The movie.......Expelled

[4elise]

Hi, fairly new to the forum, so many probably do not recognize me. I’d like to make a few points about the debate between evolution and intelligent design.

(For the record, I am a scientist by profession, a physicist to be specific. I support evolution as a valid scientific theory. I am also a practicing Catholic and pretty serious about it.)

Evolution says nothing about the existence or influence of God on the world.
In fact, recognizing that evolution as an accurate scientific theory (in it’s range of validity) is not against Catholic teaching. The church has no problem with that.

What the Church has a problem with is certain philosophical interpretations of evolution. That is, the interpretation that life is a fluke and governed solely by random mutations is not OK, according to the Church. However, the interpretation that God is behind the mechanisms of evolution (what physically seem to be random chance mutations) to create the diversity of life on Earth is OK. The problem here is that people on both sides can’t separate the scientific facts and data from the philosophical interpretations of the data. (John Paul II wrote some great stuff on Catholic belief and evolution. Please take some time to look it up and read it.)

In reality, evolution, whether a correct or incorrect model, gives no scientific proof for or against the existence or actions of God. How could it? By the definitions of both science and God, science can never prove or disprove God. Science is the study of physical reality. God, by definition, is beyond physical reality. **What people need to realize is that the real matter of contention is the conflicting philosophical interpretations.
**

Secondly, we need to take step back and try to understand each other. Not everyone who supports the theory of evolution is trying to push a materialistic world view onto children in the school system. Evolution explains many things very well. This is why a majority of scientists accept it as a valid theory. It is not flat out wrong, and there is evidence for it.

Also, not everyone who questions evolution is an uneducated idiot, nor are people with religious beliefs idiots. I’ve seen many conversations on this topic (not necessarily this one) degenerate to insults and insinuations. Instead, if we treat each other like intelligent adult human beings, we can make progress into understanding both sides of this argument.

Anyway, to summarize:

1. Evolution (the scientific theory) does not conflict with Catholic teaching(again, check out JPII).
2. The matter of contention is really the philosophical interpretations of that theory, which really have nothing to do with the science at all.
3. Both sides of this debate need to give the other side the benefit of the doubt and try to better understand each other.

Very well stated and a great clarification!

 

[4elise]

It’s not suspicion, but the deep experience of science-deniers trying to squeeze religion into the science classroom. I have no problem with students discussing various cultural perspectives such as ID, YEC, or atheistic evolution, but do it in a philosophy class, not a science class.

 

[StAnastasia]

You heard their lie personally?? That makes a big difference. What did they say versus what they did (and who in particular)? How do you personally know that the 6 stories about the “martyrs” were lies?

Premise Media contacted me in 2007 about filming my department chair – a noted evolutionary scientist – about a film featuring the work of scientists. What they did not tell us was that it was a “documentary” pushing “intelligent design.” When we were warned about this we pulled the plug on the interview.

StAnastasia

 

[ricmat]

Premise Media contacted me in 2007 about filming my department chair – a noted evolutionary scientist – about a film featuring the work of scientists.

You are a theologian, but your department chair is an evolutionary scientist? Tell me how that works.

 

[StAnastasia]

You are a theologian, but your department chair is an evolutionary scientist? Tell me how that works.

It’s an interdisciplinary department; we do a lot of cross-disciplinary teaching in the liberal studies department, and people take turns serving as chair.

 

[ricmat]

It’s an interdisciplinary department; we do a lot of cross-disciplinary teaching in the liberal studies department, and people take turns serving as chair.

Ah.

By the way, I see you use the term “science-denier” a lot lately. Do you ever use the term “God-denier?”

 

[StAnastasia]

Ah. By the way, I see you use the term “science-denier” a lot lately. Do you ever use the term “God-denier?”

I use the term “atheist.” There are of course variations within atheism, ranging from those on the more agnostic end of the spectrum, to those on the “evangelical atheist” end of the spectrum.

 

[James_S_Saint]

Premise Media contacted me in 2007 about filming my department chair – a noted evolutionary scientist – about a film featuring the work of scientists. What they did not tell us was that it was a “documentary” pushing “intelligent design.” When we were warned about this we pulled the plug on the interview.

StAnastasia

Whoa!!

You just convicted yourself.

You said that you pulled the plug based on a “warning” (i.e. suspicion) that they were “pushing ID”. Yet the film was not pushing ID. The film was exposing those who act inappropriately due to the mere mention of ID and thus malign altruistic Science.

So in, effect. The film was about you.

 

[ricmat]

Ah.

By the way, I see you use the term “science-denier” a lot lately. Do you ever use the term “God-denier?”

I use the term “atheist.” There are of course variations within atheism, ranging from those on the more agnostic end of the spectrum, to those on the “evangelical atheist” end of the spectrum.

Yes, that’s a much less “charged” term to use. It is not offensive, and implies no lack of education (which I know you are always concerned with). And the term atheist is something that those who deny God use to describe themselves.

So instead of using the term “science-denier” which may or may actually not be true, or is true only within a very narrow range, why not use the term “IDer” which describes what the person believes and is what they call themselves, instead of a caricature of something they don’t believe?

 

[StAnastasia]

Whoa!! You just convicted yourself. You said that you pulled the plug based on a “warning” (i.e. suspicion) that they were “pushing ID”. Yet the film was not pushing ID. The film was exposing those who act inappropriately due to the mere mention of ID and thus malign altruistic Science.

“altruistic science”?

 

[ricmat]

Premise Media contacted me in 2007 about filming my department chair – a noted evolutionary scientist – about a film featuring the work of scientists. What they did not tell us was that it was a “documentary” pushing “intelligent design.” When we were warned about this we pulled the plug on the interview.

StAnastasia

Whoa!!

You just convicted yourself.

You said that you pulled the plug based on a “warning” (i.e. suspicion) that they were “pushing ID”. Yet the film was not pushing ID. The film was exposing those who act inappropriately due to the mere mention of ID and thus malign altruistic Science.

So in, effect. The film was about you.

LOL!

BTW - the term StA used - “pulled the plug” - has recently been modernized to “hide the decline.”

 

[reggieM]

Whoa!!

You just convicted yourself.

You said that you pulled the plug based on a “warning” (i.e. suspicion) that they were “pushing ID”. Yet the film was not pushing ID. The film was exposing those who act inappropriately due to the mere mention of ID and thus malign altruistic Science.

So in, effect. The film was about you.

That says it. :clapping:

 

[edwest2]

Hi, fairly new to the forum, so many probably do not recognize me. I’d like to make a few points about the debate between evolution and intelligent design.

(For the record, I am a scientist by profession, a physicist to be specific. I support evolution as a valid scientific theory. I am also a practicing Catholic and pretty serious about it.)

Evolution says nothing about the existence or influence of God on the world.
In fact, recognizing that evolution as an accurate scientific theory (in it’s range of validity) is not against Catholic teaching. The church has no problem with that.

What the Church has a problem with is certain philosophical interpretations of evolution. That is, the interpretation that life is a fluke and governed solely by random mutations is not OK, according to the Church. However, the interpretation that God is behind the mechanisms of evolution (what physically seem to be random chance mutations) to create the diversity of life on Earth is OK. The problem here is that people on both sides can’t separate the scientific facts and data from the philosophical interpretations of the data. (John Paul II wrote some great stuff on Catholic belief and evolution. Please take some time to look it up and read it.)

In reality, evolution, whether a correct or incorrect model, gives no scientific proof for or against the existence or actions of God. How could it? By the definitions of both science and God, science can never prove or disprove God. Science is the study of physical reality. God, by definition, is beyond physical reality. **What people need to realize is that the real matter of contention is the conflicting philosophical interpretations.
**

Secondly, we need to take step back and try to understand each other. Not everyone who supports the theory of evolution is trying to push a materialistic world view onto children in the school system. Evolution explains many things very well. This is why a majority of scientists accept it as a valid theory. It is not flat out wrong, and there is evidence for it.

Also, not everyone who questions evolution is an uneducated idiot, nor are people with religious beliefs idiots. I’ve seen many conversations on this topic (not necessarily this one) degenerate to insults and insinuations. Instead, if we treat each other like intelligent adult human beings, we can make progress into understanding both sides of this argument.

Anyway, to summarize:

1. Evolution (the scientific theory) does not conflict with Catholic teaching(again, check out JPII).
2. The matter of contention is really the philosophical interpretations of that theory, which really have nothing to do with the science at all.
3. Both sides of this debate need to give the other side the benefit of the doubt and try to better understand each other.

1. The Church, and Pope John Paul II, recognize more than one theory of evolution. And there are those that are not compatible with Catholic teaching including those of a neo-Darwinian provenance that explicitly deny to divine providence any truly causal role in the development of life in the universe.

See part 64 of this document:

vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20040723_communion-stewardship_en.html

Pope Benedict, referring again the statement by Pope John Paul II, also added this: “But it is also true that theory of evolution is not a complete, scientifically proven theory.”

Pope Benedict, while respecting faith and science, nevertheless said that we must have the audacity to say something:

bringyou.to/apologetics/p81.htm

Pope Benedict XVI

Monod nonetheless finds the possibility for evolution in the fact that in the very propagation of the project there can be mistakes in the act of transmission. Because nature is conservative, these mistakes, once having come into existence, are carried on. Such mistakes can add up, and from the adding up of mistakes something new can arise. Now an astonishing conclusion follows: It was in this way that the whole world of living creatures, and human beings themselves, came into existence. We are the product of “haphazard mistakes.”

What response shall we make to this view? It is the affair of the natural sciences to explain how the tree of life in particular continues to grow and how new branches shoot out from it. This is not a matter for faith. But we must have the audacity to say that the great projects of the living creation are not the products of chance and error. Nor are they the products of a selective process to which divine predicates can be attributed in illogical, unscientific, and even mythic fashion. The great projects of the living creation point to a creating Reason and show us a creating Intelligence, and they do so more luminously and radiantly today than ever before. Thus we can say today with a new certitude and joyousness that the human being is indeed a divine project, which only the creating Intelligence was strong and great and audacious enough to conceive of. Human beings are not a mistake but something willed; they are the fruit of love. They can disclose in themselves, in the bold project that they are, the language of the creating Intelligence that speaks to them and that moves them to say: Yes, Father, you have willed me.

---

We are not haphazard mistakes.

Peace,
Ed

 

[edwest2]

As a scientist, I invite to review and comment on the following regarding certain conclusions that are A) Outside of the realm of science and B) Are clearly philosophical.

What are they doing in textbooks?

I did a little research and I think we can prove quite easily that mainstream evolution does not support the evidence of intelligent design in nature at all. Evolution is defined as a blind, undirected process built mainly on randomness. There is no plan or purpose for evolution – this contradicts the claim that “everything is designed” and that there is design to be found in nature.

We can see this in current biology textbooks:

“[E]volution works without either plan or purpose — Evolution is random and undirected.”
(Biology, by Kenneth R. Miller & Joseph S. Levine (1st ed., Prentice Hall, 1991), pg. 658; (3rd ed., Prentice Hall, 1995), pg. 658; (4th ed., Prentice Hall, 1998), pg. 658; emphasis in original.)

“Humans represent just one tiny, largely fortuitous, and late-arising twig on the enormously arborescent bush of life.”
(Stephen J Gould quoted in Biology, by Peter H Raven & George B Johnson (5th ed., McGraw Hill, 1999), pg 15; (6th ed., McGraw Hill, 2000), pg. 16.)

“By coupling **undirected, purposeless **variation to the **blind, uncaring **process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superfluous.”
(Evolutionary Biology, by Douglas J. Futuyma (3rd ed., Sinauer Associates Inc., 1998), p. 5.)

“Darwin knew that accepting his theory required believing in philosophical materialism, the conviction that **matter is the stuff of all existence **and that all mental and spiritual phenomena are its by-products. Darwinian evolution was not only purposeless but also heartless–a process in which the rigors of nature ruthlessly eliminate the unfit. Suddenly, humanity was reduced to just one more species in a world that cared nothing for us. The great human mind was no more than a mass of evolving neurons. Worst of all, there was no divine plan to guide us.”
(Biology: Discovering Life by Joseph S. Levine & Kenneth R. Miller (1st ed., D.C. Heath and Co., 1992), pg. 152; (2nd ed… D.C. Heath and Co., 1994), p. 161; emphases in original.)

“Adopting this view of the world means accepting not only the processes of evolution, but also the view that the living world is constantly evolving, and that evolutionary change occurs without any goals.’ The idea that **evolution is not directed **towards a final goal state has been more difficult for many people to accept than the process of evolution itself.”
(Life: The Science of Biology by William K. Purves, David Sadava, Gordon H. Orians, & H. Craig Keller, (6th ed., Sinauer; W.H. Freeman and Co., 2001), pg. 3.)

“The ‘blind’ watchmaker is natural selection. **Natural selection is totally blind **to the future. “**Humans are fundamentally not exceptional **because we came from the same evolutionary source as every other species. It is natural selection of selfish genes that has given us our bodies and brains “Natural selection is a bewilderingly simple idea. And yet what it explains is the whole of life, the diversity of life, the apparent design of life.”
(Richard Dawkins quoted in *Biology *by Neil A. Campbell, Jane B. Reese. & Lawrence G. Mitchell (5th ed., Addison Wesley Longman, 1999), pgs. 412-413.)

“Of course, no species has 'chosen’ a strategy. Rather, its ancestors ‘little by little, generation after generation’ merely wandered into a successful way of life through the action of random evolutionary forces. Once pointed in a certain direction, a line of evolution survives only if the cosmic dice continues to roll in its favor. “[J]ust by chance, a wonderful diversity of life has developed during the billions of years in which organisms have been evolving on earth.
(Biology by Burton S. Guttman (1st ed., McGraw Hill, 1999), pgs. 36-37.)

“It is difficult to avoid the speculation that Darwin, as has been the case with others, found the implications of his theory difficult to confront. “The real difficulty in accepting Darwins theory has always been that it seems to diminish our significance. Earlier, astronomy had made it clear that the earth is not the center of the solar universe, or even of our own solar system. Now the new biology asked us to accept the proposition that, like all other organisms, we too are the products of a random process that, as far as science can show, we are not created for any special purpose or as part of any universal design.”
(Invitation to Biology, by Helena Curtis & N. Sue Barnes(3rd ed., Worth, 1981), pgs. 474-475.)

Peace,
Ed

 

[James_S_Saint]

As a scientist, I invite to review and comment on the following regarding certain conclusions that are A) Outside of the realm of science and B) Are clearly philosophical.

What are they doing in textbooks?

Exactly.

You cannot leave “what Science IS” to scientists. The are NOT logicians and NOT philosophers. Philosophers distinguish and discern categories. **Philosophers **are the judges of thought, not scientists or any other profession.

Case in point within the above post a philosopher knows that “randomness” does not actually exist and can never exist in the material world. What is it doing being the “cause of” ANYTHING in a Science book???

The philosopher knows that the Quantum Mechanical statistical wave that collapses when a photon is observed is NOT a physical object or occurrence at all.

The philosopher knows that Quantum Mechanics is nothing but applied mathematics and is NOT physics, but applied to physics as a tool so as to predict otherwise unmeasurable occurrences.

The philosopher knows the difference between religion and military government, not the politicians, nor religious leaders.

And the philosopher knows from whence purpose comes, most certainly not scientists.