Is Evolution a Dangerous Idea? If so, why?

Your entire post is excellent, Thomas, but extension to nonscience issues would be misusing a theory that is intended for natural science. In my opinion, only the misuse of evolutionary theory would be dangerous.

Darwins ideas were dangerous to Darwin and, presumably to all who have the hutzpah to defy the belief in a loving, caring deity who, in order to show his love for his favorite critters, (humans). Darwin developed three central tenets of his theory

1. Everything living is releated to everything else and, in fact, had descended from " ancestors in common ". DArwin had some real evidence to show this. To do this, he adopted Huttons thinking that "the world is really old", older than religious books would have you believe. If that aint dangerous , The Reverend Bishop Wilberforce made a career of trying to smoke Darwin at every occasion (until the Rev was killed in an accident )

2 Darwin experimented on pidgeions, barnacles, bees and rodents-and he came up with a mechanism for his concept of "transmutation". He called it Natural Slection, as opposed to artificial selection practiced by animal breeders for centuries. The dangerous part of this was that his natural selection was "mindless mechanistsic, and as Thomas said an algorithm. No Gods Need Apply, was what everyone heard .

3 These changes of form accrued in little, bits at a time from generation to generation from "Ga" grandparents to descendents. This was spat at by Creation ists who believed that everything was pretty much "CREATED" in a form that was "fully formed" at origin. ASO for the Creationists to be right, all of Darwins, and oither scientists who followed, were wrong about all thoawe fossils that seemed to occur in intervals in the stratigraphic record. Thats dangerous out of hand to Creation "science". It then makes all the other myths suspect. VERRY DANGEROUS

We know today that DArwin was probably wrong in his fallback on natural selection. Hoqwever, this was a mechanism that , without the 200 years of subsequent data , Made pwerfect scientific sense. Now, with all of our evidence that shows that entire new faunal assembages occur after huge cataclysmic events and broad environmental changes,, we are fairly ure that most evolution is adaptive. GENOMICS, (the kind where scientists can actually look at "fossil genes ferom divergent living species) has enabled us to understand the actual relationships between LIVING species and speculate how they may have developed through paleohistory.

Daniel Dennet wrote a really good book , surprisingly called "DARWIN's DANGEROUS IDEA", Within which he critiques several concepts and beliefs in evolution, like Wrights "Evolution of God" and the concepts of Social Evolution. As Wandel said, its a theory of natural science that has been stretched to conveniently fit other less relevant areas . These too are dangerous to the science because they are mainly full of spweculation and holes of evidence which affects credibility of the theory.

Dennet is a cool ol fart.I have his picture in my office next tho a woodcut of DArwin. Heres his picture I found in Wiki

In 2006 he suffere3d a major heart problem which had him on deaths door. He was saved by a long operation and some tricky sewing. His friends and relatives , upon seeing him as he recuperated, aid that they prayed for him constantly. to which Dennet aske
"DID you als sacrifice a goat"?

Everything they do was not natures doing, it is called engineering because nature does not do it.

I did. Now of you were to ask about what I posted rather than pretend you dont understand we might be able to get somewhere.

1) Sociology and political science are sciences.

2) Successful theories in one science are applied in other sciences all the time. Witness the application of game theory and Malthusian economics to evolutionary biology, or of matrix algebra to quantum mechanics, or of quantum mechanics to Chemistry. It doesn't matter what field a theory was originally intended for.

3) So what if some scientific theories are dangerous to some things? Not everything in the world is worth preserving, and endangering the things that are not is fine.

What Thomas said.

One point I forgot in my first direct response to your question: Evolution is an immediate danger to Christianity, the world's most believed-in religion. Almost every time a community of Christians gathers in church, they recite the Apostle's Creed, which begins: "I believe in god, the Father Almighty, maker of Heaven and Earth." Together with modern cosmology, evolution removes a powerful reason for believing that there is a heaven, and that Earth had a creator at all. In this sense, the fact of biological evolution is a direct threat to one of the most powerful schools of thought on this planet.

By extension, evolution also threatens every religion that ever spun off from Christianity. That includes Islam, the second-most-believed-in religion on this planet.

Certainly fine by me

Theres a built in fallacy because theories arent assembled into a monolithic structure they are severble. The components of nat selection are only underpinned by natural science , not social sciences.

Projection is not scientific prediction. Governmental theories that "based their being" on Darwin were only projecting based on some desired outcome, not scientific fact. So far, no valid predictions in social sciences have been successfully applied. . even a lot of pure hard science gets tossed under the bus as something more defensible comes along. Gould and Eldredge are some of the latest victims.

Malthus was actually considered by Darwin when he undertook his "notebooks on transmutation". His idea, as precious as it was derived from Malthusian concepts of limited resources. Darwin used Malthus to conceive of the reason for nat selection as a way to breed more successful competitors for these limited resources. Darwin didnt know that every 600000 years or so, some really big cataclysmic event did a smack-down and caused new "hopeful monsters" to adapt fater and better fit the new niches that had been abandoned by the noiw dead "master races"

BENEATH that statement is a really dangerous concept that all this goings on sans Gods is pure fuckin materialism . (Thats one of the precepts that torques guys like our past friend RL(and one or two others) off--he really NEEDS a god behind all this science).

The overall issue is simply CONTROL, anything that questions the bases for all this shamananaism and mythos and priesthoods can topple the control mechanisms. Djever wonder why all the worlds religions (except maybe animistic ones) are so vested in Pomp and long established tradition? Its the priests making demands on behalf of the Gods who only talk to them.


Its still impossible to get elected for public office in the US if youre an atheist. Try it sometime.

That used to be true ten years ago. Meanwhile, one US Congressman from California by the name of Pete Stark has come out as an atheist. More power to Stark! And more power to the Californians who elected him!

HE came out! Lets see if he gets re-elected now that his godlessness is known by all right thinking people

Since the San Francisco Chronicle published this article about him in 2007, and since he's still in the House, I figure he already did get reelected. Glory glory halleluja! His truth is marching on.

DAYUM. well, he breaks the myth. Now, lets see ifn we can get somethin like this done in ALABAMA

Rubbish ! I can make an accident at the bottom of a hill by pushing a car from the top and then letting go. Am I not responsible for the making, yet I wasnt even there. God can still be responsible for creation by the mechanisms we see all around us...evolution, the big bang...When you can tell me what happened before the Big Bang you might have some credibility...in the meantime you are denying the universe was created when there is no evidence to suggest otherwise.

Evolution is an immediate danger to Christianity, the world's most believed-in religion.
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In Scandinavia and Germany where we have/had religous instructrions in even state schools we learn/learned about creation and in sience about evolution.
Nobody ever thought about that as a contradiction or in any way a danger for Christianity.
I must admit I hardly ever run into members of obscure Christian sects. I think sects are more dangerous than evolution, at least for the believers.

This is why Evolution is dangerous. Religionists feel that, absent any evidence against a creator, Must default TO a Creator. AScience just really doesnt give a **** because its too busy to worry about boogeypeople and "loving gods who created a nice apartment for humans".
One of the really funny points for religionism is that how quickly mainstream religions have attempted to embrace their dogma to continually found evidences of the development of this planet.
If a really asuper "intelligent designer " was involved, he really was a **** up , what with all the species that seem to be terminal and all the cataclysmic events that have befallen earth so that life had to ADAPT to entirely new conditions. If an intelligent designer were really out there and at work, its methods have merely shown life to be a "good luck/bad luck" proposition.
The Big Bang leaves evidence of its happening via the shape of the universe and by the remnant energy detectable in sequential "layers" of the universe disc. I find the evidence less than satisfying but I find no evidence at all for "Let there be light"

The universe was created. You are just arguing who or what.

Im not arguing. I dont really give a **** beyond what evidence shows. If you want to violently argue that point. Go find someone who cares.

I have the evidence and the fossils, Im satisfied in predictive science > i dont need boogeypeople and sky hooks (to quote Dr Dennet)

The concept of "The Dangerous Idea" is that the right thinkers have very little desire to actually think about what evolution is applicable to. This very simple and elegant idea , (perhaps the greatest idea of the past millenium), has become the basis of all biological and most developmental medical research. Many "parochial" schools (not only Christian Fundamental) need to CONTROL the entire playing field so that they dont lose their own constituencies. A Too well educated laity is a bad thing for religions.

I love this response the most of any in the thread.