Asking the Hard--but Right--Questions

The foundational assumption of science as it has been defined (by thought leaders in natural science and science education) for the past two centuries is methodological naturalism--the process by which one conducts one's investigations without consideration of the possibility of anything outside nature. The material universe is approached as though it is a closed box. The only explanations allowed for what transpires in nature are those contained within nature itself. Whatever the procedural merits of such an approach, it is a short step from methodological naturalism to philosophical naturalism, the mindset that nature is really all there is. In biology, there is the assumption that evolution must be true because there is no naturalistic alternative. Biologists assume the creative power of natural selection because there is no naturalistic alternative. While biologists may well deserve respect as experts in biology, and indeed their contributions to our understanding of the complexity and diversity of biological processes are of exceeding great value, they have no right to impose a philosophy on the rest of society. A rigorous attention to one's starting principles and the ability to distinguish between unproveable axioms and testable hypotheses (and the data required to make the test) are crucial to competent thinking.

From the beginning we must insist on good definitions adhered to consistently. Bait-and-switch equivocation will not do. We should never permit persons--as happens all too frequently--to make their terms out of rubber, designed to stretch or shrink at will. In this debate, we must learn at a minimum to distinguish between the phenomena characterized as microevolutionary and those that fall under the classification of so-called macroevolution--illegitimate extrapolations from what is perceived to happen on a much smaller scale.

And here is where we must take a closer look at natural selection. Is it capable of doing everything required of it in Darwin's theory, as originally stated or since modified? Biology has been unable so far to come up with any alternative to the two-part mechanism of random mutation and natural selection. But the evidence is sorely lacking that this mechanism has the creative power required to account for the diversity and complexity of all life. Appeals to examples of microevolution as demonstrating the "fact" of macroevolution must be challenged because of the (often unrecognized) category error.

More in this vein tomorrow.