Thursday, February 09, 2006

DARWIN DAY IS GETTING CLOSE

FEBRUARY 12TH IS THE BIRTHDATE OF CHARLES DARWIN

Saturday, February 12th, is the 197th birthday of Charles Darwin. It is difficult to rank Darwin’ genius alongside other scientific geniuses such as Einstein, Newton and Copernicus. Newton’s work is a more useful to our everyday lives. Einstein’s theories are fundamentally brilliant and prescient. But Darwin answered the big question. How did we get here? What is the place of all life on earth? What might we become?

The Author frequently writes on evolution and the battle between established science and the ignorance peddler’s that promote so-called “Intelligent Design”. There is established evolutionary science and there is intentional ignorance. And the politicians and hucksters that prey upon the intentionally ignorant. So let’s remember there is no theory of “Intelligent Design”. It is not dead. It was never alive. It slouches as a zombie, blind, chafing thighs, never far from the sepulchers of tyrants, whether long dead or slowly expiring.

EVENTS ALL AROUND THE WORLD AND HERE AT HOME

The website for Darwin Day is:
http://www.darwinday.org/englishL/home/index.html?
Events are planned all over America, including Indiana and New Mexico. The Author will probably attend one. And he urges his readers to attend an event. A list of events is also on the Darwin Day website at:
http://www.darwinday.org/englishL/home/2006.php

Many of these events, at least in America, will be at churches. The central theme is the obvious fact that science and religious faith are not mutually exclusive. And that evolution may exist within a spiritual worldview.

And it you can’t make a Darwin Day event, celebrate in your own way. Read an article[i] or a website about evolution. Check out a documentary show on cable. Or do nothing but marvel at the world around us filled with life forms so uniquely evolved over billions of years of natural selection. Or just be you. Billions of years of natural selection have given you that ability!

AND DON'T FORGET HONEST ABE

February 12th is also the 197th birthday of the Great Emancipator, President Abraham Lincoln. Both men, both great men, were born on the same day.

HUMBLE BUT INSPIRED IN THE DESERT OF THE REAL!

[i] http://www.biologie.uni-hamburg.de/b-online/e36_2/darwin_influence.htm
This article, “Darwin’s Influence on Modern Thought”, by renowned biologist Ernst Mayr, is worth the time and effort.