Evolution: An Investigation and a Critique

by Theodore Graebner

J. B. Warren, of the University of California, has well stated the effects of the evolutionary theory on religion and morals:

"Its legitimate tendency is to degrade mankind from that mental and moral dignity that is always recognized as belonging to them, and to place them on an essential level with the brute creation—even with the lowest forms of vegetable and animal existence. According to that theory, man differs from the lower organisms not in kind so much as in the degree of development. Mr. Darwin himself was troubled about the value of his own convictions, on the ground that his mind was evolved from that of lower animals. That is to say, he reckoned his own mental actions as valueless and untrustworthy, because of the essential identity between his mind and that of the lowest creatures that live in the mud of our swamps. Thus we see the legitimate tendency of this theory to degrade the mental dignity of man. And it also degrades the moral nature and faculties of man, and undermines the very foundations of moral and religious principle, in that it teaches that man is only a better developed brute—the natural result being that man is no more under moral obligation than the brute, or has no different basis of moral obligation from the brute, but only a better idea of right and wrong, because on a higher plane in the process of evolution. It strikes at the root of the doctrine that men are, by their origin and nature, under peculiar and special obligations to God. In the words of the late Dr. Robert Patterson, such a theory tends to 'obliterate a belief in the divine origin and sanction of morality, and in the existence of a future life of rewards and punishments, and to promote the disorganization of society, and the degradation of man to the level of the brutes, living only under the laws of their brutal instincts.' Such a theory is dishonoring to man and offensive to God."

When these discrepancies between a world-view governed by the Christian's faith in Revelation and one governed by the theory of evolution are once clearly understood, there will be no need to inquire, why, on the one hand, enemies of the Bible in all ranks of life greeted with such joyous acclaim the principle announced by Darwin and, why, on the other hand, a chief purpose of Christian apologetics has become the demonstration that Christianity is justified even by reason in the world-view which it inculcates, and that, on the other hand, the evolutionary hypothesis is contradicted by the facts of religion, of history, and of natural science.

CHAPTER TWO. Unexplained Origins.

The evolutionary scheme of development is, by its originators and defenders, accepted as a working hypothesis by which it is believed that the origin of all forms which matter has taken, and of the activities of living things, including man and human society, can be accounted for. It is an attempt to answer the old question, suggested to the thinking mind by a contemplation of nature: Whence these things? It it a theory of origins.

Now, a hypothesis, being "a theory, or supposition, provisionally employed as an explanation of phenomena," must be verified before it can be accepted as truth. Moreover, it can stand even as a hypothesis only if it meets the test of observation and experiment. It it can demonstrate its adaption to explain all the facts, it may, until another and better theory is propounded, be accepted as a theory. When it does not explain the facts, it must be modified or abandoned.

Since the evolutionary hypothesis is employed as an explanation of certain origins, a legitimate test of the theory is its adaptation to explain these origins. This test we now shall apply. We shall try to answer the question: Is the evolutionary theory entitled to the name of a working hypothesis? Is it able to account for those things which it is set forth by its spokesmen to account for? Does it account for the origin of the universe, of life, and of the various forms of life?

Scientists as a rule disclaim any intention to account, on the basis of their hypothesis, for the origin of matter. When it is suggested to them that any theory of origins should also account for the FIRST ORIGIN, the beginning of things, they direct us to philosophy: "Evolution is not concerned with the origin of matter; it takes matter for granted; the origin of matter is properly a philosophical and not a scientific problem."

Let us note the fallacies of this position. In the first place it is not proper to introduce the word "science" into this plea. Science is, indeed, only concerned with things that can be demonstrated by observation and from experience; and since no one has seen the beginning of matter, science is very properly not concerned with it. But evolution is not a science. It is a hypothesis, a theory. It is an explanation proposed for certain phenomena. 'And we have a right to demand that, if it wants recognition even as a theory, it must explain those phenomena. Now the principle of evolution is: All things have developed through certain forces which inhere in matter. In other words, without being acted upon from the outside, (without a creative word of God, for instance,) the unvierse [tr. note: sic] has come to be what it is to-day. In matter there are from the beginning certain forces inseparable from matter. These acted in such a way that very simple plants and animals became very complex; and this without any directing Intelligence. This is the evolutionary theory. Now, we hold that a theory which claims to account for the beginning of all animal life (and every species of animal life), for the beginning of plant life (and of every species of plant life), for the beginning of life germs, of the globe, of the sun and stars, cannot stop short when we press our questions still farther and ask: Whence is matter? Whence is force?

Nor, indeed, do evolutionists hesitate to express an opinion concerning the origin of matter and force. The universe, as it exists to-day, is made up of matter disposed in various forms,—stars, rock, plants, animals,—and endowed with energy in various forms; and from the earliest age of speculation, as we have seen, the human mind conceived of a time in which there was unorganized matter, substance without form. Like the ancient Greek philosophers, evolutionists to-day try to formulate a working hypothesis to account for the origin of the universe. It is believed that, in a broad way, the Nebular Hypothesis put forth by La Place indicated the manner in which the earth and the system to which it belongs have been evolved. We have outlined, briefly, in our first chapter, the main features of this theory. We shall now indicate the difficulties which stand in the way of its acceptance even as a working hypothesis.