creating a rumpus

From EKKLESIA:

A group of leading scientifically and theologically qualified scholars has issued a clear rebuttal of the 'intelligent design' ideology that has gained ground among conservative religious believers, especially in the USA, in recent years. The International Society for Science and Religion (ISSR) in Cambridge notes that "there has been much interest in the view that our current scientific understanding of evolution is incoherent. According to this view, certain biological features, because they appear to be 'irreducibly complex', could not have evolved by natural selection and therefore must have been created by the intervention of an 'intelligent designer'."

ISSR adds: "This view has been challenged, not only by atheists such a Richard Dawkins, but also by religious believers. Among these are many members of the International Society for Science and Religion (ISSR), the world’s foremost scholarly organization devoted to the dialogue between science and religion."

The concept of intelligent design is, says the report, “neither sound science nor good theology.” The authors do not attempt to specify precisely how they believe the religious believer can speak of God’s action as creator – a question on which they may differ among themselves. They are united, however, in resisting what they call “the insistence of intelligent-design advocates that their enterprise be taken as genuine science – just as we oppose the efforts of others to elevate science into a comprehensive world view (so-called scientism).”

COMMENT: I am not a creationist in the sense that this word is now understood, especially in America. I do not believe the world began 4000 years ago. I do not believe the two creation myths in Genesis to be true literally, as a whole or in part. I do not believe that dinosaurs shared our planet with the first humans. I do not believe people have the right to believe any of this without being regarded as incredibly ignorant and uninformed.

I do believe that scientists have got the chronology of the history of the earth and its inhabitants right, although there is much that still needs filling in, not least, the exact history of the human race.

However, I believe that God creates. I believe there was a major creation event followed by many lesser creation events. I believe that the universe would cease to be without God's continuing observation of it. Although I am not happy to be tarred with the same brush of creationist intelligent design I do believe, 100%, in intelligent design. In other words, I do not believe God just started the ball rolling. I believe he is constantly involved in his creation and the "evolution" of his creation.

I am sure that the theory of evolution will turn out to be, basically, correct, especially in respect of the chronology and the fact that all creatures are linked back to the first appearance of life on this planet. But I think scientists have accepted it as a complete and proved theory when there are obvious gaps in it and problems with the logical consistency of it. I think scientists are scared of one question having more than one answer. Of course, a million or so bacteria stuck in a small space will mutate. Of course, a few finches that find their way to a remote island will, in time, end up looking very similar because of interbreeding (see also - West Virginia). But that doesn't mean that you can automatically apply this truth to all aspects of evolution.

To me, the mathematics of natural selection just do not add up, even taking into account the vast periods of time involved (and, in fact, evolution of species appear to happen within very small time scales). I cannot, for example, see how fish that don't breathe air can evolve into fish that do breathe air, unless a male fish and a female fish, are both born as mutants with primitive lungs (fully working), at the same time in the same place so that they can mate with each other (and even then it would be unlikely that their offspring would have the same complete mutation). People look at figures like a million or a billion and think they are huge numbers. But they are not. In our universe they are very small numbers, in deed.

It seems to me that evolution as a theory can only be realistic if we accept that there is something going on that has the appearance of intelligence. I choose to call this God but I can't prove it is or even prove that this agency is really intelligent. It may be something more akin to the agency proposed by Gaia theory.

Both creationists and scientists are holding back science and theology because the argument between the two factions has led to both sides taking up rigid doctrines from which they will not shift. I don't give a toss about hardcore creationists because they are just very stupid people. But it annoys me that scientific thinking theologians cannot talk about God's creative action in the world because they will immediately be accused of being scientific Luddites. But the biggest problem this debate has caused is that scientists have become intransigent over the possibility of different and/or many answers to any given scientific question. They have became as guilty of blind stubbornness and lazy thinking as the Biblical fundamentalists who say that if one part of the Bible is wrong then all of it is wrong.

The other week, I was reading an article on quantum mechanics in "The New Scientist" and the author wrote the sentence - "Of course, there can't be anything outside of the universe."

That struck me as a very unscientific thing to say because the writer was putting boundaries on scientific experimentation before such boundaries had been proven beyond reasonable doubt. In the quantum world there is much that is dependent on observation but the mechanics of this does not seem to apply in classical physics. If scientists took theologians and other philosophers more seriously than they do at present they might, at least as a working hypothesis, take on board the possibility of "outside." What if there is something outside of the universe that is providing the function of an observer of the classical universe. It doesn't have to be a god. It doesn't even need to be sentient or intelligent. But, if it is there, we will never discover it scientifically as long as scientists are so intent on defending old theories that they become unable to dream of new ones.

Finally, just as background information. I do not believe you can be a theologian, philosopher or preacher without having as good an understanding of science that it is possible for a layperson to have. I have always taken the attitude that if something is conclusively proved by science then I will believe that in preference to any religious understanding I may have on the matter. If science proved God did not exist (and contrary to Dawkins' undergrad philosophical conclusions it has not yet done so) then I would stop believing in God. I am not saying the reverse should apply to scientists but, at the same time, a real scientist should never create boundaries for their scientific research in the same way philosophers should never be scared into creating boundaries in their thinking.