"But one the most popular authors of our times claims that Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist."

True, but he didn't say that Darwin made it necessary to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist. So, what is your point in quoting him?

The danger is not that the humanness of humans will be "denied" as you say. The danger occurs when a theory of origins becomes enough to intellectually fulfill you.

In what way? I find the theory of evolution to be the most "intellectually fulfilling" scientific theory I've ever encountered. However, it hasn't made me into an atheist, nor has it caused me to deny the "humanity" of humans. Once again, what is your point?

As I suggested earlier, we need both the natural view and the transcendent view. We ignore the transcendent view at our peril. "

And once again, I agree. One more time, what is your point?

Just to follow up on what I said above, some of the first people that the Nazi's started euthanizing were the severely disabled, deformed or deficient. They began euthanizing these kinds of people, including children, even before the outbreak of WWII. This was their view of eugenics. Certainly, people like Mrs. Tada who I talked about above would, at some point, have been targeted as undesirable.

http://highschoolbioethics.geo...

I get concerned when I hear people like Dr. Provine talking publicly, like he did in the movie "eXpelled", about ending his life so he won't be a burden to his family or society. This is the same kind of thinking that led down the slippery slope to the holocaust, isn't it? Maybe Dr. Provine is just speaking for himself, but if that is the case then why speak out about it publicly? The peculiar twists and turns of the logic of his thinking are of special concern. He claims that everything is determined so there is no free will. So, there is no such thing as personal freedom? So, anything I do say or think won't make any difference? How about you? Why bother then having any kind of debate or discussion? Why, in fact, bother with education? What about constitutional rights? Are there any? Does it matter then whether or not human beings are enslaved? Persecuted? Discriminated against? You cannot make changes. You cannot make reforms. You cannot do anything to change the human condition or society. Where does that kind of thinking lead?

And how, exactly, does atheism per se deny the "humanness" of humans? Buddhism, for example, is an atheist "religion", yet Buddhists treat humans (and other sentient beings) completely differently from, say, rocks and trees.

Or are you asserting that only Christians can recognize the special qualities of humans?

Two things.

First - the 'buddhism is an atheist religion' claim is an oft-repeated canard that falls apart the moment anyone bothers to sit down and explore the subject. Buddhism past and present is populated with all manner of gods, otherworldly realms, pantheistic and panentheistic views of the totality of existence, reverence of bodhishatvas and more. Yes, there are specific and fairly recent interpretations of buddhism that are married to an utterly materialistic 'there is nothing unfamiliar with naturalism here and buddhist salvation is actually death' view. But that no more makes buddhism 'atheistic' than Lubos Motl and certain members of the Society of Friends makes christianity 'atheistic'.

Second, let's get our facts clear: Atheism, on its own, isn't all that much. It's the belief that God(s) doesn't exist (Or, if they've been smacked with the 'that's a positive claim and therefore you must provide evidence' line enough in debate, 'a lack of belief in the existence of God(s)'.) On its own, it proposes nothing. Not even that atheism is preferable to theism. Not a thing.

But if you're suggesting that there hasn't been one hell of a diversity of atheistic worldviews and philosophies that have explicitly attacked the view of humans as beings of particular responsibility, duty, status, and right - come on, Allen. I'll owe up in a heartbeat to the abuses done in God's name, or even in the name of spiritual belief in general.

If you want to talk about atheism purely, then sure, it doesn't deny the 'humanness' of humans. It doesn't affirm it either. It sits there, inert, compatible with any and all worldviews and philosophies - it could even get away with a quasi-theistic belief, a deification of a thing or concept.

If you want to talk about atheistic philosophies - worldviews that weren't theistically neutral, but outright rejected and denounced belief in God and traditional religion - well, considering you said you'll be debating Peter Singer soon, I'd say you're scheduled to learn quite a bit about one facet of that.

Science cannot possibly determine any of those qualities of "humanness" that one might lump under the heading of the "humanities." What is controversial about any of this? Did you expect me to assert otherwise?

Did you really think I said it to be controversial?

And how, exactly, does atheism per se deny the "humanness" of humans?

I don't think it does. I don't think atheists do either.

But one the most popular authors of our times claims that Darwin made it possible to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.

The danger is not that the humanness of humans will be "denied" as you say. The danger occurs when a theory of origins becomes enough to intellectually fulfill you.

As I suggested earlier, we need both the natural view and the transcendent view. We ignore the transcendent view at our peril.

"That science is badly taught in this country is a fact. I don't think that's because it doesn't emphasize atheism enough. I think that's because it's taught as 'Absolute Scientific Knowledge' when it's nothing of the sort."

I couldn't disagree with you more. Having been trained in this country as a scientist, I have been exhorted over and over again to understand that everything that science has discovered is both historically contingent and provisional. In fact, it isn't generally scientists who take the distorted view of science, it's usually non-scientists who do.

One of the most basic principles of empirical science is that one's "theories" are only as reliable as the data from which they have been inferred. Every scientist that I know realizes that there is no such thing as a scientific theory that can't be challenged, revised, or even thrown out entirely as the result of new information.

But that new information must be empirical; that is, it must be derived from the observation of nature and natural processes. Until ID supporters start to produce and publish empirical results that clearly and unambiguously differentiate between "directed" and "undirected" processes in nature, what they are doing isn't science.

To be specific, reinterpreting information using a new theoretical framework that doesn't unambiguously differentiate between these two kinds of causes isn't science, it's sophistry.

Or are you asserting that only Christians can recognize the special qualities of humans?

"The view that humans are just animals is scientifically supportable."

[emphasis added]

Take out the word "just" in this sentence, and I entirely agree. Indeed, only an idiot with no knowledge of mammalian anatomy and physiology, vertebrate phylogeny, and basic biology could think otherwise.

However, I do not agree that humans are just animals. On the contrary, there is a whole universe of things that humans are that cannot be analyzed or reduced to scientific knowledge, beginning with something as trivial as being named entities. One of the things that humans have seemingly always done (since becoming human, anyway), is to give things names (including, of course, other animals). There is absolutely no way to empirically determine what a person's "real name" is, nor can there ever be…short of asking them (or someone who knows them).

Again, I believe that Kant provides a reasonably good definition of what it means to be human, and that his definition is not in any way derived from empirical science.

The transcendant specialness of humankind is not.

Again, I agree. Indeed, this has been one of my points all the way along. Science cannot possibly determine any of those qualities of "humanness" that one might lump under the heading of the "humanities." What is controversial about any of this? Did you expect me to assert otherwise?

By contrast, if an individual, especially as part of a larger social group, observes the effects of particular moral prescriptions, and comes to a conclusion about the validity of those prescriptions based on the effects of such prescriptions as they are put into practice, then this deliberative and empirical process constitutes an objective justification for such ethical prescriptions.

Again, this morality is not really objective in any dictionary or common sense of the word and succumbs to the fate of any utilitarian morality. It depends upon the one person's observations (bias-based), his interpretation of the results, and the society's opinions.
As with your Kantian example there is nothing here to make morality transcend the murderous dictator. If he likes the results of his efforts or if he determines that he is strengthening his foundations rather than weakening them then how is he not ethical and moral? How long does one have to wait to let the actions play themselves out before determining if his actions were "moral" or not?

===
For Huxley, his problem with eugenics was not that it was not the logical extension of Darwinism (he thought it was), or that it was wrong in and of itself (we are natural products no less than weeds), but rather that man was proabbly permanently incompetent to place himself as the judge and executive in the matter. In his garden/colony analogy he freely stated that the "logical ideal of evolutionary regimentation" would be one in which the
\http://aleph0.clarku.edu/huxley/CE9/E-EProl.html

" administrator … guided by purely scientific considerations,… would, like the gardener, meet this most serious difficulty by systematic extirpation, or exclusion, of the superfluous. The hopelessly diseased, the infirm aged, the weak or deformed in body or in mind, the excess of infants born, would be put away, as the gardener pulls up defective and superfluous plants, or the breeder destroys undesirable cattle. Only the strong and the healthy, carefully matched, with a view to the progeny best adapted to the purposes of the administrator, would be permitted to perpetuate their kind."

But man is not up to this task and the logically ideal situation is unattainable because:

"However, I doubt whether even the keenest judge of character, if he had before him a hundred boys and girls under fourteen, could pick out with the least chance of success, those who should be kept, as certain to be serviceable members of the polity, and those who should be chloroformed, as equally sure to be stupid, idle, or vicious. The "points" of a good or of a bad citizen are really far harder to discern than those of a puppy or a short-horn calf; many do not show themselves before the practical difficulties of life stimulate manhood to full exertion. And by that time the mischief is done. The evil stock, if it be one, has had time to multiply, and selection is nullified."

In sum, Huxley reminds his reader:

And I have dwelt upon the fact that, though the progressive modification, which is the consequence of the struggle for existence in the state of nature, is at an end, such modification may still be effected by that [34] selection, in view of an ideal of usefulness, or of pleasantness, to man, of which the state of nature knows nothing.

Huxley does not, of course, advocate the only real solution we have - killing the unfit - and this is because we are not competent.

I have briefly described the nature of the only radical cure, known to me, for the disease which would thus threaten the existence of the colony; and, however regretfully, I have been obliged to admit that this rigorously scientific method of applying the principles of evolution to human society hardly comes within the region of practical politics; not for want of will on the part of a great many people; but because, for one reason, there is no hope that mere human beings will ever possess enough intelligence to select the fittest. And I [35] have adduced other grounds for arriving at the same conclusion.

So, in the end Huxley advocated scientific social planning via

the creation of conditions more favourable than those of the state of nature; to the end of facilitating the free expansion of the innate faculties of the citizen, so far as it is consistent with the general good. And the business of the moral and political philosopher appears to me to be the ascertainment, by the same method of observation, experiment, and ratiocination, as is practised in other kinds of scientific work, of the course of conduct which will best conduce to that end.

In short, Huxley felt that scientists ought to determine which faculties of man are to be considered good and that biological and evolutionary principles should be applied to politics and society in order to assure the propagation of such traits and the elimination of the traits not so considered.
Reminder, Huxley did not believe in killing the unfit.
He was against it because he thought man was incapable of making that judgment. Others agreed with him on the other issue and not on the last.

BTW, when I have chided Will for his determination to end his life if his cancer returns, I have done so by pointing out that it's something he would do "of his own free will".
To which he has replied that, on the contrary, he is constrained to do so by his love for his family and friends, and his overwhelming desire to spare them the pain of a protracted and agonizing death, not to mention the crippling expense. No "free will " involved, IOW.

That brings up an interesting dilemma I read about just last night. A newly wed woman is carried across the thresh hold of an airplane on its way to Hawaaii, their honeymoon destination. The movie that they will be showing on the plane is "Whose Life is it Anyway?" Which is about a quadriplegic seeking assisted suicide. It is very difficult, obviously, for such people to kill themselves. A flight attendant apologizes to the woman who happens to also be a quadriplegic. However, the lady, who was paralyzed in a diving accident when she was 17, has made something out of her life, despite her handicap. For example, she is an accomplished artist, painting and drawing with her mouth, she has served on several presidential commissions and has been influential in getting legislation passed protecting the rights of the disabled. Recently she coauthored a book on, guess what, eugenics. Now here's the irony. After her accident she had also contemplated suicide. Again, how does a quadraplegic commit suicide? So, is the world a better or worse place with this woman? Is it abetter or worse moral choice?

It's important to realize the limitation of science and scientists. In fact, a whole lot of the controversy over evolution has been scientists passing off their philosophical leanings as the stuff of scientific/objective truth. Hell, I personally believe all the hate of ID has less to do with any honest belief that it's a 'threat to science' and more to do with anger at having to share what use to be tools largely reserved for angry lil' atheist types.

Thanks for your contributions to this thread. I have learned in my life that scientists are about the LEAST likely people to understand the limitations of their pastime. And it's from that failure of understanding that we get things like eugenics (Nazism, and the Holocaust, were political aberrations, supported by scientists who suffer this sad misunderstanding of their limitations).

I learned at my father's knee the amazing power of science. I also learned the limitations. He was a Big Banger, long before it won out over Steady State in 1964. From my point of view it was humorous whenever what was being taught as 'Absolute Scientific Knowledge' one year fell out of favor the next, when the new theory became 'Absolute Scientific Knowledge'. Had I not loved science anyway, I might have rejected the whole endeavor as not very interesting or useful.

That science is badly taught in this country is a fact. I don't think that's because it doesn't emphasize atheism enough. I think that's because it's taught as 'Absolute Scientific Knowledge' when it's nothing of the sort.