Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Harvard Gets Controversial
Here's an article describing a new multi-million dollar research project recently announced at Harvard. Researchers are going to be looking into the origins of life on this planet. The article presents the study as Harvard's entry into the debate about evolution vs. intelligent design. Here's a quote from one of the men who will be working on the project:
Without getting into my personal views on evolution and the like, let me just say that I think this researcher is a bit loopy. Suppose he's right, and the project does produce results that indicate life began via a series of events that could have taken place without divine intervention. So what? That doesn't mean there was no divine intervention.
I firmly believe in divine intervention in a lot of contexts. But I also firmly believe that divine intervention rarely manifests itself through a series of events that could not have happened without divine intervention.
Scientists should recognize this, and I hope it becomes part of the overall debate when the results of this Harvard study come out. Just because you can say X could have happened without Y having happened, that doesn't mean that Y didn't happen. At least the researcher didn't say he hopes to prove indisputably that there was no divine intervention. I think even the biggest skeptic would admit that would be impossible.
My expectation is that we will be able to reduce this to a very simple series of logical events that could have taken place with no divine intervention.
Without getting into my personal views on evolution and the like, let me just say that I think this researcher is a bit loopy. Suppose he's right, and the project does produce results that indicate life began via a series of events that could have taken place without divine intervention. So what? That doesn't mean there was no divine intervention.
I firmly believe in divine intervention in a lot of contexts. But I also firmly believe that divine intervention rarely manifests itself through a series of events that could not have happened without divine intervention.
Scientists should recognize this, and I hope it becomes part of the overall debate when the results of this Harvard study come out. Just because you can say X could have happened without Y having happened, that doesn't mean that Y didn't happen. At least the researcher didn't say he hopes to prove indisputably that there was no divine intervention. I think even the biggest skeptic would admit that would be impossible.
Comments:
It would seem to me that, if the scientists have to create an experiment to prove that life could form "on it's own", they've already defeated their own hypothesis. Unless it happens purely on it's own (and who would be there to know?), then there is at least human intervention (in the case of the experiment) and obvious proof that things of that magnitude are planned or "created" by Someone.
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