Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz

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Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
OP - February 12, 2009, 05:45 AM

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/4588289/The-Vatican-claims-Darwins-theory-of-evolution-is-compatible-with-Christianity.html

An early theory of evolution developed by muslim zoologist Al-Jahiz (c. 781 -r 868):

"Animals engage in a struggle for existence; for resources, to avoid
being eaten and to breed. Environmental factors influence organisms
to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming
into new species. Animals that survive to breed can pass on their
successful characteristics to offspring."

From Kitab al-Hayawan (Book of Animals)

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #1 - February 12, 2009, 06:27 AM

With this year marking the 200th anniversary of the birth of Darwin, with today being his 200th birthday, any organisation wanting to stay relevant in the 21st century must now tow the line even though fundamentally, in the past they rejected it based on scripture.

With the raft of information hitting the various media throughout the year showing the overwhelming body of evidence in support of evolution, you'd still have to be naive to continue rejecting it.

So now some evidence of vague statements from St Augustine or Aquinas makes the 'theory' true.

Although it was the same St. Augustine who said the earth was flat!

I hadn't known about the statement from Al-Jahiz. Very interesting. I wonder if he went into it in more detail. For him to come up with that ieda and then just leave it at that would be a shame.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #2 - February 12, 2009, 07:27 AM

Evolution was first observed by the ancient Greeks. Both St. Augustine and the muslim scientists who spoke about it got their knowledge from the likes of Aristotle, to whom evolution was a familiar concept. There is nothing amazing, nor even mildly surprising, about people describing evolution pre-Darwin, it was a well known fact.

Darwin's amazing feat wasn't to describe evolution, which any fool could have done by the 19th century, it was to explain how it worked.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #3 - February 12, 2009, 08:22 AM

Quote from: Cheetah on February 12, 2009, 07:27 AM
Darwin's amazing feat wasn't to describe evolution, which any fool could have done by the 19th century, ...

So what would you call creationists and intelligent designers of the 21st century then?

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #4 - February 12, 2009, 08:32 AM

Just read a bit about Al-Jahiz on Wiki. Apparently he was the son of an African slave. Ended up writing about 300 books, even one on eroticism!

Quite a feat.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #5 - February 12, 2009, 08:37 AM

Quote from: a.ghazali on February 12, 2009, 08:22 AM
Quote from: Cheetah on February 12, 2009, 07:27 AM
Darwin's amazing feat wasn't to describe evolution, which any fool could have done by the 19th century, ...

So what would you call creationists and intelligent designers of the 21st century then?

I call them all sorts of things, a.ghazali, but nothing I could repeat in front of polite company.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #6 - February 12, 2009, 11:26 AM

Quote from: panoptic on February 12, 2009, 05:45 AM
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/4588289/The-Vatican-claims-Darwins-theory-of-evolution-is-compatible-with-Christianity.html

An early theory of evolution developed by muslim zoologist Al-Jahiz (c. 781 -r 868):

"Animals engage in a struggle for existence; for resources, to avoid
being eaten and to breed. Environmental factors influence organisms
to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming
into new species. Animals that survive to breed can pass on their
successful characteristics to offspring."

From Kitab al-Hayawan (Book of Animals)

Why, we all know Islam invented science.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #7 - February 12, 2009, 12:51 PM

Quote from: Cheetah on February 12, 2009, 07:27 AM
Evolution was first observed by the ancient Greeks. Both St. Augustine and the muslim scientists who spoke about it got their knowledge from the likes of Aristotle, to whom evolution was a familiar concept. There is nothing amazing, nor even mildly surprising, about people describing evolution pre-Darwin, it was a well known fact.

Darwin's amazing feat wasn't to describe evolution, which any fool could have done by the 19th century, it was to explain how it worked.

But Al Jahiz is describing natural selection.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #8 - February 12, 2009, 01:07 PM

Indeed he did. A very rough and ready form of it, but he got further than anybody else, including Aristotle, before Darwin came along.

Here's the wiki link about him...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al-Jahiz

I wonder why he's not more widely known about?

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #9 - February 12, 2009, 01:16 PM

Quote from: panoptic on February 12, 2009, 12:51 PM

But Al Jahiz is describing natural selection.

No? He says "Environmental factors influence organisms to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming into new species."

They dont' just develop these 'good' characteristics e.g. a giraffe stretching its neck and thus making it longer.

According to Darwin they start of with a multitude of characteristics, some good & some bad. Those with the 'good' characteristics i.e. those that match the environment optimally, are more likely to survive. Its an important difference, but its what diffentiated Darwin and made him who he is today.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #10 - February 12, 2009, 01:19 PM

There's also sexual selection for characteristics that may even be a hindrance to survival, (like the peacock's tail), that al-Jahiz didn't get as far as noticing. He was obviously still ahead of his time though.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #11 - February 12, 2009, 08:10 PM

It's a bit hard to tell if he was thinking along the lines of Lamarck or Darwin. The wording isn't clear enough to decide.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #12 - February 12, 2009, 08:15 PM

Quote from: osmanthus on February 12, 2009, 08:10 PM
It's a bit hard to tell if he was thinking along the lines of Lamarck or Darwin. The wording isn't clear enough to decide.

Its ambiguous enough to stand the test of time, that's all.

But given he did not explain it in more depth, I don't think its fair for him to be credited with the benefit of doubt. I think what he said could merely be explained by observation.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #13 - March 29, 2009, 08:11 AM

The al-Jahiz quote with which "panopticon" kicked off this thread is problematic:

"Animals engage in a struggle for existence; for resources, to avoid
being eaten and to breed. Environmental factors influence organisms
to develop new characteristics to ensure survival, thus transforming
into new species. Animals that survive to breed can pass on their
successful characteristics to offspring."

The first hurdle: this is a translation from Arabic. Key words for evolution theory include "species". What was the Arabic word al-Jahiz used which the translator rendered as "species"? One would have to determine to what extent al-Jahiz meant what we mean today scientifically. For speciation is the crux of evolution theory. Otherwise, al-Jahiz could very well have merely been referring to "new" taxonomically discernible shapes and sizes and colors involved in biological intra-species change, irrelevant to speciation.

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #14 - April 03, 2009, 11:48 AM

Quote from: Cheetah on February 12, 2009, 01:07 PM
I wonder why he's not more widely known about?

Probably cuz he didn't play for the right team...

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Re: Vatican claims evolution for St. Augustine and Thomas Aquinas / Al- Jahiz
Reply #15 - April 03, 2009, 09:48 PM

Quote from: a.ghazali on February 12, 2009, 06:27 AM
I hadn't known about the statement from Al-Jahiz. Very interesting. I wonder if he went into it in more detail. For him to come up with that ieda and then just leave it at that would be a shame.

I didn't know that either. I wonder what Arabic word he actually uses that they've translated as 'species'...

EDIT: Oops, I see Hesperado has already JaN'd me!

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