How I came to believe (Introduction)

by dhw, Friday, October 09, 2015, 12:16 (3116 days ago) @ David Turell

DAVID: I've explained why I don't agree with Darwin other than common descent which may well be guided. Darwin vacillated about a 'creator'.
dhw: But you have not said whether you are happy with what Darwin actually wrote at the conclusion of Origin. I am also quite shocked at your continued refusal to distance yourself from those atheists and anti-Darwin theists who misrepresent Darwin's theory of evolution as “atheism's creation myth” when you have actually criticized Darwin for NOT dealing with creation and when he himself made it crystal clear that his theory was not atheistic.-DAVID: Of course I am happy with his 'creator' sentence; the issue is whether he really meant it, or was it a sop to the religious. -That is not the issue at all. His theory has been accepted by millions of theists, which proves his claim that it did not need to offend the religious, and so it is absurd to say that it is atheistic. His theory set out to prove common descent, as opposed to the biblical version of separate creation, and quite explicitly did not seek to disprove the existence of God.
 
DAVID: I also have noted that atheists use Darwin because the theory of evolution is totally a chance mechanism which fits their agenda. The word 'creation' also encompasses the process of evolution in which new forms are 'created'.-You know as well as I do what “creation myth” was referring to, but we needn't play word games since you also refused to distance yourself from the statement: “Aside from the obvious (and intriguing) challenge of understanding the enormous complexity of life's information payload, evolution purports to explain its origins”. You acknowledge that Darwin's theory does not cover the origin of life, you know that he categorically stated that his theory was not anti-religious, but still you won't condemn those who twist the theory to suit their agenda, whether theistic or atheistic. I wonder what you're afraid of.