In this conversation, Dr. David Shin sits down with Dr Harris to discuss theistic evolution. She holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and previously served as a senior scientist in the pharmaceutical industry, including work with Pfizer. She now serves as Chair of the Natural Science Department at Weimar University.

<p>In this conversation, Dr. David Shin sits down with Dr Harris to discuss theistic evolution. She holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and previously served as a senior scientist in the pharmaceutical industry, including work with Pfizer. She now serves as Chair of the Natural Science Department at Weimar University.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Weimar University

Christina Harris

David Shin

Seventh-Day Darwinians?

You're a scientist, you have your PhD in chemistry, you did your postdoc taught as a professor at former senior scientists at Pfizer and other corporations, you hold several scientific patents in your name.

Do you think that Christianity is compatible with macroevolution?

If evolution was how we got to where we're at, that means that sin and death existed before we even got to where we're at now.

It wasn't by man that came sin, it was by God.

They say the Cambridge explosion is 500 billion years ago, so I disagree with the time frame, but I think that the flood is probably our explanation for it.

Looking below that layer, we don't see the transitional species that you would expect.

Harris, have you ever struggled with doubt?

And how do you navigate that as a scientist when you struggle with doubt?

If we're going to trust God for our salvation, why not trust Him with everything?

If you're a teacher and the way you're teaching and talking about origins is causing people to doubt what Scripture says, then it becomes a salvation issue.

David Shin and welcome to Here We Stand, a Weimar University podcast where we tackle real issues with biblical conviction.

Truth over trends, evidence over noise, and scripture over opinion.

In a culture of compromise, here we stand.

Harris, I want to go back to an article that was published in the Evidence Review in 2003 by Clifford Goldstein, and it's entitled, Seventh-Day Darwinians.

And I quote, What amazes me isn't so much that people believe in evolution, after all, I used to, but that those who still want to be Seventh-day Adventists.

I can respect someone who, believing in evolutionary theory, rejects the Adventist Church entirely.

I have no respect for those who think they can meld the 2.

And to those teaching in our schools who believe in evolution and yet take a paycheck from the Seventh-day Adventist Church, I say, if you honestly reject a literal six-day creation in favor of theistic macro-evolution, fine.

Now, turn that honesty into integrity and go somewhere where you won't have to cloak your views under the enfractuosities of language." This article addresses Adventist educators who believe that God used evolutionary processes in creation.

You have your PhD in chemistry from University of Colorado in Boulder.

You did your post-doc Sloan Kettering in New York City.

You taught as a professor at Western Michigan University.

Former senior scientist at Pfizer and other corporations.

You hold several scientific patents in your name.

And you Have served and are currently serving as the chair of the natural sciences department at Weimar University Which you've held for the past 12 years And you are a committed creationist right now Were you always a creationist?

I had heard, I knew the creation story and I believe that there was a God, but I think I kind of just lived my life like God wasn't there.

Just, yeah, just busy with school and I was just a student.

But I did pray before exams, so I kind of believed that there was a God, but I yeah, it's kind of it was complicated.

As someone trained in modern science and industry research, Could you define for those that are watching and have never heard of Theistic Evolution, what is Theistic Evolution?

Okay, it's basically an attempt to reconcile Genesis 1 through 3 with the evolutionary narrative.

And so, yeah, it's just people that want to believe the Bible, but they look at Genesis 1 through 3, and they said, that doesn't parallel with what I see in science.

And so they try to merge the 2 and it has some some some things that it it it would say to us if we were to think about what does that actually mean when I believe that And yeah.

So it's people that are saying that God used evolution to do creation.

So they say that that beginning in Genesis 1 through 3 is an allegory or metaphor, and it's not real.

We'll come to some of those aspects of those that believe in theistic evolution and the claims that they hold.

Let's ask this question about the difference between micro and macro evolution, because that was mentioned in the article.

Yeah, Clifford Goldstein mentioned macro evolution.

When people say evolution, so that we don't equivocate, but sometimes when people say, most often when a Christian says, I don't believe in evolution, they mean I don't believe in macroevolution.

Macroevolution is saying that there was change over time between above the species level, you know, where you hear that humans came from apes or that birds came from fish or yeah things like that and so that happens on a time scale that we can't observe.

No one's ever seen that but micro evolution is looking at the small changes that we can see, that you can actually experimentally observe over time.

They often look like fruit flies and things like that, and they see that there was changes.

Darwin saw the beaks of the birds that he saw, the finches that he saw on the Galapagos Islands.

Those are kind of microevolutionary changes.

That's yeah It's an awkward combination So that's micro evolution within a species and then macro evolution is like beyond a species, right?

Yes Yeah micro evolution could also chew contain like things like genetic mutations and things like that, that get pronounced because of breeding and such.

But another thing that people confuse is the idea of natural selection.

They say that natural selection led to, they associate that with macroevolution.

Natural selection tells us how we got survival of the fittest, but it doesn't tell how we got to where we're at right now.

So for macro evolution to work, it's not natural selection that helped that to work.

Natural selection, you already have what you started with, and there's just changes that take place over time, it's not the big changes.

I would just say it's like survival of the fittest.

Yeah, So you have to have something there to survive that is the fittest.

It's natural selection doesn't cause any of that to occur.

So for natural selection to happen, there needs to be something there in the beginning.

Do you think that Christianity is compatible with macro evolution No, why?

Well, there's there's many things that you see in Scripture, I mean if if life's if we don't accept Genesis 1 through 3, there was not an Adam and Eve.

And if there was not an Adam and Eve, then if evolution was how we got to where we're at, that means that sin and death existed before we even got to where we're at now.

And that means that Adam wasn't the first...

He didn't lead, it wasn't by man that came sin, it was by God who became sin.

And if God is the 1 that originated sin, we don't need a Savior, He does.

It changes the plan of salvation, ultimately.

Because what you're saying is that salvation is to save us from death, which is the result of sin.

But if God used death in the process of creation, then salvation becomes nonsensical.

What do you think about the character of God?

Describe for me what evolution teaches about the, or what the implications of evolution are on suffering and death, and how does that apply to the character of God?

Suffering and death was all a part of the macroevolutionary process that we see, because there were failed experiments along the way.

And so that's talking about—the macroevolution is talking about arrival of the fittest and not the natural selection survival of the fittest and it it would just say that God maybe he couldn't couldn't do it otherwise But I just think the story that we have in Genesis 1 through 3 is beautiful.

And why would you settle for something that doesn't really make sense?

The idea that God was the author of death.

Because that's totally contrary to what scripture says.

It makes me think of probably 1 of the greatest social experiments in the last hundred years with with what Adolf Hitler was doing in Germany.

And it was a form of genetic engineering and survival of the fittest.

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Seventh-Day Darwinians?

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