Do modern creation scientists accept Immutability Of Species

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The Concept Of Homology

Russell Artist, Ph.D.

The concept of homology, in the historical sense, was defined in The Origin of Species by Darwin as "recognition of fundamental plan in animals and plants is due to descent with modification." Inheritance of successive slight modifications from a common ancestor was very likely a reaction to the extreme view of the immutability of species held in Darwin's times. This paper seeks to show that it is neither hopeless nor unscientific to attribute a common plan or a basic pattern of a Creator to the similarities shown by the forelimbs of vertebrates.

A review of recent and widely adopted high school textbooks in biology shows that homology in the Darwinian sense is still being offered as "proof" of evolution. Recognition of the rapid inroad of evolutionary teaching into our educational system to the complete suppression of creationist viewpoints calls upon scientist and non-scientist alike to lead in a return of the data of the natural sciences with creation guidelines.

Tower of Babel

Chapter 3 is the key chapter of the book. According to Pennock, scientists are becoming frustrated in debates with creationists because the audiences are mostly pro-creation. The first reason he gives for this is that the audiences are ignorant and are unable to evaluate the arguments adequately (p. 119)! The second and more important reason, which he frequently repeats, is that ‘many people are predisposed to reject the distasteful idea that we humans evolved from ape-like ancestors’ (p. 119). If Pennock really believes that this is the main reason creationists reject evolution, then he is greatly deluded!

Pennock suggests that perhaps if creationists were introduced to evolution in a context that was neutral they might be more receptive—so he introduces the ‘evolution of languages’. Pennock states that if we believe in the ‘evolution of languages’, then we should also believe in biological evolution. Of course, the word ‘evolution’ is being used here in an extremely loose way. ‘Development’ is a less loaded or controversial word than ‘evolution’ to describe the history of languages. In another paper, The development of languages is nothing like biological evolution, I analyze the comparison of the development of languages with biological evolution in detail, with explicit reference to some of the main claims of Pennock.13 In this book review I will just note some points about Pennock’s treatment of the subject.

Pennock outlines William Jones’ famous proposal of a common source (later called Indo-European) for Sanskrit, Latin and Greek, and other European languages. He makes the absurd claim that Jones here introduced the revolutionary idea that languages change over time and that this was ‘… a radical break from the traditional, Christian view that languages, divinely created, were immutable …’ (p. 134). But no-one, whether Christian or not, has ever believed that languages are immutable! For example, the Romans supposed that Latin had developed from Greek, and around 1500, several scholars proposed that French, Italian and Spanish had developed from Latin.14 Even the fact that the Romance languages had developed from the spoken Vulgar Latin instead of the literary Classical Latin was noted by the scholar B. Aldrete in 1606.15 For a long time, many scholars also believed that Greek had developed from Hebrew, and although there were many similarly ridiculous theories, no one ever suggested that languages were immutable.

Pennock at the same time holds creationists up to ridicule by saying that they believe in ‘immutability of species’. One must really wonder if he has ever bothered to study what he attacks. Right from the inception of the modern creationist movement, creationists have repudiated fixity of the species, . and even pointed out that rapid speciation within a kind is good support for the creation model.12

Creation scientist is a bit of a contradiction in terms.

Only 0.15% of people with biological training deny evolutionism. This means 99.85% with an actual understanding of the subject accept evolution as an accurate explanation for the diversification of life.

One thing that I always wonder about creationists: does it concern you that essentially everyone who knows more about the subject than you do disagrees with your conclusions? I dunno, but for me something like that would be kind of a red flag that I should probably reexamine my opinions.

Aside from questioning your numbers or calling out the fallacies of Ad Vercundiam and Ad Populum, do you really think current acceptance of an idea by anyone constitutes a reason for other people to accept that idea? Ideas are accepted by an individual for two main reasons: because they understand it and perceive it to be correct, or because they trust the perceptions of others. If having to chose between the two, I would prefer the former, while it seems you would suggest the latter.

Aside from questioning your numbers or calling out the fallacies of Ad Vercundiam and Ad Populum, do you really think current acceptance of an idea by anyone constitutes a reason for other people to accept that idea? Ideas are accepted by an individual for two main reasons: because they understand it and perceive it to be correct, or because they trust the perceptions of others. If having to chose between the two, I would prefer the former, while it seems you would suggest the latter.

One thing that I always wonder about creationists: does it concern you that essentially everyone who knows more about the subject than you do disagrees with your conclusions? I dunno, but for me something like that would be kind of a red flag that I should probably reexamine my opinions.

How does a creationist pass BIO 101 to become a scientist?

Aside from questioning your numbers or calling out the fallacies of Ad Vercundiam and Ad Populum, do you really think current acceptance of an idea by anyone constitutes a reason for other people to accept that idea? Ideas are accepted by an individual for two main reasons: because they understand it and perceive it to be correct, or because they trust the perceptions of others. If having to chose between the two, I would prefer the former, while it seems you would suggest the latter.

Enough of the No True Scotsman crap. I don't care if the people I refer to all called "scientists who accept young earth creationism" or "creation scientists", that's a matter of terminology and to claim they don't exist or that they aren't "true scientists" because they don't tow the modern paradigm is just a form of posing. The question of my thread is whether these people accept the Immutability Of Species or whether they reject it. It is not about if you don't like what I call them.

you answered the question in the first post, so what's the point of this thread?

No one who has earned a genuine PhD in biological sciences is going to entertain the notion of immutable species.