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How do you answer the question often put by theists, that a view of a purely material world where we are products of blind evolution, is bound to be dismal and bleak without wonder or joy.

For what it is worth, this works for me.

Inheritance.

There are no things could, so much enduring give,
As fragile things, that swiftly die; and live.

Those ageless hosts, who lived and died.
That with nature, might, in us provide.
The fragments of the ancient life and woe,
Which are every feeling, that we know.

Accept then the wisdom of three billion years.
That comes to us with human joys and tears.
As is appreciate, the brightest grace,
Ancient nature gives our human race.

Fernapple 9 Sep 8
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5 comments

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1

Where is the poetry from ?

Sorry to say its me.

@Fernapple It's very nice.

@Flowerwall Thank you.

@Fernapple You are not an atheist, correct? It would seem certain that the author of this poem believed in God.

@Flowerwall Not at all that was not the meaning, perhaps it is not as plain as it should be. The point of the poem is about what we owe to evolution, not a creator. Especially how instincts for appreciation and a concept of beauty, pleasure and happiness are gifted to us as a result of all the creatures before who died or lived, because their instincts told them to go the wrong way or the right.

Imagine a young creature out wandering alone for the first time having left the nest, in search of a home, it stands on a hill top and looking out it sees two valleys, does it go to left or right ? Being an uneducated animal, it chooses which way to go, based only on which valley seems most beautiful to it. And over the years, every one of our millions of ancestors, must have made dozens of such choices. And every such choice would have been rewarded or punished by natural selection, with longer life and more breeding success, or poor breeding and earlier death, each therefore affecting our DNA, gradually refining our emotions and instincts. So that now we only have ideas such as beauty, which is our instinctive feeling for goodness, because of the pains and deaths of all those before us.

@Fernapple I understand how you meant it now.

1

Evolution affects our brains too. We've evolved to sense and be aware of things in ways which far exceed our ability to label them with science. Attributing the disconnect to metaphysics, when its merely a limit in our understanding, seems over wrought. Nice poetry tho, if youre sentimental

1

I reply that I'm so very glad I don't need sky fairies to bring wonder and joy into my life, sorry you do.

1of5 Level 8 Sep 8, 2019
2

I think that you've demonstrated that wonder and joy do not come from God, but like God they come from within. Neither is required for the other and whilst there's no shortage of joyless believer to demonstrate that point I'm far more grateful for the wondrous atheists like yourself.

2

I smile and tell them "that's for me to know and you to find out" and go on with my happy life.

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