Public Theology in a Bilingual Space between Consilience and NOMA
Dr. Changsei Lim
Dr. Changsei Lim graduated from the Protestant Seminary at the University of Bochum in Germany, where he specialized in John Polkinghorne and the theology of science for his doctoral studies. He currently serves as senior pastor of a local church in Seoul while also working as a Research Professor at the Forum Center for International Public Theology in Berkeley, CA.
Abstract
This paper examines how conservative Korean Christianity, creation science, and the popular reception of sociobiology shape contemporary ideological currents in South Korea. Centering on Wilson and Dawkins’ memetic critique of religion. The study engages Stephen Jay Gould’s scientific objections to meme theory and his more constructive NOMA model. Recognizing NOMA’s limitations, the paper ultimately proposes a framework grounded in critical realism as a more adequate alternative to reductionist accounts of religion.
Introduction
The history of the Korean church has long provided a favorable environment for fascistic tendencies to take root, echoing the situation in early 20th‑century Europe as fascism emerged. After the Korean War, Christians who fled communist persecution in the North established churches in the South and became central to the rapid growth of Korean Christianity. Unsurprisingly, they developed strong anti‑communist and politically conservative identities, and later became active supporters of Korea’s fascist military regimes. This dynamic resurfaced on December 3, 2024, when martial law was unexpectedly declared; conservative Christians were among its most vocal supporters, with pastors and congregants leading street rallies and waving Korean and American flags.
Accordingly, the Creation Science Association has also played a significant role in reinforcing conservative churches. Creation science has been widely employed as a pedagogical tool to shape the faith and ideological outlook of teenagers and young adults. Thousands of engineers, teachers, and young researchers belong to the Creation Research Association, which remains a powerful force in Korea and is currently the largest creationist organization in the world.
At the same time, the influence of E.O. Wilson’s sociobiology and Richard Dawkins’ theory of the selfish gene has expanded markedly within Korean society. Although sociobiology arrived in Korea relatively late, Koreans—especially younger generations—have embraced it which is widely regarded as a scientifically rigorous framework for explaining human behavior and social structures. A prominent Korean scientist, who trained under E.O. Wilson at Harvard University, has helped popularize these ideas through frequent media appearances. The term ‘consilience’—which he promotes—has gained broad cultural currency. Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene has likewise become a bestseller.
This enthusiasm for sociobiology and genetic determinism has led many young Koreans and intellectuals to adopt neoliberal and new‑right perspectives without critical reflection. Sociobiological critiques of Christianity have further reinforced atheistic attitudes among youth who are disillusioned with conservative churches and have negatively affected existing congregants, particularly younger Christians.
Given this cultural–religious landscape, biological science has emerged as a powerful regime shaping public discourse on creation and evolution, while promoting a problematic rhetoric of consilience grounded in genetic determinism. This social reality presses theology of nature to recognize the urgent role of public theology in defending democratic values, civil society, and the integrity and sustainability of the ecological web of life.
Stephen Jay Gould, one of the most influential evolutionary theorists of the twentieth century, addresses this social reality through his critique of meme theory, which exposes significant weaknesses in Wilson and Dawkins’ reductionist account of religion. Gould also offered a more constructive assessment of religion’s role in human society through his NOMA model of science and religion. As we will see, while there is value in this model, NOMA remains limited and proposes an alternative framework grounded in critical realism.
Edward Wilson’s Sociobiology and Religion
Edward Wilson had envisioned pursuing sociobiology since his college years. He later described himself as having been under the spell of the “Ionian Enchantment”[1]—a conviction in the unity of the sciences—the belief that the world is orderly and ultimately explicable through a small set of natural laws. This intellectual lineage traces back to Ionia in the sixth century BCE with the figure of Thales of Miletus. For Wilson, the molecular revolution was a decisive turning point; it reinforced his commitment to reductionism, which he regarded as the essential methodological foundation for sociobiology.
Guided by this conviction, Wilson undertook extensive research and published The Insect Societies in 1971. Two years later, he introduced his major work, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis, a comprehensive study of the biological foundations of social behavior and complex societies. The book systematically integrates all social organisms—from colonial bacteria and amoebas to primates—under the principles of group biology, as Wilson intended.
Regarding Wilson’s genetically determined approach to the relationship between biology and social behavior, the central problem becomes evident in the final chapter, Chapter 27, “Humans: From Sociobiology to Sociology.” At the outset of this chapter, Wilson advances his vision of a genetically unified consilience, extending the universal principles he deems applicable to animals into the social sciences that seek to explain human society.[2]
When Wilson argued that biology could serve as the primary key to solving human problems through a unified framework—and that the various fields of human inquiry should be integrated around the natural sciences—he faced strong criticism from many scholars, including his colleagues at Harvard University. In response, Wilson’s On Human Nature contends that human culture itself can be explained through evolutionary theory. As a result, culture becomes, in his view, nothing more than an expression or extension of human genetics.
His provocative statement reads: “The genes hold culture on a leash. The leash is very long, but inevitably values will be constrained in accordance with their effects on the human gene pool.”[3]
To support this view, Wilson argues that culture is fundamentally a product of the brain, and that the brain itself participates in a Lamarckian process of cultural evolution. Culture and the brain co‑evolve through the brain’s autocatalytic activity. Genetic evolution enhances cultural capacities, while culture, in turn, increases the genetic fitness of those who acquire it. This reciprocal process is what Wilson terms “gene–culture coevolution.”[4]
This model argues that culture is created by the communal mind, and each mind in turn is the product of the genetically structured human brain. Genes and culture are inseparably linked. Genes prescribe epigenetic rules— Some individuals inherit epigenetic rules that enable them to survive and reproduce more effectively within their surrounding environment and culture.[5]
Wilson’s appeal among younger generations and public intellectuals tends to encourage a reduction of complex political questions—and the democratic pursuit of the common good—into forms of cultural determinism. This is especially evident in discussions of civil society, gender inequality, and immigrant communities, where sociobiological explanations are taken as sufficient accounts of deeply structural and historical issues.
However, Wilson’s model of gene–culture coevolution downplays the cellular networks through which an organism actively regulates gene expression. The gene is no longer deterministic in the organism’s interaction with the environment; rather, environmental influences shape key epigenetic processes—such as DNA methylation—that regulate gene expression without changing the DNA sequence itself.
Wilson’s biological reductionism represents a form of scientific empiricism that elevates the objective scientific standpoint above religious transcendentalism, implying that science can ultimately answer questions traditionally reserved for religion. Within this framework, Wilson argues that ethics and religion are products of autonomous evolutionary processes far more thoroughly than most theologians are willing to concede.[6]
Given this challenge, Arthur Peacocke—renowned theologian of nature and defender of critical realism—seeks to integrate biological insights into a theological account of human nature. Yet sociobiologists remain unable to conceive of God as the primary cause or the agent operative in, with, and under the entire evolutionary process unfolding through time.[7]
Richard Dawkins’s Genetic Determinism and Criticism of Religion
In 1976, one year after the publication of Edward Wilson’s Sociobiology, Richard Dawkins released The Selfish Gene. Unlike Wilson—who explains collective evolution by extending insights from insect societies to human social and cultural life—Dawkins concentrates on genes and their networks, moving beyond the individual gene as a discrete unit. The two evolutionists also debated the origins of altruism, differing in their emphasis on group selection versus gene centered evolution. Nevertheless, Dawkins’s genetic theory and Wilson’s group selection remain complementary: both maintain that human social behavior and activity can ultimately be explained through biological and genetic principles.
For Dawkins, the gene is the fundamental unit that persists across generations by replicating itself within the bodies of many organisms. The organism, therefore, is nothing more than a “survival machine,” a kind of “marionette” manipulated by its genes. DNA—what Dawkins famously calls the “immortal coil”—occupies the driver’s seat not only in shaping every organism but, by extension, in influencing human culture as well.[8]
According to Dawkins, reproduction, altruism, and even morality—acts of considering or helping others—are ultimately strategic behaviors aimed at preserving genes. Dawkins rejects the idea that altruistic behavior represents an individual’s sacrifice for the good of the group to which they belong. Instead, he argues that what appears to be self‑sacrifice is better understood as a gene‑driven strategy that enhances the reproductive success of the genes themselves.[9]
Dawkins extends the concept of the selfish gene into the cultural realm. To do so, he coined and popularized the term ‘meme.’ In his account, memes arise as units of transmission—ideas, practices, symbols, melodies, and rituals within cultural sphere. These memes form a “meme pool,” and as they propagate within it, they pass from brain to brain through processes of imitation and communication. Dawkins’ meme theory thus becomes central to his critique of religion, which he interprets as a particularly successful—and often maladaptive—set of memes.[10]
Dawkins first speculates—drawing on the evolutionary philosopher Daniel Dennett—that religiosity may once have offered adaptive advantages for human survival. In Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, Dennett describes Darwin’s theory as a “universal acid,” an intellectual solvent capable of eating through traditional explanatory frameworks and posing a profound challenge to established intellectual and religious value systems.[11]
In Dawkins’s account of the Darwinian survival value of religion, religious belief functions as a byproduct of evolutionary processes rather than as an adaptation in its own right. He illustrates this with the example of a moth swooping toward a candle flame. The moth is not attempting to destroy itself; rather, its nervous system is programmed to maintain a fixed angle to distant light sources—an adaptive strategy under moonlight that becomes maladaptive in the presence of artificial flames.
Religion, Dawkins argues, emerges through an analogous mechanism. In cultural transmission, inexperienced children must rely on the accumulated knowledge of adults in order to survive. Because their survival depends on trusting parental instruction, children are predisposed to accept whatever adults teach them—including religious doctrines. Thus, a child’s mind, shaped by evolutionary pressures to obey authoritative guidance, becomes susceptible to absorbing even fear‑laden sermons. For Dawkins, this cognitive vulnerability is the cultural analogue of the moth’s navigational system: a once‑adaptive mechanism that can lead to maladaptive outcomes under new conditions.[12]
Meme pools emerge within diverse evolutionary‑psychological and natural‑selection environments. They function analogously to gene pools. Different meme pools arise in response to variations in human environments and brain functioning, and among these, religious meme pools also develop. The human mind, in this view, is psychologically primed for religion. This predisposition aligns with what Daniel Dennett calls the “intentional stance”—a cognitive strategy in which agents attribute intention or agency to external forces. Such a stance has survival value because it accelerates decision‑making in dangerous or uncertain situations. Religion, therefore, becomes an evolutionary byproduct of a brain mechanism designed to enhance rapid judgment and group survival.[13]
In developing his theory of the meme machine, Dawkins challenges Gould’s NOMA principle, describing it as a form of “the poverty of agnosticism” if science is presumed to have nothing whatsoever to say about the question of God’s existence. In Dawkins’s view, such a strict separation of domains artificially shields religion from scientific scrutiny. Yet he also contends that Gould himself, despite advocating NOMA, was in practice strongly inclined toward a de facto atheism.[14]
Scientific Criticism of Meme Theory: Stephen Gould’s Critique
Numerous theological responses have been offered to the critiques of religion advanced by Wilson and Dawkins. Yet such theological rebuttals have attracted interest primarily among pastors and certain Christian communities.
For this reason, it is crucial to highlight how scientists themselves have evaluated meme theory and its application to the critique of religion. Scientific perspectives—especially those of figures such as Stephen Jay Gould—carry a different kind of public credibility and can illuminate the conceptual and empirical weaknesses of meme theory in ways that theological arguments alone may not.
Stephen Jay Gould was a prominent American paleontologist, evolutionary biologist, and historian of science. He spent most of his career teaching at Harvard University and working at the American Museum of Natural History in New York. Together with his Harvard colleague Richard Lewontin, Gould sharply criticized not only meme theory but also sociobiology and genetic determinism more broadly. Gould’s scientific critique can be distilled into three central points.
First, Gould challenges the assumption that Darwinian evolution is exclusively or exhaustively explained by natural selection. His theory of punctuated equilibrium advanced evolutionary thought by emphasizing that long periods of stasis are punctuated by relatively rapid bursts of change. In Gould’s account, evolution became the preferred term for Darwin’s idea of “descent with modification,” a shift that encouraged its association with progress. Herbert Spencer popularized the word—understood as “unfolding”—and pushed it into biological discourse. Darwin initially resisted the term, which does not appear in the first edition of Origin of Species, but he eventually adopted it in The Descent of Man (1871), acquiescing to a usage that had already gained wide currency.[15]
Despite Gould’s defense of Darwin against Spencer, Darwin incorporated Spencer’s phrase “survival of the fittest” into the definitive sixth edition of Origin of Species, noting that the term was in some respects more accurate than “natural selection” and sometimes equally convenient.[16]
The evolutionary record, he argues, does not reveal a directional movement toward complexity but rather fluctuating patterns of diversification and extinction. The history of life is best understood as a “full house”—an ever‑shifting distribution of forms shaped by expansions and contractions of variation across the entire system and “its changing pattern of spread through time.”[17]
Meme theory presupposes the existence of numerous cultural and religious meme pools, among which only those favored by natural selection persist. But if natural selection operates only partially or cannot be generalized across all levels of biological and cultural change, then the scientific basis for their critique of religion collapses.
In fact, the argument advanced by Dawkins has produced political consequences for how natural selection is understood, reinforcing forms of social Darwinism that have taken cultural root among younger generations in Korea—particularly the notion that “survival of the fittest” legitimizes competitive individualism. This reception has nurtured new‑right sensibilities and even sympathy for a fascist‑leaning military ethos, often expressed through a mimetic alignment with the American Trump‑era MAGA movement.
In collaboration with Martinez Hewlett, a molecular and cellular biologist, Ted Peters—a leading figure in the science‑and‑religion dialogue—supports Gould’s critique of Wilson’s book, Consilience, especially regarding claims about the evolutionary origins of ethics and religion. Peters affirms that Gould’s criticism is well‑grounded: sociobiology, framed within a neo‑Darwinian paradigm, applies evolutionary principles to every dimension of human nature and thereby risks reducing complex moral, cultural, and religious phenomena to mere biological functions. Gould labels this tendency “Darwinian fundamentalism.” In this sense, Gould’s critique exposes the conceptual overreach of sociobiology and challenges its claim to offer a comprehensive account of human meaning.[18]
Second, Gould argues that Dawkins’s position rests on a fallacy of analogy. In Chapter 8 of The Structure of Evolutionary Theory, Gould critiques Dawkins’s genetic determinism, particularly the way Dawkins portrays genes as autonomous agents driving evolution. Gould therefore contends that Dawkins commits what he calls the “Pareto error”: the mistake of treating a single level of a complex hierarchical system as if it were the sole or primary causal agent. By elevating faithful replication as the central criterion of a gene‑centered view of evolution—rather than focusing on interactors—Dawkins pushes selection to its lowest operational level. As he puts it, “Darwin himself went as far as he could in this direction, by breaking down the Paleyan edifice of highest‑level intentionality (God himself) to the lowest level then practical—organisms struggling for reproductive success.”[19] Gould rejects Dawkins’s cultural–genetic analogy—the very foundation of meme theory—as fundamentally flawed.
Indeed, cultural codes cannot be observed directly in the brain or in people’s heads; rather, they are publicly constituted as a shared web of significance—a system embodied in intersubjective communication and in our interactions with the world across diverse realities. These shared meanings shape our perception and ultimately bring forth a meaningful world.
Third, Gould argues that biological and cultural evolution proceed according to fundamentally different dynamics. As noted earlier, Wilson proposed a coevolution of genes and culture, while Dawkins claimed that culture contains replicators—memes—analogous to biological genes. For Gould, however, cultural evolution unfolds rapidly and in a largely Lamarckian fashion, whereas biological evolution proceeds far more slowly. His analysis in Wonderful Life of the Burgess Shale fossils illustrates how evolution operates in radically unpredictable ways. The history of life, he argues, is inherently contingent: if we were to “replay the tape of life,” evolutionary pathways would diverge dramatically from the course actually taken. This deep unpredictability undermines any attempt to draw simple analogies between biological evolution and cultural development.[20]
Gould’s Proposal on the Relationship Between Science and Religion: NOMA
In light of Gould’s critique of genetic determinism, it is important to examine his approach to NOMA as a framework for understanding the relationship between science and religion. Gould begins by emphasizing that science and religion constitute two essential domains of human life. This position stands in sharp contrast to the negative attitudes toward religion held by many scientists, particularly those working within evolutionary theory.
For Gould, science investigates the factual characteristics of the natural world and constructs theories grounded in empirical evidence. Religion, by contrast, occupies an equally significant sphere because it addresses questions of meaning, purpose, and value—questions that science, by its very nature, cannot answer. Religion is especially indispensable, he argues, because science alone cannot generate ethical norms. In this respect, religion provides the moral and existential guidance that scientific inquiry requires but cannot supply.
Thus, science and religion must respect one another’s spheres because each addresses a distinct but equally necessary human need. To articulate this mutual respect, Gould introduces the term ‘magisterium.’ In Catholic usage, the term denotes authority or teaching office, but Gould adapts it to mean a domain of inquiry governed by its own principles, methods, and forms of discourse. Within a magisterium, the authority of that mode of teaching is recognized, and conversations take place according to its internal norms. In this sense, the legitimacy of each magisterium must be acknowledged: science governs empirical facts about the natural world, while religion governs questions of meaning, value, and moral purpose.[21]
According to Gould, the figure who most fully embodied the NOMA model in his own life was Charles Darwin. Darwin pursued scientific inquiry with great passion while also living as a committed Christian. Gould described Darwin’s scientific posture as the “cold bath”—a disciplined, cool‑headed approach to studying nature, free from preconceived notions or value‑laden assumptions. Yet this methodological detachment did not sever Darwin from his religious commitments. He remained active in church life until the end of his days, regularly attending services and giving generously to programs for the poor. Gould even suggests that Proverbs 3:18 should have been included in Darwin’s funeral rites, arguing that Darwin lived a morally exemplary life as a man of faith and was therefore worthy of salvation.[22] However, Gould’s slight exaggeration stands in contrast to Darwin’s own self‑description as an agnostic.
Gould also revisits the historical episodes often cited as emblematic conflicts between religion and science, the most famous being the confrontation between Galileo Galilei and the Vatican. He argues that this clash arose not from any inherent or necessary opposition between the two domains but from a series of misunderstandings, political pressures, and particular historical circumstances. The same pattern, Gould suggests, reappeared in the nineteenth century. Pope Pius IX asserted papal infallibility and took an adversarial stance toward scientists and intellectuals who challenged ecclesial authority. During this period, materialist philosophies—including Marxism—were rapidly gaining influence, and the Pope regarded evolutionary theory as an expression of atheistic science, condemning it accordingly.[23]
Gould also revisits the creationism debate in the United States. William J. Bryan emerged as the leading figure in the early twentieth‑century movement opposing evolution and defending creationism. Bryan believed that evolutionary theory lent scientific legitimacy to eugenics. Since the late nineteenth century, eugenics had exerted a powerful influence on American society, shaping racial discrimination and inspiring a range of discriminatory laws. Bryan, a politician committed to combating such racism and inequality, viewed evolution as the intellectual root of eugenics and therefore as a dangerous doctrine. In his eyes, evolutionary theory promoted a “law of the jungle” mentality and functioned as a pseudoscience that justified the oppression of the weak by the strong.[24]
Bryan regarded Darwinism as an ideology that threatened the moral foundations of a society shaped by biblical values. He believed that evolutionary theory undermined democracy and reinforced class inequality by promoting a worldview in which the strong inevitably dominate the weak. From his perspective, the creation‑science movement—which opposed evolution—was not merely a doctrinal stance but an expression of faith, a practical commitment to love, justice, and equality.[25]
However, for Gould, biblical literalism and the notion of a young earth—complete with an image‑of‑God anthropology formed only a few days after the inception of planetary time—constitute a mythology set against those who acknowledge the basic factuality of both the immensity of time and the veracity of evolution.[26]
Gould’s reexaminations of the history of science and religion are intended to foster moderation and dialogue between the two domains, moving beyond narratives of conflict. The NOMA model he proposes is not merely a framework in which science and religion coexist without interfering with one another. Rather, Gould views these realms as two essential pillars of human life. They cannot be fused, yet some form of integration is indispensable. When science and religion respect one another’s boundaries, practice moderation, and engage in genuine dialogue, they can together cultivate forms of wisdom that enrich human life. In this sense, Gould believes that the pursuit of wisdom—long regarded as a central human aspiration—remains possible.[27]
However, in the final section, Gould argues that although science and religion should pursue moderation and dialogue, they must also be clearly distinguished from syncretism. For Gould, certain contemporary attempts to integrate scientific and theological claims—such as scientific theology and theistic evolution—cross this boundary. In particular, Gould identifies three central theses of modern scientific theology that, in his view, exemplify this syncretistic tendency.[28]
For instance, the quantum model of wave and particle cannot serve as evidence for the divinity and humanity of Jesus; the analogy is inadequate. Likewise, Genesis and the Big Bang theory cannot be placed within the same explanatory domain, since science does not offer a theory of the ultimate origins of the world. The anthropic principle and fine‑tuning, often invoked to suggest that the early universe was structured to permit human existence, represent for Gould an excessively anthropocentric interpretation. In his view, the evolution of the universe and of Earth has no inherent purpose; it is entirely contingent.
Responses to Gould’s Charge of Syncretism
Despite Gould’s critique, John Polkinghorne underscores the intelligibility of the world within a theistic framework. As a bottom‑up thinker, he moves from the particularities of experience to the generalities of understanding, highlighting the verisimilitudinous character of human knowledge in both science and theology. For Polkinghorne, intelligibility is the key to reality, grounding an epistemic circularity in which nature discloses itself through the human apprehension of the object.
To this end, he appropriates critical realism in order to seek both consonance and discontinuity, rather than pursuing a unified worldview achieved through integration or assimilation. His scientific realism is closely tied to philosophical theology, and he finds it more adequate to employ models, metaphors, and analogies within precise and limited scientific language, rather than accepting the view—associated with Ian Barbour—that theories merely correlate patterns of observational data. Theories, for Polkinghorne, carry serious ontological pretensions: epistemology models ontology.
Polkinghorne identifies Ernan McMullin’s notion of scientific realism with critical realism, grounded in science’s empirically demonstrated capacity to attain verisimilitudinous knowledge. In doing so, he highlights the significance of induction, particularly as reframed under the influence of Karl Popper. As he notes, “To speak of induction…is to attempt a discourse that will have validity in all possible worlds…we need to take this particularity very seriously.”[29] Thus he appears more as a critical rationalist shaped by Popper’s method of conjecture and refutation than as a syncretic assimilator, contrary to Gould’s characterization.[30]
On the other hand, even the renowned atheist physicist Stephen Hawking acknowledges the religious implications of the Big Bang and fine‑tuning. A purely scientific approach, articulated through mathematical models, cannot address the deeper question of why there should be a universe for such models to describe in the first place.
According to Ian Barbour, the anthropic principle aligns more closely with a theology of nature than with the traditional design argument of natural theology, since atheists typically interpret the principle in terms of chance and necessity.[31]
Furthermore, Kenneth Miller, a professor of biology at Brown University, expresses concern about Gould’s approach to the relationship between religion and science, both of which seek to cultivate wisdom and require sustained attention to their respective domains. Miller contends that evolution is not inherently hostile to religious belief and can, in fact, contribute to the pursuit of wisdom.[32]
Miller highlights Augustine’s reading of Genesis as a continuing and unfolding process, in which God’s commands are fulfilled progressively rather than instantaneously. He further notes that Genesis 2:7—“the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground”—is, in his view, scientifically accurate to a striking degree.[33]
Given this consonance, a theology of nature remains an undercurrent in the dialogue between science and religion. It does not begin with science but is grounded in religious experience and historical revelation within a particular tradition. In the spirit of critical realism, it employs models and metaphors in contrast to naïve realism, and these models of reality are evaluated by shared criteria such as agreement with data (understood as theory‑laden), coherence (including the modification of auxiliary hypotheses), scope (the capacity to form an inclusive worldview), and fertility.
This approach allows both science and theology to remain fallible yet truth‑seeking, model‑dependent yet genuinely referential to reality. It seeks coherence between faith and reason without collapsing one into the other. As Barbour observes, “science and religion are considered to be relatively independent sources of ideas,” even as their concerns overlap in significant and meaningful ways.[34]
A synthesis of critical realism with NOMA enables us to move beyond the troubling political and cultural implications associated with the sociobiology of thinkers such as Dawkins and Wilson. This synthesis becomes crucial for refining a public theology of science that incorporates the significance of cultural narrative and bilingual rationality within the public sphere.
Accordingly, Paul S. Chung, Distinguished Professor at the Forum Center in Berkeley, advances a form of critical realism situated within a cultural narrative that sustains a semantic horizon. Scientific observation cannot dispense with linguistic mediation and critical reasoning; it never occurs in a conceptual vacuum. On this basis, Chung challenges Stephen Jay Gould’s NOMA, particularly in relation to epigenetics, where biological life interfaces dynamically with socio‑ecological factors. If Gould insists on the strict independence of the magisteria, how would he respond to a theological account that approaches the epigenetic problem through ethical responsibility—already intertwined with biological life?[35]
Epilogue: Critical Realism and NOMA
In Gould’s view, building a bridge between the two “rocks of ages”—science and religion—requires a careful integration that avoids any form of syncretism. Scientific principles and findings, he insists, should not be forced into religious frameworks or made to yield religious conclusions. His Goldilocks solution appears to offer a balanced middle ground. Yet in practice, Gould rejects natural theology outright and remains wary of any theology of nature.
According to Wilson, “if religion…can be systematically analyzed and explained as a product of the brain’s evolution, its power as an eternal source of morality will be gone forever.”[36]
On the contrary, Gould articulates his position succinctly: “The first commandment of all versions of NOMA might be summarized by stating: Thou shalt not mix the magisteria by claiming that God directly ordains important events in the history of nature by special interference knowable only through revelation and not accessible to science.”[37]
His formulation underscores a strict separation of domains and a prohibition against theological claims entering scientific explanation. Yet this perspective invites reconsideration. A critical‑realist approach encourages collaborative dialogue between religion and science, fostering a renewed relationship with nature and a vision of a shared world. Both disciplines rely on the construction of theories or models shaped by acts of creative imagination, and both are marked by their analogical, intelligible, and revisable character. Such methodological affinities open space for deeper engagement across the magisteria without collapsing one into the other.
As we read from Darwin himself, “There is grandeur in this view of life; with its several powers having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most wonderful and most beautiful have been, and are being evolved.”[38]
References
Barbour, Ian G. Religion and Science: Historical and Contemporary Issues. New York: HarperSanFrancisco, 1990.
Darwin, Charles. The Origin of Species, 6th ed. New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1909.
Chung, Paul S. “Stephen Jay Gould, Punctuated Equilibrium, and NOMA.” https://youngsung.devmisc.com/global-exchange-post/punctuated-equilibrium/
Dawkins, Richard. The Selfish Gene. New York: Oxford University Press, 1976.
———. The God Delusion. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006.
Dennett, Daniel. Darwin’s Dangerous Idea. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1995.
Gould, Stephen J. Full House: The Spread of Excellence from Plato to Darwin. New York: Harmony Books, 1996.
———. The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2002.
———. Wonderful Life. New York: W.W. Norton, 1989.
———. Rocks of Ages. New York: Ballantine Books, 1999.
Hewlett, Martinez, and Ted Peters. Evolution from Creation to New Creation: Conflict, Conversation, and Convergence. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2003.
Miller, Kenneth R. Finding Darwin’s God. New York: Harper Perennial, 2002.
Polkinghorne, John. Scientists as Theologians: A Comparison of the Writings of Ian Barbour, Arthur Peacocke, and John Polkinghorne. London: SPCK, 1996.
Wilson, Edward O. Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge. New York: Vintage Books, 1999.
———. Sociobiology: The New Synthesis. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975.
———. On Human Nature. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978.
Peacocke, Arthur. God and the New Biology. San Francisco: Harper, 1996.
[1] Edward O. Wilson, Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge (New York: Vintage Books, 1999), 3-4.
[2] E. O. Wilson, Sociobiology: The New Synthesis (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975), 547.
[3] Wilson, On Human Nature (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1978), 167.
[4] Wilson, Consilience, 138.
[5] Ibid., 138-39.
[6] Ibid., 205.
[7] Arthur Peacocke, God and the New Biology (San Francisco: Harper, 1996), 110.
[8] Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene (New York: Oxford University Press, 1976), 2.
[9] Kin selection is a Darwinian principle that accounts for both aggression and altruism by distinguishing between those who are genetically close and those who are more distant. Wilson extends this framework by explaining group selection and kin selection in animals and, by analogy, applying these dynamics to human society.
[10] Dawkins, The God Delusion (Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006), 192.
[11] D. Denett, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea (New York: Simon and Shuster, 1995), 63.
[12] Dawkins, The God Delusion, 173-74.
[13] Ibid., 182-83.
[14] Ibid., 58.
[15] S. J. Gould, Full House: The Spread of Excellence from Plato to Darwin (New York: Harmony Books, 1996), 137.
[16] Martinez Hewlett and Ted Peters, Evolution from Creation to New Creation: Conflict, Conversation, and Convergence (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2003), 53. Endnote 2.
[17] Gould, Full House, 15.
[18] Hewlett and Peters, Evolution from Creation to New Creation, 63.
[19] The Structure of Evolutionary Theory (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2002), 616.
[20] S. J. Gould, Wonderful Life (New York: W.W. Norton, 1989), 51.
[21] Gould, Rocks of Ages (New York : Ballantine Books, 1999), 5.
[22] Ibid., 45.
[23] Ibid., 106.
[24] ibid., 154.
[25] Ibid., 155.
[26] Gould, Full House, 19.
[27] Gould, Rocks of Ages, 59.
[28] Ibid., 215.
[29] John Polkinghorne, Faith, Science & Understanding (New Haven and London: Yale University Press,2000), 35.
[30] Polkinghorne, Scientists as Theologians: A Comparison of the Writings of Ian Barbour, Arthur Peacocke and John Polkinghorne (London: SPCK, 1996), 14-21.
[31] Ian G. Barbour, Religion and Science: Historical and Contemporary Issues (New York: HarperSanFrancisco, 1990), 205.
[32] Kenneth R. Miller, Finding Darwin’s God (New York: Harper Perennial, 2002), 170.
[33] Ibid., 256-57.
[34] Barbour, Religion and Science, 100.
[35] Paul S. Chung, “Stephen Jay Gould, Punctuated Equilibrium, and NOMA” at https://youngsung.devmisc.com/global-exchange-post/punctuated-equilibrium/
[36] Wilson, On Human Nature, 201.
[37] Gould, Rocks of Ages, 85.
[38] Darwin, The Origin of Species, 6th ed. (New York: P. F. Collier & Son, 1909), 528-9.