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Does The Big Bang Require An Absolute Beginning To The Universe?

Has Dr. Sean Carroll escaped the theistic implications of the Big Bang?

Does The Universe Have A Cause?

One of the most popular arguments for God’s existence is the argument from the beginning of the universe. It goes like this:

1. Everything that begins to exist has a cause.

2. The universe has a beginning

3. Therefore, the universe has a cause.

That conclusion serves as a springboard to identify that the cause of the universe must be timeless, spaceless, and possess immense causal power. When combined with other scientific observations of the universe, it is implied that this cause additionally is both intelligent and personal. The argument from the beginning of the universe provides powerful evidence that God is the Cause of the universe.

Because this argument’s reasoning is valid and its conclusion strongly implies theism, atheists commonly attack the argument by denying one of its premises: namely, the second one, that the universe had a beginning. Dr. Sean Carroll is one such atheist. He attempts to escape the theistic implications of the beginning of the universe without denying the (appearance of a) beginning of the universe. A friend presented to me this slideshow from Dr. Carroll not too long ago:

What We (Don’t) Know About The Beginning Of The Universe

What We Don’t Know

In this presentation, Dr. Carroll points to the reality that scientists can peer all the way back into the history of the universe except for the precious few moments after the cosmic creation event that we call the “big bang.” He appeals to this unknown epoch of time to claim that it is illegitimate to ask if the universe had a beginning. But rather he says that the question should be “is it plausible that the laws of physics allow for a universe with a beginning?” His answer is “yes, the laws of physics do allow for a universe with a beginning.” This means that Dr. Carroll is positing that the laws of physics exist outside and independent of this universe, exist eternally, and permit the appearance of a universe that has a beginning (our universe).

Already, Dr. Carroll has claimed that the super-natural exists- the necessary and inescapable implication of the argument from the beginning of the universe. His view is that there is something that exists eternally beyond this universe, so while he may be an atheist, he is still a super-naturalist. This is important to keep in mind through the rest of this discussion.

Because super-natural laws of physics could exist eternally, they permit an eternally existent reality (one with no beginning and no need for a Cause). So, Dr. Carroll posits that the only question we have is, “what is the nature of that eternal reality that allows for a beginning of the universe we live in?” He presents several different models and offers that one of these or a yet-to-be-theorized model could also be on the table.

If Dr. Carroll is sound in his reasoning, the major implication here is that the universe’s creation at the big bang does not necessarily posit a Creator of physical reality. And on first glance, it appears that Dr. Carroll has been successful in his attempted undermining of the argument from the beginning of the universe for God’s existence. For those who are not familiar with the argument from the beginning, please take a few minutes to watch this video from Reasonable Faith:

No Time, But Time

With all due respect to Dr. Carroll as a theoretical quantum physicist, he is not a philosopher and makes three elementary mistakes in his argument. Each mistake individually undermines his conclusion.

First, his logic allows him to argue from the plausibility of an eternal physical reality permitted by super-natural laws of physics to the plausibility of an eternal physical reality. Here is his argument formalized:

1. The reality that exists can be fully described by super-natural laws of physics (sans time).
2. The super-natural laws of physics (sans time) allow for an eternal reality.
3. Therefore, the reality that exists allows for an eternal reality.
The parenthetical phrase is quite important to this argument because Dr. Carroll must grant that time, as we experience it, began to exist with the big bang. However, he cautions the viewer in Slide 8, that “there was an initial moment — a time before which there was no time” (emphasis added). By that he is saying that there is a super-natural time or another dimension of time. The time that we experience exists within this other time, and the time that we experience had a beginning within this other time.

It is this super-natural time that serves as the defeater for both premises of his argument (because both premises rely on it). Considering the fact that his laws of physics exist outside of this universe, they are bound by this super-natural time. An eternal reality requires a series of an infinite number of past moments. The discovery that our universe has a beginning places a hard stop on the number of past moments, so our universe is demonstrably not eternal and has a definite beginning. Dr. Carroll, though, attempts to escape a beginning to all physical reality by positing this super-natural time.

It is this super-natural time that he is claiming to be eternal- with an infinite number of past moments already traversed and an infinite number of future moments yet to be traversed. But he has a problem. An actual infinity is asymptotic, meaning that infinity is a theoretical boundary that is approached but never reached. This is a feature of mathematics that must also exist outside our universe to constrain the laws of physics which Dr. Carroll already assumed exist outside our universe. If the moments in this super-natural time can be counted using numbers, mathematics necessarily constrains this super-natural time, as well. If Dr. Carroll’s super-natural time is past-eternal, then an infinite number of moments have happened. But because it is a necessary feature of mathematics that an actual infinite number is impossible to reach, it is also impossible that an infinite number of moments have happened. Thus it is impossible that supernatural reality is infinite into the past no matter what kind of time is posited. Without the greater reality existing into the infinite past, it is not eternally existent, thus it also had a beginning.

Dr. Carroll knows that time, as we experience it in this universe, comes to an absolute beginning; however, he does not seem to recognize that the laws of physics are not the only thing that cause the present time to come to an absolute beginning- mathematics does as well. The laws of physics, that govern the expansion of our universe, just dictate where along the time-line that absolute beginning is located for our universe (approximately 13.7 billion years ago). All he has done by positing a super-natural time is to move the problem back one step. The super-natural time, though not limited by the laws of physics that govern our universe (or the super-natural yet physical reality of Dr. Carroll), is constrained by mathematics, which necessarily forces that super-natural time to an absolute beginning.

Dr. Carroll’s first philosophical mistake is that he has undermined both of his own premises as he is making his argument for his conclusion. He has attempted to escape a necessary implication of time by positing another type of time, but even that type of time is stuck with the necessary implication he is trying to avoid. Without the truth of his two premises, his conclusion does not follow. Not only that, the conclusion that he is trying to undermine (that physical reality had a beginning) is only delayed by one step, but it still is necessarily true.

Cherry-Picking

Dr. Carroll posits that while we may not know what kind of universe we live in, it is some kind of eternal universe where time (in one sense or another) exists in the infinite past. Dr. Carroll presents the naturalist with many options to choose from or they are permitted to suspend their choice for a better model: cyclic universes, hibernating universes, reproducing universes, and time-symmetric multiverses.

All of these cosmologies have one feature in common that, if impossible, makes them all impossible (regardless of which one you wish to choose). This feature is the past series of infinite moments that was demonstrated as impossible above. Even if the naturalist were to suspend their commitment to a particular model, they have not suspended their commitment to a past series of an infinite number of moments. Thus, they are still committing themselves to an impossibility.

Now, Dr. Carroll uses the unknown of the initial moments of the universe to argue that it is possible at this universe is part of a larger, eternal reality. But this is not a matter of epistemology (what we have not yet discovered, in this case) but a matter of ontology (what is impossible). What is impossible (ontology) cannot be discovered (epistemology). Epistemology is necessarily confined by ontology. What is possible to be known is necessarily limited by what is impossible to exist. Dr. Carroll has taken only a portion of the full evidential base of reality to make his case and has ignored (or is ignorant of the implications of) the larger evidential base. (The larger evidential base that I am referring to is that of the constraints on reality by mathematics explained above).

His second error is that he has cherry-picked the evidence of the flexibility of laws of physics in support of his view and ignored the evidence of constraints of mathematics that would defeat his view.

God of the Gaps?

According to Dr. Carroll, the options to explain our universe’s beginning are endless, so why must we feel committed to choosing God? This would be a classic example of god-of-the-gaps reasoning. An <option>-of-the-gaps reasoning is an improper application of the process of elimination. The process of elimination is an evidential knock-out exercise. You start with many options on the table of possibility and remove them based upon their impossibility of explaining the evidence available. If you are to conclude that one option is correct without having logically removed the other options, then you have committed an <option>-of-the-gaps fallacy. However, if you have knocked-out the other options based upon the evidence, then the conclusion that the remaining one is possible (or even true) is logical, and no fallacy has been committed. All sorts of diagnosticians use this reasoning method in their work to identify causes of problems and resolve them: computer technicians, auto mechanics, medical doctors, etc.

Dr. Carroll presents several eternal cosmologies (super-natural but physical realities) as being on the table, which they are, until we evaluate them evidentially based upon the nature of mathematics. Once mathematics is brought to bear upon the options on the table, all eternal cosmologies are logically (thus legitimately) knocked out and removed from the table of options. Thus, only cosmologies with a beginning still exist on the table of possibility.

Dr. Carroll has not evidentially eliminated cosmologies with a beginning from the table, and he has concluded that an eternal cosmology is correct. An “eternal universe-of-the-gaps” fallacy has been offered by Dr. Carroll as an alternative to the sound argument from the universe’s beginning for God’s existence. Yet the theist has evidentially and logically removed eternal cosmologies from the table of options, thus they are not committing a “beginning/god-of-the-gaps fallacy” when they conclude that all physical reality had an ultimate beginning.

Contrary to Dr. Carroll’s claims, his critics have not committed an <option>-of-the-gaps fallacy by not removing other options from the table legitimately; it is Dr. Carroll who has not evidentially or logically removed an ultimate beginning to reality from the table, thus he is the party that is guilty of his own accusation- the commission of an <option>-of-the-gaps fallacy- His third mistake.

“Proof of the beginning of time probably ranks as the most theologically significant theorem. This great significance arises from the theorem establishing that the universe must be caused by some Entity capable of creating the universe entirely independent of space and time. Such an entity matches the attributes of the God of the Bible…”- Hugh Ross

A Way of Escape: Denying Logic

A way to avoid these necessary implications, though, is to deny that logic (thus denying mathematics as well) and these philosophical categories exist either prior to the big bang or without the universe is to ultimately destroy any foundation by which to ground or govern ANY quantum (physical) and/or metaphysical (non-physical, including natural or super-natural) causal activity prior to the big bang and/or outside this universe. This move would rule out ALL causes, which would mean that Dr. Carroll must offer a model for the cause of the big bang and/or origin of the singularity with the non-existence of logic, mathematics and causes.

And let’s make this just a bit more difficult for Dr. Carroll: in order for logic and mathematics to exist, they must have a foundation outside of even his super-natural reality for his super-natural reality to be governed by them. God is the only source of such a foundation, so even if Dr. Carroll was correct that a supernatural reality does exist, God is still necessary and cannot be logically escaped. For more on this, please check out my posts “6 Ways Atheism Is A Science Stopper” and “The Multiverse Instead of God?: Four Philosophical Problems.”

Conclusion

So, Dr. Carroll is correct that we do not know those early moments of the universe. But that does not give us a reason to think that God is not necessary. What we know from other knowledge disciplines simply defeats Dr. Carroll’s attempts to escape the God of the Bible. Because of what we know from the other knowledge disciplines, his appeals to unknown features of reality simply do not help his conclusion. The fact that he has to ignore these other knowledge disciplines (which ironically ground his own discipline) in order to make his case is telling. Dr. Hugh Ross put it quite nicely in his book “The Creator and the Cosmos: How The Latest Scientific Discoveries Reveal God“:

Does Archaeological Evidence Confirm Names, Dates, And Places In The Bible?

4. Is the NT True?, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Wintery Knight

I spotted this post on Be Thinking by UK apologist Peter S. Williams. (H/T Eric Chabot at Think Apologetics)

So let me pick the ones I liked most for this post.

Here’s a good one:

Jerusalem and The Pool of Bethesda

John 5:1-15 describes a pool in Jerusalem, near the Sheep Gate, called Bethesda, surrounded by five covered colonnades. Until the 19th century, there was no evidence outside of John for the existence of this pool, and John’s unusual description “caused bible scholars to doubt the reliability of John’s account, but the pool was duly uncovered in the 1930s – with four colonnades around its edges and one across its middle.”[38] Ian Wilson reports: “Exhaustive excavations by Israeli archaeologist Professor Joachim Jeremias have brought to light precisely such a building, still including two huge, deep-cut cisterns, in the environs of Jerusalem’s Crusader Church of St Anne.”[39]

And this one:

Jerusalem and The Pool of Siloam

In the 400s AD, a church was built above a pool attached to Hezekiah’s water tunnel to commemorate the healing of a blind man reported in John 9:1-7. Until recently, this was considered to be the Pool of Siloam from the time of Christ. However, during sewerage works in June 2004 engineers stumbled upon a 1stcentury ritual pool when they uncovered some ancient steps during pipe maintenance near the mouth of Hezekiah’s tunnel. By the summer of 2005, archaeologists had revealed what was “without doubt the missing pool of Siloam.”[40] Mark D. Roberts reports that: “In the plaster of this pool were found coins that establish the date of the pool to the years before and after Jesus. There is little question that this is in fact the pool of Siloam, to which Jesus sent the blind man in John 9.”[41]

I just read this one because I am working my way through John. In case you haven’t read John, you really should it’s my favorite gospel.

Here’s another one:

Herod the Great

We have a bronze coin minted by Herod the Great. On the obverse side (i.e. the bottom) is a tripod and ceremonial bowl with the inscription ‘Herod king’ and the year the coin was struck, ‘year 3’ (of Herod’s reign), or 37 BC.

In 1996 Israeli Professor of Archaeology Ehud Netzer discovered in Masada a piece of broken pottery with an inscription, called an ostracon. This piece had Herod’s name on it and was part of an amphora used for transportation (probably wine), dated to c. 19 BC. The inscription is in Latin and reads, “Herod the Great King of the Jews (or Judea)”, the first such that mentions the full title of King Herod.

Herodium is a man-made mountain in the Judean wilderness rising over 2,475 feet above sea level. In 23 BC Herod the Great built a palace-fortress here on top of a natural hill. Seven stories of living rooms, storage areas, cisterns, a bathhouse, and a courtyard filled with bushes and flowering plants were constructed. The whole complex was surrounded and partly buried by a sloping fill of earth and gravel. Herod’s tomb and sarcophagus were discovered at the base of Herodium by archaeologist Ehud Netzer in 2007.

And one more:

The ‘James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus’ Ossuary

James, the brother of Jesus, was martyred in AD 62. A mid-1st century AD chalk ossuary discovered in 2002 bears the inscription “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus” ( ‘Ya’akov bar Yosef akhui di Yeshua’). Historian Paul L. Maier states that“there is strong (though not absolutely conclusive) evidence that, yes, the ossuary and its inscription are not only authentic but that the inscribed names are the New Testament personalities.“[68] New Testament scholar Ben Witherington states that: “If, as seems probable, the ossuary found in the vicinity of Jerusalem and dated to about AD 63 is indeed the burial box of James, the brother of Jesus, this inscription is the most important extra-biblical evidence of its kind.”[69] According to Hershel Shanks, editor in chief of the Biblical Archaeological Review: “This box is [more] likely the ossuary of James, the brother of Jesus of Nazareth, than not. In my opinion … it is likely that this inscription does mention James and Joseph and Jesus of the New Testament.”

And finally one short one:

Tiberius Caesar

The Denarius coin, 14-37 AD, is commonly referred to as the ‘Tribute Penny’ from the Bible. The coin shows a portrait of Tiberius Caesar. Craig L. Blomberg comments: “Jesus’ famous saying about giving to Caesar what was his and to God what his (Mark 12:17 and parallels) makes even more sense when one discovers that most of the Roman coins in use at the time had images of Caesar on them.”[48]

This is a good article to bookmark in case you are ever looking for a quick, searchable reference on archaeology and the Bible. There are many more examples in that post.

Now some people might be wondering why archaeology doesn’t confirm every detail in the New Testament. And here’s what J. Warner Wallace has to say about that:

But what are we to say to those who argue the Biblical archeological record is incomplete? The answer is best delivered by another expert witness in the field, Dr. Edwin Yamauchi, historian, and Professor Emeritus at Miami University. Yamauchi wrote a book entitled, The Stones and the Scripture, where he rightly noted that archaeological evidence is a matter of “fractions”:

Only a fraction of the world’s archaeological evidence still survives in the ground.

Only a fraction of the possible archaeological sites have been discovered.

Only a fraction have been excavated, and those only partially.

Only a fraction of those partial excavations have been thoroughly examined and published.

Only a fraction of what has been examined and published has anything to do with the claims of the Bible!

See the problem? In spite of these limits, we still have a robust collection of archaeological evidences confirming the narratives of the New Testament (both in the gospel accounts and in the Book of Acts). We shouldn’t hesitate to use what we do know archaeologically in combination with other lines of evidence. Archaeology may not be able to tell us everything, but it can help us fill in the circumstantial case as we corroborate the gospel record.

I think you can form an opinion about the whole New Testament based on the record of confirmations. The verdict is in: the New Testament should be presumed trustworthy.

Should Christians be one-issue voters? with Scott Klusendorf

Podcast

Podcast: Play in new window

The creator of VeggieTales, Phil Vischer, just put out a video causing some Christians to doubt the importance of voting for pro-life candidates. Frank wrote a response to the video that you can access at Crossexamined.org. On this show, pro-life author and trainer, Scott Klusendorf, joins Frank to discuss the flaws in Mr. Vischer’s video and to make the case for life in a concise way. They also respond to some of the most prominent pro-abortion objections and show that Christians do not qualify a candidate on one issue, but we rightfully disqualify a candidate on one issue. Just watch the one minute video at caseforlife.com to see why (this is a video that YouTube tried to censor).

If you want to send us a question for the show, please email us at Hello@CrossExamined.org.

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October 30, 2020/by Frank Turek

Are The Accounts Of Jesus’s Ascension Contradictory?

4. Is the NT True?

By Erik Manning

Bart Ehrman says that the author of Luke can’t seem to get the story of the Ascension of Jesus right. In his Gospel, Luke says that Jesus ascended into heaven the day of his resurrection. In The Acts of the Apostles, Jesus hung around for 40 days before leaving his disciples. Dr. Ehrman writes in his blog:

“In Luke 24 (you can read it for yourself and see) Jesus rises from the dead, on that day meets with his disciples, and then, again that day, he ascends to heaven from the town of Bethany. But when you read Acts 1, written by the same author, you find that Jesus did not ascend on that day or that place. Jesus instead spends forty days with his disciples proving to them that he had been raised from the dead (it’s not clear why he would have to prove it! Let alone do so for forty days!), and only then – forty days after his resurrection – does he ascend. And here he ascends not from Bethany but Jerusalem. Luke tells the same story twice, and in two radically different ways. Historical accuracy does not appear to be his major concern.”

Luke And Compression

But there’s a problem here. Luke doesn’t say Jesus’ ascension took place on the same day as the resurrection. There are no indicators of time in the account of the stories. What Luke is doing is using a literary device called compression, which is a standard rhetorical method for the reporting of the time. Compression is taking a longer storyline and putting it into a brief form.

As philosopher Tim McGrew points out, other ancient historians have used this device, including Sallust, Lucian, Cicero, and Quintillian. (Historiae, Vera Historia 56-57, De Orateore 3.27.104-105, Institutio Oratoria 8.4)

Luke uses this technique elsewhere. Paul tells us he went to Arabia for three years after his conversion. Let’s read Galatians 1:16-20:

“I was pleased to reveal his Son to me, in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately consult with anyone; nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me, but I went away into Arabia, and returned again to Damascus. Then after three years, I went up to Jerusalem to visit Cephas and remained with him for fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James the Lord’s brother. (In what I am writing to you, before God, I do not lie!)”

But if we read Acts 9:23-26 at face value, it seems like Paul goes directly into Jerusalem:

“When many days had passed, the Jews plotted to kill him, but their plot became known to Saul. They were watching the gates day and night in order to kill him, but his disciples took him by night and let him down through an opening in the wall, lowering him in a basket. And when he had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples. And they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple.

But this isn’t a contradiction. Just how long of a period is ‘many days’? If we’re only reading Acts, it doesn’t necessarily feel like a 3-year period, although it certainly could be. (See 1 Kings 2:38-39) So what about the journey to Arabia? Luke doesn’t mention it, but that doesn’t necessarily contradict Paul’s story in Galatians. This trip may have happened within Luke’s ‘many days’ in Acts 9:23, and Luke omits it.

This is an example of Luke taking related events where he omits time as well as some of the details. If we aren’t reading carefully we can assume they’re totally complete.

Luke also leaves a 4-year gap between Acts 12 and 13, and he also omits Jesus’ family trip to Egypt that we find in Matthew. Luke isn’t claiming to give a total account of Jesus’ life. That’s not how ancient biography works.

Compression And Other Gospel Writers

Moreover, Luke wasn’t the only Gospel writer to use such a technique. Matthew used compression in the story of the centurion’s servant. He omits all remarks of the Jewish elders and the centurion’s friends who served as go-betweens in Luke’s account.

He compresses the story by leaving out these extra people and stages of the narrative. (Compare Matthew 8:5-13 with Luke 7:10) Some have tried to say this is a contradiction, but they just don’t understand compression.

Likewise, Matthew 9:18-26 compresses the story of the healing of Jairus’ daughter. Mark gives us a much longer version of the story with two different stages of development. In the first stage, Jairus’ daughter was sick to the point of death. In the second stage, the messengers come and tell Jairus that his little girl just died.

Matthew gets to the point — the daughter dies, and Jesus raises her back to life. Matthew takes 176 words (at least in our English Bible) for what Mark takes 481 words to tell us. Ehrman has tried to complain that these accounts are also irreconcilable but they’re not when we understand that Matthew is telescoping the events.

But What About The Location Of The Ascension?

But Bart isn’t done. Remember that in the above quote, he also said Luke gets confused with the location of the ascension. But let’s look at the text for ourselves rather than accept Ehrman’s portrayal of it.

Here’s Luke 24:50-51:

“And he led them out as far as Bethany, and lifting up his hands he blessed them. While he blessed them, he parted from them and was carried up into heaven.”

And here’s Acts 1:12:

“Then they returned to Jerusalem from the mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day’s journey away.”

Let’s take a look at a map:

Um…where exactly is the contradiction here? It at least feels like Dr. Ehrman is looking for trouble where there is none.

Does Luke Contradict Matthew? Go To Galilee Or Stay In Jerusalem?

But Dr. Ehrman has one more parting shot. In his book, Jesus, Interrupted he says that Matthew and Luke disagree regarding the ascension.

In Matthew’s version, the disciples are told to go to Galilee to meet Jesus, and they immediately do so. He appears to them there and gives them their final instruction. But in Luke, the disciples are not told to go to Galilee. They are told that Jesus had foretold his resurrection while he was in Galilee (during his public ministry). And they never leave Jerusalem—in the southern part of Israel, a different region from Galilee, in the north. On the day of the resurrection Jesus appears to two disciples on the “road to Emmaus” (24:13–35); later that day these disciples tell the others what they have seen, and Jesus appears to all of them (24:36–49), and then Jesus takes them to Bethany on the outskirts of Jerusalem 1s gives them their instructions and ascends to heaven. In Luke’s next volume, Acts, we’re told that the disciples are in fact explicitly told by Jesus after his resurrection not to leave Jerusalem (Acts 1:4), but to stay there until they receive the Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost, fifty days after Passover. After giving his instructions, Jesus then ascends to heaven. The disciples do stay in Jerusalem until the Holy Spirit comes (Acts 2). And so the discrepancy: If Matthew is right, that the disciples immediately go to Galilee and see Jesus ascend from there, how can Luke be right that the disciples stay in Jerusalem the whole time, see Jesus ascend from there, and stay on until the day of Pentecost?

p. 49

The problem here is Matthew never says Jesus ascends right then and there. Read the text for yourself:

“Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:17-20

Bart simply assumes that the ascension happens here because this is where Matthew concludes his Gospel, but the ascension actually isn’t actually in the passage.

Furthermore, Dr. Ehrman also assumes that Jesus commanded his apostles to “stay in the city of Jerusalem until you have been clothed with power from on high” on the same day that he rose. We all know that commonly the four evangelists jumped around from story to story without always giving the actual time or precise order of when things were done or taught. Luke leaves out the post-resurrection appearances in Galilee mentioned by Matthew, but he never says Jesus remained only in Jerusalem from the day he rose until his ascension. Ehrman seems to think that every telling of every event should include every important detail about it. But why should we assume that?

Remember that Luke is compressing the story. While we have clear time indications (Luke 24:1, 13, 21, 29, 33) that the first 43 verses took place on the day of Christ’s resurrection, the sayings found in Luke 24:44-49 could have taken place at any time during the five weeks that Jesus stuck around in Acts 1:1-12. Luke gives no explicit time indicator when these sayings were made.

Don’t Doubt Luke. Doubt Bart.

Luke, possibly running low out on his scroll, gets down to the nitty-gritty and telescopes his story, perhaps knowing that he’s going to write his sequel very soon.

Far from being a sloppy historian who is only interested in telling us some theological story and not the facts, Luke is using standard rhetorical devices and isn’t at all contradicting himself in the details. Bart speculates elsewhere that this story is so contradictory that the ascension in Luke must be an interpolation by an unthinking scribe, but there’s no reason to go there based on what we’ve seen here.

I think we should be far more skeptical of Bart’s representations of the text than Luke’s Gospel.

Evidence in the Flesh for Apologetics

2. Does God Exist?, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Dawn Simon

I was raised in a family and a community where religious beliefs were considered personal and virtually never discussed. I attended a Catholic grade school and continued with religion classes through high school. I was a good student and knew what I was supposed to believe – but no matter how hard I tried, I just could not convince myself that any of it was true.

I had a long list of questions but mostly kept those to myself. I was pretty sure that these doubts made me a bad person and I was not eager to advertise this fact. The few times I did seek help left me feeling that there were no answers to my questions. I developed an idea that belief in God was some sort of magical thinking – and while I too desperately wanted this magic, it clearly was not meant for me. Another difficulty I faced was that believers always seemed so sure about their faith. I am not a person who is certain about anything – this too made me think that Christianity – or faith of any kind was not for me.

Moving ahead to my time now in Kearney, Nebraska – I moved here in 2009 and met Tim Stratton a few years later when he was in the early stages of developing his FreeThinking Argument for the existence of God. At this time, there was a fair bit of noise being made in the local newspaper about issues related to evolution and it was attracting attention at work. Because of this I started regularly reading the opinion pieces, as well as associated comments. The name Tim Stratton appeared frequently. To be clear, I did not agree with a single thing he wrote. However, he was unfailingly kind, whereas some people on “my side” were behaving atrociously. This was the first thing I noticed about Tim – and if not for that, I truly might still be an atheist today.

I was able to meet Tim in person at a local public outreach event about evolution. This was a brief meeting – but a short time later he added me as a Facebook friend. This is when the arguing started in earnest (and to be honest has not completely ceased to this day – we just argue about different things now). For a period of about two months, we exchanged messages almost daily that initially were centered on his FreeThinking Argument for the Existence of God. Those discussions could probably best be summarized as exchanges where I would tell him I was not convinced of some specific point (which is my default position) and then Tim would both encourage me and try to convince me. If you know either of us, you already know that these were not short discussions.

About a month into this I was forced to admit — contra many scientifically-minded atheists — that while I was not certain, I did think humans possessed libertarian free will. It is worth noting here that in my discussions with Tim, I had already been relieved of the notion that one needed to be absolutely certain to believe something was true. The natural extension of this was that if I believed I had free will, according to Tim’s argument (which despite my best efforts seemed strong) meant I also believed in God. This realization took my breath away (and the memory of it still does the same) – I know exactly where I was and what I was doing when for the first time in my life I felt like God was talking directly to me.

This was just the beginning though – it took at least 6 months more before I called myself a Christian (Mike Licona’s work on the historical Resurrection eventually sealed the deal). It was an incredibly tumultuous time in my life. I was starting to really believe that Christianity was probably true and while part of me found that exciting, a bigger part was truly terrified at the prospect. Tim helped me at every single step of the way – I have countless stories of doubts and fears that he helped me through with reason and kindness.

During this time, I could not help but compare my conversion story to that of others – and I will admit I found it frustrating. Tim would tell me about other people he had helped and how in a 24-hour period they accepted Jesus Christ as their savior. It was hard for me to understand how this was possible and to be honest, I didn’t think it was fair. Why was it so much work for me? What I came to realize – surely with God’s help – was that my conversion story had to be different because of how I am wired. If God had appeared to me in the flesh, I am certain I would be more convinced of a brain tumor than God’s existence. Reason and argument was the only way it could work for me. I am not proud of that, but it is the truth. I am profoundly grateful that God is able to reach people in a myriad of ways – and specifically that he used Tim and apologetics to reach me.

What Does Thermodynamics Have To Do With The Origin Of The Universe?

2. Does God Exist?, Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Bob Perry

Big Bang cosmology isn’t the only scientific evidence that the universe had a beginning. There are parallel laws of nature that point us to the same conclusion. We get one of them from the study of thermodynamics. This is not something that is hard to comprehend. You already understand it because you have to charge your cell phone every night.

A battery contains a fixed amount of energy. You can use that energy but you won’t get any more. If you don’t plug it in to recharge it, the battery will eventually go dead. As far as we know, the universe is a “closed system” similar to a giant battery. But it’s not rechargeable.

Barring some outside influence, this kind of process can only go in one direction. We all recognize that this is how energy works. It’s not a mystery. It’s a simple concept that is based on a couple of natural laws:

The Law of Conservation of Energy — energy is neither created nor destroyed; it can only be transformed from one form to another.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics — in a closed system, the total entropy of the system will always increase and this process is irreversible.

So, let’s put these together.

Don’t be freaked out by the term, “entropy.” Think of it as “level of chaos.” Just like the battery, there is only a finite amount of energy in a closed system. The amount of energy cannot be increased; it can only be transformed to a higher level of chaos. An example might help.

To Understand The Second Law Of Thermodynamics, Burn A Match

You have a match in your hand. The head of the match is made of combustible material that has the potential to create a flame. The amount of potential energy concentrated in the head of the match and is fixed. It cannot increase. When you strike the match, the potential chemical energy in the head of the match converts to heat energy in a flame. Then, the heat energy from the flame disperses into the room. Our energy system has gone from a concentrated potential energy source to a flame, to a random dispersal of heat into the air. In other words, it has taken a more “chaotic” form. When we say that “entropy has increased,” that is all it means.

Here’s the key — the process will not go in the opposite direction. You won’t see the heat content in a room suddenly coagulate into a single flame, and then reorganize that flame into a concentrated ball of chemical energy in a single location (like the head of a match). The very idea of such a thing is ridiculous.

Thermodynamics tells us that energy only goes in one direction

The Universe – A Giant Battery

The universe works the same way. Like a giant battery, it contains a fixed amount of energy. As time marches on, the energy inside it becomes more and more useless as it disperses. The “chaos” level (entropy) of the entire system is always increasing. At some point, the usefulness of the energy will run out altogether. Scientists call this “heat death.” The universe is headed toward heat death.

This is a law of nature. It is the basis for the operation of everything from the engine that launches a rocket into orbit, to the biological machinery that runs every cell in your body. And what it means is that we know the whole system — the whole universe — must have started this energy transforming process when its “battery” was full.

The universe had to have a beginning. And, for the same reasons mentioned in our discussion of the cosmological argument, something outside the known universe must have flipped the switch to initiate the beginning of the process. Listen to Frank Turek’s short explanation for the Second Law…

https://youtu.be/Q6tv_L0Bn5w

… and how William Lane Craig connects it to a cosmic beginning:

https://youtu.be/atnk5VBVd-g

The Price of Panic, with Dr. Jay Richards

Podcast

Podcast: Play in new window

What have we learned from the COVID pandemic and our response to it? Does the data show that the lockdown worked? What was the total human cost of the lockdown? What steps did the media take to disseminate “panic porn”? Why were the models so wrong? Why do we have conflicting scientific opinions? How many people really did die from COVID? Is the current increase in cases really something to worry about? What is the death rate and are deaths going up or down? How should we respond to this time?

Dr. Jay Richards joins Frank to discuss those and other questions related to his timely new book “The Price of Panic: How the Tyranny of Experts Turned a Pandemic into a Catastrophe”.

If you want to send us a question for the show, please email us at Hello@CrossExamined.org.

October 21, 2020/by Frank Turek

The Importance of Critical Thinking

Theology and Christian Apologetics

By Kathryn, V.

As a Christian apologist, it is easy to take for granted the understanding that when we impart information to others, they clearly comprehend what we are talking about.

Now, that may be the case with well-studied and well-versed individuals who understand critical thinking, however, the average American has not been exposed to critical thinking unless they have attended university. It is an unfortunate fact that the art of critical thinking is not taught in the vast majority of either primary or secondary schools.

Critical thinking is a skill that is a threat to our culture’s view of political correctness because it encourages people to see things from a different perspective that thinks through an idea or thought and compares it with an opposing view.

Anyone who has studied our western culture for any length of time is well aware that our cultural ideologies have had more influence on the church than the church has had on the culture in the last fifty years.

The vast majority of professing Christians in America today cannot explain why they believe what they believe. This has not been ideal for the Church, as studies show that there has been a sharp decline in church attendance over the past thirty years.

The absence of critical thinking is at the center of this apathy toward the importance of validating one’s belief in absolute truth which is at the core of the Judeo-Christian faith.

Much of this lack of fervor for one’s faith is because many are not sure if the Bible is valid for today’s world. It is a fact that less than nine percent of those individuals who profess to be Christian, believe in biblical inerrancy. Why is this? Part of the answer to this question lies in the inability to think critically. To think critically requires that one ask questions, but to ask a question suggests that one may find an answer that goes against the grain and that would cause friction. It is easier to simply go along with what one is told and then formulate one’s own set of beliefs based on what one feels is right.

Human nature is consistent in that our feelings fluctuate with circumstance (John 2:25) and because of this fact it is imperative that we seek the reality that forms the foundation of our beliefs and not base our eternity on emotions and feelings. Without the knowledge of God, people perish (Hos 4:6), but we cannot truly know the Creator unless we seek him in his word.

It goes to follow, that if you do not believe in the inerrancy of Scripture then you cannot truly come to know the character and nature of God.

The problem lies in the reality that all are called to know God and to live in obedience to his word and without a basic belief that the Bible is to be trusted, then there will be a disconnect. There are numerous books that spend at least a full chapter to show how scholars critically validate the Bible, and these include helpful tools that are used in this process. What I have discovered in my own interactions with the average believer, however, is that they do not have the confidence to break down the processes that scholars use to validate the Bible. Most of the reason for this lack of confidence stems from an unfamiliarity with the terminology and processes used in historical and literary research.

It is for this reason that I decided to devote an entire book to the process of how scholars use the tools of historical and literary criticism to validate the Bible, as well as other historically-based documents. The goal is to help the reader become intimately familiar with the terms and processes that scholars use to validate the word of God.

Hopefully, my readers will use the Under Investigation workbook as a tool to help them reach others for the kingdom of God by confidently explaining the scrutiny that the Judeo-Christian Bible has gone through and how other holy books have not been able to withstand the same type of analysis and critical investigation.

Hard Evidence the Book of Acts Was Written by an Eyewitness? A Reply to Bart Ehrman

4. Is the NT True?

By Jonathan Mclatchie

Last week, New Testament scholar Dr. Bart Ehrman published an article at his blog, in which he responded to a reader who had asked him his opinion on a popular approach to arguing for the reliability of the book of Acts. The questioner specifically cites popular apologist Dr. Frank Turek and Acts scholar Dr. Colin Hemer, who have pointed to specific and detailed knowledge demonstrated in the book of Acts that reveal its author to be close up to the facts, well informed and habitually reliable. The questioner noted that “Many of these are insignificant, but others seem to be things ‘only an eyewitness could know,’ like the location of a sailor’s landmark or sea approach to a city.”

Readers who are interested in a presentation of examples of this sort of detailed and specific knowledge shown by Acts may wish to check out this webinar I did with philosopher Dr. Timothy McGrew (which also contains a solid discussion of some of Ehrman’s objections to Acts). This webinar I did with Acts scholar Dr. Craig Keener is also worth checking out. For those more inclined to read written material, I highly recommend Colin Hemer’s book The Book of Acts in the Setting of Hellenistic History, which covers many examples of this. I will also provide a few examples here to give a flavor of the sort of evidence we are talking about. I will list a handful of instances of the titles of local officials that Luke so effortlessly gets right.

Luke gets right the precise designation for the magistrates of the colony at Philippi as στρατηγοὶ (Acts 16:22), following the general term ἄρχοντας in verse 19. Luke also uses the correct term πολιτάρχας of the magistrates in Thessalonica (17:6). He also gets right the term Ἀρεοπαγίτης as the appropriate title for the member of the court in Areopagus (Acts 17:34). He also correctly identifies Gallio as proconsul, resident in Corinth (18:12), an allusion that allows us to date the events to the period of summer of 51 A.D. to the spring of 52 A.D., since that is when Gallio served as proconsul of Achaia. Luke also uses the correct title, γραμματεὺς, for the chief executive magistrate in Ephesus (19:35), found in inscriptions there. Furthermore, when Luke tells us of the riot in Ephesus, he indicates that the city clerk told the crowd that “There are proconsuls” (Acts 19:38). A proconsul is a Roman authority to whom one might take a complaint. Normally, there was only one. So, why does Luke so casually use the plural term (ἀνθύπατοί) here? It turns out that, just at that particular time, there was in fact two as a result of the assassination by poisoning, in the fall of 54 A.D., of the previous proconsul, Silanus (see Tacitus’ Annals 13.1). This, again, is something that would be rather difficult to get right by fluke.

Luke even uses the correct Athenian slang word that the Athenians use of Paul in 17:18, σπερμολόγος (literally, “seed picker”), as well as the term used of the court in 17:19 — Ἄρειον Πάγον, meaning “the hill of Ares”.

Luke also gets right numerous points of geography, sea routes and landmarks. For example, he gets right a natural crossing between correctly named ports (Acts 13:4-5). He names the proper port, Perga, for a ship crossing from Cyprus (13:13). He names the proper port, Attalia, that returning travelers would use (14:25). Luke also correctly names the place of a sailor’s landmark, Samothrace (16:11). He also correctly implies that sea travel was the most convenient means of travelling from Berea to Athens (17:14-15). As I documented in a previous article, Luke even gets the implied location of the island of Cauda correct in Acts 27, despite Ptolemy and Pliny the Elder getting it wrong. And so it goes on and on.

How does Ehrman reply to this argument? He writes,

…I do NOT appreciate Frank Turkey [sic] or Colin Hemer for making the argument, since surely they know better. If they do know better, shame on them for trying to dupe others. If they don’t know better, would someone please tell them to start thinking more clearly?

Unfortunately, in this case as we shall see, it is Bart Ehrman, not Turek or Hemer, who needs to start thinking more clearly. Ehrman asks how we know Acts to be historical reportage rather than legend. He writes,

The traditional answer is that Acts was written by an eyewitness, a person who accompanied Paul on his missionary journeys. The presumption is that if it was written by an eyewitness, then the accounts almost certainly must be historically accurate. I won’t be going into that issue here (of whether eyewitness = accurate), but if you have ever known an eyewitness to an event who got it completely wrong (and if you’re a sentient human being, I bet you have known at least one!) you can immediately see at least one aspect of the problem.

The argument here is actually not that Luke is reliable because he was an eyewitness. Rather, we infer him to be an eyewitness because of, among other things, his demonstrated reliability on so many matters. Luke’s demonstrated meticulousness and detailed accuracy as an historian reveals him to be someone who is close up to the facts, well informed, and habitually reliable. This is best explained by his being an eyewitness. And Luke’s track record of accurate reportage gives us some reason to trust him on matters on which he cannot be directly cross-checked. I discuss some of the reasons why we think Luke was an eyewitness in a previous article, so I will not repeat myself here.

Ehrman notes that,

The reason for thinking Acts was written by an eyewitness is that in four passages in these chapters, the author moves from talking about what “they” (Paul and his companions) were doing to about what “we” were doing. It sounds like he’s including himself in a number of the events as one who was there. The natural conclusion: he was an eyewitness.

This is a simplistic representation of the argument, since there is a lot more to it than that. For a scholarly discussion of why the use of the plural pronoun indicates that the author was an eyewitness, readers may refer to Craig Keener’s commentary on Acts, which covers this in detail. I mentioned in my previous article, for instance, that the “we” pronouns trail off when Paul travels through Philippi, only to reappear in Acts 20 when Paul passes once again through Philippi. This is suggestive that the author had remained behind in Philippi and subsequently re-joined Paul when Paul returned through Philippi.

Returning to the detailed knowledge shown by Acts, Ehrman thinks he has found a flaw in this argument. He writes,

If you can show that the account knows where certain places actually were, and knows details about what were in those places, and landmarks, and so on: doesn’t that show the author must have been with Paul on his journeys? Uh, why would it show *that*?? Wouldn’t it just show that he knew about these locations and what was in them? Wouldn’t you get precisely the same kind of narrative if this was someone who had traveled a good bit himself, or knew others who had, and pieced it all together?

To illustrate this point, Ehrman offers an analogy. He writes,

Suppose in 2000 years someone uncovers a story that describes an event that happened to Professor Bart Ehrman in March 2016. Professor Ehrman taught at the University of North Carolina which was located in a college town named Chapel Hill. That semester he was teaching his course on the New Testament in a large lecture classroom in a building called Hamilton Hall. On the afternoon of March 14, Professor was just leaving his office in Carolina Hall to take the three-minute walk to his classroom, when he heard a massive explosion, and going out of his building he saw that Hamilton Hall had been destroyed in an explosion, killing 172 people. Later investigators discovered that it had been caused by a gas leak.

Now, this future researcher who has uncovered the story decides to look into the archaeological record to see if the account is accurate. He learns that way back then there really was a state called North Carolina, and sees that archaeologists had indeed uncovered a town called Chapel Hill, where there really was a university. More than that, they had excavated the university and had found Carolina Hall and – mirabile dictu – there was an actual map of the campus in the ruins. It turns out one of the major lecture rooms for large classes was a short distance away, within eyesight, in Hamilton Hall. Just as in the story!! Moreover, the records of all the professors from the early 21st century were discovered, and there was a fellow named Bart Ehrman who did indeed teach courses on something called the New Testament, and was teaching one such course in Spring semester, 2016.

BINGO! This story MUST have been written by someone who was a companion of Bart Ehrman who was there to see all these things! How else would he have had all this information about NC, Chapel Hill, the university, Hamilton Hall, Carolina Hall, Bart Ehrman, and a class on the NT that particular semester? And that means Hamilton Hall really was destroyed by an explosion caused by a gas leak, right?

Uh, well, no. Millions of people know about NC, and the existence of Chapel Hill, and that there is a university there. Hundreds of thousands know about both Carolina Hall and Hamilton Hall, and have a general sense of their proximity, and that some fellow named Bart Ehrman teaches NT there. Why would the account of the gas leak-explosion have to be written by someone who was there at the time? Or even someone who knew me? Or someone who observed the event?

Ehrman speaks here as if, in the first century world, the geographical, political, terminological, and other subtle facts that the book of Acts gets right would have been widely and easily known or accessible. However, this is absolutely absurd. The argument for Acts being based on eyewitness testimony is that the book of Acts gets hard things right. Ehrman’s illustration about the University of North Carolina implies a situation where one can easily look up these facts, using modern resources like Google or Wikipedia, and include them in a fictional story. However, in the case of the book of Acts, which was written in a world without the ease of access to information that we enjoy today, Ehrman’s proposed scenario would imply that the author would have had to travel around all of those same places (or at the very least interview people who had been there) and include those very specific facts in an account of historical fiction, a genre that did not even exist at the time. Ehrman’s scenario here is very ad hoc and anachronistic.

A further issue with Ehrman’s statement is his use of the word “must.” None of us are arguing that the evidence proves that Luke was an eyewitness and traveling companion of Paul. We are talking about probabilities, and what best explains the relevant data. It is also not the case that Julius Caesar must have crossed the Rubicon, or that Abraham Lincoln must have emancipated the slaves, though the evidence for those things is very strong.

In Ehrman’s final paragraph, he writes,

I’m not saying that because of this Acts is unreliable historically. I’m saying that if someone wants to argue it is, they need to come up with good arguments instead of completely irrelevant ones. I do understand that if the author had gotten all the geographical information wrong it could be relevant to whether the account was accurate or not; my argument is that getting that kind of information right is not. If Christian apologists don’t see the difference – then I’m afraid I can’t help them.

Now, if all Ehrman meant here is that the correctness of the specific details in Acts doesn’t logically entail the historical truth of the narrative, then I would have to agree (though I do not know anyone who has ever argued that it does). However, Ehrman is here saying something that is much stronger. Here, he is asserting that the arguments in question are “completely irrelevant.” This statement is totally indefensible and is logically impossible, since it cannot simultaneously be relevant if the information is incorrect but completely irrelevant if the information is in fact correct.

We can be charitable here, however, and take him to be speaking colloquially, to mean that the relevance of accurate details in Acts is negligible or not worth speaking of. However, this too is problematic. What is the argument for this? One might conjecture that Ehrman takes it to be part of the background information that Acts is highly realistic fiction, a conclusion he has come to on independent grounds. But how does he arrive independently at this conclusion? In fact, the sort of arguments that Ehrman wields against Acts (such as alleged discrepancies with Paul’s letters) would suggest that it isn’t highly realistic fiction, since on Ehrman’s view Acts is contradicting primary sources for the life of Paul. If the author of Acts went to the trouble of visiting all of the places that he claims Paul travelled to, gathering highly specific information in order to incorporate them into his realistic fictional account of Paul’s travels, why would he also contradict the Pauline epistles, which would have been in wide circulation and therefore much more easily accessible? Ehrman’s standards in regards to those alleged discrepancies are entirely wrong. All of the contradictions Ehrman alleges between Acts and Paul’s letters, as I have documented elsewhere (e.g. see my ongoing series of reviews on this site of Ehrman’s book Jesus, Interrupted) are the result of over-readings, tendentious interpretations, and arguments from silence. The forcefulness that Ehrman ascribes to those, combined with his dismissal of the difficult details Luke gets right concerning geography and other matters as “completely irrelevant” is astounding, and really reveals his unscholarly bias against the New Testament.

To conclude, I do NOT appreciate Bart Ehrman for making the argument, since surely he knows better. If he does know better, shame on him for trying to dupe others. If he doesn’t know better, would someone please tell him to start thinking more clearly? This post by Ehrman represents yet another example of why Ehrman should no longer be taken seriously as a scholarly critic of Christianity, despite his popularity in atheistic and Muslim circles. It is time that Ehrman is called out for his poor scholarship, bad standards, and faulty epistemology. For more on that, I refer you to my ongoing series of reviews at this site of Jesus, Interrupted (part 1, part 2, part 3)

Challenges to neo-Darwinian theories of development

2. Does God Exist?, Philosophy of Science

By Julie Hannah

In Article 1, “The arising of our universe: design or chance?” I discussed evidence for the design behind our finely-tuned universe, which has convinced some mainstream scientists of the existence of a transcendent Creator. Article 2, “Can living cells arise randomly from non-living chemicals?” presented recent research findings that call into question the theory that living cells could have arisen from random operations on non-living chemicals. This article considers challenges to reductionist aspects of neo-Darwinian theories of evolution.

How does science account for the range of complex life forms? According to the deterministic neo-Darwinian Modern Synthesis model, random errors in DNA-copying cause mutations, and only some of the resulting forms survive the environmental process of natural selection. It is generally agreed that these gene-driven processes can account for some aspects of development, but many scientists are questioning whether they can fully explain the complexity of all life forms. Eugene Koonin, an evolutionary biologist at the National Center for Biotechnology Information makes this blunt observation: “The summary of the state of affairs on the 150th anniversary of the Origin is somewhat shocking: in the post-genomic era, all major tenets of the Modern Synthesis are, if not outright overturned, replaced by a new and incomparably more complex vision of the key aspects of evolution. So, not to mince words, the Modern Synthesis is gone” (“Origin at 150,” 474–75).

Standard evolutionary theory is being challenged in the following three major areas.

Challenge 1: Only small, continuous changes?

Microevolution involves minor genetic mutations and natural selection. But according to geneticists Baguñà and Garcia-Fernàndez, repeated microevolution does not explain major evolutionary transitions, and as a result, “even to the most unbounded optimist, we are still far from understanding morphological diversity and evolution” (“Evo-Devo,” 706). Evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould argued that there was a fundamental difference between minor adaptations and the formation of new species, an opinion that is also expressed by paleobiologist Douglas Erwin of the Smithsonian Institute in his article, “Macroevolution is More Than Repeated Rounds of Microevolution.” Anthropologist Jeffrey Schwartz points out that some major groups “appear in the fossil record as Athena did from the head of Zeus—full-blown and raring to go, in contradiction to Darwin’s depiction of evolution as resulting from the gradual accumulation of countless infinitesimally minute variations” (Sudden Origins, 3). And Eugene Koonin concludes that “the idea of evolution being driven primarily by infinitesimal heritable changes in the Darwinian tradition has become untenable” (“Origin at 150,” 474).

Challenge 2: Only random variations and natural selection?

Some scientists are questioning the purely random nature of evolutionary change. For example, molecular geneticist James Shapiro makes this observation: “It is difficult (if not impossible) to find a genome change operator that is truly random in its action within the DNA of the cell where it works. All careful studies of mutagenesis find statistically significant non-random patterns of change” (Evolution, 82). Gerd Müller, Head of the Department of Theoretical Biology at the University of Vienna, argues that developmental systems seem to have innate tendencies towards certain solutions, and these tendencies have as strong an influence on development as random DNA variations (“Extended Evolutionary Synthesis,” 4, 7). Professor of evolutionary biology Kevin Laland agrees that “much variation is not random because developmental processes generate certain forms more readily than others” (“Does evolutionary theory need a rethink?” 162).

The theory of random variations also presents unresolved problems. According to genetic biologists Thornton and DeSalle, “It remains a mystery how the undirected process of mutation, combined with natural selection, has resulted in the creation of thousands of new proteins with extraordinarily diverse and well optimized functions. This problem is particularly acute for tightly integrated molecular systems that consist of many interacting parts . . . It is not clear how a new function for any protein might be selected for unless the other members of the complex are already present, creating a molecular version of the ancient evolutionary riddle of the chicken and the egg” (“Gene Family Evolution,” 64).

Simon Conway Morris, who holds the Chair in Evolutionary Paleobiology at Cambridge, also argues that adaptation is not an undirected, random walk through all possibilities. For example, when muscle tissue develops into organs that produce electricity, the process requires very precise amino acid replacements at specific sites, together with accelerated evolution of the new function, and Conway Morris concludes that “there is little doubt that these changes are very far from random” (Runes of Evolution, 38). He therefore argues that while the underlying principles of Darwinian evolution are correct, they do not provide a complete explanation of development, and a more comprehensive theory of evolution is required.

Gould also pointed out that many evolutionists now doubt the exclusive role of natural selection in genetic change (“New and General Theory of Evolution,” 12). And Andras Pellionisz, an expert in genome informatics, suggests that the theory of natural selection should be extended to include goal-directed aspects (“Principle of Recursive Genome Function,” 349).

Challenge 3: What about the complex genetic code?

It is generally accepted that the modern genetic code evolved from a simpler form, but there is no agreement about when or how this initial code evolved. In their article, “Chance and Necessity Do Not Explain the Origin of Life,” microbiologist Jack Trevors and cyberneticist David Abel explain why they believe natural selection could not be the primary mechanism for developing DNA coding (“Chance and Necessity,” 734 – 35):

“Without the machinery and protein workers, the [DNA] message cannot be received and understood. And without genetic instruction, the machinery cannot be assembled . . . It is not reasonable to expect hundreds to thousands of random sequence polymers to all cooperatively selforganize into an amazingly efficient holistic metabolic network.”
“Natural processes, mechanisms, and chemical catalyses do not explain any of these emergent conceptual phenomena. . . . Even ‘meaningful’ RNA or DNA inserted into a lifeless physical world such as the ancient Earth, would not be ‘readable.’ It could not communicate its coded message for protein synthesis unless a language (operating system) context already existed.”
“Contentions that offer nothing more than long periods of time offer no mechanism of explanation for the derivation of genetic programming. No new information is provided by such tautologies. The argument simply says it happened. As such, it is nothing more than blind belief.” In other words, “time made it happen” might be science’s version of “God made it happen.”

Atheist biologist Richard Dawkins insists there is only an “illusion of design in the living world” (God Delusion, 25), and he claims that “cumulative selection, by slow and gradual degrees, is the explanation, the only workable explanation that has ever been proposed, for the existence of life’s complex design” (Blind Watchmaker, 317, original emphasis). However, atheist geneticist and evolutionist Richard Lewontin disagrees, pointing out that Dawkins’s adamant assertion ignores an enormous amount of recent research. He writes: “Dawkins’s vulgarizations of Darwinism speak of nothing in evolution but an inexorable ascendancy of genes that are selectively superior, while the entire body of technical advance in experimental and theoretical evolutionary genetics of the last fifty years has moved in the direction of emphasizing non-selective forces in evolution” (“Billions of Demons,” 29).

Computational physiologist Denis Noble argues that the highly reductionist and deterministic worldview of neo-Darwinism is not a necessary conclusion from the scientific evidence. He expresses the desire of many biologists to “distance [themselves] from the biased conceptual scheme that neo-Darwinism has brought to biology, made more problematic by the fact that it has been presented as literal truth” (“Evolution Beyond neo-Darwinism,” 12). And as Gerd Müller points out, this is not the view of only a handful of fringe scientists because an increasing number of publications call for a major revision of standard evolutionary theory (“Extended Evolutionary Synthesis,” 2).

The more recent approach to evolutionary development is not deterministic or gene-driven. Instead, it argues that there are complex non-random processes at work. However, Laland et al. point out that there is passionate resistance to the newer Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (EES): “The number of biologists calling for change in how evolution is conceptualized is growing rapidly . . . Yet the mere mention of the EES often evokes an emotional, even hostile, reaction among evolutionary biologists . . . This is no storm in an academic tearoom, it is a struggle for the very soul of the discipline” (“Evolutionary Theory,” 162).

Marcos Eberlin, a winner of the Thomson Medal in Chemistry, summarized a wide range of recent scientific findings in his 2019 book Foresight: How the Chemistry of Life Reveals Planning and Purpose, which is endorsed by three winners of Nobel Prizes in science. Eberlin reaches this conclusion about the evidence regarding the development of life on Earth: it “seems to point beyond any blind evolutionary process to the workings of an attribute unique to minds—foresight. And yes, I know: We’re told that it’s out of bounds for science to go there… [but] I urge you to inspect the evidence” (Foresight, 13–14).

Note

Adapted from A Skeptic’s Investigation into Jesus, J P Hannah.

https://www.amazon.com/Skeptics-Investigation-into-Jesus/dp/1532674619

Used with kind permission from Wipf and Stock Publishers: www.wipfandstock.com.

References

Baguñà, Jaume, and Jordi García -Fernàndez. “Evo-Devo: the Long and Winding Road.” The International Journal of Developmental Biology 47 (2003) 705–13.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/8892395_Evo-Devo_The_Long_and_Winding_Road

Conway Morris, Simon. The Runes of Evolution: How the Universe Became Self-Aware. West Conshohocken, PA: Templeton, 2005.

Eberlin, Marcos. Foresight: How the Chemistry of Life Reveals Planning and Purpose. Seattle: Discovery Institute, 2019.

Erwin, Douglas H. “Macroevolution is more than repeated rounds of microevolution.” Evolution and Development 2 (2000) 78–84.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1046/j.1525-142x.2000.00045.x

Gould, Stephen Jay. “Is a new and general theory of evolution emerging?” Paleobiology 6 (1980) 119–30.

http://www.somosbacteriasyvirus.com/gould.pdf

Koonin Eugene V. “The Origin at 150: Is a New Evolutionary Synthesis in Sight?” Trends in Genetics 25 (2009) 473–75. doi:10.1016/j.tig.2009.09.007.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2784144/

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Tag Archive for: apologetics

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Note

References

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