Creation and Evolution

A thorough and stimulating analysis of the relationship between Darwinism and Religion. As a professor of philosophy who is also religious, Goodman brings a balanced but searching critique of arguments on various sides, asking a number of central questions about religious opposition to Darwinism, the way in which the biblical creation narrative should be read, the evidence for evolution by natural selection, contemporary objections to evolution and how evolution can complement theism. The book surveys the backgrounds of today's conflict and offers a thematic treatment of the Biblical creation story as a critique of literalism. It then articulates the history of the case for evolution before considering three lines of critique from Darwin's contemporary Sedgwick, Popper and Intelligent Design. Goodman does not believe that the methodological naturalism of science implies an ontological naturalism, criticising the likes of Dennett on that score. He himself proposes that God works in and through nature and that value is endemic in nature; also that natural selection does not eliminate teleology, which he sees as presumed in Darwin's concept of adaptation. This results in a more nuanced understanding of this contested field.