| 1. Information |
| The instructions for how to build, operate, and
repair living cells represent a vast amount of information
(estimated at 12 billion bits). Information is a mental,
non-material concept. It can never arise from a natural
process and is always the result of an intelligence. Just as
a newspaper story transcends the ink on the paper, life’s DNA
itself (like the ink) is not the information, it is simply a physical
representation or housing of the information (the story).
Modifying the DNA
via mutation can never produce new genetic information to
drive upward evolution, just as spilling coffee on the newspaper,
thereby modifying the distribution of the ink, will never improve the
story. |
| Key
references: Genetic
Entropy (Sanford), In the
Beginning was Information (Gitt). |
|
| 2. Formation of Life |
| Dead
chemicals cannot become alive on their own. The cell is a miniature
factory with many active processes, not a simple blob of
“protoplasm” as believed in Darwin’s day. Lightening striking a mud puddle or some “warm little
pond” will never produce life. This is another view of the core
issue of information as the simplest living cell requires a vast
amount of information to be present. The “Law of Biogenesis”
states that life comes only from prior life. Spontaneous generation
has long been shown to be impossible (by Louis Pasteur in 1859).
Numerous efforts to bring life from non-life (including the famous
Miller-Urey experiment) have not succeeded. The probability of life
forming from non-life has been likened to the probability of a
tornado going through a junkyard and spontaneously assembling a
working 747 airplane. The idea that life on earth may have been
seeded from outer space just moves the problem elsewhere. |
| Key
reference: Why
Abiogenesis is Impossible,
Jerry Bergman, CRS
Quarterly, Volume 36, March 2000 |
|
| 3. Design of Living Things |
| Design
is apparent in the living world. Even Richard Dawkins in his
anti-creation book The Blind
Watchmaker admits “Biology is the study of complicated things
that give the appearance of having been designed for a purpose.”
The amazing defense mechanism of the Bombardier Beetle is a classic
example of design in nature, seemingly impossible to explain as the
result of accumulating small beneficial changes over time, because
if the mechanism doesn’t work perfectly, “boom” – no more
beetle! This is also another view of the core issue of information,
as the design of living things is the result of processing the
information in the DNA
(following the blueprint) to produce a working organism. |
| Key
reference:
The three-part video series Incredible
Creatures that Defy Evolution
describes many more examples like that of the Bombardier
Beetle |
|
| 4. Irreducible Complexity |
| The
idea that “nothing works until everything works.” The classic
example is a mousetrap, which is irreducibly complex in that if one
of its several pieces is missing or not in the right place, it will
not function as a mousetrap and no mice will be caught. The systems,
features, and processes of life are irreducibly complex. What good
is a circulatory system without a heart? An eye without a brain to
interpret the signals? What good is a half-formed wing? Doesn’t
matching male and female reproductive machinery need to exist at the
same time, fully-functioning if any reproduction is to take place?
Remember, natural selection has no foresight, and works to eliminate
anything not providing an immediate benefit. |
| Key
reference:
Darwin’s Black Box
(Behe) |
|
| 5. Second Law of Thermodynamics |
| The
Second Law of Thermodynamics refers
to the universal tendency for things, on their own, to “mix”
with their surrounding environment over time, becoming less ordered
and eventually reaching a steady-state. A glass of hot water becomes
room temperature, buildings decay into rubble, and the stars will
eventually burn out leading to the “heat death” of the universe.
However, the evolutionary scenario proposes that over time things,
on their own, became more ordered and structured. Somehow the
energy of a “Big Bang” structured itself into stars, galaxies,
planets, and living things, contrary to the Second Law. It is
sometimes said that the energy of the Sun was enough to overcome
this tendency and allow for the formation of life on earth. However,
application of energy alone is not enough to overcome this tendency;
the energy must be channeled by a machine. A human must repair a
building to keep it from decaying. Likewise, it is the machinery of
photosynthesis which harnesses the energy of the Sun, allowing life
to exist, and photosynthesis is itself a complex chemical process.
The maturing of an acorn into a tree, or a zygote (the first cell
resulting from fertilization) into a mature human being does not
violate the Second Law as these processes are guided by the
information already present in the acorn or zygote. |
| Key
reference: The
Second Law of Thermodynamics
(answersingenesis.org) |
|
| 6. Existence of the Universe |
| By
definition, something must be eternal (as we have “something”
today and something cannot come from “nothing”, so there was
never a time when there was “nothing”). Either the universe
itself is eternal, or something/someone outside of and greater than
the universe is eternal. We know that the universe is not eternal,
it had a beginning (as evidenced by its expansion). Therefore, God
(the something/someone outside of the universe) must exist and must
have created the universe. Einstein showed that space and time are
related. If there is no space there is no time. Before the universe
was created there was no space and therefore no concept of time.
This is hard for us to understand as we are space-time creatures,
but it allows for God to be an eternal being, completely consistent
with scientific laws. The question “who created God” is
therefore an improper/invalid question, as it is a time-based
question (concerning the point in time at which God came into
existence) but God exists outside of time as the un-caused first
cause. |
|
| 7. Fine-tuning of Earth for Life |
Dozens
of parameters are “just right” for life to exist on this planet.
For example, if the Earth were just a little closer to the Sun it
would be too hot and the ocean’s water would boil away, much
further and it would be covered continually in ice. Earth’s
circular orbit (to maintain a roughly constant temperature
year-round), its rotation speed (to provide days and nights not too
long or short), its tilt (to provide seasons), and the presence of the
moon (to provide tides to cleanse the oceans) are just some of many
other examples.
The presence of large amounts of water, with its amazing special
properties, is also required. Water is a rare compound in that it is
lighter in a solid state than in a liquid state. This allows ponds
to freeze with the ice on the surface allowing the life beneath to
survive. Otherwise bodies of water would freeze from the bottom up
and become solid ice. Water is also the most universal “solvent”
known, allowing for dissolving/mixing with the many different
chemicals of life. In fact, our bodies are 75-85% comprised of
water. |
| Key
reference: The
Privileged Planet
(Gonzalez/Richards) |
|
| 8. Fine-tuning of Physics |
| The
fine-tuning of the physical
constants that control the physics of the universe - the
settings of the basic forces (strong nuclear force constant, weak
nuclear force constant, gravitational force constant, and
electromagnetic force constant) are on a knife’s edge. A minor
change in these or any of dozens of other universal parameters would
make life impossible.
The
“multiverse” idea that there may be many universes and ours
“just happened” to have these proper values is outside of
science and could never be proven. Even then we would have to ask
“what was the cause of all these universes?” |
| Key
reference:
Hugh Ross lists about 100
parameters on the Reasons To
Believe web site. See also Design
and the Anthropic Principle |
|
| 9. Abrupt Appearance in the Fossil Record |
| The
oldest fossils for any creature are already fully-formed and don’t
change much over time (“stasis”). The “Cambrian Explosion”
in the “primordial strata” documents the geologically rapid
appearance of most major groups of complex animals. There is no
evidence of evolution from simpler forms. Birds are said to have
evolved from reptiles but no fossil has ever been found having a
“half-scale/half-wing”. A reptile breathes using an “in and
out” lung (like humans have), but a bird has a “flow-through”
lung suitable for moving through the air. Can you even imagine how
such a transition of the lung could have taken place? Abrupt appearance and
stasis are consistent with the biblical concept of creation
“according to its kind”, and a world-wide flood that scoured the
earth down to its basement rocks, depositing the “geologic
column” and giving the appearance of a “Cambrian Explosion”.
Smarter, more mobile creatures would escape the flood waters longer,
becoming buried in higher-level strata, leading to a burial order
progressing from “simpler” forms to more complex/higher-level
forms, which people now wrongly interpret as an evolutionary
progression. |
| Key
reference: Fossils
Q&A (answersingenesis.org) |
|
| 10. Human Consciousness |
| A
person is a unity of body + mind/soul, the mind/soul being the immaterial part of you that is the real inner you.
Chemicals alone cannot explain self-awareness, creativity,
reasoning, emotions of love and hate, sensations of pleasure and
pain, possessing and remembering experiences, and free will. Reason
itself cannot be relied upon if it is based only on blind
neurological events. |
| Key
reference: The
Origin of the Brain and Mind,
Brad Harrub and Bert Thompson,
CRS
Quarterly, Volume 41, June 2004 |
|
| 11. Human Language |
| Language
is one of the main things that separates man from the animals. No
animal is capable of achieving anything like human speech, and all
attempts to teach chimpanzees to talk have failed. Evolutionists
have no explanation for the origin of human language. However, the
Bible does. It says that the first man, Adam, was created able to
speak. The Bible also explains why we have different human
languages, as God had to "confuse" the common language
being used in Babel after the flood, in order to force people to
spread out around the world as He wanted. This was only a
"surface" confusion though, as all languages express the
same underlying basic ideas and concepts, enabling other languages
to be learned and understood. |
| Key
reference: The
Mystery of Human Language (Morris, icr.org) |
|
| 12. Sexual Reproduction |
| Many
creatures reproduce asexually. Why would animals abandon simpler
asexual reproduction in favor of more costly and inefficient sexual
reproduction? Sexual reproduction is a very complex process that
is only useful if fully in place. For sexual reproduction to have
evolved complimentary male and female sex organs, sperm and eggs,
and all the associated machinery in tandem defies
the imagination. |
|
| 13. The Bible's Witness |
| The
Bible is true. The history of the Bible is true. The words of the
Bible concerning our origins were given to men to write down, by
God, who was the only living being present. We were not there! God
said He created the universe. God said He created all living things.
We know that life is much more than chemicals. God put His life into
Adam and that life has been transferred from generation to
generation all the way down to us! |
| Key
reference: The
New Evidence That Demands a Verdict
(McDowell) |
|
|