Theistic evolution vs. Darwinism (Introduction)

by dhw, Wednesday, May 22, 2013, 16:39 (3985 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: This excerpt is on point as to how I view my theory. I know it destroys standard Darwinism. It should. -http://www.uncommondescent.com/intelligent-design/is-the-intelligent-designer-an-interv...-I shan't quote the excerpt, as it will take up too much space, but I'll just quote your conclusionAVID: Darwin's random mutation and natural selection cannot work. Too little time and the fossil record doesn't remotely look like that method was in operation.-Once and for all, can we take it for granted between us that random mutations and gradualism are out. Darwin would have agreed with you that if gradualism is out, then so is his theory, but you subscribe to the theory of punctuated equilibrium, and you see yourself as an evolutionist, which means that you accept common descent, and that is the crucial difference between evolutionists and creationists. (Hence the heading Uncommon Descent used by anti-evolutionists.)
 
dhw: If God intervenes for "major jumps forward in speciation", that is not just a "form of creationism" ... it IS creationism.-DAVID: Of course. Lets define creationism/ creationists. 1) First there are the fundamentalists who believe Genesis and the Earth is young and perhaps only as old as 4004 BC, per The Bishop of Usher. They envision the universe, the Earth, and the start of life created in seven days. They even have a acronym YEC. 2)There are old earth creationists, who accept the idea that the universe and the Earth are much older, But they still feel that God created the universe, the Earth, and started life, but in more than seven days. 3) Finally there are theistic evolutionists like me, and yes we are a form of creationist, only we are the third way. We feel God uses evolution as a favored process. How much is pre-planned and how much is dabbling is not clear, but it fits the scientific findings better than the first two types of creationist. It is the approach that Nagel is looking for; he knows about it and won't accept it.-You and I can discount categories 1) and 2) (Tony probably wouldn't), and focus on 3) as a basis for discussion. The battle now is therefore over common descent. If God intervenes (dabbles), you have separate creation, which is the opposite of common descent. I shall now put on my theist hat, because your idea of theistic evolution is very different from mine, and it must be very different from Darwin's when he put on his own theist hat (my edition of Origin contains many references to the Creator, conveniently ignored by the neo-Darwinists.) As Darwin himself put it, "There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or one..." Here then is my theistic scenario: Your God created life, and into those first few forms he inserted a mechanism for reproduction, adaptation and innovation, but this mechanism was not an automaton. Automatons do not innovate. He gave it sufficient intelligence to enable it to act autonomously, so that once it was in place, he was able to sit back and watch what happened. He also created the Earth in such a way that the environment would be constantly changing, and life forms would adapt and innovate accordingly, in an infinite variety of ways. With the intelligence that he had given them, the early forms of life learned to cooperate, and to create more complex forms between them. We see this cooperation in virtually every biological process. It is even echoed in the beautiful little video on bird embryology that you have treated us to. Cells now automatically repeat the movements, interactions and combinations first invented by their ancestors millions of years ago, when each innovation was brought into being. This explains the diversity of life, and how the original single cell has evolved into the astonishingly complex multicellular organisms that exist today, including ourselves. The great experiment ran and is still running its own course, and if he hasn't lost interest, God is still watching it unfold.-Science cannot handle divine intervention, but the concept of the "intelligent cell" makes intervention unnecessary. The whole process of evolution is driven by interaction between the environment and God's inventive mechanism. The scenario fits in perfectly with Darwin's theory of common descent. And that, no doubt, is why he repeatedly insisted that his theory was compatible with religious belief.-However, I will now put on my agnostic hat and go one step further, since you are determined to impose your beliefs on the atheist Nagel. I don't think yours is the approach he's looking for at all. I think what he's after is that very same mechanism, designed not by your God but by different forms of intelligence which themselves evolved out of energy within changing matter. You might call this an atheistic variant of panpsychism.