Three scholars of “biodiversity and biology” suggest ditching the Darwinian descent of man graphic

I guess Groovamos must have a bad moon rising. :) Creedence Clearwater Revival - Bad Moon Rising (Official Lyric Video) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zUQiUFZ5RDw i.e. I would much rather have the astronomy of Hubble than the senseless hubbub of astrology, Thank Christianity for that! Hubble pictures: https://www.google.com/search?q=hubble+pictures&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjMscrErbrkAhUJKKwKHQTsDbsQ_AUIEigB&biw=1593&bih=770 bornagain77

Around 1970, I saw Grof give a speech about the use of psychedelics and ways in which they were like non-drug-induced mystical experiences. I also know the use of low dose psilocybin in therapy is being used in conjunction with Jungian psychology. So I appreciate Groovamos' comments. hazel

77: "Nope! In fact, Christianity dispensed with astrology and gave us astronomy in its stead." I was raised in the Baptist church and at no time was I told astrology had been or was to be "dispensed with" by my religion. The idea that God would have or never would have designed human consciousness to have any phenomenology in parallel with heavenly bodies was never discussed in our church. On the other hand you have the giants of the study of the human mind, Carl Jung, Joseph Campbell, and Stanslav Grof all self-assured of the more than just usefulness of astrology. In the case of Grof (M.D., Ph.D) you have a reverent scientist expressing in his autobiography a deep gratitude for this gift of the Creator to confused and blundering humanity. As for myself, I have little practical interest in astrology beyond the phenomenon as it manifests in therapy sessions with psychedelics, and having liberal friends who study and apply it to their lives. Christianity is going to have to make some large adjustments to the application of psychedelics in alleviating human suffering, and I take no pleasure in Christians shooting themselves in the foot out of ignorance of mental phenomena, and the churches in the West being vacated in parallel BTW Hopkins has opened a new clinic dedicated to the study of psilocybin and its psychotherapeutic applications: https://www.baltimoresun.com/health/bs-hs-hopkins-psychedelic-research-center-20190904-7ufx4b65zrfjpgetqwczr6eezy-story.html Hopkins has been researching this field since Grof took a job at their Spring Grove psychiatric center in 1967 studying the application of LSD-25 to the alleviation of suffering in terminal patients, and wrote his second book based on that activity. groovamos

That's the NY Times, Pater. Not exactly a bastion of science and reality. ET

@ET Read the last sentence of BA77's comment. "Consequently, it was only in the West, rather than in Asia or the Middle East, that alchemy evolved into chemistry, astrology into astronomy." Pater Kimbridge

No one said astrology evolved into astronomy. Learn how to read. ET

If astrology evolved into astronomy, why is there still astrology? Pater Kimbridge

We still don't know that much about evolution, human or otherwise. Heck we don't even know what determines form. ET

That graphic, and others like it, were created before we knew much about human evolution (or evolution in general) and was significantly affected by Eurocentric and human exceptionalism biases. Brother Brian

Pater Kimbridge

What? Astrology and Christianity don’t get along?

Nope! In fact, Christianity dispensed with astrology and gave us astronomy in its stead.

The Christian Origins of Science - Jack Kerwick - Apr 15, 2017 Excerpt: Though it will doubtless come as an enormous shock to such Christophobic atheists as Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and their ilk, it is nonetheless true that one especially significant contribution that Christianity made to the world is that of science.,,, Stark is blunt: “Real science arose only once: in Europe”—in Christian Europe. “China, Islam, India, and ancient Greece and Rome each had a highly developed alchemy. But only in Europe did alchemy develop into chemistry. By the same token, many societies developed elaborate systems of astrology, but only in Europe did astrology develop into astronomy.”,,, In summation, Stark writes: “The rise of science was not an extension of classical learning. It was the natural outgrowth of Christian doctrine: nature exists because it was created by God. In order to love and honor God, it is necessary to fully appreciate the wonders of his handiwork. Because God is perfect, his handiwork functions in accord with immutable principles. By the full use of our God-given powers of reason and observation, it ought to be possible to discover these principles.” He concludes: “These were the crucial ideas that explain why science arose in Christian Europe and nowhere else.” https://townhall.com/columnists/jackkerwick/2017/04/15/the-christian-origins-of-science-n2313593 No False Gods Before Me: A Review of Rodney Stark’s Work by Terry Scambray (December 2018) Excerpt: Informed by Jewish wisdom and Greek reason, the Christian God was “not only eternal and immutable but also conscious, concerned, and rational.” Jesus Christ is the embodiment of this rational principle as “the Word (logos) made flesh,” reason incarnate.,,, “The early Christians fully accepted this image of God,” Stark writes and then reasonably deduced “the proposition that our knowledge of God and his creation is progressive.” For example, even though the Bible does not condemn astrology, Augustine reasoned that if human destiny was determined by the stars, humans would lack one of Christianity’s indispensable features, free will; therefore, practicing astrology was sinful. So also slavery was normative in all ancient societies and rationalized even by many Christians; yet slavery clearly violated Jesus’ revolutionary concept that individuals are created in God’s image and thereby possess inherent value of immeasurable worth. As Paul wrote, “All are one in Christ Jesus.” From this theocentric faith in reason and progress, Christendom ventured forward to establish freedom and capitalism, organize universities, invent science, abolish slavery while at the same time bestowing virtue on physical labor all of which drove the incomparable advances in Western technology. And finally, Christendom spread these gifts around the world. Stark distances this version of progress from the meme of “Enlightenment progress,” sometimes called “Whig history.” With his usual deftness, he calls this claim, as well as other Enlightenment disinformation, “nonsense.” And that’s because progress was inherent in Jewish and Christian millenarianism, the idea that “history has a goal and humanity a destiny,” as the peerless historian, Paul Johnson puts it.,,, The basis for much of the antipathy toward Christianity is the image of the medieval Catholic Church fostered by “distinguished bigots,” as Stark calls Edward Gibbon and Voltaire among other Enlightenment notables. Stark, relying on primary source historians like the renowned Marc Bloch, shows, on the contrary, that medieval Catholicism was the breeding ground for modernity. Most, if not all, ancient societies believed in fate. However, Yahweh gave humans the wondrous and terrifying attribute of free will, freedom. Individual freedom in the West then merged with the legacy of Athenian democracy and the Roman republican tradition to form “the new democratic experiments in the medieval Italian city-states,” as Stark reminds us. These rival polities organized the first universities in a unique tradition of institutional learning and discourse which began at Bologna then spread to Oxford, Paris and elsewhere in Europe. From the medieval university science was born. The distinguished philosopher and mathematician, Alfred North Whitehead, astonished a Harvard audience in 1925 when he said that science is a “derivative of medieval theology [since it arose] from the medieval insistence on the rationality of God, conceived as with the personal energy of Jehovah and with the rationality of a Greek philosopher.” Whitehead’s thesis was but another bolt from out of the blue because the notion that medieval philosophy, scholasticism, led to the development of science was astonishing! Though it should not have been, since scholasticism was complex, diverse, penetrating and devoted to reasoning from the two books that undergird Christianity: the book of God, Scripture, and the book of nature, Creation. As Stark writes, “Not only were science and religion compatible, they were inseparable—the rise of science was achieved by deeply religious, Christian scholars.”,,, So Christianity, then and now, never was antithetical to science. And this is because European Christians believed in a rational God whose imprint could be discovered in nature; thus, they confidently looked for and found natural laws. As Johannes Kepler, the venerable 17th century cosmologist, wrote, “The chief aim of all investigations of the external world” is to discover this harmony imposed by God in the language of mathematics. Stark concludes, “That the universe had an Intelligent Designer is the most fundamental of all scientific theories and that it has been successfully put to empirical tests again and again. For, as Albert Einstein remarked, the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible” which Einstein called a “miracle.” And this “miracle” confirms the fact that creation is guided by purpose and reason. https://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=189497&sec_id=189497 Christians – Not the Enlightenment – Invented Modern Science – Chuck Colson – Oct. 2016 Excerpt: Rodney Stark's,,, book, "For the Glory of God,,,, In Stark's words, "Christian theology was necessary for the rise of science." Science only happened in areas whose worldview was shaped by Christianity, that is, Europe. Many civilizations had alchemy; only Europe developed chemistry. Likewise, astrology was practiced everywhere, but only in Europe did it become astronomy. That's because Christianity depicted God as a "rational, responsive, dependable, and omnipotent being" who created a universe with a "rational, lawful, stable" structure. These beliefs uniquely led to "faith in the possibility of science." So why the Columbus myth? Because, as Stark writes, "the claim of an inevitable and bitter warfare between religion and science has, for more than three centuries, been the primary polemical device used in the atheist attack of faith." Opponents of Christianity have used bogus accounts like the ones I've mentioned to not only discredit Christianity, but also position themselves as "liberators" of the human mind and spirit. Well, it's up to us to set the record straight, and Stark's book is a great place to start. And I think it's time to tell our neighbors that what everyone thinks they know about Christianity and science is just plain wrong. http://www.cnsnews.com/commentary/chuck-colson/weve-been-lied-christians-not-enlightenment-invented-modern-science The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism and Western Success – 2006 Excerpt: Rodney Stark comes out swinging right from the bell in "The Victory of Reason," his fiercely polemical account of the rise of capitalism. Stark, the author of "The Rise of Christianity" and "One True God: Historical Consequences of Monotheism," is sick and tired of reading that religion impeded scientific progress and stunted human freedom. To those who say that capitalism and democracy developed only after secular-minded thinkers turned the light of reason on the obscurantism of the Dark Ages, he has a one-word answer: nonsense. "The success of the West, including the rise of science, rested entirely on religious foundations, and the people who brought it about were devout Christians,".,,, Capitalism, and the scientific revolution that powered it, did not emerge in spite of religion but because of it. If this sounds paradoxical, it shouldn't, Stark argues. Despite the prejudiced arguments of anticlerical Enlightenment thinkers, free inquiry and faith in human reason were intrinsic to Christian thought. Christianity, alone among the world's religions, conceived of God as a supremely rational being who created a coherent world whose inner workings could be discovered through the application of reason and logic. Consequently, it was only in the West, rather than in Asia or the Middle East, that alchemy evolved into chemistry, astrology into astronomy. http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/22/arts/the-victory-of-reason-how-christianity-led-to-freedom-capitalism-and.html

bornagain77

PK, Actually, the key issue with humanity is that we are morally governed, starting with our intellectual lives; where such simply cannot be accounted for on a computational substrate. If you doubt such moral government of our rational life, consider what it would mean to seriously deny our duties to truth, to right reason, to prudence (so, to warrant), to sound conscience, to justice etc: _____ . That's right, utter, cynical nihilism. Likewise, Reppert pointed out the fatal flaw with computationalism:

. . . let us suppose that brain state A [--> notice, state of a wetware, electrochemically operated computational substrate], which is token identical to the thought that all men are mortal, and brain state B, which is token identical to the thought that Socrates is a man, together cause the belief [--> concious, perceptual state or disposition] that Socrates is mortal. It isn’t enough for rational inference that these events be those beliefs, it is also necessary that the causal transaction be in virtue of the content of those thoughts . . . [But] if naturalism is true, then the propositional content is irrelevant to the causal transaction that produces the conclusion, and [so] we do not have a case of rational inference. In rational inference, as Lewis puts it, one thought causes another thought not by being, but by being seen to be, the ground for it. But causal transactions in the brain occur in virtue of the brain’s being in a particular type of state that is relevant to physical causal transactions.

If we are free enough to responsibly, credibly argue, reason, conclude and choose, we are not accounted for on the chemistry, biology or even the neural networks of our bodies. So, it is indeed relevant for us to ask questions as to what it means for us to be responsible, rational, knowing creatures. And serious answers to our being on both sides of the IS-OUGHT gap are going to require that the root of reality be sufficient to account for such rational, responsible, morally governed freedom. The answer is not going to be, occult astral influences. Nor, just- happened- to- be- so- and- to- be- reproductively- successful- genetic- programming (which itself is coherent functional complexity beyond the credible reach of blind chance and/or mechanical necessity acting on a sol system or observable cosmos scope). Nope, the root of reality adequate to ground moral government (including of mind) is going to have to be not only a being independent of causal antecedents [i.e. a necessary being] but also inherently good and utterly wise. And that is an outline sketch, already of a figure ever so many are desperate not to have darken their doorsteps. Especially, those of temples of the lab coat clad priesthood. KF kairosfocus

PK, really, now. Pardon, your prejudice is showing. KF kairosfocus

What? Astrology and Christianity don't get along? Pater Kimbridge

Maybe when compared with astrology. ET

Psychology is not a science? Pater Kimbridge

And most times it is just comedy for the sake of being comedy. Whatever your link depicted it definitely isn't science. ET

Sometimes comedy is used to point out fundamental truths. Pater Kimbridge

Better, as in a more comical kind of way, right? ET

This one is better anyway: https://imgur.com/gallery/2QMeKs2 Pater Kimbridge