"The danger of worshipping Darwin"

Gambler

Interesting article posted to the BBC News site by an Atheist on the danger of placing Darwin himself above the science:

In this year of his double anniversary, are we in danger of turning Charles Darwin if not into God, at least into the founder of a secular religion?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7924423.stm

Malari

I saw a promo for this last night and thought "I must watch that" but didn't realise he was putting that kind of spin on Darwinism. Sounds a bit ridiculous.

Goduznt Xzst

Malari wrote: »

Sounds a bit ridiculous.

My thoughts exactly.

Dades

I fail to find any relevance of the title of that article, to anything he has actually written in it.

It's a tabloid headline with content that completely fails in any attempt to justify it.

sink

I think what he is saying is that 'Darwinism' is in danger of turning into dogma if people place him on a pillar rather than the scientific method. I don't see any danger of that ever happening and he hasn't shown any evidence, but I will hold my judgement until I have watched the program.

Goduznt Xzst

It looks like a show that is dealing mostly in hypotheticals, for sensationalist affect:

ergo, "people like Darwin right? Well imagine if fundamental weirdos liked Darwin :eek: and imagine if these weirdos made a cult of Darwin :eek::eek: and then there where so many of them they voted a Darwin Cult weirdo into government, and then this guy became the PM and tried enforcing the draconian laws of this Darwin Cult on the people. I mean that would suck right and Santa would probably be replaced by a Darwin Monkey who instead of bringing you gifts just sits in the corner throwing feces at you. The End. Moral: I made up some stuff in my head which means it is dangerous to worship Darwin, QED"

You could replace "Darwin" with "Cheese" and it would have the same intellectual weight.

velocirafter

its sounds a bit like this southpark episode

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_God_Go_XII

pts

I found it pretty interesting, even though I didn't agree with everything written.
However I did find that the final paragraph resonated with some of the discussion's in A&A:

But religions are absolute. They bring their truth and then repel all boarders. They divide mankind into the saved and the ignorant damned.
In this story, there is no us and them. Darwinism, as I take it, is a creed of observation, fact, a deep modesty about conclusions and lifelong readiness to be proved wrong.
I don't say it offers everything that religion can. But I do say that, in this respect, it is better.

It seems to pick up some similar themes as:
http://judson.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/07/15/lets-get-rid-of-darwinism/?scp=6&sq=darwin&st=cse

Gambler

Yeah, to be honest the article seems to be more a means of pulling in people to watch the program and to my mind it fails in that effort, I'm not inclined to watch it after reading the article..

I do have to say, the premise is something that the religious types would love to have us talk about more in the hope that they can continue to portray evolution as a "belief" or a "leap of faith" and in that sense I find it worrying when atheists start to play into that idea.

The last thing we need is people saying "Even an Atheist like XXXX thinks that we treat Darwin like a deity that can't be wrong". The fact is that we all are open to the idea that his theory could be wrong, we just need someone to bring a reasonable alternative hypothesis to the table before we give it credence.

robindch

Dades wrote:

It's a tabloid headline with content that completely fails in any attempt to justify it.

Doesn't altogether surprise me, since Marr is one of the BBC's better interviewers. He does a talk program on Monday mornings on Radio 4 which, in general, is fairly critical of religion whenever it shows up. He also has a constant stream of biologists, sociologists, historians, medics and similar types on as guests and allows them to air evidence-based opinions.

I wonder if he's trying to grab the creationists' attention by playing into their hands?

Zombrex

The article warns about treating science as dogma (which I think most would agree), but is very light on examples of where this is actually happening.

The best he can come up with seems to be that Owen's statue in the main hall of the museum was moved (doesn't explain for how long, or why), and that there are cultures books about Darwin (Darwin or evolution it is not clear).

That doesn't seem that convincing.

sink

Wicknight wrote: »

The best he can come up with seems to be that Owen's statue in the main hall of the museum was moved (doesn't explain for how long, or why),

David Attenborough talked about this on his last tv documentary 'The Tree Of Life' celebrating Darwin's 200th. He said it was simply to commemorate his birthday but did not mention the statues would be returned to their original positions at any stage.

nkay1985

velocirafter wrote: »

its sounds a bit like this southpark episode

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_God_Go_XII

That's exactly what I was going to post. I think he watched that South Park episode, then sat down and decided "Yes, this is exactly what's happening right now." Not much to it tbh.

AtomicHorror

We've ditched some of Darwin's science because it didn't hold up... I don't think we're in danger of putting the guy on a pedestal. We still hold Newton in high regard even though he was wrong about Mercury.

Simon.d

Darwin was a good scientist, but I think he's getting a rather disproportionate amount of praise... As is known, the model of natural selection was deduced independently in an around the same time by another biologist (something to do with trees!), which put pressure on Darwin to publish his own works, meaning the science of evolution would probably have been highlighted around that time without his contribution..

Regarding importance to science, I think Darwin's contribution pales in comparison to that of Albert Einstein, who is my benchmark for a truly great scientist..

sink

Simon.d wrote: »

Regarding importance to science, I think Darwin's contribution pales in comparison to that of Albert Einstein, who is my benchmark for a truly great scientist..

Niehls Bohr doesn't get enough respect, he was right where Einstein was wrong.

AtomicHorror

Simon.d wrote: »

Darwin was a good scientist, but I think he's getting a rather disproportionate amount of praise... As is known, the model of natural selection was deduced independently in an around the same time by another biologist (something to do with trees!), which put pressure on Darwin to publish his own works, meaning the science of evolution would probably have been highlighted around that time without his contribution..

Regarding importance to science, I think Darwin's contribution pales in comparison to that of Albert Einstein, who is my benchmark for a truly great scientist..

Darwin's significance is in his contribution to our understanding of the nature of ourselves, of humans. We're simultaneously less special yet more amazing than we assumed. That's something that every scientist, if not every person, can relate to. Einstein's findings are certainly more complex, more of a paradigm shift. But perhaps not as personal to us.

Galvasean

Ask people what Darwin did and they'll (generally speaking) know he devised the theory of evolution, which they can elaborate on somewhat.
Ask the same people what Einstein did and answers are usually along the lines of, 'Theory of Relativity' - which they cannot elaborate on or the discovery of the speed of light (I know a couple of people who seem to think Einstein invented the speed of light).

Simon.d

AtomicHorror wrote: »

Darwin's significance is in his contribution to our understanding of the nature of ourselves, of humans. We're simultaneously less special yet more amazing than we assumed. That's something that every scientist, if not every person, can relate to. Einstein's findings are certainly more complex, more of a paradigm shift. But perhaps not as personal to us.

I agree, but the point I was making is that we could just as easily be praising Alfred Russel Wallace for discovering Wallacism ( doesn't have the same ring!), who actually published a paper on Natural Selection prior to Darwin.. How many of ye heard of him? He came to more of less the same conclusions as Darwin, but get's none of the credit (even though he got there first...)

Wallace (on Natural Selection) wrote:

The action of this principle is exactly like that of the centrifugal governor of the steam engine, which checks and corrects any irregularities almost before they become evident; and in like manner no unbalanced deficiency in the animal kingdom can ever reach any conspicuous magnitude, because it would make itself felt at the very first step, by rendering existence difficult and extinction almost sure soon to follow.

A Primal Nut

Gambler wrote: »

Interesting article posted to the BBC News site by an Atheist on the danger of placing Darwin himself above the science:



http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7924423.stm

Nobody worships Darwin - thats rediculous. Its the creationists who always focus on the messenger: "Darwin married his cousin, changed his mind on his deathbed, bla, bla, bla." As if that has anything to do with whether evolution is true or not. I think most evolutionists are able to seperate the theory from the messenger. In religion, the messenger is the most important thing, even if the message is rediculous.

AtomicHorror

Simon.d wrote: »

I agree, but the point I was making is that we could just as easily be praising Alfred Russel Wallace for discovering Wallacism ( doesn't have the same ring!), who actually published a paper on Natural Selection prior to Darwin.. How many of ye heard of him? He came to more of less the same conclusions as Darwin, but get's none of the credit (even though he got there first...)

Natural selection alone was not what Darwin's theory was about, and it's considered the most self-evident element in the model. I'd be surprised if a quite a few people have not suggested it in some form or another prior to Darwin. Not to diminish Wallace's contribution to the field, but he was some way from the fully realised model that Darwin had been brewing simultaneously. Wallace and Darwin's combined paper (Wallace's first comprehensive airing of his ideas on natural selection) is 17 pages. Darwin's book is about 700 and was nearing completion when Wallace wrote his part of what would become that joint paper. So I don't think we can really credit him as equal or greater than Darwin in this. An important contemporary certainly, but I don't think he's been unfairly treated by history (at least not by modern historians). Except perhaps in the way that history tends to become distilled so that only the giants are remembered by everyone.

AtomicHorror

A Primal Nut wrote: »

Nobody worships Darwin - thats rediculous. Its the creationists who always focus on the messenger: "Darwin married his cousin, changed his mind on his deathbed, bla, bla, bla." As if that has anything to do with whether evolution is true or not. I think most evolutionists are able to seperate the theory from the messenger. In religion, the messenger is the most important thing, even if the message is rediculous.

That's because religious information is conveyed on the basis of authority. It's hard for some to conceive of a system of knowledge which replaces authorities with "experts" who may be torn down at a moments notice.

Goduznt Xzst

Did anyone actually watch it? Funnily enough I had completely forgotten about it until a devoutly Christian Aunt of mine, who doesn't accept evolution and who knows I am an Atheist, rang me to tell me to watch this. Knowing Andrew Marr is an Atheist, I said that I would if she would watch it in entirety herself, to which she agreed.

I think the reasoning behind Andrew Marrs choice in title became clear from this. It is really a hook with bait on it to get Christians who still don't accept evolution to watch it. From the title alone it looks like it's going to be a piece which is against evolution, when it really isn't. It went on to show that evolution is a proven fact and that the danger is not the theory itself, but what we as humans do with it and how we understand it.

Malari

Yeah, I watched it. It was nothing new to me, but I impressed my boyfriend by quoting famous lines from Haldane and Huxley before Andrew Marr spoke them :pac:

The nature of the article became clearer as you watched the program. It was the history of Darwin's theory and how it was received at the time, as well as the acceptance and interpretation of it by varied historic figures, and it's further influence right through the 20th century. Worth watching, I thought.

Dades

I watched the first half last night and will watch the rest over the weekend.
Interesting stuff.

Though apart from some dramatic music, I wasn't really sensing the 'danger' tbh. :P

robindch

Saw it as well. You gotta hand to Marr, though, he can do a dramatic voice and intense stare with the best of them.

Still, the bit about the Terra del Fuegans was new to me -- of all the things that they could have left behind, a teacher, a doctor, a farmer, a carpenter or a blacksmith, they left the poor saps with a priest.

Does anybody know how that bit finished up? Did the priest leave TdF again on the Beagle, or did he stay on?

Galvasean

Goduznt Xzst wrote: »

I think the reasoning behind Andrew Marrs choice in title became clear from this. It is really a hook with bait on it to get Christians who still don't accept evolution to watch it. From the title alone it looks like it's going to be a piece which is against evolution, when it really isn't. It went on to show that evolution is a proven fact and that the danger is not the theory itself, but what we as humans do with it and how we understand it.

As I recall National Geographic recently had the title 'Was Darwin Wrong?' on one of their magazines. After some deliberation they concluded 'no'. :cool:

AtomicHorror

Galvasean wrote: »

As I recall National Geographic recently had the title 'Was Darwin Wrong?' on one of their magazines. After some deliberation they concluded 'no'. :cool:

New Scientist did one better and ran a front cover "Darwin Was Wrong". The conclusion of which was "but only a little bit".

Dades

robindch wrote: »

Still, the bit about the Terra del Fuegans was new to me -- of all the things that they could have left behind, a teacher, a doctor, a farmer, a carpenter or a blacksmith, they left the poor saps with a priest.

Phew - I wondered was I the only one who never knew about his time in TdF. :pac:

Goduznt Xzst

robindch wrote: »

Still, the bit about the Terra del Fuegans was new to me -- of all the things that they could have left behind, a teacher, a doctor, a farmer, a carpenter or a blacksmith, they left the poor saps with a priest.

No, they left the poor saps with GOD. Unfortunately for the Priest though, this trip would prove to be one of Gods tests of faith by making the scary natives pull out his hair with clam shells.

I think this episode was going down the route that evolution removes the foundation of our morals and ethics that are based in religion as it can explain our human traits without the need to be imbued with a soul at some point in our evolution. So without this foundation, then what is the point of having ethics and morals at all?

There was nothing however in the show about worshipping Darwin, so maybe this will be covered in a subsequent episode.

Galvasean

AtomicHorror wrote: »

New Scientist did one better and ran a front cover "Darwin Was Wrong". The conclusion of which was "but only a little bit".

I'm surprisd our nuetral nemesis hasn't quoted it (out of context) in the other place..

AtomicHorror

Galvasean wrote: »

I'm surprisd our nuetral nemesis hasn't quoted it (out of context) in the other place..

Oh he did. He spent several posts gurning and interrobanging erratically about the "evolutionist thicket" (the subject of the piece was the inaccuracy of the "tree-of-life" metaphor when dealing with horizontal gene transfer). He seemed to lose interest when it became clear that this was really, really old news.

I don't think he's quite grasped that the front page of New Scientist is not an automatic indication of a scientific breakthrough. Really getting tired of that mag I have to say.

robindch

AtomicHorror wrote: »

the front page of New Scientist is not an automatic indication of a scientific breakthrough. Really getting tired of that mag I have to say.

Ditched it years ago.

philologos

I think the guy has a point. Not only are people referring to Darwinism in biology, but in several other fields also, many where it isn't even relevant to the discussion at hand. Why can't we just take evolution as it is without glorifying it to the extent that many atheists do?

pH

robindch wrote: »

Ditched it years ago.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EmDrive#New_Scientist_article

pH

Jakkass wrote: »

I think the guy has a point. Not only are people referring to Darwinism in biology, but in several other fields also, many where it isn't even relevant to the discussion at hand. Why can't we just take evolution as it is without glorifying it to the extent that many atheists do?

Why shouldn't they, who are you (or him, or indeed anyone?) to tell other people what they can glorify? What does it matter to you (or him) anyway? Some sense that those doing it are not technically correct?

This is a free country, you're free to glorify your made up God, others are free to honour and respect great men and the works they did (IF THEY WANT TO). There's no compulsion here, when you are forced to repeat an homage to Darwin and ask for his blessing every day at school, when he's specially mentioned as due "respect" in the constitution, when the "Society of Darwinian Scholars" have a stranglehold on state schools and get the government to indemnify them from billions of euros worth of liability for a pittance, I'll be the first to agree with you, until then, why exactly aren't people free do honour and glorify whatever the hell they want to?

philologos

pH wrote: »

This is a free country, you're free to glorify your made up God, others are free to honour and respect great men and the works they did (IF THEY WANT TO). There's no compulsion here, when you are forced to repeat an homage to Darwin and ask for his blessing every day at school, when he's specially mentioned as due "respect" in the constitution, when the "Society of Darwinian Scholars" have a stranglehold on state schools and get the government to indemnify them from billions of euros worth of liability for a pittance, I'll be the first to agree with you, until then, why exactly aren't people free do honour and glorify whatever the hell they want to?

They are indeed, I just don't see how this glorification has any purpose in accurate discussion on matters that aren't to do with biology.

Theres no compulsion to honour Darwin just as much as there is no compulsion to honour Jesus Christ. If your parents have elected to bring you to a religious school when you feel that you don't want to, that's a greivance you should bring up with your parents. It's still not a compulsion.

Glorification of Darwin or evolution beyond the level of merely accepting the biology that he brought forth, does give credence to it being seen almost as a religion.

sink

Jakkass wrote: »

Glorification of Darwin or evolution beyond the level of merely accepting the biology that he brought forth, does give credence to it being seen almost as a religion.

So I guess hanging a poster of Wayne Rooney on you wall means your part of the Manunitedist church. Why do you attempt to expand the definition of religion to include almost anything?

Mal-Adjusted

what exactly is "Darwinism"? it sounds like some branck off religion, like Luthorism(sp?)
He was the first of two (possibly three) people to propose a theory of evolution...how does that transcribe to worshipping him?

pH

Jakkass wrote: »

Glorification of Darwin or evolution beyond the level of merely accepting the biology that he brought forth, does give credence to it being seen almost as a religion.

No, this is just playing with words, many things can be described figuratively as "a religion", but you wouldn't take them literally. For example, many people could describe a passionate soccer as "following man utd as a religion", but it's a figure of speech, no one in their right mind would accuse the Man Utd board or Alex Ferguson as literally being involved in running religion.

As usual you're far to quick jumping between literal and figurative meanings of words to justify your rather absurd assertions. Even if there was an organised system of "evolutionism", with meeting halls, a central text, hierarchy and rules would it be a religion? Would anyone describe say the boy scouts or the ICA as religions? Of course not (except in a figurative sense), people can come together for a common cause or activity, enjoy it, spend time and effort on it and be passionate about it yet it's still not a religion.

Mal-Adjusted

pH wrote: »

Even if there was an organised system of "evolutionism", with meeting halls, a central text, hierarchy and rules would it be a religion? Would anyone describe say the boy scouts or the ICA as religions? Of course not (except in a figurative sense), people can come together for a common cause or activity, enjoy it, spend time and effort on it and be passionate about it yet it's still not a religion.

+1 i do karate, and we have all of the above, meeting halls, central text, heirarchy and rules. would anybody call that a religion? thought not.

chozometroid

pH wrote: »

No, this is just playing with words, many things can be described figuratively as "a religion", but you wouldn't take them literally. For example, many people could describe a passionate soccer as "following man utd as a religion", but it's a figure of speech, no one in their right mind would accuse the Man Utd board or Alex Ferguson as literally being involved in running religion.

As usual you're far to quick jumping between literal and figurative meanings of words to justify your rather absurd assertions. Even if there was an organised system of "evolutionism", with meeting halls, a central text, hierarchy and rules would it be a religion? Would anyone describe say the boy scouts or the ICA as religions? Of course not (except in a figurative sense), people can come together for a common cause or activity, enjoy it, spend time and effort on it and be passionate about it yet it's still not a religion.

There is still no definition of religion that is universally accepted, but here are a few:

Religion

1. a set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe, esp. when considered as the creation of a superhuman agency or agencies, usually involving devotional and ritual observances, and often containing a moral code governing the conduct of human affairs.
   
2. a specific fundamental set of beliefs and practices generally agreed upon by a number of persons or sects: the Christian religion; the Buddhist religion.
3. Belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe.
   
4. A personal or institutionalized system grounded in such belief and worship.
5. The life or condition of a person in a religious order.
   
6. A set of beliefs, values, and practices based on the teachings of a spiritual leader.
   
7. A cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion.

I think what Jakkass is getting at, is that when someone highly reveres Darwin, have a devout faith in his teachings, and derive from him concepts that are outside of mere science, it conveys a religious observance to Darwin, or what he has come to represent.
You could say he is their foundation of knowledge, and the originator of their belief system.

pH

chozometroid wrote: »

I think what Jakkass is getting at, is that when someone highly reveres Darwin, have a devout faith in his teachings, and derive from him concepts that are outside of mere science, it conveys a religious observance to Darwin, or what he has come to represent.

And what I'm saying is that just because you highly revere someone, and have 'faith' in them doesn't mean it's a religion or got anything to do with one. There are plenty of examples (see above) of people having 'faith' in an organisation which are not religions. No matter how much I revere Baden Powell, no matter if I take his concepts and apply them outside the scout movement, no matter how much 'faith' I have that his scouting program is beneficial for boys, the Boy Scouts are not a religion. To pretend it actually is, is to deliberate confuse literal and figurative uses of the words religion and religious.

You could say he is their foundation of knowledge, and the originator of their belief system.

Again, this is of no relevance, you can have a charismatic originator of a belief system (for example Marx and Communism) but neither Marxism nor Communism is a religion. The only way you can crowbar "evolutionism" into a religion is to crowbar pretty much every group as well, then you're merely redefining the word religion to mean "any group of people sharing a common belief".

chozometroid

pH wrote: »

And what I'm saying is that just because you highly revere someone, and have 'faith' in them doesn't mean it's a religion or got anything to do with one. There are plenty of examples (see above) of people having 'faith' in an organisation which are not religions. No matter how much I revere Baden Powell, no matter if I take his concepts and apply them outside the scout movement, no matter how much 'faith' I have that his scouting program is beneficial for boys, the Boy Scouts are not a religion. To pretend it actually is, is to deliberate confuse literal and figurative uses of the words religion and religious.



Again, this is of no relevance, you can have a charismatic originator of a belief system (for example Marx and Communism) but neither Marxism nor Communism is a religion. The only way you can crowbar "evolutionism" into a religion is to crowbar pretty much every group as well, then you're merely redefining the word religion to mean "any group of people sharing a common belief".

Exactly, how one defines religion makes all the difference, but it doesn't have to be so generic as "any group of people sharing a common belief."

Scientology claims no belief in a god, but is called a religion, mainly because they want it to be called a religion, but also because it follows this definition:
religion requires "beliefs in something transcendental or ultimate, practices (rites and codes of behavior) that re-inforce those beliefs and, a community that is sustained by both the beliefs and practices

As a Christian, I could say I don't like the idea of such an organization being recognized as a religion, putting it on the same level as my own, but it doesn't really matter. Religion is just a word.

The Boy Scouts do not attempt to explain why we are here, and how life began.

Evolutionism is a belief system that requires faith, and attempts to explain the origin of life, which either involves a deity, or denies the existence of one. By this description, evolutionism could be classified as a religion.

By this definiton:
a system of practices which act according to beliefs, including belief in the existence of at least one of the following: a human soul or spirit, a deity or higher being, or self after the death of one’s body.
...evolutionism does not qualify as a religion.

In light of this pointless discussion, I think you are offended by the word religion, and do not want to be labeled in the same way as the people with whom you most vehemently disagree.

Zombrex

chozometroid wrote: »

Evolutionism is a belief system that requires faith, and attempts to explain the origin of life, which either involves a deity, or denies the existence of one. By this description, evolutionism could be classified as a religion.

No it doesn't

The reason Darwin is revered is because was a clever guy that came up with concepts that fundamentally changed how we viewed nature. In fact he is more revered for what he did than who he was. He seems to have been a nice guy, but what people really remember him for was his achievements and what his achievements meant for the rest of us.

He discovered a natural process, happening in nature, that allowed nature to build up from simply components very complex systems.

This process was discovered, not invented, in the same way the speed of light has been discovered. Darwin didn't make up anything new, he simply realised how a natural process was work, and this discover fundamentally changed what we, humans, thought about what was possible in nature. Before Darwin there was no plausible method for nature to produce complexity from simplicity. People had suspected that this might be happening some how, but they didn't have a way that nature could do it.

Darwin didn't produce a belief system. He didn't produce anything (at least not in relation to evolution) He discovered something in nature that was always there, just waiting to be discovered.

Other scientists have done that as well. We revere Einstein for his work on relativity that fundamentally changed how we view the notions of space and time.

As far as I can see the only reason people are comparing Darwin to religion is because his work, his discoveries, over lapped into areas that religion traditionally held sway. But that is just another case of religion over reaching what it knew and proclaiming things that turned out to be wrong. Hardly Darwin's fault now is it?

You said it yourself, because Darwinian biological evolution explains how complex life arose it must be a religion to accept it. Which is nonsense. Just because it provides an explanation in an area that religion traditionally laid claim to doesn't mean it is a religion, or that the people who accept it are following a religion.

Various areas of geology have explained why the Earth is the way it is that directly challenged religious notions of the origin of the Earth, but would anyone seriously say geology is a religion?

And Darwinian evolution is a process that can be applied ot a lot of things, not simply biology. It is simply a natural process. I have used computer programs based on this process to do various things such as sort images more efficently. In computers it is known as genetic programming, and it has nothing to do with biology. But the process that has always been in nature can be applied to a lot of things, in the same way you can apply the principle of how rivers sort stones to various things, or apply the natural phenomena of electricity to power your laptop.

chozometroid

Wicknight wrote: »

You said it yourself, because Darwinian biological evolution explains how complex life arose it must be a religion to accept it.

I didn't say that it must be a religion to accept it.
I said it could be classified as a religion. That is because it just can.
Darwin may have not created this belief system, and evolution may just simply be defined as "a natural process," but evolutionism is certainly a belief system. One that does require faith.

Thanks for showing how badly atheists/evolutionists do not want to be labeled as (having)a religion.

Mal-Adjusted

chozometroid wrote: »

Thanks for showing how badly atheists/evolutionists do not want to be labeled as (having)a religion.

bieng one of these things does not necesitate bieng the other, you know

chozometroid

Mal-Adjusted wrote: »

bieng one of these things does not necesitate bieng the other, you know

That's true. It just seemed apporopriate in this case. I apologize.

Zombrex

chozometroid wrote: »

I didn't say that it must be a religion to accept it.
I said it could be classified as a religion. That is because it just can.

I'm not following how? Are you suggesting that anything that puts forward a theory on how life arouse can be called a religion?

Considering Darwinian biological evolution is simply a sub-set of chemistry (life is after all composed of chemical reactions) is chemistry a religion?

And Robin will no doubt point out chemistry is simply a subset of physics. Darwinian biological evolution is simply a physical process, following the laws of chemistry, so is physics a religion now?

Why children go to a physics class room are they worshipping a religion?

chozometroid wrote: »

Darwin may have not created this belief system, and evolution may just simply be defined as "a natural process," but evolutionism is certainly a belief system. One that does require faith.

My understanding is that "evolutionism" is a 18th century term pre-dating and replaced by Darwinian evolution that attempted to assert that life forms have an in-build "desire" to improve upon themselves with each generation.

I imagine though that is not the usage you are using the term with, so I will need you to explain what you mean by "evolutionism" before I can comment on it being a belief system or not.

chozometroid wrote: »

Thanks for showing how badly atheists/evolutionists do not want to be labeled as (having)a religion.

Nonsense, the more people claim incorrectly that evolution is a religion, or that atheism is a belief system, the more reason I have to go on the internet and give out about people claiming stuff that isn't true.

If you stopped I would have nothing to do all day except ring the NTL guy to complain about my picture reception.

robindch

Jakkass wrote: »

They are indeed, I just don't see how this glorification has any purpose in accurate discussion on matters that aren't to do with biology. [...] Glorification of Darwin or evolution beyond the level of merely accepting the biology that he brought forth, does give credence to it being seen almost as a religion.

There are many, many reasons why it's not a religion, and I'm sure other posters will cover some of them.

But out of interest, do any irreligious people here feel that they "glorify" Darwin?

I've never met anybody who does, or even comes close, though I'm aware that plenty of religious people seem to feel that since Darwin's ideas supplanted pre-existing religious ones, that his ideas must therefore be religious in nature too, and that the guy who produced these ideas occupies the same political place that a religious leader does.

robindch

chozometroid wrote: »

Thanks for showing how badly atheists/evolutionists do not want to be labeled as (having)a religion.

As above, I think it shows at least equally well that there's a lot of religious people out there who seem to think that everything is a religion.