One leading evolutionary scientist has recently made a most revealing admission. Richard Dickerson, an authority in the esoteric field of chemical evolution, has said:
Science, fundamentally, is a game. It is a game with one overriding and defining rule. Rule No. 1: Let us see how far and to what extent we can explain the behavior of the physical and material universe in terms of purely physical and material causes, without invoking the supernatural.1
Thus, science (or at least evolutionary "science.") is not necessarily a search for truth, as we used to be told, but a game in which scientists try to find naturalistic causes for all things, including even the origin of the universe and everything in it.
I still remember the remarkable statement of a professor in the audience at the conclusion of a creation/evolution debate in which I had participated a number of years ago. He said, in effect: "You may well be right; special creation is probably the truth and evolution is wrong. Nevertheless, evolution is science, and creation is religion, so only evolution should be taught in schools." Not every evolutionist is as frank as this, but this really is the game they play.
A second rule seems to be that the end justifies the means. In Stephen Jay Gould's book, The Mismeasure of Man, that noted evolutionary author argues that the sociopolitical bias of an author (Gould himself has admitted being a Marxist) could well have an effect on his scientific results. Commenting on this, another admitted evolutionary Marxist at Harvard, Dr. Richard Lewontin, has (no doubt subconsciously) suggested this second rule of the evolutionists' game plan:
Scientists, like others, sometimes tell deliberate lies, because they believe that small lies can serve big truths. 2
Although scientists never cite any real scientific evidence for evolution, doctrinaire evolutionists insist that there is such evidence, because any alternative is outlawed by the rules.
In other words, it's natural selection or a Creator. This is why prominent Darwinists like G. G. Simpson and Stephen Jay Gould, who are not secretive about their hostility to religion, cling so vehemently to natural selection. To do otherwise would be to admit the probability that there is design in nature--and hence a Designer.3
A third rule of this game of evolutionary science seems to be to insist that all scientists, by definition, are evolutionists. Even though there are today thousands of creationists with post-graduate degrees in science who are pursuing careers in science, these are commonly ignored or ridiculed or even denied status as scientists at all by the evolutionary establishment. The ploy is that, no matter what scientific credentials they might have, scientists cannot become creationists without forfeiting their status as scientists.
In fact, many think it would be better not ever to let creationists become scientists at all. Many years ago, when I was an engineering department chairman at Virginia Tech, I asked the biology professor there in charge of the doctoral program in that department whether a creationist student could get a Ph.D. degree in his department. The answer was—flat out—"NO!" No matter how outstanding his grades or his dissertation or even his knowledge of evolutionary theory might be, if he did not believe in evolution, he could not get the degree. That is the rule of the game!
This commitment to the rules has been expressed most starkly by two liberal Iowa professors:
… as a matter-of-fact: creationism should be discriminated against.... No advocate of such propaganda should be trusted to teach science classes or administer science programs anywhere or under any circumstances. Moreover, if any are now doing so, they should be dismissed. 4
That "liberal" opinion was written by an Iowa State University engineering professor and published by the main national organization dedicated to fighting creationism wherever it surfaces--an organization whose establishment was funded by the Carnegie Foundation. An even more "liberal" sentiment was expressed by another Iowa professor who said that any professor should have the right to
fail any student in his class, no matter what the grade record indicates 5
if that professor discovers the student is a creationist. Furthermore, the student's department should have the right of
retracting grades and possibly even degrees 6
if the student becomes a creationist later.
Two recent California cases illustrate how the game is played. In Vista, California, the school board, after a recent election, for the first time had a majority of Bible-believing Christians on the board. The evolutionists in the community are now trying to promote a recall election because of their groundless fear that the "fundamentalist-dominated" board might try to introduce creationism into science classes in their schools. The board had never intended to do any such thing, but had simply proposed that a non-evolutionary supplementary text, Of Pandas and People, be approved for reference use in biology classes. This book does not mention creation or God and does not oppose evolution per se, but does argue that the intricate complexity of living creatures implies some kind of "intelligent design." The furor of the evolutionary contingent in the community, at even the hint that God somehow might have been involved in origins, was something to see!
Soon after that, a similar teapot-tempest blew in at San Francisco State University, where Dean Kenyon, one of the co-authors of the book, Of Pandas and People, was a tenured professor. Dr. Kenyon had been teaching the standard course in evolution there for many years and was a recognized authority on evolution, even having authored a widely used textbook arguing for the naturalistic origin of life. A number of years ago, however, he had become a creationist, partially through reading creationist books. When he came out of the closet, so to speak, with his new book advocating "intelligent design," and especially after this book received such notoriety in Vista, his department chairman, supported evidently by the rest of the department, censored him and took his course away from him.
It is encouraging and surprising in this case, however, that the faculty senate at San Francisco State and even the American Association of University Professors are partially supporting Dr. Kenyon in this situation, so far at least, contending he was denied due process. Maybe there is still some slight hope that the rules of the game can be changed to incorporate academic freedom for creationist students and faculty in public institutions.
However, do not count on it. Dr. Eugenie Scott, Director of the National Center for Science Education, has made it clear that the evolutionary establishment not only opposes the teaching of Biblical creationism in public schools and colleges, but also "scientific creationism," "intelligent design," "abrupt appearance," or any other system which would dilute naturalistic evolution. They oppose allowing any arguments or evidence that might throw any doubt on evolution at all. The name of the game is evolution, and only evolution, with no hint of anything else.
Furthermore, evolutionism is not limited to science courses. The schools and their evolutionary leaders are engaged in a deadly game with very broad goals, and these social goals are all based on evolution.
The social and conceptual revolution that we are now witnessing—can be traced back to Darwin.... They are also using evolutionary and ecological concepts to explain social conflict and social change. As revolutionary as their work may appear to conservative scholars, it is grounded in the evolutionary model that scientists no longer question.7
The rules of this evolutionary game definitely do not include fair play for creationists or for Christians in general. If they win, the prize will eventually be a world government controlled by a political, economic, and educational system grounded and built on evolutionary humanism. Just before he died, the famous Christian scholar, C. S. Lewis, who had long supported the idea of theistic evolution, changed his mind, and said:
I wish I were younger. What inclines me now to think you may be right in regarding [evolution] as the central and radical lie in the whole web of falsehood that now governs our lives is not so much your arguments against it as the fanatical and twisted attitudes of its defenders.8
This is, indeed, quite a game that some people are playing!
REFERENCES
1 Richard E. Dickerson: "The Game of Science." Perspectives on Science and Faith (Volume 44, June 1992), p. 137.
2 Richard C. Lewontin, "The Inferiority Complex," New York Review of Books. October 22, 1981.
3 George S. Johnston, "The Genesis Controversy," Crisis. May 1989, p. 17.
4 John Patterson," Do Scientists and Educators Discriminate Unfairly Against Creationists?" Journal of the National Center for Science Education, Fall 1984, p. 19.
5 Kendrick Frazier, "Competence and Controversy," Skeptical Inquirer (Volume 8, Fall 1983), pp. 2-5.
6 Ibid.
7 Betty Jean Craige, "The Pursuit of Truth is Inherently Disruptive and Anti-Authoritarian," Chronicle of Higher Education (January 6, 1993), p. A56.
8 C. S. Lewis, Private letter (1951) to Captain Bernard Acworth, one of the founders of the Evolution Protest Movement (England). Cited by Dr. Ronald Numbers in his book, The Creationists (Adolph Knoff Co., 1991), p. 153.
* Dr. Morris is Founder and President Emeritus of ICR.
