What is Creation?

There are a number of ways to answer the question: what is creation? It is first defined as “the act of creating,” particularly life, our world, and our universe.¹ Creationism, on the other hand, is the belief that a supreme being made all of these things by his own hand.² Evolution, to the contrary, holds that everything is formed through random evolutionary changes among systems, often compiled over enormous durations.

According to modern science, these arbitrary changes are either preserved via ‘survival of the fittest systems’ or eradicated via ‘elimination of the weakest systems.’ Although the former preserves many of nature’s ensembles due to their relative stability, the latter eliminates ensembles due to their relative instability. Because both of these evolutionary mechanisms are then cumulative over time, only stable systems are ultimately conserved, built upon, and refined.³

This is the basic premise behind Universal Darwinism, or the theory of universal selection. It holds that Darwin’s principle of natural selection, or ordinary survival of the fittest, has been at work throughout all of evolution both biological and non-. In other words, it proposes that species aren’t the only things shaped via selection, as all natural phenomena ultimately follow from both survival of the fittest and elimination of the weak.⁴

Everything from particles to galaxies interact, collide, and even destroy one another. Like living things, then, competition is alive and well among them, too. While the weakest things perish, the most stable endure. This has been the way of the universe for billions of years, as it has shaped both life and ourcosmos from the beginning.

Universal Darwinism therefore presents itself as another answer to what is creation. It provides the very mechanism that has driven the evolution of our universe and everything within. It explains how nature itself refines systems by selecting for or against them. So while most scientists already embrace evolution, many are now embracing Universal Darwinism as well.

There is, however, another possibility, which is that a creator set this evolutionary plan into motion some billions of years ago. Although this entity would thus be responsible for the emergence of our universe, unlike in Intelligent Design, this being does not intervene in either daily life or evolution’s unfolding.

This is similar to the view maintained in Deism, which holds that ours is an all-capable deity who both designed and implemented this entire evolutionary scheme. Perhaps the very dawn of our universe aside, its many phenomena have evolved naturally over time with no further intervention.⁵

It should then be clear that there are two very real possibilities behind the genesis of our cosmos that are consistent with science. One is that evolution gave rise to all natural phenomena via blind natural selection. The other is that an all-knowing being set this plan into motion eons ago. Although the former has been confirmed repeatedly through testable science, there is as yet no definitive proof of the latter. As is the case even in Deism, the existence of a creator has yet to be proven experimentally.

But science has yet to prove that a creator does not exist as well.

~David Goldberg

References

1 “Creation”, Merriam-Webster (2019).

2 Brosseau, Olivier; Silberstein, Marc (2015)."Evolutionism(s) and Creationism(s)". In Heams, Thomas; Huneman, Philippe; Lecointre, Guillaume; Silberstein., Marc (eds.). Handbook of Evolutionary Thinking in the Sciences. Dordrecht: Springer. pp. 881–96.

3 Kelley, D. B., (2013) The Origin of Phenomena, Woodhollow Press, pp. 47-58.

4 Kelley, D. B., (2013) The Origin of Phenomena, Woodhollow Press, pp. 1.

5 "Deism". Jewish Encyclopedia. (1906). Retrieved 2012-10-10. DEISM: A system of belief which posits God's existence as the cause of all things, and admits its perfection, but rejects Divine revelation and government, proclaiming the all-sufficiency of natural laws.