Henry Morris wrote in Impact #26:
The evolutionary explanation for origins, although impossible either to prove or to test scientifically, is nevertheless defended by its proponents on the basis that it is the only explanation which is naturalistic, not involving the “supernatural” element of a divine Creator. According to a leading British evolutionist:
“The theory of evolution (is) a theory universally accepted not because it can be proved by logically coherent evidence to be true but because the only alternative, special creation, is clearly incredible.” (D.M.S. Watson, “Adaptation,” Nature, Vol. 123 [sic Vol. 124] (1929), p. 233).Special creation, of course, is a perfectly “credible” concept if God exists, so this statement is a tacit admission that the theory of evolution is fundamentally atheistic, an attempt to account for the universe and life without God.
Answers in Genesis in a rebuttal to Bishop Spong provided the same quote (correctly cited) but described Watson as “one of the leading biologists and science writers of his day.” Another creationist article, “Why Do People Believe in Evolution?” tells us:
…Professor D.M.S. Watson, who held the position of the Chair of Evolution at the University of London for more than twenty years, echoed the same sentiments when he stated that evolution itself is accepted by zoologists, not because it has been observed to occur or can be proven by logically coherent evidence to be true, but because the only alternative, special creation, is incredible (1929, 123 [sic 124]:233). These kinds of statements leave little to the imagination, and make it clear that those who say such things believe in evolution not because of any evidence, but instead because they have made up their minds, a priori, that they are not going to believe in God.
“Harun Yahya” a fundamentalist Islamic creationist from Turkey, in “Scientists Confirm the Signs of God” described Watson as “the famous English zoologist and evolutionist.” A few minutes at an internet search engine will provide many other examples of creationists using this quote.
First of all, the quoted article was published over seven decades ago. That such old quotes must so continually brought up speaks volumes to the quality of creationist arguments. If a decades old source was cited to attack views on physics or chemistry it would be considered laughable. Why should biology be considered any different? And a lot has happened since 1929. That is before the modern conception of Darwinism was formulated and before a great deal of evidence for evolution and how it works was found. Also many creationist web sites are saying that Watson was important evolutionist. This is simply a false statement. Watson is not listed in any of the books on the history of evolutionary biology that I have checked. He is not in any references on important scientists that I have checked either. Watson was a minor figure at best in his own time and has pretty much been forgotten today. I dare say that one could “prove” anything by quoting “authorities” regardless how long they have been dead, regardless to how out-of-date their views were, and regardless how “important” they were.
But even if the Watson quote was not hopelessly out-of-date and even if Watson was an influential figure in evolutionary biology the quote would still be invalid because it is out-of-context. One must ask why Watson thought that special creation is “clearly incredible.” The answer is that the evidence has ruled it out. In context Watson writing long before the vast majority of research on natural selection was done, gave the opinion that Darwinism might someday become the dominant view of how evolution happens because the competing views will be disproven by the evidence. He also believed that this is how evolution was established.
Lets look at some relevant passages of what Watson wrote in the August 10, 1929 issue of Nature. What I am quoting can be found in various sections of the article that appears on pages 231 to 234. What Morris quoted will be in green though note that different creationists have quoted different parts of the article:
The only great generalization which has so far come from zoological studies is that of evolution….
Evolution itself is accepted by zoologists not because it has been observed to occur or is supported by logically coherent arguments, but because it does fit all the facts of taxonomy, of palæontology, and geographical distribution, and because no alternative explanation is credible.
Whilst the fact of evolution is accepted by every biologist, the mode in which it has occurred and the mechanism by which it has been brought about are still disputable….
…
It is not unusual for a student of fossils to discuss the habits of an extinct animal on the basis of a structural resemblance of its ‘ adaptive features ’ to those of a living animal and then to pass on to make use of his conclusions as if they were facts in the discussion of an evolutionary history or of the mode of origin of a series of sediments.
In extreme cases such evidence may be absolutely reliable : no man faced with an ichthyosaur so perfectly preserved that the outlines of its fins are visible can possibly doubt that it is an aquatic animal, and such a conclusion based on structure is supported by the entire absence of ichthyosaurs in continental deposits of appropriate ages and their abundance in marine beds. But if extremes give good evidence, ordinary cases are always disputable. For example there is so far as I know, not the least evidence in the post-cranial [i.e. below the skull] skeleton that the hippopotamus is aquatic : its limbs show no swimming modification whatsoever, and the dorsal position of the eyes would be a small point which to base assumptions.
…
There is no branch of zoology in which assumption has played a greater, or evidence a less, part than in the study of presumed adaptations. The implication which lies behind any statement that such and such a structure is an adaptation is that under the existing environmental conditions an individual possessing it has a greater chance of survival than one which has not.
The extraordinary lack of evidence to show that the incidence of death under natural conditions is controlled by small differences of the kind which separate species from one another or, what is the same thing from an observational point of view, by physiological differences correlated with such structural features, renders it difficult to appeal to natural selection as the main or indeed an important factor in bringing about the evolutionary changes which we know to have occurred. It may be important, it may indeed be the principle which overrides all others ; but at present [i.e. 1929] its real existence as a phenomenon rests on an extremely slender basis.
The extreme difficulty of obtaining the necessary data for any quantitative estimation of the efficiency of natural selection makes it seem probable that this theory will be re-established, if it be so, by the collapse of alternative explanations which are more easily attacked by observation and experiment. If so, it will present a parallel to the theory of evolution itself, a theory universally accepted not because it be can proved by logically coherent evidence to be true but because the only alternative, special creation, is clearly incredible.
The alternative explanations which are put forward of the existence of the differences which separate species from species or one geographical race from another are in essence three : [visit a library if you want to know what they are :-)]
…
Thus the present position of zoology is unsatisfactory. We know as surely as we shall that evolution has occurred ; but we do not know how this evolution has been brought about. The data which we have accumulated are inadequate, not in quantity but in their character, to allow us to determine which, if any, of the proposed explanations is a vera causa. But it appears that the experimental method rightly used will in the end give us, if not the solution of our problem, at least the power of analysing it and isolating the various factors which enter into it.
So in essence, Watson is saying that evolution was accepted because of “the collapse of alternative explanations” which is hardly what Morris was trying to imply. Saying that an explanation has collapsed is considerably different it was dogmatically rejected a priori.
I might add that views in science often owe, in part, their acceptance not only on being able to account for the evidence (as Watson noted that evolution did) but to alternative explanations being systematically ruled out. After Watson wrote his article, the philosopher of science Sir Karl Popper argued that science does not move by “proving” things but by disproving them. Popper’s thesis is controversial though his idea that scientific ideas should be, in principle, subject to being disproven by future evidence has been very influential. In any event if Watson had been a chemist and not a biologist, he could have probably written similar things about atomic theory as well. In the end, the only things that one can really “prove” in any absolute sense are mathematical theorems. Mathematical theorems can be proven only because they are not about the real world and use assumptions that just assumed, without justification, to be true. As Stephen Jay Gould has written:
Moreover, “fact” does not mean “absolute certainty.” The final proof of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science, “fact” can only mean “confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent.” I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.
[ Hen’s Teeth and Horse’s Toes. New York: Norton. 1994. Pp 254-255. Online here.]