The other day, Andrew Sullivan wrote this:
Re-reading the theocons for my book on conservatism, I have been struck by how, in recent years, they have come to a consensus that in order for their political-theological project to be coherent, they may have to undermine Darwin and evolution. This political Pope may help provide cover. You cannot restore Aquinas as the central figure for the West’s understanding of its own politics without dethroning Darwin. For the neocons, this will present a real challenge: to say things they know are untrue in order to promote a political reordering that they approve of. Some will balk, like Krauthammer. But others will find a way to be tactically silent, or worse. Power is at stake.
Put aside the fact that Pope Benedict is not (and does not purport to be) a Thomist. Put aside my doubts about whether “theocon” is a particularly helpful term. And put aside the merits of Sullivan’s often-repeated, deliberately tendentious characterization of this Pope as “political.” I am genuinely curious as to what he meant, or could possibly mean, with the statement, “You cannot restore Aquinas as the central figure for the West’s understanding of its own politics without dethroning Darwin.” Seriously — no snark intended. What is he talking about?
Posted by Rick Garnett on December 6, 2005 at 04:09 PM
Comments
I think that Aquinas might have found Mr. Sullivan’s assertion laughable. Aquinas’s major works all reflect his commitment to the principle that faith can and should be supported by reason. Indeed, faith contrary to reason he considered mere superstition. The challenge to Sullivan is to point to a single article of Aquinas’s religious faith that consciously contradicts Aquinas’s understanding of the natural world in any way. I think he would be hard pressed to identify any position held by Thomas in sacred theology that contradicts his views on the phenomenal order.
Two examples come to mind. First, from the Summa Theologica (part I, q. 45, art. 8), Thomas asks “whether creation is mingled with works of nature and art?” Aquinas draws a sharp distinction between supernatural creation (acts of exnihilation) and natural generation. Generation for him would certainly have been broad enough to cover evolution since “in the works of nature creation does not enter, but is [merely] presupposed to the work of nature.” Furthermore, he says, in refuting the idea that every occurrence in nature is an act of creation, that when things become actualized in nature they are not “made ‘directly,’ but only ‘indirectly’.” Finally, “creation places something in the thing created according to relation only; because what is created, is not made by movement, or by change. For what is made by movement or by change is made from something pre-existing. And this happens, indeed, in the particular productions of some beings….” (part I, q. 45, art. 3)
The second example involves Aquinas’s inquiry into the disputed question about whether the world (the cosmos) had a beginning or end. Aquinas was certainly no fundamentalist in the sense in which that term is used today. He explicitly agreed with Augustine’s demythologizing of Genesis 1, rejecting the literal interpretation. In his “Disputed Questions about the Eternity of the World,” he rejected both Aristotle and Averroes (everlasting motion or change) for two very different reasons. Wearing his Christian theologian’s hat, he rejected Aristotle because it was contrary to his faith. But wearing his philosopher’s hat, apart from his religious belief that the world came into being out of nothing by Divine creation, he defended the position that, considering all we know about the universe, we can’t prove either that the world had a beginning or that it didn’t. Thus, time may be either finite or infinite. Philosophically, he kept a completely open mind on the subject. It seems to me that nothing in natural change or movement (including evolution) would have been considered by Aquinas contrary to his Christian faith.
Davis Nelson Legal Philosophy Blog
Posted by: Davis Nelson | Dec 8, 2005 8:43:21 PM
Alkali:
I am no expert either, but it seems to me that the Aristotelian teleological argument (the ‘ends’-based argument to which you refer) is not a necessary reading of St. Thomas. There is, for example, the now extremely famous take on Aquinas by Grisez, Finnis and the “new natural lawyers” that emphasizes so-called self-evident goods and expressly disavows teleology. I fail to see how such a reading would be incompatible with Darwinian evolutionary theory.
This is not to disagree with your interpretation of Sullivan’s comments. I mean to point out only that Sullivan’s statement is itself quite shallow (even for someone who has no deep knowledge in this area…and deep knowledge is required for anyone wishing to make such categorical statements). Thomas (oddly enough) seems to have become a polarizing figure these days.
Posted by: md | Dec 7, 2005 8:38:34 AM
Here is a guess and I am no expert in these matters:
Aquinas follows Aristotle’s doctrine of causes. Aristotle holds that all things, even natural objects, have four causes: (1) a material cause, i.e., the material that makes up an object; (2) a formal cause, which has to do with the idea of an ideal form (e.g., the formal cause of an octave is the ratio two to one, and in general number); (3) an efficient cause, i.e., the one who produces the object, and (4) a final cause, the purpose or end that something is supposed to serve. [Cribbed shamelessly from Wikipedia; if I were a better person I’d remember this stuff.]
The idea of a final cause is particularly important for Aquinas because it gives rise to all sorts of propositions about natural law and in particular sexuality.
Darwin’s theory of evolution and descent are foursquare at odds with the idea that natural objects — even human beings — can be said to have final causes.
Posted by: alkali | Dec 6, 2005 4:48:26 PM