He proceeds to reveal startling depths of enthusiasm for Behe, Behe's book, and intelligent design. He talks about how he never previously believed in God and never wanted to until he read Behe, who of course in his own writing steers clear of theological ruminations (apart from noting that he's a Roman Catholic). A senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, McWhorter clearly has been thinking and reading about the subject for years. He makes a stimulating, well informed interviewer for Behe.
Sounds good, right? No, bad! Very bad! Bad McWhorter! Apologize now!
OK, I will!
Something evidently happened behind the scenes at Bloggingheads. So the interview was taken down, at which point an anonymous Orwellian Administrator posted as follows:
John McWhorter feels, with regret, that this interview represents neither himself, Professor Behe, nor Bloggingheads usefully, takes full responsibility for same, and has asked that it be taken down from the site. He apologizes to all who found its airing objectionable.
Now, you must go and watch the interview for yourself over at Uncommon Descent. Here's the link where it used to be. You can disagree with Behe and McWhorter; think they're both full of baloney if you like. But there's no question that simply as an interview, a piece of casual, conversational journalism, the McWhorter exchange is exemplary. It's fascinating. He admires the book, undoubtedly, even becoming passionate about it at points, but also poses challenging questions. There's nothing to apologize for here. Yet clearly he was pressured into taking it down. By whom?
The irony is that Wright himself has stood out from other Darwinists for his honesty and openness. I blogged earlier on his offer of a "grand bargain" of peace between Darwin-believers and Darwin-doubters. Is our part of the bargain then to be seen and not heard? Or maybe not even seen. Wright seems to be away from email. One assumes this happened while he was out of the shop.
Efforts to get a meaningful comment from anyone else at Bloggingheads have so far not panned out. We'll keep you posted.
But OK, let's try to give the benefit of the doubt. Maybe you have to be a practicing scientist in a white lab coat to have an opinion on Darwinism? You mean like Behe himself? No, dummy, like McWhorter who's only got a PhD from Stanford in linguistics, taught at Berkeley and Cornell, and wrote a book about the evolution of language! Obviously just another know-nothing creationist.
Or could it be that there's something inappropriate, according to the vaunted Bloggingheads tradition, about an interviewer expressing undisguised friendliness to the subject of his interview? Hmm, compare and contrast with this Bloggingheads interview with atheist Darwinian biologist P.Z. Myers by Abigail Smith, a wide-eyed, giggling University of Oklahoma grad student in a tank top. In one segment, the stolid Myers and flirty Smith commiserate with each other about the misery of having to review "creationist screeds" such as those by Michael Behe. Does this young lady, who also blogs, ever challenge Myers on anything? Maybe I missed it.
Here's her cheerfully obscene take on censoring Behe. It's odd, what she says about the Behe-McWhorter interaction would be far more accurately said about Myers-Smith. We'll leave it at that, since this is a blog for all the family.
Add to Del.icio.us
Add to Technorati
Add to Digg
Add to Newsvine
Add to Facebook
Add to StumbleUpon
Subscribe
@Turmarion: "Since ID has no proof, its proponents try to argue about arguing itself (is it rude or crude?)."
But don't several authors who are theistic evolutionists ALSO try to argue their position, despite the fact they have no proof? (Obviously, I'm not talking about just evolution, but /theistic/ evolution.)
"After the war and in the wake of the Holocaust, thankfully, most mainstream Christians repudiated anti-Semitism."
Jews reading this would feel a lot more at ease if you didn't have to add the word "mainstream" in there.
Mark: But don't several authors who are theistic evolutionists ALSO try to argue their position, despite the fact they have no proof?
Strictly, the existence of God can be neither proved nor disproved. What theistic evolution tries to do is to show that evolution is not inconsistent with God's existence. Really, TE is more a matter of philosophy. It accepts the science as it is, and then uses philosophical arguments to show that it is possible to see God at work even through natural, random processes. To say that it is possible to think of God as working through evolution is very much different from saying you can prove He exists, or making predictions about biological processes. No TE advocate I know of claims he can prove God's existence.
ID by contrast claims that certain processes cannot be explained short of by what is essentially direct Divine intervention. In effect it claims to be science, not philosophy, and makes negative predictions, i.e., it predicts that no mechanisms will be found to explain certain processes (e.g. flagella or the clotting cascade). Unfortunately for ID, all such examples it has given have later been shown to be explicable by ordinary natural means as a result of scientific research (none of which ID does, btw).
The point is that the science is unassailable, and TE doesn't try to reject it, whereas ID does.
"After the war and in the wake of the Holocaust, thankfully, most mainstream Christians repudiated anti-Semitism."
Jews reading this would feel a lot more at ease if you didn't have to add the word "mainstream" in there.
Maybe I should have said "all Christians but those on the fringe". I don't think there is any significant number of people who claim to be Christian who are also anti-Semitic, but that doesn't meant there are none. It's not perfect, but I think Jews have more reason to feel at ease in modern America than in most other places over the last couple of millennia.
"What theistic evolution tries to do is to show that evolution is not inconsistent with God's existence. Really, TE is more a matter of philosophy. It accepts the science as it is, and then uses philosophical arguments to show that it is possible to see God at work even through natural, random processes. To say that it is possible to think of God as working through evolution is very much different from saying you can prove He exists, or making predictions about biological processes. No TE advocate I know of claims he can prove God's existence."
For what it's worth, I said "argue", not "prove." I'm very disappointed that TE, at least in your experience, is only willing to show that it is "possible" to see God at work, and that evolution is "not inconsistent" with God's existence. I mean, big deal. They should be a little more daring and at least try to argue that it is very, very unlikely that evolution could have occurred /without/ God's involvement. "Possible" and "not inconsistent" is just wimpy. I'm not saying TE is wrong, but it doesn't seem to address the needs of Christians who, based on their scientific knowledge, are doubting the existence of God. Doubting the truth of those science-related portions of Scripture, yes, but not doubting the existence of God.
Oh, and different people in ID argue differently. Don't broadbrush. Some go for the proof, "the things in nature must've been designed" and some are less strident: "the things we see in nature are most consistent with design."
Mark: I'm very disappointed that TE, at least in your experience, is only willing to show that it is "possible" to see God at work, and that evolution is "not inconsistent" with God's existence. I mean, big deal. They should be a little more daring and at least try to argue that it is very, very unlikely that evolution could have occurred /without/ God's involvement.
Well, the issue is what you have to work with. Galileo's theory ws thought to be a threat to faith. One (among many) reasons was that if the Earth was seen as the center of the universe, it was easier for people to think of mankind as the center of God's creation. On an abstract level this may be a valid point; but the evidence just wasn't there. The Church had to give way, since it became clear that the Earth went around the sun, period.
Another example: Basing themselves on Aristotelian physics, Christians up until the Renaissance believed that angels moved the planets. A comforting thought of God's involvement in the universe, but it was knocked out by Kepler and Newton. Thus instead of it being "very, very unlikely" that planets could move "without God's involvement", it was now a matter of planetary movement being "not inconsistent" with God's providential ordering of gravity. Small beer for some believers, perhaps, but what do you do? Reality is what it is.
This is how it is with evolution. There simply is no really good, demonstrable point at which the evidence compels one to say, "Gee, there's no way this could happen by natural processes." Thus, one is compelled to think in terms of what is possible and consistent with God.
"Possible" and "not inconsistent" is just wimpy. I'm not saying TE is wrong, but it doesn't seem to address the needs of Christians who, based on their scientific knowledge, are doubting the existence of God.
Well, that's the rub. I can sympathize with such people, but one can't promote something that's just not correct to make people feel better. I would recommend in such cases that more knowledge, not less, is the solution, and that such people should read people like Francis Collins or Ken Miller or C. S. Lewis's The Problem of Pain, which addresses aspects of this issue. I would argue also that the existence of a universe amenable to life at all is evidence for God.
In the end, though, God obviously wished to make His existence much less than clear. All believers have to be content, to an extent, with the statement of Isaiah 45:15: "Truly you are a God who hides himself, O God."
Nice post, Turmarion. By the way, that Isaiah verse should be learned at the same time as Job 19:26: "Through my flesh, I see my Creator."
Post a Comment
By submitting these comments, I agree to the beliefnet.com terms of service, rules of conduct and privacy policy (the "agreements"). I understand and agree that any content I post is licensed to beliefnet.com and may be used by beliefnet.com in accordance with the agreements.