Intelligent Design - Sacred Imagination
It is strange, being an agnostic, happy to sit on the fence, hopeful to find acceptable compromise between religion and science, and then I'm forced to deal with school boards voting 6:4 in favor of "Intelligent Design" over "Evolution". A big UGH! seems a worthy response.
http://www.startribune.com/stories/1592/5715501.html Kansas school board approves science standards casting doubt on evolution
I shouldn't be so defensive of science perhaps. It's not as if adding a little health skepticism to science class is a BAD thing. I'm the ultimate skeptic. I accept Evolution as more of a Hypothesis than a Theory, at least in regards to believing we've got the dominant mechanisms determined.
I play the "middle group", and say (1) The fossil record clearly demonstrates a chronological progression of change and continued complexification of life (2) The genetic structure of different species seems to be related, and in a branching relations (3) Microevolution via random mutation and survival of the fittest (Natural selection) happens in time periods we can observe.
I don't think anyone is arguing that dogs did not "evolve" from wolves, that all the wide variations of dogs come from a set of ancestors which were far less diverse. That's microevolution within a species, promoted through artificial selection. Similarly all the domesticated animals and plants have been selected by humans for what we think we want.
Science would extend this visible evolution, promoted by humans, to say that perhaps all animals (and eventually plants), come back to a small number of common ancestors.
Myself I'm most impressed by the genetic and skeletal similarities between animals. The idea that the skeleton of a human can be bone-for-bone "mapped" onto a fish skeleton is an amazing idea. It's not "proof" of a common ancestor, but you have to wonder, if species did NOT have a common ancestor, why not allow for even more variation?
There's plenty of different levels of resistance to evolution. Some literalists want the Garden of Eden to be history, simultaenous creation of all species, and Man and dinosaur walked the same earth apparently. Others will accept that evolution occured in the fossil record, but perhaps through catestrophic events (like Noah's flood) where the old species were wiped away, and new species were scattered onto the earth, completely independent of the previous generations. Others again might say perhaps evolution BETWEEN the species occured, but the steps were "God inspired", like a big chess game maybe, or perhaps with ennumerable angels watching over each little corner of creation, and adding a little salt and pepper here and there when no one was looking, maybe even Cupid's arrows being fired into sex-crazed animals trying to make the next generation.
Serious I accept these as valid philosophical questions, far beyond what I can imagine or attempt to properly catalog now. Myself I'm most interested in the angel theory. I sort of like the "parallel processing" model of life. Rather than "Intelligent design", I'd imagine "Sacred Imagination" as the source.
God being busy, having many more worlds to tend than just the earth, set forth a myriad myriad angel spirits to walk the lands and play on the seashores and see what they could make. Every once and a while they perhaps have tribal councils, and elect delegates to higher councils who do the same until a small band of brave angels go up and have a talk with god and tell them about their adventures. They compare notes and finally go back to their locales and get back to work, not being commanded from on-high for any specific goals or directions, but just building action upon potential upon vision of what is possible.
Pretty much my angels are like gardeners. They don't really have a deep understanding of how everything works, but they play around. They look for beauty and they let it grow upon itself into something new.
The result of this tinkering is what we call evolution and what allows us to imagine their existence.
Now if I were an atheist, I'd be unlikely to support such imagined gardeners. WHO are these angels anyway trying to manipulate MY life! There's a lots of anger in the self-made or random universe. We don't know WHY we're here, and WHY isn't GOD here NOW telling us why we're here! Angels are problematic, being too small to really see the big picture we want, and a little scary for possibly manipulating us against our little wills.
Now I now my little angel Gardener model for evolution is not much good for science class. I'm not likely going to scientifically determine methods of communication with such beings. Science best deals with dead things that can be dissected. Living spirits aren't prone to falling for the same experiment twice, so even if we tricked them into exposure once, they'd not likely fall for it again. On the other hand, I imagine they would like to communicate with us, and I imagine if they can do this, it's probably through our quieter moment, times when we have no ambition or worries, when we can really listen and imagine what it might be like to be such an angel in a beautiful world.
I really accept the Muses view of these angels - that inspiration and all consciousness is a gift from their work and at best we can just try to take in what we see with as little judgment as possible, and lots and lots of thanks.
Again, I don't think science can do much here. I think evolution can bring out the work of angels, even if we can't really understand all the mechanisms. We can appreciate their work better.
Sure, maybe I'd be happier if scientists all believed as I do, that there's little helpful spirit angels guiding evolution. It doesn't help their work, but it might help them see the beauty of it all. Well, I really think all scientists probably are about searching for beauty, even if they can get distracted by little power trips. Life is messy, humans are messy, and it takes a lot of work to clear the vision and see what's behind it all.
I wish the Kansas school district well for their experiments into Intelligent Design. I really don't get it, sorry, but happy landings. There's probably as many "Deadends" in religion as science, and a little playful effort in thought experiments doesn't harm anyone, right?
http://www.startribune.com/stories/1592/5715501.html Kansas school board approves science standards casting doubt on evolution
I shouldn't be so defensive of science perhaps. It's not as if adding a little health skepticism to science class is a BAD thing. I'm the ultimate skeptic. I accept Evolution as more of a Hypothesis than a Theory, at least in regards to believing we've got the dominant mechanisms determined.
I play the "middle group", and say (1) The fossil record clearly demonstrates a chronological progression of change and continued complexification of life (2) The genetic structure of different species seems to be related, and in a branching relations (3) Microevolution via random mutation and survival of the fittest (Natural selection) happens in time periods we can observe.
I don't think anyone is arguing that dogs did not "evolve" from wolves, that all the wide variations of dogs come from a set of ancestors which were far less diverse. That's microevolution within a species, promoted through artificial selection. Similarly all the domesticated animals and plants have been selected by humans for what we think we want.
Science would extend this visible evolution, promoted by humans, to say that perhaps all animals (and eventually plants), come back to a small number of common ancestors.
Myself I'm most impressed by the genetic and skeletal similarities between animals. The idea that the skeleton of a human can be bone-for-bone "mapped" onto a fish skeleton is an amazing idea. It's not "proof" of a common ancestor, but you have to wonder, if species did NOT have a common ancestor, why not allow for even more variation?
There's plenty of different levels of resistance to evolution. Some literalists want the Garden of Eden to be history, simultaenous creation of all species, and Man and dinosaur walked the same earth apparently. Others will accept that evolution occured in the fossil record, but perhaps through catestrophic events (like Noah's flood) where the old species were wiped away, and new species were scattered onto the earth, completely independent of the previous generations. Others again might say perhaps evolution BETWEEN the species occured, but the steps were "God inspired", like a big chess game maybe, or perhaps with ennumerable angels watching over each little corner of creation, and adding a little salt and pepper here and there when no one was looking, maybe even Cupid's arrows being fired into sex-crazed animals trying to make the next generation.
Serious I accept these as valid philosophical questions, far beyond what I can imagine or attempt to properly catalog now. Myself I'm most interested in the angel theory. I sort of like the "parallel processing" model of life. Rather than "Intelligent design", I'd imagine "Sacred Imagination" as the source.
God being busy, having many more worlds to tend than just the earth, set forth a myriad myriad angel spirits to walk the lands and play on the seashores and see what they could make. Every once and a while they perhaps have tribal councils, and elect delegates to higher councils who do the same until a small band of brave angels go up and have a talk with god and tell them about their adventures. They compare notes and finally go back to their locales and get back to work, not being commanded from on-high for any specific goals or directions, but just building action upon potential upon vision of what is possible.
Pretty much my angels are like gardeners. They don't really have a deep understanding of how everything works, but they play around. They look for beauty and they let it grow upon itself into something new.
The result of this tinkering is what we call evolution and what allows us to imagine their existence.
Now if I were an atheist, I'd be unlikely to support such imagined gardeners. WHO are these angels anyway trying to manipulate MY life! There's a lots of anger in the self-made or random universe. We don't know WHY we're here, and WHY isn't GOD here NOW telling us why we're here! Angels are problematic, being too small to really see the big picture we want, and a little scary for possibly manipulating us against our little wills.
Now I now my little angel Gardener model for evolution is not much good for science class. I'm not likely going to scientifically determine methods of communication with such beings. Science best deals with dead things that can be dissected. Living spirits aren't prone to falling for the same experiment twice, so even if we tricked them into exposure once, they'd not likely fall for it again. On the other hand, I imagine they would like to communicate with us, and I imagine if they can do this, it's probably through our quieter moment, times when we have no ambition or worries, when we can really listen and imagine what it might be like to be such an angel in a beautiful world.
I really accept the Muses view of these angels - that inspiration and all consciousness is a gift from their work and at best we can just try to take in what we see with as little judgment as possible, and lots and lots of thanks.
Again, I don't think science can do much here. I think evolution can bring out the work of angels, even if we can't really understand all the mechanisms. We can appreciate their work better.
Sure, maybe I'd be happier if scientists all believed as I do, that there's little helpful spirit angels guiding evolution. It doesn't help their work, but it might help them see the beauty of it all. Well, I really think all scientists probably are about searching for beauty, even if they can get distracted by little power trips. Life is messy, humans are messy, and it takes a lot of work to clear the vision and see what's behind it all.
I wish the Kansas school district well for their experiments into Intelligent Design. I really don't get it, sorry, but happy landings. There's probably as many "Deadends" in religion as science, and a little playful effort in thought experiments doesn't harm anyone, right?
posted by Ares Olympus at 5:18 PM
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