Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: Dumb_Ox

I don't understand process structuralism. I googled it up and came up with this, "the view that there are deep laws of change that determine some or all of the features of organisms". I can see how this would be ahistorical in the sense that any scientific law would be ahistorical. What his evidence for this is, perhaps someone else can answer.

Personally I don't see why any Catholic would follow these various anti-Darwinians. The Church has repeated over and over that it has no problem with the biological sciences, it only has a problem with those who misuse its findings. It has specifically asked us not to engage in these battles,"we cannot but deplore certain habits of mind, which are sometimes found too among Christians, which do not sufficiently attend to the rightful independence of science and which, from the arguments and controversies they spark, lead many minds to conclude that faith and science are mutually opposed. (7)” (GAUDIUM ET SPES, 36)

Darwinism itself is neutral but for those who can't tear themselves away from a nominalistic worldview, the finding of chance in a string of particular causes is a direct challenge to God. I believe Darwin held that view but evidently so do many anti-Darwinians.


54 posted on 10/07/2005 6:56:26 AM PDT by Varda
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 39 | View Replies ]


To: Varda
You raise some good points. But I would quarrel with your statement that "Darwinism itself is neutral." Darwin himself held that there was no qualitative difference between man and other animals. Moreover, Darwinist theory allows that mankind can change into a significantly different species over time--even a non-rational, non-communal species, given the right environment. This poses a bunch of philosophical and theological questions, which need to be addressed.

This whole ID vs. Darwinism debate is screwed up because Darwin himself was a bit confused about the relation of philosophy to science and vice versa. In many ways, we continue this confusion.

Also, I don't think Darwin thought of science in the same way that the Gaudium et Spes presents the field of inquiry. There are "false friends" not only across language barriers, but within one language itself.

81 posted on 10/07/2005 2:35:44 PM PDT by Dumb_Ox (Be not Afraid. "Perfect love drives out fear.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 54 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson