"Science is based on the assumption that natural laws are fixed and invariable. This assumption cannot be proven, therefore science itself is unproven. Another hole shot in evolution theory!"

One of my father's favorite anecdotes about science and religion comes from his university days, long before I ever stepped foot on a university campus myself. A student asked whether science can explain the meaning of life, and the professor didn't say a word. Instead, he turned his back, walked to the chalkboard, and wrote the word DESCRIBE in giant two foot tall letters. He then turned around, addressed the class, and explained that science describes the observable universe. It seeks to do no more, and no less. We should not confuse the specific conclusions or theories of science with its basic definition or its purpose.

In other words, it is a lie to say that science depends on the "assumption" that the universe follows fixed, invariable laws. When a scientist says that his theory is based on the "assumption" of the validity of certain physical laws, he or she is not saying that those laws themselves are assumptions. He or she is only saying that while each of those laws have their own separate justifications, he is not going to bother re-stating them for the purpose of beginning to work on his or her own theory, so they will simply be treated as assumptions. This is a classic example of creationists abusing short-hand terminology and grossly misinterpreting it.

Science is merely a descriptive endeavour, utilizing reason and the senses. It is a method, not a set of conclusions (as opposed to theology, which is a set of conclusions with no method). If observation had led to the conclusion that the laws of nature were variable, then scientific theories would have incorporated that conclusion. However, observations have not led to any such conclusion. Instead, they have led to the conclusion that those laws are fixed and invariant. Any "variation" in measured physical constants over the years has always fallen well within the margin of measurement error, so there has been, to date, no evidence whatsoever for the notion that the laws of physics change randomly.

Christian fundamentalists would love to produce verifiable evidence that this is not the case, but despite centuries of trying, they have never succeeded. The best they have ever offered is anecdotal "evidence" of miracles which are observed by believers under favourable conditions, and which they can never duplicate under controlled conditions. Their repeated attempts and failures have therefore only reinforced the conclusion that the laws of nature must indeed be invariant (or at least, invariant to such a degree that any variations are insignificant and unmeasurable). In spite of this legacy of failure, they still insist that the invariability of physical laws is some sort of random assumption, plucked out of thin air! What else are we supposed to conclude from the evidence? That in spite of the total lack of measured variation anywhere, that we should conclude random variations must exist everywhere? What sort of bizarre anti-logic would that be?

The fact that the descriptive models of science work, and have been successfully used to model phenomena both near and far, both in the present and in the distant past (as verified through examination of geological records and observations of distant astrophysical phenomena which would have occurred millions or billions of years ago) has led to the conclusion that the laws of physics are unchanging; that the universe is not random or subject to the capricious whims of fickle deities. Scientists did not simply leap to this conclusion out of blind faith, or make the assumption for their own aggrandizement. It is the creationists who assume that they did so, because they are so accustomed to such leaps of faith and self-aggrandizing delusions that they simply cannot see their way clear to a philosophy which doesn't rely on them.

This is a recurring theme in creationist thought: they project their own mentality onto others, and then accuse the victims of this defamation of being no more rational than they are. It is at this point that we must examine the creationists' own use of assumptions. While Christian fundamentalists are completely wrong in their assessment of the laws of physics as "assumptions", they are correct in their assessment of their own faith as a set of "assumptions". But even as assumptions go, it is a whopper: it isn't enough for them to assume that there is a God, or even to assume that he created us. They have to assume that the Bible is the literal truth, which is actually a way of incorporating hundreds of thousands of separate assumptions (all of the separate claims of the Bible) under one great meta-assumption which they call "Biblical Inerrancy". The fact that many of those claims are self-contradictory doesn't seem to bother them, and when confronted with some of the myriad inconsistencies, they complain that we're "nit-picking". What they fail to realize is that if the Bible were truly "inerrant", there would be no nits to pick! Even if the invariance of physical laws were an assumption, it would be a lie for creationists to claim that it is no worse than their own grandiose assumption of Biblical inerrancy, which cannot even pass the fundamental logical test of self-consistency.

Fallacy watch:

• Straw-man fallacy (assumes that the high stability of natural laws is an unsupportable premise when in fact it can be shown to follow from evidence).