Monday, July 07, 2008

"No ethics, No meaning, No free will"

At least this guy's consistent.

Darwinist philosopher William Provine on what I refer to as the logical conclusions of materialism and darwinism:

"There is no intelligent design in the natural world. When mammals die, they are really and truly dead. No ultimate foundations for ethics exist, no ultimate meaning in life exists, and free will is merely a human myth. These are all conclusions to which Darwin came quite clearly." (Stanford University, April 30, 1994)

I argued this point all last week with atheists who seem to want to have their cake and eat it too. I just think that few of them really understand the implications of a purely material universe in which brains can exist, but not immaterial minds or, apart from chemical reactions in the human brain, consciousness or morality or love or justice or honor or purpose or meaning -- all the things that man has associated with being human. All snuffed out by consistent atheism. If there is no divine breath behind man's life, then all of this is just a house of cards, a cruel trick of mindless evolution.

At least this guy's willing to say so.


h/t Denyse O'Leary's blog: http://post-darwinist.blogspot.com/

7 comments:

pettitji said...

Consciousness is just what brains do. Why is this particularly human? Or a problem for you?

BallBounces said...

It is not a problem for me.

It is a problem for materialists, who believe that matter - atoms and molecules - is all that there is. Consciousness seems to be immaterial, as does free-will, etc. But, to the strict materialist it is all just mindless atoms and molecules swirling around.

So, it is the atheist I quote in this passage who says that there is no ethics, no meaning, and no free will.

Not me.

I say there are.

And that it is because God created us.

BallBounces said...

Try this for a primer:

http://www.statenews.com/index.php/article/2006/06/not_all_science_fits

metasyntactic variable said...

I recently watched Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed. Provine was equally forthcoming in his interview, even prophetically daring for his brain tumour to return.

BallBounces said...

May God have mercy on him.

Unknown said...

Charles Colson said much the same thing in other words when he addressed students at Harvard about ethics. He wrote a wonderful article about the experience entitled "Comfortably Numb at Harvard."

BallBounces said...

JR - Thanks for the lead; I'll check it out. Colson et al are speaking at an Apologetics Conference in Charlotte NC in November. I hope to get down for it.

"... nothing intellectually compelling or challenging.. bald assertions coupled to superstition... woefully pathetic"