"Creation Scientist" is not an Oxymoron

Posted by Worldview Warriors On Tuesday, April 1, 2014 3 comments

Over the years, we’ve heard it said—often times aggressively—that creationists aren’t scientists. If a man or woman professes to believe in Jesus Christ and the Bible, he or she is deemed incapable of being scientific! How absurd! Here is one of many examples of such criticism:

"I dispute Henry Morris's claim that thousands of scientists are creationists. No scientist today questions the past and present occurrence of evolution in the organic world. Those ‘thousands of creationists' with legitimate post-graduate degrees and other appropriate credentials are not scientists, precisely because they have abandoned the scientific method and the scientific attitude, criteria far more crucial to the definition of scientist than the location or duration of one's training or the identity of one's employer" --Steven Schafersman, of Rice University's Department of Geology (Geotimes, August 1981, P. 11).

Such statements are easy to come by. Here’s another typical example from noted believer in evolutionism, Richard Dawkins, from Oxford:

It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid, or insane (or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that).

It’s rather intriguing that one would say such things given that the bulk of what we know of as science today was founded by creationists. In some cases, the claim of “unscientific” is put on a creationist who is a biologist, geologist, or paleontologist or some scientist in a field directly related to evolutionary biology. But, as we can see from the above quotes (and there are many of them to find online), the idea that creationists cannot be scientists or even intelligent for that matter is pushed around as though it’s settled. These people have no idea that they are standing upon the work of some of the greatest minds science has ever known—who just happen to be creationists.

Science is broken up into branches i.e. there are different categories of things that science is involved in. Social science—behavioral and societal. Natural science—physics, chemistry, geology, oceanography, meteorology, biology including zoology and botany. Formal science—logic, mathematics and statistics, even computer science. Applied science—most notably medicine and possibly engineering. We can argue that this field should be called this type or whatever, but the point is that science has different branches. For many of these branches, you will find a creationist at its foundation. For example:

Oceanography: Ben Franklin first scientifically explained the Gulf Stream although men had studied the oceans as long as history goes back. Matthew Fontaine Maury was a believer who published the first text on oceanography.

Geology: Nicolas Steno is credited with 3 defining principles of geology. However, many had described different geologic features and even some processes for centuries before Steno. It was assumed for centuries that the Flood was at least partially responsible for many geologic features. Modern day geologists who are young earth creationists would include Andrew Snelling, Ph.D., Steve Austin, Ph.D., John Morris, Ph.D., Kurt Wise, Ph.D., and Emil Silvestru, Ph.D. Meteorology (the study of the atmosphere): Aristotle is generally given credit for founding this study. Many creationists have added to its principles and applications including Albert Cologne and Roger Bacon.

Even in biology, the science of life, we find creationists at the foundation like Carl von Linné (Carlus Linnaeus) who founded modern biology and the system of taxonomy we still use in biology today. He is especially credited with his work in modern botany. A subcategory of biology, microbiology, was founded by Anton van Leeuwenhoek who was a creationist. He did not invent the microscope but greatly enhanced its usefulness. Andreas Vesalius is considered the father of the modern study of human anatomy. William Harvey, who first accurately described how the circulatory system works, was a follower of Christ as well. He was also instrumental in the creation of the modern scientific method especially in medicine. Gregor Mendol is credited with great advancements in genetics and modern day botany. Louis Pasteur demonstrated that spontaneous generation is an old wives’ tale. Today, a similar idea, abiogenesis, is a core believe by many atheists. Strangely, that idea was debunked two centuries ago. Another monumental contributor to modern health care is Raymond Damadian. He is a young earth creationist who recently played a role in the Ken Ham/Bill Nye debate. He is the inventor of the MRI which has advanced the practice of medicine more than nearly anything else in the last 30 years. Lyle Johnson, another creationist, developed the Johnsonian telescope for NASA.

Five of the most notable physicists in history (Newton, Faraday, Einstein, Thomson, and Maxwell)were each outspoken in their conviction and faith that the universe was placed here by a Creator. Einstein was not a Christian, but never the less, each of these men knew in their hearts that only a Creator could account for what they knew to be true in science.

We could also note Joseph Lister, Johan Kepler, Robert Boyle, Georges Cuvier, Lord Rayleigh, Charles Babbage, John Ambrose Fleming, Henri Fabre, Lord Kelvin, George Stokes, Robert Boyle, Leonardo Da Vinci, Pascal, Rudolph Virchow, Louis Agassiz and many others.

The truth for the atheist ranting that a creationist is “ignorant, stupid or insane” is that he wouldn't have science in its state today without the moronic creationist. Many of the most brilliant minds who studied the world around them or made major contributions to technological advancement were lovers of Jesus Christ. We only touched on a few of those who made monumental contributions to the study of the world and/or universe. Not only is it possible for a creationist to be a scientist, it seems to actually enhance one's ability to do the work! The awe and wonder of a scientist to want to learn how God created the universe and to study how God set all the various processes we see around us in motion is what fuels the creationist. And since the creationist has it right from the start—that at the start of it all is the God of the Bible—he or she is far more capable of awesome discoveries.

Psalms 14:1 and Psalms 53:1 tells us about the secular scientist. He doesn't stand a chance.

3 comments:

David J. said...

Most of the scientists you listed would fall under Dawkins' "ignorant" category. But that is understandable, because most of them lived before Darwin. I find it strange that you include Kelvin, as he estimated that the earth is many millions of years old.

Einstein didn't believe in an intelligent creator.

ohiosnuccadoc said...

Thank you for your comment and thank you for reading my blog, David. You feel that most of the greatest minds science has ever known are "ignorant?" Darwin did not come up with an original idea. He wrote a book on what many others were tooling around with for well over a century. But either way, many of them, in fact, were after Darwin. But that makes no difference. Darwin didn't discover anything. He saw the same world you or I would but he wrote a story about its origin and how the diversity we see came about. He literally had no evidence other than the result to base his opinion (which was not, technically a scientific one since he was not a scientist).
I did not indicate Einestein was a Christian. I merely pointed out that he was confident in a higher power. Interesting note on Kelvin. I'll have to look into that. It makes no difference, really, but it's interesting. This writing had nothing to do with the age of the earth but was merely about those who added so much to the world of science but also believed it could not have come about by accident.

Steve R

Lee Patterson said...

More on Kelvin:
http://crev.info/2013/10/lord-kelvin-extolled-as-giant-of-science-and-creationist/
http://crev.info/?scientists=william-thomson-lord-kelvin