The blind safecracker

The theory of evolution (i.e. macroevolution, universal common descent) is often thought to pose a specific challenge to inerrancy of Scripture. Some professing Christians think that problem can be solved by simply denying inerrancy or reinterpreting Gen 1-2. 

However, this is not just an issue of how evolution relates to the Bible, but how evolution relates to religion in general. Religion is concerned with man's place in the world. To invoke the fact/value distinction, religion is concerned with man's ultimate significance in the great scheme of things. 

Theistic evolution grants the basic evolutionary narrative. It accepts the way Darwinians typically interpret the fossil record (and other putative lines of evidence for evolution). But this creates two major problems for religion:

i) To judge by the fossil record (as Darwinians read it), evolution did not intend the human race. In Gould's metaphor, if you rewound the tape of evolution, the outcome would be different each time, both in general and in particular. 

Not everyone agrees with this. Conway Morris thinks human evolution was inevitable. But even if we agree with him, that doesn't mean evolution intended the human race. If you randomly dial the lock on a high school locker, eventually you will hit upon the right combination. By process of elimination, it's inevitable that that combination will turn up. 

But you didn't intend that combination, because you didn't know ahead of time which combination would unlock it. That's not something you could aim for. Evolution is the blind safecracker. 

ii) Another problem is that evolution implies physicalism. It attributes man's superior intellect to encephalization. Bigger brains. But in that event, brain death extinguishes the person. 

There are, of course, important ways to challenge these conclusions. However, they don't come from within evolution. Rather, they challenge evolution itself.