Imagine a lawsuit. A man stands trial for murder. Is he innocent? Is he guilty? We won’t know until the facts are presented. But in every lawsuit, there are two sides: the prosecution and the defence. The facts don’t just walk in, pronounce the verdict, then walk straight back out. The facts are presented, and both sides attempt to either show why the facts support their case, or why they don’t support their opponents’ case.
The same is true for the origins debate. Both Christians and Evolutionists look at the same evidence and come to different conclusions, just as prosecutors and defence lawyers do in a lawsuit. Richard Dawkins admitted as much in an interview with Bill Moyers in 2004. Dawkins claimed that “Evolution has been observed, it’s just that it hasn’t been observed while it’s happening” (in other words, it hasn’t been observed). When asked to clarify what he meant by Evolution being observed, he said that the consequences of it have been observed. He likened it to a detective coming on a murder scene. The detective didn’t see the murder, but he sees clues. Moyers interrupted Dawkins by saying “circumstantial evidence”. Dawkins admitted “circumstantial evidence, but masses of circumstantial evidence.”
Circumstantial evidence, for those who are unaware, is evidence that relies on inference to draw the conclusion. “You’re holding the chalk, therefore you drew the inappropriate image on the chalkboard”. Now, I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t want a legal system that convicts based on circumstantial evidence. If I’m on trial for a murder I didn’t commit, I want the standard of proof to be “beyond reasonable doubt”, as it currently is. But if circumstantial evidence is too weak to potentially convict someone of murder, should it really be used to gamble our eternal destiny?
Evolution, as Richard Dawkins admits, is a belief based on circumstantial evidence. It’s based on inference from facts. Facts which can easily (and more logically) be used to support Biblical creation. Evolution is therefore not a scientific theory, but a religious creation myth.