Door Number Two: The Existence of Evil is the Most Powerful Argument

It�s All About Religion

In my previous post I discussed David Barash�s op-ed piece in the New York Times reviewing the usual religious beliefs that motivate evolutionary thinking. Barash�s piece is not peculiar, it is standard evolutionary reasoning. For instance, another evolution professor, Jerry Coyne, responded today, in support of Barash�s arguments. Coyne explains that he agrees with Barash �100%� and adds a few additional comments of his own.

First, Coyne echoes Barash�s non scientific claim that evolution explains how the wonders of the biological world evolved spontaneously. Coyne writes:

The argument from complexity. As we all know, evolution dispelled this most powerful argument for God when Darwin showed that �design-like� features could arise from a purely naturalistic process. 

There�s only one problem. That is a lie. What Coyne writes here is not an exaggeration, not a controversial point, not a questionable point, not an unsupported suggestion. There simply is no nice way to put it�this is a bald faced lie, period.

Darwin showed no such thing. That is not my opinion. I�d be delighted to tell you Darwin and the evolutionists have made such a discovery. How cool that would be. But anyone even remotely familiar with Darwin�s work knows that this just didn�t happen. Not even close. Coyne�s claim is just laughable.

But the more important part of Coyne�s response is the religious part. Here, again, he supports Barash fully. Coyne writes:

The existence of evil. This, to me, is the most powerful of Barash�s arguments for incompatibility between science and religion. Theists must perforce explain evil�both �moral� evil (humans doing bad things to other humans) and �natural� evil (diseases like childhood cancer, earthquakes, and other stuff that kills innocent people)�as part of God�s plan. There�s no easy way to reconcile these with a loving and all-powerful god, though the entire discipline of theodicy is devoted to the effort. I haven�t yet seen a successful reconciliation, and theists know, deep in their hearts, that the problem remains. But such �evils� are, as Barash explains, easily understandable in a naturalistic universe: they�re an inevitable result of either evolution, physics, or geology.

No easy way to reconcile the world�s evils with a loving and all-powerful god (Coyne forgot the all-knowing part)? Coyne obviously has strong religious beliefs that drive his thinking. Imagine that you too believed what Coyne believes. Then of course you would be an evolutionist.

This religious theory drives evolutionists such as Coyne to abuse science (as we saw above). But of course there is nothing new here. As we have discussed before, Coyne elaborates on his religious views (that is before he denied them) in his book, Why Evolution is True. It�s all about evil and dysteleology and how this world would never have been intended by any creator or designer.

Should we laugh or should we cry. Evolutionist are so drunk with their own metaphysics they can�t even see it. They are oblivious to their own shtick.

Religion drives science, and it matters.