The Theories of Creation - my point of view

This is typically a controversial subject, but since it came up several times in discussions within business meetings recently (in 1 on 1 conversation or small groups), I thought I'd pore my thoughts about it here.

As always, I have created a video for those of you who prefer watching than reading.  There is likely more info in the video too:

There are generally 3 different theories running around:

1. The God Theory
2. The Evolution Theory
3. The Scientific Creation Theory

Only one of them is an actual scientific theory (the Theory of Evolution) tested and trialled in labs around the world. 

The funny thing is, in discussions with young professionals recently, the one that seemed to come up as the "logical" one, is the WAY less popular Scientific Creation Theory.

To be precise, the theory advanced here is that scientifically advanced aliens came to Earth a long time ago, and used the planet as a biology lab to create, at first, simple creatures like bacteria and unicellular algae, and through iteration and further genetic manipulation, they eventually created Humans that looked like them.

One reason this theory came up in conversation is because we were talking about how things like myths and legends, science, religious scriptures (or stories), and folklore all fit together nicely, as well as to explain the diversity of life.

I think another reason this came up is due to the disillusion about any theistic philosophy (Islam, Christianity, Judaism etc...) being just a little bit.... crazy... and the fact that the Theory of Evolution has a few major holes that science has so far been unable to plug.

As a scientist, I like the part of the Theory of Evolution that Darwin worked on:  Natural Selection.  This part is all about how a species will adapt to its environment by letting those members of the species survive and proliferate better if they have characteristics favorable to its survival whenever the environment changes. 

What most people consider the Theory of Evolution is in fact about how species came to be from building blocks, to unicellular life to fish, to lizard to mammal and to human.... 

While natural selection has strong evidence Darwin explored back in the 1800's and we have proven time and time again, the HOW species evolved from step to step through random mutation through huge amounts of time is still a mystery.

Scientists simply assume it happened through chance even if the probability is super low given the huge amounts of time allotted.

However, we are as of yet unable to demonstrate abiogenesis and the evolutionary hops between discovered species (through fossils mostly) in good scientific form.

 

Abiogenesis:
The Miller-Urey experiments and others similar afterwards do show that somewhat complex organic molecules can spontaneously appear from the primordial oozes.  No experiment so far was able to demonstrate that process being able to form the simplest working and reproducing archaeobacteria.  Some insinuate that the first bacteria may have ridden an asteroid from elsewhere to bridge that gap, but one still wonders how those came to be in the first place...  Complex life has to form somehow somewhere!!!  See:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller%E2%80%93Urey_experiment



Evolutionary gaps:
People complain about "the missing fossils" in the gaps between species.  With reason.  These gaps are filled up by scientists saying that mutations in one species through natural selection processes could have done large "hops" about every 100,000 years or so, to explain the differences in fossils observe, the fact that we can't find the "in-between" bones, and the very low to nil probabilities of beneficial mutations in the first place. 
See:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._coli_long-term_evolution_experiment

The E.Coli long-term experiment was set to motion in 1988 to try to prove (or disprove) the possibility of these major positive leaps in mutations creating very new species.  65,000 generations later, today, the scientists supervising this experiment have observed approximately hundreds of millions of mutations overall, with 10-20 of them being beneficial with the most remarkable being a very small change in an enzyme structure allowing for the bacteria to process citrate as an energy source in aerobic conditions.  Since the bacteria was already able to process citrate in anaerobic environments, and already had all the chemistry machinery in place to process the citrate within, its not a big jump.  So the theory of "large jumps" in evolution between fossils where there would be significant genetic and phenotypic differences looks harder and harder to swallow.

Intelligent Design:
Though often ridiculed because the Catholic Church is attempting to have this the God Theory adopted as science in the classrooms in the United States of America, the concept of Intelligent Design makes more and more sense.  At least to the intellectual elite and entrepreneurs I hang out with.  They come up with the theory of ancient aliens coming to Earth and making life by themselves and their own reading.

In a nutshell, the hand of intelligent scientists easily explains abiogenesis and also the gaps between observed fossils (iterations of a model that was released in the wild for a while, observed and then removed most likely to make way to a new variation or species better suited to the scientist's idea.  Can easily explain how genes are carried from species to species and why genes and chromosomes are often reorganized from one species to the next somewhat.  Again, design helps a lot in plugging the holes.

I've adopted this theory more than 25 years ago already (see www.rael.org ) so its nowhere new to me as a Raelian. 

Of course, no way to prove right now the presence of ancient aliens on the Earth...   It makes sense, but without hard evidence, its hard to make it stick well.

Just fun to talk with intelligent people that are looking for alternative ways to see how everything connects together. 



In this case, Scientific Creation theory connects:

• Ancient myths, legends and folklore
• Old religious stories and scriptures
• Ancient structures from around the world (see:  http://www.daniken.com/ )
• How the different species have come to be on the planet
• How life started simple, and complexified
• The gaps between evolutionary hops

All those theories should be further discussed and why not?  Eventually we'll figure it all out, through proper application of scientific principles.  :)