Posted on 02/22/2004 2:32:07 PM PST by attiladhun2
Whether a new trend or mode of thought has a generally beneficial or corrupting effect is not usually apparent for some decades or even centuries from the time it first becomes widely accepted. However, in the case of Darwin's hypothesis, the insidious nature of his doctrine was revealed within a very short span of time.
Communists, anarchists, and other social revolutionaries of the nineteenth century were already confirmed materialists before Darwin began to espouse his ideas. What the Origin of Species did, however, was endow their atheism with something of a scientific aura. It turned an emotional attachment to godless materialism into an intellectual one. Bomb-slinging radicals needed not any longer blame their renunciation of the Church and her dogmas on abuse at the hands of some wicked old nun while attending catechism. The lumps on the tops of the heads of budding young radicals as they fidgeted in their chairs administered via the knuckles of Sister Theresa and other holy hags could now be considered only secondary evidence for atheistic materialism.
The old Menshevik revolutionaries were content to let the evolutionary process play itself out. They were still committed to Marx's dialectical process and believed that the Capitalist Stage of human development would eventually advance into the Socialist Stage. Some saw this as the Final Stage, while others foresaw a Communist Stage beyond that of universal socialism where crime and warfare would finally come to an end and the institution of the state itself would become obsolete. The, on the other hand, Bolsheviks believed they could bypass the slow process of social evolution altogether and usher in the Communist Stage outright. In this respect they could be called believers in social-punctuated equilibrium. In a way, they were right, because they did create a Monster, though not the Hopeful one envisioned by some of Darwin's recapitulationist expositors. In this case the lizard did not lay the egg which became a bird, but the lizard laid an egg and a sociopathic-mass murderer was hatched complete with all the accouterments of slaughter.
The notion of progress is an ancient one. A cursory reading of Greco-Roman literature will establish that. It was obvious to a philosopher like Aristotle that human society moved from less to more advanced states largely through the invention of new ideas and products. This was considered quite natural. However, until relatively recent times it was concomitantly believed that some things remained largely fixed. This was considered part of the nature of things as well. Some fixed things included the role of the male as father and provider and the role of the female as mother and nurturer. The institution of marriage between these two was considered as much a part of the natural order as the change of seasons. The law was another one of those things considered fixed. These concepts were like immovable boulders in a phenomenological river.
Darwin's hypothesis has radically changed all of that. Beginning in the late 19th Century, law schools began to replace the Scriptures as the basic legal foundation with the Darwinian hypothesis. Rather than a permanent reference point, the law began to be seen as an evolving concept. With a concept of law now more analogous to a glob of puddy than a slab of stone, the letter of the law and original intent were not as important to jurists trained under the new paradigm. Activist judges could now find ideas like "the separation of church and state" in the First Amendment when such a phrase does not exist there. They then could use this invented phrase to seriously compromise the Free Exercise clause of the Bill of Rights or even to ignore it almost completely.
Although Justice Black and the other members of the Supreme Court who gave us Roe vs. Wade did not dare cite The Origin of Species as evidence in their infamous 1973 ruling, who can doubt that evolution did not influence their thinking? Did they not study the same “monkey to modern man” charts we all did in high school and college? Did they not also hear (erroneously) the same lectures describing gill slits at certain stages of pre-natal mammalian development? This would indicate, one would suppose, a rather fishy ancestry for all us fur-bearing critters!
We are now beginning to see the final outworking of this legal Darwinism. Radical homosexual activists and their allies knew they were making little headway in shoving their lifestyle down our throats in the people's legislative chambers. So what more logical place to turn to have the legal imprimatur stamped upon their particular perversion than a gaggle of judges who see the law as so much silly puddy! The institution of marriage as a union between one man and one woman is now in grave danger of being overthrown by activist judges who see such a definition as outmoded. In their minds if the law is an evolving thing then every other social institution that has a legal basis must be likewise evolving and cannot be considered permanent. Marriage was in a tenuous state to begin with in our modern world, and will not likely survive this latest onslaught.
In the last generation social activists and their friends in the legislative branch gave us the welfare state. This helped to virtually destroy the nuclear family in some minority communities. As a consequence, a horde of fatherless young men was turned loose upon society. Gang violence, drug addiction, and a second and even third generation of fatherless young people are even now spreading their misery far beyond the boundaries of "the hood." Many of these same social activists are now sitting on the judicial bench ready to rule traditional marriage out of existence by fiat. Who can doubt what the whole country will eventually look like after the final nail is hammered into the coffin of traditional marriage by these activist judges. Just drive around any big-city ghetto and view the garbage-strewn streets and the graffiti covering practically every wall. Observe the barred windows and doors. Look at the crowds of aimless young men hanging around the street corners shooting dice and drinking cheap wine. You are looking at the future of your own and nearly every other neighborhood. This is evolution, all right, but not quite what Darwin and his disciples had in mind.
How can a person be a member of a "religion" if they do not believe it is a religion?
I wonder how many of them are religious? I would imagine it breaks down very much like the population in general (i.e., the vast majority of them are Christians).
Easy. There are people who believe Athiesm is the absence of religion but that is simply not the case. Religion is simply what we do based on what we believe about life the universe and everything. Everyone has a believe about these things and everyone responds, more or less, accordingly. Our religion is that response.
Surely you are not suggesting Mr. Chick is a small-minded racist bigot!!
I don't know about the Jews, but he sure doesn't like us Catholics very much.
I think your definition is too broad. Here's one definition from dictionary.com:
re·li·gion ( P ) Pronunciation Key (r-ljn) n.
1.
A. Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe.
B. A personal or institutionalized system grounded in such belief and worship.
2. The life or condition of a person in a religious order.
3. A set of beliefs, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader.
4. A cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion.
Maybe you could shoehorn evolution and/or atheism under 4. However, 4 seems to hinge on zeal or conscientious devotion. Under that definition, any activity or belief could be considered a religion, even conservativism, liberalism, stamp collecting etc.
I'm not going to claim that. I'm also not going to claim that the majority of physicists approach their research without the parameters of the theory of gravity. What's your point?
Evolution has not been proving, like the word marriage it gets a reshape every so often.
No scientific theory can be proven. The only thing that can be said about a theory is that, based on the available evidence, it has not been disproven.
All theories are subject to change and/or disproof as new evidence comes to light. Every scientist knows this.
and by all means give it credibility with holy "peer review"
Can you think of any other process that would be better for reviewing scientific theories? There is no better path to success in the scientific community than shooting down an established theory. A Nobel Prize awaits anyone who can come up with a theory that better suits the available evidence than the theory of evolution.
Oh man, I thought I was the only one who caught that...
You're talking about Social Darwinism here, which was a perversion of the theory of evolution by racists in the 19th-20th century. One thing to keep in mind is that every life form existing on the planet today is the fittest survivor.
A scientific theory does not address moral issues. The theory of evolution doesn't tell us how to live our lives nor define what is right or wrong, any more than cosmic string theory.
One of the better discussions I've read was talking about the differences between religion and science. The basic point went something like this...
Not only do we not know everything, we have to concede it is possible that we cannot know everything. All that we perceive is, after all, coming through our senses, which themselves may be questionable, or incapable of sensing some things. This is a very basic question in philosophy.
Every major religion answers this with a variation on the same theme. "Give up. Don't even try." Accept this book, this word, this person, as the be-all and end-all of knowledge. Even if you cannot know everything, this person (book, creed, whatever...) does, so you may be satisfied.
Modern science takes a fundamentally different track. We may not be able to figure out all that is true, but we can at least figure out what is false. The more false possibilities we eliminate, the closer we come to a true understanding of the world. The way to determine whether a possibility is false is to experiment, and show our ideas to everyone, so that they may, in turn, experiment with our ideas, possibly showing that they are wrong.
On the actual topic, evolution has been exposed to withering criticism for over a century now. Some of the original ideas were shown to be wrong, but others have stood up. With modifications - this is how science works, after all - the theory has stood up quite well. It combines observations in archaeology, genetics, basic biology, and a few other fields.
By all means, keep poking at it. But at least present evidence - not some harebrained screed about how some people who believe in evolution are evil!!! (That last, by the way, was directed towards the original poster, not Modernman, in case that wasn't obvious to anyone.)
Drew Garrett
Probably just a concidence. Also, it's probably just a coincidence that the college student who supports creationism in the comic is somewhat, er, Aryan-looking.
Evolutions are Social Darwinists. Just look at how most of them behave on these threads. I keep in mind that every species on this planet was created exactly as it is and is not capable of evolving. Believe me though, I used to believe in evolution 100 percent.
A scientific theory does not address moral issues. The theory of evolution doesn't tell us how to live our lives nor define what is right or wrong, any more than cosmic string theory.
Have you ever heard of the science of psychology? There are scientific theories about behavior. However you are describing the theory of evolution as a simple theory for our existance apart from creation. This in itself addresses all moral issues of the bible by definition. The purpose of the athiestic theory of evolution is to relieve us from any responsibility to God and allow us to do what ever we want. This is religion by substitution.
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