Glimmer in our eyes

In 'Design' vs. Darwinism, Darwin Wins Point in Rome

The Times: The official Vatican newspaper published an article this week labeling as "correct" the recent decision by a judge in Pennsylvania that intelligent design should not be taught as a scientific alternative to evolution.

"If the model proposed by Darwin is not considered sufficient, one should search for another," Fiorenzo Facchini, a professor of evolutionary biology at the University of Bologna, wrote in the Jan. 16-17 edition of the paper, L'Osservatore Romano.

"But it is not correct from a methodological point of view to stray from the field of science while pretending to do science," he wrote, calling intelligent design unscientific. "It only creates confusion between the scientific plane and those that are philosophical or religious. ...

Many Roman Catholic scientists have criticized intelligent design, among them the Rev. George Coyne, a Jesuit who is director of the Vatican Observatory. "Intelligent design isn't science, even though it pretends to be," he said in November, as quoted by the Italian news service ANSA. "Intelligent design should be taught when religion or cultural history is taught, not science."

In October, Cardinal Schönborn sought to clarify his own remarks, saying he meant to question not the science of evolution but what he called evolutionism, an attempt to use the theory to refute the hand of God in creation.

"I see no difficulty in joining belief in the Creator with the theory of evolution, but under the prerequisite that the borders of scientific theory are maintained," he said in a speech.

To Dr. Kenneth R. Miller, a biology professor at Brown University and a Catholic, "That is my own view as well."

"As long as science does not pretend it can answer spiritual questions, it's O.K.," he said."

It's the clunkiest headline I've seen in the Times for a while, but like everything else in the paper worth reading for the content.

And worth reading as a reminder that evangelicals don't speak for a majority of Christians, especially when they seek to recast religion in self-centered terms.

I liked this concluding quote from professor Facchini: "God's project of creation can be carried out through secondary causes in the natural course of events, without having to think of miraculous interventions that point in this or that direction."

I've always found the 'intelligent' part of ID to be insulting--I think labeling God intelligent diminishes God to human terms. What is intelligent to God is quite possibly unintelligable to us.

It's not to say let's throw up our hands and be sheep. Rather, it's like looking at a far-away object. The best way to do it isn't to stare straight at it; rather, to catch a glimpse of it out of the corner of the eye.

Image from the Sistine Chapel of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam via Artarchive.