The relevance of Darwin mythmaking to ID
| March 18, 2007 | Posted by O'Leary under Intelligent Design |
In a comment to one of my posts of yesterday, on the popular myths (and ridiculous hagiography) around Darwin, someone responded, “I am not seeing the ID relevance of this article.”
Really not? Okay then, let me unpack it. When I started covering the ID controversy in depth (about 2002 onward, while writing By Design or by Chance? ), I quickly became aware that the Darwin myths were the single most important reason why – irrespective of any evidence whatever – average educated people could not imagine that Darwin and his heirs might be mistaken in their interpretation of the history of life.
Indeed, Darwinian evolutionist Douglas Futuyma picked up that current when he wrote in the 1998 edition of his textbook,
Together with Marx’s materialistic theory of history and society and Freud’s attribution of human behavior to influences over which we have little control, Darwin’s theory of evolution was a crucial plank in the platform of mechanism and materialism…
Yes, you see, Darwin is right up there with Einstein – where Freud and Marx also used to be – as one of the guys who explained it all for you.
Now, obviously, one consequence of materialist apotheosis (becoming a materialist divinity) is that you can’t be wrong even when you obviously are. Miracles are ascribed to you or allegedly done in your name. The people who oppose you are evil, and are hatching wicked plots against the righteous elect who believe in you.
Now, religious sects in North America often behave in this fashion. But they do not often demand what the Darwinists have demanded and so far got – that all children be legally compelled to learn their dogmas (and only their dogmas) at taxpayer expense in publicly funded schools. Had the American elite not already been sold on the religion of materialism, materialism’s creation story (Darwinism) would certainly not have attained this status in biology classes. And there is now no longer any question that the materialists do mean to found a church.
Slowly, materialists are succeeding in their effort to establish their church as the national religion. And, just as a sociologist of religion might predict, the vigorous Christian sects of North America, Catholicism and evangelicalism, are blowing the materialists off but the dying liberal ones are accommodating them.
Now, how does this affect ID? Well, in the present environment, any scientist who says, “My data better fit a hypothesis of the workings of nature that includes design than one that does not” is essentially either an infidel or a heretic. Thus, the question is not whether his data provide useful information but whether we should (1) burn or (2) drown the faithless wretch.
In my own view, most educated people will not evaluate the question of whether design is an intrinsic part of nature in a reasonable way until the dubious Darwiniania is shown up for what it is – dubious mythmaking and inappropriate hagiography. The Darwin bicentennial is a good place to begin.
(Note: A couple of years ago, I was discussing an obscure question with a fellow science journalist who confided that his personal reverence for Darwin stemmed from the fact that Darwin was a “moral” atheist – thus demonstrating that an atheist could be moral.
I was a bit surprised because I apprehended for the first time the yawning gulf between his life experience among the elite and mine among the unwashed.
I’d never doubted that a Christian could be moral. That’s just expected. But the typical serious Catholic aspires to be a saint, which ratchets the bar up considerably higher. Even so, John Paul II was declaring people saints and blesseds all the time. (The typical serious Protestant aspires to a similar status, though expressed somewhat differently.) In other words, the problem was never whether morally praiseworthy behaviour is possible in principle but whether one really intends to follow the many virtuous examples oneself.)
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One more thing:
““I guess the point I’m making is that religious people, despite their belief in a higher power who has sent down morals, make clear and informed decisions to ignore some or all parts of that moral code as it suits them.—
I don’t think most religious people do this. I think this is based on ignorance of the Bible (mainly). Some laws aren’t meant to be followed by Christians (as I mentioned in my last comment). Some laws are universal Biblically. Some laws pertain to certain people only at certain times in certain nations. The religious people I know follow the letter of the law and don’t pick and choose. Those that do- I see them as wasting their time. Living your life on what suits you is the opposite of what Christianity is about. It’s about being humble and accepting that the one who gave you life gives it at His leisure and can just as easily and rightfully take it away. That alone is reason enough for me to respect and obey all the law given.
A few notes . . .
First,this thread is overlapping considerably with the Mar 17th, “Showdown” one, on the roots of morality issues; I suggest a bit of cross-thread reading. On points plucked almost at random:
1] Ekstasis, 20: even if we believed in right vs wrong, we would not have such a desperate and intense desire to justify ourselves if we had no feeling of impending accountability  that we will be held to account for our actions . . .
A telling hint on the real nature of human reality isn’t it. (Almost as if our minds had “Made by God” written into core software . . .?)
Also, if a deeply cognitive process such as this is on evolutionary materialist grounds equally deeply an illusion, why then should evo mat thinkers trust ANY of the deliverances of the cognitive faculty, including their own system of thought? [Cf the other thread]
2] Ph, 23: I’d rather make a choice based on what I feel the right thing to do is, rather than because I think I’ll be punished if I do the wrong thing.
But, is that feeling anything more than a delusion driven by biological and socio-cultural evolutionary chance and natural regularity driven forces? If not, then why not live by the “lion” forces not the “gazelle” bleats — for we definitely feel BOTH impulses?
[That is, following up on De Sade: nature made men stronger, and there is a well-known synergy between adrenalin forces and sexual pleasures, so why not get higher thrills from what we now call sadism? More directly, why do we feel certain things are "right" and why do we think that we should follow those impulse rather than the ones of "nature, red in tooth and claw"?]
3] TL, 24: The point that you miss is: the argument is not that atheists are amoral, but that there is no basis for morality without an authoritative voice saying what is moral and what is immoral. Otherwise, morality is subjective.
And, there are some competing subjective influences. De Sade’s principle that what nature gives is right and since men are stronger they therefore have a “right” to do with women as they please has serious consequences.
4] Citing Glyn: “The best that modern philosophy has been able to produce after hundreds of years of attempting to replace the idea of God with a comprehensive alternative based on ‘reason’ turns out to be a diluted and less than completely coherent version of the New Testament moral vision.
And factual inadequacy and incoherence are of course major worldviews tests.
5] Shaner, 26: the argument is that atheism has *no* basis for claiming any non-relative morality. It just borrows it from somewhere else. Note what I said: not “better†morals, as you have tried to redefine it, but “noneâ€Â. You say it does. Prove it.
Of course one can try to collapse morality into culturally or personally relative rules. But that is not at all the same thing, as is in the other thread just now.
6] TB, 27: I think the biggest question is: Is there an universal moral law at work that all people do know subconsciously?
Indeed, and here is the biblical take on that observed UNIVERSALITY (thus, too, the issue that there are some time and culture specific elements that no longer apply but also principles and precepts that are “all-times, all-places”]. I here draw from Paul’s letter to Rome [Chs two and thirteen -- hope that misses the filter]:
BTW, this is the precise core argument that Equiano and other antislavery activists used against the trade, then the institution itself. Why did the British lion feel obligated to listen to this bleat of the tasty African gazelle?
What worldview best makes sense of that?
GEM of TKI
PS on redefinitions of marriage, kindly read the first six verses of Matt nineteen before thinking that Jesus did not speak to the creation order male-female roots of marriage and family. Namely, observe that what God has joined men should not put asunder. If easy divorce is against God’s intent, how much more so what does not respect creation rooted maleness and femaleness?
A few notes . . .
First,this thread is overlapping considerably with the Mar 17th, “Showdown” one, on the roots of morality issues; I suggest a bit of cross-thread reading. On points plucked almost at random:
1] Ekstasis, 20: even if we believed in right vs wrong, we would not have such a desperate and intense desire to justify ourselves if we had no feeling of impending accountability  that we will be held to account for our actions . . .
A telling hint on the real nature of human reality isn’t it. (Almost as if our minds had “Made by God” written into core software . . .?)
Also, if a deeply cognitive process such as this is on evolutionary materialist grounds equally deeply an illusion, why then should evo mat thinkers trust ANY of the deliverances of the cognitive faculty, including their own system of thought? [Cf the other thread]
2] Ph, 23: I’d rather make a choice based on what I feel the right thing to do is, rather than because I think I’ll be punished if I do the wrong thing.
But, is that feeling anything more than a delusion driven by biological and socio-cultural evolutionary chance and natural regularity driven forces? If not, then why not live by the “lion” forces not the “gazelle” bleats — for we definitely feel BOTH impulses?
[That is, following up on De Sade: nature made men stronger, and there is a well-known synergy between adrenalin forces and sexual pleasures, so why not get higher thrills from what we now call sadism? More directly, why do we feel certain things are "right" and why do we think that we should follow those impulse rather than the ones of "nature, red in tooth and claw"?]
3] TL, 24: The point that you miss is: the argument is not that atheists are amoral, but that there is no basis for morality without an authoritative voice saying what is moral and what is immoral. Otherwise, morality is subjective.
And, there are some competing subjective influences. De Sade’s principle that what nature gives is right and since men are stronger they therefore have a “right” to do with women as they please has serious consequences.
4] Citing Glyn: “The best that modern philosophy has been able to produce after hundreds of years of attempting to replace the idea of God with a comprehensive alternative based on ‘reason’ turns out to be a diluted and less than completely coherent version of the New Testament moral vision.
And factual inadequacy and incoherence are of course major worldviews tests.
Pause . . .
Wellâ€â€looks like my perfectly reasonable reason was challenged by Phevans 10: “This is a far better summing up of the Christian position than the atheist one: ‘if shop-lifting might land me in hell, I’d better not shop-lift’. What’s the difference?â€Â
Good question. Is Judeo-Christian morality really no different than the atheist’s utilitarianism? Well, there are carrots and sticks in both, but there’s this difference: The stick is the same on both sides (at least for those who believe eternal torment is a post-biblical teaching)â€â€we die and that’s it. It’s the carrot that makes all the difference: Isaiah 22:13 (“let us eat and drink; for to morrow we shall die [×Âָכוֹל וְש×Âָתוֹ ×›Ö¼Ö´×™ מָחָר נָמוּת]â€Â) for the materialist versus the possibility of eternal life (Daniel 12:2). It’s not the negative but the positiveâ€â€the gift of life and rewards for righteousnessâ€â€that constitute the main difference between crass utilitarianism and Judeo-Christian morality.
And then ΚαιÃÂÃŒÂFocus 15 brings up what sounds to me like Natural Law. Materialists, at least those in biology and in the humanities (if not physics), abhor mathematical realism, whereas theists tend to be sympathetic (see John Byl, Theism and Mathematical Realism, 2001). Judeo-Christians believe in absolutes, be they mathematical or moral (as in natural law), whereas the utilitarianism of the materialists is as fickle as the ebb and flow of public opinion or the selfish whims of a dictator.
Also atheists tend to be statistsâ€â€because the state is all there is!â€â€and thus it is the state that confers upon us our rights. But Jefferson in 1776 would write that men “…are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights,†and such was also the case in the 1789 French Declaration of the Rights of Manâ€â€Ã¢â‚¬Å“Therefore the National Assembly recognizes and proclaims, in the presence and under the auspices of the Supreme Being, the following rights of man and of the citizen …†But I find no reference to the deity in the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights of the United Nations.
And this brings to mind Psalms 111:10, “The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom [רֵ×Âש×Âִית חָכְמָ׆יִרְ×Âַת ×â€Ã—³]†(and Prov 9:10â€â€Ã¢â‚¬Å“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom [תְּחִלַּת חָכְמָ׆יִרְ×Âַת ×â€Ã—³]â€Â; Prov 1:7â€â€Ã¢â‚¬Å“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge [יִרְ×Âַת ×â€Ã—³ רֵ×Âש×Âִית דָּעַת]â€Â; etc.). Belief in the Deity inspires fear that is a starting point, and here I am reminded of the Star Trek character called “Qâ€Â. Q was completely omnipotent and thus to be feared, yet the captain and crew of the Enterprise saw no reason to deify himâ€â€why? Maybe because there was no hint that on any particular level Q was their creatorâ€â€as in Isaiah 64:8: “But now, O LORD, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand.â€Â
But Foss 12 is offended: “I really do think one of the lowest blows in the theist vs. atheist debate is to paint the atheist as a person who has no reason to be moral.â€Â
Nobody says that atheists have no utilitarian reasons to be moral, but neither can anyone deny that atheists lack any higher, transcendant reasons to be moral. All morality should be respected, but we need not be impressed by the materialist’s reason to be moral.
Now, as Richard Dawkins likes to point out, what really matters it the truth. He concedes, if I recall correctly, that certain belief systems might condition morality, but why base morality on a lie? I agree, but if Dawkins’ assessment of the facts is correct thenâ€â€let’s face itâ€â€nothing matters! Why all the sound and fury if we’re here today and gone tomorrowâ€â€extinguished in the blackness of an eternal night.
Rude says: “if Dawkins’ assessment of the facts is correct thenâ€â€let’s face itâ€â€nothing matters! Why all the sound and fury if we’re here today and gone tomorrowâ€â€extinguished in the blackness of an eternal night.”
The thing is Rude I do not know anyone that is not a theist that sees it that way. You are describing a nihilist. I know plenty of atheists and agnostics but no nihilists. I’m sure they are out there but the thinking well educated people I know that do not have a specific deity at the root of their worldview all manage to find splendor and grandeur in the universe and man none the less. The lack of received knowledge does not equal a lack of knowledge. This is just as true with spiritual knowledge as any other kind of knowledge.
H’mm:
My original did come through in the end. And, Rude has spotted the Greek nicely in my handle. [But, will it come out in most browsers?]
Further on points:
1] Rude, 34: the utilitarianism of the materialists is as fickle as the ebb and flow of public opinion or the selfish whims of a dictator. Also atheists tend to be statistsâ€â€because the state is all there is!â€â€and thus it is the state that confers upon us our rights.
In short, evo mat accounts characteristically end up in socio-cultural moral relativism, or individual relativism. [Thus, nihilism is simply an idiosyncratic expression of same.] BTW, thanks on the note on the French revolutionists – i.e. their acknowledgment of God.
But of course, the problem is that there is such a thing as core, generally accepted morality, as say is summed up in the above excerpts from Paulo, Apostolo, Mart. That is how reformers such as William Wilberforce and Olaudah Equiano are able to appeal to those who are “right†based on the formally enacted rules of their community, in this case Britain circa 1789:
2] Reform as a sign that morality is objective:
From the above, we see the fact of reform based on universal core morality.
That is strong testimony indeed that morality is at least as objective and appeals thereto are potentiallyat least as compelling as reasoning relative to claimed empirical facts. Further, the Christian claim is that this core morality is a Law above the state, which is accountable before the Author of morality for justice. So, by appealing to that Law beyond the law, we call to reform.
Nor, can the evo mat advocates in the thread effectively deny the fact that they too face this precise sense of moral oughtness. But on evo mat premises are these anything more than just feelings driven by accidents of the evolution of man, not real obligations? If so, and if I have power to do as I please, why not make rules to suit myself?
So, again: if our minds are this deeply delusional, why should we trust them in reasoning in general, on evo mat grounds?
Or, since the fundamental law of biological nature on evo mat premises is “survival of the fittest,†thus in material part “nature red in tooth and claw,†why – relative to such premises — should the hungry British lion [Parliament] heed the feeble bleat of the tasty African gazelle [Equiano]?
3] JMCD, 35: the thinking well educated people I know that do not have a specific deity at the root of their worldview all manage to find splendor and grandeur in the universe and man none the less. The lack of received knowledge does not equal a lack of knowledge. This is just as true with spiritual knowledge as any other kind of knowledge.
Translating: our intuitions, our spirits, our hearts testify to the grandeur in nature and in man, but we refuse to acknowledge their Author! (Read Ac 17 and Rom 1 to see the classic Christian rebuke to this. C S Lewis’ retort that in effect a calculator has no sense of awe on being inputted with the numerical scale of the universe is acidly apt, too. BTW, it is fair comment o observe that such circles as you report on are not at all fully representative of the range of opinions on morality of informed evolutionary materialists across time and even currently.)
A part of that “grandeur†[and the shame, too] is of course morality. And here JMCD evidently accepts the brute fact that such a thing as moral knowledge, i.e. of right and wrong, nobility and shame exists. Even radical relativeists, who loudly insist on respecting “tolerance,†imply this. But the FACT of morality is not the issue. The proper issue is: on an inference to best explanation basis, what grounds such objective moral knowledge and underlying obligation to do the right?
[The Judaeo-Christian theistic answer is that The Law is Written on our hearts by the One who made us. What is yours? Why is it better: more factually adequate, coherent and explanatorily powerful?]
GEM of TKI
Jmcdâ€â€what I meant was that the logic of the materialist is utterly nihilisticâ€â€not that the materialist has thought this through and understood it. I guess what it boils down to is that our tenured, government funded elites who buy into materialism don’t think much about the big things because they are so occupied with little things. The streets may be littered with human detritus spawned from their nihilistic philosophy, but they have the solution: compel the same working stiffs who bankroll them to clean up the mess.
BTW Rude:
On follow up; Wiki, sadly, lives up to its growing, deserved reputation for secularist bias.
For, Paulo, Apostolo, Mart and his expositions in Ac 17, Rom 1 – 2 & 13, Eph 4 esp are conspicuous by absence in the linked article’s discussion of Natural Law. (We cannot properly understand Augustine, Aquinas etc without that backdrop! Not ro mention in its own right, as my excerpt, in 6, comment 32 above shows.)
But then we all “know” that modern liberty and the founding of the US republic had “nothing” to do with this Christian tradition on justice, government and liberty under God, don’t we . . . ?
GEM of TKI
H’mm:
Two interesting excerpts:
First Anglican Theologian Richard Hooker, in Ecclesiastical Polity, as cited by Locke in his 2nd Essay on Govt:
Where Locke went with it:
Notice how Locke uses the pauline, love does no harm form of the GR in his reasoning on the Law of Nature.
GEM of TKI