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Creation Science Book Review:
Scientific Creationism, by Henry Morris
Review by Greg Neyman
© 2006, Old Earth Ministries
Review Published June 2006
Old Earth Ministries Science website
Chapter 3, Part 1: The Laws of Thermodynamics
As is typical with the claims related to the first two laws of thermodynamics, this section shows that Morris does not treat the subject fairly, and misunderstands the law. First, I'll summarize his arguments, then provide rebuttals.
The Claims
Morris starts out with "Predictions of the Evolution Model Relative to the Basic Laws." In this first point, he says that based on evolution, the laws should indicate that random matter evolves through time into higher levels of complexity. On the other hand, Morris claims that the creation model predicts the two laws. From the time of the perfect creation, things have been changing in a downhill manner, towards disorder.
Chapter 3 - Uphill or Downhill?
Part 1 - The Laws of Thermodynamics
Part 3 - Variation and Selection
------------
Chapter 1 - Evolution or Creation?
Chapter 2 - Chaos or Cosmos? (4 Topics)
Chapter 4 - Accident or Plan? (4 Topics)
Chapter 5 - Uniformitarianism or Catastrophism (4 Topics)
Chapter 6 - Old or Young? (4 Topics)
Chapter 7 - Apes or Men? (4 Topics)
Chapter 8 - Creation According to Scripture (14 Topics)
Morris then goes into a discussion of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, and defines it within three different contexts. In "classical thermodynamics" any physical change has an increase in entropy. In the context of "statistical thermodynamics," energy and entropy are intimately related. Any energy flow increases entropy, and thus increasing disorder. Finally, in "informational thermodynamics," entropy is seen as a measure of "noise" or degree of uncertainty in the communication of the information. It attempts to use mathematical concepts to describe the process.
While all these are nice, the basic laws can be thought of without these explanations. They appear to only serve to impress the reader with the writer's knowledge.
To this point, Morris has emphasized that entropy and the 2nd law always indicates a movement toward disorder, and never towards order. Morris claims that evolutionists appeal to several arguments to overcome this basic problem.
The first argument is "The Second Law does not apply to living systems." This argument states that living systems basically tend toward order, and non-living systems tend towards disorder. As Morris points out, this indicates that the Second Law does not apply to living things.
The second argument is "The Second Law is only a statistical statement, and exceptions are possible." Morris responds to this with a quote from Stanley Angrist, which states that statistically, local reversals of entropy are nearly impossible. More on this in the rebuttal section.
The third argument is "Perhaps the Second Law was not operating long ago." As Morris points out, this argument is better suited to young earth creation science than to evolution.
The fourth argument is "Perhaps the Second Law doesn't apply to other parts of the universe." This comes from a quote by Isaac Asimov, who suggests that we don't know everything there is to know about the universe. I agree with Morris that this cannot be the case.
The fifth argument is "The Second Law does not apply to open systems." Evolutionists say there is more than enough energy reaching the earth from the sun to offset the loss of energy due to entropy. In rebutting this argument, Morris says that this is irrelevant, as it confuses the quantity of energy with the conversion of energy. Morris also claims that there is no such thing as a closed system. The basic premise of the second law favors the evolutionist, as Morris expands the law, to consider how the energy is converted. This conversion is not important to the basic operation of the law. We are considering the presence of the energy...not its conversion.
With that said, I agree with Morris that there needs to be a power converter to utilize the energy. Morris spends two pages on this issue of how to utilize the energy. From an old earth creationist perspective, this is irrelevant. Progressive creationists believe in fiat creation, just as Morris does, so they don't have an energy utilization problem. Theistic evolutionists have a creative God shaping the evolution process, so they already have the master Power Converter at work in their system. This may seem like a simplistic answer to Morris' complex rebuttal, but that is all that is needed. It is only the atheistic evolutionist that would have a problem with this.
Rebuttals to Morris' Claims
When you boil it down, there are several key issues.
"The 2nd Law says that everything tends toward disorder, making evolution impossible." This is a basic misunderstanding of the 2nd law. It does not say that all things tend toward disorder. It says heat will not spontaneously flow from a colder body to a warmer one, or that total entropy will not decrease. This does not prevent increasing order. Entropy is not the same as disorder. Sometimes they correspond, but sometimes order increases as entropy increases. Also, this does not prevent areas of lower entropy and higher entropy within a system. The earth is large, and entropy is not equal in all parts of the earth.
This also introduces a misconception among creationists. They believe that evolution depends on entropy. It does not. The only processes required for evolution to occur are reproduction, heritable variation, and selection. Studies have been done to analyze the relationship between entropy and evolution, and none of these studies has provided any evidence against evolution. In fact, these studies support evolution.
When it comes to creating order, Morris admits that increasing order is possible. However, he addressed this with his requirement for a power converter (page 44). This is a fictional addition to the 2nd law, as the 2nd law says nothing about programs to direct growth. In fact, growth and order can be seen today without a program. Clouds form complex orderly patterns...streams sort stones based on size...cooling basalt forms hexagonal patterns of cracks...snowflakes organize into unique patterns...melted rocks form crystals. All these processes show order from disorder within a natural system.
There is also the misconception by creationists that increasing order violates the second law. It does not. A violation would be a decrease in entropy without an increase elsewhere to offset the decrease. When water molecules come together to form a cloud, the surrounding region around the cloud has less water vapor. The order is offset by disorder elsewhere in the system.
If you boil it down, evolution does have a power converter. The environment itself serves as the power converter.
What Morris does not realize is that if the solar energy needed a power converter to make it useful millions of years ago, it also needs a power converter today to sustain life. If God's creative works are done, and He is no longer providing this conversion, then what is sustaining life? As evolutionists point out, the environment itself is the converter. The natural laws of physics account for the useful conversion of this energy.
Morris sets up his creation account as God creating (six days), followed by God sustaining His creation via natural laws. These same laws that allow life to be sustained today also easily permit the evolutionary theory to work. Morris' theories about creation actually contains the mechanism that allows evolutionary theory. The power conversion argument makes no sense, because in Morris' theory the natural laws that govern our world provide this power conversion.
This brings up another point. Some creationists claim that the law of entropy only started with the fall of man. Prior to man's sin, everything was perfect, and there was no decay. However, this is easily shown to be false. Jim Schicatano says,
The simplest example to prove that the process of entropy existed before original sin is to observe what has been occurring each and every day since the sun first radiated its warmth to our planet. All Creationists, regardless of their interpretations, place the sun's creation before the creation of Adam and Eve. Whether they believe that the sun was created on the First Day or the Fourth Day, it is clear that the sun illuminated and heated the Earth since its creation - before mankind existed. This process illustrates the most basic concept of entropy in action. Since the hot sun heated the cold Earth before Adam and Eve were created, we can be sure that the natural process of entropy, and the Second Law of Thermodynamics, was in action before sin entered our universe. Without the fundamental principle of entropy, energy radiating from the sun would not warm and illuminate the cold, dark Earth. Consequently, by placing the sun's creation before the creation of human beings, the Bible has confirmed that the natural process of entropy existed long before sin had entered the universe.
Clearly, the sun was burning fuel (decaying) to produce heat long before Adam sinned. The process of decay was already in action, even while God was still creating.
In summary, the natural laws that God designed to sustain life today are the same natural laws that provide the power converter to the evolutionary model. Rather than providing an argument against evolution, Morris has inadvertently supported evolution.
For More Reading
If you are not a Christian, and you have been holding out on making a decision for Christ because the Church always preached a message that was contrary to what you saw in the scientific world, then rest assured that the Bible is the inerrant Word of God, and you can believe in Christ and receive salvation, while still believing in an old earth. Click here for more.
Are you a Christian who believes in young earth creationism? Now that we have shown the many difficulties of the young earth creation science model in this and many other articles, how does this impact your Christian life? If you are a young earth creationism believer, click here.