Tornadoes in Junkyards and Monkeys with Typewriters: A Meditation on the Problem of Symmetry and Design in Nature
By Matt Balasis on January 22, 2010
MINNEAPOLIS (Herald de Paris) – “The origin of life appears at the moment to be almost a miracle, so many are the conditions which would have had to have been satisfied to get it going.” Francis Crick, co-author The Double Helix.
Linked above is a fascinating retrospective of sorts assembled by the science editors over at the New York Times which solicited a number of prominent contemporary thinkers to comment on their favorite passages from Darwin’s “On the Origin of Species”. Like many, I have read this book more through quotes and references, than I have actually gone cover to cover. I’d like to read it, but in the meantime articles like this one in The Times provide more than enough fodder for discussion. The first of the five passages analyzed stands out the most for me.
“It may be said that natural selection is daily and hourly scrutinizing, throughout the world, every variation, even the slightest; rejecting that which is bad and preserving and adding up all that is good; silently and insensibly working, whenever and wherever opportunity offers, at the improvement of each organic being in relation to its organic and inorganic conditions of life.”
It is an elegant passage from an elegant work, but I was struck by an item mentioned in the commentary that followed it by William B. Provine, Andrew H. and James S. Tisch Distinguished University Professor, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University … whew. The quote is as follows:
“Here Darwin has turned his great idea of natural selection into a little god, who behaves like the Intelligent Design creator. He does this many times in this book and all later works; but were you to ask him, he clearly believed the causes of natural selection are utterly purposeless. In this respect, Darwin has guided modern evolutionary biology more deeply than he could have suspected. My colleagues in Evolutionary Biology constantly say, “natural selection acts on variation” or similar phrases, and so they write about natural selection as Darwin did: deny all purpose, and use teleological language in describing natural selection.”
What would almost certainly relegate me to the status of insufferable nuisance were I in attendance at one of Dr. Privine’s lectures, is the postulate that the causes (of natural selection) are “utterly purposeless”. I also tend to get really irritated by future subjunctive clauses in the third person, specifically the hypothetical “were you to ask him” thing … how can you really know what Darwin would say? What if he were having a really bad day? How do I really know what Hemingway would do if I poked him with a stick? When I come upon a passage like this my first inclination is to decode intent by means of what knowledge of syntax and semantics I possess. In doing so I find a problem with the premise, that a cause can be purposeless. By definition a cause must have an effect and can therefore never really be purposeless in that it functions as a conduit towards some consequence, acting to facilitate a specific outcome. A cause’s “purpose” in its most rudimentary sense is to trigger that effect, you can’t have one without the other. It would be like saying the recent heavy snowfalls caused the avalanche but that was not their purpose. Purpose is therefore ostensibly inherent in the trigger that trips the hammer which fires the bullet. When a leaf eating insect happens to don a greenish hue, to say that this adaptation is the result of a “senseless” or random process seems like a contradiction in terms. The process (natural selection) which produced the adaptation is at the very least a trigger with inherent properties contributing to production of the aforementioned effect. Its like saying a trigger’s “purpose” is not really to fire the bullet, it just happens to accidentally strike the charge and propel the bullet every time it’s pulled.
The presumption that there is no purpose to a cause (in nature) flies in the face of the majesty and elegance of both the processes, mechanisms, and the resultant structure as a whole of nature, and that’s just a gut feeling if you’ll allow me. A feeling that I’ve experienced staring at the sun setting over a calm lake or listening to the whispering in the trees after an ice storm during a cold morning walk in the woods. In fact, I sometimes wonder if Darwin wouldn’t have tapered his rhetoric were you to ask him regarding the “senselessness” of natural selection if he were privy to contemporary models of molecular biology; specifically the awe inspiring structure of the DNA molecule.
As a confused undergraduate with aspirations in both the sciences and the arts I considered myself a true agnostic, not because it seemed to be the trend among both my peers and my instructors, but because I felt I simply didn’t know enough to believe in a creator with any certainty. It seemed logical enough, I didn’t believe in God, the way I didn’t believe in ghosts or goblins or bigfoot. Was I implying that goblins didn’t exist? No, I just felt I needed some proof either way. A true skeptic, I was raised in a metropolis (New York) where the gullible tended to do poorly … where you might even say they’d be “selected” out of the population. In the years that followed I left New York for Minnesota and mellowed somewhat, becoming enamored with the beauty of the physical world around me as I started a family and watched my children grow from infants to toddlers to young adults. I marveled at their uniqueness and was at times astonished at my own capacity to love them. A slow simmering doubt seemed to creep into my consciousness that began to eat away at my skepticism. Tossing my 2-year-old up into a backdrop of clear blue sky or watching children at a playground. My skepticism made me skeptical about my skepticism. How could all this be a purposeless accident? It would imply that love and reason and beauty have no purpose and are themselves the random transient artifacts of a random transient species. That seems unlikely, even were I raised on planet Vulcan, I would turn to my pointy-eared contemporaries and tell them I’m inclined to think there is something more to this love that I feel for my offspring than the obvious evolutionary advantage it may afford. As illogical as it may sound, this irresistible and profound affection may even exude a quality that is, in a way, eternal. At some point the effect, the trait, the adaptation, becomes a cause in it’s own right taking on a pragmatic life of its own, a life that we cradle and shape the way an artist would carve a sculpture out of stone. At that moment we pass beyond the confines of cause and effect, evolution and selection, and become our own causes, creators in our own right, driven by common morals to some greater state, we move towards increased complexity with every generation, we become.
Alfred North Whitehead, a brilliant early twentieth century mathematician turned philosopher, found himself circling back from his scientific training and his agnostic roots to a place where he all but acknowledged a process based “becoming” steeped entirely in ethereal guiding elements. It was not lost on his contemporaries that these elements could loosely be construed as a kind of “force” in nature, an incorporeal essence driving our becoming, a deity if you will. Now I’m not about to trust in the force when I debate when to try and enter a busy highway from an on-ramp, but surprisingly, there are artifacts of design in our natural world that point away from the random and which encompass a sublime symmetry and an inherent beauty, not the least of which is the DNA molecule itself, the blue print and the foundation of all life.
We know that the ingredients to create a DNA based organism were present in the primordial soup when life first appeared millennia ago, but the probability that this would occur randomly is remarkably unlikely. In a quote from The Intelligent Universe, Fred Hoyle the noted English astronomer (London, 1983, pp. 18 – 19) went on to say:
“If you stir up simple non organic molecules like water, ammonia, methane, carbon dioxide and hydrogen cyanide with almost any form of intense energy … some of the molecules reassemble themselves into amino acids … demonstrated … by Stanley Miller and Harold Urey. The … building blocks of proteins can therefore be produced by natural means. But this is far from proving that life could have evolved in this way. No one has shown that the correct arrangements of amino acids, like the orderings in enzymes, can be produced by this method. …. A junkyard contains all the bits and pieces of a Boeing 747, dismembered and in disarray. A whirlwind happens to blow through the yard. What is the chance that after its passage a fully assembled 747, ready to fly, will be found standing there? So small as to be negligible, even if a tornado were to blow through enough junkyards to fill the whole Universe.”
And then there is this by Jim Brooks:
“This generalized proposition-that processes of chance and natural law led to living organisms emerging on Earth from the relatively simple organic molecules in ‘primordial soups’-is valid only if there is a finite probability of the correct assembly of molecules occurring within the time-scale envisaged. Here there is another great problem. In the above example for a relatively small protein of 100 amino acids, selection of this correct sequence had to be made by chance from 10 to the 130 alternative choices. The operation of pure chance would mean that within a maximum of about 500 million years (or somewhat less), the organic molecules in the ‘primordial soup’ might have to undergo 10 to the130th power trial assemblies to hit on the correct sequence. The probability of such a chance occurrence leading to the formation of one of the smallest protein molecules is unimaginably small. Within the boundary conditions of time and space which we are considering, it is effectively zero.” (Brooks, J., “Origins of Life,” Lion: Tring, Hertfordshire UK, 1985, pp.84-85).
The amusing infinite monkey theorem states that given enough time a monkey sitting in front of a typewriter typing random letters would eventually produce a complete Shakespeare play, but this is not the case with the paradigm of the whirlwind in the junkyard. We are looking at a window of about 500 million years for this remarkable arrangement of elements to have taken place. The probability that a DNA molecule spontaneously came together during this 500 year window is frankly beyond improbable, the chances, are effectively zero. There are those who would argue that forces governing evolutionary biology and natural selection may have contributed to a process by which such a molecule evolved, perhaps over thousands of years, but I don’t buy it, you can’t have it both ways. Inorganic matter does not behave like organic matter, you cannot superimpose the rules governing organic matter to a collection of lifeless elements. Rocks do not evolve and neither would the chemicals required to construct a DNA molecule.
Call it faith, call it a hunch, call it what you will, there is something special about this life around us. Jaque Monod, the evolutionary biologist who insisted that the advent of humans as a species was a completely unpredictable and random occurrence, nevertheless conceded that “When matter becomes part of a living thing its no longer the same as other matter … it becomes essentially unpredictable.” Unlike inorganic matter, the organic biosphere does not play by the rules of physics or the laws of thermodynamics. One may argue that evolution is a systematic process triggered accidentally (the only way to truly know this for sure is if we somehow knew what precisely set life into motion and we haven’t yet a clue) but while all the universe crumbles around us in a state of perpetual entropy, as a species we continue to move upwards toward some more advanced state. We are the first species on this planet capable of perceiving qualities of mind and spirit that are wholly intangible. While we love our children and while this is perhaps instinct, we can also interpret something as beautiful, something else as joyful, we can employ reason and feel love … and that, is unique in our species. We are aware of properties that are eternal and which are infused into the very fiber of our consciousness. It is difficult if not impossible to attempt to interpret our will towards reason and love and beauty strictly in terms of evolutionary edicts. For lack of a better characterization, our tendency to assimilate and reflect on examples of love or beauty incarnate in images or moments frozen in time, can only be deemed a kind of divine proclivity. We are trying to be like something we don’t quite understand but we know it when we see it.
I still have doubts about a great many things, but the subversive in me no longer resists notions of faith. My rebelliousness now seems to rail against a surprisingly acerbic band of thinkers who appear to have taken it upon themselves to crush any argument that even remotely implies intelligence, symmetry, or purpose, to our design. I’m no Einstein, but even I can say with some certainty that there is no certainty to assumptions with implications as vast and monumentally universal as these … it would be like me claiming to know that the universe as a whole is really a speck of dander on my neighbor’s springer spaniel, and to argue that position with astonishing bombast. Whether or not we are some random accident, purposeful creation, or exacting experiment, is in the end unknown. Ultimately this open question renders both sides of this debate legitimate and viable, and that my friends is precisely my point here. A free thinker needs consider all sides and possibilities not simply those that fit a particular trend. To flatly deny the possibility that there could be evidence of intelligent design in our natural surroundings is to be as inflexible as the wild eyed fanatic on the corner condemning me to fire and brimstone because I’ve not repented. In the end, I prefer to hold to the Socratic tenet, “an unexamined life is not worth living” and keep an open mind.
I should add, the 10 to the 130th power probability of DNA forming on its own is a conservative estimate, some models go so far as to estimate the probability (depending on conditions) as high as 10 to the 162nd power.
The argument isn’t really “ID/Creationism” versus “Evolution”. Evolution happens – creatures evolve. We evolved from earlier forms. The evidence is there, the mechanisms are well understood. The evolutionary model makes successful predictions all the time. The Theory of Evolution is a solid as atomic theory, tectonic plate theory, and the germ theory of disease.
Many religious people believe in natural evolution – they believe God set off the Big Bang and let it run from there. Others believe the Book of Genesis is 100% factual history and life on Earth started in 4004 BC, in October. So there is no consistent “creationism” viewpoint.
So the argument is really “evolution acceptance” versus “evolution denial”, where evolution denial is no different than any other form of reality denial. Evolution denial = Holocaust denial = lunar landing denial = round Earth denial.
Evolution is a solid theory, simple at the core and complex in the details. It employs well-understood mechanisms:
Replication + Variation + Selection = Evolution
It has evidence to support each component, it has mountains of evidence found in the fossil record, in vestigial traits in living creatures, in atavisms, in morphology, in genetics and in molecular biology. The facts of evolution are supported by and mesh with other sciences like geology, paleontology, physics, other aspects of biology, cosmology, etc. And it is supported by thousands of critical scientists trying to prove each other wrong, or trying to add their own insights to the theory.
For evolution to NOT be true, many other sciences must have also made major mistakes.
Evolution-deniers claim Evolution is “only a theory” because they say “theory” = “guess” or “hunch”. But in science the word “theory” means a complex model to explain many facts. The theory that life evolved from earlier life is as well supported as the “theories” that the continents drift, that germs cause disease and that stuff is made of atoms. You can bet you life on all of those “theories”.
Evolution-deniers claim there is no evidence for Evolution. This is a lie. Here are a long list of strong evidence for evolution, and even a list of how you’d disprove evolution, and why the evidence supports evolution:
http://www.talkorigins.org/faqs/comdesc/section1.html
Evolution-deniers claim scientists are “abandoning” evolution because some scientists signed a statement saying they are skeptical that Darwinian evolution accounts for all the variation in the species. But (1) this doesn’t mean those scientists believe it takes divine or non-natural intervention for evolution to happen, and (2) the list is a fraud:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ty1Bo6GmPqM
Not only that, but there are nearly 12,000 Christian CLERGY who’ve signed a statement supporting evolution and rejecting the teaching of creationism as science. Science isn’t about voting, but even if it was, evolution still wins.
http://www.butler.edu/clergyproject/Christian_Clergy/ChrClergyLtr.htm
Evolution-deniers claim the fossil record does not support evolution, and that there are no intermediate species or transitional fossils. This is an outright lie.
Professional evolution-deniers like Kent Hovind or Harun Yahya claim that a “transitional fossil” is some unworkable mutant like half-crocodile/half-duck or half-starfish/half-flounder. They paint these ridiculous pictures of absurd creatures, then say “see! Evolution is false because these don’t exist!”.
Evolution deniers say “you expect me to believe a reptile one day gave birth to a bird?” Of course, it doesn’t work that way, any more than a Latin-speaker one day decided to teach their child French.
Like changes in language, evolution works by tiny changes in populations over a long time, so that species slowly morph into different forms. When you grow from an infant to an adult, your left leg doesn’t grow to full size first, then your right arm, then your head. Similarly, evolution doesn’t put a crocodile’s head on a duck’s body.
Here is a devout Christian explaining about all sorts of intermediate species and how the fossil record absolutely supports evolution: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9a-lFn4hqY
Here is an example of how scientists used evolutionary theory to predict a particular undiscovered species should exist, when it should have existed, and where to dig NOW to find a fossil of it. They went to that spot and found five examples. What successful predictions has creationism ever made?
http://tiktaalik.uchicago.edu/searching4Tik.html
(click the hard-to-see “next” button to page through this site’s story)
Here is a fantastic video explaining many many transitional species:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qfoje7jVJpU&feature=PlayList&p=258CAE2F4546AA95&index=8
Evolution-deniers, unable to refute the actual theory of evolution, then say “evolution doesn’t explain the creation of the first life or the creation of the universe.” That is also dishonest, because the theory of evolution doesn’t ATTEMPT to explain those. It’s like saying all of chemistry is false because it doesn’t explain where the elements came from.
That said, we’ve learned a LOT through “origin of life” research.
The birth of the universe is cosmology, not evolution. And non-life to life is abiogenesis and organic chemistry. The theory of evolution is about how different species formed.
Evolution-deniers claim we’ve never SEEN evolution – that’s a lie, because we have:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/26/science/26lab.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=slogin
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080417112433.htm
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13845002/
These example even ADD information (through gene duplication & divergence), something many evolution-deniers say is impossible:
http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/reprint/15/8/931
http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2148/8/195
Finally, bad scientific theories get killed by the scientific process: The Four Humours, Polywater, N rays, luminiferous aether, phlogiston, etc. The mechanisms of evolution have only become stronger and better understood over the past 150 years. Again, you can bet your life on it.
So only by rejecting knowledge and denying reality (or by lying) can you deny that life evolved and continues to evolve.
As for faith – the same guy who developed the concept of Original Sin – St. Augustine – also said that when scripture conflicts with the evidence in nature or with common sense, then assume the scripture is allegorical.
The article brings up some interesting questions but the author perhaps neglected to mention that the molecule may have been concieved extra terrestrially entering our atmosphere as an incidental passenger on a comet or meteorite?
A very interesting article. However, I must take issue with your reading of ’cause’ and ‘purpose’. A cause does not necessarily indicate that the events are purposeful. Otherwise we would quite conveniently say that an auto-accident had the ‘purpose’ of killing the individual in the other car. Nor is it conventional to state that the cause of the accident had the purpose of wrecking the cars. Indeed, the cause of the accident may very well have been the child on the street.
That a cause has an effect and subsequent consequences is, moreover, a means of imposing an understanding on the events, an understanding that molds the concept of ‘consequence’, as well as cause and effect. After all, a consequence is by its definition the *end* of a process of events. In a real world situation, the end is always arbitrarily defined by the viewer.
That said, I do not mean to slight the human need to view purpose in the world. Most likely, it is this need which has contributed so much to not just human, but possibly mammalian evolution.
When speaking of the beginning of life, it seems to me absolutely impossible to say that life began as it did for a purpose of reason. It began, the chain of events that lead to this moment can only be viewed etiologically; otherwise we are speaking of imagination, fiction, or the unreal–things that may be real on other planets, but simply are not real here.
The likelihood of a man named “Matt Balasis” publishing these exact words on this exact day followed by these exact comments is “frankly beyond improbable, the chances, are effectively zero”.
If I may respond so some of the comments above. I’d like to first of all state that I am in no way refuting the integrity or validity of evolution as a whole. RickK said:
Evolution-deniers, unable to refute the actual theory of evolution, then say “evolution doesn’t explain the creation of the first life or the creation of the universe.” That is also dishonest, because the theory of evolution doesn’t ATTEMPT to explain those. It’s like saying all of chemistry is false because it doesn’t explain where the elements came from.
I am really more or less in agreement with this line of thinking, evolution doesn’t explain creation — the two are separate and distinct. Nowhere did I say that one in any way might somehow invalidate the other — my point was precisely that they are distinct, so much so it would be disingenuous to apply the principles of one to the other. You cannot say that a collection of lifeless chemicals somehow evolved over centuries into DNA.
In response to John Woodward:
The cause effect discussion is a tricky one that is certainly open to the criticism of simply tailoring semantics to fit an end, but if I may elaborate, Dr. Provine in his original quote essentially argued that evolution is not teleological. My contention is that like the Greek noun “telos” there is an inherent dualism in any cause / effect paradigm. In Greek “Telos” can mean a finished end, or an end aimed at. My quandary is essentially encapsulated by this dichotomy, without knowing what the end is, how can we truly gauge whether there was purpose or design in the means? Whether in the end there is an aim? If Evolution as a process is not teleological, (and I concede the confluence of variables alone in any given adaptation would appear to make it unlikely) its results would not converge on any common principle but would cross and branch out in random organic manifestations, yet that is simply not the case. life on this planet is most certainly becoming more complex, this would imply an “aim” would it not?
to J.Pavik:
This doesn’t solve the problem of how the molecule came together, if not here then somewhere these same elements had to form this same molecule and the probability that it happened randomly continues to be exceedingly unlikely.
To Tim:
I can do that because like the monkey behind the typewriter I am a DNA based life form (any resemblance to the chimp is coincidental I might add).
William B. Provine, Andrew H. and James S. Tisch Distinguished University Professor, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Cornell University, was kind enough to respond to this article via an email exchange earlier in the day, below are selections from that conversation:
——————————
Dear Matthew,
Thanks for referring me to your article. I read it carefully.
My father wrote his doctoral thesis under Alfred North Whitehead at
Harvard, working on William James’ psychology. This was about 1930. He had
previously been at the Union Theological Seminary in NYC, but decided to
violate the family tradition (last male child became a minister of the
Columbia Presbyterian Church) by going to graduate school at Harvard. He
was breaking a tradition going back for four (and perhaps many more)
generations before him. My father was greatly influenced by Whitehead.
You seem to be influenced by reading Whitehead also. Whitehead understood
evolution not at all. His philosophy, which seemed so deep to me in
college, now seems so shallow when one understands evolution.
You really want to have “purpose” in life. I understand that feeling. I was
dominated by it until I took my first evolution course in graduate school.
I told the professor, Lynn Throckmorton, that he and Theodosius Dobzhansky,
the author of the book we read in the course, had left out design and
purpose, and that was the most important part of evolution. You would have
been proud of me then. Throckmorton was very kind, and invited me, if I
still felt the same way at the end of the course, to address the entire
class and tell them what the instructor had left out from the course. By
then, I had given up all hope of purpose in evolution.
Your addiction to purpose made me laugh. I could have written the same
thing (though not as well as you) in 1964. Now I try to understand
evolution with absolutely no purpose. We add it to evolution. There’s none
in evolution. So I NEVER talk about “natural selection” as an agent.
Natural selection results from causes: more organisms born than can
survive; the survival organisms are not a random sample of the population,
but those who leave the most offspring; we call this natural selection.
Darwin clearly describes natural selection in chapter 4 as a process that
is fueled by causes just as I describe above. Not a sign of purpose in it.
But Darwinthen adds these passages, in part to offend less to his audience.
He was already an atheist by the time he wrote On the Origin of Species.
Some day, you should look at his correspondence with Harvard botanist, Asa
Gray, a devout Christian. Darwineven published, at his own expense, two
reviews by Gray of his book. Gray argued that God controlled the variation,
so natural selection was not contradictory to God. Darwindistributed this
pamphlet to all his religious friends. But when his work was well known and
accepted, he put in the end of his two volumes on Variations of Animals and
Plants Under Domestication, a statement in which completely separated
himself from Gray’s belief of God’s control of variation. You should read
the Barlow edition of his autobiography. There was, he said, about as much
purpose in evolution as the blowing of the wind.
Evolutionists have problems describing natural selection without treating
it as an agent. I suggest you read a recent book from an old friend of
mine, John O. Reiss, who feels as I do: get all the teleology out of
evolutionary biology. His book is: Not by Design: Retiring Darwin’s
Watchmaker. This is a tough book to read, though I assigned it to my
evolution for non-majors class at Cornell. The students really wrestled
with this book but gained from it. Universityof CaliforniaPress, 2008.
Best wishes, Will
——————————
Regarding my contention that life on earth shows an aim in that it appears to be evolving from lower complexity to greater complexity he had this to say:
——————————
Of course, some of evolution
shows more complex life. At the same time, we might see species under
pressure from environmental change, get simpler, or go extinct. Bacteria
have done well since their origin, and don’t get more complex each million
years. Your view of evolution must take into account the role of extinction.
Only 250 million years ago, the extinction at the end of the Permian, more
than 90% of marine species went extinct, and more than 80% of land species
went extinct. This was a time of great reduction of oxygen in the
atmosphere, with the result of many species acquired better breathing. Among
these are the ancestors of crocodiles and alligators, and of dinosaurs, both
of which can breathe in one direction, a more efficient breathing than
mammals possess. Birds came from dinosaurs, who had this great method of
breathing, and to this day birds can go to the top of Mt. Everest and fly
right off, and mammals cannot do that. Birds have an extra air sac and
hollow bones, as did their dinosaur ancestors. The examples of de-evolution
are everywhere. Life does not get uniformly more complex.
Best wishes, Will
——————————
In response I would only add that while I am aware of examples of de-evolution, the notion seems inherently contradictory. Certainly in the grand scope of time on earth, the biosphere’s evolution from its primordial antecedents to its present state is an example of lower to greater complexity. While there have been “steps backwards” along the way … the old chart does not go from upright large brained and nimble-handed homosapien back down to knuckle dragging primate.
Finally I would like to thank Dr. Provine for not only authoring the passage that was the impetus of this story, but for being gracious enough to add his learned voice to this discussion.
I’ve never had a conflict between evolution and the concept of god (if that’s what you want to call it). I believe in a higher order to what we can perceive. I don’t know why and I don’t need proof. I just do. The fact that the concept of god can’t be proved is why it’s called faith. I also believe in science. It shows how everything is put together, how everything works. It’s the glove that fits the hand. And finally, I also believe that the universe is teeming with intelligent life. You can call me nuts but I’ve seen things and know this has to be true. I have to beam up now. The Mother ship is calling.
This is one thought provoking topic that will continuously be dissected from different points of view- The “free thinker” versus the rigid one. Beautifully written Matt!
Matt, I thought it was a brilliant article. You have moved the argument one step closer to some divine purpose without refuting evolution. I don’t see why the two can not coexist. The junkyard analysis – difficult to refute the odds of randomness occurrence. To me, proof of purpose was even more simple than that. A pocket watch. If there is no purpose then you have to believe that the gears, the metal, the glass, all the moving parts ultimately came together randomly. I have one thing to add. Can we humans create something more intelligent than us? I have not seen it thus far. Is it a stretch to believe something superior created us, something other than randomness? The odds! Organic molecules in the ‘primordial soup’ might have to undergo 10 to the130th power trial assemblies. Man! I got my money on some intelligent force and the Jets today. I got a feeling that the football will somehow randomly make it to Colts endzone, hopefully more times than the Jets endzone. But that’s just faith.
I love this. My father is a well-respected, award-winning physicist, and the more he understands about the improbability of the universe, the more he says he believes there is a higher power involved in its engineering.
Consequently, I’m a firm believer that there’s nothing wrong with simultaneously believing in “God” (however you choose to define that term) and believing in evolution. I see it as no more far-fetched than proposing that alien life forms had some part in the direction of our evolution, as I’ve heard several notable evolutionary biologists suggest. Or perhaps the two theories are the same! Now *there* is a head trip!
Disclaimer: At the same time, I take no issue with those who choose to believe in evolution but not in a god. To each his or her own. I just hope that mutual respect can be exchanged between the two groups.
Kristen, Achilles, Herman, Paul,
Thank you, I appreciate your thoughtful comments. You all in your own eloquent ways echoed the point I wanted to make more than any other — namely that when you consider how much we don’t know it is at least presumptuous to make blanket assumptions, at worst it may belie the facts. I am not a physicist or mathematician, but I know a few, and like Kristen I understand there are a surprising number of prominent thinkers in these particular fields that find it difficult to deny a sense of symmetry and beauty in the cosmos strongly hinting at design and purpose. Evolution itself is a magnificently beautiful and balanced theory and it is hard to say what Darwin would have made of the claim that this remarkable evolving system of life may yet be another indication of some “becoming” we may yet be in the midst of.
Thank you, Matthew, for you considerate response. I take your issue with Telos and teleology to heart. Indeed, not knowing whether there is a telos does not, in and of itself, suggest that there is. Rather, you find that were evolution not teleological “its results would not converge on any common principle but would cross and branch out in random organic manifestations, yet that is simply not the case”. I can see where you have drawn this argument, and, at the risk of repeating what Prof. Provine wrote, would suggest that the appearance of organization and design does not necessarily indicate a telos. Indeed, in the work of Ilya Prigogine complexity is an end in itself, a process without telos, though it may seem so.
That said, the human desire to generate meaning in these systems has determined all art, philosophy and even science perhaps since the ‘dawn of man’. Thus, searching for a telos is not necessarily a nonconstructive action.