I suppose a “God” just creating us and the animals isn’t that much of a stretch is it ?
hehe… I thought I was the only one who had a hard time understanding his writing ! 
This thread smells of the T-word. Of course, all if fair game in GD.
My $0.02:
Evolution is a scientific theory. One does not “believe” in it per se. As a matter of fact, believing in evolution would be the exact opposite of science. Science consists (briefly) of coming up with the best theory to explain the facts, and then trying to disprove it. Evolution has withstood the test of time as a valid theory that has not been disproven. Science does NOT prove anything. Creationism on the other hand, is usually presented as an alternate “belief” system. Creationists do not challenge their theories (not do proponents of the wool-over-the-eyes “Intelligent Design” production), therefore, it is not science. If a school wants to teach science, only science has a place in that classroom. Creationism and Intelligent Design belong in a Comparitive Religions course.
My very_very_basic_and_probably_wrong knowledge of what the current theory is is that it didn’t come out of nothing, but came out of itself. That the universe is circular and it’s end and beginning is the same event. To use the north-pole analogy if you carry on walking after the north pole you are going south. If you go back past the beginning of the Universe you are at the other end and going the other way. The universe has existed forever and is yo-yoing.
I’ve half-read ‘Universe in a Nutshell’ about 4 times. I completely had no clue what he was talking about all 4 times.
Part of maturity and the scientific method is accepting things based on evidence, even if they are unpleasant. I’d much rather be more closely related to a chimp than to Jerry Falwell, but alas, science says otherwise. 
The OP has got to be a parody. This really belongs in The Pit.
Which of the following do you feel could not / does not happen:
- Variation exists in all species
- Competition for resources (food, mates, living space, etc.) exists between species, and between indiviuals of a given species. This is because resources are limited.
- Individuals, left unchecked, would produce more offspring than can be supported by those limited resources. Even if we started from Adam & Eve, there would be gazillions of us, rather than ~6 billion, if resources were unlimited.
- Because resources are limited, and competition exists for those resources, those individuals who possess some advantage (because of their particular variations), even if slight, will have a better chance of reproducing than those who do not possess such advantages.
Over time, as generations come and go, those individuals which possess more advantageous traits will be the most likely to reproduce, thus passing those advantages on to their offspring. The population will shift such that individduals will be better able to procure those limited resources. This is called “adaptation”, and the process described above which results in adaptation is “natural selection”. This is the cornerstone of evolution. And there are scads of evidence to support the fact that the above does, indeed, happen.
If the OP is serious, I’d like to hear what your school actually taught you about a subject as complex evolution, since they certainly taught you some interesting and unorthodox things about the relatively simpler subjects of punctuation and capitalization…
What you got against apes? Have you ever looked into the eyes of a real gorilla, up close? They are amazingly humanesque. The Africans have a saying (from “Gorillas in the Mist”) - how can you look into his eyes and NOT say he is your brother?
Something tells me you’ve had an aversion to actually learning about evolution (education in science is hardly brainwashing). It’s not easy to explain the entirety of how evolution can work on a scale of simple to complex, but species DO evolve, and it happens all the time. The example of the moths who bear the same markings of the local trees for camoflage. Take the same moth in numbers and transplant them to a different local ecosystem - burch trees, for instance - and over a short period of time, all the moths will look like birch trees. Evolution occurs through survival adaptation and natural selection.
Why does it offend you that we are animals? Why does it offend you that we are apes?
Evolution does not turn bacteria into animals. Evolution (specifically, speciation) is a branching phenomenon, not a linear one. Animals share a common ancestor with bacteria, but one did not become the other. We share a common ancestor with all other animals. We share a common ancestor with all other apes. Simple observation of our anatomy, and that of most other vertebrates, for example, reveals striking similarities. Why should that be the case if we were all specially created?
I’m pretty sure no one “believes” in evolution – there’s no point, since it happens whether you believe in it or not.
It’s like asking me to believe in my chair.
The moths may look like birch trees. Natural selection is not a guarantee of survival. If the requisite variation which makes a given moth look a little more like a birch tree than its fellows never occurs, then extinction of that population becomes a more likely scenario, for example. Or, perhaps, if there aren’t any predators of those moths, then they may not change at all.
To the OP: evolution is a complex topic, and I am pretty certain that you didn’t get much useful information in the 3rd grade, other than maybe the fact that “it happens”. You didn’t indicate what grade you are currently in (assuming you are, in fact, still in school), but my suspicion is that you didn’t get much more detail in later grades, either. Plenty of folks here have a reasonable understanding of the processes at work, and would be more than happy to answer any questions you might have.
Too bad.
Bottom line is, anybody who doesn’t understand and accept that evolution is a fact, period, doesn’t understand the first thing about it. Basically, the entire field of biology doesn’t make sense without evolution as a conceptual framework. Throw out evolution, you throw out biology. Throw out biology, you throw out chemistry and medicine. Throw out chemistry and medicine, and you might as well go back to living in a cave and eating roots and berries, and worshipping the great fireball in the sky.
And saying “nucular.”
Didn’t Stephen Jay Gould develop that theory-- punctuated capitalization? 
Wasn’t it Stephen J. Gould?
Yes, you’re right. It’s more complex than what one can write in a quick post. I was trying to simplify it for someone less convinced that evolution actually occurs.
Not that this hasn’t already been answered a bunch of times, but the universe doesn’t really care if you’re comfortable with your past or not. We don’t get to cherry pick the reality of history and biology based on whether it flatters us or not.
But I think this is one of the biggest reasons that so many people can’t accept evolution. “I’m no monkey!”, they shout. They take it as a personal insult. And let’s face it – being hand crafted by the Divine puts us in a much better light. But once again, what happened is what happened, and that’s not going to change no matter how much it bruises our egos.
But if your ego needs massaging, try this – you are a member of the only species that evolved enough to build cities, go to the moon, and offer up internet porn. That’s a pretty elite species if you ask me. Hell, we don’t even fling our poo anymore.
Well, you don’t. I still know how to have a good time.
albatross?
I will leave the more biologically minded dopers to deal with evolution, but I do wish to be of some help. I feel your are quite right to denigrate your former education insitution, which failed you in more ways than simply not instilling a proper respect for the scientific mention, as evidenced by your OP. I would like to volunteer to help you, one sentence at a time.
To begin with, since you are speaking of a particular school which you attended, it is proper to insert “a” before the word school in the above sentence. As used, it is a collective noun. Brainwashed should be one word – I know compound words can be difficult, but a moment’s consulation of a reliable dictionary will avoid any embarrasment caused by mistaken seperation, hyphenization or indeed general misuse of compound words. The pronoun “I” is always capitalized in English, as, I believe, in most other languages. That your school should be so deficient as to omit this from your studies is most worrying. Also, phrases such as: “I think” and “off and on” should be surrounded by commas. You may think of comma placement as essential anywhere you would pause if you were speaking the sentence, instead of writing. However, for pauses of a slightly longer duration, or which indicate a change in sentences, a period is necessary. It is only after these sentence-seperating periods are inserted that the next letter must be capitalized. So, the corrected sentence would be as follows:
This sentence is far more intelligible to the average reader.
Your pro-creationist OP makes a common pro-Creationist mistake; it’s OK, lack of knowledge is to be expected from your viewpoint.
Evolution is not a system that includes the creation of matter. It is a scientificly observed phenomenon of species developing into other species. It has nothing to do with life starting, the “Big Bang” theory, or any of a number of things Creationists mindlessly tie to it.
As for proving it to you… if you can’t look at the enormous facts presented in favor of evolution and the complete lack of any competing scientific explanation or theory and make a rational conclusion, then yes, you are brainwashed, but not the way you think you are.