Database of Quotes

Over the last few months, I have been collecting various quotes on evolution, atheism, Christianity, and the occasional "stray" quote that I find interesting. On this page, I aim to create a database of these quotes sorted by topic as much as possible. The majority of these quotes focus on evolution. Please feel free to use these quotes when sharing your faith with your friends.


The main purpose of this page is to debunk the following false notion made by atheist Professor Richard Dawkins:
“It is absolutely safe to say that if you meet somebody who claims not to believe in evolution, that person is ignorant, stupid, or insane (or wicked, but I’d rather not consider that).”

After reading the quotes on this page, it should be clear that evolution is not a view that is shared by everyone, as Dawkins claims, nor is it a feasible theory.



In fact, my own research has led me to agree with Dr. Duane T. Gish: “The more I study and the more I learn, the more I become convinced that evolution is a false theory and that special creation offers a much more satisfactory interpretive framework for correlating and explaining the scientific evidence related to origins.” ~ Duane T. Gish

Note: This list is by no means complete; I will be adding to it from time to time, so please keep checking back for more info! Also, please note that many of the people quoted here are themselves Christian scientists or leaders in the Creation/I.D. movement. However, there are more than a few quotes from evolutionists on why their theory does not stand to scrutiny... in such cases, I have tried to label them as such and give context where available.




--------------


Evolution: General


“The subject of evolution and creation is complicated by people’s tendency to see what they want to see, rather than seeing the facts as they really are.” ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin's Demise


“Evolution is not a fact. Evolution doesn't even qualify as a theory or as a hypothesis. It is a metaphysical research program, and it is not really testable science.” ~ Dr. Karl Popper, a leading philosopher of science

“The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an unproved theory –is it then a science or a faith? Belief in the theory of evolution is thus exactly parallel to belief in special creation – both are concepts which believers know to be true but neither, up to the present, has been capable of proof.” ~ British biologist L. Harrison Matthews

“Overwhelmingly strong proofs of intelligent and benevolent design lie around us… the atheistic idea is so nonsensical that I cannot put it into words.” ~ Lord Kelvin

“Evolution is a fairy tale for adults" ~ evolutionists, Dr. Paul LeMoine

“The evolution theory is purely the product of the imagination.” ~ Dr. Ambrose Flemming, President of the Philosophical Society of Great Britain

“In Grimm’s fairy tales, you kiss a frog and in two seconds, it becomes a prince. That is a fairy tale. In evolution, you kiss a frog and in two million years, it becomes a prince.” ~ Dr. D. James Kennedy

“For over 20 years I thought I was working on evolution but there was not one thing I knew about it. So for the last few weeks I’ve tried putting a simple question to various people and various groups of people. 'Can you tell me anything you know about Evolution, any one thing that is true?' I tried that question on the geology staff at the Field Museum of Natural History and the only answer I got was silence. I tried it on the members of the "Evolutionary Morphology Seminar" in the University of Chicago, a very prestigious body of evolutionists, and all I got there was silence for a long time, and eventually one person said, 'Yes, I do know one thing. It ought to not be taught in high school!'” ~ evolutionists Dr. Collin Patterson

“Darwin’s evolutionary explanation of the origins of man has been transformed into a modern myth, to the detriment of science and social progress…. The secular myths of evolution have had a damaging effect on scientific research, leading to distortion, to needless controversy, and to the gross misuse of science…. I mean the stories, the narratives about change over time. How dinosaurs became extinct, how the mammals evolved, where man came from. These seem to me to be little more than story-telling.” ~ Dr. Collin Patterson

“…Evolution not only conveys no knowledge, it seems to convey anti-knowledge…. Most of you in this room will have to admit that in the last ten years we have seen the basis of evolution go from fact to faith! It does seem that the level of knowledge about evolution is remarkably shallow. We know it ought not to be taught in high school, and that’s all we know about it.” ~ Dr. Collin Patterson

“I fully agree with your comments on the lack of direct illustration of evolutionary transitions in my book (Evolution). If I knew of any, fossil or living, I would have certainly have included them… Yet Gould and the American Museum people are hard to contradict when they say there are no transitional fossils… I will lay it on the line –there is not one such fossil for which one could make a watertight argument.” ~ Dr. Collin Patterson

“To my mind, the theory of [evolution] does not stand up at all. If living matter is not, then, caused by the interplay of atoms, natural forces, and radiation [i.e., time, chance, and chemistry], how has it come into being? I think, however, that we must go further than this and admit that the only acceptable explanation is creation.” ~ H.S. Lipson

“Creationists often appeal to the facts of science to support their view, and evolutionists often appeal to philosophical assumptions from outside science.” ~ Jonathan Sarfati (emphasis his)

“…The fact is that scientists are not really as objective and dispassionate in their work as they would like you to think. Most scientists first get their ideas about how the world works not through rigorously logical processes but through hunches and wild guesses. As individuals, they often come to believe something to be true long before they assemble the hard evidence that will convince somebody else that it is. Motivated by faith in his own ideas and a desire for acceptance by his peers, a scientist will labor for years knowing in his heart that his theory is correct but devising experiment after experiment whose results he hopes will support his position.” ~ Boyce Rensberger

Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. The eminent Kant scholar Lewis Beck used to say that anyone who could believe in God could believe in anything. To appeal to an omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen.” ~ Richard Dickerson

“In a very real sense, therefore, advocacy of the doctrine of continuity [i.e evolutionism] has always necessitated on retreat from pure empiricism [i.e., logic an observation], and contrary to what is widely assumed by evolutionary biologists today, it has always been the anti-evolutionists [i.e creationist], not the evolutionists, in the scientific community who have struck rigidly to the facts and adhered to a more strictly empirical approach… It was Darwin the evolutionist who was retreating from the facts.” ~ Michael Denton

“The Darwinian theory of descent has not a single fact to confirm it in the realm of nature. It is not the result of scientific research but purely the product of imagination.” ~ Albert Fleishman

“Once we see, however, that the probability of life originating at random is so utterly minuscule as to make it absurd, it becomes sensible to think that the favorable properties of physics, on which life depends, are in every respect deliberate…. It is, therefore, almost inevitable that our own measure of intelligence must reflect higher intelligence –even to the limit of God.” ~ Sir Fred Hoyle

“Creation,’ in the ordinary sense of the word, is perfectly conceivable. I find no difficulty in conceiving that, at some former period, this universe was not in existence, and that it made its appearance in six days (or instantaneously, if that is preferred), in consequence of the volition of some preexisting Being.” ~ Thomas Huxley

“…I suppose that nobody will deny that it is a great misfortune if an entire branch of science becomes addicted to a false theory…. I believe that one day the Darwinian myth will be ranked the greatest deceit in the history of science. When this happens, many people will pose the question: ‘How did this ever happen?’” ~ Dr. I.L. Cohen

“Similarity does not equal relationship. Evolutionists often use similarity between animals and man to ‘prove’ Darwinism…. Creationists likewise use similarities to support creation…. So God used His blueprint for many of His creatures. Similarities don’t mean common ancestry but a common architect.” ~ Don Boys

“One cannot be exposed to the law and order of the universe without concluding that there must be design and purpose behind it all…. The better we understand the intricacies of the universe and all it harbors, the more reason we have found to marvel at the inherent design upon which it is based.” ~ Dr. Wernher

“There is the theory that all the living forms in the world have arisen from a single source which itself came from an inorganic form. This theory can be called the ‘general theory of evolution,’ and the evidence which supports this is not sufficiently strong to allow us to consider it as anything more than a working hypothesis.” ~ G.A. Kerkut

“Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science.  Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion -- a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality.  I am an ardent evolutionist and an ex-Christian, but I must admit that in this one complaint -- ...and Mr. Gish is but one of many to make it - the literalists are absolutely right.  Evolution is a religion.  This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution today.” ~ Dr. Michael Ruse, professor of philosophy and zoology at the University of Guelph

"We have reached a situation where a theory has been accepted as fact by some, and possible contrary evidence is shunted aside. [This is] mythology rather than science." ~ Robert Shapiro on the Miller-Urey experiment; Origins: A Skeptic's Guide to the Creation of Life on Earth, pg 112


We should keep in mind that we have a vast amount of experience of things, with relative degrees of order, coming into existence, and no one has ever yet experienced anything, or has plausible empirical evidence of anything, coming into existence from nothing or from "something" with no order — which really means no nature, no character — at all. In this sense the emergence of something from nothing or from chaos has a probability of exactly zero relative to our data. Now it is true that probability, like "logic," can be interpreted in numerous ways. But it would be refreshing to hear the naturalistic cosmologist admit that all of our empirical evidence is against order emerging from disorder and something emerging from nothing, and to confess that his metaphysical necessity of such emergences rest on the assumption of a naturalistic world view, rather than proving such a view.  ~ Dallas Willard


"Any kind of evolution of order of any kind will always presuppose pre-existing order and pre-existing entities governed by that order. Therefore, not all order evolved. It's characteristic of the thoughtlessness and ignorance which plagues the discussion of these issues that Darwin's Origin of Species is thought, by many theists as well as anti-theists, to be an explanation of the origin of life and of living forms generally, when nothing was further from Darwin's own mind. But evolution, whether cosmic or biological, logically cannot be a theory of ultimate origins of existence or order, because its operation presupposes the existence of certain entities with specific potential behaviors and an environment of some specific kind that operates upon those entities in some specifically ordered fashion." ~ Radacted from Dallas Willard, "Language, Being, God and the three Stages of Theistic Evidence," in Does God Exist? by Moreland and Nielsen, page 208.

“It’s not really a question of who is biased, but which bias is the correct bias with which to be biased!” ~ Jonathan Sarfati

“In short, evolution is a faith that the facts have failed. Biblical Christianity is a faith that fits the facts.” ~ Gary  Parker (emphasis his)


“Like all other scientific theories, Darwinian evolution must be continually compared with the evidence. If it does not fit the evidence, it must be reevaluated or abandoned – otherwise it is not science, but myth.” ~ Jonathan Wells




Evolution: Genetics

“The more science discovers about genetics, the more of a problem it poses for the doctrine of evolution.” ~ John MacArthur


“The probability for the chance of formation of the smallest, simplest form of living organism known is 1 to 10340,000,000…. The size of this figure is truly staggering, since there are only supposed to be approximately 10 electrons in the whole universe!” ~ Professor Harold Morowitz

“Some scientists have calculated the odds that DNA could form by chance at roughly 10 to the 40,000 power to 1. That’s, a one with 40,000 zeros behind it! Scientists consider anything 10 to the 50th power or above impossible.” ~ Patrick Marks

“The likelihood of the formation of life from inanimate matter is 1 to a number with 40,000 noughts after it (1040,000)…. It is big enough to bury Darwin and the whole theory of evolution. There was no primeval soup, neither on this planet nor any other, and if the beginnings of life were not random, they must therefore have been the product of purposeful intelligence.” ~ Fredrick Hoyle

“…chemical similarities cannot be explained through evolutionary connections, for the creatures involved are not closely related. Similarities in DNA and other cellular chemicals do not necessarily mean that one creature evolved from another. Instead, one can reasonably argue that the similarities indicate a common designer.” ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin’s Demise

“…the quality of information that could be stored in a pinhead’s volume of DNA is equivalent to the content of a pile of paperback books spanning the distance from earth to the moon 500 times –each book being unique from the others!”  ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin’s Demise

“The minimal number of components necessary for a machine to function is called its irreducible complexity. Biochemist Michael Behe explains that in the mechanical world, if one essential components (such as a spark plug or wing flap) is missing, the entire machine won’t operate.” ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin’s Demise

“The human body has 100 trillion cells. All the cells in the human body lined up side-by-side would encircle the earth 200 times. If all DNA in a human were placed end to end, it would reach the sun and back 400 times.” Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin’s Demise

“…for even the simplest cell to ever get started requires an awesomely complex assembly of chemical structures. That this could have happened through random chance is statistically impossible…. DNA –containing the code for this first living cell –is very complex and does not naturally occur…. It’s existence can only be reasonably explained by some external, organizing force. It is impossible that an encyclopedia could have occurred at random, without intelligent design behind it.” ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin’s Demise

“…there are trillions times trillions times trillions of different ways that a single gene could have come together. Yet only one way would lead to a functional DNA molecule.”  ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis, Darwin’s Demise

“…when the odds that a particular process will produce a given effect get too low, good scientists normally look for a better explanation…. [However] At this point, evolutionists often say that ‘Time is the hero of the plot…. Sure, the odds are low, but there’s all that time, nearly 5 billion years!’ But 5 billion years is only about 1017 seconds, and the whole universe contains fewer than 1080 atoms. So even by the wildest ‘guesstimates,’ the universe isn’t old enough or big enough to reach odds like the 1 in 103,000,000 that Huxley, an evolutionist, estimated as the odds against the evolution of the horse.” ~ Gary Parker, Creation: Facts of Life (brackets, mine)

“The occurrence of any event where the chances are beyond one in ten followed by 50 zeros is an event which we can state with certainty will never happen, no matter how much time is allotted and no matter how many conceivable opportunities could exist for the event to take place.” ~ Emile Borel


“Some people like to call mutations ‘the means of creation.’ But mutations don’t create; they corrupt!” ~ Gary Parker




Evolution: The Big Bang and the Universe

“It is emphatically the case that life could not arise spontaneously in a primeval soup of any kind…. Furthermore, no geological evidence indicates an organic soup ever existed on this planet. We may therefore with fairness call this scenario ‘the myth of the pre-biotic soup.” ~ Sir Fred Hoyle

“The probability of life originating from accident is comparable to the probability of the unabridged dictionary resulting from an explosion in a printing shop.” ~ Joe White and Nicholas Comninellis

“The complexity of the simplest known type of cell is so great that it is impossible to accept that such an object could have been thrown together by some kind of freakish, vastly improbable event. Such an occurrence would be indistinguishable from a miracle.” ~ Dr. Denton


That the universe was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, I will no more believe than that the accidental jumbling of the alphabet would fall into a most ingenious treatise of philosophy.” ~ Jonathan Swift, The Works of Jonathan Swift: Miscellaneous Essays

“Life cannot have had a random beginning. … The trouble is that there are about two thousand enzymes, and the chance of obtaining them all in a random trial is only one part in 10 to the 40,000 power, an outrageously small probability that could not be faced even if the whole universe consisted of organic soup.” ~ Dr. Fred Hoyle and Dr. Chandra Wickramasinghe


"Another source of conviction in the existence of God, connected with the reason and not with the feelings, impressed me as having much more weight. This follows from the extreme difficulty or rather impossibility of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe, including man with his capacity for looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity. When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look to a First Cause having an intelligent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a Theist." ~ Charles Darwin; What Darwin Really Said, pg 97; originally from The Autobiography of Charles Darwin, 1809-1882, edited by Darwin's grand-daughter Nora Barlow

“There are only two possible explanations as to how life arose: Spontaneous generation arising to evolution or a supernatural creative act of God…. There is no other possibility. Spontaneous generation was scientifically disproved 120 years ago by Louis Pasteur and others, but that just leaves us with only one other possibility… that life came as a supernatural act of creation by God, but I can’t accept that philosophy because I do not want to believe in God. Therefore I choose to believe in that which I know is scientifically impossible, spontaneous generation leading to evolution.” ~ Dr. George Wald

Popular Posts

Did Pontius Pilate actually exist?

April Fools

Quote of the Week: Ravi Zacharias On The Problem of Evil