Replacing Darwin – Dr. Nathaniel Jeanson

[00:00:00] Dean and now here’s your host Kevin Conover bring your time welcome to

[00:00:07] educate for life I’m your host Kevin Connor on my websites educate for life.org and my website if you want to

[00:00:13] check it out you can get all kinds of courses on apologetics things proving

[00:00:18] the truth of the Bible so we we cover issues like how do we know the Bible’s actually God’s Word we cover creation

[00:00:24] and evolution we cover why is there suffering evil and hell all the

[00:00:29] different subjects that people have questions about we live in a very skeptical culture right now and so it’s very helpful to be able to raise your

[00:00:35] kids or to get information yourself so that you’re prepared to be able to give a reason for the hope that is within you

[00:00:42] – maybe co-workers or teammates or peers whatever it might be all available

[00:00:47] online there for you we’re also this program is going to be airing on Sunday on Cape Rays FM 106.1

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[00:00:59] we’re also on YouTube we’re on Facebook we’re on periscope all the different social media outlets so you can check

[00:01:05] them out there my guest today is dr. Nathaniel Jenson and he has a PhD in cell and

[00:01:12] developmental biology from Harvard University he serves as a research biologist author and speaker with

[00:01:17] Answers in Genesis and formerly conducted research with the Institute for Creation Research he came out with a

[00:01:24] book back in I believe it was 2017 replacing Darwin the new Origin of

[00:01:29] Species dr. Jensen thanks for being on the program today thanks so much for having me on Kevin absolutely so very

[00:01:37] exciting this book you’ve been back and forth you’ve had criticism of the book but explain to our listeners the title

[00:01:44] replacing Darwin the new Origin of Species the title has a couple things

[00:01:50] going for one is I didn’t use a past tense because science is a process for your continued discussion so I wrote the

[00:01:57] book wanting to set the research agenda for the next 50 years and replacing Darwin because we’ve reached the stage

[00:02:04] and the creation/evolution debate that I think is a real fulk from a real turning point so you look at the past 50 years

[00:02:10] back to the Henry Morris joint Duane Gish days there was a lot of I’d call it defense

[00:02:15] saying no evolution si this what they’re saying is not quite valid there they’re pushing it too far and you can still

[00:02:21] understand what the Bible says with good science but it’s a largely defensive they’re making these attacks against

[00:02:27] Scripture how do we defend the Bible against it whereas now I think I feel like the tide is changing there’s so

[00:02:32] much data that’s accumulated creationists are taking the lead on research that it’s not just rebutting

[00:02:38] Darwin but replacing these ideas with a superior explanation for the Origin of Species creationists are coming up with

[00:02:44] discoveries evolutionists didn’t see coming and finding out new things about the world that we also didn’t see coming

[00:02:50] so that’s the replacing part rather than just rebutting it and it’s a really exciting time to be in the middle of

[00:02:56] this absolutely I I couldn’t agree more I’ve heard you know I’ve talked to different people about this particular

[00:03:02] issue scientists and and researchers and so forth who have said you know it’s

[00:03:07] been an uphill battle dealing with evolution you know ninety percent of kids go to public schools where by

[00:03:13] default they were being taught evolution but you see this tide turning what are some of the things going on that you see

[00:03:20] that that where it’s less of a defensive position and it’s more offensive what

[00:03:26] else are you seeing specifically specifically in what the book focuses on

[00:03:31] almost exclusively was the main question Darwin tried to answer and solve the Origin of Species and if you look at the

[00:03:37] evidence that he proposed which is really unchanged evolutionists haven’t come up with much to do 150 years other

[00:03:43] than new examples of the old arguments those arguments have been pushed forward

[00:03:48] almost in isolation Darwin tried to disprove the creationist ideas of 1859

[00:03:54] modern evolutionists are basically still living in this bubble acting like their opponents haven’t updated their ideas in

[00:04:00] the century and a half when of course that’s not true and so the advances in creation science having a better

[00:04:06] understanding of what design predicts if God designed the world how should it look we have a much better understanding of that now than creationist in 1859 and

[00:04:14] perhaps more importantly the 1859 position for creationists was really

[00:04:20] based on just simple observations of the world not not starting with Scripture and saying what does the Bible actually say about the Origin of Species and then

[00:04:27] going forward into the natural world it was just the world looks designed therefore species are designed created

[00:04:33] in their current location those are some of the old outdated ideas that if you just read Genesis one through eleven

[00:04:38] fairly quickly you’ll say that can’t possibly be true because the world is flooded about 4,500 years ago so God

[00:04:44] couldn’t have put today’s species in their current locations because it those obviously change those those came from

[00:04:49] some animals on board the ark that landed some in the Middle East then migrate is at present location so anyway

[00:04:55] so these are some of the updates that have happened within creation science that render the old arguments effectively useless and perhaps even

[00:05:02] more important all that is the birth of the field of modern genetics the only field of science that directly records

[00:05:09] whose species come from Darwin had no access to this we now have reams and reams of data to analyze and we’ve we’ve

[00:05:18] just made all sorts of discoveries that fit exactly what the Bible says species having just a few set of ancestors

[00:05:24] living a few thousand years ago and through through God’s design effectively putting putting genetic capacity and

[00:05:31] these creatures from the start they could diversify over time within limits it’s this advance in end birth of a

[00:05:37] whole field that that Darwin knew nothing about that’s really got the ball rolling at a fast pace in the

[00:05:43] creationist direction that’s great now does this at all is there a

[00:05:49] correlation here with the intelligent design movement with like Steven Mayer and so forth do you believe there’s

[00:05:54] there’s inner interaction here between you know creation science and intelligent design I’d say there’s

[00:06:01] significant scientific overlap and then there’s there’s some fairly big philosophical differences in terms of

[00:06:06] scientific overlap Michael Bay his work comes to mind immediately his work in the irreducible complexity he’s

[00:06:12] approaching it perhaps more from a biochemical perspective but to me he has one of the most airtight arguments

[00:06:18] against evolution is one of the strongest anti evolutionary arguments out there now he accepts billions of

[00:06:24] years of Earth history he’s ok with humans and chimpanzees having a common ancestor but in terms of defeating

[00:06:31] Darwin and rebutting him very strong case I haven’t seen as much from their

[00:06:36] camp in terms of replacing him and I think that’s part of the with the philosophical differences

[00:06:41] for political reasons they say we’re trying to do a big tent approach we’re not going to identify the designer so

[00:06:47] they have everything from agnostics to young earth creationist is part of their tent as a strategy but I think it also

[00:06:54] limits what they can do to replace Darwin because well what’s what’s your basis for the better idea what are you

[00:07:00] going to agree on is the starting point aside from some undefined intelligent

[00:07:05] force it just it’s hard to get much beyond that I think so they’ve done some fairly rigorous work mathematically

[00:07:11] about chemically and and I learned a lot from reading Michael Bay his books which

[00:07:16] has allowed me that I think in me and my colleagues the earth creationist colleagues to take leaps forward and say

[00:07:21] we’ve got a starting point we’ve got the Bible this gives us a general framework in which to ask and answer research

[00:07:26] questions and we’ve seen remarkable success even with even within the last 10 years that’s great now your

[00:07:33] background you have a PhD in cell and developmental biology from Harvard University that’s pretty significant can

[00:07:40] you give us a little bit about you know your the path you’ve traveled as far as did you start out wanting to get into

[00:07:47] developmental biology and these sorts of things did you grow up in a Christian family where where are your origins as

[00:07:53] it pertains to this issue I owe a lot to my upbringing I was home-schooled through eighth grade i went to a small

[00:08:00] christian high school that my parents picked because it took a stand on genesis and they said we works we are

[00:08:05] explicitly young earth creationist school i went to world view weekend conferences remember hearing Ken Ham I

[00:08:12] think I was in eighth grade so it’s of my notes from that so I grew up with a background of my parents saying where

[00:08:19] you’re going to learn creation science they’re going to learn what the other side says you’re going to learn how to answer it it’s strong enough background

[00:08:26] so that when I went off to secondary college a state school in Wisconsin commuting I was prepared for those going

[00:08:33] to hear in class there really was no surprises of oh wow they say this I I wonder what the answer is it it was

[00:08:38] stuff I’d heard before I had the answer to and there was no being blindsided so that I think played

[00:08:45] a huge role I would bring up creation and class when I could and I felt it was appropriate I knew they weren’t paying

[00:08:51] the school to hear me talk so you got to pick and choose your time but there was nothing that that that bowled

[00:08:57] me over really thanks to that upbringing when I went off to graduate school my interest was really more cancer than

[00:09:02] creation science though in the back of my head I thought well if I ever do go into creation science having a Harvard

[00:09:08] degree might be helpful and it was a variety of circumstances perhaps even being born again in graduate school even

[00:09:15] though I had a Christian upbringing I don’t I don’t know that I felt that the gospel was good news really until most of my by through graduate school and

[00:09:21] then my interests changed so right after I graduated joined the Institute for Creation Research to try to use my

[00:09:27] training basically for maybe a more immediate ministry purpose I guess if

[00:09:32] you’re a scientist everything becomes an experiment and that’s been my career experiment for the past decade yeah well

[00:09:38] that’s that’s fantastic so I’ve always thought to myself you know I it’s a really powerful perspective to come from

[00:09:46] a PhD in something that deals directly with you know what evolution would claim

[00:09:51] at biology is its claim to fame you know they’re arguing that evolution works

[00:09:56] from a biological perspective and yet you’ve found exactly the opposite what are when we when you were going to

[00:10:03] school at Harvard whether or at that state school in Wisconsin were there things that popped up that caused you to

[00:10:09] question your belief in creation we are coming up on a segment break here but

[00:10:17] when we get back my guest is dr. Nathaniel Jensen and he is an expert in cell biology he says evolution does not

[00:10:24] work and so stay with us we’re going to talk about his experience going to Harvard and then why he landed where he

[00:10:30] is today he is the author of the book replacing Darwin you can check that out at Answers in Genesis org they’ve got

[00:10:38] all kinds of resources that you can get there to help you in understanding this issue and being able to answer your own

[00:10:45] questions and also answer the questions of the people around you so stay with us we’re gonna be right back [Music]

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[00:11:53] thanks for being with us today this is educate for life I’m your host Kevin Conover it’s a Friday here in San Diego

[00:11:58] my guest is actually in Kentucky he works for Answers in Genesis dr. Nathaniel Jenson and if you don’t know a

[00:12:05] lot about Answers in Genesis an incredible ministry started by Ken Ham I’ve actually had Ken on the radio here

[00:12:11] before and they have the Ark exhibit it’s a gigantic full-size Ark it sits to

[00:12:19] the biblical proportions awesome opportunity to see really was the Ark a

[00:12:25] feasible thing that the Bible describes is that real history or is that just a story and so dr. Jensen I was talking with you

[00:12:34] briefly off-air you work for our Answers in Genesis and you’re do you primarily do research for them yeah I’m in the

[00:12:41] research department I travel fairly rarely five trips a year for less I tend

[00:12:46] to do it internationally just because there’s been an explosion of activity in Latin America in particular I take trips

[00:12:53] to Europe on occasion I’m hoping to make it a Germany my mother’s German so I’m half German speak fluent German hobo

[00:12:59] hoping to deliver lectures in German but most of my time here is is doing research and then writing it up either

[00:13:06] in a technical form or in book form like I did for replacing Darwin well one of the complaints that I hear sometimes

[00:13:12] from or I read about from atheists or those who are advocates of evolution is

[00:13:18] that creation science isn’t real science it doesn’t make predictions how you how

[00:13:25] would you respond to somebody who said creation science doesn’t actually make predictions and it’s not real science

[00:13:30] and this is this is an incredible point because not only is it come up a lot and

[00:13:36] popular discussions it’s written in federal law the famous 1982 Arkansas

[00:13:41] Court decision where there were they overturned Arkansas law mandating the teaching of creation science that was

[00:13:47] one of the points the judge made he said you can’t teach creation science it’s not science because it doesn’t make predictions and that mantra has been so

[00:13:54] I was born 1980 it’s been repeated my whole life yeah that’s what I that’s the milieu I grew up in knowing this is what

[00:14:00] they’re demanding so I grew up listening to ish Duane Gish debate and here’s the

[00:14:06] problems evolution hearing the evolutionists invoke that point basically as their favorite last

[00:14:11] resort see you can watch debates you can you can you know experience engaging

[00:14:18] people online or on the street that the conversation tends to follow a fairly

[00:14:23] predictable path and it tends to land on that exact point well I can’t come up with an answer the evolutionists might

[00:14:29] say you know they may not come up with any defense of the problems of evolution or they might well it’s just an area of

[00:14:35] researcher you can come up with all sorts of ways to say look evolution doesn’t work in at the end of the day

[00:14:41] they’ll resort to well who cares until you can give me something better you’ve got no place at the Scientific table and

[00:14:47] that’s basically where the where the national legal discussion is at and where the popular discussion is as well

[00:14:54] that’s what students will hear in the university it’s written in textbooks over and over again so it’s a huge point

[00:15:00] that most people aren’t aware of because they don’t pull out that card until they get backed into a corner basically so

[00:15:08] how would you respond to that how would you respond to that because I’ve I’ve actually uh I was actually handcuffed to

[00:15:13] it an evolutionist by BuzzFeed for 24 hours and that’s one of the things he brought up was he said creation science

[00:15:20] doesn’t make predictions it just tries to poke holes in evolution and he said and you know what he said we’re fine

[00:15:25] with not knowing the answers that’s what science is all about that’s about you can be wrong and he said at least we

[00:15:32] make predictions and then we can you validate those predictions through testing and so forth and he said what

[00:15:38] what predictions does creation science make so I would answer in a number of ways

[00:15:44] first of all I’d say replacing Darwin is the answer to that objection because it

[00:15:50] has put in print testable predictions claims about the natural world for which you don’t yet know the answer

[00:15:56] claims about the rate at which DNA mutates the rate at which species form there are all sorts of predictions

[00:16:02] literal predictions and then what they’re demanding with the evolutionists have been asking for for 40 years is

[00:16:07] give us a claim that future observations could reveal to be true or false and so one of the main claims I put in the book

[00:16:14] is look here’s here’s for humans for example in African people groups because no one has yet measured a particular

[00:16:20] type of DNA the rate of which DNA mutates in certain African groups I said look here’s some numbers they’re gonna

[00:16:26] they’re going to change their DNA at this many changes per generation I put a number in the book that’s something we

[00:16:32] can go and test and what’s been really interesting to observe is looking at some of the evolutionary critics there’s

[00:16:37] been a few who’ve tried to publish rebuttals to the book and that when they deal with that chapter there’s one in

[00:16:44] particular an anonymous evolutionary blogger is saying well this is a problem in he doesn’t restocking about his main

[00:16:51] his main response to me putting a prediction in print and then basically

[00:16:56] saying to evolutionists now meet your own standards you put a prediction in print his basic response was Jensen

[00:17:02] doesn’t get to pick which predictions we should put in print I thought well I think I’m on the right track as an answer to this one that’s that’s one

[00:17:09] answer the second answer is and this blows me away these predictions are already coming true so one of the

[00:17:15] predictions we can make if you say look God created kinds of creatures they’re

[00:17:20] not species or not even the level of genus but probably more the level of family for example everything from

[00:17:25] Tigers to house cats are in the cat family they descend from a pair on board the Ark of Noah according to Scripture

[00:17:32] and combine that with science so there’s over 30 species of capped alive today

[00:17:37] that that makes a prediction then that cats have been forming at a certain number of species per year or it takes

[00:17:44] this many years to form a new species on average that’s the type of prediction you can make and that that whole model

[00:17:50] actually predicts species to continually form this is something that Lucius don’t even see coming

[00:17:56] because I think it takes millions of years for these species to come about well lo and behold about four months

[00:18:01] after my book came out one of the most famous exhibit a examples revolution Darwin’s finches those finches in the

[00:18:07] Galapagos that Peter and Rosemary grant have been studying for 40 years they announced in science magazine January of

[00:18:13] 2018 that they that they observed the formation of the new species of Darwin’s

[00:18:18] Finch well you run the numbers and they were shocked by this of course because it’s supposed to take millions of years

[00:18:23] they’re shocked by this you run the numbers and the rate at which these species are forming so if you if you

[00:18:29] take that observation extrapolated the whole globe what that translates to is at an average rate of three to four new

[00:18:37] species new bird species per year if you run the numbers for young earth creation so there’s around eleven thousand total

[00:18:44] bird species on the planet today there’s about forty five honey years since the flood so you say the bird species today

[00:18:51] come from the handful of bird kinds on board the ark eleven thousand divided by 4500 it gives you about two to three new

[00:18:58] species per year so it’s right in line with what young earth creationist has predicted so I’d say first of all answer

[00:19:04] that that that big 40 year old question you know you don’t make accessible predictions false actually false there

[00:19:10] in print there in my book and beyond that and as this again blows me away they’re already coming true is that

[00:19:15] there’s work I’m doing right now and in human genetics I said in the book we should be able to see the history of

[00:19:22] civilization written into our DNA the transatlantic slave trade Genghis Khan’s

[00:19:27] Empire the Roman Empire the Greek Empire there should be signatures in our DNA of this we’re seeing that now come true and

[00:19:32] hopefully some research it’ll be published this year shows that to be true so not only is it factually an error but the tables have been

[00:19:38] completely reversed we’re making predictions they’re coming true and I’m not seeing the evolutionists counter

[00:19:44] that with their own predictions let alone ones that are coming true that’s that’s fantastic now is is this getting

[00:19:51] out into the general public or is this kind of on the cutting edge of science when you say like the the tide is

[00:19:56] turning or do you feel that this is actually creation / intelligent design these

[00:20:03] sorts of things are making headway in say the schools and the universities in these sorts places or is is this more

[00:20:10] on the academic research level in my

[00:20:16] mind it’s turning the tide because it’s meeting that the harshest standards

[00:20:22] evolutionists have plied to creationists and it’s flipping that that whole table around so in my mind the academic

[00:20:29] discussion the technical discussion or maybe I should even say that the logical discussion has now been completely

[00:20:35] reversed whether the rest of the culture follows whether the mainstream academic community follows logic and rationality

[00:20:43] is a whole other question and maybe put it this way I often get asked by mainstream reporters you know why do you

[00:20:50] disagree with 97% of the scientific community or in other words how can all these smart people be wrong and they

[00:20:55] either want me to say there’s a conspiracy or they want me to say we got to throw out science either which are true yeah I say no there’s there’s a

[00:21:02] third explanation it namely our national educational system has for

[00:21:09] whatever reason ruled out the teaching of creation science the vast majority

[00:21:16] probably 99% of the scientists who do work in the u.s. today have gone through

[00:21:21] their entire career from kindergarten through graduate school never being

[00:21:26] required to read the other side because the law says apparently you’re not supposed to do that so here they’ve gone through being

[00:21:33] taught evolution that it’s the superior explanation being told that creation doesn’t make testable predictions which

[00:21:39] is false they don’t even know what the other side says so how can you disprove creation science if you don’t even know

[00:21:44] what they’re saying it’s it’s a it’s a profound ignorance that exists in our

[00:21:50] culture and to me the way to turn the tide would be through education but we

[00:21:56] have these these major stumbling blocks culturally legally that prevent people

[00:22:02] from being exposed to the other side one perhaps ironic read out of progress in

[00:22:08] creation science is it comparing textbooks from the 50s to today so you look in the 1950s evolutionary textbooks

[00:22:14] they don’t really discuss creation science at all it’s it’s maybe a letter from a professor to a student saying

[00:22:20] look I know you come from a Bible background but the Bible of signs are different areas you don’t have to worry about it today you’ve got a whole

[00:22:26] chapter is an evolutionary textbook saying here’s how you deal with creation science may be a weird way to measure progress but they know creation

[00:22:33] scientists have to be dealt with I don’t think they try to educate themselves what we actually believe and the fact

[00:22:39] that we’re making these great predictions and even in fields that have tremendous human interest well who doesn’t want to know their past what

[00:22:46] does it mean to be a European an African American an Asian American an Asian person genetics is rewriting all of this

[00:22:53] and the only way you see this is with young earth creation science so I’m seeing huge potential impact for this

[00:23:00] but I’ll just know that the mainstream community has instituted a system that

[00:23:07] basically prevents anyone from being exposed to this in the normal course of their education so that’s still a big

[00:23:12] stumbling block but to me the pieces are in place to break through that wall and make a big difference that’s great yeah

[00:23:19] and if a lot of people decide to get involved and make a difference my guest today is dr. Nathaniel Jenson he’s with

[00:23:24] Answers in Genesis he has a PhD in cell and developmental biology from Harvard University stay with us we’re going to

[00:23:30] continue to discuss his book replacing Darwin the new Origin of Species we’ll be right back

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[00:24:41] today this is educated for life I’m your host Kevin Conover my web sites educate for life.org it’s a great resource if

[00:24:47] you’re looking for a curriculum or something to go through with your students if you homeschool your kids or if you want to use it in a youth group

[00:24:53] or a Bible study it’s all kinds of videos for THD videos all on the

[00:24:59] different subjects that people have questions about we deal with issues like what about the issue of homosexuality

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[00:25:17] great resource for you check it out we also have over a hundred different radio programs now with scientists from all

[00:25:22] over the world and other people testifying to how Christ has impacted their life and how God is continuing to

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[00:25:45] recently interviewed Brooks Gibbs who’s traveling the country talking to people about raising resilient children and

[00:25:51] from a biblical perspective it’s fab salutely fantastic and today we have on

[00:25:56] our show dr. Nathaniel Jensen who’s an expert on the issue of creation and

[00:26:02] evolution he has a PhD in cell and developmental biology from Harvard University he works with Answers in

[00:26:08] Genesis that’s Answers in Genesis org if you don’t know who they are they’re a fantastic ministry based out of Kentucky

[00:26:13] they have a life-size Ark from the dimensions in the Bible and it’s an

[00:26:20] entire huge walkthrough that you can check out goes through all the the evidence for creation and the history

[00:26:26] that’s recorded in the Bible about what has happened in the relationship between God and man and dr. Jensen when you were

[00:26:35] going through school through the school in Wisconsin and through Harvard did you

[00:26:41] ever come upon things that you you hid as you were learning that you were like wow you know this makes me think maybe

[00:26:49] evolution is true or were you constantly thinking to yourself wow this just validates what I

[00:26:54] I’ve known to be true which is that creation is true I guess three answers

[00:27:00] come to mind one is I picked a degree in biology or a slice of biology that

[00:27:05] doesn’t deal as much with origins evolutionists are fond of saying nothing in biology makes sense except in light of evolution well quite frankly it’s

[00:27:12] relevant only to origin science dealing with where we came from answering questions like how did how does cancer

[00:27:19] arise and how do you cure it what what genes control the human developmental

[00:27:25] process or a mouse developmental process most questions that the NIH funds have nothing to do with evolution and so it

[00:27:32] didn’t come up much hard at all in my education maybe biology 101 one or two or they they give you an introduction to

[00:27:38] to cell biology introduction to organismal biology but then I jumped into my field fairly quickly and we’re

[00:27:45] dealing with present tense questions how do skin cells resists UV light rays from

[00:27:53] the Sun or how does how does a skin cell correct DNA damage just basic

[00:27:58] fundamental questions about how life works and to throw an evolutionist ask a

[00:28:04] completely different question how did life arise how did we get to this state that you’re asking answering different questions using different tools so it

[00:28:11] didn’t come up that much the second thing is not my upbringing I think prepared me very very well for it I was

[00:28:17] reading creation science materials and actually people asked me how did you survive Harvard one of the things I

[00:28:23] bring up is comes from an article I read a few years ago sort of a retrospective looking back like what worked well this

[00:28:30] article I read from world magazine said advice to incoming freshmen expect to read double you’re going to hear that

[00:28:36] whatever discipline you’re going into you’re going to hear in class the the mainstream view so if you’re studying

[00:28:41] art you’re setting science whatever it is mainstream view in class if you want to know the Christian worldview on whatever you’re studying you’re going to

[00:28:47] have to read just as much outside of class as inside class and I sent that to my sister who’s 16 years younger than me

[00:28:53] because she was just starting school and I mother said well you did that and this wasn’t a look what a good job I did it

[00:28:59] was oh this worked I was reading creation science materials intelligent design materials in high school outside

[00:29:07] of class as an undergraduate I was prepared for this and and very little came up that

[00:29:13] that bothered me now the last 10 years – in creation science there’s stuff that comes up where hmm I don’t have the

[00:29:19] answer for this but because I know the Bible is true it’s been confirmed over and over again I’ve seen so many

[00:29:25] questions go away with digging into it it really doesn’t bother a much at all

[00:29:31] and it’s really more just at right now for me during researches it’s a it’s a

[00:29:36] prompting to dig into the issue deeper and whenever I do discover the answer because this has been a process that

[00:29:43] repeats itself multiple times over it makes the answer all the more exciting because you go into thinking hmm I don’t

[00:29:49] know what the answer is here they seem to make a decent argument I don’t know what the opposite data are and I dig

[00:29:55] into it and oh wait a minute this is this is completely backwards and here’s the real answer and it’s even better than we thought it’s that sort of

[00:30:01] process that that that strengthens my commitment to this it it encourages me

[00:30:09] and gives me hope for even more and we’ve had so much success even if even

[00:30:14] within 10 years that very little now seems to arise for what you don’t have a good answer the evolutionists aren’t up

[00:30:21] to speed on what creationists think they tend to recycle old arguments and so someone says well how do you answer this

[00:30:26] let’s just you know exhibit it’s it’s it’s illustration number 15 of a

[00:30:32] principle it goes back to Darwin and we answered that 10 years ago that sort of thing so I didn’t get that much in way

[00:30:39] of concern or challenges during my education being neck deep in the primary

[00:30:47] literature reading the other side which I do regularly and in dealing with their primary data raises new questions but

[00:30:54] with the background I’ve had with the successes that I’ve already seen and with a framework in place many of these

[00:31:00] are fairly easy to solve but some questions like the one I’m working on right now has taken 5-10 years to solve

[00:31:06] but now we’re starting finally seeing the answer take a while and it’s really exciting what question is that that

[00:31:11] you’re currently answering right now so the big picture question is can we see the history of civilization written in

[00:31:18] our DNA okay if evolutions true so if human history goes back one thousand years the first modern

[00:31:24] humans goes back six million years to a common ancestor with a chimpanzee you think about the history of civilization

[00:31:30] the last three thousand years or so that’s just the tail end and in in a

[00:31:35] long timeline that’s just a little blip but you’ll hardly expect to see some sort of genetic signal so for example to

[00:31:42] use a really recent example of history the the the sad history of the transatlantic slave trade here’s ten

[00:31:49] twelve million Africans forcibly moved against their will from Africa to the new world they’re forced to speak now

[00:31:56] English Spanish into European languages European language is essentially yet genetically you can clearly see their

[00:32:03] African and origin because and of course history confirms us the question though is how different are they from modern

[00:32:10] Africans so a background piece of biological information that plays a huge

[00:32:15] role in this debate is something we call a DNA clock so every generation mistakes

[00:32:21] are added to our DNA sequence sperm and egg copy DNA I went Furman ik fuse

[00:32:26] during fertilization life begins the offspring during the process within

[00:32:32] sperm and egg if copying DNA mistakes happen so if you were to compare my DNA to one of my four kids you’d see

[00:32:38] differences that you don’t see in me or my wife because we live in a fallen world mistakes happen yeah dr. John Sanford

[00:32:45] said there’s about 100 to 300 mutations or or he said point I think he said what

[00:32:51] do they call them imitation yeah point mutations is that is that what you’re talking about

[00:32:56] yeah that’s that’s there’s there’s several different clocks that that occur in ourselves depending on which genetic

[00:33:03] compartment you’re looking at that’s one of them and so what he’s focused heavily on is this is damage that’s accumulating

[00:33:10] and that even the secular community is talking about the the human species going towards extinction because there’s

[00:33:16] so many mistakes being added every generation that’s one element of it the other element of it is well now we’ve

[00:33:22] got a stopwatch in a sense I mean it’s not that precise but we hear something that every generation there’s a tick

[00:33:28] another tick another tick or another 100 ticks depending on how many mistakes occur and so you can look back in time

[00:33:33] so if we look in history we know transatlantic slave trade begins around 1500 AD it gets outlawed mid 1800s I

[00:33:42] think it might be Brazil 1866 perhaps that’s the last one from that point

[00:33:47] forward the Africans who were brought over to the new world really don’t have

[00:33:53] much more contact with Africa that they’re separated they’ve been separated for 150 years

[00:33:58] well that’s several generations for the African American clock to tick in the

[00:34:03] new world independent of Africa and 150 years several generations for the African clocks tick within Africa so

[00:34:09] African Americans and Africans have been getting more different from one another

[00:34:15] the last hundred fifty years and you should be able to see that signal how close or similar are Africans African

[00:34:20] Americans and that’s the sort of principle you can apply all over history so Genghis Khan sweeps through Central

[00:34:25] Asia gets to Eastern Europe probably rape and pillage is you’re going to have some Asian lineages that show up in

[00:34:32] Europe right around say the correct the time you might expect from the Genghis Khan ik incursion that sort of thing

[00:34:39] these are the these are the sort of historical events we should be able to see the number of differences between

[00:34:45] various people groups should match what we know from history and the evolutionists don’t even think of

[00:34:50] looking into this because that’s just the tail end of history DNA mutates the changes really slowly we won’t even

[00:34:56] think about looking at that because that’s just that’s far too recent an event for for our slow clocks to

[00:35:01] actually record in essence they think our DNA clocks act like a sundial you can’t get that precise it just moves

[00:35:08] really slowly it takes hundreds of thousands of years no human history is compressed into about 4,500 since the flood and with

[00:35:15] only 4,500 years to work with each of these events are a big chunk of it you should be able to see these genetic

[00:35:20] differences and so the research we’re doing so far looks like yes we can actually see this signal which is really

[00:35:26] exciting in and of itself but once you establish that principle to be true you can go back and say oh wait a minute we

[00:35:33] thought this was true from history’s and one of the projects I’m working on right now is the history of the Americas before Columbus which is a topic I knew

[00:35:40] virtually nothing about growing up hardly covered in the textbooks archeology has undergone a massive transformation the last 30 years in the

[00:35:46] mainstream scientific community well now you add engine next to it and I think we’ve got

[00:35:52] evidence that there was a massive population replacement just uh just in

[00:35:57] the ad era which is something no one’s talking about basically what I’m getting at if this turns out to be true is we

[00:36:03] have the chance now with genetics to rewrite history and it it’s just this this is these are directions I never

[00:36:08] anticipated going but we would go with it where the data leads and haven’t been so successful all these surprises that

[00:36:15] popped out you say this is crazy this is this is wild but it’s so much fun and this is really interesting too and this

[00:36:22] relates we’re coming up on a break here but this relates to mitochondrial Eve is that correct that’s one area and one

[00:36:29] that one of the area’s we’ve neglected is the Y chromosome that’s the ten year question basically that now we’re finally beginning to solve okay we have

[00:36:36] one more segment left stay with us this is dr. Nathaniel Jenson he is an expert in cell and developmental biology he has

[00:36:42] a degree from Harvard University and he’s a research biologist author and speaker with Answers in Genesis you can

[00:36:48] find out more about him at Answers in Genesis org you can also check out his book replacing Darwin the new Origin of

[00:36:54] Species stay with us we’re going to be right back [Music]

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[00:37:59] [Music] thanks for being with us today this is educate for life I’m your host Kevin Conover we’re here in Southern

[00:38:05] California Kay praise 106.1 FM in North County and AM 12:10 in San Diego

[00:38:12] we also are on YouTube we’re on periscope Facebook all the different social media outlets you can check it

[00:38:18] out I’ve got all kinds of amazing interviews with people from all over the world including former Muslims former

[00:38:26] Buddhists I’ve got some with atheists like Lawrence Krauss Dan Barker all

[00:38:32] kinds of interesting perspectives to hear but ultimately what I’m trying to

[00:38:37] do is let people testify to the truth of God’s Word and how Jesus Christ can

[00:38:44] change a person’s life ultimately what we’re all about is the fact that Jesus Christ has come has died on the cross

[00:38:51] has testified to the truth has paid the price for our sins and if we will commit our lives to him and make him our Lord

[00:38:57] and Savior that we can spend eternity with God we can restore that broken relationship that happened all the way

[00:39:03] back in the garden and so if you haven’t made the decision to dedicate your life to Jesus Christ today’s the day Bible

[00:39:09] says today is the day of salvation so you can take some time just to pray to

[00:39:14] God personally there’s nothing special about the prayer it’s really about your heart and then make Jesus Christ your

[00:39:21] Lord and Savior tell him that you’re sorry for your sins and that you want him to take over your life and to come

[00:39:27] into your life and make him your Lord and that’s all it takes the Bible says for us to have a restored relationship

[00:39:33] with God so I hope you’ll do that soon if you haven’t done that my guest today is dr. Nathaniel Jensen and he studies

[00:39:42] specifically creation and the evidence for creation and he argues that

[00:39:47] Darwinism is past its time it’s not a good theory we have enough evidence that it needs to be replaced

[00:39:54] it’s a bad theory it doesn’t solve the problems and dr. Jensen before we get

[00:39:59] into mitochondrial Eve and the y-chromosome are you seeing I’ve seen

[00:40:05] several scientists or people that have been advocates of evolution who have

[00:40:11] kind of changed their minds and including uh there was a very famous

[00:40:18] fellow at New York University he was a professor of law I believe wrote a book on this how he thought Darwin Darwinism

[00:40:25] was not a good theory anymore either and he wasn’t even a Christian are you seeing more and more people become

[00:40:31] skeptical of Darwinian theory I don’t have a good sample size to say here’s

[00:40:38] here’s a trajectory and I haven’t kept up with it as much because the few examples I’ve seen if people change have

[00:40:44] received such harsh blowback yeah from the academic community for their views

[00:40:50] that I thought there is so much disincentive to ever announce your

[00:40:55] skepticism who’s going to take the risk and come out publicly yeah it’s such a cultural push against it I thought it’s

[00:41:01] just hopeless to try to even keep track you praise the Lord when people do but the advice we still give people is

[00:41:08] basically if you’re in secular I could die trying to get your PhD keep your head down yeah they’re going to do

[00:41:13] everything they can to stymie your career even taking very dishonest steps

[00:41:18] it’s it’s a it’s a dangerous field in which to be a Christian in a sense and so why is this why the Serpent’s

[00:41:25] harmless as doves is the rule that applies here in particular and and and did you ever have any pushback yourself

[00:41:32] at Harvard abates with peers or with professors not as much while I was a student and I

[00:41:40] think part of the reason is because I’m dealing with basic health questions and evolution doesn’t have much to do with it and I had a professor who was willing

[00:41:46] to accommodate and work with me and as soon as it it changed of course as soon

[00:41:52] as I graduated and announced I was going to the Institute for Creation Research and gave a talk in Boston and hundred

[00:41:58] atheist showed up and tried to make as much trouble as they could they emailed people at Harvard and emailed my

[00:42:04] immediate supervisor where I did my PhD and and the wind suddenly shift as soon

[00:42:09] as that happens and and he read things like what he he must have gone through and lied that’s one option I think or he

[00:42:17] was paid to do this they’ll come up with all sorts of conspiracy theories basically to explain how I made it

[00:42:23] through never once though considering the possibility that no actually know what I’m talking about and I still reject

[00:42:29] evolution and I still got a PhD that’s just that’s not allowed to be a part of the discussion so things shifted

[00:42:36] dramatically as soon as I made it a career choice in the direction of creation sign yeah yeah I’ve heard similar stories so in the previous

[00:42:44] segment we are talking about mitochondrial Eve the Y chromosome can you shed some light on that for us as far as the research is concerned yeah so

[00:42:51] my initial research about 10 years ago started looking at mitochondrial DNA this is DNA it’s inherited through

[00:42:57] females males and females have it but only moms pass it on for for technical reasons so my three my four children

[00:43:03] have my wife’s mitochondrial DNA I have my mother’s that DNA mutates as well we

[00:43:09] now know it’s about one mistake happens every five to ten generations so to see

[00:43:15] a difference in my lineage you have to go back to my great-great-great our many great-grandmother to find a difference

[00:43:20] between my DNA and hers but what’s crazy is on average let’s say in non African

[00:43:26] people groups because there there tends to be a different mathematical difference between Africans and not Africans and not Africans like myself

[00:43:33] there’s only about 20 mistakes total 16 to 20 mistakes total that have happened

[00:43:39] since the beginning since the flood and that’s very explicable by one mistake

[00:43:45] every five to ten generations in other words there is a clock a maternal DNA clock that ticks at a

[00:43:53] rate that fits exactly the biblical timescale what was a question then for

[00:43:58] the last ten years is what about the male lineage males are males genetically

[00:44:03] they’re X Y Z Mo’s are xx so in the beginning you would have had Eve being

[00:44:09] xx Adam being X Y at the flood Noah’s XY his wife is xx there’s a there’s really

[00:44:15] a single Y chromosome lineage at the flood because Shem ham and Japheth forget their Y chromosome from Noah

[00:44:21] anyway 2009 that’s right about when I start in creation signs there was one paper out

[00:44:26] in the mainstream literature talking about the rate at which the Y chromosome clock ticks and it was about 10 times

[00:44:33] slower than I thought it would be and seemed to fit the evolutionary timescale several years later 2015 another

[00:44:38] publication comes out they’re looking at several hundred pedigrees men of known

[00:44:44] relationship from Iceland same results seems to fit the evolutionary time scale and looking at the history of

[00:44:51] mitochondrial DNA research there had been about 15 to 20 studies on this clock and severe disagreement in the

[00:44:58] literature obviously because it disagrees with evolution so big uproar and I figured well maybe just be a

[00:45:04] matter of time before the Y chromosome clock falls into line with the biblical model – I didn’t know well it turns out

[00:45:10] the answer has been forthcoming the the the earlier study is from 2009 2015 that

[00:45:18] I that I mentioned and didn’t know what to do with were based on low quality data what’s happened since then so there

[00:45:25] was a second paper that came out in 22 2015 and another one came out in 2017 these were high quality data papers and

[00:45:32] lo and behold the rate at which the Y chromosome mutates is much faster when you actually get high quality data and

[00:45:38] it fits exactly the young earth timescale the the number of differences in Y chromosome are about 500 to 600 ish

[00:45:46] differences among men around the globe a little bit more in Africans well the from these high-quality data sets the

[00:45:52] rate at which Y chromosome changes is 2 to 3 mistakes per generation so my boys

[00:45:58] would be on average two to three Y chromosome DNA differences different than me and I’d be two to

[00:46:05] three Y chromosome differences than my dad and on back you go so you can explain all that within 4,500 years

[00:46:11] what’s what you can’t make up and I want to preface this by saying I have tremendous respect for my mainstream

[00:46:17] evolutionary colleagues they’re smart people and know how to do science but they’ve been taught a single way of

[00:46:23] thinking on the origins issue they know nothing what young earth creationists believe they’re taught evolutions of fact you should even question it anymore

[00:46:28] I’ve debated a guy who is written in public saying creation science is is not

[00:46:34] even worth debating anymore it should just be ridiculed that’s the attitude they’re taught and that pretzel twists

[00:46:40] they did to avoid the implications of their high quality data are remarkable one tried to essentially convert his

[00:46:47] high-quality results to low-quality data because well we know the low quality data gave results that confirmed

[00:46:52] evolution and so there must be something wrong with my high quality data said it was amazing stuff like that where I thought I know you guys are smart and I

[00:47:00] know you can do this and and this is the last thing I’d expect you to do but

[00:47:05] because they’ve been so trained to live in a bubble essentially I it to them I

[00:47:11] think it really is the smart thing to do yeah well their evolution is true it’s it’s not it’s not we’re trying to it’s

[00:47:17] not a conspiracy it’s well I guess there must be something wrong and that that’s just the rational thought of them and it

[00:47:23] but it just blows me away yeah they’re there rather than following the evidence where it leads they’re they’re allowing

[00:47:28] their paradigm to get rid of good evidence yeah exactly yeah I was I was

[00:47:36] reading about Einstein on this exact issue when he was talking about a steady state universe which I thought was

[00:47:41] really interesting too where he said he confessed to Georg Kemal that he had fudged his math in order to try to make

[00:47:47] his math fit his paradigm instead of allowing his math to ultimately lead to the conclusion that the universe had a

[00:47:53] beginning which I thought was really interesting too but I guess we all have to be careful about about that what what

[00:48:00] do you say to somebody who says that Christians tend to you know they look at

[00:48:05] the Bible they take what the Bible says and then they don’t change their mind because even if the evidence is contradictory they go with what the

[00:48:12] Bible says how do you respond to someone who says something like that first thing I do is say are you

[00:48:17] talking philosophically or scientifically because in my experience in the sciences on one side of the

[00:48:23] debate the evolutionists are those who live in a bubble they don’t know what the other side says they are unwilling

[00:48:29] to learn what the other side says so there aren’t that many people in my experience in the evolutionary camp who

[00:48:34] try to figure out what creationists say the few who do who do debates again

[00:48:39] there’s one guy debated just last year who basically says they’re not even gonna try to read what you say but I’m

[00:48:45] gonna say you’re ridiculous yeah that’s that’s not rational whereas on the other side I and my colleagues spend lots of

[00:48:52] time reading what Richard Dawkins is Jerry Coyne says I’m reading the primary literature so I have the raw data at my fingertips I can test I can finish their

[00:48:59] sentences and say yep I know what you’re going to say here’s the evidence here’s why you say it which to me is the way

[00:49:04] any debater should try to approach an issue you should know your opponents position much better than he knows it or

[00:49:10] she knows it and and that’s the the ironic environment in which we live now

[00:49:15] when it comes to the philosophical side do I believe the Bible’s true yeah and it’s a settled question in my mind

[00:49:21] because that’s that to me that’s the point of philosophy is finding out what the answer is not just swinging like a

[00:49:27] door and its hinges being blown about and and even if people try to deny it that’s the way everyone lives there’s I

[00:49:33] don’t think I’ve met a single person out there who’s constantly wondering you can’t exist as a human being

[00:49:39] wondering if the Sun is going to rise and if I take a step forward is my existence going to collapse or just all

[00:49:45] these other crazy philosophical questions that people wonder about everyone settles on something yeah and they have reasons for doing it and you

[00:49:52] live consistent with whatever you believe you may not be completely honest with yourself about what you do believe

[00:49:57] but your actions have a way of revealing that yeah and so to me I have good reasons for

[00:50:02] believing the Bible’s true but even believing the Bible’s true there are so many possibilities when it comes to

[00:50:08] origins I would argue that the creationists are the more open-minded of

[00:50:13] the two views because they know what the other side says they know what’s with the various ways of explaining things

[00:50:20] the hypotheses to test and I’ll also say even within a creationist framework the Bible gives details on the origin

[00:50:27] species that they arose in the last few thousand years uh that they come from kinds there’s a framework there but

[00:50:33] there’s a lot that’s unsaid the Bible does not say whether the DNA clocks have been mutating at a constant rate or a

[00:50:39] variable rates the data currently seem to say surprising to me that the constant rate is a pretty good first

[00:50:45] approximation sort of the evolutionary assumption but it takes you back only 6,000 years so that’s that’s perhaps one

[00:50:53] of the biggest takeaways for me sort of one of the biggest empirical discoveries for me within the last ten years is to

[00:50:59] say people are always talking about this is absolute truth and this is the way science is in the consensus there’s so

[00:51:05] much that’s uncertain science is a very powerful way of knowing the world but also very clumsy way there’s it you

[00:51:12] can’t prove anything with science you can just disprove alternative ideas and there’s so many possibilities when it

[00:51:18] comes to origins scientifically that for anyone to say I’ve arrived I’ve found

[00:51:23] the answer is is to me immediate red flag that they haven’t looked into this issue too much absolutely I don’t think

[00:51:30] there’s any scientific claim that could theoretically adjudicate the bigger

[00:51:36] questions of human meaning in existence and origins there’s there’s there’s helpful tool to try to get us closer to

[00:51:41] the answers but science is never going to take you there it’s just not not designed to do that and so looking at how people actually

[00:51:50] practice science it’s the creations to keep the open mind the evolutions I think you are a fairly closed-minded by training and by choice and on the bigger

[00:51:57] philosophical question I’d say the Bible is the best supported view out there and that’s where I put my faith and and

[00:52:04] that’s where I’m living my life and someone else has also made a choice they may not be honest with me or themselves

[00:52:09] about what that choice is but they’re living with some sort of view they’ve decided on yes yeah some sort of premise dr. Jensen thank you so much for being

[00:52:16] on the program today it was a big blessing to have you and I really appreciate your work thank you very much

[00:52:22] absolutely that’s dr. Nathaniel Jensen with Answers in Genesis org you can check him out there you can also pick up

[00:52:28] his book replacing Darwin the new Origin of Species it’s full of very valuable

[00:52:33] information and cutting-edge science and research he has a PhD in cell and

[00:52:38] developmental biology from Harvard University so big blessing thanks for being with us today I hope you enjoyed

[00:52:44] the program hope you enjoyed Brooks Gibbs if you got to tune into that program also and we’ll be back again next week and have some

[00:52:51] other great interviews in the meantime if you want to check out my website educate for life org that’s a great opportunity to get yourself informed and

[00:52:58] answer a lot of the questions that pop up on a regular basis among relatives and friends and peers and and whoever

[00:53:05] else might be out there wondering what the truth is god bless you did you miss part of today’s program don’t worry

[00:53:10] we’re con mitad to helping you get the info you need okay that was dumb but for

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