Intelligent design [was] old news to Darwin

Chicago Tribune ^ | 13 September 2005 | Tom Hundley

[PatrickHenry]

So what would Charles Darwin have to say about the dust-up between today's evolutionists and intelligent designers?

Probably nothing.

[snip]

Even after he became one of the most famous and controversial men of his time, he was always content to let surrogates argue his case.

[snip]

From his university days Darwin would have been familiar with the case for intelligent design. In 1802, nearly 30 years before the Beagle set sail, William Paley, the reigning theologian of his time, published "Natural Theology" in which he laid out his "Argument from Design."

Paley contended that if a person discovered a pocket watch while taking a ramble across the heath, he would know instantly that this was a designed object, not something that had evolved by chance. Therefore, there must be a designer. Similarly, man -- a marvelously intricate piece of biological machinery -- also must have been designed by "Someone."

If this has a familiar ring to it, it's because this is pretty much the same argument that intelligent design advocates use today.

[snip]

The first great public debate took place on June 30, 1860, in a packed hall at Oxford University's new Zoological Museum.

Samuel Wilberforce, the learned bishop of Oxford, was champing at the bit to demolish Darwin's notion that man descended from apes. As always, Darwin stayed home. His case was argued by one of his admirers, biologist Thomas Huxley.

Wilberforce drew whoops of glee from the gallery when he sarcastically asked Huxley if he claimed descent from the apes on his grandmother's side or his grandfather's. Huxley retorted that he would rather be related to an ape than to a man of the church who used half-truths and nonsense to attack science.

The argument continues unabated ...

[snip]

[RightWingNilla]

I think its time for these guys to move to Guyana and start quaffing down spiked kool-aid.

[Right Wing Professor]

Do you believe we should ditch "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance?

Until now, frankly, I didn't much care.

However, it appears that your theocratic pals regard acknowledgement of the authority of their God as some sort of trigger for a 'covenanted' state that permits them to institute their biblical theocracy.

That gives the words a somewhat different significance, no?

[Diamond]

How do you get to "selfish" from "promoting group survival?"

I asked why I should (morally) be concerned with the survival of the group and I was told, because without the group my chances of survival go way down. So I guess the reasoning is that if I'm selfish it hurts the group and if the groups don't survive, then the species doesn't survive and if the species dies out, then I will not survive. While that does have practical value it doesn't explain morality. What is the source of the moral rule that I ought to be unselfish? Saying that because it is better for me and mine somehow just doesn't sound like a justification of the moral rule that I should be unselfish.

Cordially,

[Junior]

What is the source of the moral rule that I ought to be unselfish? Saying that because it is better for me and mine somehow just doesn't sound like a justification of the moral rule that I should be unselfish.

Not a justification, but a source, as it were. This trait has been selected for for millennia.

[Elsie]

Mormon's what?

Secret oops... SACRED temple ceremonies.

[Elsie]

There are nuts everywhere; of every type and financial status.

[Elsie]

There are nuts everywhere; of every type and financial status.

Of course; no TRUE Scotsman is nuts!

[Elsie]

..and ToE is not a religion.

By the same logic; neither is atheism.

[Elsie]

Some of your posts still induce a life-threatening-blood-pressure-raising level of rage when I read them.

WOW!

What power I got!!

---

(No, really; which ones??)

[Elsie]

Now we know that the stars can't fall to earth, and the verse is read as a metaphor for angels descending to earth.

Well, since this describes a FUTURE event, it's a bit early to be asserting this as angels.

What about the HAILSTONES in Revelations?

Real or not?

[Elsie]

Exactly, I skim his posts.

Golly, I read all of you guys'!

[Elsie]

Now we are seeing the results of that dumbing down.

AMEN!

[Elsie]

Hey!

I'M the spamming idiot.

Don't try to take MY glory!!!!

[Elsie]

Considering that they generally overlook that Shem and Isaac were literally contemporaries, I doubt they have a sense of time

Isaac??

I thought it was CURLEY!

[Elsie]

Since I am heartily tired of moral hucksters who claim theirs is the only and one true font of goodness, while all the time exemplifying the worst of behavior, I remain, uncordially, yours, RWP.

And evidently Comic Sans MS ain't it - according to VuV

[js1138]

What is the source of the moral rule that I ought to be unselfish?

Being selfish or unselfish is a personality trait, not a moral rule.

[Elsie]

If it were possible that all the world became Christian, would that be a bad thing in your mind?

Well.........

There goes Mardi Gras!!!!

[Elsie]

Which is false?

The first one, for obviously the folks throw out Acts chapeter 15 & 19

[Elsie]

Agnostic - that's means you don't KNOW for sure; right?

So, when He shows up, you WILL know for sure.

Make your choice then; Thomas.

[Elsie]

We have no illusions about creationists, either.

But we DO have a whole LOT of opinions!!!

EvoDude