http://www.evolutionnews.org/2009/07/clarity_and_confusion_stephen.html

“There’s simply no reasonable way we can empirically tell whether variations and environmental pressures are intended or not.”

I think that’s technically incorrect. Inferring intent from the appearance of design *is* an empirical inference (since it derives from observation of contingent things). However, I don’t think it’s properly scientific, because there’s no way to really quantify it, record data about it in the way that is usually done for scientific research, etc. Science doesn’t exhaust the empirical.

So, I should have said that there is simply no reasonable way that we can scientifically quantify the question of whether or not variations and environmental pressures are intended.

I think that random mutation and natural selection are *both* necessary explanatory components of the theory. The adjective “random” wouldn’t be necessary if the mutations weren’t explanatory. That qualifier is important to the explanatory framework of the theory.

What Darwin was trying to explain, and the question the theory is meant to answer, is “How could the appearance of intendedness have been achieved without life actually having been intended?”

If the mutations were actually intended rather than random, or if the selection were actual selection rather than “natural” (which, in the mechanistic philosophy is basically a synonym for “lacking intentionality”) selection, the explanatory framework of the theory is undermined, and it fails to explain what it was meant to explain.

Keep in mind, when the theory states that mutations are “random”, it cannot simply mean that they appear or seem random. They don’t *seem* like anything, because they happened before we were here to observe them and are lost to the past. The theory can only be trying to say that they *are* random.

By the way, this brings me to one rather tricky aspect of Darwin’s theory: It takes on a subtly different meaning when being used in an experimental sense, versus when it is being used in a historical sense to account for the appearance of design in general.

When we are observing evolution in a test tube experiment, for instance, we may describe the mutations as “random” without it having any metaphysical meaning. It simply means that there are no correlations that we can observe.

Likewise, when observing animal populations in real-time, we may note that they change as a result of environmental pressures, at least partly because certain genotypes are better suited to those pressures, and end up surviving in greater numbers. We might even use “natural selection” to describe this, without it containing any philosophical baggage concerning whether or not those environmental pressures were intended by God.

However, when the theory is used as a general purpose historical explanation for the appearance of design, or intent, in life, both “random” and “natural” take on the meaning of “unintended”.

Note also that this is the primary manner in which Darwin meant them. It was no big revelation that animals exhibit variations that are uncorrelated to us, or that their phenotypes can be changed by environmental pressures. After all, these items of knowledge are the entire basis of animal breeding, which creates desired phenotypes by strictly controlling the environments in which the animals live and reproduce.

Darwin’s big contribution was to suggest that these things could, in a total lack of intention of telos, account for the omnipresent appearance of intendedness in life.

It’s a clever little explanation (though, I believe, it is ultimately incoherent – in a nutshell because it tries to both explain and explain away design simultaneously). However, I don’t believe that something being clever and having explanatory content automatically renders it scientific rather than philosophical. The various multiverse theories proposed to deal with the Anthropic Principle are also clever and explanatory, but few people try to pretend that they are science. There’s simply no reasonable way we can empirically tell whether variations and environmental pressures are intended or not.

a & b) Yes, I would say that stars etc are created and designed by God.

c) I don’t understand how Providence works, but in a nutshell, God intends are foreordains everything that happens in the universe, and not only foreordains it, but perpetually upholds it. While things that happen may *seem* random (as in unplanned) to us, that’s only because we can’t see the grand plan, and in fact they really aren’t.

d) Yes, we have “natural” explanations for how stars etc form, although to my knowledge, those explanations don’t involve randomness (as in unplannedness) as an *explanatory* component.

e) No, it’s not appropriate, from a scientific perspective, to refer to God as the Creator of those things. In fact, it’s not appropriate to talk about their designedness at all, in my opinion.

=====================

Now, all that said, let me explain why I believe that Darwinian theory is in a different boat from our theories of how stars and other heavenly bodies form, and why the word “random,” in evolutionary biology, necessarily differs from the meaning of the word in other sciences such as physics.

Darwinian theory fundamentally differs from other sciences both in 1) the sense in which “random” is used, and 2) in terms of what types of things the theory is trying to explain.

In most sciences, and in every day life, “random” is used in a descriptive manner, not in an explanatory manner.

For instance, if I throw a die 100 times, and observe a roughly even distribution of numbers, I may describe the results as “random”. However, that doesn’t imply anything about whether the results were intended by God. In fact, I’m not explaining the causes at all. I am merely *describing* the results that I see before me, not explaining the causes of those results (which are too numerous and complex for me to observe).

In Darwinian theory, this is reversed. The *results* that we see (life, and particularly advanced life) don’t look random. They look designed. It’s the causes, which we can’t observe (because they happened before we even existed), that Darwinian theory describes as “random”. Darwinian theory says “Life may look designed and non-random, but the causes actually are random.” The randomness in Darwinian theory is explanatory, not descriptive. This sets it apart from other scientific theories (and, imo, actually makes is a philosophical theory, rather than a properly scientific one).

Darwinian theory also differs from other theories in terms of what it is trying to explain. In physics, we are generally trying to explain various regularities and patterns. For instance, in explaining how stars form, we are generally trying to explain such things as their chemical makeup, why they are clustered together in galaxies, etc, etc.

Darwin, on the other hand, was specifically trying to explain why life looks designed, and he tried to give an explanation that rendered that design illusory (ie, not actually the product of design). That’s why, for instance, he named his mechanism “natural selection“. Selection is usually an intentional (ie design) term. He was trying to offer a substitute designer – something that could create the appearance of intent without actual intentionality.

I agree that it’s not appropriate to invoke God as designer in science proper. However, I don’t believe that this applies when the very thing you are trying to explain is why something looks designed. In that case, ruling the design explanation out is a exercise in naturalistic philosophy, not science.

I said above that it’s not appropriate for science to address the topic of designedness at all. However, it is Darwinism, not its critics, that (illegitimately, in my opinion) injected the topic into science in the first place, although it did it in order to explain it away. And that, in turn, is why we have all these textbooks and research papers presenting atheistic philosophical claims as if they were science.

Yes, Miller endorses the “Chruch’s teachings on evolution”, but he undestands “Church’s teaching” very special way. Miller is some kind deist, as he has stated in his book “Finding Darwin’s God” , and he believes that Catholic Church also is teaching deism, without any actual causal intervation of God during history. He denies very many of the Church’s teachings, including virgin birth, allknowing God, etc. It would be interesting to hear, if he believes in historical resurrection of Jesus, or not. I have not ever heard he saying that he believes in it in the historical meaning.

“When I confronted my two Catholic colleagues [Miller and another] on the panel with the apparent miracle of the virgin birth and asked how they could reconcile this with basic biology, I was ultimately told that perhaps this biblical claim merely meant to emphasize what an important event the birth was. Neither came to the explicit defense of what is undeniably one of the central tenets of Catholic theology.”
http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB124597314928257169-lMyQjAxMDI5NDI1NjkyNzYzWj.html

“This is a very good summary of the essential points of evolution. Do you agree with this version of evolution? Is the Catholic Church mistaken to assert that this version is compatible with Catholic belief? Are Stephen Barr, and Ken Miller–and the current Pope–theologically or scientifically misguided?”

Yes. Document summarizes very well the Catholic understanding of evolution. Barr and current Pope are not theologically misguided. But Miller is not in their group. Document sais VERY CLEARLY that catholic church supports some versions of evolution, but neo-Darwinian, not guided versions of evolution ARE “INCOMPATIBLE WITH CATHOLIC FAITH”. From document:

” In continuity with previous twentieth century papal teaching on evolution (especially Pope Pius XII’s encyclical Humani Generis ), the Holy Father’s message acknowledges that there are “several theories of evolution” that are “materialist, reductionist and spiritualist” and thus incompatible with the Catholic faith. It follows that the message of Pope John Paul II cannot be read as a blanket approbation of all theories of evolution, including those of a neo-Darwinian provenance which explicitly deny to divine providence any truly causal role in the development of life in the universe. Mainly concerned with evolution as it “involves the question of man,” however, Pope John Paul’s message is specifically critical of materialistic theories of human origins and insists on the relevance of philosophy and theology for an adequate understanding of the “ontological leap” to the human which cannot be explained in purely scientific terms. The Church’s interest in evolution thus focuses particularly on “the conception of man” who, as created in the image of God, “cannot be subordinated as a pure means or instrument either to the species or to society.” As a person created in the image of God, he is capable of forming relationships of communion with other persons and with the triune God, as well as of exercising sovereignty and stewardship in the created universe. The implication of these remarks is that theories of evolution and of the origin of the universe possess particular theological interest when they touch on the doctrines of the creation ex nihilo and the creation of man in the image of God.”

Ken Miller, Catholic, endorses the Chruch’s teachings on evolution, just as Stephen Barr does, so your representation of Miller’s position does not appear accurate.

Miller specifically refers to Imago Dei, an International Theological Commsision document submitted to and approved by (then) Cardinal Ratzinger, the current Pope.

http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_20040723_communion-stewardship_en.html

A quote from a section of Imago Dei:

“According to the widely accepted scientific account, the universe erupted 15 billion years ago in an explosion called the “Big Bang” and has been expanding and cooling ever since. Later there gradually emerged the conditions necessary for the formation of atoms, still later the condensation of galaxies and stars, and about 10 billion years later the formation of planets. In our own solar system and on earth (formed about 4.5 billion years ago), the conditions have been favorable to the emergence of life. While there is little consensus among scientists about how the origin of this first microscopic life is to be explained, there is general agreement among them that the first organism dwelt on this planet about 3.5-4 billion years ago. Since it has been demonstrated that all living organisms on earth are genetically related, it is virtually certain that all living organisms have descended from this first organism. Converging evidence from many studies in the physical and biological sciences furnishes mounting support for some theory of evolution to account for the development and diversification of life on earth, while controversy continues over the pace and mechanisms of evolution. While the story of human origins is complex and subject to revision, physical anthropology and molecular biology combine to make a convincing case for the origin of the human species in Africa about 150,000 years ago in a humanoid population of common genetic lineage. However it is to be explained, the decisive factor in human origins was a continually increasing brain size, culminating in that of homo sapiens. With the development of the human brain, the nature and rate of evolution were permanently altered: with the introduction of the uniquely human factors of consciousness, intentionality, freedom and creativity, biological evolution was recast as social and cultural evolution.”

This is a very good summary of the essential points of evolution. Do you agree with this version of evolution? Is the Catholic Church mistaken to assert that this version is compatible with Catholic belief? Are Stephen Barr, and Ken Miller–and the current Pope–theologically or scientifically misguided?

Miller, again, quoting from Imago Dei:

“More important, the same document makes a critical statement on how we should interpret scientific studies of the complexity of life: “whether the available data support inferences of design or chance . . cannot be settled by theology. But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence.”

Right there, in plain view, is the essence of compatibility between evolution and Catholic theology. “Contingency in the created order,” the very essence of evolution, is not at all incompatible with the will of God. The official Church document reemphasizes this point by stating that “even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation.” And evolution, as Stephen Jay Gould emphasized brilliantly in his writings, is truly a contingent natural process.

The concerns of Pope Benedict, as expressed in his earlier writings and in his coronation homily, are not with evolution per se, but with how evolution is to be understood in our modern world. Biological evolution fits neatly into a traditional Catholic understanding of how contingent natural processes can be seen as part of God’s plan, while “evolutionist” philosophies that deny the Divine do not. Three Popes, beginning with Pius XII, have made this abundantly clear.”

For those not familair with the debate, Miller is the co-author of the most widely used high school textbook in the U.S., imaginitvely called “Biology” and a persuasive expert at the Kitzmiller trial.

We are indeed interested in dialogue. That’s why I’ve appeared at forums with Kenneth Miller, Karl Giberson, Larry Arnhart and others, and that’s why I’ve been engaging in this exchange of views with Dr. Barr after he critiqued my initial article written for the Washington Post. That’s also why on our new Faith and Evolution site we have a section titled “Debates” where we highlight articles by those who disagree with us. You surely don’t mean to suggest that comments on blogsites are the only way of having an exchange?

As for why Discovery Institute doesn’t allow comments at Evolution News and Views: I suggest that you go read the comments posted at some of the main pro-Darwin blogs like Panda’s Thumb. If you do, you will see that the level of vituperation, flaming, and ad hominem attacks is such that it makes an open comment policy on our blog virtually impossible. If the comments received were as reasoned as the ones that predominate at First Things, there would be no problem. As it is, we are a small organization, and can’t afford to assign someone full-time to go through all of the insults and only post the reasoned comments.

Answer to Question 1: I haven’t given any label to my views up to this point, nor have I heretofore given any thought to the terms “directed evolution” and “teleological evolution”. In response to your suggestion of these terms, I have now considered them. My initial reaction is that they would be confusing and unhelpful. Different people have very different ideas in mind when they speak of how God “directs” the world. There are also different notions of teleology. For example, Aristotle’s philosophy and biology were heavily teleological; but I gather that he did not believe in a God who created and designed the world. I do see teleology in the biological realm, but my ideas of teleology do not correspond to many teleological ideas I have heard proposed.

Here is what I think about terminology: There needs to be some word to describe the merely biological theory that life evolves and that it does so largely because of natural selection. The only word that exists at present to describe this biological idea is Darwinism. If we are going to use the word Darwinism to describe atheistic or reductionist philosophical views, then we will have to find some other agreed-upon word to describe the mere biological theory. At present, there is no such agreed-upon substitute word, or even any proposal or discussion of finding one. So we HAVE to use the word Darwinism to describe the mere biological theory — there is simply no other word available. Moreover, all dictionaries that I have been able to find agree in giving only ONE meaning to “Darwinism” — and I once spent an hour in a university library looking at dozens of dicyionaries, including biology and science dictionaries.

Given that this usage is fixed and probably unchangable, we must use some different word to describe the atheistic and reductionist philosophical ideas that are so often found in association with Darwinian biology. I propose “atheistic hyper-darwinism” or some similar term. The point is that we must use DIFFERENT terms to refer to the mere biology and the philosophical offshoots, if we are to avoid horrible confusion. There are lots of possible ways to refer to the philosophical offshoots. There is only one servicable term to denote the biology: Darwinism.

If one is going to insist on using “Darwinism”, to refer to atheist and reductionist views, one has the obligation to propose another term for the mere biology, in fairness to the many people who accept the mere biology but reject the atheism and reductionism.

One more point on the expression “directed evolution”. I would note first that not only life, but also the universe and stars etc,. evolve. Scientists talk of “cosmic evolution” and “stellar evolution”. So let me start by considering whether I would use “directed evolution” as a term in cosmology and astrophysics. I believe that the formation of stars and planets is part of and happens in accrdance with God’s eternal plan. He willed that there be a world with stars and planets, in order that life would have a place to dwell and a source of energy to sustain it. Every detail of how stars and planets form in general and how our Sun and earth formed in particular he foresaw and willed from all eternity. But I also think that the formation of stars and planets happens entirely in accordance with the laws of nature that God has ordained. A cloud of gas of sufficient size will form a star eventually, and will do so even if the particles in the gas are moving about in a random way, i.e. no special fine-tuning of the motions of the particles is required for a star to form. This an indisputable fact that can be demonstrated mathematically. Of course, to get a particular star would require particular motions of the particles. God willed from all eternity that THIS star, the Sun, would form and that it would have exactly this size, this chemical composition, and so on. And he therefore willed those antecedent events to happen that would lead to this particular result. But to understand the natural processes and mechanisms that lead to the formation of stars, including the sun, one does not have to refer to divine activity.

Like everyone else in the world, I refer to “stellar evolution”. To say that I believe in “directed stellar evolution” would be a bad idea, because it would give the false impression that I thought miraculous “interventions”, or special divine tuning of the motions of particles was needed — and I don’t.

So much for terminology.

Answer to Question 2: The simple reason why I do not “repudiate” the ideas of Kenneth Miller, is that I do not know what they are, except in a rather vague way. I have never had any reason to study his views. I do not regard myself as part of a “movement”. I have my own views, and only care whether they agree with the teachings of the Catholic faith and the scientific facts, NOT whether they agree with other writers on the subject. If, as you suggest, Kenneth Miller believes that there is anything about the future that God does not know (for example, what the outrcomes of evolution will be) , then he would be in contradiction to clearly taught articles of the Catholic faith — for example as taught “de fide” by the council called Vatican I. OF COURSE, I would repudiate that, because I accept the teachings of the Catholic faith, as I think everyone knows who reads what I write. (And, I should note that the Catholic teaching on this is thoroughly biblical. The First Vatican Council cited the Bible’s statement that “God reaches from end to end ordering all things sweetly”.) But, at present, I simply do not know what Miller’s views are on such questions with any precision. If I have to review one of Miller’s books, or for some other reason am called on to respond to something he has written or said, I will do so, after a careful study of precisely what it is that he has written or said.

Answer to Question 3. I would answer first by noting that the very same question could be asked about the development of the inanimate world. According to our best theories, early in the history of the universe matter was in a very disorganized form — quarks, gluons, photons, electrons, neutrinos, other kinds of leptons, etc., moving around in a random way. There were regions of higher and lower density, to be sure, but current theory says these “density perturbations” were themselves the result of random quantum fluctuations of certain fields. From all this, cosmic evolution produced galaxies, stars, planets. The chemical elements were synthesized. Yet, I see in all this a divine plan and purpose. God wanted life — human life most of all. That requires stars and planets. It requires a rich chemistry involving dozens of elements. Indeed, even more basically, it requires that there be three space dimensions of vast extent, and one time dimension of vast duration and with a directionality. To get all that, all sorts of things have to be built into the very deep structure of the laws of physics. God gave being to the universe, and he so conceived its laws and structure that it would unfold to give those thngs he wanted. So, I see design and purpose very clearly manifested in the world — but at the same time, I see no contradiction in saying that the motions of the particles that filled the universe early on were “random” in exactly the sense that physicists say they were. To say otherwise would, I think, betray either a crude understanding of the concept of randomness or a crude understanding of divine providence.

I would say much the same thing about biological development. I would also say that there is probably a great deal of directedness in biological evolution that is built into the chemistry and physics of the universe. This a point that Simon Conway-Morris makes. Evolution keeps finding the same “solutions” to problems. I used the analogy in one article in First Things of rivers that wander and meander “aimlessly” but nevertheless always find their way to the ocean. I also think that a great deal of teleology is built into the Darwinian idea itself, but people on both sides are too blinded by ideology and preconceptions to notice it. One can see that “purpose” comes in if one asks WHY natural selection selects some things and not others. WHY does natural selection tend to weed out mutations that harm vision for creatures that live above ground, but not those that live in the perpetual darkness of caves — so that some cave-dwelling species eventually go blind or even lose their eyes
altogether. The question cannot be answered without adverting to the BIOLOGICAL PURPOSE of eyes. There is teleology even in darwinian biology, if one looks in the right place. One need not look for it in the mutations being non-random. That is not the only way that teleology and purpose can exist in biology.

I would also note that no kind of biological,theory can account for man himself. We have spiritual souls. These cannot be accounted for by any biological process, whether Darwinian or otherwise. The soul is infused directly by God in each human being from the first (“Adam”) to the last. If that is so, as both faith and reason instruct me, then there is a mighty work of God that manifests design and purpose very directly: for the spiritual powers of intellect and will have a clear purpose, being directed toward what is true and good.

As this has gotten inordinately long, I will save other comments to a later round, if there is one.

Hurricanes form and move randomly. As I understand both Collins and Barr this does not mean that God is unaware of or can’t control the weather. We just see no evidence that He routinely does. Perhaps God did steer hurricane Katrina right into New Orleans and caused 2000 deaths. There is no evidence that the movement of the Hurricane was anything other than random and unguided–the same concept seen in biology.

That does not mean in any way to suggest that God’s providence does not abide on earth and in heaven.

It appears that people hold different concepts of randomness and its relationship to Divine providence.

Mr. West, if you are really interested in dialogue why doesn’t your website allow comments?