Re: [asa] Random and design

This is good Pim. I wrote something somewhat similar on my blog (
http://www.davidopderbeck.com/throughaglass.html):

An entry on <a href="
http://www.evolutionnews.org/2006/11/francis_collins_on_square_circ.html">EvolutionNews
and Views</a> criticizing a lecture by Francis Collins' caught my eye.
I've <a href="
http://www.davidopderbeck.com/archives/2006/10/francis_collins_1.html">previouslyoffered
some of my own criticism</a> of Collins' new book. However, the ENV
criticism, I think, was unfair, and reflects a serious theological problem
with some "strong" ID arguments.

On the ENV site, Logan Gage argues that Darwinism is fundamentally
incompatible with theism, because Darwinian evolution is "unguided and
unplanned":

<blockquote>If Darwinian evolution--by definition--is "unguided" and
"unplanned," then Collins's view seems logically incoherent. How can a
process be both "guided" and "unguided" (or "planned" and "unplanned") at
the same time? Either evolution is "unguided" as the Darwinists contend, or
it is guided in some way—which means that the Darwinian view of evolution
must be false.</blockquote>

For the notion that Darwinian evolution is "unguided" and "unplanned," Logan
cites a letter sent to the Kansas State Board of Education by some Nobel
laureates, which states that "evolution is "the result of an unguided,
unplanned process of random variation and natural selection." Logan argues
that Collins' "theistic evolution" position is incompatible with the popular
view of Darwinism identified in the Nobel letter.

Logan's criticism is unfair because, to the extent the Nobel laureates meant
"unguided" and "unplanned" in a metaphysical sense, their position is
<em>not</em> a scientific view about evolution, nor is it what someone like
Collins means by "evolution."

Whether God guided and planned evolution (if and to the extend evolution
happened, a question I'm not addressing here) is a metaphysical question
that is not addressed by evolutionary <em>science</em>. When evolutionary
science speaks of planning, guidance and randomness, it means that the
natural processes involved suggest no statistical correlation with any
influences external to those natural processes. Even within that context,
evolution is not "random" in the sense that anything at all can and does
happen -- evolution happens within a framework of deeper natural laws,
including the laws of genetics and inheritance. As some evolutionary
theorists, such a Simon Conway Morris (a Christian) observe, the operation
of these laws can give rise to remarkable regularities, including the
convergence of different pathways on a relatively small number of sensory
organs and body plans.

I would agree with Logan, then, that if the Nobel laureates were using
"unguided" and "unplanned" in a metaphysical sense, they were stepping far
beyond the bounds of evolutionary science, and were suggesting something
that is utterly incompatible with theism. It isn't clear to me whether that
was the sense intended. It certainly is not the sense in which someone like
Francis Collins uses terms like "random" in relation to evolution.

If "random," "unguided" and "unplanned" with regard to evolution are
understood simply to mean "uncorellated with any external causes," I don't
see how this is inconsistent with a theistic understanding of creation. As
I sit here in New York typing this today, it is raining lightly outside.
Meteorologists can explain this weather pattern fully in naturalistic
terms. It is an "unguided," "unplanned," and "random" pattern, in the sense
that there is no way to correlate the pattern with any external causes. It
is of course an orderly pattern, based on deeper natural laws, which makes
it explainable and to some extent predictable. But it can be explained
solely through the apparently unguided process of natural laws.

I say "apparently unguided" because, as a Christian, I don't believe for a
moment that this weather pattern is "random" or "unguided" in a metaphysical
sense. I believe in a God who is sovereign over all creation, upon whom all
creation depends, and in whom all creation is held together. God didn't
merely wind up the processes that led to the rain in New York today and let
them go off randomly on their own -- He is above and in and through them
completely as sovereign creator and sustainer. The fact that I can't
directly perceive or correlate God's will and action in this regard with the
rain I observe doesn't mean God is elided or elidable.

 In fact, this is exactly what I <em>expect</em> within the rich framework
of the Christian doctrine of creation. I don't <em>expect</em> God
ordinarily to manifest Himself in miraculous ways that contradict the deep
natural laws He established and sustains. Indeed, the very orderliness and
normality of the everyday working of creation is one of the principal
reasons I can make reliable observations and rational judgments, and is a
central expression of God's wisdom and beauty.

Given that I think and feel this way about the rain in New York, why should
I think or feel differently about the natural processes through which living
organisms change over time? There is no theological reason to think God
should act or manifest Himself differently with respect to living organisms
in relation to natural laws than He does with respect to processes such as
the weather. In fact, there are very good reasons to suspect He would
<em>not</em> make such a distinction -- the reasons of orderliness and
beauty mentioned above.

Does this mean I settle the issue in favor of theistic evolution? No.
There are, I think, hermeneutical questions about how to understand the
language in Genesis 1 and 2 concerning God's creation of the animals and of
human beings. Does the phrase "after their kinds" require separate creation
and a fixity of species? Does creation of Adam from the "dust of the earth"
and creation of Eve from Adam's "rib" require a separate, special creation
of human beings? These are reasonable questions. There are also, I
believe, reasonable questions about whether Darwinism completely succeeds
scientifically on its own merits. There is very convincing genetic and
fossil evidence, in my opinion, for gradual organismal change over time and
the relatedness of different species. The mechanisms posited for such
change -- such as natural selection and genetic drift -- however, often seem
like hand waving to me. But I think it's important to be clear about the
issues, and the broad theological issue of God sovereignly directing
creation is not one of them.

On 11/14/06, Pim van Meurs <pimvanmeurs@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> In the following I respond to a claim by Loran Gage on the Discovery
> Institute's blog:
>
> Logan Gage reviews Francis Collins' position on evolution and argues:
>
> Gage (http://www.evolutionnews.org/2006/11/
> francis_collins_on_square_circ.html#more) objects to Collins'
> position on evolution and Christianity, 'arguing' that an unguided
> and random process could not possibly involve a deity. Let's count
> the many confusions:
>
> Gage wrote: If, however, you are talking about God using Darwinian
> evolution, as Collins did, you are ultimately forced to either
> believe in a God who doesn't interact with his creation, the God of
> Deism, or an illogical God who can guide an unguided process.
>
> In other words, just because a process can be unguided, it must be
> unguided. In other words, even God himself cannot use and manipulate
> the process? That's a weird position as this means that God needs to
> violate natural law according to Gage. Even worse, it denies any
> possible role in a process which can be explained by appeal to
> natural processes.
>
> Gage then quotes from a letter written by 38 Nobel Laureates which
> clearly contradicts Gage's position
>
> Gage:According to an open letter sent last year to the Kansas State
> Board of Education by 38 Nobel laureates, evolution is "the result of
> an unguided, unplanned process of random variation and natural
> selection" (emphasis added).
>
> First of all the process of variation and natural selection as
> proposed by science is indeed unguided. Whether or not there is an
> additional entity or entities that interact, and guide the process or
> have set the process in motion, is not a scientific concept.
> Furthermore, calling variation random does not make Darwinism random,
> in fact, most anyone familiar with the theory would know that
> Darwinian theory is NOT random. It's this non-randomness which formed
> the basis of Darwin's magnificent idea. And finally, the term
> 'random' basically refers to the concept that beneficial mutations do
> no arise preferentially, which does not mean that mutations cannot be
> biased based on past performance. In fact, the idea of evolvability,
> the capacity to evolve, is based on exactly this idea. Not
> surprisingly, evolvability can arise under selective processes. A
> good example is neutrality which is an important concept when it
> comes to evolvability and although somewhat counterintuitive,
> neutrality is a selectable feature.
>
> A commenter provided the following reference:
>
> The document of the Catholic Church "Communion and Stewardship" from
> 2004, written under the supervision of Benedict XVI, then Cardinal
> Ratzinger, clarifies while discussing evolution:
>
> "But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic
> understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created
> order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine
> causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only
> in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural
> process can nonetheless fall within God's providential plan for
> creation. According to St. Thomas Aquinas: "The effect of divine
> providence is not only that things should happen somehow, but that
> they should happen either by necessity or by contingency. Therefore,
> whatsoever divine providence ordains to happen infallibly and of
> necessity happens infallibly and of necessity; and that happens from
> contingency, which the divine providence conceives to happen from
> contingency" (Summa theologiae, I, 22,4 ad 1)."
>
> In other words, the argument that Darwinian theory denies the
> existence of a deity is both flawed scientifically and theologically.
>
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-- 
David W. Opderbeck
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