The Sacred Day
the invasion of God into the ordinary day
Barbour: Religion and Science
a summary of:
Religion and Science
by Ian Barbour 1997 Harper Publishing
Chapter 3: Biology & Theology in the 19th Century
Charles Lyell’s Principles of Geology came out in 1830 and proposed that the normal geological processes we see around us occurred uniformly throughout an immense amount of time to produce the geological structures we currently see. This replaced catastrophism. Biologists of this time, however, believed in the fixity of species and Lamarck had few followers (1802). The fixity of species could be traced not only to Genesis, but to Aristotle’s doctrine of the eternal forms. During this period, much of Biology consisted of documenting how anatomy and physiology supported the argument from design.
Darwin’s HMS Beagle trip in 1832 was the beginning of 27 years of amassing data for his 1859 publication of Origin of Species. Descent of Man came in 1871 and in it he insisted that the human moral and mental faculties differ only in degree and not in kind from those of animals. Scientists of the time accepted Darwin’s claim of a long evolutionary descent from common ancestors, but mostly rejected the notion that natural selection was responsible; they most preferred Lamarck by this time. It was noted that evolution sometimes seemed to occur in parallel paths towards the same endpoint, so there was thought to be an internally programmed plan (this sounds like Simon Conway Morris, doesn’t it?). Also, accepting Lamarck meant avoiding ruthless competition and the possibility of social improvement when biological theories were ported over to politics. Huxley was a determinist and argued that everything we see today could have been predicted by total knowledge of the primeval condition. Chance itself must operate according to some law.
The integrity of Scripture appeared to be challenged by the new theory of evolution. This was exacerbated by some proponents of evolution who sought to use evolution to support their own atheistic viewpoints. However, through the successive revelations of Copernican astronomy and the new geology, there had been a bank of thought built up on how to support scriptural integrity while including modifications due to new scientific discoveries. This included distinguishing between the religious ideas of Genesis and the incorrect cosmology accepted as true by the ancient authors.
The argument from design at the basis of 19th Century natural theology was challenged because the adaptation of organic structures was coupled with a useful purpose as evidence of God’s providence. This was easily absorbed by the concept of natural selection, and evolution easily explained the presence of vestigial organs, which were very difficult to explain with the argument from design.
Meanwhile, Darwin was increasingly distanced from his own traditional religious upbringing. He was troubled by suffering in nature, which he felt was inconsistent with the notion of a good God. He did feel that the creation of a self-evolving nature was a more worthy feat for God to perform than a creation in need of continuous input. As he increasingly moved to an agnostic and mechanistic position, however, he lamented that he could no longer enjoy natural scenery, poetry or literature. “I am a withered leaf for every subject except Science. It sometimes makes me hate Science.” Darwin claimed that morality conferred survival value and hence was a product of evolution and of no intrinsic value.
Many in the Victorian climate of optimism were delighted to have evolution provide a scientific backing to their philosophical progressivism. As philosopher John Fiske wrote at the time, “the perfection of man is the goal toward which nature’s work has been tending from the first.” This led to the development of the Social Darwinism of Herbert Spencer. Darwin himself felt that future progress of mankind was hindered by sentimental policies that protect weaker individuals, but at other times he affirmed traditional Christian ethics. Spencer connected the benefits obtained with natural selection and those obtained with private enterprise free from governmental interference. Huxley tried to counter this by insisting on a sort of moral intuition that we should follow, but it is difficult to figure out the basis for its existence, much less the criteria used to decide which morals should be followed and which discarded.
The religious response to Darwin in the 19th Century was mixed. The conservative Protestants did not want to accept either evolution or the requisite changes to a literal interpretation to Genesis, but some accommodations were made. Charles Hodge of Princeton distinguished between the truths that the Biblical authors intended to teach and the anachronistic additional ideas about cosmology that they happened to believe. He accepted that animal evolution may have occurred; however, he held that Man was a special creation. The Roman Catholics at first were strongly against Darwin, but over the decades grew to accommodate evolution into their theology. By 1943, the Vatican stated that the Bible uses “the modes of expression of ancient peoples” and that the modern interpreter must “go back wholly in spirit to those remote centuries…”. Though the six days of creation may be taken metaphorically, the creation of Adam’s soul was a real event to allow for the doctrine of original sin.
The Modernists were quite happy with evolution. They saw the Bible as a record of human search for God, not as inspired scriptures. The Modernists moved to see the unity of God, humanity and nature, and human nature was thought divine. They dealt with the brutality and suffering of nature as a precondition for progress. Liberal theology differed by defending human dignity from the obvious tawdry aspects of nature by celebrating the victory of the spirit over the natural self. Liberal theology emphasized personal experience as the basis for religion and so did not have to interact strongly with either the Bible or evolution and thus avoided conflict.
Naturalistic philosophies moved from Spencer’s progressivist attempt to derive ethics from evolution and moved on to a more pessimistic outlook. The emphasis on chance was interpreted as implying that life was a “mere eddy in the primeval slime.” Betrand Russell that Man’s “hopes and fears, his loves and beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms…”. Nietzche was influenced by Darwin and claimed that good is simply power itself while bad is weakness. The Superman must liberate himself from every moral scruple. He proposed a program of eugenics to eliminate “inferior strains” of humanity.
Chapter 9: Evolution
First covered are the disputes concerning the Second Law of Thermodynamics as nullifying the evolutionary explanation of the spontaneous development of complexity from simple systems. It is noted that entropy and disorder increase in a closed system, leading to loss of information. However, the development of complex systems such as cells and organisms changes the rules of the game. Certain boundary conditions are created, such as the boundary conditions of a machine that accomplishes work or manufactures something. By setting certain restrictions, the normal physical laws are harnessed to produce something complex out of something simple; there can be no other outcome once these boundary conditions appear. So, once single celled organisms appear, they don’t evolve in the direction of reduced complexity because of the Second Law. They now have other principles acting on them which force them to evolve to match changing environmental conditions. If other cells are also changing and getting more efficient, then the first cell line will either evolve over time or disappear as a species.
Barbour next examines the concept of reductionism. Francis Crick is cited as a reductionist in his famous prediction that “the whole of biology will be explained in terms of the level below it, and so on right down to the atomic level.” Barbour distinguishes between three sorts of reductionism that often get conflated unnecessarily and thus cause misunderstandings.
Methodological reductionism involves which research strategy you choose. For example, I look at Life from the molecular perspective: DNA, RNA and proteins. I venture up to the level of plant anatomy some too. But that does not mean that I must think that the soul, intelligence, behavior or even ecological phenomena can be completely explained from a bottom up approach. I value those who study these fields, but I choose my own area to work on. I happen to take a reductionist rather than an integrative approach.
Epistemological reductionism is the concept of explaining or creating laws governing phenomena at a higher level using laws from a lower level. An example is the gas laws derived from laws concerning molecular kinetics. For this to work, there must be a connectability and a derivability between the phenomena of the two levels. As a counterexample to the gas laws, a DNA sequence of a particular gene could not have been predicted from chemical laws. DNA sequence is determined from the history of the organism; it is on a different, unconnected level from atoms.
Ontological reductionism involves our personal view of reality. A reductionist statement in this vein would be that organisms consist of “nothing but atoms” in a metaphysical sense. It is a materialist disbelief in the separate reality of higher levels.
Sentience is then tackled as an emergent property which as a reality separate from atoms, but of course still interacting with the separate world of atoms. Characteristics that summarize sentience include perception (which even single celled organisms have), the ability to integrate experience, pain and pleasure, purposiveness and anticipation. At this point, I’ll bring in something I mentioned before. Do the Scriptures care much about sentience? They speak more about humans thinking things through and making the right choice. That would involve intelligence, not sentience, and in that category, humans far surpass other species.
Three theological responses to chance:
1) God controls events that appear to be random. Every microevent is divinely directed, but it works out to look statistically “random”. Gould argues that the problem here is that there is too much waste and suffering, as well as blind alleys in evolutionary development. This makes God look evil and/or inefficient and incompetent.
2) God designed a system of law and chance. Chemical and physical properties, such as the abundance of the universal solvent, water, and the bonding proficiency of carbon atoms, was “set up” to favor the development of Life. Darwin favored this. The Anthropic Principle falls into here as well. With things set up this way, chance events would eventually lead to the desired outcome of a sentient organism.
3) God influences events without controlling them. Chance is the main driver, but God does intervene to make events go the way He wants them. It is a continuing creation. Some would hold also that God does not know the final outcome; it is a trial-by-error process.
Looking to the Bible for models of creation:
Genesis 1: imposing order on chaos.
Jer. 18:6; Isa. 64:8: God as a potter
Job 38:4: God as an architect laying out the foundations.
John 1: God creates through His logos
“God as Lord and King” was extended and amplified by medieval and Calvinist thinkers to emphasize predestination and omnipotence, which led to problems with theodicy and evolution.
Matthew 6:26: Fatherly care for nature (watching out for sparrows)
Arthur Peacocke’s models:
– the world is God’s body and God is the world’s mind (but they seem defective to me)
– God is a choreographer of an ongoing and unpredictable dance
Chance is a way of exploring all the potential forms
– God suffers with the world and is not omnipotent
– the world itself is self-creative (evolution)
Different modes of communication between Science and Christianity:
Conflict:
Dawkins tends to add needless dogmatic philosophical and religious statements to his science without careful discussion. He states that since chance and natural selection are the only source of complexity (in Nature) then a complex God could not exist. Of course this is just saying that if one can’t sense something physically it can’t exist, which is the core of the traditional atheist position and not new; there is no transcendence, because there is no transcendence. On the other side, the Biblical literalists discard scientific discoveries when they don’t fit their view of the Scriptures.
Independence:
Neo-orthodoxy places science and Christianity in two different spheres. However, the immanence of God is discarded and a wall of separation between Man and the rest of Nature is erected, which conflicts with science. Christian existentialism falls into this independence mode since it posits that God is only a personal decision and is not active in the natural, physical world. Another theological position that fits here is linguistic analysis, which separates religious and scientific language and makes them incompatible.
Chapter 10: Human Nature
Humans are closely connected to primates and the rest of the mammals. Only a 1% difference in coding sequences distinguishes us from chimps and gorillas, a difference similar to that between horses and zebras. When Australopithecus afarensis appeared in Africa 4 million years ago, this ape had moved from the trees to grasslands and became upright, had its hands freed, and shifted to a hunting lifestyle even before there was any increase in brain size. Thus, the subsequent increase in brain size appeared to have developed in response to problems to be solved in this new environment. Chipped stone tools were not developed until Homo habilis 2 million years later, but you’d have to think that, previous to this, these apes were gathering in groups and stoning other animals or hitting them with large sticks, which wouldn’t leave any fossil artifacts. Homo sapiens appeared 500,000 years ago, but agriculture didn’t get started until 10,000 years ago and writing 6,000 years ago. So we really are only recently descended from real live nonhuman animals.
Other animals have some similarities with us of course, but it is the differences that are unexpected. Chimps can use sign language to put together simple sentences, can put things into groups (like food or tools) and can recognize themselves in a mirror, but they are still far below the level of even a 2-year-old human child.
E. O. Wilson has worked to construct a system of sociobiology, wherein all human action can be reduced to genetic determinants. In this way, sociology and humanities will eventually simply become a part of the study of biology. A problem with this sort of reductionism is the determinism that is its philosophical consequence. Wilson advocates that we know the biological reasons for our actions, which makes a lot of sense, but then goes on to say that all ideological constructs and decision making processes are products of our genetically determined instincts. At this point, there is no place for real freedom of thought or decision making.
Barbour points out that, like biological evolution, there is a cultural evolution occurring in humans, and that the latter has a greater influence than the former on human behavior at present. There is a history of ideas and responses that doesn’t go away or revert to a genetic default. As each social problem arises, a response occurs and becomes an institution or custom, which then develops and gains a life of its own through the generations, creating boundary conditions for how humans act and even for how humans evolve genetically.
Interestingly, in Wilson’s world, there are no morals and there is no responsibility. In Barbour’s world of cultural evolution, there is now community responsibility on top of individual responsibility, so that structures, such as the Church, can be held accountable before God. We see that a lot in the Old Testament (the nation Israel instead of the Church of course). As well, there is now an important role for the prophet. If the institutions are going off in the wrong direction, prophets are needed for setting the right course. In a world of cultural evolution, conflict resolution is not the only answer – prophets are essential.
Barbour goes over four ideas on what the mind and thought is all about.
1) Dualism. This goes back to Plato and Augustine and then to Descartes. The mind and the body (in modern terms, the neuronal connections) are two distinct entities which are completely different from each other. The mind has causal efficacy over the activity of the brain neurons. One problem is wondering how these two entities could interact if they are so different. From an evolutionary perspective, how could the mind have arisen from the body? Descartes felt that animals were mindless machines and dualism does not allow for anything intermediate between mind and body.
2) Materialism. This goes from the Greek atomists through the French Enlightenment and then to B.F. Skinner. The latter insisted that psychology needed to be scientific and science deals only with objective events so therefore mental events must not exist. Instead, we must consider only behaviors, because these can be measured. This, however, forces a metaphysics of materialism on the subject as an assumption. Pain produces many behaviors, but it is not the sum of these behaviors.
3) Two-Aspect Theories. A different language should be used for mind and body. They are on parallel tracks. However, the nature of the actual mental events is left unaddressed.
4) Multilevel Theories. The “self” emerged through evolution. It started as purposiveness, exploratory behavior, and sentience and as such had adaptive value. In the development of humans, a great leap in this evolution occurred, but the evolution as a whole followed a continuous gradient. There emerged from physical neural interactions, from organizational relationships in the brain, a certain irreducible level of operation that had its own set of laws independent of the lower hierarchical levels. It is able to control these lower levels without violating their own laws and the interaction between the two is reciprocal. This affirms human freedom of decision and self-determination.
Chapter 12: God and Nature
Barbour starts with some models of how to view God in His interactions with Man and Nature. First, from medieval Christianity comes the monarchical model. The stress here is on omnipotence, with all events dependent on God’s will and power. This may have derived from Plato’s eternal forms and from Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover, the ultimate Absolute. Aquinas added that God is impassible and is not affected by the world and is not even grieved by our choices. Barbour notes some problems with this model. First, omnipotence and predestination appear to disallow human choice. Second, theodicy problems occur (why would a good God allow evil?). He notes the attempts by neo-Thomists to retain both omnipotence and freedom. There are some interesting, nuanced ways of looking at it. It is difficult, however, to say that God has foreknowledge while not predetermining the action. Barbour also says certain correct things against patriarchy and religious intolerance so that he is accepted in his social group comfortably, as a social animal. The arguments don’t make any sense, but we all make these sorts of compromises (e.g., I will watch a sporting event with friends though, intellectually, I think it’s an absurd phenomenon).
Barbour then looks at some alternatives. First, God can be seen as the determiner of indeterminacy. In quantum mechanics, there are certain events which cannot be predicted. God is the one that calls these events. Subatomic events have tremendous effects on large scale events, so God influences the world in a bottom-up fashion.
Second, God may be seen as the communicator of information. God provides the information by choosing from all the possibilities in chaotic processes, as Polkinghorne proposes. Peacocke looks as God as the choreographer of dancers who can also contribute to the final outcome of the dance. In this way, God exerts a top-down influence.
Third, God could be seen to be omnipotent, but to voluntarily limit his authority to provide us with free will and Nature with chance evolution. God redeems our imperfections rather than prevents them. God may be said to be vulnerable and the outcome of any event is unpredictable even to God. There would be real chance and randomness. Evil is inescapable, but this is mitigated by God’s suffering alongside us.
Fourth, linguistic analysis encourages us to use language appropriate for each category. Thus, we can distinguish between the cause of events physically and the meaning of the events in God. We don’t need to search for a physical mechanism, such as quantum indeterminacies, to explain God. The language of divine action is complementary to scientific language rather than a competitor to it.
I would note that these sorts of discussions are interesting, but they are not the sorts of topics that are discussed in the Scriptures. When I read the Scriptures, I see a lot of text devoted to keeping ourselves holy as God is holy. Just think through the books of the Old Testament. That’s the bulk of the text. Sin is pretty big too. I don’t see that discussed much in Barbour or in most philosophical treatments of theology. I’m not trying to be a downer, but I’m just thinking of the bulk of the text in the Scriptures. When grace and love occur, they are such a reviving breeze because it occurs in context. God’s wooing and suffering is all the more grand. In most of these philosophy texts, we seem to have Man and God pretty well defined, without much mystery, and like two neutral entities trying to make a connection. That can lead to some interesting metaphysical ideas, but why not try launching off from some themes which have a much richer vein of support as a topic in the Scriptures?
