While Darwin’s theories have been widely accepted during our lifetime, they sparked a controversy when they arrived in 1859, and continued to be hotly debated through 1950. Outside scientific circles (e.g. in the media), the debate usually centered on the fact that Darwin’s Theories denied religious teachings about the origin of species, and the origin of life. Inside scientific circles (where religious explanations were not accepted im the 20th century), the debate usually centered on Darwin’s lack of any definitive proof that a new species had ever actually arisen from evolution.

The scientific news since 1950 is that quite a lot of new data have emerged that cast increasing statistical doubt about Darwin’s theory that random mutations coupled with natural selection could completely explain the origin of species.

Before going further, it would be good to summarize Darwin’s theories. First, although Darwin’s work product has been sumarized as “The Theory of Evolution”, Darwin did not discover evolution, and his ideas about evolution and natural selection are not controversial. Almost everybody accepts that biological variations arise randomly from mutations and that the more competent biological variants within a species are more likely to survive.

Here’s the controversial part. Drawin’s theories outlined in The Origin of Species and the Descent of Man insisted that all new species could have been created via evolution and only by evolution. Further, Darwin insisted humans, and all complex animals had evolved randomly from the simplest life forms. Darwin’s theories had two big advantages: (a) Comprehensive (i.e., addressed large questions; and (b) No need for a Creator.`

As a non-biological scientist, I always wondered why advocates of Darwin would get so hostile when one suggested that something other than random mutations could have led to the origin of a species. One answer is that scientists couldn’t come up with a better alternative to a Creator than random mutations. Darwin’s theories provided an alternate story about The Origin of Species that did not require a Creator. For people who didn’t want a Creator, Darwin was essential. For people who were OK with having a Creator, Darwin was not as appealing, because the evidence that random mutations could create new species was never very strong.

In these times, belief in a Creator cannot be taken as evidence in favor of a scientific theory. But, if you take as an axiom that belief in a Creator cannot be evidence for a theory, then non-belief in a Creator also cannot be evidence. If you can’t use atheism as evidence in favor of The Origin of Species and the Descent of Man, the remaining evidence was never never strong, and, recently, has gotten weaker.

In Darwin’s youth, he studied geology with Adam Sedgwick, a legendary geologist who developed theories about geological evolution. Sedgwick, the ranking expert on the fossil record, believed that the sudden emergence of many distinct species in the fossil record, coupled with a complete lack of closely-similar species from which they could have evolved, was a strong argument against The Origin of Species and the Descent of Man and Sedgwick never accepted Darwin’s conclusions.

I want to stress that Sedgwick never argued against “evolution”, nor do modern scientists who argue against Darwin’s theories. What they argue is that “evolution” is not sufficient to explain the origin of life, the origin of species, and the general complexity and competence of life processes.

As to the “new evidence” I promised, there are three types of new scientific evidence that have cast doubt on Darwin’s theories

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More Fossil Records

Since the days of Sedgwick, there have been many digs, finds, and additions to the fossil record. While a detailed discussion of the fossil evidence is beyond the scope of this article (and beyond me), the many new fossil discoveries have generally supported the earlier evidence that lots of distinct species seem to appear in the fossil record suddenly with no corresponding discovery of “missing links”, i.e., fossils of similar species that could credibly demonstrate a chain of “evolution” from one species to another.

Cosmology

For a long time, cosmologists expected to find other planets in which life had evolved in a fashion corresponding to ours. After a century of searching an ever-larger chunk of the universe, cosmologists have found life nowhere else. Further, cosmologosts have recently been discovering that the conditions that permit life must exist within extremely narrow ranges of many chemical and physical parameters that “happen” to exist on earth, but exist nowhere else.

Thus, cosmologists, following Darwin, had expected to find that the universe evolved gradually in response to random, material events. If “life on earth” arose randomly, such evolution must be “probable”, and likely to be repeated. What cosmologists have found is that the earth is totally unique within the explored universe, and that life has been found nowhere else. Further, in cosmology, the discovery of the Big Bang suggests a universe that had a definite begining as opposed to a universe without beginning or end that evolved gradually.

Evolution of DNA

The 1957 discovery by Watson and Crick that biological systems arise from very specific DNA molecules has led to the understanding that biological systems rely on specific and improbable combinations of complex digital codes which enable living organims to live and to accurately and precisely reproduce themselves.

A partial understanding of the complex digital codes within DNA have allowed bio-mathematicians to estimate the probablility of a series of random mutations leading to a modified DNA molecule that could generate a new and functional organism, i.e., a calculation of the odds of random mutations leading to the creation of a new species. The calculation that has come back … the odds of random mutations creating a new species are estomated at 1 in (10 to the 77th power). For people who didn’t take many STEM classes, those odds are less than one in a zillion, gigillion, gazillion, but somewhat greater than 1 divided by googol (10 to the 100th power).

Conclusion

Weirdly, discussions about Darwin seem to hinge on things that seem to be beyond science. Scientists have been unable to explain how or why existence, life itself, human life, consciousness (or dogs, cats, worms, or bugs) began.

Darwin’s theories attempted to explain how species and human beings (dogs, cats, worms, bugs) began. This writer has described how some modern scientists are having trouble believing Darwin’s theories. Along the way, I discovered that a lot of scientists have always had trouble believing The Origin of Species. Darwin never tried to explain how and why life itself, human consciousness, or the universe began.

Nevertheless, other scientists, sometimes called Evolutionary Scientists or neo-Darwinists commonly believe and preach that existence, life itself, human life and consciousness (and dogs and cats), all came about through a random evolutionary process that had no purpose. The more we learn, the less likely it seems that existence, life itself, human life, and consciousness evolved in the way that these guys describe. Their statements are sounding more like religious convictions.

I believe I have learned from this investigation that scientists have no answers to certain important questions that people have been asking for millenia. More correctly, they have answers, but their answers are not supported by any evidence that could pass scientific muster.

Various religions provide answers to these questions, but we can’t really be sure whether these answers are right or wrong. That is why they call it “faith”.

Categories: Commentary, Culture, Philosophy, Truth/Science