Dr Steve Lloyd was a guest on ITV’s Alan Titchmarsh Show on Darwin Day, 12 February 2009. He was part of a panel discussing the question, “Did God make the world?” His fellow panellists were Nick Ferrari of LBC Radio and Sue Carroll, the Daily Mirror columnist. The producers tried, but failed, to get an evolutionist to appear on the panel.

Steve began by pointing out that there is nothing incontrovertible about evolution in the light of the extraordinary design and information found in living systems. The theory of evolution faces some major challenges from recent scientific discoveries.

Sue Carroll raised the issue of death and asked whether that could be part of a perfect divine plan. Steve was able to highlight the incompatibility of the evolutionary story of death and struggle over millions of years with the biblical account of a perfect world that was marred by human sin.

Nick Ferrari was sceptical of the dogmatic pronouncements of scientists and suggested that the theory of evolution was unable to explain the human spirit and conscience. He also asked whether, in the face of sickness and death, people pray to David Attenborough or to God. Although not articulated from an explicitly Christian or creationist perspective, Nick Ferrari’s doubts seemed to resonate with the studio audience, which was interesting in view of the widespread scepticism of evolution revealed in recent opinion surveys.