We All Fall

We each had our own fall.

The first, almost immediate condition the fall introduced was a universal physical death. Adam and Eve became mortal through their choice and passed such mortality on to the human family. Whether, as James Talmage thought, eating the forbidden fruit introduced an actual substance that altered the human physiology, making mortal that which was immortal; whether God otherwise effected some other transformation of Adam and Eve’s immortal condition to human; or whether the story is allegorical of the human family’s descent from their pre-mortal abode to earthly, bodily habitations, the fall represents for Mormons the portal though which all humankind pass from God’s presence to a state of vulnerability and physical separation from God.

- Givens, Terryl L. (2014). Wrestling the Angel: The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity, p. 192

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BYU and the Reconstruction of the Legend of the First Vision

Last year Richard Bushman generated a bit of a stir when he said,

I think that for the Church to remain strong it has to reconstruct its narrative. The dominant narrative is not true; it can’t be sustained. The Church has to absorb all this new information or it will be on very shaky grounds and that’s what it is trying to do and it will be a strain for a lot of people, older people especially. But I think it has to change.

He later clarified his meaning (here and here) to make clear that he simply meant that we need to bring new information into the way we tell the story of the Restoration, which the Church has begun to do (e.g. Gospel Topics essays, The Joseph Smith Papers, etc.)

This year's Gospel Doctrine curriculum focuses on the Doctrine and Covenants, and although the First Vision isn't actually in the D&C, it is the focus of Lesson #3. My observation is that we still have a lot of work to do to reconstruct the story of the First Vision. The story has been told from the exclusive vantage point of Joseph Smith's 1838 telling with added layers of popular interpretation for so long that historical inaccuracies are practically baked in. The problem is that the inaccuracies are almost as beloved as the vision itself. During the recent lesson in my own ward, I looked for opportunities to insert gentle historical correction. However, the traditional story (and associated interpretations) was presented (and reflected by the class) so strongly that I chickened out for fear of doing more harm than good.

With that as background, I want to draw attention to a publication by the BYU Religious Studies Center that I think represents a solid step in the right direction. In 2012 BYU's RSC published a book titled, Exploring the First Vision, which is now available online (and also at Deseret Book) [1]. Much of the book provides defense against various adversarial arguments. However, for the purposes of this post, I believe the most significant chapter is James Allen's essay, "Emergence of a Fundamental: The Expanding Role of Joseph Smith’s First Vision in Mormon Religious Thought." (Actually, this essay was originally published in 1980. It's a shame that it has had so little influence.)

In his essay, Allen discusses some of the history surrounding the USE of the First Vision and traces how it changed from a relatively minor story in Church history to a central pillar of the Restoration. In the process, the First Vision went from story to legend, and he dispels some of the historical inaccuracies that have become attached to it. Forgive me for quoting two long paragraphs, but I think they are important (emphasis mine).

As they began to use Joseph Smith’s first religious experience for various instructional purposes, Mormon teachers and writers were also creating certain secondary but highly significant historical perceptions in the minds of the Latter-day Saints. There was no intent to distort or mislead, but what happened was only one example of a very natural intellectual process that helps explain the emergence of at least some basic community perceptions. It seems to be a truism that whenever great events take place, second- and third-generation expounders tend to build a kind of mythology around them by presuming corollary historical interpretations that often have little basis in fact. In this case, the deepening awareness of the vision, along with a growing community sensitivity for how essential it was to Mormon faith and doctrine, created an atmosphere in which other historical inferences could easily be drawn. These included the ideas that (1) over the centuries, considerable “rubbish concerning religion” had accumulated that only revelation could correct; (2) most, if not all, Christians believed in the traditional Trinitarian concept of God; (3) the Christian world denied the concept of continuing revelation; (4) Joseph Smith told the story of his vision widely; and (5) he continued to be persecuted or publicly ridiculed for it, even to the time of his death. Such historical interpretation, much of it misleading, soon dominated popular Mormon thought. The challenge for individual believers, including Mormon historians, would be to separate the essential truths of the vision experience from corollaries that may not be so essential to the faith.

Once the vision assumed its predominant place in Mormon writing and preaching, it became much more than Joseph Smith’s personal experience—it became a shared community experience. Every Mormon and every prospective convert was urged to pray for his or her own testimony of its reality—in effect, to seek a personal theophany by becoming one with Joseph in the grove. Latter-day Saints did not forget the importance of the angel Moroni, but gradually the First Vision took precedence over the visit of the angel as the event that ushered in the Restoration of the gospel. It was only a short step from there to the expanded use of the vision as a teaching device whenever the doctrine of God or the principle of revelation played any part in the discussion. As the years passed, the list of lessons, truths, principles, and historical interpretations taught or illustrated by the vision grew longer. Each writer or preacher saw it as fundamental, but each also had his or her own private insight into what it could illustrate or portray.

This is admirably honest, sensitive, and straightforward. The next time I need to make a corrective point, I will start my sentence with, "I read a fascinating book on the First Vision that was published by BYU's religion department a few years ago. I learned..."

Now I just need a way to make the point that the First Vision wasn't as strange or unique as we think it was.

Notes:
1. In other words, the book is available from the most orthodox publishers there are, aside from the correlation department itself.

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Joseph Fielding Smith and the Milk Mystery

I have a collection of draft posts in various phases of completion, most of which will probably never see the light of day. I was browsing through them and discovered that I had two involving--of all things--Joseph Fielding Smith and milk. Why let an odd combination like that go to waste? I've dusted them off and polished them up a bit. The first can be found here. Below is the second post.

Several years ago I was reading a story on Slate.com about cheese and thought of Joseph Fielding Smith. Let me explain.

When I read Man, His Origin and Destiny years ago, I noted a passage that struck me as odd. People pushing back against science often point to things that are not understood in order to highlight its limits--sometimes with the implication that those things are a mystery beyond science, and therefore the work of divinity. It is a common form of the 'god-of-the-gaps' argument.

In his book, President Joseph Fielding Smith identified some mysteries.

A scientist is able to understand the structure of a brain and the nervous system but who is able to tell whence comes a thought? What makes the heart beat? Why will two rose bushes only two feet apart, drawing nourishment from the same soil bear roses one deep red and the other pure white? Where and how comes the delicate coloring of the pansy or violet out of the same soil? Why are snow crystals always formed in six-pointed stars or sides, never in five or seven? One scientist has said that, "Water and sugar and the complex minerals which make the granite rocks all follow laws which are utterly unchangeable, but which are, as far as we can see, without any special reason: it is as profitable to speculate why the chlorophyll of vegetation is green and why the blood of animals is red. . . . Science knows why snow is white, and why it is beneficent; but it cannot explain the law of six." A black hen will lay a white egg and another hen either white or black will lay a brown egg. The eggs of some birds are blue, some are brown, some are white and some are speckled. William J. Bryan once said: why can "a black cow eat green grass and then give white milk with yellow butter in it?" Who can explain why these things are so? [Man, His Origin and Destiny, p. 14-15, bolding added]

Viewed from today's perspective, most of these questions have good answers. Probably the only question still standing is "whence comes a thought?"

William Jennings Bryan's question about cows, grass, and milk is particularly silly, and here's where Slate.com comes in, explaining why white milk becomes yellow cheese.

Beta carotene is a fat-soluble yellow pigment and antioxidant found in grass. After a cow chews the cud, beta-carotene dissolves into the animal’s fat stores and ends up in fat globules in its milk. However, protein clusters and the membranes that surround fat globules in milk conceal the pigment’s color, reflecting light in a way that makes milk appear white and opaque. But during the cheesemaking process, the pigment is released: After bacterial culture and rennet have been added to milk and the coagulated mixture is cooked, the fat membranes dissolve and the protein clusters loosen so they can’t reflect light anymore.

While the article addressed the color of cheese rather than butter, the answer is basically the same. And just for the sake of completeness, grass is green because it contains chlorophyll, which is a poor absorber of green light, and the cow is black because it produces light-absorbing melanin in the hair and skin.

Another mystery solved by science!

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Before Richard Dawkins, There Was Orson Pratt

At By Common Consent, writer WVS shared an excerpt of Wilford Woodruff's journal, which captured a speculative explanation that Orson Pratt gave for the origin of God. After referring to the trial-and-error process that chemists often go through, Pratt said:

An eternity was filled as it were with particules of intelligences who had their agency, two of these particles in the process of time might have joined their interest together exchanged ideas & found by persueing this course that they gained double strength to what one particle of intelligence would have & afterwards were joined by other particles & continued untill they organized a combination or body though through a long process...

Pratt's process is that of an individual advancing in organization. But if you look at it from a slightly different angle and apply his process to populations, then you're not very far from 'the replicators' in Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene. (The 'replicators' chapter defies a concise summary quote, so you'll just need to click through and read it.)

This all reminds me of something that Terryl Givens recently wrote [1]:

Mormons ironically find an unlikely (and surely unwilling) ally in the arch-atheist Richard Dawkins. In his controversial critique of religion, he wrote that: “Any creative intelligence of sufficient complexity to design anything comes into existence only at the end product of an extended process of gradual evolution.” Elaborating this point, he said that

you have to have a gradual slow incremental process [to explain an eye or a brain] and by the very same token, God would have to have the same kind of explanation. … God indeed can’t have just happened. If there are Gods in the universe, they must be the end product of slow incremental processes. If there are beings in the universe that we would treat as Gods, … that we would worship … as gods, then they must have come about by an incremental process, gradually.

It's fun when the 'new atheism' sounds like the old Mormonism!

Notes:
1. Givens, Terryl L. (2014). Wrestling the Angel: The Foundations of Mormon Thought: Cosmos, God, Humanity (p. 216).

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On Being Faithful to the Future

I've been a little more active in my reading lately, but am unable to comment in detail on some of the pregnant passages I have found. So from time to time I will simply post quotations as food for thought. First up:

Often Christians focus on the need to be faithful to the past, to make sure that present belief matches that of previous generations. I support the sentiment in general, but we must be just as burdened to be faithful to the future, to ensure that we are doing all we can to deliver a viable faith to future generations.

--Peter Enns, The Evolution of Adam, What the Bible Does and Doesn't Say about Human Origins, (pp. 147-148).

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The Evolution of Adam

When I bought The Evolution of Adam, by Peter Enns, I was afraid that I might be in for a tenuous attempt to read evolution into the Bible. What I found instead was an engaging discussion of the history and cultural background of the Old and New Testaments, in support of Enns's argument that Adam was probably not a historical person.

As fate would have it, I happened to be in the middle of the book during April General Conference, which made for an interesting juxtaposition. In the middle of a powerful talk on Jesus Christ and the Atonement that used two boys' harrowing experience on a cliff as a metaphor, Elder Jeffrey Holland turned for a moment to the importance of the fall of Adam and Eve.

In our increasingly secular society, it is as uncommon as it is unfashionable to speak of Adam and Eve or the Garden of Eden or of a “fortunate fall” into mortality. Nevertheless, the simple truth is that we cannot fully comprehend the Atonement and Resurrection of Christ and we will not adequately appreciate the unique purpose of His birth or His death...without understanding that there was an actual Adam and Eve who fell from an actual Eden, with all the consequences that fall carried with it.

Enns is by no means a secularist. He is a professor of Biblical studies who is clear and straightforward about his belief in Jesus Christ [1]. Nevertheless, as Enns sees the historical evidence, which he lays out in the first half of the book, Adam was probably a mythological character that the ancient Israelites used to orient and define their identity.

The second half of the book examines what this conclusion means for Paul's teachings. Briefly put, if I understand Enns correctly, Paul used Adam to show Jews and Gentiles that they were united in having a common problem that was solved by Jesus Christ. Since that common problem pre-dated Abraham and the law of Moses, and since Jesus had solved the problem, there was no need for Gentile Christians to convert to Judaism first and/or be circumcised. To put a finer point on it, Paul was explicating the origin of sin and death in a Biblically novel way [2] to solve a problem (i.e. refute the Judaizers). The fact that he used a scriptural figure that (according to Enns) probably did not exist is simply a reflection of the fact that Paul was a first-century Jew. (By comparison, there is no necessary reason to think that Job was a historical figure just because he is mentioned in D&C 121. Joseph had no reason to think otherwise, and Job was a fitting example to make the point.)

Noting that "It is commonly argued that, as goes the historicity of Adam, so goes the historicity of Christ," Enns's perspective can be summarized by these passages (italics in original):

Admitting the historical and scientific problems with Paul’s Adam does not mean in the least that the gospel message is therefore undermined. A literal Adam may not be the first man and cause of sin and death, as Paul understood it, but what remains of Paul’s theology are three core elements of the gospel:

The universal and self-evident problem of death
The universal and self-evident problem of sin
The historical event of the death and resurrection of Christ

These three remain; what is lost is Paul’s culturally assumed explanation for what a primordial man had to do with causing the reign of death and sin in the world. Paul’s understanding of Adam as the cause reflects his time and place [p.123].

So, even without attributing their cause to Adam, sin and death are with us, and we cannot free ourselves from them. They remain the foes vanquished by Christ’s death and resurrection. The fact that Paul draws an analogy between Adam and Christ, however, does not mean that we are required to consider them as characters of equal historical standing. Unlike Adam, Christ was not a primordial, prehistorical man known only through hundreds and hundreds of years of cultural transmission. The resurrection of Christ was a present reality for Paul, an event that had happened in Jerusalem about twenty-five years before he wrote Romans [p. 125].

For Enns (to use Elder Holland's metaphor), it doesn't really matter how the boys got into their predicament. What matters is the cold reality of their predicament and need for saving.

I fear that my highlighting Enns's argument that Adam was not a historical person will result in otherwise interested readers passing on Enns's book. That would be a mistake because even if you can't accept his conclusion, there is much to learn. For one thing, he admits that there are other possible interpretations, even if he does not favor them. Further, LDS readers ought to be more conversant with the cultural and historical background of the Bible, as understood by mainstream scholars. But there are also some gems that serve our own parochial interests. For example, LDS readers may find this statement striking:

The Protestant reading of Paul reflects medieval theological debates, not Paul or the Judaism of his time.

If I hadn't read this book, I would not have known that there is a movement among New Testament scholars called the New Perspective on Paul, which at first blush seems to reinterpret the New Testament discussion of grace and works in a way that undercuts Protestant critiques of Mormonism on these issues. LDS readers who must commonly address this issue with their Protestant acquaintances may want to give further consideration to the New Perspective. Similarly, Enns acknowledges that the doctrine of "original sin" is an Augustinian innovation that is not supported by scripture. And like others of his books, this book also cuts against the Protestant doctrine of scriptural inerrancy while maintaining reverence for the scriptures.

Of course Enns does not have extra-Biblical scripture to rekcon with. Adam and Eve appear in every additional LDS book of scripture, including Joseph F. Smith's vision described in D&C 138. Explaining them away as non-historical scriptural characters might be possible, but is orders of magnitude more difficult in an LDS context. Perhaps it is acceptable and sufficient to say that Adam is a combination of man, myth, and legend.

Enns does not pretend to have the final word and hopes for ongoing conversation. I hope that Elder Holland's talk does not end the conversation in LDS circles. Even taken on its own terms, the talk was more circumspect than one might have expected.

I do not know the details of what happened on this planet before that [the fall], but I do know these two were created under the divine hand of God, that for a time they lived alone in a paradisiacal setting where there was neither human death nor future family, and that through a sequence of choices they transgressed a commandment of God which required that they leave their garden setting but which allowed them to have children before facing physical death. [bolding added]

If that is the bare minimum of acceptable LDS doctrine on Adam and Eve, Elder Holland has still left a lot of space for exploration and discussion [3].

Notes:
1. BYU's Maxwell Institute featured a great interview with him on their podcast.
2. Enns points out that after the initial chapters of Genesis, Adam is virtually ignored in the Old Testament.
3. See also my previous posts, The Further Fall of Adam, and Book of Mormon Scholarship as an Elias for Evolution.

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Facts and Authority

The Crucible of Doubt, by Terryl and Fiona Givens, contains this quote from Austin Farrer that I liked and thought I would pass along:

Facts are not determined by authority. Authority can make law to be law; authority cannot make facts to be facts.

This would seem to be obvious, but you don't have to look too far to find facts disputed on the basis of authority (i.e. position within the Church). By virtue of their authority leaders of (and within) the Church are entitled to establish law, and I strive to obey the law. But when it comes to facts, authority is not a guarantee of accuracy.

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The Crucible of Doubt: Granting Permission to Believe

Modern science has taught us a lot about how our bodies work. To say it all boils down to chemistry may be an oversimplification, but there is a lot of truth in that statement. What does it mean then, when we feel love and affection for one another? Are our emotions and desires the work of chemicals that manipulate our subjective experience, and therefore not really real? These kinds of questions are sometimes posed by budding rationalists, who wonder what role such chemical reactions should play in their life. A common answer goes something like this: 'We are humans and we have no choice but to experience life as humans. Our emotions and feelings are real to us. Understand where they come from so that you don't make bad decisions based on them, but don't over-think them either. It is not a betrayal of reason and logic to be human. Enjoy life!'

Sometimes we need permission to just be ourselves. One of the messages I took away from The Crucible of Doubt: Reflections on the Quest for Faith, by Terryl and Fiona Givens, is that we should give ourselves permission to believe.

Coming into the first chapter, The Use and Abuse of Reason, I was a little skeptical that I would agree with what the authors would say. It is easy to say that there are ways of 'knowing' other than science and reason. Such statements usually strike me as a kind of epistemic jealousy. Artists and writers may have dreamed up things as strange as relativity and quantum mechanics, but they could never deliver the empirical reality. I was pleasantly surprised that the Givens did not seem to be trying to put science 'in its place' as much as put it in a human context.

The problem is not that science cannot give us direction with life’s most urgent questions. It is because, in actual practice, logical reasoning does not give us much guidance. We don’t really live our lives, in any meaningful way, according to the dictates of logic. And we certainly don’t embrace our most cherished beliefs, values, or opinions on the basis of reason alone—however much we may protest we do....

[A]s moral agents, immersed in a world of human relationships and human values, we most appropriately choose and judge and act as human beings whose desires and motivations and bases for action are deeper than and prior to logic.

I can get on board with that, since even certainty is a feeling.

The discussion in the first chapter connects to the last chapter, where the Givens take up the inevitability of belief and how we channel it. After describing three views of the cosmos (both theistic and atheistic), they write:

...we assemble the scattered pieces of evidence from science, from life experience, from intuition, and from reason into a tentative whole, trusting some sources of meaning and distrusting others. We cannot escape the burden of faith, within or outside the parameters of religious conviction.

So we can't help but believe in something, but what if that something turns out to be wrong? The Givens, in turn, ask if that is really such a horrible thing, and quote William James as follows:

He who says “Better to go without belief forever than believe a lie!” merely shows his own preponderant private horror of becoming a dupe. . . . This fear he slavishly obeys. . . . For my own part, I have also a horror of being duped; but I can believe that worse things than being duped may happen to a man in this world. . . . It is like a general informing his soldiers that it is better to keep out of battle forever than to risk a single wound. Not so are victories either over enemies or over nature gained. Our errors are surely not such awfully solemn things. In a world where we are so certain to incur them in spite of all our caution, a certain lightness of heart seems healthier than this excessive nervousness on their behalf.

This is all well and good, but there are elements of Church doctrine where we might suspect that we are indeed being duped. What then? The Givens answer:

Perhaps...one might focus on the message rather than the messenger. One might consider that the contingencies of history and culture and the human element will always constitute the garment in which God’s word and will are clothed. And one might refuse to allow our desire for the perfect to be the enemy of the present good. Finally, we might ask ourselves, with the early disciples, “to whom [else] shall we go?”

The worst risk such a life of faith entails is not that such a life might be wrong—but that it might be incomprehensible to those unprepared to take such a risk.

Perhaps you find yourself unable to abandon belief in certain core doctrines of Mormonism in spite of science and reason. As I read them, the message of these two chapters of The Crucible of Doubt is this: 'You are a human and will unavoidably believe things that go beyond science, and often make choices ignoring it. It is not a betrayal of rationality to believe. Embrace what you find beautiful, good, and compelling in Mormonism. Enjoy life!'

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Abraham's Myths

This is mostly a note for myself, but I thought I would post it for anyone interested. I've been re-reading Inspiration and Incarnation: Evangelicals and the Problem of the Old Testament, by Peter Enns. Although written for an evangelical audience, it applies almost equally well to Mormons. (I've mentioned the book before, and it is routinely recommended by Ben Spackman.) In reading chapter 2 I was struck by Enns's explanation for why Genesis resembles the older myths of other ancient cultures. Before proceeding it is important to know what Enns means by 'myth.'

Myth is an ancient, premodern, pre-scientific way of addressing questions of ultimate origins and meaning in the form of stories: Who are we? Where do we come from?

Enns thinks it all starts with Abraham. (The italics are original.)

It is important to remember where Abraham came from and where he was headed....The Mesopotamian world from which Abraham came was one whose own stories of origins had been expressed in mythic categories for a considerable length of time. Moreover, the land Abraham was going to enter, the land of the Canaanites, was likewise rich in its own myths....

As God entered into a relationship with Abraham, he "met" him where he was--an ancient Mesopotamian man who breathed the air of the ancient Near East. We must surely assume that Abraham, as such a man, shared the worldview of those whose world he shared and not a modern, scientific one. The reason the opening chapters of Genesis look so much like the literature of ancient Mesopotamia is that the worldview categories of the ancient Near East were ubiquitous and normative at the time. Of course, different cultures had different myths, but the point is that they all had them....

What makes Genesis different from its ancient Near Eastern counterparts is that it begins to make the point to Abraham and his seed that the God they are bound to, the God who called them into existence, is different from the gods around them....

We might think that such a scenario is unsatisfying because it gives too much ground to pagan myths. But we must bear in mind how very radical this notion would have been in the ancient world. For a second-millennium Semitic people...to say that the gods of Babylon were not worth worshiping but that the true god was the god of a nomad like Abraham--this was risky, ridiculous, and counterintuitive....

To put it differently, God adopted Abraham as the forefather of a new people, and in doing so he also adopted the mythic categories within which Abraham--and everyone else--thought. But God did not simply leave Abraham in his mythic world. Rather, God transformed the ancient myths so that Israel's story would come to focus on its God, the real one.

[T]he question is not the degree to which Genesis conforms to what we would think is a proper description of origins....The question that Genesis is prepared to answer is whether Yahweh, the God of Israel, is worthy of worship....Genesis makes its case in a way that ancient men and women would have readily understood--indeed the only way.

Although the Egyptians aren't mentioned, they also had a rich mythology. That Enns builds his argument around Abraham is of special LDS interest given our Book of Abraham. However, the argument is equally applicable to Moses. God's covenant people were surrounded by powerful polytheistic cultures and empires for hundreds to thousands of years. It makes sense that they needed myths of their own, and that those myths looked somewhat similar to those of their neighbors.

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On the Origin of Hitler

About a month ago I was browsing through Science and noticed a review of a recent book by historian Peter Bowler. (The review requires a subscription, so instead I'll direct interested readers here for a roughly equivalent review.) His book, Darwin Deleted, imagines a world where Darwin did not exist, as a device for illuminating other ideas about evolution. Apparently he argues that if Darwin had not existed, evolution might not have been as contentious of an issue. This is because, while many religious people weren't particularly thrilled with the idea of evolution, it was natural selection as a mechanism that really got their dander up. It was just too materialistic--even for some scientists. In fact, during the early twentieth century natural selection took a back seat until the modern synthesis of the 1940s put it back in the center. As I understand it, Bowler imagines a world where evolution was accepted relatively peacefully, with natural selection being discovered later.

Bowler also argues that the atrocities of World War II would still have occurred without Darwin. This seems completely obvious to me, but a staple of anti-evolution propaganda is to blame Darwin for Hitler. In fact, just last week the Discovery Institute posted a video on YouTube doing just that. At first glance you can see why the argument appears convincing. Darwin said that evolution occurs by survival of the best adapted, so Hitler took Darwin's theory to the logical conclusion by attempting to eliminate the weak.

I can accept that some people just repeat this kind of thing because that's what they heard, but it's harder for me to believe that thinking people take such things seriously. It seems transparently nasty and dumb to me. For one thing, even if Darwin did serve as a source of Hitler's inspiration, that fact wouldn't have any logical consequence for the validity of Darwin's ideas about how nature works. (I bet the German artillery loved Newton's ideas too!) Moreover, we could hardly hold Darwin responsible for the deeds of a future sociopath. But what I find more annoying is that people who say this must ignore or forget known facts and social currents that existed independent of Darwin.

For example, animals were bred for desired traits for centuries and millennia before Darwin. Darwin himself drew on artificial selection--i.e. breeding--for his insight of natural selection. Consider the following quote:

… Experience has long since taught mankind the necessity of observing certain natural laws in the propagation of animals, or the stock will degenerate and finally become extinct. But strange to say, in regard to the human animal, these laws, except in certain particulars, are more or less disregarded in these latter times. The inevitable consequence is, the race is degenerating, new diseases are introduced, while effeminacy and barrenness are on the increase: and worse than all, this evil condition of the body has its effects upon the mind…

That was George Q. Cannon writing in 1857, three years before he was called as an Apostle and a year before Darwin published Origin of Species. You could just as easily say that Hitler was applying widely accepted principles of animal breeding to humans. It simply doesn't take a theory of species formation to decide that your race (however defined) is better than others, or to hate Jews, or to be nationalist, or to think the "weak" are a drain on society, and so on. The Nazis appropriated anything that seemed to lend support to their ideology. If Darwin's theory was one of those, then that's unfortunate but it's hardly Darwin's fault (he died in 1882, for heaven's sake) and means nothing for its validity as science.

One more thing: the idea that species progress was not Darwin's. Darwin understood that natural selection would result in adaptation to environmental circumstances, not the production of some kind of platonic ideal. Thus, to argue that elimination of the weak was necessary for human evolutionary progress would be a bastardization of Darwinian evolution. As I mentioned above, Darwinian evolution was eclipsed for a while by other ideas about evolution, some of which involved progress. (If blame is to be laid, I would bet those ideas had more influence.)

In their zeal to cast aspersions on evolution, anti-evolutionists also often go a step further and say that Darwin himself was a supporter of social Darwinism. To the extent that is true it is unfortunate although, again, it doesn't matter what Darwin thought with respect to the validity of his theory. But although he was a product of his time, Darwin was relatively progressive in some of his views (eloquently opposing slavery, for example) and it seems that detractors have a difficult time making their case without distorting his writings. For example, in The Descent of Man he wrote:

At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world.

Oh, that's terrible! Except when you look at the context you see that the sentence is the first half of a hypothetical he uses to make a point about how extinction erases the gradations between species. And considering Europe's colonial enterprise Darwin's statement probably seemed like an unremarkable prediction [1]. It's rather uncharitable to rip that sentence out of context and present it as though Darwin hoped for the extinction of other races, as the DI video does, but that's the kind of garbage I've come to expect from them.

Social Darwinism and the eugenics movement, to say nothing of the Nazis, were wrong. If we pawn it all off on Darwin, however, then we miss important lessons about the naturalistic fallacy, the naive application of science, human rights, ethics, the golden rule, economics, and so on. When it comes to Hitler, Darwin is a distraction.


Notes:
1. Americans weren't innocent either. Manifest destiny, anyone?

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Watch Your Inner Animal

Back in 2008 I read paleontologist Neil Shubin's book, Your Inner Fish. (Dave at Times and Seasons invited me to do a joint review of it.) Now PBS and Neil Shubin have teamed up to make a three-part documentary. It began airing in April and is now available online in its entirety.

The three parts are Your Inner--Fish, Reptile, and Primate. It is extremely well done, and Neil Shubin conveys an infectious enthusiasm. You really should watch the whole thing. But if you only watch one, then I think the Primate episode is the best.

For me, the most important issue raised by the series is the proper pronunciation of 'opossum.' All my life I have understood the 'o' to be silent, but now I see two experts in the video saying "uh-possum." On the other hand, according to the National Park Service, the 'o' is silent. Is this a regional thing, or what?

By the way, several years ago I put together a series of posts that I titled, What Separates Humans from the Animals? I was interested to see that a couple of the examples used in the documentary are covered in my series.

I don't want to hear any excuses about how you couldn't find the documentary, so here it is again: Your Inner Fish.

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Material Continuity in the Resurrection and Bold Inquiry

You have probably seen the following quote from Joseph Smith before, delivered at an 1843 conference in response to a speech by Orson Pratt:

There is no fundamental principle belonging to a human system that ever goes into another in this world or in the world to come; I care not what the theories of men are. We have the testimony that God will raise us up, and he has the power to do it. If any one supposes that any part of our bodies, that is, the fundamental parts thereof, ever goes into another body, he is mistaken (History of the Church, 5:339)

I'm currently reading Samuel Brown's book, In Heaven as It Is on Earth: Joseph Smith and the Early Mormon Conquest of Death, and chapter 2 contains a discussion of the material continuity of the body. It turns out that there was already a large discussion within Christianity on what the emerging findings of science (especially chemistry and biology) meant for the resurrection. It was already apparent that living organisms constantly exchanged matter with their environment. Would the resurrected body be composed of the same matter as the mortal body, or would the structure only remain the same? According to Brown,

...Smith allowed the possibility that a body might contain surplus matter, that perhaps “vegetable” matter could be excluded from the resurrection body. However...no significant part of the material body could disappear. However circular the reasoning, Smith would not abandon the requirement for material continuity. Like many of his lay peers, Smith believed that to allow a reshuffling of physical material threatened a death powerful enough to destroy personal integrity and the promise of postmortal community.

If Joseph's position was scientifically untenable then, it is all the more so now. But I like the boldness with which early church leaders tackled conceptual problems. Just a few years previous to Joseph's statement quoted above, Parley Pratt had taken on the same issue in the Millenial Star (although coming to a different conclusion). After acknowledging that objections to the resurrection on the grounds of overlapping claims to matter were superficially plausible, he turned his displeasure to a certain class of defenders.

While, on the other hand, these objections have been met by superstition, bigotry, and ignorance, not with a design to enlighten the understanding or to inform and convince the judgment, but with an endeavor to throw a veil of sacredness over the whole subject, as if it were a mystery to be believed without the possibility of understanding it.

Perhaps a few sentences like the following have been sufficient to smother all further enquiry:-"Ignorance is the mother of devotion." "Don't let your mind think on such subjects, it is a temptation to infidelity." "It is wicked to enquire into such things." "All things are possible with God," &c.

I like Parley's no-nonsense attitude!

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Don't Forget that the Universe is Strange

Over at BOAP.org, WVS expresses his doubt that absolute foreknowledge and free will can co-exist (here and here), and I think I agree with him. But it reminds me of one of the irritants I found in Converging Paths to Truth, a book published by Deseret Book and the BYU Religious Studies Center. You may recall that I highlighted the book a couple of months ago, and hinted that I had some gripes. So here's one of them.

J. Ward Moody's essay is "Time in Scripture and Science: A Conciliatory Key?". The title is a bit of a misnomer because there's not really any reconciliation. It's more of a rumination on the concept of time, using both scriptural and scientific perspectives. It has the kind of ideas that any science enthusiast has kicked around at one point or another. Good clean fun.

Not far into his essay Moody takes up relativity, a scientific concept that captures the imagination and perhaps ranks only behind quantum mechanics in its difficulty to comprehend. Moody, of course, knows this.

It is tempting to stop and shout, “Of course there is a difference [between past, present, and future]! The past is behind, the future is ahead and the present is now! Only dimwitted philosophers could get confused about such an obvious thing!” Indeed! But there are some physical, philosophical, and religious facts that challenge such a straightforward interpretation.

When Albert Einstein gave the world the special theory of relativity, he irrefutably established that events which are simultaneous to one person are not simultaneous to another person moving with respect to the first.

Got that? Relativity seems like philosophical nonsense, but is in fact irrefutable. I presume that Moody would say the same for quantum mechanics. So far, so good.

Turning to a little speculation about God's sense of time, Moody says

If every point of time can be called “now” according to some perspective, then the entire extent of time must already be created. You cannot say that, at this instant, a point of time is known to be “now” before it has come into being. Therefore all time—and with it, all past, present, and future—must already exist. If so, it is trivial for God to know the future.

Moody has a couple of criticisms of this idea (also known as block time). Then he says,

Even though block time allows for God to comprehend all time, I am uncomfortable with it from a religious perspective. It seems a bit like predestination with our decisions already made and existing in a future that can only unfold to us as our “now” hyperplane passes through it. I see no purpose in living in such a universe. If I know anything about life from my own experience, it is that we have agency. Our decisions matter and are not made before we make them. Time must allow for this.

Oh, well I guess that settles it then. It's fine with me that Moody is not a fan of block time, and I don't mind that religion adds to his suspicion. What irritates me is that he asserts that block time cannot be correct because it doesn't comport with his personal experience. Well guess what? Relativity and quantum mechanics don't fit with my personal experience either!

Sometimes nature doesn't do things the way we think it should. That's science.

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Converging Paths to Truth...and Peace?

A little over a decade ago I purchased my first book on Mormonism and science, The Search for Harmony. It contains a number of classic essays, and it will always have a fond place in my heart. However, as I have revisited it from time to time, I've noticed that it has a somewhat gloomy tone as various authors express their sadness that the Church has betrayed its original openness to truth and marginalized supporters of science. Given that most of the essays were written during the 70's and 80's, this is understandable. After all, it was 1980, for example, when Apostle Bruce R. McConkie included evolution in his talk, "The Seven Deadly Heresies."

As I look back at the essays in that book, I don't share the sense of gloom. Most Church members and leaders are perhaps not as enlightened on scientific topics as I wish they were, or think they ought to be, but more and more I sense a return to the spirit of President Heber J. Grant's admonition to leave science to scientists.

As evidence, I would like to highlight the Summerhays lectures, a series of talks given at Brigham Young University by faculty on science and religion between 2003 and 2008. In 2011 the lectures were published by both the Religious Studies Center (a publishing arm of the BYU religion department) and Deseret Book. The RSC has since made the book available for free on its website. The lectures themselves are not all that remarkable--some are better than others--but I believe that their very existence, combined with the publishers standing behind them, make them important. The book models the attitude expressed in a Church Newsroom commentary last July that,

Mormons welcome truth from whatever source and take the pragmatic view that where religion and science seem to clash, it is simply because there are insufficient data to reconcile the two. Latter-day Saints approach such tensions as challenges to learn, not contradictions to avoid.

Contributors include Terry Ball (dean of Religious Education), Robert Millet, (former dean of Religious Education), and Michael Whiting (evolutionary biologist), and their essays anchor the book (in my opinion). Each contributor presents his own view, but collectively the lectures contain positive comments on the role of BYU in education in the sciences, critique of creationism and defense of Darwin's character, an overview of the BYU Evolution Packet with a link to where it can be found, calls for peacemaking and a "healthy agnosticism," and more.

Below I excerpt parts that I liked, or think important. I also have some criticisms and additional comments, but I'll save those for a separate post.

Ball:

Rather than adding to the tension that some individuals and institutions create between science and religion, a Brigham Young University education should help students increase their understanding and appreciation for both. ...we should not only avoid alienating secular learning from spiritual development but also endeavor to avoid compartmentalizing and departmentalizing the two. Spiritual development can and should occur in all classes taught on the BYU campus, and secular learning may indeed find application in Religious Education classes.

How tragic it would be if a BYU student who had the potential to become a James E. Talmage or a Henry Eyring never reached that potential because some teacher, purposefully or unwittingly, convinced that student that one must abandon faith in God in order to be a credible scientist, or conversely, that one with a testimony of the restored gospel cannot accept the tenets of science. It is imperative that as a community of learners at BYU we work to avoid such a tragedy.

Millet:

More times than I would like to remember, during the decade that I served as dean of Religious Education, I received phone calls from irate parents who simply could not understand why Brigham Young University was allowing organic evolution courses to be taught. They would then ask what I planned to do about it, as though I were the head of the campus thought police. I would always try to be understanding and congenial, but I would inevitably remark that such things were taught at this institution because we happened to be a university; that what was being taught was a significant dimension in the respective discipline; and that we certainly would not be doing our job very well if a science student, for example, were to graduate from Brigham Young University and be ignorant of such matters.

I must admit sadly that when I was a student here at BYU and even in my first years as a faculty member, it was not uncommon for ideological grenades to be flying back and forth between the Joseph Smith Building and the Eyring Science Center. This person was labeled as godless, and that one was categorized as ignorant or naive. This faculty member hustled about to put forward his or her favorite General Authority quote, while that one relied upon a Church leader with a differing perspective. Thereby authorities were pitted against one another. Very little light, if any, was generated, but there was a great deal of heat, including much heartburn for university and college administrators. And of course the real losers during this “war of words and tumult of opinions” were the students. They admired their science teachers and valued their opinions but did not want in any way to be in opposition to what Church leaders believed and taught. They trusted their religion teachers but were not prepared to jettison their field of study. Further, such standoffs did something that for me was even more destructive: they suggested that one could not be both a competent academic and a dedicated disciple—one had to choose. And such a conclusion is tragically false. It defies everything that Brigham Young University stands for.

It is wrong to hide behind our religious heritage and thus neglect our academic responsibilities; there may have been a time when some faculty members at BYU excused professional incompetence in the name of religion, on the basis that BYU is different, that it is a school intent on strengthening the commitment of young Latter-day Saints. This was commendable but insufficient. It is just as myopic, however, to hide behind academics and thus cover our own spiritual incompetence. We can be thoroughly competent disciples and thoroughly competent professionals. We do not hide behind our religion, but rather we come to see all things through the lenses of our religion.

If my Latter-day Saint colleagues and I can enjoy such a sweet brotherhood and sisterhood with a growing number of Evangelical Christians—a group with whom we have been in intense dialogue since 2000—then surely it is possible for men and women of faith who labor in varying avenues of science to enjoy cordial and collegial relationships with those involved in the study and teaching of religion, especially at Brigham Young University, the best of all worlds. Our epistemological thrusts may be different. Our presuppositions may be different. Our tests of validity and reliability may be different. But our hearts can be united as we strive to look beyond the dimensions of our disciplines toward higher goals. Some things we may and should reconcile here and now, while other matters may await further light and truth and additional discovery.

Whiting:

I am not aware of any other scientific idea that has generated as many diverse views in the Church as evolution has, and very often the discussion of this wide range of ideas has resulted in more heat than light. When I teach evolution in the BYU classroom, I must often curtail students who begin selectively quoting their favorite General Authorities and pitting the quotations of one against another, as if one General Authority could beat the other up. While I am grateful that the Church has never expressed the same extreme views about evolution as have other religious denominations, there still persists a belief that evolutionary ideas and Church doctrine are fundamentally hostile to each other and that the full acceptance of one requires the compromise of the other.

I, of course, recognize that there are ideas in evolutionary theory that can be spun in such a way as to be in direct conflict with the doctrines of the Church, and unfortunately some prominent evolutionary biologists have gained great fame by doing so. Likewise, I recognize that there are interpretations of Latter-day Saint scripture that can be formulated in such a way as to contradict current ideas in evolutionary theory. What I would caution against is forcing a Joshua ultimatum here with “Choose you this day whom ye will serve” (Joshua 24:15), as if these are fundamentally and diametrically opposed views of creation with no degree of overlap and no possibility of reconciliation. In my experience, students who continue to think of this as a dichotomy will either have their faith so shaken when they learn the evidence for evolution that they drift away from the Church, or they will simply shut their eyes and their minds to what I consider to be a glorious way to view creation.

Ball:

In recent times, religious scientists not only have had to defend their faith in God and revelation, but also frequently find their commitment to scientific principles unjustly questioned. A Georgia judge, arguing against the teaching of evolution in school, offered an overzealous polemic that illustrates the point well. Making absurd accusations about the effect of Darwin’s theories on society, the judge claimed that the “monkey mythology of Darwin is the cause of permissiveness, promiscuity, pills, prophylactics, perversions, pregnancies, abortions, pornotherapy, pollution, poisoning and proliferation of crimes of all types.” Such pejorative and irrational rhetoric only serves to fan the flames of hostility between science and religion while deepening the dilemma for men and women devoted to both disciplines.

Whiting:

I might mention here that some portray Darwin as a man eager to destroy faith and tear down religion. These people are like the detractors who paint Joseph Smith and the history of the Church with similar brushstrokes. Within the Church, I have occasionally heard members equate Darwin with Korihor, the anti-Christ from the Book of Mormon. But these caricatures are too simplistic and not true to the record. (It seems to me that members of the Church should be particularly sensitive to the misrepresentation of mid-nineteenth-century historical figures in order to push a particular agenda forward.) Certainly the ideas that sprang from Darwin’s work had a profound influence on religious thought and still continue to do so, but by all accounts Darwin was a loving father and a kind man, afraid of confrontation, and someone who would much rather study the mining habits of earthworms than be involved in a debate over science and religion. Darwin was a complex man, and many lengthy biographies have delved into factors in his life that may have influenced his scientific ideas, including his faith, but at his very core, Darwin was simply a scientist trying to explain patterns in the natural world, and the notion that he had a hidden agenda to destroy religion is simply wrong.

There has been a temptation for some members of the Church to place us in the same category as religions that identify themselves as creationists. I tell my students that Mormons are creationists in the same way we are born-again Christians. Does the Church have a doctrine of being “born again”? It certainly does, but it is so radically different from churches that label themselves as born-again Christians that we have not adopted the name because we do not embrace the dogmas associated with being “born again.” Likewise, the Latter-day Saint doctrine of creation is sufficiently distinct from those religious groups that label themselves “creationists” that I am grateful the Church has not adopted this label.

Intelligent design is based on the (flawed) notion that there are certain features in the biological world that are too complex to be explained via evolution and that the probability of evolution giving rise to complexity is so vanishingly small that it is simply not possible. Consequently, they argue, the only scientific explanation for biological complexity is that there must be an intelligent designer working behind the scenes. The attempt to mandate the teaching of intelligent design in public schools led to a lengthy trial centered in Dover, Pennsylvania, in 2004. The overwhelming evidence during the trial established that intelligent design was a mere relabeling of the type of creationism described above and that it [is] not a scientific alternative to evolution. So while the Latter-day Saints do indeed have a doctrine of creation and certainly a belief in a Supremely Intelligent Creator, we are neither creationists nor proponents of intelligent design because both labels come with unwanted and uncomfortable doctrinal baggage.

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How Joshua's Sun Stood Still While the World Turned

I've been reading John Walton's Ancient Near Eastern Thought and the Old Testament: Introducing the Conceptual World of the Hebrew Bible. It's a little on the dry side, but it gives you a flavor of the world of the Old Testament. One part that caught my attention was Walton's interpretation of the episode of Joshua and the sun standing still.

Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.

And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day. [Joshua 10:12-13]

This story is usually summarized as follows: The Israelites were battling the Amorites but were running out of daylight. So Joshua commanded the sun to stop--which it did by God's concurrence--giving them extended light in order to conquer the Amorites. That requires a bit of inference, however, since the scripture never says what Joshua's motivation was. And one thing that doesn't make sense is that Gibeon is east of Ajalon. If the sun was over Gibeon and the moon over Ajalon, it suggests that Joshua was in between them, and that it was actually morning. Why would Joshua be concerned about daylight in the morning?

The story has been a frequent focal point for battles over the nature of miracles, with defenders asserting the power of God and the need for faith and critics (who might otherwise be believers) pointing out the unlikely nature of such an occurrence. Some, such as John A. Widtsoe, took a middle ground: defending the power of God on the one hand, but recognizing that other means may have been used, or the story may have been poorly transmitted.

John Walton takes a different path that relies on knowledge of ancient Near Eastern culture. The ancients believed that the movements of celestial objects were manifestations of the power of the gods and that they communicated information about the disposition of the gods. Since these cultures used a lunar calendar to establish months, the new moon (beginning) and full moon (middle) were of particular interest to their timekeeping.

The point of full moon was determined when the sun and moon were at opposition, which is to say that the sun and moon were on opposite horizons for a few minutes. If opposition occurred on the fourteenth day of the month, then all of the days were full days (i.e. 1/30 of a month), which was a good omen. If opposition occurred on the wrong day (the fifteenth, for example), then the days of the month were not the right length, which was a bad omen. Mesopotamian omen literature contains various interpretations of celestial happenings, and commonly uses terms like stand, wait, and stop to refer to relationships between celestial objects. Walton:

When the moon and/or sun do not wait, the moon sinks over the horizon before the sun rises and no opposition occurs. When the moon and sun wait or stand, it indicates that the opposition occurs for the determination of the full moon day.

With this as background, Walton translates the Joshua passage as follows:

"O sun, wait over Gibeon and moon over the valley of Aijalon." So the sun waited and the moon stood before the nation took vengeance on its enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar, "The sun stood in the midst of the sky and did not hurry to set as on a day of full length?"

The shift in meaning is quite subtle, with most of the change being in the last phrase. "And hasted not to go down about a whole day," becomes "and did not hurry to set as on a day of full length."

I looked at a couple of alternate Bible translations to see what they do with this passage, especially the last phrase. The NIV and NRSV are both consistent with the KJV. However, Young's Literal Translation renders it as follows: "and hath not hasted to go in -- as a perfect day," which supports Walton. Thus, the way this passage is translated seems to hinge on what you think the original authors had in mind. If you didn't know about the surrounding omen literature, you wouldn't have any reason to think anything other than that the length of daylight was significantly extended.

There is still a little uncertainty as to what the exact scenario was. Some have thought that Joshua wanted a good omen for the Israelites. Walton thinks that Joshua wanted opposition to occur on the wrong day so that the Amorites would be demoralized by a bad omen.

Joshua's knowledge of the Amorites' dependence on omens may have led him to ask the Lord for one that he knew would deflate their morale-for the opposition to occur on an unpropitious day. This does not change the general idea that God fought on behalf of Israel, but it does give the interpreter a more accurate picture of the way in which God did so.

Whatever the exact details, a little background on the culture radically transforms this story and renders debate over the size of the miracle mostly moot.

Before ending, let me head off a potential objection. Helaman 12:14-15 does not authenticate the traditional interpretation of the Joshua story. Mormon does not specifically mention Joshua, so it is possible that the parallel is a coincidence. However, even if Mormon did have Joshua in mind, he may have misunderstood the meaning (or we have misunderstood Mormon's meaning) since he was long removed from ancient Near Eastern culture, as are we.

Further Reading:
See also Walton's original essay, "Joshua 10:12-15 and Mesopotamian Celestial Omen Texts," most of which can be read here.

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Review of Parallels and Convergences

In March of 2009 a group of LDS engineers (mostly) gathered for a conference at Claremont Graduate University focusing on Mormon perspectives on engineering. Videos of the talks were made available online, and now Kofford Books has published the talks as a collection of essays. It is edited by A. Scott Howe and Richard L. Bushman (yes, the), the principle conference organizers.

Overview

What does Mormonism have to do with engineering? Is there something about the gospel that improves bridges, batteries, or automobiles? Terryl Givens' introduction, "No Small and Cramped Eternities: Parley Pratt and the Foundations of Mormon Cosmology," which was the keynote address at the conference, provides the basic orientation. He describes Pratt's role in systematizing and popularizing Joseph Smith's teachings, particularly with respect to the eternal nature of element and the physical corporeal nature of God. The result can perhaps be summarized with the following sentence.

What this means is that, by naturalizing Deity, the entire universe of God and humankind, heaven and hell, body and spirit, the eternal and the mundane—all are collapsed into one sphere.

With this idea in place it becomes easier to see God as a master engineer, who possesses and uses technologies that seem miraculous to us. Thus the interest of LDS engineers. The rest of the book follows in this vein with speculative excursions into the nature of spirit matter and how human advances in technology may fulfill prophecy and God's purposes. Essays cover the concept of Gaia, how Mormonism dovetails with transhumanism, a novel argument for the existence of God, and more. The book wraps up with a survey of technological advances by David Bailey. It is a credit to the organizers that they were able to attract the involvement of Richard Bushman, Terryl Givens, and David Bailey.

The introduction to the first section of chapters opens with this arresting idea, which also serves as an additional overarching theme:

In the same way that each person should have the privilege of hearing the gospel in his or her own language, it might be important to consider that technical language is another mode of expression into which we ought to translate our most important concepts.

Although the scientific revolution began with figures like Galileo and Newton, most of what is taught in college courses on any scientific topic dates from the late 19th century onward. With two minor exceptions, none of our canonized scripture was written after 1847. Is it any wonder, then, that scripture and science often do not speak the same 'language'? In fact, Givens goes so far as to suggest that the "humanizing and temporalizing" of God by Joseph Smith's King Follett discourse,

does have one virtue, however—one that we will have the boldness perhaps to someday plumb, in that it lends itself to the world’s best hope for a naturalistic theology. Stripped of all invocations of transcendent entities and transcendent eternities, such a universe should be at least potentially appealing to the hardcore materialists currently working the anti-God/anti-religion circuit [1].

After quoting Richard Dawkins--a prominent scientist and atheist--to the effect that god-like extraterrestrials probably exist, a later essay asserts:

“Eternal progression” is what Mormons call that perhaps unfamiliar version of Darwinian evolution. “God” is what Mormons call those god-like extraterrestrials that didn’t start that way. Whether we ever get to know them or not, there are very probably gods. So says Richard Dawkins. So said Joseph Smith.

Translation indeed!

The book has many interesting ideas--sometimes old ideas presented in new ways. For example, chapter 11, "Spiritual Underpinnings for a Space Program," makes an impassioned defense of space exploration, and the authors envision a future day of planet colonization as fulfilling God's purposes.

It should be apparent that the peopling of other worlds will occur according to natural laws and that the recent outpouring of inspiration regarding space technology might be for the purpose of building a foundation of necessary technologies that will allow us to participate in this great work.

In this essay, planetary colonists become futuristic Jaredites.

This is all heady stuff that's fun to think about. Given the speculative nature of the topics discussed, I suppose it was inevitable that I would find some things to object to. Some of the towers of logic are constructed quickly, but perhaps not durably. I am not an engineer; my background is in the biological sciences. Nevertheless, a few problems stood out to me that I would like to briefly tackle.

Criticisms

One essay claimed that:

Inside each cell, ribosomes are a form of enzyme that are highly interconnected with microtubules. They read RNA strands and manufacture proteins that are building blocks for various cell structures. Microtubules function as both scaffolding and as microprocessors for the cell. From an engineer’s perspective, the microtubules (controller) and ribosomes (factory) would be exactly the sorts of functions where we would want to have a capacity for remote control.

Anybody who has taken a cell biology course will be familiar with the scaffolding role of microtubules. But the notion that they are microprocessors that participate in neural networks, and might even be involved in consciousness, was new to me. Granted, I am not a neuroscientist; but my brief look into the scientific literature suggests that these ideas are being promoted by a small handful of theorists who admit that they don't have solid evidence of these functions yet. Thus I believe that any functional role of microtubules in brain function, apart from their structural role in cells, remains hypothetical at best. As to the broader point, I am not aware of a significant interaction between ribosomes and microtubules under normal circumstances, and I don't know that I've ever heard of microtubules playing a role in the regulation of gene expression--they certainly are not among the chief mechanisms.

You might expect me to bring this up, but in the essay arguing for space exploration the authors write:

The Creation story mentions several points at which God and those involved in the preparation of the new world initiate new phases in the Creation sequence. We can imagine advanced celestial engineers periodically visiting the new world to take samples of the atmosphere, water, soil, and variety of organisms and determining that the planet is ready for the next step. We can see in our mind’s eye advanced celestial biologists selectively engineering certain organisms and releasing them into the environment where they take over the older generations, and slowly bring the biosphere up to a new level of readiness.

Indeed, I think this kind of scenario is envisioned by many Mormons. However, the paragraph immediately preceding the one just quoted says:

Perhaps the evidence shows a kinship of all life because the advanced engineers used the same highly adaptive set of programmable building blocks to construct the bodies of each species. Whether the organisms appeared strictly through emergence from a single ancestor or were physically brought and placed in turn as an already developed species, that kinship would be apparent.

This is an argument that is popular with young-earth creationists and intelligent design proponents alike. It seems quite reasonable because it appeals to common sense and experience, but unfortunately it is not well supported by the evidence. Now is not the time to get into the details, but generally speaking, the sequence divergence for the same gene in different species is proportional to their evolutionary separation. Furthermore, our genomes bear the marks of history; approximately half is made up of broken viruses and other self-replicating (or formerly so) DNA elements, much of which we share with other species in patterns that are easy to understand from the perspective of common descent but difficult to justify from a design perspective. With respect to patterns, the same could be said for the fossil record.

The same essay employs quotations from several Church leaders in support of the idea that life on our planet was brought from a previous one, and this is used as implicit support for the idea that we might reach out and colonize other planets. One of the leaders quoted is Joseph Fielding Smith, who said that the universe is peopled with God's children. Although strictly speaking this quote is not misused, it is misleading in the larger context. President Smith is often said to have predicted that man would not go to the moon, with the Apollo landings as an obvious refutation. But this obscures his larger point which, ironically, was that Earth was created as the dwelling place for humans, and that we have no business trying to colonize the moon or any other planet. He might turn out to be wrong on that too, but he clearly would not have agreed with the thesis of the essay.

Chapter 7, "Quantified Morality," sketches out an idea of how morality can be quantified. The basic principle is that moral decisions maintain the greatest number of future possibilities. This interesting idea is then converted into the concept of entropy, which theoretically could be quantified. To put it simply, destructive behaviors are said to increase disorder (entropy) and righteous behaviors minimize disorder, or even create order (i.e. decreasing entropy). The problem with this that any local decrease in entropy is always more than offset by an increase in entropy elsewhere. Yes, your room is more ordered after you clean it, but any drop in entropy is offset by the energy you use and the heat you produce while doing so. Living organisms are great at increasing entropy. So if changes in entropy are the measure of morality, a desolate planet is morally superior to one filled with life. Yet, even though I think this essay is fundamentally flawed, there are gems of interest. Consider this:

As we contemplate the eternal principle of self-replication as a way to combat entropy at all levels [which I dispute], we can speculate that self-replication also applies to planets—that the inhabitants of one world grow and progress until they eventually achieve the ability to replicate their biosphere on another world: “And as one earth shall pass away, and the heavens thereof even so shall another come; and there is no end to my works, neither to my words. For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man” (Moses 1:38–39).

I never thought of that scripture like that before.

Chapter 8 contains a more mundane error.

We have evidence that our ancestors used spears 5 million years ago, but did not fire-harden the points until 500,000 years ago. Over 100,000 years later, we began making complex blades. Roughly 65,000 years after that, we began using the bow and arrow; 14,000 years after that, we began using gunpowder. Less than a thousand years later, we used a nuclear weapon in war.

This appears to assume that spear use by chimpanzees can be extrapolated to the common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees 5-6 million years ago. Be that as it may, the subsequent chronology puts the first nuclear weapon at roughly 320,000 years ago.

Conclusion

The value of this book is not in its explication of science, which I have noted is suspect at times. To me, the value of the book is the new perspectives that it brings to the scriptures and words of Church leaders, emphasizing the exciting and forward-looking side of our theology. I think it would make a nice gift for your scientifically inclined LDS friend or relative. My personal opinion is that if you want this for yourself, a cheaper electronic copy is a better choice, but I may be biased by the fact that I was already broadly familiar with the contents of the book. Then again, there are several engineers in my ward who might enjoy the book and it's too bad I can't easily lend it to them. In my opinion, more Mormons should be thinking along the lines of this book.

Notes:
This review is based on a complementary Kindle copy that I received.

1. Givens elaborated on this somewhat in the Q&A at the conference.

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Stewardship and the Creation

I just finished reading Stewardship and the Creation: LDS Perspectives on the Environment, and the more I think about it the more remarkable the book seems. It's a compilation of essays and articles by LDS authors reflecting on environmental attitudes and issues. It levels some criticism at our western culture, and it even includes some soft criticism of creationism. What makes it remarkable is that it was published in 2006 by the Religious Studies Center of BYU, a research and publishing arm of the BYU religion department. You can read it for free at their website.

Environmental issues tend to be contentious, particularly in the current U.S. political climate. Skepticism--or even disdain--of environmental causes tends to emanate from the same political party that LDS members tend to belong to. As the bloggernacle's own Steven Peck (BYU professor and co-editor) writes:

While on a recent fishing trip with some good Latter-day Saint men who otherwise would never swear, they could not say the word environmentalist without putting the word damn in front of it.

He further notes:

From my experience with members of the Church, I see that they have a profound love for nature. They love camping, hunting, and spending time in the wilderness. ... Many of those who express outrage at the mention of environmentalism are Scouters who profess a strong conservation ethic. They have profound memories of being in wilderness areas, which they speak about with love and passion. But talk to these same people about environmental protection, and they vehemently denounce it and claim such legislation is supported only by extremists and malcontents. When I suggest to my good Latter-day Saint family and friends about global warming, the worldwide loss of species, or the protection of our wild areas, they scoff not only at the idea that we should be concerned about these things but that there is even such a problem that needs attention.

Yet, as Elder Neal A. Maxwell wrote,

This restored work not only involves the things of eternity but is also drenched in daily significance. True disciples, for instance, would be consistent environmentalists—caring both about maintaining the spiritual health of a marriage and preserving a rain forest; caring about preserving the nurturing capacity of a family as well as providing a healthy supply of air and water...Adam and Eve were to "dress the garden," not exploit it. Like them, we are to keep the commandments, so that we can enjoy all the resources God has given us, resources described as "enough and to spare" (D&C 104:17), if we use and husband them wisely. [A Wonderful Flood of Light, p. 103.]

Cultural and political leanings notwithstanding, this book repeatedly points out that environmental concern has strong foundations in our scripture and the teachings of the prophets. If you don't like the word environmentalism, call it conservation, self-reliance, stewardship, or provident living. It ultimately amounts to much the same thing.

In light of the knee-jerk polarization that can occur on this topic, it is unfortunate that the book didn't open with Peck's essay, "An Ecologist’s View of Latter-day Saint Culture and the Environment," because he explores how Latter-day Saints approach several environmental issues and compares it to the broader environmental movement. In spite of a few high-profile disagreements (e.g. population control) and different starting premises, he finds substantial overlap. I think this essay best lays the groundwork for understanding the rest of the book, and I would recommend readers start with it.

A number of the essays are excellent and overlap somewhat in their presentation. I will warn you that some of the chapters are a bit dry, so if they don't interest you, move on to others. Some essays focus more on Utah itself-- especially the late 1800s--while others are more general. I found chapter 11, "A House Divided: Utah and the Return of the Wolf," particularly interesting. Wolves have an image problem that they apparently do not deserve, and I did not realize what central players they were/are in western ecology. (I couldn't help but wonder if their re-introduction to Utah might reduce the number of automobile-deer accidents).

There is always difficulty getting people to accept cause-and-effect relationships. Chapter 8, "The Hope for Extraordinary Ecological Improvement," describes damage that was done in Utah by overlogging and overgrazing. The result was a loss of mountain watersheds and consequent catastrophic floods. Yet some opposed projects to restore and protect the watersheds, attributing the floods to acts of God. There is certainly a basis in scripture for attributing natural disasters to God, but the scriptures and prophets have also been clear about our subjection to the laws of nature.

Chapter 13, "Rattlesnakes and Beehives: Why Latter-day Saints Should Support Ecologically Sustainable Development," makes the interesting suggestion that the latter portion of Doctrine and Covenants 59 can be read as a prophetic forewarning of our environmental problems. In that vein, we might think of it as the Word of Wisdom for the planet.

Chapter 12, "How Can Church Members Increase Their Environmental Awareness?" has a handy little chart of Ensign articles that treat environmental topics. It's not very large, but it's not nothing, either.

For the rest of this post, I'll just quote parts that stood out to me. Maybe they'll pique your interest enough to go read the book.

Chapter 1:

The dilemma we face in organizing our economic activities is that financial capital that Brigham Young identifies as being the least important is also the easiest to measure. Consequently, conventional thinking about economic activity is focused almost exclusively on financial capital with very little attention given to those aspects of human and natural capital that do not have an easily measured financial value.

Humans are free to choose wisely to partner with nature in mutually effective ways, but we are also free to ignore or even interfere with or destroy the work of nature. However, humans are not free to choose the consequences of our actions, the one being sweet and the other being bitter. The penalties for violating natural laws are real and irrevocable, and we as a culture will surely bear the consequences.

There are many who confuse prosperity with the power to waste. An oft-spoken rationale for waste is that if people own something, they are entitled to do with it as they please. This rationale is based on an assumption of the primacy of financial capital while deemphasizing human and natural capital. Brigham Young offers a different perspective by reminding us that one can never have enough to be wasteful, that everything that was created was created for a purpose, and that we interfere with God’s plan when we waste something that He created for a purpose.

Most people realize that for democracy to succeed, it must have a responsible and informed electorate. What is not as obvious is that for free markets to succeed in bringing forth a just and lasting prosperity, the market must have a responsible and informed “consumerate” and “investorate.” For those of us who are fortunate to live in a free market democracy, it is an important part of our sacred stewardship to be part of the responsible and informed electorate, consumerate, and investorate.

Chapter 7:

The scriptures indicate that this arrangement [humans as dominant] has been in place since the creation of Adam, and anyone who takes them seriously has to concede a certain utilitarianism behind the Creation, with man as the designated utilizer. To view the earth, her creatures, and her products strictly in utilitarian terms, however, or to assign them values on the basis of their temporal, immediate, man-centered utility, does not seem justified—especially when it was God himself who started pronouncing his creations “good” long before Adam was on the scene.

Chapter 11:

None of our modern prophets were trained in the complexities of conservation biology. Nevertheless, because they recognize environmental stewardship as a commandment, they advocate the same fundamental ideals as conservationists, namely, that humans are responsible for all life on earth.

Chapter 13:

Of course, wherever human judgment is required, opposing and impassioned social argument is inevitable. Judgment surrounding questions of environmental protection is no exception, and naturally many Latter-day Saints prefer to avoid what could be contentious issues. However, the fact that decisions are difficult or politically loaded and that definitive or detailed instruction has not proceeded from Church leadership does not excuse Latter-day Saints from the obligation to apply wise judgment in the use of “all things which come of the earth” (D&C 59:18). Disciples of Christ cannot choose the do-nothing option simply because there are competing and politically sensitive arguments. The duty to obey supersedes the detail.

Though the natural environment is in a state of perpetual flux and there is in real terms no ideal environment, the past three to four decades have witnessed a global awakening to the fact that humanity, in its rush for the golden egg of economic prosperity, is threatening the very existence of the goose on which it is dependent; namely, this incredibly unpredictable and majestically beautiful natural environment.

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John Welch's Reading List

As described in my last post, John Welch recently gave a talk at BYU about science and religion, at which he distributed a list of suggested reading. Thank you to "mapman" for sending me a copy, which I have made available here.

Looking over the list, I see a number of interesting books and articles that I look forward to checking out. Of course no list can be comprehensive, but I was a little surprised and disappointed to see some works left off of the list, such as articles by Duane Jeffery, David Bailey, or Steven Peck. (I note that Welch, the editor of BYU Studies, included only a single article from Dialogue: A Journal of Mormon Thought. And an ad for a free trial-subscription of BYU Studies [1].) It's also curious that among the entries from the Encyclopedia of Mormonism, "Organic Evolution" and "Origin of Man" are not included.

Actually, after looking through the list some more, I can't help but wonder if Welch farmed the compilation out to an assistant, or if he's actually read all of the articles. First I noticed that the section, "Selected Physical Science and Mathematical Articles in BYU Studies," also contains biological articles. "Big deal," you say, "you're just being pedantic." OK, fine; maybe so. But beyond that, can somebody explain to me why the "Beta-Lysin" article by Donaldson was included on the list (or why it was published in BYU Studies in the first place)? I have a hard time believing that Welch read that article and decided that it made a worthy contribution to relating science and religion.

Several of the works have been highlighted in posts on this blog. They are listed below with links to my posts.

• Boyce, Duane. "Of Science, Scripture, and Surprise." FARMS Review 20:2 (2008).
• Eyring, Henry J. Mormon Scientist: The Life and Faith of Henry Eyring. Salt Lake City: Deseret, 2007
• Grandy, David. "Ideology in the Guise of Science."FARMS Review 19:2 (2007).
• Sherlock, Richard. "Mormonism and Intelligent Design." FARMS Review 18:2 (2006).
• Welch, John W. "The Power of Evidence in the Nurturing of Faith," in Echoes and Evidences of the Book of Mormon.
• Widtsoe, John A. Joseph Smith as Scientist (1920). (Also here.)
• Bushman, Jess R., "Hutton's Uniformitarianism," BYU Studies 23:1 (1983).
• Walker, Steven C., "Selling the Soul of Science for a Pot of Message: Evangelizing Atheism in The God Delusion," BYU Studies 47:1 (2008)

Enjoy!


Notes:

1. BYU Studies articles older than two years are available for free.

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Summer Reading: Update to Required Reading

We're about half-way through summer, and maybe you are looking for something to read. I have intended to post a required reading list for evolution to add to the others on the sidebar for a long time, but have not because (i) I am lazy and (ii) I lent out one of the books and didn't get it back for a longgggg time. Maybe you've already read these books. But if you haven't they contain some of the clearest explanations of the evidence for evolution that I know of. As a bonus, it's been long enough since their publication that you can probably find them in your local library.

Why Evolution is True, by Jerry Coyne - This is the single best book on the evidence for evolution that I have seen. In 225 pages Coyne simply and clearly explains what evolution is, how it operates, and describes many of the evidences for it. Reading this book is like attending a class by a great teacher. If you read nothing else, this is the book to read.

The Greatest Show on Earth: The Evidence for Evolution, by Richard Dawkins - This book was published soon after Coyne's book and makes references to it, so I recommend reading Coyne's book first. Both treat some of the same themes, but this book is complementary and has some material not covered in Coyne's book. It is worth reading in its own right, and I think of it as a companion volume. If Coyne's book is like attending a class, this book is like having the professor to your house for a more intimate discussion in your living room.

Both Dawkins and Coyne are famous for their vocal atheism. However, you won't find strident criticism of religion in these books. It would be impossible for these books not to discuss some religious beliefs because they provide contrasting ideas--still widely held--that bear on interpretation of the evidence. But as Dawkins put it, "This is a book about the positive evidence that evolution is a fact. It is not intended as an anti-religious book. I've done that, it's another T-shirt, this is not the place to wear it again [p. 6]."

Relics of Eden: The Powerful Evidence of Evolution in Human DNA, by Daniel J. Fairbanks - I am not aware of another popular book that tackles the evidence for evolution found in DNA as in detail as this one. Fairbanks is a geneticist formerly at Brigham Young University and now at Utah Valley University. (For my summary of the book, see here.) The purpose of the book is is "to present just a fraction, but a very compelling fraction, of the DNA-based evidence of evolution. I have chosen to focus on human evolution because some people are willing to accept the idea that other species have evolved but draw the line with humans, usually for religious reasons."

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