The Great Dothan Creation/Evolution Debate
Photo courtesy Danny Tindell, Dothan Eagle
The Dothan Debate: American Vision president Gary DeMar (centre) moderates between
evolutionist Rick Pierson (L) and CMI's Robert Carter at right. This picture was
prominent on the front page of the local newspaper.
Our very own Dr Robert Carter (scientist and speaker
at CMI-US) participated in what was billed as the Great Dothan Creation/Evolution
Debate in Dothan, Alabama. The event was sponsored by
American Vision and HIS Radio 94.3 FM.
Rob’s opponent, Mr Rick Pierson, is well-known in the area as an outspoken
opponent of creationism. The debate was held at the Opera House in downtown Dothan
on November 27, 2007. Community support was strong. The facility (590 seats) was
completely full before the opening bell. At least 300 people were turned away at
the door.
This was the first public debate for Dr Carter, who holds a Ph.D. in marine biology
from the University of Miami. He says, ‘I knew 20 years ago that I wanted
to be a creation scientist and speaker, but I specifically did not want to be in
any debates! However, the people of Dothan were looking for someone to come and
answer a challenge issued by a local antagonist. Once the opportunity was presented
to me, I could not turn it down.’
… during the debate, Carter appeared to stump Pierson with a question …
He goes on: ‘We knew going in that this opponent would not be some sort of
walkover. He has two undergraduate degrees (one in computer science and one in biology)
and won top awards from his university department while obtaining his second degree.
Certainly no slouch, as he proved.’
Rob started the evening with a multi-point defense of biblical creationism. His
main point was that evolution, as an outworking of atheistic naturalism, is impossible
in general. To believe in pure evolutionary naturalism, one must believe in the
miracle of the Big Bang, the miracle
of the spontaneous origin of life, the miracle
of the origin of complexity, and the miracle of the origin
of information. ‘Complexity is the Achilles heel of evolutionary theory.
And the fact that information cannot come from random natural processes is the final
nail in the evolutionary coffin,’ Carter says.
Photo by Brandon Vallorani
Part of the overflow crowd gathering at the Dothan creation/evolution debate.
After that, Carter, who is actively involved in creationist research on human genetics,
briefly outlined why there is no evidence for the evolution of man from apes. He
said that he wanted to keep the debate at a level where the audience could understand
what he was saying.
Pierson started out with a list of evidences for evolution that supposedly debunked
creationism, but he said he was not going to deal with most of them and that he
would focus on just two of the points. Carter said this disappointed him for he
had spent the bulk of his time preparing for the points that were not raised (not
that he did not handle the other issues well)!
Pierson then launched into a detailed discussion on some complex issues in modern
genetics. Most of the audience members with whom we spoke said that they could not
follow the debate from this point until Carter’s closing arguments. Even though
he wanted to keep things simple, Carter obviously had to answer the points Pierson
was raising, and answer them at the same level.
But Carter had little trouble brushing off Pierson’s absurd claim, bordering
on the discredited Lamarckian theory, that the Bible falsely implies that women
have one more rib than men. Carter pointed out that even ancient people had no trouble
realizing that if a father lost his little finger, his sons would still have all
10 fingers, and that in any case, the rib is the one bone that regrows—see
Regenerating ribs Adam and that ‘missing’ rib.
After the initial opening comments, each speaker had some time to rebut the opening
statement of the other. They then went into a cross-examination session where each
speaker was allowed to ask the other three questions. Pierson’s questions
mostly dealt with evolutionary arguments about leftover genetic junk (‘pseudogenes’). Carter’s
first question was in the form of a challenge for his opponent to explain the rise
of information using nothing but natural processes (the reply from Pierson was nothing
more than standard arguments about an RNA world that preceded the DNA-based life
we know today, without really answering the question, and ignoring the
immense chemical problems with this idea; see also
The RNA World: A Critique). The next two questions from the creationist
came from recent evolutionary challenges to traditional evolutionary theories: He
asked for an evolutionary explanation for the results from the ENCODE Project (which
essentially destroys the old idea of “Junk DNA”)
and he then asked for an evolutionary interpretation of a new paper that claims
that the earliest ape ancestors walked upright and that modern apes have lost the
ability (this, of course, is in complete contrast to the evolutionary story that
has been told for over 150 years
New findings solve human origins mystery).
Post-script: Creation-Thumper Stumped?
The Dothan Eagle newspaper ran a prominent front-page article on the debate,
headed ‘Darwin or deity?’ The report was very fair and encouraging.
Among other things, it stated that ‘during the debate, Carter appeared to
stump Pierson with a question dealing with the number of generations it should have
taken to correct some mutations, according to evolutionary theory [i.e.
Haldane’s Dilemma].
‘Pierson paused in mid-answer.
‘“It’s very hard to answer these off the top of your head,”
he said.
‘After pausing another moment, he said, “This looks bad, doesn’t
it?”’
From all reports, it appears that the debate was successful. Carter says that it
showed the community that there are Christians willing to take a stand on important
faith issues, that there are answers to common evolutionary ideas, and that a consistent
application of biblical Christianity leads to rational and defensible conclusions.
The debate can now be viewed on this DVD.
Ministry opportunities
American visitors: If your church could benefit from having ministry by Dr Carter
on the relevance of creation and some of the exciting evidence for it, contact us
to express preliminary interest.
Further reading
Related resources
Published: 23 January 2008(GMT+10)
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