Bob Ellis at Dakota Voice promptly replied to my previous post. I said this:
If a Christian wants to take issue with Islam from a position that is legitimate within the confines of Islamic thought, then he would have to concede that there is no god but Allah and that Mohamed is his profit. If he wishes to criticize evolutionary theory from a position that is scientifically legitimate, then he will have to concede [almost all the things that evolutionary biologists believe].
Bob says this:
If a Christian concedes these fundamental elements of Islam, then there is no point in arguing about the truth of Islam, because you've already agreed that Islam is true. It may be "legitimate within the confines of Islamic thought," but that doesn't mean it's true or even legitimate in a broader sense.
Of course. A Christian may find it impossible to argue within the context of Islamic thought without surrendering the principles of his faith. He may conclude that the same thing is true about arguing within the contexts of legitimate science. But the Intelligent Design people are explicitly and intelligent trying to make their case within that latter context. To do so, they have had to concede most of the truth of what Darwinists argue. That was my point. I say:
Evolutionists get to define the legitimate ground in biology for the same reason that chemists get to define the ground in chemistry: in each case they have the only scientifically viable theories and research programs.
Bob objects:
No, evolutionists do not get to define what is legitimate, only what they consider legitimate. They don't have all the answers; like the rest of us, they are looking for answers.
Evolutionary biology in particular, and science in general, are more or less institutionalized traditions, like the Catholic Church or American League Baseball. To have any substance, each tradition must define for itself what is inside or outside. Anyone is free to dissent, and reject natural selection, or transubstantiation (is that still current doctrine?), or the designated hitter. But that puts you outside science, or makes you a Protestant, or requires you to bat even if you are a pitcher. It is possible, of course, that science has gone off the rails, and that a radical break with the tradition is necessary. But to do that you would have to create a new tradition that is as successful at modeling all the phenomena that science is interested in. Bob says:
Evolutionists also don't have the only scientifically viable theories. Creation scientists have scientifically viable theories; they only reason they aren't considered scientifically viable by some is because the dominant segment of the scientific community has redefined the study of science from "the pursuit of knowledge" to "the pursuit of knowledge within an exclusively naturalistic framework."
To which I reply: no. The standard for science is a theory that generates a research program, and a research program that confirms the theory. No such alternative to evolutionary biology exists. I'm sorry, but creation science is ridiculous. It has produced nothing resembling a theory and has no research programs. It has as much to do with science as The Da Vinci Code has to do with history, or religion, or anything else. Intelligent Design is a much more respectable enterprise precisely because it has not even attempted to present an alternative to evolutionary biology.
Finally, there is a very good scientific reason why all modern science ignores supernatural causation: science has only natural means for testing a hypothesis. One can confirm or rule out natural causes by experiment or data gathering because such causes are finite. This cause (e.g., radiation, mutation, a viral infection) mostly likely produced that result, or this cause could not have produced that result. Biblical faith posits an omnipotent God. Such a God could bring about any situation whatsoever. His influence can never be ruled out, and for that reason it can never be confirmed. Scientists often find themselves unable to explain a natural phenomena, but that tells us only that science has failed, not that the phenomena is inexplicable or that it involves some miraculous power. Otherwise, science would replace faith, something I suggest would not be good for science or for religion.
I do agree with Bob one one thing: evolutionists can be as pig-headed and bigoted as any person of faith. In my experience, evolutionists are usually more intolerant. I have found myself defending evolution before Methodists, and Christianity before evolutionists. The Methodists were more reasonable. But that has to do with the politics surrounding science, and not with science itself.
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