“Professionally Unethical” to Confuse Observational and Historical Science

A few weeks ago one of our staff members sent me an email reply she received from a scientist she had contacted. She had asked him for permission to use a photo he had taken for one of our publications. Here was his reply:

Although I do license my images to some organizations, I will have to politely decline your request. As a scientist and in particular as a biologist, it would be professionally unethical to have my name associated with an organization that is so vehemently anti-science. The stance against evolution is particularly appalling: for me to support this stand would be like asking a physicist to deny gravity, for a chemist to not believe in atoms, or for a mathematician to disavow integers. Needless to say, these are all absurd.

And as a further note, if I could in fact provide strong evidence to counter our understanding of evolution, this would make my career as a scientist. But as with searching for evidence that atoms don’t exist, this would be a profound waste of time.

As one of several scientists working for AiG, I always chuckle when people claim we are “anti-science.” Their accusation stems from the fact that they fail to define science properly. There are two categories of science: observational/experimental and historical/origins. Observational science involves the science of the present, which I often call “here-and-now” science. It results in medicines and technology and is observable, testable, and repeatable. Historical or origins science involves the science of the past. Molecules-to-man evolution and creation by God’s spoken command are not observable, testable, or repeatable. Observational science that is involved with understanding gravity, atomic structure, and mathematical integers is very different from historical science that determines the age of the earth or how animals have changed over time.

I don’t deny gravity because without it we’d all be floating everywhere! I don’t deny atomic structure because it is something observable in the present. And even though I really don’t like math, I don’t deny the importance of mathematical properties like integers for doing calculations. What I do deny is using man’s ideas about the past (who wasn’t there) to determine the truth about the past. This scientist is clearly mixing the two types of science and what he is actually opposed to is using the truth of God’s Word as a starting point for knowing about the past instead of his own ideas.

Although he claims that finding “evidence” to counter evolution would make his career as a scientist, it would actually end it, at least as far as the secular world is concerned. Over and over and over again the evidence has been clearly shown to be absolutely consistent with and to confirm the historical science based on God’s Word. And that when we start with God’s Word, correct scientific predictions can be made. Yet when scientists such as myself attempt to publish such information in secular scientific journals, speak at secular scientific conferences, or get jobs at secular universities, we are typically prohibited not because of the observational science we have accomplished but because it supports and confirms the historical science based on God’s Word. (Fortunately, creation scientists do have places to publish peer-reviewed scientific research like the Answers Research Journal and others.)

I encourage you to watch the Bill Nye vs. Ken Ham debate if you have not already done so. Ken did a very good job of explaining the differences between these two types of science and Bill did a good job of continually confusing them and denying the difference!

Keep fighting the good fight of the faith!