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New Church History Essay on Evolution


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5 hours ago, rongo said:

I side with scriptural literalists, like Smith and McConkie, when it comes to human geography, etc. But, I read a lot of science, and I would still have loved to have read Eyring's response. I think it would have been that the literal interpretation is just wrong, but it's interesting that he didn't touch that in his book dealing mainly with reconciliation between science and faith.

Are you saying you do not believe in biological evolution based upon your studies of scripture?

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9 hours ago, MikeFoxtrot said:

Are you saying you do not believe in biological evolution based upon your studies of scripture?

And also based on my studies of science, and reason. Not based solely on scriptural interpretation, although this colors and influences how I see science. 

Everybody has his own "weighting" system between scripture interpretation, reason, and science, and this yields a spectrum of views on things like organic evolution, literal historicity of things in the scriptures, etc. 

Although I now teach strictly German, I am certified to teach high school biology and middle school science (physics, chemistry, biology, and earth science) through 2033. I find science fascinating, and I can test as proficient or more on it as any skeptic. In the past, I've had fundamentalist students (non-Mormon) who were upset about learning about evolution, and I've told them that there is nothing to fear and nothing threatening to their faith in learning about the theory in detail. What are the reasons behind the theories, and what evidence is given? You can strongly disagree with it and still learn why people think that, and what the evidence is. And, if you want to be able to intelligently refute it, then you have to understand it and be conversant in it on their terms. 

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9 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

I've racked my memory, and the last time I can remember this topic coming up in a Church context was an Institute class at Harvard back in the 1990s. :unknw:

I think it's much more common in private settings (one-on-one, fathers and sons campouts, camping with youth, etc.). 

I remember asking a member of our stake presidency in Chicago (a head physicist at Fermilab, a particle accelerator) about all sorts of things as a high school student. Great discussions! He told me that just as Newtonian gravity works well for things on our scale, it breaks down at the subatomic level (the Planck distance) --- and the speed of light as an inviolable limit works well for things at our level, but it is able to be surpassed (tachyons; expansion of the universe that exceeds c, leading to theories about dark energy). On evolution, he said that of course there is adaptation, but (his words) "you don't get birds from frogs." 

I think you're right that these sorts of discussions in church classes are rare, but they do happen, and they are a heisses Thema for a lot of people. 

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14 hours ago, Duncan said:

I just wonder, honestly, how much about evolution did Pres. Smith and Elder McConkie, did they ever study it to any real degree? if not who cares what they think about it? I'd take someone like Dr. Henry Eyring's opinion over theirs.

Unless one rejects things like the resurrection or the reality/possibility of physical miracles, there are limits to "taking scientific opinions over prophets." The question is where one draws that red line (everyone differs on exactly where one puts that), but there are a number of fundamental things (like the resurrection or Jesus' miracles or angels) that are soundly rejected by science that are fundamental to Mormon faith. Added to that is the fact that many people have personally experienced miracles that defy science.

I think that President Smith and Elder McConkie were probably well-read in the sciences (especially because they considered loss of faith on the part of members because of it to be a problem) --- they just didn't acquiesce to it always, without question when it came to things they considered to be vital. 

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On 6/20/2022 at 4:54 AM, rongo said:

And also based on my studies of science, and reason. Not based solely on scriptural interpretation, although this colors and influences how I see science. 

Everybody has his own "weighting" system between scripture interpretation, reason, and science, and this yields a spectrum of views on things like organic evolution, literal historicity of things in the scriptures, etc. 

Although I now teach strictly German, I am certified to teach high school biology and middle school science (physics, chemistry, biology, and earth science) through 2033. I find science fascinating, and I can test as proficient or more on it as any skeptic. In the past, I've had fundamentalist students (non-Mormon) who were upset about learning about evolution, and I've told them that there is nothing to fear and nothing threatening to their faith in learning about the theory in detail. What are the reasons behind the theories, and what evidence is given? You can strongly disagree with it and still learn why people think that, and what the evidence is. And, if you want to be able to intelligently refute it, then you have to understand it and be conversant in it on their terms. 

What sort of evidence might change your position of biological evolution?

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4 minutes ago, MikeFoxtrot said:

What sort of evidence might change your position of biological evolution?

That's a good question.

Maybe if organic evolution did a much better job of explaining how complex things like flight, the eye, the brain, etc. developed through gradual, incremental changes over extremely long periods of time because random mutations made survival and likelihood of passing on genes more likely. It's axiomatic that evolutionary changes are very slow and over unimaginably long periods of time, but there are things that had to have had instant "leaps" without "intermediate forms." With sexual reproduction, for example, you have to have not only that develop through evolutionary mechanics, you also have to have the opposite sex develop at the exact same time and in the exact same place. 

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On 6/20/2022 at 5:01 AM, rongo said:

the speed of light as an inviolable limit works well for things at our level, but it is able to be surpassed (tachyons; expansion of the universe that exceeds c, leading to theories about dark energy).

You must be misremembering the conversation. Tachyons are hypothetical only (no evidence for their existence). Physics absolutely accepts c as a hard speed limit. 

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1 hour ago, MiserereNobis said:

You must be misremembering the conversation. Tachyons are hypothetical only (no evidence for their existence). Physics absolutely accepts c as a hard speed limit. 

But the apparent expansion of the universe exceeds the speed of light on the outer edges (it appears to be moving faster than c, and accelerating). This is what has given rise to the "dark energy" theories, because astrophysicists are trying to explain how those areas can be moving so fast. 

His point (his name was Dr. James Jorgensen; cf. page 4 here  https://publications.anl.gov/anlpubs/2008/01/60754.pdf ) was that apparent laws that work at certain "macro" levels do not at "micro" levels (gravity is a good example of this). That's why quantum physics was developed; Newtonian mechanics and even Einsteinian relativity are violated at the Planck length. One point he made was that when the Father and the Son appeared to Joseph Smith, they weren't bound by c --- while having physical, resurrected bodies, they didn't have to leave aeons earlier so that they could arrive in upstate New York in 1820. For most purposes and observations, c is the upper speed limit in the universe, but there are exceptions (especially at the Planck length), and we "see through a glass darkly" and there are things we don't know. 

Richard Muller, the father of the "dark energy" theory, does not believe tachyons exist, and the reason he doesn't is because he doesn't want to (he feels that would violate free will). You are correct that tachyons are theoretical only (I'm not sure how we would even detect them), but they are hypothesized because they arise out of the math. If they do exist, then they exceed c by astronomical amounts.

Edited by rongo
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On 6/19/2022 at 10:27 AM, Emily said:

The church is not anti-evolution. All done. No need to ever debate the subject again.

If only!  There will still remain the debate between more fundamentalist believers who think old prophets are more authoritative than modern ones and will simply dismiss this as a further unfortunate greying of absolute truths taught by old prophets.  

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I think no one really talks about it anymore because it has become as taboo to talk about in church as masking and vaccination.  I think everyone knows that it will highlight an uncomfortable great divide in membership.  

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1 hour ago, rongo said:

But the apparent expansion of the universe exceeds the speed of light on the outer edges (it appears to be moving faster than c, and accelerating). This is what has given rise to the "dark energy" theories, because astrophysicists are trying to explain how those areas can be moving so fast. 

His point (his name was Dr. James Jorgensen; cf. page 4 here  https://publications.anl.gov/anlpubs/2008/01/60754.pdf ) was that apparent laws that work at certain "macro" levels do not at "micro" levels (gravity is a good example of this). That's why quantum physics was developed; Newtonian mechanics and even Einsteinian relativity are violated at the Planck length. One point he made was that when the Father and the Son appeared to Joseph Smith, they weren't bound by c --- while having physical, resurrected bodies, they didn't have to leave aeons earlier so that they could arrive in upstate New York in 1820. For most purposes and observations, c is the upper speed limit in the universe, but there are exceptions (especially at the Planck length), and we "see through a glass darkly" and there are things we don't know. 

Richard Muller, the father of the "dark energy" theory, does not believe tachyons exist, and the reason he doesn't is because he doesn't want to (he feels that would violate free will). You are correct that tachyons are theoretical only (I'm not sure how we would even detect them), but they are hypothesized because they arise out of the math. If they do exist, then they exceed c by astronomical amounts.

I don't need to say anything more after this post because it is a total derail, but c IS the upper speed limit, not just for most purposes and observations. Even quantum physics accepts this (included with entangled particles -- no usable information is passed, there is no way to communicate FTL with entangled particles). The expansion of the universe is happening FTL, but that's more semantics than physics. Those galaxies are not traveling FTL, the empty space between them is expanding, so nothing is moving FTL.

Physics is pretty hard core certain about this.

Anyways, have the last word if you'd like :) 

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2 hours ago, rongo said:

That's a good question.

Maybe if organic evolution did a much better job of explaining how complex things like flight, the eye, the brain, etc. developed through gradual, incremental changes over extremely long periods of time because random mutations made survival and likelihood of passing on genes more likely. It's axiomatic that evolutionary changes are very slow and over unimaginably long periods of time, but there are things that had to have had instant "leaps" without "intermediate forms." With sexual reproduction, for example, you have to have not only that develop through evolutionary mechanics, you also have to have the opposite sex develop at the exact same time and in the exact same place. 

Never mind that the senses also have to develop in tandem; the organs need the nervous system processing architecture in place in order to provide usable information. If I'm not mistaken these are controlled by many different genes. 

I reconciled myself to genesis-via-evolution while I was in high school...then it stopped making sense. 

I'm intrigued by demonstrations of self-organizing systems a la Jeremy England, but I don't see his theories as establishing a universal principle of self-organization capable of explaining separate but concurrent developments like these.

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11 hours ago, rongo said:

That's a good question.

Maybe if organic evolution did a much better job of explaining how complex things like flight, the eye, the brain, etc. developed through gradual, incremental changes over extremely long periods of time because random mutations made survival and likelihood of passing on genes more likely. It's axiomatic that evolutionary changes are very slow and over unimaginably long periods of time, but there are things that had to have had instant "leaps" without "intermediate forms." With sexual reproduction, for example, you have to have not only that develop through evolutionary mechanics, you also have to have the opposite sex develop at the exact same time and in the exact same place. 

I don’t want to assume, so would you mind explaining the alternative model (if any) that you accept?

And does this alternative model do a better job at explaining how biological life operates?

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7 hours ago, Chum said:

Why does it have to be reconciled?

Because some people find the concepts to be conflicting. It seems you don’t see the conflict. That’s one way to reconcile it. 

7 hours ago, Chum said:

Inconsistencies are more likely to indicate a shortfall in our knowledge than a failure with the data.

What is an inconsistency or disharmony you see in regards to evolution and the rest of your understanding about life on earth?

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4 hours ago, MikeFoxtrot said:
12 hours ago, Chum said:

Why does it have to be reconciled?

Because some people find the concepts to be conflicting. It seems you don’t see the conflict. That’s one way to reconcile it. 

What an odd response. Is it possible that you were so repulsed by what I wrote, that you rewrote it in your head? Asking because this answer only fits something that's 180° off what I said.  

4 hours ago, MikeFoxtrot said:

What is an inconsistency or disharmony you see in regards to evolution and the rest of your understanding about life on earth?

I find the Church's council on evolution to be impeccable so no disharmony for me.  I occasionally run into other things that don't fit. When I do, I mark them for future reconsideration and move on. Some things reconcile themselves. Some get fixed when I allow a more nuanced perspective. Others will remain disharmonious when I die, which is okay.  Better than okay because pat endings make me itch.

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11 hours ago, MikeFoxtrot said:

I don’t want to assume, so would you mind explaining the alternative model (if any) that you accept?

And does this alternative model do a better job at explaining how biological life operates?

Sure. My model is Brigham Young's explained throughout Journal of Discourses (passim). The world was created in creative periods of indeterminate length. Adam and Eve were born on another world and brought here, as were plant and animal life.

"How biological life operates" (i.e., cellular respiration, metabolism, protein synthesis, replication, reproduction, etc.) is understood exactly the same way under both models. 

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12 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

As I have shared on this forum before, I was completing my master's degree at one of America's Big Ten universities when one of its emeritus professors of biological anthropology (and the discoverer and namer of a certain human 'ancestor' in the fossil record) gave a newspaper interview in which he stated that he could no longer accept the dominant narrative of human origins. There was just too little evidence, he argued, and too many gaps. When asked by the reporter what the alternative was, he admitted that he didn't have one but asserted that a desire to avoid religious explanations had pushed scientists to endorse conclusions they otherwise wouldn't have found sufficient. He also said that, despite a growing unease with the narrative, he had felt compelled not to say anything until securely into retirement because there was as much dogmatism in the academy as there ever had been in the monastery.

The chair of my advisers was a socio-linguist whose office was in the Anthropology Department, and en route to a meeting with her the next day, I overheard a cluster of researchers discussing how tragic it was that the once-great Prof X had lost his mind.

I’d like to read his newspaper interview. What was his name so I can search around for it? Thanks. 

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5 minutes ago, MiserereNobis said:

I’d like to read his newspaper interview. What was his name so I can search around for it? Thanks. 

I can't remember (hence 'Prof X')! Nor can I remember the name of his major fossil discovery.

I've tried several times to search for it myself, but the newspaper's online archive doesn't go back that far. :(

I did clip out the page and save it, but unfortunately everything from my student days in America is still at my sister's house there.

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1 hour ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

I can't remember (hence 'Prof X')! Nor can I remember the name of his major fossil discovery.

I've tried several times to search for it myself, but the newspaper's online archive doesn't go back that far. :(

I did clip out the page and save it, but unfortunately everything from my student days in America is still at my sister's house there.

Thanks anyways!

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2 hours ago, Hamba Tuhan said:

I can't remember (hence 'Prof X')! Nor can I remember the name of his major fossil discovery.

I've tried several times to search for it myself, but the newspaper's online archive doesn't go back that far. :(

I did clip out the page and save it, but unfortunately everything from my student days in America is still at my sister's house there.

Are you possibly thinking of Dr. John Robinson? He was the one that found and named 'Mrs Ples'. He was a UW-M anthropology professor emeritus.

20220622_102020.jpg

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9 hours ago, cacheman said:

Are you possibly thinking of Dr. John Robinson? He was the one that found and named 'Mrs Ples'. He was a UW-M anthropology professor emeritus.

Sadly, I can't read that. I tried Googling the headline and the professor's name, but only two results came up, and neither of them is to the article. Do you have anything legible?

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