How Atheism Is Taught as Science in Schools

It’s a debate tactic I’ve encountered many times. You see, it allows an evolutionist to frame the origins debate and define the terms that will be used in conversation in the most positive and favorable way possible for them. Why?

First, by describing evolution as simply “change in living things,” they can automatically structure the debate as if “science-denying creationists” are arguing against observational science. Everyone knows that there are biological changes that can be observed in creatures over time, but that doesn’t equate to evolution in action.

Second, by narrowing the discussion to so-called biological evolution, they can avoid the many problems involved in broader conversations surrounding the origins debate. Some problems include the impossibility of life coming into existence from nonlife, the massive rift in their explanations of how rocks and fossils found within them are supposed to have formed, and the fact that many evolution-believing astronomers are abandoning the big bang because of the gaping inconsistencies within it.

Unless defined beforehand as a discussion specifically about so-called biological evolution, the insistence that the term evolution should be limited only to the topic of biology is shallow on the face of it.

Should someone argue that the idea of evolution has nothing to do with cosmology, geology, or first life, simply get them to go to a book retailer like Amazon.com and type in key words cosmic evolution, geological evolution, and chemical evolution and see the reams of book titles that appear with similar names.

Here is just a tiny sampling of several books advertised on Amazon.ca under these categories.

Cosmic Evolution

Geological Evolution

Chemical Evolution

The fact is, you can open almost any book on science, and you will almost always see the same idea. Whether you are discussing the cosmos, chemistry, geology, genetics or the earth’s geography, all of reality is described to have originated through some kind of naturalistic process and then proceeded to evolve into what we see today.

A perfect example of this comes from National Geographic’s The Sciencebook: Everything You Need to Know About the World and How It Works. Published in 2008, it basically reads like a proverbial Bible for naturalists, as it conforms to a completely materialistic worldview.

Its foreword (titled “Science: The Essence of Cool”) was written by Marshall Brain, the founder of the website HowStuffWorks.com. In it, he begins by rhetorically asking what science is, and after explaining that he’s discussed the matter for years with various people, he then gives his personal definition. See if you notice something that stands out toward the end:

“Science is the coolest thing that human beings do! Science is humankind trying to figure out how absolutely everything in the universe works.” It is that pure and simple. Science knows no boundaries. Science wants to take it all apart and say, “OK, we get it!” In an ideal universe, we will even figure out where our universe came from.1

Now, I don’t think anyone would have a problem with the first part where he describes science as a tool to discover how things work because that involves the scientific method, where you can set up experiments and repeatedly observe the results. But how exactly could you set up an experiment showing the universe coming into existence (a historical event) and then repeat that experiment?

He then asks another question, “But is that really what science is? Just to make sure, I did what any normal person would do: I consulted the dictionary.”2 And what did he find and reference as the true definition of science? “Systematic knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation.”3

This definition is exactly what I just mentioned—empirical science is based on repeated experimentation and direct observation. And yet, what was his conclusion about that official definition? “That is so wrong! The dictionary has taken the most exciting things humans beings do and has made it as boring as possible.”4

Now, of course, he is being a bit hyperbolic here, and perhaps we can understand he’s trying to get people hyped up about science, but he is forced to admit: “I guess the definition is right in a technical sense, but talk about a letdown.”5

Interestingly, he then goes on a long, rather rambling explanation over the next few pages, discussing his experience writing the foreword on an airplane and describing several mechanical systems and technical principles involved in how the jet functions and how wonderful flying is because it was all brought about by “science.”

Again, I think anyone—regardless of their worldview—would agree. All that technical proficiency he describes was brought about through the exact definition of science that he ironically said is “wrong” and “boring”—through repeatable observation and experimentation.

But here is where it gets interesting. By page 15, he begins to blend his materialistic worldview into his definition of science: “Where . . . does science come from? . . . Here is what science tells us right now.”6

Now I’ll have to skip much of his dialogue for brevity, but I’ll give you the key pieces of this remarkable story that he insists is “science.” I’ll let you look it up yourself if you want more details. So how did it all start?

There was a big detonation [i.e., the big bang] that marked the beginning of our universe. The explosion condensed into space that was filled with immense amounts of hydrogen gas. The hydrogen atoms harbored inside of themselves an attractive force that we call gravity. . . . The hydrogen atoms started fusing into heavier and heavier atoms. . . . Out of such dispersed debris came a cloud that, again through gravity, produced our solar system [i.e., cosmic evolution] and the planet we call Earth [i.e., geological evolution]. On this planet of water . . . there were all the chemicals needed for uncountable chemical reactions to occur spontaneously. . . . The atoms and molecules chained together in such a way that they possessed the ability to reproduce copies of the chains, which is a reaction that we refer to as life [i.e., chemical evolution]. Simple living cells, through a process of mutation and selection, became more complex cells . . . finally plants and animals [i.e., biological evolution] . . . until, one day, there was a species on Earth that embodies what we call general intelligence [i.e., human evolution]. With that intelligence comes language, learning, logic, love, and, lo and behold, curiosity. And from that curiosity comes science.7

Get it? Supposedly, life on earth is the outcome of unguided, naturalistic, evolutionary processes that occurred over billions of years. No God required. But notice how he attempts to apply the intellectual credibility typically gained by someone using the term science to justify an entire story that lacks the ability to perform even one repeatable, observable, scientific experiment to verify it.

Can you set up an experiment in a lab demonstrating the big bang and cosmic evolution? No. Can you repeat an experiment showing the formation of earth over and over again? No. Can you demonstrate life coming from nonliving chemicals? No. Do you have repeatable, observable experiments demonstrating one kind of creature turning into a different kind (for example, a lizard-like creature turning into a bird)? No. Can you set up an experiment in a laboratory showing me apelike creatures turning into people over hundreds of thousands of years? No!

So the story of evolution isn’t supported by the very concept evolutionists are constantly trotting out to attempt to legitimize their worldview—empirical science. But as Mr. Brain opined, the definition of science is knowledge of the physical or material world gained through observation and experimentation.

Yet again, no one has observed any of the five pillars of their materialistic faith (cosmic, geological, chemical, biological, or human evolution), and none of them can be demonstrated experimentally.

But as you thumb through the rest of this rather monolithic, 431-page tomb, it constantly toggles between descriptions of a wide variety of technology which were all brought about by the scientific method (what Mr. Brain described as “boring”) and (apparently much more exciting) unobservable, non-repeatable, made-up stories about the supposed origin of everything—none of which can be demonstrated through empirical science. And so, the undiscerning walk away thinking everything being discussed is “scientific,” when really, it’s just the skin of science stuffed with the religion of humanism being presented as one concept.

Watering Down the Definition of Evolution

Now having covered this, I want to get back to my original point as to why many evolutionists insist that the term evolution only be applied to the study of biology. The reason is simple. Faced with the reality that none of their other stories can be demonstrated scientifically, they are desperate to show “evolution in action” to the world in order to validate their worldview.

So join me for Part 2 of “The Evolution of Everything” where we’ll debunk some of best examples of “microevolution” (from a leading US university), demonstrating that evolution of any sort has never been observed