Faith in Evolution
“Evolutionists(some) say that if God makes sense to us, it is not because he is really there, it’s only because that belief helped us survive and so we are hardwired for it. However, if we can’t trust our belief-forming faculties to tell us the truth about God, why should we trust them to tell us the truth about anything, including evolutionary science? If our cognitive faculties only tell us what we need to survive, not what is true, why trust them about anything at all?”
I’ve wondered also, if the argument is really that we’ve just evolved to believe in God, as it’s beneficial to us, then what’s the argument for giving up faith? We don’t like evolving anymore?
I suppose the claim is that there’s science now instead, but science is an unproven field of study when it comes to procurring the best mates(eHarmony is full of lies). Keep faith! Let evolution decide!
We haven’t evolved to specifically believe in a god. Our brains evolved to the point of such high cognitive activity that we are self aware and this awareness leads us to wonder where we came from and how things work. Religion was one answer; it was the first science. So giving up faith for science is just giving up a failed hypothesis for an accepted theory.
Yes, that’s certainly one theory. Can you prove it?
As it is, and as I’ve said before, science does not answer all religious questions, and it never will. It is not the job of science to apply meaning to the universe, but of philosophy. There is not a dicotomy between faith and science. One can believe in both… or neither. There are some awfully nutty atheists in the world, too.
I can probably find scientific articles to back it up but for future reference following the word “theory” with “Can you prove it?” doesn’t make sense. Theories are descriptions and explanations of factual phenomena so by their very nature they are already proven. What I said would be a hypothesis, or an educated guess based on my general knowledge.
Evolution=factual phenomenon; the Theory of Evolution=explanation/description of how it works.
Gravity=factual phenomenon; the Theory of Gravitation=explanation/description of how it works.
Fun fact: We know more about how evolution works than how gravity works, making the theory of evolution more complete than the theory of gravity.
On your other point about science and religion/philosophy being separate; they are beginning to converge. Mainly because all religion/philosophy have real world implications and deities are thought to often interact with our universe meaning that, if they’re real, we should be able to measure their impact through science. And then there’s neurology and psychology with the work of Viktor Frankl, Sam Harris, Philip Zimbardo, and many others who study/studied morals, ethics, and meanings to life.
