The Human Conscience: Divine Design or the Nature of Our Neurons?

Abstract

Christians through the centuries have long turned to Romans 2:14-16 to show that the human conscience is a sign of the restraints God has placed on sin within all fallen human beings. The universal presence of the human conscience is put forward by many apologists as evidence for the existence of a creator God. In recent decades, however, some scientists have proposed naturalistic causes for the existence of a common human morality. This has been put forward as evidence against the existence of a supreme deity or deities. There is no reason to suppose that the human inclination to do good and avoid evil is anything other than a survival mechanism, the result of millions of years of evolutionary processes. To suggest that the source of the 'law within our hearts' is a supreme law giver is repugnant to new atheists such as Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins. Are these neurological explanations sufficient to explain the existence of the human moral compass apart from a moral law-giver who exists outside of creation? Is this evidence open to other possible interpretations? Might the interpretation of the data or even the data itself be flawed?

How might Christians, with their centuries-long Scriptural understanding of human conscience, respond apologetically to the claim that human conscience can be explained neurologically as a result of the brain's Neodarwinian evolutionary development? This is the main problem to be addressed in the following work.

The main research problem can be subdivided into the following research questions which, taken together, should answer the main problem. Each of these sub-problems will be addressed using a chronological framework. Consideration will be given to how these sub-problems were answered in the past, the current state of thinking, and the paths which future research seems likely to take.

The first set of sub-problems has to do with the Christian theological understanding of conscience and natural law. First, consideration will be given to the Romans 2:14-16 passage, a key portion of Scripture dealing with the question of the human conscience, where it comes from and how it functions. Second, how has Christian thought through the centuries regarded the origin and operation of the human conscience? The answer to this question will be limited in scope, but will touch on the major themes on the subject of natural law and conscience in historical Christian tradition and in the major confessional systems of thought present today. This would include, especially, natural law and conscience in the early church writers, as well as in the Thomistic, Lutheran and Calvinist traditions. The roots of Christian’s ideas of conscience in earlier Greek and Roman thought will also be considered.

The second set of questions has to do with the current neurological explanations for the human conscience. First, what are the basic assumptions of the Darwinian and now Neo-Darwinian evolutionary hypothesis, especially as those assumptions relate to the development and function of the human mind? As in the examination of the development of Christian thought on the question of conscience, the scope of work on this question will be limited to the general themes necessary for this mini-thesis. Second, what specific explanations have been proposed, and are currently being proposed, for the human conscience based on these Neo-Darwinian assumptions?

The last set of questions has to do with analysing and synthesizing the data gathered in answer to the previous questions in order to address the main thesis problem. First, what are the foremost apologetic concerns to be addressed when considering the Christian theological view on the origin of conscience in light of the Neo-Darwinian proposals for the emergence of the human moral compass? Each perspective will be evaluated and critiqued. Second, are there areas where both the Christian and Neo-Darwinian ideas show convergence and others where they show divergence? Third, considering the questions of foremost apologetic concern, and any convergence or divergence of ideas, what might be the most appropriate Christian apologetic response?