"Science v. Religion" ... or "Science & Religion"
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The ongoing court case about evolution and intelligent design in Dover, Pennsylvania, is, according to the usual storyline trotted out for such occasions, a battle between Christian creationists and rational scientists. But it is more about a struggle between good philosophy and bad philosophy. The theological point remains that God created the body of man from some pre-existing thing, and whether it be holus-bolus from the slime or though a million-year process of evolution, is not of great import. "I see no problem combining belief in the Creator with the theory of evolution, under one condition -- that the limits of a scientific theory are respected," Vienna archbishop Christoph Cardinal Schonborn said.
And the limits of scientific theory are where the disputes arise. The theory of evolution -- whatever its strengths and weaknesses -- simply does not deal with ultimate causes. Being a scientific theory, it deals with measurable changes and hypotheses about how those changes take place. It has nothing to say about where the ape or the finch or the lungfish or the primordial slime came from in the first place. And it has nothing to say about the human soul, which is not a material organ like the heart or gall bladder, and therefore cannot be measured. The soul is the domain of philosophy and theology, not natural science.
Too many proponents of evolution propose it not as a scientific theory, but as a fact, like the laws of thermodynamics. As a scientific theory it represents a great advance in understanding how species change -- how finches adapt their beaks to their environment. It is also promising in understanding how one species might become something else altogether, or how very complex organs like eyes or ears might develop. But promise is not the same as evidence, and the theory of evolution, like all theories, is in need of supporting evidence. Assertions that the theory has proven more than it has are simply bad science.
The bad philosophy is worse. Good philosophy understands the proper competencies of the various disciplines. Mathematics is competent to analyze the quantitative aspects of physical bodies; it is not competent in calculating ethics. Aerodynamics is essential for understanding flight; it does determine whether watching an eagle soar is beautiful or not. Pure philosophy deals with questions about the origins of things -- why is there something rather than nothing? Bad philosophy asks scientists, who can only measure what is measurable, to theorize about things which aren't -- God, creation, the human soul.
If religious teaching makes a false scientific claim -- e.g., that the Earth is flat -- then science, in its proper competence, has a correction to make. But where science starts to make metaphysical (literally, "beyond physics") claims -- e.g., about the existence of God or the origin of matter -- then good philosophy needs to put it back in its place. In Dover, evolutionary science is masquerading as a philosophy of human origins. Combined with secularist zealotry, it has resulted in the current court case.
On the particularities of intelligent design -- the theory that life is too complex not to have had an intelligent designer of some sort -- I hold no particular brief for or against. In any case, the Dover Area School District is not proposing to actually teach intelligent design. It simply mandates that a four-paragraph statement be read before the theory of evolution is taught, wherein the fact that evolution is a theory is underscored, and the alternate view of intelligent design is mentioned. That's it.
Yet if the theory of evolution is a scientific theory, and intelligent design is a philosophical conclusion about the origins of life, there should be no conflict. Teach evolution in biology class. Teach intelligent design in metaphysics. No problem. The conflict arises only because evolution is really taught as both a scientific theory and a philosophy of origins. Evolutionists of a rather extreme sort -- the sort which would consider the four anodyne paragraphs in Dover as violating the Constitution of the United States -- may be good scientists, but they are bad philosophers. What the students in Dover's high school need is not so much a few paragraphs about intelligent design as a good philosophy course.
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Science without religion is lame; religion without science is blind.
-- Albert Einstein
-- Albert Einstein
The ongoing court case about evolution and intelligent design in Dover, Pennsylvania, is, according to the usual storyline trotted out for such occasions, a battle between Christian creationists and rational scientists. But it is more about a struggle between good philosophy and bad philosophy. The theological point remains that God created the body of man from some pre-existing thing, and whether it be holus-bolus from the slime or though a million-year process of evolution, is not of great import. "I see no problem combining belief in the Creator with the theory of evolution, under one condition -- that the limits of a scientific theory are respected," Vienna archbishop Christoph Cardinal Schonborn said.
And the limits of scientific theory are where the disputes arise. The theory of evolution -- whatever its strengths and weaknesses -- simply does not deal with ultimate causes. Being a scientific theory, it deals with measurable changes and hypotheses about how those changes take place. It has nothing to say about where the ape or the finch or the lungfish or the primordial slime came from in the first place. And it has nothing to say about the human soul, which is not a material organ like the heart or gall bladder, and therefore cannot be measured. The soul is the domain of philosophy and theology, not natural science.
Too many proponents of evolution propose it not as a scientific theory, but as a fact, like the laws of thermodynamics. As a scientific theory it represents a great advance in understanding how species change -- how finches adapt their beaks to their environment. It is also promising in understanding how one species might become something else altogether, or how very complex organs like eyes or ears might develop. But promise is not the same as evidence, and the theory of evolution, like all theories, is in need of supporting evidence. Assertions that the theory has proven more than it has are simply bad science.
The bad philosophy is worse. Good philosophy understands the proper competencies of the various disciplines. Mathematics is competent to analyze the quantitative aspects of physical bodies; it is not competent in calculating ethics. Aerodynamics is essential for understanding flight; it does determine whether watching an eagle soar is beautiful or not. Pure philosophy deals with questions about the origins of things -- why is there something rather than nothing? Bad philosophy asks scientists, who can only measure what is measurable, to theorize about things which aren't -- God, creation, the human soul.
If religious teaching makes a false scientific claim -- e.g., that the Earth is flat -- then science, in its proper competence, has a correction to make. But where science starts to make metaphysical (literally, "beyond physics") claims -- e.g., about the existence of God or the origin of matter -- then good philosophy needs to put it back in its place. In Dover, evolutionary science is masquerading as a philosophy of human origins. Combined with secularist zealotry, it has resulted in the current court case.
On the particularities of intelligent design -- the theory that life is too complex not to have had an intelligent designer of some sort -- I hold no particular brief for or against. In any case, the Dover Area School District is not proposing to actually teach intelligent design. It simply mandates that a four-paragraph statement be read before the theory of evolution is taught, wherein the fact that evolution is a theory is underscored, and the alternate view of intelligent design is mentioned. That's it.
Yet if the theory of evolution is a scientific theory, and intelligent design is a philosophical conclusion about the origins of life, there should be no conflict. Teach evolution in biology class. Teach intelligent design in metaphysics. No problem. The conflict arises only because evolution is really taught as both a scientific theory and a philosophy of origins. Evolutionists of a rather extreme sort -- the sort which would consider the four anodyne paragraphs in Dover as violating the Constitution of the United States -- may be good scientists, but they are bad philosophers. What the students in Dover's high school need is not so much a few paragraphs about intelligent design as a good philosophy course.
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I couldn't resist posting parting comments in the online debate on the Globe & Mail...
The invective is frightening, to say the least, because the more one side accuses the other of being dogmatic, the more they themselves demonstrate the inherent dogmatism of their own position. Is this what enlightened conversation is about?--------------------
Again, speaking from my personal experience as one of Mr. Giza's former students, I took everything that was taught me with a grain of salt. I went on to study philosophy in university, and exposed myself to all sorts of ideas and modes of reasoning. Anyone who's even had an inkling of training in the philosophy of science knows that even the scientific method is subject to criticism. The only definitive conclusion I've come away with is this: we as human beings are in no position to claim any sense of certitude about our knowledge, because by our very nature we are limited to seeing things from an all-too-human perspective. Much of this conversation smacks of nothing but hubris.
I daresay that few, if any, of those readers engaging in this fundamentalist anti-fundamentalism themselves understand all that's implicated by the science that they've elevated to this pedestal. How many are taking for granted the things that scientists (as if they were a homogenuous group themselves) are teaching, without themselves examining the basis of those conclusions?
I'm not a deist, but I'm in no more position to tell someone what not to believe as I would be in telling them what to believe. I can't say whether there is or isn't a higher being, any more than anyone in this conversation can. So let's stop talking as if we could or had the means by our humanly-created scientific method to decide something that, by definition, isn't a scientific question. More importantly, if we can't agree to disagree, let's at least be more respectful in our tone.
posted by þΛųL jØŋαŦhΛŋ @ 17:00
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