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JANUARY 6, 2004 –
I was an anthropology minor in
college.
The first semester of
courses was a test of patience and blind faith beyond anything
academia should accept. In not one, not two, but all three of the
100-level anth. courses I was taking, the centerpiece of the
instruction revolved around preaching Darwin’s theory of random
evolution as if it was proven, undisputed fact and the only
reasonable explanation of things.
I had planned on
being an anthropology major – as the quest to understand all of
mankind and what universally connects us - is the central work of my
life. But after this barrage of arrogant blindness, I quickly
shifted course and stuck with anthropology on a secondary level
only, using it to fill me in about the peoples of places I knew
nothing about, such as small villages in India, Asia, and South
America as well as give me a fuller picture of history about things
like Native American history. But as for taking anthropology’s
scientific foundations seriously, there wasn’t a chance.
What’s wrong with
teaching Darwinism? There’s nothing wrong with teaching Darwin’s
theory of random evolution. Survival of the fittest is a nice idea
that bears some elements of truth and has shaped much of our recent
social and scientific history.
But personally, I
consider Darwin’s explanation of evolution to be complete bunk.
Evolution is not random, it is directed.
Now don’t start
jumping up and down and think you have a champion for teaching
Creationism. “Intelligent Design,” as the Pennsylvania school
system aptly labeled it, is simply about that: the idea that there
is some intelligence guiding things.
What that
intelligence is is open to debate. It may be a Supreme Being, such
as the Judeo/Christian God. It may be aliens who designed our
planet or universe like a farm or a science experiment (I have
recently completed a screenplay on this possibility this past year
which hopefully will be coming to theaters before too long.) It may
be that the intelligence that directs evolution is within us, within
our DNA, within our spirits.
The thing that Darwin
nailed that seems pretty untouchable is that things evolve. But
Darwin’s central guess and main point, that this evolution is
“random” and not directed, that it is purely the result of random
mutations, that these completely random mutations regularly create
sort of freak new types of animals and plant life which then
compete, via “survival of the fittest,” and the winner gets to
survive, the less fit line fading into oblivion; Darwin’s central
theory that all of our evolution to date and all future evolution is
guided by these completely chance random mutations of DNA is
absolutely asinine, from my opinion.
Take Venus Fly Traps,
for example. These are carnivorous plants, plants that actually
snap up and digest flies, that put off a scent which attracts the
flies they want to eat, which have a reactive mechanism which then
snatches shut, trapping the fly, and then which release chemicals
that allow the plant to digest the fly.
Now, such a plant has
quite an advantage for survival. In fact, it should thrive in many
places around the globe. It not only can absorb nutrients from the
ground and produce energy via chlorophyll reactions with sunlight
like other plants, but it can supplement its diet with fly digest,
and we all know flies exist all over the darned place.
So, if Darwin was
right and evolution was completely random, then there should be no
real reason these plants should turn up one place or another.
According to Darwin’s take on things, suddenly one plant mutated to
put off a fly attracting scent, created a fast moving (particularly
for usually stagnant plants) fly trapping mechanism, and the
developed the ability to digest these flies, all just as some fluke,
chance tweaking of some DNA. This could have occurred anywhere.
But it didn’t. Where
do Venus Fly Traps exist in America? Just in the bogs of North and
South Carolina.
Now the question
becomes, is there an intelligent reason that plants in these areas
might have chosen to evolve themselves, adapted if you will, to
begin make all of the incredible changes which allow them to consume
flies?
The answer is yes.
While if evolution were random, a Venus Fly Trap, or other fly
consuming plant, would be just as likely to evolve in a place with
healthy, nutrient-rich soil as in a place with inadequate soil, this
did not happen. The Venus Fly Trap only evolved into existence in
the bogs of North and South Carolina, the soil of which happens to
be direly lacking in nitrogen content. And guess what eating flies
provides for the Venus Fly Traps? Right, nitrogen.
Now one possible
theory is Darwin’s, that this is just random chance. That it was
entirely random that plants somehow managed to develop a way to
obtain nitrogen from a source other than the soil, air, or sun only
in an area where nitrogen was lacking.
But now take into
account this fact, provided by the
Saint Louis County Parks Department’s Sherwood Forest Nursery and
Garden Center website: “…the characteristic common to all
(carnivorous plant) habitats is the lack of nutrients in the soil.”
All. Carnivorous
plants only exist naturally where they need to. Though certainly
obtaining nutrients from flies and other insects, as carnivorous
plants do, wouldn’t hurt in other areas, the supposedly random
mutations, as Darwinism would explain it, that led to the evolution
of carnivorous plants only, by chance his theory says, just happened
to occurred in places where it was needed.
To put it another
way, if someone or something were designing the planet, the plants
they designed for the rest of the planet would have no success in
such areas, and so they would have had to come up with a different
type of plant for such areas with nutrient-poor soil.
Or to put it another
way, plants living in or near such areas, if they had the ability to
guide their evolution, would likely guide it to reach out to the
vital nutrients flying around them. Some will within the very
plants’ being or some deeper level of intelligence within its
biological makeup would guide it, for the sake of survival, to adapt
itself by evolving into a carnivorous organism.
Now of all these
theories, which seems the least likely.
While we can not know
for sure in anyway if some Supreme Being or aliens or other
intelligent guiding force of some sort created the Venus Fly Trap
just so there would be some plant that could survive in the
nitrogen-lacking bogs of North and South Carolina, but it is
possible, i.e. we can not disprove that possibility. Furthermore,
it is possible that a planet was created by such a force or being so
that the plant life on it would have the ability to adapt itself
intelligently to its conditions as they change. Not provable, but
possible.
The possibility that
there is either some intelligent spirit or intelligent biological
mechanism existing within plants which allowed these adaptations to
occur only when and where they were needed is an intuitively obvious
one, and one that can not be proven false.
Of the above three
possible theories, only Darwinism seems to come up short. If
evolution is random, as his theory states, then carnivorous plants
should have popped up and thrived and random places all over the
planet. They may be the only survivors in places with poor soil,
but there is no reason they could not do well in other areas as
well, and so should exist in rich- as well as poor-soil areas of the
planet, if his theory is correct.
Again from the
Sherwood Forest Nursery and Garden, “The bogland areas where (the
Venus Fly Trap) normally grows are devoid of the nutrients that it
requires, so the plant grows stems, which have traps on the end. It
is in these traps that the insects are caught.”
Sound random?
Now Darwin has some
good points, and evolution is an undeniable reality. But whether or
not that evolution is random is at least debatable, from my
perspective absurd.
And so along comes
the Dover Area School District in Pennsylvania offering, at last,
some other possible explanations to complement the teaching of the
nonsense Darwin spewed forth centuries ago. “Intelligent Design.”
As
CNN reports,
“Intelligent Design does not presuppose any supernatural being, and
is not creationism, the school district said in its response, saying
the school district will also continue to teach evolution.”
The school district
is not teaching Judeo/Christian Creationism. They are simply doing
what I just did above, suggesting that it is okay to question
Darwinism. In other words, students should keep an open mind and
look into other possible theories, in particular with regard to
Darwin’s theories which are easily thrown into question by even the
most basic scientific observations.
Unfortunately,
partisan politics and blind faith is blocking the teaching of basic
science in our schools. However, unlike back in the Scopes Monkey
Trial days, it is not the Christian Fundamentalist right that is
trying to block the teaching of science in our schools.
Now, the
anti-religious left is seeking to block the questioning of unproven
scientific theory just as the religious right fought to block the
questioning of unproven religious theory back in the 1920’s in
Tennessee.
Just as wrong as the
religious extremists were in trying to block the teaching of
evolution theory, the ACLU and Americans United for Separation of
Church and State are wrong for trying to block the teaching of
“Intelligent Design.”
In fact, the teaching
of Darwinism as if indisputable fact is a major mistake. The theory
of random mutation-guided evolution was so clearly, provably absurd
that it drove me away majoring in an entire supposedly scientific
field.
Relax,
ACLU, and get back on the side of defending free speech. If anyone
tries to ban the teaching of Darwinism or evolution, by all means
stand up for free speech and education. But get off your “anything
religious people might agree with is inherently bad and against the
law” high horse and accept the fact: Darwin was very likely wrong,
and our children deserve to be offered other, more likely
possibilities as to what guided where we come from and will
determine where we are headed. | 
