Introduction

A common prejudice holds that science describes the world as it is, whereas religion tells us why it is the way it is and how we should act. In this paper this claim will be analyzed from the perspective of Darwinism. Darwinism has shown normativity to be something non-exclusively human, something prevailing throughout all living nature. This normativity brings along the Darwinian notion of goodness as fitness. That notion will be confronted with different concepts of good as used in the philosophical tradition. A very important one is the moral one that, as will be demonstrated, is intimately connected with religion. Finally, it will be discussed whether and in what sense Darwinism does or does not need this religion.

Normativity in nature

To better understand the presence of normativity in nature we can look at the example of a well-known feedback machine: a central heating system. Such a system consists of a thermostat, a boiler and a radiator. With the thermostat one can of course fix the desired temperature. This temperature is called the standard or the norm temperature. The thermostat measures the temperature of the room at regular intervals. If the measured temperature is below the fixed temperature, it sends a positive signal to the boiler, which means that it should produce heat. After some time the thermostat measures the temperature again and if the temperature is still below the desired one, it continues to send a positive signal to the boiler; if, however, the temperature is above the standard it sends a negative signal to the boiler, which means that it should turn itself off.

            Why is this an important example? Because it shows how within a completely mechanical system norm based behavior can arise. We saw that, although in our explanation of the workings of the system we used only mechanical laws, we were forced to use the word ‘should’ in our description of the meanings of the signals. This distinction between a mechanical level of explanation and a normative level of description is characteristic of all feedback systems in which a program (the integrated circuit in the thermostat) and an executor (the boiler) can be distinguished. “But couldn’t we just say instead of ‘the signal means that it should produce heat’, ‘heat!’ ” That is possible, but that description is in the form of an order and orders must be obeyed, whence we are back to where we started: the necessity of words like ‘should’ and ‘must’ in the description of feedback systems.

However, what is the character of this ‘should’ and ‘must’? Logical necessity does not seem to be at stake here: a positive signal meaning that the boiler should start heating, has nothing to do with formal logical laws. Neither physical necessity, if a thing like that really exists; physical necessity would rather be at stake at the mechanical level of explanation. Thus, what other uses of the word ‘must’ and ‘should’ can we think of? Are we confronted with a new meaning of these words, or... do they perhaps have something to do with our well-known but difficult to understand ethical ‘must’ and ‘should’? It might already be elucidating that according to the Oxford English Dictionary the word ‘evil’, which originally tended to be used far more often that the word ‘bad’, meant something like ‘exceeding due measure’ or ‘overstepping proper limits’.

            Nevertheless, before we examine this bold conjecture any further, we had perhaps better examine two related objections to the argumentation above, whose dismissal might provide us with some clarification. The first objection is that there exist mechanical feedback systems such as the cycle of water, for which we do not need normative terminology. We can give a completely mechanical explanation of this phenomenon involving terms as the ‘condensation temperature of water’, the ‘density of the clouds’, the ‘gravitational pull on the clouds’, and if we like, we can add a more prosaic description about water being attracted towards the sun, clouds getting heavier and heavier and raindrops starting to fall, henceforth returning to the sea. A description using words as ‘should’ and ‘must’ in any non-logical, non-physical way is anthropomorphic and absolutely nonsensical here: the clouds should drop their water?!, ‘No, they just drop it’. In the same way the use of ‘should’ in the example of the heating system can be avoided, let alone the use of the words ‘good’ and ‘bad’. The boiler just receives a signal that triggers a mechanism by which more gas is burnt per second. The second objection is that only because of a purpose outside the central heating system, men’s comfort of a stable temperature environment, can the signals of the system be described by intentional words such as ‘should’. Only because of this purpose the word ‘good’ can be applied to the negative signal (the temperature condition of the room is okay, it is good, please stop heating) and ‘bad’ to the positive signal (the temperature is not-okay, it is bad, please start heating). One must not forget, however, that in this predication of the words ‘good’ and ‘bad’ it is we, ethical human beings, who materialize our norms in non-ethical objects.

            To the first objection I can respond by saying that the water cycle is a feedback system in which no program and executor can be distinguished and I referred solely to this subtype of feedback systems. The second objection brings us straight to the main theme of this paper: Darwinism. Of course, CH would not exist without human beings, but humans themselves are a ‘product’ of evolution and this process did not have a designer. And, as every student of biology knows, not only a CH but the human biological system itself just as that of other living beings is made up of numerous feedback systems: the hormone system, the respiratory system among others, which all go back to one fundamental feedback system: the genetic system of replication. The genes code for the phenotype, the actual appearance of the animal, and the constitution of its phenotype determines whether a creature fighting against the natural elements (natural selection) and its congeners (natural and sexual selection), is adapted well enough to replicate its genes: there is a feedback between genes and phenotypes. Only those genes will survive that code for those ‘flesh bodies’ that are fit and replicate themselves.

The distinction just made between genotype and phenotype corresponds to the earlier one between program and executor. The enzymes transcribed from the genetic code serve as signals in the earlier example. These enzymes or collections of them mean something, some for example during embryonic development: they order to create blue eyes, others in the full grown state: they order the body to fall asleep. Unlike in the earlier example however, no question arises whether ‘good’ or ‘bad’ can truly be predicated of certain signals and their materializations: elements of the bodies of living beings and elements of their behavior. For example, the sharp and strong teeth of a lion, which the lion genes code for through their enzymes, express: deer are good for me.

Whereas the goal of the central heating system lies outside itself, the goal of living beings (or better: their genes) lies in themselves, since their true goal is only to replicate themselves. In the end, all the elements of the bodies and their behavioral characteristics depend on this goal: the teeth of lions or their hunting strategies can only be understood from the perspective of their survival, which finally means their replication. Good is therefore that what helps in the goal of replication. One might object that replication is not a real goal, not something good itself, but then the question arises what could be meant by a real, ultimate goal. In this age of nihilism after the death of God it seems that such an ultimate goal cannot exist. Hence the second objection that words as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ only apply to feedback system because of a designer who had a purpose with it behind it, is met by our demonstration that humans as all other replicators are feedback machines without a designer that have the goal in themselves.

The above elaboration of the meaning of the word good is in agreement with the original meaning of the English word good being ‘suitable’ (again according to the Oxford English Dictionary).[1] Or, in other, more Darwinian words: good is fit. It also seems to accord with the original meaning of the Greek word for good, agathon, which Heidegger, I think correctly so, analyses as taughaft, a word hard to translate into English, although the German verb ‘taugen’ might perhaps be translated by ‘to dow’ as in ‘he dows for naught’. Finally, it is also corroborated by the classic definition of the good by the greatest writer on ethics of all time, Aristotle, as ‘that at which all things aim (1994a4)’, an end ‘that is wanted for its own sake’, which Darwinism equates with replication.

However, a comparison with Aristotle’s definition and theory of the good immediately raises questions which might allow us to further clarify the Darwinian idea of good. Firstly, as is well known, Aristotle denies that animals understand the words ‘good’ and ‘bad’, or are in any sense confronted with them. Of course we can speak of a good horse; we mean a fast and strong horse that can be put to good use by men. Only man, because he is rational knows the good as good. Animals do not; they could only be confronted with the useful (sumpheron) and the harmful (blaberon). Darwinism denies this line of reasoning. Rationality is not something exclusively human; all living nature is rational. Darwin himself gave in his Origin of Species the example of a dove keeper who rationally selects according to tiny differences which doves are to be crossbred to get even fitter doves. Darwin then adds that nature itself is just one master dove keeper, nature itself is rational. The Darwinian principle of selection, a word normally only applied to humans, to farmers who select their crops, expresses just that: the word ‘selection’ comes from se-ligo, to interprete. Therefore: nature thinks! although of course not consciously (which is no problem for Darwinism since it regards pure consciousness, just as every other spiritual entity, as a non-agent). Hence, it makes perfect sense to speak about good and bad with regard to animals. Another advantage of this line of reasoning is that it avoids the paradox of Socratic ethics: man cannot wittingly do something bad, since his knowing implies his avoidance of this evil; however we see men of knowledge do bad things. In Aristotle this paradox returns in the discrimination of the apparent good and the real good (to phainomenon agathon versus to agathon hauton); Aristotle cannot clearly distinguish between these two, since the apparent good is also thought to be the thing that is wanted because of itself. Therefore, knowing a thing as good does not make it truely good, whence we don’t need the word ‘knowledge’ in our definition of good.[2]

A second objection might be that the word ‘good’ is equivocal. We can speak of a good knife, a good pair of teeth, of good health and a good strategy, of good behavior, a good man, a good painting, and a good society. We mean something like a useful knife, a strong pair of teeth, a clever strategy, friendly behavior, a virtuous man, a true painting and a righteous society. Aristotle himself mentions this equivocality too: ‘But in what sense then are these things called ‘good’? because they do not seem to be accidental homonyms. Is it that all goods derive from or contribute to one good? Or is it rather that they are good by analogy: as sight is good in the body, so is intuition in the mind, and so on? (1096b30)’. Unfortunately, after this remark Aristotle drops the topic and, as far as I know, never returns to it. Darwinistically speaking, one might say that replication offers the principle of analogy by which things can be called good. But, does this analogy not hold in the case of organisms and artifacts only?[3] Paintings and societies do not replicate themselves; hence the notion of fitness does not seem to apply to them. Or does it? Nowadyas, a good painting seems almost to be one that attracts a lot of people to the museum and of which a large number of replica’s can be sold, as Benjamin pointed out in his Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter der technischen Reproduktion[4].

The third objection is related to of the most important uses of the word good: the moral use. Good in the sense of morality often implies unselfishness; a moral person seems to hold society to be more important than his own individuality. At the same time, however, a moral person values his own individuality highly, since he considers himself to be the absolute authority deciding what is right and wrong.

This leads to all sorts of paradoxes as Hegel pointed out in his analysis of Kant’s moral philosophy: you have to be unselfish, but you can never know whether a secret purpose lies behind your act; you still have to act, but it is not the act, but the intention that counts; but a mere intention is nothing and cannot be tested; to test yourself to show that you are truly non-selfish, you will have to suppress your (sensual) desires; however the goal of your is ultimate happiness and that is inconceivable without sensuality. Kierkegaard furthers the paradoxes of this position in his Works of Love. In this work the un- or otherworldliness of morality becomes extremely apparent; the moral good is not the good of this world. Hegel and Darwinism deny that; both maintain, although in a very different sense, that the institutions of the world, as they have stood the test of time, are good.

Hegel's position of Sittlichkeit, as a sublation of this morality, incorporates elements of morality. The workings of a state in the Sittlichkeit cannot exist without the morality of religion of its subjects, the religious attitude (Gesinnung) as he demonstrates in his Lectures on the History of Religion. Even positive law needs this Gesinnung of forgiveness and friendliness to determine in concrete cases what to decide.

Darwinism on the other hand seems to deny the necessity of religion. Its fundamental entities, the replicators, are selfish. After all, imagine an altruistic replicator; such a replicator would immediately be exploited by selfish ones, which hence have better survival perspectives and outcompete the altruistic ones soon. However, we see that even among animals, creatures sacrifice themselves for their fellow creatures. Thus Darwinism needs to do some explanation. An easy solution to this problem would be to regard the sacrifice as something good for the kin. However, modern Darwinism doesn't accept kin selection any more, since the kin is not itself a replicator but a quasi-atemporal form, which every mechanical explanation cannot accept.

Darwinism has found three ways to deal with these problems: the theory of selfish genes, evolutionary stable strategies (ESS's) and game theory. The selfish gene theory states that genes and not phenotypes are the true replicators; these genes are selfish since they are only concerned with their own replication, but one and the same gene can have different effect in two phenotypic bodies (one gene that codes both for a child’s screaming for food and a mother’s caring behavior); in that way altruistic behavior on the phenotypic level can result out of selfish behavior on the gene level. ESS is just a mathematical version of the law that you are as good a rower as the team your in, and depends critically on game theory. Game theory itself has shown after many years of research the platitude, already known to Plato and the complete tradition of philosophy, that it can sometimes be better cooperate and for instance share food amongst each other than to fight each other to the death. However, for this game theoretic cooperation to work within society, a relatively large initial community of people that already trust and do not cheat each other has to be present.[5] As yet, Darwinism cannot explain how this community is formed.

Should Darwinism invoke religion, as Hegel did, to understand this? It is a fact that almost all stable communities of more than fifteen people that are not tied by bloodlines have a common religion. That does not mean that religion is true, ‘true’ understood as empirically adequate or something like that; Darwinism will regard religion as a symbolic parasite that modifies behavior and replicates itself successfully through the brains of its practitioners. But that does not change the fact that religion seems to be needed. The next section will consider these linguistic parasites in further detail.

As a final remark, Darwinism is often criticized for justifying genocide and murder: only the fittest survive, therefore we should kill all the weak and invalid. However, as we have seen, Darwinism explains altruism as well and does not at all judge it wrong. It then seems that Darwinism is only a descriptive and not normative theory of ethics, since you cannot deduce any ‘ought’ from an ‘is’, even if the ‘is’ concerns a description of norms (the so-called natural fallacy). However, this natural fallacy seems to assume that we, as ethical subjects, can apply our normative judgments on a value free world. On the other hand, my analysis of Darwinism shows that you, as a disembodied subject, are not the one who determines in the end what is good and bad; as a living being you find yourself already situated within a meaningful world full of normative structures. Any strong deviation from the situation, that has stood the test of time, will probably lead to extinction (hippies are dead). But then Darwinism almost seems to accept the status quo. Might religion, however, even within a Darwinian framework provide a critique of this status quo?

Religion

Anybody who wants to say something meaningful about religion in the West nowadays will have to take Enlightenment into account. During the period of Enlightenment science, rational speculation and a historically critical reading of the Scriptures destroyed most of the traditional religious representations. The only task that remained for them was to provide a sensual image as a moral guideline to the masses that could not rationally understand the ethical truths, a conclusion already drawn by Spinoza in his Theological-political Tractate. However, in the development of enlightened thought not only were representations criticized, but also these ethical ideas themselves. Nietzsche’s critique of Christianity as slave morality is well known, but more than a century earlier philosophers had already criticized the practices of Christianity: why should you fast, why give money to the poor? It seems stupid to starve yourself in the light of some idol as well as to give your hard-earned money away. Hence the final reason for religion’s existence seems to be gone.

            However, despite all these discussions some of the stories about Christ remain somehow undisturbed. Of course many of us reject the stories in which Christ talks about life after death, the final Judgment, but still some of the stories strike us as meaningful. For instance, the story of Jesus’ throwing the merchants out of the temple (religion has nothing to with economy!) or the story about the woman that was to be stoned. Let’s focus on that one. What makes this famous story so impressive is Christ’s unique solution. Christ regards this woman not just as a lawbreaker, but as a mortal human being. By confronting each one of the Pharizees individually, and not as a group, with the question: ‘Let the one without sin cast the first stone’, he makes them mortal beings that do not live up to their unselfish standards. They experience that their existence is ‘grace’, is a ‘gift’ too. They can’t justify themselves in any way, they don’t have their life in their own hands. Might that be why they forgive her?

            I did not mention God in this example; religion in this day and age can have nothing to do with God, since God is death. But religion used to be more than divine service. Religion comes from the word re-ligare, which means ‘to bind fast’. Christ in a sense reminds us, binds us to our ‘essence’, our own mortality. This mortality is something that Darwinian replicators do not seem to know of. In the example above however, this might just as well have been the basis of forgiveness. Of course, we do not have to forgive, no society ever existed based a rule on that, and every society needs the instrument of punishment. However, sometimes we can.