MAKING CONNECTIONS

In this lesson we have looked at a few of the ways that biology and genetics, as well as several religious views, offer ways to make sense of human behavior as it relates to good and evil. By studying the function of the brain, many scientists have come to understand that both conscious and unconscious behavior is due to how the brain works. 

People of faith and theologians consider the behaviors of good and evil to be related to a variety of causes. The belief that humans are in a state of original sin, have free will to choose good or evil, or have either a moral conscious or impulse that influences behavior are some of these. Click on the link below to watch a video about some ways that people, especially Christians, explain good and evil:
So how might we think about both biology and theology as a part of what causes humans to behave as either “good” or “evil?” Below is a response to this question by Rev. Dr. Patrick Russell, chairman of the ELCA Alliance for Faith, Science, and Technology, and former Fellow in Theoretical Neurobiology at the Neurosciences Institute in La Jolla, CA.

You may also click on the link below to see the full article.
The human brain may well be said to be the most complex object in the known universe. Even if our consciousness is the product of physical processes (neurons firing, chemicals being released) in our brains, those processes are themselves at every moment sensitively dependent on our environment (including other people), our previous choices, and many random influences. In short, our brain state is itself influenced by our actions, which in turn are determined by our brain state in a ceaseless feedback loop. No one factor, be it our genetic composition, our past, our social setting, is entirely responsible for our brain state and our choices, though all of them are influences.

A widely-held view of the mind and its relationship to the brain that I favor is called nonreductive physicalism. What this mouthful means is that, while we believe the mind to be the result of physical and biological process, the human mind and consciousnes cannot be reduced to – fully described in terms of – these processes. In this view there is no need to postulate a separate, nonmaterial realm in which our minds exist literally disembodied from our brains. Our minds are believed to be located in our biological selves, but we are not mere automatons obeying blind physical laws. Rather, we are constrained and influenced by biology, by our genes, our heritage, our environment, but we are still free to make choices within these constraints.1
With this understanding in mind, we can see that a scientific, or biological, view of human behavior combines with a religious-based view of a human ability to be influenced and choose actions.1 However, it is important to note that this is not the end of the story, or the final answer to this or other questions. Not every religion or belief system agrees with the idea of free will, or sin and evil. In the same way, some scientists firmly believe that only the processes in the brain are responsible for human action. But as you may recall from other lessons, we are still searching for ways to connect the two understandings of science and religion. 

Both science and religion continue to make sense of human behavior and often change how they understand this issue. An example of this is work of E.O. Wilson and how he has changed his view of altruism. Religions are also becoming more open to inter-faith dialogue that brings together different views of sin and evil. You too will change in your understanding of how biology and theology might work together.
So remember, when you connect the biological and theological understandings of human behavior, you don’t need to disconnect from one or the other!
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1 See full article for the fully developed religious-based view of free will.