Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Happy Birthday, On the Origin of Species


This is for all the monkeys, and their uncles.

Yep, ol' Darwin sure knew how to write 'em, and keep them in the public consciousness long after his own trip on that Beagle in the sky. Or something.

The funny thing, of course, is that it's STILL as controversial as ever, with fundamentalist sorts taking offence to being related to apes (I'm sure, in all fairness, that the gorilla isn't altogether thrilled to be related to you either, bub) and decrying OOS as atheist blather or--worse--the work of the devil.

Since I don't believe in a personal god, myself, I'm free to believe in this evolution stuff without wrestling over what it says about my faith. That said, I don't think that understanding evolution and having faith in god(s) are incongruent. You can believe that since God made monkeys and you, that it's just a big happy family situation that the Bible left out in favour of golden calves and other fun stuff.
Or, you know, you could get all bent out of sorts about it and rail on about it to Fox news. Although I find that a mite silly...

Here's what P.Z. Meyers has to say.
Article on the Scopes Monkey Trial in the Edmonton Journal.
Feature article on the book.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The late Pope Jean Paul II even flat out said, "This evolution jazz doesn't conflict with a belief in God. So chill, for cryin' out loud."

Not that I have much use for organized religion myself, generally.

Ms. Fitz said...

That sounds exactly like JP2 would say it, too. He was a hep cat from the east village, yeah *snap, snap, snap*

Anonymous said...

It seemed close enough.

Also, kudos for indirectly referencing the classic Blinky episode.