Posted on 09/13/2005 4:15:07 AM PDT by 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]
(Excerpt) Read more at chicagotribune.com ...
Remember, organisms lacking this drive would quickly disappear from the breeding population, leaving only those who had it.
LOL. Why don't you read the book, free on line, rather than pull quotes from some smarmy, incorrect website run by cultists.
Then we can discuss it.
http://www.freebooks.com
bluepistolero
I know where her name comes from. I didn't like the book, though it was better than the movie.
The statement is modified by, ...unless you have a standard that stands outside of everyone...It is conditional. You do have a Standard outside yourself that you do not wish to acknowledge, and your capacity to make moral judgments is irrefutable evidence of it. I'm telling you the truth. You just think it is a lie.
Cordially,
bluepistolero
So I should be selfish to be good? Assuming for the moment that is true, do I have a moral obligation to survive?
Cordially,
"I notice that you say 'my' moral code? Is there more than one moral code? Does your moral code obligate me? If so, why? If not, why not?"
You didn't know that some people have different moral codes than you? Have you been raised in a basement? Do you ever read books?
"You say that moral codes come from "the nature of our existence", and that if you don't follow your reason you will not last too long. I can think of many exceptions to that principle, for example people who do good and end up be killed for it, or people that do evil and prosper. Second, do I have a necessary moral obligation to survive? If so, then where does this moral rule come from, that is, to survive?"
Someone using their reason is being moral; someone who denies it is being immoral.
" If you are going to explain how evolution produced morality you can't posit a prior moral rule to explain it."
I never did. Read again.
"Third, regarding "the nature of our existence". Is there a fixed nature to our existence? "
Yes.
"f not, and if our nature changes (and Evolution teaches that it has and will continue to do), does morality itself then change?"
Evolution says no such thing. Nor did I.
Misrepresentation of the entire Theory of Evolution aside, doesn't the Bible say that God made us from dirt or dust? Or maybe you're reading the second creation story in Genesis 2, I can never keep them straight...
In the late seventies I lived in a roach-ridden old apartment in Fall Church, VA and became grudgingly impressed with the sophistication of some roach behaviors. I know they can't have much brain capacity, really, but they know the concept of line-of-sight and "hiding" really well. If they can see you, you can see them and they know it. They dodge expertly among boxes and cans on a shelf or counter.
I was chasing one about in such a manner and paused, hand in the air, when I realized it was making its break over the edge of the counter. I thought I'd have a clear shot at it as it tried to speed down the side. It anticipated ME and lept straight out into the air and was gone under the side molding in a flash.
Another thing they do when out in the open is freeze when they first see you. They'll let you get only so close and then they take off. That's a pretty good simulation of a rabbit by something with probably 1/500th or less of the neurons.
No one is calling for the death penalty for anyone but murderers. (And a lot of liberals I know don't even want that.)
But that doesn't stop the lies.
Again, what's so bad about a nation led by God? It's almost funny how we've been inculcated with the unitarian notion that this is somehow a negative.
If it were possible that all the world became Christian, would that be a bad thing in your mind?
How substantively different are they? Am I obligated by them?
Have you been raised in a basement?
No.
Do you ever read books?
Yes.
Someone using their reason is being moral; someone who denies it is being immoral.
Hmmmm. I'm going to let that one percolate for a while.
Cordially,
Great! I'm reassured. Now tell me which is false:
1) A church or congregation which does not accept the Mosaic Law has another god before them, and is thus guilty of idolatry.Is having a god other than the Mosaic Law's God not idolatry? Is idolatry punishable or non-punishable? If punishable, by what? Does Mosaic Law itself mention the topic?2) That would be punishable by death.
When He shows up in person I won't be in the way.
Speaking as an agnostic, it would depend on what exactly happened to all the agnostics.
Quite a damaging admission? You have already presented us with simple-minded distortion of American history, as written by a Calvinist theologian--which also has the 'merit' of brevity, so much quicker and easier to get through than all those primary sources, all the scholarship of historians, &c. &c.
And why deal with the complexities of human morality, human history, human freedom and dignity when--hey presto!--you've got a package of boil-in-the-bag bromides all packaged up on your 'free books' website.
Sort of like the fast-food version of morality.
Funny how you don't engage Darwin, who published nothing on ethics or morality, on science, in which he remains a seminal thinker.
One could grow dubious about your true agenda...
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