Creation science is an effort to explain the origin and early history of the Earth and life on Earth in a manner consistent with creationism and the religious beliefs of Biblical literalists, who view the book of Genesis as inerrant. This encompasses such topics as the age of the universe, the age of the Earth, macroevolution, a global flood, and the origin of humanity. Because creation science directs its efforts toward confirming the Bible rather than investigating open questions, is often percieved as rejecting any evidence that the Bible is not inerrant out of hand, and for other reasons, nearly all scientists view it as pseudoscience.
Philosophy and theology
Creation science is described by its proponents as a synthesis of science and religion, as it attempts to draw on both sources in developing its theories. As such, it differs both from pure creationist theology and from the widely accepted philosophy of science which excludes the supernatural a priori.
Like creationist theology, it presumes the accuracy of Genesis; indeed, most adherents to creation science believe it to be inerrant. Unlike creationist theology, however, creation science adopt some features of the scientific method as a means to demonstrate its claims about events in the past. In particular, adherents to creation science believe that scientific evidence exists that is consistent with the standard conservative interpretation of Genesis. Unlike mainstream science, however, creation science holds that the study of natural phenomena can reveal evidence of supernatural events and direct action by God.
In addition to allowing for supernatural events in history, creation scientists also distinguish between what they call "operational science" and "origins science." Operational science, according to creation scientists, involves the laws and phenomena of nature which are repeatable and testable through experiment; for instance, the laws of gravity, chemistry, and microevolution. However, creation scientists assert that issues of "origins science" are different from issues of "operational science," because they involve one-time events which cannot be observed or repeated, but can only be inferred from the evidence. Asserted examples of such issues in origins science are common ancestry, the age of the Earth, and historical geology, in which the ability of scientists to study the issues is limited by the available evidence, because the actual events cannot be observed first-hand. It is argued that in issues of "origins science," conclusions are much more tentative due to the unrepeatable nature of the events, that the conclusions are therefore much more subject to philosophical bias than in "operational science," and that "origins science" therefore admits multiple possible interpretations of the evidence.
Not all creationists believe in creation science, and Old Earth creationists tend to be notably less forceful in their opinions than Young Earth creationists.
Creation science is closely related to intelligent design, which differs in that its proponents claim to not make any theological assumptions. Critics note that the intelligent design movement was started (by many of the same individuals previously campaigning for creationism) after attempts to get creation science in public classrooms met major opposition due to constitutional church-state separation issues in the United States.
The mainstream scientific community considers creation science to be religiously motivated anti-science propaganda.
Subjects within creation science
Subjects within creation science can be into split into three broad categories, each covering a different area of origins research; creationist cosmologies, flood geology, and creation biology.
Creation biology
Creation biology states that life was created by God in a finite number of created kinds rather than through biological evolution. It also claims that much of the currently observable speciation took place through inbreeding and harmful mutations during a proposed population bottleneck after the great flood of Noah's ark, which they claim was an actual historical event that happened exactly as described in the Bible.
Creation biology argues against biological evolution (see creation-evolution controversy). Popular arguments against evolution have changed over the years since the publishing of Henry M. Morris's first book on the subject, Scientific Creationism, but these themes often arise: missing links as an indication that evolution is incomplete, arguments based on entropy, complexity, and information theoretic arguments claiming that natural selection is an impossible mechanism, and general criticism of the historical sciences as lacking experimental basis. The origin of the human species is particularly hotly contested; the fossil remains of hominid ancestors are not considered by advocates of creation biology to be evidence for a speciation event involving homo sapiens.
Flood geology
Main article: Flood geology
Flood geology is based on the belief that many of Earth's geological formations were created by a global flood matching what was described in the story of Noah's ark. Fossils and fossil fuels are believed by its followers to be animal and plant matter which were buried rapidly during this flood, while submarine canyon extensions are explained as having formed during a rapid runoff from the continents after the seafloors dropped. Sedimentary strata are described as sediments allegedly laid down after Noah's flood.
In addition to the above ideas that are in opposition to the principles of mainstream geologists, advocates of flood geology reject uniformitarian geology and especially radiometric dating.
Creationist cosmologies
Several attempts have been made to construct a cosmology consistent with a young Earth rather than the standard cosmological age of the universe. These cosmologies, detailed in the main article, attempt to tackle problems such as that much of the light we observe on Earth has been in transit for millions and even billions of years.
History
Within the history of creationism, creationism was originally based purely on theology. The vast majority of Church Fathers and Reformers accepted Genesis straightforwardly, and even the few who did not, such as Origen and Augustine, defended an earth that was on the order of thousands of years old.
The discovery of the ancient age for the age of the Earth prompted some to look to studying geology within the Biblical timeframe detailed in the Ussher-Lightfoot calendar. In the first half of the nineteenth century, the leaders were the scriptural geologists in Britain. About a century later, the Canadian George McCready Price, wrote extensively on the subject. However, the concept only revived during the 1960s following the publication of The Genesis Flood by Henry M. Morris and John C. Whitcomb.
Subsequently, creation science has expanded into biology and cosmology. However, efforts to have it legislated to be taught in schools in the United States were eventually halted by the Supreme Court's interpretation of the first amendment in Edwards v. Aguillard 1987.
Scientific criticisms of creation science
Creationists often claim that creationism, and more specifically creation science, is not only scientific, but that it is even more scientific than evolution. This presents a demarcation problem, which in the philosophy of science, is about how and where to draw the lines around science. For a theory to qualify as scientific it must be:
- consistent (internally and externally)
-
parsimonious (sparing in proposed entities or explanations)
- useful (describes and explains observed phenomena)
- empirically testable & falsifiable
- based upon controlled, repeatable experiments
- correctable & dynamic (changes are made as new data is discovered)
- progressive (achieves all that previous theories have and more)
- tentative (admits that it might not be correct rather than asserting certainty)
For any theory, hypothesis or conjecture to be considered scientific, it must meet at least most, but ideally all, of the above criteria. The fewer which are matched, the less scientific it is; and if it meets only a couple or none at all, then it simply cannot be treated as scientific in any sense of the word.
Specific objections raised against creationism as actual science include:
-
Creationism is not falsifiable. Theism is not falsifiable, since the existence of God is typically asserted without sufficient conditions to allow a falsifying observation. God being a transcendental being, beyond the realm of the observable, claims about its existence can neither be supported nor undermined by observation, hence making creationism, the argument from design and other arguments for the existence of God a posteriori arguments.
- Creationism violates the principle of parsimony. Creationism fails to pass Occam's razor. Adding supernatural entities to the equation is not strictly necessary to explain events.
-
Creationism is not empirically testable. That creationism is not empirically testable stems from the fact that creationism violates a basic premise of science, naturalism.
- Creationism is not correctable, dynamic, tentative or progressive. Creationism professes to be the absolute Truth, the word of God, not a provisional assessment of data which can change when new information is discovered. Once it is claimed that the Truth has been established, there is simply no possibility of future correction. The idea of the progressive growth of scientific ideas is required to explain previous data and any previously unexplainable data as well as any future data. It is often given as a justification for the naturalistic basis of science. In any practical sense of the concept, creationism is not progressive: it does not explain or expand upon what went before it and is not consistent with established ancillary theories.
In light of its poor adherence to the standards of the scientific method, creationism, and specifically creation science, can not be said to be scientific. First, its hypothesis/solution is not based on analysis and observation of the empirical world - rather, it comes directly from scriptures. Moreover, as there is no way to test the theory. And lastly, the underlying assumptions of creationism are not open to change.
Scientists note that creation science differs from mainstream science in that it begins with an assumption, then attempts to find evidence to support that assumtion. Conversely, science sets out to learn about the world through the collection of empirical evidence and the use of the scientific method.
Historically the debate of whether creationism is compatible with science can be traced back to 1874, the influential science historian John William Draper published his 'History of the Conflict between Religion and Science'. In it he portrayed the entire history of scientific development as a war against religion. This somewhat skewed presentation of historical fact was propagated further by such prestigious followers as Andrew Dickson White in his essay 'A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom'.
Opponents consider creation science to be an ideologically and politically motivated propaganda tool whose purpose is to promote the creationist agenda in society. They allege that the term "creation science" was chosen to purposely blur the distinction between science and religion, thereby undeservedly legitimizing creationism by association to science.
Creation science and falsifiability
Creation science is commonly called unfalsifiable by prominent members of the mainstream scientific community. Falsifiability was proposed by Karl Popper as a criterion for whether an idea should be considered scientific. If no experiment could be devised which would prove a theory false, then the theory was not a function of science, but rather metaphysical or pseudoscience. Popper argued that certain ideas, such as Freudian psychology, were not falsifiable, because any possible observation could be fit into the theory, so that the theory, although not necessarily false, were metaphysical, rather than strictly scientific.
He classified theories into three broad categories based on how falsifiable they were:
- "...There will be well-testable theories, hardly testable theories, and non-testable theories. Those which are non-testable are of no interest to empirical scientists. They may be described as metaphysical." Popper, Karl, Conjectures and Refutations (New York: Basic Books, 1963), p. 257.
Many prominent scientists have argued that "creation science" is an oxymoron and purely metaphysical, because it is unfalsifiable. Some other scientists and philosophers of science argue that statements such as these are not true to the definition of falsifiability and are instead merely specious rhetorical devices. For instance, Phillip Quinn, a philosopher of science, wrote:
- "Unfortunately, the patently false claim that creation science is neither testable nor falsifiable seems well on its way to becoming, for some evolutionary biologists, a rhetorical stick with which to belabor their creationist opponents. In a recent collection of essays, Stephen Jay Gould claims that "'scientific creationism' is a self-contradictory nonsense phrase precisely because it cannot be falsified' ... Ironically, in the next sentence Gould goes on to contradict himself by asserting that "the individual claims are easy enough to refute with a bit of research." Indeed some of them are! But since they are easily refuted by research, they are after all falsifiable and, hence, testable. This glaring inconsistency is the tip-off to the fact that talk about testability and falsifiability functions as verbal abuse and not a serious argument in Gould's anti-creationist polemics." ["The philosopher of science as expert witness", p. 43, in Cushing, J., Delaney, C.F. & Gutting, G., Science and reality: Recent Work in the Philosophy of Science, University of Notre Dame Press, 1984]
Creationists, of course, acknowledge that some aspects of creationism are unfalsifiable, but assert that other aspects are falsifiable. They claim parts of their beliefs are very difficult to falsify solely because the related events took place in the distant past. Creationists also argue that the unfalsifiability of an idea does not necessarily mean that the idea is false, but only that contemporary scientists lack the tools to test it effectively. They see the unfalsifiable aspects of the theory as ambiguities in the idea, rather than cause to dismiss the idea out of hand. Finally, they assert that many aspects of evolutionary theory are also unfalsifiable, such as common ancestry between humans and apes. They claim that no falsifying experiment could be conducted to test that theory, so a theory need not be wholly falsifiable in order to be considered scientific.[1]
Bibliography
A history of the revival of this form of Creationism can be found in Ronald L. Numbers, The Creationists: The Evolution of Scientific Creationism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992), but gives a somewhat distored picture in that it is limited to 20th century and is concerned only with the movement in the USA, while neglecting significant groups in Great Britain, Europe and Australia.
Creation science
- Batten, Don, Editor The Answers Book ISBN 0-949906-23-9 (Brisbane, Australia: Answers in Genesis, 1999)
- Morris, Henry M., ed., Scientific Creationism ISBN 0-89052-003-2 (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 1985)
- Morris, Henry M. and Gary E. Parker, What is Creation Science? ISBN 0-89051-081-4 (El Cajon, CA: Institute for Creation Research, 1987)
- Mortenson, Terry, The Great Turning Point: The Church's Catastrophic Mistake on Geology — Before Darwin ISBN 0-89051-408-9 (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2004)
- Wilder-Smith, A. E., Man's Origin, Man's Destiny ISBN 0-87123-356-8 (Wheaton, IL: Harold Shaw Co., 1968)
- Sarfati, Jonathan, Refuting Evolution ISBN 0-890512-58-2 (Brisbane, Australia: Answers in Genesis, 1999)
- Sarfati, Jonathan, Refuting Evolution 2 ISBN 0-890513-87-2 (Brisbane, Australia: Answers in Genesis, 2002)
- Sarfati, Jonathan, Refuting Compromise ISBN 0-890514-11-9 (Green Forest, AR: Master Books, 2004)
- Woodmorappe, John, Studies in Flood Geology ISBN 0-932766-54-4 (El Cajon, CA: Institute for Creation Research, 1993)
- Woodmorappe, John, Noah's Ark: A Feasibility Study ISBN 0-932766-41-2 (El Cajon, CA: Institute for Creation Research, 1996)
- Woodmorappe, John, The Mythology of Modern Dating Methods ISBN 0-932766-57-9 (El Cajon, CA: Institute for Creation Research, 1999)
- Wilder-Smith, A. E., Scientific Alternative to Neo-Darwinian Evolutionary Theory ISBN 9-99213-967-6 (Costa Mesa, CA: TWFT Publishers, 1987)
- Whitcomb, John C. and Henry Morris, The Genesis Flood ISBN 0-87552-338-2 (Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1964)
- Roth, Ariel A., Origins—Linking Science and Scripture ISBN 0-8280-1328-4 (Hagarstown, MD: Review and Herald Publishing Association, 1998)
Criticism
- Bates, V. L., 1976, Christian Fundamentalism and the Theory of Evolution in Public School Education: A Study of the Creation Science Movement [Ph.D. dissert.]: University of California, Davis.
- Lewin, R., 1982, Where is the science in Creation science? Science 215, pp. 142–146.
- Vawter, B., 1983, Creationism: Creative Misuse of the Bible, in Frye, R. M., ed., Is God a Creationist? The Religious Case Against Creation-Science (New York, Scribner's Sons), p. 71–82.
External links
Creation science
Criticism
