Theory of Devolution - Introduction

The purpose of this article is to define a real base for the imaginary setting for "The World that he Gave" series of novels. (At present, they are unpublished.)

The power we call electricity is so commonplace that we do not stop to think of the wonder of it, but the early experimenters in this field. A bewildering, yet phenomenal power that was invisible except in it effect. It flowed along solid wire. Where could it be? It was easy to understand how water flowed in pipes driven by gravity. Electricity seemed to behave according to the same rules, but in some strange incomprehensible way. What was the gravity, to make it work? A similar dilemma exists today; how does gravity work? It is not inconceivable that other exciting discoveries await us. The series exploits this idea.

Devolution assumes that we humans once enjoyed a better state than the one we currently experience. The term 'state' encompasses state of mind, the relationship to the Earth and its wildlife, but in particular embodies spiritual status. The latter is such a broad classification that it will need further definition later in this article. In these discussions, it is important that we recognize that the use of the term 'state' allows large variations (of behaviour and beliefs) to exist within each of the states. Therefore, appearances or generalities must not lead to conclusions.

The artefacts for the devolution theory are observations of society and its written records. Essentially these are human behaviours and beliefs. It implies two periods - now and then. It also implies one or more, future states for humans on Earth. Some believe that a third state exists today and has been here in greater or lesser degrees for about two thousand years.

The theory of evolution also has many well-known artefacts, which are mainly the fossilized remains of plants and living creatures that died long ago. The process is so common that it supplies much of the Earth's fuel as fossil fuels.

Observers of fossils make assumptions as to their age and species from many scientific measurements and some very unscientific comparisons. Fossilization takes place in an amazingly short time, sometimes quickly enough to fossilize soft tissue before it rots or otherwise decays. It even occurs within the living human body by fossilizing organic foreign objects within months to a few years.

It is described as 'turning to stone' or petrifaction. Typically, calcium and silicon based minerals replace some or all of the organic matter while retaining the original structure and size. The presence of water supplies a ready source of minerals necessary in the process. Determining the age of the artefact when other materials have replaced the organic materials, is clearly a challenge. If we could only reverse the process and bring the fossils back to life, what stories would they tell?

Devolution of humankind is only a theory and not a philosophy, which would need to be a far more detailed analysis of current human behaviour and thus falls outside of the definition of our limited artefacts.

Theory of Devolution - Overview

A definition for the current age must surely be 'The Materialistic Age', well at least for so-called First World countries. Third World countries still suffer desperate poverty. Many countries are a mixture of both conditions. However, this has existed for as long as humans formed tribes and nations. Wealth often came through oppression resulting from an imbalance of power. Today, technology has introduced entertainment, transportation, productivity and a measure of wealth for the masses previously reserved for oppressors and royalty. Technology will increasingly play a vital and important part in the future but if technology equates to tools then it is not a new phenomenon. Tools made of wood, skin, bone and stone followed by the control of fire preceded the manufacture and use of papyrus and the building of the earliest pyramids. The Bronze and Iron Ages came later. This speaks volumes about the importance of the written word to our earliest ancestors and indicates the focus and direction of their great intelligence.

Tools or technology is thus all part of the current state of humankind. This differentiates humans from the animal kingdom, but it is not the only thing. The most primitive of people also have strange behaviours. They practise the worship of seen and unseen entities that they reason deserve their sacrifices and worship activities. The actions could arguably be an instinctive response of the spirit, but there is no question that it is a conscious decision of the mind. Animals too, may appear to have strange behaviours, such as the dog that turns in circles before settling down to sleep. We understand this to be a good defensive action, but it is instinctive, not one of its intellect.

Whether humans have this extra quality, along with intelligence, called the spirit, is debatable because by definition, it is not physical and therefore it is not physically detectable, but we see its results, like the invisible wind, that reveals itself by its effects.

There is a story that precedes writing, about a time when the spirit was the most significant and important part of the human being and apparently there was no need for tools. The human's name was Adam and he communicated easily, naturally and openly with his creator who was his Father and God. As a loving father, God saw that Adam needed a wife. It is significant that he took a rib from Adam to make a wife for him. He did this after putting Adam into a 'deep sleep' - the first anaesthetic.

This reminds us that when God created the birds and animals the record says repeatedly that after their kind they would increase in numbers, implying that He created male and female for each creature. Adam's rib was a simple way to get all the genes and DNA, the signature parts of him that made him uniquely human. Her name was Eve. They lived in a beautiful garden, called Eden. It provided for their every need and for the needs of their animals. Adam's most difficult task was to name the animals.

The state they lived in, in Eden was very different to their end state. This end state is the same state we have today, or is it?

Theory of Devolution - The DNA Record

The greatest record of a species, of all species, is the DNA, but even this has limitations. DNA as a means of determining a proof of the single pair of human parents of all humans is confounded by the way the male's Y-chromosomes seem to disappear from their descendents rather rapidly. (Y-chromosomes also come from the genes of the maternal father and so descendents can lose the DNA of a pure male parents' line within a few generations.) Another problem seems to be the lack of DNA from our ancestors. We also seem to be able to determine our non-human ancestors rather more accurately than we do the human ones. Imagine trying to trace evolutionary paths after a few iterations of copy-and-paste in the animal kingdom and if Adam resulted from a similar operation too.

The mapping of the Homo sapiens human genome has revealed more than one hundred genes that are not used. Now that is an observation. Based on religion or training that observation may be phrased differently e.g., "… one hundred genes are no longer used." This implies something not apparent in the observation, for instance from an expectation, that evolution is the source of these unused genes. Many conclusions in the theory of evolution derive from such observations and generalities.

In addition, the changes of state need millions and millions of years to make them more believable. This introduces the need for 'missing links' to bridge the conceptual jumps necessary to move from the one state to the next.

The recording and analysing of DNA records, use computers extensively. This is interesting because a computer program may also contain many routines that are unused in that program. These are located in libraries of common or general-purpose routines and are typically part of the purchased programming language package. All programs will use some of the routines, but only a very strange program would use all of the routines - perhaps only a manufacturer's test program.

If human designers see value in leaving unused portions of code in their programs, why shouldn't the Creator himself do so as well? He has developed this thing for programming and shaping life forms called DNA, a library of common routines for building eyes, ears, brains, limbs etc. He has developed a method for defining small differences in each of these for different species, which may live in different environments, called genes. He has a variety of programming techniques that takes humans years of study to understand. It seems reasonable to leave a few unused genes in the DNA. It even indicates the method He might have used to create such a variety of creatures - by copying a known good and tested idea from an existing species to create either something similar or even something vastly different. Programmers (and others) call this copy-and-paste.

One day, millions and millions of years from now, scientists will observe these unused portions of code and call them 'fossil routines' because this will support the theory that all computer programs came from a single ancestor program. Over thousands of years, small differences … okay this is stupid, I know, but just as stupid as saying evolution is the only way that we came into being.

There is a 'self help' built into the DNA model. It is most profound. Darwin observed it, without understanding how it happened, in his famous 'finches' observation, how finches had adapted quite significantly in various places around the world. His equally famous conclusion from the observation has extrapolated from being 'evolution within the species' to the dangerous and inconclusive 'evolution of the species.' Almost without exception when asked for proof of evolution, evolutionists offer examples of this self-help within the species. The problem, of course, is that the other takes millions and millions of years, just to observe. No one these days, is prepared to wait that long.

Theory of Devolution -The Written Record

The earliest humans had this strange passion to record things. Very soon, in terms of years, not even generations, they would have noticed the cycles of the seasons and related them to the cycles of the moon. Some bright spark would have marked off the cycles on a rock or tree and writing would have been born. Others would draw pictures, some on the walls of caves and maybe elsewhere, but only the pictures in the protection of the caves remained.

Then there were the early Mesopotamians who wrote on stones. Perhaps we should say rather they scratched, chipped and chiselled on stone. This had a huge advantage of being rather more permanent. It shouldn't come as a great surprise that their story of creation, where the creators spoke the world into being, was the central theme for other people of the region's records of creation. While the stories may be similar, the principles behind the creation stories differ. The Bible story indicates a single deity speaking the creation into being. Others see multiple deities involved and sometimes even becoming part of the creation.

Abram the Hebrew came from Ur in Sumer, a region of Mesopotamia. The Sumerians were a highly developed and cultured people. There early ancestors wrote with a reed, on soft red clay, using wedge shaped symbols, called cuneiform. Abram would have known their stories of creation and the flood and believed in a multitude of gods and demons, but then God revealed himself to him as the single true God. Certainly, his newfound faith modified his understanding of creation. If God asked him, he would even have changed it completely. Later God changed his name to Abraham, the great patriarch of the Hebrews. God blest Abraham with great wealth and even if he could not write, he would have had scribes in his employ. Since he travelled, the writings would no doubt have been on scrolls. The Bible as we know it probably had its beginning then. Later of course, Moses would have collected and edited the stories into the Torah. Moses too had long conversations with God and these would have influenced the writings.

While there are common elements in the creation stories of Egypt and Mesopotamia the story of Eden is unique to the Torah and thus to the Bible, but it seems well integrated into the ancestry of Abraham and it is safe to assume it was part of some written record prior to the work of Moses. Since the names of Adam and Eve have Hebrew connotations it can be assumed it was very much part of Abraham's tradition and literature.

Theory of Devolution - The Existence of the Garden of Eden

How true is the account of the Garden of Eden? Stories are best spoken. As such, we would expect them not to be precise presentations of truth, but perhaps, if anything, to be vehicles of truth. This is a matter of personal conviction and faith. Remember however, the clear claims that God inspired the Bible, and the inference that this extends to His divine protection and intervention in compilation, editing and interpreting of all therein.

Even so you may ask, "How does this help? Much of the Bible is about the sins of the great heroes of faith, believers in God. Are we to follow their sinful examples?"

Of course not.

"Are we to learn from them?"

Absolutely!

You may also ask, "Does the Creation story and the Garden of Eden story contain truth."

Yes - emphatically, there is great and essential truth in them.

Finally, we come down to it, "Are they accurate word for word - and in particular is the six 'days' of creation precisely what it says?"

If the answer is 'Yes' will you stop reading further and discount the previous statement about 'essential truth'?

Alternatively, if the answer is 'No' will you stop reading further and discount the previous statement about 'essential truth'?

Rather read the Bible and decide.

Theory of Devolution - The Eden State

To understand the world at the time when Adam and Eve lived in their garden home, we need to examine in more detail the principles of their dominion. God gave Adam a job. Essentially, it was to care for His creation. The biblical record speaks about this as the heavens (sky, stars, outer space etc.), the whole world and the entire animal kingdom. Even today that is a tall order, but for Adam it was a reasonable, attainable and enjoyable task, which can only mean that he had the abilities, the wherewithal for the position. To Adam these resources were natural, but to us they may appear to be supernatural.

There was no need for tools, as we understand them, no roads and bridges, no vehicles, no aircraft, no radios and no scientific instruments. There are no recorded details of the tools of his dominion, however throughout recorded history there are accounts of what we call miracles that give us glimpses of the tools that God might have given to Adam. Examples of these might be:

• Making a dry road through the Red Sea
• Feeding the nation of Israelites throughout their journey through the desert
• Blowing down the walls of a city with loud sounds
• Stopping the sun in the sky for hours
• Instantaneous distance travel
• Filling every available container in the neighbourhood from a small container of oil
• Changing water into wine
• Walking on water
• Raising the dead
• Healing the sick
• Lifting off the ground and ascending into heaven

If all of these miracles were available to Adam before the fall, then journeys to other planets and galaxies were not impossible. In short, if Adam had all that the carrot of technology promises for us today and for tomorrow, then he could have done the job required of him.

He decided with his wife, mother of all humanity, to get smart instead.

When God banished Adam and Eve from the Garden, the commission to care for His creation remained, but the supernatural powers to do the job - of communication and travel, if they existed, remained lost to the world, locked in Eden.

Adam's rib was a cell factory, a source of his DNA, but where did all the other parts for Eve come from? Human's came as the last of a long line of DNA based creation. It hints that it followed the same pattern. What happened then was a tried and tested process. Why God didn't create Eve at the same time as Adam, is an interesting question. As if God, the Father for Adam should somehow have been enough.

When He created the animals perhaps, God had sufficient DNA prepared for male and female, but again the question arises, what was the clay used to build the bodies? Then there is an intriguing concept, once God shaped the body, of filling that frame with cells and then reproducing the DNA into every cell.

It was not a simple gene modification as we have today, but a complete DNA transplant. Dare I suggest instant cloning as a possibility? Interesting times are in store for the scientists.

It is a logical assumption that all the miraculous power toys were available to Adam and Eve, but if not, that is not the issue. What is important is that the miracles were available throughout history. In great grace, God very often implements them through individual people and occasionally through angels, but always for the benefit of people. Perhaps this principle is an example of one of those laws. He is still our loving Father.

Theory of Devolution - The Current State

The first essential for Adam and his descendents was to communicate, gather food and find a safe place to stay. Technology was in its infancy. Its first use was in tools to ease the task of survival. If not the next task, then sooner than later, it was to record their vanity, laws, history and stories.

What we do know is that writing preceded the Stone Age, so how long did our earliest human ancestors take to learn to write? It seems realistic that primitive language was incomplete, that gestures made up the shortfall, and besides being a part of the process of extending the language, those gestures, strokes and shapes - pictures, would soon progress from signs in the air, to marks on the ground and then to a more permanent media. The spoken word is more about principle. The written word brings precision.

A casual observer of humankind today might see that the ultimate purpose of man is to replace all that God can do for him, with creations of his own hand. Technology has made huge strides in all the fields of human endeavour, energy, medicine, travel, education, communications and entertainment to name a few.

As technology solves the problems of functionality, it addresses the desire for comfort, luxury, style and fashion.

No longer is a young man with a family, committed for life to the company store.

Now all individuals are tempted into becoming slaves to the system and their own desires. In vain, they cry, "Stop it I like it."

Religion and churches are falling into disuse, but religious fads are favoured. Fashion takes care of them in due course as the next fad comes along.

There is little respect for law as situational analysis takes its place.

Atheistic psychologists treat spiritual problems.

Now this is really generalising. Of course, wonderful work takes place in all fields, especially for mental and physical disorders, but for everything there is a price and this then presents a choice. What do I need or want and what can I afford. Funds rarely go to the greatest need.

The journey back to the technology of Eden is long, arduous and expensive.

Theory of Devolution - The nature of God's consistency

Now summarising the two states we have:

1. 'God does it all'
2. 'We do it all.'

Most religions consider God as consistent. We could put money on the fact that tomorrow the sun will come up. If it didn't the loss of the money would be the least of our problems. It is strange that evolutionists point to the consistency between species as a reason to say that God did not create them when a common design indicates so clearly a common designer.

Now extending this concept to the spiritual world and perhaps to heaven then we can expect that God would put systems in place. It would have laws like the laws of physics, such as gravity and the conservation of energy. The laws themselves may be radically different, perhaps even inconceivable, but the system would operate consistently. God would determine its function and that would then explain some spiritual phenomena.

This sounds like a subject out of Bible School and maybe that is where it would receive a more comprehensive treatment, but this is at the heart of our discussion. Is it possible (again) to have heaven on earth?

Well assuming that Eden was that way and assuming something happened to break the terms of Adam's exclusion from Eden, then surely, if we see the consistency of God then it is.

Way back in the Garden God makes a prophecy that bible scholars say points to the Messiah (to use the Hebrew form) or Christ (to use the Greek form). In the curse of the serpent He says that the offspring of the woman will 'crush your head and you will bruise his heel'. We could debate (and get nowhere) whether this prophecy has been fulfilled or not, but what is clear is that Jesus Christ came to be a sacrifice to pay for all penalties for sin before or after His death, including Adam's sin.

Now, whether that reinstated the Eden State, or not is another discussion for Bible School, but for them it is not an issue. Their interest is how to preach the good news of that forgiveness. In this hypothesis, the issue is, if reinstated or not, can we harness that power? If it is there, it has been there all along. Could we stumble on it in our scientific experimentations? Could we exploit it? Like energy, used by both good and evil, would that power be available to all? If we point to the constancy of God, the answer must be 'Yes'. The availability of Eden to us would depend on the answer to our previous question, but we are not going there. It is only the power, which we want.

The series "The World That He Gave" presents the story of the discovery and exploitation of this resource.

Theory of Devolution - Conclusion

Interpretation and controversy only make the records of humankind interesting. How do they stand up in the courts? Even to make a foolproof Identity Document is a great challenge for our technology. Identity theft is a recognisable and regular crime. The Internet is challenging core principles such as intellectual property and the freedom of information. How can we prove who we are, what we communicated and originated and what we have and haven't done? Our religions tell us that Karma and the Final Judgement indicate that in the end we will have justice. Clearly, our records are useless for this. We want a judgement with a full, complete, honest and unbiased record that will reveal the thoughts, motives and attitudes of all parties involved. In short, a record we expect an omniscient, omnipresent and omnipotent God to provide.

The novels in "The World that he Gave" series, with the licence of the writer of fiction, make the toys of this record and miracle powers available. Firstly to scientists and then to a witch doctor and hints that anyone could use them if they obey the laws of the Universe that provides them, thus hinting at a return of the human race to Eden. Humanity devolved from Eden to the lesser life we have today, but under certain conditions, the human race may return to that former glory.

The books do not explain the thinking behind the "power" that they discover. They may be science fiction, in which case they are more science than fiction, or drama and they certainly examine human emotion, but with the above background, booksellers may classify them as esoteric or even religious, but whatever their genre, it is the hope of the author, that they will be equally enjoyable, entertaining and challenging.