"Cute how they ignore our understanding of evolution and claim Darwin had some evil ulterior motive."
They are both IDIOTS.
Like all truly great scientists, Darwin was absolutely honest. Eventually, Darwin became an agnostic (post theist). And he came by that honestly...after a life of scientific honesty. If you are dishonest as a Scientist, your peers will despise you, and you will suffer ignominy that can never be overcome. Not ever...
"Regarding the many reasons for man's belief in god, Darwin wrote during the end of his life: "I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble to us; and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic."
aboutdarwin.com
What were Darwin's religious views?
"Charles Darwin was baptized on November 17, 1809 at St. Chad's church in Shrewsbury, and his mother, Suzsanna, took him to services at the Unitarian church in High Street. She died when Darwin was just eight years old, but he continued to attend church on a regular basis with his sisters. There is very little known about Darwin's religious beliefs during his childhood. He was sent to Rev. Case's day school at St. Chad's for one year, and afterwards was sent to Dr. Butler's Shrewsbury School where he studied until age sixteen. It is, therefore, safe to assume that Darwin received a proper religious schooling during his childhood.
When Darwin was a young man he found it very difficult to let go of his religious beliefs. Indeed, during the Beagle Voyage he was very orthodox, and would often quote passages out of the bible to the ill-mannered sailors on board. By the time he returned to England in 1836 he had come to view the events depicted in the Old Testament as allegory in nature. What events during the Beagle Voyage caused Darwin to become less religious? During the Voyage he had ample opportunity to see the cruelties of slavery and wondered how god could allow such inhumanity to exist. He also could not accept that a kind god would allow humans to live in such a wretched state as the natives of Tierra del Fuego. Why would god allow such suffering in the world was an internal conflict Darwin could not resolve.
During the next twenty years of his life, Darwin was engaged in research on the origin of species. He came to see that species were not fixed over time, but rather they adapted to their changing environment from one generation to the next. This flied in the face of the Church which held fast to the notion that all species were created by god as perfectly suited for the environment he placed them in. There was no need for change in the perfect world that god created. Over these twenty years Darwin became less and less religious as he slowly uncovered the laws of natural selection.
Back in his Cambridge days he believed in William Paley's "Argument from Design" as evidence for god's place in nature. By the time Darwin wrote "Origin of Species" he held the view that: "The old argument of design in nature, as given by Paley, which formerly seemed to me as conclusive, fails, now that the law of natural selection has been discovered. We can no longer argue that, for instance, the beautiful hinge of a bivalve shell must have been made by an intelligent being, like the hinge of a door by man. There seems to be no more design in the variability of organic beings and in the action of natural selection, than in the course which the wind blows. Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws" (Barlow, Page - 87)
Now, there appears to be a common misconception regarding the religious views of Charles Darwin. First of all, Darwin was never an atheist. While it is true that in his later years he was not religious to any extent, he never entirely discounted the existence of god. In his Autobiography, Darwin says he was a theist by the time he wrote "Origin of Species" and that he believed in an intelligent first cause. However, it was his view that the nature of this "first cause" was something beyond man's vision. The death of his daughter, Annie, on 23 April 1851 was a crushing blow to his religious beliefs, and from this time forward he stopped attending church with his family. It was only after a very long and slow process spanning his entire life that Darwin came to be an agnostic.
How did Charles Darwin resolve the supposed conflict between science and religion? Well, for Darwin there never was much of a conflict. He saw religion as a strictly personal matter and regarded science as completely separate from religion. In general, he thought that the question of god's existence was outside the scope of scientific inquiry. However, and this may seem contradictory, he did think that his theory of evolution was compatible with a belief in god, but did not think that the natural laws of evolution imply a purposeful god created them.
Regarding the many reasons for man's belief in god, Darwin wrote during the end of his life: "I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble to us; and I for one must be content to remain an agnostic." (Barlow, Page - 94) |
