Posted on 07/24/2003 1:55:39 PM PDT by Mr.Atos
Hi Betty! You roped me in on this one, because I think you unfairly represent Darwin's point of view. Normally you and A-G are too philosophical for me to follow along and I just enjoy the ride.
Darwin was normally very private about his religious beliefs so his faith is easy to mis-understand, but in a letter to Mr. J. Fordyce in 1879, he revealed a sense of his state of mind:
"What my own views may be is a question of no consequence to any one but myself. But, as you ask, I may state that my judgment often fluctuates...In my most extreme fluctuations I have never been an Atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God. I think that generally (and more and more as I grow older), but not always, that an Agnostic would be the more correct description of my state of mind."
I'm familiar with Dawkins, but not Dennett. Dawkins is openly hostile to religion and its not hard to find him repeating his hostility in his writing and in his public statements. I would not characterize Darwin's worst case agnosticism with Dawkin's outright hostility and atheism. Thanks for listening (reading?).
Indeed, for the first time ever I've been subjected to a rash of "cheap debating tricks" on another thread. One of them was the strawman tactic, another was things taken out of context, another was applying the subject to a different object.
Something has changed at the foundation of the debate in the last couple of days and I don't know what caused it. Do you?
Neither will find satisfaction of heart, as they fight each other like Philistines turned by the Lord against each other, but I continue to think that the later have been serving to disrupt the denial of the former. (That, as you maintain with postmodernism's grandpappy Fredrich Nietzsche, bb.)
Meanwhile Christ will continue to work through Logos, Rhema, and those who have already crossed over from death to life, to tell the truth in love and allow new life to begin where old, unsatisfactory and never suitable husks are shed. Call me a doubter --I strongly doubt that even the gates of Hollywood will prevail against the Church.
That case hasn't been made. Certainly Europe was Christian but it was Christian for a thousand stagnant years before the Renaissance and Enlightenment periods and it was in that few centuries that Western Civilization rose above the others. I find it a more reasonable assumption that it was a result of changing attitudes in the period rather than the Christian culture.
Perhaps! Perhaps it is simply indicative of two senseless fools (?) arguing opposing views about the same damn thing!!! But when you look at the fundamentals of the argument they make, both agree that the reality of opposable thumbs is particularly significant in identifying man as a supreme being. And despite their argument as to whether man is the product of divine construct or evolutionary selection, they both agree on the fundamental conclusion. And is that not the basis, to some degree, for solidarity? Perhaps neither of them is actually senseless nor the fool in their conclusions... only in their rejection of the truth.
I dunno. Maybe an increasing sense of desperation among our correspondents?
Thanks for raising this very fair point, <1/1,000,000th%. My concern, as a student of culture and history, really is less with what Darwin believed or what he thought about the significance of his theory, than with the usages to which he has been put by the Progressive Left.
Your characterization of Dawkins is certainly accurate. He is both an atheist and a socialist. But this complex is very common among our cultural and scientific elites these days. Scientists such as Dawkins and Dennett use their reputations as fine scientists in order to legitimate their prosecution of quite unrelated cultural initiatives -- such as this "Brights movement." I don't know any other way to understand this movement than as a concerted attempt to undermine traditional American (and British) institutions and culture, using the tactics of folks like Antonio Gramsci.... There is a great deal of hatred in our "Bright boys" for the specifically American type of sociopolitical order, and the conservative culture on which it is built. So they want to "change things." That way, the human race can "evolve" along into a "better" destiny, a "better" world.
They begin with an attack on religion and its symbols. But the attack is especially vicious on the great faiths -- Judaism and Christianity -- that posit the sanctity and inviolability of the individual human person under God. Note this characterization of man is inconvenient for the purposes of the types of projects the Progressive Left has in mind for us.
The government putting up a plaque of the ten commandments or statue of Moses is not necessarily endorsement of religion, any more than posting Hammurabi's law. It is a nod to history, specifically the history of government.
Since atheism is a religion, this is ultimately a hypocritical and puritanical approach. The government spends a lot more money and resources "endorsing" atheism, something religious people find offensive. The people who do the most to endanger the first ammendment aren't baptists, they are secular humanists.
The first ammendment is about secularizing government, not stamping out public religious symbology.
I agree with everything you said except this. I think the media emphasis is placed on these few folks because the media is the leftist elite and they'll plug anyone that supports their ideology. Everyone else gets ignored.
I would say the scientific elites are too busy with their activities and don't really pay much attention to the political landscape around them unless a funding issue arises. I was saying on another thread, that somehow I was able to get into my forties without ever noticing the creationist/evolution controversy. I think I'm pretty typical.
One of these issues, which preceded this strange conduct, must be a very sore spot for the other side:
I think this may be true of most scientists. But the exceptions I could name are strongly active, highly influential cultural figures besides, whose pronouncements on subjects outside their fields are widely respected and well heeded. Some of these people have a political agenda: to support Left ideologies that deliberately seek to undermine traditonal concepts of sociopolitical order and, thus, the liberal state. FWIW.
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