A Quote by Huston Smith
One reason education undoes belief is its teaching of evolution; Darwin's own drift from orthodoxy to agnosticism was symptomatic. Martin Lings is probably right in saying that more cases of loss of religious faith are to be traced to the theory of evolution ... than to anything else.
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More cases of loss of religious faith are to be traced to the theory of evolution. . .than to anything else.
Creationists reject Darwin's theory of evolution on the grounds that it is "just a theory". This is a valid criticism: evolution is indeed merely "a theory", albeit one with ten billion times more credence than the theory of creationism - although, to be fair, the theory of creationism is more than just a theory. It's also a fairy story. And children love fairy stories, which is presumably why so many creationists are keen to have their whimsical gibberish taught in schools.
Alfred Russel Wallace, the codiscoverer of the theory of natural selection. Following their twin announcements of the theory in 1858, both Darwin and Wallace struggled like Laocoöns with the serpentine problem of human evolution and its encoiling difficulty of consciousness. But where Darwin clouded the problem with his own naivete, seeing only continuity in evolution, Wallace could not do so.
A Chinese paleontologist lectures around the world saying that recent fossil finds in his country are inconsistent with the Darwinian theory of evolution. His reason: The major animal groups appear abruptly in the rocks over a relatively short time, rather than evolving gradually from a common ancestor as Darwin's theory predicts. When this conclusion upsets American scientists, he wryly comments: "In China we can criticize Darwin but not the government. In America you can criticize the government but not Darwin."
No teaching that is not based on reason can be tolerated by critical minds, but the belief that an accident of blind force produces this highly organized world is far more fantastic than the theory that a Super Intelligence devised its ordered evolution.
Even if it were true that evolution, or the teaching of evolution, encouraged immorality that would not imply that the theory of evolution was false.
The fact of evolution is the backbone of biology, and biology is thus in the peculiar position of being a science founded on an unproved theory -is it then a science or a faith? Belief in the theory of evolution is thus exactly parallel to belief in special creation - both are concepts which believers know to be true but neither, up to the present, has been capable of proof.
My attempts to demonstrate evolution by an experiment carried on for more than 40 years have completely failed.....It is not even possible to make a caricature of an evolution out of paleobiological facts...The idea of an evolution rests on pure belief.
...evolution is not a religious tenet, to which one swears allegiance or belief as a matter of faith.. It is a factual reality of the empirical world. Just as one would not say 'I believe in gravity," one should not proclaim 'I believe in evolution.
Evolution is a theory, and it's a theory that you can test. We've tested evolution in many ways. You can't present good evidence that says evolution is not a fact.
Evolution is promoted by its practitioners as more than mere science. Evolution is promulgated as an ideology, a secular religion - a full-fledged alternative to Christianity, with meaning and morality. I am an ardent evolutionist and an ex-Christian, but I must admit that in this one complaint - ...and Mr. Gish is but one of many to make it - the literalists are absolutely right. Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution today.
Some claim evolution is just a theory. As if it were merely an opinion. The theory of evolution, like the theory of gravity, is a scientific fact. Evolution really happened. Accepting our kinship with all life on Earth is not only solid science. In my view, it’s also a soaring spiritual experience.
Even though their arguments did not invoke religion, I think we all know what's behind these arguments. They're trying to protect religious beliefs from contradiction by science. They used to do it by prohibiting teachers from teaching evolution at all; then they wanted to teach intelligent design as an alternative theory; now they want the supposed "weaknesses" in evolution pointed out. But it's all the same program - it's all an attempt to let religious ideas determine what is taught in science courses.
I have a standing offer of $250,000 to anyone who can give any empirical evidence (scientific proof) for evolution. My $250,000 offer demonstrates that the hypothesis of evolution is nothing more than a religious belief.
You know, Darwin said through natural selection things go gradually, and he was talking about pigeon's evolution or horses evolving, getting faster. But in fact if you look at evolution on a bigger scale, cosmic evolution and you look at culture evolution you see it jumps, it goes through phase changes, and that's very exciting.
Natural Selection is not Evolution. Yet, ever since the two words have been in common use, the theory of Natural Selection has been employed as a convenient abbreviation for the theory of Evolution by means of Natural Selection, put forward by Darwin and Wallace. This has had the unfortunate consequence that the theory of Natural Selection itself has scarcely ever, if ever, received separate consideration.
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