Darwinian Evolution: From the Philosophy of Two Men To the Physchology of the Western World

This is my 10th Grade Thesis and I would like to share it with you for comments and critiques.

Man, ancient or modern, searches for knowledge, the universal truth, to explain his origin and purpose. In the pursuit of knowledge, men formulate methods to test reality. The Greek thinkers used strict logic and experience in their attempt to discover universal truth. Although all the Greeks philosophers employed the former method, many contradictory schools of thought were formed. The Epicurean school concluded that knowledge was only found in what could be proven by sense perception. Followers of Plato decided that knowledge originated in intangible principles. The ancients established exceedingly different conclusions, not because there are several truths, but because man is grounded in his philosophy, not reality. The opinions of man skew his vision of reality, for man will uphold his prejudice over the evidence just to proclaim himself correct. When the majority possesses the same prejudice, they control all elements of a society. Therefore, the philosophy of the people directly shapes society. The modern man’s mindset is the culmination of the societal notions of the past centuries. Westerners believe that the function of government is to improve society for the people’s benefit. The government regulates public education, in which intellects and athletes are superior to the disabled, or those incapable of contributing to the success of society. The skilled leaders become successful capitalists and use their power to manipulate the populace. These tenets of modern thought are native to Americans and undisputed among them. Nevertheless, Americans do not recognize that these social, political and economic examples are links in the chain of Darwinian Evolution. This assumed science affects all aspects of present-day life. However, Darwinian Evolution is not actually science, but a philosophy, and in that philosophical foundation, Evolutionists are fallacious and weak in their arguments and possess little scientific evidence.

According to a 2005 poll by the Pew Research Center, 42% of Americans hold the view that “living things have existed in their present form since the beginning of time,” compared to 48% of Americans who believe that humans evolved over time. The majority and minority in this poll conflict in their decisions because of their distinct philosophies. A philosophy is the elevation of a particular system of reasoning as truth. Therefore, logic is vital to the study and interpretation of science. Science is a set of methods designed to describe and interpret observed or inferred phenomena, past or present, aimed at building a testable body of knowledge open to rejection or confirmation. Therefore, to practice true science all theories must be tested. A theory is a well-supported and well-tested generalization that explains a set of observations. The National Association of Biology Teachers define the theory of Evolution as, “The diversity of life on earth is the outcome of biological evolution- an unpredictable and natural process of descent with modification that is affected by natural selection, mutation, genetic drift, migration and other natural biological and geological forces.” Herbert Spencer, an American philosopher, and Charles Darwin, an English naturalist, were the main formulators of traditional Evolutionary theory. The philosophies which under-gird their worldviews are methodological naturalism: Life is the result of natural processes in a system of material causes and effects that do not allow the introduction of supernatural forces, and humanism: A doctrine centered on human interests that usually rejects supernaturalism, and stresses an individual‘s dignity and capacity for self-realization through reason. Naturalistic and humanistic philosophies were not new waves of thought when Evolution was theorized, for Greek thinkers had contemplated them thousands of years before. However, these foundational ideas were revived in the Enlightenment of the 18th century and both significantly impact modern American society.

Such philosophies, embodied in Darwinian Evolution, have led to a revolution of knowledge, from faith as knowledge to faith as “your own moral universe.” As Evolution spread, it denied a core principle in human history: Man always knows something on account of a predetermined bias. Evolutionists approach nature expecting it to defend their core principles, as do Intelligent Design proponents, who advocate that life on earth is the product of a supernatural Intelligent Designer. The secular reformers of education adopted the maxim, “I think therefore I am.” The religious reformers replied, “I believe so that I may understand.” There is an innate connection between the material, thinking and existing, and the immaterial, believing and understanding. The physical parts of man and the essence, or mind, of man are interwoven. Evolution through naturalism revolutionized this principle. It denies that the immaterial and subjective mind exists and states that man can only observe objective facts. This incredible change is evident in this popular analysis of man: “Facts are objective and can be tested; value judgments are subjective and relative to each person.” This idea justified a split, not between science and understanding, but between Evolutionary ideology and all other knowledge.

From the point when Evolution spread across the continents, it was embraced as the basis for science, politics, economy and sociology. Emphatic commands made by Evolutionists illustrate this: “We shouldn’t press upon education a crown of religious thorns; don’t crucify science upon a cross of religion.” Scientific materialists believe science and materialism, the theory that everything can be explained as being or coming from matter, are one and the same, and that the realm of objective ‘truth’ belongs entirely to materialistic science. Evolutionists judge the arguments of Intelligent Design to be faulty only because they does not have a materialistic bias. This empirical revolution has yielded much fruit in American society. “The use of propaganda has given way to the predictable result of a one-sided legal regime, and Evolution has become the focus of a culture war instead of something that can be discussed in education and politics,” says one of the leading Intelligent Design authors, Phillip Johnson. This is predictable because Evolutionists equate their opinion with absolute truth, and thus they will, like religious radicals, stop at nothing until “false positions”, or opposing views, are silenced. In political struggles the change is blatant. American elections, which once pitted the working class against Wall Street, are currently between parties that have entirely different laws of morality. The Democrats and Republicans have historically disagreed on interpretations of the Constitution, but in this time the same parties debate the value of life. Evolutionary thought is instilled in the American mind, and through man it affects all elements of western society.

The claims of Evolution, if they are scientific, must be supported by accurate experiments. To begin analyzing Evolution it is necessary to understand spontaneous generation, the theory that life arises spontaneously from non-living matter. This was a popular view during the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. However, the Frenchman Louis Pasteur performed a conclusive test which proved that life could not come from non-life. Pasteur boiled fluid in a glass container with a curved neck, and left it open to the air. No life was found in the flask several days later. The curved neck prevented dust and other biotic factors from entering into the fluid and growing. Evolutionists, though, must believe in this disproved theory of the origin of life to justify the ‘primordial soup’ self-generating into cells. If Evolutionists desire to be actual scientists, they must not stray from conclusive evidence to supplement their philosophical bent.

Charles Darwin, the promoter of Evolutionary thought, made several major points in his writings on the process of Evolution. Darwinian Evolution depends on natural selection as the ‘guiding’ force that propels the advance of life. In On the Origin of Species Darwin compares natural selection to animal breeders in order to support the progress of evolutionary diversity. However, the examples of animal breeders, and the modern examples of car and computer designers, are contradictory to the definition of Evolution; for man’s influence is intelligent design. These contradictions are plain to all but Evolutionists themselves, for their allegiance is their philosophy, not to logical reality. Darwin not only propelled Evolutionary ideology, but he also exhibited the blindness which his followers inherited. “Have we any right to assume the Creator is an intelligent source?” wrote Darwin in the On The Origin of the Species. Darwin was calling natural selection a Creator, thus transforming a supposed force into a conscious being. He also tried to base his theory on probability, which did not strengthen his argument; rather it seemed his attempt at excluding all ideas other than his naturalistic opinion. From these examples it is a simple matter to conclude that Darwin’s theory contains significant flaws at its core. As a result, all ideas generating from it will bear disfigurements.

Besides these core issues, Darwinian Evolutionists are known to use fallacies in their line of reasoning, such as the fallacy of ‘begging the question’, In which the advocate of one side assumes the point in question. Many evolutionists commit this error when arguing that the evidence for Evolution is so overwhelming only a prejudiced person would be skeptical of it. The Evolutionist has already decided that there is no truth but his own philosophy. Because of their philosophical mindset, Darwinian Evolutionists must evaluate all aspects of life through the lens of materialism and naturalism. As a result, Evolutionists defend those ideas whether the evidence supports them or not. Intelligent Design proponents also view the world through their theoretical outlook, except that such theorists have been known to baffle Evolutionists in their presentation of philosophy and contrary evidence. I.D. advocates proclaim that Evolutionists fear the possibility of their theory being demolished and their principles rendered false. Supporters of Evolution and Intelligent Design, as scientists, must recognize and acknowledge bias in arguments, but evaluate the evidence fairly.

The choice of philosophy is left to the individual; however, both theories claim that chemistry and anatomy confirm their respective positions. Nonetheless, the evidence can support only one view because these philosophies have conflicting premises. Evolutionists cite the following illustrations as evidence of anatomical Evolution. The Galapagos finches, whose beaks adapt according to the environment, display natural selection. The similarity of bone structure in various animals points to descent via slow, successive modifications. The presence of vestigial structures, such as limb-like bones in whales, stand as leftover traces of evolutionary history. The renowned Haeckel’s Embryo drawings, showing the stages of embryonic development, exemplify the similarity between varying animal species, including humans. In the last several decades man has made many advances in chemical science, and Darwinian Evolutionists have adapted their theory according to these advances. According to the Evolutionist author Richard Dawkins, “the discovery of DNA has dealt the final blow to the belief that living material is deeply distinct from non-living material,” for DNA is not an organism, but it functions and reproduces. The Darwinian Evolutionists use this macroscopic and microscopic data to justify their philosophical stand.

The theorists of Intelligent Design, as the foundation of their argument, state that information is not material. Supporters of this line of thought assert that “the constant process of transferring information from one medium to another and recovering it brings home the separation of information and matter.” This separation is crucial because information implies a non-materialistic quality to life, and hence life would amount to supernatural creation brought on by an intelligent source. The proponents of I.D. employ Darwin’s writings in their defense by emphasizing the weaknesses he acknowledged in his theory, such as the lack of transitional forms and geological intermediates. In a famous quote from On the Origin of the Species Darwin confessed, “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed, which could possibly have been formed by numerous, successive, slight modifications, my theory would absolutely break down.” If irreducible complexity exists, then Darwin’s theory must be false. Intelligent Design promoters think this confession to be the principal flaw in Darwin’s theory. I.D. proponents use examples of the eye and bacterial flagellum to prove that irreducible complexity exists, for both structures necessarily need all of their parts to work. Those who promote Intelligent Design provide logical, natural, and chemical data for their conclusions.

By scientific standards, the observed phenomena that Evolutionists claim buttress their argument must be well-tested according to the hard facts. The Galapagos Finches are thought to support the theory of natural selection, which is the preservation of favorable variations in animals that eventually leads to a change of species. However, this evolution is a sample of microevolution, which is a variation under the species level. It does not prove macroevolution, which is a mutation over the species level, although Evolutionists must possess such data to verify their theory. A well-known evidence of Evolution, Haeckel’s diagrams of embryonic development, was purposefully altered by the artist. Haeckel grouped the most similar stages of the animals together, instead of outlining the direct stages of development. Though this has been acknowledged by Evolutionists, most still place this example of inaccurate evidence in biology textbooks and use it as trustworthy evidence. Another proof Darwinists claim is that the homology of bone structure between species represents common ancestry. On the other hand, the Intelligent Design advocate can easily use that similarity as evidence for a common designer. Evolutionists also believe that vestigial structures point toward the animal’s evolutionary past. However, the examples given by Darwinists, such as the hind-limb bones in a whale and even the appendix of humans, are now being revealed by scientists as functioning and necessary sections of the animal. An evidence that Darwin predicted would be visible in our day is that the fossils of many transitional forms would be discovered and that breeders would succeed in creating new species. Neither has occurred. Evolutionists’ widely trusted proofs deteriorate when weighed against the reality of the natural world.

When a weatherman makes an incorrect forecast, he is not praised, but seen as untrustworthy. Evolutionists are in the same situation but, on account of their philosophical prejudice, they continue to hold Darwin as a master of science. For this reason, many Evolutionists rarely inform the public about the mass of evidence contrary to their claims, such as the absence of animal ancestry in the Cambrian explosion. Most of the public does not know that DNA is a prime example of Intelligent Design and Irreducible Complexity, because the structure of this chain has extremely difficult and important functions. In order to work needs a set combination of sugars, phosphates and nucleotides. William Dembski, a prominent Intelligent Design theorist, claims that, “biological and paleontological evidences and other scientific data, with very few exceptions, tend to falsify the Darwinian story of macroevolution and its chemical origin of life.” Intelligent Design proponents not only claim that Evolution has little material evidence, they also consider the effects of the Evolutionists’ philosophy in regard to any evidence. Darwinism, they observe, functions as the central cosmological myth of modern culture that is assumed true rather than looked at as a scientific hypothesis that has been submitted to rigorous testing. The former refutations, made with the aid of widespread data, uproot Darwinian Evolution by revealing its lack of evidence in its vital components.

On the surface, Darwinian Evolution is colored with a widespread trust in ‘science and overwhelming evidence’. However, Evolution’s core of humanistic rationality and naturalism attempts to destroy the reality that every man has an immaterial essence, and is therefore always subjective. Philosophy is the mental result of this invisible substance of man, and it is the root of all man’s decisions. Evolutionists are compelled to dominate all other philosophies because they view their philosophy as universal truth. Evolutionists desperately grasp for arguments and data to defend their doctrine, for they must secure the people’s mindsets in order to control society. This struggle for absolute power culminates in the worldwide political, economic and social ills of inequality and violence. But - man can avoid such calamity if he will relinquish his tenacious hold on the ideas of the Enlightenment thinkers. He will then be capable of not only practicing true science, but of understanding the complexity of man’s nature. The Greek philosophers devoted themselves to the pursuit of the nature of reality, but their presuppositions about that reality blinded them to the undeniable truth found in the heart of every man: Knowledge is only found through God, who is the Creator of Life and the source of Life’s purpose.