I’ve been watching the excellent PBS series on evolution, and I enjoyed it immensely. However, I am puzzled about why the fundamentalists are still so upset about Darwinian evolution-whatt’s the big deal? I thought the whole thing was settled years ago-yet this guy from Australia (Dan Hall/Hill?) traveles the country, preaching his nonsense that the dinosaurs drowned in Noah’s flood? Is the Indiana legislature that moronic that they have to halt the teaching of evolution? Why are people still flogging this long-dead horse?
The Boards here often feature (great) debates about creationism and evolution.
Note: You should search in Great Debates as this is not a factual question that you posted here in GQ.
Search on creationists, or creationism, etc. You’ll be busy reading/discussing for hours.
GQ is for questions of a factual nature.
You would be surprised. Many of the supposedly “settled” arguments keep cropping up.
Like Philster said, try reading some of the Great Debates (search for “evolution”). Or, try reading the “feedback” section of http://www.talkorigins.org.
Many Creationists say that Evolution is a dead theory.
The “big deal” is that the Theory of Evolution supposedly conflicts with their literal interpretation of the Bible, an interpretation which is the core of their beliefs and self identity.
And the nonsense preacher’s name is not Dan, but Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis.
I think the preacher explained his position very clearly in the mini-series. He said that if one questions the truth of the bible, then one could question all of the moral precepts in it.
This is a GD, not a GQ, so I’ll move it.
bibliophage
moderator GQ
And, in fact, the episode of the PBS Evolution miniseries that was mentioned in the OP has already had a GD thread about it:
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=89960
Phobos wrote:
I think it goes deeper than this.
Even the most strongly Fundamentalist Christians, who insist on interpreting every book, chapter, and verse in the Old and New Testaments literally, don’t have a problem with the Earth being round or going around the sun. (Okay, there’s a few that do have a problem with that, but flat-Earthers are distinctly in the minority.) But they do have a problem with evolution. It evokes an almost visceral, knee-jerk reaction.
I have a hunch that this emotionally-charged rejection of evolution isn’t just due to the fact that evolution contradicts Genesis chapters 1 and 2. It’s because, according to the best evidence that evolutionary biology has to offer, human beings are animals. Impulsive, instinct-driven animals. And not just any animals – we seem to be most closely related to hairy, smelly, violent, promiscuous apes. “Ew, gross!” you can just hear the people say. “I don’t wanna be a dirty ape!”
A lot of religious sentiment has to do with morality – that is, fighting ones own instincts, allegedly for the greater Good. Saying that humans are animals undercuts morality.
I’ve never understood the problem here. If Christians believe that humans are all tainted by sin and must redeem themselves, isn’t that another way of saying we have to learn to be civilized despite the legacy of our animal past?
No, I think the surface dispute about scriptural interpretations (and all the political infighting that entails) is the root of the debate.
Creationist: “There’s no way I came from a dirty ape! Man was created as described in the bible!”
Evolutionist: “So, you’d rather believe you came from dirt than a ‘dirty’ ape?”
Creationist: “Ummm… God used very clean dirt!”
I tend to agree with tracer’s assessment. However, I think there’s a bit more to it than even that.
Many people turn to religion to seek spiritual comfort, for meaning in what appears to be a largely meaningless existence. Many religions, Christianity being a prime case in point, offer the answer to the question, “Why are we here?”
Evolution also answers that question, but the answer is far less comforting: we are here as a product of chance. Or, in other words, we are not here for any “greater purpose”, we simply are. We live, we die, and that’s pretty much all we can look forward to.
Needless to say, this does not sit well with many Christian types. If we accept that maybe the Bible isn’t completely accurate regarding our origins, then who knows what else may be inaccurate! Maybe there is no life after death. Maybe God doesn’t really love us. Maybe God doesn’t even exist!
Spiritual chaos results. The best defense, for some, is denial. “God must exist.” “We…I…must be special!” Evolution, therefore, must be wrong. Likewise, the Bible must be literally true. At the extreme, acceptance of evolution is tantamount to spiritual damnation.
Obviously, not all Christians feel this way. It seems that those Christians who are sufficiently confident in their spiritual beliefs are those who are most likely to accept both that evolution occurred (and is occurring), and that parts of the Bible may not be the literal truth, but contains many truths, nonetheless.
tracer, Darwin’s Finch - - isn’t that what I said? 
I think I may develop a nervous tic from all the evolution debates I’ve been having with Creationists lately (here and in other message boards).
Creationist - Hey! Phobos!
Phobos - yeah?
Creationist - ANSWERSINGENESIS!
Phobos - faint
I find it amusing when Christians pick and choose from the bible. It’s all or nothing, isn’t it? It is the supposed word of a supposed God, isn’t it?
IMHO, you either have to take all of it, or none of it, and when you look at all of it, it’s quite easy (for some) to disregard all of it.
I don’t know about that Lolo, I think a lot of people look to the bible as parables, not to be taken literally, and they get some benefit from that. Count me among those who disregard the whole thing, though.
I have to admit, it does astound me that anyone can take the book completely literally. With even the barest critical eye, there is so much stuff that is just purely ridiculous. Here’s an example I just thought of. Why would God need to use dust to make man? Why wouldn’t he just make man come into being, out of nothing? Why did he “need” dust? Clearly (to me at least), this was an oversight of the human author.
That’s not even getting into the fact that it is self-contradictory, and therefore cannot be 100 percent literal truth.
Before someone calls me on the “bible contradictions”, here’s a nice list:
http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/contradictions.html
Some are a stretch, but others are very clearly blatant inconsistencies.
Darwin’s Finch wrote:
I have a personal hypothesis that many attributes of popular religions, Christianity in particular, are there to satisfy somewhat infantile desires.
In this instance, evolution – or, for that matter, any other less-than-comforting answer to the question of why we are here – is essentially like having the universe, “God the Father,” tell you that you were an accident. No child likes being told by their parents that they weren’t planned, that they’re only here because of a failed contraceptive. It makes them feel unwanted. So, then, a universe/God that tells you that no person’s existence was “planned” according to a divine will would be equally unsettling.
As I stated in my thread “MEME WARS”, I think it was
unfortunate that Richard Dawkins, Susan Blackmore,
and Stephen Pinker (appeared in segment six), were
not in the religion segment.
Even though Richard Dawkins coined the word “meme”,
it is Susan Blackmore who is “popularizing” the
new science of “MEMETICS”. If you read her book,
“The Meme Machine” or read her stuff on the internet,
you will see that she considers all religions and
theories on creation as “Meme Complexes”.
If you get a chance to see the segment she is in, I
think you will see her absolute conviction that memetics
is a 25 year old theory that is here to stay. She
does a lot of travel giving workshops, unfortunately
I missed the one she gave recently in North Carolina.
She teaches in the UK.
In the segment she talks about the internet, and leaves
you with this question----Who is in control, genetic
information, or memetic information? This should make
sense, because here you are reading this, instead of
having sex.
My question is (after the robots have eliminated us)
will different groups of robots be fighting wars,
and debating over which human robotics engineer was
the “One and only God”? Check out what Bill Joy has to
say about robotics and nanotechnology in his article
in “wired magazine”.
jesse
jesse morrison wrote:
Oh, sure, go ahead and rub it in, why don’tcha? :mad:
actually, as I lay me down to sleep last night I thought of the bible and it occurred to me how amusing it is to watch people scramble to justify it.
I mean, at a certain point, why not simply admit the faults and move on?
Fundie Christians are particularly unequipped to defend the blatant contradictions in the bible and whenever challenged resort to asserting YOU simply “take the bible out of context” or “don’t understand.”
anyway, I digress… just found it amusing.
There are actually very detailed rationalizations for every contradiction. Some are quite reasonable, but others are obviously of made ad hoc to resolve the contradiction.