After we’ve looked at a tiny sample of our environment’s fine tuning, let’s look at life itself. Could we have come from a fish? Apes? How did we get a conscience? What defines right and wrong for us?
We’re even going to talk about the golden ratio that is found in the shells, sunflower, pinecones, the galaxy, a hurricane, an unfurling leaf, petals, even the ocean waves!
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This is a four-part series:
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PART 2: LIFE
Life in its smallest unit is a cell. They perform thousands of routine functions on a microscopic level. They are able to communicate to one another though chemical signals to determine how to form an arm or leg, and to make sure your head ends up on top. They are able to convert energy, divide, even repair.
A cell contains everything it needs to exist on its own and replicate, and most are so small they are not even visible to the human eye! Now, if you put one living cell in a sterile test tube with the perfect solution and temperature for a cell and poke a needle into it, the molecules will come out. But even in a perfect environment, another living cell cannot reform itself. It cannot be put back together.¹
Not only can something not come from nothing, but even the parts that exist can’t be put back together to form what they once were.
The chance of a simple 200-component organism developing by mutation and natural selection, just once, is less than one chance out of a billion trillion, according to Henry M. Morris in his book “For Time and Forever.”
1:10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000
According to evolution, the organism would have started with one part and successfully added 199 parts — one more after each generation. You can see the problem with the mathematical odds when you consider that even a one-celled plant can have millions of molecular parts.¹
DNA
DNA, located inside the cell’s nucleus, is a carrier of genetic information. It is the blueprint, design and instruction to make proteins, molecules, legs, eyes, hearts. It is the language of life, as they say.
Each human cell holds a copy of the entire 3 billion letter human genome. That coding would would take a fast typist, working 8 hours a day, 50 years to type it out. It would fill 5,000 books stacked 200 feet high. And it all fits inside a microscopic cell nucleus too small for the human eye to see.¹
“Who placed this working code, inside the cell? It’s like walking along the beach and you see in the sand, ‘Mike loves Michelle.’ You know the waves rolling up on the beach didn’t form that — a person wrote that. It is a precise message. It is clear communication. In the same way, the DNA structure is a complex, three-billion-lettered script, informing and directing the cell’s process.” — “Is God Real,” everystudent.com
Evolution
Could we have come from a fish? Apes? I’m going to start with basics, in case you are a baby scientist like me. According to the book “Explore Evolution: Arguments For and Against Neo-Darwinism” (which I highly recommend), there are three definitions of evolution:
- Evolution #1: Change over time
- Evolution #2: Universal Common Descent (Darwinism)
- Evolution #3: The Creative Power of Natural Selection (Neo-Darwinism)
Charles Darwin changed the course of thinking in the 1800s with his book “Origin of Species” in which he proposes that we all came from one organism and have changed into multiple species slowly over time by natural selection (see above illustration).
Creationists believe that instead of one family tree we are an orchard of trees. God created organisms as stated in Genesis and they have evolved with variation since.
For the sake of time, there are three major problems that stood out to me with Darwinism during my reading:
1. Missing transitional animals. If every species has evolved slowly over time, one would expect to find intermediate organisms, but the fact is that we don’t. Transitional animals are the rare exceptions. Also, textbooks often fail to mention that many of the sequential mammal-like reptile samples presented are from different geographical locations and widely separated sedimentary rock. There is no neat order of fossil transition in the earth’s sedimentary layers one would expect to find. Not to mention some fossils from millions of years ago (such as the jellyfish, nautilus shell and ginkgo leaf) are exactly the same today as they were then.(Also see the Cambrian explosion.)
2. Hitting the limits. Natural selection can take away or vary features, but can it add an eye? “Explore Evolution” gave a couple interesting examples of breeding regarding this dilemma. “Breeders have tried for decades to produce a chicken that will lay more than one egg per day. They have failed. Horse breeders have not significantly increased the running speed of thoroughbreds, despite more than 70 years of trying. Darwin’s theory requires that species have an immense capacity to change, but the evidence from breeding experiments shows that there are definite limits to how much a species can change …”
Dog breeding is another example of how forced natural selection and interbreeding can lead to defects rather than advantages. Great Danes, bred for large size, now have bodies too large for their hearts and can develop bone cancer. Bulldogs, bred to have large heads, now need their puppies to be delivered by Cesarean section. Breeding evidence does not show an unlimited elasticity for change.
3. The molecular machine.
There is one last argument that stands out from the book — the machine-like tail found on a bacterial cell. Stay with me here, this is amazing.
During Darwin’s lifetime cells were thought to be simple blobs of protoplasm. Today we know cells are complex structures with motors, machines and circuits. Pictured is a flagellum (the whip-like tail) that powers a bacteria cell. It goes up to 100,000 RPMs and is built like a human machine — complete with a rotor, shaft and stator.
What does this have to do with evolution? This flagellum has 30 different protein parts. All 30 parts are necessary for function, and if you take away one it will not work. The problem Darwinists have is finding how natural selection could build such a structure. “According to Darwin, complex structures can arise — but only gradually, as natural selection preserves and accumulates numerous, small variations over time,” the book says.
The bottom line: “You can’t put something together like that gradually because they need a large number of parts working together at the same time before they will work at all,” says biochemist Michael Behe. See him explain it here.
Darwin himself said, “If it could be demonstrated that any complex organ existed which could not possibly have been formed by numerous, successive slight modifications my theory would absolutely break down.”
Darwinsim works well for small scale change and variation, as an Evolution #1 subscriber would say, but random mutation and natural selection don’t have the creative power to make all life from one single organism, even given all the time of eternity.
Conscience
How did we get a conscience? What defines right and wrong for us? Why don’t more people randomly kill each other because they want their shoes or don’t want to wait in line or even just on a whim? About 0.0046% of Americans have killed another human being.
Can molecules endlessly rubbing together or random species mutations create a conscience, a set of morals to live by? Even motorcycle “bad to the bone” types draw a clear line from drinking too much beer or creating a ruckus, and rape or child abuse. It is an inner voice telling us right from wrong.
Scientists still do not know where the conscience is located in the human brain.
The golden ratio
We are not recklessly designed globs, either. There is an art form and pattern found throughout nature at both microscopic and galactic levels. It is called the golden ratio.
The golden ratio is 1:1.61 (or 0.618 in its inverse). It is a perfect and symmetrical pattern, as seen in the diagram above. It is created by dividing a line into two parts so that the longer part divided by the smaller part is also equal to the whole length divided by the longer part.
Didn’t get that? Me either, let’s look at this phenomenon in pictures. Look for the perfect spiral in each photo below.
The golden ratio is found in the shells, sunflower, pinecones, the galaxy, a hurricane, an unfurling leaf, petals, even the ocean waves! It’s also abound in the human body. Look at this photo of a woman’s face. I placed the golden ratio (without the spiral) over her face and it matched up to her features perfectly.
Here just a few examples of how the human body adheres to the 1:1618 ratio:
- The hand is as long as the upper arm.
- The foot is as long as the forearm.
- Each finger is longer than the next at the golden ratio.
- The measurement between the floor and navel compared to the navel and top of the head adheres to the ratio.
The golden ratio in a numeric pattern, is known as the Fibonacci sequence: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34 … When you add the previous two numbers it equals the next number. When you divide a number by its immediate predecessor in the pattern you will get 1.618.
The Fibonacci sequence makes it easier to identify even more things that fit the golden ratio. For example, the number of petals and tree roots and branches are normally in the Fibonacci sequence:
- Buttercup: 5 petals
- Chicory: 21 petals
- Daisy: 34
This phenomenon has been discovered and rediscovered throughout history and can be found in ancient pyramids, buildings and artwork. In fact, the most successful structures, art forms and compositions of all time seem to be based on this divine proportion.
Musical instruments are often based on the golden ratio. And some of the greatest music ever written reflects a correlation with the famous 0.618. For example, Mozart’s Sonata n. 1 in C Major and Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, first movement, both adhere to the ratio.¹
And if you’re not blown away by the nature, waves and even music, listen to this: “Astronomers have discovered variable stars that periodically dim and brighten at frequencies close to the famed golden mean,” American Scientific reports.” The whole universe is singing His song!
In fact, the very dimensions that God himself gave Noah to build the ark adhere to the golden ratio. “This is how you are to build it: The ark is to be three hundred cubits long, fifty cubits wide and thirty cubits high (Genesis 6:15).” The ratio 5:3 equals 1.66 (as accurate as possible with such simple numbers). The same is true of the measurements for the ark of the covenant. They also equal 1.66.¹
If this fascinates you, look up fractional geometry! Wow. The rabbit hole goes deeper and deeper.
Discussion guide
Here is a PDF of the discussion guide if you would like further reflection or to do it as a group.
Next: Is the Bible accurate? >>
The Bible has been printed and circulated at least six times more than any other book in history. Let’s go over some common questions: Is it true? Has it been altered? Does archeology support the Bible?READ THE NEXT POST