So if the Da Vinci code is controversial, what is this?
Published 5.18.2006 by ~mattg
Humans, chimps may have bred after split
Now, tell me, if the idea that Christ had a child gets the Vatican in a tizzy, what will this news do to the theory that man was created in God’s image…
Filed under News
The Vatican (and, in fact, most Christians) accept evolution as the mechanism God used to create humanity. So the announcement above would do nothing.
The idea that there were two splits is interesting, but it hasn’t been confirmed yet. Neither of these species (after the first split) would be what we would consider modern — human or chimp. Were they still able to interbreed after the previous split? It would be unusual, but not unheard of. Most researchers want a lot more genomic analysis before they call this case “closed.”
Let me be clear that I’m not saying anything for or against this… As you stated, it’s new research. I am also well aware of the Vatican’s view on evolution, and the fact that they accept the theory is a victory for rational Christians everywhere.
I guess that’s my real question, then… If we can choose some parts of the Bible as a “story” and other parts of the Bible as “history,” who’s to say that we are wrong in our assumptions of the historical accuracy of the book? According to the Bible, God “created” man in his image. Upon first read, that sounds like he went down into his workshop and molded the necessary pieces together, gave them life, and viola, man…Now science has put some context around that, telling us that, for all we know, the Creation of man was done through eons of evolution, but guided by God. So in that sense, science has “explained away” the text of the Bible into something that scientists can accept as logical, yet still within the bounds of their religion.
So why, then, is the Church so closed-minded on other parts of the Bible? Why are the tales regarding Jesus read with the notion that they are the absolute historical events. For all we know, they are the “movies” of their generation: loosely based on real events, but modified to appeal to a wider audience and bring in more people.
Why the double standard? I guess that’s my question…
Believe it or not, it’s not all that much about the Bible. One of the Gospels freely admits that there’s stuff about Jesus that wasn’t recorded. Theologically, I’m not sure it would make much sense to say that Jesus had a kid, but it’s not that big a whoop. He is, according to Christian tradition, both fully human and fully divine. It was the Gnostics who claimed He was only divine and not at all human.
The major complaint the Catholic church has is that it accuses them of a massive lie and cover-up, including murder.
The Priory of Sion ceased to exist long before it is so claimed in the book. The info on the PoS in the book is actually part of a scam from the middle ages.
There’s part of me that’s amazed that people can’t tell fiction from fact, but then I remember just how frackin’ stupid humanity is.
The whole “The Catholic Church is opposed to this movie” is some of the best P.R. the movie could have hoped for. If the movie studio didn’t hire someone to keep calling up officials in the Catholic church and bugging them about the movie to provoke the desired reaction, someone in the P.R. department should be fired.
Dan Brown, as a writer, has a simple formula for creating popular novels. Spelled out so coldly, it’s Machiavellian. But then, most writing is. I ought to know!
What I want to know is far more offensive: We are told that God took a rib from Adam with which to create Eve. Well, men don’t seem to be missing any ribs; but men are missing a baculum. Since biblical Hebrew lacks a word for penis, some have argued that it wasn’t really a rib but the penis bone that God took from Adam. Now, since man is created in the image of God, and Adam was created before Eve, does that mean God has a dick bone?
I wonder how women feel about this origin story.
Oh, and Matt, neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory does go further than you describe it above. Not only does it show how all this design work can happen without a designer, it shows that there is no guiding principle, such as God, to guide the design or the process. The Darwinian algorithm is entirely blind in that regard. Of course, Darwinism doesn’t prove there is no God, but only that one of the main tasks historically attributed to God as only something God is capable of doing can be done and is done through means of natural selection. So there could very well be a God, but there is no reason to believe in a creator God responsible for this Creation. Of course there are still other varieties of God one could believe in, from Aristotle’s Unmoved Mover to Anselm’s that of which no greater being can be conceived—the logic of which, strangely, can also be used to argue for a giant cheeseburger in the sky. Whatever sort of God one does choose to believe in, science does show that miracles do not happen, that no matter how hard you pray to God, He won’t make an exception just for you, and, most importantly, that it is up to each of us to take responsibility for the good and evil activity in this world.
So, now that I have two readers… whatever will I do.
Rob, I agree with the whole P.R. thing. Who is driving the frenzy behind it, I’m not sure. It could be the movie’s P.R. people, or simply the news media trying to make some news in a pretty slow time. Either way, they are definitely driving more people to see the movie.
I am, by no means, a good critic of literature. A developer by trade, my reading is pretty much limited to 2 inch think books on language constructs and syntax. I enjoyed the Da Vinci code, probably because it was an easy read with plenty of action, not too many big words, and a bit of controversy. I will see the movie, if only to see how they translated the book into a movie.
As you mentioned (and I did in a previous post), it’s FICTION. I think the quote you are looking for is “A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals…”
T… I did not know about that story. Interesting. And I don’t claim to be an expert on anything here that isn’t related to development, so thanks for the insight.
Whatever sort of God one does choose to believe in, science does show that miracles do not happen, that no matter how hard you pray to God, He won’t make an exception just for you, and, most importantly, that it is up to each of us to take responsibility for the good and evil activity in this world.
Oh? As a biochemist, I’d be classified as a scientiszt, and I know of no such proof. In fact, attempting to prove that God never intervenes would be, by definition, impossible — it’s like proving there are no green crows.
Rob, you’re right, there’s no proof. As a philosopher, I choose my words carefully. I said that science shows, not proves. It’s a fine line between doing science and doing philosophy, especially in instances like this one, so I apologize for any confusion. To give a better account of what I’m getting at I humbly submit a short essay by John Dewey, The Influence of Darwin on Philosophy. Give it a read when you have the chance—you too Matt. I will give the warning that there is some ancient Greek in there, but the context of the individual words should be enough of an indication of what the words mean (if memory serves, the words are telos and eidos. Telos means the appropriate end, like an acorn to an oak tree; eidos means form or idea). Enjoy!
You say science does show that miracles do not happen. But yet there are many coincidence in which science itself cannot explain. But in the bible it says that God uses things, including people, nature, etc. So miracles, how can you prove they do not happen. If someone is told they’re going to die from lung cancer and it goes away. Is that not a mircale? Yeah science can say well this and this happened to cause it to go away. But what if that was an act of God for it to go away, that He was the cause for it to go away.
And who really cares if Christ had a kid. Bible says that he felt all the emotions that man felt, even temptation. But that doesn’t change what he did. The Da Vinci Code is very interesting though, and it was a good book. But it being fiction, and with a lot of the unexplainable, who knows what happened.