The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief by Francis Collins

Author:Francis Collins [Collins, Francis]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Published: 2008-09-03T16:00:00+00:00

Reasons for Lack of Public Acceptance of Darwin’s Theory

There can be no question that the theory of evolution is counterintuitive. For centuries, humans have been closely observing the natural world around them. Most observers, regardless of religious persuasion, have been unable to account for the complexity and diversity of life forms without postulating a designer.

Darwin’s idea was revolutionary because it offered such a totally unexpected conclusion. Seeing new species evolve was not part of anyone’s everyday experience. Despite the unquestioned complexity of certain inanimate objects (such as snowflakes), the complexity of life forms seemed wildly out of proportion to anything observable in the inanimate world. William Paley’s parable of finding a watch on the moor—which would cause any of us to deduce the existence of a watchmaker—resonated with many readers in the seventeenth century, and continues to resonate with many people today. Life appears designed, so there must be a designer.

A major part of the problem in accepting the theory of evolution is that it requires one to grasp the significance of extremely long periods of time involved in the process. Such intervals are unimaginably beyond individual experience. One way to reduce the eons of history into a more comprehensible form is to imagine what would happen if the 4.5 billion years of the earth’s existence, from initial formation to today, were instead compressed into a twenty-four-hour day. If the earth was formed at 12:01 A.M., then life would appear at about 3:30 A.M. After a long day of slow progression to multicellular organisms, the Cambrian explosion would finally occur at about 9 P.M. Later that evening, dinosaurs would roam the earth. Their extinction would occur at 11:40 P.M., at which time the mammals would begin to expand.

The divergence of branches leading to chimps and humans would occur with only one minute and seventeen seconds remaining in the day, and anatomically modern humans would appear with just three seconds left. The life of a middle-aged human on earth today would occupy only the last millisecond (one-thousandth of a second). It is not surprising that many of us have a great deal of difficulty contemplating evolutionary time.

Furthermore, there can be no question that the major resistance to broad public acceptance of evolution, especially in the United States, relates to the perception that it argues against the role of a supernatural designer. This objection, if true, has to be taken with great seriousness by all believers. If you are compelled (as I am) by the existence of the Moral Law and the universal longing for God, if you sense that there is a glowing signpost within our hearts, pointing toward a benevolent and loving presence, then it is quite natural to resist any force that seems bent upon chopping down the sign. Before mounting an all-out war against that invading force, however, we had best be certain that we are not shooting at a neutral observer, or maybe even an ally.

The problem for many believers, of course, is that the conclusions of

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