Bob Dehaan wrote:
> I would be happy to take
> macroevolution seriously if there were empirical evidence that natural
> selection played a significant *creative* role in it.
Let me suggest some modification of vocabulary here. I would say that
natural selection does nothing whatsoever that is authentically *creative.*
Rather, it acts as a positive feedback mechanism in the context of a search
program. Briefly here is why I say this:
The fundamental meaning of "to create" is "to give being to."
I view the universe as a Creation that was given being by its Creator. One
important aspect of that being is a vast "potentiality space" of viable
organisms. In the course of time, mutations (usually characterized as
random) function to search this potentiality space for organism suitable for
some particular environment and ecosystem. What is commonly called "natural
selection" is the positive feedback that amplifies the population of
organism particularly suited to the context. It does not *create" anything.
It only signals the *discovery* of a potentiality that has been there from
the beginning as part of the being given to the Creation by its Creator.
To call natural selection *creative* is, I would say, to misuse the term in
the same way as do the proponents of naturalism.
Howard Van Till
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