“Since Americans are three times as likely to believe in the virgin birth of Jesus as in evolution, liberal derision for President Bush’s religious beliefs risks marginalizing the left.”
Cite?
I’m no theologian, but virgin birth does not = creation, correct? obviously the two are related, but that quote doesn’t translate into “Americans are 3x as likley to agree with creation over evolution,” correct? That’s the first question
The second question here is can this be corroborated? I’m blown away that evolutionary fact is dismissed 3:1 by Americans in favor of Biblical history. Am I that naive or is Nicholas D. Kristof using data gathered by the 700 Club to support his op-ed?
Correct that virgin birth does not equal creation.
I think it is just purporting to show how many Americans accept supernatural aspects of religion versus well proven statements of science. That what the left may deride as the religious fringe – Bush’s Southern Baptist roots included – is in fact pretty mainstream religion.
I did some googling, beyond the Kristof article I can’t find much support for those numbers. Kristof has used them in another article of his as well. They are apparently based on a Pew study that showed 28% to 83% evolution to virgin birth. I pried around the Pew site and I couldn’t find anything. Furthermore, this doesn’t make a lot of sense as other studies show only 77% of the US is Christian. I’ll poke around the Pew website. There are a bunch of surveys out there, though, and they all ask and show slightly different things. It is apparent that only a minority of people accept evolution as scientifically proven. But other studies show that most are in favor of teaching it, and teaching only it as a scientific theory. Admittedly, most people are also in favor of presenting religious tenets of origins. I think this goes with the high level of religiosity but relatively low level of gullibility of the American public. They want to appease their religious sensibilities, but I think most studies show that this mostly doesn’t infringe on their views of science.
I am highly skeptical of that number. For three times as many Amercians to believe in anything (be it virgin births, creationism or a winning season for the Devil Rays) as those who accept evolution there could be at most only one third of Americans who buy evolution. If more than 1/3 did believe in evolution than three times that number would be >100%. And that assumes there are no “don’t know - no opinion” responses. I’m not even factoring in for mutually exclusive scenarios.
Everyone I know accepts evolution to some degree. Admittedly, I don’t live in the south or hang out with fundies, but I really, really doubt that less than 1/3 of Americans “believe” in evolution.
I wonder if the answer depends on just how one defines “believing in evolution”. This ABC News report on a Gallup poll says:
So, from that poll, do you conclude that 49% believe in evolution? Or only 10%? Or some number in between, depending on the level of “participation” one believes God had? Personally, I would tend to go with the first figure, in which case there’s obviously no way believers in virgin birth outnumber evolutionists by 3:1.
Sorry for the nitpick, but as far as I know, Bush has no Southern Baptist roots. His current denomination is Methodist. He joined that denomination when he married Laura, who apparently has been a life long Methodist. It’s not as clear to me what denomination he was prior to getting married, but George H.W. Bush is Episcopalian, so persumably that is the tradition that George W. Bush was raised with.
Good. I’m glad you were being skeptical of that quote instead of using it as fuel for the fire. It’s such a pompous, arrogant way of wording the religious divide. And I say this even though I am a self-proclaimed Agnostic, without a religious bone in my body.
I also believe you have to take into consideration the strengh of one’s beliefs. For example some people believe a rabbit’s foot will bring good luck, but they would not alter their daily ways around this belief (some would). So where does this count.
Religion is FAITH. You can’t have religion without it. Faith is something that you believe, not necessarily something that is proven.
However most people compromise their faith somewhat to fit into the world. So your stats are always skewed.
Well, something’s wrong, as there’s no place on it for people who believe humans were genetically engineered by aliens, or were directly created by God 15,000 years ago. I can’t believe no-one believes that. I suppose they put those in ‘no opinion’ but they mislabelled it if so.
Further it’s unclear - if you believe God created the universe in such a way that evolution would eventually occur, but didn’t alter the universe later to ‘nudge’ it, where do you go?
Sorry, everyone knows polls can be bullshit, I judt couldn’t resist pointing some out.
Additionally, I suspect that many of those faiths that do not accept evolution are not going to be composed of the same people who favor the Virgin Birth. The latter is a Catholic doctrine, also shared by some Protestants but not all (and I’m not sure which accept it and which don’t). But Catholicism is also quite accepting of evolution.