An Open Letter to Creationists

Dear Creationists,

Let's talk about evolution.

To close off November, I thought we might take a dive into science. Personally, I am super interested in how science, the humanities, and politics intersect. In schools everywhere, students go to different classrooms to talk about different subjects. In the real world, it's not so tidy. Everything overlaps in some way or another, so when we discuss hotly contested topics like evolution, we should take an interdisciplinary approach.

One of the biggest questions of human existence is, "Where did we come from?" For centuries, great thinkers everywhere have been trying to find the answer. Today, the answer has boiled down to two schools of thought: Creationism and Evolution.

Creationism has been around as long as the Bible, and so it is most widespread in followers of the Christian tradition. Essentially, it argues that humans came from a divine creator. The hardcore Creationists believe that all of humankind originated from Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. Man was created 'in God's image,' and went on to populate the Earth.

On the other hand, evolution is rooted in scientific fact. It asserts that Homo sapiens evolved from apes and several hominin variations. This semester I'm actually taking a class all about biological anthropology - the very discipline dedicated to studying human evolution and the different hominins that we came from.

There's countless evidence of human evolution. We have found hundreds of fossils and remains that have given irrefutable evidence that there used to be other two-legged hominins walking around this planet millions of years ago. There's all kinds of cool little critters, from one of the oldest hominins, Ardipithecus ramidus to the tiny Homo florensiensis. All of these discoveries over the years have given us some sort of picture of how humans evolved, and what led to the later explosion of Homo sapiens.

The skull of Ardipithecus ramidus.

If you really sit down and study evolution (like I had to do this semester to receive one of my science credits), you would be amazed by our world. Evolutionary factors like Darwin's natural selection and psychological concepts like social learning prove the astounding capabilities of this planet. Sure, it took millions of years, but every minute was culminating into the society we have today. How mind-blowing is it that we used to live in trees and make crude stone tools, when now we have laptops and airplanes?

If you want to stick to your religion, the complexities of evolution gives God way more credit than Creationism.

Think about it: Creationism says that - poof - one day, perfect humans appeared on the planet. Conversely, with evolution, humans are the product of small, gradual changes that culminated into these big-brained apes capable of cooperating, showing compassion, and learning from others.

By nature, we build on what we know. The reason that we have the cities and civilizations that we do is because we are capable of improving upon what others have done before us. Our world is the product of millions of years of steady changes - not one moment of divine intervention.

This debate is clearly of interest to me, so while working on this letter, I Googled 'Creationism' and happened upon the official 'Creation Science' webpage.

The first paragraph on the page reads:

"Scientists who focus on details all day long may inadvertently miss the big picture of this incredibly complex creation around us. Flowers, stars, the wind, snow, nettles, ice cream, acid, love, bears, and granite. All that is in this giant universe just kind of "exploded" into existence and complexity all by itself? There is no Creator behind it all?"

Focus on that bolded part for a second. Those two sentences actually support the idea of evolution and disprove Creationism. Remember, evolution is gradual change. Nothing evolves rapidly. The word itself implies a certain slowness. However, Creationism suggests the very idea of some sort of 'explosion' of human life.

The point is to stay vigilant. Ask yourself why you're coming to the conclusions that you are. What led you to your beliefs? Question the conventions of your convictions.

And you know what? Maybe there is some sort of Creator behind our existence. But, right now, we don't know that for sure. So what do we know for sure, then? Well, I would argue that we know something is true if there's evidence supporting it.

And there's evidence for evolution.

Yours truly,

P.S. Climate change is also real! We love science!