Re: [asa] Opposing Anti-Evolution

>
> The post below by David Campbell,
>

> The main question then of this post is to ask, when is it wrong to oppose
> anti-evolution?
>
>

By antievolutionary, I mean opposed to the claims of biological evolution, a
category that would include creation science and typical ID. The rejection
of teleology as a part of evolutionary science, which characterizes modern
evolutionary biology, implies that purportedly evolutionary philosophical
views are generally contrary to evolutionary biology. Marxism, eugenics,
social Darwinism, etc. claim to be promoting scientific evolutionary
progress, whereas modern evolutionary biology says there's no such thing.
Organisms evolve in various directions, but there is no "progress" or
"improving" in any absolute sense.

Evolutionary biology can't say anything one way or another regarding
philosophical, etc. views that take up evolution as a model but do not claim
scientific justification. Process theology, in its view that God changes
over time, may in part draw on biological evolution for inspiration, but
biological evolution does not logically entail process theology or even give
it greater support than any number of other views. From a Christian
perspective, process theology typically has serious problems, and anyone who
thinks that coercion has no place in love needs sentenced to babysit a
toddler for a while. (I have one available.)

Evolution does give some ideas about how our brains work, which might have
some implications for philosophy, but I would not think that these would be
fundamental.

ID indeed is quite variable. Some young earth advocates have seized on the
name while attacking the mainstream ID movement. Some ID advocates deny
that one species can evolve from another (even though they do all the time
in lab and in the wild, and many creation science folks accept evolution
within a taxonomic family or so); others accept all biological evolution as
an example of design and focus entirely on anthropic principle-type
arguments; and most fall out somewhere in between. Furthermore, Kurt Wise
has suggested that antievolutionary might be appropriate to characterize
those whose goal is attacking evolution, as opposed to the effort to develop
a coherent alternative model.

-- 
Dr. David Campbell
425 Scientific Collections
University of Alabama
"I think of my happy condition, surrounded by acres of clams"
To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
"unsubscribe asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.