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At 15:09 02/06/2005, Martin Weiss wrote:
>As far as I am aware Darwin said little if anything about the origin of 
>life on Earth.

My copy of The Origin of Species is the 6th edition, 1872. In the 
concluding sentence Darwin writes,

"There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having 
been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and 
that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of 
gravity, from so simple a beginning, endless forms most beautiful and most 
wonderful have been, and are being evolved."

I can imagine how slowly and carefully Darwin penned these words. This is a 
feeble kind of deist apologetics, but it is important to acknowledge that 
he wrote it.

This is exactly the same, shrinking, deist view of god underlying the 
various species of militant creationism: a god who can only inhabit the 
gaps in scientific knowledge. Which is why the gaps are being defended so 
fiercely.


[log in to unmask] * http://www.interactives.co.uk
*
Give people facts and you feed their minds for an hour.
Awaken curiosity and they feed their own minds for a lifetime.
*
Ian Russell  

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