I don't think anyone would want to say that the present pope, Benedict XVI, has the charisma of his predecessor, John-Paul II. Or the avuncular warmth of John XXIII -- or the deep-seated understanding of that prelate about how his institution was in need of reform. But, we are often assured, one place where Benedict does make up is as a theologian. When it comes to understanding and developing what it all means intellectually, he is the very best.
Why then does he have such a blind eye or tin ear -- you choose your metaphor -- when it comes to modern science? Over Easter, in the most important sermon of them all, he stressed that whatever humans may be, we are not random. We are as we are by design.
"If man were merely a random product of evolution in some place on the margins of the universe, then his life would make no sense or might even be a chance of nature. But no, reason is there at the beginning: creative, divine reason."
Now let me try to be understanding here. I realize where the Pope is coming from. As a Christian, humans cannot be just a chance occurrence. Perhaps we could have blue skin and twelve fingers. Possibly we might be hermaphrodites. But we had to exist and we had to have thinking and moral capacities. We had to have brains big enough to do this. The late Stephen Jay Gould had to be wrong in some important way when (in his book Wonderful Life) he said:
"Since dinosaurs were not moving toward markedly larger brains, and since such a prospect may lie outside the capabilities of reptilian design, we must assume that consciousness would not have evolved on our planet if a cosmic catastrophe had not claimed the dinosaurs as victims. In an entirely literal sense, we owe our existence, as large and reasoning mammals, to our lucky stars."
Gould was not saying that human evolution was uncaused or random in that sense. But he was saying that there is no design. Human evolution had no more forethought than, say, the pattern that a pile of sand makes when emptied from a bucket. And while Gould was a bit of a maverick in some ways, there is no modern evolutionary biologist who would disagree with him on this. Evolution depends on mutations that simply don't have direction. Charles Darwin was absolutely adamant about this. When his good friend, the Harvard botanist Asa Gray, tried to put divine direction into the changes, Darwin simply told him that he wasn't doing science any more.
And that is absolutely the position today. To put direction into evolution is to be a supporter of the non-scientific theory of Intelligent Design. I should add incidentally that this does seem to be the position of Benedict's friend Cardinal Schönborn of Vienna, who a year or two back in an op-ed piece in the New York Times came right out and endorsed Intelligent Design.
The point I am making is that, as things stand at the moment, there is a flat-out contradiction between the claims of modern biological science and the theology of the Roman Catholic Church. And the fact is that the Pope, for all of his vaulted theological expertise, is either ignoring this fact or is glossing over it, probably because he has made the decision that, when push comes to shove, theology trumps science. Schönborn was not out in left field on this matter. Indeed, he is tipped to be the favorite for the next pope and so he was hardly saying and writing things that would put him out of the running.
Note what I am saying and what I am not saying. I am saying that "as things stand at the moment" there is a clash and that the Pope is not helping. I am not saying that the clash could not be resolved. Although as it happens -- and I have said this on many occasions -- I don't think the clash can be resolved by trying to get more out of science. Richard Dawkins (following Darwin) seems to think that humans are more than chance because evolution works through "arms races" -- the prey gets faster and so the predator gets faster -- and that ultimately this will produce human-type brains. Simon Conway Morris thinks that there exist always niches waiting to be occupied, one of these niches is for humans, and so at some point it was bound to be filled. Even Gould thought that complexity increases and so at some point, if not here on earth then somewhere in the universe, humans would appear.
I am not convinced that any of these work. I am convinced that none of these give you an iron-clad guarantee that they must work, which is what the Pope needs. For instance, having big brains requires lots of protein and if that isn't around then your arms races might take you in another direction. Even if niches do exist, I am not convinced that they must be occupied. If that comet had not hit earth, we might still be at the level of dumb dinos. And complexity happens but does it always make sense? A tangled ball of string is more complex than one that is neatly bound, but it is hardly on the route to intelligence.
My own thinking is that if you are going to get anywhere then you need to work on the theology. I have suggested that, since we have appeared, we could appear. Hence, God (being outside time and space) could simply go on creating universes until humans did appear. A bit of a waste admittedly but we have that already in our universe.
As the parent of this idea, I am expectedly rather fond of it. But I am not promoting it now because it is right, but simply to say that some solution needs to be found. At least, some solution needs to be found by Christians. Otherwise, the New Atheists are right, and science and religion cannot be reconciled. Hence, you must take your choice, and since science is right the appropriate conclusion follows at once.
Jonathan Dudley: Christian Faith Requires Accepting Evolution
Alexander Goerlach: The Lutheran Pope
The folk idea about randomness is that its just random - there is no purpose or direction to what is happening. The scientific idea - and it would be nice to see biologists catching on - is that it is intrinsic to all natural processes.
For evolution, random processes are important. Before life appeared, stars happened, and stars are structured phenomena - after all, they have to ignite - that are brought into being by random processes leading to a gravity-driven mass density increase. In other words, the structure of a star is not a random process..
So, when a scientist says that something so highly structured as the human mind is arrived at by random processes AND that it there is no arrow or direction to it those random processes, they are not making sense as far as physicists are concerned. Much more likely is that there are stable structures arrived at - like the suns as described above - by random processes.
Dr. Ruse is the foremost philosophical expert on evolution and the conflicts surrounding it, so he should be well aware that culturally-derived ideas flavor its interpretation of data. It is highly probable that a blind spot from 19th century cultural wars is at work that prevents biologists from seeing
You seem to associate randomness with purpose and direction when you say, "the folk idea about randomness is that its just random - there is no purpose or direction to what is happening," followed by the strange assertion that biologists do not grasp randomness as intrinsic to nature. Really? What do you believe biologists and geneticists think are the raw materials of evolution if not random genetic variations? You state random processes are important for evolution. Excellent. Do you believe biologists and geneticists do not recognize mutation, recombination, and genetic drift as random?
What does design, purpose, or direction have to do with genetic variability? Design and purpose are first and final causes in theology; they are not concepts amenable to scientific investigation which studies secondary causes. As for direction, perhaps you do not understand that adaptation and natural section are NOT random. Reviewing an undergrad text or speaking to a colleague in another department will quickly resolve these errors, banish notions of folklore and culture wars, and hopefully reassure you life scientists who study living processes are not as clueless as you imagine.
The other type of chance is the one found in quantum mechanics...well. That's where it gets tricky, because things are the way they are because the particles make constant "choices" that, as far as we know, are random. But since the particle states only happen to be when they are "observed", that would still be compatible with an idea of a god, even an almighty abrahamic god.
Logically,BTW, your conclusion "So intelligenÂt design is a scientific possibilitÂy. " depends on accepting the premise "Biology does allow evolution with occasional intelligenÂt design..." as true. So it is circular reasoning.
Also, BTW, where did you get the notion that a consensus of biologists accept god's design?
Evolution is a scientific discipline that insists upon working with observed, defined, repeatably obtained evidence. ID is a make-believe alternative fantasy meant to keep the religious door open while overtly contradicting as little science as possible.
There is no room for make-believe in science. There is no room for intelligent design in evolution.
It is funny that Ruse appeals to Gould here, because Gould endorsed this view of separate domains.
The error that Intelligent Design makes is to pretend it is a theory with scientific support. The reason Benedict is not endorsing Intelligent Design is that he is making no such claim.
Could God create a world which to the tools available to our science appears to have these random elements, but is in fact such that it will produce moral agents? Unless one has some independent argument against the existence of God (which one quite reasonably could, but Benedict clearly doesn't) there does not seem to be any reason why not.
Can we review what happened in the previous cases?
My personal opinion: firstly, there's no god, so the theological issue doesn't bother me. The idea of intelligent humans evolving and creating civilization is fascinating and I want to know why it is true independent of something a religious person says. This is a great scientific question. Obviously I am primarily interested in a scientific answer. I think Dawkins and Morris come very, very close, it almost seems "iron clad" enough for my satisfaction, for what that's worth. My only hang up is that we almost went extinct and didn't by evolving our current intelligence.
As I remark to UncleBob below, tall trees such as California redwoods take up a lot of resources and energy too, but the explanation for them is precisely the arms race. Trees competing for slight advantages in height led to astoundingly tall trees. Why not have an arms race led to astoundingly smart humans. And evolutionary arms race is probably an important part of the explanation.
"Even if niches do exist, I am not convinced that they must be occupied."
Obviously in evolution or even business, filling a niche that no one else has filled is a major advantages. To the extent possible, evolution will favor filling niches.
Now there seems to me one obvious place where an evolutionary explanation doesn't seem to do justice to the evolution of human intelligence. To my understanding it is a fact that humans almost went extinct and it is only the latest developments in our big brains, namely language, that both saved us and led to civilization. The real question is how the heck that happened. That seems to require an explanation other than arms races and niches and is far more dramatic than the specifics of the K-T extinction event being significant to our evolution.
Note that I am not a biologist. But based on what I know about evolution, the discussion above is superficial and flawed.
The notion that if the asteroid didn't kill of the dinosaurs consciousness wouldn't have developed is obviously bogus. Extinction happen from time to time in evolutionary history and for one reason or another the dinosaurs were going to go extinct. As early as the Triassic there were mammal-like creatures. Dinosaurs were evolving into birds by the Cretaceous. That birds and/or mammals with some level of intelligence were going to eventually make up a major part of the ecosystem was inevitable. The dinosaurs were going to go extinct and eventually, right after the dinosaurs or eras later, some form of mammal and/or bird intelligence was going to happen.
But I suppose the old, tired response--though in no way scientific--will have to suffice for the scientist lacking evidence: "It must be so because here we are!"
the same for religion and its beliefs; their religious paradigm will overwhelm their logic and reasoning abilities. neither the religious nor the materialist have come to terms with this aspect of the paradigm effect and their cherished beliefs. even the person that made the all time best seller paradigm video has a christian paradigm. the expert on paradigms has his own paradigm.
calling another person ridiculous is arrogant no matter what their views are. seek to understand rather than call others names. you have no idea how you sound to someone that knows the fallacy of darwin's evolution creating awareness.
now I would have ended the statement about lack of evidence with: just give us time then science will figure it out. ie scientism defined.
the materialists put their faith yes faith in the future discoveries of science.
I think your answer of how nothing creates order (It just does, randomly) is less than scientific and more faith. There is still not one shred of a thread of one life form mutating into another.
I like the analogy another philosopher, Anthony Flew (devout atheist who "followed the argument" without bias until he reasoned there was a God) made concerning consciousness. Look at a marble table in front of you. How long would it take before that table developed consciousness? How about humor? Personality?
Egg-zactly.
The evidence that we have is of one Creator of hydrogen working and life forms that work.
The function of hydrogen inside of us making possible our existence is evidence that the universe has a Maker.
Please give a reference for what Dawkins said about the human brain being a result of an arms race, because I'm pretty sure you got the context wrong.
It also does nothing to explain the origin of the selections.
"We believe that we know something about the things themselves when we speak of trees, colors, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for things - metaphors which correspond in no way to the original entities".
On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense (1873)
And this may be so for good reason. For example, Easter sermons aren't a good time to start out with formal definitions and then argue about implications and apologetics.
I continue to find it quite baffling how evolutionary biologists fall into the same traps that economics and finance before them and computer science after them populated with such gusto, after it had already been discredited in the very scientific revolution that they are so proud of.
You can't just go around and make claims about what evolution and selection can and cannot do. The instabilities generated even by the most basic turbulent phenomena in physics are already such that the universe of concepts is torn to pieces in which this discourse takes place.
It's too hard. And this is absolutely not news at all. These limitations have been rediscovered over and over again. Time to accept that life itself requires apologetics.