[asa] TE/EC Response

With Cameron and Gregory so eloquently summarizing the state of our
recent discussions from their perspective, let me try to provide a
similar summary from my perspective.

1. In light of the recent exchange between Cameron and David, it seems
to me that perhaps the bottom line difference has to doing with how
convincing we regard the evidence for a secondary cause based
evolutionary account. I fully agree with David's assessment of the
state of the art. I would probably go even one step further and say
that due to the historical nature of biological evolution and due to
contingent nature of some of critical events (chance mutations, cross-
overs, genome acquisitions, extinctions, etc.) and due to the
antiquity of these events, that it may not be possible to construct
the kind of detailed scenario that Cameron insists upon. To him, it
seems, these sorts of provisos casts a dark cloud over our confidence.
Others of us (and most professional practicing life scientists) find
the current state of affairs to be good enough to assert with
confidence appropriate for any scientific theory that the key pieces
of the story are in place and convincing enough. I, for one, have had
that bent since the late 70's and have only seen gaps filled,
questions answered, and more and more success of the general
evolutionary biological story. The evo-devo developments of the past
two decades have addressed in principle in my mind many of the
difficult questions that Cameron keeps raising.

Perhaps it's a different psychological bent between TE's and ID's.
Maybe TE's do have a lower bar. But, Cameron or Denton or Behe is not
giving me any new information when they tell me how much we don't
know. I know full well. Yet, I am convinced of the general story by
the evidence that is there. Perhaps there is a difference between the
way biologists think and the way chemists think. I am trained
primarily as a biologist but have straddled the fence with a strong
chemistry and biophysics history as well. It is probably the case the
most non-life scientists take the word of their biologists colleagues,
but, as I said before, most professional life scientists are convinced.

If this is the case, then we are at an impasse of sorts. I don't
really see a problem with that. I'm convinced; the community of
practicing scientists is convinced. That's the way it is. There may
come a day when that's not the case and the voices of ID advocates,
Denton, et al. will turn the tables. I may someday be convinced
otherwise. But today is not that day and I think through the
theological implications of my science in light of how the world looks
to me today. Since Gregory has been so fond of reminding us of the
sociology of science, he should not be overly shocked to hear that
science is what scientists think (today). May or may not be right. In
fact, in light of history, it's likely not to be right. However,
today, in our science education we teach what we (the scientific
community) think is the best explanation for things.

What to do? Well, let's keep working: those trying to fill in the gaps
of the current theoretical framework (science as usual) and the
critics (the revolutionaries). The critics have a tougher go at it and
may find it difficult to get funding, to publish, etc. But that's the
way it works. Time will tell who is right (if we are realists of any
sort, which I am).

2. As for the term "Darwinism". Most of us on the TE/EC side of things
reject the arguments that Cameron and Gregory and perhaps others have
put forth that "Darwinism" is intrinsically anti-theistic. To think so
is a conflation of secondary causes (nature, creation, etc.) with
primary causation (God's role) (as David Siemens eloquently put it).
Darwin committed that error--Asa Gray answered it in his day. Dawkins
commits the error today. As does Cameron and most ID folks. To state
it boldly: my option #4 is identical to Cameron's option #1 from the
secondary causation point of view. Macroevolution does not require
miracles--it can all happen "without God lifting a finger"--is that
clear enough? (although I unequivocally reject Cameron's way of
putting that--concurrence is not merely sustaining the laws of nature--
it is active governance--micromanaging, if you will). However, from
the primary causation point of view evolution is guided (as are all
secondary causes, even the actions of free agents). So, I, as most
life scientists, think that Darwinism is a scientific idea (and not a
ideology) embodying the Darwinian mechanisms of "random" mutation that
does not anticipate the need of the organism, natural selection,
gradualism, etc. All of these say nothing about God's role in the
process. It seems that in principle Cameron agrees that it's possible
for divine governance to be "hidden" in stochastic processes, but the
fact that he can't distinguish between his option #3 and my option #4
and his belief that improbable sequences of mutations are not possible
without divine guidance suggest otherwise.

3. This is not to say that God cannot perform a miracle during
evolutionary history. I strongly affirm that he is fully able to work
outside of normal secondary causes and believe that we have several
reported events of such in scripture. I don't see any reason to appeal
to such in the course of cosmic history. In scripture miracles seem to
be associated with special redemptive and revelatory events. I don't
expect to see them normally. In fact, the "normal" (God's regular
governance) is a necessary milieu for the miraculous (God's irregular
governance). Given the historical nature of evolution, I'm not sure
how you can tell the difference between a miracle and a God-governed
chance event.

4. As for storing up genotypic changes...this is exactly what
exaptation does. All the pieces are present already and when they are
combined something novel emerges which can now be selected upon.
Irreducible complexity is no mystery. Gene duplication, sexual
recombination, horizontal gene transfer, genome acquistions are all
mechanisms that accomplish this. It is true that I am not able to come
up with the detailed account of how this has happened, but I can give
credible scenarios that combined with the record in the genomes, gives
striking confirmation of the theory. And the evidence keeps coming...a
few weeks ago there was some discussion of the origin of the immune
system in Science (including a picture from the Dover trial with a
stack of books and papers confounding Behe's claim that there was no
theory of the origin of this complex system). It appears that
vertebrates got it via some lateral gene transfer in a viral
infection. Once the incipient function is there (and it didn't arise
gradualistically), Darwinian mechanisms have their fodder. So the
modern account involves both Darwinian mechanism and newly discovered
non-Darwinian mechanism. All the pieces of the eye, even at the
biochemical level, are homologs of pieces of other functioning
systems. Perhaps an eye evolves in the twinkling of an eye (as Dawkins
cleverly put it--I guess he knows his Bible even if he doesn't believe
it).

5. Cameron speaks of the Laplacian universe where God must be the most
skilled Fats Domino that one can imagine. While I have no trouble
imagining that God can do this, I'm not sure I believe it's necessary
to think this way. While I have a reductionist and mechanist bent, I
don't think they work at every level or through every level. All the
usually things can be said here--quantum indeterminacy, chaos, etc.
But, I don't find it necessary to do that. This is a critique of some
of my TE/EC colleagues. As under point #2 I don't want to conflate
God's role with any particular creational dimension. God can do what
he want how he wants. And I don't really think we can explain how and
where it happens in creaturely terms. If a key mutation occurs whether
it's via a radiation event that God tweaked to pop out at a certain
time (or even specially created) or a spontaneous low probability
isomeric transition of a nucleotide at the point of replication. It
doesn't bother me that God tweaks. What seems to be the case is that
God tweaks in a way that we usually can't tell.

6. Cameron's view that the sequence of evolutionary events seems
improbable is an argument for design just is wrong in my opinion. I've
commented on this before. The probability of the next mutation is the
same no matter what mutation occurred before it. Relevant to this is
Gould's essay about batting average records. There's only one way for
the distribution to go--similar, he argues, to biological complexity.

7. The pattern of evolution or the "fact" of evolution (trees of
relatedness from classification or sequence comparisons or Bernie's
appeals recently to chromosome fusions, etc) are convincing especially
in light of known mechanisms of reproduction and inheritance and the
kinds of changes that we not only infer but actually do see as we
compare sequences from generation to generation. No I don't have the
detailed mechanism for how all evolutionary change occurred. Neither
have I a detailed mechanism for development from fertilized egg to
adult organism. But the pattern is there and there is nothing
inconsistent (with my level of credulity) with thinking that it
happens without special intervention. Figuring out the mechanism in
more detail is part of our task.

8. As for Bill's question about the connection between "apparent age"
and "apparent randomness". If I believed that the Bible taught that
the earth is young, I'd probably adopt some kind of apparent age view.
I don't believe the Bible requires that viewpoint. I do believe that
the Bible teaches that God governs all events even those that appear
to be random. Thus, even with the most hideous of events, I believe
that God is in control and has his reasons, although I don't always
fathom them. I don't believe that I'm at the mercy of chance and
necessity (or even my own brilliant and not-so-brilliant choices) and
I trust God in his wisdom and plan to do what he will in my life that
will accomplish his purposes for me. My kids' genetic and biological
makeup are the result of multitude of chance events, yet I believe
that they have been fearfully and wonderfully made and knitted
together by their sovereign Lord. Their psychological and social
histories are similarly contingent, and influenced by their own free
choices. Yet even those are directed by their sovereign Lord. Do I
have empirical evidence of this divine governance? Probably not
anything that is convincing even to a moderately skeptical person.
Yet, the Bible tells me so.

TG

________________
Terry M. Gray, Ph.D.
Computer Support Scientist
Chemistry Department
Colorado State University
Fort Collins, CO 80523
(o) 970-491-7003 (f) 970-491-1801

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Received on Tue Jul 7 23:49:44 2009