Defending Adam After Darwin: On the Origin of Sapiens as a Natural Kind
For many contemporary Christian theologians, evolutionary biology rules out any account of an Adam and Eve that would explain the origin of our species. In response, I propose that they have uncritically embraced the anti-essentialist presuppositions of the dominant scientific narrative for the orig...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Fernleihe: | Fernleihe für die Fachinformationsdienste |
| Published: |
Philosophy Documentation Center
[2018]
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| In: |
American catholic philosophical quarterly
Year: 2018, Volume: 92, Issue: 2, Pages: 337-352 |
| Further subjects: | B
Theology
B Christians B EVE (Biblical figure) B LIFE of Adam & Eve B ADAM (Biblical figure) |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (doi) |
| Summary: | For many contemporary Christian theologians, evolutionary biology rules out any account of an Adam and Eve that would explain the origin of our species. In response, I propose that they have uncritically embraced the anti-essentialist presuppositions of the dominant scientific narrative for the origins of our kind. In fact, there are sound and robust reasons to think that human beings share an intrinsic essence that puts them into a natural kind. I also propose that our natural kind can be defined by our developmental capacity for language, which I suggest is needed for abstract thinking. Thus, it is still reasonable to trace the origins of our natural kind to an original individual. He would have been the first anatomically modern human to have evolved this capacity for hierarchical and non-linear language that allowed him to construct an abstract internal map of the world. |
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| ISSN: | 2153-8441 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: American catholic philosophical quarterly
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.5840/acpq201831145 |