BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!

Subject: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 06:50 AM

The god of my idolatry, Charles Darwin, was born 200 years ago today, descended from pools of slime!

(A good day to read On the Origin Of Species, which is an amazing book almost no one reads, though everyone refers to it. A record of an awesome mind at work.)

Happy Birthday, Charles!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Black belt caterpillar wrestler
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 07:39 AM

You have to be a speed reader to read all of it in one day! Luckily my copy is safe somewhere in all the boxes crated up for a house move, along with "Voyage of the Beagle".

Happy Darwin Day to all.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: DannyC
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 07:43 AM

...   and yet, here in my State (USA), we host a 'Creationist' Theme Park wherein (I am told) mechanical figurines of various Bible characters can be seen riding on the backs of dinosaurs. Where's Clarence Darrow when you need him?

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: fretless
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 09:29 AM

This seems like a good place to put in a plug for Laurie Lebo's Devil in Dover, an excellent recounting of the recent trial in Dover Pennsylvania that set the precedent for the removal of intelligent design (i.e. creationist) curricula in Dover's public school science classes. It is a really fine read -- get your local library to order it so others can read it too.

Ol' Chuck Darwin has been getting some knocks in the US press lately, because, it is claimed, others were prepared to offer theories of evolution/natural selection around the same time he was. Happy Birthday anyway, fella. We're better off for what you did.

And on the topic of timely birthdays, let's not forget that Abe Lincoln was born on the same day in 1809.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 09:40 AM

Yes, and I was born the day before but not in the same years. Edison was too. Great minds were all born within 24 hours of each other.

Yeah, Chuck and Abe -- what a pair they were! I remember one time we were sittin' around playing Old Sledge with Sam Clemens when Abe said...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...............snort.....(pulls up the covers)...........

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 09:55 AM

"And on the topic of timely birthdays, let's not forget that Abe Lincoln was born on the same day in 1809."

Thank you fretless. To read the LA Times today, you'd barely know it was his birthday. While I don't expect Mudcat to necessarily note his birthday--after all we are an international community--I expect more of what is supposed to be a major American newspaper.

Incidentally, LAT had a wonderful page 5, main section story on Darwin and his legacy.

I guess this is what is more important in the LA Times' world.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 10:19 AM

Didn't there used to be a holiday for Lincoln in the US? Replaced by President's Day or some other imperialist crap?

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: JamesBerriman
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 10:28 AM

Celebrate with Darwin's ghost at the Leopard in Burslem tonight:

http://stoke.twestival.com/2009/02/09/the-best-ghosts/

Quote:

So, in a previous post we were pondering whether Charles Darwin, who celebrates his 200th birthday on Twestival night (coincidence? I think not), spent any time at the Leopard in Burslem.

Well, there's evidence. The landlord, Neil, took a moment out of ripping out a few 1950s 'improvements' to let us know that he has a diary entry in which Darwin writes about helping a family servant out by placing her in the Leopard as landlady and then, to help her settle in, spending a summer there. Well, it is hard just to stay there for 'one drink'…

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 10:31 AM

Yes, there used to be an actually observered holiday for both Lincoln and Washington (Feb 22). Now we have a bastardized Monday holiday that celebrates presidents in total...including a James Buchanon, a Richard Nixon and a Jimmy Carter. It gives US government workers, and some private industry, a three day holiday, but not much in the way of celebrating these two great presidents, or US history.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 11:02 AM

We just watched Inherit the Wind again - what a movie. Happy 200th!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: goatfell
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 11:23 AM

From a Christian happy birthday Darwin and Lincoln

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Bill D
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 11:25 AM

...and, as the Wash Post notes today in a LONG article, science now has the tools and is beginning the process of detailed analysis of human evolution, using DNA and the fruits of the Human Genome Project.

That museum, with dinosaurs mixed with bible characters, will remain an amusement, just as meetings of the Flat Earth Society do.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: fretless
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 11:31 AM

Expanding on the topic of Lincoln's birthday and events not noted in the U.S., I was reminded yesterday that February is Black History Month in the U.S., and that this is the first year since the founding of the U.S. republic that the president signing the declaration for the month-long recognition was himself black/African American. Which, I guess, could be taken as a good thing -- that Obama's blackness has taken a back seat to his role as a president and an individual -- or a bad one: that the media is so insensitive to the historic nature of his presidency that they ignored the historic symbolism. The friend who reminded me ascribes to the latter interpretation. I'm less sure. But who can deny that this is a historic moment?

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 11:36 AM

Please note that today is also the 100th anniversary of the founding of the NAACP.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Bill D
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 11:51 AM

I note from that Post article that 42% of those polled in a national Pew Research poll 'believe' that humans have "existed in their present from since the beginning of time".

It will TAKE some time for science to overcome viewpoints based on acceptance of certain 'authorities' which try to interpret every new 'fact' according to what they are already sure of.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Rapparee
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 12:10 PM

Well, it's been obvious from the Beginning that I am the center of the Universe.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: robomatic
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 12:13 PM

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SAINT CHUCK!


from a mostly happy evolver

to paraphrase Firesign Theatre

"I'm with you Chuck, but you still put me through too many changes!"

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ebbie
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 01:24 PM

Darwin - Lincoln: born on the same day, same year

Adams - Jefferson: died on the same day, same year

How many other coincidences can you list? (I recognize the significance of your birthday, Rap. Happy belated Birthday wishes. )

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 02:34 PM

Nov. 22, 1963
JFK - Aldous Huxley (Author Huxley's death went virtually unnoticed in the USA owing to the enormity of the JFK assassination.)

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: gnu
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 03:52 PM

The Discovery Channel's Daily Planet show is all Darwin tonight, I believe??? Should be good.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ebbie
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 07:15 PM

"Nov. 22, 1963
JFK - Aldous Huxley (Author Huxley's death went virtually unnoticed in the USA owing to the enormity of the JFK assassination.) " John on the Sunset Coast

You're right, John. I don't even remember Huxley's death. If we look I'll bet we can find other significant but unnoted events on that day.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ron Davies
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 09:00 PM

Since we're celebrating things Darwin-- with good reason-- perhaps we should be honest enough to admit that though he is often cited as patron saint by many of the atheists who grace Mudcat, he himself was no atheist--and he made that clear.

Nor were many of the other usual suspects cited in Mudcat atheists' screeds--Jefferson, Washington, Franklin.   Nor Einstein.

Paine--very likely. But he was a decidedly a mixed bag.   Many positives.   But also called Washington a coward. Being imprisoned in France did not agree with him.

And offered Napoleon a strategy to conquer the US.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 09:30 PM

John on the Sunset Coast:

In my boyhood we had separate holidays for Lincoln and Washington, on the 12th and 22nd of February. I remember when I was young enough not to be sure which was which.

Presidents' Day is, to my way of thinking, a sloppy-minded, lazy abomination.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 12 Feb 09 - 10:05 PM

Well, I was just checking legal US and California holidays.
The Federal holiday for Presidents is, this year, Washington's Birthday (observed) Monday Feb 16...His actual b.d. is Feb 22. I guess it is no longer called Presidents Day...well half a loaf, etc.
The Feds have 10 legal holidays.

California, on the other hand, has 16(!) legal holidays (17 if you count the day after Thanksgiving), as if the state can afford them, given our economic miasma!

Add'l to the Feds, Calif. has Lincoln's B'Day (yea!), Good Friday (hmm, a religious holiday!), Cesar Chavez Day, Emmancipation Day (I've never heard of this one), and Calif. Admission Day. To its credit, or to its greed, most private businesses do not close for most of these holidays.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Stringsinger
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 03:56 PM

it's amazing that only 39 percent of the American public accepts Evolution as scientific fact if we are to believe these polls.

How is it that so many Americans have become so ignorant? Could it be that they've been brainwashed by "terrorists"?

Darwin was one of the great liberators of science. He continues to be a great man revered for his contribution all over the world with the exception of certain theocratic countries and the tendency toward this in the US.

Are 41 percent of Americans thinking about Evolution as does the Taleban?

Stringsinger

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 04:14 PM

People can be ignorant without being stupid.....Ignorance is often intentional. "My mind's made up....don't confuse me with facts."

*IF* someone is emotionally/psychologically committed to a religious belief that 'everything was created in 6 days at some specified time', then they must fit all data into that model. There are religious models which do a very clever job of doing that Gerrymandering of fact & logic. They take some assumptions and construct a position that is internally consistent. It makes folks FEEL good to believe that there IS a simple, basic answer to how it all happened.. "God did it" It is hard work to escape from ANY mindset passed down for generations and believed by your entire social group.

America has a high % of folks who grew up with such beliefs, and is a relatively young nation. We will 'probably' change gradually as (and if) education begins to get thru the superstitutions we inherited.


(I just watched 3 programs on Darwin/Evolution last night where detailed, modern PROOF of evolution was demonstrated. Too bad they are not required for all students from 4th grade to college.)

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 04:30 PM

All the religions of the East seem to believe in varioius theories of spiritual evolution...a gradual process of human advancement that occurs over eons. If you believe in that, then it is no difficult thing to also believe in Darwin's theory of evolution. The two theories do not conflict. They simply work on different levels. The one works with with physical evolution in a physical world, genetics, the bodily processes, all physical stuff that can be observed and studied in a lab. The other deals with the subtle and non-physical aspects within physical beings....meaning it deals with consciousness.

A physical being without consciousness is either temporarily unconscious...or it's dead. It's incapable of evolving under those circumstances. Therefore the study of consciousness itself is a worthy subject in regards to evolution, whether or not one can dig up any physical evidence out of the ground to support a theory about it.

If it weren't for a fairly advanced degree of consciousness in us human beings, I would not have noticed or responded to this thread at all, nor would Peter have posted it, nor would Darwin have thought up his theory and made his observations, nor would you who is reading my words right now be taking some notice of my response, and possibly composing an answer to it.

To assume that the 41 per cent of Americans who don't believe in Darwinian evolution are the only alternative to Darwin...or to intelligence itself...would be as silly as to assume that the Sperm Whale is the only alternative to the flea...or the tiddlywink is the only alternative to the hydrofoil....or any other non-sequitor you would prefer.

I'm all for Darwin. I'm all for spiritual evolution too. As you said, Peter...Happy Birthday, Darwin!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 04:48 PM

The buddhist tradition, to which I belong, doesn't believe in spiritual advancement over eons -- actually it believes the opposite -- everything is going downhill.

It is not clear to me that Darwin did believe in God. He was usually pretty cagey. And after the death of his daughter, which nearly killed him with grief, I don't remember him saying anything positive about any deity.   If someone has a correction to that, I would be interested, but I don't think so.

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 04:50 PM

It is true that there need not be any serious conflict between Darwin and religion in general...but religion in some specific forms can't admit evolution.

All that is required is to say "I still believe God made it all work, and it's interesting to 'see' the ways he used."

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Zen
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 04:55 PM

All the religions of the East seem to believe in varioius theories of spiritual evolution...a gradual process of human advancement that occurs over eons. If you believe in that, then it is no difficult thing to also believe in Darwin's theory of evolution. The two theories do not conflict. They simply work on different levels.

This is quite true and I witnessed the same at first hand teaching biology, including evolution, to a large group of Tibetan monks on a "Science meets Dharma" exchange.

Zen

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Bill D
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 04:56 PM

Darwin waited years to publish his more controversial findings because his beloved wife WAS an evangelical Christian who would have been very upset at the direction the book took thought.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Zen
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 05:03 PM

The buddhist tradition, to which I belong, doesn't believe in spiritual advancement over eons -- actually it believes the opposite -- everything is going downhill.

Also as a Buddhist, I agree with Peter... spiritual "advancement" is the wrong way of looking at it. My point is that the monks found no conflict between Darwin's theory of evolution and their own tradition or understanding.

Incidentally, Darwin's ideas were initially rejected by the Royal Society, only being taken up shortly afterwards by the infinitely more enlightened minds of the Linnean Society.

Zen

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 05:07 PM

Buddhism ultimately views life as "suffering" doesn't it, Peter? Is not the objective to overcome desire and thereby transcend suffering? Is not the world itself seen as a form of illusion? If so, then evolution would be something occurring within the illusion...like an event occurring within a dream. It's an interesting way of looking at it, I guess, but I feel more comfortable with a somewhat less dour outlook.

As for Darwin believing in "God"....There are so many different ways of "believing" in "God" that I don't think we have much chance at all of determining what Darwin thought about it at this point. You'd have to BE Darwin to know what he thought about it.

We don't even have much chance of determining what other people we know think about it. We just fixate on the words themselves...the old symbols arise in the mind, symbols set by past conditioning...and we imagine that we know by a single word what is meant when another person says "God" or anything else like that. We don't know. We assume...very broadly...what that other person is thinking...we plant OUR familiar symbol on him or her...and our assumptions may be very wrong.

People can't get past the words. They learn a new word at some point in their life, and they then think they now know what the hell they're talking about! ;-) They don't know. They just know another damn word, that's all.

You can experience anything at all in life and you can know it intimately by the experience, without any words at all, but you cannot encapsulate it in a word. You can only pretend that the word clearly sums up the reality. This is what people generally do. They just argue over the familiar symbols...the ones they like, the ones they don't like. That is not thinking at all. It's reacting to programmed response. But it imagines that it is thinking, and brilliant thinking indeed! He who is the most clever with words imagines himself to be the master of those around him. Ah! King for an hour, a minute, a day!   

No wonder it was said that "All is vanity."

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: robomatic
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 05:14 PM

I love a good story, and the Darwin story is just one of the best, from his youth, his trip on the Beagle, his interactions with the noble Fitzroy, his putting of his theory 'on the shelf', the ethical dilemma when he was asked to review Wallace's paper, his association with Thomas Huxley and Huxley's spirited 'defense' which was pretty aggressive, the confrontation with Wilberforce, it is true drama.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 06:51 PM

As always, LH, very thoughtful. Actually, the Buddhist tradition has a variety of versions of this. The core is that any development is personal, not social (which was kind of implied in your original point). But there are historical sketches -- probably influenced by proto-Hindu myths like the Kali Yuga. In some Buddhist traditions, the world is going to pot post-Buddha, and will only be redeemed by Maitreya Buddha (the Buddha of the future).   My experience has been that nobody much takes Maitreya seriously, except for one or two of the weird Japanese cult Buddhisms.

The Zen position on time is exemplified by the fox koan. (A monk refused to believe in karma, and was reborn as a fox for 40 generations -- when I asked a Zen teacher whether that meant that Buddhists had to believe in karma, he smiled and said the reason he was reborn 40 times was to give him a lot of time to think about it......).

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 07:10 PM

Ha! ;-) Lovely...!

The thing I really like about you, Peter, is that you actually listen carefully to what another person is saying, you think about it dispassionately, and you look for common ground. You don't just assume that a battle for personal supremacy has begun and you must win it. A great many people don't listen to what another person says, they have no intention of seriously thinking in any constructive way about what the other person said, and they automatically assume there is and must be a conflict. They don't seek to find common ground, because what they are after is VICTORY....

I enjoy discussing things with you. It's a positive experience.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 08:43 PM

In the Guardian of the day (13th February), the Guardian ran this piece about the terrible twins (sort of), Darwin and Lincoln - Scientist v statesman: who can call the battle of the bicentennial men

First and last paragraphs:

"Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were born on the same day two centuries ago, thanks be to the false god of coincidence. But which, you cry, was the greater? Was it the man who transformed our understanding of the human race, or the man who made the mightiest nation on Earth also the custodian of liberty and democracy? Was it the scientist or the statesman?...

...I believe in the primacy of politics as a human activity for the simple reason that it is more important than anything else. Science must dance to its tune, not vice versa. The calibre of politicians is a crucial determinant of human happiness. Theirs is not a profession but the consummation of social activity. That is why Darwin died in his bed and Lincoln to an assassin's bullet. That is why Darwin gets my admiration, but Lincoln gets my vote."

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 09:33 PM

It is absurd to do this kind of "who was greater than who" stuff -- it is demeaning to the whole dynamic of human history. As we are somehow to cherish oranges more than apples.

(Woody Allen said it best: "Hollywood is for the birds. They're always giving out prizes -- greatest dictator, Adolf Hitler!" )

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ron Davies
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 10:33 PM

True, Peter, but the same holds true for "greatest decade for all music."    No obvious choice.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 13 Feb 09 - 10:47 PM

Well, Hollywood normally does what they figure will market best, and what is that? Generally speaking, it's a primitive and totally predictable cliche with cardboard "good guys" and "bad guys". Occasionally, though, Hollywood actually manages to produce an original movie. Or at least, some director does, anyway.

There is, indeed, no "greatest decade for music" and there never will be. It's a matter of personal taste, that's all, and personal taste is a direct result of one's personal experience, specially in the formative years of life. My Dad loved big band jazz, for example. It was the popular music of his youth. I didn't like it much at all, I liked the popular music of my youth which happened to be folk and rock. ;-) That's how it usually goes.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 04:48 AM

"Do I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes."
                                                          - Walt Whitman

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ron Davies
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 10:30 AM

Very good, Peter. Glad you noticed and did not try to sweep it under the rug.   Very apt quote.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ron Davies
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 10:57 AM

Back to the topic:   It seems that those atheists who may try to claim that Darwin was atheist but did not declare his atheism due to concern for his wife need to come up with some evidence.

It appears that he was never an atheist--from his own personal conviction above all else.

Wikipedia is not of course infallible but on this topic it quotes Darwin--, late in life, 1881, after he had finally rejected Christianity-- in a meeting with an atheist who sought his support:

Darwin:   Why do you call yourselves Atheists?

Guests:    We did not commit the folly of god-denial (and) avoided with equal care the folly of god-assertion.

So Darwin pointed out that what they were describing was agnosticism, not atheism.

Darwin:   I am with you in thought but should prefer the word Agnostic to the word Atheist.

Darwin was in fact by the end of his life an agnostic--but never an atheist.

It is also not reasonable to speculate that he would have become an atheist had he lived much longer.   The Dow Jones average went down 82 points yesterday. At that rate in 100 days it will be below zero.   Extrapolation of a trend into the future is groundless--and senseless.

In fact it makes eminent sense for a man who relied on empirical evidence in his thought to reject fundamentalist Christianity--but also reject atheism--since belief is a field in which there can obviously be no conclusive proof.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: DannyC
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 11:19 AM

Got a l'il weepy the last few nights singing: "Foresaken, almost human, He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone"... So there... I've got a decent Christian component (along with loads of other notions) floating around in the ole psyche. I fact, I'll take dollops of my old-time religion from the Theology of Liberation/Paolo Freire variety.

I live among many militant Creationists. I used to try to ignore them until they started to directly impact world affairs via the a$$hole from Crawford, TX.   Going forward I intend to take any and every opportunity (via public internet forums, street corner/doorstep/backfence conversations, whatever) to highlight the American Christian Right's strident and oppressive ignorance. We've got 'em on the run - no time to rest now.

(Don't fret mother, I promise I'll try to get to Mass tomorrow morn...)

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Peter T.
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 11:26 AM

Absolutely, Darwin was evidence-mad. As I said, Darwin was pretty cagey. I guess the interesting thing (given the Lincoln connection) is that Lincoln's views on God were also pretty agnostic (although it is hard to call them agnostic, Lincoln's God seems to be like some universal force that works out truth in human affairs).   I think this is one of those places where the two men actually touch -- they paid a kind of deep meditative attention to the life of things. Different things, but there was this deep meditative attention that resulted in these extraordinary feelings for the pattern of things.   

yours,

Peter T.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Bill D
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 11:28 AM

Ron... 'one' of the reasons he delayed publishing was out of concern for his wife. I think I am the only one who mentioned this, and I made no claims about Darwin's ultimate 'belief'.
In Darwin's day, it was not an easy thing to contemplate, much less take a public position on. Let's just say that he was 'aware' of the potential awkwardness of the implications of his research.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 12:30 PM

It's awkward for Christian/Islamic/Judaic fundamentalism, no doubt, but it's not awkward for a number of other varieties of spiritual belief.

Good quote from Walt Whitman, Peter. I would say from my observations all through life that everyone I know contradicts himself or herself....and quite frequently too! And so do I. ;-) It depends on the moment you catch them in, what mood they are in, what point they are trying to make, what argument they are pushing, etc. This is particularly evident with family members, spouses, and people one is in close relationship with. They contradict themselves thousands of times over in various ways, large and small, and they never even notice it, because they are always, after all, caught up in the moment... ;-)

If one were to sift back through the posts of any member of this forum and search for times when he or she has contradicted a previous statement, one could find many examples of it...but why spend the time to do that? It would be pointless, unless one was fighting a court case...or on a political campaign. ;-) Politicians are forever leaping with glee on something the other guy said that apparently contradicted something else he said, because the business of a politician is to destroy the other guy by any means, fair or foul.

Whitman was relaxed enough about himself...and forgiving enough...to freely and good-humouredly admit to the fact that he contradicts himself. He was also wise enough to recognize that he "contains multitudes" (as do we all). We are each not just a single version, a single outlook, or a single statement on reality, we are many and various. The only thing that never contradicts itself is a machine. That's because a machine doesn't think at all. It is lifeless. A machine would make the perfect defendant in a courtcase, wouldn't it? ;-) No inconsistencies whatsoever. It might also make the perfect politician. Hmmmm......!!!

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ron Davies
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 04:24 PM

As long as everybody is aware he was clear that he was an agnostic, not an atheist.   And that it was primarily from his own conviction, not out of respect for his wife.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Little Hawk
Date: 14 Feb 09 - 06:27 PM

Sounds okay to me...I think an agnostic is someone with the humility to admit that he doesn't know for sure if there is a God or not, and that seems like a sensible attitude for someone to take, given that there is no specific empirical evidence around to prove it or disprove it one way or another.

Subject: RE: BS: Happy Birthday, Charles Darwin!!
From: Ron Davies
Date: 15 Feb 09 - 10:13 AM

Exactly right, LH. And exactly my point.