God & Evolution: Indirectly or Not At All?

When it comes to opinion polls, wording is everything.  In a news posting entitled, "Belief in Evolution Up Since 2004,"YouGov reported on the findings of a poll it recently conducted investigating American beliefs about God's role (or lack of a role) in evolution.  Those results show that some 21% of those polled agreed with the statement that, "Human beings evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years, and God did not directly guide this process."  The alternative responses are: "Human begins evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years, but God guided this process" (25%); "God created human beings in their present form within the last ten thousand years" (37%); and "not sure" (17%).  Readers can see the full results of the poll (here).

The YouGov posting goes on to note that when compared with similar polls conducted by CBS in 2004 and 2008 this most recent poll shows an increase in those who believe that "human beings evolved without guidance from God" from 13% in 2004 to 15% in 2008 to 21% in 2013.

The problem is that, as reported in a CBS news posting concerning its 2004 poll, the wording for the statement about God's not guiding evolution is, "Humans evolved, God did not guide [the] process."  The YouGov statement is wordier but still comparable were it not for the word, "directly".  In the CBS poll God is not involved at all.  In the YouGov poll God is not directly involved.  That leaves the possibility that God is indirectly involved in at least a couple of possible ways.  It is possible that God set the process of evolution going but since then has not been involved.  It is also possible that in one guise or another God indirectly encourages the emergence of a more godly humanity but does not directly influence the course of events because that would violate human freedom.  Now, both of these possibilities leave room for debate, but that is precisely the problem.  The YouGov wording is too open ended.  It requires interpretation.  And there is no way of knowing how many individuals who believe that God is involved with evolution indirectly decided to affirm the statement that, "Human beings evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years, and God did not directly guide this process" and how many decided that the second response, "Human begins evolved from less advanced life forms over millions of years, but God guided this process," better fit their views.  Some respondents who do not believe that God is involved in evolution at all, on the other hand, might also have a problem with the wording of the first YouGov statement.  It leaves open the possibility that God might be indirectly involved when they believe that God is not involved at all.  Such a person might chose "not sure" rather than leave even a slight possibility of divine involvement in evolution.

There is little doubt that the number of Americans who reject divine involvement in evolution is growing.  There is every reason to doubt on the basis of the YouGov poll that it has grown by 8% in nine years.  It would not be particularly surprising if it has, but we don't know that it has based on this data.  And while this may be a minor point, statistical data such as this is always open to interpretation and should never be taken as certain even without the added inconsistency of wording in this particular case.  As the texts on survey methods remind us, questionnaires don't reveal what people think. What they do reveal is how a particular group of respondents answered a particular question on a particular day.

Ships Passing In the Night

Bill Nye, a well-known science educator, has just released a brief video entitled, "Bill Nye: Creationism Is Not Appropriate For Children," which interested readers can view below.  In this video, Nye argues that parents should not teach creationism to their children even if they believe it themselves.  It is not fair to the kids and harmful to our national good as the world's leading technological society (along with Japan, he thinks) for creationist parents to impose their own world view on their children.  The youtube index in which his video is listed shows that his remarks have spawned quite a few creationist rebuttals, which is hardly surprising.

Nye advocates a standard pro-evolution, pro-science perspective, but there is one point at which I think he is off base.  Toward the end of his remarks, he says to creationists,

"Your world just becomes fantastically complicated when you don't believe in evolution. I mean, here are these ancient dinosaur bones or fossils, here is radioactivity, here are distant stars that are just like our star but they're at a different point in their lifecycle. The idea of deep time, of this billions of years, explains so much of the world around us. If you try to ignore that, your world view just becomes crazy, just untenable, itself inconsistent."

It is common for partisans on both sides of the science vs. religion debate to describe their opponents' views as irrational because for them those opposing views literally do not make sense.  Nye is wrong when he calls creationist views "crazy" and "untenable".  Those who are convinced in the literal truth of the Bible find his views equally crazy and untenable—from their point of view.  They see Nye's views as being just as dangerous from a creationist perspective as he feels theirs are from his.  And while he is correct that creationism is inconsistent with the facts of science, which for him is reality, his views are inconsistent with the Bible from a literalist perspective, which for them is reality.  Social scientists have long pointed out that we create our realities socially, based on inherited worldviews.  The "real world" is what our social group says that it is.  Now, I personally am persuaded that  science represents reality, but I know reasonably intelligent, rational, and logical thinkers who believe that Genesis 1 defines reality.  They live in a social world of relationships, websites, books, and religious leaders who all support their view of reality and make it tenable.

I agree with Nye that their view of reality is wrong, but I disagree with him when he styles their views as being crazy or untenable.  Creationism is for biblical literalists entirely rational and consistent given their social and ideological world.  It serves no purpose for us to shout across the chasm that separates us, "You are stupid, crazy, and irrational!!!"  All that comes back is an echo.  It is exactly like  trying to "communicate" with a person who doesn't speak our language by shouting at him.  No matter how loudly we yell, she does not understand.

Note: according to a CNN news posting (here) Nye's video has "gone viral" and indeed sparked a backlash among creationists.

The Whole Bible in One Paragraph

In his introductory remarks to Genesis 1:1-2:4 in his 1982 commentary on the Book of Genesis, Walter Brueggemann writes,

“The main theme of the text is this: God and God’s creation are bound together in a distinctive and delicate way. This is the presupposition for everything that follows in the Bible. It is the deepest premise from which good news is possible. God and his creation are bound together by the powerful, gracious movement of God towards that creation. The binding which is established by God is inscrutable. It will not be explained or analyzed. It can only be affirmed and confessed. This text announces the deepest mystery: God wills and will have a faithful relation with earth. The text invites the listening community to celebrate that reality. The binding is irreversible. God has decided it. The connection cannot be nullified.” (Genesis, p. 22-23)

The  Bible relates the story of God's mysterious relationship with creation.  It is a story filled with powerfully good news because the heart of that relationship is God's grace for creation.  If we bring these insights into the 21st century, what we find again is that God's creation is evolutionary.  God is even now graciously creating us through God's faithful presence in the Spirit.  Amen.

Darwin, Texas, & Textbooks

According to a news posting on the Dallas Morning News website entitled, "New science e-books approved by state education board," the Texas Board of Education avoided a confrontation over materials for teaching biology in the state's schools.  Texas could not afford to buy new biology textbooks this year, and the board decided instead to publish a list of recommended supplementary online materials.  It looked like the the list might include some items promoting intelligent design (ID) theory, which is widely seen as a "front" for conservative Christian creationism doctrines.  According to the news posting, a number of "social conservatives" sit on the board, including its chairperson, and there was a real possibility that there would be a fight over the supplementary list as a result.  In the end, no ID texts were included, and the potential skirmish never materialized.

The Austin Statesman noted in its posting (here) on the Board of Education's decision that a Presbyterian minister, the Rev. Kelly Allen, was among those speaking against including the ID material on the supplemental list. It quotes her as saying, "I don't want my children's public school teachers to teach faith and God in a science classroom. True religion can handle truth in all its forms. Evolution is solid science."

Whatever our personal beliefs about evolution, Pastor Allen is correct in saying that evolution is solid science.  ID, on the other hand, has failed to establish itself as a viable scientific alternative for the study of biology. It is theology disguised as science, and as such it has no place in courses teaching the science of biology. If allowed in science classrooms, the teaching of ID not only introduces extraneous subject matters, but it also offers teachers of a certain theological persuasion the opportunity to evangelize their students with their religious beliefs.  Pastor Allen is also correct in her statement that religion can "handle truth in all its forms."  Religious faith at its best is a search for and a commitment to truth.  Not only can it "handle" scientific truths, it can embrace them.

Non-Territorial Magisteria

Yesterday's posting presents the argument that religion and science are usually and unnecessarily understood metaphorically as being two domains occupying separate territories in conflict with each other.  It's a useful metaphor for those who want to wage war on each other or profit from that war.  It is also a false metaphor that gets us into all sorts of trouble.

OK.  So, what do things look like if we reject the territorial metaphor?  One example might come from Michael Ruse's 1999 "Review of Stephen Jay Gould's 'Rocks of Ages," in which he critique's Gould's contention that religion and science are "non-overlapping magisteria"  (NOMA).  Ruse argues that NOMA effectively forces theists to have to constantly give away to science because science "rules supreme" in the "empirical realm."  Ruse worries that a strict construction of the boundary between science and religion puts unjustifiable constraints on the freedom of religious people.  He concludes, "One is denying [them] the right to revise and reinterpret one's faith in the light of scientific advances."  He criticizes Gould for not allowing theologians do that very thing, namely reinterpret Christian doctrine in light of scientific findings.  As an agnostic he wants to give theists the "right to explore and develop their beliefs in the light of modern science."

Ruse doesn't seem to realize that Christian thinkers have long exercised that right and many continue to do so today.   Since the days when the earliest church began to articulate its Jewish faith in Greek philosophical terms, Christian theologians have regularly and even aggressively used contemporary thought to restate our faith.  They didn't looked on those philosophies as being enemy territory but rather is being resources for discovering new aspects of our faith.  There is every reason to use scientific findings that way in our day.  When we're not engaged in a zero-sum game protecting the purity of our theological turf, we are free to accept the truth of those findings and learn from them.  They don't change our faith in Christ as Lord and Saviour.  They don't deny the presence of the Spirit in daily life.  And they only serve to expand our understanding of God as Creator.

People of faith who embrace evolution, in short, gain a great deal and lose nothing by walking away from the turf war going on between creationism and scientism.  That's not to say we ignore it so much as to say that we persist in seeing the relevance of both science and faith for understanding and living in our world.  They are resources for living.  Perhaps we should revive the old-fashioned non-territorial metaphor of God being revealed to us in two books, the Book of Nature and the Book of Faith (a.k.a the Book of Revelation, the Book of God).