[asa] YEC and ID arguments

Several Roman Catholic thinkers recently have made the following
argument:

1) Darwinian evolutionary theory can indeed easily slide towards
atheism/materialism, and this must be countered.

2) Arguments against atheistic/materialistic Darwinism need not be
religious, nor scientific, but rather philosophical. Thus, such
arguments are indeed based on reason rather than faith, but they do not
employ scientific reasoning.

Below is a remarkable quote (see
http://stephanscom.at/edw/katechesen/articles/2005/12/02/a9719) from the
Vienna Cardinal Schonborn, who is certainly skeptical of what he calls
Darwinism (by which I think he means atheistic evolution):
 

        
        Here is another analogy that has been eagerly used since the
Enlightenment: the analogy of a watchmaker, who produces a watch which
then runs on its own until it has to be wound up again or occasionally
repaired; the little thing runs as soon as it is made. The fact that
Richard Dawkins sees no use for such a watchmaker in explaining our
world, is not the point that makes him an atheist. Steven Weinberg, whom
I cited above, formulates as follows the usual assumption about
scientific method: "The only possible scientific procedure consists in
assuming that no divine intervention takes place and then in seeing how
far science gets on this assumption" (Dreams of a Final Theory). The
scientific method, as understood by Weinberg and many others, is thus a
conscious rejection of any "divine intervention." They want to see how
far we can get with this method without having to posit a watchmaker or
a pool player or a starter at the beginning of the game.
        
        Sometimes the way in which the scientific method excludes any
divine intervention is called "methodological atheism." I do not see it
that way; this excluding is simply authentic scientific method and has
nothing to do with atheism. The scientific method should not assume a
watchmaker who intervenes; it searches for the explanation of
mechanisms, connections, causal relations, and events.
         

Schonborn's anti-Darwinism is quite different from the William
Paley-type "watchmaker" apologetics of most American ID proponents.
It's the "Watchmaker (God) of the gaps" approach of the U.S. ID movement
that the Dover case correctly identified as 1) serving no scientific
purpose, and 2) exclusively serving one particular sectarian purpose,
thus promoting one particular religious view over other views (both
religious and non-religious).
 
Cheers.
 
Charles (Chuck) F. Austerberry, Ph.D.
Assistant Professor of Biology
Hixson-Lied Room 438
Creighton University
2500 California Plaza
Omaha, NE 68178
 
Phone: 402-280-2154
Fax: 402-280-5595
 
e-mail: cfauster@creighton.edu
 
Nebraska Religious Coalition for Science Education
http://nrcse.creighton.edu <http://nrcse.creighton.edu/>

        Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2006 08:54:13 -0400
        From: "David Opderbeck" <dopderbeck@gmail.com>
        Subject: Re: [asa] YEC and ID arguments
        
        Dave Siemens said: *You are confusing scientism-materialism
with Darwinism-evolution.
        *
        Roger said: *I sure wish I could see your and Arago's POV, but
for the love of God, I surely don't. What are you trying to get at
anyway?*
        **
        Dave and Roger, I understand some of your frustration with me
and Greg.
        Like you, neither of us (I think Greg would agree with me here
-- correct if I'm wrong) think the Dawkins-ites are *right *in
conflating common descent with scientism-materialism; and neither of us
(again, Greg, correct if I'm
        wrong) are suggesting YECism is acceptable. All of us agree:
common descent doesn't in itself have to imply scientism-materialism,
and clearly false positions such as YECism should be rejected.
        
        But Greg and I, working in social sciences, see that people in
our disciplines overwhelmingly *do *conflate common descent with
scientism-materialism. And not only that, as we study the history and
sociology of science, we see that people in *your* disciplines -- at
least in biology -- do so as well. And further, we see that in the
culture at large, conflating common descent with scientisim-materialism
is a huge, huge problem; I at least would daresay it's a bigger threat
to faith than YECism. This is why I mentioned the Wired article. Turn
also to the "science" column in the Wall Street Journal (today's
essentially positivist column on "why false beliefs persist in the face
of contrary evidence" is a good example), the New York Times, etc., and
you will see the same thing:
        faith in anything beyond "science" is derided as irrational, and
Darwinism is Exhibit A in the supposed triumph of "science" over
"faith."
        
        So what I'm a bit frustrated by, and where I have trouble
understanding your perspective, is that you don't seem to understand how
big this problem of scientism-materialism-positivism is becoming in our
culture. On this list, we can cheerfully affirm that Darwinism doesn't
necessarily imply materialism, and technically, that's true. But out in
the "real" world, Darwinism is exactly used to imply materialism.
        
        And this leads, for me at least, to the problem of teleology and
design arguments. For the love of God, I don't understand what I sense
is a deep hostility to any sort of teleology or design argument in
biology among some (not all) in the TE camp. I do understand caution,
since there are some plainly flawed teleology / design arguments, and
many of those are employed by YECs. But when I read someone like
Francis Collins with the one hand employ teleology / design arguments in
cosmology and with the other blithely dismiss the very same sorts of
arguments in biology, I say "huh?" It seems to me that the brick wall
against any design / teleology arguments in biology lends aid and
comfort to those who say Darwinism does imply scientism-materialsm.
        
        

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Received on Sat Oct 21 18:05:43 2006