[asa] Millions of years population growth

My wife just bought a book on the human body at a homeschool conference, and
realized afterward it was published by Answers in Genesis ("God's Design for
Life - The Human Body", by Debbie and Richard Lawrence). Overall it's
pretty good, aside from the section at the beginning, "How do I teach
Creation vs. Evolution?" There were a number of statements here which I
know how to answer, including some comparisons of "Evolutionary Myth" vs.
"The Truth" -- except for one which I would like to ask here. I've read
this one recently somewhere else, and would be interested in any comments on
it.
 
It says, "Evolutionary Myth: Humans have been around for more than one
million years. The Truth: If people have been on earth for a million years,
there would be trillions of people on the earth today, even if we allowed
for worst-case plagues, natural disasters, etc. The number of people on
earth today is about 6.5 billion. If the population had grown at only a
0.01% rate (today's rate is over 1%) over 1 million years, there could be
10^43 people today (that's a number with 43 zeros after it!) Repopulating
the earth after the Flood would only require a population growth rate of
0.5%, half of what it is today. [Footnote referencing: John D. Morris,
Ph.D., The Young Earth, p. 70-71. See also
www.answersingenesis.org/go/people]"
 
I haven't checked their math, but I'm sure their uniformitarian assumptions
leave something to be desired. But how about the population growth after
the Flood only requiring a 0.5% growth rate, versus the orders of magnitude
longer time with the evolutionary history of mankind? I'm sure the growth
rate earlier in history should have been higher than our present 1% due to
larger families, but taking into account wars, plagues, disease, etc., the
fluctuations in population could have been great too.
 
 
 
Late in the book, when dealing with genetics, there was (I think) a rather
unfair comparison of Darwin vs. Mendel.
 
"Mendel performed his experiments at about the same time that Darwin was
developing his theory of evolution. Unlike Darwin, who based most of his
theory on guesses and suppositions, Mendel performed his research very
carefully and recorded exactly what he saw. He was able to demonstrate each
of his ideas by showing the data from his experiments. In fact, the results
Mendel achieved contradicted Darwin's idea of selective breeding resulting
in new species.
Mendel was able to demonstrate that genes from the parents determine what
teh offspring will look like. Therefore, he showed that one kind of plant
or animal will always produce that same kind of plant or animal.
Evolutionists have had to "update" Darwin's theory by saying that mutations
(mistakes) in the genes are what caused the changes fromone kind of animal
to another. However, nearly all mutations that have been observed have only
resulted in negative changes, not positive changes as would be required for
one creature to change into another kind of creature."
 
 
There were a couple of other choice quotes in the book. In the beginning it
describes the "scientific method", including making a hypothesis, observing
the results of experiment, etc. "It's okay to have a 'wrong hypothesis.'
That's how we learn. Be sure to try to understand why you got a different
result than you expected."
 
And, "Since the evidence does not support their theories, evolutionists are
constantly coming up with new ways to try to support what they believe. One
of their ideas is called punctuated equilibrium....There is no evidence for
this, nor any known mechamism to cause these rapid changes. Rather it is
merely wishful thinking. We need to teach our children the difference
between science and wishful thinking."
 
My comments to my wife were, too bad this YEC view of science isn't really
science, because they propose a hypothesis, then throw out the test results
which disagree with their predetermined belief. In fact, they are
constantly "coming up with new ways to try to support what they believe" and
engaging in "wishful thinking." The "evolutionists" (i.e. scientists) on
the other hand are doing science, and regularly disproving current or past
hypotheses based on actual data.
 
 
Jon Tandy
 

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Received on Thu Apr 26 00:47:35 2007