Re: [asa] Neo-Darwinism and God's action

It was the first time I'd read the term 'theistic Darwinists,' the argument against which seems quite convincing. Darwin was not a theist - he didn't believe in 'God's action' - his position on religion was 'muddled,' using Huxley's term 'agnostic.' So putting 'theist' and 'Darwinist' together does seem contradictory, which is how Gage portrays his opponents.
   
  Of course one can accept certain features of Darwin's theories and researches without becoming a 'Darwinist' (i.e. the ideology of 'ism'). The DI appears to be retreating into a critique of particularly Darwinian evolution (i.e. not Gouldian or Wilsonian or Dawkinsian or McGrathian) and Darwinism. I suggest they really should rather be concerned with 'evolution-ism,' but that's an aside. By calling people 'theistic Darwinists' I suppose more than a few ASA feathers will be ruffled and TEs will be pressured to establish their 'natural(istic) theology' more carefully. Such may turn out for the better in terms of clarity of discourse.
   
  The crux of Gage's argument seems to be the following:
   
  "Can an intelligent being use random mutations and natural selection to create? No. This is not a theological problem; it is a logical one. The words random and natural are meant to exclude intelligence. If God guides which mutations happen, the mutations are not random; if God chooses which organisms survive so as to guide life's evolution, the selection is intelligent rather than natural."

  Gage's point is that 'neo-Darwinism' is not the same thing as 'guided evolution.' The bolded sentence is ID's lynchpin. 'Guided evolution' involves a theological reading that Darwin omitted in his works and that a vast majority of 'modern synthesis' contributors (exception Dobzhansky and Fisher, outside of their scientific publications) neglected or even ridiculed. Would anyone disagree with that? If so, the following point awaits:
   
  Gage's claim that Randy "had to abandon orthodox evolutionary theory to keep intelligent guidance" appears valid. If 'orthodox evolutionary theory' means 'no intelligent guidance,' which is what Darwin claimed and what J. Huxley cemented for the mainstream meaning of 'neo-Darwinism,' then Gage's claim that Isaac is an 'evolutionist' but not a 'neo-Darwinist' would be legitimate. Otherwise, are TE's trying to change the scientific definition of 'neo-Darwinism' to suit their particular theological position?
   
  Gage writes: "When intelligent beings direct events, the events are not random either physically or metaphysically, and thus the agency is potentially detectable. And events that appear random may or may not actually be random. They cannot be both random and non-random at once."
   
  This might be the most concise expression of a nagging problem for evolutionary philosophy that I've yet seen. And who would guess that I am still not an IDist!! What the bolded sentence happens to illustrate is the importance of human-social thought in this multilogue because human-social thought deals with intentionality, agency, teleology, decision-making and purposive action in a way that natural science does not and cannot. Thus, what Gage's commentary leads to is a discussion, not only of the relationship between 'science and religion' (with philosophy sadly often marginalized), but also of the relationship between natural sciences and social-humanitarian thought. It may sound strange, but I get no impression that TE has made any effort to do this.
   
  For example, though I have not read Randy's letter in CT, the following quote of the text by Gage is highly questionable: "human creative activity may involve random actions." Could you please explain what you mean by this Randy? Yes, of course humans flip coins and cast lots, place bets, roll dice, etc. But they (we) CHOOSE to do so; i.e. they (we) cannot 'act' without intentionally choosing (creatively) to do so. Are you suggesting that 'human choice' is random?? This obviously relates to 'intelligence' in ways beyond what I'm able here to articulate.
   
  Merci,
  Gregory
   
  p.s. I liked Gage's bit about 'not escaping unscathed after conceding a materialist origin story.' A. Peacocke's immanentist re-write of Genesis' origin(s) story using 'scientific' language is imo a good example demonstrating how 'scathed' one can be in their theological interpretation, giving the appearance of a 'materialistic-natural scientistic' pov, all with very good intentions.
   
  
Randy Isaac <randyisaac@comcast.net> wrote:
          Jack Haas just drew my attention to Logan Gage's response to my letter in the Jan 2008 issue of CT. I would greatly appreciate your views on the last two paragraphs of his article. We have touched on randomness several times in this forum and I believe it continues to be one of the fundamental questions. Logan seems to believe that if there is divine guidance there will necessarily be evidence of non-randomness. Or have I misunderstood him?
   
  Randy

       
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Received on Fri Feb 15 04:12:32 2008