Who even knows what number we’re up to anymore? I’m not certain but I think that’s meant to say nineteen.
Anyway, task at hand and all that, of late I have been witness to much talk of the Evolution/Creationism debate.
While the Creationism side maintain that the Evolution side must be wrong because their beloved Theory of Evolution is riddled with holes (which it actually is mainly because all the people who could have given evidence about that era, from that era, long ago perished meaning scientists can only extrapolate, or infer facts), and these gaps in time left by the Theory of Evolution, according to Creationists, indicate that Creationism is the only reasonable explanation for the Origin of Life.
The Evolution side stop short of laughing in the face of the Creationism side before putting forward their myriad examples of the existence of life on Planet Earth 600 million years ago, compounded by clear evidence of an evolutionary process; they accept that the Theory on which they’ve based a lifetime of beliefs, while logical it may be, on account of the above reason regarding multimillion-year-old living souls (also the fact that the Dewey Decimal system, thus accurate records, was not introduced until several centuries later), is not perfect and does in fact present areas of doubt.
Evolution has scientists, thus tangible evidence. Creationism has the Bible which, according to Creationists is pretty much an accurate account of what went on; of course Creationists now encounter a similar issue as the Evolutionists – a dearth of living souls to testify to these aforementioned ‘facts’.
Creationists believe that because the Theory of Evolution is questionable, by default, every living soul on Earth ought to turn their belief systems onto that other major theory: the Theory of Creation.
Evolutionists believe that because the Theory of Creationism is fantasy, logically, sensible people ought to do some scientific research on the matter and see where that leads them.
With both sides having pleaded their case I feel I may now step in with my objective viewpoint. If I could begin by offering an analogy: when two foods are put before someone with the instruction to eat, after tasting one of the foods and finding it undesirable, one wouldn’t immediately assume the other to be desirable, would one?
No, one wouldn’t; that would be short-sighted of one. Disproving one side of an argument doesn’t make the other side right, it just makes that side wrong.
Even so, nobody has conclusively disproved either side of this argument and likely, no one ever will.
If it is to come down to the facts and reality of the situation, obviously, given tales of mystical beings, talking serpents, Immaculate Conception and even reanimation, what reasonable person could accept the Theory of Creationism into their lives?
Article by Tim Walker
Edited by Mary N Joseph
Photography by N Simon-Else