A popular Christmas song is the “Twelve Days of Christmas.” Our church has its own lyrics to the twelve days of Christmas. The gift on the first day of Christmas is “Jesus Christ our Lord.” The gifts on the second day of Christmas are “Two Testaments and Jesus Christ our Lord.” This biblical theme continues for all twelve days. But the Darwinists have their version – “The 12 Days of Evolution,” hosted by Joe Hanson, on the series it’s OKAY to be SMART. 1
Day 1 – Hanson starts out quoting Theodosius Dobhanzski – “Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.” Then he states “If life has a point, it is making more life.” It is interesting that Joe just comes out and admits the point that I make – If you believe in Darwinian evolution, you believe that at best, we are just all animals engaged in a battle of survival.
Joe seems to know that scientists do not even have a good story about how life began. Talking about Darwin’s idea he states “It might not tell us how life began.” Then Joe talks about natural selection. Yes, natural selection happens. But it cannot work on anything not already there – it works by eliminating. It works pretty inefficiently. Look at all of the genetic disorders that people and animals have. If it did work more efficiently, probably none of us would be here. All of us have a buildup of genetic mutations2.
Day 2 – Joe compares DNA to a set of instructions for building a house, and genetic mutations being changes to those instructions. He states, “When construction begins, some of those houses that get built fall down. Some of the houses aren’t better or worse, just different. But some of the houses turn out even better!” He states “Life isn’t just chance. It’s the non-random selection of random variation.”
The truth is using that methodology; you will get only minor improvements in the house at best. Once you start making bigger changes – without any kind of planning – the house will fall down, or at least start losing function. And here is why:
I was in a classroom once, right next to a large assembly room. The wall separating the classroom and the assembly area did not go all the way up to the ceiling, which was very high. The classroom area was likely not part of the original plan. So when it got noisy in the assembly area, it was difficult to hear the instructor in the classroom. It was a very poor setup. The reason they could not just put in a drop ceiling is because they would also have to add lighting. This would not only involve the lights and the wiring, but you could potentially overload a circuit; and new circuits may have to be added. Additionally, you need to add ducts and vents for the heating, ventilating and air conditioning (HVAC). And you need to extend the fire suppression system so that it runs down to the drop ceiling. The room could be functional without the fire suppression system; but not without the HVAC and lighting. This is not going to all come together and work by accident. It takes planning. Making random changes and throwing out the worst ones is not going to get it done.
In the case of adding a room to a house, or increasing the size of a house, you need materials to construct the walls, whether it is siding, 2 X 4s, and sheetrock; or masonry materials. You need to increase the foundation that the house is built on. You want to ensure that the added foundation is tied into the existing foundation so it does not “float away.” You need more flooring, whether it is carpet, hard wood, or tile. And you need material to put the flooring down. If you have another room, you will definitely need to add duct work and air vents, and lighting. The current HVAC and electrical systems again may not be designed to handle the increased demand and may require upgrades. New windows may be needed, with all of their components. If the upgrade is a bathroom, you will need new plumbing (requiring new lines), ventilation, a bathroom counter, and maybe a linen closet.
So, “tiny changes,” without anyone asking the question: “Where are we going with this?” are not going to successfully make major changes to a house – let alone turn a house into a ship; although I am sure Darwinists could make up some nice story how that could happen. They might talk about how a house could evolve into a houseboat, and then a ship, totally understating the problem and ignoring all of the planning to make something like that happen.
A good real world biological example of this problem is fruits flies. Scientists have mutated generation after generation of fruit flies to try to come up with something other than a fruit fly. But they have only come up with severely mutated fruit flies that could not survive outside of the lab; for example fruit flies that have an extra set of wings, but no muscles to power those wings.3
Day 3 – Hanson talks about crickets on the island of Kauai that were not destroyed by parasites because they could not chirp. The problem is, this is actually a loss of genetic information and function that provides a survival advantage only in this specific circumstance. It is not an example of how a single celled organism could gain enough genetic information to become all of life on this planet.
Day 4 – Hanson admits that the eye is “amazing bits of biological engineering.” Then he tells a nice story with illustrations about how the eye “evolved.” He starts his story saying that “Light sensitive cells first showed up in simple single celled creatures, helping them swim towards the sun.” He actually states “eyes are pretty easy to evolve, so easy that nature’s done it independently 50 to 100 times.” Really? What he is really saying is that for Darwinian evolution to be true, the eye would have had to evolve independently 50 to 100 times. This is actually a problem for Darwinian evolution. But Joe is committing a logical fallacy by assuming Darwinian evolution to be true; so the eye must have evolved 50 to 100 times. Then he uses that assumption as proof of Darwinian evolution and says evolving an eye is “easy.” Has anyone ever seen the eye evolve 50 to 100 times? Has anyone ever seen the eye evolve one time? To me, it makes a lot more sense to believe we have a creator who created the eye in people and animals. Hanson cites a computer simulation as to how Darwinian evolution could produce an eye. The problem with these computer simulations is they are done by people that already know what an eye is and where they are trying to go – unlike Darwinian evolution. And they do not factor in all of the overwhelming number of harmful mutations. Some mutations are lethal and would end the process on the spot. Most are not removed by natural selection and over time cause a loss of information and function. An example of another program with these shortcomings is cited as answer number 8 in a 2002 article in Scientific American – “15 Answers to Creationists Non-Sense.”2 This same article in answer number 10 uses legs where antennae should be on a fruit fly to show how Darwinian evolution could work.
Day 5 – Mosquito isolation developing new species. Were there entire DNA sequences being added to the mosquito genome, resulting in a creature more advanced and complex? No. They are still mosquitoes! And turtles are still turtles.
Day 6 – Hanson talks about problems of evolution – “Evolution is Dumb!” and talks about the “survival of the good enough.” On Day 4, when talking about the eye, Hanson stated “That kind of complexity, rather than over throwing Darwin’s theory, is proof of its power!” Which is it? Is Darwinian evolution this amazing process that can form an eye, or is it “survival of the good enough”?
Day 7 – Hanson talks about male nipples. Again, if something has a purpose, that “proves” evolution because the purpose gives a survival advantage. If something does not have a purpose, that still “proves” evolution because evolution is a mindless process and there is not a survival disadvantage. When my wife and I were building our house, we started with a basic blue print and then selected options. Men and women are all people, and it takes a male and a female to make a baby. It make sense that the human body would have a basic blue print and then develop as male in the presence of a Y chromosome, or as female in the lack thereof. And male nipples may actually have a purpose in sexual stimulation.5
Day 8 – Hanson makes the old claim that Darwinian evolution does not violate the second law of thermodynamics because we get energy from the sun. The problem is that just adding energy does not prevent disorder from increasing. Throw a party and see how much order the energy of the party brings to your house. The energy has to be purposefully directed. And what do we actually observe in biology? What we actually observe is genomes deteriorating.6
Day 9 – Hanson claims Darwinian evolution can create information. He talks about how segments of DNA can be duplicated in sexual reproduction. Does this reflect reality? Can you take a set of instructions for anything, randomly duplicate a segment of those instructions, make random changes to the duplicated section, and come up with something better? And what do we observe in real life? We observe duplicated genes causing genetic disorders. The genome.gov site makes this argument that duplicated stretches of DNA can produce new function. But they do not give any examples where we have actually observed that happen. It does state “extra copies of the gene can contribute to a cancer”- something we do observe.7
Day 10 – Hanson addresses the question of why there are still monkeys (or apes) and again talks about “survival of the fit enough.” However, I can tell you that this is not a question that I would throw at a Darwinist. He refers to apes as his “cousins.” I ask the question: Would Hanson’s “cousins” even be asking these questions or addressing these issues of why are we here? We are not “another ape.”
Day 11 – Hanson talks about how modern medical treatment keeps people from dying that would have died in times past. But he gives examples of how we are still “evolving.” There are some genetic mutations that might provide some advantages in certain very specific circumstances. But we are all still people! According to Hanson’s reasoning, I should be a new species – Homo terryous – since I never grew wisdom teeth. Also, Hanson ignores the overwhelming number of genetic disorders from genetic mutations. Just do your own internet search on genetic disorders and see what comes up.
Day 12 – Hanson talks about the Coelacanth, which was allegedly extinct, but found in 1938. Hanson states “It has just barely changed since the time of the dinosaurs.” Talk about being blind to the truth! This is a good argument for creation. He claims “In evolution’ eye’s, humans and Coelacanths are equally successful.” Again, would coelacanths be having this conversation? He admits that “evolution doesn’t have a purpose.”
In Paul’s last letter before he is executed, he tells Timothy that God “has saved us, and called us with a holy calling, not according to our works, but according to his own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began.” – II Timothy 1:9 KJB. Who are you going to believe? Are you going to believe Darwin and Hanson and there is no purpose or the only purpose in life is making more life? Or are you going to believe Paul that God has a purpose for your life?
Terry Read
