Adoptionism and biology: an interpretation of Darwinism?

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear Owen and others,

A comment made in a discussion elsewhere in the forum caught my attention as potentially very interesting:


It strikes me that Darwinism is simply Arianism as applied to biology.

This is a connection I've not heard explicit mention of before, and I'll admit I am intrigued. There may be fruit for some interesting discussion on this.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[Owen Jones]

Arius, as I understand him, believed that Jesus was born a man and progressed to a state of divinity (perfection). Likewise, the whole point of evolution is that, through a progressive evolution, life is perfected.

The perfect ideal, the experience of it, or the expectation of it, is certainly a constant in human history and in most cultures and religions. With God out of the picture, that does not mean that the perfect ideal ceases to be a fundamental human experience and expectation. Darwinism is a symbolism. It is a symbolic form of the experience of an intra-mundane progression toward perfection. The psychology of the evolutionist is similar to that of Arius in that it is possible to achieve perfection in this world, absent a divine coupling or fusion with human nature. That is more like a case of moral striving. Darwinism is a moral system of striving for perfection on the species level.

[M. Partyka]

Arius, as I understand him, believed that Jesus was born a man and progressed to a state of divinity (perfection). Likewise, the whole point of evolution is that, through a progressive evolution, life is perfected.Jesus is still both Son of God and Son of Man under Arianism. In its most concise form, Arianism simply teaches that the Son is not consubstantial with the Father -- i.e., the Father alone possesses the Godhead, whereas the Son is a created (yet somehow "divine") being.


The psychology of the evolutionist is similar to that of Arius in that it is possible to achieve perfection in this world, absent a divine coupling or fusion with human nature. That is more like a case of moral striving. Darwinism is a moral system of striving for perfection on the species level.I wouldn't limit this psychology to just secular evolutionists, either. Pagans of many different faiths speak of some sort of inner divinity in which we all are supposed to share. I think one of the ways in which Christianity is unique among religions is in its denying that divinity is a natural property of humanity -- something we possess by default -- and its insistence that we can only participate in divinity through the God-Man Jesus Christ. No other religion, to my knowledge, claims that God came down and became one of us to establish the connection with our nature and provide us with the path to divinity. Instead, they all presume that connection is already there, and they give us ways in which we can (or ought to) utilize it.

[M.C. Steenberg]

Dear all,

I have moved the above three posts to this new thread, created for the topic (and have modified the first, mine, so as to make it a more coherent introduction to this thread; one can examine the post's edit history to see how it looked in its original form). It seems that the thread these were originally found in, Creaton and evolutionary theory (http://www.monachos.net/forum/showthread.php?t=4551), is inextricably and inescapably bound up in conversation about whether various scientific points mean Genesis should be taken literally or figuratively, etc., and the present interesting topic didn't appear to have any hope of not being lost there. I've moved it here so it can be explored, with the express intention that conversation about the general merits of evolution, etc., will not be the focus of this thread; rather, a look at the ways in which the thought of Arius may or may not have some kind of connection to Darwinistic theories.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[M.C. Steenberg]

Above, Owen wrote:


Arius, as I understand him, believed that Jesus was born a man and progressed to a state of divinity (perfection). Likewise, the whole point of evolution is that, through a progressive evolution, life is perfected.

If this is what you meant by the connection, then I'm not in fact sure there is anything particularly 'Arian' about it. This more properly describes adoptionism: an interpretation of Jesus' divinity that long pre-dates Arius (fathers are condemning it as heretical as far back as the early second century). What you are suggesting seems in fact to be that Darwin presents an essentially adoptionist understanding of creation; though I'm not certain that this accurately reflects Darwin's thought (adoption into what? by whom? Proper adoptionism understands someone / something to the the 'adoptor').

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[Owen Jones]

You're right. I've confused the basic tenet of adoptionism with Arianism.

[Owen Jones]

So, I'm speculating, but my premise is that there is not an unlimited number of ways of thinking about things. And that there is nothing new under the sun. Which means that Darwinism is not something that just drops out of the sky, but that there are intellectual antecedents, not just because of direct historical influences, but because in the past people have had similar experiential conditions that led to similar concepts, because consciousness has a certain structure to it. And one constant concept would have to be the idea that perfection is not something that pre-exists but evolves and progresses over time, with history as the medium, if you will. In other words, history is a process of progressive movement from an archaic realm, advancing through stages, culminating in the present. This is the essence of Darwinism, and the implication is that we will continue to evolve and progress to a more, and more perfected state, biologically, until we overcome the need for more evolution because there will, at some critical point, no longer be a need for competition. This parallels certain Christian views of eschatology, on the one hand, and parallels the adoptionist view of Christ's divinity as something that does not pre-exist (what can that possibly mean?), but progresses over time.

[Owen Jones]

Taking the analogy one step further, Jesus' baptism is a case of "punctuated equilibrium."

[M.C. Steenberg]

In the above, Owen wrote:


So, I'm speculating, but my premise is that there is not an unlimited number of ways of thinking about things. And that there is nothing new under the sun. Which means that Darwinism is not something that just drops out of the sky, but that there are intellectual antecedents, not just because of direct historical influences, but because in the past people have had similar experiential conditions that led to similar concepts, because consciousness has a certain structure to it. And one constant concept would have to be the idea that perfection is not something that pre-exists but evolves and progresses over time, with history as the medium, if you will. In other words, history is a process of progressive movement from an archaic realm, advancing through stages, culminating in the present. This is the essence of Darwinism, and the implication is that we will continue to evolve and progress to a more, and more perfected state, biologically, until we overcome the need for more evolution because there will, at some critical point, no longer be a need for competition. This parallels certain Christian views of eschatology, on the one hand, and parallels the adoptionist view of Christ's divinity as something that does not pre-exist (what can that possibly mean?), but progresses over time.

The idea of progression into perfection is a wholly Christian approach to created reality, rooted in the experience of the eschatological Christ in time in the incarnation. In Christianity, 'perfection' (teleiotes) is an eschatological, not protological, concept. It is what comes at 'the end' -- a point both explicit and obvious in the Greek term, which has as its root telos, 'end'. There is a general imbalance in the understanding of 'perfection' in many circles today (which we've discussed several times in the past here in the Community), which forces 'problems' onto the understanding of patristic approaches that the fathers themselves did not suffer. The idea that the created realm was 'perfect' at the beginning, when God created it, and somehow became 'imperfect' through distortion, is not only something that the fathers (and the early fathers in particular) do not support, but against which they argue explicitly. All creation is inherently imperfect, precisely because it created, and therefore growing / becoming. Its perfection is met in the eschatological Christ, in its telos.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

[Owen Jones]

When I referred to a pre-existing perfection, I was referring to the Orthodox dogma of the Trinity, not a state of pre-fallen nature.

Darwinism is predicated supposedly on the idea that the simple becomes more complex, however, it is a very attractive, appealing moral system, and what is involved is a progressive evolution, not just from the simple to the more complex, but from something that is less ordered, more chaotic, to something with greater form leading to something better, to the point where we can envision a day where man has evolved to the point where, as in Star Trek, we've figured out a way to not have to evolve anymore, because we have solved all of the problems that required evolution in the first place, e,g, competition for scarce resources. So we can eliminate war and poverty, etc. Darwinism's religious eschatology is what makes it popular, not its theory of origins.

The two strands of Darwinism are gradualism and, now, punctuated equilibrium (because the fossil record does not support gradualism).


So I look for equivalent structures and I find in Adoptionism a progressive evolution of Jesus the man into Christ the God, not some pre-existing Logos of perfection that enters flesh. And this is accomplished through a combination of Jesus' moral striving (gradualism) and God the Father's intervention -- in Baptism and Transfiguration -- which are equivalent to the neo-Darwinianist punctuated equilibrium.

[Father David Moser]

The idea of progression into perfection is a wholly Christian approach to created reality, rooted in the experience of the eschatological Christ in time in the incarnation. ... The idea that the created realm was 'perfect' at the beginning, when God created it, and somehow became 'imperfect' through distortion, is not only something that the fathers (and the early fathers in particular) do not support, but against which they argue explicitly. All creation is inherently imperfect, precisely because it created, and therefore growing / becoming. Its perfection is met in the eschatological Christ, in its telos.

I believe that the Fathers, in speaking of the consequences of the fall indicate that it was at this time that mankind - and hence all of creation - became subject to corruption. Corruption is essentially the breaking down of a complex thing into its component parts and a destruction of the underlying structure. With this though we could posit then that prior to the fall, all of creation, with man at its head was *naturally* moving towards perfection. This is why that concept (from chaos to order) is so deeply ingrained in our perception of the world. At the fall, however, man left the "path" of perfection and chose instead the path of corruption. Following the head, all of creation began to exhibit corruption and thus we see the "origin" of Einstein's second law of thermodynamics - the move of all systems to entropy (a state of equilibrium wherein energy disspiates from areas of large concentration to areas of lesser concentration until all is even). The second law of thermodynamics expresses the tendency of complex structures and systems (which focus energy in useful ways) when left to themselves, will fall apart until they reach a state of equilibrium (which we might say is chaos).

Fr David Moser

[Matthew Panchisin]

The idea of progression into perfection is a wholly Christian approach to created reality, rooted in the experience of the eschatological Christ in time in the incarnation. In Christianity, 'perfection' (teleiotes) is an eschatological, not protological, concept. It is what comes at 'the end' -- a point both explicit and obvious in the Greek term, which has as its root telos, 'end'. There is a general imbalance in the understanding of 'perfection' in many circles today (which we've discussed several times in the past here in the Community), which forces 'problems' onto the understanding of patristic approaches that the fathers themselves did not suffer. The idea that the created realm was 'perfect' at the beginning, when God created it, and somehow became 'imperfect' through distortion, is not only something that the fathers (and the early fathers in particular) do not support, but against which they argue explicitly. All creation is inherently imperfect, precisely because it created, and therefore growing / becoming. Its perfection is met in the eschatological Christ, in its telos.

INXC, Dcn Matthew

It is interesting to note here that it is not possible for Orthodox Iconographers to write if you will things like an Icon of the Immaculate Conception.

I mention this because ultimately there is a point when speaking of God or His "attributes" (I'm not sure that is the right word) that only transcendent statements or expressions can be made. In other words negative reflections can be lies and often distort man who is made in the image and likeness of God. Such a technique is often used these days for theological exploration I think which doesn't seem right.

In Christ,

Matthew Panchisin

[Victor Mihailoff]

If this is what you meant by the connection, then I'm not in fact sure there is anything particularly 'Arian' about it.


Arius, as I understand him, believed that Jesus was born a man and progressed to a state of divinity (perfection). Likewise, the whole point of evolution is that, through a progressive evolution, life is perfected.

I also assumed something else was meant for the connection between Arianism and Darwinism.

One dictionary definition of Arian: adj : of or relating to Arius or his doctrines esp. that the Son is not of the same substance as the Father but was created as an agent for creating the world.

It can then be conjectured that evolution was an agent for developing species. (If you believe in it, and I do not)

That was the connection I saw.

In Christ, Victor

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

There is a faulty premise in the alleged connection between Darwinism and adoptionism, namely that there is a telos in evolution. There isn't. Evolution does not describe a movement towards perfection but rather the process whereby organisms adapt to ambient environments and predator challenges. One adaptation cannot be considered "superior" to another, nor should emergent complexity be confused with perfection. The most effective adaptations are sometimes the simplest.

There is another faulty assumption here; that the Incarnation or theosis can be either contended OR supported by naturalistic theories of organic morphology and function. This is a fairly basic category error. Incarnation and theosis are works of grace and human will and have no bearing on our genetics endowments .... and vice versa.

What one could and should claim here though is that a particular human trait (e.g. the disposition to violence in the defence of territory - having an evolutionary origin) can be transcended and transformed by that recapitulation of our humanity inherent in the Incarnation and our response. However, such a transformation may only incidentally feed back into the process of evolution. Certainly evolution does not compromise the Incarnation "in the other direction" as it were.

Just so you all know where I stand. I do not regard ANY truth characterised by a theory attempting to account for empirical data to be alien to or incompatible with Orthodoxy, (cf. St. Justin Martyr). Blessed Augustine's comment in his work on Genesis is apposite ...


"Even a non-Christian knows something about the earth, the heavens, and the other elements of this world, about the motion and orbit of the stars and even their size and relative positions, about the predictable eclipses of the sun and moon, the cycles of the years and the seasons, about the kinds of animals, shrubs, stones, and so forth, and this knowledge he holds as being certain from reason and experience.

Now, it is a disgraceful and dangerous thing for an infidel to hear a Christian, presumably giving the meaning of Holy Scripture, talking nonsense on these topics; and we should take all means to prevent such an embarrassing situation, in which people show up vast ignorance in a Christian and laugh it to scorn. " (St. Augustine on Genesis)

[Owen Jones]

I'm always fond of hearing from my friend, Father Gregory. However, he has made a mistake regarding Darwin's own writings and intentions on the one hand, and has misconstrued my meaning regarding an equivalence between adoptionism and Darwinism on the other. The equivalence is an equivalence of symbols and experiences, not of content.

First, Darwin is very explicit in his book. He clearly states that natural selection is moving toward the perfection of mankind, and that this new theory (which is not new at all -- Aristotle dealt with it) will bring about a revolution in psychology that will aid in that movement toward perfection. He borrowed his theory (he explicitly acknowledges this in the text itself) from Herbert Spencer, who was the leading British Victorian economist of his day. So it is well grounded in, and motivated by an immanentized telos. It is representative of the experience of the desire for innerworldly (immanentized) fulfillment.

Second, that adoptionism and natural selection have an equivalency does not mean or intend to mean that there is an equivalency of content. But they symbolize the same desire for a progressive evolution toward a perfect world.

The Judeo-Christian experience of perfection is one of falling away from perfect beginning which is rectified by the Incarnation of Christ, His suffering, death, and rising from the dead, while the symbol of the Beginning in natural selection is one of incompleteness, imperfection.

The experience of a perfect world and a lack thereof and the tension in between the two is a human constant.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

There is a difference between Darwin and contemporary characterisations of evolution. For all his objectivity Darwin lay in thrall to 19th century notions of "progress." That should be our target, not the science.

On "falling away from perfection" Owen ... strictly this MIGHT be characterised as the post-Augustinian position of the west but the vast majority of the fathers, particularly in the east, regard humanity as a work in progress when created ... for example, we had the potentially for immortality but not the actuality at the beginning. This is of course why the Irenaean theodicy is much more in keeping with BOTH the Scriptures and contemporary scientific accounts of human development.

See here ...

Ancestral Sin and Salvation (http://www.orthodox.clara.net/Theology/salvation1a.htm)

[Owen Jones]

Yes, of course, you are right, FAther, being created Good, and being created Perfect are two different things, and I should have noted the distinction. But I was simply trying to highlight the distinction between the Beginning, according to Genesis, and the cosmogonic myth of Darwinism, which is clearly what it is. In the Beginning, for the Darwinist, there is unformed, chaotic matter, as in Genesis, and natural processes and randomness over time supplant the Creator. For something to be good, and perfected, requires time and random collision. Whereas in Genesis, the Beginning was Good, and there was, ahem, a devolution. That's not the end of the story, for us. But one thing at a time, please...

As for Darwin, there is tons of stuff here on that subject, which we went round and round about for eons it seems. There is a fallacy me thinks between trying to separate Darwin the scientist, who is this objective empiricist on the one hand, observing birds on the Galapagos and taking careful notes, and Darwin the good British liberal progressive on the other. It is the same fallacy of trying to separate the two strains of empiricism and mystical ideology of Renaissance and post Renaissance scientists who clearly state their purpose, which is to transform the elements of nature into something entirely new, such as turning lead into gold. This example simply serves as a type for turning the old human nature into a new human nature. The inheritors of this scientific revolution all now say that the stuff about changing lead into gold is irrelevant. It was just one of those scientific dead ends that we don't need to talk about. And yet they have not shed its underlying motive, which is to transform and perfect nature. At a certain level, every modern scientists is committed to turning lead into gold still.

And so, by the same token, one cannot separate Darwin the field biologist from Darwin the progressivist utopian ideologue. He clearly states that his observations mean little apart from the vantage point of Spencer's theory of natural selection. He was only accumulating data in search of a theory. And every "modern" biologist is wedded to the mystical aspects of the theory, despite their minor adjustments to it. The theory of Natural Selection as a theory of origins, and as a harbinger of future perfection of the races, is an example of an immanentized mysticism of innerworldly fulfillment. That in and of itself does not mean that each and every aspect of the science is wrong. But the theory is fundamentally unscientific. It's an ideology. Whenever you have a human controller, you have an ideology.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

I am not at all interested in Darwin Owen. Like him I am interested in whether this or another theory adequately describes a biological process and makes useful predictions about genetic development. My faith commitment to God as Creator of all that there is remains entirely untouched by these insights. As has so often been said, Genesis is not an alternative science text book.

[Owen Jones]

OK, let's take another case. Karl Marx accurately predicted the current global financial crisis. He said private banks would induce people to take on credit they would not be able to pay back, thus forcing the banks into insolvency requiring the government to nationalize them! So there is a certain empirical accuracy to Marx that we have to give credit to. But his theory of class conflict as the sine qua non of history is inherently bloodthirsty and totalitarian. Yes, there is some scientific accuracy in his writings, but it is irresponsible to say that we are not interested in Marx the theoretician, because of all of the damage it does. Same with Darwin. Or Freud, or any of the other great ideologues. If everyone is running around thinking like a Freudian or Marxist or Darwinist, without examining their theoretical premises, that's a problem that we can't simply say is irrelevant and walk away from.

I would say that this particularly applies to priests, who just assume that because we in the "pews" believe in God and Orthodoxy, we are not also holding contrary beliefs and assumptions that negate our Orthodox beliefs, these theoretical beliefs and assumptions having been absorbed through the educational system and the culture. I may be outwardly Orthodox, but if my life conforms to the theory of natural selection and survival of the fittest, then it is my Orthodox observances that are irrelevant. I will be living according to an unexamined theory that is fundamentally at odds with my Orthodox faith.

Another set of specific cases -- the treatment of alcoholism and drug addiction. In the heyday of psychiatry, there was the belief that this new science could cure what ails society through psychoanalysis. This theory was applied to the treatment of alcoholism. The idea was that if the alcoholic could be brought to a level of analytical understanding of why he drank, then he would be relieved of the obsession and could go back to drinking normally. This is based on the Freudian theory of repression of childhood conflict that must be sexually based, that leads to neurosis. Of course, this does not work. But we are all Freudians now. Virtually everyone thinks in our society that if they can come up with an analytical understanding of their problems, then their problems will be solved. This applies across the board, but is especially devastating to alcoholics. When they try to apply Freudian analysis to their condition (whether or not they have even heard of Freud), it is a virtual death sentence.

So these bogus theories abound, and they are not irrelevant to our spiritual well being. Attempts to marry Darwinist theory with Christianity only lead to the victory of Darwinist theory over Christianity. That does not mean that we shouldn't study microbiology, but the study of microbiology and genetics is probably impeded by Darwinist dogma, rather than the other way around.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Owen, you cast your net too wide and make non sequitur comparisons. The whole field of genetics and microbiology was opened up originally by Mendel but humans had been breeding animals to select for certain characteristics for millennia ... we just didn't understand the mechanics of the biological process. All that evolution brings to the table is observable and testable environmentally driven selection for certain traits that arise randomly through mutation over aeons (but in certain time periods much shorter periods as with moth colouring after the Industrial Revolution).

What don't you like about Darwin in the sense that you see it as antagonistic to Christianity? We are describing a biological process here not offering an alternative to a divine Creator. I know that atheist Darwinists make that illicit jump but theists who subscribe to evolution (such as myself) decline to join them in this phoney war.

[Owen Jones]

You're being very kind, Father, in asking the question, since if bespeaks of a wonderful openness. I'm afraid in responding I will be much too argumentative sounding. Let me try to approach it from this angle, not based on Christian theology at all, but simply to suggest that we ought to go back to the original text and see what it has to say. What did Darwin actually say? That's the starting point. Without that as a foundation, it's really tough, because discussion of Birmingham moths really get us off track. AS for the moths, though (as with the breeding of domestic animals) I clearly remember this example from my high school biology text. But later I took a second look, and realized it has nothing to do with evolution as laid out by Darwin (it was actually Herbert Spencer, not Darwin, to whom we should ascribe the theory-- as is evident from Darwin's text). We can call it natural selection, but it is not evolution. Even if the case of the moths were factually correct, and there is now evidence brought to light that it was falsified evidence, but let's assume for a minute that the case of the moths in Birmingham was true evidence, it is not evidence or proof of evolution in the same since that evolution is typically propounded. There was no species change. And there was no real change within the species either. The light colored moths supposedly died out, the dark colored ones survived, because of the surfaces of things becoming darker due to coal dust, and therefore, the predators were able to see and eat and eliminate the lighter colored ones, and the darker ones survived, so superficially, you have a change in moths, which is called evolution. But again, there is no biological change whatsoever. As an analogy, let's look at Hitler, who desired to exterminate all of the Jews, and breed blond haired people. If he were entirely successful, over time there would be only blonds, and no Jews. So there would be a change, but not at the biological level, and certainly no change in species. And yet all of Darwinism depends on the ability to adapt biologically in order to change, evolve and progress from extremely simple inorganic compounds, to life, to complex life forms, in which a progressive change takes place toward more advanced species. The example of the moths if anything refutes that, it certainly doesn't add any credence at all to the theory.

This is not an argument in and of itself against evolution theory, it is simply that the example used in not an example of evolution and does not support evolution theory. Yet it was, and perhaps is still used, as an example in the high school biology texts.

The problem with theistic evolution is that it basically equivalent to Deism. God as a kind of watchmaker who winds of the watch and watches it run on its own. That is the inevitable implication.

Then there is the whole problem of the claim to origins. Remember, Darwin titled his book "On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle of Life."

The problem is that he or his disciples have never, and can never, make the case that evolution is an explanation for origins, and yet they always claim that. Aristotle dealt with this problem, the problem of infinite regression, over 2500 years ago. And yet the Darwinists, who are extremely poor theorists, never consider this. So while it could possibly be an explanation for change and development ( I doubt it is, and I doubt that it has ever been or ever will be scientific) it certainly is not a scientific theory of origins.

Now we can posit a Creator as the originator, and place Him at some point early on in the process, but by Darwinism's own principles, He certainly isn't needed after that. And by Darwin's own account, the whole point of the theory is to be able to perfect human nature by understanding that what motivates us is purely the result of naturalistic influences.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Ah, now we are getting somewhere. That is very useful. Thank you Owen.

I accept that the moth example deals with trait selection and not with speciation. I accept that evolution's contentious aspect in relation to Scripture and Tradition is the notion that new species can emerge from precursors and that there can be significant physiological changes in both morphology and function from one species to the next. What HAS changed recently in evolutionary biology is the ancknowledgement that Darwin's "Tree of Life" does not take account of horizontal gene exchange and that we should probably be talking about a "Web of Life" instead. There was an article about this recently in New Scientist. Nevertheless the notion that there can be gross (albeit gradual) species metamorphosis is not changed. Your response identifies this but does not directly address the issue. So, when you move on to "origins" I COULD find myself agreeing with you IF by that you meant the silliness perpetrated by many atheists that evolution does away with the need for a Creator. Infinite (or rather in this case asymptotic) regression indeed. If by "origins" however you mean the genesis of homo sapiens as entirely discontinuous from, say, homo erectus then I suspect that I will be disagreeing with you since it in no way impugns the sacred image and likeness of God in us (it seems to me) to accept that there were CONNECTED precursors of modern humans in the hominid family. Anyway, be that as it may, let's pass on to "deism." I am most certainly not a deist. If God can raise the dead and do stupendous miracles (especially stilling storms) he's not incapable of making humans from scratch. But, that's not my point. His USUAL way of working is to work WITHIN (NOT OUTSIDE) the natural process. So I see God as the divine artificer WITHIN the evolutionary process directing it towards his intended end. Of course such a divine telos is entirely repugnant to atheist evolutionary biologists who resist all notion of directed evolution. But, "directed" or "non directed / spontaneous / chaotic" is not a choice upon which science can arbitrate. So, the choice remains a matter of faith.

[Owen Jones]

From the perspective of the evolutionary biologist, Father, it doesn't matter what you believe, atheistic or not. Because they make the claim of science and their scientific claim of naturalistic advancement does not require God at all at any stage other than at the stage which they will not address, which as at the Beginning.

As believers we can say that WE plug God in wherever we please, but that is not a very sound position to take, especially when we are addressing what are essentially heresies of Christianity. In the old days the Church took heresies head on, through extensive intellectual engagement and many, many Church councils. Today we say, well, it doesn't matter, when the heretic spouts all kinds of nonsense. And the problem for Orthodoxy today is not heresy within the Church but the heresies of Christianity that are well established outside the Church and which influence unwitting parents and children, especially in our public school system, but which also dominates the media and the arts, and can undermine the confidence and conviction of the faithful, feeling that theology is somehow inferior to modern science. And unless we know our stuff, we are being irresponsible.

Why do I speak in terms of a heresy of Christianity. Because the idea that mankind will eventually be perfected through an evolution of biological mechanisms is quite simply a heresy of Christianity, since the whole idea of the perfection of human nature is a Christian one. And once men concede, as was done in the 18th Century, that all you need God to do is start things off, then it's Katy bar the door. That leads to all of the modern ideologies, of which Darwinism is one, that promise a progression of history to a point of perfection, usually hastened by an elite which claims it has some kind of special knowledge that will help to hasten this new age of history into being. It's really quite clear in Darwin. All you have to do is go to the text. He said that this theory, which he does not claim to be his at all, but acknowledges that it comes from Herbert Spencer, will bring about a revolution in psychology that will lead to the perfection of the human race.

At this point, it doesn't matter much what the scientific evidence is pro or con for natural selection as a complete explanation of human behavior and motivation, because we know that from the beginning we are not dealing with a scientific theory, but with an ideology.

AS a result of this ideological motivation, there is no longer a need to strive for the right orientation. There is only a need to understand motivation. And the psychological and psychiatric profession, drawing on Darwin's naturalistic explanation for human behavior based on biology, have invented a therapy for mankind's problems that has nothing to do with sin, with good and evil, with repentance, with virtue, with God, with heaven or hell, i.e. there is no need to reorient man toward God, toward a transcendent telos. None of that is necessary. Because, according to Darwin, we now know the basis of all human motivation. Nothing else matters.
The only thing that is necessary is to understand motivation based on the Darwinist model so that we become normalized in our behavior. That is to say, by understanding that all of behavior is biologically based, we realize that our bad behavior is simply the result of a false sense of guilt due to civilizational constraints that causes inner conflict that in turn causes us to "lash out", or an automated, unconscious reaction to external stimulai. And once we realize this we can pursue our aims without guilt messing us up, and without acting out on our instinctual drives and or as the result of an unhealthy repression of our instinctual drives. So that when we realize, for example, that anger and violence are simply vestiges of territorial imperatives of an earlier stage of human evolution, we need no longer resort to these methods. And voila, everything will be peace and love. And now it is claimed that it is the scientists studying neurobiology who will eventually be able to cure us of these lingering traits, probably just by popping a pill that will circumvent the various receptors in the brain that were necessary for the cavemen, but which are harmful today and standing in the way of liberal progress.

i.e. the whole Darwinian edifice is totalitarian at its core.

[Ryan]

Darwinian evolution is, in my opinion, incompatible with Christianity chiefly because it posits death and corruption before the Fall.

This topic is, of course, something of a dead horse here, so I'll set it aside. A more fundamental point hasn't really been made, a point ignored both by "Creationists" and Christian evolutionists.

Namely: despite its pretensions of neutrality, modern science rests on metaphysical presuppositions, as any approach to knowledge must. Chief among these is a dualistic separation between the material and the spiritual, and the belief that knowledge of the latter is unimportant in understanding the former. Many scientists today go one step further and reject the existence of the spiritual, adopting a purely materialist monism. Either way, modern science assumes that observable phenomena are not permeated with spiritual forces, or, if they are, these forces are not relevant in understanding observable phenomena.

Such an approach, it seems to me, is unacceptable to any faith, such as the Christian one, that acknowledges an interpenetration of spiritual and material substances. "The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom"- some knowledge about the supernatural is indispensable to understanding the natural. Even the pagan natural philosophers understood this, with the exception of the materialist Epicureans. Who can honestly say that modern science is not ideology, when it rests on dualist philosophical foundations that can be traced to medieval scholastics and Aristotelians?

This isn't to say that findings of modern science are completely wrong, but they are often distorted.

Moreover, modern science not only looks at the world in a distorted way; the world it is looking at is already distorted by the Fall. This, in my opinion, should make Christians think twice before revising or re-interpreting Divine revelation on creation in light of contemporary scientific models.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Dear Ryan and Owen

If indeed science, ancient or modern, compromises its empiricism with ideology let us by all means confront that and expose it for what it is. In that context I find myself in complete agreement with both of you IF the alleged error has been committed. But when Christians (heretics or not) go on to say that humans were made 6000 years ago entire and complete in a garden ("somewhere"), then count me out. This is you see my difficulty. Those who want to compromise the science supposing it to be really an ideology after all or "only a theory" end up by degrees with a religious position that leads eventually to atheism or an Amish sort of Christianity.

[Owen Jones]

Since the title of this thread is Adoptionism and biology, let me return to that topic. One way of starting is by looking at the experience of imperfection. Everyone in some way experiences this, and it is not a new thing, exclusive to something called "modern man." Everyone experiences this on a daily basis. We may also call it the experience of disorder. Things are not the way they should be.

When we get up in the morning, we don't just do things that are biological necessities, we go out and work for a whole lot of things that have nothing to do with biological necessity. We work to make things better. Better organized. More productive. And not just for economic reasons but for aesthetic reasons as well. There is something pleasing about getting an engine humming perfectly, and not just because it will run more efficiently with less gas consumption. Why is that? Believe me, there are actually people who have asked that question, going as far back as we have history.

Coupled with this is the experience of immortality. We work, give birth, save, for what? To satisfy the desire for immortality. That we will live on in the memory of others. Or that we will leave some lasting legacy for others to experience and enjoy. Why the heck is that??? Believe me, there are people who actually ask these questions and have thought and written extensively on the subject.

With Christ, many of these questions come into unique focus, with a kind of unique power. Because what do we see in Christ but perfect order, harmony, aesthetic symmetry, everything just right, at the right moment, but still in some mysterious way not the end but leading to the end. Who is this Christ that we see in Him beauty, perfect and an image of the perfect immortal being? And the claim is that He was that way from before the beginning of time, and yet He wants us to be just like that, without having been that way before. So we must make progress toward that goal. And it is not a goal to be achieved or seen in this life but is a transcendent goal -- fancy word being telos. So there is an immediate urgency to be like Christ and to share in His world now, but also with the recognition that this is a lifelong process that extends beyond this body, this world.

This is a very, very tall order. Very demanding. To be like Christ who is eternal perfection, since we were not born that way. So why not make Christ born a bit more like us, and see that he progressed through his imperfect beginning to his mature, adult state of perfection. So that we are not only gods by adoption but so is Christ. That makes him perhaps a bit more like us, and makes it seem or appear to be more rational a demand for us to be just like him.

But this has a the effect of immanentizing the process of spiritual development and progression into in intra-mundane, historical process, rather than a participation in the transcendent. So instead of seeing and experiencing Christ as fully god from the beginning who becomes fully man in the flesh, in which which we participate in Christ to the extent that is possibly as creatures, we actually become more like Christ, in fact, we become Christs, because we progress from birth to a state of spiritual perfection, just like Christ did. I do not know if I have accurately characterized the teachings of the adoptionists at this point, but it seems to me that this is the underlying assumption behind it.

And so while it took another 1800 years for the historical process to be seen as a purely immanent one, what we might see is that this immanentization of history is a symbolic equivalent of adoptionism, in secular form. it is clearly an equivalency that modernism is based entirely on the idea that the human race or species represents an innerworldly, historical progress from the imperfect to the perfect. You see this quite clearly in Hegel, and in a sense, everyone in the world today is supposed to be a Hegelian, because man has now progressed to the point where the Mind of Christ is Hegel, and history can come to an end. Hegel defined the Protestant Principle as the fact that the Mind of God and the mind of man (i.e. Hegel) have become one.

All of the great modern systems stem from this idea, that there is an immanent historical process that inevitably leads mankind from a state of imperfection to perfection. Marxism in the field of economics and politics. Comte in the field of "positive science." Darwin in biology. Freud in psychology. (although Freud was an historical pessimist and a political reactionary who nevertheless believed that many of man's problems could be alleviated by psychoanalysis).

We now know experientially and through observation that none of the claims of any of these systems is even remotely true. We don't even need Christian dogma to tell us that.

[Ryan]

If indeed science, ancient or modern, compromises its empiricism with ideology...

Empiricism is ideology... I don't think you understand that it is the methodology which is flawed. I have no doubt that the evolutionists were completely scrupulous in following this methodology.

The point of view you describe as leading to atheism or Amishness has been accepted in the Church since ancient times, and we're not Amish yet.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Empiricism operates every time you eat. How else are you to describe what happens when you digest food? Empiricism is not an exhaustive account of reality but a necessary one when attempting to describe and account for natural processes. On the atheism / Amish challenge I have known plenty of people who have lost their faith trying to prop it up unnecessarily against truths from other disciplines. It is not a notion of truth that St. Basil or Justin Martyr would have approved.

[Herman Blaydoe]

Empiricism is ideology... I don't think you understand that it is the methodology which is flawed. I have no doubt that the evolutionists were completely scrupulous in following this methodology.

The point of view you describe as leading to atheism or Amishness has been accepted in the Church since ancient times, and we're not Amish yet.

Gotta go with Ryan and Owen on this one. empiricism is as much an ideology as any, it simply isn't honest about it.

empiricism: the theory that all knowledge is derived from sense-experience. In the dictionary I looked it up in, it is listed as a philosophy.

It is easy to be objective, if you know what the objective is....

Herman the subjective Pooh

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Since Owen your argument is predicated on an assumption that I do not accept (that Darwinism is based on an ideology antithetical to Christianity and therefore has nothing to say on how the world is) I think I will stop posting now because I cannot accept that evolution is a doctrine designed to undermine Christianity. It's asking someone to choose between Republicanism and Beef Strognaoff.

Dear Herman

It's that little word "ALL" that's tricky isn't it? I can be an empiricist when describing natural processes without being an exclusive empiricist, ie., the "nothing but-tery" position of reductionists and their atheist bed fellows.

[Ryan]

Empiricism is not an exhaustive account of reality but a necessary one when attempting to describe and account for natural processes.

In the context of modern science, empiricism is an epistemology based entirely on sense experience. It originated a few centuries ago, it was founded on dualism, and it is incompatible with Christianity, which believes many things about the natural world unsupported by sense-perception alone. Empiricism in its ancient form was propounded by the Epicureans and as such was explicitly rejected by the Church.



On the atheism / Amish challenge I have known plenty of people who have lost their faith trying to prop it up unnecessarily against truths from other disciplines.

Then they opted for modern ideology instead of ancient faith- a common and tragic occurrence.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Dear Ryan

With these views then logically you should not participate in or benefit from anything in your culture and society that has been facilitated by progress in the natural sciences since these are based on a monstrous and demonic lie. So, don't have any medical treatment, drive your car to work or do anything in fact that is based on a scientific modelling of observational data ... empiricism. Even the Amish don't go that far.

[Owen Jones]

I don't know if Darwin intended to undermine Christianity in developing the theory. I only know he was criticized for as much by colleagues, friends and family, including his wife!

But that is not my point, in any case.

Now, evolution as such is not something unique to Darwin. Otherwise, why would philosophers from Aristotle to Kant have felt compelled to address the issues presented by a theory of evolution? No, what Darwin did was apply a theory propounded by Herbert Spencer as a complete theory to explain both human origins and the superiority of some races over others. Spencer's theory was that there is a process of natural selection based on the principle of survival of the fittest in competition for scarce resources. It is a theory used to buttress 19th Century British liberal economics. It is almost entirely based on the theories of Thomas Malthus, which have, of course, been very effectively refuted.

For Darwin, under this competitive stress, nature selected the strongest elements within a species which, over time, were acquired biologically and then produced new, stronger species that were better able to adapt, and so on. He used Spencer's theory to explain the absolutely marvelous way in which animals in natural habitats were able to function.

Now, there are so many problems with this. Kant really addressed them before Darwin. One of the problems is that we have no experience of either spontaneous generation or generation from one species to another. We only have the experience of like generating like. This does not in itself deny the possibility, as Kant said, of sea life evolving into marsh life, and into land life, etc., and so on. But the problem is that if you keep pushing things back, you need some kind of transcendent law of evolution that is built into inorganic matter that pushes it to evolve. So you have a number of problems issuing from this. You cannot explain individual existence of something just by its species. And vice versa. You cannot explain a thing, just by examining the thing. There is some transcendent law behind it, a problem which Darwin and his followers simply do not seem to grasp, and when pointed out to them, they get angry and run off in a huff.

So I mention that the moth myth is not and was never an argument that defended the evolution of species into something other than what they already are, and yet it is used time and again to defend just that. And when it is pointed out, the defenders of Darwin just change the subject. This is what an ideologue always does. When cornered, he changes the subject, or he runs off in a huff.

[Ryan]

With these views then logically you should not participate in or benefit from anything in your culture and society that has been facilitated by progress in the natural sciences since these are based on a monstrous and demonic lie. So, don't have any medical treatment, drive your car to work or do anything in fact that is based on a scientific modelling of observational data ... empiricism. Even the Amish don't go that far.

I'm afraid that this is a slippery slope fallacy and if we are resorting to such methods then we are truly at an impasse. As I said, modern science gives a distorted picture; a distorted picture is not completely wrong.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

I agree with you Owen when you more clearly limit your targeting to Darwin's ideological overlay.

I agree with you Ryan when (at least) you concede that science is not all wrong.

.... which is something I suppose ... but I am still a tad suspicious that I am being softened up for a more comprehensive onslaught on evolution itself.

[Herman Blaydoe]

Dear Ryan

With these views then logically you should not participate in or benefit from anything in your culture and society that has been facilitated by progress in the natural sciences since these are based on a monstrous and demonic lie. So, don't have any medical treatment, drive your car to work or do anything in fact that is based on a scientific modelling of observational data ... empiricism. Even the Amish don't go that far.

Fr. Gregory, with all due respect, I fear you have picked a very unfortunate term to defend, with "empiricism". I believe it does not mean quite what you think it does. Scientific modeling, or, more correctly, the scientific method, is NOT empiricism. One does not have to be an empiricist to be a scientist. In fact, a true scientist has no choice but to reject empiricism, since he (or she) must acknowledge that unknown variables and immeasurables often affect the outcome of an equation or experiment and must be accounted for in some manner. Empiricism is the height of hubris in that it rejects the existence of something simply because it hasn't been discovered yet. It rejects anything that cannot be sensed or measured, and is therefore self-defeating, particularly at the microcosmic and macrocosmic levels.

Empiricism is a philosophy, by definition, and therefore means quite the opposite of what you are trying to say. I agree that further dialog is going to be quite frustrating if we continue down this path.

Herman the Engineer

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

Then we (or maybe I) will not use the term Herman for we are using it quite differently. This isn't a problem.

[Owen Jones]

I think it is always good to start with concrete cases, actual examples, rather than abstractions or theoretical positions. In that sense, it means that we begin with empirical observation and examination. It's a good method. The Bible uses it. Christ uses it. Christ did not start with the theory of the Incarnation and then spend his short life explaining it. He lived it.

The Fathers use this same approach. If there is a theory to be developed from it, OK. But best not to start with a theory or an abstraction. The idea of theistic evolution is a very difficult thing to discuss because -- what does it mean? You have to grapple with this problem of meaning before you can discuss anything. Whereas, if we go to an actual text, and read what somebody actually wrote, and use that as our starting point, then I think we can at least have something to discuss. And in this case it's important to start with what Darwin actually wrote, and not what subsequent generations say he wrote, or what subsequent generations say he meant. He's pretty clear. You really don't need a whole lot of analysis to get his meaning and intention. Most of the text is available online.

[Owen Jones]

Here's the concluding chapter, should anyone care to take a look:

http://www.literature.org/authors/darwin-charles/the-origin-of-species/chapter-14.html

Pretty quickly one can see some very startling conclusions that ought to give us pause.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

It means a characterisation of evolution that does not trespass into theology or anti-theology and a belief in a Creator God that doesn't preclude or exclude the insights of science concerning the HOW of it all. Quite clear really.

[Evan]

Owen,

If I may:

Is it truly necessary that we disregard any and all data that Darwin brings to bear, on the grounds that the conclusions that he reaches are incompatible with a Christian view of human development? Can we not admit that the facts speak for themselves, and yet deny the force of his more obviously philosophical arguments?

Do we not admit that great artists can reveal fascinating things about the human condition, despite their questionable underlying philosophical aims? Was Homer less of a poet because he was a pagan? Joseph Conrad less of a storyteller because he was an atheist? I realize the analogy is imperfect, but I feel that we may be drifting into ad hominum territory if we say that Darwin gives us nothing, because of what he believed about the world, irrespective of what concrete material truths he brought to bear concerning it.

Even if he insists that his findings lead to certain conclusions, I don't think this is binding on us. The facts, so far as I am concerned, stand alone.

In Christ,
Evan

[Owen Jones]

Well, I see two problems. Marx had facts. Do we have to believe in Marxism? He was right in some of his economic observations. But that does not mean that we have to accept Marxism. Same with Freud. He had some valuable insights. But that does not mean we have to take psychoanalysis seriously. Hardly anyone does anymore as a respected profession, except that most people have unwittingly absorbed psychoanalytic dogma. The same holds true for Darwin.

And by the way, what are the facts? It is still an undemonstrable theory. There are no facts that I am aware of to support it. If there are, I would like to see them. This is because it is not a biological theory, but an economic one, based on the theories of Thomas Malthus, and Herbert Spencer. Again, please, go to the text. Darwin says he has a lot of facts, too numerable to mention in the book, but he doesn't even mention one. He observes animals in their habitats quite well, but those are facts that can support the theory. The fact is there is no case study or case history of one species evolving into another. It is a hypothesis. Many of the original arguments used to defend it have been debunked, such as the development of the human fetus supposedly recapitulating the evolutionary schema.

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

So what was homo erectus? We have the remains. Fact.

[Owen Jones]

The fact of "hominoids" does not prove that these are evolutionary precursors. Piltdown man was supposed to be the "missing link" but it turned out to be a hoax. Look, the fact that chimps share a lot of our DNA does not prove we have a common ancestor. I have minerals in my body commonly found in nature, without which I will immediately die. So this links me to the mineral world. So what? Does it prove that I am evolved from the inorganic mineral world?

There are a lot of unsolved encounters with UFO's. Does this prove that alien beings are routinely scouting the planet? Actually, probably better proof of that than fossils prove evolution. If anything, the fossil record disproves Darwinism. Under Darwin, you had to have randomness and gradualism. When they finally admitted that the fossil record, known at the time quite well (geologists issued the first critique of his theories) disproved gradualism, the Darwinists came up with something called "punctuated equilibrium" to overcome the objection. They will always do that. It's the same thing when Marxists come up with explanations as to why their economies are failing.

It's been a while since I read it, but The New Biology by Augros and Stanciu cover all of the problems with Darwinian proofs. These are not fundamentalist kooks. It seems to me that one is obligated to read the critical literature before one assumes without reservation that a theory is factually supported. I remember my high school biology teacher, who was an advocate of evolutionary theory, at least admitted that it was a theory, not a fact. What he did not know, because biologists do not study politics and history and philosophy and theology, is that Darwinism is an economic and psychological theory, not a biological theory.

Also, I am still wondering about any case in which the real science of micro-biology has made a discovery that is dependent on the Darwinist model.

[Owen Jones]

I guess the broader question is this, when a scientific theory conflicts with the Church's theological vision, what then do we say, do? And I think one thing that is always avoided in these discussions is the question -- what is man? and what is a person? and the biological/Darwinian model claims to answer that question but it doesn't, and it cannot. To simply discard that issue as irrelevant speaks to the totalitarian nature of the scientistic mindset. All of the great ideological system builders tell us that they have solved the riddle, and the rest is just clean up work on minor details. Darwin himself claimed that now that we understood human beings, it would be just a matter of time before the revolution in psychology that would result would bring about the perfection of mankind. All of these are bogus claims, of course, and yet the retort is, we don't care about that. We just care about facts. But facts have no meaning. You cannot separate facts from the theories that purportedly determine which facts are relevant and which are not, and what the facts purportedly mean. It's never, ever just about facts. There are a gazillion facts about my body, all of which might be relevant to a pathologist, or a diagnostician looking for what is making me feel bad, but they are meaningless regarding the question, what am I. The most brilliant nuerobiologist in the world cannot tell me who or what I am. When he tries to do so, he just sounds like the incompetent that he is.

[Fr Raphael Vereshack]

I know I've brought this up before but I think a very important concept in this discussion is the Patristic understanding of nature.

For the Fathers nature provides the specific and irreducible character of each species. And the origin of each nature is from the pre-eternal counsel of the Word, each nature in image of Him as its Creator. It is through the specific characteristics of each species that their nature as image corresponds in distinct fashion to the Word.

In modern times however the Patristic understanding of nature shifted to that of component aspects. The understanding of the relationship between creatures in turn was greatly affected by the understanding that since we all share the same components then specific nature is no longer the irreducible starting point for what is created.

I think then that any discussion of evolution sooner or later must touch on these two visions- whether they are mutually exclusive and contrary to each other; or whether they could overlap.

First though we have to come to terms with what underpins each way of thinking about creation.

In Christ- Fr Raphael

[Fr. Gregory (Hallam)]

I doubt whether Owen and I are ever going to do anything else than talk past each other until we address The More Fundamental Question of the relationship between revealed truth and truths from other areas of human life. If I really did think that a Talibanesque epistemology was the only way of accepting anything as true in Christainity I would have surrendered my orders years ago.

[Evan]

" You cannot separate facts from the theories that purportedly determine which facts are relevant and which are not, and what the facts purportedly mean."

Owen, forgive me if I'm misunderstanding you, but taken literally, this statement is nothing less than a repudiation of scientific inquiry. Taking brute facts and interpreting them in accordance with unifying theories are what scientists do. If there were no facts, no agreed-upon data points, empirical science would be fundamentally irrational.

So, when I say that I don't have to be a Darwinian to accept Darwin's empirical findings, I don't think that commits me to an absurd position. What Darwin would have wanted me to think upon examining the data he brought to bear doesn't concern me in the least-- many have reached different conclusions despite accepting the datum itself. The analogy to Freud is, I think, incorrect-- Freud, unlike Darwin, DID NOT rely upon objectively ascertainable data. He was therefore more of a philosopher than a scientist. I think there's a stronger case for throwing the baby out with the bathwater in such contexts.

The same could be said for Nietzsche, Voltaire, Spinoza, and their ilk. These men didn't purport to present facts; they presented ideas. I don't think you can take much from them without compromising your faith to a certain degree (well, I suppose you could acknowledge that they were intelligent men who could write well). I don't have any truck with such authors/writers/thinkers.

I fully acknowledge that we should be wary of thinkers of any stripe that hold anti-Christic views. Of course, such views color their work to some degree-- how could they not? But seperating the wheat from the chaff, in Darwin's case, I don't see as entirely impossible.

In Christ,
Evan

[Owen Jones]

Evan,

With respect, my Welsh cousin, you are arguing about something in the abstract. And I suspect, and forgive me if I am wrong, but I suspect that you are defending the scientific basis of Darwinism because of what you have been told, and not because of what you really know. And my argument is that to understand Darwin and Darwinism, you actually have to go to the text and read what he actually said. Like on every other topic here on Monachos, if we want to know what the Patristic commentary was on a topic, we go round and round on the subject until Dn. Matthew points out that it would be a good idea to actual go to the texts themselves and see what the particular theologian in question actually says, and sometimes there is agreement, sometimes there is disagreement, depending on the topic, sometimes there are different interpretations, etc., but if you don't start with the actual text, then it is not productive. So if we want to focus on facts as our starting point, let's use the factual data of the content of the text.

And I just want to assure Fr. Gregory that I don't wear a towel on the top of my head! I don't mean to be too cheeky about it, but I think epistemology did not become a separate discipline in philosophy until around the 18th century. Although the Theatetus is not a bad foundation, and of course Christ gives us a very good epistemological foundation when he says, "I speak only of the things I have seen and heard." Meaning to me that he does not spin theories.

[Owen Jones]

This is a statement made early on in the final chapter called Recapitulation and Conclusions:

"Nothing at first can appear more difficult to believe than that the more complex organs and instincts should have been perfected not by means superior to, though analogous with, human reason, but by the accumulation of innumerable slight variations, each good for the individual possessor."

So right off the bat he is dealing head on with the objection that God created us and positing the proposition that we are the sum of accumulated variations. The two are juxtaposed and it is clear that he deems them contradictory.

[Owen Jones]

The above quote from Darwin requires a little explanation. Darwin uses the terms Creation and creation. By Creation he refers to what he believes took place, that God breathed life into matter at some point in the evolutionary process. By the term creation, he means "special creation" to refer to the belief that God created specific life forms as we know them today. He debunks this idea, saying it is to hard to imagine that God did or could create such diversity existing in such perfect adaption to its environment in each and every case. He describes his own theory as true because it has "grandeur." So it is really an aesthetic argument.

He repeatedly states that he is drawing inferences from his field data to support the proposition that all life is evolved from a single "prototype." He says that his propositions are self-evidently true, because the alternative -- special creation -- is too difficult to believe.

He admits that there are arguments against his theory. The two most important arguments are a) that if it could be shown that an organ could not exist apart from gradual changes then his theory would collapse and b) that if there is no evidence of linkages, then his theory collapses. In the former case, this is essentially what the whole intelligent design debate is about. For a good survey of the intelligent design argument, see the chapter on evolution in Godless, by Ann Coulter. Granted, it's polemical, but also a very excellent treatment of the subject. In the latter case Darwin admits that the geological record shows no linkages, but he argues that the geological record is incomplete and that he is confident that as the science of geology will progress to the point that these linkages will be found, and also that the geological strata of the earth is very chaotic and has been subject to disruptions over the eons which has distorted the clean evolutionary narrative that he describes.


As for Fr. Hallam's question, if I were to start with a Patristic understanding of what man is, I would have to say that there is a serious flaw in Darwinism, if for no other reason than that it commits the reductionist fallacy. Darwin and his followers define man in terms of being a sum of his evolutionary parts, and he implies that man can be understood completely in those terms. And as the profession of psychology absorbs his theories there will be significant breakthroughs in our understanding of our selves.

The Fathers of course look at man quite differently and I won't try to summarize their anthropology here. But let me suggest that if we are going to dismiss any discussion of theory in the matter of Darwin as irrelevant, then we have to be consistent and dismiss Patristic theory on the subject as well. And with that dismissal we are going to have to dismiss the fruits of prayer and the meditative experience as having any valid cognitive and scientific significance. It is reduced simply to feelings and opinions that is subject to invalidation by scientific "facts."

Of course this is exactly what has happened socially, culturally, in scientific AND theological education, and so on. Theology really has nothing to say about what man is, only what man opines about, and even that is reduced to a matter of taste, like what chocolate you might prefer. It has nothing scientific to say.

So I would argue, in sum, that as a result of my meditation on Scripture and the Fathers, to the best of my understanding, Darwinism cannot possibly be a true account of "human nature," quite apart from any discussion of the meaning of the field data of animals in their habitats. I assume we can have agreement that this is not a fundamentalist argument I am making. Not once have I relied on a fundamentalist reading of Genesis.

[Evan]

"With respect, my Welsh cousin, you are arguing about something in the abstract. And I suspect, and forgive me if I am wrong, but I suspect that you are defending the scientific basis of Darwinism because of what you have been told, and not because of what you really know."

Guilty as charged. I am a law student, not a scientist, and I'm responding to what I see as problematic arguments that seek to blur the distinction between fact and theory until nothing is objectively true and even bare facts are suspect, so that we can dismiss a theory that's met with almost universal acceptance in the scientific community, including by believing Christians, because its proponent was an atheist.

Now, empirical science has a good track record-- a testament to which is the very fact of our communication. I am aware that there is hostility to Christian values in general within that community, but when Steven Jay Gould, a committed agnostic but a brilliant evolutionary biologist, tells me that we're dealing with Non-Overlapping Magisteria when we're talking about Christian theology on the one hand and evolutionary theory on the other --that the two are not in tension; when Francis Schaeffer, head of the Human Genome Project, agrees with him; when Father Gregory directs me to a discussion in which Kallistos Ware adds his vote; and when I really don't want to find myself worshipping a "god of the gaps," the truth of whose material workings rests uncertainly on the possibility that those fossil records may just be completed, I don't see the need to fight this battle. It certainly has the effect of scandalizing nonbelievers to deny the truth of evolutionary theory, which isn't a reason in and of itself not to do so (so does affirming the truth of the Resurrection, a scandal if there ever was one), but perhaps the need for such contentiousness is escaping me.

Here is an example of what I am reacting to:

"Darwin and his followers define man in terms of being a sum of his evolutionary parts, and he implies that man can be understood completely in those terms."

To which I say, who cares? If the facts which he brings to bear don't support that illegitimate leap from the fact of progressive physiological development to an understanding of man as solely being the sum of his parts, why are we bound to reject it all?

In Christ,
Evan

[Owen Jones]

First of all, as I pointed out, Darwin was not an atheist, at least not in his own mind. But his theory pushes toward atheism. It has the result of atheism, of making atheism popular and acceptable. It has the same impact of Deism. All you need is a god to wind things up and he then lets things run of their own accord. If this is irrelevant to Christianity, and to Christian believers, then Christianity has become irrelevant.

Second, Darwin did not just believe in progressive physiological development, he believed in progressive psychological development. And all modern psychology is based in one way or another on his theory of instincts, and of the psyche as a product of evolutionary development. This of course cannot be consistent with Christian teaching in any way. But it is not just some airy theory that has no impact on peoples' lives. These days, when people have mental and emotional problems, even the Church washes its hands and sends them to psychologists. The nature of the psyche is key. The Darwinist understanding and the Christian understanding are clearly at odds.

Under Darwinism, there really is no such thing as good and evil, or virtue and sin. There certainly is no such thing as demonic forces influencing behavior or thought. All human behavior, for good or ill, is defined in purely utilitarian terms as whatever preserves the best stock of the species. If you want to pick and choose, and say, well I believe of the facts of evolution, but not all of the theoretical stuff, then fine. Just be consistent and say the same about Christianity. Just be a good protestant, and throw out all of that theological junk. None of it was in the Bible anyway. I only care about the facts of Jesus' life.

Oh, but wait. Darwinism has historical, cultural, political consequences, just like Christianity. It is a vision that involves people, moves people to live and think differently, to take action. For example, it contributes to the ideology of racism, with eugenics having only gotten a bad name as a result of Hitler. But eugenics was widely accepted, even by most American presidents, prior to Hitler's attempt to rid the world of the inferior genetic types, and the intellectual proponenets of eugenics all take the cue from Darwin. And certainly there is a good deal of sublimated eugenics going on today, what with the arguments used for abortion, etc.

But let's not bring any of this up because we want Christianity to look respectable. A good little bourgeois religion that never ruffles anyone's feathers. Heaven forbid other people would accuse us of having a Talibanish epistemology!

I could go on and on. But, like you say, who cares? Just worry about your own soul and make sure it's going to heaven. God doesn't care about all of this other stuff, surely. He really didn't care about all those ancient heresies either. And we could have dispensed with all of the ecumenical councils as just a waste of a lot of manpower. Surely the Church would have been better off trying to impress the Roman Empire that it was only concerned about the souls of its small flock, and was not interested in calling into question the idols of the then prevailing culture. And when roman philosophers attacked Christianity, why, who cares? We just care about how our own little communities are doing. Don't want to get involved in all kinds of intellectual debates.

[Evan]

"But let's not bring any of this up because we want Christianity to look respectable. A good little bourgeois religion that never ruffles anyone's feathers. Heaven forbid other people would accuse us of having a Talibanish epistemology!

I could go on and on. But, like you say, who cares? Just worry about your own soul and make sure it's going to heaven. God doesn't care about all of this other stuff, surely. He really didn't care about all those ancient heresies either. And we could have dispensed with all of the ecumenical councils as just a waste of a lot of manpower. Surely the Church would have been better off trying to impress the Roman Empire that it was only concerned about the souls of its small flock, and was not interested in calling into question the idols of the then prevailing culture. And when roman philosophers attacked Christianity, why, who cares? We just care about how our own little communities are doing. Don't want to get involved in all kinds of intellectual debates."

Right. Now, we've fallen into caricaturing and distorting one another's viewpoints for the sake of... well, I'm not sure for the sake of what, since I've never supported any of the positions you're bloviating against. I thought Father Gregory might have been exaggerating to make a point in labeling your epistemology Talibanish, but it's hard to disagree when you're willing to engage in such argumentative techniques.

Look, you're perfectly within your rights to reject any and all contribution to the scientific corpus by men who believed that their findings undermined Christian doctrine, if that makes you feel more secure in your faith. I simply don't see why we can't approach Darwin like any other intellectual figure with an agenda, seperating what conclusions are clearly colored by his personal sympathies from those which have enough objective support to convince the greater body of the scientific community. The neat thing about empirical science is that it's by definition open to correction as new facts come to light. To suggest that said community has settled upon the truth of evolutionary theory because they're all post-Enlightenment deists, agnostics, atheists, etc. raises the question of what you know that they don't. Presumably, they've read Darwin, too.

Is it your contention that those scientists, Christian or otherwise, who have found that one can accept evolution in a more qualified way than Darwin himself may have wanted them to, while at the same time affirming the truth of Christian account of Creation, are simply ignorant of Darwin's agenda or, alternatively, are sticking their heads in the sand?


"If you want to pick and choose, and say, well I believe of the facts of evolution, but not all of the theoretical stuff, then fine. Just be consistent and say the same about Christianity. Just be a good protestant, and throw out all of that theological junk. None of it was in the Bible anyway. I only care about the facts of Jesus' life."

I fail to see the usefulness of this analogy. Maybe it would have an impact if, say, one of us was actually arguing that Christian doctrine emerged as an interpretation of a factual record, as opposed to, say, divine revelation.

[Owen Jones]

What is the objective support?

[Evan]

At the risk of turning this into a purely scientific and therefore improper discussion (and, at that, one unlikely to change anyone's mind)...


The Archaeopteryx, the Sinosauropteryx, and the Epidexipteryx? The progressive modifications of the tetrapod skeleton, as evidenced in the fossil record? Homologies, both genetic and anatomical, shared among species? The fact that neither radiometric nor relative dating has been convincingly attacked, and thus the development within and across species in the fossil record can be accurately traced?

I've yet to see a Creationist argument that doesn't depend upon denying premises that are almost universally accepted within the scientific community, the accuracy of carbon-14 dating being the most popular "target." Of course, these secularists could all be wrong, and you could be right.

[Owen Jones]

Is that it?

[Evan]

Well, frankly, I'm not sure exactly what your opinion as to the development of life is, so I'm not sure entirely how to engage you on these issues. Do you at least accept micro-evolution?

[Owen Jones]

Homologies are facts. The Darwinian interpretation of homologies are inferences. There is a big difference. There is a substantial amount of critical literature out there about homologies and whether or not they support Darwinism. Enough I should think that the critical literature ought to at least be considered, so that it isn't entirely a closed issue. These critiques are based on logic, philosophical reasoning, as well as empirical data. One of the things about homologies is that sometimes they don't exist in cases where you would most expect them, for example in different strains of bacteria. I am homologous to mineral deposits, because I have mineral deposits in my body that are exactly like the mineral deposits in the earth. If I didn't have these minerals in minute amounts with extremely fine tolerances I would be dead in a matter of minutes. But does that mean I am evolved from rocks? The Darwinist would say yes. Count me as a skeptic that that is a proof that I have evolved from rocks. Do I seem narrow minded in my skepticism?

Regarding the age of the earth, I don't consider that dispositive one way or another, and so I haven't brought it up. But I understand that some pretty good mathematicians say that it is not only mathematically improbable but mathematically impossible that randomness over the current estimated time of the earth could produce anything like the complexity that we observe. Yet the age of the earth, again, is argued as some kind of proof of Darwinism. Again, it is a kind of fundamental necessity if the theory is true to have a very, very old earth, but it is not a proof. It only makes it somewhat easier perhaps to draw the inference. Again, the issue really is not proof so much as whether the case is closed on the subject. And I would say on this issue it is very much an open question -- that is to say, whether randomness can produce progressive development from the simple to the complex over time. Actually, it would tend to directly fly in the face of what we know about thermodynamics and the universe. The model there is, one might say, one of devolution, of a winding down, a slow death.

As far as progressive development that seems to be evident in the fossil record, from hominoids to humans, or the example that you gave, we now know of course that homo sapiens as the naturalists call us appeared quite suddenly relatively recently and in every case you still have the problem with a lack of linkages. It strikes me that this is a progressivist bias imposed on natural history, rather than proof. The fact that there are fossil records of human like beings whose skeletal remains do not appear to be as advanced as we are, does not serve as a proof that we have evolved from them or that we share a common ancestor. (incidentally, Neanderthals had somewhat bigger brains than we have). Rather, it is an inference that depends on the evolutionary model as the starting point, rather than the end point.

In fact, if anything, it seems to me that Darwinism is not simply an unverifiable theory, it is also non-falsifiable. There is absolutely no way you can set up any kind of model or experiment that could potentially falsify the theory. And of course this is the same objection to faith in God. You cannot set up any controlled experiment. And yet a controlled experiment that will allow for falsifiability is the cornerstone of modern experimental science that they all are absolutely adamant about. Yet why shouldn't it also apply to natural selection? Why not simply admit that it's a paradigm, but certainly not a scientific fact?

Finally, at least for now, I want to respond to the inference that if one is critical of Darwinian dogma, that means that one is something called a "creationist." I'm not sure what that word means but I suspect it has something to do with fundamentalism and Biblical literalism. So I am assuming your assumption is that I am a fundamentalist "creationist" or something like that -- forgive me if I have misconstrued your meaning. Sadly, there are perhaps many Christians who feel they are doing a service to the Church by saving it from fundamentalism and ridicule by accepting the premises of Darwinism, even though Darwinism strikes me as an alternative religion with all of the earmarks of fundamentalist dogmatism.

As for micro-evolution, it's much easier to make a case for it. There are people in Africa who have certain genetic defenses against malaria, which, sadly, also causes cycle cell anemia. And one can infer from this that it is a mutated trait that has survived because it has a survivability premium attached to it. Or the fact that negroes have dark skin and flared nostrils, and the women easily store fat in the buttocks. This cannot be proven, it is still an inference, because there really is no way to prove it, but I think it does not have the numerous problems, questions and obstacles that macroevolution obviously has. Clearly genetics is in its infancy, but we are better understanding things that go wrong and cause diseases and deformities and the like. You don't need God to have caused these by interfering in each specific case, any more than you need to be the proximate cause of every event that ever takes place. That was a medieval Catholic school of thought known as Occasionalism, if I'm not mistaken. Not that He couldn't, but it just appears that He doesn't work that way. In any case, I'm not sure that micro-evolution is properly labeled. I mean, it's not really evolution is it? Change, development, yes. Adaptation, yes. But I don't see that we can call it evolution.

Finally, I want to mention some of the more impressive critical literature:

Race and State, by Eric Voegelin
The New Biology, by Augros and Stanciu
Godless, by Ann Coulter. She is a polemicist, but that does not mean she hasn't done her homework or hasn't summarizes the Intelligent Design argument quite brilliantly -- she has. The ID argument, as I understand it, is largely centered around the problem of inherent complexity. An objection which Darwin raised as well. We now know that organs are a lot more complex than he ever imagined. His model was more like Newtonian building blocks. So you start out with one block, and you add another block and you eventually get a house. But the Newtonian model simply does not work or apply, either with respect to what we are learning about the function of genes, or the function of individual organs.

There is a lot more stuff that I don't pretend to understand that is available in the critical literature if one wants to go searching for it. One of the problems is that the critical literature is often a lot more difficult to follow than Darwin himself, because they have to deal with a lot of complex issues that Darwin over-simplified.

[Evan]

I apologize for labeling you a Creationist. It was my hope that doing so would inspire a substantive response that would make your particular views on human development clear. I am glad to see that I was successful, and that we work, at least, from one shared premise-- that there ARE facts, and that it is fair to seek to reconcile them with other facts and posit unifying hypotheses. We also share a skepticism for hypotheses that stretch beyond the facts to the point where they're no longer connected to them, and also for hypotheses that purport to be conclusions. And we share a common distaste for Darwinism as a philosophy that explains everything and anything about why we are, and what we are.

Yet an important question remains, the answer to which I think will vastly improve our dialogue:

"The fact that there are fossil records of human like beings whose skeletal remains do not appear to be as advanced as we are, does not serve as a proof that we have evolved from them or that we share a common ancestor. (incidentally, Neanderthals had somewhat bigger brains than we have)."

I ask this in all innocence: What precisely do you believe to be at stake here? If we admit a common ancestry, is it your contention that we are no longer uniquely and wonderfully made? Are we no longer made in the image of God?

[Ryan]

The "Talibanesque epistemology" remark was really uncalled for. Please, let's all avoid slippery slopes and caricatures. These things really have no bearing on whether a given argument is true or not, or whether it is Orthodox.

I would like to respond to the point of the "Non-overlapping magisteria" of science and religion. I would argue that Christians can recognize no such concept, as long as they believe that God created the entire universe out of nothing; that God had a purpose for the creation and a particular purpose for each particular creature; that God is continually active in the Creation, guiding it toward its purpose; that the visible and invisible aspects of creation interact and intertwine.

It seems to me that, if we accept such an understanding, then examining the creation, even its material aspects, without any consideration of its origin or divinely ordained purpose, is a kind of self-imposed blindness leading to delusion. To say, "we're just looking at the facts" is a veiled faith statement of its own; a faith that our fallen cognitive and sensory capacities can gain a reliable picture of the universe and its natural workings independently of divine revelation.

The spiritual and material (religious and scientific) realms are divided, cordoned off from one another, and they have little to say about each other without overstepping their bounds- if I am not mistaken, this is the substance of the "non-overlapping magisteria" position. I have certainly seen such a position put forth. For example, Archbishop Lazar Puhalo , in this video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uPrB_rMjJmA), actually says that the Bible does not say anything about the creation. He interprets the entire Genesis creation narrative as pure metaphor, an approach the Fathers, as I understand it, rejected firmly. For the Fathers, the realms were not so divided; they frequently drew conclusions about the spiritual realm from the material and vice versa. In a sense, they employed what modern scientists would consider "pseudo-science," as we do today each time we say "The heavens proclaim the glory of God." Christianity rejects the matter-spirit dualism (or, in some cases, materialist monism) in inherent in the modern scientific methodology.

Which leads me to a last point- the non-overlapping magisteria does not really eliminate the "God of the gaps" problem- it creates what I might call a "God of the receding boundary". As modern science offers explanations for more and more questions that previously had only religious explanations, the faith retreats into metaphor and internal spirituality; it becomes introspective and allegorical, to the eventual point that it has very little to say about the tangible world around us.

And this is because the realms really do overlap. It has long been understood in Christian spirituality that honest contemplation of creation leads one to conclude the existence, wisdom, and goodness of the creator, whereas modern theories are putting forward a picture of the universe that develops without any conscious guidance. We are certainly free to believe, scientists will say, that God oversees the various processes being described, but there is nothing in the "facts" to prove it; such a belief is based on "subjective" perceptions of beauty and order.

As I have mentioned before, in my opinion, modern science produces a distorted picture of nature. Distorted does not mean completely wrong. There are obvious benefits (as well as dangers) in modern technology and medicine. But when the findings of modern science appear to contradict the traditional Orthodox teaching, I think that, instead of revising the Orthodox stance into allegory or dismissing it with words like "well, those Fathers were basing themselves off of the science of their day," we should humbly accept that our human faculties are fallen, and that, furthermore, we are looking at a fallen world.

If "the facts" (in the empiricist sense) give us a picture of an eternal, cyclical, and uncreated universe, of an ancient earth doomed to eventual and final destruction by cosmic forces, of man evolved haphazardly over millions of years because of mutations and natural selection, then perhaps we should acknowledge the serious limitations of "the facts". Some pagan philosophers argued that the universe must be uncreated, since heavenly objects had a circular rather than linear motion, and circles have no beginning. St. Basil responded with the point that, when we draw a circle, it appears to be beginningless, but we do actually begin drawing it at a particular point.

Similarly, phenomena that appear cyclical can have a beginning; things that look very old may be very young. Our senses and cognition are prone to misunderstanding. Not only are we fallen beings looking at a fallen and distorted world, but we are constantly ensnared by passions and tempted by demons. Under such conditions, how can we, individually or collectively, expect to get an objective view of the world without constantly praying for divine mercy?

The divine revelation which the saints imparted conveys a far deeper truth about the world around us and about ourselves than anything empiricist methods can produce- we should not be ashamed of it nor should we qualify it in the face of modern theories. The truest understanding of the natural world emerges for the saints in an advanced stage of prayer- it has always been completely independent of technical or theoretical advances in secular science.

[Owen Jones]

Thanks, Ryan. You have stated it much better than I could. But let me try to elaborate just a little on the problem of "objective science." There is no Archimedian point from which you can examine reality that is extraneous to it. That includes but is not limited to material things. It also involves processes and relationships. We are part of the reality that we seek to examine. It's not simply that we bring prejudice and beliefs into the picture. But the very structure of reality includes mind. So the mind is not a detached observer but is part and parcel of what is observed and in some mysterious way incorporates all of reality. This is not a metaphor for anything, but a scientific evaluation of reality and its intelligible structures.

[Owen Jones]

Evan,

When you pose the question, what is at stake here, I hesitate, because it seems as though you imply that I am taking a position to defend a stake that I have in something, like a piece of property, from encroachment. You have already implied that I am psychologically a weak person because if feel that my faith is threatened by Darwinism, and I assume that this issue of what I have at stake is part and parcel of this same assumption.

But this is not the way I look at things.

But if I were to grant your premise, it works both ways. Most Darwinists view belief in God as a threat to their system, and treat religion the same way Marx treated it, or, his theory of the withering away of the state. What seems to be at stake for the Darwinist is that as long as "religionists" stick to their own private business there is no problem, but once they start mucking about with science, they see themselves to be threatened. So they must not be allowed to influence science, or public expenditures on science, or classroom curricula, etc.

Now, back to the question. The primary reasons I am a skeptic as to common ancestry is that a) there seems to be no evidence for it, only inferences that can be drawn only when one assumes naturalism as one's starting point and 2) both theology and philosophy bring to bear any number of questions and objections that Darwinism cannot answer, 3) Orthodox Christianity is more scientific in its treatment of the idea of the human, our nature, origins, purpose, end. It is not only the most sublime vision that we have of the nature of the human, but it also works in practice. The Darwinistic vision is inherently reductionistic and does not work in practical applications.

[Evan]

Ryan,

I think we can all agree that unfortunate things were said by all concerned. It is my hope that we can continue this discussion in a charitable and mutually productive way.

"I would like to respond to the point of the "Non-overlapping magisteria" of science and religion. I would argue that Christians can recognize no such concept, as long as they believe that God created the entire universe out of nothing; that God had a purpose for the creation and a particular purpose for each particular creature; that God is continually active in the Creation, guiding it toward its purpose; that the visible and invisible aspects of creation interact and intertwine."


The NOMA comment was not intended to cordon off science from religion, only to raise the question of whether evolutionary theory is necessarily in conflict with the Christian doctrine concerning creation. That's the context in which Gould defined NOMA; a limited one, that didn't necessitate that one accept the proposition that religion and science have nothing to offer one another. Perhaps it was unfortunate to use the term here, as it seems to have brought in unnecessary baggage.

"When you pose the question, what is at stake here, I hesitate, because it seems as though you imply that I am taking a position to defend a stake that I have in something, like a piece of property, from encroachment. You have already implied that I am psychologically a weak person because if feel that my faith is threatened by Darwinism, and I assume that this issue of what I have at stake is part and parcel of this same assumption."

If I seem to have implied any such thing, I retract it. We are working with asymmetric information here; you know more about what you think than I do, and in trying to engage with you, I've tried to connect things you've said with arguments I've heard elsewhere. If in doing so, I've made certain assumptions, I've done so fully prepared to reject them as I learn more about your specific positions.

"The primary reasons I am a skeptic as to common ancestry is that a) there seems to be no evidence for it, only inferences that can be drawn only when one assumes naturalism as one's starting point and 2) both theology and philosophy bring to bear any number of questions and objections that Darwinism cannot answer, 3) Orthodox Christianity is more scientific in its treatment of the idea of the human, our nature, origins, purpose, end. It is not only the most sublime vision that we have of the nature of the human, but it also works in practice. The Darwinistic vision is inherently reductionistic and does not work in practical applications."

What's troubling to me here is how we go from common ancestry to Darwinism. We both know that there are scientists (Francis Collins, among others) that have accepted the former without embracing the latter, endorsing theistic evolution. When I ask what's at stake here, I do so because I'm uncertain as to how it's problematic to embrace evolution in this qualified way, rather than rejecting it altogether-- doing the latter suggests that there's something inconsistent about Collins' perspective, that allowing for common ancestry admits too much, from a Christian perspective. I want to understand why you think that's so. Or do you simply believe that there's not enough evidence as of yet?

[Owen Jones]

For the sake of accuracy, Darwin believed in theistic evolution. He clearly states that there was a Creator who breathed life into matter. He states that quite clearly in print. He does not believe that God could have created specificity and diversity as it exists. He does not believe that is possible. Rather, he thinks it is far more likely that the complexity and diversity in nature is the result of natural causality, based on randomness, gradual change, and the competitive nature of things. The latter theory is based on 19th century liberal economics.

So when one is critiquing Darwinism, one is inevitably critiquing "theistic evolution."

The problem with common ancestry, again and again we pray, is that there is not a shred of actual evidence supporting it. And it is impossible to imagine any kind of experiment that could be conducted that would either validate or falsify it. It's inherently unfalsifiable.

It is an inference -- Darwin repeated uses that term -- that uses the model of naturalism as its starting point. The fact that there are human-like creatures that existed millions of years ago and died out is hardly proof of common ancestry. Homology is clearly not a proof, because all nature is homologous and it only stands to reason that it would be so. My bio-chemical structure is not alien to that of the rest of the world. Why should it be? This is not ipso facto a proof of common ancestry.

So for those and a host of other reasons, that leaves me a certifiable skeptic regarding common origins, quite apart from what Christian dogma has to say. But when you add Christian dogma into the mix, it strikes me as a more rational and intelligible explanation for existence, and a more accurate description of what human beings were, are and can become. It is much more comprehensive, and when applied to actual cases, it actually works, whereas when you apply the principles of Darwinism in actual, specific cases, you get all kinds of bad consequences. I do think there is a certainly credibility and validity in critiquing ideas based on their consequences. Don't you?

[Evan]

"I do think there is a certainly credibility and validity in critiquing ideas based on their consequences. Don't you?"

I think most rational people would agree with you. However, as I have stated, I am yet unconvinced that I need to be a Darwinian to draw anything of value from what Darwin contributed to the scientific corpus. In particular, I see no reason to follow Darwin in his conclusion that because he believes that evolution is in effect (forgive the Dawkinism) a blind watchmaker, all God needed to do was breathe life into being at the outset, and dumb, senseless natural processes would take over and, given enough time and permutations, we'd get you and me, and we can go about our business look good Deists and love only those who love us and trample the weak and sterilize the "feeble-minded" and do all sorts of cool progressive stuff (good ol' Oliver Wendell Holmes).

Obviously, no Christian can accept such a picture. But can we not say that the development Darwin pointed us towards is, in fact, a reality, while at the same time denying that it took place, as Darwin concluded, as a consequence of blind luck? That what he saw as impossible is possible with God, as indeed are all things? That his very inability to perceive God in the evidence of randomness, gradual change, and competition reflects not God's absence but the limits of the human understanding?

[Owen Jones]

Are we bartering now? Is that what it comes down to? I can pick and choose and negotiate what is scientific, what is philosophically and theologically sound?

You know, we have a whole series of trends over the last several hundred hears as Christians have absorbed liberalism into their ethos and mind set. It's been pretty disastrous, all in all. Darwinism is part of the liberal world view. Nothing more, nothing less. The opposite of liberalism is not fundamentalism and literalism. It is reason and true faith, which is what Orthodoxy represents. It not only is the True Faith, but it is the last remaining bulwark against liberal ideology in the world today. Which means it stands for Reason as opposed to magic. This has practical consequences. As more and more psychologists go to work on people, using the Darwinian mindset as the foundation for their theories, we are told that there are more and more mentally sick people. It is time that we recover our Biblical and Patristic heritage regarding the nature of the soul, the relationship between soul and body, and the relationship between the Creator and the created. None of that is contained in Darwinism, because they don't need it. When it comes down to practical application, tts claims are bogus, because the Darwinian paradigm of the human simply doesn't work. Infusing it with Christianity cannot save it, it only corrupts Christianity.