> The question is not whether "Evolution is a scientific theory", but
> whether or not it is *inherently* an anti-theistic theory.
The counter-question which immediately comes to my mind is:
"Is Newton's theory of planetary motion *inherently* an
anti-theistic theory?"
or alternatively:
"Is LaPlace's solution to Newton's equations, which proved that
God does not need to occasionally re-adjust planetary orbits in
order to keep them stable, inherently anti-theistic?"
You partially answered these questions further on in your post, when you
implied that it is not "functioning according to natural law" which makes
a theory anti-theistic, but rather a reliance upon _chance_ rather than
_design_.
> A subsidiary question is whether Darwin had been a committed
> Biblical theist, whether he would have formulated his theory in a
> different way that would have still accounted for the facts, but would
> not have contained its "anti-religious flavour" as Thompson noted:
>
> "The doctrine of evolution by natural selection as Darwin formulated,
> and as his followers still explain it, has a strong anti-religious
> flavour. This is due to the fact that the intricate adaptations and
> co-ordinations we see in living things naturally evoking the idea of
> finality and design and, therefore of an intelligent providence, are
> explained, with what seems to be a rigorous argument, as the result of
> chance. It may be said, and the most orthodox theologians indeed
> hold, that God controls and guides even the events due to chance- but
> this proposition the Darwinians emphatically reject, and it is clear
> that in the Origin evolution is presented as an essentially undirected
> process. For the majority of its readers, therefore, the Origin
> effectively dissipated the evidence of providential control."
> (Thompson W.R., "Introduction", Darwin C., "The Origin of Species",
> Everyman's Library, 1967, J.M. Dent & Sons Ltd, London, p.xxiii)
But this raises another question in my mind:
Consider an evolving proto-star. This system is "chaotic," like the
weather. Given our best knowledge of the state of a proto-star, it is
impossible for us to predict what sort of planetary system it will
eventually produce; the final outcome depends sensitively on the
gravitational attraction of objects half a universe away. "Chance" -- at
the level of chaos and (it would seem necessarily) at the level of quantum
mechanics -- plays a roll in determining what kind of planetary system
eventually evolves.
So it is impossible to predict if any given proto-star will evolve a
planet of suitable size and position to support life; however, given an
ensemble of proto-stars, we can predict that some fraction of them will do
so.
Do you think that God guided and designed ("progressively created") this
PARTICULAR solar system, in this particular galaxy, to produce this
particular planet to support human beings? Or is it possible that God
allowed the galaxies to evolve according to natural mechanisms (with
"chance" playing its proper role) to produce *a* planet, somewhere,
somewhen, capable of supporting life and humanity.
Is *this* theory of stellar/planetary evolution inherently anti-theistic?
If so, why? If not, how is it theologically/philosophically different
from "Darwinian" evolution?
Or to put the question another way: Why is "chance" inherently
anti-theistic in biology, but not in physics?
You continue:
> Darwin's theory of
> evolution was one of the greatest disasters suffered by the Church of
> Jesus Christ. Denton, not even a Christian sees this clearly:
>
> "As far as Christianity was concerned, the advent of the theory of
> evolution and the elimination of traditional teleological thinking was
> catastrophic. The suggestion that life and man are the result of chance
> is incompatible with the biblical assertion of their being the direct
> result of intelligent creative activity. Despite the attempt by
> liberal theology to disguise the point,
> the fact is that no biblically derived
> religion can really be compromised with the fundamental assertion of
> Darwinian theory. Chance and design are antithetical concepts, and the
> decline in religious belief can probably be attributed more to the
> propagation and advocacy by the intellectual and scientific community
> of the Darwinian version of evolution than to any other single factor.
But I reject that "chance and design are antithetical concepts."
Mathematicians, physicists, and engineers are now happily employing
genetic algorythms and MonteCarlo techniques to find solutions to certain
problems. Designed systems can employ "chance" to produce desireable
outcomes.
It seems to me that the fundamental problem is not the use of "chance" as
part of a scientific theory, but rather a confusion of the
physicist's use of the word "chance" (an outcome unpredictable or
unspecifiable in terms of initial conditions) and the biologist's use of
the word "chance" (an event which is NOT caused by the organism in order
to improve its survival or reproduction) with a _metaphysical_ use of the
word "Chance" (having no determining cause whatsoever).
> Today ensconced in our comfortable agnosticism, after a century of
> exposure to the idea of evolution and quite inured to the idea of a
> universe without purpose, we tend to forget just what a shock wave the
> advent of evolution sent through the Christian society of Victorian
> England....It was because Darwinian theory broke man's link with God
> and set him adrift in a cosmos without purpose or end that its impact
> was so fundamental. No other intellectual revolution in modern times
> (with the possible exception of the Copernican) so profoundly affected
> the way men viewed themselves and their place in the universe."
>
> (Denton M., "Evolution: A Theory in Crisis",1985, Burnett Books,
> pp66-67)
>
> This is why YEC (and even Progressive Creationists like me) are so
> wary of evolution. To us it seems self-evident that it is used by
> Satan in his attack on the Lord's Church, as portrayed in Rev 12:15:
This is a very good point. Theistic Evolutionists would contend (or at
least, *I* would contend) that Satan has been so successful, at least in
part, because we have been using poor tactics in the war, by attacking
evolutionary theory on scientific grounds rather than attacking the
metaphysical assumptions about "chance and design being antithetical."
> The question is, is
> the Darwinist theory of macro-evolution an integral part of Satan's
> "flood" or is it neutral, in fact just another good thing that Satan
> has perverted?
That is a *very* good question; thanks for stating it explicitely.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In theory, there is no difference between | Loren Haarsma
theory and practice, but in practice | lhaarsma@opal.tufts.edu
there is a great deal of difference. |