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PZ Myers. 2005 Apr 20. Papal anti-evolution. <http://pharyngula.org/index/weblog/papal_anti_evolution/>. Accessed 2008 Dec 01.

Posted on M00o93H7pQ09L8X1t49cHY01Z5j4TT91fGfr on Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Papal anti-evolution

We have a much more serious problem with this new pope than that he had to serve in the Hitler Youth for a while or that he is a zombie: Bill Dembski loves him, thinks he's going to favor Intelligent Design creationism, and that he's going to help destroy evolution. John Lynch seems to know a bit about his background on the topic, and is unimpressed with the quality of the Catholic anti-evolution argument. Here's Pope Ratzi on evolution:

It is the affair of the natural sciences to explain how the tree of life in particular continues to grow and how new branches shoot out from it. This is not a matter for faith. But we must have the audacity to say that the great projects of the living creation are not the products of chance and error…(They) point to a creating Reason and show us a creating Intelligence, and they do so more luminously and radiantly today than ever before. Thus we can say today with a new certitude and joyousness that the human being is indeed a divine project, which only the creating Intelligence was strong and great and audacious enough to conceive of. Human beings are not a mistake but something willed.

Bleh.

I can see why Dembski would be giddy with delight, though: he's got a fellow anti-scientific teleologist in the Vatican now. And in the White House? Dembski thinks so:

I’m predicting that Bush and Benedict XVI will play much the same role in the distintegration of evolution (i.e., the ateleological materialistic form of it that currently dominates the West) as Reagan and John Paul II did in the disintegration of communism.

Neither Bush nor Pope Ratzi are scientists. They don't do science, they don't support science. They aren't going to provide any evidence, and they aren't going to persuade anyone on scientific terms. It is revealing, to say the least, that Bill Dembski thinks these two can determine the outcome of a scientific endeavor—and it's clear that the Intelligent Design creationists don't see this as a project that will be settled by legitimate evidence. It will be settled by the side that has the most potent autocrat.

Posted by PZ Myers on 04/20 at 07:13 AM
Creationism • Godlessness • 5 Trackbacks • Other weblogs • Permalink

I don't pay that much attention to papal politics. Is this really a change from the previous pope? You would expect religious leaders to believe that events in this world are shaped by divine will, even if purely materialistic explanations abound.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 07:24 AM
PZ I don't think they really care much anymore about even the facade of science. These bills in Alabama that Nick has been writing up have a provision that you cannot criticize them as being religiously motivated ... it would be illegal to say that.

Check this out for example

"In 2004, Mitchell reportedly defended SB 336 by saying, "I think there is a tremendous ill-balance in the classroom when you can't discuss all viewpoints. This bill will level the playing field because it allows a teacher to bring forward the biblical creation story of humankind," although he later commented, "We are trying to take every step we can to ensure that the people who are operating under this legislation are not challenged on the idea it is a religious effort."

So they're trying to rig it so that no one can call purposely backing this shit, so that biblical creationism can be taught, religiously motivated.
#: Posted by DarkSyde on 04/20 at 07:25 AM
"Neither Bush nor Pope Ratzi are scientists. They don't do science, they don't support science." Is Bill Dembski a scientist or is he a "scientist"? Does he "do science" and does he "support science"?
#: Posted by Danny on 04/20 at 07:48 AM
Bill does sophistry, not science. At least you can ask him yourself what the testable scientific theory of non human intelligent design is and, assuming he repsonds, you'll likely get a bunch of bullshit which will bounce around from trying to intimidate you with pseudomathematics, to claims there really is a scientific theory of non human ID in the context of evo but you can't understand it, to the claim that science doesn't matter because it makes wild assumptions like "Magic can't be used as an explanation unless the magic is testable' or the crazy claim that 'the universe exists'.
#: Posted by DarkSyde on 04/20 at 08:08 AM
I'm a little puzzled. Just what do you expect a believing Catholic to say about the universe and life and how they came to be the way they are? Clearly a believing Catholic has to accept "intelligent design" in the most straightforward sense of those words, even if he also believes that the designer used natural selection to get to his desired results. I think that's an incredibly odd, roundabout, and inefficient way for an intelligent designer to work, but that's what science-friendly Christians think; otherwise, they're no longer Christians.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:09 AM
Danny, no. But Reagan and JP II were politicians. To the (limited) extent that they played a role in the downfall of communism, a political system, it was by engaging in politics.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:10 AM
Of course I'm not surprised that the head of the Catholic church believes in a magical being who guides our lives. The troubling thing is that some people believe this is a point of view that legitimately belongs in our interpretation of science.
#: Posted by PZ Myers on 04/20 at 08:19 AM
Ethan--yeah, it's a change. JP II took the same general stance (God created everything, then guided natural forces to make us) but was very progressive about science. He pretty much said that the evidence is indisputable for evolution and needs to be reconciled with religious beliefs, rather than denied. He had an interesting exchange with Steven Hawking that I'll try to remember. I disagree with most of what the post-mortem pope did, but even I have to give him the science thing.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:24 AM
"We have a much more serious problem with this new pope than that he had to serve in the Hitler Youth for a while ..."

Thank you.
#: Posted by The Commissar on 04/20 at 08:29 AM
If Benedict and Bush are to science what Reagan and John Paul II were to communism then there is no need to worry, because communism collapsed on its own with little help from any Western leader.

By the way, PZ, how do I disable email notification of follow-up comments by default? I usually forget to uncheck the box, so I then have to unsubscribe to every thread I post to.
#: Posted by Alon Levy on 04/20 at 08:30 AM
Megan,
I was vaguely aware that JPII was good on science. However, looking at the quote from Ratzi I can't help but think that JPII would have signed on to it as well. It doesn't deny evolution as much as it claims to see the hand of God in its workings. One might say the same about gravity. Whether or not Ratzi is willing to lend support to the ID crowd is a separate question. I'm not aware that it's been answered yet.

I think I'll stick to regarding his fondness for protecting pederasts as his worst failing..... for now.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:33 AM
Neither Reagen nor John Paul II brought down Communism! The Soviet Union collapsed under its own weight! It didn't do that in 8 years, it took several decades of U.S. and world policy for the CCCP to collapse.

What we have to get used to is that we are entering a new "Dark Ages." Where the only education is a religious one. Where superstition and guesswork is held in higher esteem than rigorous scientific study. I for one welcome our new insect overlords!
#: Posted by Monty Zoom on 04/20 at 08:40 AM
If you believe in God, then you believe in ID - that's a no-brainer. The real leap of faith is to DENY the existence of God, yet still assert ID. Boggles the mind.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:41 AM
It's hard to say you know. He might turn out to be no worse than John Paul II. And JPII was a mixed bag, but we could have done much worse for the last 26 years. Seems to me like you might run into a theology problem if he contradicts a prior Pope. I don't know how that works. But I think they have to be stick with the partie line that JPII was basically inerrant about all things or close to it ... but just from a political viewpoint you have to figure he might hold off stating the JPII was dead wrong about anything even if it's technically kosher.

To tell you the truth I wouldn't even be talking about Ratzi or Popesm ... but it's being shouted out at me from every news channel, every blog, every newspaper, every telephone conversation, and has been for a fukcing month straight. I seriously wonder if there's any other news being made the last few weeks.
Based on what I'm hearing I'd predict for this guy the same thing that Bush has done for the US. He will take the church from the center of the world's attention with everyone wishing it the best in the aftermath of a loss, and within a year or two the RCC will be either ridiculed, ignored, or hated by much of the rest of the planet, and catholics will be at each other's throats bitterly divided like they haven't been in decades, while Ratzi stuff his buddies pockets full of cash in imaginative giveaways that look half way honorable. That'd be my best guess, but who knows?
#: Posted by DarkSyde on 04/20 at 08:41 AM
Yeah June but Demsbki doesn't just believe in God and ID, his version of ID specifically says that God DID NOT use common descent/diversification.
#: Posted by DarkSyde on 04/20 at 08:43 AM
Of course I'm not surprised that the head of the Catholic church believes in a magical being who guides our lives. The troubling thing is that some people believe this is a point of view that legitimately belongs in our interpretation of science.

True, but those people are pretty much the same today as they were a few weeks ago. If things look bad, it's because they've been that way for a while.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:46 AM
OK, so despite some of the wording of your post (e.g. "Papal Anti-Evolution"), there's no evidence of anything uniquely troubling about Ratzinger with regard to evolution and natural selection. Precision is a virtue, Professor, even when you're venting.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 08:53 AM
Oh, come off it, PZ: You and I may know that there's no guiding intelligence behind evolution, but you can hardly expect the Pope to say that, even if he believed it.

The best we freethinkers can hope for is for him to acknowledge, as John Paul II did, that Darwinian evolution isn't incompatible with Christian belief. If God wants to step in late in the process and inject a nonphysical element -- a "soul" -- fine. We don't see it, and we needn't try to account for it; it's his problem.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:01 AM
I agree that entitling the post "Papal Anti-evolution" is not a great description of the true case.

PZ, this really isn't a change from Pope John Paul II. Read JP's full comments on evolution from 10 years ago sometime. It is unlikely in the extreme that Benedictine will change anything regarding the Church's teaching on evolution. The essential belief is that evolution happened and the Church has no problem with current evolutionary theory, but God is responsible for it all (as, according to the Church, He is for everything). The difference between the Catholic Church and Protestant fundies is that, as far as evolution goes anyway, the Catholic Church recognizes the difference between religion and science and does not try to claim its belief is anything other than faith, whereas evolution is science. In fact, the Catholic Church has quite happily had evolution taught in its own schools for decades. From some anecdotes I've heard, it may even be more open to teaching it in its classrooms than public schools these days, given the pressure fundies are putting on public schools to teach "alternatives" to evolution.

Dembski's just too stupid to realize that. Just because the Church considers evolution to be God's way of producing the diversity of life does not mean that it will support his pseudoscience or move to promote the teaching of intelligent design in the science classroom.
#: Posted by Orac on 04/20 at 09:04 AM
To follow up: as a Jew, as a supporter of gay rights, women's rights, death with dignity, and freedom of speech (among other things) I have much bigger problems with Rat****er than his failure to be an atheist.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:06 AM
As I've already said, I don't expect the pope to be an atheist. My points here were that 1) that quote from Ratzinger is so much babbling noise, and isn't particularly impressive as a defense of much of anything, and 2) some members of the ID crowd think he's just wonderful, and are arguing that the opinions of a religious leader and a Republican non-scientist are going to have a significant effect on the process of science.

Read the last paragraph for my summary of the problem. It definitely isn't that the Pope believes in Jesus.
#: Posted by PZ Myers on 04/20 at 09:15 AM
Theophylact is right. All John Paul II ever said was that evolution was not incompatible with Catholic doctrine. That's all you could ever expect any Pope to say. It went further than any other Pope before him. Of course a Catholic theologian is going to say God is responsible for it all. The point is, the Church recognizes that the belief that God is responsible for the diversity of life is a matter of faith. Look at Ratzinger's own quote: "It is the affair of the natural sciences to explain how the tree of life in particular continues to grow and how new branches shoot out from it. This is not a matter for faith."
#: Posted by Orac on 04/20 at 09:18 AM
"You and I may know that there's no guiding intelligence behind evolution"

I'm sorry - you KNOW this? how, exactly?
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:24 AM
Since the influence of the RCC seems to be strongest in South America and Africa I would be more interested in seeing some sensible talk about condoms from Ratz. That could have real, positive results. How much guidance he thinks his magic friend provides evolution is pretty much hot air.

US and European Catholics pretty much ignore any impractical nonsense coming from the Vatican anyway.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:26 AM
I know there is NO EVIDENCE for a guiding intelligence.

People who think otherwise are welcome to tell me what it is. The ID creationists have been saying there is for years, and have failed to show anything for it.
#: Posted by PZ Myers on 04/20 at 09:27 AM
If you believe in God, then you believe in ID - that's a no-brainer. The real leap of faith is to DENY the existence of God, yet still assert ID. Boggles the mind.

I think many die-hard evolutionists who have a personal faith would be very surprised to hear that they believe in Intelligent Design.

Ratzi's official position is a dangerous one, because it superficially aligns him with JP2's comparatively progressive stance on evolution, but undermines its core message. JP2's position was really a more adamant legacy of Pius XII's statement that evolution is not inimical to the Catholic faith. JP2's position represented an advance in the right direction in that he emphasized that faith and science do not belong in the same place and in underscoring that evolution is "the most robust theory" to explain biological evolution.

In calling for "audacity" Ratzi is clearly trying to reintroduce matters of faith and religion into the scientific conversation. That erodes the distance that the two Popes previous took care to place between them.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:30 AM
"I know there is NO EVIDENCE for a guiding intelligence."

Okay ... and so you *know* there isn't one?

Do you *know* that things (don't press me on what I mean by "things," because we'll end up in linguistics-land, where I don't think either of us want to be) exist independent of observation?

Science is useful. If you want to build a structure that won't fall down, make your stomach stop hurting, or travel great distances quickly, it's the best game in town.

Science can't determine ends, though - and it can't answer questions like this.

I'm not at all down with creation "science" being taught in schools. By all means, teach 'em evolution and its implications - but I'd like to see ethics instruction there as well. There are other "conversations" beyond the scientific.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:36 AM
It's the "chance and error" phrase that worries me. This is classic creationist jargon. To me, use of this language implies that B16 doesn't <i>understand<i> evolution nearly as well as JP2 did, and therefore isn't capable of making informed decisions about it. In my experience, those with the least knowledge of evolution are among the most hostile to it.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:49 AM
Once again, we have witnessed a pope evolve from a lower Primate.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 09:54 AM
A useful way to see what PZ is going on about is to think of creationism as a position that comes in degrees and shades. The current pope, like his recently deceased predecessor is, no doubt, a selective creationist. JP II explicitly defended the thesis that human psychological faculties were created independenly and did not arise out of evolution. This is a creationist position - it is just less extreme than (say) someone who claims the 6000 year position etc.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 10:19 AM
According to catholic.net, http://www.catholic.net/RCC/Periodicals/Inside/01-97/creation.html Pope John Paul II never embraced "Darwin's theories of evolution," and any suggestion that he did so was a distortion by the mass media. What's really interesting is that the Vatican has its own specialist in these matters, according to catholic.net. He is (or was -- the date of this article is unclear) Vittorio Marcozzi, who, the article says, "was summoned by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger to the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith to debate with eminent scientists who have written on evolution and creation." Here's what the Vatican expert on evolution, summoned by the man who is now pope, has to say about it, in part:

Evolution is not admissible without the mediation of a supreme Mind which established the laws of nature governing natural processes and which created nature itself. ... For Darwin - a materialist criticized by his own wife for his lack of faith - evolution was set in motion by outside causal factors such as natural selection and the struggle for survival. According to the English scientist, all beings, including man, evolve from causal mutations. Apart from the absence of clear proofs for the intermediary forms of human existence, can we really believe that such marvelous beings, particularly man himself, are products of mere chance?

A billion and a half years have passed between the existence of one-celled and many-celled organisms, and yet there seem to be no intermediate forms linking the two.

These links are missing; they may never be found. What explains such great evolutionary leaps? Can they possibly be the result of material changes?

I rather see a divine intervention.

It looks as if the Vatican expert on evolution doesn't even understand it.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 10:26 AM
, the Catholic Church recognizes the difference between religion and science and does not try to claim its belief is anything other than faith,

I have always found this puzzling, because an understanding of science, A TRUE understanding of empirical science, leads to conclusions about the supernatural that are unavoidable. To their(dis) credit fundies are more consistent with Christian doctrine than Catholics even thought they are wrong about evolution.

The Catholic view of God placing souls into the first human doesn't allow for:

1. original sin
2. Makes the first human a product of souless parents.
3. Effectively makes the sacrifice of Jesus unecessary due to the above.

There simply is no way around the difficulties without making shit up.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 10:39 AM
"I have always found this puzzling, because an understanding of science, A TRUE understanding of empirical science, leads to conclusions about the supernatural that are unavoidable"

Do tell.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 10:43 AM
A billion and a half years have passed between the existence of one-celled and many-celled organisms, and yet there seem to be no intermediate forms linking the two.
Yes! That is so true! So... answer me this, Mr. Science Type Person:

Where is all the evidence for (what would presumably be) a 1.5-celled organism?

Furthermore, how could 1/2 of a cell be advantageous to anyone?
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 10:56 AM
Here's the official Roman Catholic opinion on evolution as I understand it:

They accept evolution as a scientific fact but reject any "survival of the fittest" conclusions that people may draw from it. In other words, they accept that Darwin was right, but reject any kind of "social Darwinism." And, naturally, in any spot where randomness occurred, they see the hand of God. Not too strange coming from a church.

The Catholic Church also considers the creation story/stories in Genesis to be metaphor, not literal, so they would NOT be on board with any kind of "Young Earth Creationism."
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 11:01 AM
Read my posts (both of them) and it should be apparent that my puzzlement came from the implication (unintended?) that this Pope is in some way "anti-evolution." While I'm at it, I'll add that you also imply (without intending to as well?) that this new guy in some way marks a turn for the worse compared to his predecessor: "He [Dembski]'s got a fellow anti-scientific teleologist in the Vatican NOW..." (emphasis supplied). In fact, there doesn't seem to be any reason to think this new fellow is any worse (or better) on science than John Paul II. My question (and maybe I didn't express it clearly) amounted to this: why all the fuss over one more theist who accepts evolution? (He's an important theist to be sure; but he almost certainly will NOT depart from the views of his predecessor, so nothing important has changed.) I find this fuss particularly puzzling, given that you've gone to some pains elsewhere to distinguish theists who accept evolution from the principal objects of your ire: the Discovery Institute types and their ilk. You merely condescend to the former; you spray the latter (deservedly, no doubt) with all the verbal bile you can muster.

So no, I didn't misunderstand your post in the obtuse way you suggest I did.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 11:43 AM
I am an atheist now, but I was a Catholic when I was a child. At Catholic school they taught us plain evolution in science class (often by a priest) and the Genesis in religion class. As far as I can tell, Catholics don't see any contradiction in doing so.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 11:48 AM
Here's what John Paul II said, ex cathedra:

Taking into account the scientific research of the era, and also the proper requirements of theology, the encyclical Humani Generis treated the doctrine of "evolutionism" as a serious hypothesis, worthy of investigation and serious study, alongside the opposite hypothesis. Pius XII added two methodological conditions for this study: one could not adopt this opinion as if it were a certain and demonstrable doctrine, and one could not totally set aside the teaching Revelation on the relevant questions. He also set out the conditions on which this opinion would be compatible with the Christian faith–a point to which I shall return.

Today, more than a half-century after the appearance of that encyclical, some new findings lead us toward the recognition of more than one hypothesis within the theory of evolution. In fact it is remarkable that this theory has had progressively greater influence on the spirit of researchers, following a series of discoveries in different scholarly disciplines. The convergence in the results of these independent studies–which was neither planned nor sought–constitutes in itself a significant argument in favor of the theory.

What is the significance of a theory such as this one? To open this question is to enter into the field of epistemology. A theory is a meta-scientific elaboration, which is distinct from, but in harmony with, the results of observation. With the help of such a theory a group of data and independent facts can be related to one another and interpreted in one comprehensive explanation. The theory proves its validity by the measure to which it can be verified. It is constantly being tested against the facts; when it can no longer explain these facts, it shows its limits and its lack of usefulness, and it must be revised.

Moreover, the elaboration of a theory such as that of evolution, while obedient to the need for consistency with the observed data, must also involve importing some ideas from the philosophy of nature.

And to tell the truth, rather than speaking about the theory of evolution, it is more accurate to speak of the theories of evolution. The use of the plural is required here–in part because of the diversity of explanations regarding the mechanism of evolution, and in part because of the diversity of philosophies involved. There are materialist and reductionist theories, as well as spiritualist theories. Here the final judgment is within the competence of philosophy and, beyond that, of theology.

The magisterium of the Church takes a direct interest in the question of evolution, because it touches on the conception of man, whom Revelation tells us is created in the image and likeness of God. The conciliar constitution Gaudium et Spes has given us a magnificent exposition of this doctrine, which is one of the essential elements of Christian thought. The Council recalled that "man is the only creature on earth that God wanted for its own sake." In other words, the human person cannot be subordinated as a means to an end, or as an instrument of either the species or the society; he has a value of his own. He is a person. By this intelligence and his will, he is capable of entering into relationship, of communion, of solidarity, of the gift of himself to others like himself. St. Thomas observed that man's resemblance to God resides especially in his speculative intellect, because his relationship with the object of his knowledge is like God's relationship with his creation. (Summa Theologica I-II, q 3, a 5, ad 1) But even beyond that, man is called to enter into a loving relationship with God himself, a relationship which will find its full expression at the end of time, in eternity. Within the mystery of the risen Christ the full grandeur of this vocation is revealed to us. (Gaudium et Spes, 22) It is by virtue of his eternal soul that the whole person, including his body, possesses such great dignity. Pius XII underlined the essential point: if the origin of the human body comes through living matter which existed previously, the spiritual soul is created directly by God ("animas enim a Deo immediate creari catholica fides non retimere iubet"). (Humani Generis)

As a result, the theories of evolution which, because of the philosophies which inspire them, regard the spirit either as emerging from the forces of living matter, or as a simple epiphenomenon of that matter, are incompatible with the truth about man. They are therefore unable to serve as the basis for the dignity of the human person.

Here's one site where it's available: http://www.saint-mike.org/Library/Papal_Library/John_PaulII/Addresses/evolution.html

I would be surprised and disappointed were Benedict XVI to back away from that stand. As I understand it, John Paul II invited several well-informed biologists to discuss this issue for a couple of years before saying anything at all -- James Ferris may have been one, if my memory serves correctly. It's a reasoned stand, and not one that should give much comfort to creationists.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 12:57 PM
See here, too: http://cas.bellarmine.edu/tietjen/Resources/vatican_admits_darwin_correct.htm
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 12:59 PM
C. Schuyler said: "Just what do you expect a believing Catholic to say about the universe and life and how they came to be the way they are? Clearly a believing Catholic has to accept "intelligent design" ...<snip>"
(I'm just using this post as an example, not criticizing its content).

What I would like to point out is this: when we criticize people's statements, we shouldn't have to temper our criticisms by arbitrary constraints such as what religion they belong to. In other words, yes, a Catholic has to accept ID, but no one has to be Catholic!

What someone believes in private is, of course, up to them and I won't criticize someone for merely believing in a religion. However, if someone makes public statements, they open themselves up to public criticism. It's no defense to say, "That's what they have to say, since they're (insert religion here)." Of course we're not surprised at such statements, but that fact doesn't make the statements immune from criticism.

So when this guy says that living things "..point to a creating Reason and show us a creating Intelligence, and they do so more luminously and radiantly today than ever before", we have every right to point out that this is crap; or more specifically, that "Human beings are not a mistake but something willed" presents a false dichotomy: we are neither a mistake nor something willed, but a product of evolution, and to say otherwise is, as a matter of fact, incorrect.
#: Posted by Pete on 04/20 at 01:04 PM
"as a matter of fact"

So it's a fact that we are not willed?
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 01:15 PM
I shouldn't feed the trolls, but Knemon should know that the theory of evolution has no need for any hypothetical guiding intelligence. Knemon, after being all but directly invited to present any evidence for guiding intelligence has instead seen fit to flit on to other insipid little logic games.

If we're having a scientific discussion about what is or isn't, there needs to be evidence for whatever hypothetical Knemon wishes to introduce. Show us something supernatural, Knemon. Show us the observations and evidence for our having been willed by some guiding intelligence. That we are the product of evolution is as much of a fact as that of gravity or a heliocentric solar system.

Knemon's tactic appears to be an effort to prove a negative, that evolution is false, by demanding we prove that there is no magic sky pixie du jour. One may as well ask me to prove that God didn't paint this graffito of the Baby Jesus Escape Hatch instead of a Madonna.
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/20 at 02:56 PM
But I think they have to be stick with the partie line that JPII was basically inerrant about all things or close to it ... but just from a political viewpoint you have to figure he might hold off stating the JPII was dead wrong about anything even if it's technically kosher.

As far as my understanding of Catholic theolology goes the pope is only considered infallible when he makes a special kind of statement. Such a statement has only been made once. (I think it declared that Mary, the mother of Jesus, was lifted directly into heaven without dying.)
These special statement can also only be about fundamental matters of faith. The pope offering the opion that one scientific theory is correct would not qualify as infallible.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 03:30 PM
On a related topic, over at Powerline, Hindrocket thinks the bible somehow provides more insight into human nature than the study of primates does. How else to read this:

"But who do you think has a more sophisticated understanding of human nature: Cardinal Ratzinger, the new pope, or the researcher who believes that studying bonobos can enable humans to construct an 'ideal world'?"
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 04:07 PM
As an ex-Catholic who got all A's in religion for 14 straight years, I can tell you what the lumpen- or garden variety Catholic was taught:

Darwinian evolution is OK, as long as you admit that at some (unspecified) point in the progression, God put immortal souls in humans.

Aside from style, I don't see much difference between Ratzinger's statement and either Humani Generis or the common and commonsense attitude toward evolution that American Catholics displayed in the 1950s and for a while thereafter.

It seems to me that Southern backwoods yahoo views have crept into the ordinary Catholic consciousness (from the right, but balanced, so to speak, by Kumbiyah views from the left) in recent years, so that American Catholics are more likely to express skepticism about evolution generally than they used to be.

What non-American Catholics imagine is anybody's guess. They see swirls in pizza sauce as evidence for divinity.

If we believe in darwinian principles of selection, the outlook for Ratzinger's reactionary views (psychologically, he wants to go back to the 1840s in everything else, so why not with biology, too?) must be dim.

I read the creation/evolution debates back in the early '80s, and I found a lot of really crappy defenses of evolution. Even the best defenders, like Kitcher and Ruse, were none too profound, although given the carny-barker presentation of that generation of creationists, they didn't have to be.

Thanks to suggestions I read here, I have gone into the current literature.

The sophistication/deviousness of the creationists' arguments have improved by a great amount, but the counterargumentation is evolving even faster. I was greatly impressed by Pennock's 'Tower of Babel.'

If evolution means anything -- that is, if it has any utility (like keeping people healthy) -- then the future belongs to it.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 05:18 PM
I, too, am an atheist who grew up Catholic and attended Catholic schools; plain vanilla evolution was taught in science classes. I can't imagine this being an issue. The church has a whole laundry list of things more important than picking a fight with science. (You know, like making sure people at risk for HIV don't use condoms, and encouraging the faithful to breed like rabbits by avoiding birth control.)

As a Catholic, my understanding was that the creation stories of Genesis were not to be taken literally. The natural workings of the universe, in all their magnificence, were to be taken as a sign of the glory of god, and as a reminder that s/he can't be pigeonholed into a performer of magic tricks.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 05:40 PM
Just because Dembski thinks the pope is on his side against evolutionary biology, it doesn't mean he is; Dembski thinks a lot of things. I don't hold out any hope that Ratzinger will soften the conservative positions he's known to have, but before I fret that he's going to be any harder-line than Wojtyla's fairly tolerant position on modern science (which I'd guess Ratzinger was a party to), I'm going to need more evidence.
#: Posted by Matt McIrvin on 04/20 at 07:19 PM
The sophistication/deviousness of the creationists' arguments have improved by a great amount, but the counterargumentation is evolving even faster.

I think the Internet helped a lot. I'm heartened by the fact that climate scientists finally seem to be following the evolution defenders' lead in using the Web as a clearinghouse for defenses of their work.
#: Posted by Matt McIrvin on 04/20 at 07:24 PM
So Demski no longer argues that ID will win out through its superior arguments; instead, he figures that the combined temporal and spiritual power of Bush and Benedict will be enough to displace science with ID Creationism. Talk about giving someone enough rope to hang themselves...
#: Posted by Bartholomew on 04/20 at 07:54 PM
I can't spell. That should, of course, have been "Dumbski".
#: Posted by Bartholomew on 04/20 at 07:56 PM
Although not quite an atheist, I spent 8/12 years in Catholic schools as well, and they taught evolution in science class without once mentioning God. Pope Benedictine is highly unlikely to change that.
#: Posted by Orac on 04/20 at 08:58 PM
Orac (#21) and theophylact (#20) summed it up best I reckon. From what I can tell, PBXVI isn't going to change any of the progress PJII made in terms of acknowledging evolution as a reality.

Actually, this should be cause for celebration. What they are basically saying is that scientists know what they are doing with science and it should be left up to them. The Catholic church's (and other churches') responsiblity is to work out how these new science discoveries impact on their faith.

By the same token, scientists aren't the ones who should be running the church, especially scientists who don't actually believe in God.

There is nothing contradictory in letting science do its thing and accepting modern scientific consensus and yet maintaining a faith in a God who kicked the whole process off and establish the laws which govern the process of life and evolution.

It all had to start somewhere, which is why the 'big bang' theory was such a big step in science. 'God' is the church's response to the question 'how did it all start?'. PZ, you are more than welcome to have a different answer. But neither position affects at all the ability to conduct science and figure out how it all worked since it started.

The church shouldn't be afraid of scientists conducting science, and scientists shouldn't be afraid of Church conducting church. That's why PJII's statement above is actually a glimmer of light in all this.

In response to June, I believe in God, but I certainly don't suscribe to ID. I do believe in intelligence and design however (in lower case). I believe humans have the intelligence to figure out the design of things even as apparently complex as a flagellum. I also believe that understanding something in depth in no way undermines its specialness or 'cool design factor'. ID as a philosophical construct is useless because its too narrowly focused (nevermind all the other reasons why it doesnt help our understanding of the world).
#: Posted by dp on 04/20 at 11:01 PM
Incidentally, I had an encounter with Dembski years ago when he toured down-under promoting this brand-new concept of 'ID'.

I knew nothing about what it was then, but went to talk to him afterwards about the myriad of problems with simply saying 'i don't understand it, therefore it has to be God'. I was looking for a reasoned dialogue with an intelligent counterpart, but got completely brushed off until his minder explained why I was worth listening to. He then went in to a long pre-prepared hyper-defensive spiel that left me none the wiser.

It was my first exposure to ID, and it certainly put me right off it from the start.
#: Posted by dp on 04/20 at 11:08 PM
I think people are misunderstanding me. I do believe in evolution. I'm just saying that the question of whether it is a willed process is unanswerable by science. "Evolution is as much a fact as gravity" - absolutely. "It's a fact that there is no intelligence/purpose behind it" - uh, no it's not. That's a question beyond the purview of science.

"Insipid logic games?" Yeah, see, that's what I mean about there being other conversations than the scientific.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 11:19 PM
I'm with you on that one Knemon...
#: Posted by dp on 04/20 at 11:21 PM
Well, thanks.
I'm not saying *I* necessarily think there is a guiding intelligence. I'm not - what did the earlier poster say - a "backwoods" type (cute). I'm not a Catholic or evangelical fundamentalist; I've never even been baptized. But I'm willing to accept the possibility that there is more than the material/empirical ... which seems to threaten some people. S'all I'm saying.
#: Posted by on 04/20 at 11:41 PM
It's a fact that evolution is a theory depending upon not a shred of teleology. You want to discuss Willed Processes, you're going to be having something other than a scientific conversation unless you've got something other than belief to bring to the table. You're welcome to believe that such conversations are all transcendental and beyond the purview of science; whatever gets you through the night. I can't tell what makes Thor any worse than the IPU other than by the behavior of their believers and I'm not interested in whatever it is that insipid trolls worship.
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/20 at 11:55 PM
Threaten some people? Get over yourself. An agnostic believes nothing for which there is no evidence. To quote Dawkins, "Bertrand Russell used a hypothetical teapot in orbit about Mars for the same didactic purpose. You have to be agnostic about the teapot, but that doesn't mean you treat the likelihood of its existence as being on all fours with its non-existence."
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 12:02 AM
My point is that regardless of whether you believe evolution was a 'willed process' or not, you can still study that process through science.

What the young-earth creationist crowd and dembskiists want is for us to ignore what science has revealed and continues to reveal about the process.

In that context, the Catholic church should be thanked for letting scientists do what they (and only they) do best. It is the churches' problem how to reconcile that scientific knowledge with their faith (or whether it is reconcilible).
#: Posted by dp on 04/21 at 12:12 AM
This is going off-topic - no more mention of the pope or Dembski here - but I'd like to take you up on this, Knemon.

The positing of an "intelligence behind" evolution has a logical emptiness that puts it well inside the realm of things we ought to disbelieve. There is an infinite class of such things. One could just as easily say "It's not a fact that there are no green trombone-playing Finnish-speaking stamp-collecting hermit crabs on Mars." Well, actually, yes it is a fact that there are none. The proposition that there are such entities has nowhere to hang itself on in our framework of the world -- for it to be true, the overwhelming majority of what we hold to be true would have to be false. That’s why we disbelieve this kind of universal negative, instead of remaining agnostic toward it.

You are using the word "fact" here in a very restricted sense, which, interestingly, usually only comes up when deities are being discussed. Some people want to “leave the door” open for things like deities - but that means you have to leave the door open to a host of other things that in practice no one would even consider.

When you say there may have been an "intelligence behind" evolution, you make a statement with a counterfactual implication. In this case, the implication is this: "Had the intelligence not been behind evolution, things would have turned out differently." (If you are not willing to claim this, then your statement about intelligence being “behind” evolution loses all meaning - it can be a phrase you like to say or like the sound of, but what could it possibly mean?) (--this is a long post, so if you answer anything in it, I would like it to be this: what really are you envisioning, in concrete terms, when you say there could be an “intelligence behind” evolution?)

With this in mind, here is why it is a fact that there is no intelligence behind evolution.

Imagine a machine that carries 1000 billiard balls up a conveyor belt and drops them into a rapidly spinning box. The balls bounce around chaotically as they are dropped in. Finally the box stops spinning and the balls are let out of the box one by one. You record the order of the balls as they come out. It is random. If there is a paradigm case of a process with no intelligence behind it, this is very close to it. That there is no intelligence behind the sequence of balls is a fact in as good a standing as any other fact I am aware of.

The thing about evolution is -- at its most basic level, the processes involved are no different than in this example. However, instead of chaotically bouncing balls, we have objects that can replicate themselves. From the simple beginning of a self-replicating object, and the dumb laws of physics, we got... all this. Saying there might be an “intelligence behind” it is really no more sensible than saying there was an “intelligence behind” the sequence of balls that came out. You have precisely as little reason to posit intelligence for evolution, as you do for the billiard balls.

No, of course I’m not saying evolution is “random” - I’m saying it is mechanical. We see intelligence in evolved entities in retrospect because of the entirely mechanical workings of natural selection. Intelligence is produced by, not “behind”, evolution.
#: Posted by Pete on 04/21 at 12:18 AM
"whatever it is that insipid trolls worship."

(a) I don't really worship anything, as I said.
(b) Yes, you do seem a little threatened. I read this snarling as a sign of "issues." But hey, whatever gets YOU through the night.

"You want to discuss Willed Processes, you're going to be having something other than a scientific conversation"

Yes, precisely. I believe that's what I said in the first place. Don't bring "creation science" into a biology class; don't draw ethical conclusions from biology.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 12:39 AM
Pete - thank you for addressing me with respect. I may indeed be an "insipid troll" but that's not the role I'm trying to play.

"logical emptiness" - But logical emptiness can be spiritual fullness. Logic and empiricism used in tandem form one tool - a very powerful tool - for understanding and affecting the world. But they are not the only lenses through which we should be looking.

"Intelligence is produced by, not “behind”, evolution"

This actually is much closer to what I think.

I even think this is the truest meaning of "in the beginning, there was the word" (logos) - that is, where we can transcend our material nature/evolutionary history is in our (evolved) capacity for self-reflection, abstraction, signification.

"then your statement about intelligence being “behind” evolution loses all meaning - it can be a phrase you like to say or like the sound of, but what could it possibly mean?) (--this is a long post, so if you answer anything in it, I would like it to be this: what really are you envisioning, in concrete terms, when you say there could be an “intelligence behind” evolution?)"

Well, that's just it. It's not a concrete thing - by definition it must be prior/external to the observable "world" - so any attempt to capture it in the terms we use to describe rocks, atoms, fish or monkeys is going to fall short. Long before the scientific method was developed Augustine, e.g., was grappling with these issues.

And if I like to say it, like the sound of it, why is that not enough? I guess it depends (shades of Clinton!) what your definition of "mean" is ... is science the only arbiter of "meaning"?

I'm agnostic on a good day - atheist on a bad - but I don't understand why some people react so nastily to the very possibility of something beyond the material. A lot of that seems to be scientists patting themselves on the back for being in the smart-kids' club, and it's just all sort of sad. These issues ("metaphysics" broadly read) are there and they're not going to go away ...

"More in heaven and earth
Than is dreamt of in your philosophy."
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 01:03 AM
Knemon, I agree that ethics should be taught - in sunday school, in church, and in the home. Not in public schools.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 02:43 AM
Public schools are precisely where ethics need to be taught the most.

No, not "ethics" in the sense of "stop it or you'll go blind."

Ethics in the sense of, e.g., "human rights": what is this concept? What are some historical sources of it/arguments for it? Some derive it from religion - others from a Rawlsian social contract.

What is a society? a state? how do they interact? Why do we (most of the time) coexist peacefully instead of cracking open each others' skulls and feasting on the succulent goo within? How can we minimize said cracking and feasting?

Private ethics, religion, "family values" (man I hate that phrase), are all well and good but civics are much more important. If we banish discussions of right and wrong from the "public" (state-funded) realm, then we deserve exactly the kind of society we're getting.

I realize I've taken this thread way off-topic. To sum up: evolution true, ethics necessary, materialism can be as dangerous as fundamentalism.

The end, by me.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 03:03 AM
"If we banish discussions of right and wrong from the "public" (state-funded) realm, then we deserve exactly the kind of society we're getting."

Hmm... I suppose when you think about it, religiously correct societies like Salem in the 17th century, Europe in the Middle Ages, etc, etc etc. were far more morally clear, from a certain standpoint. But I'll take a culture that tolerates public exposure of Janet Jackson's mammary over one that burns witches any time. The fact that her poor breast has become a political/moral hot potato is distressing.

But back to topic:

The question is why Ratzinger would want to open up the creationist can of worms without some concession from non-Catholics. Others have noted he wants one Christian church with himself at the head. It is very unlikely that American Christianists are so hot to trot for creationism that they will accede to Papism. But it's also true these people are nuts so one can't be sure what they'll do. Maybe they will once more agree to genuflect to Rome if that means they can teach lies to Americans.

But I can't imagine that BXVI would care enough to contradict what JP II said about evolution, unless there was something in it for him. Excuse me, the Church.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 11:23 AM
Godless volution is dangerous fundamentalist materialism that won't stop the brain-sucking zombies that lurch among us. See, we're right back on-topic to Papa Ratzi.

Pete, it's sad that even after saying it as slowly and sweetly as possible, with vivid word pictures, only the tone of your voice is noted and taken as the cue to go right back to rocking the supernatural hobby horse, urging Straussian public lies to keep the unwashed in check.

I'll wait and see if any forthcoming ex cathedra pronouncements on evolution change the science content in parochial schools. Dembski would seem to be getting ready to celebrate the death of Gould's NOMA, since to him, science isn't about who's right, but who is in power. With one Magisterium, what's to overlap?
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 11:28 AM
It's a Straussian public lie that we shouldn't crack open each others' heads?

You are living proof that materialism can be just as nasty and paranoid as fundamentalism. Why for you got so much anger and contempt?

"But I'll take a culture that tolerates public exposure of Janet Jackson's mammary over one that burns witches any time."

Me too. But it'd be nice if we were educating citizens to be able to explain with some sort of argument, even one that admits non-materialist (gasp!) premises, why we should care about each other and the public good.

Isn't there some possibility of a third way between Salem and Postmodernia?
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 12:17 PM
No.

Universalizng, salvationist monotheisms must be the enemies of freedom.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 12:46 PM
The Straussian public lie invokes fear of God to discourage brain feasting, because it doesn't trust enlightened self interest and a social contract to achieve the same end.

I have contempt for stale arguments and smug misrepresentation.

Nobody here should have any trouble with non-material premises. I read as much science fiction and fantasy as the next geek, I just don't think there's much to be said for teaching the Silmarrillion in a history classroom.

There are many alternatives to Salem and Postmodernia; perhaps you can stop arguing from a position that resembles the worst of both?
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 12:49 PM
"it doesn't trust enlightened self interest and a social contract to achieve the same end"

Well, look around you - are we getting any closer to that end?

I want some sort of lie because I'd like to see a return to the concept of the common good. It's almost completely gone, and we're left with government of Enron, by FOX, and for the bottom line.

If you think we can get out of this mess we're in without a lie, any lie - well, I hope you're right. But I'm a glass-half-full sorta guy.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 02:04 PM
arrgh. half-*empty*.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 02:17 PM
"Our first business will be to supervise the making of fables and legends, rejecting all which are unsatisfactory; and we shall induce nurses and mothers to tell their children only those which we have approved." -- Plato, The Republic

So liar, which facts are first for your bonfire?
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 02:24 PM
Can't the lie be an add-on, not a carve-out? But if I have to burn something:

The fact (if it is such, and all y'all scientists seem pretty sure it is) that the perceptible world is all there is, that we are but stochastic agglomerations of billiard balls ... this is a fact that we might wanna leaven with some little white lies.

Many people were frightened by Darwin, and especially his bastard child "Social Darwinism" (not saying it's his fault, but people sure ran with that ball) because they saw where it could lead.

For instance, in the Scopes monkey trial of great fame, the objection wasn't just that evolution was being taught, but also that pernicious racial/eugenist theories were in the text.

You might argue that we're past all that, that science is only going to lead us in positive directions from now on. Again, I hope you're right - but what in human history makes you confident about that?

And when I say I want ethics in the schools, I don't mean they have to be taught as revealed truth. But a little instruction on the history of these ideas, and the ends to which they've been put, could be a good thing. Or?

The ID movement creeps me out too. I want that stuff kept out of the science classes. I think we agree more than we disagree, and where we part is in our relative optimism/pessimism about the dispensability of the lie.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 02:42 PM
We are not billiard balls; we are organizations of quantum field processes.

And, most scientists are painfully aware of his/her prospects (or lack there of) for understanding "what's really out there" (i.e. beyond scientific instrumentation).

If it bothers you that we're just a bunch of well-organized waves, that color probably doesn't actually exist, that there is no such thing as "touching" something (or macroscopic "phases", for that matter)...

...then please don't shoot the messenger.

If this causes the "meaning of life" to drain away, and if empirical science is stepping on the toes of your god, then it's either time to re-evaluate one's perspective on that god, or time to re-evaluate the god, itself.

Or, if you would like to make up a little white lie, that is perfectly fine with me - we all do it some time or another.

Granted, of course, not all of us choose to lie when constructing one's core beliefs about the Universe.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 03:16 PM
The "billiard balls" were imported from an earlier post.

Materialism can be dangerous. Popular, sub- or pseudo-scientific theories of evolution (biological or social, Nazi or Marxist) have led to atrocities in the past.

Sometimes the white lies are all that keep us from the abyss.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 03:28 PM
"it'd be nice if we were educating citizens to be able to explain with some sort of argument, even one that admits non-materialist (gasp!) premises, why we should care about each other and the public good. "

By "non-materialist" you mean religious as opposed to scientific, I can only assume. You don't mean "non-materialist" in the sense of basing one's values on something other than money, right?

If you mean religious, I don't know how to explain any sort of argument, as I understand the term, by such means because God trumps all. That's not an argument, that's an assertion (cue Michael Palin!). That is not to deny theology as it is to say that argument implies, for me, dependence upon reason, not an unquestionable authority.

Where in the Scopes trial was the supposed eugenicism/racism supposed to be found? In the textbooks Scopes was teaching from or in Origin Of Species or the Descent of Man?

You seem to take the position that there is something wrong with both creationists and scientists. But "a pox on both your houses" is not a defensible position in the battle to prevent lies from being taught to our children. There are facts, hard facts, about the origin of species, that must be taught for biology to make any sense. The position is in no way morally equivalent to creationism.

You don't like the fact that there are no human moral lessons to be drawn from evolution? Well, the truth is it has none, any more than the uncertainty theorem does. It's like trying to draw life lessons from a study of the harmonic series of vibrating strings. Ethics, morality, right and wrong, are an entirely different subject. They are not the subject of biology but of the humanities.

The fight about evolution is about one thing only: whether Americans should be teaching lies in science classes. It has nothing whatsoever to do with what should be taught in other kinds of classes.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 03:35 PM
White lies about science are a crazy thing to advocate. If people misunderstand evolution and base a racist theory on their misunderstanding, that is no reason whatsoever to lie about evolution. That's a reason to explain evolution better.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 03:40 PM
"That is not to deny theology as it is to say that argument implies, for me, dependence upon reason, not an unquestionable authority."

There is a third way - an attempt to wed faith and reason - go by the name o' Thomism. At the time, it was a big deal, as nifty as digital watches were in the 70s (a shout-out to the late, lamented Douglas Adams).

"You seem to take the position that there is something wrong with both creationists and scientists."

No. There is something wrong with both religious fundamentalists and materialists who assert that they KNOW, they just KNOW, goddamit, that there is nothing but matter/waves/yadda ... and anyone who holds out hope for something more is a knucle-dragging backwoods etc. etc. etc. See some earlier posts on this thread.

"The fight about evolution is about one thing only: whether Americans should be teaching lies in science classes. It has nothing whatsoever to do with what should be taught in other kinds of classes."

Good. Double-plus-good. We agree.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 03:43 PM
I don't see any reason why a universe which is known to be built upon waves or matter necessarily implies anything about one's personal beliefs, morality, quest for transcendence, or anything else that is not particular to those physical facts. These are different modes of thought.

That a particular scientific fact would shake someone's faith in God strikes me as, I don't know how to say it otherwise, very weird. That's like having one's love of classical music being destroyed by going to an art museum. They have nothing in common.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 03:58 PM
Better a materialist than a liar. If it pisses you off that discussions of faith are not supported by science, you can sulk and blame it for society's ills, but don't compound them by advocating the replacement of science with little white lies.

You can adopt another philosophical stance, that of Martin Gardner's fideism, that holds that he has no scientific basis whatsoever for his religious beliefs, but holds them anyway because he bloody well feels like it. In his case, he also is a mysterian, clinging to the notion that consciousness is composed of unexplainium, which is yet another god of the gaps, but I digress. But it looks to me like you'd make faith mandatory, which rather misses the point of intellectual and religious freedom.

If you agree that "The fight about evolution is about one thing only: whether Americans should be teaching lies in science classes. It has nothing whatsoever to do with what should be taught in other kinds of classes," it's clear that we are on opposite sides of that fight.
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 04:04 PM
It's weird, but it happens. Science can kill morality the way deconstruction can kill literature.

You're right that it *shouldn't* happen.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 04:05 PM
I'm looking at people like Tom DeLay, who is no friend to science, who is vocally religious, and who is absurdly immoral.

Science can kill morality? So can religion. So can greed. So can poverty.

So freaking what?
#: Posted by PZ Myers on 04/21 at 04:09 PM
Science has not killed morality. That is a pure Mary Shelly romanticism. Scientific facts have nothing to say about morality. They are facts. Whether the universe is ultimately made of strings, waves, particles, or Jeebons (little Jesus particles) has nothing to do with why Andrea Yates killed her kids or Jeffrey Dahmer liked to eat his victims.

Nor has deconstruction killed literature. It's alive and quite well. A poet of Szymborska's power is rare for any generation. If you like narratives, there are plenty of great people writing. Try Alan Furst.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 04:13 PM
PZ, I see no reason to concede that science can kill morality. I can't see how it possibly could.

People's mistaken opinions of what science is "supposed to mean" can wreak as much havoc, however, as any other mistaken opinion. And some of that havoc will surely be in the moral dimension.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 04:17 PM
Ken Cope - wait, what? How are we on opposite sides of that fight? In science class, teach evolution. In civics class, let people know that there are other conversations, other lenses, available.

Faith is not supported by science. It doesn't need to be. I can't maintain much faith for any length of time, but I envy those who can. Some of y'all here apparently despise and scorn those who can. Different strokes.

"But it looks to me like you'd make faith mandatory"

Where did I say that?
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 04:18 PM
Scapegoats and strawmen and lies, oh my.

You tell me, you're the guy wanting to put white lies in the science curriculum. You're the one who has the problem with naturalism, with your argument from consequences, equating religious fundamentalists with whatever you think materialists are. And since you're the guy advocating lying for ethics, I'm kind of right where I thought I was when you started snarking on this thread from the sidelines, wondering why I'm feeding a troll.
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 04:25 PM
" can't maintain much faith for any length of time, but I envy those who can. Some of y'all here apparently despise and scorn those who can. "

No doubt. Proof that science has nothing to do with behaving well. Just as similar remarks on rightwing Christianist sites prove that professing religious belief has no correlation with moral behavior.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 04:32 PM
"white lies in the science curriculum"

No no no. Sorry. I meant white lies in the civics curriculum.

The "noble lie" we need might be that we are all endowed with inalienable rights by a divine creator, or that we have all surrendered the right of self-defense to the state in exchange for protection, or any number of things. I don't know. It could be belief in that toaster orbiting Mars. But most people seem to need something more than science can give them.

I'm honestly not trying to troll. The people on this board seem to know a lot about science and the politics thereof, much more than I do at any rate, and while I started out snarking, I've been trying to honestly engage during the last string posts.

This can be the end. I'm fine with that. You're probably doing something more worthwile, so I won't waste any of your time.

Tristero - Sad but true.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 04:35 PM
The problem with little white lies is that there is no place to stop. I don't think the authors of the Declaration were lying. Far from it; they used the language of their times and their beliefs. Today, they might put it differently.

For what it's worth if I recall properly, the original draft of the Declaration had nothing about being endowed by a Creator but just asserted inalienable rights. The Creator was added at Adams' request, but doing so was hardly a lie.

I think you are assuming that morality must be based on something immutable and eternal, or at least the illusion of same. I think history shows us that such moralities are prone to spectacular failure. It strikes me a sense of morality can just as easily arise from the commonsense consensus of a community combined with reason and persuasion.
#: Posted by tristero on 04/21 at 04:47 PM
So you'd swap out the language of the first amendment to the Constitution (still binding last I heard) for Jefferson the Deist's flowery language in the Declaration (not), instead of replacing On the Origin of Species with Genesis? Oh, well that's a relief then...

I'd like it if civil servants made a passing grade on a high school exam on the Constitution as a condition for office rather than the big show of Bible-swearing, but that would conflict with your grand lies-for-facts scheme.
#: Posted by Ken Cope on 04/21 at 04:50 PM
"It strikes me a sense of morality can just as easily arise from the commonsense consensus of a community combined with reason and persuasion."

Here we are back at the optimist/pessimist impasse. I wish you were right, but I fear that you're wrong.

A lot of this is probably just grass-is-greener syndrome. I was raised atheist and always envied the faithful for their faith. Lots of people are raised religious and end up turning violently against it.

Biology was actually the one science course I liked. Chemistry just made my head hurt - I couldn't visualize any of the structures, and I can't keep a lab book (or anything else) neatly. But the grand scheme of evolution is thrilling to me, one of the great monuments of intellectual endeavor. As long as science stays in its (big) box, I think it's a very good thing.

Maybe I'll just lurk around on the board, follow the links and learn a thing or two.
#: Posted by on 04/21 at 04:54 PM
Okay, Ken. You got me. I'm a theocrat. If it were up to me, women would be barefoot and pregnant, Jews would wear big pointy hats and bells, and working on a Sunday would get you three days in the stocks.

I don't have a grand scheme. I listed some possibilities. You zero in on one of them and freak out. You seem like a very angry, bitter person. Maybe you need one of those squeezy stress-balls.
#: Posted by