Philosophy Unit 2, Topic 6: Religion and science

Origin of the universe

Creationism

God created the world in 7 days, and on the 6th day he said "Let the land produce living creatures" and "Let us make mankind in our image, our likeness so that they may rule over..."- Genesis 1

• God created the world from nothing, showing omnipotence "Ex Nihilo"
• It was created by command
• God controlled the order
• Things were created in their final form

Evidence in favour

• Nobody saw the Big Bang and  although the Hadron collider has attempted to recreate it, it failed.
• With the Big Bang, there is no idea as to where the matter came from, so it could have been the Christian deity.

The Big Bang

There was an implosion of matter 13.7 billion years ago

Evidence in favour

• CMB is thought to be radiation from the Big Bang
• The red shift that is noted by other planets, show that the universe is expanding, like the big bang suggests.

Creation of life

Genesis 2: Adam and Eve

God created man, Adam, who was in his perfect and final form. He was tasked with naming all of God's creations. God then made Adam a mate out of his rib, showing his omnibenevolence, called wo-man, meaning from man. Animals are therefore completely separate from humans

Evolution

Charles Darwin came up with the idea of natural selection. A mutation in DNA can cause a change in characteristics, EG. a giraffe with an extra long neck. It may be advantageous as it allows them to reach higher leaves, and not run out of food. Others without this mutation, may die, leaving the long necked giraffe to reproduce and its genes to be passed on.

1. Human beings were not created in their final form (looking how they do now)

2. Humans are not separate from animals, we are part of the same ‘tree’

3. God did not create humans as they were – we evolved along with everything else

Evidence in favour

• DNA tests show that we do in fact, have a common ancestor
• Animals that are not suited to their environment go extinct eg. the dodo
• We have fossil records to show physical changes in humans.

Evidence against

• There are gaps in the fossil record, making it less likely that we are the product of evolution.
• Humans have never seen it
• Scientists say some parts of organisms are too…