{"id":7351,"date":"2014-04-01T14:54:52","date_gmt":"2014-04-01T13:54:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/?p=7351"},"modified":"2014-04-01T15:06:02","modified_gmt":"2014-04-01T14:06:02","slug":"divine-foot-door","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianvoice.org.uk\/index.php\/divine-foot-door\/","title":{"rendered":"A Divine foot in the door"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Richard<\/a>
Richard Lewontin<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

An American evolutionary biologist, geneticist, academic and social commentator explained 15 years ago that atheists cling on to evolution not because it is true, but because the alternative scares them.<\/p>\n

Richard Charles “Dick” Lewontin<\/a><\/strong> made the extraordinary admission in a foreword to the last book of astronomer the late Carl Sagan, ‘The Demon-Haunted World.’<\/p>\n

To give credit where it is due, Lewontin has opposed GM crops but not because they arise from scientists playing God (he doesn’t do God, as you will see), rather because of the power they give agri-conglomorates over farmers.<\/p>\n

On the bad side, he\u00a0has described himself as a Marxist and materialist. \u00a0He clearly adheres to the philiosophy of Positivism, which holds\u00a0the view that that there is valid knowledge (truth) only in scientific knowledge.<\/p>\n

In the review of Sagan’s book (<\/span>online here<\/a><\/strong>) Lewontin wrote:<\/span><\/p>\n

Our willingness to accept scientific claims that are against common\u00a0sense is the key to an understanding of the real struggle between science and the supernatural. We take the side of science\u00a0in spite<\/i>\u00a0of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs,\u00a0in spite<\/i>\u00a0of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life,\u00a0in spite<\/i>\u00a0of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism.<\/p>\n

“It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our\u00a0a priori<\/i>\u00a0adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how counter-intuitive, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door. … To appeal to an omnipotent deity is to allow that at any moment the regularities of nature may be ruptured, that miracles may happen.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As a character from a Monty Python sketch would have said: ‘Oh, what a give-away’.<\/p>\n

P.S. While we are on the subject of give-away quotes from evolutionary\u00a0biologists, did Dr Michael Ruse describe evolution as a religion? You decide<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An American evolutionary biologist, geneticist, academic and social commentator explained 15 years ago that atheists cling on to evolution not because it is true, but because the alternative scares them. Richard Charles “Dick” Lewontin made the extraordinary admission in a foreword to the last book of astronomer the late Carl Sagan, ‘The Demon-Haunted World.’ To […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[1121,1120,1119],"class_list":["post-7351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-carl-sagan","tag-divine-foot-in-the-door","tag-richard-lewontin"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t