Changes

[[Image:lighterstill.jpg]]

[[Image:lighterstill.jpg]]

[[Image:Cosmic_evolution.jpg|right]]

[[Image:Cosmic_evolution2.jpg|right]]

There is a common belief that evolution and religion, Darwinian evolution and Christianity especially, are world pictures that are forever opposed. This is a belief today endorsed and promulgated both by extreme evangelical Christians (who support some version of Biblical literalism) and ardent ultra-Dawinians (who hold that their theory necessarily falls into an atheistic mode of thinking). Traditionally, however, this opposition has not been universally accepted. Many people find that there is much in common between the two systems and, thus, great opportunities for sympathetic dialogue. Much of the difficulty and debate arises from ignorance about the various positionsPage 280 | Top of Article involved. This is especially true of evolution. In discussing the idea of selection, it is convenient to make a three-fold distinction between the fact of evolution, the path of evolution, and the theory or mechanism of evolution.

There is a common belief that evolution and religion, Darwinian evolution and Christianity especially, are world pictures that are forever opposed. This is a belief today endorsed and promulgated both by extreme evangelical Christians (who support some version of Biblical literalism) and ardent ultra-Dawinians (who hold that their theory necessarily falls into an atheistic mode of thinking). Traditionally, however, this opposition has not been universally accepted. Many people find that there is much in common between the two systems and, thus, great opportunities for sympathetic dialogue. Much of the difficulty and debate arises from ignorance about the various positions involved. This is especially true of evolution. In discussing the idea of selection, it is convenient to make a three-fold distinction between the fact of evolution, the path of evolution, and the theory or mechanism of evolution.

==The fact of evolution==

==The fact of evolution==

==The theory or mechanism of evolution==

==The theory or mechanism of evolution==

The theory or mechanism of evolution has garnered many hypotheses. Notorious before DarwinPage 281 | Top of Article was Lamarck's idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics, which had not originated with him; Erasmus Darwin had accepted it, as did Charles Darwin much later. In the Origin of Species, Darwin described the mechanism that is generally accepted as the chief force for change: natural selection. More organisms are born than can survive and reproduce, leading to a struggle for survival and, more importantly, reproduction. Given naturally occurring variation, and the fact that those that survive will tend on average to be different from those that do not, there will be a differential reproduction, natural selection. In time this leads to full-blown evolution, and evolution of a particular kind, for selection produces organisms with adaptations. The eye and the hand come naturally as a result of Darwin's causal process.

The theory or mechanism of evolution has garnered many hypotheses. Notorious before Darwin was Lamarck's idea of the inheritance of acquired characteristics, which had not originated with him; Erasmus Darwin had accepted it, as did Charles Darwin much later. In the Origin of Species, Darwin described the mechanism that is generally accepted as the chief force for change: natural selection. More organisms are born than can survive and reproduce, leading to a struggle for survival and, more importantly, reproduction. Given naturally occurring variation, and the fact that those that survive will tend on average to be different from those that do not, there will be a differential reproduction, natural selection. In time this leads to full-blown evolution, and evolution of a particular kind, for selection produces organisms with adaptations. The eye and the hand come naturally as a result of Darwin's causal process.

==Conclusion==

==Conclusion==