In the message below Bob brings up an excellent point concerning the
purposelessness of Darwinian Evolution versus our belief that God has been
quite intentional in his creation of the universe and, more specifically,
his creation of each of us. I propose, however, that this is where the
distinction between methodological naturalism and philosophical naturalism
becomes of central importance. In methodological naturalism we
intentionally posit no purpose or ultimate goal in our theory of how nature
operates. We do this, knowing all the while that nature is purposeful
because at the root of it all is God. In Philosophical Naturalism, to the
contrary, one presupposes that nature itself has no purpose.
Perhaps the problem here is the blurring of the line between the theory and
the phenomena. As Christians we never think of phenomena as being an
accident but as scientists we almost always ascribe our explanations of and
predictions concerning physical phenomena to purposeless theories. For
example, one could ask, "is there a purposefulness in classical mechanics?"
The answer would be no. Classical mechanics presupposes no god, no goal,
it does not even attempt to explain why it works or outline it's
limitations. This purposelessness of classical mechanics does not,
however, mean that the phenomena of planets orbiting the sun is without
divine intent. Perhaps it would be good to wonder for a while if it would
even be possible to do science under the auspices that every theory ought
to start explicitly with the existence of the triune God and the truth of
the Bible and then follow logically from there.
-----Original Message-----
From: RDehaan237@aol.com [SMTP:RDehaan237@aol.com]
Sent: Wednesday, July 05, 2000 3:15 AM
To: David_Bowman@georgetowncollege.edu; asa@calvin.edu
Subject: Re: intelligent design
In a message dated 7/4/2000 12:19:42 AM, David_Bowman@georgetowncollege.edu
writes:
<< So Bob, why is local adaptation incompatible with teleology for
Darwinian
mechanisms? >>
David,
For the reasons you stated. You wrote:
"It seems to me that a process possessing short-term causal correlations at
a
local scientific level of description, but which is unpredictable in the
long
run (where the short term causal influences can not be extrapolated to the
long term via any deterministic or quasi-deterministic stochastic
scientific
description) this does not imply a lack of purpose--especially a lack of
*Divine* purpose. All it
implies is a scientific inability to discern any teleology that may be
present based on the consideration of those local conditions."
Are purposes Divine in origin?. If so, they lie outside the purview of
science. Is science unable to discern any teleology? Then it lies outside
the reach of science.
What I am saying is that the current theory of Darwinian evolution, held by
the scientific community as expressed by some of their prominent
spokespersons, and by large segments of the literate public, is that
Darwinian evolution is a purposeless, directionless process with respect to
distant goals. This is applied to human beings, and the conclusion is
drawn
that there is no purpose to be found in human evolution. This is the point
of the quotations I offered in an earlier post.
It is hard to say how widespread this view of evolution is held, because it
is hard to find out who speaks for the theory of evolution, and how
forthright they are in the face of some parts of the American religious
community. For almost every expert opinion on the subject, an equal and
opposite one can be found.
I have stated elsewhere that this view of the purposelessness of natural
selection is has both a scientific basis and a philosophical one. The
scientific one is that natural selection does not work for the distant good
of an animal or plant. How can it? It only works only for its immediate
adaptation to its present environment. Moreover, environments do not ch
ange
in a directional manner with respect to a future goal. So neither the
randomness of mutations nor environment can be counted on to lead toward a
given distant, prefixed goal. Thus Darwinian evolution is purposeless.
This
is what I have called the "necessary inference", not an opinion, from the
inherent character of natural selection.
If anyone can show that it is not so, I am willing to listen.
Moreover, secular scientists are hard put to identify what a future cosmic
or
biological goal for evolution might be? Complexity? Human life? There is
no
basis for identifying one.
This is where the atheism of some influential evolutionary authors kicks
in,
and provides a philosophical basis for declaring that evolution is
directionless and purposeless.
I hope I have addressed your questions.
Regards,
Bob
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