# USA "Next to Last" in international evolution survey. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 15, 2006, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863 "2006-08-15T19:04:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/61 "2006-08-16T19:36:11Z")
OK, OK, nobody’s panicking. Carry on. ---
**Author:** ![Dead\_Badger](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/848f3c/32.png) [@Dead\_Badger](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dead_Badger)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/62 "2006-08-16T21:00:34Z")
[QUOTE=A Monkey With a Gun] Does anybody know how they worded the questions for this study? Does anybody know the sample size? Does anybody know if the questionaires were sent at random? [/QUOTE] Well, since no-one else seems particularly interested in looking up the actual article at hand, I quote a fair use proportion of the same (bolding mine): > [@Miller](#): > > Beginning in 1985, national samples of U.S. adults have been asked whether the statement, **“Human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals,”** is true or false, or whether the respondent is not sure or does not know. We compared the results of these surveys with survey data from nine European countries in 2002, surveys in 32 European countries in 2005, and a national survey in Japan in 2001 (5). Over the past 20 years, the percentage of U.S. adults accepting the idea of evolution has declined from 45% to 40% and the percentage of adults overtly rejecting evolution declined from 48% to 39%. The percentage of adults who were not sure about evolution increased from 7% in 1985 to 21% in 2005. After 20 years of public debate, the public appears to be divided evenly in terms of accepting or rejecting evolution, with about one in five adults still undecided or unaware of the issue. This pattern is consistent with a number of sporadic national newspaper surveys reported in recent years (6-10). > > A dichotomous true-false question format tends to exaggerate the strength of both positions. In 1993 and 2003, national samples of American adults were asked about the same statement but were offered the choice of saying that the statement was “definitely true, probably true, probably false, definitely false,” or that they did not know or were uncertain. About a third of American adults firmly rejected evolution, and only 14% of adults thought that evolution is “definitely true.” Treating the “probably” and “not sure” categories as varying degrees of uncertainty, ~55% of American adults have held a tentative view about evolution for the last decade. I’m not about to go hunting down the cited surveys, but this at least indicates to me that the US surveys were not worded in a loaded manner. We can debate forever about the bias of the web article; that, to me, is not particularly interesting. What _is_ interesting is that belief in evolution is both low and declining in the US relative to its global peers. I believe, based on a cursory read-through, that the original article demonstrates this in a convincing manner, and that the findings are worrying for anyone with more than a passing interest in American education policy and achievement, whether one believes that the theocratic sky is falling or not. ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/63 "2006-08-16T21:19:11Z")
Damn good post, **Dead Badger**. It is a bit worrisome. I guess I went out on a bit of a limb in this thread on account of having read so damn many articles about how bad the US is in science and education. My kneejerk reaction is “chill out, that’s gotta be mostly bullshit”. And this is the pit, where I kinda just shoot from the hip. ---
**Author:** ![armedmonkey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@armedmonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/armedmonkey)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/64 "2006-08-16T21:24:14Z")
Yes, everybody, that is a backpedal. ---
**Author:** ![Triskadecamus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b19c9b/32.png) [@Triskadecamus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Triskadecamus)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/65 "2006-08-16T23:22:39Z")
[QUOTE=DanBlather] Now explain why Germany, where there was a small experiment in Eugenics, has higher belief in evolution than the uS. [/QUOTE] I really don’t have a definitive answer for you, since I have not studied the social history of Germany well enough to analyze that aspect of German philosophy. However, considering that eugenics in Germany was a part of Nazism, rather than part of evolutionary theory, or general scientific opinion, it may well have been rejected with the whole body of ideas related to Nazism, and never closely related to evolution. But that is just a guess. I believe what I have posted here above because I hear the attribution of eugenics to evolution and “evolutionists” over and over again from church members in the region. They are not talking about theory, but actual personal experiences of their parents, grandparents, and even themselves, in a few cases. Please don’t make the mistake that I encourage the belief. I just want everyone to be aware that the precursors to this block of beliefs were quite plainly evil to anyone who witnessed the results. Scientifically recognized authorities practiced all the things I mentioned, and not on an occasional incidental basis, but as a regularly implemented policy. People were sterilized, and had involuntary abortions because they were “Chronically unemployable” in the opinion of the social services bureaucracy. No due process, no appeals, and the reason was that they were assumed to be genetically detrimental to society. The evolution of the human species was assumed to be worth their sacrifice. Now I don’t suppose for a moment that modern biologists hold these opinions as part of their professional understanding of evolution. Nor to I find the response of “Creationism” to be related to a search for truth, or expression of religious faith. It is authoritarianism of the rankest type. It came into currency because of the evil it replaced, in this one community, and spread very quickly to others for whom it provided a rationale to reinforce secular influence over churches. That is not my point, though. If you want to overcome ignorance regarding evolution in the public mind, you have to deal with the history of the theory, its proponents, and acknowledge the lies that were hidden by it, and advance the real truth about it. Assuming that all Protestant Christians are too stupid to understand it will accomplish only a deeper division. When you say evolution, you refer to a causational process in an undirected population of living things that allows change over long periods of time. When they hear evolution, it refers to an elitist social engineering plan, based on bigotry, and self aggrandizement. You cannot change the current perception of what evolution is without overcoming the perception of what it was. Denying that it ever was that is just another lie. It was like that. It should never have been, but it really was like that. And the academic and scientific world paid no heed to it for half a century, or longer. Politics followed that lead. And so, Christians became politicians. And they are certainly not showing their stupidity in the way they have managed that endeavor. Fight ignorance, not the ignorant. Tris ---
**Author:** ![Nic2004](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/4491bb/32.png) [@Nic2004](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nic2004)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/66 "2006-08-16T23:33:31Z")
[QUOTE=Lissa] Hey, I never said that my feeling was _rational._ I’m afraid of Christians but I’m also afraid of clowns and those biscuits that come in a tube. [/QUOTE] The first good belly laugh I’ve in days!! Thanks! ---
**Author:** ![Orbifold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/779978/32.png) [@Orbifold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orbifold)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/67 "2006-08-16T23:51:42Z")
**Triskadecamus** , what I find condescending is the suggestion that the solution to creationist bullshit is for me to get down on my knees as a scientist and beg for “social oversight” from the poor misunderstood moral majority. > [@Triskadecamus](#): > > That is not my point, though. If you want to overcome ignorance regarding evolution in the public mind, you have to deal with the history of the theory, its proponents, and acknowledge the lies that were hidden by it, and advance the real truth about it. Assuming that all Protestant Christians are too stupid to understand it will accomplish only a deeper division. When you say evolution, you refer to a causational process in an undirected population of living things that allows change over long periods of time. When they hear evolution, it refers to an elitist social engineering plan, based on bigotry, and self aggrandizement. I do not “assume that all Protestant Christians are too stupid to understand it”; I doubt anyone in the thread is assuming that. If we did, we wouldn’t advocate _teaching_ evolution, now would we? Get your own assumptions straight before you start attributing assumptions to others. I do assume (not without reason, I think) that there are some on the other side of this debate who do understand evolution but nevertheless have decided not to be convinced of its truth, ever. Your response to this is apparently just to explain things _more patiently_, while talking about eugenics. That will go over well at a PTA meeting, surely. The issue is not what some bastards did in the 1920’s. The issue is what kind of education we’re going to give to those lovely not-at-all-stupid Protestant children today, and it can be debated on those terms. Bringing up eugenicists even just to refute will do nothing but give people who don’t want to listen an excuse not to. ---
**Author:** ![Loopydude](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e56c9b/32.png) [@Loopydude](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loopydude)\ **Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/68 "2006-08-16T23:59:18Z")
[QUOTE=Triskadecamus] When they hear evolution, it refers to an elitist social engineering plan, based on bigotry, and self aggrandizement. [/QUOTE] I don’t know many creationists, but the few I do wouldn’t know what you’re talking about here. When they hear “evolution” they hear “something that is at great variance with the Biblical story of Creation”. They also feel the whole notion is simply undignified. You know, “Animals indeed!” I could readily accept that early in the 20th century some small portion of the Creationist movement was energized by the evils of Social Darwinism, but as others have pointed out, Creationist hostility towards evolutionary theory easily predates the Lynchburg attrocities, and the latter seems to be on _nobody’s_ radar in the present. Who else out there is asserting that modern Creationist rejection of evolution is in any way a reactionary consequence of pseudoscientific eugenics? Who would even be aware of it if it was? How can this even be argued convincingly? Also, I don’t think the assumption of many or any of us is that Creationists generally are stupid, or even that the great majority of them are sufficiently ignorant of modern biology to blame poor education. It’s actually far worse than that, really, because I think what the authors of the study are saying in their commentary is that these people _are_ smarte enough, they _are_ educated enough, and that more brains and learning aren’t going to remedy the situation. It’s a far more complicated and potentially intractable problem than simple stupidity or ignorance. This above all else is why it’s truly frightening. ---
**Author:** ![Orbifold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/779978/32.png) [@Orbifold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Orbifold)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2006, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/69 "2006-08-17T00:10:34Z")
And as long as I’m ranting, let me say this: I’ve had it up to my eyeballs with this perception that as an academic and proponent of reason that I have to apologize for what I am. So much so, in fact, that I defend the status and worth of academics and academia vociferously. If that makes me sound condescending, then that’s too damn bad. But I’m not going to apologize for what I am, and I’m sure as hell not going to apologize personally for the actions of assholes in the 1920’s who are totally unconnected to me any more than I expect an average modern day Christian to apologize for the Inquisition. I’m bright enough to realize that the actions of the inquisitors have _no bearing whatsoever_ on the morality of, say, tax-free status for churches today. And I fully expect the average Christian on the street to understand that the actions of 1920’s eugenicists have _no bearing whatsoever_ on the morality of teaching evolution. (See? I _don’t_ think they’re stupid.) But do not expect _me_ to get down on my knees to justify myself to the “moral majority” just because you think I don’t understand _them_ well enough. If any one of them _is_ silly enough to think that I’m the moral descendent of eugenicists then quite frankly it’s high time they understood _me_. ---
**Author:** ![Princhester](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3e96dc/32.png) [@Princhester](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Princhester)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2006, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863/70 "2006-08-17T04:45:16Z")
I agree that Trisk has it wrong. I think, though, you haven’t hit on the essence of it either. The essence of it is that science and the dogmatic and supernatural aspects of religion are an uneasy mix. I know that’s controversial, and I’ve had debates upon it before, but that’s my take. In my view many religious people know either intellectually or at a sub-conscious level that a rigourous scientific approach to the big questions of life ends up someplace that has little necessity for dogmatic and supernatural aspects of religion. This is why the more fundamentalist (ie dogmatic) you are, the more against the idea that evolution can be happily slotted into your religion you will tend to be. The more progressive your religion (ie the more you view it as a sort of community group of nice and like minded people viz UK C of E) the less you are against supplanting a scientific for a supernatural explanation of origins. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/usa-next-to-last-in-international-evolution-survey/368863.md?page=3)