For some reason a lot of religious people attempt to argue that Darwin was wrong, just as a lot of people seem to have always wanted to show that Einstein was wrong. There appears to be something about these targets that attracts a certain type of person, even though there might be better pickings to be had objecting to the big bang or quantum theory from the point of view of scoring points for the worldview being pushed. After all, the Bible (for example) says that God made the Heavens and the Earth (and the rest of the universe gets a throwaway line), so why object specifically to evolution rather than, say, theories of planetary formation?
I'd guess because... 1. people take it personally that their ancestors were simpler creatures. 2. it's a target they can sort of, more or less, understand, even if they can't really. (I have a feeling people object to Einstein's theories because they don't like the idea of being browbeaten by Jewish intellectuals...) On 1 December 2014 at 13:08, <zibb...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > On Saturday, November 29, 2014 7:38:54 PM UTC, John Clark wrote: >> >> >> On Sat, Nov 29, 2014 at 11:03 AM, spudboy100 wrote: >> >> >> The word "purposeless" is purposeless unless there is a referent. >>>> Purposeless for who? Maybe the universe finds me to be purposeless but I >>>> don't care any more than the universe would care if I found it to be >>>> purposeless; we both just ignore the others opinion of and continue to go >>>> about our business. >>>> >>> >>> > But the universe is stronger than you are >>> >> >> But I am smarter than the universe. Lots of people are smarter than me >> but the universe is as dumb as a sack full of rocks and at least I'm >> smarter than that. >> >> John K Clark >> > > I should think we'll need an origin-of-life answer to scientific standards > before we can start finalizing on the assumptions underpinning all that. > > Opinion: this matter has been caricatured as a debate between creationism > and naturalism. This isn't a logically reasonable position simply because, > even from a perspective of natural selection, the point at which natural > selection begins to act, and why...or what is the pressure driving a force > of natural selection, is unresolved until we actually begin to approach a > convincing explanation of life. At the moment, the price of separating > 'origins' from life - by talking about self-replication as the origin of > natural selection forces - is tantamount to 'backing off' all the really > hard questions to a nebulous period prior to life. > > Which has been damaging to scientific discovery in historically observable > ways, with historically observable roots that fall short of the values, let > alone standards, of science. > > We'd have to go back to the stand-off following Darwin's publication. That > battle - at the time with Christian values - was effectively won in the > 19th century. Yet science and its supporters continued to thrash away at > religious belief when arguably a more magnanimous conciliatory framework > would have been far more appropriate. Assuming the goal was for science to > be left in peace. > > There was no way for Christian faith to take back the ground, because > science was by then all over the world, and its product had become > fundamental to the relative wealth and status - and military might - of > nations. It was desirable, but not critical whether or not classrooms in > every district taught evolution. Science was driven by small intellectual > elites from the beginning. > > The behaviour toward faith backfired in science in ways that are still > being felt today. By pushing faith into a corner, science created a > dogmatic culture within its own interior that allowed a small cadre of > 'darwinists' to effectively control the direction of enquiry. Anything > remotely that appeared to question the detail of a natural selection > worldview was policed as suspicious of being creationist at root. > > By the same turn faith was pushed ever further back, toward the limits of > science itself. Origins. This same cadre did not think this through, and > did not see it coming clearly until it was upon them. By that time, too > much was at stake for them to concede any ground...even ground that was > scientifically reasonable to concede. Therefore they had no alternative but > to conjuren up a fallacious argument that 'origins' was not a scientific > question. > > As a result no work was done that might have been, on anything pertaining > to 'origins'. It is no coincidence that the sheer vertical brick wall > science now finds itself up against, is all about origins. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Everything List" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. > Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To post to this group, send email to everything-list@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
