Reconstructed discussion whether belief in literal Adam & Eve is warranted

[grannymh]

From post 63
I am not sure what these “popular misconceptions” are

From post 54
There are a number of popular misconceptions. The first regards the history of the early church. The second regards “dogma” which is part of the history of the church dating from Pentecost. The third regards miracles as viewed in modern times

The first misconception is the

post 63. echo of the Church’s (and society’s) love affair with magic in the past

This dates to the Church’s early history.

This misconception of “love affair with magic” dates to apostolic times when only the baptized could be present during the sacred parts of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The secretivenes fed the rumor mill. The conclusion of general society which was immersed in magical beliefs etc. was obviously that magic was being practiced. By the 17th century, sleight of hand and juggler’s tricks continued in the area of magic and thus needed magic incantations. A pseudo-Latin rhyming formula “hocus pocus” came into use by jugglers and magicians. This phrase is a corruption of the official Latin language used for the liturgical moment of Transubstantiation. The fact is that the Catholic Church’s “love affair” was not with magic but rather with
with the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist.

From post 50. For long periods of time, throughout the history of the early church, the Dark Ages and the mediaeval period, the Church justified its truth-claims and the holiness of its saints by numerous hagiographic tales of miraculous deeds, some of which have been crystallised into the very dogma of the Church.

Continuation of post 63

• How is the claim that the early and mediaeval Church relied on hagiographic accounts of miraculous deeds as validation of its truth,a popular misconception?
• How is the claim that some of these accounts of miracles found their way into Catholic dogma, a popular misconception
• How is the claim that, in modern times, and in the light of modern science, these miraculous claims have dried up, a popular misconception.

I really would like to understand more clearly why you believe that what I have claimed are popular misconceptions.

The misconception here concerns the word dogma and what its truth-claims are based on. It is true that “saints” did live throughout the history of the Church and still do. They did teach the truths of the Catholic Church. And there are so-called claims of miraculous deeds. But the truths themselves do not need saints’ miracles for validation.

The truths of the Catholic Church come from Jesus Christ. The validator is God, Who through Divine Revelation and Tradition is the source of the Church’s Deposit of Faith. In other words, dogma’s come from the Deposit of Faith and not from human saints or questionable miracles. The apostles entrusted the deposit of faith to the Catholic Church which completed the period of the public revelation of God’s truths. It remains for the Catholic Church to gradually grasp Divine Revelation’s full significance over the course of the centuries. (see paragraphs 65-67, Catechism of the Catholic Church, second edition)

To be continued in the next post.

 

[grannymh]

continued from post 101

The third misconception regards miracles as viewed in modern times. Regarding the comment – “in modern times, and in the light of modern science, these miraculous claims have dried up.” To me, the apparent misconception involves a person’s belief in modern miracles. Simply due to their place in historical time, miracles such as Lourdes and previous centuries are in a category known as private revelation to distinguish them from the Official Deposit of Faith. These miracles do not reveal anything new though often they confirm a truth. Most of the time, miracles edify and inspire people to live better lives in a certain period of history. Regardless, Catholics are not obliged to believe in them even when some scientists consider a few of them as extraordinary phenomenon.

In my humble opinion, there is another possible misconception.
Alec, I am not sure if I can attribute this second one to you. It just :newidea: into my head…

Without going into “there are miracles and there are miracles” type of discussion, what I see as an additional misconception is that somehow miracles have to continue or else the truths of the Catholic Church cannot be relevant in this century. Or the misconception is that because today’s science could possibly invalidate a medieval miracle, truth would also be invalidated. As said above, miracles or connected teaching, are not the primary source of truth. (see post 101)

I am not implying that Alec did this, but I need to point out that there is a kind of cross-over from the possibility of current miracles not being scientifically real to Adam and Eve being symbolic of human beings. Actually, the start of the universe, the start of life on earth, and Adam and Eve as parents of humanity are three truths of the Deposit of Faith of the Catholic Church. Furthermore, these truths belong to the nature of a transcendent being. To me, calling these truths miraculous is like gilding the lily. I will agree that a non-theist can give his opinion that an idea about God could possibly be an error of human evaluation. And, as a theist, I counter that such a human evaluation is actually a misconception of the facts of Divine Revelation or Tradition.

Blessings,
granny

Every human being is worthy of profound respect.

 

[Dr.Bonnette]

To Anthony:

You seem to actually agree with me that methodological naturalism would not be a problem if only scientists stuck to it as a method only. The moment a natural scientist insists that natural explanations are the only possible ones, he ceases to speak as a scientist, and has become a philosopher. That is the problem. You are rightly skeptical that too many scientists today are effectively stepping into metaphysical naturalism. My point was that, as natural scientists, there is nothing wrong in scientists seeking natural causes of observable phenomena – to the extent that is possible. I really don’t think we disagree in principle.

The problem with Darwinism, as Cardinal Schoenborn and others have pointed out, is that takes as a complete explanation of reality merely efficient and material causes. From Aristotle on down to the present, traditional philosophers have insisted that formal and final causality must also be taken into account. Reductionists deny the reality of substantial forms, especially those which account for the unity and nature of substances above the subatomic level. For them, there really are no cabbages and kings – merely convenient arrangements of subatomic entities which coalesce in a kind of temporary equilibrium somehow acting in a unified manner that science can define. In truth, substances above the atomic level do exist – or else you and I do not really exist to discuss this matter (except, they would say, as neural epiphenomena). Moreover, finality is evident in the fact that science can discern the nature of things, even if they be reduced merely to subatomic realities. Scientific classification requires that things, even subatomic particles, tend to act consistently over time so as to result in predictable outcomes, which is the basic meaning of finality.

Still, as I recall my early education and experience in chemistry, we always sought natural explanations of all phenomena. That is the task of natural science. Thus, studying motion of either subatomic particles or star systems entails trying to understand what physical forces and natures account for what we observe. But natural science does not study the nature of motion in terms of the very being and causes of being of new existential perfections manifested in every physical change. That is a philosophical perspective, leading to Aristotle’s definition of motion as the act of a being in potency insofar as it is in potency. You will never find that in a physics book, and if you did, the physics book would then be doing the philosophy of nature, not experimental physics itself. When natural scientists cross that line from merely natural explanation either to affirming the existence of preternatural or supernatural causation, OR to the denial of such causation, then – such natural scientists – no longer are doing natural science, but philosophy. As such, they are outside their own field of competence, and subject to all the proper criticisms of Christian philosophy. I know there are “non-Christian” and “anti-Christian” philosophies, but they do not even pretend to exist in harmony with revealed truths. Moreover, modern philosophies fail to investigate reality in terms of the act of existence itself, which is the hallmark of existential Thomism. As St. Thomas maintains, “Existence is the act of all acts, the perfection of all perfections.” That is why God is described in Christian philosophy as “Subsistent Existence Itself – Pure Existence.”

To Grannymh,

I am glad you recall your biology class mentioning the concepts of the natural philosophical species, so that others may know that I am not inventing it! Yes, St. Thomas does teach that some things act of necessity and others do so contingently. You are finding good texts!

I am not certain that I follow your example about the strain of animals that would form the basis for Adam, and yet be separate from the evolution of other primates. That is something that might be hypothesized, but our only evidence comes from what paleoanthropologists have thus far discovered. When you go that far back in time, you have to remain open to many possibilities that you might not consider until new evidence appears. That is also why dogmatic teaching is properly the role of the Church, with the guidance of the Holy Spirit, not individual or even collectivities of natural scientists.

 

[grannymh]

To Grannymh,

I am not certain that I follow your example about the strain of animals that would form the basis for Adam, and yet be separate from the evolution of other primates.

I’m not sure I can follow my example either.

However, I’m learning some interesting stuff about the major domains and the roots of the tree of life. For example from the Tree of Life website: www.tolweb.org/life_on_earth/1

“The rooting of the Tree of Life, and the relationships of the major lineages, are controversial. The monophyly of Archaea is uncertain, and recent evidence for ancient lateral transfers of genes indicates that a highly complex model is needed to adequately represent the phylogenetic relationships among the major lineages of Life. We hope to provide a comprehensive discussion of these issues on this page soon.”

Key word in the above quote is controversial. Controversial should not be looked at in the combative mode but rather that there is more than one possibility on the table. Controversial can be in regard to which possibility is correct or if none are correct or if all are related systemically so that all possibilities are correct or maybe there is another possibility which will shed needed light. The point is that controversial means that discussion is open ended.

In other words maybe there is another major lineage. Regarding Adam and Eve, there is still lots of room for imaginative thought regarding our dear human ancestors. One idea is to go back to the beginning to find a viable possibility. This is enough to provide a discussion of more than one theory. Note: I worked in an era where we really did sit around, drink Pepsi, and brainstorm. Our laughter was spontaneous. The results were amazing!

Blessings,
granny

Human life is sacred.

 

[grannymh]

Regarding the size of the ancestral population leading to living humans.

Remember, with all due respect, until you have read and understood the references I gave you on the subject, you are not really in a position to claim that there is a controversy (there isn’t - they all agree).

Alec
evolutionpages.com

Regarding the references you gave me (post 328, page 23, apologetics thread “Evolution: A Catholic Solution?” now closed) -----having my head on a platter for not reading them is respectfully deserved.

However, when I went back to the post, I did end up in a bit of a jam trying to find some of the references. May I suggest a compromise. If you provide direct links, I will get back to reading the material.

Here are some of my unscientific notes from the few I did read. Nonetheless, I did get a feel for written research. The back and forth information about Mitochondrial Eve was very interesting in that I could almost experience the research. Especially footnote 5. Cann, Stoneking and Wilson paper which added to my vocabulary. I did get lost in the middle of the paper on the Bible literalist’s Eve. Personally, I don’t think that it is necessary to find her or her birthday.

I accidently read papers about basic evolution with dinosaurs as an example. They were intriguing in that they affirmed what some of the museum hands-on displays teach. My reaction was that the possibility of Adam & Eve, being the parents of all humanity, exists alongside the possibility of dinosaurs becoming birds or reptiles. The section on “Neanderthals are the same species as us?” was comforting.

Since I am not a scientist, I pay attention to the research paper’s Discussion, Conclusion, Consideration, Prospects, Analysis. The one thing I consider very important is what I would call qualifications, or qualifying words such as “if” or “controversial.” The qualifying word “all” always make me question if it is really all.

I look for real numbers such as 134 samples and 147 people. Percentages need to be translated into actual amounts. Personally, I like to take every study as an honest attempt to gain knowledge because I know that any attempt has the possibility of greatness.

Here are two examples from one of the links I subsequently discovered. Both quotes are taken out of context. The general subject matter pertains to 1. population bottlenecks which occur when a population’s size is reduced for at least one generation. 2. genetic drift. 3. founder effects.

First quote:
“One of the most important and controversial issues in population genetics is concerned with the relative importance of genetic drift and natural selection in determining evolutionary change.” (Harrison, G.A., Tanner, J.M., Pilbeam, D.R. and Baker, P.T. in Human Biology 3rd ed. Oxford University Press 1988 pp 214-215) www.evolution.berkeley.edu

Second quote:
“If a population is finite in size (as all populations are) and if a given pair of parents have only a small number of offspring, then even in the absence of all selective forces, the frequency of a gene will not be exactly reproduced in the next generation because of sampling error.”(Suzuki, D.T., Griffiths, A.J.F., Miller, J.H. and Lewontin, R.C. in An Introduction to Genetic Analysis 4th ed. W.H. Freeman 1989 p.704) www.evolution.berkeley.edu

One final note: even from my little reading including posts, it seems the genomic research is solid for the primates in general etc. But my gut says that a one-size evolutionary theory does not fit all. Even if primates are related to humans, I am not totally convinced that humans are related back to primates in the same way. Humans appear different from chimps, etc. in many intangible ways. Even if it is said that humans are different from animals in degrees, the extremely broad range of degrees leads me to believe that humans differ in kind. Perhaps one needs to make a choice as to how many “degrees” makes a “kind.”

Blessings,
granny

Human beings are the apple of God’s eye.

 

[anthony022071]

To Anthony:
You seem to actually agree with me that methodological naturalism would not be a problem if only scientists stuck to it as a method only.

In my last post,I said it wasn’t a method,it is a policy whereby scientists must explain natural phenomena as if nature is all there is. The scientific method is simply the experimental method,and it does not entail that a scientist must exclude supernatural causation in his explanations. Methods are not sufficient in the pursuit of truth. What is needed is logical thinking,which should not be restricted to a method.

The moment a natural scientist insists that natural explanations are the only possible ones, he ceases to speak as a scientist, and has become a philosopher.

I don’t think that the mere belief that natural explanations are the only possible ones amounts to a philosophy.

As far as science is concerned,natural explanations are the only possible ones. I’m concerned with how natural phenomena are explained within the context of science,not just with whether scientists deny the supernatural outside of the context of their research.
If it is reasonable to believe in supernatural causation outside of scientific research,then it ought to taken into consideration within scientific research as well. What sense would it make to exclude supernatural causation from science,if it is a reasonable belief? Can science really be interested seeking the truth about the natural world if it excludes a reasonable belief about what causes things to happen?

Still, as I recall my early education and experience in chemistry, we always sought natural explanations of all phenomena. That is the task of natural science. Thus, studying motion of either subatomic particles or star systems entails trying to understand what physical forces and natures account for what we observe.

But where order,origin and life are concerned,natural explanations alone don’t make sense.
Natural things do not have the power to originate themselves,create order,or to create life.
So to stick with natural explanations on these subjects is to attribute to natural causes powers that they do not have. The policy of seeking natural explanations wherever possible should not trump logical thinking. Bonaventure and Thomas Aquinas kept in mind the fact that each effect has a like and fitting cause,and that causes can be discovered by their effects. But scientists do not ask themselves what kind of cause,what power,would be necessary to create physical matter from nothingness,to create order,and to create living creatures. They just take what they see under the microscope at face value – nature is self-creating and self-sufficient. Methodological naturalism is like the principle of sola scriptura as applied to the Book of Nature.

But natural science does not study the nature of motion in terms of the very being and causes of being of new existential perfections manifested in every physical change.

I don’t understand this sentence. Can you simplify it for me?

Natural science explains motion in terms of mechanism and process,rather than in terms of the power that is necessary to accomplish things. A mechanism is just a certain kind of cause and effect or action between physical things. It is not a physical thing in itself,and it only exists insofar as it is moved to happen by some power. Science expains the universe as if it were an infinite regression of mechanisms. Reductionism ad aburdam,ad infinitum.
(On the inadequacy of the scientific outlook promoted by Francis Bacon,I recommend a book called The Seventeenth Century Background,by Basil Willey)

When natural scientists cross that line from merely natural explanation either to affirming the existence of preternatural or supernatural causation, OR to the denial of such causation, then – such natural scientists – no longer are doing natural science, but philosophy.

But sometimes it is a logical necessity to affirm supernatural causation,because,after all,God created and sustains the world in act. The line must be crossed if we are to have logical explanations,because the supernatural is involved with the natural world. God acts upon the natural causes that science studies. Merely affirming the existence of supernatural causation does not amount to doing philosophy in the sense of speculative philosophy. Although,the natural sciences were originally called “natural philosophy” well into the 1700’s.

 

[Dr.Bonnette]

To Anthony:

God operates through secondary causes. We can study those causes in nature in their own proper order. Aristotle’s physics, or the philosophy of nature, studies sensible and mobile being as such. Modern experimental physics is a subdivision of that philosophical discipline. But physics is the starting point for metaphysics. That is why I wrote: “But natural science does not study the nature of motion in terms of the very being and causes of being of new existential perfections manifested in every physical change.” Sensible matter considered precisely as being is part of the subject matter of metaphysics. When you start talking about the very being of things, and the causes of that being not as material nature but as being itself, you are entering metaphysics. The relation between Aristotelian physics and metaphysics is a bit too complicated to explain here. Still, the main point is that natural science studies the nature of secondary causes operating in the physical order – and that is fine. It is only when natural scientists start making claims about the ultimate existential basis for that secondary order of causes that we enter into properly philosophical disputes. I think you have to distinguish carefully between natural scientists who are merely doing their job of analyzing the immediate natural foundations for observable phenomena and those who seek to explain everything in terms of those natural foundations alone. The latter have moved beyond the proper role of natural science into making properly philosophical claims. They might be right, or they might be wrong. But the field of “battle” then becomes properly philosophical. Natural science has a proper role, and it does not help intellectual clarity to condemn all natural science and scientists simply because they are following conventional guidelines in doing their jobs. The fact that many of the leading scientists have started making philosophical claims does not mean that natural science itself is somehow illicit. Some of the greatest scientists in history have been believers in God and most of the leading scientists in early modern times were, not surprisingly, Christians. We must not throw out the baby with the bathwater. God made natural science, too!

 

[anthony022071]

To Anthony:

God operates through secondary causes. We can study those causes in nature in their own proper order.

That’s true. But when science studies the natural causes of biotic life,it sees them as the only causes,thereby attributing to them power to self-act that they do not have. The result is illogical explanations for how nature works.

Aristotle’s physics, or the philosophy of nature, studies sensible and mobile being as such. Modern experimental physics is a subdivision of that philosophical discipline. But physics is the starting point for metaphysics.

I’m not arguing against experimental physics,but the professional policy of methodological naturalism.

That is why I wrote: “But natural science does not study the nature of motion in terms of the very being and causes of being of new existential perfections manifested in every physical change.” Sensible matter considered precisely as being is part of the subject matter of metaphysics. When you start talking about the very being of things, and the causes of that being not as material nature but as being itself, you are entering metaphysics. The relation between Aristotelian physics and metaphysics is a bit too complicated to explain here. Still, the main point is that natural science studies the nature of secondary causes operating in the physical order – and that is fine. It is only when natural scientists start making claims about the ultimate existential basis for that secondary order of causes that we enter into properly philosophical disputes.

I think you have to distinguish carefully between natural scientists who are merely doing their job of analyzing the immediate natural foundations for observable phenomena and those who seek to explain everything in terms of those natural foundations alone.

The theories of evolution,abiognenesis and chaos do explain explaining everything in terms of natural foundations alone,whether or not scientists do it outside of their research as well.

The latter have moved beyond the proper role of natural science into making properly philosophical claims.

Again,I’m not just objecting to scientists who advocate a naturalistic world-view outside of their research,I’m objecting to the fact that the theories themselves are naturalistic. They explain everything as if natural causes are the only causes. One doesn’t have to say outright that nature is all there is in order to promote the naturalist world-view. One can promote it simply by explaining all natural phenomena in terms of natural causes alone.
Authoritative explanations become doctrines.

They might be right, or they might be wrong. But the field of “battle” then becomes properly philosophical.

The field of battle is how the natural world should be interpreted.
Catholic doctrine and science contend over how the natural world should be viewed (as if God exists or as if only Nature exists) and the proper attribution of what causes natural phenomena,in particular life,order and the beginnings of things.

Natural science has a proper role, and it does not help intellectual clarity to condemn all natural science and scientists simply because they are following conventional guidelines in doing their jobs.

The conventinal guideline of M.N. is unjustifiable. No one can demonstrate by reason that all natural phenomena can be adequately explained with scientific laws and natural causes alone. Francis Bacon didn’t even bother to make a real argument for the truthfulness of that view. He just promoted it because it was more useful for acquiring power over Nature than the Scholastic view of Nature,which he disdained.

 

[anthony022071]

The paragraph in the above post which begins “That is why I wrote:” is Dr. Bonnette’s.
I forgot to delete it.

 

[anthony022071]

In “Communion and Stewardship” # 68 & #69 cited in post 95, Can the following quote about the difference between necessity or contingency, be considered the basis for a possible acceptance of the evolutionary theory as defined in post 96?

The theory itself does not allow for divine providence,so it doesn’t make sense for Catholics to accept the theory. It is all about natural contingency,and has no room for contingency guided by divine providence. Also,the definition of evolutionary theory from that web-site is an example of the faulty thinking of science that I’ve been pointing out.

<“Evolutionary theory deals mainly with how life changed after its origin.”>

Here they regard natural life as if it were an amorphous,monolithic thing,like evolutionary rock,and as if it had only one beginning. They ignore the fact that species are composed of individuals which are conceived or reproduced and die. Natural life originates every time that a living creature is conceived or reproduced.

<“Science does try to investigate how life started (e.g., whether or not it happened near a deep-sea vent, which organic molecules came first, etc.), but these considerations are not the central focus of evolutionary theory.”>

If it is not the central focus,then why does evolutionary theory deal with the origin of species? Is there a difference between the study of origin of life on Earth and the study of the origin of species? Did life on earth originate separately from species and individual creatures?

<“Regardless of how life started, afterwards it branched and diversified, and most studies of evolution are focused on those processes.”>

Again,natural life is viewed as it were amorphous thing that changes shape as it flows through time. And the branching and diversification is viewed as a matter of process,rather than what happens at conception or reproduction.

 

[grannymh]

The theory itself does not allow for divine providence,so it doesn’t make sense for Catholics to accept the theory. It is all about natural contingency,and has no room for contingency guided by divine providence. Also,the definition of evolutionary theory from that web-site is an example of the faulty thinking of science that I’ve been pointing out.

<“Evolutionary theory deals mainly with how life changed after its origin.”>

Here they regard natural life as if it were an amorphous,monolithic thing,like evolutionary rock,and as if it had only one beginning. They ignore the fact that species are composed of individuals which are conceived or reproduced and die. Natural life originates every time that a living creature is conceived or reproduced.

<“Science does try to investigate how life started (e.g., whether or not it happened near a deep-sea vent, which organic molecules came first, etc.), but these considerations are not the central focus of evolutionary theory.”>

If it is not the central focus,then why does evolutionary theory deal with the origin of species? Is there a difference between the study of origin of life on Earth and the study of the origin of species? Did life on earth originate separately from species and individual creatures?

<“Regardless of how life started, afterwards it branched and diversified, and most studies of evolution are focused on those processes.”>

Again,natural life is viewed as it were amorphous thing that changes shape as it flows through time. And the branching and diversification is viewed as a matter of process,rather than what happens at conception or reproduction.

Your comments help me think some more about the people involved. How would you address this situation? One of my daughter-in-laws has a scientific education and admires the “work in biology” of Richard Dawkins. She is a stay- at-home Mom and wasn’t really aware of his latest book, The God Delusion. These are my questions. Is it theoretically possible to separate the “original work in biology” from the man? Can we look at basic science itself as something good because it involves nature–that is nature which was created as good by God?

I have some ideas, etc., I’d like to add to the above discussion. Due to the late hour here, may I postpone my comments. The keyboard is about to become my pillow.

Blessings,

Human life is God’s pride and joy.

 

[hecd2]

In post #69, you write: “I never said I was a positivist, nor can you reasonably infer that I am one.” Still, your modus operandi is to reduce all licit knowledge to natural science.

As I’ve commented before, you seem to be focused on a desire to label my philosophical opinion rather than to address yourself to the arguments that I am making. It’s all very well to say, “he’s a positivist, we can safely ignore him”, but that is a lazy way to proceed, and since my position is more reasoned that blind adherence to any single school, it is also likely to be self-defeating. I shall, however, indulge you this time by commenting that logical positivism entails a degree of reductionism that I do not hold.

In saying, “My claim is that which we can sense (see, hear, touch, feel, smell), either directly or indirectly, with or without the aid of instruments, is all that we can know exists,” you embrace the Vienna Circle’s famed Verification Principle. Even its own proponents quickly came to realize that it cannot pass its own test. How do you directly or indirectly sense verify the claim that only directly or indirectly sense verifiable knowledge is “all that we can know?” Can you put that claim into a test tube, check it on an interferometer, or a schedule of pointer readings?

I freely agree that my claim cannot be logically proven in the sense of a piece of formal logic or a mathematical theorem. But I do claim that it is a reasonable conclusion in the same vein as any strongly evidenced claim based on observation - say Einstein’s GR or the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. Let us look at this a little more closely, because it is important.

Your mistake, and the mistake of many others, is to confuse epistemology (discovering truth about reality) with the exercise of pure logic and the conduct of mathematics, which are strictly syntactical but arbitrary languages. Given Peano’s axioms (we’ll return to that later) you can prove that 2+2=4; but no substantial truth statement about reality is formally provable, and that includes the premise that I state above: “that which we can sense (see, hear, touch, feel, smell), either directly or indirectly, with or without the aid of instruments, is all that we can know exists”. It is an empirical statement, based on the observation that there is no other way for knowledge (even second hand knowledge) to enter our consciousness. Note that I did not claim that what we can sense yada-yada IS all there is, rather that it is all that we can KNOW exists. Nor am I claiming that that apparent sense evidence is always a true representation of reality - it usually is when we cross the street or design an aeroplane or determine the fine structure constant or the structure of DNA; but it is trivially obvious that our brain can receive distorted sense data or act as though it had received sense data when none was, in fact, present: that is why the methods of formal science are so powerful in extracting truth claims about reality that are good approximations of reality. However, they are always approximations, subject to further refinement. Now, if you are looking for a formal logical proof for a foundation of knowledge, you won’t find it here, nor, I would argue will you find it anywhere, and certainly not in Aristotle nor Thomas who both used contemporaneous observations about the world (naive, limited and erroneous physics if you like) as the premises for their philosophical and theological systems and proofs, some of which I have already pointed out.

Again, in post #69, you confirm that you are “…closest to a pragmatic verificationist.” Not only does this give you all the baggage of the unverifiable Verification Principle, but it raises a fascinating question about all your philosophical and scientific claims in this thread. If you understand the history of the term “pragmatism,” you should know that the pragmatic theory of knowledge is defined, not in terms of objective truth, but in terms of “what works.”

Of course I understand that - and I claim that “what works” is the closest we can get to truths about reality. I am not denying the existence of an underlying reality - I do not subscribe to solipsism as you must realise. True statements are those that reflect this reality, such as “the sky is blue” - which is not a statement about qualia but a statement about physics and wavelengths. What does it mean to say that Newtonian mechanics is true? It is true and is used in the domain in which it works, in non-relativistic scenarios, say in determining the design of a motor car. But it is not true where relativistic effects are significant, which happens to include the GPS system of satellites; in that case truth includes some rather counter-intuitive considerations (otherwise the device that depends on them would tell us we are driving along Oxford Street when we are, in fact, on Piccadilly). The truth of a statement therefore depends on context and on how closely it corresponds to reality. There is no such thing as an absolutely true and logically provable statement about reality.

That does not mean that we cannot make statements that are approximately true with high confidence. Our lives depend on them.

continued

 

[hecd2]

continuation

Thus, “2 + 2 = 4” is a “truth.” But for the pragmatist, it is true because it “works,” whereas, for the traditional philosopher, it works because it is true.

This is a rather naive view. You must know that you can view 2+2=4 in two ways - first, as an observation that comes to us through our senses that two things of a class plus two things of the same class equals four things. Let us look at this first, because I would agree that the observation 2+2=4 of things, reflects underlying reality, but it is subject to the same impossibility of formal proof from which all statements about reality suffer, in that it is an observation that comes to us through our senses…

If we turn to the formally provable theorem that 2+2=4 in the arithmetic of natural numbers, this says nothing about reality (pure mathematical constructs are not directly connected with reality, but follow by applying fixed rules to a set of axioms that are not themselves provable). It is not necessary for an object with the properties of the square root of minus one to exist in order for complex numbers to exist, to take the simplest example; or for a vector space of an infinite number of dimensions to exist in order for Hilbert space to have provable properties, to take a more advanced example. The axioms on which the arithmetic of natural numbers is based are called Peano’s postulates and cannot be derived within arithmetic itself (according to Goedel’s second incompleteness theorem and Tarski’s undefinability theorem). They can be derived from more primitive postulates or a metalanguage - for example, from the axioms of propositional and predicate calculus and Zermelo-Fraenkel set theory with choice. But these axioms are themselves unprovable in their own terms, and no mathematician or logician has suggested a schema in which these 21 axioms are themselves proven; and if they were to do so, they would introduce an axiom scheme which itself would be unproven.

So your blithe statement that 2+2=4 is a truth, when unpacked, presents all these problems of proof, which, it seems to me, leads inevitably to the conclusion that the correspondence between statements and reality cannot be formally proven, but rely on how well those statements work in practice. See, for example, the anomaly of the precession of the perihelion of Mercury.

If the criterion of truth is now to be defined in terms of how it works for us in life and ordinary experience, then all your claims about God, the soul, Adam and Eve, molecular biology, natural scientific “truth,” and so forth, must now be redefined to mean only that they “work” for us – not in terms of the objective truth claims you have been purporting to defend

What I freely give up is the notion of formal proof of the truth of statements about reality, because the premises are always and necessarily unprovable. What I cling to however, are reasonable inferences about reality based on sense experience, which are warranted by their efficacy.

As Stumpf points out, "It was inevitable that such a method should raise the question whether saying about an idea that “it works” is the same as saying that “it is true.” (Socrates to Sartre, 5th ed., Samuel Enoch Stumpf, p. 390.)

Indeed, but what I say is that an idea that works better (ie that is more consistent with observation and that makes more accurate predictions) than another idea is a closer approximation to reality. And that’ s the best that we can ever hope to do. Who says that all reality is accurately conceivable within the conceptual capacity of human minds?

Alec
evolutionpages.com

 

[edwest2]

First, Adam and Eve were two people. They were real. Adam is referred to as an individual elsewhere in the Bible.

Second, the Congregation for Saint’s Causes is investigating two miracles attributed to Pope John Paul II. Anyone can, like Secretary of State Clinton, go examine the tilma, or cloak, of Our Lady of Guadalupe. Right now. The Church has declared it was not painted by human hands.

Sadly, the false impression is that miracles (and religion) are just fading away. When the Pope canonizes someone, he makes the decision infallibly.

All I’m reading here is the same tired arguments. The worshippers of science are telling Catholics that new, new knowledge shows that this or that never happened in the Bible. An interesting hobby but it goes against Church teaching.

God can act directly in His Creation whenever he wants to. Jesus Christ did. Do any Catholics here doubt He raised Lazarus from the dead?

Finally, a lot of this follows the Marxist idea from the 1920s, except the Scientific Community is standing in for the State: propaganda will be disseminated to remove religious beliefs from among the people. At the time, they viewed their biggest problem being children being taught by grandparents. They made it a point to get schools to teach kids an atheistic worldview.

So, it doesn’t matter how often someone says that science is this pure, unsullied thing and that it’s only a few people who give it a bad name. Go to youtube. Just type in Richard Dawkins or PZ Myers. Go ahead. They are using their titles and positions as scientists to not only promote atheism but to prove that science and atheism are linked. It’s happening here too.

Peace,
Ed

 

[grannymh]

Indeed, but what I say is that an idea that works better (ie that is more consistent with observation and that makes more accurate predictions) than another idea is a closer approximation to reality. And that’ s the best that we can ever hope to do. Who says that all reality is accurately conceivable within the conceptual capacity of human minds?

Alec
evolutionpages.com

Could your last question be referring to the intangible?

Blessings,
granny

Human life is sacred.

 

[grannymh]

If it is not the central focus,then why does evolutionary theory deal with the origin of species? Is there a difference between the study of origin of life on Earth and the study of the origin of species? Did life on earth originate separately from species and individual creatures?

The following are some thoughts –
Did life on earth originate separately from species and individual creatures?
Personally, I see life as the peak of nature’s beauty created and maintained by a loving Creator.

Another poster on an older thread answered your question this way. Take a look at a building from bottom to top. The basement is usually a bunch of things somewhat like the physical universe which God created. The first floor is when God breathed life into these things making them the building blocks of life. The second floor is when God molded the building blocks into humans and other creatures. The third floor and above is the time from God’s creation to now, with all the changes that have taken place. In other words, Divine Providence is guiding all the stages.

Is there a difference between the study of origin of life on Earth and the study of the origin of species? Some people divide the two so that the study of the origin of life is part of philosophy/theology and the study of living things is part of science. Others keep the two together as in the above example of a building.

If it is not the central focus, then why does evolutionary theory deal with the origin of species? Some scientists like to look at the origin of the species as starting on the second floor in the above example of a building. That way the question of a loving Creator doesn’t have to be answered. Catholics prefer to start at the beginning with God.

What I hope I’ve demonstrated with my comments is that there is really a choice of how one views creation. BTW, my favorite sentence in your post is: “Natural life originates every time that a living creature is conceived or reproduced.”

Blessings,
granny

All human life is meant for eternal life.

 

[RobbyS]

In that case, you must hold that all natural scienceis incompatible with Catholic doctrine, which is a very bizarre position to hold.

Because the evidence shows that humans are biologically related to other animals in degrees of closeness according to a phylogeny, because the molecular evidence shows that humans and other geat apes had a common ancestor, and becasue we see the emergence of humans in the palaeontological record.
The rest of your claims are wrong, they contain fundamental errors of understanding that have already been explained to you and they are off-topic.

Alec
evolutionpages.com

Given that Aristotle was a naturalist, and that on the level of observation, his perception of “substance” is the same as ours, I differ on you on the easy dismissal of what, say, Aquinas, said. Even Darwin acknowledged a debt to Aristotle the naturalist. And since
the human beings that Aristotle or Aquinas observed were pretty much the same as the ones you and I observe, a proper humility requires that we be open to the possibility that they saw things that we are blind or tone death to. Livingamong machines as wedo, we tend to forget that a machine is basically the materialization of a human ability, and that if we think of ourselves as organic machines,we are looking at things bassackwards.

As to the question of whether we differ by degree or kind from the othe ranimals. Mortimer Adler took up that question many years ago. I don’t have his book handy,and so I really can’;t give you hisargument, but it helped form my impression that the human intellect is so different from that of of the other primates as to amount to a difference in kind. If we are not different in kind, then we approach that at least asyntopically. Which BTW is pretty much how Aquinas characterizes our ability to “know” God.

 

[Texas_Roofer]

… you seem to be focused on a desire to label my philosophical opinion rather than to address yourself to the arguments that I am making… but that is a lazy way to proceed, … it is also likely to be self-defeating…
I freely agree that my claim cannot be logically proven in the sense of a piece of formal logic or a mathematical theorem… But I do claim that it is a reasonable conclusion in the same vein as any strongly evidenced claim based on observation…
Your mistake, and the mistake of many others, is to confuse epistemology (discovering truth about reality) with the exercise of pure logic and the conduct of mathematics, which are strictly syntactical but arbitrary languages…

So the kettle says the pot is black?

 

[grannymh]

Post 63. Excuse me if I am a little challenging here: I know that you know that this is a friction of ideas not a friction of people.

Agreed–our discussion is a friction of ideas. This grants me the freedom to explore Adam & Eve from all kinds of view points, including the non-theistic and agnostic.

One favor. Please continue to correct my scientific vocabulary.

Since the scientific findings preclude the possibility of a bottleneck of two in the human and pre-human lineage, we can safely conclude that a literal Adam and Eve never existed. Unless…unless you or someone else has an alternative hypothesis that accommodates both ideas. I know that you have been considering such a thing, but you have not yet told us what it is.

Here is an update on my wandering thoughts. The topic “whether belief in literal Adam & Eve is warranted” leads to two different “belief” choices based on scientific possibilities.

Choice one is: "The genetic diversity and other characteristics of human genomic history precludes the possibility of two parents in human ancestry. Thus Adam and Eve are not literally unique, but rather part of 10,000 or so others.

Choice two is: The understanding of Adam and Eve as being unique in the history of hominids is a scientific possibility. I realize that in comparison to choice one, choice two is a long way off from being an alternative hypothesis. Nonetheless, the possibility of choice two is strong enough to support scientific inquiry.

It’s my turn to be a “little challenging.” Since both choices relate to scientific inquiry, the creationist/evolutionist labels are not in play. Important note: it is still possible to employ scholasticism since that is a time-honored method. Thus, anyone can take up the challenge of choice two.

The genetic diversity and other characteristics of the genomes of living humans precludes the possibility of a bottleneck of two parents in human ancestry. If I am wrong, then someone needs to post a contradictory assessment of human genomics that is consistent with a relatively recent severe bottleneck - I am not aware that such a reasoned assessment exists, or given the evidence, can exist.

Admittedly, I started out looking for a contradictory assessment of human genomics. However, as my Irish mother taught me – there is more than one way to skin a cat.
A contradictory assessment is not the only way to get past the bottleneck.

To begin. The following explanatory statement about Adam and Eve is easier for me.

n The evidence shows that humans are biologically related to other animals in degrees of closeness according to a phylogeny, because the molecular evidence shows that humans and other great apes had a common ancestor, and because we see the emergence of humans in the paleontological record.

This explanatory statement deserves another interpretation. There is a choice. The understanding that Adam and Eve were unique in the history of Homo sapiens can be derived from our understanding of pre-history physical earth including inhabitants.

Molecular evidence is not the only factor to be considered. Furthermore, the paleontological record tells what kind of matter hominids were made of but not a lot about who they are. There is evidence of their artisty and tool making.

While the molecular evidence shows relationship between animals, including the amazing Homo sapiens, phylogeny does not necessarily stop with a common ancestor. According to “Understanding Evolution” found on www.evolution.berkeley.edu “ Phylogenetic systematics is the formal name for the field within biology that reconstructs evolutionary history and studies the patterns of relationships among organisms.” and “Many phylogenies also include an outgroup — a taxon outside the group of interest. All the members of the group of interest are more closely related to each other than they are to the outgroup. Hence, the outgroup stems from the base of the tree.”

The key words above are “history” and “base of the tree” which extend further back than the clades on the evolutionary tree, i.e., the node or point that determines a specific group of organisms that includes an ancestor and all descendents of that ancestor.

“Understanding Evolution” continues: “The basis of a cladistic analysis is data on the characters or traits, of the organisms in which we are interested. These characters could be anatomical and physiological characteristics, behaviors, or genetic sequences.” The key word is behaviors.

What we now have are three more areas to use in understanding Adam and Eve: 1. evolutionary history across the board, 2. scientific description of the tree’s base plus answering specific questions concerning the first life forms, and 3. significant behavior differences found in humans – described as species identity.

So far, I have some of Alec’s data for area 2. – lowest common denominator of life is the fact that all life uses the same DNA molecule. (description included) There are very basic things which differ between major domains of life (the archaea, bacteria and eukaryotes) but are common within the domains. But the DNA itself and the amino acids are common across all domains.

Blessings,
granny

All human life is sacred.

 

[hecd2]

Briefly, the problem with your complaints about God’s justice in granting miracles is that you again assume that only materialistic values, such as healing, are relevant. From God’s point of view, the salvation of souls trumps healing, and that we have the hubris to think we know better than He how to accomplish this task is amazing to me.

Well, this sort of argument is a kind of free universal trump, and worthless in reasoned debate. In effect you are saying that any philosophical, theological or moral problems associated with an act of a putative God can be swept away, because God has his good reasons for doing things that appear to us to be unjust/deceptive/cruel/arbitrary. But these issues cannot be swept away, because a God who is prepared occasionally to intervene in the normal course of nature to procure the healing of an individual is clearly capable of intervening to moderate the unspeakable suffering of tens of millions from disease, famine, drought and genocide, but does not do so. If the concept of justice means anything at all, this is clearly unjust.

I am aware that Ernst Mayr proposed a biological species concept,

No - Ernst Mayr proposed, or rather formally defined, THE biological species concept (the BSC), which is one concept for defining species in biology.

but his words mean what they say, namely, that we need to get to the “underlying philosophical concepts.”

Well, that might be so, but what point are you making? Mayr defended the BSC against alternatives all his life, and laid out very clearly in “What Evolution Is” (his final book published in 2002), his reasons for claiming that the BSC is the most helpful concept for defining species.

You are unaware of the natural philosophical species concept simply because you are immersed primarily in modern biology, not in the historical discussion of species among non-positivist philosophers.

Perhaps you are referring to the Aristotlean notion of species representing natural kinds that possess essences (if so, why refer to it by a handle that no-one else uses?). As I have pointed out before, the essentialist approach to species definition has had to be completely abandoned in the light of modern biology, (no credible species concepts remain that rely on essentialist concepts). Mayr himself was very clear about the biological facts that invalidate the essentialist approach, but, in truth, essentialism as a foundation for defining species died with Darwin.

Your easy derision of metaphysical proofs for God’s existence, especially the proof from motion, merely reveals that you are unfamiliar with a proper presentation of the proofs themselves – and that you confuse the antequarian cosmological concepts of Aristotle with his legitimate metaphysical insights. Aristotle defines motion as “the act of a being in potency insofar as it is in potency?” Note this has nothing to do with ancient notions of time and space, but is expressed in terms of states of being itself – a properly metaphysical perspective.

Whoa! - steady on there. The foundations of Aristotle’s notions of motion are to be found in his Physics, and his definition of motion in Book III. In that book, he clearly defines one form of motion as being what he calls locomotion (others are, as you know, substance, quality and quantity). The whole of Book IV is given over to a discussion of the framework for motion focused on what we call motion and what he calls locomotion (change of place). He defines place, “void” and time as foundational concepts for motion in ways that we now know to be mistaken. As the Thomistic proof for God that relies on a Prime Mover, also relies on the Aristotlean concepts of motion, and since that proof relies on a universal claim that all motion requires a mover, then it also relies on the claim that all sorts of motion require a mover that is not itself. So I only have to show that the claim relies on mistaken notions about one sort of motion to undermine Thomas’s whole argument. But, as I have said, Aristotle’s notions of space and time (in Book IV, which he begins by saying: "The physicist must have a knowledge of Place…whether there is such a thing or not, and the manner of its existence and what it is - both because all suppose that things which exist are somewhere … and because motion in its most general and primary sense is change of place, which we call locomotion.), and relative and absolute motion (using the term to mean locomotion as he describes it in Books V and VII) are mistaken, and the conclusions that he draws about them, specifically about natural motions and the need for a mover, are also mistaken, so that Aquinas builds his house on sand. And don’t think that locomotion is the only one of the kinds of motion with these problems. The others also have problems which we can investigate (Aristotle’s notion of motion towards whiteness, for example, is hopelessly in error), and there are also examples of motions (in the Aristotlean sense) that Aristotle never dreamed of, such as quantum changes of state, say spin, or atomic energy levels which change in the absence of a mover.

I am not denigrating Aristotle - clearly we owe a huge debt to his thinking - as Newton so eloquently put it, we stand on the shoulders of giants. But that does not mean that we should treat his ideas as some sort of sacred text. It is clear to anyone who knows anything about physics that he makes many very fundamental errors in his understanding of nature, because of his early place in the history of science, but also because he makes statements that he claims to be true without ever testing them and which have since been empirically falsified, and that these in turn feed through to and undermine the truth of large areas of his metaphysics.

Alec
evolutionpages.com