Posted on 09/17/2005 11:39:07 AM PDT by Arnhart
The continuing debate over Darwinian evolution versus "intelligent design" reminds us that many conservatives fear Charles Darwin.
That's a mistake. Conservatives should see Darwin as their friend and not their enemy. Darwin's evolutionary theory supports the conservative realist view of human nature as imperfectible, in contrast to the Left's utopian view of human nature as perfectible.
Many conservatives fear Darwinism because they think it promotes an atheistic materialism. That too is a mistake. There is no necessary conflict between Darwinian science and religious belief. And far from being morally degrading, Darwinism supports the idea of a natural moral sense as part of the evolved nature of human beings.
More specifically, Darwinism sustains the conservative belief in ordered liberty as rooted in the social order of the family, the economic order of private property, and the political order of limited government.
I have elaborated my reasoning for these conclusions in a new book--DARWINIAN CONSERVATISM.
I'm also not saying that religious people must oppose evolution. Only that they're within their rights when they ask that more religious or less atheistic theories of creation or evolution also be given some attention in the schools. I don't ask that they be taught as dogma or as science, but it's important for young people to be aware of such views.
I'm also not saying that people who believe in evolution or people who don't value human life are liberals. It's not some coding secretly directed at you or any one else. I mean what I said: liberals who claim to put a value on human life, the poor and the innocent have made a mistake in their strong support for forms of research and experimentation that could hurt the values and constuencies that they claim to favor. And the same is true of conservatives who might make the same mistake.
Scientific theories may not have much to do with morality, but human societies do. Therefore I don't oppose efforts to point out where theories may be used to promote dubious or immoral actions.
What I was responding to was the idea that evolution is on "our" side. In the past you could find people who claimed to represent the right or the left who used evolutionary theories to promote ideas and policies that we'd recognize as unconscionable. I don't care which "side" they were on. I just don't want them to ever have that kind of power again. It's not a "win" for this side or that if those sorts of policies return.
Probably we will see more genetic engineering in the future. And the consequences may not always be positive. Therefore I don't condemn people who want to put the brakes on such policies or the ideas and worldview that inspires them.
Well, I think you've got the answer already. Psychopathology isn't religion. But I could toss your comment back at you with as much sense and as little conclusiveness: how could a believer be worse than the atheistic materialists who killed tens of millions of people in Russia and China?
What I had to say wouldn't have been out of place a half century ago. After the horrors of the early and middle twentieth century, it was assumed by many people that what we needed was to return to a religious worldview and the constraints that it imposed. That was pretty much taken for granted in the America of the 1950s, and that's what a lot of us grew up with.
Today we see an increase in atheism and secularism. It looks a lot like a return to the simplistic optimism of Enlightenment and Victorian atheists. I'll try to keep an open mind about it, but it's at least possible that forgetting God again will have bad consequences once more.
Atheistst who do bad things are bad, no doubt. But what about people who say God told them to do bad things? And what about the people who believe them?
I agree! Can we start with this one? (And I have a lot more of these if need be.)
The first people of the earth had to endure winter for the entire twelve months of the year. Most of the land was covered by massive, moving layers of ice and deep snow. No trees or bushes, or flowers could survive in the harsh gripping cold. The lakes and rivers were frozen, so no water flowed. It was a land of endless cold. One day when the first people were out hunting they came upon a bear who had a sack around his neck. The hunters were very curious and asked the bear what was in the sack. The bear growled a reply that he had a sack filled with the abundance of summer's warmth and light. The hunters wanted the sack and offered to trade, but the bear would not part with his sack. The hunters begged the bear, but still he refused to give up his sack. When they saw that it was useless to argue any longer, they decided to return to their people and think of some plan to take away the coveted sack. The chief heard the entire story and called his people together to arrive at a plan of how to take the sack away from the reluctant bear. They decided to lure the bear to a great feast, fill him with food, and when he slept, steal the sack. A tempting feast of moose and caribou was prepared. The hunters searched for the bear and located him. They asked the bear to attend the feast in his honour and the bear readily accepted. The bear arrived in the evening, but did not have the sack around his neck. Although disappointed the people served the feast anyway. The bear ate his fill and fell asleep. The chief was frustrated and wanted the sack. He ordered four of the village's skilled hunters to follow the bear home and steal the sack by any means. The next morning the bear awoke and bid the chief and his people farewell. The four hunters followed closely behind the bear for about an hour when they came upon a large cave. Peering inside, they spotted the sack laying upon the cave floor with two black bears guarding it. The hunters were very courageous and they sprang into the cave to demand the sack. A fierce fight killed three of the hunters and mortally wounded the fourth, but before he died, he grabbed the sack and unleashed the abundance of warmth and light. Instantly, the air became warm and the sky filled with bright sunlight. The snow melted into rivers and lakes. The hills and valleys were covered with trees, flowers and bushes. Strange birds flew in great numbers and built nests and streams filled with fish. Every year since that time, Summer has come to the Dene.
[placemarker]
What I was responding to was the idea that evolution is on "our" side. In the past you could find people who claimed to represent the right or the left who used evolutionary theories to promote ideas and policies that we'd recognize as unconscionable. I don't care which "side" they were on. I just don't want them to ever have that kind of power again. It's not a "win" for this side or that if those sorts of policies return.Ironically, eugenics was an attempt to intelligently design beneficial changes to the direction that microevolution took, in order to improve the existing species. (Not to create a whole new species, which would be macroevolution.) It would be no problem to be a believer in eugenics and creationism - with just a little bit of work, the two concepts can exist very comfortably inside the same mind.
I think you've just described Hitler's mind. His racial purity program was pure ID. Any biologist could have told him that thinning out the gene pool is almost a guarantee of extinction.
And any biologist or any farmer could tell him that hybrids are often hardier than purebreds. Ask the Irish about the racial purity of their potatoes.
Also, I'm not sure that "creationism" and "intelligent design" are synonyms. Someone who really believed that a creator separately created the earth and all the kinds of creatures on it would have a hard time "playing god" with human beings in the ways that evolutionary scientists would.
Of course, these distinctions aren't water-tight. You can find people who combine religion or atheism with just about any sort of idea or practice. But in recent history, religious Christians tended to be against things like euthanasia, abortion, eugenics, and genetic engineering.
Religions, at least in recent years have had strong taboos against "playing God." One can imagine I suppose, a Hitlerian religion in which he believer or the leader is God or a god, but that goes against the general notion of religion, at least for the past few centuries.
It might be worth running through a part-by-part analysis of creationist claim versus reality.
Creationist claim: "Let me see, who was the prominent scientist who was for evolution until he published an article in June of 2004 that debunked Darwin?"
Reality: This creationist claim apparently refers to Antony Flew, philosopher.
- He was never a prominent scientist.
- He never "debunked" Darwin. He never attacked Darwin. He never ceased to accept evolution. He briefly moved from atheism to theistic evolution.
- He later became convinced that the evidence presented to him for ID had been faulty. That is, he'd been had.
What gets me though, is that we're on the verge of being able to genetically engineer people, and militant secularists act as though their opponents are going to start stoning people or burning them at the stake. Religious believers do such things in another part of the world, but there's not much danger of that happening in the West.
Where people stand depends on where they think they are. Some of the alarms scientists and secularists raise would make more sense in the Islamic world or in the pre-modern West, but I don't think encouraging some caution with regard to a technology that can transform the world in our lifetime would be a bad thing.
Irrelevant. The pre- rectification "news" will forever be touted on creationist websites. A big part of creation "science" is finding some quote you like, even if it's bogus or subsequently amended, and then staying with it -- like Dan Rather.
They really don't like change. This is reflected in their reticence in accepting science's self corrections. The Bible is supposedly constant, it doesn't change, where science changes all the time. To them that flexibility represents a lack of confidence and security.
6) Evidence is only evidence if you agree with it.
2)If it disagrees with your world view ignore it.
The cool thing about these two points is that in no case is there any need for research. ID in fact does no research except the kind creation science does, combing through real research papers for snippets to quote-mine.
Low work load, good pay, a chance to con many people. It's a win win situation. (I've always hated that little nugget)
No argument.
I'm also not saying that religious people must oppose evolution. Only that they're within their rights when they ask that more religious or less atheistic theories of creation or evolution also be given some attention in the schools. I don't ask that they be taught as dogma or as science, but it's important for young people to be aware of such views.
I'm glad to see that your views are more nuanced than I'd thought from your last post. However, there are no "less atheistic theories of creation or evolution" at the present time. ID, while it pretends to be a scientific theory, isn't a theory in the scientific sense of the word. There is no way to falsify ID, and without that, it isn't scientific. In addition, science cannot include what it cannot measure. There's no way to measure the "intelligent designer," and the concept contributes nothing to the advancement of knowledge. Noting "the intelligent designer must have done this" gets us nowhere because it suggests no new avenues of research. Indeed, it may shut off avenues of research.
I'm also not saying that people who believe in evolution or people who don't value human life are liberals. It's not some coding secretly directed at you or any one else. I mean what I said: liberals who claim to put a value on human life, the poor and the innocent have made a mistake in their strong support for forms of research and experimentation that could hurt the values and constuencies that they claim to favor. And the same is true of conservatives who might make the same mistake.
We're finding very little to argue about, although it should be pointed out that it's impossible to know where research and experimentation are going to lead, and attempting to shut off certain avenues of research because they might have unpleasant consequences isn't going to get much done.
Scientific theories may not have much to do with morality, but human societies do. Therefore I don't oppose efforts to point out where theories may be used to promote dubious or immoral actions.
Scientific theories have nothing to do with morality, and anyone who attempts to apply them to morality or to human society is misusing them. The same sort of people would and have misused religion for the same ends. It's about power. Science or religion are simply the means at hand for those who would lord it over the rest of us.
What I was responding to was the idea that evolution is on "our" side. In the past you could find people who claimed to represent the right or the left who used evolutionary theories to promote ideas and policies that we'd recognize as unconscionable. I don't care which "side" they were on. I just don't want them to ever have that kind of power again. It's not a "win" for this side or that if those sorts of policies return.
Probably we will see more genetic engineering in the future. And the consequences may not always be positive. Therefore I don't condemn people who want to put the brakes on such policies or the ideas and worldview that inspires them.
No technological breakthrough (which is what genetic engineering is), is completely benign, and once the genii is out of the bottle, it won't be stopped.
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