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To the Editor, Anniston Star,
James Evans’ February 9, 2007 article on “Science, Faith and
Politics” criticized Bishop Boniface Adoyo of Kenya for “flexing
political muscle” by calling on evangelicals in Kenya to boycott the
national museum’s display of “Turkana Boy,” and for demanding a warning
sign that “Evolution is not a fact.”
Is Evans among those who say people of faith should just
accept what any scientist says, no questions asked? That view was not in
vogue in the time of Charles Darwin, whose only earned degree was in
theology.
Evans makes the logical mistake of dicto simpliciter,
or hasty generalization, in saying “For more than 500 years people of
faith have been at war with people of science. In nearly every one of
these contests—from whether the sun revolves around the earth or whether
illness is caused by demons—the faith position has proven to be
incorrect.”
He overlooks the scientific ash heap of failed theories and
hoaxes: spontaneous generation, Ernst Haeckel’s biogenetic law of
embryonic recapitulation, Piltdown man—based on an altered orangutan’s
jaw, Nebraska man—based on one giant pig’s tooth, etc.
There is no conflict between true science and biblical
faith. Much of the scientific world has, however, abandoned true
scientific objectivity so that it becomes a religious faith system
itself. The evolutionary faith system demands we believe that life came
from non-life (spontaneous generation). If, as evolution asserts, all
life has evolved from species to species, there should be an unbroken
continuum among species, but neither the fossil record nor observation
shows that to be true.
Evans’ suggests the question of where Cain got his wife is a
serious difficulty for those who take the Bible literally. Since Eve
“was the mother of all living,” (Genesis 3:20), Cain married another
descendant of Eve. Truth is consistent with truth. Jesus prayed,
“Sanctify them through thy truth: thy word is truth” (John 17:17).
Science, Faith and Politics
Letters to the Editor
by Bob Prichard
www.oxfordchurchofchrist.com |
