Friday, August 14, 2009

Darwin, Evolution and God
By: Dr. Dildar Ahmed Alavi

The year 2009 marks the 200th birth anniversary of the great scientist Charles Darwin who was born on February 12, 1809, and, coincidently, the 150th anniversary of the publication of On the Origin of Species (published on 24 November 1859).
Charles Darwin is undoubtedly one of the most influential scientists of the modern times. Although many conservatives often use it in a derogatory sense, Darwinism, or even his name, has become synonymous with evolution. His work, or perhaps an interpretation of it, has influenced the Western way of thinking more than any other scientist’s. The matter of the fact, however, is that Charles Darwin is not the first person in the world history who propounded the idea of evolution. He is even not the first in Europe. The French naturalist Jean-Babtiste Lamarck (1744-1829), for example, had already given his theory of evolution called inheritance of acquired character. It is notable that generally people fail to distinguish between evolution as a concept and theories of evolution. The idea that all plants and animals (including humans) which we see around us today have gradually evolved from lower life forms in a long span of time (some 3.5 billion years) is accepted by almost all scientists – biologists, paleontologists, geologists, etc - of the world. This is almost taken as a reality. All biology text books are written with this concept taken as an obvious, as if self evident, fact. The roots of this concept go long into the history, and, for example, a number of outstanding Muslim intellectuals and thinkers from the Middle Ages through the present, shared this idea in one form or the other. The idea of evolution is now not limited to the living world only. The whole universe is thought to have been evolved gradually in billions of years, the process that is still going one.
But, how has organic evolution, the evolution of living things, taken place? This is the subject-matter of the theories of evolution. Darwin’s work, like that of Lamarck, does not primarily concern with evolution as a concept which as we have seen is an old idea, but with its explanation. He put forward the theory of natural selection and survival of the fittest to explain how evolution of plants and animals has taken place through ages. Opposed to the concept of evolution is idea of special creation which says that all the species of plants and animals have been created in the forms they have today. Species are immutable: one cannot transform into another. Scientists and intellectuals generally do not accept this.
Evolution is also sometimes confused with the denial of God, which has nothing to do with reality. Science as we know does not deal with the question who has created the world. It simply tends to know how it has come into existence, and how it behaves. And, it is what science possibly can, and should, do. God almighty could have created the life forms through special creation, bringing into being all species separately, or He could have brought them into being through an evolutionary process. A great number of facts have been presented to support the latter idea. The believers in God can thus take evolution as process or method He has chosen to create living things. Coming into existence of things according to some mechanism does not disprove the existence of a Creator, whose will operates in the universe through laws of nature which none but He himself has established. One can even further argue that the existence of a system itself is an evidence of the existence of God almighty. In fact, evolution gives an explanation of how God has brought into being the living organisms. Sometime people regard evolution as contrary to human dignity. “God has created man in His own image, how could he be evolved from lower forms”, or “man is the vice-regent (khalifa) of God, evolution would place him among animals”. Such are the voices we often listen. The lowly history of his creation, however, does not negate man’s special status. Our well known humble origin as individuals, for instance, does not degrade our worth as intellectual, moral beings. It is the final state and not the history or process, of coming into existence of a being that determines its position. Although he had stopped believing in the religion, Charles Darwin, as research has revealed, was not an atheist. He was a true scientist and a seeker of truth. His thoughts have even helped us in understanding scientifically how God’s will operates in the universe. In the famous words of Albert Einstein, God does not play dice. His will, or irada in Arabic, does not act haphazardly. He is not a magic man or a juggler, but omniscient, omnipotent (al-Hakim, al-Qadir, al-Khabir) Sustainer (al-Rabb – the Evolver) of the cosmos who created and still continues to create things through a system.
Charles Darwin(died on April 19, 1882)’s contributions to science and learning will hopefully continue influencing human thought pattern for long time to come.
(The writer is an Associate Professor in Forman Christian College University Lahore)

No comments: