To what extent evolution theory represents the objective truth is the crucial question; one which the Christian church needs to take on board. The presence of an automatic process - natural selection - which may be used by nature to ensure the survival of any given species does not contradict the proposition of special creation by God. Indeed, the mechanism may be viewed as vital to the continued survival of each individual species; an important device which restores, strengthens and maintains the discrete identity of the species.

Most of the creation process which appears in the book of Genesis is simply stated as 'God created ...', but in the more detailed account of the creation of mankind, we are invited to see a little further into the creation process itself. Here God causes the created man to fall into a deep sleep in order to make use of bodily material (the rib) which he then chooses to form into the woman73. In this episode, do we see the explanation which finally ties the scientific findings to the biblical record? Did God similarly make use of previously created life forms at each separate stage of the creation process? It is an interesting and intriguing possibility.

Successive revisions of the evolution theory have struggled to find the answer to the problem which is represented by the abrupt gaps which are recorded in the fossils. These sudden jumps may represent crucial evidence for the proposal that a series of special creations rather than a gradual evolution actually took place. Thus we must conclude that the available evidence appears to support the proposition that the various life forms which exist on the planet utilise the process of natural selection to maintain balance and ensure their continued survival. But there appears to be insufficient evidence to conclude that the process of species mutation, refined by the action of the law of the survival of the fittest, as proposed by evolution theory, has accounted for the arrival of man.

QUAD ERRAT DEMONSTRANDUM

God does not play dice with the world. - Albert Einstein

One of the most enduring mathematical puzzles, which had perplexed scholars for hundreds of years, was set by the great French mathematician Pierre de Fermat; it became known as Fermat’s Last Theorem. Tantalisingly, Fermat’s own proof of the theorem, to which he only alludes in his notebook, was lost to scholarship. Hence, it became the dream of many modern mathematicians to be able to construct a mathematical proof for his theory. This tremendous intellectual feat has recently been accomplished by the English mathematician Andrew Wiles, who worked on the problem for fully seven years. Fermat's Last Theorem, a sort of progression of the ancient Pythagoras Theorem, is proved according to the rules of mathematics.

Every secondary school student is familiar with one of the many proofs of the Pythagoras Theorem. So many of the practical mathematical problems we encounter in our physical world can be simplified, expressed in terms of trigonometry, and then solved via the application of Pythagoras. We see the same basic formula, postulated by the Greek mathematician - although credited as the originator of the theorem which bears his name, the principle was used by both the ancient Egyptians and the Babylonians - applied time after time to a multitude of apparently unrelated problems.