Sunday, January 31, 2021

Evolutionary Reductionism: Survival Is Not The Height Of Existence

Macro-evolution and macro-evolution do not contradict theism in any way, even though they do contradict some specific forms of religious theism.  In either case, non-theistic evolutionists tend to describe mere survival as if it is some grand expression of human accomplishment, something to be celebrated.  There remains nothing existentially special about the survival of humanity for its own sake.  One form of reductionism treats all human endeavors as if they all reduce down to the pursuit of survival itself first and foremost, with all activities being important or trivial based upon how they further or hinder this goal.  Not only is this an unsound philosophy in its own right in that survival does not encompass all of human nature and experience, but it is also primarily asserted in a non-theistic contexts.

Survival itself is meaningless without a theistic grounding for objective meaning.  Now, this does not mean that meaning exists regardless of the divine mind's nature and existence, but that it has nothing to do with human perceptions or preferences if it does exist.  Even God's existence does not logically guarantee that meaning exists, but it is the only metaphysical anchor for values.  In either case, survival for its own sake is one of the shallowest, most pointless things one could ever pursue.  If no deity existed, there could be nothing "meaningful" about survival at all, and even the logically necessary existence of the uncaused cause only proves that objective meaning could exist beyond the fact that such a thing is logically possible in the first place.

Again, there is nothing inherently meaningful about the survival of any species, as only matters of truth and morality could make the existence of even humankind meaningful.  Survival for its own sake is still a superficial concern at best.  The aforementioned misrepresentation of basic evolutionary science (with history, phenomenological psychology, and linguistics being separate from science as it is) is irrelevant to existential matters in an ultimate sense because meaning pertains to metaphysics and values, not to scientific observations of physical objects and creatures.  Any science-oriented framework of values, one that emphasizes survival as the ultimate purpose or meaning of life (and the two are very distinct [1]) is conceptually invalid and incomplete, and therefore shallow.

The struggle to survive in difficult circumstances might still certainly involve deep effort and emotion even if a person's worldview and priorities are shallow; I do not mean to say that there is or can be no depth behind survival alone.  It simply remains true that there is nothing existentially significant about mere survival.  So what if a creature gets to have a longer lifespan or reproduce?  Why pursue life at all apart from an embrace of whatever aspects of objective reality one can discover?  Any philosophy that elevates survival over truth--which evolutionary science does not do in and of itself--undermines itself due to relying on truth for its own significance in the first place!

Whether macro-evolution happened in the past, which is ultimately unknowable and therefore uncertain just like all other events between the coming into existence of the universe and the present moment, the survival of any species that has ever lived is not of automatic existential value.  The continuation of the human race is only of significance if certain objective values exist from which it follows that human life has meaning (at least if lived in a specific way), and objective values cannot exist without a deity to serve as a metaphysical anchor for them.  If survival matters in any way beyond an insignificant, subjective sense of appreciation shared only by some humans, it is only if a certain type of deity exists.


[1].  https://thechristianrationalist.blogspot.com/2017/06/purpose-and-meaning-distinct-concepts.html

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