Posted on 06/20/2007 5:24:39 AM PDT by spirited irish
In addition to original Darwinism, today there are two other versions of evolutionary theory: punctuated equilibrium and neo-Darwinism, a revamped version of the original Darwinism. No matter the variant though, evolution serves as the creation myth for the theological and philosophical worldview of Evolutionary Humanism (Naturalism).
“Evolution is a religion,” declared evolutionary Humanist Michael Ruse. “This was true of evolution in the beginning and it is true still today…One of the most popular books of the era was ‘Religion Without Revelation,’ by Julian Huxley, grandson of Thomas Huxley…As always evolution was doing everything expected of religion and more.” (National Post, Canadian Edition, 5/13/2000)
“Humanism is a philosophical, religious, and moral point of view.” (Humanist Manifestos I & II, 1980, Introduction, Paul Kurtz)
The primary denominations of Evolutionary Humanism are Cultural Marxism/Communism, Secular Humanism, Postmodernism, and Spiritual Communism. The offshoots of these are among others, New Age/green environmentalism/Gaia, socialism, progressivism, liberalism, multiculturalism, and atheism. Individually and collectively, these are modernized versions of pre-Biblical naturalism (paganism).
All worldviews begin with a religious declaration. The Biblical worldview begins with, “In the beginning God…” Cosmic Humanism begins, “In the beginning Divine Matter.” Communism, Postmodernism, and Secular Humanism begin with, “In the beginning Matter.” Matter is all there is, and it not only thinks, but is Divine:
“…matter itself continually attains to higher perfection under its own power, thanks to indwelling dialectic…the dialectical materialists attribution of ‘dialectic’ to matter confers on it, not mental attributes only, but even divine ones.” (Dialectical Materialism, Gustav A. Wetter, 1977, p. 58)
In explicitly religious language, the following religionists offer all praise, honor, and glory to their Creator:
“We may regard the material and cosmic world as the supreme being, as the cause of all causes, as the creator of heaven and earth.” (Vladimir Lenin quoted in Communism versus Creation, Francis Nigel Lee, 1969, p. 28)
“The Cosmos is all that is or ever will be.” (Carl Sagan, Cosmos, 1980, p. 4)
Evolutionary Humanism has demonstrated itself to be an extremely dangerous worldview. In just the first eighty-seven years of the twentieth century, the evolutionist project of radically transforming the world and mankind through the power of evolutionism has led to the extermination of between 100-170 million ‘subhuman’ men, women, and children.
Deadly Problems
First, in order that materialist ethics be consistent with the idea that life evolved by chance and continues to evolve over time, ethics must be built on human social instincts that are in a continuous process of change over evolutionary time. This view demolishes both moral ethics and social taboos, thereby liberating man to do as he pleases. Over time this results in a lawless climate haunted by bullies, predators, despots, psychopaths, and other unsavory elements.
Perhaps Darwin could not envision the evil unleashed by his ideas. Nonetheless, he did have some inkling, for he wrote in his “Autobiography” that one who rejects God,
“…can have for his rule of life…those impulses and instincts which are strongest or…seem to him the best ones.” (Fatal Fruit, Tom DeRosa, p.7)
Humanist Max Hocutt realizes that materialist ethics are hugely problematical, but offers no solution. An absolute moral code cannot exist without God, however God does not exist, says Hocutt. Therefore,
“…if there were a morality written up in the sky somewhere but no God to enforce it, I see no reason why we should obey it. Human beings may, and do, make up their own rules.” (Understanding the Times, David Noebel, p. 138-139)
Jeffrey Dahmer, a psychopath who cannibalized his victims, acted on Darwin’s advice. In an interview he said,
“If a person doesn’t think there is a God to be accountable to, then…what is the point of trying to modify your behavior to keep it within acceptable ranges? That’s how I thought…I always believed the theory of evolution as truth, that we all just came from the slime.” (Dahmer in an interview with Stone Phillips, Dateline NBC, 11/29/1994)
With clearly religious overtones, atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell summarizes the amoral materialist ethic:
“Blind to good and evil, reckless of destruction, omnipotent matter rolls on its relentless way.” (Russell, “Why I am not a Christian and Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects,” 1957, p. 115)
Next, materialist epistemology and metaphysics dispossesses man of soul, free will, conscience, mind, and reason, thereby dehumanizing (animalizing) man and totally destroying not only the worth, dignity, and meaning of human life, but the possibility of freedom. The essence of this annihilation is captured in the following quotes:
Man is “but fish made over…” declared biologist William Etkin (Pushing the Antithesis, Greg L. Bahnsen, p. 224). And his life is but a “partial, continuous, progressive, multiform and continually interactive, self-realization of the potentialities of atomic electron states,” explained J.D. Bernal (1901-1971), past Professor of Physics at the University of London (The Origin of Life, Bernal, 1967, xv). Furthermore, “The universe cares nothing for us,” trumpets William Provine, Cornell University Professor of Biology, “and we have no ultimate meaning in life.” (Scientists, Face It! Science and Religion are Incompatible,” The Scientist, Sept. 1988)
Man... “must be degraded from a spiritual being to an animalistic pattern. He must think of himself as an animal, capable of only animalistic reactions. He must no longer think of himself…as capable of ‘spiritual endurance,’ or nobility.” By animalizing man his “state of mind…can be ordered and enslaved.” (Russian Textbook on Psychopolitics, “Degradation and Shock,” Chapter viii)
Finally, Evolutionary Humanism posits the notion that despite the fact that man is “but fish made over…” there are in fact, some exceptions to this rule. For it happens---by chance of course---that some lucky ‘species’ and ‘races’ of the human animal are more highly evolved (superior) and therefore enlightened than the others, who are---unluckily for them---less evolved and as a consequence, subhuman. Paired to this view is the idea that if a species or race does not continue to evolve (progress up the evolutionary ladder), it will become extinct. Together, these ideas lead logically to the deadly conclusion that in order to preserve the fittest of the species---or the spiritually evolved, as is the case with Spiritual Communism--- it is morally incumbent upon the superior to replace (via the science of eugenics and population control) and/or liquidate the subhumans. In his book, “The Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex,” (1871) Charles Darwin foresaw this eventuality:
“At some future period…the civilized races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world…the anthropomorphous apes…will no doubt be exterminated.” (Descent, 2nd ed., p. 183)
In practice, the materialist worldview is a hellish recipe for catastrophe, as was amply demonstrated by the 20th century’s two most blood-soaked political movements--- pagan Nazism and atheist Communism. Both rejected God, and both were animated by Darwinism
Nazi Germany
Hitler’s murderous philosophy was built on Darwinian evolution and preservation of favored species. In his book, “Evolution and Ethics, British evolutionist Sir Arthur Keith notes,
“The leader of Germany is an evolutionist not only in theory, but, as millions know to their cost, in the rigor of its practice.” (1947, p.230)
It was Darwinism that inspired Hitler to try to create---by way of eugenics--- a superior race, the Aryan Man. In pursuit of his ambition, Hitler eliminated what he considered were inferior human animals, among which were for example, Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, and Christians.
Evolutionism in Nazi Germany resulted in gas chambers, ovens, and the liquidation of eleven million “useless eaters” and other undesirables. Evolutionist Niles Eldridge, author of “Darwin: Discovering the Tree of Life,” reluctantly concurs. Darwin’s theory, he acknowledges,
“has given us the eugenics movement and some of its darker outgrowths, such as the genocidal practices of the Nazis.” (2005, p. 13)
The Soviet Union
Even though Karl Marx wrote his Communist Manifesto before Darwin published his “On the Species,” the roots of Communism are nonetheless found in Darwinism. Karl Marx wrote Fredrich Engels that Darwin’s ‘Origin’,
“is the book which contains the basis in natural science for our view.” (Marxian Biology and the Social Scene, Conway Zirkle, 1959)
Stephane Courtois, one of the authors of The Black Book of Communism, relates that,
“In Communism there exists a sociopolitical eugenics, a form of Social Darwinism.” (p. 752)
Vladimir Lenin exulted that,
“Darwin put an end to the belief that the animal and vegetable species bear no relation to one another (and) that they were created by God, and hence immutable.” (Fatal Fruit, Tom DeRosa, p. 9)
Lenin exercised godlike power over life and death. He saw himself as, “the master of the knowledge of the evolution of social species.” It was Lenin who “decided who should disappear by virtue of having been condemned to the dustbin of history.” From the moment Lenin made the “scientific” decision that the bourgeoisie represented a stage of humanity that evolution had surpassed, “its liquidation as a class and the liquidation of the individuals who actually or supposedly belonged to it could be justified.” (The Black Book of Communism, p. 752)
Alain Brossat draws the following conclusions about the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany, and the ties that bind them:
“The ‘liquidation’ of the Muscovite executioners, a close relative of the ‘treatment’ carried out by Nazi assassins, is a linguistic microcosm of an irreparable mental and cultural catastrophe that was in full view on the Soviet Stage. The value of human life collapsed, and thinking in categories replaced ethical thought…In the discourse and practice of the Nazi exterminators, the animalization of Other…was closely linked to the ideology of race. It was conceived in the implacably hierarchical racial terms of “subhumans” and “supermen”…but in Moscow in 1937, what mattered…was the total animalization of the Other, so that a policy under which absolutely anything was possible could come into practice.” (ibid, p. 751)
21st Century America
Ronald Reagan loved God and America. America he said is, “the moral force that defeated communism and all those who would put the human soul into bondage.” (Republican National Convention, Houston TX, 8/17/1992)
Even though he was optimistic about America’s future he nevertheless cautioned that America must maintain her reliance on God and her commitment to righteousness and morality. He liked quoting Alexis de Tocqueville’s insightful analysis of the source of America’s greatness:
“Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret and genius of her power. America is great because she is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.” (In the Words of Ronald Reagan, by Michael Reagan)
As America moves into the 21st century, we have yet to admit a shameful, dark secret. Evolutionism…the creation myth, that empowered Nazism and Communism, is being taught to America’s youth in our government-controlled schools. The animalization of Americans is well advanced and coupled to a corresponding slow collapse of human worth. Already we hear of human life spoken of in dehumanizing categories such as ‘vegetable,’ “non-persons,” and ‘uterine content.’
Ominously, Evolutionary Humanism has also outstripped Judeo-Christian precepts in our universities, judiciary, federal bureaucracy, corporations, medicine, law, psychology, sociology, entertainment, news media and halls of Congress. As Biocentrism it fuels the nonhuman animal rights project, the gay rights movement, radical feminism, and the increasingly powerful and influential green environmentalist program, which demands that America submit to the draconian mandates of the Kyoto Treaty.
America, the “moral force that defeated communism” is on the verge of completely rejecting God, the natural order, and moral absolutes and instead, embracing the godless religion of evolution, amorality, and the unnatural.
Evolutionary Humanism is the most dangerous delusion thus far in history. It begins with the ‘animalization of Other,’ in tandem with the elevation of the ‘superior,’ for whom this serves as a license to make up their own rules, abuse power, and force their will onto the citizens. This is accompanied by a downward spiraling process that pathologizes the natural order, moral ethics, virtue, and social taboos while simultaneously elevating narcissism, tyranny, cruelty, nihilism, confusion, perversion, sadism, theft, and lying to positions of politically correct “new morality,” which is then enforced through sensitivity training, speech codes, hate crime laws, and other intimidation tactics. If not stopped, as history warns us, this rapidly escalating downward process leads inevitably to totalitarianism, enslavement, and eventually mass murder.
In a portent of things to come, evolutionist B.F. Skinner said:
“A scientific analysis of behavior dispossesses autonomous man and turns the control he has been said to exert over to the environment. The individual…is henceforth to be controlled…in large part by other men.” (Understanding the Times, David Noebel, p. 232)
Copyright Linda Kimball 2007 www.patriotsandliberty.com/
Linda is the author of many published essays on culture, worldview, and politics. Her essays are published both nationally and internationally. She is a member of MoveOff.org
Actually, I get a lot of my basic cosmology from Plato. Do you consider him "religious?"
I don't recall ever saying that my creationist views have nothing to do with my religious beliefs. Jeepers, I've been citing Genesis! That should tell you something.
Now, let's ask you: Do your evolutionist ideas have nothing to do with a religious or philosophical belief? For instance, would you consider yourself to be, say, a materialist? As you know, that is a philosophical doctrine, not a scientific one. Atheism is definitely a a form of religious belief -- specifically the belief that there is no God. Which, of course, is a belief that science cannot falsify, no more than it can falsify the "existence" of God.
So where do we go from here?
Can we count you in for supporting the "creationism doesn't have anything to do with your religious beliefs" argument? That's the context of the post you're replying to.
You made the following statement with regard to creationists in genereal:
You don't have to know the specific content of their belief; one has only to look at what they do.
148 posted on 06/22/2007 10:54:52 AM PDT by betty boop
No, I wouldn't describe myself as a "materialist". What's your opinion of the argument equating evolution with paganism based on a common "materialism".?
tactical..Are you willing to discuss the issue using the commonly understood and accepted definitions of the terms or not?
Irish...Now either it’s true that matter is in constant motion, meaning that man,the world, and reality itself are on an Evolutionary Escalator going ‘up,’ or this is not true but false. If true, then as made clear by evolutionists quoted in the essay, there can be no unchanging moral standards. By extension, there can be no unchanging definitions, protocols, and so on. Therefore, your demand to betty that she be, “...willing to discuss the issue using the commonly understood and accepted definitions of the terms or not?” is completely hypocritical.
I was referring to Islamists in that passage tacticalogic. It was Stultis who insisted they were "creationists."
What "commonly understood and accepted" terms or philosphy measure theological validity by the existence or absence of dynamic physics?
tactical-—Can we count you in for supporting the “creationism doesn’t have anything to do with your religious beliefs” argument? That’s the context of the post you’re replying to
Irish...Absolutely. Just as your support for the creation myth of evolution has everything to do with your neo-pagan religion.
Science is but an attempt at explaining and extrapolating upon one’s creation story and the world and cosmos withinwhich man must live and die. The Aztecs, Caanites, Babylonians-—evolutionists all-—, each had ‘science’ to explain and extrapolate upon their creation myths and thereby help make sense of their world.
I have no opinion. I haven't thought about the issue at all.
According to the definitions you've posted, and supposedly agreed to accept, they seem to be.
tactical...What “commonly understood and accepted” terms or philosphy measure theological validity by the existence or absence of dynamic physics?
Irish...Your strawman tactic is clumsily contrived. You cannot respond logically or truthfully to my question for one simple reason: logic, truth, and reality cannot exist on the Evolutionary Escalator.
Care to?
Okay. Yell "strawman", declare victory, and go away.
People whose entire education consists in rote memorization of the Q'uran as the only thing needful in life have never had an opportunity to cultivate reason, or the life of the mind. For this reason, I objected to Stultis declaring Islamists creationists; for the debate between creationists and evolutionists is premised on reason, on rationality; and the typical "graduate" of a Madrassah cannot even get into that game.
It seems the only purpose to declare Islamists as "creationists" is to lump them into the same category as creationists who are well-educated and who have reflected deeply about certain claims of Darwinist theory, and have reasonable objections to them. By tossing both Islamists and creationists (as just defined) into the same basket, some important distinctions are lost. "Creationism" and "creationist" then can become words of opprobrium, and then perhaps people might say there's not a dime's worth of difference between one creationist and another. The deliberate losing of important distinctions is a very cheap strategy.
My Webster's American Family Dictionary (1998), for instance, uses this phrase to define religion: "a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe...containing a moral code for the conduct of human affairs."
No man can logically deny that he has one of these.
Even in your post to me you are speaking a great deal about "good" and "evil". If you are to acknowledge in any way that there is such a thing as good and evil, you are presupposing that there is a moral law. A moral law cannot logically exist in this world without a moral law Giver - this is my viewpoint, the lens through which I see all matter. It is logical. To deny a moral law Giver leaves one in the position you espoused and betty boop picked up on earlier, i.e., that all value judgments are subjective, ergo, a society that cares for its young versus a society that eats its young have no moral distinction. I beg to differ with that view, and I thought betty boop handled that argument well.
There is One Lawgiver, who decides "right" from "wrong" - that same One who is outside our time, above our finite observation, and yet may be known in this world by the revelation of life, of creation itself. We are free to discuss what is correct and what is incorrect, what is logical and illogical, what is true/real and what is false/imaginary without passing judgment upon one another. I'm still learning how to do that; betty boop and Alamo-Girl are my mentors in this arena.
For matters of judging good and evil I take my stand on the Bible unashamedly, for its words alone comport rationally in total with all that is in a way no mere human observation/understanding/analysis could ever tell. You would not be doing yourself harm if you read it from cover to cover. Men of much more intellect that we have been doing so for centuries, and have not found it wanting. I've seen it put this way:
Basic
Instructions
Before
Leaving
Earth
Is that a “Yes” or a “No” on the proposition that you don’t have to examine someone’s religious beliefs to know if they’re creationists?
Precisely.
Your proposed solution to this "cheap strategy" is do re-define creationists and being the Good People who believe in and do the Right Things. You seem to think the way to combat an invalid "guilt by association" argument is to counter it with an equally invalid "righteous by association" argument.
I would say rather that one’s view of creation is an indicator of one’s religious belief system.
So would I. That seems to be in line with the standard definitions, and the crux of the exchange you've gotten into the middle of. It's kind of interesting to be ageed with while being told how wrong you are.
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