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the demands of evolution and creation cannot be reconciled with each other because they represent two fundamentally different, mutually hostile, and mutually exclusive systems. They do not represent various aspects of the same truth, but rather two mutually opposing systems. They differ and diverge from each other right from the presuppositional level so that any attempt at reconciling them is a vain exercise. What's needed in such cases is to scrape the inferior set of presuppositions, so that the remaining better set of presuppositions provides the more authentic picture of reality.
Dr Johnson C Philips.

How then does one know for certain what the superior truth is?

curiousdannii
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FAZE MISSLE FAZE MISSLE
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    We cannot... But evolutionary theory is a scientific theory very well supported by facts. – Mauro ALLEGRANZA Jan 10 '20 at 12:20
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    Evolutionary theory says nothing about Creation. By the time things can evolve they have already been created. Where Creationism says organisms do not evolve it is surely not worth arguing about. –  Jan 10 '20 at 12:49
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    One is a baseless claim. The other is the logical inference from the intersection of evidence from biology, genetics, geology, archaeology, and anthropology. This is a hard one. – Cell Jan 10 '20 at 13:12
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    Evolution is in a curious state as it is a theory about genetics but the fossil record is largely free of DNA. Most of the mutations we do notice now are severely harmful (as we don't generally notice the ones that aren't.) We'll need much more than the few decades of genetic observation that we have now in order to conclusively prove that mutations can introduce beneficial function to a genome. – curiousdannii Jan 10 '20 at 15:54
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    The quote is accurate in as much as evolution is a strictly undirected process, so the so called "theistic evolution" arguably shouldn't be considered true evolution. So our options are atheism or deism with evolution, or theism with creationism of some kind. So proving evolution or creationism is reduced to proving the (non)existence of God, which any philosopher should know better than to attempt. – curiousdannii Jan 10 '20 at 15:59
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    @curiousdannii The quote is inaccurate as far as in people knew organisms share a common ancestor before the discovery of DNA and therefore predating genetics. FYI microbiologists see the acquisition of beneficial mutations every other week when they place their subjects under selection pressure. – Cell Jan 10 '20 at 16:31
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    Neither the terms "Creation" nor "Evolution" are well defined in the passage quoted. "Creation" can have many meanings, even in the context of life and the universe. For example an initial "Creation" (by an intelligence or otherwise) could occur at the Big Bang, leaving plenty of room for evolution. Or it might mean creation of life in it's more-or-less current form. "Evolution" might mean "macro evolution" (the generation of current species starting from the most primitive blocks of life) or "micro-evolution" (small changes in characteristics of species based on survival-of-the-fittest). – DJClayworth Jan 10 '20 at 21:49
  • Without pinning down these definitions the statement in the question is too vague to be reasonably analysed. – DJClayworth Jan 10 '20 at 21:49
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    @Cell no people did not know all organisms had a common ancester before DNA, we don't even know that now. If life arose spontaneously once it could have arisen more than once. – curiousdannii Jan 10 '20 at 23:30
  • @curiousdannii Don't look up phylogeny trees, when "on the origin of species" by Darwin was published, or when DNA as the heritable medium was discovered. The results will shock you. – Cell Jan 11 '20 at 00:51
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    @Cell I don't know what about phylogenetic trees is meant to be shocking. – curiousdannii Jan 11 '20 at 01:12
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    I feel that Dr Johnson C Philips.is creating an unnecessary opposition between evolution and creationism and coming at the issue rather naively. All we need do is say that evolution is God's method. As for beneficial random mutations, Erwin Schrodinger argued that the idea doesn't work. It is significant that one of the first great paleontologists was Teilhard de Chardin, a Jesuit Priest. I cannot imagine why Philips concludes that evolution is evidence against a Divine origin. . –  Jan 11 '20 at 11:58
  • @PeterJ . "All we need do is say that evolution is God's method." Not everyone is comfortable doing mental gymnastics in interpreting their religion. For some people the bible is meant to be literal and god created the first people in his image. For those kinds of people evolution and creationism cannot coexist. – Cell Jan 16 '20 at 23:06
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    I see no point in arguing with those who read the Bible literally. This is why I'm surprised Philips bothers. In the US there might be some point, but religion seems to have become a rather strange affair over there. . –  Jan 17 '20 at 14:17

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Without endorsing Dr Phillips' perspective — more because I find it presumptuous and arrogant than because I think he is factually wrong — the way to evaluate a scientific claim is on the preponderance of evidence. The 'preponderance of evidence' scheme implies the following:

  • The one makes the effort to incorporate all relevant observations as evidence for one's preferred theory
  • That evidence is evaluated in terms of its overt, physical properties, not in terms of subjective assertions, or assertions about the subjective intents of others
  • That the resulting theory presents a coherent and internally consistent story

As a rule, creationism in its political sense fails all three of these principles: it ignores massive amounts of observable evidence, it dismisses other observations as fabrications or lies promoted by scientists and secularists, and it glosses over glaring inconsistencies in its own theoretical presentation. Evolution is clearly superior as a scientific theory.

That being said, creationism is only problematic in its political sense: in the effort to press their theory as 'scientific' while avoiding the rigors of scientific observation and analysis. At the end of the day, evolution does not affect our daily lives, and one can function perfectly well in society — outside of a few careers in medicine, biology, and academia — without ever thinking about it at all (in exactly the way that one can walk to the grocery store without working out Newton's laws of motion). In that sense, a belief in creation in innocuous, and if it is an integral part of an overarching moral system, it may be superior for that purpose. Not everything needs to be evaluated on scientific grounds. The reason this issue has become so notorious is that evolution has become a symbol in some fundamentalist religious circles of the incursion of secular moral decadence, or of the rejection of religion and God — an impression magnified by some of evolution's more vile and aggressive proponents — and symbolic warfare is always irresolvable.

Most religious people are perfectly content to accept evolution as part of the 'Divine Plan,' and most secularists are willing to coexist with religious belief in that 'live and let live' sense. However, hard-liners on both ends of the spectrum do their best to maintain the polarization, for reasons I do not care to speculate on. See it for what it is: a political dogfight that is less about the bone in question than about establishing dominance.

Ted Wrigley
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One line of reasoning to assess the truth or falsity of a belief system is to look at what Jesus would call the fruit in an individual or society that holds that belief. In other words, if you want to know whether someone's thought processes are sound, take a look at the outworking of their thought in the life that they live.

Perhaps you might say that the evidence is circumstantial, perhaps not. But I would argue that the last century has witnessed, in formerly 'Christian' countries at least, a catastrophic decay in morality at all levels in society. I cannot help but correlate that decline with the replacement of belief in a loving Creator God with adherence to the doctrine of 'survival of the fittest' and the 'selfish gene'.

Surely when we see people living for themselves with scant regard for the impact of their actions on others, indeed trampling on others to get to the top, it seems just to be consistent with the idea that what matters is that you survive, regardless of whether or not anyone else does in the process.

In my opinion, such a struggle does not bring progress, but rather is the progenitor of the destruction of a race. We formerly Christian countries are not destined for greatness, but rather societal collapse, if things carry on the way they are.

To follow that line of reasoning then, to argue for evolution as a process that produces life and order is like arguing that a bomb explosion will produce beautiful art.

Only a great artist can bring forth beauty. Only an all-wise, all-powerful God could have created a world as stunningly beautiful as ours. And to say that He used evolution to do so is like saying that Rembrandt produced his work by throwing millions of paint buckets at the canvas in the hope that one day the result would be a masterpiece.

Alun Lewis
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    Could God create a masterpiece by throwing millions of paint buckets at a canvas? – WillRoss1 Jan 10 '20 at 23:40
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    There is a moral dimension to all this. To bring about the creation of a perfect world by a process of death and decay is not only absurd but evil. A good God would not do this. The death and decay that we see around us is the result of man's sin and came after the original creation. – Alun Lewis Jan 11 '20 at 06:12
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    How convenient... – armand Jan 11 '20 at 14:42
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    I fail to see how the outward results of someone's belief system is at all related to the truth or falsity of those beliefs. If an entire society firmly believes that they will be struck down instantly by a lightning bolt should they ever lie, steal, or murder, it will be a very well-behaved society. But just because their belief results in a better society doesn't make it true. Even if the outworking of a firm belief in creationism is a more perfect society, that is completely orthogonal to whether or not creationism is an accurate description of how we got here. – Nuclear Hoagie Jan 16 '20 at 20:39
  • @Nuclear Wang This is where I have to disagree. I'm saying that character is a litmus test of the truth of one's beliefs. Believe in retributive lightning bolts and you will never appreciate that God is merciful and loving. You will become like the harsh God that you worship. Ultimately though you have to taste and see that God is good. Then you'll know the truth in its full life - giving power – Alun Lewis Jan 17 '20 at 22:57
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    @AlunLewis _I cannot help but correlate that decline with the replacement of belief in a loving Creator God with adherence to the doctrine of 'survival of the fittest' and the 'selfish gene'._ What does morality have to do with the truth of a scientific theory? Even accepting that evolution created doubt in the minds of those who believed in God (if i follow your reasoning), is their moral behaviour really the result of scientific evidence? That's utter nonsense. **Maybe, and most likely, it's the result that their God based morality wasn't so good after all.** –  Jan 20 '20 at 18:22
  • @Pyrott People that believe they are animals end up behaving like animals. As a proponent of evolution, what basis do you have for saying that killing someone else to further your own ends is wrong? – Alun Lewis Jan 21 '20 at 19:18
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    @AlunLewis So 97% of the scientific community behaves like animals... It's not very smart to refuse years and years of evidence on the basis of how people behave. People's behaviour doesn't even come close to be a "test" on the truth of a scientific theory. That's a problem with how people react to evidence, not a problem with the evidence itself. To answer your question: law enforcement organizations kill terrorists to further our own ends sometimes. Or should we let them kill innocents? Wrongness is contextual. There's no absolute answer as your God believes. –  Jan 21 '20 at 22:29
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How does one find Truth is the same as it's always been: seek with an earnest heart. Perhaps that is what you are doing now, so here is my answer from the universe.

Dr. Phillips is wrong. Just like Hegel suggested you can find a synthesis between two opposing viewpoints without compromising either. There is always another line between any set of data. So never get too complacent. Both science and religion have fallen into this trap: narcissism. They are in love with their own models. Yet their models obviously have not accounted for everything otherwise there'd be no conflict and the world would be at peace.

The following is from the Messianic prophesy of the Jews. You can marry the two with having multiple dimensions of Time. The physicist Richard Feynmann posited the existence of loops of time, energy, and particles (what I've called Feynmann Loops). With two dimensions of time you can reconcile of the conflicts between what happened with science after the discovery of the Americas (and a whole new race of humans) and their own history going back to the Jews and Ancient Egypt.

There is always a way to find the Truth. Remember that. Most people are simply fairly content without it, so it took us 5000 years to have the sophistication to understand GOD and the Universe itself. But yet, the Truth never changed...

Marxos
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