Artificial Life: It's All That
Thursday, May 20, 2010 at 10:32PM | by Otter 
We're So Twisted: Life's New ChapterIronically I'm blogging about angels and my mother's dying, and the mailbag suddenly is full of synthetic life. Life's irony alone convinces me there are reasons to keep living.
From the Mailbag:
What do you think of the "synthetic life" in the news? Is it that big a deal?
Yes.
Absolutely.
Let's get one thing crystal clear: this is as unambiguous a signal as you could want that "life" is not, at its operational level, an opaque mystery. It's a recipe. It's a formula. It's a process.
Like all scientific discoveries, this week's announcement of the construction of artificial life forces theological reflection back on a new axis, or at least invites it to reconfigure itself.
The idea that natural processes cannot give us ourselves pretty much died this week when scientists, for all practical purposes, showed that if you just get the mixture right, you've got replicating DNA.
I don't know of anybody that thinks seriously about these things who isn't extremely cautious about the incredible burden this puts on humanity to be serious, to think wisely, and to exercise restraint and benevolent intelligence. There's no denying that the bioethical issues are enormous.
But this is big knowledge. This contributes mightily to our understanding of the world, and strengthens our intelligence in it. And of course it's not "playing god" any more than blood transfusions are "playing god," it's just that, as Genesis 1-3 teaches, the acquisition of knowledge brings on us a proportionate responsibility.
If we fear new knowledge, it is in exactly the same sense that the Bible enjoins one to fear god.
With the knowledge of this thing comes a great obligation.
Theism still has space to breathe and to stretch. But it cannot find it in the basic processes of life. As amazing as they are, there is less and less space for the language of the "supernatural." That word, like many others that have traditionally adhered to the word "god," needs to be rethought, and possibly abandoned. If there is a will above nature, it bears itself precisely as nature does.
There is yet room to talk about the extraordinary, but at this point I'm utterly uncomfortable with the word "supernatural."
Artificial Life, Bioethics, Religion, Science in Science 
Reader Comments (5)
But Professor Otter, doesn't this sort of discovery point toward a Creator rather than away from one?
Jennifer, I don't think nature "points" anywhere but at itself. But you, who are a part of nature, may and do and should react to nature with considerable freedom: our reactions to nature may be anything at all, and I see nothing wrong with you anthropomorphizing and giving thanks and worship to whatever lies deep in the process of baking the life-cake. For all anybody knows, it's a personal or supra-personal force (the latter seems likely to me, as the universe cannot give existence to anything greater than itself).
But I'd be very, very careful not to confuse that reaction on your part or mine with this evidence "pointing" to anything of the kind. It points only to itself. Theistic and Christian apologists (or closet intellectual dominionists) have made that mistake before, and it will eat you for breakfast.
Jennifer, how can humanity's ability to manipulate DNA only point to a creator? (I am assuming you mean "outside, supernatural entity" when you say Creator. I apologize if I misunderstood.) If every new scientific gain can only be interpreted as showing God's glory, we're staring at a tautology: God exists because God exists.
Otter, when something points to itself, an anthropomorphized outside force is no longer necessary, functionally speaking. Its sole value lies in story, even if for some the story takes the form of science. Perhaps that's what you meant and I'm being redundant, but that's how I'm seeing this new DNA breakthrough.
As for whatever lies deep in the process of baking the life-cake, the universe lies there. The universe is the cake, and it's the process, and it's the ingredients, and it's the recipe. It's impossible to parse infinity, though we all try. ;-)
You are right: the universe cannot make anything greater than itself. And when it creates things within itself, of itself, it's "merely" redistributing itself. The universe is "all" there is. The whole idea strikes me dumb with awe.
It depends on what function you're talking about in that "functionally speaking."
For the universe to proceed? No, there's no need to anthropomorphize.
To relate to the universe and its processes in such a way that we maximize the best in who we are?
Sometimes it is. Certainly I wouldn't want to make the judgment that it isn't.
I'm not sure I do try to parse infinity.I'm not especially interested in "the god behind nature" or "the god above the-way-things-are," though if there is such a god I'm not sure how one would know it.
But that relationship of God that holds God to be "outside of" nature has a specific intellectual history that's awfully complicated I'm just not sure it's necessary when one speaks of a god, though I'd agree many Christians would die on that hill.
Natalie, I guess I was thinking that if we can manipulate DNA and make it do what we want it seems to me that there must be some reason for that. To me it seems to suggest that DNA was designed to be mailable. Perhaps (prbably!) my own beliefs are clouding my judgment too much, though. It's certainly probably that my lens for viewing life colors how I view science as much as I try to avoid that.