Materialism

Bertvan@aol.com
Thu, 25 Nov 1999 10:44:06 EST

The evolution/creation debate is rarely about science; it is about
philosophy. Materialism against all other philosophies. There is nothing
wrong with someone promoting a philosophy of materialism. It is wrong to try
to impose it upon society as "scientific truth". All the facts about
evolution known at this time could be compatible with many philosophies. We
don't know how major variations and increased complexity arose. They could
have occurred by some materialist mechanism, without purpose, plan or design.
Or they could have occurred in accordance with some unknown design and
purpose. Most Darwinists in this debate don't seem capable of such
tolerance. They insist evolution be defined as something which contradicts
everything except a materialist philosophy. No one denies life might be
explained by naturalistic theories. However, at this point naturalistic
explanations have no claim to absolute "truth". Darwinists seem hung up on
the possibility of the existence of a "designer". Science should forget
about any "designer" and concentrate on figuring out the details of the
design. If one exists. If a design does indeed exist, the efforts of those
scientists who work under that assumption will probably prove to be more
fruitful. There are people, called Young Earth Creationists, who cite the
bible as scientific evidence, and Darwinists like to claim they are typical
of everyone criticizing Darwinism. That is not true of any of the critics of
Darwinism on this board. I suspect many scientists are not committed
materialists, but they have been intimidated by those who are. They
probably fear being called a YEC if they voice any public skepticism of
orthodox Darwinism. So when they say the things quoted by Steve Jones, they
also repeat the mantra, "But I believe in Darwinism, I believe in Darwinism,
I believe in Darwinism."
Bertvan