Biology versus ideology
people often associate evolution with progress... biologically, this is bunkum
A lot of people naturally associate the concept of evolution with ideas of progress, of improvement, of forward and upward movement to some higher goal. Hence the biological theory of evolution has often been co-opted by causes and movements seeking justification for their own utopian visions of progress, whether by means of communism, capitalism, eugenics, or whatever other hideous ideologies humans have managed to dream up. (I said in another post that the Bible has been used to justify many mutually-opposite ideologies - the same can equally be said of the theory of evolution by natural selection.)Biologically speaking, this is bunkum (I could have used other words beginning with 'b'). The theory of evolution, as a strictly biological theory, has nothing to say about progress. Evolution by natural selection tends towards increased diversity of species, increased complexity (at least in general, I think), and better adaptation of a particular species to its environment. That's about it. It doesn't have anything to say about a future utopia or a master race of superbeings. Any speculations of this nature lead us promptly out of the realms of science and into philosophy and metaphysics.
That's not to say such speculation can't be valid - just that it won't be scientific, and those who engage in it shouldn't imagine that they are backed up by the science.
So with that fairly major caveat aside, I'm now going to indulge in some theological speculations about one possible relationship between evolution and progress.
The appearance of purpose
the whole process does give the impression of progress and purpose
I suspect the reason why so many people link evolution with progress is because the whole process, viewed from beginning to end, certainly gives that impression quite strongly. At one end we have self-replicating strings of protein; at the other we have immensely complex, conscious creatures who can think, love, create music, investigate the nature of reality, land on the Moon, and Twitter pointless rubbish fifty times a day. Well, not all progress is upward. ;-) But certainly there seems to be the appearance of a general direction, of some kind of progress, and, well, even of what might be called purposiveness in the whole process.A biologist, as a biologist, would perhaps only view this as interesting but irrelevant to his or her work. But as a human they or anyone else can regard it as a phenomenon that could do with investigation - just not by the methods of science.
To one who believes in a supernatural God who invisibly underlies the visible processes of nature, it's no surprise if the broad sweep of evolutionary history tends towards the emergence of rational, relational, morally-responsible creatures. It's exactly what you would expect, though of course it's not something that science could predict or indeed comment on.
The dark side of progress
However, there are at least two serious problems with this. First, the whole process apparently relies so fundamentally on pain, predation and selfish competition. Secondly, the results are so mixed: for every Mother Teresa there's a Mao Tse Tung; for every Mona Lisa there's a My Lai massacre.These really just re-state in a slightly different form the classic theological problems of evil and suffering, which I've tried to look at more fully in other posts (see links to related posts below). In brief, the usual answers are either that the evil is simply a necessary potential counterpart or flip-side to the good; or that there are malevolent, chaotic or corruptive forces at work in the cosmos alongside the good; or that humans are in some way morally responsible for at least some of the evil; or else that it's all just too darn mysterious and complicated for us mortal pea-brains to have a clue about. I tend to subscribe rather tentatively to a complete mixture of these answers. :-)
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