Scientists backtrack on Adam and Eve

An internationally-known thinktank run by evangelical scientists has reversed its view on the literal existence of Adam and Eve.

BioLogos – which has been endorsed by influential voices such as Tim Keller, former bishop Tom Wright, and Fuller professor Richard Mouw – used to maintain that a literal Adam and Eve were scientifically impossible and that all humans could not have come from a single couple. They have now backtracked on that.

S. Joshua Swamidass, an associate professor at Washington University in St Louis who specialises in ‘computation at the intersection of medicine, chemistry and biology’ and is an evangelical Christian, says: ‘This change makes space for religious beliefs once thought to be in unresolvable conflict with mainstream science.

‘The BioLogos Foundation is an important organisation in the conversation between evolutionary science and the church. Founded by Francis Collins, the director of the NIH, BioLogos has done a lot of good over the years. In particular, the organisation has given voice to many Christians who affirm evolutionary science. They also have, rightly, emphasised that the scientific evidence seems to demonstrate that humans share common ancestry with the great apes.

‘BioLogos’s position on Adam and Eve was understood to reflect the scientific consensus. But BioLogos’s new position shows that many of the claims in their past position were incorrect … BioLogos also quietly deleted several articles from their website, and these deletions are equally important to understanding the organisation’s past and current position.’

Swamidass explained that BioLogos’s previous position was that the genetic evidence demonstrated our ancestral population size was never less than 10,000 individuals at any point in the last 18 million years, and therefore Adam and Eve could not have been ancestors of us all. Another firm position was that the genetic evidence was ‘not compatible with Adam and Eve de novo [meaning ‘from the beginning’] or specially created without parents’.

Now, however, BioLogos says ‘options include … postulating that Adam and Eve were a special, historical pair who were indeed the ancestors of everyone alive today, but who were part of a larger population with whom their descendants could mate’ and that this ‘does not rule out de novo special creation’.

BioLogos president Deborah Haarsma has previously stated: ‘Over the years, we have removed old content from our website for many reasons, including articles … that overstated scientific claims, that unnecessarily excluded theological positions that are consistent with scientific evidence … we need to be honest when we overstate an argument.’

BioLogos was set up by Francis Collins, a Christian, who led the human genome project.