Stephen Jay Gould Archives

Question Evolution Day 2022 – The Cambrian Explosion

Posted on February 11, 2022 by Duane Caldwell

A Trilobite and Anomalocaris featured in the Chicago Field Museum’s exhibit on the Cambrian Explosion

Question Evolution Day 2022

Christians are called to make “the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil.” (Ep 5.16) February 12, Darwin’s Birthday, has become a great opportunity to do that. Like Halloween has become an opportunity to give people gospel tracks when they come to your door asking you for stuff, the day some are celebrating Darwin and evolution is the perfect opportunity to offer them the red pill by suggesting they question evolution on Question Evolution Day. If they’ve never heard about it, point them to Cowboy Bob’s page here to show them it’s a real thing, then go on to present them questions and evidence that will help them to see just how wrong and meritless Darwin’s theory of evolution is. Here at Rational Faith, we’ve been doing that for the past few years since hearing of it.

So for this year’s Question Evolution Day informational giveaway we’ll take a brief look at one of the problems Darwinian evolution has with what’s known as the Cambrian explosion. There are a number, but to keep it somewhat brief, we’ll focus on just one of the numerous issues.

The Problem of the Cambrian Explosion

Paleontologist and celebrated evolutionist Stephen Jay Gould, co-author of the evolutionary theory of “Punctuated Equilibrium”, is quoted as saying: Continue Reading

Evolution: Not Science, Pseudoscience

Posted on May 6, 2016 by Duane Caldwell

A duck dressed as a scientist is still a duck. And a pseudoscientific theory dressed up like real science is still pseudoscience. That just leaves the question: is evolution pseudoscience? Fortunately, that’s an easy question to answer: yes. And even better, you don’t need to be a scientist to recognize a pseudoscience, just as you don’t need to be a doctor to recognize the difference between a human and a non-human like a duck. Anyone who knows what a “human” and a “duck” is can easily discern the difference. And anyone who knows what “science” and “pseudoscience” is will likewise easily discern the difference.

As you are probably already aware, a favored tactic of proponents of evolution is to label both Creation and Intelligent Design disciplines as “pseudosciences.” The irony of course being that it is a trivial matter to demonstrate that Darwinian goo-to-you evolution is the epitome of a pseudoscience. Yet regardless of how clear the evidence is, you will never, ever get an evolutionist to acknowledge that Darwinian molecules-to-man evolution is a pseudoscience. So in this article we’ll first take a look at how Darwinian evolution fits the definition of a pseudoscience perfectly; then press on to demonstrate how evolution breaks a number of the known laws of science further proving it to be pseudoscience in spite of their protestations that “it’s science.”

According to the bastion of popular secular knowledge known as Wikipedia, a pseudoscience is:

“…a claim, belief, or practice presented as scientific, but which does not adhere to the scientific method. A field, practice, or body of knowledge can reasonably be called pseudoscientific when it is presented as consistent with the norms of scientific research, but it demonstrably fails to meet these norms.”[1]

So one cannot know whether something is a pseudoscience until one first understands the scientific method. Again, according to Wikipedia, the scientific method is:

“a body of techniques for investigating phenomena, acquiring new knowledge, or correcting and integrating previous knowledge. To be termed scientific, a method of inquiry is commonly based on empirical or measurable evidence subject to specific principles of reasoning. The Oxford English Dictionary defines the scientific method as “a method or
procedure that has characterized natural science since the 17th century, consisting in systematic observation, measurement, and experiment, and the formulation, testing, and modification of hypotheses.”[2]

Evolution fits the definition of a pseudoscience

Evolution fits every criteria necessary to be identified as a pseudoscience: Continue Reading

Evolution – A Faith Commitment

Posted on May 11, 2014 by Duane Caldwell

Though they’ll never admit it, most evolutionists adhere to evolution as followers in any other religion adhere to their faith.

In what was intended to be the first article I posted on this site –
What is Rational Faith, Part 1¹– I mentioned that those who believe in the godless theory of Evolution (which includes most atheists and materialistic scientists) – adhere to it as one adheres to and follows a religious faith. In other words it has taken on the significance of religion in their lives. Most evolutionists would deny this, as would atheists who think that because they define their atheism as a lack of faith/belief in God, they therefore think themselves immune to the common banalities (as they might describe it) of being a follower of a faith. Yet when you look at the impact of evolution on their lives, and how it changes their thoughts and behaviors, one can only conclude that for those who thoroughly understand the theory, it has taken the place of God in their lives². Now you’ll note I’ve qualified the statement by the phrase “those who thoroughly understand the theory.” I do so to distinguish the true adherents from those who follow it without thinking because it’s the “in” thing to do; it’s the majority belief, and they don’t want to be out of the main stream or worse – appear ignorant, or as John C. Lennox puts it, they

“…don’t wish to appear scientifically illiterate…”³

Those who know little about evolution apart from the fact that it supposedly tells us where we came from and it’s what scientists believe, should read articles like Reclaiming The Intellectual and Moral High Ground – which will inform them both on claims made regarding evolution – and why they’re incorrect. If they still believe in evolution, then they appear to have a faith commitment as do other adherents to the Evolutionary faith.

So now that we understand about whom I’m speaking the question becomes how can I defend such a claim? Simply – by the fact that those believe in evolution exhibit the same signs and behaviors as those who follow any other religious faith. As the saying goes, if it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck, a quacks like a duck – it’s probably a duck. There are a number of such tell tale signs, let me just give you a few off the top of my head: Continue Reading