Sandro Magister, Professor Rhonheimer Writes. And the Holy Office Agrees
Exclusive to www.chiesa, an open letter by the Swiss philosopher in defense of the "understanding and farsighted vision" of Benedict XVI on sexual morality. And to follow, the note released the same day by the congregation for the doctrine of the faith

Is it impossible for God to allow for the generation of a hominid monster, one that resembles a human being but without a rational soul, and not only that, without any self-restraint. "Mad" it would be called, like a "mad" dog. Ferocious and quick to use violence to get what it wants?

A reader over at The Thinking Housewife links to this article: US scientists create mice from two fathers

"Bonald" comments (link via the Western Confucian) on the same article by Stephen Barr which I wrote on here: "The example he gives is the band structure in metals. This is certainly formal, although metals don’t have the intrinsic teleology or indivisible unity of biological substantial forms. What we need is a sort of weaker idea of form for this lower order of being, one without teleology."

Is a pure body of water, or a metal lattice a substance? Or just a group of individuals? Or something in between?  Associations other than substantial unities have form, but it is an accidental form, not a substantial form. But an accidental form will have some sort of teleology. But it should also be said that discerning the end of something can be difficult for us, especially if we are trying to determine remote ends rather than proximate ends. But I do not think that is the problem we have with electronic band structure, since we are looking at potencies and actualities of parts of a whole. How much can a part be actualized before it is no longer a part of that whole? It seems to me that electronic band structure is just the quantification of those actualities. (James Chastek has this relevant post: Quantitative and logical parts.)

Zenit: Doctrinal Congregation's Note on Light of the World

DOCTRINAL CONGREGATION'S NOTE ON "LIGHT OF THE WORLD"


"The Thought of the Pope Has Been Repeatedly Manipulated"

VATICAN CITY, DEC. 21, 2010 (Zenit.org).- Here is the note released today by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith "On the Trivialization of Sexuality: Regarding Certain Interpretations of 'Light of the World.'"

* * *

Following the publication of the interview-book Light of the World by Benedict XVI, a number of erroneous interpretations have emerged which have caused confusion concerning the position of the Catholic Church regarding certain questions of sexual morality. The thought of the Pope has been repeatedly manipulated for ends and interests which are entirely foreign to the meaning of his words -- a meaning which is evident to anyone who reads the entire chapters in which human sexuality is treated. The intention of the Holy Father is clear: To rediscover the beauty of the divine gift of human sexuality and, in this way, to avoid the cheapening of sexuality which is common today.

Some interpretations have presented the words of the Pope as a contradiction of the traditional moral teaching of the Church. This hypothesis has been welcomed by some as a positive change and lamented by others as a cause of concern – as if his statements represented a break with the doctrine concerning contraception and with the Church’s stance in the fight against AIDS. In reality, the words of the Pope -- which specifically concern a gravely disordered type of human behaviour, namely prostitution (cf. "Light of the World," pp. 117-119) -- do not signify a change in Catholic moral teaching or in the pastoral practice of the Church.

As is clear from an attentive reading of the pages in question, the Holy Father was talking neither about conjugal morality nor about the moral norm concerning contraception. This norm belongs to the tradition of the Church and was summarized succinctly by Pope Paul VI in paragraph 14 of his encyclical letter "Humanae Vitae," when he wrote that "also to be excluded is any action which either before, at the moment of, or after sexual intercourse, is specifically intended to prevent procreation -- whether as an end or as a means." The idea that anyone could deduce from the words of Benedict XVI that it is somehow legitimate, in certain situations, to use condoms to avoid an unwanted pregnancy is completely arbitrary and is in no way justified either by his words or in his thought. On this issue the Pope proposes instead – and also calls the pastors of the Church to propose more often and more effectively (cf. "Light of the World," p. 147) -- humanly and ethically acceptable ways of behaving which respect the inseparable connection between the unitive and procreative meaning of every conjugal act, through the possible use of natural family planning in view of responsible procreation.

On the pages in question, the Holy Father refers to the completely different case of prostitution, a type of behaviour which Christian morality has always considered gravely immoral (cf. Vatican II, Pastoral Constitution "Gaudium et spes," No. 27; Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2355). The response of the entire Christian tradition – and indeed not only of the Christian tradition – to the practice of prostitution can be summed up in the words of St. Paul: "Flee from fornication" (1 Cor 6:18). The practice of prostitution should be shunned, and it is the duty of the agencies of the Church, of civil society and of the State to do all they can to liberate those involved from this practice.

In this regard, it must be noted that the situation created by the spread of AIDS in many areas of the world has made the problem of prostitution even more serious. Those who know themselves to be infected with HIV and who therefore run the risk of infecting others, apart from committing a sin against the sixth commandment are also committing a sin against the fifth commandment – because they are consciously putting the lives of others at risk through behaviour which has repercussions on public health. In this situation, the Holy Father clearly affirms that the provision of condoms does not constitute "the real or moral solution" to the problem of AIDS and also that "the sheer fixation on the condom implies a banalization of sexuality" in that it refuses to address the mistaken human behaviour which is the root cause of the spread of the virus. In this context, however, it cannot be denied that anyone who uses a condom in order to diminish the risk posed to another person is intending to reduce the evil connected with his or her immoral activity. In this sense the Holy Father points out that the use of a condom "with the intention of reducing the risk of infection, can be a first step in a movement towards a different way, a more human way, of living sexuality." This affirmation is clearly compatible with the Holy Father’s previous statement that this is "not really the way to deal with the evil of HIV infection."

Some commentators have interpreted the words of Benedict XVI according to the so-called theory of the "lesser evil." This theory is, however, susceptible to proportionalistic misinterpretation (cf. John Paul II, Encyclical Letter "Veritatis splendor," No. 75-77). An action which is objectively evil, even if a lesser evil, can never be licitly willed. The Holy Father did not say – as some people have claimed – that prostitution with the use of a condom can be chosen as a lesser evil. The Church teaches that prostitution is immoral and should be shunned. However, those involved in prostitution who are HIV positive and who seek to diminish the risk of contagion by the use of a condom may be taking the first step in respecting the life of another – even if the evil of prostitution remains in all its gravity. This understanding is in full conformity with the moral theological tradition of the Church.

In conclusion, in the battle against AIDS, the Catholic faithful and the agencies of the Catholic Church should be close to those affected, should care for the sick and should encourage all people to live abstinence before and fidelity within marriage. In this regard it is also important to condemn any behaviour which cheapens sexuality because, as the Pope says, such behaviour is the reason why so many people no longer see in sexuality an expression of their love: "This is why the fight against the banalization of sexuality is also part of the struggle to ensure that sexuality is treated as a positive value and to enable it to have a positive effect on the whole of man’s being" ("Light of the World," p. 119).

Fr. Romanus Cessario, O.P.

Fr. Romanus Cessario, O.P. from Province of Saint Joseph on Vimeo.

Debate between Michael Behe and Stephen Barr

For ISI: Should Intelligent Design Be Taught as Science? mp3

Stephen M. Barr
Professor of Physics, University of Delaware

Michael Behe
Professor of Biochemistry, Lehigh University and Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute

Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL
4/7/2010

First Things: The Ruins of Discontinuity
Looking for answers to the fragmentation of Catholic theology in America.
Reinhard Hütter

Dominican Daily:
Saint Joseph "the man of dreams"
A homily by Fr. Jean-Pierre Torrell, O.P.

The Virtue of Justice
Archbishop DiNoia to Preach on Feast of St. Thomas

What's Your Calling?

NLM: FFI Roman Conference Analyzes Second Vatican Council, Rupture and Continuity

blip.tv: Discussion on Pope Benedict XVI's address in Westminster Hall during his visit to the UK. By some of the Dominican Students of the Irish Province of the Dominican Order

Chiesa: Sexual Ethics. Six Professors Discuss the Ratzinger Case
Luke Gormally, of the Pontifical Academy for Life, replies to Martin Rhonheimer, of the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross. Then two Italian Catholic philosophers. And an Argentinian. And George Weigel... All started by something the pope said

Kreeft v. Spencer on Islam

Thomas More College
Lisa Graas
Patrick Madrid: Peter Kreeft and Robert Spencer Debate the merits and demerits of Islam

Stephen Barr on science and metaphysics

Stephen Barr, The Symbiosis of Science and Metaphysics (via Joe Carter).

The arrogance of scientists lecturing to philosophers on how they should do philosophy? That is what I thoght at first, especially when Naturally, John Farrell expressed his appreciation at First Things, especially of the closing:

In short, Aristotelian/Thomistic philosophy has paid a heavy price for the two and a half centuries in which it largely ignored what was going on in the natural sciences. A sustained re-engagement with science would enrich its conceptual and linguistic resources. This re-engagement cannot simply be an attempt to translate statements of modern science into existing Aristotelian terms. That cannot be done in many cases. Rather, many more Aristotelian/ Thomistic metaphysicians than currently do must learn to listen to and understand science in its own native tongue.

But then I went ahead and read the rest of the essay.

Beyond directly theological issues, does modern physics have anything to say to metaphysics, and therefore indirectly to theology? Some might argue not, on the grounds that metaphysics speaks about such general features of reality - of being as being - that it cannot be affected by discoveries of particular contingent facts about the world. And yet, Aristotelian metaphysics, which has such an important place in Catholic thought, was not conceived in isolation from scientific investigation. Aristotle was himself a great scientist and both his metaphysics and science make use of the same technical apparatus of form, matter, substance, accident, potency, act, and so on. Indeed, it was largely as a theory of nature that Aristotelianism first commended itself to medieval Christian thinkers.


It is a great problem that traditional Aristotelian/Thomistic metaphysics and modern science no longer speak the same language, as they did in the Middle Ages. Indeed, there are many terms and concepts in the language of each that are now almost untranslatable into the language of the other. Some argue that this is the fault of modern science, which restricted its attention to a limited range of questions having to do with the merely quantitative aspects of things and with efficient and material causes at the expense of formal and final causes. While there is some truth in this, it is only a part of the story. The language of Aristotelian/Thomistic metaphysics has changed very little since the advent of modern science and its vocabulary seems from a scientific perspective quite stilted and awkward for many purposes.


Physics has had enormous success in explaining why things happen as they do in the natural world, but its modes of explanation do not fit neatly into the four-fold classification of material, formal, efficient, and final causes. For example, when physicists explain the electrical conductivity of metals in terms of the "band structure" of the energy levels of the electrons in a crystal lattice of atoms, to which of the four causes does that correspond? As this example illustrates, explanation in modern physics is almost entirely in terms of mathematical structure and involves an enormously rich set of ideas about form. The fact that modern science is nonetheless typically accused by Aristotelian/Thomistic metaphysicians of neglecting "formal cause" shows that they are working with a different notion of form than are contemporary physicists and mathematicians. In Aristotelian/Thomistic philosophy, the ideas of formal causation and substantial form have a teleological thrust that is largely missing from the physicist's conception of form, which corresponds more to Lonergan's broader idea of form as "intelligible structure".


Another example of a linguistic/conceptual difference between Aristotelian thought and modern science is that the former usually envisions the action of one thing upon another (for example fire heating iron), whereas in modern physics the physical world is explained in terms of mutual "interactions". A third example is that the notions of "species" in Aristotelian philosophy and modern biology are not compatible. Aristotelian species are what mathematicians call "equivalence classes", so that if A is of the same species as B, and B is of the same species as C, then A must be of the same species as C. However, it does not appear possible in biology to define species in a way that always satisfies this condition. (The existence of "ring species", such as the Larus gulls, illustrates the problem, as indeed does "speciation" in evolution, whereby all animals are of the same species as their parents and offspring, but not as their remote ancestors or descendents.)

He makes some good point about Aristotle being a "scientist" and a "philosopher." But the rest...

Even if they are well-meaning, Catholic scientists who would seek to advance the credibility of the Church and the Catholic intellectual tradition should instead examine their starting points and assumptions, and check their reasoning. Those philosophers and theologians who would seek to have discussions with such scientists (as the River Forest School used to promote) should always check the logic (especially the definitions of terms).

Even now we still have some Dominicans of the River Forest School continuing the work of the school: Fr. William Wallace, especially. And then there is Anthony Rizzi, who was apparently influenced more by Maritain. Aristotelian-Thomists have no problems reviewing contemporary scientific literature -- what will irritate the Catholic scientists is when they do so critically. Philosophers and theologians of other schools may be more deficient in their training, so I would not suggest that they grapple with the literature right away--rather they should study logic, physics, and philosophy/history of science. Talking about the "mode of explanation" of Aristotelian physics shows that Barr has not gone far enough in a critical examination of what he believes. One does not evaluate what some philosophers have written with belief -- one must start off first by asking whether one has belief or true knowledge, and only then can one critique what others have said.

Aristotelian-Thomistic vocabulary begins with what we first know and it is used to understand what we come to know. We do not go in reverse, attempting to understand what is better-known through what is less-known, which is what contemporary scientists would have us do. If modern science is criticized as neglecting the formal cause, it is conjunction with critiques about its mathematical character and reductionism.

Barr concedes that physics almost entirely in terms of mathematical structure, and yet "involves an enormously rich set of ideas about form," using the example of electronic band structure, Claiming that is so does not make it so. What he neglects to examine is how one arrives at that mathematical structure in the first place -- quantity and measurement -- from what causal interactions are such measurements derived? Moreover, the avoidance of teleology does not make a causal (i.e. scientific) account of x wrong -- it merely makes it incomplete, and those who would maintain that this is a complete explanation (or the only one attainable) are therefore wrong.

As for species -- James Chastek has written something recently on this question, and I have yet to think about what he says. Is it necessary for an account using a more traditional notion of species ("kinds") to be reconciled with the modern biological notion? No. But that does not mean that it cannot be done, even if one can concede that species refer to populations of individuals that reproduce and are isolated from other populations (Ernst Mayr's definition). Talking about a group and its lineage of reproduction/descent does not exclude the possibility that there are natural limits to the variation of structure within that group/lineage.

Plus:
Philosophy Lives
Why Stephen Hawking’s attempt to banish natural theology only shows why we need it.
John Haldane

James Chastek, Modes of considering the false

The Dominican Province of St. Joseph: Dominic: Light of The Church

Fr. Fessio

Fr. Joseph Fessio, S.J. on Pope Benedict XVI and Ignatius Press



He was also on Catholic Answers Live last Tuesday (RA, MP3).

Canterbury Tales: Did Thomas Aquinas Deny the Immaculate Conception? (Garrigou-Lagrange)

Thomistica.net: Migne on-line. All of it.

VFR: The Darwinian theory of evolution is a fraud—and it’s not Lawrence Auster who says that, it’s the Darwinian scientists who say it

The Plausibility of Life. Resolving Darwin's Dilemma (Google Books)

An interview with Marc Kirschner and John Gerhart by Greg Ross

Can you describe the new theory briefly?


Our theory addresses the most mysterious part of Darwin's theory of evolution, namely "variation." As you may recall, he postulated that small differences of form and function inexorably arise among individuals in any group of animals. One individual, bearing its variation, may be more fit than others of the group to survive and reproduce in the environment at hand. In time, its descendants out-reproduce the others and come to replace them.


About half a century ago, we learned that heritable variation does not occur without mutation. Any place in the genome can suffer mutation, which is a change of the local DNA sequence. It appears to strike at random, and rarely. Our theory of "facilitated variation" is meant to explain how rare and random mutation can lead to exquisite changes of form and function.


We give center place to the fundamental processes by which animals develop from the egg to the adult and by which they function as adults. These are the "conserved core processes." They make and operate the animal, and surprisingly they are pretty much the same whether we scrutinize a jellyfish or a human. There are a few hundred kinds of processes, each involving tens of active components. Each component is encoded by a gene of the animal's genome, thus using up the majority of the 20,000 genes possessed by complex animals such as frogs, mice and humans.


The components and genes are largely the same in all animals. Almost every exquisite innovation that one examines in animals, such as an eye, hand or beak, is developed and operated by various of these conserved core processes and components. This is a profound realization for the question of variation, because it says that the different and seemingly novel features of animals are made and run by various of the same core processes, just used in different combinations, at different times and places in the animal, and used to different extents of their output. Variation is not as hard to get as one might initially think. A Lego analogy is applicable: The same Lego parts can be stuck together to give a model of the Eiffel Tower or of a soccer ball.


If the core processes remain the same, what changes in evolution? We suggest that it is the regulation of these processes. Regulatory components determine the combinations and amounts of core processes to be used in all the special traits of the animal. Whereas components of the core processes do not change in evolution, regulatory components do, and they are the targets of random mutational change. Genes for regulatory components comprise a minority of the genome (under a quarter, as a rough estimate), fewer than genes for core processes, but still a lot of genes and a lot of regulatory DNA. The thrust of our argument is that rather few mutational changes, affecting regulatory components, are needed to generate complex innovation.


In summary, then, we posit that the conserved core processes greatly facilitate the animal's generation of complex variation by reducing the number and kind of regulatory changes needed and hence the number of random mutational changes needed in the genome. Facilitation comes from the great versatility and adaptability of the processes and their proneness to regulation.


Where then do the conserved core processes come from? How were the Lego blocks invented?


In our book we dwell mostly on the long period of animal evolution from the onset of the Cambrian epoch, over 540 million years ago, to the present, during which altered regulation, due to random mutation, brought core processes together in various combinations and amounts, producing the enormous variety of new anatomical and physiological traits of the diverse animal groups.


The core processes had themselves evolved before the Cambrian, some even billions of years before. We envision four episodes, each separated from the next by a long interval during which life-forms diversified based on the varied use of those recently acquired processes, driven by regulatory change. First, as early bacteria-like cells evolved, the processes arose for synthetic and degradative (energy-producing) metabolism, for DNA synthesis and for gene expression, including protein synthesis. This innovation entailed the evolution of many hundreds of kinds of enzymes, proteins and genes that are found today in all life-forms—animals, plants, fungi, protists and bacteria.


The second episode occurred roughly two billion years ago, as the first eukaryotic cells evolved, perhaps coincident with the initial accumulation of oxygen in the atmosphere. Eukaryotic cells are much more complicated in their organization and coordination of activities. Processes evolved for arranging components at different places and for moving them from place to place. Genomes got larger, a complex cell cycle arose culminating in mitosis and cell division, and the first sexual reproduction took place with meiosis and the fusion of two cells. These new processes entailed the evolution of many new proteins, which seem to have originated from old proteins of bacteria. They are used by all modern life-forms except the bacteria and have been conserved with little change from those first eukaryotic ancestors.


A third episode occurred at the time of the earliest multicellular animals, perhaps one billion years ago. These processes of multicellularity involve the means of cell-to-cell communication, of cells adhering to each other and to a blanket of materials that cells deposit around themselves, and specialized junctions connecting cells. The means evolved for developing a multicellular animal from a single-celled egg. Specialized cell types evolved, such as nerve and muscle. Some of the new proteins used in these processes look as if they were spliced together from pre-existing parts, and their genes were spliced together from pieces of old genes, in various combinations and numbers. Others arose through the duplication of genes and diversification of base sequences of the duplicates, yielding large "families" of slightly different genes and encoded proteins.


A final episode, discussed in the book, occurred just before the Cambrian period and involved the innovation of the body plans of animals. This innovation compartmentalized the embryo and allowed a large increase in the complexity of development—namely, the independent use of different combinations and amounts of core processes in each of the domains of the developing animal's body plan, to give the many anatomical and physiological innovations of the Cambrian period to the present.


What are the recent advances that have permitted the new insights behind your theory?


Key recent advances have revealed how a single-celled egg develops to a functional adult. These advances rest on breakthroughs in many other areas of biology concerning how genetic information is transmitted to the next generation, how this information is recovered to produce the active components of cells, how energy is obtained and used, what limited set of chemical building blocks makes up all cells, how particular kinds of cells like nerves and muscles accomplish their functions, and on and on. Few of these insights were known even three decades ago. Much of this basic research was pursued without reference to evolution, but rather concerned what is required for life itself. The insights were surprisingly general, holding across large groups of animals, in cases even all life-forms from bacteria to humans.


The public knows about these breakthroughs mostly by their medical implications, but ultimately they allowed the understanding of development and evolution. Evolutionary biologists increasingly realized in recent decades that the changes of animals in evolution reflect changes in development. Now, in the past decade, the analysis of development has burst open. Out of all this research came the recognition of conserved core processes—what they do and what their components are. Out of developmental biology came the realization of the widespread use of these processes, and genome sequencing has shown that genes are widely conserved across the animal kingdom. For example, roughly 15 percent of our genes are like those of bacteria, 25 percent are like those of single-celled fungi, 50 percent are like those of fruit flies, and 70 percent are like those of frogs.


How can animals be so different and yet so much the same? The resolution of the paradox is found in the use of the same versatile adaptable components in different combinations and amounts to different ends, to generate the different anatomies and physiologies of the diverse kinds of animals.

And:

What questions remain to be answered?


The question is ongoing of what really occurs within the animal when it generates innovations. Our theory of facilitated variation is but a plausible sketch of how it might occur, and the theory reflects a direction in research, not a verdict reached.


Developmental biology is moving at a rapid pace, and the evolution of developmental mechanisms is a subject of high interest. For example, evolutionary biologists have long thought that the wings of birds are evolutionary modifications of the forelimbs of a reptile-like ancestor, which in turn are evolutionary modifications of the front fins of a lobe-fin fish-like ancestor. Now, every aspect of the development of fins, limbs and wings is under study to illuminate likenesses and differences down to the level of molecules and DNA sequences.


When a difference is found, the inquiry turns to the question: How different is it, really? What is new and what is old, at the level of molecules? What kinds of changes were needed to effect it? Similarly, the evolution of eyes is under intense study, as is the evolution of beaks of birds, or of segments, legs and wings of insects. Our main conclusion that evolutionary innovations involve very little that is really new, and that much innovation comes from the adaptive behavior of conserved processes, derives from these kinds of studies.


As a general direction in biology, the more we learn about how animals develop and function, the more we learn about how they have changed in evolution. While past variation will always be a subject for speculation and theory, the relevant research findings will increasingly clear our eyes and minds, and innovations will be produced in the laboratory, as is already under way to modest ends in agricultural animals. Presumably at that point, doubters would concede that maybe it's possible by natural causes.

The Authors:
Marc Kirschner
John Gerhart

Fr. Rhonheimer jumping to conclusions?

With respect to how he understands the "condom controversy":

Sandro Magister: On the Condom and AIDS, the Pope Has Come Down from the Cathedra