Six Degrees of Evolution?

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How rich is evolution and the processes that brought us... us?

Evolution (change over time) can/could include:

1. Direction via direct divine agency, e.g., possibly, the first cell, the Cambrian templates, man from pre-existing matter and/or chemical/biological material.

2. Direction via intentional intelligent front-loading of DNA templates with possibilities that are realized at a future point. (There is glossed-over scientific evidence for this.)

3. Direction via programmed algorithmic variation (DNA switches being turned on/off) which pushes life in certain directions to achieve the twin teleological goals of persistently robust life and breathtaking, mind-numbing, God-glorifying variation. (There is glossed-over scientific evidence for this.)

4. Direction via chemical/bio-chemical laws. Darwinists increasingly recognize that chemical evolution at least is fundamentally law- as opposed to random- based. (It's what puts the "inevitable" in the idea that the universe must be teeming with life; it's also what is currently used to "prove" the truth of origins of life (OOL) darwinism!) The darwinist, of course, says these laws "just are".  No curiosity there.

5. Direction via random mutation subject to a sovereign God. Intelligent Design proponents Michael Behe, William Dembski, and Jay Richards all say that this mechanism alone (coupled with 4. above), is plausibly sufficient to create all of life as we see it. (This is where the minimal claims of IDers get really close to theistic evolutionists, yet they are still at each other's throats.)  The issue is not random mutation, it is undirected mutation. The irreducible issue is the nature of nature -- is it dead and random, or created by a God who sustains and directs it?

6. Undirected random mutation i.e, copying errors. This is where most of the grief of disease and deformity comes in. Something's not working right.

Darwinists lump 5 and 6 together and attribute everything to it and 4 (without the direction part). What other choice do they have?  Their philosophical premise going into the study is that the evolution of life is undirected and unintended. Unfortunately for them the empirical evidence is that random mutation is a demonstrably feeble mechanism (e.g., see Behe). And yet they stubbornly cling to their beliefs based on a shop-worn 19th cc. philosophy.

Here's the point: they are not really free to pursue the evidence where it leads, or to reach interpretations warranted by the evidence; unlike theists, they are severely limited in their options; they've got all their eggs in the materialist basket, and, if reality is actually richer and more complex than what their science allows, tough. They will continue to look through blinkered lens and see evidences for purpose, design, intelligence, and engineering while denying that any of these are actually present.

If the only tool in your darwinian kit is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.

Are You A "Theistic Personalist"?

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Over at Ed Feser's excellent philosophy blog, he is going on about the difference between classical theists and the modern types, who are somewhat disparagingly dismissed as "personalists".

The formula ‘God is a person’ is (given the history of theistic thinking and writing) a relatively recent one. I believe that its first occurrence in English comes in the report of a trial of someone called John Biddle (b. 1615), who in 1644 was brought before the magistrates of Gloucester, England, on a charge of heresy. His ‘heresy’ was claiming that God is a person. Biddle was explicitly defending Unitarian beliefs about God, already in evidence among Socinians outside England.

In other words, Biddle’s ‘God is a person’ was intended as a rejection of the orthodox Christian claim that God is three persons in one substance (the doctrine of the Trinity). One can hardly take it to be a traditional Christian answer to the question ‘What is God?’ According to the doctrine of the Trinity, God is certainly not three persons in one person. And when orthodox exponents of the doctrine speak of Father, Son, and Spirit as ‘persons,’ they certainly do not take ‘person’ to mean what it seems to mean for [Richard] Swinburne and those who agree with him. They do not, for example, think of the persons of the Trinity as distinct centres of consciousness, or as three members of a kind. (pp. 59-60)

This quote, from the Answering Infidels site provides an accessible definition of theistic personalism.

First, the problem of evil as it is argued by atheists depends on a certain conception of God. Here we may distinguish between “classical theism” and “theistic personalism.” For a theistic personalist, God is a person like us; he’s just far more powerful. But for classical theists, God is not a person, nor does he have emotions like humans. God isn’t like us at all. A classical theist would reject a concept of God which views him as the sort of being who would come to our rescue when we’re in danger, for this wouldn’t be a changeless, eternal being (and, according to the classical theist, sheer anthropomorphism). A theistic personalist, on the other hand, would reject the idea that God lacks a personality: God has emotions and can rush to our aid whenever he so chooses. My own position lies somewhere in between these two views; however, I lean towards theistic personalism. Thus, if God allows some particular evil, I would argue that he has reasons for allowing it. A classical theist, however, would say that I’ve got the wrong view of God. Both camps believe in a God who is all-powerful and wholly good. They disagree about what it means for God to be changeless. My point here is that most of the arguments used by atheists would not affect classical theists at all, so we need to understand that these arguments, at best, only affect a particular conception of God.

I'm not sure that this definition is philosophically rigorous, but it gives you an idea of what is at stake. Roman Catholicism is wedded to classic theism; modern movements such as pentecostalism are, most emphatically, not. Which of the two ideas is most in keeping with the thrust and parry of Scripture? I would say theistic personalism.

"He who has seen me has seen the Father".  Why explain it away?

I guess that makes me a theistic personalist.

Related articles

• Fesser's criticism (stephenlaw.blogspot.com)
• Wouldn't Be Prudent: (brothersjuddblog.com)

Stephen and Jane Hawking: Both Sides Now

If you want to know more about Stephen Hawking, you might be interested in reading this article: "Stephen Hawking: the closed mind of a dogmatic atheist. A review of Music to Move the Stars" by Jane Hawking.

This book review talks about Stephen's wife Jane, their life together, his illness, and the care she provided, his rise to fame, his adultery, their divorce, his ardent atheism and her equally ardent Christianity. As usual, hubris tops the list of human sins.

I know little about Jane Hawking, but, based on this short article, it seems to me that she, and not Stephen, may well be the real hero in the Hawking house.

h/t Manawatu Christian Apologetics Society.

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Does 1 + 1 Always Equal 2?

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I was asked:

*Would you say that 1 + 1 = 2 did not exist before humans discovered it?

I responded: No, but I'm not an atheist. Do you think that 1+1=2 existed before the universe came into existence?

*Joe_Agnost said...  So before humans discovered math, say 1 million years ago, an apple and another apple DIDN'T equal 2 apples??  Of course they did...

Let's consider this, under atheistic assumptions.

There is a universe. It is uncreated. It is mindless. No mind. No consciousness.  A rock rolls down a lifeless Earthscape. There is a rock now lying at the bottom of the hill. Later, another rock rolls down the hill.  There are now the original rock, and the rock that came after it.  So, 1 + 1 = 2, right?

Wrong.

First, the number one is a mental concept, an abstract. It does not yet exist. There is no mind to conceive of it. So, one, as a mental concept, cannot exist. Same for the number two. Abstracts cannot exist without minds to convey them. All we have at this point are rocks.

Second, 1 + 1 = 2 is an arithmetic operation. Arithmetic operations require minds to both conceive of them and perform them. Minds have not yet been "invented" by cosmic evolutionary processes.  So, 1 + 1 = 2 is an incoherent, meaningless statement. It is impossible for 1 + 1 = 2 to exist where there is no mind to instantiate it.

The theist, of course, believes that there has never been a moment in reality when Mind did not exist and 1 + 1 did not equal 2. So, the theist can confidently assert that, yes, 1 + 1 = 2 before humans "discovered math".  (Notice Agnost's word "discovered", not "invented".)  The theist can also confidently posit that 1 + 1 = 2 before this universe was created, and that 1 + 1 = 2 not only in this realized universe, but "in all possible worlds".

As I said in a previous blog, I don't think we realize what a great role the assumption of mind plays in our apprehension of reality, nor do we realize what a mind-boggling idea it is for the atheist to think that there was a time in the universe when mind was not, and things like numbers, abstracts, beauty, etc. did not exist and then came to exist as minds emerged from mindless slime.

Regain your humanity. Rebel against the atheist machine.™