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From: cjh@petsd.UUCP (Chris Henrich)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Creationism and the Dark Ages
Message-ID: <392@petsd.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 30-Nov-84 16:35:11 EST
Article-I.D.: petsd.392
Posted: Fri Nov 30 16:35:11 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Dec-84 20:47:45 EST
Organization: Perkin-Elmer DSG, Tinton Falls, N.J.
Lines: 104

[]
>  Subject: Creationists are not stupid
>  Ok creationists are not stupid. At least not in a way that can
>  be measured with something as crude as a Stanford-Binet I.Q.
>  test.
>   The question i would like to see addressed is:
>  			Are they dangerous? 
>  ( Did the dark ages just happen? 
>    Did many of these well meaning, but frightened, individuals knowingly
>    help further the development of this ideological holocaust ? 
>    Could thinking people haved stopped it?
>    Could it happen again?  )
>  						danw
> 
> >Your questions are provoking.  Would you please expand on them a bit
> >so I more clearly see the direction of your argument?  In what way do
> >you see creationists as directly responsible for the dark ages?  Yes,
> >I know that the Roman Catholic Church (RCC) and its hierarchy were
> >creationists and promulgated the Inquisition which was in large part
> >the cause of the dark ages.
> > ...
> >       				Blessed Be,
> 
> >               	        	Xxxx Xxxx

Sorting this out will take a while...

     "The" dark ages, as I understand the term, started when
the western Roman Empire disintegrated (ca. A.D. 400) and were
pretty well over by A.D. 1200.  It was about *that* time that
the Inquisition was founded.  Whatever its sins, I don't think
the Inquisition can be blamed for the fall of Rome.

     Whose fault was it?  Gibbon tried to pin it on
Christianity; I think later historians regard this as more a
statement of Gibbon's antagonism to Christianity than anything
else.  The causes of the fall of Rome were multiple: it took a
lot to bring that structure down.  

     What has all this to do with Creationism? Not much.
Creationism is a position in a modern controversy, which
didn't exist before it dawned on people that there is a
conflict between Biblical stories and the geological evidence.
The argument has been going on since then -- at least for 150
years.  The word "creationism" is relatively new, but the
phenomenon is one we have all been living with for some time.

> My point is the creationists ,while individually peaceful, are part of
> a larger movement that holds the greatest threat to personal liberties
> and civilization that can  possibly be imagined.
     Who is that larger movement?  Christians?
Fundamentalists?  The John Birch Society?  We have a better
chance of coping with Creationists by understanding them as
our neighbors, than by scaring ourselves with them as our
ferocious and barely human enemies.  From what I have seen of
Creationists, I get the impression that their combativeness
results from a justified fear that most scientists think
they're nuts.

> Those that believe " a little thought will show that conditions today are
> sufficiently different to render your argument unsupportable."
> Are doomed to repeat the histories of Germany , Spain and Iran.
     
     Doomed, are we?  By the iron laws of history?  Which iron
laws of history??  Our enemies may tell us that we are doomed
to some unacceptable future.  Let us be reluctant to agree
with them.

>  
> A return to the dark ages is possible when enough people are , apathetic 
> , don't think it's possible , or work to make it possible.
> (We have plenty of the former and the later. It is to those who don't
> think it isn't possible that i make my appeal)
> 
> 	People laughed at the hitler youth.
> 	People laughed at the Iatola Kolmanie (sp)
> 	People are laughing at the creationists. 

     The Hitler Youth were very scary; I doubt that many
people laughed at them.  As for laughing at the Ayatollah
Khomeini, wasn't it more an attempt to ease the rage and
frustration we felt than a real judgement that he was
ridiculous?  (BTW, I think we'll have an Ayatollah in this
country when the Iranians choose Jimmy Carter for their leader,
and not before.)

> For g*ds sake, take these people seriously, they deserve to be 
> taken seriously.
> 
> 
> 
> 							danw

     I think that has yet to be proved.


Regards,
Chris

--
Full-Name:  Christopher J. Henrich
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