Thank God for Evolution

Worse.

They would be called frook and quinor. That’s even too flattering.

Clooc. Swarn. Bitor.

Lol those are actually good names.

Listen I can’t do it.

Creatheism
[size=75]“We have all heard some
fundamentalist-minded person say
something like, ‘Don’t tell me I’m
related to monkeys.’
The fact of the matter is that now
that we have discovered DNA and
its code, we know that we are not
only related to monkeys, we are
related to zucchini. So let’s get over it.”[/size]
—MARLIN LAVANHAR

Hey everybody. Sorry for being absent for awhile ; heath issues.

First off I’m a newbie out here. I’m just beginning to get my see (sic) legs.

I feel to admit that I’m drawn to Thank God for Evolution because I identify with the author’s life journey. We both were ‘born-againers.’ We have that in common. And we both left it behind but can’t get it out of our system. After all – as Dowd has it, now that he’s a evangelist of evolution – that we’re in the middle of a so far 13.8 billion process of evolution, evolution has brought us to here, and is continuing when we – the royal we at present – are long gone.

In short, Dowd does claim that we evolved from early life forms, like reptiles, apes and such (simplifying), even earlier of course, so evolution has left those inborn natures lingering within us ; such as, the basics : “Eat, Survive, Reproduce.” But those natures and instincts were for challenges back then, don’t fit well today, and give us problems and challenges in our modern age (and maybe is why we live in a postmodern age – produced by those inborn natures, mixed with modernism … IMHO.

Here Dowd speaks of what he likes to call, “The Monkey Mind” :

"Why does our “Monkey Mind” exhaust us with incessant chatter, and what can we do about it?

This part of our brain, the neocortex, could be called our chatterbox, calculator, or computer brain because it is incessantly talking to itself (fretting about the past and worrying about the future), performing rudimentary cost-benefit analyses, and computing the balance of favors and debts in each of Furry Li’l Mammal’s social relationships. Monkey Mind is the nickname I shall choose here, because that name is already in use by Buddhists, . . ."
Dowd, Michael. Thank God for Evolution (p. 16 and p. 150). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

I thank god for absolute order and Universal determinism.
Actually, that’s redundant.
I thank the uni-verse for its absoluteness.

Saves me from myself.

Okay, thank God for evolution. But who do we thank for devolution? As Mark Twain quipped : “I don’t believe in evolution. Man devolved. Into the lowest form of animal on the earth.” - Paraphrased from memory.

What does Dowd do with that?

He’d have to somehow integrate two seemingly conflicting myths: i.e. that of the fall of man and that of human progress.

But Dowd does do that. As to the lowest form of animal on the earth, Dowd does admit our animal ancestry. He names them :

Furry Li’l Mammal
Lizard Legacy
Monkey Mind

According to Dowd, these are latent animal instincts within us, that give us challenges and troubles we have to deal with in life. He calls them “inherited proclivities.” To Dowd these are what produced the notion of the fall, formed by people long in the past, that knew nothing of evolution from simple chemical reactions in the prebiotic soup, to animals and plants. So not knowing evolution they named these ‘lower’ animal instincts ‘the fall.’

But Dowd contradicts Twain. To him man didn’t devolve into the lowest form of animal on the earth, but into the highest form of animal on the earth.

So Dowd does “integrate two seemingly conflicting myths.”

Dowd, apparently not able to let go of his Baptist indoctrination, now preaching to fellow Christians, about thanking God for evolution, blending evolutionary theory with Christian teachings and principles, writes in this book, of “day and night language.”

Day language is :

Night language is :

Dowd admits, in so many words, that, his target audience is those in Christendom. He passionately wants Christians to catch onto the deep time and deep space of what he considers “The Greatest Story Ever Told.” Therefore he wants them to still cling to their night language/experience, of their religion and Bible, while embracing the day language/experience of facts and 13.8 billion years evolution.

Facts are God’s native language, says Dowd. God is still revealing His truths today, with discoverings of the scientists, like He was in night language days, but now revealing them in day language.

Almost finished reading Dowd’s book. I find it a delight to read and for some time have been in full agreement with his findings on science and religion as being compatible. Great read, well written and thought out. Thanks for suggesting the work, Awareness.

Prehistoric evidence shows that the gods were there when humanity became self-conscious. When modernity banishes the gods it does so at the cost of the depth of the human soul.

Golly … gee willikers (pun intended) … I’ll be darned … someone out here read the book … and enjoys it as much as I.

I think the title is attractive to some – maybe magnetic – intriguing to some, and downright stupid to some. And it’s the latter Dowd wishes to reach ; those that think evolution is a hoax ; the Bible believers, that take it literal.

And judging by the Creation Museum here in Kentucky, also take The Flintstones literal, with pictures of humans riding dinosaurs.

Thanks Ierrellus …

goodreads.com/work/quotes/1 … s-religion

Great quotes promethean75. Thanks.
Methinks Dowd would agree with Ludwig’s anthropological materialism. To Dowd God is Reality, that is immanent in every tiny-weeny part of what she/he/it/they have produced, thru – The Greatest Story ever Told – of the evolution of the universe, up to the thoughts reading this page.

Dowd’s targeted audience is the Biblically based young earth creationists – otherwise known as young-earther’s ; those that want no part of evolving, that are hanging onto what Dowd terms ‘books written by “flat earthers.”’

Still today, they seek to deny deep space and deep time, and hold that evolution is one of the greatest hoaxes ever imposed upon MANkind (not humankind).

But isn’t their source/ancestry the same as everything else that exists today? Has evolution evolved anti-evolution resistance?

What we know about evolution is informed by the past, like archaeology, and anthropology. We know not where evolution is going. The dinosaurs went extinct. Is that the fate of the human species too?

Dowd, in his book – Thank God for Evolution – waxes rather preachy at times. In fact, entire sections of his book waxes preachy. It like he’s trying to push evolution along, trying to transform the human race into a more fair and just society, seeking to transform our institutions, religions, and corporations.

But that might not be where evolution is going at all. The human race might need to become extinct, to make room for another more improved species, like humans replaced dinosaurs.

As a result, In his preaching, his efforts to improve humankind, Dowd might be trying to piss up a rope. Some things are just impossible … without starting all over.

The human species has brought the 6th great extinction on the planet. Without a radical change in direction, it looks like we will destroy ourselves. Saving ourselves and life on the planet would require an unprecedented level of global cooperation. Apocalyptical Christians expect divine intervention from above and sometimes use it on as an argument for doing nothing to save ourselves from global environmental disaster. Spiritually minded evolutionists have repeatedly hoped for and sometimes worked towards a rise in global environmental consciousness that will lead to effective world-wide action. We may have already passed the tipping point where we can’t do anything about it. But despair which leads to doing nothing becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Let’s face it. The 6th great extinction is not all the rage. In fact, I doubt all but a small percent of the almost 8 billion people on the globe know about it. And given the silence on ILP, toward your post, reveals even those that know about it don’t care.

Being human is universal among this 8 billion population. And humans will seek to meet their immediate needs, with little thought, or options to consider long term.

This is evolution at work. It might not look good for me and you, and us, but in the last 13.8 billion years evolution has done what from our present view some pretty crazy things. Perchance in this case, that we don’t care that we’re extincting ourselves. Evolution is inexplicable to human mentation. Who knows what it’s doing.

In better news, I suppose :

Humans are still evolving: 3 examples of recent adaptations
https://www.inverse.com/mind-body/humans-still-evolving-3-recent-adaptations

Maybe they’ve lost hope. ttbook.org/interview/can-we … rld-doomed

I’m a bit on the “ouch we’re allll gonna die” side of the fence too tbh. 3 things, in order of probability, give me some small hope.

  1. proliferation of small nuclear reactors.
  2. successful fusion.
  3. alien intervention.

Our problems are really always energy problems. With enough cheap energy, everything is doable. The new design small nuclear reactors are safer, cheaper to build, and use pellets of not very disasterously dirty fuel. And clean. Fusion is the same, but a lot better on all counts. Plus yay, bonus helium. Or whatever.

Solves the water shortage problem with cheap desalination, and hell, worst comes to the worst, refidgerate the poles or some other whacky idea.

If neither of those things get off the ground… then damn, seemingly we do have aliens flitting around in the shadows, hopefully they’ll take pity on us and fix the planet.

Needless to say, we won’t fix things by cooperating - on a global scale - to cut emissions, humans just aren’t wired that way - hyperbolic discounting etc.

Hey Tab, hope you’re doing well.

And it’s five, six, seven, open up the pearly gates,
Well there ain’t no time to wonder why,
Whoopie! We’re all gonna die - Country Joe

  1. proliferation of small nuclear reactors.
    Maybe something like SNAP units - Systems for Nuclear Auxiliary Power
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Systems_for_Nuclear_Auxiliary_Power#SNAP-27

Back in the 60s there was thought to putting them into homes. But was decided against because it would be an easy grab for uranium.

They did put them into outer space, for power units up there. The downside to that is that when they come down – what goes up must come down – they break up and spew uranium into the atmosphere, and breathing in one particle smaller than the naked eye can see means certain death from cancer.

  1. successful fusion.
    From what little I know about Fusion is that so far it’s a pipe dream.

  2. alien intervention.
    They’d likely just wipe us out, for being such primitive barbaric animals.

Well we can’t go back. We can’t even go back to the mid 1800s, when population was only one billion. And most certainly can’t go back to “the garden,” back when we were hunter gathers.

We can only go forward from here, and so are dependent upon science to save us. Maybe evolution is doing science now. Let’s hope ; hope that science doesn’t destroy us before it has a chance to save us.

Otherwise, Whoopie! We’re all gonna die … and we become into the history bin of evolution … a very big heap so far.

[A] mood of universal destruction and renewal…has set its mark on our
age. This mood makes itself felt everywhere, politically, socially, and
philosophically. We are living in what the Greeks called the kairos–the
right moment–for a “metamorphosis of the gods,” of the fundamental
principles and symbols. This peculiarity of our time, which is certainly
not of our conscious choosing, is the expression of the unconscious
human within us who is changing. Coming generations will have to take
account of this momentous transformation if humanity is not to destroy
itself through the might of its own technology and science…So much is
at stake and so much depends on the psychological constitution of the
modern human.
C. G. Jung (died on June 6,1961)