The Story of Creation as Told By Theology and By Science

by T. S. Ackland

We come now to the consideration of the first of Mr. Darwin's supposed agencies—"Natural Selection," or, "Survival of the fittest." The results produced by this process must be ascribed to one of two causes: either they are the work of a Superintending Providence, watching over and directing every separate detail; or they are the result of pure chance and accident. There is nothing intermediate between these two causes. Natural law—apart from design and a designer—is, as we have seen, a nonentity—a mere expression of observed facts, for which it can give no account whatever. Mr. Darwin's argument is expressly directed to exclude the interference of a superintending Providence. Chance is the only cause which he can bring forward. The very first question, then, which arises is, What is there upon which chance may operate? What are the conditions from which the probabilities may be calculated? Mr. Darwin assumes, and no doubt correctly, that minute variations are continually taking place. But as these variations are the result of accident [Footnote: If they are not the result of accident, we again see design and need a designer.] they will take place in various directions; some of them will have a beneficial, some of them a noxious tendency. As, moreover, they are supposed to be very small at each step, the difference of advantage in the case of different individuals must be also very small, and will not be likely to produce any considerable difference in the chances of pairing. But in order that any variation may be perpetuated and increased, the pairing of similarly affected individuals is necessary. Parents, in which the variations took opposite directions, would probably have offspring of the normal type, the opposite variations neutralizing each other. And this must be repeated again and again; and with every repetition of the process required, the probabilities against it would rapidly increase. Thus, supposing that in the first generation the proportion of favourable conditions were such, that of those animals that paired there were four of each sex that had them to three that wanted them, the chances that any given pair were alike in possessing them would be represented by the product 4/7 x 4/7, or 16/49. Hence, the chances would be rather more than two to one against it. In the next generation it would be 256/2401, or more than eight to one, and so on. [Footnote: This is given merely as an illustration of the nature of the calculation. In any actual case the conditions would be infinitely more complex, but the calculation, if it could be made at all, must be made on this principle.]

But next, we have not to do with one series of changes only, but with a vast number of different series going on in different directions, if we are to have a large variety of animals produced from a common stock. All the probabilities against the separate variations must be combined, not by addition, but by multiplication, so that the probabilities against the production of all these separate forms become enormous.

Against all this improbability Mr. Darwin brings forward the supposed advantages which these variations give to their possessors. But here again a new element is introduced into the calculation. It is assumed, in the very statement of the question, that the process of adaptation has already taken place; the original stock must have been adapted to the circumstances under which they existed, or in their case the whole theory fails. If, then, a fresh adaptation is wanted, it must be because a change in external circumstances must have taken place. In order that a new variety may be established there must be a concurrence between the change of external circumstances and the change in the animals. Here we get a new, and a large factor for our multiplication.

This argument may be, perhaps, made clearer by an illustration. Mr. Darwin has written a very interesting book on the fertilization of orchids by means of insects. According to his view all insects are descended from one common type, and all orchids are also descended from one parent; but we meet with insects and orchids in pairs, each perfectly adapted to the other. We will suppose that a change takes place in a particular orchid, that the nectary recedes to a greater distance from the point to which the insect can penetrate, and so an advantage is given to those insects in which the haustellum is of a length above the average. This may have a slight tendency to increase the number of such insects; but then it will have an opposite tendency in the case of the orchid. It cannot, of course, be supposed that the variation, which is only partial in the insect, is universal in the plant. The unchanged insects will therefore be confined to the unchanged flowers, while the changed insects will be indifferent on the subject, as they will be able to reach the nectary in any case. Hence, an advantage will be given to the unchanged flower, which will be more likely to be fertilized, and the two lines of variation will move in opposite directions.

But next, the variation in the insects and the flowers must take place at the same time and the same place, or no result will follow to the insect, while the new variety of orchid must perish for want of an insect to fertilize it. It is this which makes the supposition of unlimited time almost useless, because just in proportion as the time is increased the probability of two independent events happening simultaneously is diminished.

But even supposing this difficulty out of the way, we meet with an immediate repetition of it. The insect derives an advantage from its increased haustellum, but what advantage does the plant derive from its retiring nectary? How does that help it in the "struggle of life?" But if it produces no beneficial result, the variation according to the theory must drop. Hence we should arrive at an insect suited for a new form of the flower, but no flower suited to the new form of the insect.

If, then, we reject the idea of superintendence and design, we have on the one hand an enormous antecedent improbability, while on the other hand we have only a very small power by which a direction may be given to the course of events, since by the hypothesis in any one generation the change, and consequently the superior advantage, is exceedingly small, and there is a strong tendency in related changes, as in the case of the orchid and insect, to move in opposite directions.

But next, in the varieties of animals with which we are acquainted, there is a certain connexion between the differences of independent organs, for which this theory does not help us to account. Thus, for instance, according to this theory the canine and the feline races are descended from a common ancestor. But there are several points of difference between a cat and a dog. There are the differences in the form of jaws, in the dentition; in the muscles by which the jaws are moved, and in the feet and claws. All animals of the cat tribe agree in all these respects, so do all animals of the dog tribe. We never find a cat's head combined with the feet of a dog. Why is this? Mr. Darwin attempts to account for it by his supposed law of "correlation of growth," but, as has been already shown, any such law, being by Mr. Darwin's definition the observed sequence of events and nothing more, is utterly useless, when it is brought forward as a cause for those events. On this point the theory completely breaks down.

3. The theory does not account for any changes which are not immediately beneficial. [Footnote: In the "Origin of Species" (Ed. 1872) Mr. Darwin makes an admission which is virtually a giving-up of his whole theory. He says, "In many other cases modifications are probably the direct result of the laws of variation or of growth, independently of any good having been thus gained; but even such structures have often, as we may feel assured, been subsequently taken advantage of," pp. 165, 166. Here, then, we have a preparation for future circumstances, which surely implies design.] If any rudimentary advance is made in the organism, if, for instance, the rudiments of a new bone, or joint, or organ of sense are developed, the nascent organ must, according to the hypothesis of minute changes, be useless in the first instance. Hence it would confer no advantage in the struggle of life; there would be no tendency towards its preservation and growth. This becomes a very important consideration, when certain important differences in animal structure and habits are to be accounted for. How, for instance, could the mammary glands be developed in oviparous creatures? Mr. Darwin regards them as originating in cutaneous glands, developed in the pouch of the marsupials. But his grounds for this statement are very meagre. To a great extent they rest on what an American Naturalist "believes he has seen;" and besides, the ornithorhyncus, which has no pouch, and which is lower in the scale of life than the marsupials, by Mr. Darwin's own admission (O. S., p. 190), possesses the glands. Mr. Mivart's question (Darwin, O. S., p. 189) is a very pertinent one.

Another point which this view fails to explain, is the determination of the line of development in particular directions at different periods. At one time it is most marked in fishes, at another in reptiles, at another in mammals. How is this to be accounted for?