Steve Borthwick highlights the risible attempt by the Daily Telegraph to name the top 5 arguments for evolution and creation.
I despair, I really do. I am bored witless with arguments about creationism, but it seems impossible to have a decent debate about science and God without the C-word being uttered in the first 3 minutes, and then everyone jumping up and down calling each other morons.
For the record.
- I'm a Christian, I believe God created the cosmos.
- I'm not a 'creationist' - I believe the universe is roughly as old as science says it is, until they get a better measurement. Last I heard it was about 15 billion years.
- I'm convinced that the thrust of the first three chapters of the Bible is not chronology but theology: what kind of world is this, what kind of God have we got, where do humans fit in, what's our relationship supposed to be to God, the world, and one another.
- I would love to hear more from the physicists, if the biologists could let them have a word in. There's lots of fascinating stuff about the origins of the universe, evidence of 'fine tuning' of the cosmos to make life possible etc. There's more to science than evolutionary biology, just as there's more to Christianity than how exactly God made the world. Not all physicists are theists, so it's clearly not a done deal, but there are some good debates to be had in that area.
- I don't know a great deal about evolution, but from what I have read it sounds like there's still some questions not settled, including the phenomenon of evolution happening in short bursts, followed by long periods of stability. It would be interesting to hear what someone better informed has to say about this, as I'm not expert enough to know what that's all about, or how much of a discussion is going on.
Showing posts with label evolution. Show all posts
Showing posts with label evolution. Show all posts
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Humanists call for Zoo to evolve.
The British Humanist Association is trying to get Noahs Ark, a themed zoo in Somerset, de-listed by the British Tourism Authorities. BBC story here, BHA press release here.
The BHA argues that the zoo presents anti-scientific ideas, and risks undermining the teaching of science. They state ‘We believe Noah’s Ark Farm Zoo misleads the public by not being open about its creationist agenda in its promotional activities and by advancing misunderstandings of the natural world.
The Noahs Ark website, under the heading 'Creation Research' (one of 6 principle tabs visible on all pages) says this: After looking at the current scientific explanations for origins and evolution; it is our view that the evidence available can be accurately explained using an evolution framework with an initial Creation by God. This is treated as controversial by some and welcomed by others: but our aim remains the same. We do not profess to have all the answers, but we will search for them with an open mind and publicise our theories.
That seems to me to be fairly clear about the 'agenda' of the zoo, so I'm not sure that first charge sticks. There are lots of other subsections there which explore issues of creation and evolution, without buying into either wholesale Darwinism or young earth creationism.
There are loads of museums and public attractions in which you could object to the content. Here in Somerset we have the Haynes Motor Museum, which glorifies car use (#fail - global warming) and Fleet Air Arm, which might encourage people to join the armed forces and get into fighting. Haynes also has the added issue of being incredibly dull. Wookey Hole has an area where cavemen are sited next to dinosaurs - which is historically flawed - and tells stories about witches and spells, which encourages children to believe in all sorts of nonsense. Glastonbury... well, lets not go there.
Murky territory. Maybe it's that Christians are allowed to do good things like protect animal species and encourage conservation, it's just that we're not allowed to explain what motivates us. Not happy with that at all. There's also the question of how far we trust people to think for themselves, and how far we try to 'protect' people from views that we aren't happy with. Both Richard Dawkins (see Monday's post) and the BHA seem to take the latter view, which is an interesting position for a rationalist to take.
And if you want to remove from the public eye things which are corrosive of the ability to reason and think, then start with Big Brother. Oh, sorry, that's already happened.....
Just for balance, here's a piece on the National Secular Society.
And other points of view, lest I be accused of undermining anything:
Independent
Wonderful life (supports BHA)
Fairly balanced piece at the Freethinker, which quotes an interesting letter from a local person who calls the zookeepers 'religious extremists' and 'far-Right'. Didn't realise it was run by Osama bin Laden and Margaret Thatcher, best avoid.
A site called 'Prats in Power' is very rude about the BHA, so rude I won't link them, but wonders how you become a self-appointed policeman of business.
Steve Borthwick looks at the educational value of the Ark.
Has anyone reading this actually been there?
The BHA argues that the zoo presents anti-scientific ideas, and risks undermining the teaching of science. They state ‘We believe Noah’s Ark Farm Zoo misleads the public by not being open about its creationist agenda in its promotional activities and by advancing misunderstandings of the natural world.
The Noahs Ark website, under the heading 'Creation Research' (one of 6 principle tabs visible on all pages) says this: After looking at the current scientific explanations for origins and evolution; it is our view that the evidence available can be accurately explained using an evolution framework with an initial Creation by God. This is treated as controversial by some and welcomed by others: but our aim remains the same. We do not profess to have all the answers, but we will search for them with an open mind and publicise our theories.
That seems to me to be fairly clear about the 'agenda' of the zoo, so I'm not sure that first charge sticks. There are lots of other subsections there which explore issues of creation and evolution, without buying into either wholesale Darwinism or young earth creationism.
There are loads of museums and public attractions in which you could object to the content. Here in Somerset we have the Haynes Motor Museum, which glorifies car use (#fail - global warming) and Fleet Air Arm, which might encourage people to join the armed forces and get into fighting. Haynes also has the added issue of being incredibly dull. Wookey Hole has an area where cavemen are sited next to dinosaurs - which is historically flawed - and tells stories about witches and spells, which encourages children to believe in all sorts of nonsense. Glastonbury... well, lets not go there.
Murky territory. Maybe it's that Christians are allowed to do good things like protect animal species and encourage conservation, it's just that we're not allowed to explain what motivates us. Not happy with that at all. There's also the question of how far we trust people to think for themselves, and how far we try to 'protect' people from views that we aren't happy with. Both Richard Dawkins (see Monday's post) and the BHA seem to take the latter view, which is an interesting position for a rationalist to take.
And if you want to remove from the public eye things which are corrosive of the ability to reason and think, then start with Big Brother. Oh, sorry, that's already happened.....
Just for balance, here's a piece on the National Secular Society.
And other points of view, lest I be accused of undermining anything:
Independent
Wonderful life (supports BHA)
Fairly balanced piece at the Freethinker, which quotes an interesting letter from a local person who calls the zookeepers 'religious extremists' and 'far-Right'. Didn't realise it was run by Osama bin Laden and Margaret Thatcher, best avoid.
A site called 'Prats in Power' is very rude about the BHA, so rude I won't link them, but wonders how you become a self-appointed policeman of business.
Steve Borthwick looks at the educational value of the Ark.
Has anyone reading this actually been there?
Monday, August 24, 2009
Dawkins Calls for the Priest
The Times is serialising some extracts from Richard Dawkins new book 'the Greatest Show on Earth', starting today. In it, Dawkins claims science teachers face a 'dire' plight, with a rising number of children, and parents, refusing to accept evolution, and persecuting science teachers who expound it. He compares this with historians trying to teach 20th century history to Holocaust deniers - which makes a good headline, but I'm pretty uncomfortable with anyone who uses the Holocaust to make a point in an argument.
The main body of the piece is a plea to church leaders (not quite sure why it's just church leaders, I didn't realise all Muslims were 100% behind Darwin on this one) who have accepted evolutionary theory and integrated it into their faith. Here's a bit of it:
To return to the enlightened bishops and theologians, it would be nice if they’d put a bit more effort into combating the anti-scientific nonsense that they deplore. All too many preachers, while agreeing that evolution is true and Adam and Eve never existed, will then blithely go into the pulpit and make some moral or theological point about Adam and Eve in their sermons without once mentioning that, of course, Adam and Eve never actually existed!
If challenged, they will protest that they intended a purely “symbolic” meaning, perhaps something to do with “original sin”, or the virtues of innocence. They may add witheringly that, obviously, nobody would be so foolish as to take their words literally. But do their congregations know that? How is the person in the pew, or on the prayer-mat, supposed to know which bits of scripture to take literally, which symbolically? Is it really so easy for an uneducated churchgoer to guess? In all too many cases the answer is clearly no, and anybody could be forgiven for feeling confused.
Think about it, Bishop. Be careful, Vicar. You are playing with dynamite, fooling around with a misunderstanding that’s waiting to happen — one might even say almost bound to happen if not forestalled. Shouldn’t you take greater care, when speaking in public, to let your yea be yea and your nay be nay? Lest ye fall into condemnation, shouldn’t you be going out of your way to counter that already extremely widespread popular misunderstanding and lend active and enthusiastic support to scientists and science teachers? The history-deniers themselves are among those who I am trying to reach. But, perhaps more importantly, I aspire to arm those who are not history-deniers but know some — perhaps members of their own family or church — and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case.
thoughts
1. It's quite possible to make moral or theological points about things without having to say whether they really happened or not - many great novels and works of literature do this. You wouldn't come on stage at the end of Les Miserables and say 'now don't forget everyone, this is all fiction, just a story made up by Dumas, and none of it really happened.'
2. I love the line about 'uneducated' churchgoers. That's a fine commentary on our schools system, unless Dawkins is proposing that the church play a greater role in education? Thought not.
3. I'm not sure it's the place of church leaders to go 'out of your way' to argue for evolution over against creationism. For one thing, there are a lot of other things going on in the real world, and this comes some way down the list of concerns. Secondly, we're not preaching on Genesis 1-3 every other month. I'll happily say from the pulpit (though I'd rather be at ground level) that Genesis is more of a theological document than a historical one, but it's not as though I'll get the chance to go into all of that in fine detail. People can think for themselves.
4. I wonder if that second paragraph has ever happened in reality, or whether it's a figment of Dawkins imagination. If his argument is based on facts, we should know. If it's based on fictions, then we should know. We should be told whether this blithe and withering clergyman ever existed, even as he is used to make a moral point.
5. It's quite amusing, that having systematiclly abused and ridiculed religious people for years, Dawkins is now trying to co-opt us. I'm not sure how he can argue that a) evolution disproves the existence of God and b) people who believe in God should be defending evolution. Huh? That's like asking Flintoff to bowl for the Aussies.
Further reading
Is Richard Dawkins a stage magician? (Uncommon Descent)
'The God Delusion makes me ashamed to be an atheist' (Thinking matters)
The main body of the piece is a plea to church leaders (not quite sure why it's just church leaders, I didn't realise all Muslims were 100% behind Darwin on this one) who have accepted evolutionary theory and integrated it into their faith. Here's a bit of it:
To return to the enlightened bishops and theologians, it would be nice if they’d put a bit more effort into combating the anti-scientific nonsense that they deplore. All too many preachers, while agreeing that evolution is true and Adam and Eve never existed, will then blithely go into the pulpit and make some moral or theological point about Adam and Eve in their sermons without once mentioning that, of course, Adam and Eve never actually existed!
If challenged, they will protest that they intended a purely “symbolic” meaning, perhaps something to do with “original sin”, or the virtues of innocence. They may add witheringly that, obviously, nobody would be so foolish as to take their words literally. But do their congregations know that? How is the person in the pew, or on the prayer-mat, supposed to know which bits of scripture to take literally, which symbolically? Is it really so easy for an uneducated churchgoer to guess? In all too many cases the answer is clearly no, and anybody could be forgiven for feeling confused.
Think about it, Bishop. Be careful, Vicar. You are playing with dynamite, fooling around with a misunderstanding that’s waiting to happen — one might even say almost bound to happen if not forestalled. Shouldn’t you take greater care, when speaking in public, to let your yea be yea and your nay be nay? Lest ye fall into condemnation, shouldn’t you be going out of your way to counter that already extremely widespread popular misunderstanding and lend active and enthusiastic support to scientists and science teachers? The history-deniers themselves are among those who I am trying to reach. But, perhaps more importantly, I aspire to arm those who are not history-deniers but know some — perhaps members of their own family or church — and find themselves inadequately prepared to argue the case.
thoughts
1. It's quite possible to make moral or theological points about things without having to say whether they really happened or not - many great novels and works of literature do this. You wouldn't come on stage at the end of Les Miserables and say 'now don't forget everyone, this is all fiction, just a story made up by Dumas, and none of it really happened.'
2. I love the line about 'uneducated' churchgoers. That's a fine commentary on our schools system, unless Dawkins is proposing that the church play a greater role in education? Thought not.
3. I'm not sure it's the place of church leaders to go 'out of your way' to argue for evolution over against creationism. For one thing, there are a lot of other things going on in the real world, and this comes some way down the list of concerns. Secondly, we're not preaching on Genesis 1-3 every other month. I'll happily say from the pulpit (though I'd rather be at ground level) that Genesis is more of a theological document than a historical one, but it's not as though I'll get the chance to go into all of that in fine detail. People can think for themselves.
4. I wonder if that second paragraph has ever happened in reality, or whether it's a figment of Dawkins imagination. If his argument is based on facts, we should know. If it's based on fictions, then we should know. We should be told whether this blithe and withering clergyman ever existed, even as he is used to make a moral point.
5. It's quite amusing, that having systematiclly abused and ridiculed religious people for years, Dawkins is now trying to co-opt us. I'm not sure how he can argue that a) evolution disproves the existence of God and b) people who believe in God should be defending evolution. Huh? That's like asking Flintoff to bowl for the Aussies.
Further reading
Is Richard Dawkins a stage magician? (Uncommon Descent)
'The God Delusion makes me ashamed to be an atheist' (Thinking matters)
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