By Neece, on February 8, 2010, at 12:42 pm
Contrary to many assumptions, evolutionary theory did not begin in 1859 with Charles Darwin and The Origin of Species. Rather, evolution-like ideas had existed since the times of the Greeks, and had been in and out of favor in the periods between ancient Greece and Victorian England. Indeed, by Darwin’s time the idea of evolution – called “descent with modification” – was not especially controversial, and several other evolutionary theories had already been proposed. Darwin may stand at the beginning of a modern tradition, but he is also the final culmination of an ancient speculation.
Evolution in Greece
While the Greeks did not specifically refer to their concepts as “evolution”, they did have a philosophical notion of descent with modification. Several different Greek philosophers subscribed to a concept of origination, arguing that all things originated from water or air. Another [...]
By Neece, on December 19, 2009, at 11:09 pm
The other day I wrote to Anne in response to some questions she emailed me. She replied not long after in another email. Here is an excerpt (I’ve removed the more private information): (Note: I’ve added some happy puppies playing in the snow since this topic can be rather serious, and we are having the biggest snow in WV that I’ve seen since we moved here 5 years ago)
Thank you for answering my email. I am only 21 and it seams that I am searching for myself and what it is that I can believe. I see how people lie on a daily basis to make the even more entertaining than the event really was so I find it hard to believe anything that is told to me. Giving this way of living I find it tremendously hard to base my life and way of [...]
By Neece, on November 18, 2009, at 2:30 am
By Russell Blackford and Udo Schuklenk, Comment Is Free.
Civility has its uses, but atheists should not be afraid to mock faith to undermine religious [...]
By Neece, on June 20, 2009, at 4:40 am
I was having a conversation with my friend Steve earlier about Jesus. Was there a Jewish rabbi named Yeshua walking around the Fertile Crescent around 2000 years ago, preaching the end of days? Does it matter? This is my conclusion. No, not really. We’ll never know the truth of it, and it doesn’t matter anyway.
Steve says the majority of scholars feel that there was such a guy. I’ve been under the impression for many years that the biblical Jesus never existed. But I think it’s just an exercise in scholarship and semantics, really.
Here’s where I started:
- Josephus was the nearest contemporary to Jesus, and he never met him.
- All the gospels were written 40-80 years after the supposed crucifixion. None of the gospel writers or Paul/Saul ever met Jesus.
- The Romans were meticulous record keepers back then. Not a word [...]
100 Questions for christians
So Angie would like us to come up with creative stump-the-fundie questions to add to her list.
You can see the first 10 questions to get you started on her blog post: Questions for christians.In her list are 2 videos you simply must watch. The first one is gay dolphin sex. I mean, come on, you really don’t want to pass that up, do you? The second one is a music video that is just awesome. I hate [...]