Autor: Ormerod, Neil

Buch: Creation, Grace, and Redemption

Titel: Creation, Grace, and Redemption

Stichwort: Evolution - Schöpfung; emergent probablity; A -> B -> C -> D ... -> Z (kausale Kette vs. wiederkehrender Zyklus, recurrend scheme; Wahrscheinlichkeit (probability of emergence - survival); Krebszyklus; reduktionistische Sicht <-> Erkennen als Sehen

Kurzinhalt: Lonergan's notion of a "scheme of recurrence" ... Its basis is an acknowledgment that there are deterministic and statistical laws. These interact to produce the resulting schemes. It thus allows for a "design" argument without falling over into ...

Textausschnitt: EVOLUTION AND THE CREATION OF HUMAN BEINGS

27a The second challenge to the special claims made by Christian faith for human beings arises from the theory of evolution. The formulation of the theory of evolution is one of the most significant cultural events of the last two centuries. Prior to its formulation, the cultural expectation was that things would stay the same, unless some good reason could be found to change them. Following its formulation the expectation is now that things will continue to change, or evolve, and that to stay unchanged demands some rationale. We have moved from a fundamentally static conception of reality to a fundamentally dynamic conception, largely through the influence of the theory of evolution. What began as a theory to explain the diversity and development of new species has become a totalizing worldview for everything-not just biological species, but the cosmos, institutions, cultures, technology, economies, and so on. It has taken on a total explanatory quality and in some settings become clearly ideological. (Fs)

27b The evolutionary "cultural revolution" has influenced Christian belief in a number of ways. First, the fact that evolution implies a contingent element in creation has been used by some to claim that there is no design for the universe. It is used to reject any argument "by design" that might lead to belief in a creator God. We have already seen in our consideration of providence and contingency in the previous chapter how misleading such a claim is. Second, evolution has been used to suggest that human beings have no special place in creation. We are just the product of random mutations, not the purpose and peak of creation, as suggested by Christian belief. Third, among the ideological features of evolutionary thought, one prominent element has been social Darwinism, the suggestion that our social order should be one of the "survival of the fittest." Such a suggestion hits at the heart of Christian concern for the poor and help for those most in need. Fourth, for those who identify Christian belief with a literal reading of Genesis, evolution is used to reject Christian belief because of its supposed opposition to scientific thought. As we noted earlier, to read the opening chapters of Genesis literally is basically to misunderstand their significance, and, in the face of modern science, to bring faith into disrepute. (Fs)

28a This is a tangled web to deal with, involving scientific, philosophical, ideological, and theological judgments of varying difficulty. Let us deal with these matters constructively; that is, let us seek out the intelligibility of an evolving system. In this I shall be dependent on Bernard Lonergan's notion of emergent probability. This broadens the point of entry beyond the basic biological idea to the more general notion of "evolution" or emergence within the whole created order. It involves a further specification of what we have already spoken about in the previous chapter on the notion of providence and deterministic and statistical lawfulness.1

28b Let us begin with the notion of causal lawfulness, which is either classical (deterministic) or statistical (contingent):

A -> B, unless something acts to prevent it
OR
A -> B with a certain statistical probability

In both cases a statistical element enters, for "unless something acts to prevent it" will itself be governed by a statistical law. Consider now a causal chain:

A -> B -> C -> D ... -> Z

28b Then the probability of getting to the end of the chain diminishes dramatically with each added step, for the likelihood of getting to the end of the chain is the product of each of the individual probabilities.2 Consider instead a causal cycle

Bild im Original (Kreis mit A -> B usw.)

29a This shift from a chain of events to a cycle of events dramatically increases the probability of the occurrence of the cycle itself, becoming more like the sum of the individual probabilities. Once such a cycle is established, it can in fact maintain itself. Lonergan calls such a cycle a "scheme of recurrence." Lonergan thus distinguishes between the probability of emergence of the scheme (which might be quite low) and the probability of survival of the scheme (which might be much higher).These two probabilities govern the emergence and survivability of the scheme. Once such a scheme emerges with a high enough probability of survival, it can itself become an element in an even higher scheme of recurrence. We thus have higher-order schemes consisting of schemes within schemes within schemes of recurrence. (Fs) (notabene)

29b The existence and importance of such cycles can be noted in a number of fields, for example, the Krebs cycle in cellular biochemistry,3 the nitrogen cycle in ecological science,4 and the Gulf Stream current in oceanography. These are well-known examples, but in fact such schemes are commonplace in most scientific settings if you know what you are looking for. Indeed much of the emerging science of ecology involves the identification of such cycles within the biosphere. What we are learning from ecological science is that the removal of one element in a causal cycle is often enough to destroy the whole scheme. Hence, the destruction of one plant may lead to the elimination of an insect, which is then no longer available for a certain species of bird, and so on, leading to major shifts in a local ecology. (Fs)

29c Lonergan's notion of a "scheme of recurrence" removes many of the difficulties associated with the evolutionary cultural revolution. Its basis is an acknowledgment that there are deterministic and statistical laws. These interact to produce the resulting schemes. It thus allows for a "design" argument without falling over into determinism, because in God's providential order large numbers and long time frames have explanatory power for statistical systems. The scheme of recurrence also removes the ideological element because it no longer speaks of "survival of the fittest" but of probabilities of emergence and of survival. When we move to the human realm, these probabilities are also the product of human decision making, not just biological forces. And so we cannot draw the conclusions of social Darwinism that would leave the poor, the sick, and the weak to "fend for themselves." Does it, however, present us with a hierarchically constituted notion of reality? And are humans at the "top" of such a hierarchy? Do human have a special place?

30a The question of whether being is hierarchically constituted can be answered in the affirmative as long as one is able to resist any temptation to accept a reductionist account of reality. It is easy for the physicist to claim that chemistry is really just a branch of physics; but we still retain separate departments in universities. We train people in very different skills. Chemists and physicists publish in different journals and so on. Is this just academic tribalism, or are we dealing with differing realities? Similar comments could be made about biology and psychology. Do we reduce psychology to biology, biology to chemistry, chemistry to physics, and physics to what? Or do we recognize a hierarchically ordered structure to the physical world that recognizes the reality of increasing complexifkation? The difference between the reductionist account and the "realist" account adopted here is that the first conceives of reality as constituted by looking-the more intensely we look, the smaller things we can find. The "realist" account conceives of reality as constituted by intelligibility and so recognizes the reality of increasing complexity. Increasing complexity points to new and richer intelligibility and hence new reality. (Fs) (notabene)

30b The question whether human beings occupy some special place in this hierarchy then relates to the question of whether the reality of being human is constituted by defining characteristics that cannot be understood simply as biological or psychological. The traditional answer is to argue that the human soul, understood as the form or intelligibility of a living thing, enjoys a spiritual dimension. This means that, although the soul operates as a higher-level integration of the substratum of physical, chemical, biological, and psychological activities, it is in itself something more than these and relatively independent of its material basis. (Fs)