Is Evolution the Work of Satan?

Some Christians -- notably physician and geneticist Francis Collins and biologist and philosopher Francisco Ayala -- believe in both evolution and an omniscient, omnipotent, and benevolent God. For example, Ayala said: Does the theory of evolution really get God off the hook for permitting natural evil (i.e., suffering caused by nature, as opposed to moral evil, caused by human misdeeds)? It seems to me that Ayala is begging the question. If God created the evolutionary process, why is it so clumsy? Why does it cause so much suffering?A traditional Christian response to the problem of natural evil is to blame it on original sin: But accepting the theory of evolution negates the original sin argument. How could natural evil be caused by original sin if animal pain and suffering predated the emergence of humans by hundreds of millions of years?Another response to the problem of natural evil was suggested by St. Augustine of Hippo. He reasoned that God must permit evil to exist so that free will can exist. In his view, moral evil exists because of human free will and natural evil exists because of Satan’s free will.Do Christian believers in evolution see Satan playing a large role in the evolutionary process? Or is the natural evil of evolution, contrary to Ayala’s view, a reason to reject the idea of an omniscient, omnipotent, and benevolent God?Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

What is the point of making monotremes and pterodactyls suffer for Adam's sin? I know that is the popular view of Descartes, but I think a good case can be made that that was not his position. But perhaps that discussion is off-topic.Anyway, few, if any, Christians would take that position today. Ayala doesn't.

Jon asked: Anyone's standards. Your standards, if you like. In your opinion, what standards of benevolence, omniscience, and omnipotence are consistent with a God who allows his sentient creatures to suffer from the natural evil entailed by the evolutionary process? I focused on Christians because I know they believe in an omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent God. Being less familiar with non-Christian faiths, I don't know whether Jews and Muslims attribute all three of those qualities to God. But if they do, I would be interested in hearing their views on the subject, too.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

GDR wrote: It is the first profession of faith in the Apostles' Creed: "I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth." That day may or may not come. My question is, Why has natural evil been necessary since the dawn of sentient life? The term "all powerful" doesn't seem to leave any wiggle room. Either it is all or a quantity less than all. That view may be relevant to moral evil, which may be a result of humanity's moral failings. But I don't see how that has anything to do with natural evil, especially natual evil visited upon sentient animals and human infants, who are not moral agents. It sounds to me like you are describing a being who is something less than all powerful. You apparently believe that there are natural laws that constrain God. You would not be the first believer who decided, when confronted with the problem of evil, that it would be better to believe God is not omnipotent or omniscient than believe God is not benevolent. Again, I see how the above argument might apply to moral evil and moral agents. I don't see how it justifies natural evil that causes suffering to sentient animals and human infants.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

The term "omnipotent" is synonymous with "almighty" and "all-powerful." As defined by the OED, for example, "omnipotent" means: But "process theism" has redefined these terms:

Jon wrote: This discussion is open to anyone who cares to participate.Whatever someone's faith, it is incumbent on the believer who wants to describe his or her God to use a coherent description. If they want to say, "Our God is beyond all words," nothing more needs to be said. But if they say, "Our God is omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent," they must explain what those terms mean if they want to be taken seriously.Of the various theist responses to the problem of evil, the ones that seem most ingenuous involve weakening the claim of God's omnipotence and/or omniscience. Some of the posts to this thread, as well as the "process theism" quote I provided in a previous post, suggest that many modern theists have weakened the omnipotence claim implicitly, if not explicitly.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

dwise1 wrote: I think that question is on-topic, and I would be interested to hear how Christians or other religious people who accept evolution answer it.

If we were speaking of the ordinary meaning of those terms, I would agree with you. But I was using a term from Christian theology, "natural evil," which refers to suffering caused by natural phenomena. I suppose they called such suffering "evil" because they believed it was caused by Satan and his cohorts.

Ayala is, I believe, a Roman Catholic. At least he was when he was a Dominican priest. Collins is an evangelical Christian. Call it what you will. Suffering is a fact of life. See my previous post.

I’m sorry if my earlier posts didn’t make my reasoning clear. I’ll try again.The idea for this thread came from a post made by Shadow 71 in another thread. Shadow 71 accepts evolution and believes in the Roman Catholic God. That’s not surprising, because the Catholic Church also accepts evolution and does not take the Biblical story of creation literally. (In fact, it was a Catholic priest who first suggested the big bang theory.)I am aware that the Roman Catholic God is believed to be the omniscient, omnipotent, and benevolent Creator of the universe. I suspect that view of God is also held by many non-Catholic Christians, and perhaps by some non-Christians as well.I also doubt that many believers in evolution would deny that the evolutionary process involves a lot of suffering. If you find that statement controversial, let me know, and I’ll present my evidence for that conclusion.When I review the above information, what springs immediately to mind is a version of the age-old problem of evil. Please don’t get hung up on the word evil. The suffering caused by evolution is of the kind that some theologians would call natural evil. That term actually refers to unintentional sources of suffering, such as floods, earthquakes, and disease. The term is distinguished from moral evil, which includes suffering caused by the intentional acts of people.The problem of evil is a deductive argument. If the premises are true, the conclusion is necessarily true. The argument goes like this:Premise: God is omnipotent.
Premise: God is omniscient.
Premise: God is benevolent.
Premise: Evil exists in God’s creation.
Conclusion: The concept of God is logically inconsistent.Over the centuries theologians have suggested various solutions to this problem. A famous one is that evil is necessary if people are to have free will. Thus it is in our interests to have free will in a world plagued by evil than to be automatons in a world without evil.That might arguably be a solution to the problem of moral evil, but I don’t think it adequately addresses the problem of suffering caused by nature. One way the suffering caused by nature has been addressed in the past is to blame it on Satan’s free will. According to this line of argument, if we accept that free will is desirable, we have no grounds for denying it to angels -- fallen or otherwise.My discussion of the "Satan solution" was tongue-in-cheek, because I doubt that many Christians liberal-minded enough to accept evolution would blame natural disasters on the devil. But if I'm wrong about that, please correct me.I doubt that I have presented an exhaustive list of the proposed solutions to the problem of evil, but I had hoped that this was enough of an exposition to get the discussion started. If anyone knows of other possible solutions, I’d be interested in hearing them.Based on the information presented above, I conclude that, if we accept evolution and the existence of the suffering it entails, an omniscient, omnipotent, benevolent Creator is logically impossible. I don’t see any logical solution to this problem that leaves all three of those characteristics intact.But if, for instance, someone accepts evolution and proposes a powerful, wise, and benevolent Creator, that would be a logically possible God. And in fact, it appears at least some believers today implicitly or explicitly assume limits on Gods power and/or knowledge to preserve His benevolence, which apparently they feel is the most important of the three qualities.I hope that’s a clearer explanation of my views.

If you go back and read my post carefully, you will see that:1) I agree that there is no evidence of intentional evil in evolution.2) The term "natural evil" as used in my post does not mean what you think it does.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

jar,Thank you for the link to your earlier post. The current scientific consensus is that the universe is moving inexorably toward greater entropy. But who knows, maybe everything will start over in another universe. However, the theory of multiple universes, if true, would undercut one of the currently fashionable arguments for the existence of God. An omnipotent being might be expected to do better than "pretty good." My point is not that God is necessarily bad (or necessarily non-existent). My point is that he cannot be good AND omnipotent AND omniscient.Edited by Stephen Push, : No reason given.

jar wrote: No, the topic of the thread is whether the suffering caused by evolution negates the concept of an omnipotent, omniscient, benevolent God.

Read my posts and decide for yourself.

Thank you for your thoughtful responses to my questions. I wish I could share your optimism, but I don't believe that progress is inevitable or God-given. The 20th Century was the bloodiest in history. The Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 was the deadliest in history. New infectious diseases emerge, while old ones develop resistance to our antibiotics. I think we mortals must create our own peace, justice, and joy.Thank you again for sharing your ideas. Best wishes to you and your family.Steve