Re: Evolution and faith in God: is there any contradiction?

James Goetz wrote:

[you're having threading problems. this appeared as a response to the
wrong post]

On Oct 8, 6:11 pm, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

James Goetz wrote:

On Oct 3, 5:41 pm, John Harshman <jharshman.diespam...@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

myquests.m...@xxxxxxxxx wrote:

I believe in Darwinian evolution, DO NOT believe in creationism, DO
NOT believe in the neo-creationist "intelligent design" movement, BUT
believe in God. I don't see any contradiction. Where is the problem
with evolution and the faith in God?

Darwinism did not show that God is an unnecessary hypothesis. It only
showed that species evolve and that natural selection plays some role,
and that SOME things can happen by chance (and there are a lot of
things which happened by "chance" in my own life and nevertheless I
believe they were pre-determined). But this is far from any proof of
lack of Divine control and intervention. It would be unscientific to
claim this.

Darwinism is light years away from proving that "after the first cell
the system played out for the next several billion years". To tell
people Darwinism has shown such things is not science. Put in these
terms it is a "religious" belief too.

Can someone help?

Sure. There may be no contradiction between evolution and faith in god,
but that depends on what god you have faith in. I will assume you
believe in the sort that doesn't result in contradiction, the sort who
is willing to let things take their own course over many millions of
years without the need for constant meddling.

As you point out, there can be no evidence against divine control or
meddling, if the meddling is of a sort that can't be distinguished in
any way from natural processes. Of course, scientifically speaking this
is a pointless and untestable hypothesis, but we're not talking about
science when we introduce god, for exactly that reason.

So evolution can't provide conclusive proof of the non-existence of god.
It can, however, suggest that if there is a god, he's quite different

from what people generally imagine. He doesn't appear to care about the

human species in particular, much less about individual humans. This
seems obvious not just from evolution but from the sheer size and
duration of the universe. If we were its purpose, there would be no need
to make anything so big or so old. Evolution provides only a grace note
to that theme -- if we were the purpose, the path toward us wouldn't be
so apparently random.

(reposting through google)

You are not considering all of the facts. First, DNA-based life
requires multi-generational stars, so this type of life would need a
universe about our size and age.

Perhaps, but of course that's only true (if it's true at all) if the
universe evolves in the manner our current universe evolved. If god
wanted life earlier, he could have made a universe that was enriched in
heavier elements initially. Or he could have created everything just the
way he wanted without waiting for it to work itself out. Unless he's not
omnipotent.

If that is part of your definition of omnipotence, then I agree that
God does not have that type of omnipotence. I prefer to say that God
is maximally potent, which implies that God can create any size
universe with any given set of consistant fundamental laws and God can
manipulate any probabilistic mechanism in the universe. In this case,
God could have instantaneously generated a universe rich in higher
elements. Then again, God could have instantaneously generated a
universe rich in higher elements and populated with homo sapiens. On
the other hand, God could have decided to generate a universe that
expanded from a point. And in this case, there might not be a
consistent set of fundamental laws that could generate a universe that
would expanded from a point and quickly form higher elements and
planets that are life friendly. Anyway, the concept of "quickness" is
relative to a deity that has a root existence outside our spacetime
universe.

I don't understand the distinction between "maximally potent" and
"omnipotent", especially since you agree that your god is capable of
everything I ascribed to an omnipotent god. So. Yes, god could have just
created us if we're what he had in mind, which destroys your previous
argument. The rest of your argument is just "god moves in mysterious
ways", which is a claim that we can know nothing of god's nature: the
universe communicates nothing to us. You are free to believe that, and
if you do we have no basis for discussion. You in particular have no
basis for a believe in an omnipotent, omniscient, benevolent god.

Second, you make an unnecesary
conclusion when you say, "if we were the purpose, the path toward us
wouldn't be so apparently random." I can think of at least two other
possibilities: 1) Despite the probabilistic mechanisms in evolution,
some type of intelligent was inevitable per Simon Conway Morris; 2)
The probabilistic mechanisms in evolution made it impossible to ensure
the origin of intelligent life without outside intervention in any
size universe that generates earth-like planets while the deity
decided to occasionally use intervention to ensure the origin of
intelligent life.

Using the word "impossible" in connection with the deity suggests that
he's not omnipotent. Is that your idea?

It is an issue of what is logically consistent, so I concede that God
is maximally potent. For example, God could have decided to make DNA-
based intelligent life while the pathway through the probabilistic
mechanisms in the universe is complicated to the point that there is
no way to ensure a probability on one for the emergence of intelligent
life without purposeful intervention.

Do you lose points for purposeful intervention? Now it seems to me that
if the goal were plentiful intelligent life, the initial conditions
could have been much more favorable. If we want to learn about what god
likes be examining the universe, we would have to conclude an inordinate
fondness for vacuum.

And I think Conway Morris is much sillier on this point than Gould
ever was. Human-level intelligence has happened once in the history
of life, and there is certainly no appearance of inevitability in
the random path that got us where we are. Conway Morris can't
defend his claim either.>

Either science can eventually test the Conway Morris hypothesis so
that it is a testable hypothesis or science could never test the
hypothesis so that it is a conjecture. If it is testable, then I
suspect that it will be falsified. If it is a conjecture, then I doubt
it.

We are agreed. Why did you bring it up?

There is much we can learn about god -- particular sorts of god we can
rule out -- by observing the world around us. Evolution is a tiny part
of this, not worth mentioning except for the historical reason that it
appears to contradict a couple of old stories that some people consider
revealed truth. Evolution's importance in this matter is small compared
to the size and age of the universe, and they are in turn trivial
compared to the central difficulty of theism, the problem of evil.
Theologians seem generally to have realized this. Given the existence of
evil, god can't be benevolent, omnipotent, and omniscient all at once;
pick two at most. So forget evolution and worry about that bigger issue.

Many theologians do not come to your conclusion.

I suggest that they have a personal interest in not doing so.


For example, there is
no conflict with a benevolent, omnipotent (within logical
consistency), and omniscient deity allowing freewill that can result
in evil.

Of course there is. If god knows what's going to happen and creates the
initial conditions in which that happens, and if he had a choice to
create different initial conditions in which something else happened,
he's responsible. If he's responsible for evil, he can't be benevolent.
If he didn't have a choice, he's not omnipotent. If he didn't know what
was going to happen, he's not omniscient. "Freewill" is just another Get
Out of Logic Free card for theologians.

Here, I must appeal to Christian revelation in my response. God took
full responsibility for all evil in creation by incarnating and taking
the punishment for all of the sins in the world.

That's one of the silliest features of Christian doctrine. It requires
god to go through some sympathetic magic ritual in order to do somethign
he could just have done by changing his arrangements for punishment. And
in fact he didn't take full responsibility, because (also according to
Christian doctrine) large numbers of people have not had their sins
taken away because they didn't accept Christ's sacrifice, and so will
spend eternity in hell. You may hold heretical views, but you will have
to tell me what they are if so.

For example, in short, I believe God has a long term plan for
humans to eventually act responsibly with their freewill. And in the
future, the problem of evil will be seen as a relatively short term
problem that was resolved.

No big deal, then? Necessary growing pains of the species? But why
couldn't an omnipotent god create a species that would have free will
and act responsibly from the beginning? Again, you have the problem with
omnipotence. This is another version of "suffering is good for us".
Tell that to all the people who die in great pain both from human and
natural causes. It may comfort you to think that this is all a tiny blip
in a glorious plan, but you give no reasons to think so.

I never implied that is no big deal.

I interpret "relatively short term problem" as saying this.

This is a sensitive issue. And I
am not sure if a maximally potent deity could create a species that
would have free will and continuously act responsibly from the
beginning, but that is a good question.

Why not? If the world could eventually arrive at such a state, which you
claim, why couldn't it be created that way from the beginning?

Some people who have died in
great pain were comforted with the belief that God will restore them
in the world to come while other people who died in great pain have
gotten angry with God or did not believe in God at all. I have talked
with several dying people, but granted, not the worse cases of
suffering in the world. I believe its all part of a glorious plan
because I believe the Christian biblical revelation about God
restoring all people. (I have to call it a night for now, but I can
write more about this another day.)

Ah, so you do hold heretical views about punishment and such, and you
disagree that "there is no way to the Father but through me". Apparently
all ways lead to the Father. I'll admit that's nicer than standard
Christian theology, though I see no evidence that it's true. Nor do I
see any evidence that the Holocaust led the people who died to be better
people, not to mention leading the Nazis to be better people.

.

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