A reader called Ashlea has replied to my post Natural Selection and Eugenics with this comment:
I fully believe that what Hitler did WAS Eugenics. And Darwinism is a direct link to this and other things. By eliminating a God and a creator, you really do eliminate the value of human life. If one believe that firstly, he was out on this earth by some cosmic accident, that his life is nothing more than to live and to die, and that after he does there is nothing left, no after life, what value does it have? So of course people are going to look at the "evolution" of people from mud or apes or whatever the case, and they are going to try to "perfect" it. If human life is NO more valuable that the life of an animal, which why would if be if we were once animals, and we have no soul, then what is the harm in picking and choosing and killing??
It has also led to other things, such as euthanasia and abortion. If life is as valueless as Darwinism suggests, then why not just kill of the ones who are "useless"?
What we need to realize is that Yes! We were created by an Intelligent Designer. Look at what trying to prove this wrong has done??? Resulted in the death of Millions of innocent people, people with a purpose in life.
I had started to reply with a comment there, but the reply was getting too long, so… a new post it is. 
Ashlea: I’m sorry, but you are guilty of several common mistakes there. I’ll try to enumerate them:
I fully believe that what Hitler did WAS Eugenics.
No argument there (although it has been argued by some that the Holocaust wasn’t really done to perfect humanity, but because Hitler envied the Jews.)
And Darwinism is a direct link to this and other things.
Here I can’t agree. Both Dawkins’ quote in my post and my own follow-up to it clearly explained that eugenics is simply an attempt to apply the millennia old selective breeding of animals to humans — which is artificial selection, and has nothing to do with Darwinian evolution (not "Darwinism", but that’s a subject for another post), which is based on natural selection.
By eliminating a GOd and a creator, you really do eliminate the value of human life.
I disagree, and such a thing has never been proved. You’ll note that virtually everyone who says "without God, life is pointless" is a believer… and if they were right, then atheists would be sad, nihilistic, suicidal people who saw no point to anything. That is, of course, not the case at all. In other words: only the people who need an external justification for their lives believe that such an external justification is universally needed. Forgive me for the harsh comparison, but this is like an addict who claims that nobody could ever live happily and healthily without the drug.
Besides, even if you were right, and life were pointless without a god, it would not follow that a god would exist. Something is not more likely to be true simply because the consequences of it being false "would be bad". Please see this entry in my FAQ for more details.
If human life is NO more valuable that the life of an animal, which why would if be if we were once animals, and we have no soul, then what is the harm in picking and choosing and killing??
It has also led to other things, such as euthanasia and abortion. If life is as valueless as Darwinism suggests, then why not just kill of the ones who are "useless"?
Again, you are confusing two separate things. Darwinian evolution describes how things work, now how people ought to behave — and neither Darwin nor modern biologists advocate eugenics (which, again, is artificial selection, and which humanity has performed on animals and plants for ages).
You also imply that human life is only worth anything if we have something known as "souls". This is the old argument: theists claim that a finite life is worthless; I say that its finite quality only makes it more precious, more worthy of being lived to the fullest. And, look — I care for other people even though I don’t believe they have supernatural, immortal "souls"! Isn’t this weird, according to your way of seeing things?
I’d also argue that euthanasia and abortion arise from respect for human life and dignity, not from lack of it, but that’s another story.
To conclude, most of your comment was an appeal to consequences. You didn’t try to show either how evolution doesn’t happen, or how intelligent design does; you just claimed that, if evolution is true, "things would be bad", therefore it must be false, and intelligent design wins "by default". Sorry to say, but that’s not very convincing…
P.S. – I’m glad you didn’t use the "Hitler and Stalin did what they did because they didn’t believe in God, therefore they thought they could do anything" argument. My reply to that one would have been a lot less nice…
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This “Hitler worshiped Darwin’s theories” argument is quite overplayed, and since Expelled, it has even gotten the Holocaust Museum rejecting the claim. Surely, they, who maintain the history of the holocaust, would have a valid opinion on this. It is a sad connection Stein tried to make to justify his irrational view that Evolution is evil. By connecting Darwin to Hitler, he has misled countless creationists with an asinine assumption. These are the same people who call Hitler an Atheist disregarding his writings, and Einstein a believer based on a few of his mis-quoted quotes. If it’s a PR game they are playing, ok. But they cannot honestly believe this crap.
Hey Pedro, what happened to your RSS feed? It disappeared for me all of a sudden and I thought Way of the Mind died!
“By eliminating a GOd and a creator, you really do eliminate the value of human life. — I disagree, and such a thing has never been proved. You’ll note that virtually everyone who says “without God, life is pointless” is a believer… and if they were right, then atheists would be sad, nihilistic, suicidal people who saw no point to anything.”
So true, Pedro. I’ve heard many theists make this argument. “If we don’t believe in the same God YOU believe in, we have nothing?” Come on! Can’t some theists fathom that we don’t blindly agree with their personal beliefs? Is everyone outside of their belief system immoral and utterly screwed?
BTW, your RSS disappeared for me too (iGoogle).
Thanks to you both for the tip about the disappearing RSS feed; it was due to the upgrade to WordPress 2.5.1. Apparently, it had this bug, which I’ve just installed the fix for.
“By eliminating a GOd and a creator, you really do eliminate the value of human life. — I disagree, and such a thing has never been proved.”
OK, I’ll admit I do not think it has ever been proven. Got a question though. What are some possible “meanings” of life, or “purposes” of life without God? I just can’t fathom what it would be.
And seriously, can we not do this whole circular “the meaning of life is life itself” crap. I can only accept that when we have other things that have the meaning of themselves “the meaning of pencil is pencil itself”.
You can’t fathom it just as (I assume) you can’t fathom how atheists can lead moral lives without god. You don’t understand atheists. Who cares if life has a purpose or not? Do you need to have a purpose just to be good? I lead my life the best way possible irregardless of the end reward for doing so. I think that is a bit more sincere than needing something like god to prove your life is worth it and thus acting that way.
Ashlea said “By eliminating a God and a creator, you really do eliminate the value of human life.”
Does it matter which God you eliminate? Zeus? YHWH? Loki? Kali? Baal?
Michael Jordan’s ‘Encyclopedia of Gods’ has over 2,500 entries. I suspect Ashlea would not expect us to worship them all.
No Way:…
I really think that we get confused with higher agenda’s when we think about the MEANING of life.
If you believe in evolution and track life back you’ll find that the meaning of life WAS life itself. A mere replication of itself, as it LIVED so to speak.
You can ask yourself… does a PLANT have a meaning to its life?
The only answer you can get is ..”yes… it provides seeds or spores… that’s what it lives to do.
However, intelligence, is a wonderful thing. Not only can we ASK what the meaning of life is… we can also answer.
A crackhead may say “crack”.
A writer may say writing.
A working man with a family may say… “my children.”.
A singer may say.. “when I start singing and that crowd goes freakin NUTS!!”.
It may be the case, that none of those spell “meaning” to you… but there are ENDLESS examples…
A teacher may say..”When that ONE kid who I thought would never learn this thing… LEARNED it”.
Case in point… this “MEANING” of life….
it ISN”T just life itself… it’s passing life itself on.
There are also things we do like helping people and making life for them and/or ourselves more enjoyable.