Does Darwinism Attempt to Replace God?

11-30-2004 | W.T. Stewart

[cainin04]

Over the past days there has been a great discussion about the role of the theory of evolution and whether it alone or the thoughts on Intellegent Design should be taught in schools.

I made the argument that Darwinsism attempts to replace God. "If you have Darwinism there is no need for God the Creator." But many of the Free Republic members disagreed.

Read the text from this recent text book used today in public schools and draw your own conclusions. I found this in Lee Stroble's "Case for a Creator."

Futuyma Douglas author of "Evolutionary Biology"--page 3--"By coupling undirected, purposeless variation to the blind, uncaring process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superflous."

The book "Sign of Intellegence" cites several of the other popular text books. The writers cite the terms used to describe evolution; "evolution is random and undirected,"without plan or purpose,"Darwin gave biology a sound scientific basis by attributing the diversity of life to natural causes rather than the supernatural creation."

Stroble also cites an article from Time Magazine, "Charles Darwin didn't want to murder God, as he once put it. But he did."

One can read text book after text book, they all come to the same conclusion--Darwin replaced God.

Why then is a theory that has so many holes in it, still being taught as "fact?" Many excuses could be listed, but I would say it is just part of the liberal establishment trying to remove God from our schools and our country as a whole. In history class we can't read the "Declaration of ID" or say the Pledge of Allegiance, because they mention God; in English we can't read a story from the Bible, because that is seperation of church and state--yet we CAN read other religous materials as long as they are not Christian; and of course in science class we can't mention ID because that would include God.

Americans are going to have to stand up. We can not sit back and watch these atheistic liberals have every mention of God removed from our country. If we do stand up, not only will we produce children who have no understanding of our country, our history, or our values, but we will also see our nation fall into a great moral decline.

However, I do not think we are going to allow that to occur. In this last election we had a clear choice between a man of God--a man with values--and a man with little or no values. We chose the man with values. The fight will continue and Patriotic-God loving Americans can never give in. Read what is in your child's text books and if it attempts to remove God, speak out against it. Your voice matters--it matters not just for your child's sake, but for the sake of all America's citizens.

[Havoc]

No, it doesn't matter because you're clearly delusional and more than happy to push strawman arguments rather than rational arguments.

It's an entirely rational argument. It just isn't convenient for you to your misfortune. FR exists. Postings on FR exist. That I am not concerned with, but you could be anything - a bot, random traffic, a posting error producing a random response that just happens to fit the discussion by chance. I mean let's face it, the odds of that are far lower than a single mutation causing a single celled critter to become a fish, let alone a bunch of mutations causeing a bunch of different critters leading up to the fish. Your responses, whatever you are, could all be explained by random modem garbage trapped in memory somewhere and dumped by chance continually and erroneously into the posting mechanism by a fault in the software. The probability is higher for that to be happening right now than for any one of your theories of evolution. I'm just playing the odds game and arguing the obvious for any person with a basic understanding of logic and first year grasp of Copi. You're backpeddling.

No, that isn't. That's why what you presented was a "faulty analogy".

faulty, no, inconvenient - yes. That was an rhetorical invocation of irony. I don't believe in you, thusly we can't be having this conversation. I'm actually responding to computer trash dumped errantly into a buffer. The person assumed behind the label is a myth. So, I can sit here and trash that label, it's mythical family, etc and it doesn't matter because the label is all that exists as a figment of our imagination collectively to explain the posted responses. I can rationalize you with understanding of known systems to explain you away in any number of ways. All of them logical - we can't be bothered with plausablility - we're talking theory, and if you can't throw the highly improbable out the window in discussing theory, you're a quack, right. DNA, RNA systems in the human body have built in mechanisms to gaurd against mutation - any mutation, much less a beneficial one - or better a beneficial one that can be inherited. Your evolution theory requires far more leaps of faith and willfull ignoring of rationality than my understanding of God does.

In other words, the fact that you are wrong doesn't change your proclamation that you are right.

I wasn't wrong, much less factually wrong. You leapt to a conclusion apparently based on an errant assumption and got it wrong. And in common fashion, you still can't admit your error of assumption and are blaming me for your foul up. At the same time, it must be noted that your understanding of the subject at hand is as much tied to your ability to deal with assumptions. Kinda scary.

You assert absolute knowledge that you are right and that anyone who disagrees

How rude of the Wright brothers, huh! Darn them two, the rest of human civilization has to be right because they have different opinions. Where else but here is such faulty, inexcuseable logic considered useful? It works nowhere else if for no other reason than the laws of logic and chance alone; but, you swing it like it matters. Franklin is a Dork because he discovered electricity instead of just having the same theory about it as everyone else. What a judgemental, knowitall jerk, huh. How about Galileo, was right on the money while most of the rest of the world was wrong - what a quack, right. But screw him, he's inconvenient to the moment. All of human history is full of heretics that are proven right in the end but who ultimately stood alone as quacks and were explained away as such till it became unfashionable to deny the obvious anylonger. I'm not sure, but you seem now more galled at my confidence than at my belief. I'm not. But you haven't seen what I have either. That's not my problem. My faith grew out of my access to the Bible and my willingness to test it. I've been convinced by tangibles resulting from that exploration - not a pile of theories of what might be if it were all true. I rest easy at night with solid proof in my mind. You sleep with theories and denounce those confident in the facts as quacks. In Galileo's time, you'd have called him a nut, quack or heretic along with everyone else. Today you have the benefit of hindsight and long held proofs. My mathmatical proofs are scripture which I doubt you've read or at least read with any seriousness. Never too late and I invite you to do so. But don't condemn from ignorance or vanity what you cannot explain for yourself.

To me, that's the height of arrogance.

Funny, that's why the pope jailed Galileo in his own home. Are you Catholic by chance and just pulling my leg? Galileo was so arrogant as to challenge the Church with the truth and therefore the athority of the Pope. In the end, Rome had to apologize over Galileo hoping to save face if memory serves. Truth is arrogant to anyone who benifits from ignorance of it. Too bad.

[Bars4Bill]

Darwinism itself says NOTHING about religion.

Twenty years before the publication of The Origin of Species, Darwin jotted in his notebook:

"Man in his arrogance thinks himself a great work, worthy the interposition of a deity. More humble and I believe true to consider him created from animals."

Thus Darwin launched his "research" with a decidedly anti-religion prejudice, not to mention a hatred for his fellow man; and carrying the scientific method upside-down, Darwin began with a theory and concluded with a problem.

[Havoc]

People spend a lot of time excusing what they believe when they can't prove their ground and are more apt to attack you at the juggler than admit they've been living a lie in error. That is human nature. A man blind from birth has no concept of sight and never will have in the literal sense unless you can make him see. When it comes to God, most people are that blind man, and many of them are willfully so. They feel that if they can explain their actions on the basis of being blind, they're not responsible to open their eyes and see anything they do. The crime is that the literal blind man can't help it. These folks on the other hand, have no excuse ultimately before God. They have all the access and provision that you and I have and in many cases refuse to see. It's a sad state of affairs. But it is no excuse for them no matter how hard they will try to excuse themselves with it. There is one who knows all and judges all. And he's as indisputable as the Wright flyers.

The Bible tells us of the events leading to the Exudus till the time that God's people arrived in what is now Israel. They scoff at that. When Egyptian documents in the form of Ipuwer arise to confirm, they call it by different names and denounce it under all kind of spurious guises of intellect trying to deny what they had denied before in the Bible. The truth is not the object of interest because it's buried and denounced as soon as it's seen for what it is. It isn't enough that it's in the Bible. It isn't enough that the Egyptians wrote about it too, nor is it even enough that Solomon bothered to go back and erect markers at the crossing points on the red sea, nor is it enough that the seafloor beneath said crossing point is littered with chariot wheels and the like. There is no amount of factual evidence that cannot be ignored by people. Some don't believe because they just don't know any better and haven't had contact with the scriptures or the facts, etc. For others, It's a grudge, a superiority trip, an intellectual dilusion, a spiritual blindness caused by willing rebellion, etc. Only God can reach those people if those people will allow it. In the mean time, they must denounce God to feel good about themselves.. And that is liberal behavior. They have to feel something about everything and otherwise be in denial about their failures. Liberals can never admit failure because it's not really a failure if your intentions were good. The road to hell is paved with all kinds of intentions - good ones included.

[DoctorMichael]

Twenty years before the publication of The Origin of Species, Darwin jotted in his notebook..............

Yes, he may have. I'd have to check the validity of your quote.

Nonetheless, as I said, 'The Origin of Species' and 'Darwinism' say nothing about Religion. I was not referring to anything else let alone something taken from somewhere else. If you want to imply something else then you're perfectly welcome to.

More to the point: I'm REALLY bored with Crevos that can't reconcile our simultaneous Divinity with Scientific Fact.

Best W/Fishes

[Havoc]

You see, the problem with this is that it doesn't advance your argument

It wasn't intended to advance my argument, it was foundation for understanding my experience. Nothing advances the argument for you as you've aptly displayed so I'm not sure why you're now trying to pretend that anything does, much less that such is my intention. I could claim I built a bridge out of spider silk spun from my own behind. You already have claimed something similar. You attacked me, I framed my experience and rebutted. Doesn't change the fact that Darwinism and the Genesis story are mutually exclusive happenstances - something you still can't find it in yourself to address now that you've been shot out of the water in trying to make people believe there is no conflict between the two.

Just like your beliefs are beliefs.

Yep. Problem is, in testing others, I couldn't prove them to myself for myself. Those I hold now, I could. The difference between you and me is that I accepted a truth that was proven to me by God. You have settled for a pile of hypothesis that you've convinced yourself could be true *if* and apparently because you don't like God interfering in your life by way of conscience.. Good liberal position, I want x (sex outside of marriage for example), therefore to heck with God because if you believe in God you have to behave. And dang what a cruel place the world would be if men all followed God's word and didn't lie to and abuse women for their unbridled lusts. Imagine a world where women weren't all cynical, distrustful gold-diggers with 3 kids and two divorces because men can't keep it in their pants and do what's right. Man would that be a disaster - not being able to abuse and ruin every female available before someone else could get to them and make a decent go at a life with them undestroyed by deception.. As Galileo and countless others have proven, the beliefs of the few usually are right; but, are denounced and unpopular if not a death sentence in some cases.

Two things you never discuss with family or at dinner - religion and politics - why - it isn't PC to convict people about things about which they know they are wrong. Better to be polite and let them go to hell so they can be polite and shout obscenities at you from hell when you get to heaven. If I found an overpass collapsed and passed you on my return from finding it 2 miles from the nearest junction and didn't warn you, you'd cuss me all the way back. But if I told you the truth about God as advance warning, you curse me all the way there and back. Oh well...

Of course, this is a red herring that you toss in, so airplanes, helicopters and hovering crafts don't really matter here.

A red herring indeed. People flying was a joke until it was proven. And so were the people pushing the idea. But people didn't mind going out to see the next moron flapping wooden wings 3 ft long on the back of a bicycle hoping to get off the ground.. Moron watching is good sport. Now you're just in outright denial.

Hey, you're the one who asserted that evolution calls "God" a liar.

That's a bit week, I didn't assert it, I proved it by posting scripture. You then dodged by begging concepts of God as though you didn't know what on earth you'd said before. Give us a break. And try to convince yourself with these excuses before trying them out on the rest of us.

[Dimensio]

How rude of the Wright brothers, huh! Darn them two, the rest of human civilization has to be right because they have different opinions.

Okay, tell you what. When you actually accomplish something based upon your religious beliefs that would be utterly impossible for someone with different religious beliefs -- even if it were merely a disagreement on interpretation of scripture -- this analogy might actually hold water. Until then, it's a diversionary tactic where you compare yourself to people who were clearly in the right (ignoring, of course, that alternative methods for accomplishing similar ends were later developed) without establishing that you yourself are in the right.

[Havoc]

Physical or not doesn't enter into it. If I do an image of man as a likeness on canvas, it is no less an image if it is rendered in 2d rather than 3d - it is still a representation or likeness. Given that Scripture then says that the animals were made first, and then God made man.. then it elaborates that God made man out of the dust of the earth.. You're reaching. No assumptions needed.

[Bars4Bill]

Yes, he may have. I'd have to check the validity of your quote.

Okay, professor. Check with the New York Gay Times Book Review for "Created from Animals," by James Rachels, clipped but undated since I no longer buy that piece of shit or waste time at their website.

[Havoc]

Until then, it's a diversionary tactic where you compare yourself to people who were clearly in the right

Diversion, bunk! It's pointing out the obvious. The truth of a matter is never popular and ESPECIALLY when the rest of the world already *believes* something else. And that is usually the case. History is littered with such examples and it was offered to say as much.. nothing else. And it was offered in rebutt to your attempt at this everyone else believes different argument. The Catholics like to use this fallacy in debate as well; but, they take a slightly different twist by adding that they've believed it for a long time. If you want to play numbers, then we should look at the Chinese and say that Freedom in a Constitutional republic is wrong because there are billions of Chinese and they embrace totalitarian atheistic communism, right? They've also been around with their system for a while longer than everyone else, so the age of it must mean something too, right? That was the offer - to dispell your fallacious assertion. I don't need to prove myself to you. And I can't prove God to you, you'll have to do that for yourself; but, you can't do it by denying God and giving him less of a chance than you've Given Darwin, can you. Easy enough to see that if I chose to disbelieve in you and chose instead, arbitrarily to believe against you because I've decided that you're inconvenient to me, then I've just hobbled myself for ever getting to the truth about you. You can't be honest with yourself about God, I can do well enough Defending God to others from you; but, it took God revealing himself in my life and I was willing to believe.. you aren't. I have plenty of experience with that. Belief is a funny thing. People will talk themselves out of believing things they just saw if they don't want to believe it. There are people that I know that have witnessed things I've seen and talked themselves out of it to the point they won't even discuss it now. It isn't like God is hiding from you either - he's everywhere. All you have to do is start talking - respectfully I would advise if you intend to get anywhere.

I missed the school bus one morning when I was in Highschool. The school was 8 miles away and half an hour to 45 minutes from start of classes. It was winter and I wasn't getting to school but on that bus. But it had already gone by. So I prayed that God would do something to get me to school. This is an early example in my life. It is something that didn't violate God's will or scripture. I asked God to find a way and direct me to it to get to school. The gut response I had was to wait. So I waited. Five minutes later, the schoolbus pulled up again. I asked if the bus driver had seen me when she pulled away while I approached the stop, and she said no.. she just had this sudden sense that she needed to turn off and come back around and before she thought about it, she'd done so. I made it to school on time with the bus. Little things like that add up over time till you're willing to trust God to provide a way for anything to happen - like watching a guy's glass eye pop out of his head while his hands are raised in the air.. Full sized glass eye, spinning about on the floor while a full, real eye developed with sight in his socket. You can't explain such things away with science and nobody will publish it because it offends their sensabilities. This is why the far right must be discussed in terms not unlike the veriage used by racists; but, people who turn a blind eye to ethnic clensing, homosexuality, beastiality, pedophilia, etc are seen as "tolerant" - as though tolerance of sick things is supposed to be good?! Seek God. You can then view yourself as whacked when you prove him to yourself. Then what will you do? You still will have a big choice to make afterward. The way you act, I would bet you've already been there or have done so much God would disapprove of that you have to live in denial. Who knows, you are afterall, just errant modem static..

[Right in Wisconsin]

Get a life!

[Dimensio]

Full sized glass eye, spinning about on the floor while a full, real eye developed with sight in his socket.

I'm a bit preoccupied right now, so I'll have to address the bulk of Havoc's latest post later, but does anyone else actually believe this?

For me, it's not just the implausability of the claim, but also the fact that I've never actually heard of anyone who believes in faith healing ever say that such a thing has happened before.

[Right in Wisconsin]

God is everything and anything He chooses to be. The ony person questioning His truth is you. Have at it, I'm sure he'll respect your opinion.

[bondserv]

You posted a quote from one person. So what?

1) Science deals with the tangible, the observable. Science can make no claim about a God one way or the other.

2) Claiming that "evolution attempts to replace God," shows you don't understand either topic very well.

3) Evolution is a fact. You'd better get used to it. The "Theory of Evolution" is the body of thought science has gathered to explain HOW allele frequencies in populations change over time. If you still doubt that this happens, you might ask why we keep having to come up with new flu vaccines every year.

Adaptation? When did science observe speciation?

Last I checked they were failing at trying to get flies to become a new species.

[Michael_Michaelangelo]

Static Placemarker

[Dimensio]

Get a life!

What a brilliant rebuttal! Surely you've demonstrated without a doubt the truthfulness of your claim.

I mean, really, when called on a claim that is clearly a mistake or even an outright fabrication, telling your opponent to "get a life" is a sure-fire way to win the debate.

[Right in Wisconsin]

All the science in the world won't save your soul. Doesn't matter what you think, believe or feel, or how much scientific evidence to the contrary you claim to have, God's Will will be done.

It must be difficult to feel comforted by your science. Obviously (I think) your human and experience emotions. How do you know what you should be happy about or what to be sad about? Who sets the standard? Did a person decide one day to tell us what is right or wrong? How did they decide, and how did they know everyone would agree?

Whether you believe in Him or not is inconsequential to His existence. It is, however, consequential to your salvation.

[Right in Wisconsin]

I loved reading your posts to Demensio. Don't waste your time with him as he really is demented. I had the pleasure of his discourse and I told him not to respond to me. He continues. No matter what you say, he will naysay. And if he doesn't know what to say, he will condescend. He is so afraid of God's existence that he is in denial. If he were a true atheist, why would he come to us in these posts? Obviously he has a curiousty and an absolute need for vindication. Hopefully he will see the light....soon.

[Right in Wisconsin]

You mean they discovered a fossil of a fish with wings? Transitional or adaptational fossils are micro-evolution. If you can direct me to the source of an actual macro-E fossil, I would certainly like to see some examples.

[Dimensio]

had the pleasure of his discourse and I told him not to respond to me

Yeah, because you just hate it when someone exposes holes in your reasoning.

He is so afraid of God's existence that he is in denial.

Which God, out of the thousands worshipped throughout human history, do I fear?

If he were a true atheist, why would he come to us in these posts?

I have a morbid fascination with the general scientific ignorance (and ignorance in general) of creationists.

Obviously he has a curiousty and an absolute need for vindication. Hopefully he will see the light....soon.

Obviously you are an arrogant blowhard who ignores reality so that you can consistently post about how you are right no matter how much contrary evidence is put to you. Why else would you come here?

[Right in Wisconsin]

I agree with your concept, but what is frustrating to me is that others on this post cannot accept that someone can actually believe God created man in his image. A few (won't mention names) claim it is their duty to inform us that science proves the Bible wrong and therefore we are wrong. How can people be wrong in their own beliefs? It's wrong for the other person's belief system.

I would presume that most people on here are adults and crossed the evolution threshold a long time ago and rejected it. Others accepted it. So what, big deal.