What is the evidence for evolution? Everywhere we are told categorically that evolution and a billions of years old universe is a fact.
We are told in dramatic language how all the complex creatures and plant life came from single-celled organisms.
So the evidence for evolution is seen in anatomy, molecular homology, biogeography, and fossils.
Variations in creatures and plants do happen, but was the information already present within the DNA, or can variations occur through sexual reproduction, will polyploidy variation or hybridization or mutation cause new variations?
What about pesticide resistance, isn’t that evidence of variation and change?
Major update: 10th March 2023
Table of Contents menu:
Table of Contents:
1. Are Christians bonkers to believe in the Creation story?
I heard a young person say the other day that if anybody didn’t believe that evolution was right must be bonkers.
It seems that wherever we look and whatever we read is pushing the idea that everything started from a Big Bang billions of years ago.
Big names tell us that it is fact, people with many letters after their name keep reinforcing the theory.
The section of science that does not agree with the Big Bang theory just gets side-lined and silenced.
Therefore many Christians are pushed along with the popular science and doubt whether God made mankind and animals as it says in Genesis.
Christians may then feel guilty about not believing what the Bible says or they try to reconcile popular science with a non-literal interpretation of the Bible.
Does it matter, do we have to choose? What evidence for evolution is there?
Let’s look at the Khan Academy website 2 that is explaining how evolution is true:
The writer (does not provide their name) states that the evidence for evolution comes from many different areas of biology:
- Anatomy. Species may share similar physical features because the feature was present in a common ancestor (homologous structures).
- Molecular biology. DNA and the genetic code reflect the shared ancestry of life. DNA comparisons can show how related species are.
- Biogeography. The global distribution of organisms and the unique features of island species reflect evolution and geological change.
- Fossils. Fossils document the existence of now-extinct past species that are related to present-day species.
- Direct observation. We can directly observe small-scale evolution in organisms with short lifecycles (e.g., pesticide-resistant insects).
We will look at each of these things, in turn, to see what evidence for evolution there is, but first:
2. The theory of natural selection
According to the BBC website, Darwin proposed that:
- individual organisms within a particular species show a wide range of variation for a characteristic
- individuals with characteristics most suited to the environment are more likely to survive and to breed successfully
- the characteristics that have enabled these individuals to survive are then passed on to the next generation
This theory is called natural selection and creationists, those who believe that God created the world as stated in Genesis, have no problem with this.
Animals and plants will change and adapt to their environment, but they do not change into something completely different from their original ‘kind’.
So a leopard will not change into a moose.
But the thought of natural selection has been taken too far, so upon this idea, a whole molecules-to-man evolution has grown.
Although this evolution is widely accepted, especially by nontechnical popular science, there are objections by rational, highly qualified scientists.
These scientists have tried to speak out, but the sheer weight of the popular science which is propagated on virtually every nature and outdoors programme on TV has drowned out the other voices.
3. Does anatomy prove evolution?
Different human skulls provide no evidence for evolution. The clue is in the word ‘human’ skulls, because from one ‘kind’ of human being came the diversity we see now and this is proven in modern genetics tracing back to what the scientists call: Mitochondrial Eve.
Also, dogs and bacteria do NOT prove evolution.
We are told quite convincingly that there are different human skulls giving evidence for evolution from ape-type people to humans.
But is it that clear-cut? Carl Wieland says:
where once evolutionists could talk of Homo ergaster, erectus and sapiens as three separate Homo species, now these are reduced to erectus and sapiens.
“Skull wars: A recent skull find in Africa made many think that it somehow ‘proved evolution” by Carl Wieland 7
Study leader Dr Tim White, co-director of the Laboratory for Human Evolutionary Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, points out the widespread occurrence of what’s known as taxonomic splitting:
‘There’s been a recent tendency to give a different name to each of the fossils that comes out of the ground, and that has led to what we think is a very misleading portrayal of the biology of human evolution.’ 3
Other evolutionists are not convinced that H. ergaster and H. erectus are the same species, despite the evidence confirming the tight anatomical overlap of features.
However, this only highlights how all such matters involving classification of fossil bones are, by their very nature, highly subjective.
It is not at all unreasonable, in the light of that subjectivity, for the creationist to maintain that there should really only be one Homo species acknowledged, namely Homo sapiens.
This is actually consistent with what certain evolutionary paleoanthropologists, most notably Milford Wolpoff of the University of Michigan, have been saying for some time now.
They do believe that the individuals whose bones have been labelled erectus were the evolutionary ancestors of modern people (as were Neandertals, in their view).
But they seem to believe that the similarities are such that all Homo erectus specimens, along with Homo neanderthalensis and others, should really be called Homo sapiens—which means, in a nutshell, people. 4 5
And recently, Wolpoff et al., showed that the features of various human skulls indicated that there must have been interbreeding among modern-looking Homo Sapiens and Neanderthals and even Homo erectus—thus making them the same biological species, by definition. 6
Milford Wolpoff (mentioned above) is an evolutionist and is a leading proponent of the Multiregional origin of modern humans, but he believes:
subsequent human evolution has been within a single, continuous human species.
‘Multiregional origin of modern humans’ Wikipedia 8
This species encompasses all archaic human forms such as Homo erectus and Neanderthals as well as modern forms, and evolved worldwide to the diverse populations of anatomically modern humans (Homo sapiens)…
that while Neanderthals were different subspecies, they were still human and part of the same lineage.”
Many evolutionists say that these differences in skulls prove evolutionary changes, but another group of evolutionists say that they are all from the same species.
You can see how speculative it all becomes.
Within this section on anatomy let’s look at Homologous features, the Khan Academy states:
If two or more species share a unique physical feature, such as a complex bone structure or a body plan, they may all have inherited this feature from a common ancestor.
Khan Academy
Physical features shared due to evolutionary history (a common ancestor) are said to be homologous.
To give one classic example, the forelimbs of whales, humans, birds, and dogs look pretty different on the outside.
That’s because they’re adapted to function in different environments.
However, if you look at the bone structure of the forelimbs, you’ll find that the pattern of bones is very similar across species.”
Evolutionists often quote how the horse has changed as evidence for evolution.
Why have some things not changed at all – the cockroach has not changed in supposedly 300 million years.
Many creatures have died out, dinosaurs are the obvious ones, but also dragons. See: Are dragons, real creatures?
Just because there are similarities in design does not mean that they have all evolved from the same original creature, but rather there are similar design elements that have been used in several different species.
Take for example the Ford dashboard and switches on one of their cars compared to the Ford Transit, it just shows that certain features have been designed by the same company.
What’s the more logical conclusion from observing bone patterns and other examples of homology: that they descend from a common ancestor, or they were designed according to a common plan?
In many cases, either explanation will work, and both may seem reasonable.
But at times, only creation according to a common design works, see the next section:
Science is always advocating new ideas which is okay provided the theory is not presented as fully proven and a complete answer.
See this article: Are Scientists always right?
Scientists are just discovering God’s trail through the universe and are uncovering his designs and physical scientific laws and many scientists believe this.
4. Does molecular homology prove evolution?
Homology is the state of having the same or similar relation, relative position, or structure.
Dr Gary Parker wrote:
Actually, studies of molecular homology have produced major controversies within the evolutionists’ camp, since DNA trees frequently disagree with evolutionary trees based on fossils and/or on comparative anatomy.
by Dr Gary Parker on February 13, 2016 9
The evolutionist split is greatest when it comes to conflicting attempts (based on dubious, compounded assumptions) to use molecular homology as some sort of ‘evolutionary clock.’
After documenting the misfit of molecular data with both of two competing evolutionary views, Michael Denton writes this summary…”
Below is this summary from Michael Denton who “described himself as an agnostic,… argued that evidence of design exists in nature,… an evolutionist and he has rejected biblical creationism…” 10
The difficulties associated with attempting to explain how a family of homologous proteins could have evolved at constant rates has created chaos in evolutionary thought.
Denton, ‘Evolution: A Theory in Crisis’, p. 306.
The evolutionary community has divided into two camps—those still adhering to the selectionist position, and those rejecting it in favor of the neutralist.
The devastating aspect of this controversy is that neither side can adequately account for the constancy of the rate of molecular evolution; yet each side fatally weakens the other.
The selectionists wound the neutralists’ position by pointing to the disparity in the rates of mutation per unit time, while the neutralists destroy the selectionists’ position by showing how ludicrous it is to believe that selection would have caused equal rates of divergence in ‘junk’ proteins or along phylogenetic lines so dissimilar as those of man and carp.
Both sides win valid points, but in the process the credibility of the molecular clock hypothesis is severely strained and with it the whole paradigm of evolution itself is endangered.”
So again evolutionists are divided and can’t agree on molecular homology and yet we are repeatedly told that evolution is a complete, scientifically based concept and that there are masses of evidence for evolution.
5. Does biogeography prove evolution?
The evolutionist Khan Academy states:
most of the mammal species in Australia are marsupials (carry young in a pouch), while most mammal species elsewhere in the world are placental (nourish young through a placenta). Australia’s marsupial species are very diverse and fill a wide range of ecological roles.
Khan Academy
Because Australia was isolated by water for millions of years, these species were able to evolve without competition from (or exchange with) mammal species elsewhere in the world.
The marsupials of Australia, Darwin’s finches in the Galápagos, and many species on the Hawaiian Islands are unique to their island settings, but have distant relationships to ancestral species on mainlands.
This combination of features reflects the processes by which island species evolve.”
Throughout the strata of the world is a worldwide line that is known as the Great Unconformity.
It “is a surface in the rock record, in the stratigraphic column, representing a time from which no rocks are preserved.” 11
A number of geologists believe that this is evidence of a worldwide flood.
Some creationists believe that a lot of the questions can be answered by referring to a wide world flood.
Dr Andrew Fabich wrote about macroorganisms (which is: ‘an organism large enough to be seen by the normal unaided human eye’):
all macroorganisms must have descended from the ark and dispersed across the planet.
‘Living Evidence of a Global Catastrophe: How Microbial Biogeography Supports Noah’s Flood’ by Dr Andrew Fabich on October 17, 2018 12
In doing so, the creationist bears the responsibility of describing a mechanism for how all macroorganisms arrived at their current location.
The only remaining issue, then, is where macroorganisms lived before the Flood.
The only record we have of where most macroorganisms lived before the Flood is trapped in the fossil record…
Dr Andrew Fabich continues and mentions the word: ‘Speciation’ which is the evolutionary process by which populations evolve to become distinct species:
In this post-Flood world, we observe macroorganisms dispersed in unique ecosystems.
‘Living Evidence of a Global Catastrophe: How Microbial Biogeography Supports Noah’s Flood’ by Dr. Andrew Fabich on October 17, 2018 15
Dispersal of macroorganisms to unique ecosystems is a difficult topic for both the evolutionist and creationist alike and has been reviewed elsewhere (Statham 2010).
Suffice it to say that the creationist interpretation of biogeography makes more sense out of coordinating where macroorganisms are found in the fossil record and on which continent we find macroorganisms today.
One difficult issue surrounding the fact that there was a Flood still remains this idea of how did macroorganisms get to their present day locations.
For example, how did the marsupials end up predominantly on Australia?
The factors in place providing for movement of macroorganisms across the globe include transoceanic transport on vegetation mats, transport by man, migration and partial extinction, and speciation (Statham 2010; Wise 2002).
These mechanisms are powerful for explaining modern day biogeography.
What is key to realize about the macroorganism biogeography is that we have macroorganisms living in distinct habitats/ ecosystems even in a post-Flood world.
We even have remarkable evidences of recolonization after modern day catastrophes like Krakatoa or Mount St. Helens that highlight the ability of macroorganisms to regain access to a decimated ecosystem as what happened after the Flood 14 …
One intriguing idea is that the macroorganisms inhabited distinct ecosystems before the Flood for the same reasons that they inhabit distinct ecosystems after the Flood (Snelling 2008b).
This argument is made from the observations that fossil strata represent the ecosystems that organisms lived in before the Flood—hence there is the idea that they lived in separate ecosystems.
This idea about distinct ecosystems before the Flood makes sense both in light of the fossil record and in modern day observations.
While we see distinct ecosystems filled with distinct macroorganisms today, this is not the case at the microorganism level…
Several modern approaches to answering this biogeographical question have involved collecting soil samples across four continents to demonstrate that various Pseudomonas species (that is, a diverse group of predominantly environmental bacteria that are widely found across soil and water) are present on all continents, but that they are not necessarily the same species (Cho and Tiedje 2000).”
So Biogeography does not prove evolution or creation, both have their answers and difficulties.
6. Do fossils prove evolution?
Fossils are a big chunk of evidence for evolution and the Khan Academy states:
Fossils are the preserved remains of previously living organisms or their traces, dating from the distant past.
Khan Academy
The fossil record is not, alas, complete or unbroken:
most organisms never fossilize, and even the organisms that do fossilize are rarely found by humans.
Nonetheless, the fossils that humans have collected offer unique insights into evolution over long timescales.
Earth’s rocks form layers on top of each other over very long time periods.
These layers, called strata, form a convenient timeline for dating embedded fossils.
Strata that are closer to the surface represent more recent time periods, whereas deeper strata represent older time periods.
Fossils found in different strata at the same site can be ordered by their positions, and ‘reference’ strata with unique features can be used to compare the ages of fossils across locations.
In addition, scientists can roughly date fossils using radiometric dating, a process that measures the radioactive decay of certain elements.”
Some creationists would disagree with the layers being laid down over a long period:
With this theory, the worldwide flood caused massive damage where all the rocks, soil particles, debris and creatures were buried in the maelstrom.
The marine animals and smallest land creatures would have been buried first and the most mobile ones last.
Under huge pressures and pockets of extreme temperatures, as the earth’s plates moved and the mountains were pushed up, many of those creatures were either fossilised or destroyed.
The quote above also mentions Radiometric dating which some believe isn’t as accurate as it is made out and there are discrepancies.
This is a huge subject and space prevents me from going into that.
The bottom line is that fossils don’t show evidence for evolution from small-celled creatures to the ones we know now.
Popular science tells us that this theory is a fact.
7. Does microevolution and macroevolution provide the answers?
Dr Gary Parker had given a lecture at Tennessee University when one of the professors approached him afterwards and challenged him on a comment about mutation selection and they got into a conversation:
Then I asked if he, as an evolutionist, believed that there was a time in the earth’s past when the most complex forms of life were bacteria.
by Dr. Gary Parker on March 28, 2016 16
He said, ‘Yes, of course.’
Then I asked if he believed there was a later time when life on earth included bacteria but also a wide variety of invertebrates (clams, snails, worms, etc.), but no vertebrates.
Even though he now knew where I was going, as an evolutionist he still had to say, ‘Yes.’
He had to agree that later still the earth included a wide variety of vertebrates (fish, dinosaurs, people) in addition to invertebrates and bacteria.
So, I concluded for him, earth’s history involved a progression from a few simple life forms to many complex ones.
But, as he himself had stated in challenging me, there is nothing about mutation-selection (time, chance, struggle, and death) which explains that kind of progression.
Mutation-selection (TCSD), yes; evolution, no.
Much of the public accepted that evolution had occurred in the past because they were taught to see mutation-selection at work in the present.
Nobody (except creationists) told them that professional scientists in the second half of the 20th century seriously challenged or even abandoned mutation-selection as a mechanism for molecules-to-man evolution.
Discoveries in computer-assisted math, cell ultrastructure, DNA, and molecular biology during the 1950s, 60s, and 70s forced a ‘revolution in evolution’ when the world’s leading experts on evolution met in Chicago in 1980.
As summarized professionally by Lewin in Science1 (and popularly by Adler and Carey in Newsweek2),
The central question of the Chicago conference was whether the mechanisms underlying microevolution * [mutation-selection] could be extrapolated to explain the phenomena of macroevolution **…
Can changes from molecules-to-man (macroevolution) be explained by (extrapolated from) the process of mutation-selection (microevolution)?
You know my answer; how did the world’s leading evolutionists answer that question?
At the risk of doing violence to the positions of some of the people at the meetings, the answer can be given as a clear, No.
Just plain NO.
Experts from around the world looking at supposed evidences for evolution in their own scientific disciplines reached the same conclusion for the same reasons creationists had already cited.
You just can’t get from microevolution (mutation-selection) to macroevolution (molecules-to-man), no matter what the time involved.”
Here’s the explanation on the quote above:
* Microevolution is defined as changes in allele frequency (or gene frequency) that can be observed within a population, ie the fraction of all chromosomes in the population that carry that gene frequency.
Microevolution can be observed and measured in short periods, even within a single generation.
** macroevolution refers to the large-scale differences that can be observed between different species and cannot be observed and measured in short periods.
An accumulation of changes resulting from microevolution will eventually lead to macroevolution through the process of speciation. In this way, they are essentially the same process, although on a different time scale. 17
Dr Carl Wieland believes that it is unwise for creationists to speak in terms of microevolution and macroevolution because it inevitably leads to:
- ‘Big Change = Small Change x Millions of Years.’
In agreeing with the statement above is really agreeing with evolution as a whole.
Then creationists have to argue at what point this microevolution doesn’t happen.
God created plants and creatures according to their kinds and within these groups, a certain amount of changes can occur – the classic example being the wolf/dog group. See: Do dogs prove evolution and are Bible kinds species?
The limits to variation—observed or unobserved—will come about inevitably because gene pools run out of ‘functionally efficient’ genetic information (or ‘teleonomic’ information).
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland 18
A full understanding of this eliminates the image of the desperately backpedalling creationist, redrawing his line of last resistance depending on what new observations are made on the appearance of new varieties.
It also defuses the whole issue of ‘micro’ and ‘macro’ evolution.
I believe it is better for creationists to avoid these confusing and misleading terms altogether.
The word ‘evolution’ generally conveys the meaning of the sort of change which will ultimately be able to convert a protozoon into a man or a reptile into a bird, and so on.
I hope to show that in terms of that sort of meaning, we do not see any evolution at all.
By saying ‘we accept micro but not macroevolution’ we risk reinforcing the perception that the issue is about the amount of change, which it is not.
It is about the type of change.”
To try and explain the passing on of information within cells and the colossal problem of going from the limited genetic information of a simple organism evolving to a more complex organism Dr Carl Wieland puts it this way:
Imagine now the first population of living things on the evolutionist’s ‘primitive earth’.
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland
This so-called ‘simple cell’ would, of course, have a lot of genetic information, but vastly less than the information in only one of its present-day descendant gene pools, e.g., man.
The evolutionist proposes that this ‘telegram’ (or very small email) has given rise to ‘encyclopedias’ of meaningful, useful genetic sentences.
Thus he must account for the origin with time of these new and meaningful sentences.
His only ultimate source for these is mutation.
[Note: Transposons or ‘jumping genes’, which involve the transfer of genetic information from one stretch of DNA to another (in the same organism, or even altogether different ones, transferred by viruses for example) are not touched upon in this discussion, as work on these ‘new hopes’ for evolution is not at sufficiently mature stage. It should, however, be noted that these processes would appear to be (like mutations) random and undirected processes, in this case involving transfers of existing information.]
A mutation is an accident, a mistake, a ‘typing error’.
Although most such changes are acknowledged to be harmful or meaningless, evolutionists propose that occasionally one is useful in a particular environmental context and hence its possessor has a better chance of survival/reproduction.
By looking now at the informational basis for other mechanisms of biological variation, it will be seen why these are not the source of new sentences and therefore why the evolutionist generally relies on mutation of one sort or another in his scheme of things.”
a) Mendelian variation through sexual reproduction
The meaning of Mendelian inheritance:
refers to certain patterns of how traits are passed from parents to offspring… Mendel’s discoveries of how traits (such as color and shape) are passed down from one generation to the next introduced the concept of dominant and recessive modes of inheritance.”
National Human Genome Research Institute 19
Sexual reproduction allows packets of information to be combined in many different ways, but it won’t produce new ‘sentences’ in our encyclopaedia illustration.
This sort of variation can only occur if there is a storehouse of such sentences available to choose from.
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland
Natural (or artificial) selection can explain the survival of the fittest but not the arrival of the fittest, which is the real question…
there has been no addition of new and useful ‘sentences’…
when its genetic basis is understood, to be an overall downward movement in informational terms.”
Scientists may try to give long explanations on how sexual reproduction evolved and why it should have done so in the first place, but an adequate answer has not been given.
Variations can and will occur through sexual reproduction, but no new kinds can be created – this is no evidence for evolution.
b) Polyploidy variation through a heritable condition
Polyploidy is the heritable condition of possessing more than two complete sets of chromosomes.
‘Polyploidy’ by Margaret Woodhouse, Ph.D., Diana Burkart-Waco & Luca Comai, Ph.D. 20
Polyploids are common among plants, as well as among certain groups of fish and amphibians.
Polyploids arise when a rare mitotic or meiotic catastrophe, such as nondisjunction, causes the formation of gametes that have a complete set of duplicate chromosomes.
Diploid gametes are frequently formed in this way.
When a diploid gamete fuses with a haploid gamete, a triploid zygote forms, although these triploids are generally unstable and can often be sterile.
If a diploid gamete fuses with another diploid gamete, however, this gives rise to a tetraploid zygote, which is potentially stable.
This is similar to Mendelian variation because no ‘sentences’ appear which did not previously exist.
This is the multiplication (‘photocopying’) of information already present.
Small variations can and will occur through polyploidy variation, but no new kinds can be created -this is no evidence for evolution.
c) Hybridization variation by combining DNA strands
Hybridization is the process of combining two complementary single-stranded DNA or RNA molecules and allowing them to form a single double-stranded molecule through base pairing.
‘Hybridization’ National Human Genome Research Institute (NHGRI) 21
Hybridization produces no new ‘sentences’ and is the mingling of two sets of information already present.
Small variations can and will occur through hybridization, but no new kinds can be created and this is no evidence for evolution.
d) Variation due to mutation
Dr Carl Wieland writing about mutation gives an illustration:
A beetle on a lonely, wind-swept island may have a mutation which causes it to lose or corrupt the information coding for wing manufacture;
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland
hence its wingless successors will not be so easily blown out to sea and will thus have a selective advantage…
(which is) quite ‘beneficial’—do not involve the sort of increase in functional complexity which evolutionary theory demands…
in order to support protozoon-to-man evolution, one must be able to point to instances where mutation has added a new ‘sentence’ or gene coding…
We do not know of a single mutation giving such an increase in functional complexity.
Probabilistic considerations would seem to preclude this in any case, or at least make it an exceedingly rare event, far too rare to salvage evolution even over the assumed multibillion year time span…
The very small number of ‘beneficial’ mutations actually observed are simply the wrong kind of change for evolution—we do not see the addition of new ‘sentences’ which carry meaning and information.
Small variations can and will occur through mutations, but no new kinds can be created.
e) Variations due to pesticide resistance, etc.
Some people say that evolution can be proved by direct observation of insects becoming immune to certain pesticides.
The pests start to get resistant to the chemical and so, they believe, that this proves evolution because they have evolved:
In some cases, the evidence for evolution is that we can see it taking place around us!
Khan Academy
Important modern-day examples of evolution include the emergence of drug-resistant bacteria and pesticide-resistant insects.
For example, in the 1950s, there was a worldwide effort to eradicate malaria by eliminating its carriers (certain types of mosquitos).
The pesticide DDT was sprayed broadly in areas where the mosquitoes lived, and at first, the DDT was highly effective at killing the mosquitos.
However, over time, the DDT became less and less effective, and more and more mosquitoes survived.
This was because the mosquito population evolved resistance to the pesticide.
Some scientists believe that the pests that are resistant to that chemical are ALREADY EXISTING, but are a few in number.
The resistant ones then breed and the population rapidly increases with pest resistant offspring:
For example, when researchers exposed the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans to the widely used nematicide Levamisole, they reported that resistance to that pesticide “accumulated within very few generations”.
‘Pesticide resistance is not evidence of evolution’ by David Catchpoole 22
The researchers explained that this rapid adaptation was likely due to the ‘standing genetic variation’ of the nematode population, i.e. that the genes conferring resistance were already present in the population, but at low frequency…
In all of the above examples, we’re not seeing the genes, the information, for complex new functions appearing out of nowhere, i.e. by evolution.
Instead we’re seeing either possible ‘amplification’ of genes (i.e. additional copies of existing genes) or, more usually, a loss-of-control over regulation of genes.
In other words, the mechanisms for pesticide resistance are not from new genes but from existing genes—and especially from damaged versions of existing genes. There has been no increase in meaningful genetic information but rather a loss of information.”
Resistant organisms do not appear, their resistance is already within some of their numbers, in their DNA and therefore this is no evidence for evolution.
8. The evolution, or not, of bacteria
The BBC website states that:
Bacteria can evolve quickly because they reproduce at a fast rate.
BBC 23
Mutations of bacteria produce new strains.
Some bacteria might become resistant to certain antibiotics, such as penicillin, and cannot be destroyed by the antibiotic.
The evolution of the bacteria is an example of natural selection and supports Darwin’s theory of evolution.”
That is a very sweeping statement, so let’s look at how resistance can arise:
A mutational loss or defect can cause resistance.
Antibiotic Resistance in Bacteria by Dr Carl Wieland 26
For instance, Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the cause of TB, has
an enzyme which (as well as its other useful functions) changes the antibiotic isoniazid into a form which destroys the bacterium.
A mutation causes the loss of that enzyme and helps the pathogen withstand isoniazid. 24
To give another example:
the 4-quinolone antibiotics attack the enzyme DNA gyrase inside various bacteria. 25
An informationally insignificant mutation which results in the substitution of one amino acid by another destroys the enzyme/antibiotic interaction.
More commonly, resistance arises through mutational defects that cause the inactivation of genes which control transport through the cell membrane.
If the antibiotic is less efficiently taken up, it does not accumulate as readily to toxic levels.
Antibiotic resistance commonly arises in ways which have nothing to do with mutation.
For instance, in some microbes the antibacterial chemical, sulphonamide, works by blocking the ability to synthesize the vitamin folic acid.
If the bacterium acquires new DNA which bypasses the block to produce this vitamin, then sulphonamide will not work as well.
This pathogen is therefore resistant.
The question is, where did the new DNA come from?
It is now known that bacteria can obtain such DNA (which can be outside the chromosome, as a so-called ‘plasmid’) from other bacteria which already have this information.
This can happen through infection with bacterial viruses, through direct transfer from another bacterium during conjugation (‘mating’ of bacteria), or even directly through the cell wall.
This acquiring of resistance from another source is clinically very important;
note that it does not involve the appearance of any new, complex information which was not already present in the world.
Regardless of the form of resistance, when the population is no longer exposed to the poison, the tendency is for the more efficient, non-resistant types to do better.”
Bacterial resistance is no evidence for evolution.
9. Variations within God’s created order
The Bible states that the creatures were created as unique kinds, but because they were going out to populate the whole Earth they were given the ability for their DNA information to change.
Their DNA couldn’t dramatically increase, but their ‘encyclopaedia’ of information could have letters within them changed and there would be a huge potential for variations.
Therefore God predicted, or foresaw, that these creatures would need the capacity to change biologically to adapt to ever-changing environments.
Each original group, known as a ‘kind’ within the Bible was presumably genetically and reproductively isolated from other such groups, yet was able to interbreed within its own group.
Baramin is an accepted creationist term for ‘created kind’.
What then do we say to an evolutionist who understandably presses us for a definition of a created kind or identification of same today?
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland 27
I suggest the following for consideration:
“Groups of living organisms belong in the same created kind if they have descended from the same ancestral gene pool.”
To talk of ‘fixity of kinds’ in relation to any present-day variants thus also becomes redundant—no new kinds can appear by definition…
Notice that this is vastly removed from the evolutionist’s notion of common descent.
As the creationist looks back in time along a line of descent, he sees an expansion of the gene pool.
As the evolutionist does likewise, he sees a contraction.”
10. Can Genesis be true despite the evidence for evolution?
Christians are getting less and less confident with the Creation story, almost every week we are told on TV programmes that such and such is millions of years old and this is a constant voice that tells us that the Bible is not reliable.
How does that make Christians feel?
What we decide has a bearing on how we view the Bible.
The Big Bang Theory is often pushed as being fact, but in reality, it has so many gaps and failings that thirty-three top scientists formulated their concerns, see here.
The Bible tells us that creation was instantaneous.
If the first chapter or so in Genesis was a nice story and not true, why would God want to start His ‘God breathed’ book with that?
Why do I say that the Bible is God breathed?
The Apostle Paul tells us that:
All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
2 Timothy 3:16-17 NIV
Surely if everything evolved from simple organisms into more and more complex creatures, then He would want to say that.
Why would God want to describe in detail something that was not true – Him creating things instantaneously out of nothing?
The Bible tells us when something is a parable or a prophetic, symbolic vision, etc.
For more details on this see: ‘What errors are in the Bible? or The Garden of Eden a parable or real?
Denis R Alexander a fellow of St Edmund’s College and editor of Science & Christian Belief argued that Christians can accept evolution with integrity. (This is on The Evangelical Alliance’s old, archived website.)
Some Christians think belief in evolution undermines the uniqueness of humankind and the reality of evil and the fall. Not so.
‘Can a Christian believe in evolution?’ by Denis R Alexander 01 May 2005 28
The Genesis account portrays Adam and Eve as Neolithic farmers. It is perfectly feasible that God bestowed His image on representative Homo sapiens already living in the Near East to generate what John Stott has called Homo divinus, those who first enjoyed personal fellowship with God but who then fell most terribly from their close walk with God (Genesis 3.8).
All those who disobey God and trust in their own wisdom in place of God’s law reiterate the historical fall in their own being (Ezekiel 28.11-19).”
Surely, the idea of God putting His image on two Neolithic farmers, called Adam and Eve, who live amongst other people living in the Near Eastern area is doing violence to the biblical account in Genesis?
Denis R Alexander is saying that for hundreds of thousands of years, Homo sapiens had been evolving and then at a certain point in this line, God stepped in and set up the story in Genesis.
Surely this is not right? Why would God want this story written up when it was not true?
Andy McIntosh professor of Thermodynamics and Combustion Theory in the Fuel and Energy Department of the University of Leeds disagrees with what Denis R Alexander had said…
Evolution undermines the doctrine of sin, and even the Gospel itself.
‘The case for creation’ The Evangelical Alliance29
Six times Genesis 1 states that what God had made was ‘good’, followed by a seventh statement affirming that all He had made was ‘very good’ (verse 31). To assume death and destruction before this is a serious theological error.
Genesis 1.31 occurs after the six days of creation. This clearly shows that fossils, which are full of death and suffering, could not have existed at that point.
Alexander’s statement that ‘God bestowed his image on a representative Homo sapiens’ presupposes the prior deaths of countless pre-hominid creatures, and undermines the clear teaching of Genesis 1 that Adam was made from dust by the creative act of God.
Physical death followed Adam’s sin, as God had warned in Genesis 2.17.
Theologically, it cannot have existed before the creation of Adam (see Romans 5 and 1 Corinthians 15).
Adam’s sin required an equally real Christ – the last Adam – to redeem us through his death on the cross.
If death was already in the world before Adam, why did Christ die?
The Bible is not a ‘pick and mix’ where we can choose the verses we like and change the meanings of other verses just to please us.
The Bible should reshape our thinking, feed our spirit and govern our everyday lives:
Your word [the Bible] is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.”
Psalm 119:105 ESV
If we change what the Bible is saying to suit our way of thinking, can we honestly say that the Bible gives light to how we walk in this world?
Some people, to avoid what the Bible is saying, make out that the verses are a parable, but the wording here in Genesis is too definite – as if it is describing something that really happened.
Parables tell a story about something fundamentally true and it is not based on anything untrue.
If the Creation story in Genesis was a parable, then it would be fundamentally untrue if humans had evolved.
Also, why would God reinforce the notion that each section was a day?
He elaborates on the meaning of the days, reinforcing the point that it was a day; evening and morning, twenty-four hours:
God called the light ‘day’, and the darkness he called ‘night’. And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day…
Genesis 1:5-13 NIV
…And there was evening, and there was morning—the second day…
…And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day…” (etc.)
Scientific facts can support an instantaneous creation if the person is willing to surrender to the notion that God is in charge.
Also, there are many flaws in the theory of evolution.
Many people don’t realise that evolution is a theory which does not provide all the answers.
11. Does evolution rob God of being Creator?
When people marvel at evolution they are not giving praise to God.
Creation is part of the glory of God.
By explaining that all of this world evolved we remove giant Evangelists for God. What do I mean?
These ‘natural’ Evangelists speak every language in the world, they speak about God day and night and are in every country and sea.
They are described here:
The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
Psalms 19:1-4 NIV
Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.
There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.”
Yes, God’s created heavens and skies and the whole of creation speak about God – they are His Evangelists, but unfortunately, their voices have been rendered almost obsolete by the voices of evolution.
For more detailed articles see: How do we put an age on the universe?
Why do humans suffer from painful childbirth?
Evidence for the Big Bang Theory and calculating the age of the universe.
References open in new tabs:
Curved Fossil Lobster. [fossils, stone]. Retrieved from Artstor ↩
‘Fossil skull fuels debate over human origin’, cnn.com, 21 March 2002 ↩
Thorne, A. and Wolpoff, M., ‘Conflict Over Human Origins’ Search, 22(5):175, July–August 1991 ↩
Thorne, A. and Wolpoff, M., ‘The Case Against Eve’ New Scientist, pp. 33–37, 22 June, 1991. ↩
Wolpoff, M.H. et al., ‘Modern human ancestry at the peripheries: a test of the replacement theory’ Science 291(5502):293–297, 12 January 2001. ↩
‘Grand Canyon – The Great Unconformity’ Allan Treiman, Lunar and Planetary Institute. ↩
‘Living Evidence of a Global Catastrophe: How Microbial Biogeography Supports Noah’s Flood’ Answers in Genesis ↩
O’Malley 2008; Thorton et al. 1988 ↩
‘Living Evidence of a Global Catastrophe: How Microbial Biogeography Supports Noah’s Flood’ Answers in Genesis ↩
‘The Fossil Evidence—Introduction’ by Dr. Gary Parker Answers in Genesis ↩
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland ↩
‘Polyploidy’ by Margaret Woodhouse, Ph.D., Diana Burkart-Waco & Luca Comai, Ph.D. ↩
‘Hybridization’ National Human Genome Research Institute ↩
‘The catalase-peroxidase gene and isoniazid resistance of Mycobacterium tuberculosis.’ by Zhang, Y, Heym, B., Allen, B., Young D. and Cole, S, 1992. Nature, 358:591-593.
See also the popular report: ‘Paradise lost? Microbes mount a comeback as drug resistance spreads’ by Beardsley, T., 1992. Scientific American, 267(5): 12-13. ↩‘Resistance to the 4-quinolones’ by Lewin, C. S., 1992. Journal of Medical Microbiology, 36:9-11. ↩
‘Variation, information and the created kind’ by Dr Carl Wieland ↩
‘Can a Christian believe in evolution?’ by Denis R Alexander 01 May 2005 The Evangelical Alliance archived website. ↩
‘The case for creation’ The Evangelical Alliance ↩