Posted on 03/08/2007 7:46:04 PM PST by ofwaihhbtn
The enthusiasm Nietzsche expresses in this passage is for eugenics, a theory of biological determinism invented by Francis Galton, Charles Darwin’s first cousin. However extreme Nietzsche’s recommendation might sound today, by the first part of the twentieth century eugenics came to be widely practiced. In 1933, little more than thirty years after Nietzsche’s death, the Hereditary Health Courts set up in Nazi Germany were enforcing a rigorous policy of enforced sterilization; to a lesser degree, similar policies were carried out in societies from the United States to Scandinavia.The full text of the article is here: The Gentle Darwinians - What Darwin’s Champions Won’t MentionIn 1912, in his presidential address to the First International Congress of Eugenics, a landmark gathering in London of racial biologists from Germany, the United States, and other parts of the world, Major Leonard Darwin, Charles Darwin’s son, trumpeted the spread of eugenics and evolution. As described by Nicholas Wright Gillham in his A Life of Francis Galton, Major Darwin foresaw the day when “eugenics would become not only a grail, a substitute for religion, as Galton had hoped, but a ‘paramount duty’ whose tenets would presumably become enforceable.” The major repeated his father’s admonition that, though the crudest workings of natural selection must be mitigated by “the spirit of civilization,” society must encourage breeding among the best stock and prevent it among the worst “without further delay.”
Leonard Darwin’s recognition of his father’s role in the formation and promotion of eugenics was more than filial piety.
(Excerpt) Read more at commonwealmagazine.org ...
Other than YOUR mumbo-jumbo, the very things there in your paragraph proves what I say to you
Wow, the good old Fermat's school of arguing: I have discovered a truly remarkable proof which this margin is too small to contain.
Respected mathematicians claim to have proven that the first living cell could not have possibly come into existance by purely naturalistic mechanisms. I don't have references handy, but this is not controversial. Evolutionists simply dismiss such research.
Oh, it's controversial - and you should provide a link to your point of view...
If you don't mind, I'll just leave you to your ignorance. You seem to be so proud of it anyway.
I wrote:
Evolutionists simply dismiss such research.
An idiot replied:
This kind of research is called "rubbish in - rubbish out". This isn't research.
I reply:
So, you know absolutely nothing about this research, but you somehow "know" it is "rubbish."
Thanks for proving my statement above. And thanks for posing as a clueless dunce to make evolutionists look like fools. We need more like you.
By the way, for anyone out there with a brain, please read the chapter called "The Enigme of Life's Origin" in Michael Denton's book "Evolution: A Theory in Crisis." Not only is it an excellent chapter, but it has references to what I am talking about.
Eugenics in some form or other has been around at least since the Spartans. Even in the U.S., repeat felons and the mentally retarded were routinely sterilized into the 20th century.
Gould does an excellent job of documenting how a lot of 19th and early 20th century anthropology around the world was distorted by a desire to "prove" the prevailing theories of which racers were superior and which were inferior, and devising various tests and means of measurement to document that. That effort existed before Darwin, and a lot of folks after claimed his mantle for their junk science.
The Nazi innovation came in wedding junk science to absolute state power, and to not just regulating marriage and trying to restrict intermarriage, but making the leap to mass murder. The Nazis had the lethal combination of absolute, dictatorial power devoid of morality and a modern level of industrialization and efficiency.
Nazi pseudo-science cannot be laid on the doorstep of Charles Darwin, let alone the scientists who have built on and refined his theories since. Any more than the mass-scale efficiency of the Nazis' crimes can be blamed on Henry Ford, or its mythology can be blamed on Nietzsche and Wagner. Or the abuses of the Crusades and the inquisition can be blamed on Jesus Christ. Or J.D Salinger can be blamed for the shooting of Ronald Reagan. Or the Beatles for the crimes of the Manson family.
When a scientist or philosopher, author or composer releases ideas into the world, they are often adopted, misconstrued and twisted, then claimed as justification for horrific crimes. It's the nature of the beast.
I think doc's point was not to defend the Nazis, but to defend Darwin from being lashed to their anchor; eudenics existed long before Darwin, long before the Nazis, so the claimed progression from Darwin ---> eugenics ---> Hitler does not survive historical scrutiny.
You are a bit behind the times. Michael Denton says abiogenesis and evolution are inevitable.
"it is important to emphasize at the outset that the argument presented here is entirely consistent with the basic naturalistic assumption of modern science - that the cosmos is a seamless unity which can be comprehended ultimately in its entirety by human reason and in which all phenomena, including life and evolution and the origin of man, are ultimately explicable in terms of natural processes. This is an assumption which is entirely opposed to that of the so-called "special creationist school". According to special creationism, living organisms are not natural forms, whose origin and design were built into the laws of nature from the beginning, but rather contingent forms analogous in essence to human artifacts, the result of a series of supernatural acts, involving the suspension of natural law. Contrary to the creationist position, the whole argument presented here is critically dependent on the presumption of the unbroken continuity of the organic world - that is, on the reality of organic evolution and on the presumption that all living organisms on earth are natural forms in the profoundest sense of the word, no less natural than salt crystals, atoms, waterfalls, or galaxies."
1) I think you meant inseparable, not inevitable. B) Who TF is Michael Denton? (Rhetorical question; I googled.)
More importantly, abiogenisis is a given; at some point in time there wasn't organic life, and then some time later there was. Even the most ardent creationist and the most ardent believer in evolution can't help but agree on that. The debate is over whether that line was crossed by natural or supernatural means. And when.
Neither belief is inconsistent with Darwinian evolution.
Next time, try reading the post before responding.
Michael Denton is the "expert" quoted by RussP, to whom I was responding. And yes, he says abiogenesis is inevitable.
On that point, you are correct. But it still stands that the theory of Evolution is not responsible for the pre-existence of eugenics any more than Henry Ford is responsible for the exploitation by the Nazi's of industrialization for mass murder.
The problem with the mathematical approaches I've seen is that they are devoid of the physical properties of the materials involved. Playing probability numbers without understanding the nature of the chemistry involved is an invalid approach.
And I thought Wikipedia was a dubious source....
No, but it is ridiculous to quote-mine (particularly these) scientists to support your position. Newton lived in the 1600's - centuries before Darwin, so his viewpoint would be uninformed by The Origin of the Species. Lord Kelvin was a contemporary of Darwin who questioned the validity of Darwin's conclusions, at least initially asserting a young-earth.
You will notice, however, that neither of these scientists were biologists or biochemists, but were physicists. As such, evolution is a little bit outside of their expertise. Their opinions therefore are of no value in this discussion, except to impress the scientifically illiterate who hear the names "Newton" and "Kelvin" and are in awe because they heard the names in high school.
Frankly, the opinions of mathematicians, unless they are also trained in biochemistry or a related field, is irrelevant. All biochemists have some mathematical training, but not all mathematicians have biochemical training. Relatively few have even taken college-level general chemistry.
Get sober and get well. Seriously.
We are not worthy. We cannot parrot true canards as you do.
You mean ". . . based on observable facts and theory" that come from their personal subjective view of the world that we all live in (not everyone sees your facts and theory as "proof"). Science is a wonderful "tool" which can at times lead to marvelous advancements in the human condition. It, however, cannot explain every phenomenon that humans have been witness to. Oh, it tries. But it is woefully inadequate to the complete task. Otherwise, we would not be engaging in these mundane arguments over and over again. But, hey, have a nice day.
In order for you to "recognize the fact of design," I presume you have developed some criteria by which you distinguish between "designed" and "not designed." It would be helpful if you would share these criteria.
As for not identifying the "designer," this isn't of much use in distinguishing ID from creationism. Surely you have personally selected a "designer" to insert. And beyond this personal fill-in-the-blank aspect of ID's feigned agnosticism, the lack of a proposed designer serves only to raise more questions than an ID allegedly answers. After all, implicit in ID is not merely the notion of a "designer," but the notion of a "creator" as well.
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