The New Convergence

Wired Magazine ^ | December 2002 | Gregg Easterbrook

[ckilmer]

The ancient covenant is in pieces: Man knows at last that he is alone in the universe's unfeeling immensity, out of which he emerged only by chance." So pronounced the Nobel Prize-winning French biologist Jacques Monod in his 1970 treatise Chance and Necessity, which maintained that God had been utterly refuted by science. The divine is fiction, faith is hokum, existence is a matter of heartless probability

[cornelis]

What about politics and science?

[cornelis]

Hope springs eternal.

[IronJack]

Nietzsche: "God is dead."

God: "Nietzsche is dead.

Which statement is verifiable?

[Dumb_Ox]

The tide began to turn a decade later, however, when William Jennings Bryan began preaching against Darwinism. He was influenced by a 1923 book, The New Geology, which argued that Earth's apparently ancient age was an artifact created by God to test people's faith.

Here is an interesting book review of a history on Young Earth creationism.

[edsheppa]

And biologist Francis Collins, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, insists that "a lot of scientists really don't know what they are missing by not exploring their spiritual feelings."

Feelings - yes, that about sums it up.

[scripter]

Ping.

[general_re]

Espousing a theory known as intelligent design, molecular biologist Michael Behe and others are attempting to forge a synthesis. Often — though inaccurately — described as creationism lite, intelligent design admits that evolution operates under current conditions but emphasizes that Darwin is silent on how those conditions came to be.

Strikingly inaccurate. This makes it sound as though ID is simply an attempt to answer the question of abiogenesis. But when many ID proponents start off with an a priori denial of macroevolution, it quite obviously goes way beyond that.

Beyond that, there's this, which is worth repeating:

The battle between evolutionary biology and faith isn't inevitable. As genome researcher Collins says, "I am unaware of any irreconcilable conflict between scientific knowledge about evolution and the idea of a creator God. Why couldn't God use the mechanism of evolution to create?"

Why, indeed...

[Tribune7]

Wired is often a pretty cool and surprisingly influential magazine.

[Nebullis]

Ronald Numbers' book looks interesting. The review falters when Noll offers his own suggestions but is good up to that point. Thanks for the link.

[scripter]

Why couldn't God use the mechanism of evolution to create?

God, being God could have used any method He wanted. The four "major camps" of young earth creation, ID, gradualism and punctuated equilibria disagree on the interpretation of the available evidence.

[scripter]

I didn't include you in my ping list by accident. My list is now sorted so I can better add/remove folks.

[general_re]

The four "major camps" of young earth creation, ID, gradualism and punctuated equilibria disagree on the interpretation of the available evidence.

And two of those camps, being theological in nature, have real troubles accounting for the available evidence. ;)

[Nebullis]

Numbers traces a decent, though, maybe not exhaustive history of modern Creationism as a religious movement. Quoting Chesterton, Noll then posits the metaphysical claims of select scientists as the battleground where Creationists are active. In practical terms, evolution theory is not metaphysics. Noll is excusing the absurdity of the battle by Creationists over evolution using the (equally absurd) stances of a few atheists. However, Creationism and its running dog Intelligent Design has evolved into a movement that seeks to destroy the very nature of science.

[Physicist]

Which statement is verifiable?

Which attribution is verifiable?

[Consort]

Physics, metephysics, consciousness, spirituality, etc: You need unified thinking to devise a unified theory; you need to include everything to devise a theory of everything.

[Consort]

metephysics = metaphysics

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the heads up!

[The Man]

Actually, neither are verifiable.

However, it is assuredly true and verifiable that Nietsche is in fact, dead.

[Doctor Stochastic]

Id has a long way to go to get promoted from running dog to lackey.