Friday, December 18, 2009

Intelligent Design...

I'm no scientist. Only wanted to be an Astronomer briefly, until I realized that there was too much math involved. But I've often wondered about the creation, and have thought for the longest time that the Biblical story of the creation, and the scientific theories that have been made against it, could exist together.

One thing I believe is that God is a scientist. So when he set about planning the creation, he did things in a logical manner. He would need to understand all of the scientific fields perfectly, and would have to work them together to create this world. For instance, he built similar genetic codes, and then tweaked them to create the diversity that we see in the world. Therefore, the ape and the human could both be built with similar codes, without being the same things. Some people point to that fact and say that we evolved from them...I look at that and think "that's a pretty efficient way to build a world". To me it sounds like a good architect...the plans all have a foundation, load-bearing walls, roofs...but they don't want them to be the same. Each is different, has a different purpose. But they rely on similar principles.

But I also know that God is an artist. I believe that he has created the diversity of this world on purpose. It allowed him to showcase his creativity while surrounding us with interesting and unique climates, animals, plants, and people. For me, he created tropical islands and blue, warm water. For others he created big mountains with snow. But ultimately I believe this diversity was intentional and it reflects the character of God as I think of him...loving, thoughtful, logical, creative.

My feelings about this were stirred up this week when I saw this documentary. Ben Stein (surprised me too) was showing how atheists and the scientific community leadership are supressing any scientists who introduce Intelligent Design into the mix of theories around where we came from and why we're here. I would recommend all people of faith to rent and watch it. It's a moving, frightening revelation of how others are unfairly promoting Darwinism, and in an underlying way, atheism. How leading atheists use the theory of evolution to convince themselves that there is no God. The interviews are frightening. The atheist scientists sound like satan himself. Basically they said "first, you need to believe the theory of evolution. Once you do, you will let go of God. Once you let go of God, you quickly let go of the hope of an afterlife. With hope gone, you realize that there's nothing there. And once you've had this de-conversion, you want to tell others about it". It was frightening.

Making matters worse is the use of the power that Big Science has to influence the classroom, what papers are written, what professors succeed, and what the courts decide. It was to me a concise way to see how satan is attacking our families from every way. Every person of faith should watch it, and determine how they will protect their families from this. I know I will.

1 comment:

John Kennedy said...

Dear Bud,
Thanks for letting us think about this by posting this on the blog. I love science. Not the super metaphysical math based physics and chemistry stuff but everything I know about science just confirms to me the existence of Heavenly Father. Since you brought up evolution, I wanted to tell you what I think is the basic way it happened. I took evolutionary science from a non member at BYU to let you know about some of what I have learned, not completely biased by our religion. I also agree with you Bud that Heavenly Father is the greatest scientist. He works through natural laws. Anyway, when you go to the temple which I believe is the ultimate authority on the subject of Creation, it is very interesting the order in which things were created. This order is laid out in the Pearl of Great Price. First came the earth, then light and dark - the sky and an atmosphere, then earth divided from water, then plants, then animals and when the earth was prepared Man was placed on the earth. When you read about the biology of evolution, plants came before animals to prepare the early atmosphere with oxygen production. Now with animals, I believe that animals did evolve over time. There is nothing in even the temple endowment that says there was not evolution of animals. Creationists say that there was "special creation" of animals, which means that animals were fully formed and placed in the world without evolution, but this would not explain the continued evolution we see now in the world, which I do not necessarily believe, and this is not founded on the story in the Pearl of Great Price or the temple. Then comes Man. Evolutionists say we are evolved. Creationists say we were specially "created". It is better than that. Based on the story in the Pearl of Great Price. Heavenly Father and Jesus put us in the Garden of Eden, apparently "special creations" but still less than Heavenly Father and Jesus. However, we know we are children of Heavenly Father and Heavenly Mother. We also know that in the Garden of Eden Adam and Eve were immortal and innocent. From things I have learned in church, I have come to the conclusion Adam and Eve were a physical son and daughter of Immortal Heavenly Father and Mother. They were then placed in the Garden of Eden and given the choice they were given. They made their decision, became mortal and we are the result. So neither plants or animals or us are special creations as Creationists would say, but animals and plants are evolved over teh Eons of time the Earth has been around and Adam and Eve were literally a Son and Daughter of Heavenly Father and Mother and they were placed in the Garden of Eden. This does not explain everything but it goes along very well with the science, the Pearl of Great Price and the Temple which are the info we have.