“Charles Darwin once said, ‘A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question.’ Yay for open-mindedness. So let’s have the freedom to see all sides of the questions.”
Yay, indeed!
“…it’s Charles Darwin’s birthday as well and 2009 marks the 200th year for the man who brought us wonderful works such as the Descent of Man which provided the backdrop for Eugenics (kill ‘em if they ain’t smart enough) which became Planned Parenthood (kill ‘em if they inconvenience you).”
Darwin himself rejected Eugenics on ethical grounds, as it would violate sympathy, “the noblest part of our nature.”
I said that Charles Darwin’s book, the Descent of Man is the “backdrop” for eugenics. While Darwin himself, to your point, did not completely drive the eugenics movement, his sons and cousin, Galton did. And many other Eugenics proponents of the early 20th century used Darwinian philosophy from that book to promote and proselytize. In the eugenics programs, tens of thousands of people were innocently sterilized based on human judgement that they should not breed – this injustice is what I speak against.
Note, I carefully said, “Descent… provided a back-drop” making no mention that Darwin himself publicly supported eugenics. Please, research the facts about what was propagated out of his works, not necessarily Darwin himself.
“Thirdly, Darwin prepared the way for eugenics. Indeed, his immediate family would soon be involved in that movement — his sons George and Leonard became active in promoting it (Leonard serving as ‘president of the Eugenics Education Society, the main eugenics group in Great Britain’), and his cousin Francis Galton became the founder of the ‘eugenics crusade.’ Evidently, Darwin was sympathetic to eugenics: West quotes him as vowing ‘to cut off communication’ with his disciple Mivart when the latter ‘criticized an article by Darwin’s son George that advocated eugenics.’ ”
We just established that Darwin _rejected_ eugenics, and you turn that to saying that he “did not completely drive the eugenics movement”. That’s some pretty slick maneuvering. In saying that he did not “completely” drive it, you imply that he DID play a large part himself; he just didn’t drive it “completely”.
In reality he is as little to blame for eugenics as the inventor of the TV is for reality shows. But anyway, that doesn’t matter. Darwin could have been a huge racist and a wife-beating misogynist and it wouldn’t have mattered. To my knowledge he wasn’t; he was pretty enlightened for his day, but it wouldn’t have mattered if he was.
Scientific theories stand on their own. And even if some really stupid people totally misunderstood Darwin’s theory and developed eugenics, that says _nothing_ about the validity of it.
That people who defend “intelligent design” continually attack Darwin in this way says a lot about how many real, scientific arguments they have though… If there were more real arguments they could let up on the “Darwin caused Hitler!”-type spurious arguments and concentrate on science. Because they do claim that ID is science, somehow.
Anyway, scientific theories stand and fall on their own merits. All the fossil records and the DNA evidence and observations of short-lived life forms over many generations tell us that evolution is something that is happening (by the way, this doesn’t automatically negate ID taking place in some part, but ID needs some evidence of its own before we consider it).
Saying “Darwin’s theory caused evil things to happen!” does nothing to negate all this evidence.
It’s like if we would attack the theory of relativity by saying “Einstein used it to make atom bombs!”.. It’s precisely the same level of argument really.
And seriously… Your view on planned parenthood is so…. Infuriating. First of all, what did Darwin and Eugenics have to do with planned parenthood?
Second of all, it’s not a freaking abortion factory telling people to kill fetuses. It’s about providing the option of termination when it is seen as prudent, yes, but it is also about _preventing unwanted pregnancies in the first place_ (through proper education and birth control), thereby lessening the need for abortions.
Oh well. I also must mention that your implication that there isn’t any academic freedom in regards to evolution is unfounded.
ID isn’t “censored”. It isn’t “expelled”. It is discussed _extremely_ much for being a something that isn’t a scientific theory at all. So far it is a hypothesis with no testable predictions, no real, scientific description, no falsifiability and so on.
Parts of it, like the idea of irreducible complexity for instance, is founded in real science. And guess what? It has been thoroughly discussed by many leading scientists. And ID still hasn’t got a leg to stand on.
Science isn’t a club were every idea is given equal room. An idea has to prove itself worthy. If ID ever does it will be let in to play. Until then people shouldn’t whine; do some research and prove your claims instead. That’s what scientists do.
I just noticed some grammatical errors and some sentences were the meaning got kind of vague and obscured in my previous comment. I apologize for that, but I hope you can understand what I meant all the way through. English isn’t my first language and it’s almost six in the morning here (insomnia is harsh at times), so I feel I have an excuse ;)
You are misinformed as to the working of planned parenthood. Providing abortions is only ~10% of their services. They’re more concerned with educating people about reproduction, something this country direly needs. Abstinence only does NOT work. If planned parenthood were more prevalent there would be much fewer illegitemate welfare babies due to increased use of contraception.
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“Charles Darwin once said, ‘A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question.’ Yay for open-mindedness. So let’s have the freedom to see all sides of the questions.”
Yay, indeed!
“…it’s Charles Darwin’s birthday as well and 2009 marks the 200th year for the man who brought us wonderful works such as the Descent of Man which provided the backdrop for Eugenics (kill ‘em if they ain’t smart enough) which became Planned Parenthood (kill ‘em if they inconvenience you).”
Darwin himself rejected Eugenics on ethical grounds, as it would violate sympathy, “the noblest part of our nature.”
Cheers,
Sam
I said that Charles Darwin’s book, the Descent of Man is the “backdrop” for eugenics. While Darwin himself, to your point, did not completely drive the eugenics movement, his sons and cousin, Galton did. And many other Eugenics proponents of the early 20th century used Darwinian philosophy from that book to promote and proselytize. In the eugenics programs, tens of thousands of people were innocently sterilized based on human judgement that they should not breed – this injustice is what I speak against.
Note, I carefully said, “Descent… provided a back-drop” making no mention that Darwin himself publicly supported eugenics. Please, research the facts about what was propagated out of his works, not necessarily Darwin himself.
From, New Oxford Review: http://www.newoxfordreview.org/reviews.jsp?did=0908-gardiner
“Thirdly, Darwin prepared the way for eugenics. Indeed, his immediate family would soon be involved in that movement — his sons George and Leonard became active in promoting it (Leonard serving as ‘president of the Eugenics Education Society, the main eugenics group in Great Britain’), and his cousin Francis Galton became the founder of the ‘eugenics crusade.’ Evidently, Darwin was sympathetic to eugenics: West quotes him as vowing ‘to cut off communication’ with his disciple Mivart when the latter ‘criticized an article by Darwin’s son George that advocated eugenics.’ ”
You can also read, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Descent_of_Man,_and_Selection_in_Relation_to_Sex
Goto the section “Social implications of Darwinism”
We just established that Darwin _rejected_ eugenics, and you turn that to saying that he “did not completely drive the eugenics movement”. That’s some pretty slick maneuvering. In saying that he did not “completely” drive it, you imply that he DID play a large part himself; he just didn’t drive it “completely”.
In reality he is as little to blame for eugenics as the inventor of the TV is for reality shows. But anyway, that doesn’t matter. Darwin could have been a huge racist and a wife-beating misogynist and it wouldn’t have mattered. To my knowledge he wasn’t; he was pretty enlightened for his day, but it wouldn’t have mattered if he was.
Scientific theories stand on their own. And even if some really stupid people totally misunderstood Darwin’s theory and developed eugenics, that says _nothing_ about the validity of it.
That people who defend “intelligent design” continually attack Darwin in this way says a lot about how many real, scientific arguments they have though… If there were more real arguments they could let up on the “Darwin caused Hitler!”-type spurious arguments and concentrate on science. Because they do claim that ID is science, somehow.
Anyway, scientific theories stand and fall on their own merits. All the fossil records and the DNA evidence and observations of short-lived life forms over many generations tell us that evolution is something that is happening (by the way, this doesn’t automatically negate ID taking place in some part, but ID needs some evidence of its own before we consider it).
Saying “Darwin’s theory caused evil things to happen!” does nothing to negate all this evidence.
It’s like if we would attack the theory of relativity by saying “Einstein used it to make atom bombs!”.. It’s precisely the same level of argument really.
And seriously… Your view on planned parenthood is so…. Infuriating. First of all, what did Darwin and Eugenics have to do with planned parenthood?
Second of all, it’s not a freaking abortion factory telling people to kill fetuses. It’s about providing the option of termination when it is seen as prudent, yes, but it is also about _preventing unwanted pregnancies in the first place_ (through proper education and birth control), thereby lessening the need for abortions.
Oh well. I also must mention that your implication that there isn’t any academic freedom in regards to evolution is unfounded.
ID isn’t “censored”. It isn’t “expelled”. It is discussed _extremely_ much for being a something that isn’t a scientific theory at all. So far it is a hypothesis with no testable predictions, no real, scientific description, no falsifiability and so on.
Parts of it, like the idea of irreducible complexity for instance, is founded in real science. And guess what? It has been thoroughly discussed by many leading scientists. And ID still hasn’t got a leg to stand on.
Science isn’t a club were every idea is given equal room. An idea has to prove itself worthy. If ID ever does it will be let in to play. Until then people shouldn’t whine; do some research and prove your claims instead. That’s what scientists do.
I just noticed some grammatical errors and some sentences were the meaning got kind of vague and obscured in my previous comment. I apologize for that, but I hope you can understand what I meant all the way through. English isn’t my first language and it’s almost six in the morning here (insomnia is harsh at times), so I feel I have an excuse ;)
Sorry anyway :)
“which became Planned Parenthood (kill ‘em if they inconvenience you).”
Planned Parenthood isn’t an abortion factory. They provide birth control and sex ed to couples to prevent unwanted pregnancy.
Oh and happy Anniversary!
You are misinformed as to the working of planned parenthood. Providing abortions is only ~10% of their services. They’re more concerned with educating people about reproduction, something this country direly needs. Abstinence only does NOT work. If planned parenthood were more prevalent there would be much fewer illegitemate welfare babies due to increased use of contraception.