Theistic Evolution

by cofty 195 Replies latest watchtower beliefs

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  cofty

  Fair point Mustard.

  I wonder how christians do reconcile theistic evolution with soteriology?

  Sulla? BTS? Bishop Spong?
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  binadub

  Cofty and NewChapter:

  I just got home from work a little while ago and read over your reponses. I'll have to do the same as you, Cofty, and put together some response with a little time for preparation. Just didn't want you to think I'm ignoring your thoughtful interest in the subject.

  NewChapter: I looked over again the replies you have made in this thread and did not find evidence that you refuted what DI claims is their objective. I did see a number of times where you expessed your interpretation of what they are about. I hope you're not referring to the Irreducible Complexity rebuttal of the mouse trap . . . even I can refute that and I'm not a scientist (evolution in reverse?).

  I have of course read the Wikipedia article; there was nothing new there. When it says "Intelligent design (ID) is a form of creationism promulgated . . . ,"

  that is correct. But that is not the new popular use of the term that you and Cofty and others are offended by, which now refers to (or implies) Young-Earth Creationists. I used to consider myself a "creationist" because I believe in a supreme intelligence, but that is what the word used to mean.

  Most of the article is factual, although it can be a little misleading. As said, one of the terms that gets muddled is "creationism." It's like the word "theory"--it depends on the context whether it is the general meaning of the word or the new popular concept of the word. "Creationism" used to simply mean beliving in a Creator. It did not carry the stigma it does now as being fundamentalist-evangelical-young-Earth-hellfire-Bible-Genesis-literal-6000-year creationists as it does now. That's one reason the term creationism was replaced with the new term "intelligent design"; to distinguish it from the fundamentalists. The article you quoted says this:

  It is a contemporary adaptation of the traditional teleological argument for the existence of God, presented by its advocates as "an evidence-based scientific theory about life's origins" rather than "a religious-based idea".

  This is what they claim is the ID objective, and I tend to agree with that. If you have any interest in a truely unbiased presentation of the subject, try this link to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, "Teleological Arguments for God's Existence":

  http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/teleological-arguments/

  It is a bit long, unbiased neutral presentation of the subject, but here is a brief quote of the conclusion:

  6. Conclusion
  Perception and appreciation of the incredible intricacy and the beauty of things in nature—whether biological or cosmic—has certainly inclined many toward thoughts of purpose and design in nature, and has constituted important moments of affirmation for those who already accept design positions. The status of the corresponding arguments of course, is not only a matter of current dispute, but the temperature of the dispute seems to be on the rise. And regardless of what one thinks of the arguments at this point, so long as nature has the power to move us (as even Kant admitted that the‘starry heavens above’ did), design convictions and arguments are unlikely to disappear quietly.

  I think it is an excellent fair presentation of the topic.

  NewChapter wrote:

  I'm reading a paper at the Discovery Institute---well I probably will not finsih it because it really is just a piece of propaganda---but I saw something that made me smile.

  Again, my purpose has never been to deny that speciation can occur in nature, especially when speciation is defined by the trivial definition of a mere reproductively isolated population. Rather, my purpose is to test the FAQ’s claims. . . . .

  Thank You NewChapter! What an excellent example of one of the points I'm trying to make about the word "creationism."
  You are obviously not aware that "trivial" has a scientific meaning other than the popular meaning, just like "theory" and other science speak.

  http://science.yourdictionary.com/trivial-name:
  

  trivial name science definition1. A common or vernacular name as distinguished from a scientific name, as chimpanzee for Pan troglodytes.
  2. A common, historic, or convenient name for a substance. The trivial name is often derived from the source in which the substance was discovered. It is not systematic and is not used in modern official nomenclature. Sucrose is the trivial name for β-D-fructofuranosyl-α-D-glucopyranoside. Compare chemical name.http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/trivial
  . . .
  3. Biology . (of names of organisms) specific, as distinguished from generic. 4. Mathematics .
  a. noting a solution of an equation in which the value of every variable of the equation is equal to zero.
  b. (of a theorem, proof, or the like) simple, transparent, or immediately evident. 5. Chemistry . (of names of chemical compounds) derived from the natural source, or of historic origin, and not according to the systematic nomenclature: Picric acid is the trivial name of 2,4,6-trinitrophenol.

  =================

  Cofty: I'll have to respond to your questions later. Probably tomorrow. I have another life. (For one thing I like to study the History of Civilization, and I just received a DVD from the Learning Company that I haven't had a chance to open.) I also want to watch the news.
  But I will respond to your questions on what science I think the DI wants to include in academia--as I understand it. I just want to do it justice and I've just about exhausted my time today responding to NewChapter. My one request is to try to stay on track. We're not arguing whether DI/ID is right or wrong, or whether I believe what their members believe about religion. That's a known debate like a lot of things. The question is whether they are religion or not (which I don't regard "deism" to be religion, unless you want to also define "atheism" as religion). I do disagree that the scientific community rejects them as scientists. There is dispute between the scientists on both sides and on either side.

  Btw, I didn't realize you are UK. (I just don't read the board enough to know the people like I did about 10 years ago.) So our cross communications here may stretch.

  (Sorry about the edits--some of the formatting gets screwed up.)

  Thanks for your interest,
  ~Binadub
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  NewChapter

  Binadub---i don't care if it is young earth, the motivation behind the movement is to sneak creationsim into the class room. There is a lot of evidence to support this. Creationists do not all agree on the details---but the important thing to them is to inject the general ideas. Speciation conflicts with Genesis. I.D. also rejects speciation through natural selection. The Wedge document shows their goal.

  If there comes the day that I.D. supporters succeed in convincing people that they are some kind of science without a religious agenda, and they slip through, then as embarrassed as I am in how we place in the world in science today, we will be dragging our knuckles soon.

  These posts have proven to me that the battle in ongoing and we can never let down our guard. People will still be fooled, and then they will pass that on. The problem is the longer a story is repeated and reworked, the more likely people will start to believe it.

  NC
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  binadub

  NewChapter:

  You must live on this forum. But you could not have possibly looked at the information presented in the few minutes since I posted. I'm only still here because I just tried to correct some of the formatting that got messed up. (Btw, you kinda lost me a few months ago when you said modern homo sapiens sapiens were descended from Neanderthals. ;^)

  ~Binadub
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  peacefulpete

  Cofty, Again I'm late to the discussion but the fundamental issue is how does someone move back and forth from critical thinking to credulity to adopt a theistic-evolutionary position. A person who is accustomed to applying scientific method or critical thinking in general is far less likely to be comfortable with a conclusion arrived at without positive evidence. Don't get me wrong people manage all kinds of mental gymnastics, especially when cultural pressure or popular concensus are involved. Even eminent scientists like Rich Feynmen can suspend critical thinking at times, however the fact remains that he knew he was being irrational and even was quoted as saying he believed simply 'because it was comforting'. I'm not sure of his religious background but I've found that the core of the matter lies in the acceptance of death as a natural process and a deep humility about our importance to the universe. Superstitions are very dificult to erradicat from the recesses of the mind and the best we can due is practice good citizenship, be generous, don't make other's life any more miserable then it is, take note of the joys of life, and hope the next generation is less superstitious then our own.
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  NewChapter

  (Btw, you kinda lost me a few months ago when you said modern homo sapiens sapiens were descended from Neanderthals. ;^)

  First of all---I absolutely never said that. Please link where I said such a thing. Since I have never understood it that way, I can't imagine that I have ever said it.

  I have talked about how close we are to Neanderthal---so close that we interbred with them. It's in our genes. But descend from them---as a species? No. But since we interbred with them, there ARE individuals who at some point must have had at least one Neanderthal ancestor. We see the same evidence with the newly discovered Denisovians.

  NC
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  Twitch

  so close that we interbred with them

  I read that in Scientific American. A little sidebar thing but I recall it saying there were traces of it in modern DNA samples. Kinda freaky actually. Must resist urge to derail, must resist...
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  NewChapter

  It's fasciinating Twitch---and it is much more than a sidebar at this point. Northern Europeans and some Asians carry the genes---among others. The Denisovian genes have shown up among Australian Aborigines. There are a lot of theories. One is that we share common African ancestors, but were separated and began to speciate, but not so much that we couldn't interbreed. That's just one thought. I'd have to read them all again to remember them all. We don't have all the answers yet, but we have the genes.

  At one time, Neanderthal was seen as the stereotypical caveman---but there is a lot of new research and the picture is changing.

  I'm not sure if it was BTS, but one of the posters here posted a link to a study that discusses a hypothesis that autism may come from Neanderthal genes. Again---nothing proven---but interesting directions none-the-less.

  NC
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  Sulla

  I understand there is a difference between JW theology and traditional Christian theology when it comes to the doctrine of sin. But I don't see how it relieves the difficulity. Whether you buy into "Adamic sin" as the WT does, or whether you believe that each of us is responsible for our own sinful nature, and its the sarifice of Jesus that covers our individual sin (instead of equalizing Adam's), the fact remains that when you have a literal Adam playing a role in the entry of sin into the human race, evolution becomes a problem - because there was no literal Adam.

  Good question. The matter has generated some discussion elsewhere. It is true that Pius was down on the idea that a first man may not have eixsted and that he didn't see any obvious way to reconcile the concept of original sin with it. That said, there have been various attempts to think it through in the last 40 years or so.

  On the one hand, if we have horses then it seems there was a first horse. As a practical matter, such an assignment is somewhat arbitrary -- there must be some sliding sacle of "horseness" that most agree is sufficiently met by Horse Zero. With humans, something similar would certainly apply. The difference being that, according to Catholic theology, humans have immaterial souls which are the sorts of thing that do not go out of existence when the bodies die. Since this is a contrast with the relatives of human beings, that would serve as a pretty clear line: humans are those primates with immaterial souls.

  That is obviously not a falsifiable claim.

  With respect to theologians who are smarter than I, it isn't immediately obvious to me why the concept of Original Sin relies on the historicity of some first man. Others have thought similarly: it may be that our "fallenness" is not the result of a single act by a single man, but a problem of the human race in general, arising from the moment we began to make moral judgments.

  So, a chimp rips a rival limb from limb in competition for sexual rights or whatever. This is a chimp being a good chimp, but when a human does it and realizes that the moral universe is different for him than for the chimp, then you have an act that is proper for a chimp and not for a human. I tentatively suggest that the fact we live in a different moral universe and routinely fail to live in accord with this "true" nature is the essence of what we mean by Original Sin.

  If this idea is not entirely preposterous, then it doesn't matter whether there was ever a single first man or not. This sin, this brokenness, is something that we all experience by virtue of the fact that we are all humans; it is both shared and inherited in this way. We live in a moral universe that calls us to be something we have great difficulty being: good and virtuous men in harmony with the One who Is (who, I assume, exists).

  Anyhow, that's my thought.
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  Sulla

  Cofty, Again I'm late to the discussion but the fundamental issue is how does someone move back and forth from critical thinking to credulity to adopt a theistic-evolutionary position. A person who is accustomed to applying scientific method or critical thinking in general is far less likely to be comfortable with a conclusion arrived at without positive evidence.

  peacefulpete, I think you're trying to steal a base here. What positive evidence do you have that your wife loves you (assuming you are married)? Because she has sex with you? Because she says so? What would count as positive evidence? And, haven't most men arrived at a comfortable conclusion without anything that really counts as positive evidence?