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]

[Dr. Eckleburg]

No-one is promoting evolution to "undermine Christianity". That is tinfoil hat raving. Evolution is promoted because we have looked at the evidence for it and find it persuasive

Trust them, bp; they're doctors.

Now all you blue-eyed twins line up over here...

[bluepistolero]

And here I thought science was all about the whys? Why do things act the way they do? Why is the sky blue? Now I'm being told that there are no whys in science, like LA maybe, there is no there there?

bluepistolero

[Quark2005]

So many times, these threads are not about science, but an attack on religion, and the only religion that is ever under attack, is fundamental Christianity.

Nothing that I said was an attack on Christianity. Evolution is based on solid science, as backed by an overwhelming wealth of evidence, which you can either choose to ignore or try to understand; that's up to you.

Just because a discussion happens to say something you disagree with does not make it a personal attack on your religion. If you read my responses, you would realize I share many of the same beliefs you do.

I dare a one of you to attack fundamental Judaism, the same Word, with the zeal so often displayed here.

Last I checked, fundamentalist Jews, Muslims, Hindus and many other religions also deny the reality of evolution; you have this in common with them, and for the record, I would have the same things to say to any of them that I would to a Christian Biblical literalist.

[bluepistolero]

Not too good for a blue-eyed bluepistolero.

bluepistolero

[Sloth]

Evolution claims that life began with and explosion, and explosion of absolutely nothing, that explosion of nothing created a dot, a dot that could be smaller than a period on this page, that dot than exploded and over the course of billions and billions of years, that explosion became earth and all the suns, moons, stars, planets, etc.

Than on earth, some how it started raining and that raining on the rocky surface caused some kind of soup, that soup gave way to life and out of the depths of this soup came the life that later became all life on earth.

You are either ignorant or lying. Evolution makes no such claims.

[Vive ut Vivas]

That all? Piece of cake. I already know who you got the "six definitions of evolution" riff reom.

I think anybody who uses arguments from Kent Hovind and Jack Chick should be automatically disqualified. I'd be embarassed.



From Big Daddy

[Dr. Eckleburg]

Just ditch the twin.

[Junior]

All too soon, the usual people start referring to Christians as some type of subhuman creatures and making fun of their beliefs.

Give examples, please.

[bluepistolero]

I responded to your post re the inerrancy of the bible. There was nothing personal against you. I was making my scientific observations in response to your post. It is your opinion, and your right to think that evolution gives you a valid viewpoint of the world. I don't dispute that you have that right. What I do find offensive, is that some Christians have another viewpoint, and for that, they are attacked as somehow sub-human in intelligence. Their rights and their opinions, are considered as not worthy of having the right to exist. Unless they think as the world thinks, they must be de-marginalized and ridiculed.

bluepistolero

[highball]

That's fine. You are entitled to that belief. You're just not entitled to call that belief "science" or ask that it be taught in science class.

I don't know what your beef with Darwin is. Evolution and natural selection are in no way incompatible with a belief in God.

[Thatcherite]

All too soon, the usual people start referring to Christians as some type of subhuman creatures...

Provide several citations please, or withdraw this ridiculous allegation. True, YEC beliefs do have fun poked at them; not because they are Christian, but because they are stupid. FYI a majority of the evo posters *are* Christians.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

Last I checked, fundamentalist Jews, Muslims, Hindus and many other religions also deny the reality of evolution; you have this in common with them, and for the record, I would have the same things to say to any of them that I would to a Christian Biblical literalist

And that is your error if you think the heresies of Islam and Hinduism share anything with Biblical Christianity.

Discernment counts.

[js1138]

YEC beliefs do have fun poked at them; not because they are Christian, but because they are stupid.

And ignorant.

[Vive ut Vivas]

Whoops. That'll teach me to read the whole thread before I post.

[Dimensio]

It is not science, and the proof of that is, to be science, a theory must be able to meet certain experimental tests and be provable.

Wrong. Theories in science cannot be proven, ever. Please actually try to learn something about the subject before lecturing us on it.

[highball]

Who's making fun of anybody's beliefs?

I personally oppose people who want their beliefs taught as fact, or think their beliefs should be given "equal time" with scientific facts, but that's not the same thing at all.

[bluepistolero]

Well, actually, your post just proves the point. Alas, I am too stupid to continue to converse with such brilliant minds, after all you just said so yourself. Good day.

bluepistolero

[Thatcherite]

No-one is promoting evolution to "undermine Christianity". That is tinfoil hat raving. Evolution is promoted because we have looked at the evidence for it and find it persuasive

Trust them, bp; they're doctors.

Now all you blue-eyed twins line up over here...

I am amazed, do you genuinely subscribe to the notion that hundreds of thousands of scientists, the world over, are engaging in a giant conspiracy to undermine a particular form of Christianity (for no apparent benefit to themselves)? Or are you being sarcastic? My problem is, that some of the views put forward in these threads seem beyond parody.

[Dimensio]

. All too soon, the usual people start referring to Christians as some type of subhuman creatures and making fun of their beliefs.

Please point to a post in this discussion where Christians -- all Christians, and not a subset -- are likened to "some type of subhuman creatures".

[b_sharp]

"What would Darwin's theory predict the behavior of Family A to be?

"1) Give the food to family B.

"2) Take the food for family A and let family B fend for themselves.

"Be honest with yourself.

Kin selection, a part of the ToE, would predict that the actions of the two families would depend on how related those families felt they were. The relation does not have to be genetic but can be communal.

What did happen?