3rd Way

I have recently been quite interested by the discussion emanating from Denis Alexander's excellent article entitled "Viva la evolution" on the third way website. 

After a group of YECS decided to reply on mass CiS mobilised and responded on mass. It seems that a lot of different groups are gearing themselves up for next years 200th anniversary of Darwin's birth.

Along with the usual polemics surrounding this subject I was quite interested to note quite how loosely the term"Darwinism" was being used by everyone. Some (mostly YECS) equated it with materialism or naturalism, whilst those from a more scientific background equated it with evolution in general. Everyone seemed to overlook the technical usage of the word which equates to Darwin's specific beliefs which, along with evolution through decent, modification and natural selection, also contained ideas such as panspermia. Of course the phrase neo-Darwinism was then coined to refer to Mendelian genetics merged with natural selection, however even that is somewhat out of date, especially as recent results from the fields of epigenetics and RNAi seem to indicate some really quite interesting alternatives to simple gene based evolution.

This looseness of terminology unfortunately leads to confusion, and thus plays into the YECS hands. All of a sudden the normal (and exciting) development of evolutionary science is seen as undermining "Darwinism" (which of course it does) and thus somehow backing up the creationist arguments. I think it is time to put to bed the idea that Darwinism equates to evolution. Evolutionary theory is strong and developing. Darwin made a seminal contribution with his idea of natural selection, but science has now moved on rapidly. It is time people began to view Darwinism in the same way they view Newtonianism.