sam Essays (361 words) - Herbert Spencer, Biological Evolution

Darwin brought to life the idea that things evolved according to the environment they are in. He also stated that humans were not exempt from this process because, humans, like all organisms, are a part of nature, and thus we are forced to recognize that evolution is natural. This resulted in social Darwinism, a belief that the term ?survival of the fittest? does not only apply to animals, but humanity as well, and led to many other ideas like Eugenics, by Sir Francis Galton, who believed that the poor and insane should be sterilized because they were undeserving of life. Another good example of social Darwinism is Karl Pearson, who believed that some races were superior to others, and the inferior races deserved to die because they would delay the advancement of the human species. Because people trusted more in scientific fact than their own faith this caused many people to have doubts about creationism. The Catholic Church officially rejected evolution because it challenged traditional beliefs that people were created by god. Before Darwin, Catholicism hadn?t really been challenged by scientific fact. This new wave of thinking heavily influenced by Darwin had people believing that religion was a thing of the past. Creationism was how the world was started by god, and Darwin?s theory was that it was done by natural selection. Because religion wasn?t how we came to be on earth, there was no divine intervene. We have no god. Darwin heavily influenced the idea that everything was done through nature, as oppose to a higher power. Because we are just an advanced evolution of animals, we still share some of the same characteristics that they do. This was a big shocker to many because most people during that time were very religious and believed that human nature was kind and loving. They did not want to think that we came from a primitive species. However, there were some that did accept his theory and they helped bring out a new idea that we are animals, and just like our ancestors, we are beasts by nature and we were set upon the earth for no particular purpose.