Darwinism & the Culture of Death

New Oxford Review ^ | June 2006 | Anne Barbeau Gardiner

[shekkian]

I'm refering to trying to believe in an omnipotent God who created the world in six days, and making him match up with a planet Earth that is, supposedly, five billion years old. That's not the God I learned about in Sunday School. (I'm Baptist, on a side note.)

[Politically Correct]

I don't think that's the gist of the article (book review).
The Nazi's just ran with the ideas and presuppositions that are implicit in Darwinism.
Just as the Left today takes the same presuppositions and runs with them.

You can make funny but it doesn't substitute for actually thinking about the implications of your presuppositions.

[DoctorMichael]

I'm NOT making funny!

I'm serious!

:

Thanks once again!

[Dumb_Ox]

Proposed analogy: "Social Darwinism" is to Darwinian evolutionary theory as scientism is to science.

There's no question social Darwinism often accompanied the scientific theory of Darwin, to the point where both became confused with each other. The debate gets really nasty if you start highlighting the social darwinist writings of Darwin himself, which some people use as an ad hominem attack against the whole theory of "descent with modification."

Edward T. Oakes, one of the better analysts of philosophical Darwinism, reviewed Weikert's book. His review was to have appeared in First Things, but it was bumped so I think it will show up in Books and Culture, if it hasn't already.

[mjolnir]

Evolution is to Nazis the way the scientific explanation of gravity is related to those who push people out of windows.

If you look at the article or read Weikart, you know that he agrees with your point. That's why the reporter says that:

"Even so, Weikart concedes that these intellectuals who "built their worldview on science" may not have realized that at the foundation of their edifice were certain "philosophical presuppositions" that did not come "from empirical science and about which science could not arbitrate." In other words, as brilliant as they were, these German scholars and scientists could not quite manage to draw the line between the science of Darwin and Darwinian moral philosophy.

Now, I can understand you taking issue with the reporter calling the latter "Darwinian moral philosophy" or Weikart calling what he writes about "Moral Darwinism." However, he is taking issue with the same mistake you do, namely the fallacy that "is" implies "ought". The mistake that what we know about morality or aesthetics can be reduced to a scientific expalnation, however holistic, such as E.O. Wilson proposed in "Consilience" or Peter Singer councils in his "Darwinian Left" should be resisted. E.O. Wilson describes his conversion from Christianity to Darwinism as an epihany and an "enchantment" and he preaches the faith by insisting that scientists have unspecified "overwhelming evidence" for the materialist worldview. But how is Darwinism connected to metaphysical materialism? How is Darwin's theory--- a scientific theory--- supposed to compete with Christitianity? It's this sort of thing that Weikert is taking issue with. For instance, Singer thinks the fact that Darwin's theory of evolution has been proven somehow disproves the notion that human life is uniquely sacred. Obviously, he's wrong.

Weikert's arguing not so much against anything having to do with Darwinism as with how it's been interpreted to justify Epicureanism, which takes morality to be something inside us rather than a standard we have to live by, and way Darwin's theory is used to justify the various versions of Epicureans. Weikart's point is that the identification of morality with feelings, whether we’re talking about the morality of ecstatic feelings, or Romanticism, in which we're to take whatever wild ride our passions pull us as long as they're ours, the morality of morbid or forbidden feelings, i.e. transgressivism, then there is the morality of irresistible feelings, supposedly inexorable predispositions to feel a certain way endorsed by the evolutionary psychologist Stephen Pinker in his essay Why They Kill Their Newborns, from which he concluded we ought to view baby murder leniently, the morality of higher feelings, or Aestheticism, endorsed by John Stuart Mill and Hannibal Lector, the morality of religious feelings, or Spiritualism represented by leftists, especially environmentalists (Are you a religious man? Edward O. Wilson: No. Well, I'm a spiritual man. I like to call...think of myself that way. I have most of the same feelings, emotional capacity for a sense of exhaltation as a deeply traditionally religious person.) and what J. Budizenski (who I'm cribbing from) rightly notes, moralism, which identifies morality with moral feelings and describes the view of James Q. Wilson and perhaps Larry Arnhart and Charles Murray as well.

There are arguments to be made for each of these, just as there are arguments to made against them. I wouldn't worry about the author being anti-Catholic, either-- something anti-Catholic coming out of the New Oxford Review happens about as often as Ted Kennedy proposes tax cuts. Weikart is criticizing scientism, not science.

[SaveUS]

"Unless of course you're one of those who believes that Catholics aren't Christians, in which case go ahead and steep in your prejudicial juices."

LOL I was raised Southern Baptist and have NEVER EVER heard a preacher say a bad word about Catholics, or that evolution is wrong. I have found that just like my parents and their parents, I can follow Christianity and believe totally in science. My most favorite of all sciences, Archaeology, even gets regularly attacked by these people. If actual physical evidence from millenia ago that hasn't been touched since it was laid down get nothing but a "that's not true according to the bible", or "those fossils can only be a few thousand years old, according to the bible." then you have very little chance of swaying their opinions. Just be sure they NEVER get a say in our classrooms.

[after dark]

Most posters need to read the Darwin's theory. There is no such thing as cafeteria Darwinism. If you reject any portion of his theory you are not a Darwinist. Muddying the waters by stating that people who disbelieve Darwin's theory ,believe the world is only five thousand years old is intellectually dishonest.

[fish hawk]

"If the solar system was brought about by an accidental collision, then the appearance of organic life on this planet was also an accident, and the whole evolution of Man was an accident too. If so, then all our thought processes are mere accidents-the accidental by-product of the movement of atoms. And this holds for the materialists' and astronomers' as well as for anyone else's. But if their thoughts- i.e., of Materialism and Astronomyh-are merely accidental by-products, why should we believe them to be true? I see no reason for believing that one accident should be able to give a correct account of all the other accidents. C.S.Lewis "God in the Dock"

[Stultis]

Between the publication of the Descent of Man and the 1930s, the sanctity of human life came under all-out attack. Infanticide, involuntary euthanasia, abortion, and suicide all became topics of public debate. ...whereas previously they had been carried out absent debate?

[blowfish]

It never ceases to amaze me how many Godless Darwinists we have on this board.

It never ceases to amaze me how many gullible ... (be polite here) ... people ... we have on this board.

[blowfish]

Of course, the basic thesis is a load of buffalo bagels. Man has been committing atrocities since the depths of time, and there's always a panoply of rationalizations to choose from. If fact, one of the all time chart-topping favorites is:

God is on our side!

[after dark]

When Darwinists do not get the bottom kissing ,they feel they are entitled to, they resort to verbal abuse.

[VictoryGal]

Carl doesn't speak for me, nor is he the final word on evolutionary science.

[VictoryGal]

Can you deny that a "day" to the Almighty may well be billions of years to puny mortals such as ourselves?

[Politically Correct]

True, not all Darwinists are Godless even though the underlying foundation of evolution is a system where God is either absent or distant and unconcerned.
Theistic evolution is a distinction without a difference from evolution and is, in my mind, logically inconsistant with the God revealed in the Bible.

Politeness is often the first thing to disappear on a Crevo thread.....sigh

[after dark]

>Carl doesn't speak for me, nor is he the final word on evolutionary science

Carl Sagan was a great scientist. If his word on Darwin's theory ( That was slick changing the vocabulary. Most non Darwinists believe in parts of Darwin's theory)is unacceptable , why would anyone accept your word on Darwin's theory?

[yankeedame]

The late scientist Carl Sagan would say you either believe in God or you believe in Darwin's Theory. You can not believe in both at the same time.

So? Carl Sagan said it. So what? I mean, he's supposed to be Moses come down from the mountain or something? That was his opinion. Just b/c he knew how to work the media doesn't mean his opinions are worth any more then your's or mine.

[Politically Correct]

Most posters need to read the Darwin's theory. There is no such thing as cafeteria Darwinism. If you reject any portion of his theory you are not a Darwinist. Muddying the waters by stating that people who disbelieve Darwin's theory ,believe the world is only five thousand years old is intellectually dishonest.

I think you must be replying to someone else as I don't recall mentioning the age of the earth in any post here.

Your statement as no such thing as cafeteria Darwinism is somewhat misleading. By your definition most evolutionists would not be Darwinists as there seem to be lots of divergence in the group from small details of his propounding of the theory.
So strictly, they are not Darwinists, but I believe the lable is being used more broadly here.

[after dark]

I think the late Carl Sagan deserves more credit than you give him ,and Darwin is the one being equated with Moses.

[Stultis]

There is the possibility he was a class conscious Victorian who despised the egalitarian aspects of Christianity. He may have deliberately formulated a theory to excuse the excesses of cruel and powerful people.

Hardly. Darwin was indeed a patrician type in some respects: a stolid and satisfied member of the Victorian upper-middle class. But he was FAR from excusing excesses "of cruel and powerful people".

For example Darwin was a passionate abolitionist. (He was almost, indeed was for a brief period, thrown off the Beagle due to heated arguments with it's pro-slavery captain, Fitzroy.) When the British governor of Jamaica (named Eyre, IIRC) engaged in mass casualty reprisals following a rebellion by the natives, Darwin was active in a movement calling for his prosecution.

At his home in Downe Darwin devoted many, many hours to public service as a local magistrate. This was in spite of the fact that Darwin went to extremes to avoid any professional responsibility in science, being extremely jealous of any time stolen from his own research. (The only time he unable to escape such co-option was a brief period serving as corresponding secretary, IIRC, for the Geological Society of Britain. He hated it.)

Darwin also engaged himself in many local charitable and improvement activities, usually in cooperation with the local parson, Brodie Innes. For instance they established a coffee house and/or reading room (don't recall exactly which) that was quite successful, and intended as a more productive recreational alternative to taverns and public houses. Darwin, who was very good with investments (multiplying his own inheritance several times over) also set up a savings club where local working men and families could deposit small amount and receive good returns on their pennies.

As another example Darwin was very supportive of the missions movement worldwide, even after his own belief in Christianity faded. This was precisely because Darwin had seen for himself, during his travels, how missionaries would often mitigate the savagery not just of native peoples, but of the colonial ruling class and rampaging sailors as well.

Any really thorough biography of Darwin will cover all these points and many others. I recommend the following:

Darwin: The Life of a Tormented Evolutionist
by Adrian Desmond & James Moore
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0393311503/sr=8-5/qid=1150220473/ref=sr_1_5/103-9287312-1797405?%5Fencoding=UTF8