07 MAR 2015 by ideonexus

 The History of Cancer is Long

The battle of living things against cancer began so long ago that its origin is lost in time. But it must have begun, in a natural environment, in which whatever life inhabited the earth, was subjected, for good or ill, to influences that had their origin in sun and storm and the ancient nature of the earth. Some of the elements of this environment created hazards to which life had to adjust or perish. The ultraviolet radiation in sunlight could cause malignancy. So could radiations from cert...
  1  notes
 
12 JAN 2012 by ideonexus

 Jefferson Clearly Believes in God

This gives compleatly a gain de cause to the disciples of Ocellus, Timaeus, Spinosa, Diderot and D'Holbach. The argument which they rest on as triumphant and unanswerable is that, in every hypothesis of Cosmogony you must admit an eternal pre-existence of something; and according to the rule of sound philosophy, you are never to employ two principles to solve a difficulty when one will suffice. They say then that it is more simple to believe at once in the eternal pre-existence of the world, ...
  1  notes

At least in this this passage, where he sees the Universe as needing a deity to keep things together. He even appeals to the idea that most people believe there is something, so there must be something. His logic is in error here, but he also lacked the scientific understanding we have today.