Episode Transcript
Welcome to Faith and science. I'm Dr. John Ashton.
Just recently I heard about church having some meetings with regard to formulating their policy, with regard to possibly employees working in different church institutions and this sort with regard to vaccination. And essentially they had an overall ruling, I think, associated. Well, the church's policies were based on the Bible, obviously and then they were including another section on peer reviewed science and it seemed like a number of church folk weren't very comfortable with that.
So hence they were having these meetings about and whether or not things should be based on peer review science, particularly in the area of controversial issues like vaccination, theory of evolution, Big Bang theory, even sunscreen use. There's obviously a lot of controversy between scientists and vaccines. Of course, as we saw during the COVID crisis, became quite an emotive issue.
One particular reason for this of course, was that the vaccines were in some cases mandated for employment. And this caused quite a bit of, bit of concern. And it was interesting seeing the science at the time because this was really problematic.
We know the vaccines were given into like you had your injection in your arm, for example, so it stimulated the humoral immune system. But Covid was a virus that was transmitted through the air, into the body, through the respiratory system, which of course is protected by the mucosal immune system. And so in actual fact, of course a humoral vaccination wouldn't stimulate the mucosal immune system.
So in actual fact, while the vaccines would help in many individuals increase their body's resistance to the virus and help them recover more quickly from it, it wouldn't really play a significant role in preventing the spread of the virus because as the people picked up the virus early on, even if they were immunised, they would still be spreading it because the mucosal immune system wouldn't have been stimulated. And so here we see there was a lot of misinformation. I saw some of this and I was really surprised that, you know, sort of government health officials and this sort of thing seemed unaware of difference.
Of course, another interesting factor, for example, in the case of vaccines, when we talk about peer review science, was back in 2020, Monash University, you know, a very high ranking university here in Australia, did some in vitro tests using ivermectin, which was a very safe, well established drug with very strong antiviral properties. And it was found of course that in vitro ivermectin, WIP or have a massive 5,000 reduction in the virus levels at 48 hours. And it's interesting that the Use of Ivermectin, of course, seemed to be stymied, at least in certain countries.
However, in 2021, of course, researchers from Newcastle University in the UK published a meta analysis of where ivermectin had been used around the world and found that it could play a significant in reducing the effects of COVID So where do we go with regard to peer reviewed science? You know, all sort of papers that are published in reputable journals are peer reviewed. And when we say peer reviewed science, do we mean the bulk of peer reviewed science? For example, I've mentioned that, you know, I published an article in Chemistry Australia called A Creationist View of the Intelligent Design Debate. It was published as a peer review feature article in that journal back in 2007, but a number of other scientists really objected to that article being published, which resulted in the Royal Australian Chemical Institute removing it from their website.
Of course they couldn't redraw the hard copy of the journal that had been posted out, but so it just shows you some interesting areas there. And of course, when I contacted, for example, one of the opponents of my paper and asked them, well, where was the evidence that he had that I was wrong? His reply was, well, we don't have the evidence yet, but we will. You know, it's a bit strange.
We have another situation, for example, in regard to the Big Bang theory, researchers at Princeton and Harvard published a paper in Scientific America, I think it was in February 2017, titled Pop Goes the Universe, where they pointed out that really there was no experimental basis for inflation theory that underpins the Big Bang. And of course, that immediately caused a response of about 40 leading academics saying, whoa, that paper shouldn't be published. There's all these papers that have been published supporting the Big Bang theory.
And the authors replied accordingly. The original authors said, well, hang on, we shouldn't be invoking authority on this. Let's have a discussion about it.
The evidence actually isn't there for the Big Bang theory. So when we come to, you know, claiming peer reviewed science, we can be on very shaky ground and we don't arrive at truth by counting numbers. And there are many cases of this opposition to the Big Bang theory.
For example, a number of leading astronomers wrote to new scientists back, I think it was 2003, astronomers like Hilton Arc, Herman Bondi, Thomas Gold, these are the top astronomers in the world pointing out that, hang on, there isn't any evidence for the Big Bang theory. And yet if we wanted to go to peer reviewed science, you know, we'd say, oh well, there's all these peer reviewed papers for the Big Bang theory. Similarly of course for the theory of evolution.
We know that we have evidence now that the theory of evolution is absolutely impossible in terms of generating new body parts and new types of creatures. Right, sure, things can happen, can generate, you know, small mutations, can generate changes, but we can't produce new body parts. And now, you know, there are many, many leading scientists working in the life sciences field that are very strongly opposed to the theory of evolution.
So the evidence just isn't lacking there. But if we wanted to draw on the claims of peer reviewed science, again where we're saying, oh okay, the bulk of the evidence would be in that so called evidence is presented, is in the area of, you know, supporting the theory of evolution. And this leads us to a very interesting question too with regard to artificial intelligence generated information because it is going to essentially utilise the majority position.
And of course coming back to vaccines, while vaccines, you know, have certainly reduced health issues around the world. Tetanus vaccine's very important. We eliminate smallpox and a lot of other infectious diseases using vaccines.
There are also a number of issues that have been raised with, you know, vaccines that haven't worked real well and of course, you know, side effects and serious side effects and these sort of things. And there are number of scientists, for example, that claim the use, multiple use of vaccines within very young children is linked to the increased rise in autism. So a lot of these things when we come to peer review science are debatable.
And so I think if we resort to these areas, we're on pretty shaky ground. We have to evaluate the cases on their merit and really evaluate the evidence. And often this takes a very broad view of the knowledge.
I remember published a paper in Cancer Causes and Control many years ago looking at melanoma, for example, and the link with sun exposure. And again, my findings were that it wasn't necessarily linked to sun exposure. Matter of fact, sun exposure seemed to protect against melanoma because melanoma seemed to arise in areas least exposed to the sun and this sort of thing.
So there are a lot of, you know, again, controversy about this and I recently read of some another report that was given at a conference where a researcher stood up and said look, for every case of a death due to sun exposure, healthy sun exposure has probably saved 50 other deaths. Because regular sun exposure helps protect against heart disease, helps lower blood pressure, helps lower blood sugar, helps lower cholesterol, helps strengthen bones. And so, you know, weakened bones of course can lead to fractures and falls from or fractures from falls and multiple resulting serious injuries.
And so we can see that a lot of these things are a lot more complicated. So when we come to describing policy in peer reviewed literature and what even constitutes peer reviewed literature, we're on pretty shaky ground. And again, remembering that we don't arrive at truth by counting gnosis, we arrive at truth by actually finding out truth, what is true, what is correct.
And the beauty is that as Christians, even though the Bible doesn't talk about issues like vaccination, sunscreen exposure, you know, these sort of things, it certainly does tell us about our origins and how we came to be here. And we also have overwhelming evidence that the Bible can be trusted. We have the evidence of fulfilled prophecy.
We have the evidence of the testimony of changed human lives as people have accepted Jesus their Saviour. And remember, as Jesus taught, that we need to take him into our lives, just like we take bread into our lives. And it change becomes part of us, really, those molecules that constitute the components in bread, yes, become the parts of the molecules that build, build us and make us to take on board Jesus and his teachings, because he again described himself as the way, the truth and the life.
Because the promise is that when we take Jesus on board, the opportunity then is we to inherit eternal life, which is, you know, far better than any of these other issues that we deal with, I guess, because the reason we can trust the Bible is that it has been inspired by these authors over the centuries. And they all fit together, this coherent picture of a creator God who loves us, who desired a relationship with us. But early on, man stuffed up by disobeying God, by breaking the basic ten commandments that God had set out there.
But God offers us a choice. Obviously, God needed to eliminate evil from the system, and that results in death. Death is the elimination.
But God offered us an alternative. He came as Jesus and died in our place. So that if we choose that because God has died in our place, we will be entitled then to live with him forever.
And so it's choosing to make that choice that whether or not I want to live in God's kingdom, I want to live in a kingdom as God originally designed. I want to have that relationship and know this amazing being that created everything that we have and know. And this is the beautiful story that the Bible has.
And the fascinating thing is that as we look into it, more and more science supports the biblical account from so many aspects, whether it be the science of evolution, whether it be the science of cosmology, which really isn't a science, I suppose. But when we look at archaeology, when we look at sociology, when we look at psychology, we can see overwhelming evidence that the Bible account is true. As well, of course, as the prophecies and the public miracles that Jesus performed that demonstrated clearly that he truly was God.
You've been listening to faith and science. And remember, if you want to re listen to these episodes, just Google or 3abn Australia.org and click on the radio button and you'll see the programmes there.
And there are many, many programmes covering a range of topics that provide the overwhelming evidence that we can believe the Bible and the Bible's account of our loving creator. And remember to share these links, things that you found that are really interesting and inspiring with your friends on social media too. I'm Dr.
John Ashton. Have a great day. You've been listening to a production of 3 Airbn Australia radio.
