Posted on 05/20/2002 12:53:27 PM PDT by rpage3
He was from Harvard you know. He was a great leftist.He loved to criticize his predecessors for obtaining results based on personal biases they could not see in themselves.
Gould the leftist couldn't see his own bias denying the differences in races. He argued forcefully about minor changes in many species, but could never drop his Harvard yard PC bias about racial differences in the human species.
He did take on the Creationists tho, and always won.
It may be a far worse fate to have lived and not believed on Jesus Christ. Can you imagine your life without him ?
he never got to see his team erase the Curse of the Bambino, but if he's watching from heaven (a place he didn't believe existed), he just might be in for a pleasant surprise this year.
No. He’s gotta wait 17 more years.
The gods of baseball show no mercy.
How in the world atheists can even begin to mourn the passing of a large jacket of meaningless protoplasm is mind-boggling to me. According to atheist dogma--and Gould's own beliefs--his life was no more meaningful than a spring toadstool bloom.
So why mourn?
I believe the informed intelligence known as Stephen Gould persists and is having quite a personal revelation right about now. He'll come around.
Dear Friend,
In 1899, Stephen Crane wrote: "A man said to the universe, 'Sir, I exist.' 'However,' replied the universe, 'that fact has not created in me, a sense of obligation.'"
"In recent times, human beings-in particular, their scientists-have accelerated and expanded their capacity to observe the world and comment on it. This has happened because of the arrival of computers. It is now possible to see more clearly than ever before, that the same laws of physics; responsible for simple patterns of order in nature, have also allowed for the development of highly complex organisms such as human beings."
"The sophisticated organism, HOMO SAPIENS, has been able to formulate and express physical law, in the language of mathematics. Using mathematics, humans can construct models for actions and reactions that occur in the physical world. Mathematics is notoriously reliable. This is because the physical world reflects the computational properties of mathematics. There is a friendly relationship with physical laws and the mathematical theories that humans use to describe them."
"The link between mathematical theory and physical processes is so real, that science can design space ships and send them to the moon and back on the basis of it. The confidence that the underlying order of the universe can be expressed in mathematical formulae lies at the heart of modern science."
"Whereas 150 years ago, science was responsible for undermining the creationist argument from design, now science has resurrected the same argument on the basis of new evidence. Oxford mathematician, Rojer Penrose says: "There seems to be some profound reality about these mathematical concepts. . . . It is as though human thought is being guided to some eternal, external truth." Brilliant British scientist, Stephen Hawking says; "Why does the universe go to all the trouble of existing? What is it that breathes fire into the equations, and makes a universe for them to describe?"
"There is a stunning reciprocal relationship between the universe and the human mind. Einstein said, "The only incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible." Why do we possess the necessary intellectual apparatus to unlock the secret codes of the universe?"
"When Robinson Crusoe saw the footprint in the sand, he deduced that he was not alone after all; that there was someone else like himself, sharing his lonely island. The universe is vast and mysterious. But here and there we see a footprint; evidence that we are not alone. If nature yields evidence of a mind akin to our own, perhaps our mind is a significant clue to the meaning of the universe, and of ourselves in it."
"To believe that the universe is indifferent to our presence in it... is---death. There is scientific evidence to support the notion of a superior Being who is "mindful" of us. We are not homeless. The universe is not absurd. We are meant to be here. Above us, around us, and with us, there is One who breathes fire into our thoughts, our plans, our hopes and desires."
"And we belong to him."
That's going a bit far. Unless I somehow missed it, Jesus never spoke concerning God's methods of creation. In fact, the mechanics of evolution can be put forth as an example of the "gradual unfolding of God's will."
The heat generated by the theory of evolution has much less to do with the mechanical aspects of natural selection, than it does with the fact that so many people use the theory evolution as "proof" that God does not exist, with all that implies, and so many other people feel bound to dispute the point.
While the theory of evolution proves nothing about the existence of God, it does tend to draw believers into the trap of trying to prove scientifically that God does exist. (Which is basically what you're trying to do here.) That, too, is a hopeless task, as we could not hope to fashion a model of God that can pass scientific muster -- He's just too big.
On the other hand, we don't have to prove God's existence: He dispenses with the difficulties of scientific proof by personally introducing Himself to anybody who cares to meet Him. Once one acknowledges God and trusts in Him, the the evolution debate has no importance whatsoever.
Don't sweat the small stuff, Jonathan -- and considering the sorts of things that Peter called small, this is small stuff indeed.
Why are you sad about people expressing a superstition ?
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