Think About IT: Darwin, the Unbiased, Benign Observationist


Darwin is often presented as a simple scientist, with no axe to grind, to wit no preconceived ideas tainting his conclusions, and simply following the facts to wherever they lead. The following are a few quotes that may call that noble description into question.

Darwin said, concerning man’s origin and descent, “The main conclusion…is that man is descended from some less highly organized form. The grounds upon which this conclusion rests will never be shaken, for the close similarity between man and the lower animals…are facts which cannot be disputed.” ((Charles Darwin, Descent of Man and Selection in Relation to Sex, (originally published 1871. Reprint with introduction published New York: Barnes & Noble, 2004), 544.)) Now whether one believes that is true or not, they must admit that it cannot be proven; however, Darwin’s diaphanous veil of science cannot hide his faith in naturalism, for surely all can see that his absolute surety that his conclusion will never be overturned is anything but science, which by nature is open-ended.

Of man’s creation, Darwin notes, “He who is not content to look, like a savage, at the phenomena of nature as disconnected, cannot any longer believe that man is the work of a separate act of creation.” ((Darwin, Descent, 546.)) So all of the intellectuals, the evidence that man was created, is summarily dismissed as “savagery”. On what does he base this? Well similarities, the idea of natural selection (NS), and the commitment, which he mentions regularly regarding NS, “if one will accept evolution.” Of course, if you accept by faith his premises, then some of what he says may follow, but he did not, nor have Darwinists today, proven the premises upon which their naturalistic worldview stands or falls.

He states, “…man is descended from a hairy, tailed quadruped…” (Darwin, Descent, 548.)) Man, advanced from “semi-human condition to that of the modern savage…with savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health.” ((Darwin, Descent, 111.)) Again he says we “will feel no doubt that all the races of man are descended from a single primitive stock.” ((Darwin, Descent, 148.))

Of course these are ideas that he sought to promulgate in order to prove naturalism. Darwin’s belief in God, which he briefly mentions as the creator who breathed the first life into…is actually irrelevant. The reason is that Darwin sought to explain all of life apart from God, other than the absolute beginning, in a way that absolutely excluded God.

Darwin, as his successors, still confuses philosophical and religious assertions with science, which they disdain unless they are the ones making them.

Ronnie W. Rogers