On Tue, 23 Dec 1997 14:09:22 -0800, Cliff Lundberg wrote:
CL>Would a different model of evolution be acceptable to many
>creationists?
I don't believe that *any* position that has the word "evolution" in
it would ever be acceptable to the majority of creationists. The
word "evolution" has become so identified with materialism-naturalism
that it would be unlikely that creationists in general will ever
identify with it. That's why I propose the model I call Mediate
Creation, after the great 19th century Presbyterian theologian
Charles Hodge:
"But while it has ever been the doctrine of the Church that God
created the universe out of nothing by the word of his power, which
creation was instantaneous and immediate, i. e., without the
intervention of any second causes; yet it has generally been admitted
that this is to be understood only of the original call of matter into
existence. Theologians have, therefore, distinguished between a first
and second, or immediate and mediate creation. The one was
instantaneous, the other gradual; the one precludes the idea of any
preexisting substance, and of cooperation, the other admits and
implies both...It thus appears that forming out of preexisting material
comes within the Scriptural idea of creating...There is, therefore,
according to the Scriptures, not only an immediate, instantaneous
creation ex nihilo by the simple word of God, but a mediate,
progressive creation; the power of God working in union with second
causes." (Hodge C., "Systematic Theology", 1960 reprint, Vol. I,
pp556-557).
This broad creationist model can accept all the facts (natural and
supernatural) while relating them to a broad Biblical, Christian world
view.
CL>A model in which the various types of organisms
>were formed relatively suddenly? This is, after all, pretty
>much what happened, according to the fossils. Maybe the big
>problem has been that gradualism does not address this fact.
Creationist models, of course, do not have any problem with sudden
appearance, unlike most evolutionist models, which require a series
of tiny step-by-step changes:
"To 'tame' chance means to break down the very improbable into less
improbable small components arranged in series. No matter how
improbable it is that an X could have arisen from a Y in a single step,
it is always possible to conceive of a series of infinitesimally graded
intermediates between them. However improbable a large-scale
change may be, smaller changes are less improbable. And provided
we postulate a sufficiently large series of sufficiently finely graded
intermediates, we shall be able to derive anything from anything else,
without invoking astronomical improbabilities." (Dawkins R., "The
Blind Watchmaker", 1991, p318)
But I think you might be using the term "gradualism" in a way that
Darwinists don't mean it. They don't necessarily mean by "gradual",
slow, but rather by *grades*. Gradualism can be fast (although it is
contrained by genetic realities (see "Haldane's Dilemma" in Walter
ReMine's book "The Biotic Message"), but it cannot be discontinuous,
as Dawkins points out:
"What is all this telling us about real evolution? Once again, it is
ramming home the importance of gradual, step-by-step change. There
I have been evolutionists who have denied that gradualism of this
kind is necessary in evolution. Our biomorph calculation shows us
exactly one reason why gradual, step-by-step change is important.
When I say that you can expect evolution to jump from the insect to
one of its immediate neighbours, but not to jump from the insect
directly to the fox or the scorpion, what I exactly mean is the
following. If genuinely random jumps really occurred, then a jump
from insect to scorpion would be perfectly possible. Indeed it would
be just as probable as a jump from insect to one of its immediate
neighbours. But it would also be just as probable as a jump to any
other biomorph in the land. And there's the rub. For the number of
biomorphs in the land is half a trillion, and if no one of them is any
more probable as a destination than any other, the odds of jumping to
any particular one are small enough to ignore. Notice that it doesn't
help us to assume that there is a powerful nonrandom 'selection
pressure'. It wouldn't matter if you'd been promised a king's ransom if
you achieved a lucky jump to the scorpion. The odds against your
doing so are still half a trillion to one. But if, instead of jumping you
walked, one step at a time, and were given on small coin as a reward
every time you happened to take a step in the right direction, you
would reach the scorpion in a very short time. Not necessarily in the
fastest possible time of 30 generations, but very fast nevertheless.
Jumping could theoretically get you the prize faster - in single hop.
But because of the astronomical odds against success, series of small
steps, each one building on the accumulated success of previous
steps, is the only feasible way." (Dawkins R., "The Blind
Watchmaker", 1991, p72)
CL>Such a model might roughly satisfy the intuition that 'dog
>was always dog, cat was always cat', which creationists seem
>to feel. The problem of transitional forms would be softened,
>if not dissolved. This model, although mechanistic, would be
>more in line with Genesis--a refinement of it perhaps, rather
>than a affront to it.
I don't see there is necessarily any "affront" to Genesis if dogs and
cats came from common ancestors, via transitional forms. Genesis
says nothing about lower taxa like dogs and cats, as Carnell points
out:
"And exactly what does Moses teach? First, that the unit of life which
God originally created, which is expected to remain 'fixed,' is not
the 'species' of science, but, rather, the 'kind' of the book of
Genesis, such as 'herbs yielding seed,' `trees bearing fruit,'
'birds,' 'cattle,' 'creeping things,' and 'beasts.' Observe,
therefore, that the conservative may scrap the doctrine of the 'fixity
of species' also, without jeopardizing his major premise in the least.
The Christian, thus, can accommodate a 'threshold' evolution, i. e.,
a wide and varied change within the 'kinds' originally created by God."
(Carnell E.J., "An Introduction to Christian Apologetics", 1948, p238)
The real question is not, can fully naturalistic evolution be
reconciled with belief in God or the Bible?, but whether it is
*true*:
"When I discuss the subject of my book [Darwin on Trial] with people
who are followers of a theistic religion (usually Christians-they might
be Jewish), there's one problem I always run into...I'll tend to sort of
say, "I have this question about whether the Darwinian version of
evolution (the theory of evolution that is currently accepted), is true.
And then they'll tend to say in response, "Well, we found a way to
reconcile it with belief in God", or "we found a way to reconcile it
with the Bible", or something like that". And what I always then have
to say is, "Wait a minute! That's not the first point"..."Before
worrying about whether one thing can be reconciled with another,
let's first look at the question of whether it's true. Whether we need to
worry about it at all". And my argument is, insofar as this vast
creative power is claimed, for mutation and selection, it's not true.
And so there's no need to worry about the conflict even though many
versions of evolution...can be reconciled with many forms of religious
belief..." (Johnson P.E., "Phillip Johnson and Eugenie Scott", 2 tape
set, Wisconsin Public Radio, 1992)
CL>Such a model would involve a more humble approach to the
>evidence, a greater recognition of the extremely fragmentary
>nature of the early fossil record. The existence of many
>important ancestral forms would have to be merely postulated.
There is a real doubt that the fossil record is as fragmentary
as Neo-Darwinists like to make out:
"The record is not so woefully incomplete," offered Steven Stanley of
Johns Hopkins University; "you can reconstruct long sections by
combining data from several areas." Olson confessed himself to be
"cheered by such optimism about the fossil record," and he listened
receptively to Gould's suggestion that the gaps in the record are more
real than apparent. "Certainly the record is poor," admitted Gould,
"but the jerkiness you see is not the result of gaps, it is the
consequence of the jerky mode of evolutionary change." (Lewin R.,
"Evolutionary-Theory Under Fire: An historic conference in Chicago
challenges the four-decade long dominance of the Modern Synthesis",
SCIENCE, Vol. 210, 21 November 1980, pp883-884)
Ever since Darwin, the fossil record has been interpreted in such
a way as to satisfy the requirements of Darwinist theory:
"But I do not pretend that I should ever have suspected how poor
was the record in the best preserved geological sections, had not the
absence of innumerable transitional links between the species which
lived at the commencement and close of each formation, pressed so
hardly on my theory." (Darwin C., "The Origin of Species", Everyman's
Library, 1967 reprint, p311)
"We paleontologists have said that the history of life supports that
interpretation [the story of gradual adaptive change], all the while
really knowing that it does not." (Eldredge N., "Time Frames", 1985,
p144)
CL>Paleontologists occasionally reflect on the lack of evidence,
>but this is not in their interest. You don't get grants for
>bragging about your ignorance. You give grants to curators for
>maintaining 'The History of Life', not for preserving a few
>miserable traces. The familiar model of evolution, in which we
>try to force known forms into evolutionary sequence, may be
>not only wrong, but shallow, for not recognizing the extent
>of the mystery and diversity of life's history.
Eldredge has been very candid about this. The pressure of Ph.D
candidates to get positive results which support the reigning
evolutionary paradigm is enormous:
"Results. Like all other humans starting out on some quest, on some
project with a definite goal, scientists are determined to get results.
Complicating the normal routine is the hassle of obtaining a Ph.D. A
piece of doctoral research is really an apprenticeship, and the
dissertation a comprehensive report that shows the candidate's ability
to frame, and successfully pursue, an original piece of scientific
research. Sounds reasonable, but the pressure for results, positive
results, is enormous. If your choice is to look at evolution, and you've
carefully picked out a trilobite species that meets all the criteria for a
good example, and if your preliminary forays reveal a rather
distressing sameness to the beasts from New York to Iowa, from the
beginning of Hamilton time on up through its last gasp 8 million years
later, a feeling of desperation is inevitable." (Eldredge N., "Time
Frames", 1985, p59)
Happy Christmas!
Steve
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