In my prior post, I shared the question I asked Hugh Ross in a Skeptics Forum at church this past Sunday. Continuing on in my story ...
Hugh put down his cup of water and smiled. "Fuz and I get that thrown in our face all the time during debates on university campuses."
From those of you who engage in apologetics using evidence from science, can I hear an amen? :-)
Next to the threadbare "god of the gaps" argument, the issue of falsifiability is one of the most common objections raised by skeptics.
Hugh continued, "At RTB we promote a creation model that is testable. There are tests in our model, which, if failed, would cause us to have to refine the model. Failing those tests would be corrosive, but not fatal. However, there are also tests which if failed, would prove fatal to our model."
I nodded. He clearly understood what I was asking. I wanted some examples of fatal findings.
"Incidentally", Ross added, "the young earth creationists have a testable model as well. The problem is, their model has failed tests which have proven fatal to their model. The ID movement, however, does not really have a model to test."
[Ross is referring to the ID approach represented by Dr. Dembski and the explanatory filter. The explanatory filter is empirical, and it does offer a pass/fail condition for determining if an object like the bacterial flagellum is designed. This is as far as it goes, however. There really are no full blown ID models which offer an explanation for the origin of life and tests for knowing if it is a valid hypothesis. In this, Ross is quite correct.]
"And the supporters of evolution never produce a testable model in our debates with them. This is to their detriment. The audiences want to see a model to model comparison. We present our model, and stick our necks out and make predictions about what future discoveries will reveal. Our debate opponents have not risen to this challenge yet."
[Ross later added that he believes evolution supporters have models ... they just refuse to present those models in engagements with Christians. ]
"You asked for examples", Ross added. I nodded eagerly.
"Here are some examples of discoveries which would prove fatal to our model. If we are to discover that our universe did not have a beginning, then our model fails. There is no way imaginable to reconcile an infinite universe with what we find in the Bible.
A second finding which would prove fatal to our model is if we determine that humanity did not originate from a single man and a single woman in the recent past."
[The recent past meaning 50,000 to 100,000 years ago versus millions of years.]
"A third test that if failed, would prove fatal, would be to find out that there are no differences between the animals and human beings."
I was curious about cosmology. I stepped back to the microphone. "What if the existence of multiple universes was proven?", I asked.
"No, that would not prove fatal. In fact, God has told us He will create more than one universe. God created this universe, and he told us a new creation is coming."
Interesting point. I suppose you could consider the new creation a new kind of universe ... we do know that the laws of physics will be completely different.
"Discoveries which show that the universe had a transcendant causal agent, likewise, would prove fatal to the naturalistic model."
Certainly true. I would argue that a finite universe is such a finding. I looked over my shoulder and saw that the line of questioners was really beginning to grow. I decided to yield the microphone to the next person.
I thanked Dr. Ross and returned to my seat. I learned that Hugh would be speaking in the evening. I decided to attend.
He presented some fresh material in the evening which I am saving for a later post. I waited till after the evening talk to ask him something I had always wanted to know ...
[continued]
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