Prophetic Voices

ART09051602 --- 16 May 2009 --- © Jan A. A. van der Wulp --- courlisius@skynet.be
This article may be distributed freely only if complete and unabridged -- PDF version locked
Authorised translation from the original Dutch

A MODEL OF THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES: BIOLOGICAL FACTS
By Jan A.A. van der Wulp, B.Eng, M.Sc.

INTRODUCTION
1. This article will - in the current year 2009, the two hundredth anniversary of Darwin's birth - make a contribution regarding the origin of plants, animals and human beings, irrespective whether this happened by evolution or by creation. The article investigates the experimental facts which every Model of Origin must satisfy, if it is to be acceptable from a natural-scientific point of view.

2. The following text is not a plea for creationism, neither is it a plea for neo-darwinistic evolution. There is no talk of the Bible, nor of a possible Creator. The article does not put forward philosophical positions, neither creationist, nor evolutionary. The text does not contain a single theological statement. It simply covers scientific and experimental facts, observations and data, based on research in the field and on experiments done over the centuries, which every Model of Origin must satisfy if it is to be acceptable from a natural-scientific point of view.

3. The science of engineering and the natural sciences deal in observations, in experiments, in facts. It must be possible to verify these facts, the observations must be capable of being repeated. A model in experimental science can only be established on the basis of observations and experiments. A model thus established is continually tested. It is only reliable when every scientist, anywhere in the world, is able to test that model for reliability, by carrying out new experiments, in which not a single test contests the results of the model. Each model in natural sciences has to meet the condition that a single item of evidence to the contrary is sufficient to have to discard the model, even if there are numerous proofs in its favour.

4. For that reason one has to differentiate clearly between experimental science on the one hand - which operates with field research and laboratory experiments -- and forensic science on the other hand. This latter attempts to explain historical events, using data applying to the present situation, and reasoning backwards in time.

5. This article is restricted to the biological facts of the Model of Origin, together with some elements from demography and archaeology. It exclusively deals with facts established by natural science and the science of engineering. The discussion deals with data established by experimental sciences, by gathering experience over many centuries. NO philosophical positons are taken, NEITHER are theological points of view. It will surprise many people that this basic assumption will result in a definitive understanding in regard to the Model of Origin without the necessity of employing a single postulate or position from philosophy or theology with regard to the origin of things and beings. Now follows proof.

DEVELOPMENTS IN BIOLOGY
Natural Processes
6. Darwin and the nineteenth century biologists were of the opinion that the biological processes of natural selection, and genetical mutations, and still other biological mechanisms could explain the changing of plant and animal species into higher forms. This, they thought, would happen under the influence of things happening by accident, chemical processes, cosmic radiation, changes in temperature and pressure and other influences characteristic of their surroundings. Chance would play a big part in this, and because of the long span of time, of millions of years, such developments would be possible.

7. It is indisputable that natural selection, mutations, and other biological mechanisms exist, and that they can lead to changes within the biological species. This sometimes is called Micro-evolution. A biological species contains all individuals capable of mating together, and reproduce. Examples are: Man, dog, goat, hen. The very many breeds of dogs and hens with different characteristics are proof of the effectiveness of these biological mechanisms.

8. These days, it is equally undisputable, that such processes - during the past 4,000 years - have never led to a new species -- a goat does not become a sheep, a hen not a partridge, a monkey not a human being. Darwin and his contemporaries had no knowledge of microbiology, knew no genetic biology, no DNA. That knowledge did not exist in those days. So-called Macro-evolution never was observed.

Chance
9. Scientists in later times had to drop chance as a requirement for new species, as mathematical statistics has shown that chance can never serve as an explanation for the large hereditary changes necessary to change any particular species into one of a higher sort. Mathematical statistics show that an independent event never occurs if the chance of it's occurring is one in one with fifty noughts. This is written 1 in 10exp50. Exp comes from the word exponent. Recall that 10exp3 equals 1,000.

10. Many hereditary changes must occur simultaneously in both males and females of a lower biological species, and be present in adult members of the next higher species for the new species to be able to maintain and reproduce itself.

11. The evolutionist, by introducing long periods of time, will suggest a change occurring by chance. 'It seems impossible, but, assuming an extremely long time, it is bound to happen at some point' is the argument used by the layman in mathematics.

12. The chance of those simultaneous and combined changes in adult members of different gender (who may not always live together and are not always subject to the same external influences) is far smaller than 1 in 10exp50, think of 1 in 10exp250. For that reason such occurrences are utterly impossible. It is not because of the extremely long times that such occurrences are possible, it is due to the extremely small chances that this is utterly impossible. Moreover the obvious presence of Design in the DNA of living creatures points to some other mechanism

Influence of the surroundings
13. The later evolutionists of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries were left with the influences of the surroundings as the possible cause in the gradual evolution in small stages: radioactive rays, changes in temperature or pressure, electrical influence (bolts of lightning), and biological influences such as selection, mutation, genetic passion, population restriction.

14. Well then, the results of experiments carried out over at least 4,000 years of cultivation of cattle and plants have shown that influence of the surroundings has not produced new species with other properties than those already existing. Also, these evolutionists did not understand genetic microbiology as we do nowadays.

15. This view has been confirmed by laboratory experiments during the last hundred years at least. One may breed new types of dogs, or a different kind of corn, but dogs remain dogs and corn remains corn. It is true that modern laboratory experiments with the complicated and high-technological methods of cloning will produce new species with other genetical properties, but that is not the well-known and assumed natural development in the world of the evolutionist.

FACTS FROM NATURAL SCIENCES
16. Well now, let us summarize what modern experimental science, grounded on the experience of breeders of animals and plants, as well as field experiments and laboratory tests by professional biologists, have determined. Let us also look at the results of demographic research, of archaeology, and of physical information science. Afterwards, we may draw a surprising conclusion.

From Biology
17. Life originates only from life. The well-known French scientist Pasteur has shown that life only originates from a living being. Pasteur's experiments were repeated thousands of times, always with the same result. Dead material cannot produce life. The statement that from the original soup living beings originated through continious lightning and chemical processes lacks every experimental basis.

18. The complex inheritable factors (genome), fixed in the DNA of each individual species, including man, is unique, and stable. Species cannot be transformed into each other. A sheep does not become a goat, a hen not a partridge, corn does not become wheat, whatever one tries. Four thousand years of cattle breeders and farmers confirm the stability and unicity of the genome of all species.

19. Crossings between different species, if at all possible, are infertile. A dog does not mate with a goat. An ass will mate with a horse, but the descendant, both the male and the female mule, are infertile. Many hundreds of experiments in biological research over the centuries have confirmed the stability and the unicity of the genome. Chromosome numbers of a cer-tain species can change. It happened with crops. Think of the human child which suffers from the Syndrome of Down (with a mongoloid face). However, that normally is thought to be a biological degeneration, not something positive.

20. The Human DNA is far too complex, and differs too much from any other DNA, for the possibility to exist that there could be some higher animal -- such as an anthropoid ape -- that could possibly have been an ancestor of man. One should recall that, because they are mutually fertile, all people, white or yellow, tall or short, clever or stupid, all belong to one and the same original species. From experimental science NO physical or chemical processes are known, and NO influences from surroundings, which could realise a transformation of the DNA of a higher animal species into the DNA of mankind. And one has been looking for such a change for centuries.

21. To-day we know it would require thirty million positive mutations to change the DNA of a higher ape into the DNA of man, although both genomes only seem to differ a few percent. There does NOT exist any mechanism to be able to realise this change of DNA in a restricted time.

22. This applies mutatis mutandis (the necessary mutations having been made) to all other biological species. Mutations in the gene complex are possible, e.g. by radioactive radiation, but this results only in degenerated forms of the same species. Conclusion: Biological species cannot be changed into one another.

23. COROLLARY: The species of plants, of animals, and of man, have originated, each species exactly as they are now. How that came about biology does NOT know.

24. COROLLARY: Each biological species must have descended from only one pair of original or first parents. The unicity and the stability of the DNA do not allow a different conclusion: there existed a first unique pair of parents for each species.

25. This applies to elephants and mice, to tigers and martens. It applies to all species. All mankind equally descended from only one first couple of man. The genome of those first parents was so rich in inheritable factors, which may be observed these days, present among the many races and kinds of people. That is the reason why people differ so much from one another. How this first couple of each species came into existence, biology does not know.

From demography and archaeology
26. Demography is the science of the inhabitation of earth by mankind. It concerns itself with habitable areas, climate, availability of food, illnesses, wars, and all natural and cultural factors that have influenced the numbers of people and the areas where they live, until now.

27. Demographic computer models of the growth of the number of people on earth start with the present figure of something over six billion, and then calculate backwards to the past. Taking into account disasters, wars, food shortages, illness and plagues, and counting with the differences in climate and agriculture output, an average growth percentage per area is calculated. This percentage varies with time, depending on known historical periods. Such very complex computer models -- starting with a figure of something over six billion -- arrive at the first couple of parents living approximately six to seven thousand years ago.

28. A simpler calculation, assuming less detailed information, only uses catastrophic conditions -- little food, unhealthy living conditions - and estimating the average population growth at 0.1% (which does not agree with reality, being too low). Then, calculating backwards from the present about six to seven billions, one arrives at a first couple living 23,000 years ago. Taking slightly higher, more realistic growth figures, also differentiating according to areas of inhabitation, and using differences in historical periods, one arrives, of course, at a shorter time than 23,000 years, namely six- to seven thousand years.

29. Archaeological research into artefacts (stones and other utensils), and sedentation (types of settlements in hamlets and villages) show that the time humanity has lived on earth cannot be higher than at most ten thousand years. The number of excavated artefacts and villages, is far too small to be able to accept a longer period. If mankind had been on earth tens of thousands of years, or more, we should everywhere stumble upon artefacts and the remains of habitations. However, we do NOT, therefore habitation cannot possibly have been that long. The number of artefacts and places of inhabitation and sojourn that have been found is roughly one thousand times too small to be able to accept very long times of sedentation.

30. A length of stay of mankind on earth much longer than six to ten thousand years is nonsense. It is fiction. It is a figment of the imagination, because demographical and archaeological facts say differently.

From natural science
31. The Second Law of Thermodynamics (the law of heat, an important part of physics) teaches that in a closed system, entropy can only increase. In nature, entropy is the disorder on molecular scale. If no action is taken on earth, everything turns to ruins. The order which material displays in a nice house, built in stone, slowly decays into the disorder of a heap of rubble, if one does nothing. (The physicist says: 'the entropy increases'). That occurs by itself, although it may take a long time according to earthly understanding.

32. From this Main Law it follows that there MUST be a beginning to time. In a closed system, the direction of time follows that of increasing entropy. An unending universe and a cyclical universe are impossible. And, where there is a beginning there must also be an end. Physically that would be the state of maximum entropy.

33. From geophysics and cosmology at least seventy (70) natural scientific experiments and measurements are known, showing that the inhabitable earth is young. Inhabitable means that life, as we know it, would be possible. We need at least oxygen, moderate temperatures, enough light of the sun, the existence of vegatation and animals.

34. Some of these experiments include physical and chemical processes, such as measuring: 1. the amount of cosmic dust on the earth; 2. the amount of cosmic dust in space; 3. the amount of Helium-4 in the earth's atmosfere; 4. the decay of the earth's magnetic field; 5. the amount of alumimium in the oceans; 6. the amount of Uranium in the oceans; 7. the existence of radio-active halo's on Polonium crystals in formations of granite; 8. the existence of polystrate fossils (up to 10 meter) in carbonlayers; 9. the growth of live coralrifs; 10. the decay of short-lived comets. These only are ten of the named 70 experiments, to indicate the type of research done.

35. The results of these observations range from several thousands to a maximum of approximately one hundred thousand years: they give the possible age of the inhabitable earth. The dispersion in the results arises through uncertainties in the experiments and measurements. The important fact is that the results are centred around the seven to ten thousand years.

36. CONCLUSION: Ages of the inhabitable earth, of plants and animals, and of human-kind, amounting to hunderds of thousands or millions of years, are nonsense from a natural scientific point of view. One cannot make pronouncements based on experimental science about the age of the uninhabitable earth. This extremely cold ball (planet) without oxygen and without green vegetation might be millions of years old.

PHYSICAL INFORMATION SCIENCE
37. The German scientist Prof Dr. Werner Gitt has developed the physical information science. It is known that material and energy are insufficient to explain (life) processes. Information is necessary to build and to realise changes.

38. When building a house, one needs bricks (material) and masons (energy), as well as the drawings and the report of required materials from the architect (information). When a young person grows, he/she needs food and oxygen (material and energy) plus the building plan laid down in the DNA (information). Wherever there is growth and change, one can distinguish these three elements matter (material or substance), energy and information.

39. In the modern information and communication technique (ICT) one only processes information, usually recorded on hard disks, magnetic tapes, and USB sticks.
That information is present in coded form. The information is always coded, and always needs a carrier and that carrier is some sort of material object. The hard disk of the computer contains the coded information of the computer programs and the data. The same goes for the USB sticks. Does this mean that information is a material quantity ? No ! It is true that information is always carried (in coded form) by one type of material or another (the information carrier), but information, taken on its own is no material item. Please, realise, information is not a static quantity, it is a dynamic concept, it concerns something to be transported from the source to the receiver.

40. Information is an intellectual, a spiritual, quantity, that always originates from an intelligent sender (a source with intelligence), which in coded form is carried by some sort of material. The source of the intellectual information in telecommunication and computer technique is always the human being itself, the designer. That cannot be argued about. It is the computer programmer who makes the software, it is the programmer who is the intelligent sender (source) of the information, which is recorded in code on an information carrier. It is the computer user who, as intelligent human being, records his data in coded form on disks and sticks.

41. In principle it is no different in biology. The proteins of the DNA carry the necessary, coded, hereditary information about the structure, the building plan and the purpose of (the cells) of the living being. Indeed, one may argue about the source of the coded genetical information stored in the DNA of each species (who did think it up ?), but that forms no longer part of the natural sciences.

42. Because, according to the physical information science, the source of that intellectual quantity, the genetic information, MUST lie outside the material itself, OUTSIDE the pure biology, even though this information is carried by the proteins of the DNA.

43. The theologian following the creationist model, then talks about God as the intelligent source, but that is no biological, nor scientific pronouncement. The evolutionist sticks to the evolutionary model, and talks about self-organisation, self-formation, and the self-development of the material into a living being, which is also not a natural-scientific statement.

44. It applies to both the creationist and to the evolutionist that, according to the physical information theory, the information, being a spiritual quantity, MUST come from a source with intelligence. How that source is to be explained is NO pure natural-scientific pronouncement, it is a philosophical-theological enunciation. And it is a fact that this difference, between what is certain, according to the natural sciences, and what not any longer belongs to it, generally is not sufficiently made clear

SUMMARY
45. It was ascertained which indisputable experimental data each model of origin must meet, be it evolutionist or creationist, if it is not to come into conflict with the reality of human experience over the centuries.

46. First with the biological model it was demonstrated, that life can only be generated from life. Life cannot come forth from dead matter.

47. Next in the biological model it was demonstrated that to change one species into other species is impossible, by reason of the unicity and the stability of the genome (inheritable complex). And that each species existing today, including man, originated from only one couple of original or first parents. Biological evolution, that is the coming into being of new species, from natural causes, of whatever nature, is impossible.

48. With the demographic and sedentary model was shown that the time during which humanity can have existed on the inhabitable earth, cannot be more than at most 10,000 years, and probably is no longer than six to seven thousand years. An inhabitation time of humanity lasting many tens of thousands or millions of years truly is a figment of the imagination.0

49. The natural scientific law of thermodynamics confirms that time must have had a beginning. Therefore, there must also be an end to time.

50. It was mentioned, that the geophysical experiments give many indications for a relatively young inhabitable earth, also of the order of 10,000 years. One may freely speculate about the age of a possible uninhabitable earth, a cold sphere, without any growth, which cannot bear life.

51. It is clear from the model of the physical information science that information is a non-material, in fact a spiritual quantity, which in a coded form is tied to the material concerned; information originates from a spiritual quantity, that is an intelligent source, a source with the power of reason. In information science and other more technical engineering science that spiritual source has always man as the designer, the programmer, the user.

52. In biology however, one is able to discern the coded information in the DNA, the building plan of the living cells fixed in coded form in the material, that is in the amino acids (bases of proteins) of the DNA of the species, but biology cannot tell us which is the spiritual source thereof. To speculate on that subject belongs to philosophy and theology.

48. SUMMARISING: The natural and the engineering sciences together with demography and archaeology provide more than sufficient experimental evidence to conclude that 1. (biological) (so-called macro) evolution is impossible, and that 2. the long periods of millions of years mentioned by the evolutionist, are a nonsense.

49. Every scientist, of whatever discipline, being creationist or evolutionist, may (continue to) believe in the model of origin, which he himself designed, viewn with regard to the above model, and expanded with philosophical and theological premises, should he wish to do so.

50. However, for such an expanded model to be acceptable to engineers and natural scientists, that philosopher will have to supply a plausible explanation for the spiritual quantity, which is the source of the information stored in the DNA. If he does not achieves this, his expanded model cannot be accepted by those who know about the experimental facts of the natural sciences.