Mita Lakhia

Lamarck…

“The moral universe is dominated by politics and jurisprudence – it is the universe of Rousseau”¹ – not God alone.

Because I, Jean-Baptise Lamarck, agree with this statement, I affirm today’s resolution. I stand firmly resolved that:

Evolutionary theory and a spiritual approach to nature are incompatible.

Jean-Baptise Lamarck ⁱ

Before I begin presenting my arguments, I would like to take a moment and examine the resolution in the context of today’s society. As an early leader in the field of evolutionary theory, many great scientists have followed my initial findings. Charles Darwin, Stephen Jay Gould, and Niles Eldredge have separated spirituality, or “religion,” from science, or “evolution,” to a greater extent than I initially suspected would occur. As a scientist and as a Deist, I had difficulty choosing a side in this resolution, but I eventually chose to affirm due to one specific reason – the true meaning of “spiritual approach.” A deist can be defined as someone who believes in the existence of a God or supreme being but denies revealed religion, basing his or her belief on the light of nature and reason. The difference between deists and atheists is that deists still very much believe that there is a God, whereas atheists do not. Because a deist accepts god he is more apt to see the relationship between science and religion. The connotation of “spiritual approach” in the modern world is linked to the theory of intelligent design, which I firmly oppose. Please note, while I believe in spirituality and in God, I strongly stand for the separation between science and faith. To believe in science is not to disregard spirituality, but rather to see the constraints and limitations of both doctrines. Today, we are constantly using scientific reasoning to question and test every aspect of the world around us. Due to the ever updating results of our inquisitive nature the world will never be static again.

Stephen Jay Gouldⁱⁱⁱ

Charles Darwin ⁱⁱ

Niles Eldredge ^iv

I would now like to offer the following three arguments to support my position:

First, in most cases the spiritual approach to nature is equivalent to Christianity’s creationism and “intelligent design” theories.

Secondly, evolution has a strong and tangible foundation.

And lastly, you must know nature to understand evolution, but God is not the link in between the two.

Returning to my first point, in most cases the spiritual approach to nature is equivalent to Christianity’s creationism and “intelligent design” theories. In fact, “the modern debate over intelligent design -- largely an American phenomenon -- is really about neither science nor religion, but the American constitution, which has kept religion out of schools.”² The reason for this burst of idealism and the development of a new so-called scientific explanation is not due to the sudden mixture of religion and knowledge, but rather the upgrade to “Creationism 2.0.”³ Intelligent design is nothing more than a revamped way to attempt to merge Christianity into public schools. I know this may sound appalling to many of you, but growing up as a non Christian I find it easy to see the ways people can be overlooked. The advocates of such a theory are playing with fire as they attempt to mix two polar opposites. Religion has its place, but it is not to be confused within the realm of science. “Creationism is a sectarian religious viewpoint, and intelligent design is a sectarian religious viewpoint…It is not fair to privilege one religious viewpoint by calling it the other side of evolution.”⁴ The world today is no longer separated into a few main religions. Walking into any classroom you are bound to find students who are Christian, Jewish, Islamic, and Hindu. You will also find people who are Jain, Seekh, Taoist, and many other religions. In most cases, however, that is precisely what is being done when people take a spiritual look toward nature. Tomorrow

In the time and place which I lived, the world approached such delicate topics from a different standpoint. France in the late 1700s and early 1800s was quite different from an English university in 2006. The 2001 census reported that 71.6% of the United Kingdom practiced Christianity.⁵ While that is a vast majority, the other 28.4% too deserve equal representation and are justly given it when evolution is not blended with spirituality. Oxford University stands for progress, which can only be achieved through impartiality in education; therefore it is vital that we work to solidify the line between faith and science. In 1860 when Thomas Huxley and Samuel Wilberforce stood here in the Oxford Museum of Natural History to discuss evolution, they did not have the facts we have today. I stand before you with the same convictions as Huxley, but armed with more evidence than he would have ever dreamed possible. Science is an ever changing process, and in Huxley’s time this concept was far more difficult to grasp. The late 1700s and early 1800s marked a time period where science was based on instinct rather than facts, and thus people found it by far harder to agree with everything they were told.

Oxford Museum of Natural History ^vi

Oxford University ^v

That brings me to my second contention, that evolution has a strong and tangible foundation. In 1861, the year after the first great debate, Darwin so praised my works: I “was the first man whose conclusions on the subject excited much attention. [I] first did the eminent service of arousing attention to the probability of all changes in the organic, as well as in the inorganic world, being the result of law, and not of miraculous interposition.”⁶ While that is quite a bit to live up to, I must agree with the end of his statement. Changes are a result of law, and there is quite frankly nothing miraculous about it. For this point I will take you back in time to my initial findings. I know it is not experiments which lead us to this discussion today; however, I feel it necessary to define a simplistic example of my initial reactions to illustrate my main point. In 1809 I worked to define the influence of circumstances. As a botanist, my preliminary action was to think of plants, my specialty. Let us use the example of prairie grasses. These particular grasses grow and flourish within a field, but some seeds are transported to a higher elevation. This new habitat is dry, barren, and stony, but some of the seeds are still able to germinate. Those which survive and cope with the different environment differ greatly from the initial grasses and their offspring develop different characteristics than the prairie grass first had. As a result of these circumstances, they change into different shapes and do not resemble the grass from which they originated. ⁷ Thus, one can conclude that they changed, or evolved, into something different. I ask you to then ponder, where do spirituality and God play a role? There is a clear and simple answer to this question – no where. While I do not deny that over the years there has been much tweaking and altering of my first reactions, you must remember that all theories of evolution can trace themselves back to this humbling starting point. Organisms have progressed throughout time, and therefore the link between the past and the present can be best seen through evolution.

The long neck of a giraffe is what helps it survive by reaching higher branches for food ^vii

Giraffes are another key example to illustrate this point. All animals in the wild need skills to survive, or as Darwin would put it, they must stay ahead in the race for “survival of the fittest.” For giraffes, survival requires long necks to reach higher and further to obtain their food. I initially believed that giraffes could pass on their longer necks to their offspring, as good traits, and no longer have short necked giraffes, or bad traits. Darwin expanded upon this idea with his theory of natural selection which proved why and how longer necked giraffes are all that we see today.

And lastly, you must know nature to understand evolution, but God is not the link in between the two concepts. After all, “ . . . time and favorable conditions are the two principal means which nature has employed in giving existence to all her productions. We know that for her time has no limit, and that consequently she always has it at her disposal.”⁸ Nature is a powerful force, but it is one that can still be understood through the works of science and reasoning. A spiritual outlook does not take consider the time aspect of the beauty of nature. Time is a critical element, without which nothing could exist. Take for example the development of education at Oxford. The shift from what was to what now is could not be greater. After all, God did not snap his fingers and “create” human life. Time is necessary for people to progress and only over time did we get to where we are today. Education has started at a specific place, but has grown into something far greater than it initially was. The knowledge and lifestyle that the incoming freshman class will experience will differ immensely from that of the past. Understanding that concept helps increase the understanding of how things evolve. Do remember, God does not change curriculum, people do. While, yes, this is not evolution in the traditional sense, it is a simple example of change over time. There are many elements that go into these changes, but God is not one of them.

Noah’s Arc, according to the Book of Genesis. ^viii

Furthermore, creationism, or intelligent design, can be traced directly to the Book of Genesis and the Flood. The entire story, however, fails to take into account the time and therefore cannot possible be realistic. Time is a property which displays changes in a logical fashion, without it nothing would be comprehendible. Now I do not aim to offend, but rather enlighten, thus I will move straight to the link between time and nature. “To spread knowledge, to know nature at every level, from the cosmos to man, must make for human progress,” and is the goal of mankind.⁹ As we question the progression of life, we reach a deeper understanding of nature as well. Evolution occurs over time, and knowledge of evolution cannot be complete without the immense study of patterns in our surroundings. I began this struggle early in France, but was met with many obstacles. While there were moments where I was supported as a botanist and later as a “curator of invertebrates”¹⁰, I too was ostracized for my beliefs. Napoleon was one of many roadblocks I encountered, because he, like many others, “preferred men whose thoughts threatened neither the Bible nor the ruling classes.”¹¹ There is always strong opposition to proposed changes, especially when they are as groundbreaking as this. I faced these critics head on, the only way I knew how. Darwin and others faced the same opposition as expanded on my initial findings. Darwin’s voyage on the Beagle surveying the coasts of South America and South Africa was one of many important things that led to increase understanding of nature through science¹². Without a proper grasp of his surroundings, Darwin would not have been able to provide such tangible evidence for the evolutionary theory I first proposed and he expanded upon.

The points offered to you today are but an outline of explanations of why this resolution must be upheld. The incompatibilities of a spiritual approach to nature with evolutionary theory by far outweigh any comparisons that can be made. From 1860 to 2006 much has changed regarding the views on creationism vs. evolution. The debate will never conclude, but I hope from my speech you have gained further understanding about the merits of evolution. The Christian based spiritual approach to nature, along with the tangible foundation of evolution and its clear connection to nature can only cause you to affirm this resolution. No one can deny that change is inevitable. What is here today will be different tomorrow, and it is this principle a scientist can never forget.

Word Count: 1792

Footnotes:

1. Madeleine Barthelemy-Madaule, Lamarck the Mythical Precursor (Cambridge: The MIT Press 1882) 11

2. Shankar Vedantam, Eden and Evolution, The Washington Post, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2006/02/03/AR2006020300822_pf.html.

3.Chirs Moony, Inferior Design, The American Prospect,

http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewWeb&articleId=10084

4. Elisabeth Bumiller, Bush Remarks Roil Debate on Teaching of Evolution, The New York Times

5. What Religions are there in the UK, Religions in Britain, http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/questions/religions.html.

6. Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829), http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/history/lamarck.html.

7. H. Lewis McKinny, Lamarck to Darwin: Contributions to Evolutionary Biology 1809-1859 (Lawrence: Coronado Press) 11

8. Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744-1829), http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/history/lamarck.html.

9. Madeleine Barthelemy-Madaule, Lamarck the Mythical Precursor, 11

10. Charles Darwin, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Darwin#Journey_on_the_Beagle.

11. Madeleine Barthelemy-Madaule, Lamarck the Mythical Precursor, 11

12. Charles Darwin, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Darwin#Journey_on_the_Beagle.

i. Jean-Baptiste Lamarck, http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/ridley/image_gallery/Lamarck__Jean_Baptiste_.asp.

ii. Charles Darwin, http://www.victorianweb.org/science/darwin/darwin_beard.gif.

iii. Steven Jay Gould, http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/maths/histstat/people/gould.gif.

iv. Niles Eldredge, http://c250.columbia.edu/images/c250_celebrates/remarkable_columbians/240x240_bio_eldredge.jpg.

v. Oxford, http://www.admissions.ox.ac.uk/colleges/.

vi. Oxford Museum of Natural History, http://www.oum.ox.ac.uk/.

vii. Giraffes, http://anthro.palomar.edu/evolve/images/giraffes.gif.

viii. Noah’s arch, http://www.tretiaks.com/images/products/HF8817Bsm.jpg.