Posted on 01/13/2002 8:47:59 AM PST by aculeus
He was the originator of the most dangerous idea in history. He disenfranchised God as our creator and revealed the animal origins of humanity. Many believe his influence was pernicious and evil.
But now a campaign has been launched to establish an international day of celebration on 12 February: birthday of Charles Darwin, author of the theory of evolution by natural selection.
'Along with Shakespeare and Newton, Darwin is our greatest gift to the world,' said Richard Dawkins, honorary president of the Darwin Day Organisation. 'He was our greatest thinker. Any campaign to recognise his greatness should have a significant British contribution.'
The Darwin campaign was launched by US activists two years ago to resist the anti-evolution campaigning of fundamental Christians. Now the aim is to create global celebrations by 2009, the bicentennial of his birthday.
'We have little chance of getting a national holiday for Darwin in the US - there is far too much anti-science and pseudoscience,' said project organiser Amanda Chesworth.'We are more likely to get one established in Europe, particularly in Britain, his birthplace.'
Celebrations will include seminars and lectures, and the showing of films and plays on Darwin's life, though other ideas include an atheist giving Radio 4's Thought for the Day, and a lesson on evolution being preached at Westminster Abbey. 'I'd do it like a shot,' said Dawkins.
Darwin was originally religious. He saw nature's diversity as proof of God's existence. Only a divine creator could be responsible for such marvels, it was then thought. But, after travelling the world in the Beagle, and after years of thought and experiment at his Down House home in Kent, he concluded that natural selection offered a better explanation.
Life forms better suited to their environments live longer and so have more offspring, thus triggering an evolution of species moving into new ecological niches. As philosopher Daniel Dennett said, it was 'the single best idea anyone has ever had... ahead of Newton and Einstein and everyone else.'
It is also remarkably simple. 'You can explain natural selection to a teenager,' said UK biologist John Maynard Smith. 'You have difficulty with Newton and little chance with Einstein. Yet Darwin's idea is the most profound. It still haunts us.'
Nor is opposition to Darwin confined to religious figures. Sociologists, psychologists and others involved in social policy hate natural selection, said Maynard Smith. 'They deny human behaviour is influenced by genes and evolution. They want to believe we are isolated from the animal kingdom. It is damaging, intellectual laziness. That is why we need a Darwin Day.
This point was backed by biologist Steve Jones. 'If you look at Africa, US fundamentalism, and the Muslim world, you realise evolution supporters are outnumbered by creationists. Yet these are people who have deliberately chosen to be ignorant. They are flat-Earthers without the sophistication. We need a Darwin Day to counter that ignorance.'
a truly wonderful introduction to the multifaceted power of the evolutionary idea can be found in Daniel Dennett's Darwin's Dangerous Idea
Darwin's theory regarding the origin of the species conflicts with the biblical version of creation -- without commenting on God or conflicts with the Bible.
Think Copernicus -- the man that was excommunicated from the Catholic church because his theory abuut the earth not being the center of the universe conflicted with church teachings saying it was.
You mean Galileo, who was convicted of heresy because of the solar system.
Among Wallace's discoveries in the South Pacific was a breakthrough in biogeography: the Wallace Line, the recognition of distinctly different organisms living in close proximity to each other in similar environments. He made a similar breakthrough in understanding evolution. Weak with malaria, he one day had a flash of insight on how species change.
The result was his scientific paper "On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type." Although he didn't use the term "natural selection", he argued the same thing. Rather than send his paper directly to a publisher, Wallace instead sent the manuscript to Charles Darwin, with whom he had initiated a correspondence.
Upon seeing Wallace's paper, Darwin realized he was about to be scooped, and decided to end the 20-year delay in publishing his own theory. Wallace's paper and Darwin's various correspondence and notes on the subject were read at the same Linnean Society meeting, in London on July 1, 1858.
The next year, Darwin published On the Origin of Species. Although Wallace independently reached the same conclusion, it has usually been Darwin's name alone associated with the theory. Wallace expressed no resentment at receiving so little credit for his contribution. He remained a gracious man to the last, commenting late in life that his greatest achievement had been to prompt Darwin to publish his own theory.
Darwin, in turn, proved to be a good friend to Wallace, campaigning vigorously to secure him a government pension he desperately needed -- Wallace had no more skill managing money than his father.
Wallace held other interests besides biology, some of them controversial: land nationalization, a vehement opposition to vaccinations and a belief in spiritualism. In fact, other scientists tried to investigate spiritualism, but he lacked their skepticism. His belief may have been influenced by the untimely death of his eldest child; like many others, Wallace hoped to communicate with his lost loved one through a medium.
His belief in spiritualism caused Wallace to differ with Darwin on the origin of the human mind. Darwin saw humans as highly evolved organisms; Wallace believed that the human mind was inspired by something outside evolution, and that the human spirit could continue to progress after death.
Daniel Dennett is an atheist. (ie. moron)
ah a real deep thinker I see we have here Exnihilo! I do believe you have given about as pure an example of the argument ad hominem as we are likely to see!
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