Now that Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum have finished in a tie in the Republican presidential primary vote in Iowa, we might expect to see some debate between them over evolution.
As I have indicated in some previous posts, Romney is a theistic evolutionist who sees no conflict between evolutionary science and religious belief. He is also a thoughtful proponent of religious liberty. These two positions are related, because he can defend the teaching of evolution in public schools as compatible with religious liberty.
By contrast, Santorum is a proponent of "intelligent design theory," who has acted as an agent of the Discovery Institute in Seattle in attacking Darwinian evolution. In 2001, he attempted to attach the "Santorum Amendment" to the "No Child Left Behind Act," an amendment that would have promoted the teaching of "intelligent design" as an alternative to evolutionary science.
In his recent campaigning, Santorum has continued to criticize evolution as an atheistic teaching.
Santorum stresses the religious foundations of the American political tradition, and he sees evolutionary science as a threat to those traditional religious beliefs. Romney, however, has defended the tradition of religious liberty and toleration that stretches from Roger Williams and John Locke to the "no religious test" clause of the American Constitution. Like Abraham Lincoln, who adopted the idea of evolution from his reading of Robert Chambers Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation, Romney sees no conflict between evolutionary science and religious liberty. Like William Jennings Bryan, Santorum thinks that evolutionary science subverts the religious foundations of American political life.
So it's possible that we might see a split among the Republican presidential candidates over evolution similar to what we saw five years ago.
Expect for monetary policy, I can't see any area of policy where there exists much daylight between William Jennings Bryan and Rick Santorum.
ReplyDeleteJeff-
ReplyDeleteBoth were science deniers interested in subverting scientific findings for upholding their religious "values." That was Professor Arnhart's point, I believe.
Those who can juggle two contradictory ideas such as evolution and religion at the same time know little about religion or evolution. Romney understands politics better since he is better at juggling. Santorum is simply and honest fool.
ReplyDeleteMr. Amhart,
ReplyDeleteIf you can cite John Locke as a moral authority you are yourself not free of teleological thinking. If morality is not written in the stars - indeed it is not - then it can only be found in our Being (no, liberalism of whatever stripe does not furnish us with an accurate model of Man); as the expression of what we are.
This is, I suspect, the lacuna in your vision which prevents you from spotting the true (ethnic) motivations for Pinker's obfuscations. To put it less delicately, Pinker explicitly espouses a universalist morality for implicitly ethnic particularist reasons.
Just what do you suppose the "Frankfurt School" was really all about? This is where it gets really interesting, for we depart the waters of the intellectually bien-pensant altogether.
Captainchaos,
ReplyDeleteI cannot understand what you're saying.
Expeedee-
ReplyDeleteI think you would be hard pressed to make the case that "religion" and evolution are contradictory ideas.
Many religious people accept evolution. In fact, I believe that the majority of people who accept evolution also believe in one kind of religion or another.
Also, to connect this back to Professor Arnhart's work, it may be that both the desire to understand the world through reason (which is how science discovered evolution) and the desire to understand the world through revelation (which usually culminates into religion) are BOTH universal human desires.
This isn't to say they're completely compatible all of the time. But a blanket statement such as "religion is incompatible with evolution" is surely overstating the case.