Comments on Wilber criticism

From when I've debated this with people before, there's a couple of points I'd begin with:

Some think that "creationism" is exactly the same as "fundamentalist" and "irrational". That's not actually true as best as I can understand it.

The NASA scientist who designed the instrument that orbits the Earth measuring global temperatures is a creationist (if you read what he says on the subject). But you'd have to imagine he completely switches off his brain when thinking about life, and turns it back on again when thinking about space satellites. I don't think that's the case. I think he's a rational person and he is thinking rationally about "creation" as well as "space satellites". Space satellites don't work because you'd really like to believe -- they work because you get the hard science and engineering right. 

So there are "creationists" who are rational. This is a very hard point for some people to accept. Many believe that "creationism" means "irrational". 

But how come? Well, the science of evolution generally maintains that life evolved with a couple of things:

a) there were random mutations, and

b) the mutations that happened to suit their environment are the ones that survived, and

c) given enough time, the process evolved up into complex life forms. 

That's what that critic says Wilber doesn't understand. But actually, I think Wilber just doesn't bother to spell it all out -- remember that Wilber was a biochemistry student, and good enough that he could tutor other people for cash.

Points a., b., and c. are what most people who know about evolution understand it to be. I've argued with people who are anti-creationism, and they accept that these three points I've spelled out here are indeed what "evolution" is all about. The trouble is they were taught it in science class and science culture tends to maintain that you accept what you're taught. 

The big argument with evolution as I see is that there isn't enough time. It fails at point c. The universe is not old enough for the process to have randomly mutated and selected naturally all the way on up to give the life we see today. Some people estimate that the universe is simply not old enough to have even created simple celled life, never mind walking apes. 

That is the big problem with evolution -- it rationally doesn't make sense. And this is why people, like that NASA scientist, say they are "creationists" -- they read the theory, and they figure, hm, this doesn't make sense. 

Now the big problem is, this theory is mostly made by observation after the fact, in the sense that, we are supposed to believe that the universe could have evolved this quickly. We can't create a new universe and watch how quickly it evolves using just the laws of natural selection. So it kinda comes down to a matter of belief -- some people choose to believe evolution by natural selection, and certainly there is a lot of evidence that fits the theory, but the big issue is that some think they ignore the questions around whether there really was enough time. 

In a slightly disingenuous way, that critic is saying that Wilber doesn't understand that given enough time, natural selection will create the life we see. But that ignores the actual point, which is that there hasn't been enough time, therefore evolution by natural selection should fail as a theory.

Now so far, notice I haven't said anything about God or spirits or any of that. All we're saying is that maybe just maybe the theory of natural selection is not an adequate scientific theory, and that one day it might be replaced by a better scientific theory. 

Unfortunately, many people also refuse natural selection for fundamentalist religious reasons, so there's a war between fundamentalist irrational religious people, and rational scientists. But that's very polarising. There are also rational people who simply question the theory, because they find it unconvincing. You can be an atheist and question evolution. 

There were some experiments I gather by a scientist who was trying to demonstrate natural selection in flies. He bombarded flies with radiation in order to create mutations in their DNA. This worked, and soon the flies were being born with deformities. Now natural selection would maintain that some of these deformities would be more advantageous and so would survive. Unfortunately, none of the mutations seemed to be advantageous. So that's inconsistent with evolutionary theory. But worse, after a few more generations, after the scientist stopped bombarding them with radiation, the mutated flies' offspring REVERTED back to being normal flies. The DNA had been repaired by a mechanism inside the cell. There are things which scan the DNA and REPAIR mistakes. So not only did NO advantageous mutations appear, but what mutations did appear were soon repaired and they returned to being flies. The experimented said that this was a huge problem for the theory of natural selection -- not only do things have to mutate, but they have to somehow mutate whilst overcoming the mechanism that usually repairs the DNA! 

In short, such experiments may become more widespread in future and the theory of natural selection may not last long in its current form. So yeah, there are "creationists" but a number of them are quite rational.

As I say, there's no need to invoke God or grand Designer, because when you're looking at objective phenomena, you want to look at the stuff and just understand what causes what. If natural selection is not enough to explain it, then there needs to be another mechanism, which we haven't detected. Wilber calls it a "force" but that's a word that could mean anything. Gravity is a force and it just exists, end of story. If there is some sort of force that organises matter, or that links matter, towards greater complexity, then that's also something that "just exists". 

The science of evolution often seems to get used as a way to convince people to stop being religious, and that's just a confusion of quadrants -- nothing objective can prove or disprove that sort of God. 

Hey Tayha,

I think what's going on here is a little bit of miscommunication. They're both talking over each other's heads. Wilber has been critiqued very thoroughly, and widely, for his poor articulation of evolutionary theory. It may not be the case that Wilber doesn't understand the basics of natural selection, only that he doesn't care to explain himself. Either way, it's getting him bad press.

The language he uses, particularly "drops," etc. strangely do not reflect the research he claims to have done. He should have, in his arsenal, plenty of language capable of holding a space with mainstream science, including the autopoeitic work of Varela and Maturana, as well as the biologist Lynn Margulis on symbiotic evolution. It confuses me why Wilber chooses to use the antagonistic language he does. I wonder sometimes how much Wilber has actually soaked up from these new life sciences on one hand, while not utilizing their critiques of neo-darwinism and other descriptors. He'd make a lot more sense. My guess is he hasn't internalized these somehow, or has gotten his own ideas from them and applied them where he sees fit.

PS: For another thread on Wilber criticisms, check out the post on Bald Ambition.

PPS: Here's another critical look on Wilber's understanding of evolutionary science.