The Two Faces Of Darwin

Townhall ^ | February 12, 2009 | Dinesh D'Souza

[ChessExpert]

The story is told in Adrian Desmond and James Moore's authoritative biography Darwin: The Life of a Tormented Evolutionist. Desmond and Moore point out that Darwin lost his faith many years before his publication of his magnum opus on evolution. When his young daughter Annie died at the age of 10, Darwin came to hate the God whom he blamed for this. This was in 1851, eight years before Darwin released his Origin of Species.

[ChessExpert]

This traces the evolution of Darwin's ideas on religion.

[ChessExpert]

You may be interested.

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[wendy1946]

When his young daughter Annie died at the age of 10, Darwin came to hate the God whom he blamed for this.

At least the girl didn't have to grow up listening to evolutionite BS......

[Oztrich Boy]

At least the girl didn't have to grow up listening to evolutionite BS......

You are sweet.

But kids accept their parents little foibles as normal

The children were so familiar with his intense studies that one of his sons, while visiting a neighbour's house and noting there was no lab, asked, "Where does your father do his barnacles?"

[GodGunsGuts]

I agree that Darwin lost his faith before the publication of origins, but I disagree that Darwin saw evolution as being compatible with Christianity. And while I think it is possible to hold to evolution and still remain a Christian, I don’t think the two go together, and more than any other sinful worldview goes with the same.

BTW, I read D’Souza book “What’s So Great About Christianity” a while back. There were some excellent arguments contained therein, but I think the book was marred by D’Souza’s acceptance of what can only be described as evolution-lite.

[ChessExpert]

I read the book also and recommend it.

My recollection is that Dinesh saw the historical record as generally proceeding from simple life forms to complex life forms. He took this as evidence of evolution of some sort. He did not commit to evolution through random mutation and natural selection.

I think many critics have a problem with the argument that the engine for change is random mutation. There are vastly many more ways to mess things up than there are ways to make things better, in the case of complex systems. I could just as well take a magnet to my computer and evolve it. Nor is natural selection an ideal way to winnow out the alternatives. Of course, given enough time anything is possible. The problem is that there has not been enough time.

So now I sense that the “community” is pushing the idea of alternative universes. An infinite number of universes would provide the opportunities for life to originate and evolve. But positing an infinite number of universes is an idea that does not seem to have a basis. Nor is anyone upfront about their motivation for discussing alternative universes.

Assuming multiple universes is certainly no better than assuming that the speed of light has slowed and that the earth is actually quite young.

[wendy1946]

If the girl was halfway bright she’d have been immune; evoloserism is for idiots.

[ChessExpert]

Here is some interesting history (of thought) that I did not know before reading the article:

When Darwin's co-discoverer of evolution, Alfred Russel Wallace, wrote him to say that evolution could not account for man’s moral and spiritual nature, Darwin accused him of jeopardizing the whole theory. “I hope you have not murdered too completely your own and my child.”

We don’t hear much about Alfred Russel Wallace. I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that for every person who knows that Wallace developed the theory of evolution, there are 500 people who know that Darwin developed the theory of evolution.

Substitute Darwin for Wallace, and vice versa, in the the above paragraph. Imagine that it was Darwin who wrote that ‘evolution could not account for man’s moral and spiritual nature,’ and that Wallace objected. Had that been the case, I think many more people today would say “Wallace was the true originator of the theory of evolution.”