**NABT – Was evolution an unsupervised process?**

The National Association of Biology Teachers

and Biology-Theology in our Public Schools

Is natural process unsupervised?
Does "natural" mean "without God"?
For two years, a prominent science education organization said YES & YES. Let's compare their theology with conventional theology.

Natural Process — Does it happen without God?

A normal-appearing natural event can be interpreted theistically (as "produced by God"), atheistically, or in other ways: deistic, pantheistic, animistic,...
For a theist, natural does not mean "without God" because God designed and created nature, and constantly sustains nature. And natural does not mean "without control" because God can guide nature so one natural result occurs instead of another natural result. {quoted from my page about Theistic Evolution & Theology}

And for a closer look at natural process, you can read a page (with ideas from 10 authors) asking "Is natural process guided by God?"

Natural Process, according to NABT-Theology in 1995

In contrast with this conventional theology, for more than two years, from April 1995 to October 1997, the National Associaton of Biology Teachers (NABT) declared — in their position statement on evolution, which stated that evolution is an "unsupervised, impersonal" process — that "natural" does mean "without God".

A Response from ASA Members in 1996

In late 1996, Loren Haarsma wrote a letter (on behalf of participants in the e-mail list of the American Scientific Affiliation) to the NABT Board of Directors. Their letter made many good suggestions about evolution education, including this one:
"2. The Statement's description of evolution as an "unsupervised, impersonal... process" (paragraph 5) is not religiously neutral. Science is unable to determine whether or not evolution is 'unsupervised.' Science is capable of describing the observable characteristics of evolutionary mechanisms. For example,... While each of these mechanisms can be modeled as a purely natural process, this does not tell us whether the entire evolutionary process is ultimately supervised or unsupervised. That question goes beyond the realm of science, into philosophy and religion."
You can read the letter from the ASA-list (sent November 1996) and a discussion (October 1997) on the ASA e-mail list. This letter, questioning the logic of NABT's theological statement, did not lead to any response or change.

A Reluctant Change in 1997

Eventually, however, the statement was changed. How did it happen? Here is a summary from Christian Century:

Evolution Statement Altered by Biologists
After first refusing to do so, the National Association of Biology Teachers (NABT) has dropped the words "unsupervised" and "impersonal" from its official description of evolution. The group's eight-person board of directors voted unanimously on October 11 to alter the wording of its two-year-old statement in support of teaching evolution — and the board did so just three days after it had voted unanimously not to make the change. Religion scholar Huston Smith and philosopher Alvin Plantinga had urged NABT to make the change, arguing that inclusion of the two words constituted a theological judgment about the nonexistence of God that went beyond the boundaries of empirical science.
While the fossil record may shed light on the process of evolution, the two scholars argued, it cannot answer the question of whether evolution is or is not directed by God. They argued that the statement was vulnerable, made NABT a legitimate target for creationists, and, since polls show that more than 90 percent of Americans profess belief in God, undermined Americans' respect for scientists, especially when scientists were drawing conclusions beyond the available evidence. NABT officials first unanimously refused, and then three days later unanimously reversed themselves. {Christian Century, November 12, 1997, p. 1029} { After this change, here is NABT's current statement. }

Eugenie Scott — who is director of the National Center for Science Education (an organization dedicated to pro-evolution education) and who played a major role in persuading the NABT to change its policy — tells the story.
my comments on the story by Eugenie: She says that NABT "had not intended the statement on evolution to include theological positions." If this is true, the leaders of NABT were being philosophically naive. Didn't they realize that declaring a process to be "unsupervised" was taking a deistic/atheistic theological position? They defended their statement by saying it "was being interpreted by individuals outside of science as anti-religious and unscientific." But is it only those "outside of science" who thought NABT was claiming more than science can claim? The logical question is whether scientists can know, based on scientific evidence, whether or not a natural process was unsupervised. In 1995, NABT answered by making a statement "in the name of science" that cannot be justified by science. Eugenie Scott explains: "One cannot make a scientific statement that the universe is in any absolute sense ‘impersonal’ and ‘unsupervised.’ The NABT Board dropped the two unnecessary words because it was the right thing to do, scientifically."

A Backlash-Response in 1998

In early 1998, a few months after the NABT revision, some scientists (led by Massimino Pigliucci) wrote An Open Letter objecting to what they viewed as NABT's surrender to creationists, and Eugenie Scott wrote a response, and later (in 2005) Pigliucci changed his mind. In February 1998, the ASA's e-mail list discussed the open letter and response — there are four topics (Open Letter,...) where this link takes you, plus other topics on the same page: NABT (scroll up the page alphabetically, or type #236 at end of URL instead of #7), Eugenie Scott... (#34), Re: NABT Flap & Open Letter... (#37), and The NABT Controversy (#82).

Continuing Discussions
Evolution — Does it occur without purpose and without God? contains excerpts from papers & letters in PSCF (the journal of ASA) by John McIntyre, Douglas Hayworth, and David Lahti, describing two logical fallacies; Hayworth summarizes the fallacies: "a dismissal of God's existence [or actions] is not logically warranted on the basis of evolutionary theory" (as implied in the "unsupervised" claim by NABT) and "a belief in God does not logically warrant antagonism to evolution as science."

APPENDIX

This paper began by describing the view of conventional theism, that "natural" does mean "without God", and here are some extra thoughts:
A theist believes that a supernatural God is involved in natural process, that the natural depends on the supernatural. Although thinking about natural as being not-supernatural is sometimes useful, to avoid wrong implications we usually should contrast natural-appearing (normal-appearing) with miraculous-appearing.

The NABT's education statement (1995-1997) supported...
A Bad Theological Argument against Theistic Evolution:

The main difference between theistic evolution and atheistic evolution is their nonscientific interpretation of scientific theories about evolution. A nonscientific atheistic interpretation views a process of evolution as being not designed by God, not guided by God, using matter not created by God. But a nonscientific theistic interpretation can disagree with these atheistic claims by proposing that an evolutionary process was designed by God (and perhaps also guided by God) and used matter created by God.
The bad argument occurs in two stages: First, an atheistic interpretation of evolution — claiming that it occurs without God — is accepted. Second, there is a claim that "since evolution is atheistic, theistic evolution is illogical." Actually, it's this argument that is theologically illogical, because it is based on the atheistic claim that "natural" means "without God," which implies that "if it isn't a miracle then God didn't do it" and rejects the Bible-based claim that God created and controls natural process.

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NABT – Was evolution an unsupervised process?