Recently, the Jerusalem Post printed debating opinion articles by David Klinghoffer, a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, and Larry Yudelson, editorial director of the Ben Yehuda Press.
At issue was whether the ideas of 19th century British biologist and evolution theorist Charles Darwin are “a problem for Jews” because of their implicit or explicit disagreement with some Jewish religious principles.
Klinghoffer believes they are; Yudelson believes they are not. However, neither is a professional biological scientist. As I am, The Chronicle invited me to comment on this debate.
A major problem with any discussion of evolution and Darwinism is the definition of terms. Evolution is the process by which simple forms of life become more complex. Darwinism is one mechanism describing how such a change could have taken place.
Darwinism contends that random mutation and natural selection, acting gradually over time, results in new species. However, there are at least five other mechanisms of evolution. Three (self-organization, convergence, and neutral theory) are recognized in the scientific literature; two (creationism and intelligent design) are not.
Klinghoffer and Yudelson seem to confuse evolution and Darwinism, and unfairly attribute the scientific validity of evolution to Darwinism.
One of the main driving forces of evolution is not natural selection, but reproductive success. It matters not how long an individual organism lives, but how successfully it transmits its genes.
No scientist has ever observed random mutation of a gene that was positive for the organism. Alleles do successfully mutate; but allele mutation is responsible for adaptation not speciation, and Darwin’s book was entitled “The Origin of Species,” not “Adaptations.”
Evolutionary process
Darwin’s concept of gradual change is not supported by the fossil record. All major phyla appeared rapidly during the Cambrian “explosion,” about 540 million years ago, and the predicted “missing links” of Darwinism have not been found.
In addition, no Darwinian mechanism accounts for the evolution of a closed system like the DNA-protein cycle. DNA is needed to form proteins, but proteins are needed to form DNA. Therefore, Darwinism, like intelligent design, is not falsifiable and is a belief system no different from religion.
Evolution is not a problem for Judaism as Genesis describes an evolutionary process in which “the earth brought forth life” and this life becomes more complex in time from plants to animals until humans. None of the steps in this evolutionary process is described as requiring a direct creation — using the Hebrew word barah — by G-d.
Furthermore, Dr. Gerald Schroeder has shown in such books as “Genesis and the Big Bang” that the time frames of creation and evolution are consistent when one takes into consideration the Big Bang, expansion of the universe, relativity, and the Hebrew words of Genesis.
The creation is so tuned for the production of life that, according to Nobel laureate Dr. Steven Weinberg (in his 1987 paper “Anthropic Bound on the Cosmological Constant”), if the energy of the Big Bang had been off by one part in 10 to the 120th power, life would be impossible.
Unlike Genesis, Darwinism assumes the absence of G-d. It also depends totally on good fortune where the odds of success only guarantee failure.
Numerous scientists have calculated the probability of the formation of life on earth by chance or the evolution of species by random mutation; and have concluded that there was not enough time. Moreover, Darwinism assumes the existence of life and provides no mechanism for the formation of life.
Darwinism is based on almost no data, fails to answer many basic questions, and is contradicted by many observations. Yet many scientists put it on the level of Isaac Newton’s theory of gravitation.
While any child can prove the existence of gravity, no scientist has ever observed any species turn into another. Even the best examples of Darwinism, like antibiotic resistance of bacteria, are adaptations, not speciations. Staphylococcus does not turn into streptococcus when it becomes resistant to penicillin.
If Darwinism was a well-established “scientific theory,” then why have so many scientists engaged in deception to prove its existence? The following are just a few examples: Piltdown man, Nebraska man, Java man, Orce man, evolutionary Tree of Life, vestigial organs, peppered moths of England.
The biggest deception may have been perpetrated on Darwin himself, for as he wrote in “The Origin of Species”: “There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms…”
Evolution is not a problem for Judaism because it is consistent with the Torah, Talmud and the writings of many Jewish sages.
Darwinism is also not a problem for Judaism, because it is not science but a religion devoid of facts or purpose except to deny the existence of G-d.
I van M. Lang D.V.M., Ph.D., is associate professor of medicine and director of the Dysphagia Research Laboratory of the Medical College of Wisconsin, and he is one of the some 600 scientists who have signed the Discovery Institute’s “Dissent from Darwin.”
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