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A friend asks, Why no Darwin AND Wallace Day?

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A friend stumbles onto the true meaning of Darwin and Darwin Day in today’s society when he writes to ask,

Why don’t they split the difference and call it “Darwin and Wallace Day”? They did that with “President’s Day.”

(He notes that the birthdays of Darwin and Wallace (April 14) are a little further apart than those of US presidents Lincoln and Washington, but still … .)

He is thinking, perhaps, of: Why is there a Darwin Day but no Newton Day? Never mind no Wallace Day. Okay, here’s the News desk’s response:

Actually, they couldn’t add Wallace.

If they called it Darwin and Wallace Day, it would really be about evolution.

It wouldn’t be just another atheist and co-dependent liberal Christian sausage festival that some now attempt to impose on the public as a national holiday.

What makes Wallace deadly is that he really, truly, is about evolution and only about evolution. Not about promoting new atheism.

It would be like proposing a Lynn Margulis and Barbara McClintock day. Great ladies, immense achievements, no help to Darwinian atheism in the long run.

Few really care about evolution except insofar as it enables the public promotion of naturalist atheism and eat-me-last theism.

Look, Darwin was different.

He wanted to promote naturalist atheism while remaining safe on the sidelines. We’re told Victorian journalist Thomas Huxley doubted Darwin’s theory but went ahead and promoted it anyway, to advance the cause. (See World of Life.)

It is astonishing to hear liberal Christian reverends talk as if there is any compatibility whatever between popular Darwinism and Christianity. And then there is BioLogos (Christians for Darwin).

Check out their founder Francis Collins here. Much as I dislike Christians for Darwin, I would not wish such a founder on them, or on any allegedly Christian cause.

Note: Wallace Day is celebrated, but without the coercive hooplah or pursuit of public funding.

See also: John West has updated Darwin Day in America (read free excerpt!)

Follow UD News at Twitter!

Comments
velikovskys: Survival and sex are not goals? Unguided evolution can’t even account for asexual reproduction, let alone sex. Do rocks survive? It only matters that reproduction occurs, are rocks living? So basically you are saying that there is not difference between Darwinism and evolutionary mechanisms. Only to a person who doesn’t understand what I said. My question is do you understand what you wrote " Darwinism and the modern synthesis require all genetic change to be blind and undirected- happenstance changes. No goals, no targets, just survival." I believe they are modelling evolutionary processes, And your equivocation is duly noted. They definitely do not model Darwinian evolution as darwinian evolution is neither a search It is not a goal oriented search ,Joe . Plate tectonics and the Colorado River did not have the Grand Canyon as a goal, but there it is, out of the multitude of possible configurationsvelikovskys
February 15, 2015
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"we are talking about Darwin not atheism,,," Historian Paul Johnson is Darwin's Latest Biographer -- and a Pretty Devastating One - David Klinghoffer - October 14, 2012 Excerpt: "Both Himmler, head of the SS and Goebbels, the propaganda chief," were students of Darwin, ,,, Hitler apparently carried the theory of natural selection "to its logical conclusion." "Leading Communists," moreover, "from Lenin to Trotsky to Stalin and Mao Tse-tung" considered evolution "essential to the self-respect of Communists. ... Darwin provided stiffening to the scaffold of laws and dialectic they erected around their seizure of power." Even Stalin,, "had Darwin's 'struggle' and 'survival of the fittest' in mind" when murdering entire ethnic groups, as did Pol Pot,,, ,,the "emotional stew" Darwin built up in Origin played a major part in the development of the 20th century's genocides.,,, No one who is remotely thoughtful blames Charles Darwin "for millions of deaths." But to say, as Johnson does, that Darwin's theory contributed to the growth of a view of the world that in turn had horrendously tragic consequences -- well, that's obviously true, it did. We have documented this extensively here at ENV, as have historians including our contributor Richard Weikart (Hitler's Ethic: The Nazi Pursuit of Evolutionary Progress, From Darwin to Hitler: Evolutionary Ethics, Eugenics, and Racism in Germany, Socialist Darwinism: Evolution in German Socialist Thought from Marx to Bernstein). There is, or should be, nothing controversial about this (fact of history). http://www.evolutionnews.org/2012/10/historian_paul_065281.html Moreover, God is far more active than you are willing to believe Vel. As Shakespeare put it: "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."bornagain77
February 15, 2015
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BA: Vel, as God would have it, this just ‘coincidentally’ popped up on my Facebook feed: God messes around with your Facebook posts? The Creator of all things is on Facebook, good grief. Native American Reservation Declares “Jesus Christ is Lord” With 30-Foot-Tall Billboard – January 30, 2015 Apparently God is near sighted as wellvelikovskys
February 15, 2015
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BA: velikovskys in your rush to defend the unparalleled atheistic atrocities of the twentieth century, Try to stay on topic, we are talking about Darwin not atheism, nice try. I have no doubt that if the settlers to America had been atheists the Native American would have suffered the same fate. You seem to confused between how one justifies his actions with the cause of the actions. The cause of racism is not Darwin or passages from the Bible, those are only used to justify. Stalin destroyed his enemies not in order to create a master race but to hold on to power, the same as the carnage created by the religious Japanese. I think you are far too quick to dismiss the horror of unfettered atheism. So let’s take a bit closer look shall we? No I didn't BA ,my point if both evolutionists and creationists engage in the same behavior then there is another source of that behaviour other than how one believes man came to be.velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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Vel, as God would have it, this just 'coincidentally' popped up on my Facebook feed: Native American Reservation Declares “Jesus Christ is Lord” With 30-Foot-Tall Billboard - January 30, 2015 http://blessings.buzz/2015/01/30/native-american-reservation-declares-jesus-christ-is-lord-with-30-foot-tall-billboard/bornagain77
February 15, 2015
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velikovskys in your rush to defend the unparalleled atheistic atrocities of the twentieth century, I think you are far too quick to dismiss the horror of unfettered atheism. So let's take a bit closer look shall we?
The unmitigated horror visited upon man, by state sponsored atheism, would be hard to exaggerate,,, Here's what happens when Atheists/evolutionists/non-Christians take control of Government: “169,202,000 Murdered: Summary and Conclusions [20th Century Democide] I BACKGROUND 2. The New Concept of Democide [Definition of Democide] 3. Over 133,147,000 Murdered: Pre-Twentieth Century Democide II 128,168,000 VICTIMS: THE DEKA-MEGAMURDERERS 4. 61,911,000 Murdered: The Soviet Gulag State 5. 35,236,000 Murdered: The Communist Chinese Ant Hill 6. 20,946,000 Murdered: The Nazi Genocide State 7. 10,214,000 Murdered: The Depraved Nationalist Regime III 19,178,000 VICTIMS: THE LESSER MEGA-MURDERERS 8. 5,964,000 Murdered: Japan’s Savage Military 9. 2,035,000 Murdered: The Khmer Rouge Hell State 10. 1,883,000 Murdered: Turkey’s Genocidal Purges 11. 1,670,000 Murdered: The Vietnamese War State 12. 1,585,000 Murdered: Poland’s Ethnic Cleansing 13. 1,503,000 Murdered: The Pakistani Cutthroat State 14. 1,072,000 Murdered: Tito’s Slaughterhouse IV 4,145,000 VICTIMS: SUSPECTED MEGAMURDERERS 15. 1,663,000 Murdered? Orwellian North Korea 16. 1,417,000 Murdered? Barbarous Mexico 17. 1,066,000 Murdered? Feudal Russia” This is, in reality, probably just a drop in the bucket. Who knows how many undocumented murders there were. It also doesn’t count all the millions of abortions from around the world. http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/NOTE1.HTM The Irrational Atheist: Dissecting the Unholy Trinity of Dawkins, Harris, And Hitchens - pg. 240 Excerpt: "There have been 28 countries in world history that can be confirmed to have been ruled by avowed atheists at the helm.,, The total body count for the ninety years between 1917 and 2007 is approximately 148 million dead at the bloody hands of fifty-two atheists…..The historical record of collective atheism is thus 182,716 times worse on an annual basis than Christianity’s worst and most infamous misdeed, the Spanish Inquisition.” http://books.google.com/books?id=5kYOcqb06EEC&pg=PA240#v=onepage&q&f=false
Those are pretty horrific numbers. Each number attached to a unique human being that was created in God's image and treated as worthless trash under atheism. Thus, when you try to attach Christianity to such unmitigated horror as to what atheists have committed, it is with more than just a touch of irony that I know for a fact that most devout Christians are always seeking how they can be of better service to their fellow man.
Christians Are Hate-Filled Hypocrites ... and Other Lies You've Been Told - book excerpt: The conclusions drawn here--no surprise--are that the most committed Christians practice what they preach, performing better than the rest of the population on a host of social measures including divorce, domestic violence, sexual misconduct, crime, substance abuse, and everyday honesty. http://www.amazon.com/Christians-Hate-Filled-Hypocrites-Other-Youve/dp/0764207466
Moreover, the nihilism inherent within atheism plays out in everyday personal life in that atheists die quicker and are less happy than Christians:
Atheism and health A meta-analysis of all studies, both published and unpublished, relating to religious involvement and longevity was carried out in 2000. Forty-two studies were included, involving some 126,000 subjects. Active religious involvement increased the chance of living longer by some 29%, and participation in public religious practices, such as church attendance, increased the chance of living longer by 43%.[4][5] http://www.conservapedia.com/Atheism_and_health Are Religious People Happier Than Atheists? - 2000 Excerpt: there does indeed appear to be a link between religion and happiness. Several studies have been done, but to give an example, one study found that the more frequently people attended religious events, the happier they were; 47% of people who attended several types a week reported that they were ‘very happy’, as opposed to 28% who attended less than monthly. In practical terms, religious people have the upper hand on atheists in several other areas. They drink and smoke less, are less likely to abuse drugs, and they stay married longer. After a stressful event like bereavement, unemployment, or illness, those who worship don’t take it as hard and recover faster. All of the above are likely to be beneficial to a person’s happiness. Additionally, religious people, as a result of their beliefs, have a greater sense of meaning, purpose and hope in their lives. http://generallythinking.com/are-religious-people-happier-than-atheists/ Devout Catholics Have Better Sex, Study Says - Group presents data showing those who go to church weekly have most frequent, enjoyable sex - By Elizabeth Flock - July 17, 2013 http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/07/17/devout-catholics-have-better-sex Church Divorce Rate Way Lower Than Anyone Thought - 6/23/2014 Excerpt: It's long been believed that half of America's marriages end in divorce and the problem is just as bad in the Church as the rest of the country. But when Harvard-trained researcher Shaunti Feldhahn tried to find the actual research to prove those points, she couldn't. It started her on an eight-year odyssey to find the actual facts.,,, In her book, The Good News About Marriage, Feldhahn lays out what she found during her eight years of investigating the complicated, complex divorce statistics. First, the divorce rate is way below 50 percent and much lower for those who attend church. Feldhahn estimates the overall divorce rate for the country is around 31 percent. The studies of people who regularly go to church all show a much lower divorce rate for them.,,, Feldhahn cited one example where a pastor tracked 143 couples who he had married. "It was 25, 27 years later. Less than 10 percent had been divorced," she stated.,,, For religious believers, if they'll be attentive to practice their faith with their spouse, they can almost double their odds of avoiding divorce. http://www.charismanews.com/us/44398-church-divorce-rate-way-lower-than-anyone-thought
Verse and Music:
Matthew 25: 34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ Only Grace - Matthew West https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKL0QB-_ho0
bornagain77
February 15, 2015
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BA: Sure racism has been with man throughout history and some people have rationalized Slavery in the name of religion throughout history (forgetting that Christians were at the forefront of emancipation), So racism exists and has been justified by numerous means, but only Darwinism allowed that insidious racism to be unleashed from the moral shackles of Christianity, and to produce a horror that can scarcely be imagined I'm sure it is a comfort to all those Native Americans that were killed and all those people enslaved that if it had been Darwinists wielding the blade they would have in big trouble.velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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BA, “Nazis were none to fond of Darwin” yep no bias there! :) On the list of banned books " 6. Writings of a philosophical and social nature whose content deals with the false scientific enlightenment of primitive Darwinism and Monism (H?ckel). Now how about all the Creationists who wiped out the " savage races" ? Care to rebut or just avoid?velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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"Nazis were none to fond of Darwin" yep no bias there! :)bornagain77
February 15, 2015
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BA: NAZI’s were creationists??? In fact the ‘pseudo-scientific racism’ Darwinism engendered was so insidious, Nazis were none to fond of Darwin unless forbidding the teaching of Darwin was a seal of approval. But sure,my guess is a certain percentage considered themselves both Christian and believed in creation. But your quote mentioned savage races, it wasn't Nazis who rubbed out the native Americans or the aborigines or enslaved millions of Africans and transported them across the ocean.velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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jwt: Who cares what Joe has to say about “Darwinism”?! To claim that News is incorrect you have to understand how the " Christians for Darwin" define Darwinism I am sure Joe has high regard for his pearls of wisdom. I find generally it is simpler just to assume News is inaccurate, but go on, define Darwinism as used by the fabled group " Christians for Darwin".velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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NAZI's were creationists??? In fact the 'pseudo-scientific racism' Darwinism engendered was so insidious, and obvious, that Darwinism can be traced back as a primary root cause for the NAZI holocaust: From Darwin to Hitler - video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_5EwYpLD6A The Role Of Darwinism In Nazi Racial Thought - Richard Weikart - October 2013 Excerpt: The historical evidence is overwhelming that human evolution was an integral part of Nazi racial ideology. http://www.csustan.edu/history/faculty/weikart/darwinism-in-nazi-racial-thought.pdf The racist implications of several common atheist beliefs - December 17, 2014 http://www.examiner.com/article/racist-implications-of-several-common-atheist-beliefs Sure racism has been with man throughout history and some people have rationalized Slavery in the name of religion throughout history (forgetting that Christians were at the forefront of emancipation), but only Darwinism allowed that insidious racism to be unleashed from the moral shackles of Christianity, and to produce a horror that can scarcely be imaginedbornagain77
February 15, 2015
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velikovskys:
Survival and sex are not goals?
Unguided evolution can't even account for asexual reproduction, let alone sex. Do rocks survive?
So basically you are saying that there is not difference between Darwinism and evolutionary mechanisms.
Only to a person who doesn't understand what I said.
I believe they are modelling evolutionary processes,
And your equivocation is duly noted. They definitely do not model Darwinian evolution as darwinian evolution is neither a search nor does it have any goals.Joe
February 15, 2015
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@velikovskys:
Then News is incorrect because ” liberal Christians” believe that God is necessary for the existence of all things, what they do not believe is that God must be the proximate cause , therefore evolution and God are compatible. Please define Darwinism and how it differs from evolutionary mechanisms, thanks.
Who cares what Joe has to say about "Darwinism"?! To claim that News is incorrect you have to understand how the "Christians for Darwin" define "Darwinism".JWTruthInLove
February 15, 2015
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Joe, Darwinism and the modern synthesis require all genetic change to be blind and undirected- happenstance changes. No goals, no targets, just survival. Survival and sex are not goals? Seems like the economic system is based on those goals. So basically you are saying that there is not difference between Darwinism and evolutionary mechanisms. Evolutionary and genetic algorithms are goal-oriented. They use targeted searches to solve problems. They are intelligent design evolution in action. I believe they are modelling evolutionary processes, funny criticism from a proponent of ID which main source of evidence of design in life is an analogy to design in the inanimate.velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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BA:“At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. The thing is BA, that was done mostly by Creationists, just as Creationists through the American South benefited from the enslavement of the less technologically advanced, so what is your point?velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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Joe, moreover, as I'm sure you well know, the blind and undirected, i.e. 'random', postulate of Darwinism is found to be false. First off there are multiple layers mutation protection/correction in the cell that prevent random mutations from happening to the genome.
The overlapping repair mechanisms for DNA include: A proofreading system that catches almost all errors A mismatch repair system to back up the proofreading system Photoreactivation (light repair) Removal of methyl or ethyl groups by O6 – methylguanine methyltransferase Base excision repair Nucleotide excision repair Double-strand DNA break repair Recombination repair Error-prone bypass http://www.newgeology.us/presentation32.html The Evolutionary Dynamics of Digital and Nucleotide Codes: A Mutation Protection Perspective – February 2011 Excerpt: “Unbounded random change of nucleotide codes through the accumulation of irreparable, advantageous, code-expanding, inheritable mutations at the level of individual nucleotides, as proposed by evolutionary theory, requires the mutation protection at the level of the individual nucleotides and at the higher levels of the code to be switched off or at least to dysfunction. Dysfunctioning mutation protection, however, is the origin of cancer and hereditary diseases, which reduce the capacity to live and to reproduce. Our mutation protection perspective of the evolutionary dynamics of digital and nucleotide codes thus reveals the presence of a paradox in evolutionary theory between the necessity and the disadvantage of dysfunctioning mutation protection. This mutation protection paradox, which is closely related with the paradox between evolvability and mutational robustness, needs further investigation.” http://benthamscience.com/open/toevolj/articles/V005/1TOEVOLJ.pdf
Secondly, for the vast majority of times that changes do happen to DNA, they are now known to be ‘directed changes’ by sophisticated molecular machines, not unguided ‘random changes’ from a cosmic ray, chemical imbalance, or some such entropy driven event as that:
How life changes itself: the Read-Write (RW) genome. – 2013 Excerpt: Research dating back to the 1930s has shown that genetic change is the result of cell-mediated processes, not simply accidents or damage to the DNA. This cell-active view of genome change applies to all scales of DNA sequence variation, from point mutations to large-scale genome rearrangements and whole genome duplications (WGDs). This conceptual change to active cell inscriptions controlling RW genome functions has profound implications for all areas of the life sciences. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23876611
Thirdly, DNA is designed in such a way as to expose only certain sections of DNA to 'random mutations'
New Research Elucidates Directed Mutation Mechanisms - Cornelius Hunter - January 7, 2013 Excerpt: mutations don’t occur randomly in the genome, but rather in the genes where they can help to address the challenge. But there is more. The gene’s single stranded DNA has certain coils and loops which expose only some of the gene’s nucleotides to mutation. So not only are certain genes targeted for mutation, but certain nucleotides within those genes are targeted in what is referred to as directed mutations.,,, These findings contradict evolution’s prediction that mutations are random with respect to need and sometimes just happen to occur in the right place at the right time.,,, http://darwins-god.blogspot.com/2013/01/news-research-elucidates-directed.html
bornagain77
February 15, 2015
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Darwinism and the modern synthesis require all genetic change to be blind and undirected- happenstance changes. No goals, no targets, just survival. Evolutionary and genetic algorithms are goal-oriented. They use targeted searches to solve problems. They are intelligent design evolution in action.Joe
February 15, 2015
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Joe, If God did it then it ain’t Darwinism. Then News is incorrect because " liberal Christians" believe that God is necessary for the existence of all things, what they do not believe is that God must be the proximate cause , therefore evolution and God are compatible. Please define Darwinism and how it differs from evolutionary mechanisms, thanks.velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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"I have a fundamental belief in the Bible as the Word of God, written by men who were inspired. I study the Bible daily. All my discoveries have been made in answer to prayer." – Sir Isaac Newtonbornagain77
February 15, 2015
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Piotr, do YOU realize when Jesus was born? (Hint: it wasn't on December 25th.)Joe
February 15, 2015
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News: Why is there a Darwin Day but no Newton Day? Britain almost completely closes down, except for emergency services, on Newton's birthday.Zachriel
February 15, 2015
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Do you realise when Newton was born? (Hint: no Christian would dare to celebrate his birthday as Newton Day.)Piotr
February 15, 2015
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as to 'That your political views limit God’s actions?" Hmmm, lets see political views limiting God's actions, who would be guilty of that???,,
'Reverend' Sharpton Mocks Scott Walker, Wishes 'Happy Darwin Day' to MSNBC Viewers - Feb. 14, 2014 Excerpt: “Reverend” Al Sharpton isn’t too big on the Bible, certainly not on the tale that God created the world and everything in it. MSNBC tweeted out Sharpton’s Thursday night segment where he wished his viewers and guests “Happy Darwin Day” three times,,, Sharpton was pushing Darwin, whose book The Origin of Species was also titled The Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Uh-oh, Rev. - http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tim-graham/2015/02/14/reverend-sharpton-mocks-scott-walker-wishes-happy-darwin-day-msnbc
Perhaps the good reverend should crack open a book (including the Bible) every once in a while?
"At some future period, not very distant as measured by centuries, the civilised races of man will almost certainly exterminate, and replace, the savage races throughout the world. At the same time the anthropomorphous apes, as Professor Schaaffhausen has remarked, will no doubt be exterminated. The break between man and his nearest allies will then be wider, for it will intervene between man in a more civilised state, as we may hope, even than the Caucasian, and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as now between the negro or Australian and the gorilla" - Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man, 1874, p. 178
As to politics, here is a new video upload by IDquest featuring Ben Carson:
Celebration of Creation | Ben Carson, MD - video "Ben Carson speaks on God's creation." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6ChFtIDUbg
bornagain77
February 15, 2015
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If God did it then it ain't Darwinism.Joe
February 15, 2015
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News: It is astonishing to hear liberal Christian reverends talk as if there is any compatibility whatever between popular Darwinism and Christianity. And then there is BioLogos (Christians for Darwin). Are you saying God is incapable of creating life thru those laws of nature that He created? That your political views limit God's actions?velikovskys
February 15, 2015
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