Does Darwin's theory of evolution contradict Catholicsm?

[Techno2000]

I don’t trust the dating methods or the dates published.

Yeah , like the part about it taking four billion years just for something to start happening.

 

[frobert]

Yeah , like the part about it taking four billion years just for something to start happening.

“Buried within every cell of every organism on the planet, from bacteria to barnacles to Britons, is a living, working version of the earliest life on Earth – a time machine that allows us to peel away those 4 billion years of history and work out how it all began [rather like Minix in an Intel chip!]. ‘We can stop bullshitting about the origin of life,’ says Loren Williams, a biochemist at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. ‘We can see it.’ What he and his colleagues are discovering is turning our view of life’s origins on its head” [New Scientist].

Sadly, behind a paywall.

 

[Goya]

Which are usually called “necessity”, as opposed to chance or design. By ignoring the role of necessity alongside chance and design, you are making it easy to pick scientific holes in your ideas.

Even Intelligent Design proponents allow a role for necessity. See Dr. Dembski’s Explanatory Filter for one obvious example.

rossum

“Everything existing in the universe is the fruit of chance and necessity”

–Democritus, circa 400 BC.

Same difference.

It is attributing all the complexity of the universe, from quarks to quasars, and everything in between (sub-atomic particles, atoms, molecules, RNA, DNA, complex proteins…organisms …planets, stars, and galaxies…), to mere chance, or happenstance, in the veil of necessity–as if the laws of physics require complex order…for no end at all.

It is remotely plausible in the distant abstract, where we can make little sense of the apparent chaos or disorder, due to our comparatively infinitesimal perspective, as with the quasar…yet, when we are able to fathom the functionality of the order, as with RNA, DNA…to simple organisms, up to complex organisms…the order becomes apparent…nay, undeniable…and the notion of mere happenstance as the basis of such order, becomes rather absurd.

IOW, the complexity of the order, can not occur accidentally.

Not even in the laws themselves–or should I say, least of all, the mere existence of laws themselves, as they, quite frankly, represent the most compelling evidence of cosmic intelligence unfathomable, and effectively rule out even the possibility of omnipotent dumb luck–or should I say, omniscient dumb luck–to better emphasize the inherently oxymoronic nature of the proposition.

 

[Techno2000]

Techno2000:

Yeah , like the part about it taking four billion years just for something to start happening.

“Buried within every cell of every organism on the planet, from bacteria to barnacles to Britons, is a living, working version of the earliest life on Earth – a time machine that allows us to peel away those 4 billion years of history and work out how it all began [rather like Minix in an Intel chip!]. ‘We can stop bullshitting about the origin of life,’ says Loren Williams, a biochemist at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. ‘We can see it.’ What he and his colleagues are discovering is turning our view of life’s origins on its head” [New Scientist].

Sadly, behind a paywall.

I can only imagine their Rube Goldberg explanation. :crazy_face:

 

[rossum]

to mere chance, or happenstance, in the veil of necessity

Not a “veil”. The two are different. If you continually ignore one aspect, then you will fail to understand the capabilities of the two operating together.

Even God is bound by necessity. If God wants humans to exist, then it is necessary for Him to create at least one palace in the universe where humans can live. A universe consisting only of a large diffuse cloud of hydrogen and nothing else would be disbarred by that necessity: humans cannot live in such a universe.

Such a universe is not barred by chance, but it is barred by necessity. Chance and necessity are different, which is why Democritus correctly mentions them both.

rossum

 

[rossum]

Yeah , like the part about it taking four billion years just for something to start happening.

What four billion years? Earth formed about 10 billion years after the Big Bang. Life on Earth appeared about 500 million years after that and has been going for 3.5 billion years since then.

rossum

 

[edwest211]

This is not consistent with the Catholic faith. From the Catechism:

"295 We believe that God created the world according to his wisdom.141 It is not the product of any necessity whatever, nor of blind fate or chance. We believe that it proceeds from God’s free will; he wanted to make his creatures share in his being, wisdom and goodness: "For you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created."142 Therefore the Psalmist exclaims: “O LORD, how manifold are your works! In wisdom you have made them all”; and "The LORD is good to all, and his compassion is over all that he has made."143

 

[Rau]

295 We believe that God created the world according to his wisdom.141 It is not the product of any necessity whatever, nor of blind fate or chance.

This is a reference to the fact that the universe exists. God made it so. It’s not in contradiction with Rossum as far as I can see. He was discussing various necessities that arise subsequently, eg. A planet to house Humans will have oxygen, water moves under gravity, etc

 

[Aloysium]

“Buried within every cell of every organism on the planet, from bacteria to barnacles to Britons, is a living, working version of the earliest life on Earth – a time machine that allows us to peel away those 4 billion years of history and work out how it all began [rather like Minix in an Intel chip!]. ‘We can stop bullshitting about the origin of life,’ says Loren Williams, a biochemist at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta. ‘We can see it.’ What he and his colleagues are discovering is turning our view of life’s origins on its head” [New Scientist].

Don’t be sad. Sounds like clickbait.

 

[Aloysium]

edwest211:

295 We believe that God created the world according to his wisdom.141 It is not the product of any necessity whatever, nor of blind fate or chance.

This is a reference to the fact that the universe exists. God made it so. It’s not in contradiction with Rossum as far as I can see. He was discussing various necessities that arise subsequently, eg. A planet to house Humans will have oxygen, water moves under gravity, etc

God is Truth; what He has created possesses a rational structure. This does not imply that He is bound by necessity. By His act, He determines necessity. This isn’t just nit picking about words, but a clarification as to His nature. In fixing the essential qualities of mankind-in-the-garden, it will be whole.

 

[edwest211]

Yes. Adam and Eve were given certain preternatural gifts:

impassibility (freedom from pain)
immortality (freedom from death)
integrity (freedom from concupiscence, or disordered
desires)
infused knowledge (freedom from ignorance in matters
essential for happiness)

God gave them one command and they disobeyed. This was Original Sin, which required Jesus Christ to come into the world - True Man and True God.

 

[Techno2000]

Techno2000:

Yeah , like the part about it taking four billion years just for something to start happening.

What four billion years? Earth formed about 10 billion years after the Big Bang. Life on Earth appeared about 500 million years after that and has been going for 3.5 billion years since then.

rossum

The Late Heavy Bombardment (abbreviated LHB and also known as the lunar cataclysm) is an event thought to have occurred approximately 4.1 to 3.8 billion years (Ga) ago.

Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Glark]

In the days of yore, gods were fashioned out of wood or stone or gold, but nowadays gods are fashioned out of ideas. Science has become a god to many, especially atheists, who worship it with loving devotion (many atheists study evolution science like some Christians study the Bible). Scientists like Dawkins, become high-priests and even little gods, themselves.

 

[Glark]

It’s almost laughable in its irony–the deployment of intelligence…to disprove the need or utility of intelligence.

I must disagree with you here, Goya: It’s not “almost laughable” - it’s something way beyond laughable … more like “insane”, I think.

 

[Glark]

Which is my problem with Abrahamic God, He does not explain the origin of anything that He already is. For example, being a “living God” He cannot explain the origin of life. Similarly, God cannot explain the origin of complexity. The origin is assumed without proof rather than explained.

Yahweh doesn’t explain the origin of life to humans for the same reason that Jesus didn’t explain how he raised Lazarus from the dead. How can the puny minds of humans possibly understand how God Almighty performs miracles?

The trouble with many scientists is that they are so full of the pride of their own intelligence that they believe they can figure out the miracle of life. But God laughs at their pathetic and vain little theories.

 

[Glark]

There is a third option besides chance and design: necessity. See Monod, Dembski and others.

Neither science nor philosophy can reasonably argue that anything material needs to exist.

The only reason things exist is because God wills them to exist.

 

[Glark]

The existence of intelligence is evidenced by the existence of design. An archeologist, digging away in the dirt, can differentiate between objects that have been designed by an intelligent being (namely a human) and objects that haven’t been designed (that belong to nature).

 

[Glark]

"Today, most churchmen have chosen to be silent as the world of consensus science continues to spin more and more wild fantasies (about origins) that cannot be proven, tested or verified … The damage wrought by (a) misplaced confidence (in science) is incalculable. Millions of Catholics are led to doubt and dismiss Church teaching in favour of something deemed to be more accurate, true and reliable. Who is going to remain in a Church that has ben steeped in error from the beginning? …

Within her proper realm of autonomy, the Church has held that unaided human reason can rightly conclude that there is an all-powerful Creator (CCC 34,35; Romans 1:19-20). Thus, anyone, scientist or not, who denies the existence of God is not reasoning properly. It is well within the scope of our autonomy to correct those who misuse natural science to undermine our faith.

Instead, we have become intimidated by the very word “science” to the point of inviting open and avowed atheists to sit on our Pontifical Academy of Science. Instead of pointing out the theological and philosophical errors of modern scientific speculation, we have been willing to sacrifice even sacred dogma so as not to offend the scientific community. Rather than stand our ground in demanding proof from the natural sciences, we have cowered in fear of criticism from those outside the Church."

Fr. Thomas Hickey, “Thomistic Evolution”: Development of Doctrine or Diabolical Deception?, kolbecenter.org

 

[Glark]

Water flows downhill under gravity. That is not chance, there is no purpose to it. The water follows the law of gravity by necessity.

Not “by necessity”, but by design.

 

[Glark]

And yet, in both 2 Peter and the Psalms, we are told that a thousand years for us is like a day for God.

These verses signify that God exists outside the dimension of time.

While God could have created the world in six 24 hour days and then left misleading clues about it

I’m not a Young Earth Creationist. The first of the “six days” of creation begins in Gen 1:3 with “Let there be light”, which means “God created the heavens and the earth” (v.1) before the six days - at least, that’s my reading of it. So there is room in the Scriptures for an ancient earth.

Personally, I go with the theory that God is not some kind of trickster God (akin to Loki), but rather a God who created a wonderful universe with rules and order. He then explains it in words and concepts that we can understand given how mature we are in both our ability to understand those rules and His nature.

If God took billions of years to “evolve” Adam, why did He then create Eve in an instant?

He then explains it in words and concepts that we can understand

Theistic evolutions give lip-service to Scripture; they actually don’t care what the Bible says. Nevertheless, what does this mean? … “But from the beginning of creation, God created them (humans) male and female” - Mark 10:6. Evolution says humans weren’t “created” until billions of years after creation (the six days).