Defining Creationism.

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Creationists often dismiss Darwinism with the words 'that's just a theory', as if Genesis was somehow factual. This shows a remarkable ignorance of scientific theoretical models of the Universe. Scientific theories are working models of the universe within and against which ideas, hypothesis, and evidence can be repeatedly tested. Scientific theories stand when alternative theories fail to match them as a framework on which to base and build up new ideas. For example, the cosmological Big Bang Theory was once challenged by an alternative theory, called The Steady State Theory, but it was unable to match the BBT as a complete model for what is known and believed about the Universe. Big Bang Theory endures as the best explanation there is - it works. One day something better may come to light but until then, Big Bang Theory is the main theoretical model science holds to. Other theories in science include gravity, Einstein’s theories of Relativity and Darwin’s Theory Of Natural Selection. Some might say ‘evolution’ itself is a theory but no; evolution of life on Earth is actually a fact – the word just means ‘changes over time’ and we can actually observe changes in flora and fauna ourselves. Darwin’s theory is not evolution, but a how and why mechanism of evolution – the reason why things are believed to change – he put it down to the survival of the fittest – natural selection. Natural selection is a theory - evolution itself is a fact. The theory holds simply that the creatures and life best suited to survive changes in environments, climates, temperatures and food supplies, endure – those unsuited to changes, perish to extinction. To date there are no real viable scientific rival alternative theories offering scientific explanations for evolution, and this is where Creationists come in. The problem for Creationists is that the Big Bang Theory, DNA, palaeontology, and Darwinism neatly, but not without gaps, explain the universe our planet, life’s origins and evolution, including the origins of humanity itself in ways that show zero need for a divine creator, or governing gods of any kind. They dismiss God as utterly irrelevant. Creationism can offer nothing but Biblical quotation, pseudo-science and wild ill-thought speculation. The trouble is that Creationists are rather attached to the literalism of the Bible’s non-theoretical, testable-hypothesis defying Bronze Age description of our universe where Earth, life and humanity were magicked out in six days flat. The whole basis of Creationism lies not over the whole Bible, but the opening eleven chapters of the Book Of Genesis. This slender fragment of the much bigger overall Bible carries two conflicting creation myths, the story of the fall of Adam & Eve over the theft of a fruit, the murder of Abel, the rise of a wicked humanity which is wiped out by a global flood ordained by God, and the survival of all existing animals and our own species thanks to a family of just eight people. Post-Noah, Genesis gives a lineage of succession that some continue to the birth of Jesus and which Creationists use to date the World’s initial creation to the year 4,004 BC. This is rather short of the scientifically demonstrated lifespan of Earth dating it back four and a half billion years. The Big Bang that created the universe itself occurred approximately thirteen billion years ago. The scientific evidence comes from a wide range of sources; carbon dating, the lines and layerings of rock strata, experimentation. This information can be seen, studied and examined closely, and invariably gives the same results. Creationists are left with 'But Genesis says ....' Creationists face numerous obstacles from science; dinosaurs and extinct species seriously older than the creation date set by Genesis, recognition that a live woman cannot be manufactured from a man’s rib, nor he from a puddle of mud. No wooden boat can be built as large as the Ark was believed to measure without warping so much that it falls apart and drowns its crew. It has been tried. No crew of 8 could capture, feed and look after four million species of mammal, reptile, bird, insect and bacterial creature. (let’s assume fish could swim through the floods). Also, many creatures and even whole continents they inhabit were undiscovered in Biblical times. The Australian Koala Bear, unseen before 1770 was unlikely to have found eucalyptus leaves in the Asian Near East. Despite even these simple criticisms, Creationists dare to deny that Natural Selection, which they render synonymous with evolution itself, is real compared to their utterly unsubstantiated creation myth. They stick like glue to James Ussher’s 1650 AD assertion that the Earth dates from 4,004 BC, which is so self-evidently ludicrous. Most Christians and Jews and Muslims have no issue with the main scientific theoretical models at all. They could accept Natural Selection as the instructions and rules their God followed in making the Universe along with other physical and mathematical laws and principles. To literalist Fundamentalists however, this reduces the Genesis creation story to allegory, legend, fairy tale and poetry or nonsense. Their defence is to stubbornly maintain Genesis as totally true, and dismiss the proofs and hypothesise that compose Natural Selection theory as bogus and misguided, or even wilfully Satanic. Many Creationists seek to have their teachings established alongside science in education, which has led to conflict between scientists and Creationists. Atheists challenge this as filling children’s heads with misinformation about science and history is extremely dangerous. I'll expand on this soon. Arthur Chappell