[Buddha-l] Fighting creationism

[Richard Hayes]

On Sunday 01 April 2007 17:10, SJZiobro at cs.com wrote:

> For
> instance, the that there must be a point (outside of time) where what was
> not came into being on account of a transcendent Cause that is not one
> thing among others is entirely reasonable when contrasted with the idea of
> an infinite regress.

Surely there are three possibilities. 1) The world came into being out of 
nothing. 2) The world has always existed and therefore was never created. 3) 
Every given state of the world emerged from a previously existing state, and 
no matter how far back one goes one will never find a first state.

No one has yet succeeded in convincing me that any one of these scenarios is 
entirely reasonable in contrast to the others. They all seem equally absurd 
and untenable. So perhaps the Buddha's advice was not bad when he recommended 
that we not try to answer the question of how the world got here, since 
nothing of practical importance hinges on the answer.

>  Atheists, who naturally seek other
> explanations, cannot accept any form of creation in the strict sense and
> remain atheists.

I know plenty of people who claim to be atheists who believe in some version 
of the big bang hypothesis. One version of that theory holds that 
intelligence is one of the primitive elements of the universe and that 
intelligence is inherent in all things. I know folks who claim that one could 
hold that view and still be an atheist. These various big bang hypotheses 
seem to be a versions of creatio ex nihilo. Should my atheist friends worry 
about holding two incompatible beliefs?

> Hence, even if they should concede a rationale for 
> creation being reasonable, nonetheless, they will reject the idea on a
> moral ground. 

Now you have completely lost me. Why would one have to reject a moral ground 
if one believed that the world has always existed and therefore was never 
created, or that every given state of the world emerged from a previously 
existing state, and no matter how far back one goes one will never find a 
first state.

> Unfortunately, they also apparently will not allow others to 
> teach anything contrary to what they presently hold as the status quo in
> the schools.

As I am sure you are aware, Stan, that is an egregious misrepresentation of 
the facts. Very few people of any persuasion are opposed to the idea of 
intelligent design being taught in schools. What almost every intelligently 
designed creature is opposed to is unscientific dogmas being taught in 
classrooms as if they were defeasible, fallibilistic hypotheses capable of 
being overthrown by properly collected data. It is just bad pedagogy to 
present non-scientific dogma in courses designed (intelligently) to teach 
scientific method. It does not follow from that that intelligent design is 
unworthy of being subjected to the same critical scrutiny as every other idea 
in a philosophy classroom.

> Such notions of freedom of thought, speech, etc. are then 
> summarily quashed and anything having to do with an argument for a creation
> is in some form or other presented as a surd.

If only intelligent design propagandists were as surd as they are absurd. But 
I digress.

Yours is an assertion for which I see very little evidence, Stan. Again, I 
think it's important to distinguish between being opposed to something being 
presented as something it manifestly is not and being opposed to that thing 
being presented at all. One can be opposed to teaching intelligent design 
theory in a biology classroom as if it were a legitimate scientific 
hypothesis without being opposed to it being taught in philosophy classrooms, 
homes, churches, public parks, Fox News, Republican fund-raising rallies and 
in the driver's seats of NASCAR racing cars. 

Conversely, one can be a staunch advocate of free speech and still hold the 
position that not every belief needs to be articulated in every possible 
venue. Both the scientist who wants to keep the Bible (or the Qur'an or the 
Bhagavad-gita or the Pali canon) out of the physics and biology classrooms, 
and the preacher who wants to keep Darwin out of the revivalist tent can be 
an advocate of free speech in society as a whole. It is only those who say 
that an idea may not be taught anywhere at all, and that books promoting that 
idea be burned or people espousing the idea be silenced, who are opposing the 
principle of freedom of speech.

-- 
Richard P. Hayes
Department of Philosophy
University of New Mexico
http://www.unm.edu/~rhayes