Darwin, Evolution, and Racism

[alphaparticle]

 

 'Well adapted' does not, and *should* have zero moral or ethical implications whatsoever. Those are founded elsewhere, such as, in our theological understandings.

 

 

According to whom? From a theistic point of view one could say this, but the point of the theory of evolution is to explain the world according to naturalism, without invoking a God. When God is left out of the equation what prevents one from attaching moral weight to something like evolutionary fitness or any other subjective criteria for that matter? In fact doesn't survival of the fittest imply that the highly adapted will prevail while the lesser adapted populations will shrink?

 

Alright, but there is nothing in the physical theory which would allow an atheist to found any ethical system. If they do, they are making a categorical error. You can't describe how nature works and then say that is how things *ought* to be. Descriptions don't give you moral imperatives.  Slugs may be 'better adapted' to some environments than people are, so what?

 

Anyway, as an atheist I thought there were moral absolute standards. I can describe for you the details if you are interested.

[LuftWaffle]

wasn't there racism long before there was a Darwin?  Didn't Christians use the Bible to support racism and slavery long before Darwin came along?

 

The Bible doesn't support racism or slavery in the sense of what the OP refers to. The question isn't whether "Christians" could use the bible to support racism and slavery, but whether the Bible itself supports it. It doesn't which is precisely why slavery was ended by Christians such as Wilberforce and Luther King Jr.

 

A person could use a McDonalds burger wrapper as justification for some immoral act, that doesn't mean that McDonalds actually supports the act.

[SandyU]

Darwins book "Origins of the species" talked mostly about miner evolution. But he has been given credit for major evolution because he has credentials and a name. The fact it was used for racism is pure evil. The father of lies gave the darkest days in history with those lies. Pray against his lies. Pray for Gods truth to be known in today.

[LuftWaffle]

Alright, but there is nothing in the physical theory which would allow an atheist to found any ethical system. If they do, they are making a categorical error. You can't describe how nature works and then say that is how things *ought* to be. Descriptions don't give you moral imperatives.  Slugs may be 'better adapted' to some environments than people are, so what?

I agree that descriptions don't give you moral imperatives, but they can and do influence them. Our understanding of our origins definitely impacts our understanding of human value, and ethics. Would you say that believing that all men are created in God's image and has intrinsic value, has the same net effect as believing that mankind is simply the result of time and chance and that life itself has no objective purpose or value? 

 

 

Anyway, as an atheist I thought there were moral absolute standards. I can describe for you the details if you are interested.

It's not really important what you thought while you were an atheist, but what's important is whether your thoughts were consistent with your worldview.

It also depends on what you mean by moral absolute standards, I believe moral values and duties are objective but not necessarily absolute.

I am interested in how you were able to ground objective moral values and duties as an atheist, though, so go ahead.

[alphaparticle]

 

Alright, but there is nothing in the physical theory which would allow an atheist to found any ethical system. If they do, they are making a categorical error. You can't describe how nature works and then say that is how things *ought* to be. Descriptions don't give you moral imperatives.  Slugs may be 'better adapted' to some environments than people are, so what?

I agree that descriptions don't give you moral imperatives, but they can and do influence them. Our understanding of our origins definitely impacts our understanding of human value, and ethics. Would you say that believing that all men are created in God's image and has intrinsic value, has the same net effect as believing that mankind is simply the result of time and chance and that life itself has no objective purpose or value? 

 

If you are a naturalist/physicalist, you are going to face that challenge with or without evolution.

 

 

 

 

 

Anyway, as an atheist I thought there were moral absolute standards. I can describe for you the details if you are interested.

It's not really important what you thought while you were an atheist, but what's important is whether your thoughts were consistent with your worldview.

It also depends on what you mean by moral absolute standards, I believe moral values and duties are objective but not necessarily absolute.

I am interested in how you were able to ground objective moral values and duties as an atheist, though, so go ahead.

 

 

I wasn't a naturalist/physicalist. I asserted the existence of all kinds of abstract objects. I was a moral realist and thought there were moral properties (right, wrong, good and bad) which have objective existence. So, if I say 'murder is wrong' it's a truth claim which can be right or wrong in the objective sense. That is it in a nutshell.

[LuftWaffle]

If you are a naturalist/physicalist, you are going to face that challenge with or without evolution.

Sure, but evolution is really the only option, which is why naturalists will hold to evolution and continue to do so despite the many problems with the theory.

 

 

I wasn't a naturalist/physicalist. I asserted the existence of all kinds of abstract objects. I was a moral realist and thought there were moral properties (right, wrong, good and bad) which have objective existence. So, if I say 'murder is wrong' it's a truth claim which can be right or wrong in the objective sense. That is it in a nutshell.

Ok, so you believed that objective morals values were just a brute fact of the universe. There are some atheists who believe this, but it seems odd that the moral and the physical realms should intersect in an obscure species on an obscure planet in a very large universe, which seems otherwise oblivious to such things. Such an explanation, while freeing the atheist from the embarrassment of moral subjectivism, really doesn't really offer anything more than for instance saying "I don't know", or did you see it differently?

[Guest shiloh357]

Well... evolution properly understood in the modern science has  no directionality. That's why there's an emphasis now there is no 'ladder' of life. There is no monkey, then ape, then man type of progression. There's a bush of life. Everything around us is equally 'well adapted' because it's around and still propagating. 'Well adapted' does not, and *should* have zero moral or ethical implications whatsoever. Those are founded elsewhere, such as, in our theological understandings.

 

But evolution DOES have an affect on morality and ethics. 

 

If I am just a higher primate, that evolved from a hominid ancestor that evolved from a other creatures going back to some kind of primoridial soup, then why should morals or ethics matter?   

 

What people fail to understand is your view on where you came from affects your worldview.   Evolution is meant, in part, to be an explanation of man's origin without God.  That is why evolution is seen as an alternative to Genesis 1.  Without a moral lawgiver, without an independent and objective standard of morality, who set's the standard for right and wrong?  

 

Stephen J. Gould argued that man is accident.  To him man has no purpose and there is no good reason for man to exist at all.  In his view of evolution man has no inherent worth or value.   A person who sees himself and others as nothing more than higly evolved animals will, in his heart, devalue you.  Adolph Hitler's first step in justifying the Holocaust was to devalue his victims.  

 

In Hitler's day there was a ladder of life in evolutionary thought and you can't judge Hitler except by the evolutionary thinking that was in play at that time. I realize that the hypothesis has been tweeked over time. Evolutionists used to claim that men evolved from apes and I think they would like to us to forget that chapter of evolutionary thought.  But there is an evolutionary chain a sort of "molecules-to-man" progression.   Man did evolve from something if evolution is to be believed.  I am not sure how that differs from a the "ladder of life" you mention.

 

 

It's true, I agree those guys were not only racists but scientifically ignorant. They had half-baked ideas that they turned into very unfortunate social programs. But, those were not based on *modern* evolution.

 

 

Their actions were not based on scientific ignorance, but on the evolutionary model that existed in their day.  Even moden evolution completely devalues human life if taken to its logical conclusion.  A complete naturalist who is atheistic would have no reason to see human life has having any intrinsic value.

 

 

But people misunderstand and misuse perfectly good ideas all of the time.

 

But they were not misusing it.  They were completely consistent with evoutionary thought as it existed in their day.   It may be embarrassing to liberals today, but the fact is that until the modern attempt sanitize evolution to make it more palatable to modern liberal sensitivities, evolutionists believed that some races were inferior and needed to be eliminated to make room for and to enable the survival of the stronger more fit races.

 

The cruelty of evolution isn't really seen for what it is until you apply it to humanity.  Folks are okay with "survival of the fittest"  until that principle is applied to human existence.   We are part of the evolutionary chain until we are on the receiving end of those grand evolutionary principles.   It's not a problem to apply them to dogs, cats, field mice, and other rodents, but when it comes to decide which human beings are less fit to be on earth than others, suddenly evolution has to be tweeked to remove  the obvious moral problem.

 

 

I mean, you need only go to the 'metaphysical' section of your Barnes and Noble to see how badly quantum mechanics is abused, or the theory of relativity. A scientific idea being abused or misunderstood-- even by researchers in the field! -  means something about the person being wrong, it doesn't reflect on the theories in question. The question that is relevant in  my mind is, is the idea itself a good one, even if it has been ill used by others.

 

The answer to the question is that it is not a good idea, because it wasn't being "ill used."   Adolph Hitler  and Margaret completely consistent with the evolutionary worldview,  but there is something innate in each of us that says that the evoloutionary worldview is wrong, and that is never more clearly seen than when evolution is applied to humanity. 

 

There is, even though some suppress it, an innate understanding hardwired into us that there is a value to human life that exceeds that of any other creature.  Human beings are special and we know it on the inside, which is why even naturalists understand that child molestation/abuse is wrong.   There is an objective moral code in all of us.  There are human tribes in the jungles of S. America and Africa that worship trees and have had no contact with outside cultures, but yet have had laws within their community against adultery, murder, etc., long before anyone even knew those tribes existed.

 

If man is the product of evolution and was not a speical creature made by God separate from the created order as the Bible says, then human life means nothing.   Human life only has value if there is a God who made man in his image from the dirt just the way the Bible says.  Human evolution is a myth and strikes at the heart of the Gospel.

[alphaparticle]

 

If you are a naturalist/physicalist, you are going to face that challenge with or without evolution.

Sure, but evolution is really the only option, which is why naturalists will hold to evolution and continue to do so despite the many problems with the theory.

 

 

Yeah but that's like saying I'm going to derive moral values from the theory of gravity. It just doesn't work in principle.

 

 

 

I wasn't a naturalist/physicalist. I asserted the existence of all kinds of abstract objects. I was a moral realist and thought there were moral properties (right, wrong, good and bad) which have objective existence. So, if I say 'murder is wrong' it's a truth claim which can be right or wrong in the objective sense. That is it in a nutshell.

Ok, so you believed that objective morals values were just a brute fact of the universe. There are some atheists who believe this, but it seems odd that the moral and the physical realms should intersect in an obscure species on an obscure planet in a very large universe, which seems otherwise oblivious to such things. Such an explanation, while freeing the atheist from the embarrassment of moral subjectivism, really doesn't really offer anything more than for instance saying "I don't know", or did you see it differently?

 

The bolded yeah. Ultimately there is going to be an 'I don't know moment', and that is with the brute facts about existence. For instance you could have asked me, why are there *any* properties at all, let alone moral ones, I would have said, I have no clue but this is what we observe to be the case. Why is there something instead of nothing? I don't know, but again, we know something exists. And so on. So the existence of moral properties I would have classified as a brute fact in that way yes. I thought they needed to exist because there was no good alternative that explained the facts.

[alphaparticle]

 

Well... evolution properly understood in the modern science has  no directionality. That's why there's an emphasis now there is no 'ladder' of life. There is no monkey, then ape, then man type of progression. There's a bush of life. Everything around us is equally 'well adapted' because it's around and still propagating. 'Well adapted' does not, and *should* have zero moral or ethical implications whatsoever. Those are founded elsewhere, such as, in our theological understandings.

 

But evolution DOES have an affect on morality and ethics. 

 

If I am just a higher primate, that evolved from a hominid ancestor that evolved from a other creatures going back to some kind of primoridial soup, then why should morals or ethics matter?   

 

What people fail to understand is your view on where you came from affects your worldview.   Evolution is meant, in part, to be an explanation of man's origin without God.  That is why evolution is seen as an alternative to Genesis 1.  Without a moral lawgiver, without an independent and objective standard of morality, who set's the standard for right and wrong?  

 

Stephen J. Gould argued that man is accident.  To him man has no purpose and there is no good reason for man to exist at all.  In his view of evolution man has no inherent worth or value.   A person who sees himself and others as nothing more than higly evolved animals will, in his heart, devalue you.  Adolph Hitler's first step in justifying the Holocaust was to devalue his victims.  

 

In Hitler's day there was a ladder of life in evolutionary thought and you can't judge Hitler except by the evolutionary thinking that was in play at that time. I realize that the hypothesis has been tweeked over time. Evolutionists used to claim that men evolved from apes and I think they would like to us to forget that chapter of evolutionary thought.  But there is an evolutionary chain a sort of "molecules-to-man" progression.   Man did evolve from something if evolution is to be believed.  I am not sure how that differs from a the "ladder of life" you mention.

 

 

Maybe you have a point insofar as how people view the world more generally, where they come from, where they are going and all this, just does affect stuff like morality and ethics, whether it is consistent or follows from inference strictly thought out or not. If that is what you mean then I have a better idea of what you mean here, but I'd still protest, that people being inspired by it to make up  bad ethics doesn't mean the theory itself is wrong.

 

The tree or bush of life is different because the ladder suggested some kind of progression from a lower to higher animal as if there is some top, and some bottom. The modern understanding is that every animal is equally 'on the top' as any other animal, including bacteria, including sea stars, sharks, elephants and so on. There's not one 'more highly evolved' and one 'less evolved'. The stuff that exists today exists simply because its parents/parent procreated and so on. There should be no lessons to be learned here about value because there's not really any room for that in that picture.

 

Any value picture is going to come from misunderstanding the theory or something else. As an atheist I got it from a metaethical position which includes objective moral values (as I describe above). Others promote relativism, or think they do. Most just don't think it through much and posit random stuff as good or bad without really thinking about what that means or why anybody should care about the 'good of the species' (yeah I have heard that as an excuse... ).

[Guest shiloh357]

Maybe you have a point insofar as how people view the world more generally, where they come from, where they are going and all this, just does affect stuff like morality and ethics, whether it is consistent or follows from inference strictly thought out or not. If that is what you mean then I have a better idea of what you mean here, but I'd still protest, that people being inspired by it to make up  bad ethics doesn't mean the theory itself is wrong.

 

What I mean is that how you view your origins, meaning if you feel you are the product of evolution and simply a higher animal or if you believe you are made in God's image as a special creation from the dust of the earth, apart from the rest of the created order.  That will affect your worldview and your view of absolute morality/ethics.

 

 

The tree or bush of life is different because the ladder suggested some kind of progression from a lower to higher animal as if there is some top, and some bottom. The modern understanding is that every animal is equally 'on the top' as any other animal, including bacteria, including sea stars, sharks, elephants and so on. There's not one 'more highly evolved' and one 'less evolved'. The stuff that exists today exists simply because its parents/parent procreated and so on. There should be no lessons to be learned here about value because there's not really any room for that in that picture.

 

I hear modern evolutionists all of the time referring to man as a higher animal, but in the sense that man is higher than a dog or a cat, not that we have some dogs that are higher than other dogs or human that are higher than other humans.  The point is that if you see yourself as merely an evolved animal and you see others as evolved animals, then at some point, there are going to be some who are viewed as less fit, not less evolved, like they would have said say 70 years ago.

 

 

Any value picture is going to come from misunderstanding the theory or something else. As an atheist I got it from a metaethical position which includes objective moral values (as I describe above). Others promote relativism, or think they do. Most just don't think it through much and posit random stuff as good or bad without really thinking about what that means or why anybody should care about the 'good of the species' (yeah I have heard that as an excuse... ).

 

Its' not a matter of saying Evolution actively causes people to devalue other people.  It is a matter of where an evolutionary worldview leads.  Margaret Sanger didn't say that evolution made her do what she did.   Rather it was the worldview that developed from her view of humans as animals. She didn't misunderstand the theory at all.  She was completely consistent with theory as it was understood in her day.