Origins
I went to the opening session of my conference this evening (after a slight struggle to actually get to the convention center, solved by a cute ‘trolley’ bus) and I hadn’t really paid much attention to the actual topic of this session, since I already knew I would be attending it no matter what the topic. So it turned out to be a series of lectures on evolution, or more pointedly, on the problems with the anti-evolutionism movement that has been sweeping the country resulting in lawsuits in several states, some of which have even made it to trial (see: Dover PA last summer - ruled to exclude ‘Intelligent Design’ from science curriculum). I haven’t been able to fully process the entire set of lectures, but it’s really gotten me thinking… certainly thinking about this from the ‘other side’, as I most often hear about ‘Intelligent design’ in the context of religious groups as its proponents. Now what I can say is that, ultimately, I believe in the sovereignty of God in the process of creation, and that His presence in the foundations of the world is clearly evident to me all around. And I also believe in the evidence for natural selection (which is good since I use the concepts of natural selection every day in the lab) and, as a scientist, I understand the importance of that the ideas of evolution play in shaping the way we think about the world and especially the natural world.
But I generally feel that religious ‘fundamentalists’ put God in a box, saying ‘I don’t think God would have done it this way, or that way’ as if God’s way of thinking is based on our small human understanding of the way the world works, as if we could ever fully understand the ‘how and why’ of God’s creative process. Not to say that we shouldn’t keep trying to understand, to strive to keep getting closer to wisdom, just that we shouldn’t expect to acheive full understanding. I do know that there are things that I believe that I am willing to die for, but the specifics of origins of the world (other than that they were God-directed in some way) are not on that list for me - maybe they should be, maybe not…
What do you think?
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I concur.
Comment by Geof F. Morris — May 22, 2006 @ 3:48 pm
I think it’s an important issue, but I definitely don’t think that salvation hangs on it. As far as I’m concerned, it’s not a matter of thinking how I think God would have done it but a matter of reading the way Genesis says he did it. I guess I don’t really see how you can read Genesis and believe in evolution - any comments? By the way, you mentioned in your post that there was a ruling to exclude intelligent design from science curriculum - you don’t condone that, do you? Not even accepting it as a possibility?
Comment by Alexa — May 24, 2006 @ 4:51 pm
It’s way more complicated than ‘I believe in evolution’ or ‘I believe in a literal 6 day creation’ (for me at least) - and I don’t really know where I fall on the continuum between the two. I believe that God created the heavens and the earth, but I also do believe in at least part of evolution - I’m mostly talking micro-evolution here, stuff like better adaptation of a species to their chosen environment, which is indisputably seen, from bacteria up through vertebrates. I guess I just don’t know how to align my belief in God with my experience with natural selection (micro-evolution).
And yes, Alexa, I probably would agree with keeping intelligent design out of the public schools, if only because I don’t really see much high-calibre scientific research backing it - but also because it introduces the supernatural into something that is specifically a ‘natural science’ class/education. I’m not 100% on that, but that’s my gut feeling…
Comment by drea — May 24, 2006 @ 10:05 pm
Andrea,
I think I would agree with some of what you said. Micro-evolution is observed, as you said. However, making the jump from micro to macro-evolution is something that takes a great deal of…faith. And that is my view of the popular evolutionary theory - that it is a “religious” viewpoint as much as Creationism or ID (ie., how do the evolutionists explain the origins of the initial elements of the universe?). For this reason, I strongly object to teaching evolution theory exclusively in an academic setting. I say let them teach all theories or none. Don’t you agree that an academic setting at its best is a place for discussion and debate, hearing all sides? I don’t mean to sound like I’m jumping down your throat; I apologize if I do. It’s just that your comment about the public schools struck a chord with me.
Comment by DC — May 25, 2006 @ 9:29 pm
yeah, I don’t really know how I feel about some of that Daniel - I don’t think I agree that evolution could be grouped under ‘religious viewpoints’ (as there is no supernatural being responsible, or many of the other things commonly associated with ‘religion’) - but I do think we need to be careful what we do teach in the schools - I guess I mostly have issues with the idea of teaching something in schools involving religion of any kind, cause that just opens the door to allowing other religions into the schools and that’s messy…
Also, I need to do more reading on this, but the stuff I have seen from Creationist/ID scientists is pretty weak, and I’ve not been impressed with the research so far - so if a theory is going to be taught in school, it should really have more research backing it up (though you could make the same case for parts of macroevolution, but not with microevolution…) - I’m reading Kenneth Miller’s book ‘Finding Darwin’s God’ (well, I’ve started it a while ago and will be returning to it ASAP) - he’s a cell biology prof at Brown who’s a Christian and believes in evolution (not sure which parts, but I think at least part of macro) - I’m not sure I’ll agree with everything he says, but he does present a lot of the evidence for both sides, I think…
Comment by drea — May 25, 2006 @ 10:34 pm