Posted on 01/26/2006 1:47:10 PM PST by jennyp
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Third, complexity does not imply “design.” One of Adam Smith’s most powerful insights, developed further by Friedrich Hayek, is that incredible complexity can emerge in society without a designer or planner, through “spontaneous order.” Hayek showed how in a free market the complex processes of producing and distributing goods and services to millions of individuals do not require socialist planners. Rather, individuals pursuing their own self-interest in a system governed by a few basic rules—property rights, voluntary exchange by contract—have produced all the vast riches of the Western world.
Many creationists who are on the political Right understand the logic of this insight with respect to economic complexity. Why, then, is it such a stretch for them to appreciate that the complexity we find in the physical world—the optic nerve, for example—can emerge over millions of years under the rule of natural laws that govern genetic mutations and the adaptability of life forms to changing environments? It is certainly curious that many conservative creationists do not appreciate that the same insights that show the futility of a state-designed economy also show the irrelevance of an “intelligently designed” universe.
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Evolution: A Communist Plot?
Yet another fear causes creationists to reject the findings of science.
Many early proponents of science and evolution were on the political Left. For example, the Humanist Manifesto of 1933 affirmed support for evolution and the scientific approach. But its article fourteen stated: “The humanists are firmly convinced that existing acquisitive and profit-motivated society has shown itself to be inadequate and that a radical change in methods, controls, and motives must be instituted. A socialized and cooperative economic order must be established to the end that the equitable distribution of the means of life be possible.”
Subsequent humanist manifestos in 1973 and 2000 went lighter on the explicit socialism but still endorsed, along with a critical approach to knowledge, the kind of welfare-state democracy and internationalism rejected by conservatives. The unfortunate historical association of science and socialism is based in part on the erroneous conviction that if humans can use scientific knowledge to design machines and technology, why not an entire economy?
Further, many supporters of evolution were or appeared to be value-relativists or subjectivists. For example, Clarence Darrow, who defended Scopes in the “monkey trial” eight decades ago, also defended Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb. These two young amoralists pictured themselves as supermen above conventional morality; they decided to commit the perfect crime and killed a fourteen-year-old boy. Darrow offered the jury the standard liberal excuses for the atrocity. He argued that the killers were under the influence of Nietzschean philosophy, and that to give them the death penalty would hurt their surviving families. “I am pleading for life, understanding, charity, kindness, and the infinite mercy that considers all,” he said. “I am pleading that we overcome cruelty with kindness and hatred with love.” This is the sort of abrogation of personal responsibility, denial of moral culpability, and rejection of the principle of justice that offends religious conservatives—in fact, every moral individual, religious or atheist.
In addition, nearly all agnostics and atheists accept the validity of evolution. Creationists, as religious fundamentalists, therefore see evolution and atheism tied together to destroy the basis of morality. For one thing, evolution seems to erase the distinction between humans and animals. Animals are driven by instincts; they are not responsible for their actions. So we don’t blame cats for killing mice, lions for killing antelope, or orca whales for killing seals. It’s what they do. They follow instincts to satisfy urges to eat and procreate. But if human beings evolved from lower animals, then we might be merely animals—and so there would be no basis for morality. In which case, anything goes.
To religious fundamentalists, then, agnostics and atheists must be value-relativists and subjectivists. Whether they accept evolution because they reject a belief in God, or reject a belief in God because they accept evolution, is immaterial: the two beliefs are associated, just as are creationism and theism. By this view, the only firm basis for morality is the divine edicts of a god.
This reflects the creationists’ fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of morality.
Morality from Man’s Nature
We humans are what we are today regardless of whether we evolved, were created, or were intelligently designed. We have certain characteristics that define our nature.
We are Homo sapiens. Unlike lower animals, we have a rational capacity, an ability to fully, conceptually understand the world around us. We are self-conscious. We are the animal that knows—and knows that he knows. We do not survive automatically, by instinct, but must exercise the virtue of rationality. We must think. We must discover how to acquire food—through hunting or planting—how to make shelters, how to invent medicines. And to acquire such knowledge, we must adopt a rational methodology: science.
Furthermore, our thinking does not occur automatically. We have free will and must choose to think, to focus our minds, to be honest rather than to evade facts that make us uncomfortable—evolution, for example—because reality is what it is, whether we like it or acknowledge it or not.
But we humans do not exercise our minds and our wills for mere physical survival. We have a capacity for a joy and flourishing far beyond the mere sensual pleasures experienced by lower animals. Such happiness comes from planning our long-term goals, challenging ourselves, calling on the best within us, and achieving those goals—whether we seek to nurture a business to profitability or a child to adulthood, whether we seek to create a poem or a business plan, whether we seek to design a building or to lay the bricks for its foundation.
But our most important creation is our moral character, the habits and attitudes that govern our actions. A good character helps us to be happy, a bad one guarantees us misery. And what guides us in creating such a character? What tells us how we should deal with our fellow humans?
A code of values, derived from our nature and requirements as rational, responsible creatures possessing free will.
We need not fear that with evolution, or without a god, there is no basis for ethics. There is an objective basis for ethics, but it does not reside in the heavens. It arises from our own human nature and its objective requirements.
Creationists and advocates of intelligent design come to their beliefs in part through honest errors and in part from evasions of facts and close-minded dogmatism. But we should appreciate that one of their motivations might be a proper rejection of value-relativism, and a mistaken belief that acceptance of divine revelation is the only moral alternative.
If we can demonstrate to them that the basis for ethics lies in our nature as rational, volitional creatures, then perhaps we can also reassure them that men can indeed have morality—yet never fear to use that wondrous capacity which allows us to understand our own origins, the world around us, and the moral nature within us.
Edward Hudgins is the Executive Director of The Objectivist Center.
Nope; but it did for poor Narby.
I don't know about the 'date' but I'll put my trust in Genesis, yes.
Spend the 10$ bucks, you guys, and get more info from your PC's!!!
-- EvoDude
OH?
Are there LINKS that seem to be missing??
Well, actually, it was folks like ME insisting that the Bible be read for WHAT IT SAYS.
In your train of thought, certainly there are.
And what is more, He not only destroyed it all, but He did so in an utterly moronic way, that coincidentally just happens to match the kind of myths that any ancient civilisation could be expected to have, and after his evil psychopathic episode had passed He erased all physical evidence of His actions from the rocks (Guilt? Fear of detection by the God police?)
Yep. And in the process the Church corrupted the language:
Apostle - was "messenger".
Martyr - was "witness".
Heresy - was "choice".
Gnosis - was "knowledge".
I wonder if any of the religious folk here realize that they are Gnostic heretics?
After all, they "choose" to "know" Jesus.
That isn't strictly quite accurate. What did for Narby's faith wasn't any realisation that a mindless literal interpretation of Genesis is falsified by all available evidence. He'd thought that Genesis wasn't literally true in the most naive interpretation all of his conscious life through most of which he considered himself a devout Christian. What did for his faith was the train of doubt set up by literalists insisting that if you don't accept the truth of Genesis then you aren't a Christian. In the end, as I understand it, he came to agree with them (ie he came to agree with you, Elsie). And the result in his case of the "Either Evolution is true or Christianity is true" syllogism promoted so enthusiastically by fundamentalist Christians was that Christianity must be false. On the whole I agree with both Narby and you on this issue.
Just to add, Narby has explained elsewhere that this was one issue amongst several that killed his faith. But AFAIAA it was an important factor.
And he left a rainbow colored post-it note in the sky to remind himself not to do it again.
God has Alzheimer's.
It certainly looks that way if you read the stories of the 10 commandments. Or should that be the 30 commandments? There are verses where after Moses has broken the tablets he has to remind God of what was on them... And did God really think that Adam might find a mate amongst the animal kingdom as they were paraded before him? These stories make much more sense as a compendium of folk-tales, different versions somewhat corrupted from their oral history. Along with some excellent laws and strictures for a bronze-age society of nomads.
Fifteen -- according to Mel Brooks.
... Along with some excellent laws and strictures for a bronze-age society of nomads.
I was chasing down some links the other night and read a paper that suggested that instead of (the claimed) health reasons, the dietary laws were to keep the nomadic Hebrews distinct from the Canaanites.
The gist was that the Canaanites had settled down in farming communities and could develop a workable market for foods such as pork and shellfish.
btw, you're tagline is definitely bumpersticker worthy.
Man, I hate when I mistype possessives.
The rise of evolutionary theory was accompanied with a vogue for eugenics, "the improvement of the race," "selective breeding," and "the elimination of the unfit." The consequences were disastrous. You can argue that not all the eugenicists were Darwinists, but there's no denying that the atmosphere of early Darwinism encouraged a decline in respect for human life. That's what the creationists and supporters of intelligent design are worried about. I haven't made up my mind about the question, but right now I trust the scientific chauvinists less than the religious ones.
Coming up ...
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