Evolution
Summary
The existence of a Divine Watchmaker is not the only possible explanation of how it is, that animals and plants are so well adapted to their functions.
Charles Darwin’s (1809–82) theory of evolution by natural selection, explained in his book The Origin of Species (1859), gives an alternative explanation of this phenomenon. By a process of, survival of the fittest, those animals and plants best suited to their environments, lived to pass on their characteristics to their offspring. Scientists have been able to account for the mechanism of evolution in terms of inherited genes. This process explains how such marvellous adaptations to environment as are found in the animal and plant kingdoms could have occurred, without needing to introduce the notion of God.
Of course Darwin’s theory of evolution in no way disproves God’s existence and many Christians accept it as the best explanation of how plants, animals, and human beings came to be as they are. They believe that God created the mechanism of evolution itself.
However, Darwin’s theory does weaken the power of the Design Argument since it explains the same effects without any mention of God
