Dawkins’ Intellectual-Fulfillment
Jim Babka on May 2nd 2008
I’m sure the timing had to do with the (hopefully soon-forgotten) movie, “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed.” An email, targeted at Christians, arrived in my Inbox that read, “In the Beginning… What Really Happened?” But it was the next sentence that jumped out at me.
“Science insists that life and the universe are nothing more than cosmic accidents.”
A link labeled “where does the evidence really lead?” led to a promotional video — starring the Intelligent Design movement’s Who’s-Who.
But that sentence about science is really troubling.
First, science never “insists.” That’s a straw man. Physical science involves constant questioning and never quite arriving. Each mystery solved unlocks several new questions to be resolved. Only a scientIST can insIST.
It is impossible for science to “say” anything. Science is not a person, nor is it a democracy. Science is practiced by a sometimes incorrigible, generally competitive bunch of people, often hell-bent on proving each other wrong and getting famous with some new discovery. Now, there is, generally, a scientific consensus, but science is always provisional. In most instances you are well-advised to place your bets carefully on the consensus, because it’s been known to change — even quite abruptly. But evolution, which is extensively researched, well-cataloged, and supremely-tried, is one of the safest scientific bets.
Second, statements about the purpose of life and the meaning of the universe are NOT scientific. They are philosophical speculations, outside the purview of science — beyond falsification. Science is mechanistic — obsessed with measuring material, unable to locate ethereal meaning. Science is a tool and, as we’ll see, it can easily be misused.
Third, can you see, hear, touch, smell, or taste a cosmic accident (no double entendre intended)? How would you quantify and define a cosmic accident? How would you test it and, most importantly, falsify that? Science, properly practiced, doesn’t involve metaphysical properties. Theologians and philosophers can interpret and speculate and, in my humble opinion, even have some degree of success. But there’s no materialist method for measuring what is and what is not a cosmic accident.
The great boogeyman of the Intelligent Design movement is Richard Dawkins — or as a hilarious, viral, spoof video portrays him, Dick to the Dawk.
But the supreme irony is that there’s another boogeyman on the field — Phillip Johnson, the intellectual godfather and chief strategist of the Intelligent Design movement. Johnson fundamentally agrees with Dawkins! Both shape the battle as evolution wins, God loses. As theologian John Haught put it, “…all in their own ways, carelessly tolerate a simplistic conflation of science with ideological assumptions, whether these skeptics be religious or materialistic.” (Haught, God After Darwin, p 31).
And let’s be candid here: Richard Dawkins’ movement, New Atheism, and Phillip Johnson’s movement, Intelligent Design, need each other. They are thesis and antithesis. They are the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote, or Tom and Jerry.
Now the aforementioned email advertisement might have been accurate if it had read, “Richard Dawkins insists that life and the universe are nothing more than cosmic accidents.” But that probably wouldn’t have provoked a sufficient number of Christians to click the link, so they too could learn how to burn straw men.
But Richard Dawkins did indeed say something almost exactly like that. Here’s the quote:
“…nature is neither kind nor unkind. She is neither against suffering or (sic) for it. Nature is not interested one way or the other in suffering, unless it affects the survival of DNA… The universe we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at the bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil and no good, nothing but blind pitiless indifference.” (Dawkins, River Out of Eden, p. 133)
And Dawkins also famously said that evolution makes him an “Intellectually-fulfilled atheist.”
It’s not really shocking that Christians would feel threatened by Darwin — especially since they’ve just gotten over the Galileo scandal and are just getting comfortable with Isaac Newton. Darwin’s idea seems, on the surface, to be quite dangerous to theology. And if your Christian theology is not capable of “evolving,” as God fulfills his promise to give wisdom to seekers (James 1:5), through nature (Romans 1:20), you’ll be stuck in a debate with Dawkins.
And Dawkins is going to win because Intelligent Design is, if it’s nothing else, a slick new version of, “God of the gaps” (there are gaps in our knowledge; therefore, the explanation for that gap must be God). But when gravity explains planetary motion and your child goes to university, hears this idea, and embraces it, his God suddenly becomes smaller. He learns more science, God shrinks again. This incredibly shrinking god becomes increasingly less valuable, and thus, less relevant.
Intelligent Design is really “atheism on the installment plan.”
Theologian John Haught, director of The Georgetown Center for the Study of Science and Religion, in his book, “God After Darwin: A Theology of Evolution,” identifies three types of response that Christians make to natural selection: Opposition, Separatism, and Engagement.
The forces of Opposition argue that theology and evolutionary science are ultimately irreconcilable.
Separatists contend that theology and Darwinian science are so different in method that they can neither compete nor conflict with each other. Each simply exists in different spheres.
Engagement advocates say that theology cannot remain unaffected and uninformed by Darwinian biology. In fact, Darwin’s idea isn’t dangerous, it’s a gift.
This last approach, of the three, has the most intellectual consistency. After all, the theoretical and forensic evidence really does compel acceptance of the fact that, “Evolution is the best explanation of our natural history.”
Dwelling in the Opposition camp requires one to shove their head in the sand; from dust it came, to dust it prematurely returns.
For a Christian to embrace the Separatist position is to tightly grasp cognitive dissonance. God is for Sundays and funerals only. But, sooner or later, one must ask, “Why bother with God?”
The forces of Opposition see evolution as antagonistic to Scripture. And Haught is right about them. Dawkins, et al, agree with the Evolution Opposition on the most fundamental premise — mutual animosity.
Of course, opposition to evolution is not necessarily a defense of Scripture. The “Oppositionistas” are taking up arms on behalf of their Interpretative System of the Bible. And to contend that evolution must disprove Scripture is not science, but assumption — and we all know what is said about those who assume.
Obviously, I support Engagement. I want to know what evolution might indicate about God. Evolution fills me with a sense of wonder. I see our world, as Haught puts it, as a place “seeded with promise,” and “bursting with potential for surprising future outcomes.” It is an “undeniable fact that life, mind, culture, and religion have emerged out of the barely rippled radiation of the primordial universe [and that] gives us every reason to suspect that the cosmos may still be situated… within the framework of promise.” (Haught, God After Darwin, p. 115)
So in contrast to Dawkins, I find myself to be, “an Intellectually-Fascinated Christian.” How ironic is it to find the confessor of faith, Yours Truly, holds a provisional, expanding viewpoint, eager to learn more from science, when the great scientist with a Ph.D., is fulfilled — dare I say, satisfied — by the alleged absence of evidence?
Filed in The Belfry, The Biosphere
If we’re talking about bogeymen, let’s include the “New Atheist Movement.” Creationists keep painting Dawkins as the leader whom atheists look up to, as if there were Dawkins Clubs springing up around America.
The closest thing to an “atheist movement” I know of is American Atheists, which is a small number of people claiming that all atheists agree with them on a broad range of issues. Organized atheism is about as likely to happen as a herd of cats.
Interesting article, but some parts make no sense to me. You made a leap from Dawkins saying the universe doesn’t care, to him believing it, and life, are a cosmic accidents. That is quite a stretch, science may ultimately indicate that the laws of the universe have to be the way they are (Einstein’s belief). It may find that given certain circumstances and enough time, the probability of life forming approaches 1. Certainly this is outside the scope of knowledge today, but “not caring” and “accident” are very different things.
“I want to know what evolution might indicate about God.” Why would you expect it to indicate anything?
“How ironic is it to find the confessor of faith, Yours Truly, holds a provisional, expanding viewpoint, eager to learn more from science, when the great scientist with a Ph.D., is fulfilled — dare I say, satisfied — by the alleged absence of evidence?” I expect Dawkins would respond that he finds the universe as it is to be a fascinating place, learning and understanding its treasures as science expands our knowledge is one of the great joys of life. Why muddy it up with supernatural beings?
I think you mischaracterize Dawkins here. Frankly, I don’t see the leap between “the Universe is indifferent to human existence” (what Dawkins really said) to “life and the universe are cosmic accidents” (which is what you said he said).
I also find your characterization of your respective sources of intellectual fulfillment to be exactly backwards. Evolution, the source of Dawkins’ fulfillment, is a scientific theory backed up by scads of independent lines of evidence. It is in fact Christianity - your source of fulfillment - which suffers from the “absence of evidence” problem.
I am not Kevin Klein nor have I ever met him, either virtually or in person. However, he is is clearly very insightful and intelligent. No doubt he is handsome and charming as well. :-)
Yeah, I think you come close to mischaracterizing Dawkins here. Dawkins and the New Atheists really doesn’t need intelligent design. They would probably sell fewer books without it, but their intellectual positions don’t depend on opposition to a well-established theory accepted by mainstream scientists as a probably real process by which both the heterogeneity and homogeneity of life on earth arose in their various niches over billions of years. Materialists aren’t out for anyone because they have an emotional need for materialism to be true and damn the supernatural relgions whose truth threatens their comfort. It is the supernaturalists who do that. ID needs science because science gives the IDers a bogeyman that threatens the emotional comfort of their constituents, the supernaturalists. Atheists don’t need ID. All materialists are trying to do is convince people to stop believing demonstrably untrue things, or things that, while not already proven false, are so unlikely that only a fool would believe in them (the space teapot argument), especially when those beliefs motivate them to kill, burn, and cut research funding. That’s it. Dawkins says in the God delusion that he has no problem with either spirituality, or metaphysics, or even belief in some kind of Einsteinian God, so long as those are hobbies and not professions. When people are paid to convince other people to believe in fairies, bad stuff happens.
It is impossible for science to “say” anything. Science is not a person, nor is it a democracy.
This seems really on point to me, anyway. Science is an emergent phenomenon of social interaction, like a market. It doesn’t reside in any one person, and no one person speaks for or represents it. Groups likewise. Science is a set of practices, standards, and norms that are refined over time, and the method of refining them is disagreement and testing.
Stuartl writes,
You made a leap from Dawkins saying the universe doesn’t care, to him believing it, and life, are a cosmic accidents.
The universe can only “care,” I think, if there is some consciousness running it. Dawkins obviously doesn’t think there is one. Whether or not it’s a leap to say that life is a “cosmic accident” depends on what one means by “accident.” It’s a difficult word to deal with philosophically, since it raises all kinds of questions about causality and determinism.
In one sense, an accident is an attribute that is found in nature, but that is without significance for understanding the truer or more important part of an entity. It is a “mere” accident (Aristotle’s “accidents” are sense data about objects, which have no necessary relation to what the objects actually are, and thus are of distinctly limited significance). This would be the most damning view to have of life, and indeed suggests contempt of life, but I doubt that Dawkins thinks this. Clearly he values his own life and finds life in general a pretty fascinating thing.
In another sense, though, an accident is something that is not given any great meaning in our ordering of things. An accident may be something, but it signifies nothing. It was an accident that I happened to eat blackened catfish for dinner. Being green-eyed and the fact that I live in a house built in 1960 are both accidents in the sense that they have little deeper meaning to me. Sometimes a cigar is only a cigar.
And, in a third sense, an “accident” is something unwilled by a conscious entity. People write sonnets on purpose. They sneeze on accident. Lightning strikes here and not there because of accident. Even the tides are accidental in this sense, although they can be predicted more accurately.
It seems to me that Dawkins could easily hold that life is an accident in the third sense and maybe even in the second without it necessarily meaning he is a bad person.
My own favored theory is that that life is an emergent property of matter, just as science is an emergent property of inquiry, and markets are an emergent property of exchange. Whether this is an accident or not, I am not quite sure.
@Jim,
Excellent post! :-)
I’ll mention that the position of the “Opposition” arises from the inclusion of materialistic
dogmaphenomena in religion. In such instances the spiritual pursuit, called religion, is perverted and corrupted by the material. The point being that the threat of material corruption of religion is not an external threat, but an internal one.The present religious preoccupations with material phenomena are as non-sensical as a (hypothetical) scientific preoccupation with explaining the spiritual (an oxymoron, I think).
It appears to me that the Separatists unwittingly don’t grasp the difference between spiritual introspection (religion) and objective observation coupled with reasoned understanding (science), of if they do suffer a “cognitive dissonance” (as you put it).
The “Engagement advocates” appear to be the among those who grasp the proper realm of religious and scientific pursuits. Provided religion is focused upon spiritual enrichment and science upon objective understanding of material phenomena, then they enrich each other.
I’m personally curious. What do you mean by “Christian”. It appears to me that each individual has a different opinion as to what that is. I’m fairly confident there are “Christians” who qualify that label in a manner that you’d find objectionable.
To qualify as a Christian, is it sufficient (in your opinion) to be inspired by the example of the life of Jesus (as was Thomas Jefferson, for example), or must one accept the divinity of Jesus? … and what of claims regarding the God of Abraham? To be a Christian is it sufficient to see Jesus as a man divinely inspired to altruistic morality?
I ask, because my perspective implies two conflicts. One between religion and science and a second internal to religion. In each case, it is the materialistic claims of religion that are at the center of the conflict, and I don’t see it likely that the external conflict can be reconciled until the conflict internal to religion has been.
@Jason,
Nice description, but one quibble. Emergence isn’t an accident. It is reproducible. However, reproducing the emergence of life is a daunting task due to the time frames involved. However, with sufficient resources I expect man-kind will eventually develop and understanding of this phenomena.
Ben, Thanks for the compliment.
I actually don’t like using the term “Christian.” One reason is, that term is associated, in most folks minds, with Christianity — the institution. And I’m no fan of institutions.
Another reason is, it’s not exclusive enough for me, personally. I think Jefferson was wrong about Jesus. But if the term applies to people who disagree about Jesus’ deity, then what do you call someone who believes Jesus was the Christ? How do you distinguish?
But I still use the label Christian. Choosing some other label would require renewed explanation every single time I used it. Tangents can ruin an article — make it unreadable. So when I refer to MYSELF as a Christian, I mean it in the trinitarian sense.
Jim Babka,
I’m not quite sure what to think of a universe as violent and destructive as ours is, except that it can be quite unfriendly to life of any kind. How else should one think of the black holes that meander through our own galaxy, one of which could be bearing down on our solar system right now?
The fact that our universe is such that the probability of life evolving to the stage it has reached in us is one makes it friendly enough as far as I’m concerned. I mean, almost the entire universe is empty space; but that space is not wasted. I hate to invoke the anthropic principle, but it probably needs to be as big and lifeless and violent as it is to afford our small, green, pleasant home.
Chuck,
Our world isn’t that pleasant. As another eruption at Yellowstone would rather quickly demonstrate.
I mean, almost the entire universe is empty space…
Not really, if we can find some dark matter.
“our universe is such that the probability of life evolving to the stage it has reached in us is one”
How do we know this? Please elaborate.
-Charles
When an event happens with complete certainty, its probability is said to be one. We are certain that we are here, and therefore the probability that life has reached the present stage is indeed “one.” We may disagree, however, on how this came to be.
“When an event happens with complete certainty, its probability is said to be one.”
Well, that’s the explanation I was expecting … and sorry, but it’s wrong.
Pick any real number at random. Once it’s picked, yes it’s certain that it was picked, but that doesn’t alter the obvious fact that the a priori probability of picking that specific number is necessarily zero (proof left as exercise for the reader).
Similarly, the a priori probability that we would evolve might well be near zero (the essence, I assume, of the complexity argument for god’s existence - oops, I mean the unidentified “designer”) even though we have in fact done so. Ie, there were a huge number of a priori possibilities of which one had to occur even if the unconditional probability of each one occurring was close to zero.
The mistake is a common one: confusing unconditional (AKA a priori) and conditional probabilities. The conditional probability of event A given that event A has already occurred is clearly one*. But that’s not a terribly meaningful observation.
In short, the fact that we are here tells us nothing about the unconditional probability that we would get here.
* Formally, P{A|A} = P{A AND A}/P{A} = P{A}/P{A} = 1
As always, all with an implicit “IMO”.
- Charles
No, I don’t believe that I have confused conditional and a priori probabilities. Your assumption that the universe is not deterministic, and that, if it were re-run from the origin, it might not yield the current results, is a metaphysical speculation, as is the opposite assumption. We need not consider either of them here.
What is certain is that given the set of observed universes (one), and the portion of the set containing intelligent life (one), the probability that an observed universe chosen at random from the set will have intelligent life is also one. This is why it differs from your “pick a random number” example — the sample size is not infinite. It’s just one.
This sample size is so small, however, as to render the observation trivial; it says nothing about metaphysics in either direction.
My question to Chuck was in essence what his assumed sample space is. If it is your single event one, you are correct - although then his use of the term “probability” seems rather questionable. Exploration of probabilistic behavior in such a sample space seems of - shall we say - limited interest.
In any event, I don’t know why you address “the origin”, “observed universes” and “deterministic”. My argument was simply that in our universe, the earth-based evolutionary path leading to us - wherever you start it - is one of many possible paths emerging from that starting point (although I know little of the mechanics of evolution, it’s my impression that this is undisputed), each of which is non-deterministic in any meaningful sense (ditto). Hence, my sample space is essentially that set of possible paths (equivalent, I think, to the set of end points to date, of which we are one) - a “huge”, though not infinite, number. Which is why I switched from “zero” to “near zero” in making the analogy.
Admittedly, it’s always important to clearly specify the sample space in question. In context, I thought mine was clearly the relevant one. Perhaps I misunderstood the context - or was simply wrong. Only Chuck can tell us.
- Charles