John Haught’s Deeper than Darwin
is concerned with the issue of whether, if Darwin’s theory of evolution is
correct, there is anything significant left for religious traditions to explain
— that is, whether there is any room left for a theological or religious
understanding of life.  In the book, Haught argues that we must go much deeper
than Darwin can take us to lead a rich and meaningful human life.  As Haught
puts the point: "Even though Darwin is illuminating, it by no means tells
us everything we need to know about life, even in principle.  It certainly does
not alone provide the space within which people, including the most devout
Darwinians can live their lives" (xi).  Religious faith is needed, on Haught’s
view, to create a morally meaningful space within which to live.

Haught’s case ultimately rests on
the idea that the applicability of science and religion, as well as the relationship
between the two, is most fruitfully regarded as a "reading problem." 
Thus conceived, science and religion are two different — though not
necessarily antagonistic — ways of reading the universe.  Viewed against this
framework, Haught’s thesis is that a scientific reading of the universe is, by
itself, inadequate to tell us everything that matters about the universe; we
cannot fully thrive without supplementing this reading with a religious or
theological reading of our world.  Without such a reading, we simply cannot
thrive in all the ways that we need to in order to live a good human life.

Chapter 1 explores the ostensible
tensions between the scientific and religious views of the universe.  Many
evolutionary psychologists, for example, believe that religious conviction
remains widespread because it is adaptive (e.g., relieves stress) — and not
because it is true.  Indeed, the two worldviews seem inconsistent at their very
foundations: the scientific conception of an utterly purposeless universe shaped
by unpredictable chance-driven forces appears inconsistent with the religious
conception of a universe having properties that reflect the purposes of a
loving personal God.  The best that can be said by way of reconciliation is
Stephen Jay Gould’s condescending view that science tells us what is real while
religion tells us what we value. 

Chapter 2 develops the idea that
understanding the universe is best understood as a reading problem.  Like any
other reasonably deep reading problem, the universe presents a variety of
layers that require different interpretive strategies to understand.  Just as
one who approaches Moby Dick with a literal-minded interpretive strategy
conceived to understand how the plot moves from page to page will miss the
deeper layers of meaning that the plot is intended to suggest, someone who
approaches the universe with a literalistic strategy, whether purely scientific
or purely religious, will miss the deeper layers of meaning in the universe. 
Indeed, according to Haught, the penchant for literalism on both sides of the
divide account for most of the apparent tensions between the two worldviews. 
According to Haught, a first step towards a full understanding of the world
requires us to acknowledge that "nature, like a book, can be read on
several different levels without contradiction" (23).

Chapter 3 is concerned with
exploring the implications of the universe’s "depth."  Haught points
out that science and religion are both largely motivated by a sense that the
universe presents mysteries that require a deeper way of thinking than is
needed to make our way through the mundane realities of life.  But while the
quest for depth motivates both approaches to thinking about the world, we must
realize that literalism of any kind merely "skims along the surface"
(31).  For example, Haught believes that the literalism of the intelligent
design movement "overlook[s] the disturbing novelty and struggle that
evolution entails … [and thereby] leads only to an impoverished sense of both nature
and God" (31).  Similarly, the literalism of scientism — the view that a
scientific understanding of the universe exhausts what there is to know of the
world — suppresses the ambiguity that accompanies the profundity of what there
is in the world.  Reading the depth of the universe requires a path that has
both inward dimensions of the sort stressed by religion and outward dimensions
of the sort stressed by science.  Religion must engage the facts of
contemporary cosmology, while science must engage the facts of personal
dimensions of a universe with spiritual significance.

Chapter 4 illustrates the role that
a religious worldview can play in a complete understanding of the world.  There
are two stands to the argument.  The first is grounded in the observation that
different sciences can explain the same phenomenon in different ways that
complement each other.  The explanation that the physicist gives for, say,
environmental degradation will be different from the explanation that an
economist or sociologist will give; human intentions will play a role in the
latter, but not in the former.   The second strand is grounded in the claim
that the scientific quest for clarity ensures that it will miss layers of depth
that only a religious worldview can detect.  On Haught’s view, "[a]
religiously informed consciousness — especially one that is both acquainted
with suffering and skilled in the habit of hope — may be able to detect
signals arising from the depths of nature that the methods of science,
proficient in abstractive, mathematical and nonnarrative conceptualization,
will inevitably (and quite appropriately) overlook" (45).  Thus, just as
the physicist’s explanation can supplement the economist’s explanation in
providing a complete "reading" of the phenomenon of environmental
degradation, so too can the religious worldview supplement the scientific
worldview to provide a complete reading of the world that includes layers of
depth that can’t be reached by science alone. 

Chapter 5 considers whether the world
as it appears through the eyes of Darwin leaves any room for religious hope. 
Though many biologists believe the theory of evolution leaves no room for
religious hope, many theists believe that evolution is guided by God who acts
not as a direct primary cause of the earth’s diversity, but rather as a
secondary cause who creates the laws that dictate how things evolve as well as
the initial conditions of the world.  Haught argues that life can evolve only
if (1) the universe is not completely deterministic in the sense of precluding
chance-driven events of the sort that give rise to genetic mutations; (2) the
universe is governed by invariant laws of physics and chemistry; and (3) the
universe is durable enough to provide enough time for things to evolve —
conditions that point us beyond evolutionary theory to a narrative depth that
requires a religious reading.  "[N]ature still exists," as Haught
puts it, "in such a way as to have the character of a story" (64).

Chapter 6 is concerned with Richard
Dawkins’s evolutionary materialist view that Darwin’s theory is "so
complete that it logically excludes any theological or ‘providential’
explanation of life" (74).  The mechanisms of evolution are so clumsy that
they logically preclude any explanatory role for an omnipotent,
omni-intelligent deity to play; such mechanisms are inconsistent with the
nature of an all-perfect deity.  Haught rejects the separatist response that
consigns religion and science to two logically separate domains in favor of a
response that argues for engagement.  Theology must engage with evolutionary
biology by rethinking its understanding of divine providence so as to cohere
with the compelling findings of evolutionary biology: "a serious encounter
of theology with contemporary versions of evolutionary science may not only
enrich our understanding of the universe but also revitalize our sense of
divine providence" (78).  The randomness of the evolutionary process can
be seen as an expression of the freedom granted by a loving God to the universe
to forge its own directions.

Chapter 7 attempts to make sense of
"the naked fact of ‘adaptive design’" (93).  Haught argues that only
an evolutionary theism that accepts Darwinian theory is capable of fully
accommodating the depth in nature.  Evolutionary materialism is flawed insofar
as it fallaciously infers a metaphysical materialist view from a purely
empirical theory of evolution.  Intelligent design theory is flawed insofar as
it resorts prematurely to what Haught characterizes as God-of-the-gaps
thinking.  But, by itself, evolutionary biology is incapable of making sense of
the depth and nuance of the universe.  Only evolutionary theism has the
resources to make sense of the depth that human intelligence adds to the world:
"an intelligence that naturally pursues understanding and truth, an
intelligence that can ‘survive’ only if truth is inexhaustibly deep and
attainable incrementally, can, at least in principle, form a tight adaptive fit
with an environment that is inexhaustibly deep and endlessly intelligible"
(100).

Chapter 8 considers the "Deep
Darwinian" view that the human propensity for religious thought can be
explained entirely in terms of its adaptive value.  On this view, what explains
the fact that the vast majority of people in history believe that some sort of
divine supernatural entity constitutes the ultimate reality is not that
they have somehow encountered an existing thing; rather, what explains this are
genetic mechanisms that "strive to survive."  Haught criticizes this
view on three grounds.  First, he argues that this line of reasoning wrongly
presupposes that genes are centers of personal agency that can strive or act. 
Second, and far more plausibly, he argues that one cannot infer the falsity of
religious thought from its being adaptive.  Third, he argues that the view
commits exactly the same sin it accuses religious views of — namely, it attempts
to explain the propensity for spirituality in terms of some sort of hidden
agency (i.e., the striving of genes).

Chapter 9 takes on the idea,
defended by both philosophers and scientists alike, that a commitment to
evolutionary biology entails a materialist view inconsistent with the existence
of God.  Haught argues that evolutionary biology is an empirical theory that
does not tell us anything conclusive about theism because the reality that is
truly ultimate according to theism is not empirical in character.  As Haught
puts the point:

To declare that theology is superfluous
as far as an adequate understanding of life and evolution is concerned would
require a kind of surveillance that science as such cannot command.  It is not
within the range of any scientific readings of nature to hold forth on
such issues as the ultimate nature of the real, on what lies in the ultimate depths
of being and therefore on whether theology is an evasion of truth.  Such claims
belong to metaphysics, not science (127).

Moreover, materialism is itself problematic, on Haught’s
view, because it is incapable of accounting for "life’s striving toward
the incalculable not-yet" (129).

Chapter 10 is concerned with the
issue of whether the diversity of religious views — present and past
(many religious views, after all, have long been abandoned) — gives us a
reason to think that all are false.  Haught argues that the truth of theism can
be reconciled with both religious diversity and with an evolutionary
explanation of the persistence of religious thought.  If theism is true, then
one would expect both that religious belief would have adaptive value and that
some predisposition towards religious belief would be hardwired into our
genes.  Moreover, if theism is true, then one would expect religious diversity
precisely because the infinite depth to which theism points could never be
fully captured by any one particular set of religious doctrines and symbols. 
Indeed, as time goes on, one would expect that encounters with the divine would
lead people to realize that certain religious views are false and should be
abandoned.

Chapter 11 attempts to identify those
elements of nature’s depths that require theistic explanation.  Haught believes
that the world is absurd unless there is a permanence somewhere in the universe
that redeems the evil that results when a sentient being dies and finds this
permanence in the imperishability of past events: "Deeper than evolution,
beneath all becoming, perishing and death, there resides a rock-solid registry
that prevents the erasure of all facts from the indelible record of having
happened" (152).  On Haught’s view, the permanence of this rock-solid
registry can be explained only by assuming the existence of God: "Something
judges and measures the truth or falsity of all our propositions….  Some
religions call it ‘God’" (152).  God preserves all transient events in a
permanence that allows the past to "grow without ceasing" (153) and
hence is needed to explain nature’s inexhaustible depth as expressed by an
ever-expanding past.

Chapter 12 asks the question of how
we are to think of God in a way that harmonizes with the facts of evolutionary
biology.  Haught argues that a variety of theological doctrines must be
radically rethought to square with the evolutionary picture of a world in a
perpetual process of becoming.  Perhaps most importantly, the doctrine of
original sin, and the character of redemption that is needed to meet it, must
be revised to acknowledge that evil is inevitable in a world that is
continually changing.  That the world is always in a process of becoming
entails, on Haught’s view, that it can never have been in a state of initial
perfection that was compromised by some discrete human malfeasance: "if
[the universe] is unfinished, then we cannot justifiably expect it yet to be
perfect" (169).  And this means that there is no need to continue the
search for some culpable party on whom the imperfect state of the world can be
blamed: Adam, Eve, and all other humans are absolved.

Chapter 13 considers the
possibility of discovering extraterrestrial intelligence (ET) and the
implications for our understanding of God, ultimate reality, and our
significance in the universe.  Haught believes that "[c]ontact with ETs
would provide an exceptional opportunity for theology to widen and deepen its
understanding of divine creativity" (179) and would enhance our
understanding of God’s love for diversity.  While Haught argues that our
significance would not be diminished by the discovery of ETs, he acknowledges
that it would create problems for religions that claim a special status for a
particular people; some adjustment would have to made in response to the
possibility that some ETs have a special status as well. 

There is much in the book that is
worthwhile.  Haught’s critique of the attempt to infer the truth of atheism
from evolutionary biology is sensible. As a logical matter, it seems pretty
clear that the claim that human beings evolved from much simpler life forms
just can’t bear the weight of showing that a trans-natural, immaterial reality
does not exist.  And recourse to highly dubious claims about how an all-knowing,
omnipotent, morally perfect being would go about creating life doesn’t provide
much support.  It is a wonder that so many otherwise sophisticated philosophers
and scientists have been tempted by such obviously problematic inferences.

Even so, Haught’s positive case for
the claim that theism is needed to explain "the inexhaustible depth of
life" seems equally problematic.  To begin with, exactly the sense in
which nature is inexhaustibly deep is never made sufficiently clear to make
plausible the idea that much more needs to be said than has been said by
science up to this point.  Haught’s arguments here rely on premises that are
too metaphorical to do the work they need to do to show that it is probable
that theism is true — which would be a reasonable inference from the claim
that theism plays an essential explanatory role in understanding some
theoretically significant feature of the universe.  Moreover, even if one
accepts that existing scientific knowledge cannot explain (or make sense of)
nature’s full depth, Haught provides little reason to think that science will
never provide an adequate explanation; the claim that science hasn’t explained
something doesn’t imply that it can’t or won’t someday explain it.

There are other equally serious
problems.  In support of his claim that theism plays an essential explanatory
role, Haught argues that it is not possible to coherently assert a purely materialist
explanation of mind: "[T]here is a blatant contradiction between an exclusively
selectionist explanation of mind, on the one hand, and the implicit trust
you place in your own mind’s capacity to arrive at the naked truth, on the
other.  Clearly, in asking me to accept the truth of evolutionary
materialism’s selectionist explanation of human intelligence, you have tacitly
introduced something extraneous to your pure Darwinism" (99).  This
overlooks the fact that trusting one’s own capacity to arrive at the truth
about the world is an obviously adaptive trait: an intelligent agent who failed
to trust his mind’s ability to arrive at truth would likely be paralyzed into
the sort of inaction that would result in the agent’s swift demise.  The same
can be true of the mind’s tendency to trust the output of other minds: we could
not bond with other persons, which we need to thrive and propagate, if we did
not trust what they say and do.

Still, Haught is clearly correct
about one thing: evolutionary biology can tell us nothing about how we ought to
go about living our lives.  Darwinian theory, like any scientific theory,
consists entirely of empirical claims that purport to describe what the world is
like as a matter of contingent fact.  As a purely descriptive theory,
Darwinian theory has no normative implications whatsoever.  Accordingly, if
there are objective constraints on how persons ought to live, then the
explanation of that fact must come from some other source than Darwinian theory. 
And, contrary to the strident claims of Richard Dawkins and Daniel Dennett,
science has told us nothing that rules out theism as an explanation of such
constraints.  

If in the end Haught fails to
accomplish all that he wants to accomplish, there is much in Deeper than
Darwin that deserves a careful read: while it fails to make its case for
the explanatory necessity of theism, it shows how theism can be read as a
supplement to what science tells us about life.  For the faithful, this is
surely good enough.

 

© 2004 Kenneth Einar Himma

 

Kenneth Einar Himma, Ph.D., lecturer
in the Information School and the Philosophy Department, University of Washington

Categories: Religion, Philosophical