Proof #25 - Understand evolution and abiogenesis
Recently there has been a remarkable change in the Christian community: Many
members of the Christian faith are embracing evolution. For example, there
is this article:
At Churches Nationwide, Good Words for Evolution: "On the 197th
birthday of Charles Darwin, ministers at several hundred churches around the
country preached yesterday against recent efforts to undermine the theory of
evolution, asserting that the opposition many Christians say exists between
science and faith is false. At St. Dunstan's Episcopal Church, a small
contemporary structure among the pricey homes of north Atlanta, the Rev.
Patricia Templeton told the 85 worshipers gathered yesterday, 'A faith that
requires you to close your mind in order to believe is not much of a faith
at all....' At the Evanston Mennonite Church, Susan Fisher Miller, 48, an
editor and English professor, said, 'I completely accept and affirm the view
of God as creator, but I accommodate evolution within that.'"
And this letter, signed by more than 10,000 clergy members:
An Open Letter Concerning Religion and Science: "...We the
undersigned, Christian clergy from many different traditions, believe that
the timeless truths of the Bible and the discoveries of modern science may
comfortably coexist. We believe that the theory of evolution is a
foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny
and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this
truth or to treat it as "one theory among others" is to deliberately embrace
scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children..."
The interesting thing to understand is that when you accept evolution, what
you are automatically doing is rejecting the concept of a soul. Here is why:
As soon as you accept that evolution is true, you also accept that the
creation story in the Bible is false. It is pure mythology. The concept of
the "soul", which comes from the same book, is exactly the same sort of
mythology.
Simply think through the logic. What the theory of evolution says is that
every living thing on this planet has evolved through a completely natural
process. Every species that we see today is derived from simple, single-cell
organisms over the course of hundreds of millions of years. In other words,
there was no supernatural creation process for humans as described in the
Bible's book of Genesis.
As you think about this, what you will realize is that evolved beings have
no souls. Human beings are no different from any other animal, insect, plant
or bacteria in the way that we have evolved. In the same way that every
other living thing on planet Earth is soul-less, humans are soul-less. The
whole notion of a soul is a figment of human imagination.
This makes complete sense. The biochemistry of life powers evolution. That
biochemistry is amazing and complex, but it is nothing more than a set of
soul-less chemical reactions. When the chemical reactions cease, you die.
There is no "soul" mixed in with the chemicals.
Where did the first cell come from? Many believers will argue that God
magically created the first living cell. This, of course, is silly. The
scientific principle that describes the origin of life is called
abiogenesis. In the same way that there is no supernatural being involved in
evolution, there is no supernatural being involved in abiogenesis. Both the
creation of life and the evolution of species are completely natural
processes.
There is no "supreme being" in heaven who reached down to create life on
Earth or human beings. Nor is that being answering prayers. There is no
soul. There is no everlasting life. Science tells us all of these things
with complete clarity. God is imaginary.
Understanding the Rationalizations
Many believers will say, "This is simply untrue. Even though humans are the
product of evolution, humans are still special in God's eyes. God
manipulated the evolutionary process in some magical way to divinely create
human beings, and God magically gives each human being a soul at
conception."
In order to see the truth, you need to understand that all explanations
involving "magic" are false. The fact is, God had absolutely nothing to do
with the creation of life on this planet nor with any part of the
evolutionary process. As soon as you accept this fact, you realize that you
have no soul. God is imaginary and the biblical concept of everlasting life
is a fairy tale.
The fact that we exist as a conscious, intelligent, rational species is an
accident of nature that involved no supernatural intervention. There is no
part of the scientific explanation of evolution that says, "a mythical
supernatural being reaches in right here and guides it." Evolution, by its
very nature, is a supernatural-free process.
There is no way to simultaneously "accept evolution" and "believe in an
everlasting soul as described in the Bible." If evolution is true, then the
Bible describes a creation process that is a complete myth. The concept of a
soul is myth in exactly the same way.
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