For those interested, a fascinating Slate dialog between a leading and
highly intelligent popularizer of evolutionary psychology, Robert Wright
(The Moral Animal, Nonzero: The Logic of Human Destiny), and Steven Pinker
of MIT (How the Mind Works, Words and Rules: The Ingredients of Language),
fascinating especially given the vitriolically anti-religious (e.g.,
anti-Christian and even more anti-Jewish) nature of many big name EP
theorists and theories.
http://slate.msn.com/code/BookClub/BookClub.asp?Show=2/1/00&idMessage=4515&i
dBio=143
From a Christian philosopher's perspective, the quote below may seem pretty
banal -- not exactly new or leading-edge thinking. But it's fascinating to
me that it's occuring at all within the EP community. And while these guys
are a few light years short of a parsec on issues in philosophical theology,
they tend to be much more up on the latest facts and fads (some of which
will be more than fads) in evolutionary science than Christian thought
leaders are.
Now if only Wright (et al) would consider the idea of the Fall, or more
broadly, that God's goodness, knowledge, and power do not together entail
that the Universe is just exactly the way He wants them to be. (Nature is
indeed God's handiwork, but not merely God's, and not merely good.)
John
Excerpt:
http://slate.msn.com/code/BookClub/BookClub.asp?Show=2/3/00&idMessage=4533&i
dBio=143
Robert Wright:
....
You ask whether I am "comfortable with the possibility that the arguments in
Nonzero will be extrapolated into arguments for the existence of an
intelligent designer." Broadly speaking, yes, because I think there is a
distinct chance that natural selection is a result of some sort of design.
In fact, in the book I present evidence that--I contend, in a speculative
spirit--suggests as much.
What would bother me is if the book were enlisted by Social Darwinists who
contend that "survival of the fittest" is a moral good, so war and
oppression are good, and so on. I've tried to guard against this by
attacking the (often unstated) keystone of this brand of Social Darwinism:
the assumption that God is both omnipotent and benign (hence nature, God's
handiwork, is a reliable guide to moral values). As I stress in the book,
any "God" that designed natural selection couldn't possibly be both
omnipotent and benign. There's too much suffering inherent in natural
selection. For that matter, there's too much suffering in human history--in
the rapid cultural evolution that biological evolution gave birth to when it
designed us.
....
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