What about the differences between chimps and humans?

[dlamberth]

If that's true, then maybe they should have left that clause out? but they didn't for some reason, did they?

Good question, seeing that their actions did not match the words they put into the Declaration. It's an idea that we have been fighting for since it was put to paper. But I think those words were actually a reaction with the European educated fathers of the new America in the Enlightenment philosophy than with the Bible.

 

[Humble_Disciple]

This might be graphic, but this is what chimps are really like:

What would you rather believe, that we were created in a state of innocence by a perfect God and then fell or that we descended from vile, amoral creatures? Which of these two points of view might be the better impetus for morality? Since neither can be proved or disproved, I choose the former.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

This might be graphic, but this is what chimps are really like:

What would you rather believe, that we were created in a state of innocence by a perfect God and then fell or that we descended from vile, amoral creatures? Which of these two points of view might be the better impetus for morality? Since neither can be proved or disproved, I choose the former.

That's not really an impetuous for a think on morality since humans have done much, much, MUCH, MUCH worse than chimps could ever do.

 

[HitchSlap]

Nature doesn't select squat. But you can convince guillible college kids of anything. The very term " natural selection" is a metaphor. What is actually happening is adaptation of an organism due to its environment. "Selection" implies that nature has intelligence.

Right, which is why "gullible college kids" understand ToE better than you, as they know that certain genes within a population are better suited for survival within a specific environment. That is to say, nature has selected those traits over less favorable ones.

 

[HitchSlap]

This might be graphic, but this is what chimps are really like:

What would you rather believe, that we were created in a state of innocence by a perfect God and then fell or that we descended from vile, amoral creatures? Which of these two points of view might be the better impetus for morality? Since neither can be proved or disproved, I choose the former.

Have you read de Waal's The Bonobo and the Atheist? Solid work showing how primate morals are an evolved survival trait.

 

[Humble_Disciple]

That's not really an impetuous for a think on morality since humans have done much, much, MUCH, MUCH worse than chimps could ever do.

Charles Darwin saw racial genocide, rather than a grave evil, as the survival of the fittest in action:

Darwin’s theory applies survival of the fittest to human races, suggesting that extermination of non-white races is a natural consequence of white Europeans being a superior and more successful race. Further, Darwin justifies violently overtaking other cultures because it has happened regularly throughout natural history. The arc of Darwin’s evolutionary universe evidently does not bend toward justice: He has no problem with continuing the vicious behavior of past generations...

As white Europeans “exterminate and replace” the world’s “savage races,” and as great apes go extinct, Darwin says that the gap between civilized man and his closest evolutionary ancestor will widen. The gap will eventually be between civilized man “and some ape as low as a baboon, instead of as at present between the negro or Australian and the gorilla” (201). Read that last line again if you missed it: Darwin’s theory claims that Africans and Australians are more closely related to apes than Europeans are.
The Dark Side of Darwinism | Philosophy for the Many

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

Charles Darwin saw racial genocide, rather than a grave evil, as the survival of the fittest in action:

And Christians in the American South used the Bible to support slavery, as did the Spanish in the Souther Americas.

And, and I am getting bloody sick of repeating this but some people refuse to acknowledge this: Darwin's views on race were not that extraordinary for a man living in the Victorian era. The Victorian period was not a shining beacon of racial morality and ethics.

 

[Humble_Disciple]

And Christians in the American South used the Bible to support slavery, as did the Spanish in the Souther Americas.

And, and I am getting bloody sick of repeating this but some people refuse to acknowledge this: Darwin's views on race were not that extraordinary for a man living in the Victorian era. The Victorian period was not a shining beacon of racial morality and ethics.

The difference is that the Bible condemns racism and slavery while the survival of the fittest, when applied to our own species, sanctions it.

1 Timothy 1:8-10
We know that the law is good if one uses it properly. We also know that the law is made not for the righteous but for lawbreakers and rebels, the ungodly and sinful, the unholy and irreligious, for those who kill their fathers or mothers, for murderers, for the sexually immoral, for those practicing homosexuality, for slave traders and liars and perjurers—and for whatever else is contrary to the sound doctrine.

Galatians 3:28
There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

Acts 17:26
From one man he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their lands.

Abolitionists frequently quoted the Bible to support their cause.

 

[Subduction Zone]

Nature doesn't select squat. But you can convince guillible college kids of anything. The very term " natural selection" is a metaphor. What is actually happening is adaptation of an organism due to its environment. "Selection" implies that nature has intelligence.

Your inability to understand or face reality does not change the facts. Selection is easily demonstrable. You are very confused about who is and who is not gullible in this discussion.

And no, selection makes no such implication. Please quit relying on equivocation fallacies.

 

[Warden_of_the_Storm]

The difference is that the Bible condemns racism and slavery while the survival of the fittest, when applied to our own species, sanctions it.

Except that there are passages in the Bible that tell slaver owners how to treat their slaves, and also has many Old Testament characters telling others to go and make slaves of others.

Survival of the fittest sanctions nothing.

 

[Tinker Grey]

Except that there are passages in the Bible that tell slaver owners how to treat their slaves, and also has many Old Testament characters telling others to go and make slaves of others.

Survival of the fittest sanctions nothing.

Any more than gravity sanctions pushing people off buildings.

 

[HitchSlap]

The difference is that the Bible condemns racism and slavery while the survival of the fittest, when applied to our own species, sanctions it.

I'll give you the benefit of the doubt, and I won't assume you're twelve years old.


Opinion | Racism among white Christians is higher than among the nonreligious. Here's why.

To fight racism, we need to confront religion’s racist past

The religious roots of racism in the Western world: A brief historical overview

White Supremacist Ideas Have Historical Roots In U.S. Christianity

https://www.washingtonpost.com/loca...699e8e-6512-11e9-82ba-fcfeff232e8f_story.html

 

[Hans Blaster]

What would you rather believe, that we were created in a state of innocence by a perfect God and then fell or that we descended from vile, amoral creatures? Which of these two points of view might be the better impetus for morality? Since neither can be proved or disproved, I choose the former.

This is just wishful thinking. Picking the explanation that you find more comfortable rather than examining the evidence to see what is correct.

I choose the evidence over my feelings. As someone once said: "Facts don't care about your feelings."

 

[renniks]

Right, which is why "gullible college kids" understand ToE better than you, as they know that certain genes within a population are better suited for survival within a specific environment. That is to say, nature has selected those traits over less favorable ones.

Um... nature isn't an entity. It can not " select". Some genes are more suitable so they survive. Nobody selected anything.

 

[renniks]

Your inability to understand or face reality does not change the facts. Selection is easily demonstrable. You are very confused about who is and who is not gullible in this discussion.

And no, selection makes no such implication. Please quit relying on equivocation fallacies.

If I say a certain TV show was selected, I have a suspicion you would assume a human was involved. Selection assumes a selector.
It's a poor choice of words.

 

[HitchSlap]

Um... nature isn't an entity. It can not " select". Some genes are more suitable so they survive. Nobody selected anything.

Whoooooooosh....

 

[Humble_Disciple]

This is just wishful thinking. Picking the explanation that you find more comfortable rather than examining the evidence to see what is correct.

As I've already stated, I took anthropology in college and had to write papers on the purported evidence for human evolution. I've also presented reasons, other than blind faith, for doubting this evidence.

The oscillations in finch beak sizes and the coloring of peppered months that we can observe in the present does not prove that natural selection acting on random mutation was responsible for the vast differences between chimps and humans. It's an extrapolation.

This is not just a matter of what's comfortable. From a pragmatic perspective, what belief is the better impetus for morality?

I choose the evidence over my feelings. As someone once said: "Facts don't care about your feelings."

You are saying that to probably the biggest Ben Shapiro fan in the world. It would only be relevant to this discussion if it were already proved that natural selection acting on random mutation was responsible for the vast differences between chimps and humans.

 

[HitchSlap]

You are saying that to probably the biggest Ben Shapiro fan in the world.

Say no more, I think I see what problem is.

Cheers!

 

[Hans Blaster]

You are saying that to probably the biggest Ben Shapiro fan in the world.

Figures.

 

[Humble_Disciple]

Say no more, I think I see what problem is.

Cheers!

I didn't choose the thug life. The thug life chose me.