Saturday, October 23, 2010

More on Shaw

Shaw brings up some more points in his preface that require additional digging and searching deeper. He speaks of a conversation he has with a religious clergyman. The conversation goes as follows: “The universe exists, said the father: somebody must have made it. If that somebody exists, said I, somebody must have made him” (27). This small exchange demonstrates that Shaw really wants to put the creation and possible divinity of the universe into human comprehension. Is it quite absurd to believe that the human brain cannot possibly grasp the origins of our being and everything that surrounds us?

Science can figure out how something works, but not necessarily why it works, the reason for which it is in being, or how it got there. However, in trying to do so, what we have done is limited the story of our origins to our own understanding. The fact remains that there are phenomena within our world (and beyond) that cannot possibly be understood or explained. Furthermore, even Darwin attributes these phenomena to something he cannot explain the origins of or the reasons behind its motivating factors – natural selection.

Moreover, are we committing the genetic fallacy here? If we attempt to understand something incomprehensible, we call it fact because it is science. We understand Evolution – but does that make it true? We refute other means of our origins because they do not make sense or are not understandable, but does that make them false?

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