Being a Theistic evolutionist?

[grannymh]

I understand the view about science and the best answer we currently have. However, I consider the modern Adam and Eve to be in a category totally separate from the Big Bang, bacteria and bears.

I am more interested in how the theistic evolutionist deals with the wild card of human nature and its fully-complete modern humans Adam and Eve who founded humankind. They are a wild card according to Catholicism because humans have a spiritual principle which is essential to their well-being and eventual goal after bodily death. (CCC, 1730) Best of all, these lovable first parents are a wild card because they were intelligent enough to beat the system.

Here is the puzzlement. In evolution’s history, a population, such as a common ancestor, is in flux simply because the population is internally changing to the point of its divergence. For example, various forms of the brow ridge would reasonably be in the homo/pan common ancestor and its subsequent lineages and just as reasonable in the preceding common ancestors. Paleoanthropologists deal with what is reasonable given the current fossils. Different species have been defined and re-defined in terms of assumed similarity of all population members. In the science of human evolution, reasonable assumptions have to be used since ancient populations did not have Ph.D. scientists as card-carrying members.

But is it reasonable to assume that a given population such as the homo/pan common ancestor accounts for every possible life form which has some, but not all, similar anatomical characteristics?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

“thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself” - Leviticus 19:18. Since I have quoted the Bible then I obviously sympathize with that theistic philosophy since I invoked it. This is not a sensible argument. Every critic of Richard Dawkins quotes Richard Dawkins as well. Every critic of the Bible quotes the Bible.

Neither does God. What is the origin of God. If you require Professor Dwkins to explain the origin of his aliens, then he is equally entitled to ask you for the origin of your God. Merely changing the word used for the designer(s) from “aliens” to “God” does not mean that the question does not have to be answered.

rossum

The Abrahamic God by definition, since he is the Creator of the principle we call causality, has no origin. That is, God cannot be subject to a principle God has created. I can see why you are confused by that, since your Buddhist gods do have an origin and can be as you have said, safely ignored.

But you have not addressed the fundamental flaw of Dawkins. Aliens do not solve the problem of apparent design at abiogenesis on Earth for the reasons I gave above, quoting Stephen Meyer. You cannot push that chain of aliens back more than a few billion years when you have to explain why the first aliens were as apparently designed as the later ones.

Pure and unadulterated science fiction.

 

[rossum]

The Abrahamic God by definition, since he is the Creator of the principle we call causality, has no origin.

That is not a good argument. Do you accept a rephrased version:

The Tentacular Overlord of Minohi by definition, since it is the Creator of the principle we call causality, has no origin.

No, I don’t think you will find that convincing. If merely changing the name of the entity involved can so completely destroy the argument then it is not a good argument.

But you have not addressed the fundamental flaw of Dawkins.

I was asked if it was possible for science to envisage intelligent design as an origin for life on earth. I gave an example, quoting Dawkins who was answering a similar question. Very few, if any, scientists take that hypothesis seriously. You are wasting your time arguing about it since it is not a serious contender.

Aliens do not solve the problem of apparent design at abiogenesis on Earth

There is no problem to solve. The word “apparent” is enough. How do you solve the problem of where the apparent water in a mirage goes to?

Currently the only live scientific hypothesis for abiogenesis is chemical abiogenesis, not aliens. If you want to argue against current science, then that is the hypothesis you have to argue against. If you want to show intelligent design, then aliens is one of the routes you might want to follow.

rossum

 

[LeafByNiggle]

]I am more interested in how the theistic evolutionist deals with the wild card of human nature and its fully-complete modern humans Adam and Eve who founded humankind. They are a wild card according to Catholicism because humans have a spiritual principle which is essential to their well-being and eventual goal after bodily death.

An evolutionist of any sort does not have to deal with that “wild card” because the thing that makes it “wild” is the unique spiritual aspect of Man. And that is the aspect that evolution makes no claims about. So an evolutionist looks at that spirituality and just says “not my department”. And he is right. It is not his department. Can you blame him? That does not cast any particular bad light on those things that are in his department, which is all the evolutionist is claiming anyway. Some evolutionists, that is. There are evolutionists, like Dawkins, that go further and do make claims about the non-existence of spirit, But when then do that, they cease to be scientists, and then I don’t care what they say.

 

[rossum]

Apropos, “It sure looks designed to me,” here is something that looks designed, but Disney probably didn’t have much to do with it:



Source: That’s no Mickey Mouse storm!

The human brain is a good pattern-recognition system. It is however nowhere as good a design recognition system.

We get Jesus on toast, we get Allah in a tomato, we get Mickey Mouse on Jupiter. All patterns recognised by our brain, none of them designed.

rossum

 

[Elizium23]

One thing of which I am genuinely weary is the constant assertion that such-and-such (usually evolution) is “just a theory” and there is no proof to it. Well, you all have the scientific definition of “theory” mixed up with that of “hypothesis”. Let me tell you what a theory is. “A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method, and repeatedly confirmed through observation and experimentation.” A theory is not a hodgepodge of unproven ideas, it is a synthesis of well-proven concepts. There is a theory of gravity and a theory of relativity. I don’t see any science-deniers walking off the tops of buildings trying to disprove gravity. So why does the theory of evolution get short shrift?

 

[Charlemagne_III]

We get Jesus on toast, we get Allah in a tomato, we get Mickey Mouse on Jupiter. All patterns recognised by our brain, none of them designed.

rossum

Unfortunately for Micky Mouse, there is a well designed irreducibly complex mousetrap waiting for him somewhere!

 

[Peter_Plato]

One thing of which I am genuinely weary is the constant assertion that such-and-such (usually evolution) is “just a theory” and there is no proof to it. Well, you all have the scientific definition of “theory” mixed up with that of “hypothesis”. Let me tell you what a theory is. “A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method, and repeatedly confirmed through observation and experimentation.” A theory is not a hodgepodge of unproven ideas, it is a synthesis of well-proven concepts. There is a theory of gravity and a theory of relativity. I don’t see any science-deniers walking off the tops of buildings trying to disprove gravity. So why does the theory of evolution get short shrift?

First point, the fact of gravity, like the fact of adaptive change, is the undeniable experience of the way things simply are. No one disputes gravity in that sense which is why people don’t try to walk off buildings. Very few people, except very fundamentalist young Earth creationists, deny the fact of adaptive change in life forms. These are facts about nature, they are not “theories.”

There is a slight difference between an indubitable “fact” about the world (gravity, adaptive change) and the theory that attempts to explain that fact. The “theory” that currently best explains gravity is Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity which only relatively recently supplanted Newton’s Law of Universal Gravitation as the contender for best explanation. General Relativity is still being developed as a theory and may be modified or even left behind as new facts about the universe are uncovered that are not explained by Einstein’s theory. The same is true for Darwinian Evolution.

Furthermore, a theory to explain a “relatively simple” phenomenon such as how matter attracts is substantially different in scope from one that attempts to explain the complexity of all life on Earth, how it came to exist in the array of forms that it has and why it has been so successful doing so for over 3.5b years. The truth is that there is so much more for the theory of evolution to explain and so much that hasn’t been explained by it.

Meeting and dealing with critique “comes with the territory” as far as theories are concerned. To stand up, they must withstand criticism - be absolutely bullet proof. This is why it is troublesome to hear proponents of the theory of evolution dismiss critique rather than meet it with reason and evidence. That is precisely what a theory ought not do. It should handle critique elegantly, not with polemics.

 

[rossum]

Unfortunately for Micky Mouse, there is a well designed irreducibly complex mousetrap waiting for him somewhere!

It is lucky that he doesn’t fly, because there is an evolved irreducibly complex Venus Flytrap waiting as well.

rossum

 

[Peter_Plato]

One thing of which I am genuinely weary is the constant assertion that such-and-such (usually evolution) is “just a theory” and there is no proof to it. Well, you all have the scientific definition of “theory” mixed up with that of “hypothesis”. Let me tell you what a theory is. “A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method, and repeatedly confirmed through observation and experimentation.” A theory is not a hodgepodge of unproven ideas, it is a synthesis of well-proven concepts. There is a theory of gravity and a theory of relativity. I don’t see any science-deniers walking off the tops of buildings trying to disprove gravity. So why does the theory of evolution get short shrift?

A great article on post-Darwinian evolution on The TOF Spot

tofspot.blogspot.ca/2014/01/post-darwinian-evolution.html

Several examples from the blog of how a “theory” of evolution based upon natural selection acting on random mutations simply does not suffice.

These phase changes ([from grasshopper to locust]…) occur when crowding spurs a temporary spike in serotonin levels, which causes changes in gene expression so widespread and powerful they alter not just the [grass]hopper’s behaviour but its appearance and form. Legs and wings shrink. Subtle camo colouring turns conspicuously garish. The brain grows to manage the animal’s newly complicated social world, which includes the fact that, if a locust moves too slowly amid its million cousins, the cousins directly behind might eat it.

How does this happen? Does something happen to their genes? Yes, but — and here was the point of Rogers’s talk — their genes don’t actually change. That is, they don’t mutate or in any way alter the genetic sequence or DNA. Nothing gets rewritten. Instead, this bug’s DNA — the genetic book with millions of letters that form the instructions for building and operating a grasshopper — gets reread so that the very same book becomes the instructions for operating a locust. [Emph. added]

Another example of the indeterminacy of the genome is the experiment with helmeted water fleas. In the wild, these hard caps on the fleas’ heads make them slightly less attractive to predator fishes. In the experiment, two cloned populations were used, genetically identical. One was put in water that had been doped with a chemical indicating the predator fish. The other was put in a tank with untainted water. The fleas in the first tank developed the helmet; but those in the second tank did not. Basically, if there were no chemical flags for the presence of the predator, the fleas did not use their genomes to grow helmets. Even though the same “instructions” were present in both. Some of the information the flea used was “outside the flea.”

A final example we have seen before is the Mediterranean wall lizard, which on an island devoid of plants was an insectivore and cannibal, on an island lush with plant life became a herbivore and developed a new organ to digest plant matter – in the space of 20 years!

All of this indicates that evolutions can take place rapidly – although TOF supposes that not all do – and can be rather massive, all-at-once, and targeted to an end. Not the gradual accumulation of small random changes. The new organ the wall lizards developed was not a random mutation: you’d wait a long time for that to happen. It was targeted to the lizard’s new circumstances, and called up in some epigenetic manner by environmental cues. Nor was it a matter of a pre-existing organ gradually modified to a new purpose. That would be subject to the IDers’ “mousetrap” critique. The modified organ would have to be at least survivable at all stages of its transformation. But if the genome possesses mechanisms for “natural genetic engineering” the whole intelligent design theory goes down the tube. The mutations aren’t random, and the change is not gradual. Punctuated equilibrium does not need the Darwinian mechanism Eldrege and Gould described.

 

[grannymh]

One thing of which I am genuinely weary is the constant assertion that such-and-such (usually evolution) is “just a theory” and there is no proof to it. Well, you all have the scientific definition of “theory” mixed up with that of “hypothesis”. Let me tell you what a theory is. “A scientific theory is a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world that is acquired through the scientific method, and repeatedly confirmed through observation and experimentation.” A theory is not a hodgepodge of unproven ideas, it is a synthesis of well-proven concepts. There is a theory of gravity and a theory of relativity. I don’t see any science-deniers walking off the tops of buildings trying to disprove gravity. So why does the theory of evolution get short shrift?

Would it be possible for you to share the well-proven concepts found in the science of human evolution?

 

[Peter_Plato]

A great David Berlinski interview…

tofspot.blogspot.ca/2013/10/found-upon-web-and-reprinted-here.html

…mostly on evolution… umm … of the secular Jewish cum mathematical, rather than theistic, type.

 

[grannymh]

A great David Berlinski interview…

tofspot.blogspot.ca/2013/10/found-upon-web-and-reprinted-here.html

…mostly on evolution… umm … of the secular Jewish cum mathematical, rather than theistic, type.

DB: What I do believe is that theology is no more an impossible achievement than mathematics. The same rational standards apply. Does the system make sense; does it explain something? Are there deep principles at work. Is it productive?


DB: … the fact that each great physical theory represents an enlargement of its predecessors. This is terrifically important as a rhetorical strategy because it means that the burden of skepticism becomes impossibly high with each new theory. This is just another way of protecting the sciences from criticism. To go on the attack, it is not enough to say, hey look, this particular theory is wrong, or absurd, or preposterous. You must instead take on the entire history of a tradition. Not quite sporting, I say.
:yup:

 

[grannymh]

LENT



Painting by Diego Velazquez

 

[grannymh]

Is it okay for a catholic to study evolution? I understand that Genesis is just a metaphor, (except where it says that God created everything, I know that is literal). Would I be living in sin by being an evolutionist?

As I recall, you asked about the *CCC early in the thread. *I am not sure if you received a satisfactory response. If you didn’t…

Regardless of what some people, including some clergy, say, Adam and Eve are not metaphors. They are modern people with the same blood and guts, skin and bones that we have. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition says this about figurative language found in the first three chapters of Genesis.
**CCC, 390 **The account of the fall in *Genesis *3 uses figurative language, but affirms a primeval event, a deed that took place at the beginning of the history of man. Revelation gives us the certainty of faith that the whole of human history is marked by the original fault freely committed by our first parents.

Implied in CCC, 390 are all the doctrines connected with the original fault aka Original Sin. For example, we need to know the terms of Adam’s relationship with his Creator.

As you said: “God created everything.” Genesis 1:1. It is our human species which is peerless. (CCC, 355-356, Genesis 1: 27) Adam is a spiritual creature because of his God-created spiritual rational soul. (CCC, 364-366) But Adam is not on the same level as his Creator Who is a transcendent, supernatural Pure Spirit. Consequently, Adam can live in God’s friendship only in free submission to Him. (CCC, 396; CCC, 1730-1732) The difference between God and Adam is essential knowledge when it comes to Original Sin. There are a lot of *CCC *paragraphs on Original Sin. (CCC, 396-409) Because they are intense, my suggestion is to take you time reading them.

The Catholic truth is that our first parents (CCC, 390) are actually, real, sole, fully-complete human parents of all humankind. The science of human evolution proposes that instead of two first parents, there were evolving groups of populations eventually evolving into humans over time. The general designation for this group, which also included chimpanzee ancestors, is the most recent common ancestor. The science of human evolution refers to the breaking apart of this most recent common ancestor as the Homo/Pan Split. This means that there were two lineages, one of which eventually had modern human anatomies and the other led to our “chimp cousins.”

As one can tell, it is the designation of populations evolving which contradicts the Catholic teaching of one modern Adam and one modern Eve as first progenitors of humanity. Catholics can go along with the improvements in the anatomy such as walking upright, etc. But when it comes to the division of humans from non-human beings, it is only two beings walking upright which had the God-created spiritual soul. Since we, too, have a God-created soul, it is logical that we descended from the first two humans with a God-created-soul.

It is also a reality that scientists cannot know everything which happened on planet earth, every day for centuries going backwards. This is where research relies on assumptions and estimates. A lot of work goes into formulating assumptions. And they could be valid in certain circumstances, but there is no way to test their validity on a universal basis. Logically, scientists can say that Adam and Eve are not probable, but they cannot say that Adam and Eve are impossible.

Links to the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Second Edition

usccb.org/beliefs-and-teachings/what-we-believe/catechism/catechism-of-the-catholic-church/

scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

 

[LeafByNiggle]

As one can tell, it is the designation of populations evolving which contradicts the Catholic teaching of one modern Adam and one modern Eve as first progenitors of humanity. Catholics can go along with the improvements in the anatomy such as walking upright, etc…

What are you referring to here as acquiring walking fully upright? Just humans, post Adam and Eve? Or are you allowing that some non-human primates may have walked upright, essentially like Man? Or do you insist that only Man walked like Man, and all non-human primates walked stooped over?

 

[grannymh]

What are you referring to here as acquiring walking fully upright? Just humans, post Adam and Eve? Or are you allowing that some non-human primates may have walked upright, essentially like Man? Or do you insist that only Man walked like Man, and all non-human primates walked stooped over?

None of the above. If you would like answers to your questions, google paleoanthropology.

As a Catholic, interested in the science of human evolution,

I insist that humankind descended from two sole real true fully-complete human parents designed by God as Creator. Two, because that is what it takes to procreate. Sole, because there were no other humans living at the same time that the Original Sin was committed. Real, because they existed at the dawn of human history. True, because they are in the image of their Maker. And fully-complete because they had a decomposing anatomy and an immortal soul.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

None of the above. If you would like answers to your questions, google paleoanthropology.

Google won’t tell me what grannymh believes, which was my question.

As a Catholic, interested in the science of human evolution,

I insist that humankind descended from two sole real true fully-complete human parents designed by God as Creator. Two, because that is what it takes to procreate. Sole, because there were no other humans living at the same time that the Original Sin was committed.

True, but you will allow that there may have been primates living at the time that would have all the outward appearances of being human, lacking only the eternal soul, right?

And fully-complete because they had a decomposing anatomy and an immortal soul.

That is a strange way to characterize “fully-complete”. What is a decomposing anatomy anyway? Do you mean their bodies decomposed in the ground after they died? But then, all animals did that.

 

[edwest2]

A great article on post-Darwinian evolution on The TOF Spot

tofspot.blogspot.ca/2014/01/post-darwinian-evolution.html

Several examples from the blog of how a “theory” of evolution based upon natural selection acting on random mutations simply does not suffice.

Thank you for this. I find that threads like this appear on a regular basis as a way to “test compliance” with the TOE, or to simply insist its true without doing as your examples show, looking at testable evidence.

Peace,
Ed

 

[Peter_Plato]

Thank you for this. I find that threads like this appear on a regular basis as a way to “test compliance” with the TOE, or to simply insist its true without doing as your examples show, looking at testable evidence.

Peace,
Ed

If you are interested in a more explicit examination for the points at which evolution and theism logically overlap, a series of three articles by philosopher Peter Van Inwagen do finely layout the aspects of evolution theory which are compatible and incompatible with theism.

andrewmbailey.com/pvi/Kind_of_Darwinism.pdf

andrewmbailey.com/pvi/Darwinism_Design.pdf

andrewmbailey.com/pvi/Science_Scripture.pdf