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Darwin the Dog Offers 7 Ethical Principles for Kids, Courtesy of American Humanist Association


Our thoughtful reader Jonathan sends along a link to a new website from the American Humanist Association (motto: “Good Without a God”) — this one for kids! The splash headline says “KIDS WITHOUT GOD. You’re not the only one.”
The American Humanist Association promises a national campaign to promote the site, including ads on buses and billboards. Well, let’s take a look.
For younger kids, there’s an adorable cartoon dog named Darwin who explains about how he likes science and being nice: “He believes in being a good person [sic], even though he doesn’t believe in any of the gods from his stories.”
Darwin the person dog also gives seven “promises” that kids are encouraged to emulate. They include:

  • Be nice!
  • Care for the world around us!
  • Think for myself!
  • Think about how other people feel!
  • Tell the truth!
  • Help others!
  • Take good care of myself!

Actually, that last one — which goes on to say, “I promise to eat healthy, get plenty of sleep and exercise, and practice good personal hygiene” — does resonate with a Darwinian system of values. If you don’t have physical life and health, the abilty to reproduce and compete, you’ve got nothing. But the others? From a perusal of the real Darwin’s books, with the picture of the ways of the world they offer, what morals would you draw?
More accurately they should be things like:

  • Mate early and often! Note to boys: maximize the number of your partners if at all possible.
  • Encourage members of inferior races to abstain from reproducing!
  • When you observe the suffering of the weak, don’t let it get you down! It’s all for the betterment of the race.
  • Lie or tell the truth as seems most expedient! Truth-telling carries no adaptive advantage.

Latter-day exponents of Darwinism might add:

  • Persecute, intimidate and silence those who disagree with you!
  • Shield yourself from evidence that runs counter to your conception of reality!

It feels unsportsmanlike, almost cruel, to make fun of a website like this that is so clueless, while being so evidently well-meaning in its cluelessness. Beyond that, you kind of doubt the site will see huge traffic, since atheist households are among the most childless among American religious demographic groups.
And the idea of seven cardinals no-no’s, or a Golden Rule that states, in so many words, “Think about how other people feel!”… Where did they get that from, do you think?
Isn’t it funny how humanism, materialism, Darwinism — whatever you want to call it — has to plagiarize its sense of right and wrong from the ethical tenets of the “gods from the stories” in whom Darwin the dog assures kids it’s just dandy to disbelieve.

David Klinghoffer

Senior Fellow and Editor, Evolution News
David Klinghoffer is a Senior Fellow at Discovery Institute and the editor of Evolution News & Science Today, the daily voice of Discovery Institute’s Center for Science & Culture, reporting on intelligent design, evolution, and the intersection of science and culture. Klinghoffer is also the author of six books, a former senior editor and literary editor at National Review magazine, and has written for the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, Seattle Times, Commentary, and other publications. Born in Santa Monica, California, he graduated from Brown University in 1987 with an A.B. magna cum laude in comparative literature and religious studies. David lives near Seattle, Washington, with his wife and children.

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