2 THE CASE AGAINST EVOLUTION 



Of the second group, some, like Osborn, distinguish between 

 the law of evolution and the theoretical explanations of this 

 law proposed by individual scientists. The existence of the 

 law itself, they insist, is not open to question; it is only with 

 respect to hypotheses explanatory of the aforesaid law that 

 doubt and disagreement exist. The obvious objection to such 

 a solution is that, if evolution is really a law of nature, it 

 ought to be reducible to some clear-cut mathematical formula 

 comparable to the formulations of the laws of constant, mul- 

 tiple, and reciprocal proportion in chemistry, or of the laws of 

 segregation, assortment, and linkage in genetics. Assuming, 

 then, that it is a genuine law, how is it that to-day no one 

 ventures to formulate this evolutional law in definite and 

 quantitative terms? 



Others, comprising, perhaps, a majority, prefer to distin- 

 guish between the fact and the causes of evolution. Practi- 

 cally all scientists, they aver, agree in accepting evolution as 

 an established fact; it is only with reference to the agencies 

 of evolution that controversy and uncertainty are permissible. 

 To this contention one may justly reply that, by all the 

 canons of linguistic usage, a fact is an observed or experienced 

 event, and that hitherto no one in the past or present has ever 

 been privileged to witness with his senses even so elemental 

 a phenomenon in the evolutionary process as the actual origin 

 of a new and genuine organic species. If, however, the admis- 

 sion be made that the term "fact" is here used in an untech- 

 nical sense to denote an inferred event postulated for the pur- 

 pose of interpreting certain natural phenomena, then the 

 statement that the majority of modem scientists agree as to 

 the "fact" of evolution may be allowed to stand, with no fur- 

 ther comment than to note that the formidable number and 

 prestige of the advocates fail to intimidate us. Considerations 

 of this sort are wholly irrelevant, for in science no less than in 

 philosophy authority is worth as much as its arguments and 

 no more. 



The limited knowledge of the facts possessed by the biolo- 



