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Abstract
In this book, Mariusz Tabaczek develops a contemporary, re-imagined proposal of an Aristotelian-Thomistic perspective on theistic evolution. Deeply rooted in classical philosophy and theology, the volume combines careful textual analysis of ancient, medieval, and contemporary literature with innovative, original, and constructive argumentation and modelling. Tabaczek offers a wide-ranging set of arguments on behalf of those who advocate for the relevance of classical philosophical and theological thought in the context of contemporary science and the dialogue between science and religion. Avoiding simplistic answers to complex questions concerning the origin of species, including the human species, his book inspires critical thinking and a systematic approach to all major philosophical presuppositions and both philosophical and theological repercussions of the theory of evolution. Without contradicting or abandoning the letter of the tradition, Tabaczek echoes the spirit of Aristotle's and Aquinas's philosophy and theology, moving them forward to embrace the evolutionary aspect of the contemporary view of reality.
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Working within the framework of Thomistic metaphysics, Mariusz Tabaczek O. P. has developed a version of Catholic theistic evolution that includes speciation, human origins, and the origin of life. He assigns biological evolution to the domain of divine governance rather than that of creatio ex nihilo which only applies to primitive matter and human souls. This article reviews Tabaczek’s work with an emphasis on his argument for the compatibility of hylomorphism and evolutionary change through the eduction of novel substantial forms.
This essay is a critique of a version of progressive creation developed by Michael Chaberek, O. P. He holds that there are exceptions to evolutionary descent due to the supernatural production of "natural species," taxa that allegedly do not have biological ancestry, are theologically identified with biblical kinds, and are metaphysically characterized by distinct substantial forms. Chaberek's assertion that these natural species correspond "roughly" to the Linnaean taxa of biological families contradicts modern scientific conclusions regarding the continuity of evolutionary descent. To illustrate this conflict, I examine some of the extensive evidence for the evolutionary origins of families within the Feliformia sub-order. I conclude that Chaberek's assertion of supernatural progressive creation is a God-of-the-gaps theology burdened by a defensive stance with respect to scientific progress.
This article refers to the debate between proponents of mono-and polygenism. After clearly defining these two positions in reference to the distinction between mono-and polyphyletism, it presents the scientific consensus in favor of polygenism as the default model of speciation. Taking this into account, the remaining part of the article concentrates on the monogenetic model of human speciation. Approaching this topic from the Aristotelian-Thomistic perspective, it delineates the three main theological arguments and one more scientifically grounded contention in favor of monogenism and offers a critical evaluation of Kenneth Kemp's contemporary model of theological monogenism grounded in biological polygenism. While viable, consistent, and remaining in line with the most recent paleoanthropology and human genetics, it needs to be cleared of its voluntaristic and dualistic undertones and reformulated in a way that avoids its implicit assumption of a metaphysically dubious substantial change taking place at the last step of the origin of Homo sapiens.
The phenomenon of life belongs to the most intriguing and puzzling aspects of reality, studied in various divisions of natural science, as well as in philosophy and theology. The purpose of this article is twofold. Firstly, it aims at bringing into the rich contemporary conversation on the nature, origin, and persistence of life a deeper and more thorough insight coming from the classical Aristotelian-Thomistic philosophy of nature and metaphysics. Secondly, in reference to the theological aspects of the debate, the article presents the two contrasting positions on the necessity of a direct divine intervention in the origin of life and analyzes them from the same Aristotelian-Thomistic perspective.
The opening of the archives for the pontificate of Pius XII makes it possible to see the history of the drafting of the encyclical Humani generis, the first document in which the universal magisterium of the Catholic Church addressed the question of evolution. Although its acknowledgment that the question of the evolutionary origin of the human body was, provisionally, theologically open generated no controversy at the drafting commission, the definitiveness of its reservations about monophyletic polygenism generated a disagreement resolved only by Pope Pius. Three incidents from the early 1950’s reinforce these conclusions about the proper interpretation of the encyclical.
This collection of essays explores the metaphysical thesis that the living world is not ontologically made up of substantial particles or things, as has often been assumed, but is rather constituted by processes. The biological domain is organized as an interdependent hierarchy of processes, which are stabilized and actively maintained at different timescales. Even entities that intuitively appear to be paradigms of things, such as organisms, are actually better understood as processes. Unlike previous attempts to articulate processual views of biology, which have tended to use Alfred North Whitehead’s panpsychist metaphysics as a foundation, this book takes a naturalistic approach to metaphysics. It submits that the main motivations for replacing an ontology of substances with one of processes are to be looked for in the empirical findings of science. Biology provides compelling reasons for thinking that the living realm is fundamentally dynamic and that the existence of things is always conditional on the existence of processes. The phenomenon of life cries out for theories that prioritize processes over things, and it suggests that the central explanandum of biology is not change but rather stability—or, more precisely, stability attained through constant change. This multicontributor volume brings together philosophers of science and metaphysicians interested in exploring the consequences of a processual philosophy of biology. The contributors draw on an extremely wide range of biological case studies and employ a process perspective to cast new light on a number of traditional philosophical problems such as identity, persistence, and individuality.
St. George Jackson Mivart is mostly remembered as a cautionary tale. If Mivart is mentioned at all in modern debates, it is to offer an example of how not to do biology and theology. However, in this paper I argue that, ongoing developments in evolutionary biology have produced genuine alternatives to strict neo-Darwinism that not only seek to downplay the role of natural selection, but do so in ways that are strikingly reminiscent of Mivart’s unpopular theory. Similarly, modern Thomists are also taking an approach to science and religion that mirrors Mivarts own approach.
Many advocates of theistic evolutionism develop an image of God creating within and through evolutionary processes. Defining their position as “evolutionist creationism,” they conceive God as sharing his divine power to create with his creatures. I claim that evolutionary transformations can certainly be thought as particular exemplifications of the concurrence of divine and natural causes. However, because they occur within already existing matter, they should not be conceived as an aspect of divine creation but rather as an important part of divine providential governance and guidance of the created universe toward its end.
This paper focuses on one of the metaphysical problems for theistic evolution which is the problem of evolutionary transition from one specified substantial form to another. According to the evolutionary account, new substantial forms appear owing to accidental changes in previously existing substances. However, the accidental change may only lead to production of new accidents not entirely new distinct substantial forms. The solutions proposed by modern Thomists head in two directions: One is the reduction of the number of substantial forms (species); the other consists of diminishing substantial form altogether. Both proposals stray from classical metaphysics. The evolutionary account of the origin of species ultimately needs to challenge the real existence of species and leads to nominalism. As such it cannot be reconciled with classical metaphysics.
Divine Action and Emergence puts the classical Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition in conversation with current philosophy and theology.
As a middle path between classical theism and pantheism, the panentheistic turn in the twentieth century has been described as a “quiet revolution.” Today, in fact, many theologians hold that the world is “in” God (who, at the same time, is more than the world). Panentheism has been especially influential in the dialogue between theology and the natural sciences. Many have seen panentheism as compatible with emergentism, and thus have brought the two together in developing models of divine action that do not abrogate the regularities of processes of the natural world. In Divine Action and Emergence, Mariusz Tabaczek argues that, as inspiring and intriguing as emergentist panentheism is, it requires deeper examination. He begins by looking at the wonder of emergence (which calls into question the overly reductionist attitude in natural science) and by reflecting philosophically on emergence theory in light of classical and new Aristotelianism. Moving in a theological direction, Tabaczek then offers a critical evaluation of emergentist panentheism and a constructive proposal for how to reinterpret the idea of divine action as inspired by the theory of emergence with reference to the classical Aristotelian-Thomistic understanding of God’s action in the universe.
Through a unique interdisciplinary approach that puts theology and the natural sciences into a dialogue through philosophy, Divine Action and Emergence offers a comprehensive evaluation of panentheism. It then puts forward an original reinterpretation of emergence theory, thus setting forth a constructive proposal for reinterpreting the concept of divine action that is currently espoused by emergence theory. It will appeal to scholars of theology and philosophy, those who work in the area of theology and science, those interested in emergence theory or panentheism, and finally those who are interested in the dialogue between the classical Aristotelian-Thomistic tradition and contemporary philosophy and theology.
As documented in the first installment of this essay (Hofmann 2020b), throughout the first half of the twentieth century, theological conformity to monogenism, the alleged descent of all human beings from Adam and Eve, was closely linked to Catholic doctrines of original sin. Receptivity to polygenism, the more scientifically supported account of human origins through a transitional population, was further discouraged by Pius XII's 1950 encyclical Humani generis. Nevertheless, de facto acceptance of polygen-ism became commonplace following Vatican II. A significant turning point was reached when an effort to have polygenism designated "contrary to Catholic faith" failed to persuade the Council Fathers and the topic was not included in Dei Verbum, the 1965 Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation. In 1968, the presentation of polygenism as a viable theological option in The Supplement to A New Catechism was clear evidence that opposition to polygenism within the Roman Curia had abated. Furthermore, a preponderance of post-Vatican II theological discourse on original sin either marginalized monogenism or retained it in a spiritual rather than a biological sense. The historical record shows that theological commitment to monogenism has been more deeply rooted in doctrines of Catholic tradition than was the case for geostasis. Secondly, again in contrast to geostasis, monogenism has been amenable to nuanced conceptual development, including purely spiritual characterizations. These two historical factors provide some explanation for the longstanding Catholic commitment to monogenism. To the extent that dogmatic convictions premised upon traditional doctrines of original
sin continue to be perceived as both compelling and authoritative, it can be expected
that some form of theological monogenism will also persist.
Speciation in plants and animals can involve differentiation across many genetic regions
The science of evolution acutely raises the perennial question of humankind’s place in the world. How does the theological anthropology of humans as imago Dei relate to an evolutionary anthropology with human beings derived from ancestral hominid species? Evolutionary biologists disclose ever greater similarities and continuity between animals and humans. Is human distinctiveness simply continuous with other ancestral forms of life or is there any kind of discontinuity? The answers to these questions depend not only on zoological considerations but also on one’s philosophy of nature. The standard anthropology within the Catholic Church is the dual-origin model: the human body originates through evolution, but the human soul is directly created by God. This formulation, however, is not without difficulties, primarily for its seeming Cartesian dualism of a body and soul as distinct substances. This paper develops the anthropology of David Braine who, drawing upon Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas, and Ludwig Wittgenstein, clearly situates humans as animals in great continuity with them. However, as linguistic animals who think in a medium of words, humans have a form of life—a soul—that transcends bodily processes. Braine’s anthropology provides a more coherent anthropology to understand the continuity and discontinuity of the human person in phylogenetic relationship to other species within an evolutionary perspective.
Catholic evolutionists have proposed to reconcile evolutionary anthropogenesis with Catholic doctrine by suggesting that a created soul could be infused into a body produced (in part, if not wholly) by evolution from an animal body. Could such an infusion yield not just a Platonic composite but a being with the unity of substance required by a Thomistic philosophy of nature? How could such a soul be the form of the body into which it was infused?This paper suggests that animals seem to have sense-powers with a level of complexity, if not sufficient to underlie the abstraction of concepts in a being that also has a rational soul, then at least nearly so. The burden of proof lies rather on those who think that evolutionary development of such powers is not possible.In its final section, the paper argues that the existence of Eve as a second, and the only additional, initial rational being does not create special problems for the view here articulated.
The principle of proportionate causality is often cited as a cause for concern that Thomistic metaphysics may be irreconcilable with a theory of biological evolution. St. Thomas does hold that for the generation of what he calls perfect animals, a generator of the same species is required. This study clarifies what the proportionate causes of generated organisms are for Thomas, examining his views about spontaneous generation, reproductive generation, and hybridization, while also articulating the roles of both the heavenly bodies and their separate movers as universal causes of generation. This study establishes that Thomas’s assertion of the need for a univocal generator for perfect animals is grounded not in the principle of proportionate causality, but rather in physical and biological doctrines received from Aristotle and in a causal principle that seems reconcilable with biological evolution, namely, that a remote universal cause requires more mediating causes to produce more powerful effects.
In this article I analyse the texts in which Joseph Ratzinger deals with the topic of evolution, particularly in the context of the compatibility between faith in creation and acceptance of the theory of evolution. I have grouped his writings into three periods that reflect the changes in his ideas on this topic. His early writings, until 1979, contain the most elaborate and deepest theological insights, with a defence of the compatibility between faith in creation and the theory of evolution when each one is kept within the boundaries of its own explanatory framework. There is a clear change of attitude at the beginning of the 1980s, when he becomes aware of the attempts by some atheist scientists to portray evolution as a “first philosophy”. This triggers a critical response against some technical aspects of the theory of evolution, a position that was reinforced by his contacts with anti-evolution German intellectuals during this period. The conflict reached its climax in the 1999 lecture at the Sorbonne University and the 2006 meeting of the Schulerkreis in Castel Gandolfo. After 2006 his references to this topic were few, and he seemed to return to the original ideas expressed in his early writings, stressing the intrinsic rationality and inner logic of the cosmos.
Theological attention to the Catholic doctrine of original sin has a history that extends from the letters of Saint Paul through the Council of Trent and Pius XII's 1950 encyclical, Humani generis. The doctrine has traditionally been articulated through the Genesis narrative of Adam and Eve as the first human beings from whom all others descend, an account known as monogenism. In the course of the nineteenth century, scientific research into human origins increasingly invoked polygenism, the descent of humanity from non-human ancestors through a transitional population. Subsequent Catholic engagement with evolution included resistance to polygenism from the Vati-can due to a perceived conflict with the doctrine of original sin. Humani generis included a prohibition that remains in place today in spite of widespread de facto acceptance of polygenism among theologians. Understanding the origin and persistence of this disparity stands to benefit from comparison to a corresponding ambivalence toward the sixteenth century Copernican hypothesis of a moving earth, only conclusively resolved in 1992. In Part I of this essay I introduce this historical comparison and describe the origins of monogenism and polygenism terminology in nineteenth century debate over the unity of the human race. I then describe the conceptual changes that transpired during the first half of the twentieth century and the resulting role of polygenism in the nouvelle théologie of the decade prior to Humani generis. Subsequent developments and implications follow in Part II.
Galileo. Newton. Darwin. These giants are remembered for their great contributions to one of the most important phenomena in world history: science. But what is often forgotten is the profound influence on their lives and works of thatothergreat phenomenon of Western Culture: Christianity. This book, the first volume in theGreenwood Guides to Science and Religion, explores the many ways in which religion—its ideas, attitudes, practices, and institutions—interacted with science from the beginnings of the Scientific Revolution to the end of the 19th century. Infused with the most up-to-date scholarship, the volume is aimed at the nonspecialist audience, explaining in clear language how inextricably linked science and religion have been during most of the last 500 years.
While discussing how science and religion occasionally clashed, this volume also explores thepositiveinteractions these two institutions have experienced during this seminal period in Western history. The Christian Humanism of the 16th century promoted the new, utilitarian approach to natural knowledge that distinguishes Modern from Medieval science. The Jesuits were instrumental in the development of the experimental and mathematical sciences during the Scientific Revolution. In the 17th century, the English Puritans advocated alchemical science and their opponents, liberal Anglicans, promoted a new, mechanistic approach to the sciences. The geological advances of the 19th century were often religiously motivated; the discoveries of biblical criticism of the same period were inspired by the science of the day. This volume includes a selection of primary source documents to help readers understand the arguments and beliefs of the people of the time, and an annotated bibliography to assist readers in finding further information on the topics.
This fresh collection of essays, drawn from a broad range of disciplines, brings neglected cognitive, anthropological, and historical dimensions to philosophical debates over species.
The concept of species has played a central role in both evolutionary biology and the philosophy of biology, and has been the focus of a number of books in recent years. This book differs from other recent collections in two ways. It is more explicitly integrative and analytical, centering on issues of general significance such as pluralism and realism about species. It also draws on a broader range of disciplines and brings neglected cognitive, anthropological, and historical dimensions to philosophical debates over species.
The chapters are organized around five themes: unity, integration, and pluralism; species realism; historical dimensions; cognitive underpinnings; and practical import. The contributors include prominent researchers from anthropology, botany, developmental psychology, the philosophy of biology and science, protozoology, and zoology.
Contributors: Scott Atran, Richard Boyd, Kevin de Queiroz, John Dupré, Marc Ereshefsky, Paul E. Griffiths, David L. Hull, Frank C. Keil, Brent D. Mishler, David L. Nanney, Daniel C. Richardson, Kim Sterelny, Robert A. Wilson
Bradford Books imprint
In Genes, Categories and Species, Jody Hey provides an enlightening new solution to one of biology’s most ironic and perplexing puzzles. When Darwin showed that life evolves, and that it does so by natural selection, he transformed our understanding of living things. But the very question Darwin addressed-the nature of species-continues to pose an awkward conundrum for biologists. Despite enormous efforts by a great many scholars, biologists still cannot agree on how to identify species or even how to define the word “species.” Genes, Categories, and Species is not like other books on the species problem, for it does not begin by asking, “What is a species?” Instead, it focuses on the very fact that biologists are stumped by species and their curious behavior in coping with that uncertainty. Faced with a persistent conundrum-and no lack of data on the subject-biologists who ponder the species problem have ceased to ask the most essential of scientific questions: “What new information do we need to resolve the problem?” This is the question that motivates this book and leads to the discoveries it reveals. The answer to the species problem lies not with the processes and patterns of biological diversity, Hey contends, but rather in the way the human mind perceives and categorizes that diversity. The promise of this book is twofold. First, it allows biologists to understand the causes of the species problem and to use this knowledge to avoid the major confusions that arise over species. Second, with its explanation of the species problem, it gives scholars and students of human nature a humbling example of how ill-suited the human mind is for certain kinds of scientific questions.
Chapter six speaks against the popular image, commonly accepted within the circles of contemporary advocates of theistic evolutionism, of God creating within and through evolutionary processes, thus sharing his creative power with his creatures. The criticism of this idea is followed by a constructive argument that we should classify evolutionary changes and newly emerged species as an integral aspect of divine governance rather than divine creation, which for Aquinas means but one thing or action – i.e., bringing things into existence ex nihilo, and not through transformation of already existing matter.
The doctrine of providence, which states that God guides his creation, has been widely conceived in action terms in recent theological scholarship. A telling example is the so-called divine action debate, which is largely based on two principles: (i) providence is best conceptualised in terms of divine action; and (ii) divine action is best modelled on human action. By examining this debate, and especially the Divine Action Project (1988–2003), which led to the ‘scientific turn’ of the debate, this book argues that theo-physical incompatibilism, as a corollary of this ‘framing’ of providence, can be identified as a main reason for the current deadlock in divine action theories—namely, the assumption that just as human (libertarian) free action presupposes causal indeterminism, so, too, does divine action in the world presuppose causal indeterminism. Instead of recalibrating the much-discussed non-interventionist objective divine action (NIODA) approaches, this book advocates a ‘reframing’ of providence in terms of the virtue of prudence. To this end, this book examines the ‘prudential-ordinative’ theory of Thomas Aquinas and contrasts it with the prevalent ‘actionistic’, or action-based, model of providence. In this process, the book discusses, among other topics, the doctrine of divine transcendence, primary and secondary causation, natural necessity and contingency, and teleology as essential features of this ‘prudential-ordinative’ theory. How these two approaches fare when applied to the question of biological evolution is the subject of the final part of this book, which revisits the controversy between Stephen Jay Gould and Simon Conway Morris over what would happen if one were to rerun the tape of life.
Aristotle's biological works - constituting over 25% of his surviving corpus and for centuries largely unstudied by philosophically oriented scholars - have been the subject of an increasing amount of attention of late. This collection brings together some of the best work that has been done in this area, with the aim of exhibiting the contribution that close study of these treatises can make to the understanding of Aristotle's philosophy. The book is divided into four parts, each with an introduction which places its essays in relation to each other and to the wider issues of the book as a whole. The first part is an overview of the relationship of Aristotle's biology to his philosophy; the other three each concentrate on a set of issues central to Aristotelian study - definition and demonstration; teleology and necessity in nature; and metaph themes such as the unity of matter and form and the nature of substance.
In this innovative book, Gloria Frost reconstructs and analyses Aquinas's theories on efficient causation and causal powers, focusing specifically on natural causal powers and efficient causation in nature. Frost presents each element of Aquinas's theories one by one, comparing them with other theories, as well as examining the philosophical and interpretive ambiguities in Aquinas's thought and proposing fresh solutions to conceptual difficulties. Her discussion includes explanations of Aquinas's technical scholastic terminology in jargon-free prose, as well as background on medieval scientific views - including ordinary language explanations of the medieval physical theories which Aquinas assumed in formulating his views on causation and causal powers. The resulting volume is a rich exploration of a central philosophical topic in medieval philosophy and beyond, and will be valuable especially for scholars and advanced students working on Aquinas and on medieval natural philosophy.
William Paley (1743–1805) argues for the existence of God as the intelligent creator of the world in this, his last book, published in 1802. He builds on early modern natural theology including the works of John Ray, William Derham, and Bernard Nieuwentyt, and most of his examples are taken from medicine and natural history. Paley uses analogy and metaphors, including a particularly well-written version of the 'watchmaker analogy', to prove that the world is designed and sustained by God. This sixth edition also contains a detailed bibliography, appendices on Paley's courses, and background notes on key figures. It was an influential best-seller throughout the nineteenth century, read by theologians and scientists alike, and reprinted in cheap editions for the middle classes. It inspired many nineteenth-century works on natural theology, including the Bridgewater Treatises (which also appear in this series), and is a landmark of Western thought.
Aristotle's voluminous writings on animals have often been marginalised in the history of philosophy. Providing the first full-length comprehensive account of Aristotle's biology, its background, content and influence, this Companion situates his study of living nature within his broader philosophy and theology and differentiates it from other medical and philosophical theories. An overview of empiricism in Aristotle's Historia Animalium is followed by an account of the general methodology recommended in the Parts of Animals. An account of the importance of Aristotle's teleological perspective and the fundamental metaphysics of biological entities provides a basis for understanding living capacities, such as nutrition, reproduction, perception and self-motion, in his philosophy. The importance of Aristotle's zoology to both his ethics and political philosophy is highlighted. The volume explores in detail the changing interpretations and influences of Aristotle's biological works from antiquity to modern philosophy of science. It is essential for both students and scholars.
This open access textbook leads the reader from basic concepts of chromatin structure and function and RNA mechanisms to the understanding of epigenetics, imprinting, regeneration and reprogramming. The textbook treats epigenetic phenomena in animals, as well as plants. Written by four internationally known experts and senior lecturers in this field, it provides a valuable tool for Master- and PhD- students who need to comprehend the principles of epigenetics, or wish to gain a deeper knowledge in this field.
After reading this book, the student will:
Have an understanding of the basic toolbox of epigenetic regulation
Know how genetic and epigenetic information layers are interconnected
Be able to explain complex epigenetic phenomena by understanding the structures and principles of the underlying molecular mechanisms
Understand how misregulated epigenetic mechanisms can lead to disease
As there is currently a neo-Aristotelian revival currently taking place within contemporary metaphysics and dispositions, or causal powers are now being routinely utilised in theories of causality and modality, more attention is beginning to be paid to a central Aristotelian concern: the metaphysics of substantial unity, and the doctrine of hylomorphism. In this paper, I distinguish two strands of hylomorphism present in the contemporary literature and argue that not only does each engender unique conceptual difficulties, but neither adequately captures the metaphysics of Aristotelian hylomorphism. Thus both strands of contemporary hylomorphism, I argue, fundamentally misunderstand what substantial unity amounts to in the hylomorphic framework – namely, the metaphysical inseparability of matter and form.
First monograph addressing the problem of the suffering of non-human animals in evolution
Introduction
The nature of the following work will be best understood by a brief account of how it came to be written. During many years I collected notes on the origin or descent of man, without any intention of publishing on the subject, but...
The first comprehensive synthesis on development and evolution: it applies to all aspects of development, at all levels of organization and in all organisms, taking advantage of modern findings on behavior, genetics, endocrinology, molecular biology, evolutionary theory and phylogenetics to show the connections between developmental mechanisms and evolutionary change. This book solves key problems that have impeded a definitive synthesis in the past. It uses new concepts and specific examples to show how to relate environmentally sensitive development to the genetic theory of adaptive evolution and to explain major patterns of change. In this book development includes not only embryology and the ontogeny of morphology, sometimes portrayed inadequately as governed by "regulatory genes," but also behavioral development and physiological adaptation, where plasticity is mediated by genetically complex mechanisms like hormones and learning. The book shows how the universal qualities of phenotypes--modular organization and plasticity--facilitate both integration and change. Here you will learn why it is wrong to describe organisms as genetically programmed; why environmental induction is likely to be more important in evolution than random mutation; and why it is crucial to consider both selection and developmental mechanism in explanations of adaptive evolution. This book satisfies the need for a truly general book on development, plasticity and evolution that applies to living organisms in all of their life stages and environments. Using an immense compendium of examples on many kinds of organisms, from viruses and bacteria to higher plants and animals, it shows how the phenotype is reorganized during evolution to produce novelties, and how alternative phenotypes occupy a pivotal role as a phase of evolution that fosters diversification and speeds change. The arguments of this book call for a new view of the major themes of evolutionary biology, as shown in chapters on gradualism, homology, environmental induction, speciation, radiation, macroevolution, punctuation, and the maintenance of sex. No other treatment of development and evolution since Darwin's offers such a comprehensive and critical discussion of the relevant issues. Developmental Plasticity and Evolution is designed for biologists interested in the development and evolution of behavior, life-history patterns, ecology, physiology, morphology and speciation. It will also appeal to evolutionary paleontologists, anthropologists, psychologists, and teachers of general biology.
Divine Action and Modern Science considers the relationship between the natural sciences and the concept of God acting in the world. Nicholas Saunders examines the Biblical motivations for asserting a continuing notion of divine action and identifies several different theological approaches to the problem. He considers their theoretical relationships with the laws of nature, indeterminism, and probabilistic causation. His book then embarks on a radical critique of current attempts to reconcile special divine action with quantum theory, chaos theory and quantum chaos. As well as considering the implications of these problems for common interpretations of divine action, Saunders also surveys and codifies the many different theological, philosophical and scientific responses to divine action. The conclusion reached is that we are still far from a satisfactory account of how God might act in a manner that is consonant with modern science despite the copious recent scholarship in this area.