So I've been thinking a little bit about punishment. It's weird how society pairs crimes with punishment. This is something that I read about a while back when I read Foucault's Discipline and Punish. I thought I'd revisit those themes and reflect on them a bit.
What exactly is punishment? As a first pass, it's a type of action performed by a certain individual to a certain individual for a particular reason. This much is obvious. Let's break down these parts.
A particular reason: Punishment occurs as a consequence of some broken rule.
The punisher: The person administering the punishment can be an individual or it can be an organization. One necessary condition is that either the individual or organization plays some kind of recognized role of authority.
The punished: It is assumed that the individual who is justly punished is the one who broke the rule.
The action: The action itself is supposed to be harmful in some way to the punished individual.
What I wonder about is how the action lines up with the infraction. Sometimes we notice a symmetry. Some states still enforce a death penalty. So, if an individual breaks the right kind of rules, usually involving one or more murders, then he is punished by being killed. Kill someone, be killed. Seems pretty symmetric.
However, most punishments administered by a society like the United States come in two forms: forfeiture of property or imprisonment. These sorts of punishments don't seem related at all to the corresponding crimes. For instance, the punishment for distributing a high enough volume of illegal narcotics is some amount of imprisonment. You sell something you're not supposed to, you get locked up in a building for a while. Why does one follow the other?
Foucault has his own theory, which I don't fully understand. It has to do with the connection between the criminal class and social uprising. The idea is that the criminal class can potentially cite revolution and social upheaval, so social authorities (inadvertently?) keep them contained so as to maintain the status quo.
There might be something to that theory. I want to explore other possibilities. One question that we can draw from Foucault's theory is this: What exactly is punishment for? What is it supposed to accomplish?
When you take an intro to political philosophy class. You learn that there are three different views on what punishment is for.
1. Deterrence
This view states that punishment exists to provide a negative incentive against individuals committing crimes in the future. So, punishment is a preventative act, focusing on future cases.
2. Retribution
This view rests on the intuition that there is something like justice in society. The justice understood here is the kind that has to do with a balance between crime and punishment. The basic idea is that if you do something bad to someone, something bad should happen to you, as a way to balance the scales of justice. Notice that this view doesn't take into consideration what happens in the future. It's just about satisfying a certain demand that many think is intuitive about the way that society should work. "An eye for an eye," so to speak.
3. Rehabilitation
This is similar to deterrence in that it is future oriented. However instead of focusing on how others will act in response to the punishment, this view focuses on the individual being punished, and how they will behave in the future. It's pretty self-explanatory. The purpose of punishment on this view is to change the individual in some way such that they won't commit the same crimes in the future/
These views aren't mutually exclusive. An act of punishment can satisfy the objectives of all three views. However, they do come apart. For instance, capital punishment might satisfy the goals of deterrence and retribution, but it obviously does not satisfy the objectives of rehabilitation.
Given these views, we might understand a little better the rationale behind the matching of crime and punishment. Take parenting for example. It seems clear that the objectives behind punishment in the context of parenting either fall under deterrence or rehabilitation. It's weird to think of parents punishing their children simply because "they deserved it."
When we look at the aims of society, however, all three views are under consideration. Deterrence and rehabilitation views are, in a sense, empirically verifiable or falsifiable. We can measure the effectiveness of a punishment in deterring future crime and rehabilitating criminals. Do punishments, as they are currently administered in the United States, meet the goals of deterrence and rehabilitation? That's probably a very complex question, and I don't have the answer.
Many think that even if punishment failed the goals of deterrence and rehabilitation, it would still be required to meet the demands of retribution. This view implies that at bottom, punishment is really about balancing the scales of justice. Deterrence and rehabilitation are extras. I'd like to reflect on this for a moment.
What is retribution about? When do we satisfy the demands of retribution? Suppose that someone commits a crime. Let's say that we have someone who stole a car. What kind of punishment would be fittingly retributive and why?
How would a retributive punishment fit the crime? In general, a crime is considered to be type of harm that is done either to an individual or to society in general. Some crimes are obviously harmful, like theft or murder. Other crimes are not so obviously harmful, like speeding or jaywalking. The latter category might be considered a form of harm in that it increases the probability of some harm being done. Speeding might be considered harmful because it increases the likelihood of a car accident, which is clearly harmful. So, it might be plausible to think of all crimes as harms of some sort.
In order to satisfy a general sense of retribution, the punishment must also be a form of harm. Harm must be exchanged for harm in order to balance the scales, so to speak. Is it enough for society to respond to an act of crime by inflicting harm upon the criminal? Or, does the harm inflicted require further specification?
Punishment can be specified along two dimensions, quantitative and qualitative. Quantitative aspects of punishment can include the magnitude of the harm inflicted, or the duration of the harm. For instance, life imprisonment and a year long prison sentence differ in terms of the magnitude of the punishment. Qualitative aspects of punishment can differ across the varieties of conceivable harm. These include physical harm, psychological harm, economic harm, social harm, etc. For instance, execution qualitatively differs as a form of harm from a fine for however much money.
It seems pretty clear that our sense of retribution places constraints on the magnitude of the punishment. The common intuition is that the magnitude of the punishment should at least be approximately proportional to the magnitude of the crime. We would think it unjust if a crime of murder was punished with a ten dollar fine. Likewise, we would find it unjust if a crime of speeding were met with the death penalty. The challenge here is trying to come up with some sense of quantification for all crimes and punishments. Some crimes, like theft, might be relatively easy to quantify, but what about crimes like perjury? How do you attach a number to something like lying under oath? Punishments might be similarly difficult to quantify. Punishments like fines are easy to quantify, but what about punishments like caning, or solitary confinement?
Things get more difficult when we try to match up crime and punishment qualitatively. You'd think that this would be easy to do. If a criminal steals something, then punish him by taking away some of his property or time. But here's where things take an interesting turn. In modern liberal societies like the United States, certain types of punishment are considered unjust, even if they qualitatively fit the crime. Such crimes include the various forms of physical punishment, like caning or whipping, as well as forms of public shame like using those stocks that you see in colonial villages. So even if a crime is something like rape, many think it unjust if the rapist gets raped in return. Why is this? Why do we have a sense of retribution regarding crimes, but at the same time think that the punishment shouldn't fit the crime in some respects? Note that people would probably still disapprove of these types of punishments even if they were effect in rehabilitating the criminal or deterring future crimes.
The sorts of punishments that people disapprove of are usually sorted into the category of "cruel and unusual" punishment. What makes a punishment cruel and unusual. Let's assume that there is no disproportionate magnitude between crime and punishment. Why are we not okay with the punishment qualitatively fitting the crime in certain respects? It seems clear that this sensibility partly explains why most forms of social punishment pretty much come down to either imprisonment or fine of some sort.
Wednesday, January 7, 2015
Wednesday, December 31, 2014
The meaningfulnes of life
I recently finished teaching a class called "Human Nature." There are various ways of approaching the content for this class. What I chose to do is to make this class about the "big" questions. In particular, the class was about perhaps the biggest question of all: What is the meaning of life?
I used this book as a textbook for the class. As the title suggests, the book covered twelve theories, which gave their own answers to the above questions. In case you're curious, here are the twelve theories:
1. Confucianism
2. Hinduism
3. Buddhism
4. Plato
5. Aristotle
6. Judaism/Christianity
7. Islam
8. Immanuel Kant
9. Karl Marx
10. Sigmund Freud
11. Jean Paul Sartre
12. Neo-darwinism
Each theory is broken down into four components: the metaphysical assumptions of the theory, the claims made about the nature of human beings, its diagnosis of the human condition, its prescription for human flourishing.
Teaching the class got me thinking about the question of life's meaningfulness. I've been getting progressively sadder over time because I've been getting more and more doubtful as to whether or not there is any meaning to life at all. So, as a kind of therapeutic exercise, I figure I'd do reflection on what it means for life to be meaningful.
I don't have a definition for "meaningfulness." I'll have to start with some examples and try to extract some necessary or sufficient conditions. Let's go over some cases.
A lot people think that individual death and the ultimate "death" of the universe makes life meaningless. Why strive after things if we're all ultimately going to die?
Supposing that the eventual death of all living things eliminates life's meaningfulness, we can draw at least two conclusions.
First, the meaningfulness of life depends on temporality. What I mean by this is that whether or not you think your life is meaningful now will depend on states of affairs in the future. This is what I infer when people say “What does it all matter? We’re all just going to die anyway.” This is what you can also interpret from the first chapter of Ecclesiastes.
I used this book as a textbook for the class. As the title suggests, the book covered twelve theories, which gave their own answers to the above questions. In case you're curious, here are the twelve theories:
1. Confucianism
2. Hinduism
3. Buddhism
4. Plato
5. Aristotle
6. Judaism/Christianity
7. Islam
8. Immanuel Kant
9. Karl Marx
10. Sigmund Freud
11. Jean Paul Sartre
12. Neo-darwinism
Each theory is broken down into four components: the metaphysical assumptions of the theory, the claims made about the nature of human beings, its diagnosis of the human condition, its prescription for human flourishing.
Teaching the class got me thinking about the question of life's meaningfulness. I've been getting progressively sadder over time because I've been getting more and more doubtful as to whether or not there is any meaning to life at all. So, as a kind of therapeutic exercise, I figure I'd do reflection on what it means for life to be meaningful.
I don't have a definition for "meaningfulness." I'll have to start with some examples and try to extract some necessary or sufficient conditions. Let's go over some cases.
A lot people think that individual death and the ultimate "death" of the universe makes life meaningless. Why strive after things if we're all ultimately going to die?
Supposing that the eventual death of all living things eliminates life's meaningfulness, we can draw at least two conclusions.
First, the meaningfulness of life depends on temporality. What I mean by this is that whether or not you think your life is meaningful now will depend on states of affairs in the future. This is what I infer when people say “What does it all matter? We’re all just going to die anyway.” This is what you can also interpret from the first chapter of Ecclesiastes.
Second, the meaningfulness of life depends on consciousness. I get this from the claim that death erases the meaningfulness of life. I’m assuming that consciousness is extinguished upon death. The idea, then, is that in order for life to be meaningful, that meaningfulness, whatever it may be, must be recognized. Recognition, of course, requires a conscious perceiver. Therefore, meaningfulness requires there be some conscious entity that is capable of recognizing the notion of meaningfulness.
It seems plausible to think that these two conditions are necessary conditions for meaningfulness, but we are still miles away from any kind of well developed theory of meaningfulness. I’ll come back to this when I have more thoughts.
Friday, December 5, 2014
Math and reality
It's hard to imagine science without any kind of math. It gets even harder as you move down to the more fundamental sciences, such as physics. So many concepts in physics are mathematical, such as mass, velocity, speed, force, energy, etc. From physics and upwards to the special sciences, so many laws are stated as mathematical equations. E=mc^2, F=ma, etc.
Now, the sciences are investigations into reality. What does it signify when we conclude that math is an inextricable part of science?
We take it for granted that so much of what we observe in the world is describable in terms of quantities and relations between quantities. But, the world needn't have turned out that way. The physical universe could have had no discernible pattern, thus resisting the formulation of mathematical laws describing the behavior of objects.
So why is it that math so effectively describes the world? One possible explanation is simply that math is just as much a part of reality as atoms and molecules are. Ontology is the study of existence, as well as what exists. We often think of reality in ontological terms, i.e. giving an inventory of what exists. However, this isn't all there is to reality. Reality is not just about listing things that exists. There is also the structure of reality, i.e. the way in which existing things are related. Structure matters just as much in understanding reality as ontology does. For example, just listing a bunch of wooden planks isn't enough to understand why something is a boat. A pile of wood doesn't get you said boat. You need something more. You need to know how those planks are related, i.e. how they're put together. Likewise a full understanding of reality means acknowledging that reality includes both things and structure.
So, we can say that math is a part of reality in that it is the structure of reality.
We could say the same thing about logic. Math is to physics as logic is to metaphysics, although perhaps to a lesser degree in the case of metaphysics. One can think of physics as a way of applying mathematics. Similarly, one can think of metaphysics as a way of applying logic. If logic plays a role that is similar to the role that mathematics plays in physics, then one can infer by analogy that logic is also part of the structure of reality. This shouldn't be surprising, given the close association between mathematics and logic.
One consequence of the view that numbers and logical concepts are just as much a part of reality as tables and planets are is that there is more than one way to gain knowledge about objective reality. Scientific knowledge is knowledge gained primarily via observation, i.e. through sense perception. Logic and mathematical knowledge is knowledge gained through what I call "rational insight." I don't use the word "intuition" because of its connotation with the kind of snap judgment thinking that you read about in Malcolm Gladwell's Blink and Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow. Rational insight is the faculty through which we come to know that claims in math and logic are true. It is distinct from sense perception, in that it does not involve the use of our eyes, ears, etc.
So, if we accept that mathematical and logical entities are part of the physical universe, then it turns out that perhaps philosophy, metaphysics in particular, might tell us just as much about the universe as physics does.
Now, the sciences are investigations into reality. What does it signify when we conclude that math is an inextricable part of science?
We take it for granted that so much of what we observe in the world is describable in terms of quantities and relations between quantities. But, the world needn't have turned out that way. The physical universe could have had no discernible pattern, thus resisting the formulation of mathematical laws describing the behavior of objects.
So why is it that math so effectively describes the world? One possible explanation is simply that math is just as much a part of reality as atoms and molecules are. Ontology is the study of existence, as well as what exists. We often think of reality in ontological terms, i.e. giving an inventory of what exists. However, this isn't all there is to reality. Reality is not just about listing things that exists. There is also the structure of reality, i.e. the way in which existing things are related. Structure matters just as much in understanding reality as ontology does. For example, just listing a bunch of wooden planks isn't enough to understand why something is a boat. A pile of wood doesn't get you said boat. You need something more. You need to know how those planks are related, i.e. how they're put together. Likewise a full understanding of reality means acknowledging that reality includes both things and structure.
So, we can say that math is a part of reality in that it is the structure of reality.
We could say the same thing about logic. Math is to physics as logic is to metaphysics, although perhaps to a lesser degree in the case of metaphysics. One can think of physics as a way of applying mathematics. Similarly, one can think of metaphysics as a way of applying logic. If logic plays a role that is similar to the role that mathematics plays in physics, then one can infer by analogy that logic is also part of the structure of reality. This shouldn't be surprising, given the close association between mathematics and logic.
One consequence of the view that numbers and logical concepts are just as much a part of reality as tables and planets are is that there is more than one way to gain knowledge about objective reality. Scientific knowledge is knowledge gained primarily via observation, i.e. through sense perception. Logic and mathematical knowledge is knowledge gained through what I call "rational insight." I don't use the word "intuition" because of its connotation with the kind of snap judgment thinking that you read about in Malcolm Gladwell's Blink and Daniel Kahneman's Thinking, Fast and Slow. Rational insight is the faculty through which we come to know that claims in math and logic are true. It is distinct from sense perception, in that it does not involve the use of our eyes, ears, etc.
So, if we accept that mathematical and logical entities are part of the physical universe, then it turns out that perhaps philosophy, metaphysics in particular, might tell us just as much about the universe as physics does.
Monday, December 1, 2014
Privacy and the asymmetry of information
People often consider privacy to be a right, similar to having the right to move around, say whatever you want, and buy whatever you want. It's what some would call a "negative" right, meaning that it's something that people can't impede you from having. If I have the negative right of movement, that means that people can't keep me from moving from one city to another city. Contrast this with a "positive" right. A positive right is a right to something that imposes a cost to other people. For example, having the positive right to an education means that you are entitled to something that costs other people money, namely an education.
So, privacy is a negative right. It doesn't cost anyone any money to give you privacy.
What I wonder about is why people think that this is so important. There are familiar cases in which society faces a trade off between privacy and security. Having more privacy across the board may make it more difficult for law enforcement officials to acquire relevant information regarding criminal activity.
Also there are familiar issues associated with social networking. People raise a fuss about their privacy potentially being compromised on sites like Facebook. But why does it matter so much? Again, why do people place what seems to me a disproportionate amount of value on their privacy?
The explanation that makes most sense to me is grounded in the idea that information is a form of social currency. Having more information gives you a kind of power, and being exposed (i.e. having people gain information about you) somehow diminishes your power.
So maybe privacy is a form of empowerment. The less people know about you, the more "powerful" you are, perhaps. It's like a game of poker, where the person who has the most information about their opponent is most likely to win.
Suppose that all information was freely available. You could find anything you wanted about anybody, including classified government information. Likewise, anybody could find out anything they wanted about you. Nobody could hide any information at all. Would this be a better society? I'm inclined to think that it would be, but that's just a knee jerk response.
Basically, my gut response is that privacy is an issue only when it's asymmetric. What I mean is that I'd get upset about my privacy being violated if I didn't have equal information access to the individual getting my information. If had the same kind of access, i.e. if there was symmetry of information access between myself and some other individual, then I'd be okay with that. I figure other people wouldn't be, and I wonder why.
So, privacy is a negative right. It doesn't cost anyone any money to give you privacy.
What I wonder about is why people think that this is so important. There are familiar cases in which society faces a trade off between privacy and security. Having more privacy across the board may make it more difficult for law enforcement officials to acquire relevant information regarding criminal activity.
Also there are familiar issues associated with social networking. People raise a fuss about their privacy potentially being compromised on sites like Facebook. But why does it matter so much? Again, why do people place what seems to me a disproportionate amount of value on their privacy?
The explanation that makes most sense to me is grounded in the idea that information is a form of social currency. Having more information gives you a kind of power, and being exposed (i.e. having people gain information about you) somehow diminishes your power.
So maybe privacy is a form of empowerment. The less people know about you, the more "powerful" you are, perhaps. It's like a game of poker, where the person who has the most information about their opponent is most likely to win.
Suppose that all information was freely available. You could find anything you wanted about anybody, including classified government information. Likewise, anybody could find out anything they wanted about you. Nobody could hide any information at all. Would this be a better society? I'm inclined to think that it would be, but that's just a knee jerk response.
Basically, my gut response is that privacy is an issue only when it's asymmetric. What I mean is that I'd get upset about my privacy being violated if I didn't have equal information access to the individual getting my information. If had the same kind of access, i.e. if there was symmetry of information access between myself and some other individual, then I'd be okay with that. I figure other people wouldn't be, and I wonder why.
Monday, November 17, 2014
The evocative nature of music
Music obvious has an effect on one's experience. There seem to be close relationships between forms of music and mental states, such as emotions. This kind of stuff is everywhere. Here are some examples.
Songs in a minor key often evoke melancholy, whereas songs in a major key evoke happiness.
The tempo of a song is also associated with mood. You never hear fast funeral dirges.
Sounds coming from different instruments have different effects. Compare the sound of a flute with the sound of an electric guitar playing through a highly distorted amplifier. They could play the same melody, but achieve vastly different effects on one's mental states.
Everything about music has this potential effect. The volume, tempo, rhythm, pitch, harmony, timbre, instrumentation, etc. Anything about a particular song can contribute to producing a certain mental state.
That's the power of music. That's why you have film scores and soundtracks.
Here's a question. What do we make of the fact that music has this causal effect on our mental states? Why does music have this effect? Why did our brains evolve to be sensitive to these musical details? Do certain aspects of music have the same effects on individuals across time and culture? If so, why? If not, where do these associations come from? Suppose that the association of minor keys with sadness is a western European thing. Then how did that association come about?
Songs in a minor key often evoke melancholy, whereas songs in a major key evoke happiness.
The tempo of a song is also associated with mood. You never hear fast funeral dirges.
Sounds coming from different instruments have different effects. Compare the sound of a flute with the sound of an electric guitar playing through a highly distorted amplifier. They could play the same melody, but achieve vastly different effects on one's mental states.
Everything about music has this potential effect. The volume, tempo, rhythm, pitch, harmony, timbre, instrumentation, etc. Anything about a particular song can contribute to producing a certain mental state.
That's the power of music. That's why you have film scores and soundtracks.
Here's a question. What do we make of the fact that music has this causal effect on our mental states? Why does music have this effect? Why did our brains evolve to be sensitive to these musical details? Do certain aspects of music have the same effects on individuals across time and culture? If so, why? If not, where do these associations come from? Suppose that the association of minor keys with sadness is a western European thing. Then how did that association come about?
Wednesday, September 17, 2014
Conflict, conciliation, and how group disputes are resolved in politics
Suppose that there is a minority group that is being persecuted in some way by the majority group. What can the minority group do to eliminate the persecution?
There are basically two categories of approaches. The first is conciliatory. The minority can end the oppressive treatment by convincing the majority to stop the oppression. Notable examples of this approach include the non-violent movements led by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.
The second approach is antagonistic. The minority can end persecution by engaging in some form of conflict and winning. There are plenty of examples of this approach. Any war that is labeled a "revolution" is an example of the antagonistic approach.
The distinction here isn't binary though. Instead, the two approaches lie at polar ends of a spectrum with hybrid or alternative approaches occupying points along this spectrum.
This is a helpful distinction when we talk and think about politics. Here are two points that I want to make here regarding this distinction.
First, there's a lot of confusion regarding this distinction. Oftentimes people claim to be taking one approach, when their actions indicate otherwise. Here are two examples going in both directions. First, there's this band called Rage Against The Machine. They're a 90s rock band that I was (and still am) a big fan of. They are unabashedly political, leaning heavily towards left-wing politics. Much of the band's songs contain lyrics that prescribe an antagonistic approach to social change; you hear a lot of songs where Zack de la Rocha is telling us to burn shit and to start riots. However, the band's approach to social change in real life has been decidedly conciliatory (as far as I know). Their involvement has been almost exclusively through non-violent protests and grass roots democratic organization.
The second type of example seems much more prevalent to me, especially in identity politics. Throughout the 20th century and into the 21st, women, ethnic minorities, and the LGBT community have been working hard for their rights as participants in a democracy, possessing equal standing with straight white men. Much of this work has been done via the conciliatory approach, but with the advent of the internet, we've witnessed a movement towards antagonistic approaches. This sort of antagonism isn't physically violent, but by means of shaming, insults, and other forms of verbal abuse, it threatens the possibility of cooperation between oppressor and oppressed. This cooperation is essential to the conciliatory approach.
That last example leads me to my next observation. What counts as conciliation, and what counts as antagonism. As I stated above, most approaches may be a hybrid of the two. It is important to think this through, because I think that the second example is basically a type of hypocrisy. The idea is that the conciliatory approach is considered the moral high road, and so everyone of course will claim to be conciliatory. However, they end up being antagonistic in all sorts of sneaky and backhanded ways. This is troublesome, to say the least. Therefore it is important to have a clear understanding of what conciliation is all about in order to protect that standard from hypocrisy and conceptual erosion.
There are basically two categories of approaches. The first is conciliatory. The minority can end the oppressive treatment by convincing the majority to stop the oppression. Notable examples of this approach include the non-violent movements led by Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.
The second approach is antagonistic. The minority can end persecution by engaging in some form of conflict and winning. There are plenty of examples of this approach. Any war that is labeled a "revolution" is an example of the antagonistic approach.
The distinction here isn't binary though. Instead, the two approaches lie at polar ends of a spectrum with hybrid or alternative approaches occupying points along this spectrum.
This is a helpful distinction when we talk and think about politics. Here are two points that I want to make here regarding this distinction.
First, there's a lot of confusion regarding this distinction. Oftentimes people claim to be taking one approach, when their actions indicate otherwise. Here are two examples going in both directions. First, there's this band called Rage Against The Machine. They're a 90s rock band that I was (and still am) a big fan of. They are unabashedly political, leaning heavily towards left-wing politics. Much of the band's songs contain lyrics that prescribe an antagonistic approach to social change; you hear a lot of songs where Zack de la Rocha is telling us to burn shit and to start riots. However, the band's approach to social change in real life has been decidedly conciliatory (as far as I know). Their involvement has been almost exclusively through non-violent protests and grass roots democratic organization.
The second type of example seems much more prevalent to me, especially in identity politics. Throughout the 20th century and into the 21st, women, ethnic minorities, and the LGBT community have been working hard for their rights as participants in a democracy, possessing equal standing with straight white men. Much of this work has been done via the conciliatory approach, but with the advent of the internet, we've witnessed a movement towards antagonistic approaches. This sort of antagonism isn't physically violent, but by means of shaming, insults, and other forms of verbal abuse, it threatens the possibility of cooperation between oppressor and oppressed. This cooperation is essential to the conciliatory approach.
That last example leads me to my next observation. What counts as conciliation, and what counts as antagonism. As I stated above, most approaches may be a hybrid of the two. It is important to think this through, because I think that the second example is basically a type of hypocrisy. The idea is that the conciliatory approach is considered the moral high road, and so everyone of course will claim to be conciliatory. However, they end up being antagonistic in all sorts of sneaky and backhanded ways. This is troublesome, to say the least. Therefore it is important to have a clear understanding of what conciliation is all about in order to protect that standard from hypocrisy and conceptual erosion.
Saturday, August 2, 2014
Evolution and the Christian doctrine of Imago Dei
Aside from exegetical issues surrounding the first few chapters of the book of Genesis, there really doesn't seem to be much conflict between the idea that a divine Creator exists and that life as we know it is the product of an evolutionary process. It doesn't seem so hard to imagine that God set the initial conditions and started the process off, perhaps making a few tweaks and adjustments along the way.
One area that does seem to create some tension, at least in my mind, is the doctrine of Imago Dei. This Christian doctrine roughly holds that humankind is made in the image of God. What does this mean? Since Christian orthodoxy holds that God is not a physical entity, being made in the image of God can't be interpreted as being made in the physical image of God. If that's the case, then by "image" we must mean some kind of emotional, intellectual, spiritual, or volitional faculty (or perhaps all of the above).
If it is indeed the case that man is made in the image of God, then this question is put to those (including me) who believe in the truth of evolutionary theory. According to evolutionary theory, mankind is a descendant of a number of lesser developed species. If this is so, then at what point was the image of God imparted in man? Humankind is a descendant of early one celled organisms. Surely these organisms did not have the image of God. The same could be said of other species that are part of humankind's evolutionary lineage. One might point out that the image of God was imparted when the species Homo Erectus evolved to the species Homo Sapiens. However, this transition was gradual. Can we point to some exact event where the image of God was imparted? If so, where and why that event?
For those who interpret the first few chapters of Genesis literally, the answer to this question is simple. The image of God was imparted on the sixth day of creation when God created humankind from dirt and breathed the breath of life into them (or at least him). Here there is a specific event that can be pointed to as the event where the image of God was imparted. Of course, this answer comes at the cost of a highly implausible account of the Earth's origins.
So suppose that you identify as a Christian whose beliefs are more or less orthodox. Suppose also that you are convinced by the theory of evolution as accurately describing the history of life on Earth. How do you resolve this apparent tension between science and religion?
One area that does seem to create some tension, at least in my mind, is the doctrine of Imago Dei. This Christian doctrine roughly holds that humankind is made in the image of God. What does this mean? Since Christian orthodoxy holds that God is not a physical entity, being made in the image of God can't be interpreted as being made in the physical image of God. If that's the case, then by "image" we must mean some kind of emotional, intellectual, spiritual, or volitional faculty (or perhaps all of the above).
If it is indeed the case that man is made in the image of God, then this question is put to those (including me) who believe in the truth of evolutionary theory. According to evolutionary theory, mankind is a descendant of a number of lesser developed species. If this is so, then at what point was the image of God imparted in man? Humankind is a descendant of early one celled organisms. Surely these organisms did not have the image of God. The same could be said of other species that are part of humankind's evolutionary lineage. One might point out that the image of God was imparted when the species Homo Erectus evolved to the species Homo Sapiens. However, this transition was gradual. Can we point to some exact event where the image of God was imparted? If so, where and why that event?
For those who interpret the first few chapters of Genesis literally, the answer to this question is simple. The image of God was imparted on the sixth day of creation when God created humankind from dirt and breathed the breath of life into them (or at least him). Here there is a specific event that can be pointed to as the event where the image of God was imparted. Of course, this answer comes at the cost of a highly implausible account of the Earth's origins.
So suppose that you identify as a Christian whose beliefs are more or less orthodox. Suppose also that you are convinced by the theory of evolution as accurately describing the history of life on Earth. How do you resolve this apparent tension between science and religion?