Ben Stein: Science Leads to Killing People

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Let’s review:

In a past argument, Ricmat provides comments by Cardinal Schoenborn, author of the CCC regarding evolution & ID:
A note to new posters who may not have seen this before:

From page 165 of Cardinal Schoenborn’s book Chance or Purpose (my bold & underline):
Code:
 Quote:
                "The aggressive way in which many oppose the group of American scientists who are devoting themselves to investigating 'intelligent design' does not have much to do with science. One may criticize their methodological approach. **Yet the question as to the origins of the obvious 'intelligent design' in living things is an entirely legitimate one; indeed it is a question bound up with man and his human reason.**"
Barbarian says that such things are not the Cardinal’s area of expertise (despite the fact that he just wrote a book on it).
As you know, it’s a good deal more questionable than the Cardinal thinks. But then, it’s not his field of expertise.
And in a more current argument, Barbarian invokes a comment by Cardinal Ratzinger:
Meantime, the real theory including common descent, was declared by our current pope to be “virtually certain.”

So let’s review:
  1. Evolutionary theory is not only acceptable to the church, it’s considered by the pope to be virtually certain.
** But then, that’s not his field of expertise, is it Barbarian?**

And BTW - “common descent being certain” does not equal “Barbarian’s own personal interpretation of evolution being certain.”
 
From page 165 of Cardinal Schoenborn’s book Chance or Purpose (my bold & underline):
The aggressive way in which many oppose the group of American scientists who are devoting themselves to investigating ‘intelligent design’ does not have much to do with science.

Since IDers tend to make few or no scientific claims, but rather make dishonest and spurious accusations against science (as in “Expelled”) the usual criticisms center on those false accusations. When they have made a rare testable claim, that has been discussed and investigated. Behe’s denial that irreducible complexity can evolve, for example, or Dembski’s “explanitory filter.”

IDers are now much more cautious about advancing claims, and rely more on accusations against science, these days.
Barbarian says that such things are not the Cardinal’s area of expertise (despite the fact that he just wrote a book on it).
If “writing a book on it” makes you an expert… (insert punch line here)

Yet the question as to the origins of the obvious ‘intelligent design’ in living things is an entirely legitimate one; indeed it is a question bound up with man and his human reason."

Barbarian observes:
As you know, it’s a good deal more questionable than the Cardinal thinks. But then, it’s not his field of expertise.
And in a more current argument, Barbarian invokes a comment by Cardinal Ratzinger…
In which he sums up his work, in collaboration with a group of prominent scientists and theologians, in which he discusses their findings:

While there is little consensus among scientists about how the origin of this first microscopic life is to be explained, there is general agreement among them that the first organism dwelt on this planet about 3.5-4 billion years ago. Since it has been demonstrated that all living organisms on earth are genetically related, it is virtually certain that all living organisms have descended from this first organism. Converging evidence from many studies in the physical and biological sciences furnishes mounting support for some theory of evolution to account for the development and diversification of life on earth, while controversy continues over the pace and mechanisms of evolution.
Communion and Stewardship:
Human Persons Created in the Image of God
The July 2004 Vatican Statement on Creation and Evolution

Barbarian observes:
So let’s review:
  1. Evolutionary theory is not only acceptable to the church, it’s considered by the pope to be virtually certain.
But then, that’s not his field of expertise, is it Barbarian?
But it turns out, he worked over a year with people for whom it is their field of expertise, along with Catholic theologians. And they together produced a well-reasoned and well-supported statement on the Catholic position on evolution.

Cardinal Schoenborn? He “wrote a book.”
And BTW - “common descent being certain” does not equal “Barbarian’s own personal interpretation of evolution being certain.”
Virtually certain. And yes, I think common descent is virtually certain also, for the same reason Pope Benedict XVI does. The evidence is overwhelming.

Knowing what you are talking about is a great advantage, and as you see, Cardinal Ratzinger took considerable time and trouble to make sure he knew what he was talking about.

Unfortunately, Cardinal Schoenborn did not, initially, although he has issued some clarifying statements to make it clear that he is not at odds with the Pope, or with the International Theological Commission.

In fact, in 2005, Schoenborn made it clear that he is entirely with the Pope and the Commission:

"I see no difficulty in joining belief in the Creator with the theory of evolution, but under the prerequisite that the borders of scientific theory are maintained."

This echoes the finding of those who have taken a deeper look:

But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation. According to St. Thomas Aquinas: “The effect of divine providence is not only that things should happen somehow, but that they should happen either by necessity or by contingency. Therefore, whatsoever divine providence ordains to happen infallibly and of necessity happens infallibly and of necessity; and that happens from contingency, which the divine providence conceives to happen from contingency” (Summa theologiae, I, 22,4 ad 1). In the Catholic perspective, neo-Darwinians who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided are straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science.
(again, from Human Persons Created in the Image of God)

And with that clarification, Cardinal Schoenborn turns out to have been aligned with Catholic doctrine, after all.

(BTW, “Neo-Darwinians” who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided, can’t be Darwinians at all. Darwin, after all, attributed life to God.

There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved.
Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species 1872
 
Actually, Barbarian, the Church speaks with authority only on issues of faith and morals.

Atheist/evolutionists attacking scientists for non-scientific reasons, as Cardinal Schoenborn points out in my quote, is an issue of morals. This is not outside his area of expertise. You lose.

Having an opinion that [evolutionary definition of ] common descent is virtually certain is an issue neither of faith nor morals. Ratzinger actually was outside the area of faith and morals, although its interesting to hear his opinion. You lose here again.

And once more, “common descent” does not equal “Barbarians personal interpretation of the entire theory of evolution.” Nor does “common descent” even mean “all of evolution” as your statement implies. Since the theory changes all the time (as you admit), who even knows what details of evolution Ratzinger really thought he was agreeing to at the time.
while controversy continues over the pace and mechanisms of evolution.
Ah, yes, we’re allowed to disagree here. You lose again.
In the Catholic perspective, neo-Darwinians who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided are straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science.
The above is quoted directly from your post above, Barbarian. Neo-Darwinians are those “who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided”

We’ve argued many times before about this. Barbarian being absolutely positive in the process of random variation and natural selection with no tinkering/guiding by God, and ricmat for some degree of random variation and natural selection, but including some sort of divine guidance (to make some key things more probable), while also leaving the door open to other possibilities. By the definition above, you are a neo-Darwinist. He says you’re straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science. You lose again.
 
Actually, Barbarian, the Church speaks with authority only on issues of faith and morals.

Atheist/evolutionists attacking scientists for non-scientific reasons, as Cardinal Schoenborn points out in my quote, is an issue of morals. This is not outside his area of expertise. You lose.

Having an opinion that [evolutionary definition of ] common descent is virtually certain is an issue neither of faith nor morals. Ratzinger actually was outside the area of faith and morals, although its interesting to hear his opinion. You lose here again.

And once more, “common descent” does not equal “Barbarians personal interpretation of the entire theory of evolution.” Nor does “common descent” even mean “all of evolution” as your statement implies. Since the theory changes all the time (as you admit), who even knows what details of evolution Ratzinger really thought he was agreeing to at the time.

Ah, yes, we’re allowed to disagree here. You lose again.
The above is quoted directly from your post above, Barbarian. Neo-Darwinians are those “who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided”

We’ve argued many times before about this. Barbarian being absolutely positive in the process of random variation and natural selection with no tinkering/guiding by God, and ricmat for some degree of random variation and natural selection, but including some sort of divine guidance (to make some key things more probable), while also leaving the door open to other possibilities. By the definition above, you are a neo-Darwinist. He says you’re straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science. You lose again.
Yes, barbarian has exposed himself many times. He is what his name is.
 
We’ve already tested that claim. As you saw, Darwinians destroyed any rationale for classic eugenics.
Yes, but they voted for it before they voted against it.

And with regard to Cardinal Schoenborn:
If “writing a book on it” makes you an expert… (insert punch line here)
He also wrote the CCC (that’s shorthand for Catechism of the Catholic Church). Sorry - I can’t see much of a punch line here.
 
Actually, Barbarian, the Church speaks with authority only on issues of faith and morals.
I’m pleased that you accept that. I, and others here, have been trying to explain that science does not, and cannot contradict faith.
Atheist/evolutionists attacking scientists for non-scientific reasons, as Cardinal Schoenborn points out in my quote, is an issue of morals.
Um, that’s not what he said, was it? However, if you now understand that evolutionary theory cannot support atheism, then you’ve made some progress. But if some atheists think it can (as some participants here think it can) it’s not a matter of morality, but of ignorance. Which is, as you know, not a moral failing, unless it is intentional.
This is not outside his area of expertise.
The nature of scientific inquiry is indeed outside of his area of expertise. Note that Cardinal Ratzinger was careful to make sure he was properly informed as to the nature of science, before he made any statements.
You lose.
That’s what this is about, to you, isn’t it? The truth is what matters. And that is what should matter to you.
Having an opinion that [evolutionary definition of ] common descent is virtually certain is an issue neither of faith nor morals.
I’m pleased you acknowledge that.
Ratzinger actually was outside the area of faith and morals, although its interesting to hear his opinion.
Which is why he had a good number of excellent scientists as well as theologians study the problem with him. And thereby, was able to make a great contribution to the faith.
You lose here again.
Again, the truth is what matters, and our Pope did indeed speak the truth. Knowing what you are talking about is an advantage.
And once more, “common descent” does not equal “Barbarians personal interpretation of the entire theory of evolution.”
Common descent is merely the widest claim of evolutionary theory. It subsumes all the rest.
Nor does “common descent” even mean “all of evolution” as your statement implies.
Um, yes, common descent does indeed involve all of evolution. It is, to be precise, all of evolution.
Since the theory changes all the time (as you admit), who even knows what details of evolution Ratzinger really thought he was agreeing to at the time.
The Modern Synthesis. There hasn’t been a significant addition to evolutionary theory since then. It is significant that common descent remains as it did in Darwin’s time. The four principles of Darwinism remain as they were in his time. We’ve added a lot of new things, but the foundation is what it always has been.
while controversy continues over the pace and mechanisms of evolution.
Yes. For example, by the time Ratzinger studied the question, punctuated equilibrium had become part of evolutionary theory. Almost all scientists accept it, but there is still some disagreement over how much and how fast.
Ah, yes, we’re allowed to disagree here.
I’m pleased you admit that, also. You’ve come a long way since we began talking here.
You lose again.
Remember, it’s not about winning and losing. It’s about the truth. And if you keep that in mind, winning doesn’t mean so much.

In the Catholic perspective, neo-Darwinians who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided are straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science.
The above is quoted directly from your post above, Barbarian.
Yes. Cardinal Ratzinger rather accurately asserted what the scientists here have been telling you; science not only does not contradict faith, it can’t. That is beyond the proper boundaries of science.
Neo-Darwinians are those “who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided”
No. As you know, the Neo-Darwinians here have told you repeatedly that science can’t do that. (“Neo-Darwinian” properly means “The Modern Synthesis” which, of course does not make such a claim) I think Cardinal Ratzinger was using the word in the informal sense to include non-scientists who wouldn’t know any better.
We’ve argued many times before about this.
Your post gives me some hope. You have made considerable progress. I mean that sincerely.
Barbarian being absolutely positive in the process of random variation and natural selection with no tinkering/guiding by God,
He is omnipotent, after all. Cardinal Ratzinger points out:

But it is important to note that, according to the Catholic understanding of divine causality, true contingency in the created order is not incompatible with a purposeful divine providence. Divine causality and created causality radically differ in kind and not only in degree. Thus, even the outcome of a truly contingent natural process can nonetheless fall within God’s providential plan for creation. According to St. Thomas Aquinas: “The effect of divine providence is not only that things should happen somehow, but that they should happen either by necessity or by contingency. Therefore, whatsoever divine providence ordains to happen infallibly and of necessity happens infallibly and of necessity; and that happens from contingency, which the divine providence conceives to happen from contingency”

This was the part that came just before the part you cut and pasted. So a “truly contingent natural process” is entirely consistent with Catholic faith.
and ricmat for some degree of random variation and natural selection, but including some sort of divine guidance (to make some key things more probable),
You’re free to think so, but that is not Catholic doctrine.
By the definition above, you are a neo-Darwinist.
Why thank you. I agree with the Pope that a truly contingent natural process like evolution is within God’s creative power.
He says you’re straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science.
Of course not, and you know better.

Ricmat’s “improvement” to the Pope’s words, in red:
“Neo-Darwinians are those who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided…”

Wow. I’m in good company. You did it to the Pope, too. Those two little words sure made a difference, um? But the real version:

In the Catholic perspective, neo-Darwinians who adduce random genetic variation and natural selection as evidence that the process of evolution is absolutely unguided are straying beyond what can be demonstrated by science.

The actual statement is here:
bringyou.to/apologetics/p80.htm

And everyone who cares can go see what you’ve done.

If you truly don’t understand why these are entirely different, compare this:

Chimpanzees that drive cars…

To your version:

Chimpanzees are those that drive cars…

And then your conclusion that if one is a chimpanzee, one drives a car.
You lose again.
I can’t help thinking that if you were less concerned with winning, and more concerned with the truth, you wouldn’t do things like this.
 
Barbarian, you get all upset when somebody mocks your posting style (as I did above, and previously with the “your guy” thing), or when others use phrases like “Now that you’ve learned [Barbarian’s opinion on something]”. You should think about why it is that it upsets you.
 
Barbarian, you get all upset when somebody mocks your posting style (as I did above, and previously with the “your guy” thing).
You were mocking me? Darn. Well, they say that a good parody is one that’s so smooth, people think it’s for real. You got that.
You should think about why it is that it upsets you.
I’ve always said that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. But I think you haven’t gotten it down very well yet. I certainly wouldn’t presume to edit what the Pope said, to change the meaning, for example.

And my style requires frequent diversions into evidence. Which is not so easy to parody, unless you have a supply of your own.

But I do appreciate the thought.
 
Only Barbarian’s ego could equate mockery with flattery.
Only me and 2,390,000 people. That’s how many hits it got on Google.

Anyway, as I said, you probably need to do a little work so at least it’s recognizable as mockery, if you’re going to try to imitate me. They say a gentleman is one who never unintentionally offends people. What they say about people who can’t offend people even when trying, I don’t know.

You need to work on your understatement, I think. But I’m still flattered that it matters enough to you to make the attempt. How about getting back onto the issue?
 
The case is stronger than that. As you just learned, Darwinists strongly and effectively refuted the claims of the eugenists, particularly the ones used by Nazis to justify the Holocaust. They were on the other side. There were lawyers and theologians and philosophers who agreed with the Darwinists that classical eugenics was bunk, of course. But the fact remains that Stein is trying to justify his position by blaming the group that most strongly opposed what Hitler did. As you probably realize by now, he depends on lies and prejudice to persuade.

We’ve already tested that claim. As you saw, Darwinians destroyed any rationale for classic eugenics.

Yes…and openned the door for a new form of eugenice ( see article below)

Politicians have made it so. Few of them are scientists.

Politicians have to back up their arguments with the facts they get from these scietists and medical groups.

Today, it’s pretty much genetic counseling, to let people know the risks of passing on a problem to their children.

SEE ARTICLE BELOW
No. The point of Punnett, Morgan, Muller, and other Darwinians was that the whole idea was flawed.

SO THEY REDIRECTED IT>>>THEY STILL HAD ESSENTIALLY THE SAME AIM.

By the mid-1930s, according to Daniel Kevles, ‘mainline eugenics had generally been recognized as a farrago of flawed science.’ By then, most geneticists accepted that eugenic sterilization could not rid society of its undesirables.
P.M.H. Mazumdar, ‘Reform’ eugenics and the decline of Mendelism


The killing continues, but there is no justification according to evolutionary theory.

Whether it comes from evolutionary science or not, science is not standing up against the genetic engeneering crowd

In fact, most of their policies came from people like Martin Luther; if you read “The Jews and Their Lies”, you will see Hitler’s program, with only the gas chambers missing. Let’s be honest about the issue, um?

I hardly think Martin Luther could have come up with the programs we are talking about…I am not familiar with the work you are talking about however, there could have been some material in it but the historical facts are that scientists formed the foundation and are still working on the same ideas. SEE ARTCLE:

IEvolutionary theory does not assert materialism, nor does it assert that humans are merely material processes. Darwin, in his book, asserted that God created the first living things. Wallace, who co-discovered modern evolutionary theory, asserted that man was a unique creation of God, apart from the animals. Again, you’re blaming science for the sins of your own people.
Just who are ‘my people’?______________________
Barbarian I think you are underestimating the influence eugenics had on Darwin and continues to have on science in the area of biology and medicine today.
There is an excellent article on the EWTN document site which outlines and traces th history of the eugenics movment showing its influence on Darwin and its continuing influence on the medical/science community of today. I recommend you review it.
ewtn.com/library/PROLIFE/INTROEUG.TXT

Extract:
"In 1970, I. I. Gottesman, a director of the American Eugenics
Society, defined it in this way: “The essence of evolution is
natural selection; the essence of eugenics is the replacement of
‘natural’ selection by conscious, premeditated, or artificial
selection in the hope of speeding up the evolution of ‘desirable’
characteristics and the elimination of undesirable ones.”

;;;;;;;;

The Population Council, one of the new eugenic organizations
that emerged after World War II, no longer spoke of eugenics as a religion (in fact, avoided the word eugenics altogether), but
launched “studies relating to the social, ethical and moral
dimensions” of population studies, recognizing that these
questions involve matters “of a cultural, moral and spiritual
nature.” The new field of bioethics is a response to issues
raised by eugenics. Bioethics is based on situation ethics, which
was developed largely by Joseph Fletcher, a member of the American Eugenics Society."

"In 1968, the Eugenics Review ran an article summarizing some
of the activities of the Eugenics Society. The article quoted a
proposal made by in the late 1950s by Dr. Carlos Paton Blacker,
who had been an officer in the Eugenics Society since 1931
(Secretary, then General Secretary, then Director, then Chairman):
Code:
 That the Society should pursue eugenic ends by less obvious 
 means, that is by a policy of crypto-eugenics, which was 
 apparently proving successful in the US Eugenics Society.
In 1960, Blacker’s proposal was adopted by the Eugenics
Society.

A resolution which was accepted stated (in part):
Code:
 The Society's activities in crypto-eugenics should be pursued 
 vigorously, and specifically that the Society should increase 
 its monetary support of the FPA [Family Planning Association, 
 the English branch of Planned Parenthood] and the IPPF 
 [International Planned Parenthood Federation] and should make 
 contact with the Society for the Study of Human Biology, 
 which already has a strong and active membership, to find out if 
 any relevant projects are contemplated with which the Eugenics 
 Society could assist.
At the time this resolution was adopted by the Eugenics
Society, Blacker was the Administrative Chairman of IPPF. When IPPF was
founded in 1952, it was housed in the offices of the Eugenics
Society.

The dominant figure in the eugenics movement in the United
States, considered by the English to be a model of crypto-
eugenics, was Major General Frederick Osborn, a master
propagandist. In 1956, he said people “won’t accept the idea that
they are in general, second rate. We must rely on other
motivation.” He called the new motivation “a system of voluntary
unconscious selection.” The way to persuade people to exercise
this voluntary unconscious selection was to appeal to the idea of
“wanted” children. Osborn said, “Let’s base our proposals on the
desirability of having children born in homes where they will get
affectionate and responsible care.” In this way, the eugenics
movement “will move at last towards the high goal which Galton set
for it.”

Osborn stated the public relations problem bluntly: “Eugenic
goals are most likely to be attained under a name other than
eugenics.” He pointed to genetic counseling as a prime example:
“Heredity clinics are the first eugenic proposals that have been
adopted in a practical form and accepted by the public. … The
word eugenics is not associated with them.”

Osborn is often credited with reforming the eugenics movement
after World War II, and purging the racism. However, during the
time of this reform, he was President of the Pioneer Fund, holding
that office secretly from 1947 to 1956. The Pioneer Fund is a
notorious white supremacist organization. Obviously, a secret
racist wouldn’t purge racism; he would purge open racism, leaving
a policy that critics might call “crypto-racism.”

In 1960, a member of the Eugenics Society, Reginald Ruggles
Gates, founded a new periodical to advance racist ideas. The
Advisory Council of the new journal, Mankind Quarterly, included
yet another member of the Darwin family, Charles Galton Darwin.
One idea advanced in the journal is the belief that anthropology,
if it is understood honestly, shows that mankind is divided into
four species. The first issue stated that desegregation happened
because “American anthropologists were responsible for introducing equalitarianism into anthropology, ignoring the hereditary differences between races, …until the uninstructed public were gradually misled. Equality of opportunity, which everyone supports, was replaced by a doctrine of genetic and social equality, which is something quite different.”
Code:
                       THE SHIFT TO GENETICS
Before the war, the American Eugenics Society laid out its
research aims, including many investigations in sociology,
psychology, anthropology and biology. But they noted especially
the important new fields: population study and genetics.

After the war, research in genetics was led by one of the
German eugenicist besides von Verschuer who had continued his work, Dr. Franz J. Kallmann. He had been “associated with Dr. Ernst Rudin, investigating in genetic psychiatry.” He was half Jewish, so he was driven out of Germany in 1936 by Hitler. Nonetheless, he testified on behalf of von Verschuer after the war. Kallmann taught psychiatry at Columbia, and in 1948 he founded the American Society of Human Genetics. He became a member of the American Eugenics Society. This Society developed hundreds of prenatal tests but did not look for cures, although every test was hyped as a potential lead towards a cure.

Over the next years, at least 124 people were members of both
Kallmann’s American Society of Human Genetics and the American Eugenics Society. The overwhelming evidence of a commitment to eugenics at the American Society of Human Genetics is especially troubling when you note that members of this society promoted, developed and now lead the multi-billion dollar Human Genome Project.

Negative eugenics, or ending the over-production of the
“unfit,” is obviously well underway with widespread contraception,
sterilization and abortion. But positive eugenics, or the
increased production of the “fit,” can be advanced through
artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization and genetic
engineering. The Human Genome Project would certainly help in a scheme of positive eugenics.
Code:
               SECOND NEW FIELD: POPULATION CONTROL
After World War II, the eugenics movement discovered (or
invented) the population explosion, and whipped up global hysteria about it. From 1952 on, a major part of the eugenics movement was the population control movement. The population explosion made it possible for eugenics movement to continue its work more from the fit, less from the unfit with the same people to do the same things, but with a new public rationale.

The transformation from open eugenics to population planning
is described well by Germaine Greer: “It now seems strange that men who had been conspicuous in the eugenics movement were able to move quite painlessly into the population establishment at the highest level, but if we reflect that the paymasters were the same Ford, Mellon, Du Pont, Standard Oil, Rockefeller and Shell are still the same, we can only assume that people like Kingsley
Davis, Frank W. Notestein, C. C. Little, E. A. Ross, the Osborns
Frederick and Fairfield, Philip M. Hauser, Alan Guttmacher and
Sheldon Segal were being rewarded for past services.” That is,
the population control movement was the same money, the same
leaders, the same activities with a new excuse.

One of the organizations that promoted eugenics under the new
population rubric was the Population Council. It was founded in
1952 by John D. Rockefeller 3rd, and spent $173,621,654 in its
first 25 years. That is not a bad budget for one of the
organizations in a dead movement! Clearly, the people who think
the eugenics movement died in the rubble in Berlin do not
understand crypto-eugenics, genetics or population control!

The extent of the population control movement is hard to
imagine, and harder to exaggerate. During the past 25 years,
there have been approximately 1.5 billion surgical abortions
globally. The United Nations Population Fund has sponsored three meetings bringing together the heads of state from most of the world to develop a global population strategy, in Bucharest in
1974, Mexico City in 1984, and in Cairo in 1994. No other global
problem has been the occasion for meetings comparable to these
three. The World Bank, the U.S. Agency for International
Development, and governmental agencies from nearly all the
industrialized nations have contributed billions of dollars to
campaigns designed to decrease population growth. "
 
No. “Evolutionary theory” is the one scientists use. There are philosophies of evolution that deny God, but they are not part of science, which can make no such judgements.
This is not what the Holy See has said: the Holy Father’s message acknowledges that there are “several theories of evolution” that are “materialist, reductionist and spiritualist” and thus incompatible with the Catholic faith
Fortunately, it’s a moot point. Since there are no scientists of any consequence who say that evolutionary theory can deny God,
Again, this conflicts with what the Magisterium of the Church has said: the Holy Father’s message acknowledges that there are “several theories of evolution” that are “materialist, reductionist and spiritualist” and thus incompatible with the Catholic faith
  1. Any theories (using “theory” in the colloquial sense, because such ideas couldn’t be scientific theories) that deny God or His providence are not permissible.
The Holy Father acknowledges that there are “several theories of evolution” which are incompatible with the Catholic faith.
 
Just who are ‘my people’?
The non-scientists who denied the findings of the Darwinists. As you learned, Darwinists had completely refuted the arguments of the classic eugenists before Hitler ever took power.
Barbarian I think you are underestimating the influence eugenics had on Darwin and continues to have on science in the area of biology and medicine today.
You saw the evidence. Darwinists demonstrated that the ideas of the eugenists were fatally flawed. I could post Punnett’s demonstration for you, if you’d like to see the numbers.
There is an excellent article on the EWTN document site which outlines and traces th history of the eugenics movment showing its influence on Darwin and its continuing influence on the medical/science community of today. I recommend you review it.
How would someone’s editorial change the facts I showed you? The Fords, Mellons, and the rest were not scientists. And as you learned, Darwinists like Punnett, Morgan, and others showed that the eugenics movement was based on bad science, and that their program could not identify “defectives” and even if they could, would not work.

I will grant you that the Marxists condemned Darwinism. But not for eugenics, which Darwinists debunked.

"The whole Darwinist teaching of the struggle for existence is simply a transference from society to living nature of Hobbes’ doctrine of bellum omnium contra omnes and of the bourgeois doctrine of competition"
(From your site)

As late as the 1960s, Darwin was officially banned from the Soviet Union, and it crippled Soviet Biology which still lags behind the United States.

And Marx’s analysis was wrong. When Darwin said “competition” he did not mean “nature red in tooth and claw.” He meant the competition for resources, which was generally peacable. Nor did Darwin subscribe to Hobbes’ idea of every man at war with every other man. He described the advantages of altruism and cooperation as valuable traits.

At some point, reality has to be accomodated. This is it.
 
Barbarian observes:
No. “Evolutionary theory” is the one scientists use. There are philosophies of evolution that deny God, but they are not part of science, which can make no such judgements.
This is not what the Holy See has said: the Holy Father’s message acknowledges that there are “several theories of evolution” that are “materialist, reductionist and spiritualist” and thus incompatible with the Catholic faith
I don’t know any such “theories” in the scientific sense, although I am aware of some philosophies like that. But I suspect that the Pope was speaking of “theory” in the layman’s sense, of “idea.”

Barbarian observes:
Fortunately, it’s a moot point. Since there are no scientists of any consequence who say that evolutionary theory can deny God,
Again, this conflicts with what the Magisterium of the Church has said:
Nonsense. He said nothing about scientists. If you doubt it, name me one prominent scientist who says that science disproves God.

Barbarian observes:
Any theories (using “theory” in the colloquial sense, because such ideas couldn’t be scientific theories) that deny God or His providence are not permissible.
The Holy Father acknowledges that there are “several theories of evolution” which are incompatible with the Catholic faith.
Too bad for them, then. Evolutionary theory has no place for ideas like that. If you locate a prominent scientist who says evolutionary theory denies God’s providence, be sure to let us know, hear?
 
The non-scientists who denied the findings of the Darwinists. As you learned, Darwinists had completely refuted the arguments of the classic eugenists before Hitler ever took power.

You saw the evidence. Darwinists demonstrated that the ideas of the eugenists were fatally flawed. I could post Punnett’s demonstration for you, if you’d like to see the numbers.

You are twisting the informati0on I posted. The Darwinists did not refute classical eugenics so much as tweak it, they still had the same basic beliefs but saw they needed new arguments and new methods to achieve their end. They merely became more “politically correct” in their language.

How would someone’s editorial change the facts I showed you? The Fords, Mellons, and the rest were not scientists. And as you learned, Darwinists like Punnett, Morgan, and others showed that the eugenics movement was based on bad science, and that their program could not identify “defectives” and even if they could, would not work.

I will grant you that the Marxists condemned Darwinism. But not for eugenics, which Darwinists debunked.

Marism did not condemn Darwinism but embraced it! Where do you fet your information? Everything I have read showed that Marx saw his social theories of change paralleled in Darwin’s theories of evolution.
" Thus, natural selection directs the course of evolutionary change. This discovery by Darwin was described by Leon Trotsky as “the highest triumph of the dialectic in the whole field of organic matter.” That does not sound like a rejection to me!

"The whole Darwinist teaching of the struggle for existence is simply a transference from society to living nature of Hobbes’ doctrine of bellum omnium contra omnes and of the bourgeois doctrine of competition"
(From your site)

As late as the 1960s, Darwin was officially banned from the Soviet Union, and it crippled Soviet Biology which still lags behind the United States.

Please provide evidence that Darwin was ‘banned’. I did find that Marx criticised Darwing, but not that he totally rejected him.

"Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution revolutionised our outlook on the natural world. Before him, the prevailing view amongst scientists was that species were immutable, having been created by God for specific functions in nature. Some accepted the idea of evolution, but in a mystical form, directed by vital forces which left room for the decisive intervention of the Supreme Being. Darwin represents a decisive break with this idealist outlook. For the first time, primarily though not exclusively through a process of natural selection, evolution provided an explanation of how species have changed over billions of years, from the simplest forms of unicellular organisms to the most complex forms of animal life, including ourselves. Darwin’s revolutionary contribution was to discover the mechanism that brought about change, thereby putting evolution on a firm scientific basis.

There is a rough analogy here with the role played by Marx and Engels in the field of the social sciences. Long before them, others had recognised the existence of the class struggle. But not until Marx’s analysis of the Labour Theory of Value and the development of historical materialism, was it possible to provide this phenomenon with a scientific explanation. Marx and Engels gave enthusiastic support to Darwin’s theory which provided confirmation for their ideas, as applied to nature. On 16th January, 1861, Marx wrote to Lassalle: “Darwin’s book is very important and serves me as a natural scientific basis for the class struggle in history. One has to put up with the crude English method of development, of course. Despite all deficiencies, not only is the death-blow dealt here for the first time to ‘teleology’ in the natural sciences but its rational meaning is empirically explained.”

Darwin’s Origin of Species appeared in 1859, the same year that Marx published his Preface to the Critique of Political Economy, which fully rounded out the materialist conception of history. Darwin had worked out the theory of natural selection more than twenty years earlier, but refrained from publication for fear of the reaction to his materialist views. Even then, he only referred to human origins with the phrase “light will be thrown on the origin of man and his history.” Only when he could not hide them any longer was The Descent of Man published in 1871. Such were its disquieting ideas, Darwin was rebuked for publishing “at a moment when the sky of Paris was red with the incendiary flames of the Commune.” He studiously avoided the question of religion, although he clearly had rejected Creationism. In 1880, he wrote: “It seems to me (rightly or wrongly) that direct arguments against Christianity and Theism hardly have any effect on the public; and that freedom of thought will best be promoted by that gradual enlightening of human understanding which follows the progress of science. I have therefore always avoided writing about religion and have confined myself to science.”

marxist.com/science/marxismanddarwinism.html
 
You are twisting the informati0on I posted. The Darwinists did not refute classical eugenics so much as tweak it, they still had the same basic beliefs but saw they needed new arguments and new methods to achieve their end.
No. Punnett, for example, showed mathematically that the fundamental claims of eugenics were wrong. Morgan, once a eugenist, refuted the idea that defective alleles could be removed from a population by eugenic measures, and even showed that it was impossible to identify such alleles in most cases.
They merely became more “politically correct” in their language.
After the attacks of the Darwinists, classical eugenics was dead as a science. All that is left is genetic counseling. The eugenicists after that, were lawyers, politicians, and theologians. But no scientist of any consequence supported it, and certainly no Darwinian.

Barbarian observes:
How would someone’s editorial change the facts I showed you? The Fords, Mellons, and the rest were not scientists. And as you learned, Darwinists like Punnett, Morgan, and others showed that the eugenics movement was based on bad science, and that their program could not identify “defectives” and even if they could, would not work.

I will grant you that the Marxists condemned Darwinism. But not for eugenics, which Darwinists debunked.
Marism did not condemn Darwinism but embraced it! Where do you fet your information?
The quote was from the source you linked. Didn’t you read it?

Marxist attack on Darwin:
“The whole Darwinist teaching of the struggle for existence is simply a transference from society to living nature of Hobbes’ doctrine of bellum omnium contra omnes and of the bourgeois doctrine of competition”
(From your site)

As late as the 1960s, Darwin was officially banned from the Soviet Union, and it crippled Soviet Biology which still lags behind the United States.
Please provide evidence that Darwin was ‘banned’. I did find that Marx criticised Darwing, but not that he totally rejected him.
Learn about it here:
By the beginning of the 20th century, most scientists had accepted natural selection as the means by which species evolve. For some reason, which is yet unclear, Stalin was particularly fond of the evolutionary model that Lysenko had borrowed from Limarck. Stalin, however, chose to do major editing of Lysenko’s writings to better fit his own ideology, and at one point stated that the Michurin trend was neither neo-Lamarckian nor neo-Darwinism, but rather “creative Soviet Darwinism”. Soviet scientists that chose Darwinism over the Michurin model were either sent to the gulags or simply disappeared. “Creative Soviet Darwinism” crippled agriculture in the USSR for decades/
Scientific American. “Bush-League Lysenkoism.” Scientific American. April 26, 2004.

Marx merely criticized Darwinism; his successors made it a crime. For the reasons stated above; it is inconsistent with the marxist idea of perfectability.

All the elaborate excuses in the world won’t change what actually happened.
 
No. Punnett, for example, showed mathematically that the fundamental claims of eugenics were wrong. Morgan, once a eugenist, refuted the idea that defective alleles could be removed from a population by eugenic measures, and even showed that it was impossible to identify such alleles in most cases.

The only thing that changed seemed to be that classical Darwinism was discovered to be a process that would take many generations to bring about change. The Nazi’s were trying to speed up the process by just eliminating a race or races they thought were inferior. The new eugenics is rooted to the same tree’ of and the fruits have been abortion, birth control, genetic selctivity and manipulation bu using sperm banks with sperm from selected human being who were either higher in intelligence or had some athletic ability that was recognized as desaireable…all of this is part of the ‘new eugenics’ movement. it isn’t any less evil.

If you read the partivle I posted you can see that this new genetics was the eugenics movement with a more 'palatable" approach. They have even managed to talk individuals, mothers, family practitioners, into being part of the process by choice. They have carefully selected the language they use to make it all see innocent and moral. But the sinister side is there.

After the attacks of the Darwinists, classical eugenics was dead as a science. All that is left is genetic counseling. The eugenicists after that, were lawyers, politicians, and theologians. But no scientist of any consequence supported it, and certainly no Darwinian.
______________________________________________-
OH? Then why is it so mainstream? Why aren’t these major scientist vocally opposing what is going on. I can’t believe you are saying there is no support from scientists, most of whom are doing this research with money from funding they receive ththrough politicians, and who have lawyers to protect them…true…but it is scientists who are part of the drug/pharmaceutical companies who are supporting these genetic
experiments and policies.

Thye community near me is all doctors and dentists, but none of them speak up against these things, in fact they pretty much support (abortion, birth control, genetic counseling etc…) politically and phoilosophically despite what they should know about the negative effects many of these things are having on individuals and familes.

Barbarian observes:
How would someone’s editorial change the facts I showed you? The Fords, Mellons, and the rest were not scientists. And as you learned, Darwinists like Punnett, Morgan, and others showed that the eugenics movement was based on bad science, and that their program could not identify “defectives” and even if they could, would not work.

I will grant you that the Marxists condemned Darwinism. But not for eugenics, which Darwinists debunked.

The quote was from the source you linked. Didn’t you read it?

Marxist attack on Darwin:
“The whole Darwinist teaching of the struggle for existence is simply a transference from society to living nature of Hobbes’ doctrine of bellum omnium contra omnes and of the bourgeois doctrine of competition”
(From your site)​

Yes I read that quote from the site and I pointed out they criticised social aspects of Darwinism but overall they thought it was a break through that supported their view points. They likes the fact it approcah the development of life from a materialistic view however. They did not like the concept of 'survival of the fittest because they wanted a society of co-operation and elimination of classes. VBut they did not reject Darwinism as a whole…

As late as the 1960s, Darwin was officially banned from the Soviet Union, and it crippled Soviet Biology which still lags behind the United States.

Learn about it here:
By the beginning of the 20th century, most scientists had accepted natural selection as the means by which species evolve. For some reason, which is yet unclear, Stalin was particularly fond of the evolutionary model that Lysenko had borrowed from Limarck. Stalin, however, chose to do major editing of Lysenko’s writings to better fit his own ideology, and at one point stated that the Michurin trend was neither neo-Lamarckian nor neo-Darwinism, but rather “creative Soviet Darwinism”. Soviet scientists that chose Darwinism over the Michurin model were either sent to the gulags or simply disappeared. “Creative Soviet Darwinism” crippled agriculture in the USSR for decades/
Scientific American. “Bush-League Lysenkoism.” Scientific American. April 26, 2004.

Agriculture was crippled in the Soviet Union because they wanted lage state farms and there was no reward for indivdual ownership and work…thus taking away a sense of motivation for individuals. That was how they tweaked Darwinsim, but it doesn’t mean they rejected it all together.

Marx merely criticized Darwinism; his successors made it a crime. For the reasons stated above; it is inconsistent with the marxist idea of perfectability.

All the elaborate excuses in the world won’t change what actually happened.
Your own explanations show that they were merely re-interpreting Darwinism to fit their social models. It hardly proves they rejected it, only that they 'tweaked it" just like the scientist in our own country are doing with the genetics counseling…

Neither approach will bring good fruit because they are springing from a humanistic root rather than the root of the Divine Creator.

God Bless, MaryJohnZ
 
Originally Posted by The Barbarian
No. Punnett, for example, showed mathematically that the fundamental claims of eugenics were wrong. Morgan, once a eugenist, refuted the idea that defective alleles could be removed from a population by eugenic measures, and even showed that it was impossible to identify such alleles in most cases.
The only thing that changed seemed to be that classical Darwinism was discovered to be a process that would take many generations to bring about change.
Um, no. Punnett refuted classical eugenics, not Darwinism.
The Nazi’s were trying to speed up the process by just eliminating a race or races they thought were inferior.
Your people still thought that such a thing was possible. But as you see, Darwinists had shown that such a thing was not possible.
The new eugenics is rooted to the same tree’ of and the fruits have been abortion, birth control, genetic selctivity and manipulation bu using sperm banks with sperm from selected human being who were either higher in intelligence or had some athletic ability that was recognized as desaireable…all of this is part of the ‘new eugenics’ movement. it isn’t any less evil.
Sorry, not part of modern eugenics, which makes no such claims. All it can do is show the relative risk of reproduction under some circumstances. The rest is the province of doctors, lawyers, and politicians. If you want to change it, why waste your time on people who didn’t do it?
If you read the partivle I posted you can see that this new genetics was the eugenics movement with a more 'palatable" approach.
Sorry, it was all excuses why it wasn’t really their fault. But they could have listened to the Darwinists, who showed that it wouldn’t work.

Barbarian observes:
After the attacks of the Darwinists, classical eugenics was dead as a science. All that is left is genetic counseling. The eugenicists after that, were lawyers, politicians, and theologians. But no scientist of any consequence supported it, and certainly no Darwinian.
OH? Then why is it so mainstream?
Probably because lawyers, politicians, and theologians have more influence on society than scientists.
Why aren’t these major scientist vocally opposing what is going on.
I showed you that they have. Punnett, Morgan, Muller, and many others demonstrated that it was a foolish idea. Gould, in “The Mismeasure of Man” showed this again, and forcefully demonstrated why it was wrong.
I can’t believe you are saying there is no support from scientists,
The eugenics movement was thoroughly discredited by the Darwinists by 1930. Modern scientists from time to time have refuted the idiocies like “The Bell Curve” when they have appeared. At some point, you have to make an accomodation to reality.
Thye community near me is all doctors and dentists, but none of them speak up against these things, in fact they pretty much support (abortion, birth control, genetic counseling etc…)
Perhaps they aren’t as knowledgeable as scientists. BTW, genetic counseling is a very good thing. It can prevent all sorts of horrible disorders. If one carries a common recessive gene for a genetic disorder, then one can consider the hazards if one’s intended spouse has it.

Barbarian observes:
How would someone’s editorial change the facts I showed you? The Fords, Mellons, and the rest were not scientists. And as you learned, Darwinists like Punnett, Morgan, and others showed that the eugenics movement was based on bad science, and that their program could not identify “defectives” and even if they could, would not work.

I will grant you that the Marxists condemned Darwinism. But not for eugenics, which Darwinists debunked.

The quote was from the source you linked. Didn’t you read it?

Marxist attack on Darwin:
“The whole Darwinist teaching of the struggle for existence is simply a transference from society to living nature of Hobbes’ doctrine of bellum omnium contra omnes and of the bourgeois doctrine of competition”
(From your site)
Yes I read that quote from the site and I pointed out they criticised social aspects of Darwinism but overall they thought it was a break through that supported their view points.
If so, it’s hard to understand why Darwinism was banned in the Soviet Union.

As late as the 1960s, Darwin was officially banned from the Soviet Union, and it crippled Soviet Biology which still lags behind the United States.

Learn about it here:
By the beginning of the 20th century, most scientists had accepted natural selection as the means by which species evolve. For some reason, which is yet unclear, Stalin was particularly fond of the evolutionary model that Lysenko had borrowed from Limarck. Stalin, however, chose to do major editing of Lysenko’s writings to better fit his own ideology, and at one point stated that the Michurin trend was neither neo-Lamarckian nor neo-Darwinism, but rather “creative Soviet Darwinism”. Soviet scientists that chose Darwinism over the Michurin model were either sent to the gulags or simply disappeared. “Creative Soviet Darwinism” crippled agriculture in the USSR for decades/
Scientific American. “Bush-League Lysenkoism.” Scientific American. April 26, 2004.
Agriculture was crippled in the Soviet Union because they wanted lage state farms and there was no reward for indivdual ownership and work…
Trying to grow crops in areas in which they were unfit was certainly a greater effect. There were huge crop failures as a result. And the antiDarwinian policy prevented biological research which was crippled.

**In 1964, physicist Andrei Sakharov spoke out against Lysenko in the General Assembly of the Academy of Sciences:

He is responsible for the shameful backwardness of Soviet biology and of genetics in particular, for the dissemination of pseudo-scientific views, for adventurism, for the degradation of learning, and for the defamation, firing, arrest, even death, of many genuine scientists.**
Wikipedia

Sakharov, as you may know, was the great scientist and dissident who pressured the Soviet leadership for freedom, at a time when it was truly dangerous to do so.

Barbarian observes:
Marx merely criticized Darwinism; his successors made it a crime. For the reasons stated above; it is inconsistent with the marxist idea of perfectability.

All the elaborate excuses in the world won’t change what actually happened.
Your own explanations show that they were merely re-interpreting Darwinism to fit their social models.
Hitler re-interpreted Christianity, too. But I’m sure you would agree that it would be as wrong to blame Christians for Hitler, as it would be to blame Darwinists for eugenics.

I realize the facts are disturbing to you. But at some point, you have to accept them.
 
Originally Posted by The Barbarian
No. Punnett, for example, showed mathematically that the fundamental claims of eugenics were wrong. Morgan, once a eugenist, refuted the idea that defective alleles could be removed from a population by eugenic measures, and even showed that it was impossible to identify such alleles in most cases.

Um, no. Punnett refuted classical eugenics, not Darwinism.

Your people still thought that such a thing was possible. But as you see, Darwinists had shown that such a thing was not possible.

“My people” never thought anything of the kind…stop making judgments about who I am and how I think. Obviously I am looking up this information and learning about these things while I assume you already “knbow everything” or think you do at any rate.

Sorry, not part of modern eugenics, which makes no such claims. All it can do is show the relative risk of reproduction under some circumstances. The rest is the province of doctors, lawyers, and politicians. If you want to change it, why waste your time on people who didn’t do it?

Sorry, it was all excuses why it wasn’t really their fault. But they could have listened to the Darwinists, who showed that it wouldn’t work.

Barbarian observes:
After the attacks of the Darwinists, classical eugenics was dead as a science. All that is left is genetic counseling. The eugenicists after that, were lawyers, politicians, and theologians. But no scientist of any consequence supported it, and certainly no Darwinian.

Probably because lawyers, politicians, and theologians have more influence on society than scientists.

They need scientists to give them the basis for their policies…that is what I have said numerous times and you never quite get it.

I showed you that they have. Punnett, Morgan, Muller, and many others demonstrated that it was a foolish idea. Gould, in “The Mismeasure of Man” showed this again, and forcefully demonstrated why it was wrong.

The eugenics movement was thoroughly discredited by the Darwinists by 1930. Modern scientists from time to time have refuted the idiocies like “The Bell Curve” when they have appeared. At some point, you have to make an accomodation to reality.

Perhaps they aren’t as knowledgeable as scientists. BTW, genetic counseling is a very good thing. It can prevent all sorts of horrible disorders. If one carries a common recessive gene for a genetic disorder, then one can consider the hazards if one’s intended spouse has it.

Why not just accept what God wants for a person/ Would Ray Charles have been the musician he was if he had been cured of blindness. Why judge people with disabilities as necessarily “wrong” pr lesse than others, as they may just have other gifts that come through partly because of their genetic differences.And certainly you would agree no child should be aborted because of some possible genetic defect.

As for the church and Darwinism:

Both Gnostic and divinizing visions are incompatible with the Biblical doctrine of creation. The greatest stumbling block for antiquity was certainly the belief that God creates out of nothing, without prerequisite: ex nihilo. I think that this question is still today the key question in the entire debate about creation and evolution. What does it mean to say that God creates? The great difficulty that we have, the point — I am convinced and will also demonstrate — at which Darwin faltered and failed, is that we have no concept, no vision, no idea of what it means is to say that God is the Creator. That is because everything that we know is strictly a matter of changes, alterations. The makers of this cathedral did not construct out of nothing. They shaped stone and wood in marvelous fashion. All extra-biblical creation myths and epics take it for granted that a divine being made the world within a preexisting framework. Creatio ex nihilo, the absolutely sovereign act of creation, as the Bible attests, is — and I believe one can also say this in terms of the history of religion — something unique. We shall see how fundamentally important this is for the understanding of creation as something that God wills to be independent. That will be our next topic of discussion.

Creation and Evolution: To the Debate as It Stands
Christoph Cardinal Schönborn

"Today I wish to point out that I am not the only one who is convinced of this. The belief in creation stood like a godfather beside the cradle of modern science. I shall not demonstrate this in detail, but I am convinced of it and for good reasons. Copernicus, Galileo, and Newton were certain that the work of science means reading in the book of creation. God has written that book, and He has given men the power of understanding, in order than they may decipher it. God has written it in legible form, as a comprehensible text. It is admittedly not easy to understand, and the writing is not easy to decode, but it is possible. The entire scientific enterprise is the discovery of order, laws, connections, and relationships. Let us say, using this book metaphor: It is the discovery of the letters, the grammar, the syntax, and ultimately of the text itself that God has put into this book of creation.

The proposition that the relationship between the Church and science is a bad one, that faith and science, since time immemorial, have been in a state of interminable conflict, belongs to the enduring myths of our time, indeed, I would say, to the acquired prejudices of our time. And, of course, the notion that generally goes along with it, like a musical accompaniment, is the notion that the Church has acted as an enormous inhibitor, with science the courageous liberator. Above all, the Galileo incident is usually portrayed in the popular version in such a way that he is seen as a victim of the sinister Inquisition. Such belongs to the chapter of legenda negra, the “black legend,” which developed primarily during the Enlightenment but which does not correspond entirely to the historical record. The reality appears somewhat differently. Many historical examples demonstrate how the creation faith served as the rational foundation for scientific research. Of these, Gregor Mendel, the scientist of Brünn, is but one of a multitude whose endeavors remain indelibly with us today.

It is not true that belief in God the Creator in any way hinders the progress of science! Quite the contrary! How could the belief that the universe has a maker stand in the way of science? Why should it be an impediment to science if it understands its research, its discoveries, its construction of theories, its understanding of connections and relationships as a “study of the book of creation”? Indeed, among natural scientists there are numerous witnesses who make no secret of their faith and openly profess it, but who also expressly see no conflict between faith and science. Again, quite the contrary. The fact that conflicts nonetheless have existed and continue to exist is an issue that would require separate treatment.

Allow me to quote two short texts that express this fundamental conviction of the Church. First, there is again the First Vatican Council of 1870, where we read:
Even though faith is above reason, there can never be any real disagreement between faith and reason, since it is the same God who reveals the mysteries and infuses faith, and who has endowed the human mind with the light of reason. God cannot deny himself, nor can truth ever be in opposition to truth. (I. Vat., Dei filius, Chapter 4, CCC 159)

The conclusion to be drawn is that neither the Church nor science should fear the truth, for, as Jesus says, the truth sets us free (cf. John 8:32). The second excerpt comes from the Second Vatican Council. In the conciliar constitution, Gaudium et spes, there is more particular emphasis on the question of “Natural Science and Faith”:
Consequently, methodical research in all branches of knowledge, provided it is carried out in a truly scientific manner and does not override moral laws, can never conflict with the faith, because the things of the world and the things of faith derive from the same God.
ewtn.com/library/Theology/schonevo1.HTM

Perhaps we are talking past eachother Barbarian…when you talk disrespectfully about people of faith is it because you don’t believe or because you take for granted people of faith are all bunched in with the eugenics crowd? I don’t understand your point of view on that. I have been arguing for morality in science, science that is repectful of God’s creation and not science that
crowds out God. What are you arguing for?

I still see the present situation as one in which science has denied God and all discussion of His part in cretion…even implied
participation in Creation…resulting in the modern day culture of death. Do you think really think mo one would listen if scientists spoke out and said “you’ve got it all wrong, stop aborting babies, stop manipulating genetics. stop sex selction, stop experimenting using human embyos” because we don’t believ in those practices…It is their silence which encourages or allows all that to contiue. If they really disagree with the culture of death, as you claim, where are their voices?"

In Christ,
MaryJohnZ

Don’t really have time to formulate more thoughts right now…sorry.
 
The eugenics movement was thoroughly discredited by the Darwinists by 1930. Modern scientists from time to time have refuted the idiocies like “The Bell Curve” when they have appeared. At some point, you have to make an accomodation to reality.
Tell me more about “The Bell Curve.” I thought the people here would like that book because conservatives are against affirmative action.

There are certain things that liberals should only talk about sparingly and the contents of that book is one of those and I have read most of that book although it made me very angry. I think many liberals agree with the contents of that book, but they are usually in the closet and sometimes lie about their own beliefs.

Reading that book is not something I recommend… for me it is one of the most unpleasant intellectual odysseys on can embark upon.
 
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