Charles Darwin at 200

Two hundred years have passed since Charles Darwin’s birth, said Verlyn Klinkenborg in The New York Times. But the famed naturalist's central idea—“evolution by means of natural selection”—has aged well. “It is absorbed, with adaptations, into the foundation of the biological sciences. In a very real sense, it is the cornerstone of what we know about life on earth.”

Is it? asked Jonathan Wells in The Washington Times. Darwin’s theory wasn’t just evolution, or change over time, which “no sane person denies.” His point in “On the Origin of Species” was that “all living things are descendants of a common ancestor.” That remains an unproven assumption, yet "militant atheists" will tolerate no disagreement from those who see God's hand in these matters.

Actually, Darwin didn’t “pick fights over what he did not know,” said Rick Weiss in The Washington Post. His “keen observation” caused him to abandon the belief that God created the world exactly as it is. Still, he didn’t claim to unlock “the all-important question of creation” itself—if only the “soldiers in today's culture wars, whether in black collars or white lab coats,” had the same humility.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up