Op-Ed in LATimes implies Darwin an atheist, despite his autobio saying

[papau]

that after training to be a Christian Vicar, he later became a "theist", and at death an agnostic - so why the lie? Or am I reading too much into the op-ed?

http://www.update.uu.se/~fbendz/library/cd_relig.htm
The Autobiography of Charles Darwin

1.)With respect to immortality<5>, nothing shows me how strong and almost instinctive a belief is, as the consideration of the view now held by most physicist, namely that the sun with all the planets will in time grow too cold for life, unless indeed some great body dashes into the sun and thus gives it fresh life. -- Believing as I do that man in the distant future will be a far more perfect creature than he now is, it is an intolerable thought that he and all other sentinent beings are doomed to complete annihilation after such long-continued slow progress. To those who fully admit the immortality of the human soul, the destruction of our world will not appear so dreadful. Another source of conviction in the existance of God connected with the reason and not the feelings, impresses me as having much more weight. This follows from the extreme difficulty or rather impossibility of conceiving this immense and wonderful universe, including man with his capability of looking far backwards and far into futurity, as the result of blind chance or necessity. When thus reflecting I feel compelled to look at a first cause having an intelliegent mind in some degree analogous to that of man; and I deserve to be called a THEIST.

2.) cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things is insoluble to us; and I for one must be content to remain an AGNOSTIC.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-darnton19sep19,0,1286695.story?track=tottext

The devolution of a believer
By John Darnton
JOHN DARNTON, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist for the New York Times, is the author of "The Darwin Conspiracy," published this month by Knopf.

September 19, 2005

<snip>To me, the explanation for these eccentricities seems clear. A gentle and nonconfrontational if unshakable soul, Darwin was paying a personal price for following the dictates of scientific principles to their logical end. When he began his career as a naturalist, he was a believer — originally he wanted to become a country vicar — but he followed his formidable intellect wherever it led, and it caused him to become the instrument that would overturn the hallowed dogma of Western religion. <snip>

As he aged, Darwin's atheistic convictions became stronger. He conceded Wallace's point that the phrase "survival of the fittest" (coined by the philosopher and biologist Herbert Spencer) was preferable to "natural selection" because it eliminated the idea of an entity doing the selecting. Back when he wrote "The Origin of Species" (which appeared in 1859), he probably could "be called a theist," he noted later. But by the time he was in his 60s, receiving visitors at Down House as a famous thinker revered around the world, he readily described himself as a nonbeliever.

In his autobiography, written at the age of 73, he takes Christianity to task and looks upon the religious impulse as something that's simply instinctual, "akin to a monkey's fear of a snake," as his biographer, Janet Browne, noted.

To read Browne's book is to get a sense of a man of steely intellect, brave enough to confront "a godless universe." For ultimately, if animals and plants are the result of impersonal, immutable forces, she observes, then "the natural world has no moral validity or purpose." We are all of us, dogs and barnacles, pigeons and crabgrass, the same in the eyes of nature, equally remarkable and equally dispensable.<snip>

[tocqueville]

1. Wikipedia gives this...

Charles Darwin

In 1879, as Darwin was writing his autobiography, a letter came asking if he believed in God and if theism and evolution were compatible. He replied that a man "can be an ardent Theist and an evolutionist," citing Charles Kingsley and Asa Gray as examples. As for himself, he had "never been an Atheist in the sense of denying the existence of a God". He added, "I think that generally (and more and more as I grow older), but not always, that an Agnostic would be a more correct description of my state of mind."

On Thursday, September 28, 1881, Darwin was visited by the atheist Doctor Ludwig Büchner and Edward Aveling (later the partner of Eleanor Marx). Darwin's son Frank was present, and Darwin's wife Emma invited their old friend the Reverend Brodie Innes. Darwin wittily explained that " & I have been fast friends for 30 years. We never thoroughly agreed on any subject but once and then we looked at each other and thought one of us must be very ill." In discussions after dinner Darwin asked his guests, "Why do you call yourselves Atheists?" saying that he preferred the word "Agnostic." Aveling replied that "Agnostic was but Atheist writ respectable, and Atheist was only Agnostic writ aggressive." Darwin responded by asking, "Why should you be so aggressive?" wondering what was to be gained from forcing new ideas on people when freethought was "all very well" for the educated, but were ordinary people "ripe for it?" Aveling then asked what if "the revolutionary truths of Natural and Sexual Selection" had been confined to the "judicious few" and he had delayed publication of the Origin of Species, where would the world be? Surely "his own illustrious example" encouraged freethinkers to proclaim truth "abroad from the house-tops." But while Darwin agreed that Christianity was "not supported by the evidence," he had been in no rush to force this idea on anyone and, in fact, "I never gave up Christianity until I was forty years of age."

[papau]

4. Agrees with Agnostic - and shows no push to atheist - thanks for

the posting.

Your postt agrees with the auto-bio, and indeed with the history of the Darwin family (the family did indeed have many atheists in it, and had also many atheist friends).

I just wonder why the LAT fellow felt the need to take it a step firther than the historical record seems to justify.

[wtmusic]

2. Darnton would do well to base his opinion on Darwin's autobiography

not Janet Browne's biography, in which she interprets agnosticism as the acknowledgement of "a godless universe."

Like most evangelists, her need to anthropomorphize is unrelenting:
'For ultimately, if animals and plants are the result of impersonal, immutable forces, she observes, then "the natural world has no moral validity or purpose."'

No God, no morals. Whatever.

[enlightenment]

3. Term confusion, imo.

The issue seems to be the term "atheistic convictions," which seems too strong for the remainder of the piece. Darwin sounds like a comfortable agnostic -- he believed what he KNEW; what could be proved and verified.

I am agnostic -- "without knowledge" because I DO NOT KNOW if there is a god or gods or not. (I am also content not knowing; comfortable fence-sitting, as it were)
I am not atheist -- "without god" because to be that would imply that I HAVE knowledge of something that has not been proved, to my satisfaction (scientifically verifiable).

It is not a subtle difference, in my opinion; but many people lump agnostics and atheists together, for convenience sake, I suppose.

[papau]

5. I agree

:-)

[beam me up scottie]

8. I'd say you were also a victim of term confusion.

I, along with many other atheists on DU, do not claim to have "knowledge of something that has not been proved".

That is the common theist's definition of atheist.

[papau]

10. sigh ... whatever

It is good to see you have such faith that logic is not needed.

[beam me up scottie]

12. Atheists don't need FAITH, we have truth and logic.

I see you're still trying to bait us.

Sad, really.

If only you were better at it you might get more of that much desired attention.

If you want flames, it helps to know your subject.

[trotsky]

16. It's your desperation to assign atheists with "faith"

that is amusing to say the least. Does it make your religious beliefs stronger, to try and label people?

[jobycom]

6. That section of his autobiography doesn't make him sound like a believer

He does claim to be an agnostic, and to have been a Diest at the time the Origin of the Species was written, but he also says the "religious sentiment was never strong" in him, and he says he was doubting the Old Testament and miracles even while on the Beagle. His life is a journey away from belief, and many of his ideas are "atheistic," even in the Autobiography passage you link, even if he says he was agnostic.

Plus, from his letters and conversations with friends, we know that he was trying to soften the public disapproval of his disbelief. By the time he was forty, after the death of his daughter, he told friends and IIRC wrote letters saying he no longer believed in a personal god. His autobiography says that his fathewr advised him to keep his thoughts from his fiance as he was considering marriage, in his 30s.

His life, even in this autobigraphy section, was marked by his rejection of belief in a creator god or any benevolent god, and in his development of a theory which he believed proved there was no creator god nor an immortal soul. That's pretty "atheistic."

As for him wanting to be a vicar when he was younger, he took theology courses at college and planned to be a pastor, but he said it was so he could continue his naturalist studies, since many naturalists were pastors. This allowed them a steady income. He seems to have believed as most people of the time believed, without really questioning, but as he began questioning, he began disbelieving.

[papau]

9. A steady income he did not need as his family was well off - but I

agree as to personal God point and the theist point, but I find no atheist moment - just agnostic.

[Az]

7. Some pertinent quotes

Its not conclusive exactly what he believed about gods in the end.


But I own that I cannot see ... evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created that a cat should play with mice.
-- Charles Darwin, (attributed: source unknown)

I am aware that the assumed instinctive belief in God has been used by many persons as an argument for his existence. The idea of a universal and beneficent Creator does not seem to arise in the mind of man, until he has been elevated by long-continued culture.
-- Charles Darwin, Descent of Man p. 612

It appears to me (whether rightly or wrongly) that direct arguments against Christianity and theism produce hardly any effect on the public; and freedom of thought is best promoted by the gradual illumination of men's minds which follows from the advance of science.
-- Charles Darwin, quoted from Michael Shermer, "The Gradual Illumination of the Mind: Reconsiderations and Recapitulations on the God Question," Introduction to the paperback edition of How We Believe: The Search for God in an Age of Science (2000)

I have at least, as I hope, done good service in aiding to overthrow the dogma of separate creations.
-- Charles Darwin, Descent of Man p. 61

It is like confessing to a murder.
-- Charles Darwin, quoted from the press release for the PBS television series Evolution with the comment, "For 21 years, Charles Darwin kept his theory of evolution secret from all but a few friends"

When I view all beings not as special creations, but as the lineal descendants of some few beings which lived long before the first bed of the Cambrian system was deposited, they seem to me to become ennobled.
-- Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species, quoted from John Stear, No Answers in Genesis

[papau]

11. All the direct quotes lead to agnostic at death - only the one off

Michael Shermer asserted report of a statement even has a flavor of of rejection of Theism (which he did eventually reject on his way to agnostic).

Indeed he was agnostic because he was not conclusive as to what exactly he believed about gods in the end.

:-)

[trotsky]

17. He may have also felt he was agnostic

because that tends to invite less hostility and attacks from kindly, love-filled theists.

[beam me up scottie]

13. Atheism defined for those not willing to allow theists to beg the question

There are many rancorous debates over the definition of atheism, with quite a few theists insisting that atheism should be defined in a very narrow sense: the denial of the existence of any gods. When theists simply assume that this is what atheism is, there can be a lot of miscommunication and misunderstanding in their discussions and debates with atheists.
***
Unfortunately, not every person entering such discussions does so with intellectual honesty. Thus, another reason often seen for insisting that only the narrow sense of atheism is relevant is that it allows the theist to avoid shouldering the principal burden of proof. You see, if atheism is simply the absence of a belief in any gods, then the burden of proof lies solely with the theist. If the theist cannot demonstrate that their belief is reasonable and justified, then atheism is automatically credible and reasonable.

There is also a tendency among some theists to make the error of focusing only on the specific god in which they believe, failing to recognize the fact that atheists don’t focus on that god. Atheism has to involve all gods, not simply one god — and an atheist can often approach different gods in different ways, depending upon what is necessitated by the nature of the god in question.

Thus, when someone claims that a person is an atheist because they “deny the existence of God,” we can start to see some of the errors and misunderstandings that statement involves. First, the term “God” hasn’t been defined, so what the atheist thinks of it cannot be automatically assumed. The theist cannot simply assert that whatever they have in mind must also be something which the atheist has in mind. Second, it is not true that whatever this god turns out to be, the atheist must automatically deny it. This concept might turn out to be too incoherent to justify either belief or denial.

from Defining Atheism by Austin Cline
http://atheism.about.com/

[papau]

14. too incoherent -assert the principal burden of proof not atheist problem

and walk away.

Sorry - but a fact is not proven by walking away.

Assertion without facts is faith - wlecome to the club of believers.

[beam me up scottie]

15. Incoherent, you mean like your post?

We make no assertions, which you'd know if you'd read my post.

The burden of proof IS on the believer.

You can't change the rules because you don't like them, papau, and you can't change the definitions to suit your agenda.

[Az]

18. Its quite clear

There are a multiplicity of claims for god. Some claims for god may have a means of determining directly they are false and others may be more problematic. An infinity of more have not even been made or claimed. An atheist is simply someone without a belief in god and often is very certain about specific gods not existing.

[papau]

19. very certain about specific gods not existing"- when based on no facts the

certainty becomes speculation which is faith which is in turn belief - making the lovers of logic into rejectors of logic so as to not have a "burden of proof" problem.-

yep - that works

By the way, how would your definition/logic work the term AGNOSTIC into your system -?

Are agnostics really atheists that do not have courage? If not, what really is the difference between the terms atheist and agnostic? Are atheist to be allowed to define agnostics?

All very interesting, and not the subject of this post. Darwin did not define himself as an atheist, and the LA Times op-ed writer is trying to leave the impression that he was. Of course one could argue that Darwin was an atheist but just did not know that he was, or that his denials were lies - which kills any discussion of what he believed since we then have no "credible" first hand evidence.

I'll just leave this post as I started it - the LA Times op-ed was intellectually dishonest.

Others can add their assertions, and discussions of those assertions, if they want, but they need not involve me, in my opinion.

[Az]

20. Glad you asked

Theist: A person that believes in god or gods.

Atheist: From the word Theist combined with the prefix 'a' which means without. Thus an Atheist is simply someone without a belief in god or gods.

Gnostic: Someone that knows a thing. It literally means to know. Not in some minor way of knowing. Rather it pertains to an absolute knowledge or direct unquestionable experience of something.

Agnostic: From the word Gnostic combined with the prefix 'a' which means without. Thus an Agnostic is simply someone without an absolute knowledge of a particular subject.

Thus we find that Gnostic and Agnostic function as adjectives relative to Theist and Atheist. Giving us such combinations as follows:

Gnostic Theist: Someone that knows god exists. This is not simply a strong belief that god exists. This is specifically knowledge that derives from some direct uncontrovertable experience.

Agnostic Theist: An individual that believes in god but falls short of absolute knowledge of god.

Gnostic Atheist: A person that has an absolute knowledge of the universe(or multiverse) and knows there are nor gods present.

Agnostic Atheist: This is simply a person that has no beliefs in god but does not have absolute knowledge of the universe. Should a god present itself they would most likely consider them as evidence for the existance of god and change their position.

[beam me up scottie]

21. Nice, Az!

I wonder if the theists missed you as much as the A-theists did... :evilgrin:

[papau]

22. I love the way you make up stuff to fit your logic - which Greek School

did you go to? Was that school Greek Orthodox Church run, or just some Greek classes, or perhaps something like the Athenian Academy in Tampa Florida area where the school is helped by the secular Greek Government, and not church related?

In any case dictionary definitions are :
gnosis "knowledge",
gnostikos, "good at knowing

and there is no good definition of Gnostics: they were "people who knew" that matter and life on earth were debased versions of the spirit and that one needed to get back closer to the spirit, with the sales point that knowing this made you a superior class of being, whose present and future status was essentially different from that of those who did not know.

Your interpretation is logical - it is just not correct historically or in terms of the Greek language.

[Az]

23. Was not referring to the Gnostics as the specific group

I was referring to the base of the word. And you seem to agree that the basis of Gnostic is Gnosis. And a gnostic (not a member of the Gnostic belief) clearly is someone that bases their belief on knowing a thing. The Gnostics clearly based their name on this factor.

[papau]

24. true