جستجوی مقالات مرتبط با کلیدواژه "the theory of evolution" در نشریات گروه "فلسفه و کلام"

Are the meanings of “chance” and “guidedness” consistent? The goal of this article is toprovide an affirmative answer to this question and thereby defend compatibilism (or accommodationism), which is the position that evolutionary theory and interventionist theism can coexist harmoniously. Compatibilists, such as van Inwagen (2003), Bartholomew (2008), Dowe (2011), Bradley (2012), and Sober (2014) argue that certain components or features of the biosphere exhibit both chancy and divinely guided aspects. What is chance?The concept of chance, in its scientific sense, is closely related to the concept of probability. One can interpret the probabilities used in scientific theories ontologically. If so, by “chance” we mean whatever objective property in the world the term “ontological probability” picks out (Suárez, 2022).[1] The received view suggests that chance and randomness are identical but technically speaking, “chance” describes the process that leads to the production of an outcome, while the term “random” describes the outcome itself.(Von Mises’ definition of randomness): A sequence, such as a sequence of zeroes and ones, is considered random when no successful gambling strategy can be made to predict the next number in the sequence. In other words, a sequence is random if it cannot be exploited by a gambling system for prediction. (Eagle, 2021)Furthermore, “chance” is often used synonymously with “coincidence.” Coincidence refers to the co-occurrence of two independent deterministic chains of events. In this sense, being chancy implies having a cause. Sometimes “chancy” is used synonymously with “accidental.” In this sense, a chance event does not possess a specific purpose. It is important to note that not every coincidence is considered an accident (Dowe, 2011).Genetic mutations serve as quintessential examples of chance events in evolutionary theory, as they do not occur in response to environmental threats or opportunities faced by species. In other words, there is no statistical relationship or correlation between the usefulness to a particular species of a potential mutation and the probability of that mutation occurring.The compatibility of “chance” and “guidedness”The incompatibilist might argue that chance processes cannot be divinely guided because the very meaning of being guided is not compatible with the meaning of being chancy. In response, van Inwagen (2003) points out that 1) the term “chancy” has multiple meanings, such that (2) some of these meanings can coexist with the idea of being guided, and (3) the meaning of “chancy” relevant to evolutionary theory falls within this category. Therefore, the argument just presented is not valid. Van Inwagen believes that the compatibilist perspective favors considering “chance” as coincidence. Being a coincidence requires having a cause, but having a cause does not necessarily imply having a purpose or being divinely guided. The question facing the compatibilist is whether chance is compatible with being divinely guided. Hence, van Inwagen mistakenly conflates having a cause with being guided.However, van Inwagen's approach can be modified. There are meanings of “chance” and “guided” according to which these two concepts can be considered compatible. To illustrate this, let’s consider a chain of events as follows:Mutation 1, the occurrence of feature 1 in species A; mutation 2, the occurrence of feature 2 in species B; mutation 3, the occurrence of feature 3 in species A; mutation 4, the occurrence of feature 4 in species C, and so on.This chain is random in the sense that knowing one part of it does not allow for predictions of the next event with significant probability. Genetic mutations are chance events; there is no statistical correlation between the usefulness of a particular mutation and the probability of its occurrence. If such a correlation existed, probabilistic predictions would be possible. However, it can still be argued that this chain is guided, meaning that its members are deliberately chosen by an intelligent agent. Having a pattern is a property that describes the relationship among the members of the sequence while being deliberately chosen is a property that results from the fact that each member, and consequently the whole sequence, is somehow related to an external entity, say an intelligent agent.Thus, there is no prima facie contradiction in considering a sequence of events to be random and at the same time divinely guided. One might object that although it may not seem contradictory at first, no truly random sequence can be guided. However, it remains unclear what kind of argument could support this claim solely through an analysis of the meanings of “chance” and “guidedness.” One might argue that being random suggests a lack of direction while being guided requires having a specific direction. Alternatively, one might argue that being random implies that attempting to regenerate the same sequence via a chance process would most likely fail, whereas being guided suggests otherwise. While these objections carry weight, they all require an additional premise beyond the mere meanings of “chance” and “guidedness.”One way to understand “chancy” as opposed to “guided” is to define chance within the incompatibilist sense as follows:The incompatibilist meaning of “chancy”: not being intentionally brought about by an intelligent agent, either human or non-human, nor being necessitated by the laws of nature. (van Woudenberg, 2013)In this sense, a chance event cannot be guided. However, it is worth noting that evolutionary theory itself does not make any claims about intentional agency. The defender of the incompatibilist meaning seems to have assumed ontological naturalism, but not methodological naturalism. It is evident that ontological naturalists tend to favor the incompatibilist meaning. Van Inwagen (2013) highlights that methodological naturalism does not necessitate a scientific theory to explicitly deny the existence and effects of supernatural agents. If a methodological naturalist wishes to adopt the incompatibilist meaning, she or he must make an additional argument that goes beyond merely considering the meanings of “chance” and “guidedness”. [1]. For a defense of the existence of chance in the world, see van Inwagen (1995), Sober (2010), Bradley (2012), and Emery (2022).

Darwin's theory of evolution caused a great challenge between science and religion firstly among the Christians and aftermath Muslims. As a result, Muslim thinkers were forced to express their approach on this controversial issue. In this article, an attempt has been made to collect the stands of Muslim thinkers from late 19th century to the contemporary era in order to observe the possible changes in their stands towards the Darwin’s theory of evolution. There have been different approaches towards the theory throughout less than a couple of centuries that can be divided into three categories:• Those who completely rejected the theory of evolution finding it in a total contradiction with Islam • Those who have not accepted it absolutely having serious criticisms of it, meanwhile believing that there is way to accept the theory with some exceptions• Those who have fully accepted the theory and find no contradiction between the Darwin’s theory and IslamSurveying these opinions and stands during the mentioned period shows that: Firstly, the debate on Darwin's theory is still going on and currently there is no absolute hegemony of one of the above mentioned stands on others. Secondly, as moving towards the contemporary era, more Muslim thinkers are preferring the second point of view, believing that there is a way to accept the theory with some exceptions of course.KeywordDarwin's theory of evolution, evolution, Muslim thinkers, science and religion, Islam and religion

Robert Tennant is one of the first philosophers who tried to solve the conflict between the Order Argument and the theory of evolution. Accepting the theory of evolution, he emphasized on the purposeful characteristic of the evolution process. His inductive explanation of the Order Argument is based on the order in the world as a whole and he draw the world by its intertwined plurality of six coherent species. Basis on the epistemological and ontological aspects of beauty in the natural world is one of the advantages of this argument. In this research, by a descriptive-analytic method, at first we tried to explain Tennant Argument and then give an adequate evaluation of it on the basis of the Islamic thought. The achievements of the research show that Tennant’s view about the world as a whole is comparable with the theory of personal unity of the natural world in the Islamic thought and the theory of evolution, assuming it is correct, is not in conflict with proving prudence in the whole universe.

Nearly 150 years after the publication of "Origin of Species," "evolution theory" is still subject of extensive contemplations on part of thinkers in the areas of science and religion. Darwin's theory of evolution has the diverse components that misunderstanding of it has led in many cases to disputes in vain. Among these component is, Chances. Chances has a variety of meanings, like a phenomenon that has not cause, a phenomenon that has unclear cause and the phenomenon caused by blind and purposeless cause. In contrast, Islamic philosophers have assessed these three meanings and have accepted the second and third of these meaning. But Islamic philosophers emphasized that these meaning is not against of theism. As a result, declaring the fundamental components of the theory of evolution explainable, many philosophers see a congruence between theory of evolution, even with Dawkins genetically oriented account of it, and theism. Yet, they believe that Dawkins supra-biological assertions are not logical implications of the theory.

The brief proposal of the hypothesis of the biological evolution of the living creatures is historically seen in the writings of some of the ancient Greece philosophers; but its documented and extensive presentation and promotion, as a scientific theory, has been done by the famous English scientist, Charles Robert Darwin, about two centuries ago. This has created a great challenge between the new biology and the Christian theology. This challenge has been rapidly transferred to the Islamic theology and has entailed the scientific reaction of Islamic thinkers. Since the presentation of the theory of evolution naturally brings into mind a kind of contradiction between this theory and the creation verses of Quran, thus the Quran researchers have put a great effort in solving this superficial contradiction. I have first briefly explained the mentioned theory in this article, using an Isnadi-analytic method; then categorizing Quran’s verses about creation, I have shown the exact point of contradiction; and in the third step I have explained the ideas of Quran researchers in solving this contradiction. Among the four theories, which are the main ideas in this regard, the first three theories are systematic and are based on the bases and principles of interpretation and they have been successful in solving the contradiction; but the fourth theory has a serious problem and thus not only it is not well acclaimed rather it has arose the negative attitude of many Quran researchers as well.