Standing Up Against False Dichotomies in the Evolution / Creationism Debate

[Hadrian Mar Elijah Bar Israel]

Standing Up Against False Dichotomies
in the Evolution / Creationism Debate

 By Hadrian Mâr Élijah Bar Israël

 

One of the most successful debate tactics which can exist is the creation of a false dichotomy. If you are successful, in creating a false dichotomy and if your adversary takes the bait, you can lead him into having to defend his argument from the position you create yourself, rather than from the facts on his side of the debate. This is very much what has happened in the course of the Evolution-Creationism debate, which has been going on now for more than 130 years.

Contrary to what some people claim, “Evolution” is not a belief in ‘science’ or in the scientific method, but rather describes the Atheist’s belief that life came about as the result of biogenesis (a.k.a. “spontaneous generation”), and evolved after that as the result of small random changes occurring over a long period of time. Evolution may also refer to the evolution of the Universe, moving forward from the time of the Big Bang.

Contrary to what some people claim “Creationism” is not a belief in Christianity or the Bible, but rather that the book of Genesis describes the literal (not metaphorical or spiritual) reality of how the world was created by God. However, to deny that God has the ability to create the real world as described by science is to deny God's Power over the real Universe in which we live and is therefore not a valid Christian philosophy. Saint Paul says of such people, “although they knew God, they did not honour Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.” (Romans 1:21 ESV)

Neither of these ‘theories’ hold up to a dispassionate review of the current state of science; and in fact both seem to exist for the sole purpose of supporting the false claim that that science and religion are incompatible or even fundamentally opposed world views, which they are not.

Some aspects of the spiritual life exist outside of the paradigm of science. However this same thing can be said of any ‘theory’ in science, before it is proved. Recently some Atheist scientists have even proposed theories such as the “M Theory”, which they themselves claim can never be proven and thus are more mythological than many of the misunderstandings which still persist in religion.

In fact science, aided by technology, is slowly catching up to the hidden realms, defining their dimensions, and demarcating their borders. The more science can understand about our natural world, the greater chance of someday understanding the supernatural.

The more that science progresses, the more that previously purely “theological” facts emerge as physical truths. By confirming the same results, does science not then prove that the spiritual intuition of the Fathers was in fact Truth?

If we continue to allow there to be an argument between “science” and “religion”, rather than between the facts represented by religion in science, then we will continue to feed into the false dichotomies which presently surround the debate. Instead it is time for religious people to become scientists and time for scientists to find what has been staring at them through the numbers all along!

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