If you were to enter into a typical science class, you would find out that truth is determined by what is in the pages of a textbook. Students will leave class believing the teacher due to the evidencee that is presented; it would appear, by way it was written, that all the evidencee is irrefutable and is believed by all to be truth. This is now what the student will use in their decision-making process, for their actions will produce an outcome that is in line with these teachings, but go back to the evidencee in the textbook. Evidence determined by scientists is a result of many years of researching in this field, but what reactions would result if this evidencee was known to be false but was taught as truth anyway. This scenario refers to the teaching of evolution in schools. Although we are told that evolution is a theory, we are not allowed to question the evidence that is used in support. This raises an even greater concern, what are the results of teaching students that all life is a result of evolution and there is no real purpose in life?
I

When you examine a biology textbook, you will find the discoveries made by the scientists Stanley Miller and Harold Erey. In 1953, these scientists conducted an experiment that was designed to show how the first proteins were created. Using hydrogen rich gases that were believed then to be the atmosphere of the Earth, simple proteins were created when a spark was sent through the mixture of gases. The results of this experiment were used to show that life is easy to create; evolution appeared to have a strong foundation. The results of the discovery were proved wrong circa 1970 when the mixture of gases used in the experiment was declared not to be the conditions of the Earth. Scientists who believed in evolution claimed the Earth’s early atmosphere consisted of volcanic gases (Wells 2). The experiment performed by Stanley Miller and Harold Erey was proved to be wrong over forty years ago, but if you were to ask a student if they knew this information was false, they would not.

As this hypothetical class continues, we are told that all life can be traced back to very simple organisms. The differences that we see in life around us is due to adaptations that were made to fit the environment that the organism lived in. As time continues more adaptations are made until you have a completely different organism. Step away from this for a moment, if an organism experiences changes that allow it to be able to change from one species into another, there should be fossils that show the animal during this process. Paleontology, the study of plant and animal fossils, is the field that scientists look to for support. Paleontologists have completed over 150 years excavating fossils from the ground. After all of this time of searching, not one transitional fossil has been discovered that can be used as evidencee. Dr. Colin Patterson, a senior Paleontologist for the British Museum of Natural History, was asked in an interview why he had not included any pictures of transitional form fossils in his book Evolution; he responded by explaining that he would have an illustration if one existed. Mr. Patterson would not use an artist’s representation of a transitional form because this would “mislead the reader” (Randall 1). This proves an important point, if Dr. Colin Patterson, a paleontologist and evolutionist, did not include an artist’s interpretation of a transitional form because it would mislead the reader, why are we still taught that animals are able to transition to a different species when there is a lack of physical evidencee to support this theory.

Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution teaches that life can be represented as a tree. At the base of the tree you would find similarities in the fossils; as you move higher up the tree the rate of complexity grows. The concept, the tree of life, again, only exists in textbooks; in actuality the fossil record shows that there is an extremely large amount of complex organisms that appear at the same time (Wells 3). Since the fossils appear at the same time, there would be no time for a transitional fossil. N. Heriber Nilsson, a professor, botanist and evolutionist explains the dilemma, “My attempts to demonstrate evolution by an experiment carried on for more than 40 years have completely filed…The fossil material is now so complete that it has been possible to construct new classes, and the lack of transitional series cannot be explained as being due to scarcity of material. The deficiencies are real, they will never be filled.” (Randall 2).

According to evolution, the Earth and the universe are billions of years old. Sedimentary rock is used to support the idea of an old Earth; sedimentary rock is claimed to be formed by millions of years of deposition of sediments. We are not told that sedimentary rock can be created by a flash flood. A flash flood washes away large amount of sediments; once sediments are deposited, they can form sedimentary rock by the pressure of the on top of them. This would eliminate the millions of years that are assumed to form all the layers of sedimentary rocks, but this idea is also not presented.

Based on the conditions that exist at the Grand Canyon, an evolutionist would claim that over millions of years, the Colorado River has carved the Grand Canyon. In Georgia, Providence Canyon shows that millions of years are not required to form canyons; they can be formed through catastrophic events, such as extreme flash floods. Around the 1800s, an area in Georgia, near Lumpkin, trees and roots were removed in order to have flatter farmland. The farmland would now be open to erosion since the roots are not there to hold the soil together. A period of torrential rain fell in 1846 which eroded a small ravine; the ravine continued to grow larger and larger with each rainstorm until it formed the canyon that is there today; the canyon has sixteen branches that range up to 15 stories in depth (MacArthur 53).

Chance is the key world when you ask an evolutionist how the universe was created. According to Jacques Monod, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in1965 for his work in biochemistry, “Chance alone is the source of every innovation, of all creation in the biosphere.” Chance is to be the answer for any question that can not be answered by an experiment. What would normally be impossible becomes possible due to chance. In reality, chance is the probability that something will happen. Chance does not create anything, it is simply the mathematical probability that something will occur. It is not a force that puts events into motion.

Students in New York State are required to take and pass Living Environment in order to graduate from high school. The state has a list of labs that are required in order for students to take the regents exam at the end of the year. Several questions on the regents exam are based on the understanding that you gained from accomplishing these labs The Beaks of Finches lab uses Charles Darwin’s book The Origin of Species to discuss how natural selection supports evolution. Darwin wrote The Origin of Species based on a trip that he took to the Galapagos Island. When Darwin was on the island, he conducted studies on the various types of animals; he mainly observed the different varieties of finches. Based on his findings he saw that the beaks of finches increased five percent in length after a drought struck the Galapagos Islands; this was due to the fact that the only seeds that remained were the ones that were difficult to crack. The U.S. Academy of Sciences claimed the drought had caused the finches to undergo evolutionary changes. Natural selection chooses which finches were able to survive. If every ten years a drought strikes the island, there would be a new type of finch would emerge after 200 years (Wells 5). At this point, natural selection is a fact for a species does undergo changes if the environment changes, for the finches changed with the drought. Though there is a change in the species, there is not a change from species to species.

One type of animal can endure many different environments and undergo changes, but it will still belong to the same species after all the changes are completed. This idea of change within a species can be explained by the following scenario. Two dogs that have medium length hair have a gene for long hair and a gene for short hair (Ls and Ls) Based on the genes available, the dogs could produce puppies that have the same length of hair as them, with the genes long and short, puppies with very short hair (ss) or dogs with very long hair (LL). The dogs with very short hair would not be able to survive if the geography was to change to colder levels. The dogs that have the same type of hair as their parents would survive in the same type of environment as their parents. If the environment would change and become extremely warm, the dog with long hair would not be able to survive due. Nature selected which animal was better suited for that environment, but the dog with shorter hair did not step closer to becoming an entirely new species. The same is true with the finches; they did not move closer to becoming a new species, but scientists claim that it was through natural selection that we have finches today. The beaks of the finches returned to their normal size after the conditions of the environment returned to normal. This fact is not included in order to further the student’s belief when in actuality, the evidencee does not support the point they were trying to make.

In class we are introduced to another piece of evidencee that is used to support natural selection, peppered moths. In England in the 1950s, the peppered moths had appeared to change from lighter colors to darker colors. People believed that the light colored moths resting on tree trunks would have been eaten by birds when the trees darkened. The trees had darkened because pollution had increased through. Bernard Kettlewell released both dark and light colored moths during the day into unpolluted forests and polluted forests. The birds ate the light colored moths on darker trees and the darker moths on the lighter trees. Natural selection appeared to be proved by the experiment, but the experiment was shown to be inaccurate in the 1980s. These types of moths do not rest on trees trunks during the day; they rest under branches during the day and fly during the night. Photographers represented the situation through the gluing of dead moths to tree trunks. This created a fake situation that does not normally occur in nature. Bob Rittler, a textbook author, defends the continued teaching by stating “high school students ‘are very concrete in the way they learn’, ‘we want to get across the idea of selective adaptation. Later on, they can look at the work critically.” (Wells 4). Through this statement we are able to see that in order for us to believe this theory we need to be lied to. We can look back again someday to look at the evidencee to see that the supports of our belief were false from the start.

When the topic of common ancestors enters into the list of evidencee supporting evolution, Ernst Haeckel’s embryo drawings are introduced. Charles Darwin believed the same set of drawings that we were presented with. These drawings were of different vertebrae in the beginning embryonic stage. The drawings appeared to prove that the animals were almost identical, but that is the point, drawings are not actual representations of the truth. Michael Richardson, an embryologist, and a team of other experts, compared Haeckel’s drawings to actual photographs in 1997; they discovered that the drawings were changed to show similarity. The earliest stages had actually been left out for they show complete differences. Therefore, Darwin’s idea of a common ancestor no longer has a strong foundation to stand on, but the concept is still presented as evidencee when the evidencee has been proved false (Wells 2).
II

When a student evaluates the main points of evolution that is presented to him or her, it is hard to contradict what they see; many students do not take the time to research to see if what they are taught is true. Therefore, an increasing number of students believe they are the result of an accident and have the worth of an animal. This same belief can explain the efforts that are made to save other animals instead of trying to help our own kind, for evolution teaches we are equal with animals. Animals fight to be dominant over other members of the same species through survival of the fittest. Humans who model how they live after animals will follow the same pattern as well. Individuals who would normally be their friends become their adversary, who they will struggle with to achieve dominance. Once they have reached the point of dominance, they will constantly fight against younger youths who believe the same principle. He or she will eventually reach a point where another who is stronger will overshadow them; all of the efforts will be wasted (Gates 329). The cycle then repeats itself.

When you tell a group of students that life is a result of the battle of the fittest, you can be sure to expect they will start to act like this. Bullying and harassment has been a continually growing problem that has plagued schools across. Negative acts aimed at other students with the purpose of building up oneself have caused many students to commit suicide or attack their aggressor. If the aggressor believes he is rising up by putting others down, he fulfills survival of the fittest by cutting down those who are weaker. Tragedy struck Columbine High School in 1999; Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold entered school and killed twelve students, a well-liked coach, and themselves (Cannon 1). When we hear of reports like these, we often wonder why they would do this. Both of these students were constantly harassed throughout their high school years for being different than the other students. The difference would have shocked us to for Eric and Dylan followed the teachings of Skinheads. This racist group had previously murdered a student in 1997 because he was an African American. The skinheads were obsessed with the German symbols, language, swastikas and other items that were used around World War II. Members of skinheads believed they were warriors of the Four Reich (Cannon 4). Eric and Dylan wrote papers in class proclaiming that killing people was a good thing. They wore armbands that stated, “I hate people”; classmates called them names and ridiculed them throughout their time in high school (Cannon 1). If we saw this situation before the tragedy, how would we respond? Students who believe in evolution do not hold themselves to any moral standards; these students believe they evolved from animals; this would allow them base all their decisions on their emotions. In the eyes of the students who accept this philosophy, the institution of morals and rules is against their standards. All their decisions are based on a temporary view of what is right or wrong; the institution of rules would change what they would expect as a natural outcome. With the introduction of rules their self-centered view fails and they are no longer able to proclaim what is right based on how they feel. Bullies feel that it is right for them to tear other students down who are different than they are. At Columbine we see the recipients of bullying reacting by murdering those who attacked them.

When evolution is introduced into a society, the results of the future can be compared to what happened to Germany prior to World War II. Germany is in ruins because of World War I; Germany had to pay reparations for the entire war due to the Treaty of Versailles on June 28, 1919 (Smith 544). The military was greatly reduced in its size to 100,000 men so that it would only be able to defend the nation (545). The German mark was worthless, three trillion Marks equals one dollar (561). At this point the Germans are overwhelmed with the sudden rush of failures. When Adolph Hitler worked his way into power in Germany, he promoted the evolutionary idea of different values for the various races of people (Hughes 2). Hitler led others to believe that the Germans were the strongest and greatest race in the world. They should have the right to rule all the other inferior races (Smith 604). Hitler moved to remove all the races from the country that were not Arians. He tried to purge the country of the Jews by sending them to concentration camps where they were tortured and killed (606). Hitler was able to convince the people of Germany they were a master race based on the notion that evolution causes differences in races; evolution teaches that one race of people can be superior to another due to all the race different stages of evolution. The same thing could happen in America, for many of the younger generation believe the same things that were endorsed at that time.

Evolution is taught as a theory, yet when evidencee that is used to support it is questioned and can be proved false, it is dismissed. The news media claims that the only people that go against evolution are religious; they claim they are trying to go back to the Stone Age by throwing out science (Wells 6). When there is a flaw in a theory, the theory is changed to accommodate the truth. Based on the previous statement, science is biased towards evolution and is no longer seeking after the truth if it points towards a different direction. Michael Behe, a biochemist, brought up Ernst Haeckel’s embryo drawings to The New York Times and pointed out that they were false, he was accused of being a being a creationist for pointing it out (6). The true motives have been revealed in this statement, for now we see that evidencee used to support evolution that is known to be false, is being presented anyway to change the beliefs of the students. Since the students are the next generation to step into the world they will take this rational of thinking with them. A generation where the majority of people believe that they are the result of chance can explain the growing irrational behaviors in society today. These problems will only continue to grow worse unless more efforts are made to tell others the truth.


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