Why does evolution and religion repeatedly clash?

Discussion in 'Off-Topic Discussions' started by Orson, Aug 29, 2005.

Loading...
  1. Orson

    Orson New Member

    One answer comes from science historian Edward J. Larson.

    He says that American religiosity and its opptimistic eschatology collides with the more pessimistic tale of science. That, and it offends our ego. American's prefer hope to chance.

    "This is where lots of people would like to be: beyond science. According to doctrinaire Darwinism, we arose from the muck by chance, we struggled to exist, we will return to dust and probably everything that can remember us or be influenced by our efforts ultimately will end. Intelligent design, on the other hand, posits that we came from a designer who transcends nature's limits and offers us hope that we will live beyond those limits.

    "It should come as little surprise which of these alternatives many Americans choose to believe and want to teach to their children —"

    http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-larson26aug26,0,5849191.story?coll=la-news-comment-opinions

    -Orson
     
  2. DesElms

    DesElms New Member

    Orson, did you just finish a degree, or get fired, or something... such that you have more time on your hands to post all these interesting philosophical questions?
     
  3. Ted Heiks

    Ted Heiks Moderator and Distinguished Senior Member

    You guessed 'er, Chester! When it comes to arguments, most people tend to respond to emotion better than they respond to reason.
    Theory # 1: An all-powerful Being specially created your first ancestors; generation after generation, that Creator knew you (and your ancestors) before you were in your mother's womb; that Creator has a special plan for your life; and that Creator will one day take you home to a mansion in the sky.
    Theory # 2: Your first ancestor was a single-celled entity within a primordial soup that somehow took on enough carbon to achieve life; as the generations went by, eventually multi-cellular life forms came into being; you are a highly-evolved monkey who is here because your parents were stupid and forgot their protection; in the end, everything's futile and all we are is dust in the wind.
    Which do you think most people would prefer to believe, regardless of which might actually be more reasonable?
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Aug 29, 2005
  4. Orson

    Orson New Member

    I actully enjoy the argument from design!

    Ted - we're not actually descended from the monkey, but from monkeys or apes remote ancestors, according to the evolutionary story.

    In fact, I enjoy the "argument from design" the Faithful advance. It's intuitively appealing and without evolution by instruments like natural selection rather compeling. And didn't C S Lewis advance it? I'd even say it's good poetic - sometimes profound literature.

    Arguments from design like ID also give the right something in common with the moralizing environmentalist left! Nature is the Creator's sacred design - don't despoil it -worship nature instead.

    IT's a party bringing opposites together! It's not merely a debate. I enjoy it because in American culture it's perennial. Without it, we may as well be Eurotrash.

    -Orson
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 1, 2005
  5. 3$bill

    3$bill New Member

    Annie Dillard has an interesting take on evolution and the argument from design.

    From Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Bantam Books, pp. 178-79:
     
  6. davidhume

    davidhume New Member

    There is nothing whatsoever, except faith (and ignorance....and fear) to support the Adam and Eve, Garden of Eden, Serpent as Satan, Tower of Babel, Great Flood...stories.

    However, there is ample scientific evidence to support the evolutionary position.

    It all comes down to whether we wish to trust our mind or trust a completed unsupportable religious tale.

    Take your pick!
     
  7. davidhume

    davidhume New Member

    What a completely illogical and nonsensical piece of prose!

    Thanks to the conceptual ability of our mind, it is within the ability of man to build the 3 required engines. No need to produce 9,000 and crash them together hoping 3 will 'evolve' to do the job.

    If this is the best the 'design' school of creation can come up, heaven help us (excuse the pun!).
     
  8. davidhume

    davidhume New Member

    It is also more 'appealing' to think that someone is going to deliver a million dollars to my door tomorrow morning rather then me having to go out and work another day.

    One is wishful thinking; the other reality.

    I think you get the point....

    I really wonder when we are all going to grow up and stop believing religious fairy tales.

    The fact that most of us no longer believe in Santa Claus gives me hope...
     
  9. JLV

    JLV Active Member

    Re: I actully enjoy the argument from design!

    :D :D

    Hilarious :D :D
     
  10. 3$bill

    3$bill New Member

    davidhume,
    Dillard piece is not a critique of evolution; It's a comment on the design argument in its Deist form.
     
  11. Guest

    Guest Guest

  12. davidhume

    davidhume New Member

    The design argument still maintains some form of God. And with the belief in a God comes all the religious claptrap and baggage.

    A deist is basically a sceptic who fears to go the whole way. A foot in each camp, as it were.
     
  13. 3$bill

    3$bill New Member

    davidhume,
    Dillard's point is the absurdity of the Deist argument.
     
  14. Orson

    Orson New Member

    It depends. As a critic of ID wrote in Time magazine lately, Believers have evolved! Before it was ex nihilo "Creationism" that was advanced as "scientific" - now it's ID and the argument against the "gaps" of evolution that allegedly "make" it science.

    HERE's how I see the continuum:
    I really think that deist's like my old prof (now in his 80s) Antony Flew are barely desists - then there are the traditional deists of skeptical dissent from Christisn embrace of an interrvening God - next, the New Age Unitarian Universalists - and finally, the strict ID'ers.

    Beyond this point, there are all kinds of the Faithful. Those struggling to maintain Belief, challenged by the vast findings of science clashing with metaphysiics. And then you have sotte voce proselytizers, and lastly, the active smugglers trying to foist biblical literalism on us through the public schools.

    I suspect the last two groups are most responsible for the current School Board disputes. Any disagreements?

    -Orson
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Sep 4, 2005

Share This Page