Religion and Evolution

Ever since Darwin first published The Origin of Species, evolutionary theory's implications for traditional religious beliefs have been endlessly debated. Many people, both past and present, have assumed that evolution would utterly eliminate all of religion's claims to validity; there have been many that feared this idea and a few that welcomed it. Still others have spent many hours speculating on the relationship between evolution and religion, only to develop shaky syntheses or to give up, calling the problem insoluble.

In this section we will examine when evolutionary theory does and does not imply for religious belief, without taking sides or making judgments. The section outlines some major evolution/religion syntheses and presents common arguments against them. Creationism will not be extensively discussed here; for a detailed analysis of that debate, see Evolution vs. Creation and Evolutionary Theory FAQ.

Religions as Memes

One of the first things that must be established is that religions, like all complex sets of ideas, are memeplexes composed of literally thousands of individual memes. As such, religions have come into being through a Darwinian process of differential reproduction and natural selection. Religions are highly evolved memeplexes, but memeplexes have evolved to reproduce - that is, to get as many adherents as possible. Just because a meme is in a memeplex - even a highly successful one - does not guarantee that the meme is true. For example, astrology memes are extremely popular, but have absolutely no basis in fact. At one time virtually everyone believed that the sun moved around the earth, but this too proved to be a false meme.

Of course, being in a memeplex or being highly successful does not necessarily mean that a meme is untrue either. The fact is, relative success as a replicator is not necessarily an accurate measure of a meme's truthfulness or consistency with observed fact.

Creation Myths

Evolution, of course, does not support any creation myths devised by any of the major religions. While these stories may have value as allegories or moral lessons, they cannot be taken as literal truth - the weight of scientific evidence stands with evolution. For a more detailed analysis of evolutionary theory and "scientific creationism", see Evolution vs. Creation.

Guided or Theistic Evolution

One popular synthesis of evolutionary theory and traditional religious doctrine is the idea of "guided" or "theistic" evolution, which acknowledges the reality of human evolution, but asserts that a divine hand guided evolution, somehow "encouraging" it to yield the products we observe around us today. Indeed, a version of this idea is the official doctrine of the Catholic Church.

There are many different variations on this one general theme. According to one notion, a divine hand carefully shaped the events that took place over the course of life's evolution, in a sense "fixing" the process so that humans would emerge as a result. While it cannot be empirically disproved that such a thing took place, evolution's historical contingency and fundamental unpredictability tend to disfavor this idea. Moreover, since the process is by definition silent and unnoticeable, the hypothesis is insulated from testing, which means that it is not in the realm of science (though it is in the realm of philosophy). In addition, many people disagree about the logical consistency of this sort of structure.

Another version of this idea postulates that the divine shaping only pointed evolution towards the evolution of intelligence, not necessarily of humans. This idea is more consistent with the basic nature of evolving systems, though it remains untestable and therefore is not a scientific claim. However, some argue that evolution does not need divine guidance to produce intelligent beings, any more than it needed guidance to produce bilateral symmetry. They argue that intelligence is so logical an adaptation that, though it is difficult and complex, will arise out of evolving systems. So the "guiding toward intelligence" idea is not flatly ruled out by physical evidence, but at the very least has materialistic competition and may be seen as multiplying entities unnecessarily (that is, violating the Occam's razor principle).

Intelligent Design

Another religion-science synthesis that has become famous recently is the idea of intelligent design, chiefly espoused by Michael Behe in his book Darwin's Black Box. Behe argues that evolution could not possibly explain certain biochemical systems because they are "irreducibly complex" - that is, all their parts must be together and in working order before the system as a whole will function properly. There are holes in Behe's arguments; namely, that "irreducibly complex" systems can and do arise in evolving systems. This is treated quite thoroughly by the many resources available in Behe's Empty Box.

Anti-Abiogenesis Theories

The generation of living things from nonliving matter is called abiogenesis (For a scientific explanation, see The Origin of Life on Earth.) Abiogenesis is commonly seen to be the greatest barrier to a purely naturalistic explanation for the phenomenon of life. Consequently, many people see a divine hand in this event: they argue that the original proto-cell was placed on earth by a divine being (who then may or may not have interfered with the process). While scientists do not currently have a concrete explanation for abiogenesis, and the exact mechanism may be lost to history, it is certainly not immune to natural explanation. Indeed, "origin-of-life chemistry" has produced some quite intriguing results, and all that is really needed to set off the evolutionary process is some varying, self-replicating entities.

Theories about the Origin of the Universe

While these theories are a bit outside the purview of evolutionary theory, they are still examples of common syntheses between modern science and traditional religion. Some people argue that, though a divine hand may not have been involved in evolution, it could have been the catalyst that set off the Big Bang, the event that gave the current universe its start.

It is true that scientists do not currently have a good explanation for the reasons behind the Big Bang. Consequently, a religious explanation in this domain is no more or less factually tenable than many competing explanations. While the logical consistency of such a view could still be argued, this is the religion-science synthesis that is most in accordance with available facts.

It should also be noted that evolutionary theory has recently been extended to the very origins of the universe. Physicist Lee Smolin, in his book The Life of the Cosmos, has presented an intriguing idea about natural selection among competing universes. This idea is presented more thoroughly in Interesting Ideas in Evolution.

Evolution's Explanation of Complexity

Many people react to evolution by responding, But random forces couldn't have produced all that complexity! This is an entirely natural reaction, grounded in our everyday experience of probability. However, this argument fails to take into account two important things: the power of natural selection and the length of time available. First, natural selection is an incredibly powerful force - it can give rise, in a relatively small number of attempts, to wildly improbable things, simply through the mechanism of breeding a new generation from the most successful in the last. The power of natural selection can be demonstrated by a simple word game - if you'd like to see for yourself, click here!

The other detail that this response misses is the vast amount of time that has been available to natural selection. The earth has been here for approximately 4.5 billion years; life has existed for at least 3.5 of those 4.5 billion. This gives a billion years for life to get from primitive chemicals to early bacteria, and 3.5 billion years to get from bacteria to the present diversity of life. This incredible timescale provides ample opportunity for sufficient random mutations to take place and to be exploited by natural selection.

Postulates and Explanations

It has been argued (for example, by Richard Dawkins) that the idea of explaining anything in the natural world with through the action of a divine being is logically fallacious. According to Dawkins, speculating that divinity explains complexity (or even existence) is postulating exactly that which is trying to be explained. In this view, postulating a divine being to explain any complex phenomenon (such as life, or the existence of the universe) is, in effect, postulating complexity in order to explain complexity, and would lead to the reductio ad absurdum of an infinite regress of divine beings, each explaining the existence of the next.

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Looking Further: Links and References

The following links and references are useful in the exploration of the relationship between evolutionary theory and religion.

• Books
  • The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins
  • Climbing Mount Improbable by Richard Dawkins
  • River out of Eden by Richard Dawkins
  • Unweaving the Rainbow: Science, Delusion and the Appetite for Wonder by Richard Dawkins
  • The Life of the Cosmos by Lee Smolin
  • Finding Darwin's God: A Scientist's Search for the Common Ground between God and Evolution by Kenneth R. Miller
  • Darwin's Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution by Michael Behe

• Websites
  • Principia Cybernetica Web (highly recommended)
  • The Talk.Origins Archive - Exploring the Creation/Evolution Controversy - lots of content
  • Behe's Empty Box from The World of Richard Dawkins
  • Snake Oil and Holy Water by Richard Dawkins
  • The Improbability of God by Richard Dawkins
  • Probability of Abiogenesis Calculations
  • Third Way Magazine's Interview with Richard Dawkins - see also Michael Poole's criticism of Dawkins, Dawkins' response, and Poole's response
  • Creation, Creationism, and Empirical Theistic Arguments - lots of pro-religion links

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