[jeffblue101]

Do theistic evolutionists consider God to be a blind watchmaker?



Douglas Futuyma, Evolution (2005)

Above all, Darwin's theory of random, purposeless variation acted on by blind, purposeless natural selection provided a revolutionary new kind of answer to almost all questions that begin with "Why?" Before Darwin, both philosophers and people in general answered "Why?" questions by citing purpose. Since only an intelligent mind, with the capacity for forethought, can have purpose, questions such as "Why do plants have flowers?" or "Why are there apple trees?"—or diseases, or earthquakes—were answered by imagining the possible purpose that God could have had in creating them. This kind of explanation was made completely superfluous by Darwin's theory of natural selection. The adaptations of organisms—long cited as the most conspicuous evidence of intelligent design in the universe—could be explained by purely mechanistic causes. For evolutionary biologists, the flower of the magnolia has a function but not a purpose. It was not designed in order to propagate the species, much less to delight us with its beauty, but instead came into existence because magnolias with brightly colored flowers reproduced more prolifically than magnolias with less brightly colored flowers. The unsettling implication of this purely material explanation is that, except in the case of human behavior, we need not invoke, nor can we find any evidence for, any design, goal, or purpose anywhere in the natural world.

Douglas Futuyma, Evolution (2009)

Supernatural processes cannot be the subject of science, so when Darwin offered a purely natural, materialistic alternative to the argument from design, he not only shook the foundations of theology and philosophy, but brought every aspect of the study of life into the realm of science. His alternative to intelligent design was design by the completely mindless process of natural selection, according to which organisms possessing variations that enhance survival or reproduction replace those less suitably endowed, which therefore survive or reproduce in lesser degree. This process cannot have a goal, any morethan erosion has the goal of forming canyons, for the future cannot cause material events in the present. Thus the concepts of goals or purposes have no place in biology (or in any other of the natural sciences), except in studies of human behavior.

George Gaylord Simpson, co-founder of Modern synthesis, The Meaning of Evolution.

Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind. He was not planned. He is a state of matter, a form of life, a sort of animal, and a species of the Order Primates, akin nearly or remotely to all of life and indeed to all that is material

Stephen Jay Gould, founder of NOMA dogma, Ever Since Darwin

Darwin developed an evolutionary theory based on chance variation and natural selection imposed by an external environment: a rigidly materialistic (and basically atheistic) version of evolution

[Damian]

Originally Posted by jeffblue101

Do theistic evolutionists consider God to be a blind watchmaker?

I have raised this very issue more than once on this forum. Theistic evolution and neo-Darwinian evolution are basically antithetical to each other because the former presupposes some kind of divine influence while the latter is inherently atheistic. Therefore, any believer who embraces neo-Darwinian evolution has rendered God superfluous. It's really that simple. Unfortunately, intellectual dishonesty runs rampant here and elsewhere and precludes any acknowledgement of this implication.

"Theistic Evolution vs. Atheistic Evolution"

[jeffblue101]

Originally Posted by Damian

"Theistic Evolution vs. Atheistic Evolution"

Here is a great example of that in an interview by Peter Robinson.

Peter Robinson: George Gaylord Simpson, author of The Meaning of Evolution: "Man is the result of a purposeless and natural process that did not have him in mind." True or false? Bill?

William Dembski: There's no way he could know that.

Peter Robinson: There's no way he could know that? Bob?

Robert Russell: From the point of view of science, true. From the point of view of theology, false.

Peter Robinson: Oh, you're engaging us in contradictory truths.

Robert Russell: No.

Peter Robinson: True and false?

Robert Russell: No. There's a truth that can include a truth. My bathroom scales can't tell me what I'm thinking. That doesn't say I'm not thinking.

[jeffblue101]

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/dover/day5pm.html
Dover trial testimony of John F. Haught, a Roman Catholic theologian.

A.Yes, but at that point I wasn't talking about Darwinism, I was talking about certain materialists' interpretations of Darwinism. The point of that whole book, just to put it in context, is to criticize not evolution and not neo-Darwinism, not Darwinism, but materialists' interpretations of Darwinism.

Q. Well, materialists are Darwinians. Right? They're a group of Darwinians?

A. But Darwinism in no way logically entails materialism. This is just by accident that some materialists are Darwinians and vice versa.

Do any of the atheists on Tol believe that their materialistic worldview is just an accidental correlation with neo-darwinism?

[Bradley D]

Taking a physics class and studying the workings of the single cell tells me that it all was not some fluke of nature that made the heavens and earth.

[Damian]

Originally Posted by jeffblue101

Do any of the atheists on Tol believe that their materialistic worldview is just an accidental correlation with neo-darwinism?

There are only two options here: determinism or indeterminism. Either everything is physically determined or everything is not. If everything is physically determined, then chance plays no part in evolution. However, if everything is not physically determined, then chance plays some part in evolution. And since a pure chance event has no physical cause by definition, then there can be no physical explanation for it.

So, the question is this: Does the neo-Darwinist believe that mutations are truly random? If he does believe they are truly random, then he is tacitly acknowledging that mutations have no physical cause. (That's a big gaping hole in his materialist worldview). If he does not believe they are truly random, then he is denying that evolution happens by chance.

By the way, theism necessarily implies physical indeterminism. If everything was physically determined, then God could not possibly interact with the creature. Logic dictates this much.

[alwight]

Originally Posted by jeffblue101

http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/dover/day5pm.html
Dover trial testimony of John F. Haught, a Roman Catholic theologian.



Do any of the atheists on Tol believe that their materialistic worldview is just an accidental correlation with neo-darwinism?

My own materialistic worldview exists simply because of the (afaic) total lack of evidence for anything else, while Darwinian evolution it seems has done nothing less than provide solid rational un-falsified answers to all the material evidence.

[Stripe]

Originally Posted by alwight

My own materialistic worldview exists simply because of the (afaic) total lack of evidence for anything else, while Darwinian evolution it seems has done nothing less than provide solid un-falsifiable answers to all the material evidence.

Fixed that for you.

[I aint no monkey]

I must have missed the part in biology class where God could have directed evolution and the mutations weren't random. It appears that theistic evolutionists are still anti-science just like creationists are. Yet the godless evolutionists don't publically chastise them like they do creationists because they ironically help promote the godless agenda and worldview.

[alwight]

Originally Posted by Stripe

Fixed that for you.

You may not like the word "rational" very much Stripe, which I can perhaps understand. But I'll settle for "solid un-falsifiable answers to all the material evidence".

[alwight]

Originally Posted by I aint no monkey

I must have missed the part in biology class where God could have directed evolution and the mutations weren't random.

Probably because God doesn't normally feature in science classes?

Originally Posted by I aint no monkey

It appears that theistic evolutionists are still anti-science just like creationists are.

Not to me it doesn't while many are clearly very much pro-science and far better at it than I am.

Originally Posted by I aint no monkey

Yet the godless evolutionists don't publically chastise them like they do creationists because they ironically help promote the godless agenda and worldview.

The only thing I generally take greater issue with is the denying of material reality and in the presumption that Genesis is somehow literally correct in spite of it. The general idea of a god doesn't bother me at all.

[Selaphiel]

Originally Posted by I aint no monkey

I must have missed the part in biology class where God could have directed evolution and the mutations weren't random. It appears that theistic evolutionists are still anti-science just like creationists are. Yet the godless evolutionists don't publically chastise them like they do creationists because they ironically help promote the godless agenda and worldview.

Based on your post, you seem to have missed a lot of that biology class.

Depends what people want to say when they identify themselves as theistic evolutionists. If they mean that God intervenes into an otherwise physically determined universe to guide the process, then that is problematic to say the least. However, that presupposes a lot of ideas, namely that the world is deterministic and that the world is best described by metaphysical materialism.

The only ones who help atheism are creationists, because they make Christianity look monumentally stupid by saying that you basically have to ignore scientific fact in order to believe it.

[The Barbarian]

For a Christian, God is involved in every particle of the physical world. I don't get why people want to layer some kind of tinkering over that. It all works precisely by His will. The only reason that it looks automatic is He does it by consistent rules. We couldn't survive here if He did not.

[The Barbarian]

I must have missed the part in biology class where God could have directed evolution and the mutations weren't random.

That's because science is, by it's very methodology, unable to comment on the supernatural. Too weak a method for that. Scientists can be theists, but science can't help them with belief.

It appears that theistic evolutionists are still anti-science just like creationists are.

You're confusing science with scientists. We aren't scientific all the time; sometimes it's appropriate to be unscientific. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Yet the godless evolutionists don't publically chastise them like they do creationists because they ironically help promote the godless agenda and worldview.

You've got that backwards. YE creationism is a highly efficient atheist-maker. If you ask most atheists, they'll mention that they were once creationists.

But eventually, by 1994 I was through with young-earth creationISM. Nothing that young-earth creationists had taught me about geology turned out to be true. I took a poll of my ICR graduate friends who have worked in the oil industry. I asked them one question.

"From your oil industry experience, did any fact that you were taught at ICR, which challenged current geological thinking, turn out in the long run to be true? ,"

That is a very simple question. One man, Steve Robertson, who worked for Shell grew real silent on the phone, sighed and softly said 'No!' A very close friend that I had hired at Arco, after hearing the question, exclaimed, "Wait a minute. There has to be one!" But he could not name one. I can not name one. No one else could either. One man I could not reach, to ask that question, had a crisis of faith about two years after coming into the oil industry. I do not know what his spiritual state is now but he was in bad shape the last time I talked to him.

And being through with creationism, I very nearly became through with Christianity. I was on the very verge of becoming an atheist.

http://home.entouch.net/dmd/gstory.htm

[Stripe]

Originally Posted by alwight

You may not like the word "rational" very much Stripe, which I can perhaps understand. But I'll settle for "solid un-falsifiable answers to all the material evidence".

I know.

But us scientists have higher standards.