Posted on 05/12/2006 12:13:47 PM PDT by PatrickHenry
In his op-ed "Evolution's bottom line," published in The New York Times (May 12, 2006), Holden Thorp emphasizes the practical applications of evolution, writing, "creationism has no commercial application. Evolution does," and citing several specific examples.
In places where evolution education is undermined, he argues, it isn't only students who will be the poorer for it: "Will Mom or Dad Scientist want to live somewhere where their children are less likely to learn evolution?" He concludes, "Where science gets done is where wealth gets created, so places that decide to put stickers on their textbooks or change the definition of science have decided, perhaps unknowingly, not to go to the innovation party of the future. Maybe that's fine for the grownups who'd rather stay home, but it seems like a raw deal for the 14-year-old girl in Topeka who might have gone on to find a cure for resistant infections if only she had been taught evolution in high school."
Thorp is chairman of the chemistry department at the University of North Carolina.
Yes, he did, toward the end of the war. He wanted to start a compulsory nazi christian church, and forbid any other christian worship. The occasionally voiced theory that he wanted to start an occult tree-worshipping druid-ish church, is ludicrous, given his audience, and not supported by quite detailed plans that fell into the hands of US Army intelligence during the occupation.
I was hoping for better questions myself.
According to dictionary.com, Christianity is defined as: n 1: a monotheistic system of beliefs and practices based on the Old Testament and the teachings of Jesus as embodied in the New Testament and emphasizing the role of Jesus as savior
Mormonism isn't monothesitic. Ergo it isn't Christian.
Again, not a slight, but merely a statement of fact.
I understand what you are saying...I have followed enough of the discussions on FR alone, to know of the differences...yes, its a doctrinal difference, but Mormons themselves, in spite of this difference, do believe that they are Christians...
There are great doctrinal differences between many major Christian religions, and I am not the one, who is going to set the boundaries of what is and what is not a Christian religion...
There are those who claim that Catholics cannot be true Christians because of many of their doctrines...such as the perpetual virginity of Mary, transubstantiation, founding the Church upon Peter, and on and on and on...
Perhaps its just me, but I find that declaring certain Christian religions as being not really Christian is not up to me, but rather its up to God...thats just how I feel..
I'm afraid your and Havoc's credibility on Evolution are on the negative side of zero.
Like what, for example? You're thinking maybe Hitler didn't go to a Catholic high school? Or didn't profess, for years, a desire to be a priest to his sister and anyone else that would listen?
You're acting worse than most creationists.
...by actually reading a biography of Hitler, you mean? Where do you think Hitler got the idea that Jews would make a good group to hate? Where do you think he got the frequently publicly voiced notion that he was completing the work of Jesus by murdering all the jews? Thin air?
Doc: "Those living in deserts. Or on the ocean."
But of course the topic was equines, and most people would argue that equines inhabit neither of those places...
Besides, the fact that one equine is found in a foot of sediment would imply that condition could re-occur in the same vicinity (like a flood plain, perhaps?).
You could start with this link and work your way throught it. I't's a bit old, but it covers the waterfront, and that arguments are not particularly out of date.
http://pages.britishlibrary.net/charles.darwin2/texts.html
Probably this discussion about the Mormons would be more appropriate for the religion forum...this thread already has a lot going on...
How is it that Mormons aren't christian, but catholics, with their holy trinity, are? Or are catholics out, as well? Pretty exclusive club you seem to have going here.
Last time I checked, it's best to fight it with water.
Earlier on this thread we got the usual crap that Communists came from Evolution. I posted threads to show, conclusively, that that is crap. But it will appear again, probably from the same sources. Did (do) these facts win an argument? No.
They won't convince the idiot posting them, but they will win the argument to an outside observer.
So saying that Darwin spawned Nazism is rationally idiotic, but the only way to get through the crap is to show that Hitler was a professed Christian, by his own words, and therefore just as easily attached to Creationists as to Darwin, and that is true. The argument is not sound either way, but perhaps it will penetrate the fog and make them think that by smearing Charles Darwin with either Communism or Nazism, they can be just as easily smeared with the same.
Fine, but if you do that, you have to at least conceed that Hitler was twisting Christianity beyond recognition, just as he was twisting Darwin.
Claiming Hitler was a sincere Christian is only going to offend people and completely shut them off to your argument.
Until they see that guilt by, in many cases just "supposed" association, is a false argument, they need to be reminded that smearing cuts both ways.
Okay, but that works only if you show that that you COULD smear them in that way, but don't because just as stupid as their smearing.
Smearing Christianity by itself accomplishes nothing; you're just going to offend Christians, and remember, not all Christians are confirmed creationists.
Smearing is a tactic of the Left. Sometimes it works, but it is usually phony.
I Agree. So don't do it.
Should we react with just a yawn?
You react by exposing the smear and pointing out that it's stupid. You can even show how one can smear Christianity by using the same tactic. That's fine, so long as you make clear you don't believe your smear is any more valid than theirs. It won't change the mind of the person you're arguing with, but it may help you reach a lurker who hasn't made up his mind.
The thing that penetrates the fog to my way of thinking is the fact that Hitler was Roman Catholic and Rome embraces Darwinism. Darwinism is, bottom line, racist as Darwin's original title for 'origin of the species' shows. Rome and Hitler both supported Darwin. Rome and Hitler both supported replacement theology. And Hitler was a dyed in the wool racist just as Darwin *appears* to have been. Rome had already much earlier in History been a plague to the Jews. Darwin just Gave Hitler another excuse. Go figure.
Your post #431 echoes my sentiments.....what about the Jehovahs Witnesses...I hear it said very often on the religion threads, that the JWs are also not Christians...
But apparently you're too ignorant to realize that it's impossible to be a Lutheran and a Catholic at the same time, as you claim Hitler to be.
You would be surprised at what people believed before the 50's. When I was born there were no Jews or Catholics in our area only Protestants. There was good reason, everyone disliked them and they were not welcome. The nearest Catholic Church was a hundred miles. If someone wanted to discredit you they might call you a Jew or a Catholic. Jews were hated right here in the good old USA by both Catholics and the Protestants. All this started to change in the 50's after the war. In general most people didn't like anyone different from themselves. You simply have no idea of how much things have changed.
Dawin's theory of natural selection can't be invalidated because it it inspired eugenics, and perhaps it's illegitimate to bring up what the moral implications of Darwinism are in a discussion about its truth or scope. After all, it's entirely possible that Darwin's theory is true in every possible respect and, as Dennett, Dawkins and (according to Dennett) Eugenie Scott http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/story/0,,1746189,00.html believes, that both traditional religion and traditional morality must be considered false because of it.
At the same time, however, I don't think it's demonizing Darwin or Darwin's theory to admit that he thought it did have moral and religious implications.
Among the moral implications he thought the theory had were these:
I could show fight on natural selection having done and doing more for the progress of civilization than you seem inclined to admit. Remember what risk the nations of Europe ran, not so many centuries ago of being overwhelmed by the Turks, and how ridiculous such an idea now is! The more civilised so-called Caucasian races have beaten the Turkish hollow in the struggle for existence. Looking to the world at no very distant date, what an endless number of the lower races will have been eliminated by the higher civilized races throughout the world.
http://pages.britishlibrary.net/charles.darwin/texts/letters/letters1_08.html
Darwin had been inspired by Malthus, and Darwin knew and approved of Francis Galton's applications of his ideas.
If you ever read vdare, in some of the articles you'll come across similar theorizing based upon Darwinian natural selection as applied to race.
Now, I think it's obvious that Darwin was a brilliant guy, a good guy and no Hitler, period. After all, nobody blames Malthus for Hitler. But Darwin's theory has an obvious connection to eugenics and eugenics has an obvious connection to Nazism. To say that Darwin's theories have had no connection to eugenics would be like saying those of Mathus has no such connection.
The thing is, you're right that whenever Hitler is brought in, a lot of heat but little light tends to follow.
But the eugenics movement was one that enveloped nearly of America and Europe's intellectuals, not just the Nazis, and to their credit it was Christians like Booker T. Washington and William Jennings Bryant who stood against it while secular intellectuals like W.E.B. DuBois bought into it whole-heartedly.
That still doesn't imply that Darwin's theory of natural selection is false or even that its application to eugenics is misguided. But somewhat as Pope John Paul dealt with the relationship of Christians to Jews and clarified that the Catholic Church is not anti-Jewish, it seems to me that the relationship between Darwinist theory and eugenics is not a simple one to be brushed aside with an invocation of Godwin's Law.
That is certainly what it appears to look like, from time to time...
Like a creationist, you're bringing up a bunch of irrelevant facts as if they were decisive. All of the above happened when he was a kid, years before he came up Nazi ideology. They have absolutely no bearing on what he believed when he was in power or vying for it.
He stopped going to Church after he left home.
...by actually reading a biography of Hitler, you mean?
Which one did you read?
Where do you think Hitler got the idea that Jews would make a good group to hate? Where do you think he got the frequently publicly voiced notion that he was completing the work of Jesus by murdering all the jews? Thin air?
A variety of places. But if you think he got these ideas from the Catholic Church, you are woefully ignorant.
Show me where the Catholic Church ever taught that one could complete Christ's work by killing Jews.
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