In the past few years, modern genome sequencing and computer technology have placed enormous volumes of DNA data at the fingertips of researchers worldwide. The first complete human genome sequence was completed in 2000, after a ten-year effort that cost over USD$500 million. But genome sequencing technology is advancing very rapidly — human genomes can now be sequenced for roughly $100,000, and some groups are targeting a price as low as $1,000 [Pollack2008]. This same sequencing technology has enabled biologists to study the genomes of thousands of other biological species, including many common (and not-so-common) plants and animals. This has resulted in an enormous repository of data available for the study of evolution at the most basic level.

Amino acid data

One example of DNA-type data is the table below, which compares the 146-unit amino acid sequences of beta globin (a component of hemoglobin) among various species of animals. Amino acids are coded directly by triplets of DNA letters, and thus the study of amino acid sequences is very close to the study of DNA sequences themselves. Note that human beta globin is identical to that of chimpanzees, differs in only one location from that of gorillas, yet is increasingly distinct from that in red foxes, polar bears, horses, rats, chicken and salmon. Anyone can generate similar data using online tools and databases [Evolution2009]:

Mutations

The picture is the same if we consider the pattern of mutations between closely related species. One particularly interesting example that has recently been uncovered is the “GULO” gene, which is an essential part of the machinery that makes Vitamin C in most animals. Humans lack a functioning copy of this gene — our copy is highly mutated fragment, classified as a relic gene or pseudogene. Scurvy, that scourge of British sailors and Mormon pioneers crossing the plains, occurs in humans when they do not get enough Vitamin C. Interestingly, although the GULO pseudogene is highly mutated and utterly useless, humans and chimpanzees have almost identical copies of it — the human and chimp versions are 98% identical. Evidently a common ancestor of humans and chimps adopted a diet rich in fruits and vegetables, and thus a chance mutation that disabled Vitamin C production was no longer a fatal one and was passed on to posterity [Fairbanks2007, pg. 53-55; Coyne2009, pg. 67-69].

Transposons

Another recent development in this arena is the analysis of “transposons” or “jumping genes.” These are sections of DNA that have been randomly copied from one part of an organism’s genome to another. Most of the time, these inserted genes do no damage, because they “land” in relatively unimportant sections of DNA. But they do provide an excellent means to classify species into their phylogenetic (“family tree”) relationship. This is because it is exceedingly unlikely that the same random insertion of an entire gene would occur at the same spot in the genomes of two or more different organisms or species, unless, of course, each inherited this curious feature from a common ancestor, and it is also exceedingly unlikely that a group of species with “random” assortments of transposons could be organized into a family tree. Transposon data has been used, for instance, to classify a large number of vertebrate species into a “family tree,” with a result that is virtually identical to what biologists had earlier reckoned based only physical features and biological functions [Rogers2011, pg. 25-30].

Here is an example of how transposon data can be used to determine the phylogenetic relationships (i.e., “family tree”) of various primates including humans. The columns labeled ABCDE denote five blocks of transposons, and x and o respectively denote that the block is present or absent in the genome of the given species. It is clear from this data that our closest primate relatives are chimpanzees and bonobos [Rogers2011, pg. 89; Salem2003].

						Transposon blocks
			Species		A	B	C	D	E
        /---------	Human		o	x	x	x	x
       /----------	Bonobo		x	x	x	x	x
      / \---------	Chimp		x	x	x	x	x
     /------------	Gorilla		o	o	x	x	x
-----|------------	Orangutan	o	o	o	x	x
     \------------	Gibbon		o	o	o	o	o

Other areas of research

Another research arena that is exploding with activity is in analyzing DNA of groups of existing species, then employing advanced statistical methods (e.g., “maximum likelihood analysis”), running on powerful computer systems, to reconstruct the most likely family tree for a given set of organisms. Soon much of evolutionary history will be deducible purely from this type of automatic computer-based analysis. Already, significant results have been obtained in this area. In May 2010, a researcher announced, on the basis of a very carefully performed statistical analysis, that the hypothesis of a “universal common ancestor” (a conjecture, dating back to Charles Darwin, that all life arose from a single common ancestral organism) has been resoundingly confirmed. The author, Prof. Douglas L. Theobald of Brandeis University, found that the universal common ancestor hypothesis is at least 10²⁸⁶⁰ times more likely to have produced the modern-day protein sequences that we observe in living organisms, compared to the next most probable scenario that involves multiple original ancestors [Harmon2010; Theobald2010].

Researchers are also combining analyses of DNA sequences with paleontological (fossil) data, resulting in more precise determinations of various branches in the tree of life. For example, a study published in November 2010 that combined both paleontological and molecular data established that divergence of humans and chimpanzees very likely took place eight million years in the past instead of five to six million years, as generally believed until recently [SD2010d; Wilkinson2010].

Summary

The explosion of genome sequences and DNA data banks in recent years has provided an enormous storehouse of data for biologists. Analyses of these data have dramatically confirmed the central tenets of evolution, including the common ancestry of all biological organisms, all arranged convincingly in a phylogenetic family tree, in most cases exactly as had been previously reckoned based solely on similarities of physical forms and biological functions. As anthropologist Alan R. Rogers recently noted, “Phylogenetic pattern is everywhere in nature. It makes sense only if all living things evolved from a single ancestor.” [Rogers2011, pg. 31]. Similarly, genetist Daniel J. Fairbanks emphasizes that [Fairbanks2007, pg. 170]:

[The] obvious hierarchical arrangement of life, and the literally millions of ancestral relics in our DNA — all undeniably attest to our common evolutionary origin with the rest of life. If someone can believe that all living organisms share the same creator, why not consider that all living organisms share a common genetic heritage?

In 2001 the Discovery Institute, the principal sponsoring organization for the intelligent design movement, began to form a list of scientists who question evolution. Each of the scientists on this list, known as “A Scientific Dissent from Darwinism,” affirmed the following statement [Dissent2010]:

We are skeptical of claims for the ability of random mutation and natural selection to account for the complexity of life. Careful examination of the evidence for Darwinian theory should be encouraged.

As of April 2012, this list had 840 names. So what are the facts here? Is evolution truly a “theory in crisis,” as creationist author Michael Denton once described it [Denton1986]?

Partly in response to lists such as this, the National Center for Science Education (NCSE) in Oakland, California recently instituted “Project Steve,” named in honor of the recent death of the eminent paleontologist Stephen J. Gould. In this project, NCSE announced an invitation for scientists whose first name is Steve (or variants such as Steven, Stephen, Stephanie, Stephan or Estephan) to submit their names as affirming the following statement [NCSE2008]:

Evolution is a vital, well-supported, unifying principle of the biological sciences, and the scientific evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of the idea that all living things share a common ancestry. Although there are legitimate debates about the patterns and processes of evolution, there is no serious scientific doubt that evolution occurred or that natural selection is a major mechanism in its occurrence. It is scientifically inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist pseudoscience, including but not limited to “intelligent design,” to be introduced into the science curricula of our nation’s public schools.

As of April 2012, the NCSE list had 1202 names, compared with 840 on the Discovery Institute list. If we count only those persons on these two lists who had a Ph.D. degree and/or professional position in a core field closely related to evolution (Anatomy, Anthropology, Biochemistry, Biology, Biophysics, Botany, Ecology, Entomology, Genetics, Geology, Geophysics, Microbiology, Neurophysiology, Paleontology, Physiology or Zoology), who thus are particularly well-qualified to make such a declaration, then 708 (58.9%) of the names on the NCSE list were so qualified, compared with only 258 (30.7%) of the Discovery Institute list, according to a detailed check performed by the present author. If we then further limit the Discovery Institute core field list to those persons named Steve or one of the variants above, so that the size of this list can be directly compared with the NCSE core field list, then only two signers remain (in general agreement with the fact that persons named Steve or one of the above variants constitute roughly 1% of the U.S. population). This data is shown on the chart below. Note that in the right-most set of columns, the DI column (corresponding to two persons) is invisibly small compared with the NCSE column.

In short, no matter how one objectively compares these lists, it is a fair conclusion that several hundred times as many well-qualified professional scientists accept the main precepts of evolution as dissent from them. And, given that the number of signers of the Discovery Institute list has hardly grown at all in the past two or three years, there is no indication that the number of dissenting scientists is sharply growing relative to those who have declared their support of evolution.

Francisco Ayala, a renowned evolutionary biologist and recipient of the National Medal of Science and the 2010 Templeton Prize (and a former Dominican priest), recently stated the consensus of the field in these terms [Ayala2010, pg. 49-50]:

The overwhelming majority of biologists accept evolution. Those who know professionally the evidence for evolution cannot deny it. Scientists agree that the evolutionary origin of animals and plants is a scientific conclusion beyond reasonable doubt. The evidence is compelling and all-encompassing because it comes from all biological disciplines including those that did not exist in Darwin’s time. In the second half of the nineteenth century, Darwin and other biologists obtained convincing evidence from a variety of disciplines, which had reached early maturity during the nineteenth century: anatomy, embryology, biogeography, geology, and paleontology. Since Darwin’s time, the evidence for evolution has become much stronger and more comprehensive, coming not only from traditional sources but also from recent disciplines such as genetics, biochemistry, ecology, ethology, neurobiology, and molecular biology.

… Because the evidence is so overwhelming, … evidence for evolution no longer engages the interest of biologists except when explaining evolution to the public or arguing with those who refuse to accept evolution. Although not sought and no longer needed, the evidence for the fact of evolution continues to accumulate.

For additional details, see Scientists-evolution.

It is widely believed that modern society, in spite of all its technological and scientific progress, is morally deficient, compared with past generations. Many observers, especially the religious right, blame modern science. They see scientists and scholars as advocating the view that personal self-control and inhibitions are not only unnecessary but further are downright harmful, the cause of many social ills and psychological hangups — views that many religious-oriented believers and writers consider to be hostile to traditional moral codes. As a single example, evangelical author J. Lee Grady claims that scholars and others “are plotting the virtual overthrow of conventional morals. They want a hedonistic world with no rules and no guilt.” [Grady2011]. For additional background, see Decline.

Historical background

There is some truth behind these claims. During much of the 20th century, many social scientists and scholars adhered to the doctrine known informally as the “blank slate” (from the Latin tabula rasa), namely that all human personality and behavior is a product of rearing and environment — biology plays no role, and there is no such thing as innate human nature. The concept has very deep roots in western culture, with traces seen in the writings of Aristotle, repeated in the writings of 13th century theologian Thomas Aquinas, and carried into the 18th century by Jean-Jacques Rosseau. In the late 19th century, Sigmund Freud presumed the blank slate when he depicted personality traits as rooted in one’s family environment. Twentieth century psychologist John B. Watson, the founder of behaviorism, succinctly stated this doctrine when he wrote [Watson1930, pg. 82]:

Give me a dozen healthy infants, well-formed, and my own specified world to bring them up in and I’ll guarantee to take any one at random and train him to become any type of specialist I might select — doctor, lawyer, artist, merchant-chief and, yes, even beggar-man and thief, regardless of his talents, penchants, tendencies, abilities, vocations, and race of his ancestors.

Similarly, anthropologist Ashley Montagu declared, “Man is man because he has no instincts, because everything he is and has become he has learned, acquired, from his culture, from the man-made part of the environment, from other human beings.” [Pinker2002, pg. 24].

Closely related to the blank slate doctrine is the “noble savage” doctrine, namely the notion that humans in their natural primitive state are unselfish, peaceful and free from the many blights of modern society such as greed, violence, jealousy and psychological hangups, all of which are unfortunate byproducts of modern civilization. Like the blank slate, the noble savage was reflected in the writings of Rosseau, who in 1755 wrote that “nothing can be more gentle than him in his primitive state” [Pinker2002, pg. 6].

In the 20th century, these doctrines were given considerable momentum through the writings of anthropologist Margaret Mead. After her study of South Seas islanders, she wrote “We are forced to conclude that human nature is almost unbelievably malleable, responding accurately and contrastingly to contrasting cultural conditions.” She described these native peoples as peaceful, egalitarian, satisfied with their material lot and sexually uninhibited [Pinker2002, pg. 25-26]. Numerous other prominent social scientists and scholars, including such giants as Bertrand Russell and H. L. Mencken, adopted the prevailing views of Montagu, Mead and others without serious question.

This general philosophy was interpreted by some as giving license to what most people today would term a largely amoral or even hedonistic lifestyle: If there is no fundamental reality to a human sense of material possession, then greed and competition are obsolete, and furthermore a totally communal society without private property is indeed achievable (as promoted by Karl Marx, for instance). If there is no fundamental reality to sexual jealousy, then there is no need for marriage or for sex to be restricted to marriage. If there is no fundamental human proclivity to violence, then the total elimination of violent crime is possible merely by suitably re-educating the populace. More to the point, if even moderate levels of self-control are unnecessary and even harmful to our social and psychological well-being, then everyone should seek to throw off such controls, and to oppose institutions (such as religious movements) that have advocated them.

Fall of the “blank slate” and “noble savage”

But a funny thing happened on the way to the party. In the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, a younger, more sober generation of sociologists, psychologists and anthropologists, employing much more careful experimental and analytical methods, took a hard look at the “blank slate” and the “noble savage” doctrines, and found them to be severely wanting. First of all, through studies such as comparisons between identical twins raised apart, psychologists found that many personality traits have a significant genetic component. Identical twins raised apart were found to have remarkably similar verbal and mathematical intelligence, as well as similarity in traits such as introversion, neuroticism and conscientiousness. In fact, all five of the major dimensions of human personality were shown to have significant genetic links via such studies, with heritability typically ranging from 40 to 50 percent. It is important to note that these findings are not tantamount to biological determinism, because environmental effects are still important, but the “blank slate” paradigm that prevailed for so many years has been decisively refuted.

Along this line, in the 1980s anthropologist Donald Brown, after surveying hundreds of anthropological studies from around the world, collected a set of characteristics that had been found common to all human societies, even those that have had little or no contact with the western world. He identified approximately 150 such features, including abstract speech and thought, religion of various forms, common facial expressions for different emotions, marriage, taboos against incest, greater levels of aggression among males, sexual attractiveness (with remarkable commonality in features considered to be attractive), sexual jealousy, sexual modesty, and fear of death. He concludes that there is a universal human nature, and that these features point to that universal human nature [Pinker2002, pg. 435-439].

Modern sociologists and anthropologists dealt a similarly devastating blow to the “noble savage” doctrine. Researchers returning to the South Seas islands found that Margaret Mead’s earlier findings were almost perversely mistaken. For example, far from being paragons of nonchalant innocence, some Samoans beat or even killed brides that were found not to be virgins on their wedding night, and numerous suspected adulterers received the same fate. Similarly, researchers in Africa found that the “harmless” !Kung San, in some cases, avenged murder by mass murder in return. One archaeologist summarized the rates of male deaths in warfare for a number of indigenous civilizations in South America and New Guinea. He found rates 10 to 60 times higher than U.S. and Europe during in the 20th century (encompassing both WWI and WWII) [Pinker2002, pg. 435-439]. Additional statistics and details on crime and violence through the ages and in our own time are presented in Decline and Violence. See also The Blank Slate: The Modern Denial of Human Nature [Pinker2002], authored by prominent Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker.

Self-control and success

More recently, social scientists have revisited the ancient issue of whether self-control and society-instilled inhibitions are helpful or harmful to personal and social well-being. Pinker, in a 2011 book, summarizes the latest findings on this topic in these striking and unequivocal terms [Pinker2011b, pg. 598-599]:

Most people, of course, are not so lacking in self-control that they ever lash out in violence. But among the nonviolent majority some people have more self-control than others. Aside from intelligence, no other trait augurs as well for a healthy and successful life. Walter Mischel began his studies of delay of gratification (in which he gave children the choice between one marshmallow now and two marshmallows later) in the late 1960s, and he followed the children as they grew up. When they were tested a decade later, the ones who had shown greater willpower in the marshmallow test had now turned into adolescents who were better adjusted, attained higher SAT scores, and stayed in school longer. When they were tested one and two decades after that, the patient children had grow into adults who were less likely to use cocaine, had higher self-esteem, had better relationships, were better at handling stress, had fewer symptoms of borderline personality disorder, obtained higher degrees, and earned more money.

Other studies with large samples of adolescents and adults have documented similar payoffs. Adults can wait indefinitely for two marshmallows, but as we have seen, they can be given equivalent choices such as “Would you rather have five dollars now or forty dollars in two weeks?” Studies by Laibson, Christopher Chabris, Kris Kirby, Angela Duckworth, Martin Seligman, and others have found that people who opt for the later and larger sums get higher grades, weigh less, smoke less, exercise more, and are more likely to pay off their credit card balance every month. …

After adjusting for any tendency just to tick off socially desirable traits, the researchers combined the responses into a single measure of habitual self-control. They found that the students with higher scores got better grades, had fewer eating disorders, drank less, had fewer psychosomatic aches and pains, were less depressed, anxious, phobic, and paranoid, had higher self-esteem, were more conscientious, had better relationships with their families, had more stable friendships, were less likely to have sex they regretted, were less likely to imagine themselves cheating in a monogamous relationship, felt less of a need to “vent” or “let off steam,” and felt more guilt but less shame. Self-controllers are better at perspective-taking and are less distressed when responding to others’ troubles, though they are neither more nor less sympathetic in their concern for them. And contrary to the conventional wisdom that says people with too much self-control are uptight, repressed, neurotic, bottled up, wound up, obsessive-compulsive, or fixated at the anal stage of psychosexual development, the team found that the more self-control people have, the better their lives are. The people at the top of the scale were the mentally healthiest.

Conclusions

In summary, while it is true that early- and mid-20th century social scientists and scholars embraced doctrines that lent support to those pursuing relatively hedonistic, uninhibited lifestyles (and communistic economic utopias as well), much more careful recent research has destroyed or drastically revised these doctrines. This same research largely supports precepts long held and taught by traditional religions, including:

• The need to be altruistic (because one’s fate lies much more in the hands of one’s larger community than in the remote past).
• The need to restrain impulses of violence (because our modern society is much more interdependent, and has developed much more devastating means of killing and destruction).
• The need for parents to care for and support children more years than ever before (because of the much greater requirement for education and moral training in today’s world), and for children to reasonably obey their parents’ enlightened instruction.
• The need for adults to more carefully select a companion, and to restrain their impulses for infidelity (because of the need for a multi-decade stable family unit in which to raise children and care for one’s mate).
• The urgent need to provide assistance to disadvantaged populations worldwide (because of the recent recognition of the astonishing capabilities of the human mind, and the universality of intelligence).
• The need to treat our planet and our civilization with the greatest care and reverence (because of the recent recognition of how singular our world is in the cosmos).

In this regard, the findings of modern science and the teachings of enlightened modern religion have largely converged. There is no need for warfare between the two disciplines.

For additional discussion, see Decline, Progress and Violence.

Both traditional creationists and intelligent design scholars have invoked probability arguments in criticisms of biological evolution. They argue that certain features of biology are so fantastically improbable that they could never have been produced by a purely natural, “random” process, even assuming the billions of years of history asserted by geologists and astronomers. They often equate the hypothesis of evolution to the absurd suggestion that monkeys randomly typing at a typewriter could compose a selection from the works of Shakepeare.

One creationist-intelligent design argument goes like this: the human alpha-globin molecule, a component of hemoglobin that performs a key oxygen transfer function, is a protein chain based on a sequence of 141 amino acids. There are 20 different amino acids common in living systems, so the number of potential chains of length 141 is 20¹⁴¹, which is roughly 10¹⁸³ (i.e., a one followed by 183 zeroes). These writers argue that this figure is so enormous that even after billions of years of random molecular trials, involving all the biochemical material on the ancient earth’s surface, no human alpha-globin protein molecule would ever appear, and thus the hypothesis that human alpha-globin arose by an evolutionary process is decisively refuted [Foster1991, pg. 79-83; Hoyle1981, pg. 1-20; Lennox2009, pg. 163-173].

Fallacies in the creationist probability arguments

One fallacy in this particular argument, common to many others of this genre, is that it ignores the fact that a large class of alpha-globin molecules can perform the essential oxygen transfer function, so that the computation of the probability of a single instance is misleadingly remote. Indeed, most of the 141 amino acids in alpha-globin can be changed without altering the key oxygen transfer function, as can be seen by noting the great variety in alpha-globin molecules across the animal kingdom (see DNA). When one revises the calculation above, based on only 25 locations essential for the oxygen transport function (which is a generous over-estimate), one obtains 10³³ fundamentally different chains, a huge figure but vastly smaller than 10¹⁸³, and small enough to neutralize the probability-based argument against evolution [Bailey2000].

But even after this revision, the calculation still suffers from the fatal fallacy of presuming that a structure such as human alpha-globin arose by a single all-at-once random trial event (which, after all, is the creationist theory, not the scientific theory, of its origin). Instead, available evidence from hundreds of published studies on the topic suggests that alpha-globin and other proteins arose as the end product of a long sequence of intermediate steps, each of which was biologically useful in an earlier context [Hardison2001]. Thus any simplistic probability calculation (whether it is arguing for or against some aspect of evolution) that does not take into account the step-by-step process by which the structure came to be is not meaningful and can easily mislead [Bailey2000; Musgrave1998].

What’s more, such calculations completely ignore the atomic-level biochemical processes involved, which often exhibit strong affinities for certain types of highly ordered structures. For example, self-catalyzing biomolecules such as RNA are being investigated in research into the origin of life — see Origin. Also, molecular self-assembly occurs in DNA molecule duplication every time a cell divides. If we were to compute the chances of the formation of a human DNA molecule during meiosis, using a simple-minded probability calculation similar to that mentioned above, the result would be something on the order of one in 10^{1,000,000,000}, which is far, far beyond the possibility of completely “random” assemblage. Yet this process occurs millions of times every day in the human body.

Those familiar with probability theory will recognize that one central difficulty with these creationist arguments stems from the fact that in any probability calculation, one must first very carefully define the ensemble space. As noted above, it makes no sense to consider, as an ensemble, all possible random assemblages of atoms into a protein chain, since that is not the scientific hypothesis of how alpha-globin and other biomolecular structures came to be. Instead, the only valid ensemble for this analysis is the set of all possible outcomes of an eons-long string of biomolecular processes, encompassing proteins, organisms, species and environments. But at present we have no possible way of even enumerating such an ensemble, much less determining the probability of any particular scenario or class of scenarios in this ensemble. Perhaps at some time in the far distant future, a super-powerful computer could simulate with convincing fidelity the multi-billion-year biological history of the earth, in the same way that scientists today attempt to simulate (in a much more modest scope) the earth’s climate. Then, after thousands of such simulations have been performed, we might obtain some meaningful statistics on the chances involved in the formation of some class of biological structures such as alpha-globin. Until that time, all such probability calculations are essentially meaningless.

Along this line, it is also important to keep in mind that the process of natural biological evolution is not really a “random” process. Yes, mutations are “random” events, but the all-important process of natural selection, acting under the pressure of an extremely competitive landscape involving thousands of other species as well as numerous complicated environmental pressures, is anything but random. This strongly directional nature of natural selection, which is the essence of evolution, by itself invalidates simple-minded probability calculations.

Snowflakes

Some of the difficulties with creationist probability arguments can be illustrated by considering snowflakes. Bentley and Humphrey’s book Snow Crystals includes over 2000 high-resolution black-and-white photos of real snowflakes, each with intricate yet highly regular patterns that are almost perfectly six-way symmetric [Bentley1962]. A good online source with numerous high-resolution photographs has been compiled by Kenneth Libbrecht [Libbrecht2012]. Three photos from the Bentley-Hymphrey collection are shown below. By employing a reckoning based on six-way symmetry, one can calculate the chances that one of these structures can form “at random” as roughly one part in 10²⁵⁰⁰. This probability figure is even more extreme (far more extreme, in fact) than those that have appeared in the creationist-intelligent design literature. So is this proof that each individual snowflake has been designed by a supernatural intelligent entity? Obviously not.

The fallacy here, once again, is presuming an all-at-once random assembly of molecules. Instead, snowflakes, like biological organisms, are formed as the product of a long series of steps acting under well-known physical laws, and the outcomes of such processes very sensitively depend on the starting conditions and numerous environmental parameters. It is thus folly to presume that one can correctly reckon the chances of a given outcome by means of superficial probability calculations [Bailey2000].

Conclusions

In short, the many arguments against evolution based on probability or information theory that have been published in the creationist-intelligent design literature exhibit serious fallacies:

1. They presume that the biomolecular structure came into existence through a single chance assemblage of atoms, rather than as the result of a long series of intermediate steps, each useful in a previous biological context.
2. They ignore numerous well-known physical laws and processes at the atomic level, by which remarkably rich structures can form naturally, not by chance.
3. They apply faulty mathematical reasoning, such as by ignoring the fact that a very wide range of molecular structures could perform a similar function.
4. They ignore the fact that biological evolution is not a “random” process — mutations may be random, but natural selection is far from random.
5. They attempt to invoke advanced mathematical concepts (e.g., information theory), but derive highly questionable results and misapply these results in ways that render the conclusions invalid in an evolutionary biology context.

Perhaps such failings are to be expected, since the field of probability is notorious for fallacies, and sometimes even persons with impressive-sounding credentials can fool themselves in this arena [Saini2009].

In any event, it is clear that it is extremely unwise to base one’s religious faith on probability arguments. Why look to probability to “prove” God, particularly when there are very serious questions as to whether such reasoning is valid? One is reminded of a passage in the New Testament (1 Cor. 14:8): “For if the trumpet gives an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself for the battle?”

For additional details and references, see Probability.

First of all, with respect to eyewitness records, it must be kept in mind that many other aspects of our physical world are truly beyond the realms of our senses:

• The planets and moons of our solar system are much too far away for humans to examine first-hand, although humans may travel to Mars in 20 years or so.
• For distant stars and their planets, we rely completely on powerful telescopes and exotic techniques such as measuring subtle changes in the light from a distant star (indicating that a planet has passed between us and the star). And galaxies are so much further away that there is, at present, no foreseeable technology to permit humans or our spacecraft to study these objects close-up and first-hand.
• Atoms and molecules are much, much too small for any human to examine first-hand. Thus we rely on exotic equipment such as electron microscopes and atomic-force microscopes to “see” them.
• Chemical reactions cannot yet be observed at the atomic-molecular level, at least not in any way that truly displays everything that is actually happening.
• The nucleus of an atom is far, far smaller than anything that can be seen, even with exotic equipment such as atomic-force microscopes.

In other words, each of the above aspects of our physical world can only be studied via empirical evidence that is certainly very far from anything that we can directly sense. Yet few, if any, persons nowadays seriously doubt that the sun and the planets of our solar system really do exist at roughly the distances scientists claim them to be, or that stars and galaxies populate the universe thousands or millions of light-years away, or that there really are structures known as molecules, atoms and nuclear particles, with roughly the sizes and possessing the properties that scientists assert for them.

In addition, there are a number of ways that scientists can peer into the past with considerable confidence. To begin with, radiometric dating permits scientists to measures dates of fossil layers and the like, based on measurements of the prevalence of certain radioactive isotopes that can be found in many rocks. This technique has been refined and polished over several decades, and in the process has become very reliable. What’s more, measurements of rates of radioactivity are now on very solid ground.

There is one additional type of scientific time machine that enables us to directly study the distant past, and which also permits scientists to gain considerable confidence in the multi-million-year ages asserted by geologists for the fossil layers: viewing distant stars and galaxies is, in a very literal sense, a “time machine.” For example, when we view the Pinwheel Galaxy, which is 21 million light-years away, the image we see is a record of events that occurred 21 million years ago. Quasar 3C253 is 2.5 billion light-years away, so that the light we see today was generated 2.5 billion years ago.

In August 2011, scientists discovered a Type 1A supernova in the Pinwheel Galaxy — one of the closest every observed, and, as it turns out, definitely the most carefully studied. It was first discovered by Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory scientist Peter Nugent (a colleague of the present author), using the Palomar Transient Factory (PTF), a remotely-controlled telescope facility near San Diego, California. Because this supernova was discovered only 11 hours after it exploded (from the earth’s time frame), scientists were able to study its behavior in unprecedented detail, and several major findings resulted [Preuss2011]:

1. The light intensity spectrum, from the earliest moments of discovery to the present (it is still being observed as of this writing), has been more accurately measured than with any previous supernova observation.
2. The early light intensity and spectrum measurements enabled the scientists to rule out several alternative models of supernovas, including red giant stars to double-white-dwarf systems, and confirm the progenitor star was definitely a carbon-oxygen white dwarf, and its companion was a main sequence star.
3. Initial measurements of oxygen ejected from the star found some traveling much faster than expected, but subsequent analysis explained this by determining that the oxygen was not evenly distributed when the dwarf exploded.
4. A tremendous amount of mixing had occurred, with some radioactive nickel mixed all the way to the photosphere (the outer region that generates the light that we observe).
5. In general, the sequence of radioactive decay, which produces most of the light we observe, was confirmed: nickel-56 decays to cobalt-56 and finally to iron-56, all in accordance with long-standing theoretical models and past empirical observations.

So the most carefully studied Type 1A supernova in history confirmed that the fundamental physical laws in play when this supernova exploded 21 million years ago are indistinguishable from those laws we measure in earth-bound laboratories today. Among these laws are the laws of radioactive decay, as well as fundamentals of quantum mechanics and general relativity. For these and other reasons, scientists have very good reasons to be entirely confident in the established old-earth picture of geology and evolution.

In summary, the large telescopes that scientists use to observe these distant galaxies are, in a very literal sense, “time machines.” And the fact that scientists can make ever-more-sensitive and comprehensive measurements of very distant astronomical objects, and in the process confirm, to exquisite precision, many the most sophisticated predictions of basic universal laws, is moot but overwhelming testimony to the reliability of these laws over cosmic time.

For additional discussion, see Radiometric dating, Reliability, Theory, Uniformitarian, Distance and Deceiver.

The religious right blames science in general and evolution in particular for these ills. One display at the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky, warning of the consequences of a scientific worldview, features photos of a nuclear explosion, a collection of skulls from the Holocaust, and what may be a photo of a woman undergoing an abortion. Another exhibit displays news clips about birth control, abortion, divorce, mass murder, stem cells and war.

Not to be out-done, numerous secular writers blame religion. Christopher Hitchens declares that religion is “violent, irrational, intolerant, allied to racism, tribalism, and bigotry, invested in ignorance and hostile to free inquiry, contemptuous of women and coercive toward children” [Hitchens2007, pg. 56]. These writers also note the numerous wars in Europe and elsewhere that have been fought in the name of religion [Atheists]. In a related but strange twist, historians Will and Ariel Durant question whether progress is real [Durant1968], and “critical theorists” blame the Enlightenment and scientific advances of past centuries for the disasters of the 20th century [Pinker2011b, pg. 133].

So what are the facts here? Who is to blame?

There are certainly some aspects of present-day society that qualify as instances of moral decline. For example, while the Internet has been huge benefit to society worldwide, it has unleashed tidal waves of pornography, fraud and “Internet addiction” that show no sign of abating. One other area of general concern in modern society is the rising percentage of children born to unmarried women. In the U.S., this percentage has risen from just 10.7% in 1970 to 18.4% in 1980, to 28% in 1990, to 33.2% in 2000, and to 41% in 2010 [Health2010]. Some have said that high rates of unwed parentage are an inevitable feature of a highly technological, urban, and secular society. But this claim is countered by Japan, which is certainly highly technological, urban and secular, but where only 2% of children are born to unwed mothers [Ventura2009].

But beyond items such as this, it is difficult to identify any clear instances of significant decline in morality or, even more broadly, in overall standards of living. Here are some of the latest statistics:

1. Crime. It is widely believed that crime, from minor burglary to serious violent offenses, is growing worse every year. Yet the facts point in quite the opposite direction. In the U.S., in spite of the worst economic slowdown since the Great Depression, with millions out of work and many others in desperate economic straits, violent crime in 2010 actually declined by 5.5% from the 2009 level, and the 2009 level declined by a similar percentage from the 2008 level. In fact, the 2010 U.S. crime rates are the lowest in 40 years, and are down by more than a factor of two since peaking in 1994 [Oppel2011].
2. Divorce. Another commonly mentioned ill is a soaring rate of divorce. But in the U.S., the divorce rate per thousand people peaked in 1981, and has declined ever since. Indeed, the divorce rate in 2005 (3.6 divorces per 1000 population) was the lowest since 1970. It is true that the marriage rate has also been declining, but even if one computes the number of divorces per married couples, here too the rate has fallen, from a peak of 22.8 divorces per 1,000 married couples in 1979, to only 16.7 in 2005 [Stevenson2007].
3. Teenage sex and birth. A 2010 report from the U.S. National Center for Health Statistics reported that the percentage of American high school students who have had sex (2007 data) is significantly lower than in 1991 (47.8% versus 54.1%) [Parker2009]. Similarly, in 2010 the U.S. teen birth rate fell to 34.3 births per 1000 teens, a record low. This is a nine-point drop from 2009 and a whopping 28-point drop since 1991, when the rate was 62 births per 1000 teens [CDC2011].
4. Abortion. The number of abortions in the U.S. peaked in 1991 at 24 per 1000 U.S. women aged 15-44, but has dropped since then to 16.1 [CDC2008].
5. Teenage alcohol, cigarette and drug use. According to a 2011 report by University of Michigan researchers, only 12.7% of 8th graders reported any alcohol usage in the prior 30 days, which is down by nearly half from the 25.1% level in 1991. Among 10th graders, the figure is down from 42.8% in 1991 to 27.2% in 2011, and among 12th graders, it is down from 54% in 1991 to 40% in 2011. Even more dramatic declines have been seen in cigarette, cocaine and crack usage. One area of concern is marijuana usage: in 2011, 7.2% of 8th graders, 17.6% of 10th graders, and 22.6% of 12th graders reported some usage in the previous 30 days, which figures are roughly the same as in 2003. But even these figures are down from 1997 when these rates peaked [Johnston2011].
6. War. It is widely believed that recent years have seen more violence and deaths due to warfare than ever before. Surely the 20th century, with tens of millions killed in two horrific world wars, must be the worst ever? But if we normalize these statistics by population, then beyond the “blips” of the two world wars there is an unmistakable trend of decline. According to Harvard scholar Steven Pinker, “violence has been in decline over long stretches of time, and we may be living in the most peaceful time in our species’ existence. … [I]t’s a persistent historical development, visible on scales from millennia to years, from the waging of wars and perpetration of genocides to the spanking of children and the treatment of animals.” [Pinker2011a; Pinker2011b]. See also the previous blog.
7. Religious belief and participation. There is a widespread perception that church attendance and religious belief have significantly declined during recent decades. Indeed, according to a 2010 study, Americans 18-29 years of age are less likely to be affiliated with a particular faith than the older generation. But in other ways they remain fairly traditional. Beliefs in life after death, for instance, closely resemble those of the older generation, and more Americans 18-29 engage in daily prayer today than 20 years ago [Pew2010]. Similarly, a 1997 study of American research scientists (physicists, biologists and mathematicians) revealed that 40% of these scientists believe in God, a figure not significantly different than in 1916 [Angier1997].
8. Worldwide living conditions. There is widespread concern that our global economy, while lifting up some, has condemned hundreds of millions of others to extreme poverty, particularly in light of the current worldwide economic recession. But according to the latest U.N. report (2010), its Human Development Index rose in all but three nations (Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia and Zimbabwe) from 1970 to 2010. For example, worldwide average income per capita in 2010 was $10,760, which is twice the inflation-adjusted level in 1970. Over this 40-year period, income per capita rose in all but six nations worldwide, with increases averaging 184% in developing countries and 126% in developed countries [UN2010].

With regards to the last item, Matt Ridley asks us to imagine a better-off-than-average family somewhere in Western Europe or Eastern North America in 1800 [Ridley2010, pg. 13]:

The family is gathering around the hearth in the simple timber-framed house. Father reads aloud from the Bible while mother prepares to dish out a stew of beef and onions. The baby boy is being comforted by one of his sisters and the eldest lad is pouring water from a pitcher into the earthenware mugs on the table. His elder sister is feeding the horse in the stable. Outside there is no noise of traffic, there are no drug dealers and neither dioxins nor radioactive fall-out have been found in the cow’s milk. All is tranquil; a bird sings outside the window.

Oh please! Though this is one of the better-off families in the village, father’s Scripture reading is interrupted by a bronchitic cough that presages the pneumonia that will kill him at 53 — not helped by the wood smoke of the fire. (He is lucky: life expectancy even in England was less than 40 in 1800.) The baby will die of the smallpox that is now causing him to cry; his sister will soon be the chattel of a drunken husband. The water the son is pouring tastes of the cows that drink from the brook. Toothache tortures the mother. The neighbour’s lodger is getting the other girl pregnant in the hayshed even now and her child will be sent to an orphanage. The stew is grey and gristly yet meat is a rare change from gruel; there is no fruit or salad at this season. It is eaten with a wooden spoon from a wooden bowl. Candles cost too much, so firelight is all there is to see by. Nobody in the family has ever seen a play, painted a picture or heard a piano. School is a few years of dull Latin taught by a bigoted martinet at the vicarage. Father visited the city once, but the travel cost him a week’s wages and the others have never travelled more than fifteen miles from home. Each daughter owns two wool dresses, two linen shirts and one pair of shoes. Father’s jacket cost him a month’s wages but is now infested with lice. The children sleep two to a bed on straw mattresses on the floor. As for the bird outside the window, tomorrow it will be trapped and eaten by the boy.

Conclusions

In short, there is absolutely no substance to the claim that science in general or evolution in particular is responsible for the perceived declined in morality or living standards. And there is absolutely no substance to the claim that religion is responsible for this perceived decline either. This “decline,” by all objective measures, simply does not exist, certainly not to the extent that it is often pictured in commentary of the left or right. It is a regrettable consequence of the media’s fascination with bad news.