Dear Editor,
In two recent letters to the editor, Darwinian evolution is defined by words and phrases such as "testable," "sustained by evidence rather than... faith" and "relies on physical proof" rather than "on faith." The point I wish to make is that there are metaphysical assumptions in Darwinian evolution—namely a commitment to materialism which automatically rules out any special creative acts on the part of a creator, regardless of what the evidence may indicate. Nowhere has it been proved that known natural forces can produce complex biological organisms—this is assumed.
Look at the fossils and you will see a general pattern of sudden appearance, followed by stasis.
I will close with some remarkably candid words from famous Harvard biologist Richard Lewontin (New York Review of Books, Jan. 9, 1997), whose words serve to make my point that Darwinian evolution is more philosophy than science.
"We have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create...a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive... Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door."
J.D. Carlson
Agricultural Meteorologist (assistant researcher)
Biosystems & Agricultural Engineering
Dear Editor,
David Roberts' recent anti-evolution column contains several errors.
A popular myth holds that as he lay dying, Darwin confessed to a woman named Lady Hope that he no longer accepted evolution.
Darwin's children, who were at his deathbed, denied that he ever made any such statement, or that Lady Hope was even present.
Even if it were true, the story is not damaging to evolution.
Scientific theories are measured by the quality of evidence supporting them, not by the status of those who support them.
To be significant, Darwin would have to supply evidence backing his rejection.
According to Roberts, a law of nature makes all things always "run down."
No such law exists.
Snowflakes are more orderly than the liquid water from which they are formed, and their formation (along with countless other natural processes) clearly show that things can, and do, "run up."
Roberts likens a box of colored balls sorting themselves when shaken to the formation of DNA, and scoffs at the improbability. This is a straw man.
Molecules don't behave in such a willy-nilly way. Their behavior is determined by their physical and chemical properties, and their surroundings.
Thayne Stacey
biology sophomore