child any less a divine gift.
So, was there a common ancestral group way back when that all life on Earth can trace its origins to? Well, yeah. Scientists still modify the date at which life arrived on Earth as new discoveries are made, but most will say that roughly 3.5 billion years ago life appeared on Earth (still not sure how… that’s a topic for another time…) and evolution began. Did we jump from bacteria to elephants over night? No, of course not. Go back to the dog breeding example. Tiny changes occurred on those earliest populations, and diversification at a most miniscule scale took place for the next 3.5 billion years.
Remember, I am in no way saying that God was not the one powering every step of that diversification. In fact, I believe He was. I believe a process that we now call “evolution” is exactly how God brought forth diversity of life, just as He uses a process we call “plate tectonics” to build mountains and power volcanoes. He was doing this long before we discovered His methods and named them, and continues to do so. But, in a scientific setting we only address that for which we find evidence in the natural world. We can believe in the supernatural, and many of us do, but that’s no more a part of our scientific description of evolution than is my penchant for Steve Earle music.
Wait, go back…humans didn’t come from monkeys?
Modern humans had ancestors that were “ape-like” by our way of viewing things, but were actually hominids. Hominids are not apes or monkeys. There used to be several groups of hominids on Earth, but nowadays there is only one: us. Modern humans are a type of hominid. The hominids are closely related, genetically speaking, to apes (no tail), and more distantly related to monkeys (tail), but our relationship is more like that of siblings or cousins than it is to grandparent-grandchild. We do, of course share a common ancestral group if you go far enough back.
What makes something a hominid? (These definitions are based upon the introductory textbook I use in class: Historical Geology: Evolution of Earth and Life Through Time by Reed Wicander and James Monroe) Well, among other things, hominids are creatures that walk upright on two legs, have a larger and more complex brain than apes or monkeys, and our increased dexterity makes it more likely for us to use sophisticated tools. How do scientists define “human”, then? Tough to define, but a basic definition is a hominid with an even larger brain and more reduced face than others, and a heavy reliance on tools and culture. (Considering most of you are reading this post on your computer or smartphone after seeing it on social media, I dare you to argue with that.)
I have no issue accepting that humans have changed over time, and that our physical characteristics are descended from ancestors that were not human. As a Christian, I believe that my soul, however, was not evolved from anything else. My soul was given to me uniquely. I do not have any scientific data for this; it’s just my belief. There is no scientific data for this belief, and I will reject anyone who tries to tell me such data exists. Why? Because this is a belief that involves the supernatural realm, and by definition cannot be addressed by science.
Social Darwinism
Going back to a point I made earlier, remember that evolution does not make a population better. It makes a population better suited to its present environment. I feel it is important to emphasize this, because Social Darwinism is a discredited idea and is not promoted by evolutionary scientists. Social Darwinism is a belief system that as humans compete for success and survival, the strongest and smartest survive. This philosophy has been used to justify racism and atrocities against other humans. This is an insult to scientific study.
Effects of social Darwinism have colored some people’s views of evolution as a whole. I once heard a speaker at a local church declare that accepting evolution meant accepting racism. The reason, he said, is that humans originated in Africa. European humans came about much later. This must mean that white people are more evolved than black people, and thus smarter/stronger/generally better, right? Not even close. Humans did originate in Africa and the Middle East, and as generations succeeded one another, the population of humans became well suited to the environments found in Africa and the Middle East. And, thousands of years did pass before these populations gave rise to Europeans. What was going on during that time? People were migrating. It took folks awhile to make the trek, on foot, from Africa to northern Europe. As they did so, the populations as a whole began adapting to vastly different environments. So yes, the earliest Europeans, you could say, had gone through a ton of additional evolution as a population than their ancestors. That evolution did not make them superior to their ancestral groups in Africa and the Middle East. It simply made them better suited, physically, for the northern latitudes.
So is it real?
“Evolution is just a theory, anyway.” Yeah, I hear that one regularly. Now that I’ve given you an overview of what the Theory of Evolution is all about, let’s talk about theories and laws and hypotheses.
The Theory of Evolution is a scientific theory. That means it is accepted as fact. It is not being debated by scientists. We have enough evidence that the majority of the scientific community accepts it as the best possible explanation for how we got so much diversity of life on our planet. The problem is that the general public uses the term “theory” in a way that is far different from the scientific meaning. A hypothesis is an educated guess. A scientist will address some question about the natural world, and propose a hypothesis as a potential answer. Scientists will then spend years researching, experimenting, modeling, and collecting data, to determine if the hypothesis is correct or incorrect. If it is proven to be incorrect, then back to the drawing board. The Theory of Evolution has passed that stage and has been upgraded to “theory”. In the general public, we use the word “theory” when we really should be saying “hypothesis”. In science, when a hypothesis becomes a theory, it’s a big deal. It means that it is accepted to be true, and is widely supported by a scientific evidence.
Well, why isn’t it a law, then? A theory is an explanation for some natural phenomenon with a large body of supporting evidence. A law, on the other hand, is a statement based on repeated experimental observations that describes some aspects of the universe. The difference is subtle, but here it is: theories give a thorough explanation for a phenomenon, and laws state that a phenomenon exists.
Does that mean, then, that theories do not actually get upgraded to laws? Exactly. They are two totally different things. The Theory of Evolution is a theory because it explains how life has changed (diversified) over time. If it were a law, it would simply be a statement saying that life changes over time. (Incidentally, there is a scientific law that says just that.) Laws are statements about nature, and theories are explanations.
Closing
I hope this post made the Theory of Evolution less scary for people who have been taught that it is anti-Christian. I decided to write a series of posts on science and faith because I see what is happening to reputation of Christians in the eyes of those outside the faith. The continued attempts by groups of faithful to discredit scientific theories is making us look foolish. I go back to St. Augustine’s quote on this topic:
“The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of the faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?”
We are not called to be fools. I know the verse from 1 Corinthians everyone is quick to bring up: “If any of you think you are wise by the standards of this age, you should become ‘fools’ so that you can be wise.”
Before devoting yourself to 1 Corinthians 3:18, consider also Titus 2:8: “You should be wise in all you say. Then, the one who is against you will be ashamed and will not be able to say anything bad about you.”
The “foolishness” we to which we are called by St. Paul is the belief in something beyond reason: that our God came to Earth as a human, allowed Himself to be crucified as the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of mankind, and then conquered even death by rising again. To say that this verse is simply calling us to refuse to accept science is to underestimate our calling. Our true calling is much more beautiful!
For Christians who are set on reading the first three chapters of Genesis as absolutely literal, then it is difficult to reconcile the Theory of Evolution with what is described there. If you haven’t read my post on Genesis, I hope you will. I believe the first chapters of Genesis make up a beautiful message from our Lord that was intended to convey deep spiritual truths, but I personally do not believe it was ever intended to be literal. I think it was our Lord speaking in a parable, if you will, much like He did while on Earth. Taken this way, I have absolutely no issue reconciling scientific findings with the truths of Genesis. Unfortunately, the very word “evolution” now raises the hackles of many Christians and sets me up for being shut out by my students.
The disagreement isn’t anything new. Ever since Darwin proposed evolution, groups have lauded it, hated it, said it conflicted with religion, said it could be reconciled with religion. Darwin never directly addressed human evolution, though some of his early critics realized that he considered humans no exception to the idea of evolution, and were uncomfortable with this thought. All the same, by 1865, evolution was accepted by the majority of the scientific community and even by some Christian organizations. Cambridge University, run by the Church of England, instructed its students to assume “"the truth ... that the existing species of plants and animals have been derived by generation from others widely different.”
It didn’t take long for the critics to gain the spotlight, though. One of the first people to gain fame for denouncing evolution was Charles Hodge, a Presbyterian theologian at Princeton College’s seminary. In 1871, he published What is Darwinism? , in which he insisted that it amounted to atheism, as it did not seem to allow for the recognition of God’s design in nature. This was a source of conflict between Hodge and the president of the College, James McCosh, who believed the science could be reconciled with faith. In 1929, the remainder of Hodge’s supporters were ousted, and the Presbyterian-founded College became a leader in the then-new field of evolutionary biology.
Also in the 1920s, William Jennings Bryan began his anti-evolution crusade. I mentioned the Fundamentalist movement in my previous post. The Fundamentalists, as I mentioned before, sought to affirm basic tenets of conservative Christianity, but left the issues of evolution and age of the Earth quite open-ended. Bryan is credited with beginning to elicit a shift in thinking amongst Fundamentalists. Like Hodge, Bryan took issue with evolution because he felt that it did not allow for belief in design by God. Additionally, Bryan associated evolution with Social Darwinism and fought to keep it from being taught in schools and churches (more on that in a second). He famously took the stand during the Scopes Monkey Trial, only to have his ignorance of science and religion brought painfully to light. All the same, a grassroots movement spurred by Bryan’s crusade led to anti-evolution bills being passed in six southern states, forbidding the teaching of evolution in public schools. These laws would be struck down by the United States Supreme Court in 1968.
Then there was Pope Pius XII: in 1950, he made major strides towards reconciliation of the Catholic faith and evolution when he published Humani gereris, addressing evolution and human origins. In it, he calls evolution a serious hypothesis worthy of in-depth study, and allows a pathway for the faithful to accept even human evolution. Meanwhile, we have pushback coming from evangelical Protestant Christians in the 1960s (remember Henry Morris and George Whitcomb?), and in 1972 Henry Morris becomes founder of the Institute for Creation Research. One group pushing against another, while anti-evolution rhetoric gradually becomes less of a fringe occurrence and more of a mainstream component of the Christian faith in America.
It has been propagated for too long that this theory is a scientific attempt to disprove God or the Bible. It is not. It is nothing more than a description of the process by which life has diversified since its origins. To repeat what I have said throughout this series of science and religion posts, it baffles me that Christians have such an issue with this theory. We believe that God is still the one bringing day and night, even while understanding that the Earth rotates on its axis. We believe God blesses us with rain or snow, even while accepting the science behind meteorology and the fact that the “Heavenly storehouses laden with snow” are probably a metaphor. Why, then, is it so hard to believe that God brings forth beautiful diversity in our world and the development of new types of plants and animals through a process called evolution?
The Theory of Evolution
Just for a minute, forget everything you may have been told about evolution. Let’s start from the beginning with no preconceived ideas. Because evolution is not an alternative to God, it is not an effort to discredit religion, and it is not evil. It is simply a fact of nature.
To evolve means to change. Merriam Webster defines “evolution” as
- a theory that the differences between modern plants and animals are because of changes that happened by a natural process over a very long time
- : the process by which changes in plants and animals happen over time
- : a process of slow change and development
It is simple to see some types of evolution at small scales and over relatively short time periods. In October of 2013, National Geographic published a story called The Changing Face of America. At first glance, this looks like an article and photo essay about the outdated attempt to categorize Americans based on their skin color and that of their ancestors. Really, it’s addressing much more than that: it is about the American population changing in our physical appearance, as compared to our ancestors. In other words, it is about the evolution of the American population.
Why are we changing? Quite simply, people now feel more comfortable interbreeding (as callous and science-y as that sounds) with people who look vastly different from them than our ancestors did. (Ever seen Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?) The set of genes that gives one person fair skin, freckles, and curly red hair mixes with the set of genes that gives another person dark skin, black hair and brown eyes to produce a child with a fantastic gumbo of physical features! That child will then grow up and, more likely than not, mix up her genetic grab box with that of someone else, and produce a child with his very own mix of genes. With every generation, the population as a whole looks slightly more diverse. In other words, slightly different.
This phenomenon is not unique to humans. We see it with all living things. Populations change with time. With plants and animals, social norms are typically not a driving force behind this change. In nature, environmental factors make it more likely for certain individuals to interbreed with others, thus making it more likely for some genetic packages to be passed on and mixed with others. No matter how closely related a population is, the genes are still different from one individual to the next. This is why we don’t look identical to the rest of our immediate family. It’s why puppies within the same litter look different from one another. In our human society, every effort is generally made to make sure all individuals survive to adulthood. In the wild of nature, this isn’t the case. Certain physical features quite simply make it more likely that some of the young will survive their youth, become adults, and interbreed than others. The ones that survive pass on their genes to the next generation, and the game repeats itself.
What I just described is called “natural selection”. Within every generation, some individuals survive to adulthood, reproduce, and pass on genetic material, and others don’t. If you look at the population as a whole, many of the individuals will have those characteristics that are “favorable”. It could be fur color, antler size, burrowing ability, anything. You will likely find only a small percentage of the population that lacks the “favorable” traits. Contrary to popular belief, it is not “survival of the fittest”. Natural selection does not mean that the biggest, fastest, or smartest survive. It means that the individuals with the traits best suited for their specific environment survive. As the environment around them changes, the traits that were preferred two generations ago may very well become the unfavorable ones. At that point, you’ll see the population as a whole change in appearance as different traits become “favorable”. This is exactly why it’s so important for populations to be diverse. Individuals can’t change with their environment; you’re born with what you’ve got. But survival of the population as a whole may be determined by the presence of different genes for natural selection to work on over time. Populations without diversity often lack the ability to change with their environment, and are more likely to face decimation.
Macroevolution
Most people are good with what I just described. It’s called microevolution: change within a species. The discomfort sets in when I start describing macroevolution: the origin of new species from pre-existing ones. Consider this, though: the whole concept of “species” is something humans invented. A species is a group of closely-related organisms who can interbreed and produce fertile offspring. In certain situations, you may have members of different species who interbreed and produce offspring, but the offspring is typically sterile. We as humans invented this definition because we like order; we like to categorize things. All around us, nature is moving forward and populations of plants and animals are changing, and nature couldn’t care less about our attempts to put it into categorical boxes. But, we want to be able to quickly refer to a group of similar plants or animals if needed, and so we call groups of very similar ones “species”.
When I introduce this topic in my classes, I begin by talking about dog breeding. The St. John’s Water Dog was an intelligent, capable retriever used in the early 20th century in Newfoundland to retrieve broken fishing nets. In the 19th and 20th centuries, some of these dogs were imported to Europe and bred. Breeders wanted to keep the “favorable” traits of a water-resistant coat, love of water and balanced body, and through artificial selection those traits were passed on to future generations. Over time, however, people who loved the newly discovered breed started wishing for dogs with those same favorable traits, but different appearances. So, breeders took the descendants of the St. John’s Water Dog and began artificially selecting for traits like a curly coat, a long coat, short coat, or light-colored coat. Now, its descendants are called Labrador Retrievers, Chesapeake Bay Retrievers, Flat-coat Retrievers, and Golden Retrievers. Vastly different-looking offspring, all from one common ancestral group of dogs.
What’s the point of this? Three things: first, here’s an example of several very different-looking groups of dogs coming from a common ancestral group. Second, all of the diversity I just described was introduced over a time span of about 100 years. Labs, chessies, flatcoats, goldens… these breeds did not exist in the late 1800s. All of this variation was introduced by artificial selection working on minor physical traits: a coat length here, a coat texture there. Imagine, now, that those minor changes continue for another hundred years. What would those dogs look like? What if those changes continued for 1,000 years? Millions of years? At some point, the descendants of the St. John’s Water Dog are going to be so different from the original ancestor that they don’t even look like dogs anymore. They will likely not be able to even interbreed successfully with members of the ancestral group. This is where biologists jump in and say “Look! A new species!” and rejoicing ensues.
That’s why I bore my students with dog breeding. The scenario I just described taking place over thousands or millions of years and producing a group of descendants that couldn’t even be called dogs anymore is macroevolution. It happens without us realizing it, and without the consent of humans or nature. The only difference from what is happening in nature is…usually…the interference of humans. Remember, with breeding we are the ones selecting for certain traits, and so we call it artificial selection. In nature, it’s the environment that selects for the favorable traits, and thus we call it natural selection.
I said there were three points I like to make with the dog breeding example. The third is this: when one group descends from another, it does not necessarily mean that the descendants replace the ancestors. I still hear the argument “If evolution is real, how come there are still monkeys around?” That question is a reflection of the complete and utter ignorance of everything about the topic it attempts to discuss. It also makes me want to beat my head against the wall. Descendants commonly live on Earth at the same time as the ancestral groups. The St. John’s Water Dog did go extinct as a breed in the 1980s, but for decades the breed lived alongside its descendant breeds. The end result of evolution is a more diverse body of organisms than what we originally had, as the variation within populations radiates out and produces many different-looking descendant groups.
Common Ancestors
I think where most people have a problem with evolution is when you start going far enough back in time, and realize that if this is true, it must mean that we as humans are somehow intimately connected with the animals around us. Well, scientifically, we are. Huge strides have been made in the field of genetics, and mapping the genetic code of humans and various animals. We’re strikingly similar. Some more so than others, of course. We as humans actually did not evolve from monkeys or apes, for example, but they are our closest relatives. This is based on our genotypes and our physical characteristics. From a Biblical point of view, I don’t see the problem here. As I mentioned in my post about the first chapters of the book of Genesis, even in the ancient creation story, humans and animals were all created at the same time: the fifth and sixth days of creation. Though I personally don’t believe they were literal 24-hour periods, and I read the creation story as an allegory inspired by God, I believe it was described that way for a reason. We do share similarities with our fellow creations in the animal kingdom. We were told to rule them, but that doesn’t mean devalue them. They were created by God just as we were. Studying the process behind our creation does not make it less divine, any more than understanding the natural process of reproduction makes the birth of a child any less a divine gift.
So, was there a common ancestral group way back when that all life on Earth can trace its origins to? Well, yeah. Scientists still modify the date at which life arrived on Earth as new discoveries are made, but most will say that roughly 3.5 billion years ago life appeared on Earth (still not sure how… that’s a topic for another time…) and evolution began. Did we jump from bacteria to elephants over night? No, of course not. Go back to the dog breeding example. Tiny changes occurred on those earliest populations, and diversification at a most miniscule scale took place for the next 3.5 billion years.
Remember, I am in no way saying that God was not the one powering every step of that diversification. In fact, I believe He was. I believe a process that we now call “evolution” is exactly how God brought forth diversity of life, just as He uses a process we call “plate tectonics” to build mountains and power volcanoes. He was doing this long before we discovered His methods and named them, and continues to do so. But, in a scientific setting we only address that for which we find evidence in the natural world. We can believe in the supernatural, and many of us do, but that’s no more a part of our scientific description of evolution than is my penchant for Steve Earle music.
Wait, go back…humans didn’t come from monkeys?
Modern humans had ancestors that were “ape-like” by our way of viewing things, but were actually hominids. Hominids are not apes or monkeys. There used to be several groups of hominids on Earth, but nowadays there is only one: us. Modern humans are a type of hominid. The hominids are closely related, genetically speaking, to apes (no tail), and more distantly related to monkeys (tail), but our relationship is more like that of siblings or cousins than it is to grandparent-grandchild. We do, of course share a common ancestral group if you go far enough back.
What makes something a hominid? (These definitions are based upon the introductory textbook I use in class: Historical Geology: Evolution of Earth and Life Through Time by Reed Wicander and James Monroe) Well, among other things, hominids are creatures that walk upright on two legs, have a larger and more complex brain than apes or monkeys, and our increased dexterity makes it more likely for us to use sophisticated tools. How do scientists define “human”, then? Tough to define, but a basic definition is a hominid with an even larger brain and more reduced face than others, and a heavy reliance on tools and culture. (Considering most of you are reading this post on your computer or smartphone after seeing it on social media, I dare you to argue with that.)
I have no issue accepting that humans have changed over time, and that our physical characteristics are descended from ancestors that were not human. As a Christian, I believe that my soul, however, was not evolved from anything else. My soul was given to me uniquely. I do not have any scientific data for this; it’s just my belief. There is no scientific data for this belief, and I will reject anyone who tries to tell me such data exists. Why? Because this is a belief that involves the supernatural realm, and by definition cannot be addressed by science.
Social Darwinism
Going back to a point I made earlier, remember that evolution does not make a population better. It makes a population better suited to its present environment. I feel it is important to emphasize this, because Social Darwinism is a discredited idea and is not promoted by evolutionary scientists. Social Darwinism is a belief system that as humans compete for success and survival, the strongest and smartest survive. This philosophy has been used to justify racism and atrocities against other humans. This is an insult to scientific study.
Effects of social Darwinism have colored some people’s views of evolution as a whole. I once heard a speaker at a local church declare that accepting evolution meant accepting racism. The reason, he said, is that humans originated in Africa. European humans came about much later. This must mean that white people are more evolved than black people, and thus smarter/stronger/generally better, right? Not even close. Humans did originate in Africa and the Middle East, and as generations succeeded one another, the population of humans became well suited to the environments found in Africa and the Middle East. And, thousands of years did pass before these populations gave rise to Europeans. What was going on during that time? People were migrating. It took folks awhile to make the trek, on foot, from Africa to northern Europe. As they did so, the populations as a whole began adapting to vastly different environments. So yes, the earliest Europeans, you could say, had gone through a ton of additional evolution as a population than their ancestors. That evolution did not make them superior to their ancestral groups in Africa and the Middle East. It simply made them better suited, physically, for the northern latitudes.
So is it real?
“Evolution is just a theory, anyway.” Yeah, I hear that one regularly. Now that I’ve given you an overview of what the Theory of Evolution is all about, let’s talk about theories and laws and hypotheses.
The Theory of Evolution is a scientific theory. That means it is accepted as fact. It is not being debated by scientists. We have enough evidence that the majority of the scientific community accepts it as the best possible explanation for how we got so much diversity of life on our planet. The problem is that the general public uses the term “theory” in a way that is far different from the scientific meaning. A hypothesis is an educated guess. A scientist will address some question about the natural world, and propose a hypothesis as a potential answer. Scientists will then spend years researching, experimenting, modeling, and collecting data, to determine if the hypothesis is correct or incorrect. If it is proven to be incorrect, then back to the drawing board. The Theory of Evolution has passed that stage and has been upgraded to “theory”. In the general public, we use the word “theory” when we really should be saying “hypothesis”. In science, when a hypothesis becomes a theory, it’s a big deal. It means that it is accepted to be true, and is widely supported by a scientific evidence.
Well, why isn’t it a law, then? A theory is an explanation for some natural phenomenon with a large body of supporting evidence. A law, on the other hand, is a statement based on repeated experimental observations that describes some aspects of the universe. The difference is subtle, but here it is: theories give a thorough explanation for a phenomenon, and laws state that a phenomenon exists.
Does that mean, then, that theories do not actually get upgraded to laws? Exactly. They are two totally different things. The Theory of Evolution is a theory because it explains how life has changed (diversified) over time. If it were a law, it would simply be a statement saying that life changes over time. (Incidentally, there is a scientific law that says just that.) Laws are statements about nature, and theories are explanations.
Closing
I hope this post made the Theory of Evolution less scary for people who have been taught that it is anti-Christian. I decided to write a series of posts on science and faith because I see what is happening to reputation of Christians in the eyes of those outside the faith. The continued attempts by groups of faithful to discredit scientific theories is making us look foolish. I go back to St. Augustine’s quote on this topic:
“The shame is not so much that an ignorant individual is derided, but that people outside the household of the faith think our sacred writers held such opinions, and, to the great loss of those for whose salvation we toil, the writers of our Scripture are criticized and rejected as unlearned men. If they find a Christian mistaken in a field which they themselves know well and hear him maintaining his foolish opinions about our books, how are they going to believe those books in matters concerning the resurrection of the dead, the hope of eternal life, and the kingdom of heaven, when they think their pages are full of falsehoods on facts which they themselves have learnt from experience and the light of reason?”
We are not called to be fools. I know the verse from 1 Corinthians everyone is quick to bring up: “If any of you think you are wise by the standards of this age, you should become ‘fools’ so that you can be wise.”
Before devoting yourself to 1 Corinthians 3:18, consider also Titus 2:8: “You should be wise in all you say. Then, the one who is against you will be ashamed and will not be able to say anything bad about you.”
The “foolishness” we to which we are called by St. Paul is the belief in something beyond reason: that our God came to Earth as a human, allowed Himself to be crucified as the ultimate sacrifice for the sins of mankind, and then conquered even death by rising again. To say that this verse is simply calling us to refuse to accept science is to underestimate our calling. Our true calling is much more beautiful!