You try too hard. But I still love you as a brother in Christ. It basically boils down to this:
You’re now claiming that mutations occur as the result of a law? What predictable laws cause mutations in DNA, for example? What predictable laws cause the environmental changes that affect organisms?
I think your point is that we can predict changes in the environment and what mutations will occur, precisely what effect they will have, and when they will occur. In other words, mutations occur as a result of a known “law”. What law is that?
I would prefer to see you use predictions for the future. If evolution is predictable and governed by a physical law, then we should be able to predict the rate and kind of changes that will occur in organisms for the future.
As I said, if you cannot or will not make a distinction between order and disorder (chaos, randomness, accidental events) – then your use of the term “order” is meaningless. For you, there is no randomness or disorder. Thus, you cannot really observe “order and design” in the universe, since everything you look at indicates “design”. The term “design” in this case is meaningless. It is a synonym for “is”. If nothing is not-designed, then what does the term “design” mean? How can a person detect design if there is no difference between design and order and anything other possible thing?
If it is “self-organizing” then God didn’t organize it. If God organized it, then nature is not “self-organizing”.
How do you know? What does “order” mean? If there is no difference between order and chaos, as you just claimed, then how do you know anything was even “organized”?
What makes you say “seemingly random”? Who does it “seem random” to? You?
A “seemingly random” event is evidence of “harmony”? Apparently, you think “harmony” is similar to order, or an example of order. Again, if “chaos” is an example of “design” for you – then chaos is an example of “harmony and order” also.
I think I’ve spelled this out well, and you’ve repeated your view again here quite well. Yours is the Francis Collins approach, sort of, although you take a different slant on it.
A self-organizing system is not “accidental”. For example, a seed planted grows predictably into the kind of plant related to that seed. That is a self-organizing process.
A couple of points. We cannot know for certain what happened at the waters edge.
Language and symbols always come from a mind. DNA is called the language of God.
I notice how you couldn’t bring yourself to read the John West article and certainly not make a comment about it – and have since joined the cheerleaders on the sidelines.
Interestingly, language itself shows no sign of evolution. Even the oldest languages carry exactly the same function as any language used today. It’s a collection of symbols used to describe things, and it can be used to describe anything.
The way it is often presented is that “evolution explains the development of human life since human beings evolved from apes”. The Catholic evolutionist repeats this and defends it. When reminded that a human being possesses an immortal soul which cannot be created by any natural process, the evolutionist claims “the soul is not a part of science”. So the soul for the theistic-evolutionist, is just like Ken Miller’s “god” – it’s an unnecessary appendage that cannot be detected and serves no function.
It’s not merely “my” attempt. It’s an explanation of truth from the Church’s perspective, for the Church has indeed recognized that Science and God go hand in hand. You confuse abuses of science with science and seem unwilling to make the distinction so that you can continue to condemn science for the abuses of it. I am trying to make the distinctions that must be made, both to be honest and to preserve what the Church teaches about truth.
Yes, but I don’t care about Ken Miller.
I’ve said that I accept that. I have a deeper interest in the nature of that teaching and the extent of it–for it may be the current understanding but not yet dogma, and the Scripture seems to allow for additional interpretations that do not conflict. I’d like to see the link, but I’m not really interested in distracting our discussion further on a point of essential agreement here.
I didn’t realize you were trying to argue against biology textbooks and not against me. I have not been arguing for textbooks, since I have not seen them in several years. What I had in high school and in college rarely if ever presented a Godless agenda, however.
As I’ve declared agreement with dozens of times on this thread.
How do you propose textbooks address science without mentioning God, yet not declaring self-sufficiency? I think that’s easily handled just by a clear explanation of what is within the realm of science to study, and a statement that science is unable to determine how the physical world came into being or why it functions the way it does.
Right, quoted above in CCC 159. “Detect,” however, can be a loaded term. There is evidence but not proof without faith.
It’s the scholarly debate of our day. The materialists need to be shown that this new natural process does not explain away God, but the faithful are presented with a scientific discovery about how God may have done things and ought to explore the truth of that since it illuminates further our understanding of God and His creation. It is not required for salvation, but all growth in knowledge of God, all sharing in His creation and wonder of it, is good and nurtures relationship with Him.
I’ve read ID explanations of flagellum and found them lacking in major ways that Greg pointed out in his quotes–that ID fallaciously assumes that evolution’s claim is one of instantaneous creation through random processes (that is not what evolution suggests), and the methodical error of subtracting components backwards or assuming more primitive working forms could exist. Complexity of eyes is another, but progressive development is likely because it is observed through the many different levels of similar organs we see among various species, and the varying degrees of efficiency within species (some humans have physically superior eyes to others; were they to pass on that trait more successfully, the human race would develop better eyesight).
This and the culture/ideology wars we’re in agreement on and on the same side.
You conflate that which dwells outside of science with that which is unnecessary and functionless.
Evolution cannot and should not explain the soul.
Catholic evolutionists do not deny the soul but rather seek appropriate means of explaining it–theology, not science. This behavior in no way implies that the soul is meaningless or useless.
Physics, chemistry, ecology all identify principles (if you’ve noticed, I’ve tended to use “laws,” “principles,” and “processes” in general senses) by which nature consistently operates. You don’t actually think that evolution proposes that it occurs outside of these processes, do you? Violating other laws of nature?
We can predict to the extent that we have data and can coordinate and measure all the variables. It is theoretically possible, and indeed computers help us to build models that more accurately predict a wider array of data, but we are still extremely limited in our knowledge of specific actions particularly on the molecular level, and will likely always be so limited due to the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. However, God knows all of this, so He knows what will happen and indeed can see it all as it happens. Our own ability to predict does not matter one bit in this argument. It is only God’s. For you seem to argue that evolution says even God cannot know what is going on, and therefore you conclude that evolution must leave God out. I have argued many ways by which God CAN know what is going on and indeed be the cause of it, even if we can only observe it distantly as a random distribution. Thus I think you make erroneous conclusions about what must follow from evolution.
If we had enough data, we could. On a limited level, we can. We can and have predicted the genetic doom of various species and identified significant danger among endangered species due to breeding populations being too far reduced. We can predict that habitat changes will influence the successful reproduction of particularly adapted individuals of a population and have indeed observed that. Pesticide use is a good example. We can predict that isolation over great periods of time will cause genetic drift within a species, possibly severe enough that that species will diverge into two reproductively-isolated and morphologically-distinct species.
You tell me. Is there any *thing *that was not designed? If so, how did it come to be?
You take that term too far. It is a limited and technical term specific to open systems. It is a description of what happens within the system, the organization of order by processes within it. “Self-organizing” is not a term that has anything whatsoever to do with the original creation or composition of a system, and so you cannot claim that it means that God didn’t organize it. Self-organizing systems, so defined, are an observed fact (they do exist).
You’re getting lost in semantics. Words are limited by context; take them out of context and you can make them meaningless. Taking “order” and “organization” outside the context of a system renders the concept meaningless. See above for relativity to understanding and what is relative to God.
Relativity is the difference. Relative to our knowledge and perception, the best we can describe some things is by their degree of randomness or correlation to other factors. We cannot isolate all variables; our measurement and knowledge is too limited. It gets better over time, and then we can detect correlations (relationships) among variables better. Things appear less “random,” though they “seemed” random before because that was the best way we had to describe and predict them. Does that make it more clear?
What would you call nature other than order out of chaos? And yet the more we come to understand how nature works, the less chaotic it seems. The ability of natural processes to operate in such “seemingly random” ways (in ways that we don’t fully understand and can best describe as through a series of correlating “random” distributions), and yet still produce such beautiful order and harmony, such an ability to continue functioning, to self correct and sustain (don’t take “self” too far!)…all that is evidence of both underlying order and design. God made it all, with such wondrous complexity that we can study what He did endlessly and find more revelations.
I’ve described these above. If that’s not sufficient, then I need to know how you can NOT see harmony in nature, how you view order or chaos.
So take that further and apply it to natural processes. I believe you are saying that there are processes which do not act together “intelligently,” but with some degree of lack of intention or purpose (other than carrying themselves out). I believe you would also agree that God created all of those processes, and He actually did have a purpose for them all (which is what I was insisting on).
It is, but so is an ecosystem, which does not operate by a strict set of instructions like DNA, but by the more nebulous interaction of a great many environmental variables.
They are only unpredictable because of our limitations. God knows them.
I think I have, through many examples and arguments. Ecosystems are my favorite form of order, having majored in environmental science. Yet the components of these are so complex, the interaction of variables so numerous, that we are only dimly capable of predicting particular events, though we are much more capable of making accurate generalizations.
I have to parse out and qualify your words again. Yes, order can come about by physical laws, but only because God created those laws in such a way that they could do that. He gave them purpose and direction; they are His tools. God’s creation of those laws was miraculous. The subsequent carrying out of His plans by those laws needs no suspension of them in a miracle, because if they did need suspension to carry out their purpose, God would be working against Himself, like Satan’s divided house.
Yes. But only because we can rely on consistent natural laws, processes. If they are not consistent, we can’t even begin to make educated guesses, for we have no foundation to base our speculation on.
No! That’s one of the first things most teachers try to clear up when teaching evolution. The adaptation of organisms, the development and change of species over time, is a reaction to the changing environment in which they live. Evolution is a mechanism by which God enables organisms to best adapt and make the greatest use of resources. God intends species to grow and thrive (or go extinct, as the case may be) and bring about more diversity. In the case of man, He intended a specific being and created the processes (tools) by which He would bring that being about.
Thanks. I wouldn’t be so disparaging of them, though. It actually appears that we have some common ground
You misunderstand evolution, and you misunderstand “function.” Language has absolutely evolved in very similar ways as organisms. One language has split to many dialects, and to many other languages (Romance languages being a prime example). They are influenced by their environment. Etymologies can be traced backwards to common origins.
