I may give evolution a shot.

[Risen Tree]

I've been a YEC ever since I can remember, but after reading through these forums, it has dawned on me that evolution actually has a case, much to my dismay. There seems to be an unusual tilt of the evidence away from YEC and toward evolution, and where a tilt is, often times the truth follows suit. I'm thinking about accepting evolution as true. Before converting, I need a few hangups cleared about this issue. Forgive me before reading this that I am not an expert in this subject and will bumble from time to time. You have been warned.

My questions partain to the following topics:

A. SCIENTIFIC TOPICS

1. Mutations. Whether evolution occurs revolves around this issue. If mutations occur fast enough, often enough, and in the right places, then evolution works. End of story. But if a species experiences one helpful mutation every 5 million years, then evolution doesn't have enough time to occur. Not to mention the fact that the mutation has to be a helpful one; otherwise it won't do the species any good. Furthermore, the helpful mutation has to occur in one of the reproductive cells; even a helpful mutation that occurs elsewhere in the body will not be passed on. What evidence suggests that evolution overcame these barriers?
2. Natural selection patterns. The way I see it (and I'll confess, I could be dead wrong about this), if it occurs, macroevolution does not necessarily follow a straight path of ascention; it could take a temporary declining path, such as the curve f(x) = x^3 - x^2, which has a short period of downslope.* If this is the only way for a certain species or subspecies to evolve from another, then would not natural selection eliminate the temporary downswing needed for a permanent upswing later?
3. Ecology. This is one of the reasons I've been a YEC up to this point. Take two species that are dependent upon each other for survival but evolved millions of years apart. How did the early species survive? And if the answer is by virtue of another species, what if the first species is a plant that evolved millions of years before an animal that it is dependent upon?

B. THEOLOGICAL TOPICS

1. Biblical references to the creation. Examples include the Ten Commandments and Paul's references to Adam/Christ as the ones to respectively open/close the curse of sin. How is this supposed to work? Is the word "day" in the Ten Commandments the same word used in the creation story, which could either mean a literal 24-hour day or a period/epoch/era? Also, why does Paul treat Adam as if he is a real person...or does he?
2. The human soul. Is the soul, a concept clearly taught by Scripture, unique to Homo sapiens, or did it evolve somewhere down the line? If so, when did it evolve? Remember, it is at this point that humans or our ancestors, assuming evolution occurred, that they understood concepts of sin and morality.
3. Genealogy records. They are all over Scripture and treat all lineages back to Adam as if every person along the way were a real person. Where is the cutoff point, and what evidence confirms this?

Thanks!

* proof: df(x)/dx = 3x^2 - 2x, which is negative while x is between 0 and 2/3

 

[seebs]

Heh, I just noticed your title. FWIW, I'm an INTP.

Biblical references to the creation: I would be entirely unsurprised if Paul lived his entire life believing Creation to be literal. What of it if he did? He had no need to know otherwise. Salvation is not rooted in accurate history, but in faith.

I don't think it makes any sense to speak of souls evolving. Souls are non-naturalist phenomena; if they exist at all, they are outside of evolution.

I personally interpret the story as this: Up through some point, "we" were animals; capable of behavior, but not capable of moral decisions. At some point, we acquired the "knowledge of good and evil" - the ability to make judgments of things, and, for instance, fear death, as opposed to merely fearing things that could kill us. There is evidence that, at some point in human history, ceremonial burial and art started showing up, probably close to the same time. So, at that point, we had the knowledge of good and evil, and feared death.

Understood this way, Genesis is a powerful story of God creating us "from dust", breathing life (or soul) into us, and then our decisions about how to interact with this.

I think the Bible makes perfectly good sense understood this way.

I'm afraid I'm underqualified to comment on the fine points of the math questions you have, but my understanding is that there's roughly "enough" time for life to have evolved from a single, very simple, single-celled life form a long, long, time ago.

BTW, whatever you come to believe, let me congratulate you on your courage. These are not easy questions to ask.

 

[Risen Tree]

Heh, I just noticed your title. FWIW, I'm an INTP.

Cool, so you know about MBTI. Judging your title, I figured you were an NT.

Biblical references to the creation: I would be entirely unsurprised if Paul lived his entire life believing Creation to be literal. What of it if he did? He had no need to know otherwise. Salvation is not rooted in accurate history, but in faith.

That doesn't bode well for the Bible being the inerrant, infalliable Word of God. But perhaps the literalness of the creation story wasn't what he was stressing, so much as the fact of creation (i.e. by whatever means) itself?

I don't think it makes any sense to speak of souls evolving. Souls are non-naturalist phenomena; if they exist at all, they are outside of evolution.

True. While watching a lengthy documentary on the evolution of humans two nights ago, I sensed this. How could very near ancestors create nothing more complex than an axehead after a million years of their existence, and yet we humans can create systems with more complexity than what all other species can create, combined? Of course, this is amoral, abstract thinking that I'm talking about, although thinking in terms of morality is quite often an issue of abstract thinking.

I personally interpret the story as this: Up through some point, "we" were animals; capable of behavior, but not capable of moral decisions. At some point, we acquired the "knowledge of good and evil" - the ability to make judgments of things, and, for instance, fear death, as opposed to merely fearing things that could kill us. There is evidence that, at some point in human history, ceremonial burial and art started showing up, probably close to the same time. So, at that point, we had the knowledge of good and evil, and feared death.

Understood this way, Genesis is a powerful story of God creating us "from dust", breathing life (or soul) into us, and then our decisions about how to interact with this.

I think the Bible makes perfectly good sense understood this way.

Again, I think this idea posesses some real validity to it. If it's true, the way I reconcile it is that I have no idea when I started sinning, but I can tell you the day and the hour that I became a Christian. Hmm, listen to me, perhaps I am accepting theological evolution?

BTW, whatever you come to believe, let me congratulate you on your courage. These are not easy questions to ask.

It's like that scene in The Matrix where Neo is offered the two pills. The only offer that the red pill carries is the truth. That the truth will make sense, that the truth will be what you like, etc. is not promised. Honestly, I find it that important to get to the heart of the matter and find out if evolution really did occur. For the truth of this matter will set me free.

 

[ForeRunner]

True. While watching a lengthy documentary on the evolution of humans two nights ago, I sensed this. How could very near ancestors create nothing more complex than an axehead after a million years of their existence, and yet we humans can create systems with more complexity than what all other species can create, combined? Of course, this is amoral, abstract thinking that I'm talking about, although thinking in terms of morality is quite often an issue of abstract thinking.

I know I am not supposed to post here, but I can answer this question. The reason the complexity of our tools has been increasing dramatically is do to language and written word. While DNA passes on information from generation to generation, it is extremely slow and limited compared to what we have now.

If you think about it, the inventions that had the largest impacts on society had to do with information storage and transfer. Spoken language, written language, the printing press, computers, internet.

The reason we advanced so quickly is that our methods of information storage and tranfeser are FAR quicker than that of biology, the acceleration most likely began with spoken word and drastically improved with written word. The rest is, as they say, history

 

[seebs]

Cool, so you know about MBTI. Judging your title, I figured you were an NT.

That doesn't bode well for the Bible being the inerrant, infalliable Word of God. But perhaps the literalness of the creation story wasn't what he was stressing, so much as the fact of creation (i.e. by whatever means) itself?

Well, think about it the way the Catholics speak of the authority of the Church. It's infallible in matters of faith and morals.

If the Bible says "Jesus says to love your neighbor as yourself", then that's a matter of morals, and it's infallible.

If the Bible talks about the smallest seed in the world, and you can think of a smaller one, well, big deal.

The modern notion of literal inerrancy is, quite simply, a modern notion. It's not what people meant by that a thousand years ago.

True. While watching a lengthy documentary on the evolution of humans two nights ago, I sensed this. How could very near ancestors create nothing more complex than an axehead after a million years of their existence, and yet we humans can create systems with more complexity than what all other species can create, combined? Of course, this is amoral, abstract thinking that I'm talking about, although thinking in terms of morality is quite often an issue of abstract thinking.

That's about how I look at it; what changed?

Again, I think this idea posesses some real validity to it. If it's true, the way I reconcile it is that I have no idea when I started sinning, but I can tell you the day and the hour that I became a Christian. Hmm, listen to me, perhaps I am accepting theological evolution?

Interesting. I can't tell you exactly when I became Christian, as it happens. I spent a lot of time in transitional forms.

It's like that scene in The Matrix where Neo is offered the two pills. The only offer that the red pill carries is the truth. That the truth will make sense, that the truth will be what you like, etc. is not promised. Honestly, I find it that important to get to the heart of the matter and find out if evolution really did occur. For the truth of this matter will set me free.

Yup. My firm belief is that dogmatic insistence on Creationism does little but drive people away from God. I've been very, very, unhappy with the willingness of the Creation "ministries" to lie, misquote, and otherwise betray the trust they should be upholding. The pattern of abuse directed at decent Christians who are not convinced by their arguments is, IMHO, a stronger indictment of creationism than geology. After all, God could create the world to look old, if He wanted, but a good tree cannot bear bad fruit.

 

[Risen Tree]

Well, think about it the way the Catholics speak of the authority of the Church. It's infallible in matters of faith and morals.

If the Bible says "Jesus says to love your neighbor as yourself", then that's a matter of morals, and it's infallible.

If the Bible talks about the smallest seed in the world, and you can think of a smaller one, well, big deal.

The modern notion of literal inerrancy is, quite simply, a modern notion. It's not what people meant by that a thousand years ago.

Inerrant is not the same as timeless. For example, some of the obscure commandments in the Mosaic Code serve no purpose today. However, that does not mean they are faulty; it just means that this specific application of the higher Law is out-of-date. The Law to which the Mosaic Code refers to is inerrant, as was that application designed for a particular time and culture. The new nation of Israel needed a set of rules and regulations that would establish civil order and ultimately point them to God, and the Mosaic Code fulfilled this need perfectly.

That's about how I look at it; what changed?

Nothing as far as I know.

Yup. My firm belief is that dogmatic insistence on Creationism does little but drive people away from God. I've been very, very, unhappy with the willingness of the Creation "ministries" to lie, misquote, and otherwise betray the trust they should be upholding. The pattern of abuse directed at decent Christians who are not convinced by their arguments is, IMHO, a stronger indictment of creationism than geology. After all, God could create the world to look old, if He wanted, but a good tree cannot bear bad fruit.

This is precisely what is leading me to believe that evolution may indeed be accurate. If YEC were true, why do some of their institutions stack the deck and hide important facts when brought to light? Case in point is a pro-YEC book that I bought a few years ago which says repeatedly, "Evolution says that you do not evolve something until you know you need it." Now, even in my limited knowledge of the subject, I know that's not right. Mutations occur independently of an organism's need for change, or so the theory goes. A species does not wait to start the mutation process until its survival is on the line.

BTW, I've added a few things to my original post that I've thought about since the thread began.

 

[Vance]

If you are serious about looking into evolution, I would recommend the book "What Evolution Is" by Ernst Mayr. It is easy to read for a laymen and covers all the basic points, including the answer to your first set of questions. He is, unfortunately, an atheist (or at least seems so) and this bias occasionally rolls over into his writing, but it is simply the best explanation of the concepts I have seen.

On the theoligical questions, I will take a stab at it.

If you accept that the Genesis stories are not literal, but use "types" or allegorical images, etc, then the question does arise whether those that refer to it later KNEW it was written this way, or thought it was literal. I say, it does not matter (except for Jesus', who did know, of course). Paul believed the sun revolved around the earth as well, but that does not make him less credible. We must also remember that it is our Western mind that draws strict distinctions between historical events and truths told by non-historical descriptions. Those in the cultures we are discussing would have NO problem with part of the Biblical references being allegorical. It would be just as true to them and they would discuss it the same way regardless.

2. I believe that God infused mankind with a soul at some point. I have no idea when or how, or how this may tie in to the story of Adam's creation. But I don't think the soul evolved. Remember, you need to believe that God took a hands-off approach to His creation just because He allowed things to evolve. He allows the world to run by a myriad of natural processes, but still intervenes in miraculous ways every day.

3. This is similar to the answer to question number one. Here let me quote from a response I gave over in the science forum a while back:

Yes, man is unique. Yes, God, as part of His creative process did something poetically described as "breathing" life into Man (Adam means "mankind") which made man unique, giving Man the soul that the rest of God's creation lacks.

But you need to undestand about ancient cultures and their approach to history and genealogies. They were not as picky as we are today between what is historical and what is allegorical. Whether, it be the ancient celts with their clan lineages running from themselves to their distant supernatural hero ancestors, or Caesar, who regularly proclaimed his families descent from a goddess, to a new testament writer providing Jesus' lineage, they simply thought about such things differently than we do.

For us, with our scientific minds and our intense knowledge of the true facts of so much of our history, it is vitally important for us to distinguish between real historical events and non-historical events. But in ancient times, this was not at all essential. This is VERY difficult for us to get our heads around these days, but it is simply the truth.

Caesar most likely knew that his lineage from a goddess was not literally true, but the implications from this lineage were VERY true and important to him. So, for him it was true and not true at the same time, in a way we can hardly concieve with our modern minds, especially our Western minds.

 

[Risen Tree]

If you are serious about looking into evolution, I would recommend the book "What Evolution Is" by Ernst Mayr. It is easy to read for a laymen and covers all the basic points, including the answer to your first set of questions. He is, unfortunately, an atheist (or at least seems so) and this bias occasionally rolls over into his writing, but it is simply the best explanation of the concepts I have seen.

Thanks for the recommendation. I may take a look at it.

On the theoligical questions, I will take a stab at it.

If you accept that the Genesis stories are not literal, but use "types" or allegorical images, etc, then the question does arise whether those that refer to it later KNEW it was written this way, or thought it was literal. I say, it does not matter (except for Jesus', who did know, of course). Paul believed the sun revolved around the earth as well, but that does not make him less credible. We must also remember that it is our Western mind that draws strict distinctions between historical events and truths told by non-historical descriptions. Those in the cultures we are discussing would have NO problem with part of the Biblical references being allegorical. It would be just as true to them and they would discuss it the same way regardless.

Ah yes, historical and cultural context; that certainly makes sense. History and literature did indeed use to walk hand-in-hand.

Perhaps the creation story is the "Santa Clause" of the Bible?

2. I believe that God infused mankind with a soul at some point. I have no idea when or how, or how this may tie in to the story of Adam's creation. But I don't think the soul evolved. Remember, you need to believe that God took a hands-off approach to His creation just because He allowed things to evolve. He allows the world to run by a myriad of natural processes, but still intervenes in miraculous ways every day.

It's helping me to hear that Christian evolutionists believe this.

3. This is similar to the answer to question number one. Here let me quote from a response I gave over in the science forum a while back:

Yes, man is unique. Yes, God, as part of His creative process did something poetically described as "breathing" life into Man (Adam means "mankind") which made man unique, giving Man the soul that the rest of God's creation lacks.

But you need to undestand about ancient cultures and their approach to history and genealogies. They were not as picky as we are today between what is historical and what is allegorical. Whether, it be the ancient celts with their clan lineages running from themselves to their distant supernatural hero ancestors, or Caesar, who regularly proclaimed his families descent from a goddess, to a new testament writer providing Jesus' lineage, they simply thought about such things differently than we do.

For us, with our scientific minds and our intense knowledge of the true facts of so much of our history, it is vitally important for us to distinguish between real historical events and non-historical events. But in ancient times, this was not at all essential. This is VERY difficult for us to get our heads around these days, but it is simply the truth.

Caesar most likely knew that his lineage from a goddess was not literally true, but the implications from this lineage were VERY true and important to him. So, for him it was true and not true at the same time, in a way we can hardly concieve with our modern minds, especially our Western minds.

Odd but believable. The ancient Greeks did this; I didn't realize that Hebrews did it as well.

One thing I discovered about genealogy the other day: Matthew, the literalist's gospel, traces Jesus' lineage to Abraham, not Adam. Perhaps this isn't a coincidence?

 

[seebs]

BTW, I haven't the faintest where the geneology changes from myth to history. I would guess, although I might well be wrong, that it's right around Abraham.

As to species with dependencies on other species, look at what happens when a new animal enters an ecosystem; brief massive disruption, then everything settles in a new pattern. For a while, anyway.

I'm quite content to not have all the answers. With the basic theory of evolution, I have an explanation for thousands upon thousands of things that I can observe in the world around me today. I can explain how a loving God could have let childbirth be so awful - it's not so bad, when you consider the amount of adaptation involved in making primates into bipeds. I can understand why my cat has the same bones I do, even though we don't walk on the same limbs, and there's very little rationale for common design, but there's a lot for common ancestry.

It leaves a lot of questions open, and that's something I expect from good theology. I don't think we're meant to sit around, with all the answers, being complacent.

 

[Risen Tree]

BTW, I haven't the faintest where the geneology changes from myth to history. I would guess, although I might well be wrong, that it's right around Abraham.

You too? See, that's what I think but I have little more than speculation to back it up. Now, the Bible fares wonderfully when tested archaeologically, but I wonder how far back this goes. If all stories prior to Abraham are just allegories, then three of the most controversial stories in the Bible--the Creation, the Flood, and the Tower of Babel--are put in their rightful place.

As to species with dependencies on other species, look at what happens when a new animal enters an ecosystem; brief massive disruption, then everything settles in a new pattern. For a while, anyway.

Yeah but how does the older species "hold its breath" for a couple million years waiting for its symbiotic partner to evolve?

I'm quite content to not have all the answers. With the basic theory of evolution, I have an explanation for thousands upon thousands of things that I can observe in the world around me today. I can explain how a loving God could have let childbirth be so awful - it's not so bad, when you consider the amount of adaptation involved in making primates into bipeds. I can understand why my cat has the same bones I do, even though we don't walk on the same limbs, and there's very little rationale for common design, but there's a lot for common ancestry.

It leaves a lot of questions open, and that's something I expect from good theology. I don't think we're meant to sit around, with all the answers, being complacent.

Spoken like a true NT. Yes, the world would indeed be a boring place if we knew everything. Now, I think we can know the Source of truths, but that does not mean that we know all the truths.

 

[Karl - Liberal Backslider]

I can strongly recommend Kenneth Miller - Finding Darwin's God from a theological as well as a scientific viewpoint. Also Russell Stannard - Doing Away with God?

John Polkinghorne and D Wilkinson are also good authors on these subjects.

 

[Vance]

First, I had a typo above, but I see that you figured it out. I meant to say that you need NOT believe that God took a hands off approach with regard to His creation just because he used evolution as a creative process. Nothing ever precludes supernatural intervention.

Second, I have read a number of places that scholars see Abraham as the most likely candidate for the first "historical" character, but I would have to track those sources down. Some of them are even Jewish scholars who know the linguistics and cultural aspects much better than we do.

But still, I would not relegate all previous persons to pure allegorical creations. It is very possible there was a Noah, or any number of these other people, but that the passages about them have been told in allegorical details to serve a purpose.

Also, even when using "types", they could still be based on general factual events. For example, even if Adam is a "type" of Man, there could still have been an initial communion between God and Man, a testing and failing and a curse.

Just some more thoughts to consider.

Remember, I still tend to prefer literal over non-literal, so even when I believe that it may be non-literal, I continue to assume the greatest degree of factual correlation possible.

 

[Risen Tree]

I can strongly recommend Kenneth Miller - Finding Darwin's God from a theological as well as a scientific viewpoint. Also Russell Stannard - Doing Away with God?

John Polkinghorne and D Wilkinson are also good authors on these subjects.

I just took a look at that first book on amazon.com, and it might be precisely what I need. Has anybody else read it?

Vance, good thoughts. Keep 'em coming, everyone.

 

[Risen Tree]

One thing I haven't confessed yet...this process is not easy so far. It's really odd thinking about how I'm seriously contemplating rejecting an idea that has been taught to me since the beginning by some of those I trust most. This doesn't need to become a barrier between me and them, but the bottom line is that if evolution occurred, then it occurred.

Does this make sense to anyone?

 

[seebs]

Yeah.

This is one of the reasons I dislike the very dogmatic teaching of YEC beliefs. You have people jumping up and down screaming "evolution is a lie! If evolution is true, there is no God", and then you see a really good exhibit in a museum on the equine family tree, and suddenly there's an awful lot of baby in with the bathwater.

I think recognizing that theories of how don't change the what is important.

 

[Yahweh Nissi]

One thing I haven't confessed yet...this process is not easy so far. It's really odd thinking about how I'm seriously contemplating rejecting an idea that has been taught to me since the beginning by some of those I trust most. This doesn't need to become a barrier between me and them, but the bottom line is that if evolution occurred, then it occurred.

Does this make sense to anyone?

Sure - it is very tough to change old beliefs, especially when they are held by many of your peers and elders. When I came to Uni, two years and a term ago now, my theological viewpoint changed from a liberal to an evangelical one in the first couple of terms, and I found the change difficult. Most of my family and friends back home are liberal humanists and a few are liberal Christians - and I felt like the most terrible right wing biggot thinking things like homosexual acts being sinful, pro life, etc, a part of me hated believing that. But as you say, the bottom line is that you should believe what you think is true, not what you would like to believe or what you would be comfortable with.

I commend you for being brave enough to ask these questions and move out of your comfort zone, and I hope you do come to believe in theistic evolution. But in the end you must believe what YOU think is true and be happy with your convictions.

God Bless,
YN.

 

[Yahweh Nissi]

By the way, it is good to see you back seebs

 

[Risen Tree]

Sure - it is very tough to change old beliefs, especially when they are held by many of your peers and elders. When I came to Uni, two years and a term ago now, my theological viewpoint changed from a liberal to an evangelical one in the first couple of terms, and I found the change difficult. Most of my family and friends back home are liberal humanists and a few are liberal Christians - and I felt like the most terrible right wing biggot thinking things like homosexual acts being sinful, pro life, etc, a part of me hated believing that. But as you say, the bottom line is that you should believe what you think is true, not what you would like to believe or what you would be comfortable with.

Wow, that's one of the few stories I've seen that involves conversion to a more conservative worldview. Good for you; that's certainly bucking the trend.

Whether this goes well with my family, should I choose to break the news to them (assuming that I do ultimately accept evolution), is a jump ball. For example, they took my acceptance of certain forms of feminism as Biblically accurate very well. However, I have no plans to let them in on the fact that I believe that social nudity can be Biblically permissible (remember that discussion, seebs?)

I commend you for being brave enough to ask these questions and move out of your comfort zone, and I hope you do come to believe in theistic evolution. But in the end you must believe what YOU think is true and be happy with your convictions.

God Bless,
YN.

If that's what the truth is, and the truth is what I seek, then I will ultimately find it.

 

[seebs]

Heh. I don't recall the social nudity thing, no. Sounds like a fun debate.

There's a lot of things that some people would be unhappy hearing. Luckily, my friends and family got used to me a long time ago, so whatever I believe, they won't be surprised.

 

[Risen Tree]

B. THEOLOGICAL TOPICS

1. Biblical references to the creation. Examples include the Ten Commandments and Paul's references to Adam/Christ as the ones to respectively open/close the curse of sin. How is this supposed to work? Is the word "day" in the Ten Commandments the same word used in the creation story, which could either mean a literal 24-hour day or a period/epoch/era? Also, why does Paul treat Adam as if he is a real person...or does he?
2. The human soul. Is the soul, a concept clearly taught by Scripture, unique to Homo sapiens, or did it evolve somewhere down the line? If so, when did it evolve? Remember, it is at this point that humans or our ancestors, assuming evolution occurred, that they understood concepts of sin and morality.
3. Genealogy records. They are all over Scripture and treat all lineages back to Adam as if every person along the way were a real person. Where is the cutoff point, and what evidence confirms this?

It seems that we have reached the following conclusions:

1. We have resolved that the word "day" can mean a literal day or a figurative age. It also seems possible that Paul wrote in accordance to his time, where mythological beings and historical beings are treated as one and the same. Any more thought on this one?
2. We seem to agree that it did suddenly come in at one point. Here's how I can illustrate that: Growing up, I used to have computer games where I loved to design things. One of them was a race car game, where of course I had the chance to design race tracks. I designed endless scores of them but rarely played on a given track more than a few times before becoming bored and moving onto the next one. However, one day I designed one that was simply the ideal racetrack. It was simple but entertaining, it had few thrills but was challenging, and was short but played like a fairly long track. IIRC, I enjoyed this track so much that I never designed another one; I spent the remaining life of the game almost exclusively racing that one track. Maybe that's how God dealt with humans, as he may have caused all kinds of species to evolve, but none that could have a genuine relationship with him, until we came along. Then things changed.
3. Those who have addressed this issue believe that Abraham is the oldest historical figure in the bible. This makes sense. For one, Matthew, the literalist gospel, starts Jesus' genealogy with Abraham. Also, God made his Covenant of Israel with Abraham; why would he not start with Noah or someone earlier?

Keep the responses coming. This is slowly starting to make sense.