Evolution and God . . . and Faith (Part I) Sept. ‘08
So what is “evolution”? . . Natural selection over time. . . Survival of the fittest.
It’s much a given these days, especially by the so-called scientifically / intellectually informed that evolutionary processes are understood to be the known proven truth. Examples are sited of changing colored moths, fish existing in dark caves without eyes, and experiments with genetic crossings creating flies with multiple and swapped appendages. Is this really evidence of the possibility and likelihood of evolution? For me to buy into evolution two “common sense” barriers have to be surmounted.
1) The notion of irreducible complexity . . and
2) Answering what’s “pushing” changes in the complexity of organisms
1) Irreducible complexity
The classic example is the human eye. As the realization goes, the eye only acts as an eye if the many constituent biological substructures all work in harmony. The question is, for natural selection to be at the root of evolutionary processes, the human eye and its substructures would have to have had evolutionary pre-cursors, i.e., elements of the eye that were not fully formed or served as something less structurally complex. After all, the beginning of evolution has as its basis that everything started ultimately from chemicals mixing together and eventually coming to form complex compounds and proteins. So what were the substructures or pre-cursors of the elements of the human eye?
2) What's pushing changes in complexity
Staying with the last example, even if we could identify elemental pre-cursors, what in nature or natural selection, is “pushing” change toward greater or even just different complexity? How did elements of the human eye expect to come together to create the sensation of vision? How in nature would organisms through natural selection “stumble” on the addition of a complex function like vision, and be left with a physical reality that they’ve arrived (or completed the process). Maybe vision is not even the natural selection evolutionary end-all. Maybe there’s some greater level of a biological sensation yet to come. What’s pushing complex structures to become more complex, or just change complexity?
Is there a master designer or god being orchestrating this all?
Follow this logic for a minute, all-be-it reverse logic, that I myself am a curious reporter of. There are those about, labeled as atheist. The atheist believes there is no god. And in their defense, it’s convenient that we don’t have so-called physical evidence that such a being exists. We have our trusty laws of physics and biological sciences and conclude that what we don’t know now may be known tomorrow. There’s solace in observing and hearing that we’re learning more and more, that we can trust and will ultimately put an end to conjecture about God; if it hasn’t already, that we need no god to explain all that we see. We don’t have happenings that defy physical laws, and those who would purport the existence of a god or God, have peace that the realm of such a being is labeled as spiritual. Wouldn't it be just like a god or God to hide himself to only the worthy or chosen in a “faith” realm. There’s certainly a kind of elitism for the faith believer to think that their connection to this god is held in their own perceived ethereal realm. I place myself in this family of faith, and I have enough pride upon self-examination to embrace a so-called spiritual realm, to in essence hang on to a notion that I’m part of the “chosen”. Thus I would be inclined to "not" want to have clear “physical” evidence of a creator / designer, if in fact, I was only deluding myself. If I’m honest I like thinking I have something only a few “get”! Yet, we have “apparently” physical evidence of the possibility of a creator, in that we're unable to apply evolutionary principles to the examination of developmental biological processes. The atheist once enjoyed using the argument that because all will prove to be explainable and those of the church / faith are operating in emotion driven mysticism, there's no need to appeal to the “concept” of a God. Enlightenment will shut the case. Yet enlightenment is proving, “in my estimation”, the opposite. We truly are baffled as to how natural selection would account for complexity. We’re left again, with the alternative, only a god could make it happen. And I’m personally called into accountability to that reality. I.e., the idea of a previously held notion that there’s a God and I’m in with him, which can’t be proved, is not so ethereal. The inverse (not the absence) of physical evidence is still physical evidence. I'm attempting to define a term or notion, that the "inverse of physical evidence" is the lack of evidence that a creator / designer does "not" exist. Said simply, what's the "proof" that there is no God. Doesn't the burden of proof fall both ways?
Personally, I don’t need evolution to be shown to be faulty, to hang on to “my” God, but the fact that the presuppositions of evolution / natural selection have failed – “thus far”, puts the spiritual realm in greater focus. If we’re honest we can’t rule out a creator / designer as still a plausible if not likely alternative to the understanding of how organisms came to be and came to be more complex.
In Part 2, I take up other forms of evidence for the existence of God and then what do we do with him.
So what is “evolution”? . . Natural selection over time. . . Survival of the fittest.
It’s much a given these days, especially by the so-called scientifically / intellectually informed that evolutionary processes are understood to be the known proven truth. Examples are sited of changing colored moths, fish existing in dark caves without eyes, and experiments with genetic crossings creating flies with multiple and swapped appendages. Is this really evidence of the possibility and likelihood of evolution? For me to buy into evolution two “common sense” barriers have to be surmounted.
1) The notion of irreducible complexity . . and
2) Answering what’s “pushing” changes in the complexity of organisms
1) Irreducible complexity
The classic example is the human eye. As the realization goes, the eye only acts as an eye if the many constituent biological substructures all work in harmony. The question is, for natural selection to be at the root of evolutionary processes, the human eye and its substructures would have to have had evolutionary pre-cursors, i.e., elements of the eye that were not fully formed or served as something less structurally complex. After all, the beginning of evolution has as its basis that everything started ultimately from chemicals mixing together and eventually coming to form complex compounds and proteins. So what were the substructures or pre-cursors of the elements of the human eye?
2) What's pushing changes in complexity
Staying with the last example, even if we could identify elemental pre-cursors, what in nature or natural selection, is “pushing” change toward greater or even just different complexity? How did elements of the human eye expect to come together to create the sensation of vision? How in nature would organisms through natural selection “stumble” on the addition of a complex function like vision, and be left with a physical reality that they’ve arrived (or completed the process). Maybe vision is not even the natural selection evolutionary end-all. Maybe there’s some greater level of a biological sensation yet to come. What’s pushing complex structures to become more complex, or just change complexity?
Is there a master designer or god being orchestrating this all?
Follow this logic for a minute, all-be-it reverse logic, that I myself am a curious reporter of. There are those about, labeled as atheist. The atheist believes there is no god. And in their defense, it’s convenient that we don’t have so-called physical evidence that such a being exists. We have our trusty laws of physics and biological sciences and conclude that what we don’t know now may be known tomorrow. There’s solace in observing and hearing that we’re learning more and more, that we can trust and will ultimately put an end to conjecture about God; if it hasn’t already, that we need no god to explain all that we see. We don’t have happenings that defy physical laws, and those who would purport the existence of a god or God, have peace that the realm of such a being is labeled as spiritual. Wouldn't it be just like a god or God to hide himself to only the worthy or chosen in a “faith” realm. There’s certainly a kind of elitism for the faith believer to think that their connection to this god is held in their own perceived ethereal realm. I place myself in this family of faith, and I have enough pride upon self-examination to embrace a so-called spiritual realm, to in essence hang on to a notion that I’m part of the “chosen”. Thus I would be inclined to "not" want to have clear “physical” evidence of a creator / designer, if in fact, I was only deluding myself. If I’m honest I like thinking I have something only a few “get”! Yet, we have “apparently” physical evidence of the possibility of a creator, in that we're unable to apply evolutionary principles to the examination of developmental biological processes. The atheist once enjoyed using the argument that because all will prove to be explainable and those of the church / faith are operating in emotion driven mysticism, there's no need to appeal to the “concept” of a God. Enlightenment will shut the case. Yet enlightenment is proving, “in my estimation”, the opposite. We truly are baffled as to how natural selection would account for complexity. We’re left again, with the alternative, only a god could make it happen. And I’m personally called into accountability to that reality. I.e., the idea of a previously held notion that there’s a God and I’m in with him, which can’t be proved, is not so ethereal. The inverse (not the absence) of physical evidence is still physical evidence. I'm attempting to define a term or notion, that the "inverse of physical evidence" is the lack of evidence that a creator / designer does "not" exist. Said simply, what's the "proof" that there is no God. Doesn't the burden of proof fall both ways?
Personally, I don’t need evolution to be shown to be faulty, to hang on to “my” God, but the fact that the presuppositions of evolution / natural selection have failed – “thus far”, puts the spiritual realm in greater focus. If we’re honest we can’t rule out a creator / designer as still a plausible if not likely alternative to the understanding of how organisms came to be and came to be more complex.
In Part 2, I take up other forms of evidence for the existence of God and then what do we do with him.
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