ABSTRACT

Humans can be considered in terms of their homologies with other animals, as individuals or in terms of their group interactions. Pannenberg takes all three approaches, and uses biology and genetics, psychology and the social sciences to illuminate his theological account of humanity. In this chapter, I shall consider Pannenberg's use of biology and genetics. As I noted in the first chapter o f this study, Pannenberg refers back to the German speaking school o f philosophical anthropology, developed by Scheler, Plessner and Gehlen, when he deals with human nature. In support o f this approach, and contrasting it with the early behaviourist school of psychology, Pannenberg cites ethologists, particularly Konrad Lorenz and Eibl-Eibesfeldt, as supplying biological accounts o f behaviour which can be appropriately applied to human beings. He also cites the work of Jacob von Uexküll in discussing the relation of the animal to its environment. Because of Pannenberg's fundamental dependence on these ideas, it is important to examine them in detail as science, and in their historical context. This turns out to have implications of Pannenberg's use of them.