Vatican astronomer likens creationism to superstition

[drpmjhess]

I appreciate your attempt to answer the question, but you have not yet addressed the issue. I contend that a systematic observation followed by a mathematically supported inference to the best explanation is science. You say it is not. Why not?

Can you give an example of such an observation supported by such an inference? Behe has already been shown to be quite wrong about bacterial flagella.

 

[Stephen_LB]

(1) Yes.

(2) What was this event, and when was the beginning of the history of humankind?

Obviously, we don’t know the precise nature of the event or the timing. The point as issue is this: According to the official teaching of the Catholic Church, our singular first parents sinned in time/space/history and your teaching as a Catholic theologian is in opposition to it.

 

[drpmjhess]

Obviously, we don’t know the precise nature of the event or the timing. The point as issue is this: According to the official teaching of the Catholic Church, our singular first parents sinned in time/space/history and your teaching as a Catholic theologian is in opposition to it.

I didn’t say there was no such thing as original sin. What theologians need to do is articulate the doctrine of original sin in a way that doesn’t ignore what we know about the history of humankind. Theology takes place not in a vacuum from the rest of human knowledge, but in dialogue with it. If it rejects this dialogue it quickly becomes left behind as a quaint, if irrelevant anachronism. Take a look at some of the books I’ve listed and you’ll see that Catholic theologians are engaged in a lively discussion of how to interpret original sin.

 

[Stephen_LB]

Can you give an example of such an observation supported by such an inference? Behe has already been shown to be quite wrong about bacterial flagella.

I am going to write a couple of paragraphs which will consist of approximately 500 bits of information. The chances that the sequence of characters was not designed and could have formulated randomly is about l chance in l0^150. We can conclude that my paragraph was designed. That is a very simple example of a scientific inference to the best explanation. You have yet to justify your claim that this is not science.

Behe has not been shown to be “quite wrong” by anyone. I already provided two examples of failed attempts on an earlier post, both of which you ignored.

 

[Stephen_LB]

I didn’t say there was no such thing as original sin. What theologians need to do is articulate the doctrine of original sin in a way that doesn’t ignore what we know about the history of humankind. Theology takes place not in a vacuum from the rest of human knowledge, but in dialogue with it. If it rejects this dialogue it quickly becomes left behind as a quaint, if irrelevant anachronism. Take a look at some of the books I’ve listed and you’ll see that Catholic theologians are engaged in a lively discussion of how to interpret original sin.

Well, you certainly questioned the historicity of original sin, and you also insisted that our first parents numbered about 10,000. In both cases, you are going against a clear teaching of a church that you are supposed to be representing. Theologians are not exempt from accepting the official teachings of the Church. They can, of course, speculate about matters and push the envelope all day long. In the meantime, they are, just like the rest of us, required to submit intellect and will to matters that have already been settled. This isn’t complicated. Through our singular first parents we sinned, and through Christ we were redeemed. Christ is the new Adam; Mary is the new Eve. Neither you, John Haught, or Robert Russell have not been granted the privilege of changing that formulation,

 

[edwest2]

I didn’t say there was no such thing as original sin. What theologians need to do is articulate the doctrine of original sin in a way that doesn’t ignore what we know about the history of humankind. Theology takes place not in a vacuum from the rest of human knowledge, but in dialogue with it. If it rejects this dialogue it quickly becomes left behind as a quaint, if irrelevant anachronism. Take a look at some of the books I’ve listed and you’ll see that Catholic theologians are engaged in a lively discussion of how to interpret original sin.

You behave as a person like that warned about in the encyclical Humani Generis. God is the source, not man. But as referred to in that encyclical, some have been taken over by a desire for novelty or a belief that these questions were not dealt with long ago by greater men, as if these questions remained unanswered until today.

Here is Pope John Paul II speaking about original sin and our first parents.
ewtn.com/library/PAPALDOC/JP2ORSIN.HTM

You do not exalt God and give Him proper consideration on a Catholic forum. You exalt the mind of man and the impefect knowledge of man. It drives you. It motivates you. But God is far away in your writings. As if He exists only in a building somewhere.

You have also exposed a falsehood being taught here: that the Church and those who find out things in the secular world through “science” are not in dialogue. Clearly, they are.

To my fellow Catholics, do not be deceived by those who want us, as Catholics, to agree with everything “science” tells us. It is the grave responsibility of theologians to consider in the light of revealed knowledge that God has given us, whatever information that “science” provides. Right now, there is a big effort to remove God and the Church from the eyes of the public. To make science the way, the truth and the light for man. This is wrong. It has been warned against and it is misleading sincere believers.

Can’t you talk about God and the Bible even once? Can’t you talk about the miracles happening today even once? Or won’t you just admit that what you really love is science and only science? That God is just some abstract idea that really doesn’t matter?

God bless,
Ed

 

[drpmjhess]

Well, you certainly questioned the historicity of original sin, and you also insisted that our first parents numbered about 10,000. In both cases, you are going against a clear teaching of a church that you are supposed to be representing. Theologians are not exempt from accepting the official teachings of the Church. They can, of course, speculate about matters and push the envelope all day long. In the meantime, they are, just like the rest of us, required to submit intellect and will to matters that have already been settled. /QUOTE]

The Vatican is in no position to “settle” matters that are still lively topics of discussion among biologists, geneticists, demographers, archaeaologists, paleontologists and others who study human origins. It would simply make the Vatican look silly before the educated world were it to declare “infallibly” that the human race had begun with a single pair of people at a particular time. Moreover that sort of intellectual dishonesty would damage the credibility of the church in other matters where its voice is sorely needed.

 

[edwest2]

And what the about the “intellectual dishonesty” of the bread and wine becoming the body and blood of Christ? Or about miracles of saints canonized in the present time and ruled on infallibly by the Pope?

Or is it really, science should be in charge of the Catholic Church and not God?

God bless,
Ed

 

[ricmat]

It seems as though every side of the evolution debate is engaging Cardinal Schoenborn as on their side. I just found this article that I though was interesting. An interview with the Cardinal.

Some excerpts (obviously ones which support my side) [note: I added the bold other than where they were interviewer questions.] Also, if you want to debate these points, please contact Cardinal Schoenborn directly. I’m just posting these as information.

He explained that while he believes that God is the **intelligent designer **of the universe, his position on evolution springs from a philosophical rather than a scientific standpoint.

** What are your objections to the theory of evolution?
** Evolution is a scientific theory. What I call evolutionism is an ideological view that says evolution can explain everything in the whole development of the cosmos, from the Big Bang to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.

What I criticize is a kind of immunization strategy, as if it were an offense to Darwin’s dignity if someone scientifically criticizes Darwin’s theory and says, Here and there are points that can’t be explained with this theory.

**You’ve said that scientists have been arrogant in this debate.

** There is almost a ban on debate. Critics of evolution theory are discriminated against and discredited from the start. What I would like to see in schools is a critical, open, and positive spirit so that we don’t make a dogma of evolution theory but we say, “Here is a theory. A lot speaks for it in many points, but there are points where it has no answer.”

For me, the whole question of intelligent design is primarily a question of reason. The argument that the whole complexity of life can be explained as mere random process is unreasonable in my opinion. No person who experiences such complexity would say that it created itself. That’s the point. The second step is to ask–OK, which intelligence [created this]? As a believer, I naturally think it is the intelligence of the Creator.

** What do you think of the Discovery Institute** and its work promoting intelligent design?
I think they do interesting work that deserves attention. What bothers me is the unbelievable aggression unleashed by the questions that the Discovery Institute asks. Why do scientists have to react so aggressively?

** Does God belong in biology class? **
The question of the Creator belongs in religion class. The question of the "intelligent project of the cosmos," as the pope put it, naturally belongs in with science.

I reiterate, I will not respond to this post. In part because of the “unbelievable aggression unleashed” by “arrogant scientists.”

Bye for now!

PS, if this article has already been posted, I apologize for the duplication.

 

[Stephen_LB]

Stephen LB;3377134:

Well, you certainly questioned the historicity of original sin, and you also insisted that our first parents numbered about 10,000. In both cases, you are going against a clear teaching of a church that you are supposed to be representing. Theologians are not exempt from accepting the official teachings of the Church. They can, of course, speculate about matters and push the envelope all day long. In the meantime, they are, just like the rest of us, required to submit intellect and will to matters that have already been settled. /QUOTE]

The Vatican is in no position to “settle” matters that are still lively topics of discussion among biologists, geneticists, demographers, archaeaologists, paleontologists and others who study human origins. It would simply make the Vatican look silly before the educated world were it to declare “infallibly” that the human race had begun with a single pair of people at a particular time. Moreover that sort of intellectual dishonesty would damage the credibility of the church in other matters where its voice is sorely needed.

My Easter wish for you is that you be given the grace to revere the teachings of our Church. Faith and reason are indeed, compatible, but it is a two way street. Just as our faith must pass the test of reason, we must also allow our reason to be illuminated by our faith. We are, after all, a faith that has been given certain revealed truths. Since we know that no teaching that God gives us will violate the standards of right reason, we need not fear that some revealed truth will be contradicted by science. The trick is in knowing which ones we should accept with humility and which ones we can have lively discussions about.

For the most part, we are free to believe just about anything we please. There are very few non-. negotiable teachings. On the other hand, when one of them comes along, we should stop negotiating. Scientists have vested interests just like anyone else. They sometimes find what they want to find, whether it be a homosexual gene, a 100,000 year-old-fossil, or a seriously compromised ecology. Two extremes should be avoided: On the one hand, we cannot allow ourselves to fall into religious superstition when indisputable scientific facts can rescue us from intellectual suicide. On the other hand, we cannot allow ourselves to throw out the Word of God every time some secular authority claims to have a better idea. As the man said, “It’s not what we don’t know that kills us, it’s what we know for sure that ain’t so.”

 

[edwest2]

I think it would be more appropriate to quote the Bible rather than man.

Also, what sort of “credibility” should the Church have in regard to the rest of the world? Truth cannot contradict truth according to Pope John Paul II, yet what I see here are too many people with science in their eyes. “Oh great science, how I long for you and for what you will reveal.” They might say. And what about God? As the Bible tells us, we should love God with our whole heart and our whole strength and our whole mind. And we should be holy (i.e. conforming to what God calls holy) in all that we do.

For years, the early Church was persecuted but its credibility came from the Son of God, not man.

God bless,
Ed

 

[itinerant1]

As defined by who? Everything turns on who does the defining. You have not addressed the point that methodological naturalism is a relatively new paradigm. No such restrictions were placed on all the great scientists of the past. They believed that science was knowledge gained through a disciplined and systematic investigation of data. What is your justification for abandoning this broad view of science?

The basic premise of methodological naturalism, that the particular sciences are to remain theologically neutral, is not exactly a new paradigm. For instance, Galileo understood well the distinction between astronomy and theology. The traditional liberal arts education of the medieval universities distinguished various branches of studies. These were known as the trivium and quadrivium, the seven liberal arts.

The current division of the particular sciences came about as each science made advances in its own field of study. Still, even in ancient times, such as classical Greece, there was an understanding of the different branches of knowledge. Euclid’s geometry is geometry and does not involve biology or metaphysics. Aristotle recommended that subjects be studied in a certain order: logic, the sciences, mathematics, and last of all, first philosophy or metaphysics.

The word science can be used in a broad sense. In the broad sense of the term any organized body of knowledge that is based upon certain primary principles constitutes a science. Accordingly, theology is a science. It is literally the science of God. Chemistry is a science. The object of chemistry is inorganic bodies.

Each science has its “material object” and its “formal object”. The material object is simply the thing or subject matter with which it is concerned. The material object of theology is God. The material object of chemistry is inorganic bodies. The formal object of a science is that which it studies immediately and of its very nature. The formal object of chemistry is the intrinsic or substantial changes of inorganic bodies.

Each science has its own scope and province. Philosophy is the science that studies things in their ultimate or first causes. The natural sciences study nature in its secondary or proximate causes. Philosophy is not concerned with providing explanations of sensible phenomena in their proximate causes. Philosophy investigates the first causes of things *in the natural order. *The natural sciences, biology, chemistry, etc., investigate the secondary causes of sensible phenomena.

I.D. confuses natural science and philosophy, while operating from an erroneous understanding of causes from a philosophical perspective.

Intelligent Design confuses primary and secondary causes. Hence, I.D. cannot be considered a natural science. I.D. does not have a formal object of such a nature that it can be designated a natural science.

You assert that the broad view of science is being abandoned. This is false. Science in the broad sense is being misused by I.D. in its attempt to dissolve the distinctions between the various particular sciences, philosophy, and revealed theology.

It makes no sense to assert that methodological naturalism limits the scientist. A scientist is free to provide a philosophy of nature just as he is free to investigate nature in its secondary causes. However, the two activities should not be confused or conflated.

It becomes problematic when scientist overstep the limitations of the particular sciences and attempts to provide a scientific explanation for what is strictly philosophical. For example, an evolutionist who denies the existence of final causes in nature by arguing from scientific data, is actually presenting a pseudo-scientific theory that encroaches on the domain of philosophy.

So, there are these kind of problems among Darwinists, but evolution in general remains a legitimate natural science. I.D. cannot make the same claim.

 

[Stephen_LB]

---

The basic premise of methodological naturalism, that the particular sciences are to remain theologically neutral, is not exactly a new paradigm. For instance, Galileo understood well the distinction between astronomy and theology. The traditional liberal arts education of the medieval universities distinguished various branches of studies. These were known as the trivium and quadrivium, the seven liberal arts.

-----“The current division of the particular sciences came about as each science made advances in its own field of study. Still, even in ancient times, such as classical Greece, there was an understanding of the different branches of knowledge. Euclid’s geometry is geometry and does not involve biology or metaphysics. Aristotle recommended that subjects be studied in a certain order: logic, the sciences, mathematics, and last of all, first philosophy or metaphysics.”

-----“Each science has its own scope and province. Philosophy is the science that studies things in their ultimate or first causes. The natural sciences study nature in its secondary or proximate causes. Philosophy is not concerned with providing explanations of sensible phenomena in their proximate causes. Philosophy investigates the first causes of things *in the natural order. *The natural sciences, biology, chemistry, etc., investigate the secondary causes of sensible phenomena.”

I
-----“Intelligent Design confuses primary and secondary causes. Hence, I.D. cannot be considered a natural science. I.D. does not have a formal object of such a nature that it can be designated a natural science.”

Methodological naturalism, which is ideology posing as science, illustrates what the philosopher Alfred North Whitehead has described as “the fallacy of misplaced concreteness.” While science can certainly claim its own domain, the hard line of demarcation between science and non-science is being abandoned. Cosmologists are discovering things that require the varied perspectives coming from physicists, philosophers, and theologians. That is why this suffocating paradigm has become both irrelevant and obsolete. Any one person who presumes to know exactly where to place the line is either unaware of the nuances involved or is pursuing an agenda of some kind.

Like Darwinists, TE’s exclude intelligent design from science by erecting philosophical rules of exclusion, marginalizing ID scientists even before they are allowed to enter the arena. Most philosophers of science, however, recognize such rules as being merely arbitrary rules that do nothing but get in the way of pursuing the truth about reality. As one of them said recently, “Scientistic demarcation criteria should not prevent us from following the evidence from cosmology and biochemistry when it points in the direction of design, even if the other side of the elephant marked ‘intelligent design’ might be marked ‘God.’”

Some have suggested that ID is confused about primary and secondary causes. On the contrary, The ID critics are the ones who are confused, because they do not make the distinction between law, chance, and agency. That is because they understand everything solely in mechanistic terms. ID studies the EFFECTS of intelligent agency, not its causes. This point is either not grasped or conveniently ignored. Critics continue to equate the object of IDs research with its implications, its presuppositions with inferences, its motives with methods. One can only wonder if this is an innocent misunderstanding or systematic agenda for distorting facts.

 

[Namesake]

Like Darwinists, TE’s exclude intelligent design from science by erecting philosophical rules of exclusion, marginalizing ID scientists even before they are allowed to enter the arena. Most philosophers of science, however, recognize such rules as being merely arbitrary rules that do nothing but get in the way of pursuing the truth about reality.[/QOUTE]

That isn’t correct. Philosophy has nothing to do with scientific method. Scientific method is objective and can seem to be quite cold. However, it isn’t cold at all, it’s disciplined. If you begin mixing philosophy with science you enter a different area. ID “scientists” marginalize themselves because they don’t understand the scientific method.

Some have suggested that ID is confused about primary and secondary causes. On the contrary, The ID critics are the ones who are confused, because they do not make the distinction between law, chance, and agency. That is because they understand everything solely in mechanistic terms.

 

[itinerant1]

Some have suggested that ID is confused about primary and secondary causes. On the contrary, The ID critics are the ones who are confused, because they do not make the distinction between law, chance, and agency. That is because they understand everything solely in mechanistic terms. ID studies the EFFECTS of intelligent agency, not its causes. This point is either not grasped or conveniently ignored. Critics continue to equate the object of IDs research with its implications, its presuppositions with inferences, its motives with methods. One can only wonder if this is an innocent misunderstanding or systematic agenda for distorting facts.

I am not sure what your point is that you are trying to make. Perhaps you could expound on what you are saying. For instance, you say “The ID critics are the ones who are confused, because they do not make the distinction between law, chance, and agency. That is because they understand everything solely in mechanistic terms.” Can you quote some examples of what you have in mind? I know that a criticism of I.D. from Aristotelian-Thomistic principles deals explicitly with law, chance, and agency. Have you ever read any of Aristotle’s metaphysics?

Next, you assert that “ID studies the EFFECTS of intelligent agency, not its causes.” This statement is quite vague and ambiguous. You will need to explicate on your meaning. That is, as far as Christians are concerned every science deals with the effects of intelligent agency since all created things, as created, are the effects of an intelligent creator or cause. However, the botanist, as botanist, does not need to, and should not refer to higher causes when explaining the role of the genetic structure of a seed in the development of the tree.

What is it that distinguishes I.D. in this matter? This is what you need to explain. Then you will see that the manner in which I.D. treats effects is not strictly scientific, in the sense that the natural sciences treat natural phenomena as a botanist deals with genetic structures, and plant growth, forms, and speciation, for instance.

Chance and necessity can be investigated from both a scientific and philosophic perspective. The two approaches are very different even though the philosopher takes into account what the scientist knows. And if their conclusions conflict, then either the philosopher or the scientist is in error. There remains, then, a problem to be resolved. However, when you speak of agency, you are being ambiguous. An agent can be a proximate cause or an ultimate cause, or the highest cause. What kind of agency are you talking about?

 

[itinerant1]

However, when you speak of agency, you are being ambiguous. An agent can be a proximate cause or an ultimate cause, or the highest cause. What kind of agency are you talking about?

Ignore this question in my previous post. I was thinking about agency in regard to necessity and chance causes, but it will be too confusing to get into this at this point. So, just ignore the statement for now, and we will come back to it later

 

[drpmjhess]

I reiterate, I will not respond to this post. In part because of the “unbelievable aggression unleashed” by “arrogant scientists.”
.

ricmat, I’ve read somewhere that the DI has a secret new lab where they are conducting research into intelligent design. Have you heard of this lab?

 

[MichaelTDoyle]

But we know through science that life existed on earth for three and a half billion years before humans even evolved, and that there was death and predation aplenty during all those eons, which were clearly not resultant upon some mythical “Fall” from a state of Adamic perfection.

Nor could a terrestrial “Fall” account for predation and suffering on planets where life had evolved billions of light years from Earth, and where it might have been extinguished by asteroid impact, gamma ray burst, or supernovae billions of years before the mythological Adam and Eve, who lived 6,000 BCE,

Petrus

The punishment was instituted by God. The cracking of the world could certainly have stretched back in time. I honestly believe it did. If the offense, the first offense, is against God, Who is Alpha and Omega, the punishment then would logically also include time as well as space-a restructuring of reality, for all times are one time to Him Who is above time. The scientific data then records correctly all the sad history of predation from the dawn of time, gone, forfeited is that other time, that timeless time when Man and the creation given to him were in harmony with God.

Try to see the event in physical as well as theological terms. This is THE event in God-Man relationship only superceded by the Lamb. Christ instituted physical sacraments, spit in the dirt to heal a blind man. This physical rejection against an infinite being had physical consequences, rupturing man and the creation given him’s relation with God. The healing of that relationship also had an even more dreadful physical consequence: the infinitely good God nailed to a cross, bleeding and dying.

To say that all creation for all time wasn’t reshaped almost seems like it diminishes the awfulness of the sin and diminishes the sacrifice of God to repair the bond.

peace

 

[drpmjhess]

To say that all creation for all time wasn’t reshaped almost seems like it diminishes the awfulness of the sin and diminishes the sacrifice of God to repair the bond.peace

OK – we’ll agree to disagree!

Petrus

 

[Stephen_LB]

---

-

------". Philosophy has nothing to do with scientific method. Scientific method is objective and can seem to be quite cold. However, it isn’t cold at all, it’s disciplined. If you begin mixing philosophy with science you enter a different area. ID “scientists” marginalize themselves because they don’t understand the scientific method."

-------“You don’t like it, but the fact is that science is confined to the natural, material, mechanistic world. If you mix in ideas like agency you leave science and enter philosophy. Scientists can and certainly do engage in philosophy. But when they are addressing philosophical ideas they are not acting as a scientist. They have become a philosopher.”

--------“Just reflect on what happened to B. F. Skinner. He was one of the most brilliant people in experimental psychology. Then he started commenting of social ideas and he lost some of the standing he had achieved as a scientist. Linus Pauling did a similar thing. He was a brilliant chemist, but he became a social commentator and lost much of the standing he had in the scientific community.”

Science and philosophy are distinct but not radically separated. Philosophy’s law of the excluded middle, for example, is indispensable to science. Don’t buy into this business about “the two shall never meet.” I recommend Burtt’s book, “The metaphysical foundations of modern science.” That said, there is a certain irony here. When the ID science is presented, TE’s, who complain that ID mixes philosophy with science, ignore the science and try to refute it on philosophical grounds. You have got to love it.

The scientific enterprise began in earnest when researchers began reverse engineering the designs of the Creator. They insisted that they were “thinking God’s thoughts after him.” What launched the movement was the following philosophical/theological notion: God created [A] a rational universe, ** rational minds to comprehend a rational universe, and [C] a correspondence between the two. You can’t separate that from science. I agree with your point about social commentary, but that is not the same thing.

Science had no agenda, but scientists do. According to a recent study, 94.5% of evolutionary biologists are either atheist or agnostic. You can’t tell me that this doesn’t play out in some way. In any case, ID is a scientific inference to the best explanation, nothing more. You assume, for example, that the paragraph I just wrote was “designed,” it did not occur by chance. This calculation can be done with mathematical precision. How is that mixing philosophy with science?**