Episode Transcript
[00:00:07] Speaker A: Welcome to ID the Future, a podcast about intelligent design and evolution.
[00:00:14] Speaker B: Welcome. I'm your host, Mike Keyes. In our last podcast, we were talking with Michael Flannery about his book intelligent how Alfred Russel Wallace's world of life challenged darwinism. And we're going to continue that conversation now. In our last episode, we covered a little bit about Darwin's early life as a teenager at the University of Edinburgh and how he was guided by fellow materialists who were part of a little club they had going on campus. And then this helps explain how Darwin's approach to evolution was very different than that of Alfred Russel Wallace. Michael Flannery has made available to us, really, the world of Alfred Wallace and how it was so, so different from that of Charles Darwin, even though they were co discoverers of natural selection. So welcome back to the show, Michael Flannery.
[00:01:07] Speaker C: Thank you, Mike.
[00:01:08] Speaker B: Okay, so the last thing that we were covering in the last episode was what's new about this edition of your book, which is an edited abridgement of Wallace's book, plus a lot of great introductory material, and also the forward by William Demski.
[00:01:24] Speaker C: If I might add real quickly, one of the new things that I would like to point out to readers or potential readers of this book is that I've added an entirely new appendix C, which is called Wallace versus Darwin on religion and humanity, what we now know about the kingdom of faith.
So what I'm saying here in, and I'm not going to go into details, people can get the book and read it for themselves.
But in appendix C, what I'm saying with regard to religion and the origins of religion, I think is very indicative in the same genre as the origins of the kingdom of speech.
And there are some specific anthropological data that I give in that appendix C that will bring this to light. So I think that, too, is another important aspect of what's new in this book.
[00:02:26] Speaker B: Yeah, because you were talking about Wolf's kingdom of speech book in the last episode. So that's what you're referring to here, right? Okay.
[00:02:32] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:02:33] Speaker B: Now your book's going to generate some controversy. What do you think are going to be some of the talking points of this controversy?
[00:02:40] Speaker C: Well, it's just the same thing that has always been controversial regarding Wallace. His staunch defense of human exceptionalism, his unique brand of natural selection, which on close examination was very different from Darwin's, and his argument that a truly purpose filled or teleological view of the life sciences will explain all the facts. That's always been controversial. And I think one of the important points of this book is to show that through the course of time now, well over a century later, Wallaces ideas and Wallaces arguments still hold up to careful scrutiny.
[00:03:25] Speaker B: That's great. So the original book, the World of Life, was published in 1910, over a century old. Why should we still have access to this book? Why reintroduce it to readers today?
[00:03:38] Speaker C: Well, it's a good question, and I think it's important to realize that darwinian or neo darwinian evolution is not the only game in town. There are many plausible alternatives to Darwin's reductionist formulations. Also, Wallace's many arguments for complexity, again, have withstood the test of time. The nature of the cell, the special attributes of human beings, the irreducible nature of life itself, the fine tuning of the universe. All of these have had updates to them and support, essentially Wallace's ideas of all of those aspects of the rich diversity of a teleological or purposeful nature. So I think understanding what those arguments were from the man himself, his world of life, still has some real value for us.
[00:04:35] Speaker B: Nate? Sure. And of course, as you have pointed out in earlier podcasts, Wallace had a lower socioeconomic status than Darwin, but he was recognized as a major scientist. Right. And Darwin himself promoted Wallace. Right. So to see a prominent scientist like Wallace promoting a purpose filled universe is significant for us today. Those who are doing likewise today can't just be marginalized, because these are important kinds of arguments that have been recognized as thoroughly scientific within the broader community.
[00:05:08] Speaker C: Right, and that's a good point, Mike, and I'm glad you brought that up, because, you know, we could probably take a page from Darwin's and Wallace's relationship together and say, you know, they were able to have a good, somewhat distant, but nonetheless respectful attitude toward one another. So much so that toward the end of Darwin's life, he actually petitioned the british government to award Wallace a lifetime pension.
[00:05:41] Speaker B: Yeah. Even after their tiff over Wallace moving more and more in the direction of a teleological view, Darwin still acknowledged wallaces scientifically.
[00:05:52] Speaker C: Yeah, he still respected Wallace. He still considered him a colleague, and none of this sort of polarized, you know, I can't talk to you anymore because we don't agree. Darwin didn't do that. Darwin maintained a respectful attitude toward Wallace, and conversely, Wallace always carried a respectful attitude toward Darwin. So, you know, gee, if there's anything we can take with regard to the evolution debate today, it's maybe. Maybe we could learn a little bit from the Wallace Darwin relationship in our own discussions about the nature of evolution.
[00:06:35] Speaker B: Sure. A little bit more civility wouldn't hurt the western tradition and wouldn't hurt political discourse these days either, would it? To have more civility, you know, to debate the ideas, but to be respectful of the persons that hold those ideas, even if you disagree with the ideas.
[00:06:51] Speaker C: Exactly.
[00:06:52] Speaker B: So quite a bit has been written about Alfred Russell Wallace over the last couple of decades. How would you characterize most of that writing about Wallace in contrast to what you have contributed?
[00:07:05] Speaker C: Yeah, well, most of the writing about Wallace I would regard as sort of a bifurcation, a separation. The best way I could describe it is it suffers from a kind of noma, non overlapping magisteria. The idea that, okay, we have Wallace the scientist, and then we have Wallace, this teleologist, this guy who sees purpose everywhere, and the one is invariably praised and the other is inevitably damned. But if my effort to bring Wallace back to a new audience is worth anything, it is to avoid this kind of separated or bifurcated view, which is driven more by default positions dictated by the Darwin industry than by a careful reading of Wallace's own ideas. And I believe an objective assessment of the facts will really allow or permit people to give Wallace a fair hearing. I can only echo the comment made by historian Martin Fickman in his book on Wallace from a few years ago called the Elusive Victorian. He said these were not the eccentric musings of a declining mind, but powerful syntheses of late 19th, early 20th century intellectual currents. They incorporated in influence the thoughts and activities of members of elite and popular cultures on both sides of the Atlantic. Now, I agree with that, and I would extend it even further and say that powerful synthesis provided by Wallace is still supportable today. And that is really the whole purpose of the book, is to, in effect, bring Wallace forward, make him a part of this conversation on the nature of evolution. And it's no more than fair, since he is the co discoverer of the very theory that became the drivetrain of darwinian theory in the first place. So let's bring him into the conversation, let's bring teleology into the conversation, and let's make this a much broader and more balanced discussion of what constitutes modern evolutionary theory.
[00:09:25] Speaker B: Absolutely. And if our listeners want to read in more detail the wonderful historiography that Flannery has put forward on Wallace, there is his book, Nature's prophetess, Alfred Russel Wallace, and his evolution from natural selection to natural theology. Of course, natural theology is the attempt to understand clues from nature and their implications for the God question. And although Wallace was not traditionally christian. Right. But he had a broadly theistic worldview, is that correct?
[00:09:58] Speaker C: Yes, that's very correct. Okay, if I might just add as a footnote, prior to publishing the world of life in 1910, in 1903, he had written man's place in the universe, which is about the fine tuned universe that we live in. And I find that amazingly coincident to a more recent book, the Privileged Planet, which listeners might also want to get a copy of and read.
[00:10:26] Speaker B: Sounds great. Well, we've been visiting with Michael Flannery and talking about his book intelligent evolution, how Alfred Russel Wallace's world of life challenged Darwinism. Thanks, Mike, for joining me in this little conversation today.
[00:10:42] Speaker C: Thanks for having me, Mike.
[00:10:43] Speaker B: I am Mike Keyes. Thanks for joining us at ID the future.
[00:10:49] Speaker A: This program was recorded by Discovery Institute's center for Science and Culture. Id the Future is copyright Discovery Institute.
For more information, visit intelligentdesign.org and idthefuture.com.
