I always love to hear this "fact" bandied about by those who want us to take on certain belief systems about where we came from. "Evolution is just a theory", or "Scientists have been proving what was previously taken as fact wrong for centuries". It's not just old-fashioned religious zealots like Jack Chick (
http://www.chick.com - you'll love it!), apparently, there are some high-ranking members otherwise-reputable educational systems who are trying to push for teaching this idea that God created a male and female human and a male and female of every other animal around 4,000 B.C. and we're all their descendents. In Georgia, science books were at one stage required to carry disclaimers saying that this was only one possible interpretation of the evidence. Which seems like a highly sensible thing to say - after all we should question authority - until you find out that the Bibles and the Korans and Torahs and whatever else there are aren't required to carry the same stickers! Not to mention their copies of The Da Vinci Code. I believe the stickers were later removed, but it still means there are people with influence in education pushing for this. Worse still, while I was looking up the state that did that, I found out that Oklahoma science books were required to state specifically that in fact, it was God who created us all. And we thought de Valera was bad.
Now I'm not going to go into the incestual permutations of the time, or even ask why the Bible doesn't mention dinosaurs, or ask how the half-life of carbon-14 (or whatever it is) could possibly have changed, instead, let me explain a few things.
1) Evolution
is a theory.
2) Scientists
have been proving things wrong for centuries.
1) "Evolution is a theory", I think the people who say this aren't really sure of what exactly a theory is. First we make an observation, and see, yes life exists. Then we form a hypothesis - i.e. a possible story of where life came from. This is what I think people have in their minds as to what a theory is. But all we have is a hypothesis. Now we make predictions based on our hypothesis, and do experiments to try and find out if our predictions are true. If they are,
then we have a theory.
It is extremely difficult to prove something that isn't a mathematical theorem (like pythagoras theorem or something) as fact. Even if you make 999,999 predictions and they all come true, you're 1,000,000th one might disprove it. Furthermore, since your theory (in this case evolution) has to state things *very* specifically, it might have happened but it might be slightly wrong. So Evolution is a theory, but it is
very very probably true.
2) Scientists have been proving things wrong for centuries. This is true, but look at the things they've been proving wrong - many beliefs which were before held by religious & philisophical people - the Earth is flat, the Earth is the centre of the universe.
Of course, if Evolution is ever shown to be false, the creationists will jump for joy with a feeling of great vindication. But hang on a second! They still haven't proven their story. From what I see, they are working under the following stream of logic.
Evolution is just a theory, therefore evolution is false.
Evolution is false, therefore creation by God is true. q.e.d.
Furthermore, they have this faith-based system, which is very convenient for them... It means you don't need proof. If you ask them to prove it, they swear that the Bible is proof enough because of the unquestionable faith in the Bible. Imagine me trying to explain that evolution is true because of my faith in it.
So I ask you, where are the predictions that make the story of creation a theory? Are there any? Is there any evidence aside from a book, that Adam and Eve were created and are our ancestors?
Yes it's true, evolution is just a theory.
But creation is just a hypothesis.
Of course, nothing in life is certain. I have just described a method that will solve the world's energy problems. What? You thought it was about creation & evolution? You must have mis-read it. Read it again. You read it 100 times? You must have misread every single time.
