J.P. Moreland and the Book “Theistic Evolution” (Part 1: What do William Paley, Richard Dawkins, and J.P. Moreland all have in common?)

Last November, the 1,000-page Theistic Evolution: A Scientific, Philosophical, and Theological Critique hit the shelves. Written by Biola professor J.P. Moreland, Discovery Institute’s Stephen Myer, systematic theologian Wayne Gruden, among others, the book essentially argues against theistic evolution and groups like BioLogos and the Faraday Institute that endorse it.

This post is not a book review of a 1,000-page book. Rather, I am going to respond to a brief interview Moreland gave as the book was coming out. Now, over the past four years, I’ve done my fair share of reading and writing regarding the “creation/evolution debate,” in terms of critiquing the claims Ken Ham and his young earth creationist organization, Answers in Genesis. In doing so, I’ve come to the conclusion that the fundamental reason why men like Ken Ham object to the theory of evolution and the claim that the universe is billions of years old isn’t because they hold serious scientific arguments that say otherwise.

No, the fundamental reason is that they start with a wooden, literalistic interpretation of Genesis 1-11 and an assumption that Genesis 1-11 is giving scientific/historical information. Therefore, since evolution/billions of years thus conflicts with their assumption that Genesis 1-11 is to be read in such a wooden, literalistic fashion, they conclude that evolution/billions of years is an attack on the authority of Scripture. Thus, they conclude that the only reason why anyone would ever read Genesis 1-11 any differently than their wooden, literalistic interpretation is that they have decided to “put more faith” in “fallible science” than the “infallible word of God.”

And with that, they are convinced that this “battle” is just another front in the larger “culture war” that Christians must fight in order to bring morality back to our culture.

Now, J.P. Moreland is not a young earth creationist. For that matter, I don’t think anyone associated with the book is a young earth creationist. But what I couldn’t help thinking was I read Moreland’s interview about the book was that many of his critiques and characterizations of theistic evolution are eerily similar to the very critiques and characterizations of Ken Ham. And when I say that, I don’t mean to disparage Moreland, but rather to point out what I feel is a deeper problem that far too many people have in regard to understanding evolution, the Bible, and the Christian faith.

Simply put: they’ve turned a basic scientific enterprise into a religious conflict. That is something I just don’t get.

Moreland’s Overview of Theistic Evolution
When asked about what the book Theistic Evolution addresses, Moreland articulates three basic definitions of “theistic evolution”: (1) microevolution (which he says everyone believes), (2) the thesis of common descent, and (3) the “blind watchmaker” thesis. He then says that the bulk of the book addresses the “blind watchmaker” thesis, although it does touch upon the thesis of common descent as well.

Now what struck me is the odd way Moreland described what theistic evolution is: Theistic evolution affirms that the general theory of common descent and the blind watchmaker is true, but God in some way or another guided the processes — as long as there is no way to detect that he did it.” (He then said that “detecting God scientifically” would be Intelligent Design). My first thought when reading this was, “You can’t ‘affirm the blind watchmaker’ and then say, ‘God guided the process.’” That is an oxymoron if there ever was one.

William Paley

The “God as watchmaker” claim was originally a philosophical argument put forth by William Paley in the 18th century. He started with the deistic assumption of a highly mechanized universe (i.e. like a watch), and then argued that such mechanical complexity points to an “intelligent designer” (i.e. God is the watchmaker). But it needs to be emphasized that Paley wasn’t attempting to scientifically explain how the universe works. His starting assumption was that of deism (the universe is like a watch), and he attempted to make a philosophical case that the mechanized universe points to an intelligent “watchmaker.”

Scientists, though, eventually discovered that the natural world is a whole lot more complex than a watch. And it was none other than the atheist Richard Dawkins who, in his 1986 book, popularized the phrase “the blind watchmaker” to argue that natural processes are all there is, and there is no God, or intelligent designer. And please note, by claiming that, Dawkins (like Paley) was also attempting to make a philosophical argument—namely, that there is no God, and that nature is all that exists.

But both claims of Paley and Dawkins are fundamentally based on deistic assumptions about the universe that are decidedly unbiblical from the jump—namely, that the universe is essentially a machine that God supernaturally “poofed” into existence way back when, but then left it to be run solely by natural laws and is thus largely detached from the created order. Modern day disciples of Paley thus argue that God occasionally steps in and “monkeys with the machinery” in order to do miracles, whereas atheists like Dawkins simply say there is no God in the first place, and therefore miracles don’t happen.

But please note, neither Paley’s “watchmaker” nor Dawkins’ “blind watchmaker” is a scientific argument. Both are philosophical arguments that are rooted in a deistic concept of the universe. Therefore, Moreland is simply wrong to say that theistic evolution “affirms the blind watchmaker,” because it doesn’t. The “blind watchmaker thesis” is fundamentally a philosophical argument for atheism, and theistic evolution (obviously) doesn’t affirm atheism, and it isn’t rooted in deism.

Furthermore, Moreland actually reveals his own deistic mindset when he then says, The theistic evolutionist wants to make sure no theology or religion or any idea of God or any of that enters into the methods of science.” His problem with theistic evolution is that it argues that God doesn’t just occasionally “monkey with the machinery,” but the very notion of a God who occasionally steps in to “monkey with the machinery,” comes from an Enlightenment/deistic worldview, and not a biblical one.

The biblical worldview regarding the natural universe is that God is intimately involved on a constant basis. He didn’t “create it back then,” and then leave it to itself, only to occasionally intervene. Biblically-speaking, what we call “natural laws and processes” are simply descriptions of how God continually creates and maintains the created order. Thus, theistic evolution simply acknowledges that the natural laws and processes are God’s laws and processes, and that He creates by means of them. God doesn’t have to “enter into the methods of science,” anymore than a painter has to “enter into a paintbrush,” for the natural processes are God’s creative paintbrush.

If I may put it this way:

  • The theory of evolution is a scientific argument;
  • Paley’s “Watchmaker” and Dawkins’ “Blind Watchmaker” are philosophical arguments rooted in a deistic conception of a mechanized universe;
  • Moreland’s criticism of theistic evolution is that it isn’t based on that deistic conception of a mechanized universe, in that it doesn’t attempt to argue when and where God stepped in to “monkey with the machinery;”
  • Theistic evolution, really simply saying, “As a scientific argument, evolution is convincing—let’s praise God for such creativity!”

Moreland’s Misunderstanding of What Evolution Addresses
The second thing Moreland addresses in the article is the things he feels are problematic for evolution, and that theistic evolutionists should think twice about before accepting evolution:

  • The origin of life: evolution can’t explain the origin of life
  • The origin of biological information: random processes and natural law can’t account for it
  • The Cambrian Explosion: how does one explain the “explosion” of various life forms within that rock strata?
  • The origin of consciousness
  • Irreducible complexity

I’m sure that the book delves into these objections in greater detail, which is unfortunate for this reason. Now, I’m not a scientist, but I do know enough about evolution to know that it doesn’t attempt to address things like the origin of life, the origin of biological information, or the origin of consciousness. Therefore, the fact that evolution doesn’t answer those questions doesn’t call it into question, because evolution doesn’t attempt to address those questions in the first place. To be clear, evolution is a scientific theory that attempts to explain the natural processes that bring about the varieties of life forms we see today. It explains the variations of life that happen once life has begun—it doesn’t address the issue of how life itself began.

Secondly, in regard to the Cambrian Explosion, Moreland’s comments are a bit misleading. Asking, “How does one explain the ‘explosion’ of life forms that happened in the Cambrian era?” gives the impression of a veritable “poofing” of life forms into existence. But the fact is that the so-called “explosion” took place over 55 million years. Sure, over that 55-million-year time span, we’ve discovered a wide range of life forms coming into existence, but perhaps “explosion” isn’t the best way to describe it…unless you believe explosions last for 55 million years.

Conclusion Thus Far
In my next post I will focus specifically on the part of Moreland’s interview in which he makes basically the same arguments against theistic evolution that Ken Ham makes about theistic evolution, old-earth creationism (of which Moreland ascribes to), and any other claim that isn’t young earth creationist. But what I hope is evident in this post in the underlying problem most people (not just Moreland) tend to have when trying to wrap their heads around the issue of evolution, and particularly theistic evolution.

Simply put, one’s worldview is the lens through which one looks at the world and attempts to make sense of it. What happens a lot of the time, though, is that people mistake the things they are looking at as being the basics of their worldview; they fail to realize that their worldview is the lens through which they are viewing those things, and they never bother to consider whether or not that “lens” is the right prescription. And sometimes, they don’t even realize they are looking through a particular lens.

What I’ve tried to show in this post is that, whether it be William Paley, Richard Dawkins, or even J.P. Moreland, they all seem to be trying to assess the scientific evidence we see in the natural world through the Enlightenment lens of deism. They don’t realize that as soon as you raise the question, “When does God jump in to monkey with the machinery?” you are immediately assuming that Enlightenment worldview and are looking at things through that deistic lens.

Therefore, it shouldn’t be surprising that Moreland finds theistic evolution problematic. When you put on deistic lenses, theistic evolution is going to seem to be out of focus.

But maybe the problem is the lenses.

13 Comments

  1. Interesting. I like and respect Moreland as an author, particularly when he’s writing about philosophy, ethics/morality, and am somewhat dismayed at his lack of precision here. I would’ve expected better from him.

    Pax vobiscum.

    Lee.

    1. I loved a book he helped put together about 20 years ago: “Fabricating Jesus.” I think in terms of the “creation/evolution debate,” he, like many others are simply looking at the issues through the “wrong lens.” I think it goes to show how hard it is for people to break away from a certain paradigm they don’t even realize they’re working from.

  2. The conflation of scientific theories and the philosophies that spin off them is a constant issue – on both sides . I heard about this book, but I’m not sure I want to wade through a 1000 page tome only to have it full of strawmen.

    1. There’s so many straw men in just this interview ABOUT the book I could barely tolerate it. I can’t imagine what the book itself must be like.

  3. Sorry for the double post.
    I’ve been treating Genesis, particularly the opening couple of chapters, as framing the Biblical worldview – answering those basic questions of: “who am I?”, “why does the world not seem to be right?”, “why am I here?”, among others I’m sure.

  4. Joel have you yet read books by Meyer and Behe berlinski? From your comments you don’t seem to fully grasp their arguments. Their arguments are scientific and compelling and any investigation of the mechanism of aquisition of specified information contained in life does need to be addressed. Because if darwinistic methodologies work to create the information of the human brain in a 10 to x cycles don’t you think we’d be using darwinistic methodologies to create software and solve other complex issues? We can now reproduce darwinistic random inserttationswith ease on digital information yet no scientists or capitalist would ever suggest using this mechanism to create even three lines of code. If you have read and I’ve missed your reviews of their work please send me the links. I get your point about world view above. I’m just reacting to your specific handling of the design arguments.

    1. Randy,
      No, I haven’t read them extensively. The focus of my concern in these posts (as with my posts on YECism) is what I see to be the fundamental reason for their objection to theistic evolution (or just evolutionary theory in general)–and it doesn’t seem to be, “We think there is compelling evidence to suggest (a) a young earth, or (b) an intelligent designer.” It seems to me that the real impetus for those stances (be it YECism or ID) is this fear that evolutionary theory somehow undermines the Bible or threatens the Christian faith, and that it is a competing philosophy. One sees it with Ken Ham all the time, and one sees it with Moreland’s responses in the interview.

      I think those views are simply wrong. Evolutionary theory is a scientific theory, nothing more. It attempts to explain how life–once there is life–evolves and adapts. It doesn’t address the origin of life itself, and it is unable to even comment on the existence of God because it is limited to explaining natural processes only. If further evidence causes revisions in the theory, or if further evidence ends up debunking it altogether, that’s fine. But when Evangelicals like Ham and Moreland continually present evolutionary theory as a competing philosophy that threatens to undermine the Bible, they are (whether intentionally or unintentionally) misleading people as to what evolution even is.

      As for the specific ID position that things like irreducible complexity and the very existence of information, etc., goes…I DO think the complexity of the cosmos and the existence of intelligence,information, consciousness DOES imply a higher power (i.e. God)–but I don’t see how that is a SCIENTIFIC argument. And that’s totally fine. The problem with ID is that it is trying to take something that is ultimately BEYOND what science is able to address, and it tries to stuff it into the scientific endeavor–I just think it is unnecesary. It’s like looking at a painting and trying to argue the existence of the painter by arguing “these brushstrokes” are the painter and “those brushstrokes” are the natural processes. Yes, the very existence of the painting and its beauty and design “declare the glory of God-the-painter,” but the WHOLE thing does, not just a specific “piece of evidence” in the painting.

      Having said that, asking, “Where does the information come from?” is a valid question. And I doubt evolution can ever answer it. I don’t think it can be answered scientifically, because that question goes BEYOND the limitations of what science can address.

      And having said all THAT, to go back to my main point: I think the fundamental reason for Moreland’s (and Ham’s and others’) objection to something like theistic evolution isn’t really a scientific objection–it is a faulty philosophical objection that misunderstands evolution, and it rooted in a theological fear that “if evolution is true” then the authority of the Bible is undermined.

  5. I think you make a good point about the fear of the theory of evolution being antithetical to theism v. merely explanatory of a physical process. One could say that the theory has been used by the likes of Dawkins, and you make that point too. I agree with you there. My point is that you should give the ID authors a read. Meher is a PHD of the philosophy of science so he is totally in the conceptual space of questioning what is science and what is philosophy and world view. If you read them you will get a more accurate perspective on their motives, as I have read them, and it seems your not really arguing with them but rather with an image of who you think they are. I think you will find their thought engaging and not falling into the traps that you envision them falling into above. Anyway, Joel, some good thoughts, just read the books if you get a chance, since you do so much in thinking in this area it would be worth it. Meher in particular I think you would enjoy.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.