I believe I have found the key to turning the current circle of logic - since the essay "Rainbow River" - into a spiral, a circle with some place to go. It came to me last night while thinking about the dilemma - does a power rule in our lives beyond our knowledge, or are we stuck with the laws of nature as we know them (and therefore, in my opinion, are doomed)? As an added catalyst, the quote by the Jesuit leader Pedro Arrupe on optimism came to play, and between the two thoughts I recalled Intelligent Design theory.
There is much more to it than many think. I know, because in my academic training, it was taught that time, cosmic radiation, variant genetic material, and the natural environment were what caused the evolution of the species, and any notion of the direct intervention of a divine player in this seemed childish. Mutations were random and reacted to, and were selected by, the current natural environment. In this I believed as firmly as Richard Dawkins, best- selling atheist and proponent of classical Darwinism. It did not turn me into an atheist, but rather had me happily accepted the fact that God worked through chance in this world. And thus you can see my consternation and doubt in the last several blogs. But I had forgotten about Michael Behe's book, "Darwin's Black Box."
As a biochemist, Behe was even more invested than I in Darwin's theory of natural selection - that is, that change came about through the actions of the natural environment on random mutations. He was not a true religious believer of any sort, with only childhood roots to a standard religion (it's been a while since I read the book, so I can't recall the details). But his research came up with surprising things, summed up as this: biochemical process are far too complicated to be altered by a single, random mutation, or even several of them. To create, say, the ability of an organism to filter salt from water (like mangrove trees - this is my own example from off the top of the head) would necessitate a vast array of simultaneous changes whose probability of occurrence would run to the tens of trillions to one; in other words, for basic functional changes to occur in a species, one would need many, many times more years than our present universe has; in fact, one would need something closer to infinity (if one can get close to infinity). The book ended with biochemical formulations that spun my head - as it should - but I was in overall shock from the other chapters of the book. I was an anthropologist who had taught evolutionary theory and I had been only slightly aware of the Intelligent Design theory, and that only through something of a straw-man argument concerning the development of the eye.
Of course, the obvious solution to this puzzle of complexity is exactly that - Intelligent Design, or divinely guided evolution. I have even mentioned corollaries to this before, referring to a general divine guide through evolution (Teilhard de Chardin) which struck me as more a postulate than a hard theorem. But this is a hard theorem. As such, it is strong evidence that a force outside our understanding intercedes in the actions of nature (for the Traditionalists, they are tired of looking to science to prove their ideas. They know them "through the intellect" or divinely given ideas, but I am more than a little afraid to make too many of such claims). If this is the case, then, why couldn't this power intercede in human activities? And why couldn't it intercede on a personal basis, and even respond to prayer? Why not? No wonder Richard Dawkins hates I.D. so much (as another aside, if one watches Dawkins argue on TV, one becomes painfully aware that his disdain for his opposition, and his disdain for anything tainted with "spirit", emanates from some traumatic childhood experience).
To continue on this track: why then couldn't this force intercede when I was jumping across the ice flows? Or with any number of things, or perhaps EVERYthing. Yes, it is true that this throws us back on the question "why do bad things happen to good people," forcing us to resort again to the bromide, "we just don't know." But let's face it: we don't know; we don't know, as Roeker's reference to Northern Exposure says, what good might come from a broken leg. But by opening Darwin's Black Box, it does seem we are confronted by the very real possibility that this is not a clock maker's universe, as conceived by the Deists (Thomas Jefferson was one. I might add that none of that group of founders was an atheist. The idea was considered absurd) - that is, once made and wound, the world would do its work regardless. This is not logically necessary - one could still say the any such evolution was pre-planned - but it does point to a more likely scenario - that the universe is constantly in the making; that it is not a flat blueprint, but an inspired work of an improvisational master. Seeing the drama and wonder of the world, I would have to side with the latter - it makes more sense. And with that, perhaps I could become more of an optimist like Fr. Arrupe - to believe that God is not only there, but is able and willing to make things better. I am still not convinced of that last, at least as far as the human perspective is concerned (who was it who joked that this "was the best of all possible worlds"?) but I will concede that in the vast scheme of things, this might well be so. FK
There is much more to it than many think. I know, because in my academic training, it was taught that time, cosmic radiation, variant genetic material, and the natural environment were what caused the evolution of the species, and any notion of the direct intervention of a divine player in this seemed childish. Mutations were random and reacted to, and were selected by, the current natural environment. In this I believed as firmly as Richard Dawkins, best- selling atheist and proponent of classical Darwinism. It did not turn me into an atheist, but rather had me happily accepted the fact that God worked through chance in this world. And thus you can see my consternation and doubt in the last several blogs. But I had forgotten about Michael Behe's book, "Darwin's Black Box."
As a biochemist, Behe was even more invested than I in Darwin's theory of natural selection - that is, that change came about through the actions of the natural environment on random mutations. He was not a true religious believer of any sort, with only childhood roots to a standard religion (it's been a while since I read the book, so I can't recall the details). But his research came up with surprising things, summed up as this: biochemical process are far too complicated to be altered by a single, random mutation, or even several of them. To create, say, the ability of an organism to filter salt from water (like mangrove trees - this is my own example from off the top of the head) would necessitate a vast array of simultaneous changes whose probability of occurrence would run to the tens of trillions to one; in other words, for basic functional changes to occur in a species, one would need many, many times more years than our present universe has; in fact, one would need something closer to infinity (if one can get close to infinity). The book ended with biochemical formulations that spun my head - as it should - but I was in overall shock from the other chapters of the book. I was an anthropologist who had taught evolutionary theory and I had been only slightly aware of the Intelligent Design theory, and that only through something of a straw-man argument concerning the development of the eye.
Of course, the obvious solution to this puzzle of complexity is exactly that - Intelligent Design, or divinely guided evolution. I have even mentioned corollaries to this before, referring to a general divine guide through evolution (Teilhard de Chardin) which struck me as more a postulate than a hard theorem. But this is a hard theorem. As such, it is strong evidence that a force outside our understanding intercedes in the actions of nature (for the Traditionalists, they are tired of looking to science to prove their ideas. They know them "through the intellect" or divinely given ideas, but I am more than a little afraid to make too many of such claims). If this is the case, then, why couldn't this power intercede in human activities? And why couldn't it intercede on a personal basis, and even respond to prayer? Why not? No wonder Richard Dawkins hates I.D. so much (as another aside, if one watches Dawkins argue on TV, one becomes painfully aware that his disdain for his opposition, and his disdain for anything tainted with "spirit", emanates from some traumatic childhood experience).
To continue on this track: why then couldn't this force intercede when I was jumping across the ice flows? Or with any number of things, or perhaps EVERYthing. Yes, it is true that this throws us back on the question "why do bad things happen to good people," forcing us to resort again to the bromide, "we just don't know." But let's face it: we don't know; we don't know, as Roeker's reference to Northern Exposure says, what good might come from a broken leg. But by opening Darwin's Black Box, it does seem we are confronted by the very real possibility that this is not a clock maker's universe, as conceived by the Deists (Thomas Jefferson was one. I might add that none of that group of founders was an atheist. The idea was considered absurd) - that is, once made and wound, the world would do its work regardless. This is not logically necessary - one could still say the any such evolution was pre-planned - but it does point to a more likely scenario - that the universe is constantly in the making; that it is not a flat blueprint, but an inspired work of an improvisational master. Seeing the drama and wonder of the world, I would have to side with the latter - it makes more sense. And with that, perhaps I could become more of an optimist like Fr. Arrupe - to believe that God is not only there, but is able and willing to make things better. I am still not convinced of that last, at least as far as the human perspective is concerned (who was it who joked that this "was the best of all possible worlds"?) but I will concede that in the vast scheme of things, this might well be so. FK
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