Solid.

 

I agree and it seems that James 2:8-11 is applicable for this situation... :)

"If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself,' you are doing well. But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it. For he who said, 'Do not commit adultery,' also said, 'Do not murder.' If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law."

 

It's a shame that you stopped "believing" in evolutionary theory.

 

I don't mind when a person doesn't accept the idea of a Creator. There is nothing however, that demands a person believe in evolutionary theory.

It isn't an either/or scenario - that is, if you reject God as creator, you don't automatically have to cow to the evolutionary camp. There are plenty of intellectually honest atheist scholars who flatly reject evolution theory.

Would you still find it a shame that I rejected evolutionary theory, if I only did so in order to pursue some other secular explanation for reality? That is, do you just hate God, or do you really love evolution?

 

Exist-dissolve

Laying aside the Creator idea, do you believe that we will evolve out of our sinful nature, or predilections, as you might want to call them?

Not just what I might call sin or evil, but what you would, like murder, etc.? Or are there anything items that aren't up for grabs?

I am genuinely curious. Do you believe we are getting better? Not just on the social, no-slavery, women's rights, etc., etc., kind of thing, but are we getting better with what is in our hearts? Greed, lust, anger, etc.?

Maybe those aren't "sins" in your book, well then what is? And are we going to evolve out of those things? if not, what then of evolution, simply Nietzche's "will to power"?

 

daniel--

You said:

I don't mind when a person doesn't accept the idea of a Creator. There is nothing however, that demands a person believe in evolutionary theory.

It isn't an either/or scenario - that is, if you reject God as creator, you don't automatically have to cow to the evolutionary camp. There are plenty of intellectually honest atheist scholars who flatly reject evolution theory.

I agree that there is no necessary link between athiesm and evolutionary theory. However, it works the other way too--i.e., the affirmation of a Creator by no means necessitates that one reject evolutionary theory.

You said:

Would you still find it a shame that I rejected evolutionary theory, if I only did so in order to pursue some other secular explanation for reality? That is, do you just hate God, or do you really love evolution?

No, I find it a shame that you feel that evolutionary theory and theism are incompatible. You are creating a dichotomy between theology and science that does not exist. Moreover, it is perspectives like this which, in my estimation, make Christianity look utterly foolish in light of substantiated theories about the nature and processes of the universe in which we live. While Christianity does not need to accomodate science, there is also no need to create incompatibilities where none actually exist.

 

even so--

You said:

Laying aside the Creator idea, do you believe that we will evolve out of our sinful nature, or predilections, as you might want to call them?


As I explicitly reject that sinfulness is a biologically heritable phenomenon (which is gnosticism, really), there is no actual connection between human sinfulness and biological evolution. Moreover, social "evolution" and biological evolution are two entirely different concepts which have little or no actual connection with one another.

You said:

I am genuinely curious. Do you believe we are getting better? Not just on the social, no-slavery, women's rights, etc., etc., kind of thing, but are we getting better with what is in our hearts? Greed, lust, anger, etc.?

I don't understand where this idea of "better" comes into the picture...Evolutionary theory is not about things getting "better"--rather, it is a framework for
describing the changes which occur between species. But again, what you are talking about has nothing really to do with biological evolutionary theory. You are talking about anthropology and sociology. Therefore, the categories of discussion are entirely different. With that being said, I do not think we are necessarily "better" in these ways. Humans are still dysfunctionally related to God and others, and this dysfunction is manifested in myriad ways and is perpetuated through the violence which we exact upon one another on a daily basis.

You said:

Maybe those aren't "sins" in your book, well then what is? And are we going to evolve out of those things? if not, what then of evolution, simply Nietzche's "will to power"?

Once again, you are wrongly equating sociological theory with biological evolutionary theory. If sin were a biological problem, then perhaps evolution would solve it. However, as I reject this notion (that of the biological nature of sin), I would not say that we can "evolve" out of it in the way that you are speaking of evolution. Nietzsche, in speaking of the "will to power" and the ubermensch, was not talking about humanity evolving biologically to another, higher physiological state of being. Rather, his idea was that of the existential conquering of the weak gods which humans have constructed for themselves and which bind the human heart and will to fear and submission. To Nietzsche, the overman would still be physiologically human, but would have overcome the weaknesses of the "human" spirit to live in the perfect freedom of the will to power.

 

I understand the categories, glad for you to point this out.

I realize that Nietzsche didn't agree with Darwin on some points, but he isn't left with many choices, if "God is dead".

These social, moral items and evolutionary theory do become linked, one feeds into the other. Perhaps this isn't what you are talking about, but that is why we discuss, to more clearly define terms, etc. Perhaps, given the limited interaction here, and no prior knowledge of each other, we have not understood where we are coming from, per se.

Thaty being said, my point is, evolutionary theory has no basis for sociological or moral progress, save the ongoing biological construct, with its survival of the fittest.

If Nietzsche believes that we are to existentially overcome in our minds the false constructs, isn't this still a process of biological function? Especially since man has not been endued with a soul? If there is only man with its physical state, no soul, etc., how can we mentally, existentially achieve without it being a biological phenomena also?

Does FN, or you, believe that we have something inherent within us other than mere physical parts. If so what are these things? I am no biographer of FN, if you could, please explain how he might justify this apparent dilemma. Maybe you haven't read him thoroughly enough, I am not sure. How does he define "spirit", as non corporeal, when all he has is evolution, and biological processes, with nothing greater than the physical world itself?

I am not saying that you cannot be a Christian and believe in a Theistic evolutionary model; is that what you are contending for? If so, then a different ballgame. Help us understand your position with regards to theism; you did mention our relationship to God. Whom is your God?

However, regarding traditional evolutionary theory, "better", as I have termed it, is indeed "survivial of the "fittest". Besides total chaos, which we do not have, (I would agree to anyone who might say we have seen some advancement in "civility"), how is society to go on, morally speaking?

How is it that we achieve any "betterment" at all, or who defines it as such? Vox Populi, Vox Deus?

I for one do not believe the consensus of the people will continue, or even has done so at all, to guide us into a utopian ideal. It is without hope at its core, the only hope being that those who "deserve" to survive, long term, will.

Won't go on any longer, what say you?

 

exist~dissolve --

You said:

I agree that there is no necessary link between athiesm and evolutionary theory. However, it works the other way too--i.e., the affirmation of a Creator by no means necessitates that one reject evolutionary theory.

I agree. The affirmation of a Creator by no means necessitates that one reject evolutionary theory.

Notwithstanding, if a person affirms that scripture is without error it would be impossible to embrace the notion of evolution while maintaining any semblence of intellectual honesty.

Paul, in the new testament refers to Adam many times as a literal, historical figure, Jude also refers to Adam thus, as does Luke - as do the old testament scribes and prophets. The writers of scripture refer to Adam as an historical person - so it behooves me to do likewise.

Given therefore that scripture teaches that sin entered the world through the historical pserson we know as "Adam" - and given that Scripture teaches that death only entered into the human race through this sin - we must conclude that if men evolved from soup - every iteration between soup and man would still be living right up until death entered the world.

Consider therefore how inconsistent the evolutionary model becomes when we try and marry it to the idea that death doesn't exist yet. Without birth control, and presuming that the aging process is arrested at maturity - we should expect a mated couple to produce millions of offspring in each evolutionary iteration. The population growth would be mathematically "insane" - that is:

Even if we only had any one species alive on the earth at a time, without death the world would over populate long before the first million years were up.

Really, in the last 10,000 mankind has grown from a very small base (I would say two people, but let us say it was an hundred thousand or so) - even with periodic bouts of war and pestilence the population of human beings has flourished to billions. Imagine if no one ever died in that time? The population would be far more - and that is just 10,000 years. Looking only at the current "iteration" of the premised human evolutionary chain, we project from this rate of growth that in another 10,000 years the earth will be populated by several quadrillion people. That population growth forecast is derived from the growth rate of a population that dies (typically) every seventy years. So the numbers, should no one ever die - would be far greater.

I hope that you will see, that even if there were only five links between soup and man, and even if it only took 100,000 years between each evolutionary jump - I doubt that there would be enough space on the earth to house even the offspring from the first 100,000 years in the first link of the evolutionary chain. By the next 100,000 years, I expect that the mass of these two iterations growing together would be greater than the mass of the earth - and by the third iteration, we would already be displacing much of the solar system.

I hope you will see that evolution doesn't add up unless you set aside the notion that death didn't exist until Adam - that is, in order to accept evolutionary theory as "biblically compatible" I would have to compromise on (deny) the straight forward teaching of scripture. To do so, I would have to accept myself (or someone else I admire) as an arbitrary authority for determining exactly what in scripture can be believed, and what can be discarded.

I reason that if any of the bible is false - it may as well -all- be false since lacking an objective way to determine what is true I have no real authority to believe any of it - and if I cannot be sure any of it is true, it seems arrogant (at best) to presume any of it is true.

I agree, evolutionary theory doesn't need to be the antithesis of creationism - but I put forward that it is necessarily incompatible with a Christianity that holds the bible as entirely true and without error.

Evolutionary theory is, I believe, only compatible with that variety of Christianity that on the one hand says we can believe the bible, yet on the other subjectively dismisses whatever truths are inconsistent with competing and favoured secular systems or genesis.

I think that insisting that the bible is on the one hand reliable, and on the other unreliable is not only unacceptably inconsistent - but it makes those who articulate this view look confused (at best).

 

even so–

You said:

I realize that Nietzsche didn't agree with Darwin on some points, but he isn't left with many choices, if "God is dead".

To Nietzsche, the idea that “God is dead” is not an ontological proposition, as if God has ceased to exist in being. Rather, “God is dead” because the God of pity, the God of weakness (which to Nietzsche is the God of Christianity) has ceased to be an answer to humanity’s existential dilemma. Therefore, this is not actually an atheism, but rather a critique of what he believed to be Christianity’s emasculating ethic of love and self-sacrifice.

You said:

These social, moral items and evolutionary theory do become linked, one feeds into the other

Yes, I do recognize that some have preempted the independent disciplines and used biological evolutionary theory as a paradigm for sociological development and change. Moreover, I also believe that there some potential correlations in describing social development through biological metaphors. Nonetheless, I do not think there can be a wholesale application of evolutionary theory to sociological disciplines, and attempts to do so have often been quite destructive. However, the fact that this has been inappropriately done does not invalidate either evolutionary biology nor sociological studies.

You said:

That being said, my point is, evolutionary theory has no basis for sociological or moral progress, save the ongoing biological construct, with its survival of the fittest.

While I do not agree that it has “no” basis, I will agree that the blind application of biological evolutionary theory to sociological/ethcial disciplines is improper.

You said:

If Nietzsche believes that we are to existentially overcome in our minds the false constructs, isn't this still a process of biological function? Especially since man has not been endued with a soul? If there is only man with its physical state, no soul, etc., how can we mentally, existentially achieve without it being a biological phenomena also?

On one level, you are right. As mentality cannot be bifurcated from physicality, there is a sense in which evolution of the human species would concomitantly involve a mental evolution. However, I do not think Nietzsche would reduce the origination of the ubermensch to biological change/evolution. Rather, for Nietzsche, the “becoming” of the ubermensch is an act of the will, not of nature. For Nietzsche, the natural course of the will has created the oppression of the Christian ethic. Therefore, for Nietzsche, the ubermensch will never come about through biological/mental evolution, but rather originates in the crisis of the act of will over and against the dehumanizing existential dilemma of religioned, conditioned humanity.

You said:

Does FN, or you, believe that we have something inherent within us other than mere physical parts. If so what are these things? I am no biographer of FN, if you could, please explain how he might justify this apparent dilemma. Maybe you haven't read him thoroughly enough, I am not sure. How does he define "spirit", as non corporeal, when all he has is evolution, and biological processes, with nothing greater than the physical world itself?

As far as FN on the subject, I am still unclear as to that. Personally, I am a monist. In other words, I think human persons are body/soul, an indivisible unity. I think such an explanation makes intelligible the fact that we are more than matter, and yet maintains the reality of and meaningfulness of resurrection.

You said:

I am not saying that you cannot be a Christian and believe in a Theistic evolutionary model; is that what you are contending for? If so, then a different ballgame. Help us understand your position with regards to theism; you did mention our relationship to God. Whom is your God?

I am a Christian who affirms the historic creeds of the church. I also fully affirm the idea of Big Bang cosmology and evolutionary biology as functioning as helpful and reasonably accurate paradigms through which to understand the way in which the universe developed and came to be what it is today. .

You said:

However, regarding traditional evolutionary theory, "better", as I have termed it, is indeed "survivial of the "fittest".

I don’t think this is an accurate description of evolutionary theory. While the “fittest” who survive may be “better” than those who don’t, evolutionary theory is not dealing with individual organisms. Rather, it functions on the level of description of the changes that occur between species. Therefore, when I disavow the idea of “better,” I am speaking from the perspective of evolutionary theory which is looking at species as a whole.

You said:

Besides total chaos, which we do not have, (I would agree to anyone who might say we have seen some advancement in "civility"), how is society to go on, morally speaking?

How is it that we achieve any "betterment" at all, or who defines it as such? Vox Populi, Vox Deus?

I for one do not believe the consensus of the people will continue, or even has done so at all, to guide us into a utopian ideal. It is without hope at its core, the only hope being that those who "deserve" to survive, long term, will.

Won't go on any longer, what say you?

As I do not advocate evolutionary theory in sociological/ethical disciplines, I’m not sure how to answer this in light of our discussion about biological evolutionary theory. Like you, I disavow the idea that the will of the mass of humanity will lead to an utopian ideal.

I’ll stop for now, as I need to get to lunch.

 

exist~dissolve:

I appreciate the time taken. As far as the bifurcation of physical and mental (or spiritual), was FN a monist? Do you see it as Nietzsche v. Skinner, perhaps?

I just don't believe you can divorce the beliefs from the consequences in this case. We have seen the fruit. As for indivisible nature, it is debatable, for sure, both ways, of course. It does seem ironic with your name (dissolve).

Thanks again, glad to hear you affirm creeds (Nicene? WCF?). Now let me hear you confirm Christ: as the only way to God, and that He and God are of one substance, that we are created, and that God is BOTH immanent and transcendent, and I will be happy.

Not to be demanding, but to know if we are truly on at least some of the same pages. When Paul says that in Him we live and move and have our being (no matter whom he was quoting), what do you take this to mean? Some, (some!) monists are akin to panentheists, I hope this isn't you.

 

Daniel

Sorry for the rabbit trail. It can be a good thing, though. Even if we just rehash old stuff, not all who visit here will be familiar with the particulars, so it is in a sense a good thing to trot out the trail, as it were.

Hopefully, some will be edified. I will stop on your request, or when I get tired, ha ha.

 

daniel--

You said:

I agree. The affirmation of a Creator by no means necessitates that one reject evolutionary theory.

Notwithstanding, if a person affirms that scripture is without error it would be impossible to embrace the notion of evolution while maintaining any semblence of intellectual honesty.

Well, this seriously depends upon how one defines “without error.” After all, the way in which one interprets the Scripture will determine very much what is and is not error. And speaking of “intellectual honesty,” it is difficult to understand how those who deny evolutionary theory and big bang cosmology in preference to a “literal” interpretation of Genesis can honestly believe what they do in light of the evidence of the natural world in which we live which rests in favor of evolutionary theory/big bang cosmology. Such a perspective of Scripture, in my view, requires that one completely ignore the testimony of the universe in which we live. This cosmos-denying philosophical orientation smacks very much of gnostic inclinations.

You said:

Paul, in the new testament refers to Adam many times as a literal, historical figure, Jude also refers to Adam thus, as does Luke - as do the old testament scribes and prophets. The writers of scripture refer to Adam as an historical person - so it behooves me to do likewise.

These same also probably thought a lot of rubbish about the natural world at which we would, today, scoff. I am fully willing to acknowledge that all of these thought that Adam was a historical person. However, I hardly see why this is important for the message which they were teaching. After all, unlike modern interpreters of the Scriptures, the biblical writers were hardly concerned with “historicity” in the same way that we are–the non-contextual utilization and quotation of OT passages in the gospels and throughout the Pauline writers makes this extremely clear. To these writers, the fact that Adam could be verifiably identified as an historical person is not the central issue; rather, it is the meaning embodied by Adam that is central to the thoughts they are communicating. Unfortunately, modern interpretations often miss this key issue.

Given therefore that scripture teaches that sin entered the world through the historical person we know as "Adam" - and given that Scripture teaches that death only entered into the human race through this sin - we must conclude that if men evolved from soup - every iteration between soup and man would still be living right up until death entered the world.

You should be careful about the applications which you apply to the biblical texts, especially the creation narratives. I would assert that the meaning of the creation narratives–and Paul’s subsequent conjuring of their images–is intended to communicate that the problem of sin is a human, relational one. For example, in the creation narratives, the problem of sin is located in human pride and self-assertion over against the divine will. It is this, within the myth, which shatters the “goodness” of creation. This stands as a fairly significant polemic against other creation narratives of the day which would have located sinfulness and the “badness” of human life in the capriciousness of the local deities. And in Paul, this argument about the origin of sin is used not as an abstract dissertation on theodicy, but rather in relationship to an incarnational and soteriological discourse about Christ. It is a means of contrast, showing the means by which Christ is the sole, yet universal savior for humanity.

You said:

Consider therefore how inconsistent the evolutionary model becomes when we try and marry it to the idea that death doesn't exist yet. Without birth control, and presuming that the aging process is arrested at maturity - we should expect a mated couple to produce millions of offspring in each evolutionary iteration. The population growth would be mathematically "insane" - that is:

Even if we only had any one species alive on the earth at a time, without death the world would over populate long before the first million years were up.

Really, in the last 10,000 mankind has grown from a very small base (I would say two people, but let us say it was an hundred thousand or so) - even with periodic bouts of war and pestilence the population of human beings has flourished to billions. Imagine if no one ever died in that time? The population would be far more - and that is just 10,000 years. Looking only at the current "iteration" of the premised human evolutionary chain, we project from this rate of growth that in another 10,000 years the earth will be populated by several quadrillion people. That population growth forecast is derived from the growth rate of a population that dies (typically) every seventy years. So the numbers, should no one ever die - would be far greater.

I hope that you will see, that even if there were only five links between soup and man, and even if it only took 100,000 years between each evolutionary jump - I doubt that there would be enough space on the earth to house even the offspring from the first 100,000 years in the first link of the evolutionary chain. By the next 100,000 years, I expect that the mass of these two iterations growing together would be greater than the mass of the earth - and by the third iteration, we would already be displacing much of the solar system.

I hope you will see that evolution doesn't add up unless you set aside the notion that death didn't exist until Adam

Yes, this is precisely what I would do. Despite interpretations of Scripture to the contrary (and the subsequent deployment of this philosophical presupposition as a tenable scientific methodological principle), both cosmological and terrestrial history reveal explicitly and incontrovertibly that death and decay are part and parcel of finite reality. The very constitution of the human person, in fact, requires the organism’s continual “death” in order that life might occur (i.e., the replication, division, and death of cellular material, etc.).

You said:

- that is, in order to accept evolutionary theory as "biblically compatible" I would have to compromise on (deny) the straight forward teaching of scripture.

I would question what you claim as the “straightforward teaching of scripture.” Such a claim seems to ignore the fact that one inevitably begins with a presupposition about the nature and function of Scripture and arrive at a particular conclusion which is surprisingly consonant with the beginning presuppositions.

You said:

To do so, I would have to accept myself (or someone else I admire) as an arbitrary authority for determining exactly what in scripture can be believed, and what can be discarded.

Are you, and all of us, not this already? Do you really think it is possible to arrive at an “objective” interpretation of the scriptures? Such a perspective, in my estimation, overestimates the readers ability to accurately engage the original intention of the writer. Moreover, as authorial intent is virtually impossible to objectively gauge, it is more likely that subsequent claims of “objectivity” are self-invalidating, for in claiming such, it appears that the reader has simply substituted their own presuppositions about authorial intent and called it “objective.”

You said:

I reason that if any of the bible is false - it may as well -all- be false since lacking an objective way to determine what is true I have no real authority to believe any of it - and if I cannot be sure any of it is true, it seems arrogant (at best) to presume any of it is true.

I don’t understand how the propositional statement that “the bible is 100% true” equates to having an “objective way to determine what is true.” It seems, rather, that you have simply defined the terms of truth for yourself and made universal claims about it. In my understanding, this is the same as your fear about seeming arrogant.

You said:

I agree, evolutionary theory doesn't need to be the antithesis of creationism - but I put forward that it is necessarily incompatible with a Christianity that holds the bible as entirely true and without error.

The usefulness of “inerrancy” aside, I still do not see how evolutionary theory invalidates inerrancy.

You said:

Evolutionary theory is, I believe, only compatible with that variety of Christianity that on the one hand says we can believe the bible, yet on the other subjectively dismisses whatever truths are inconsistent with competing and favored secular systems or genesis.

But this is precisely what you are doing, only inversely. You begin with a presupposed interpretation of Scripture, and submit the whole of reality to this interpretation. Therefore, if something comes along (like evolutionary theory) that does not cohere to this presupposed conception about reality, you reject it. In doing so, however, you have set the Scriptures up to be completely invalidated, for the moment that someone can come along and fracture the “inerrancy,” the whole structure collapses and one is left with nothing.


I think that insisting that the bible is on the one hand reliable, and on the other unreliable is not only unacceptably inconsistent - but it makes those who articulate this view look confused (at best).

Well, this certainly depends upon the categories to which one insists the scriptures are “reliable.” If one is talking about scientific theory, the Scriptures are not reliable at all. If one is talking about history (in a modern historical/critical way), the Scriptures are not reliable. One must be very careful into which categories one wishes to press the authority of Scripture, for in some categories the entire thing may be invalidated. And if one makes strong claims about the categorical veracity of the Scriptures, one should not be offended when these same categories take out their pound of flesh on the Scriptures. Unfortunately, this is precisely what the doctrine of “inerrancy” does and is, furthermore, precisely why people scoff at the Scriptures in modern society.

 

even so--

You said:

As far as the bifurcation of physical and mental (or spiritual), was FN a monist? Do you see it as Nietzsche v. Skinner, perhaps?

Unfortunately, I am not as well read on Nietzsche (as I would like to be) to be able to honestly answer this question. My gut instinct would say that he was a monist, but I am not positive about that.

You said:

I just don't believe you can divorce the beliefs from the consequences in this case. We have seen the fruit.

Sure, there is fruit. However, that still does not mean that the equation of biological evolutionary theory and sociological studies is appropriate, nor that the conclusions are legitimate.


You said:

As for indivisible nature, it is debatable, for sure, both ways, of course. It does seem ironic with your name (dissolve).

My name, actually, gets at the heart of what I believe. I do not believe that human persons (body or soul or body/soul) persist beyond death. Rather, we truly do "exist-dissolve"--this is nature of being finite. However, we do have hope of resurrection, a hope that is so far beyond us or any natural faculty that we possess that it is truly our only hope of persistence beyond death.

You said:

Thanks again, glad to hear you affirm creeds (Nicene? WCF?).


No, I said I affirm the historic creeds of the Church. These, in my understanding, include all of the ecumenical councils of the Church (the first 7) and none beyond that.


Now let me hear you confirm Christ: as the only way to God, and that He and God are of one substance, that we are created, and that God is BOTH immanent and transcendent, and I will be happy.


Per my affirmation of the ecumenical creeds of the Church, this is already assumed, for the creeds have no other subject.

Not to be demanding, but to know if we are truly on at least some of the same pages. When Paul says that in Him we live and move and have our being (no matter whom he was quoting), what do you take this to mean? Some, (some!) monists are akin to panentheists, I hope this isn't you.

Well, that depends very much upon your definition of "panentheism." For example, I hold to something akin to pan-entheism, meaning that "God indwells all" while maintaining the ontological distinction between God and the creation.

 

E-D -- thanks for your thoughtful response, I appreciate it.

Given that I am coming to the table (as it were) believing scripture one way, and you are coming to scripture in another - that is, given that we disagree about the very foundation upon which our respective opinions find their source - it is unlikely that our discussion can progress beyond either gainsaying, talking above/across one another, or debating the merits and flaws of each other's base presumptions.

I hope you will not be offended therefore, if I fail to pursue any of these avenues that are presently left open to me. ;-)

 

None taken.