I just want to say, on behalf of aging punks everywhere, that it’s really inappropriate to include us in your title. You can insult a “museum” like this without insulting us.
I suppose I forgot about that. I think there is dishonesty in how they present evolution as much weaker than it actually is and ID as much stronger than it actually is. It can be persuasive when people hear only that, especially when the science is beyond you. In my case, my acceptance of evolution isn’t any more intellectual than that. Evolution is more convincing, in part because it’s more honest.
Although it’s already been mentioned how these results could be skewed, I find the correlation of 51% voting for Bush in 2004 a bit ironic to this linked article.
Re: the bomb threats, I assumed there was at least a shred of evidence for them because the article chose to report them.
As far as that poll goes, meh. Polls have been making Americans look stupid for thirty years, and yet we’re doing okay.
Its always interesting for me to read of the problem that dopers have with the biblical creation story and the creationists. I can understand that proponents of creation as science in the schools should be opposed, vehemently in fact, but a theme park ?
One thing that hasn’t been addressed is exactly how firm the belief in the biblical account exists amongst the “creationists”. Based on my own history and experience, I would suggest that the “true believers” willing to ignore the science is very small. But most of the biblical creationists in general are subject to the following influences.
-
What I express needs to conform to the community I am a part of. I don’t really care one way or another.
-
Whatever puplic opinion you express does no harm. Really, is society better served when I reject God’s account in favour of science?
-
The science makes sense, but I’m sticking with God’s account. I can’t see the evidence for creation, but I’m sticking with God to be safe.
-
My leader is making this issue political and is calling on my support. I better go along.
Thus, I don’t take too seriously the claim that most Americans are creationists.
If you’re living in a democracy it can make a difference. Not so much the beliefs themself but whether they want to enforce them.
Agreed. I wish my fellow Christians would come to learn the difference between a moral duty and a civic one.
Is this the place that has an exhibit on how AIDS is God’s punishment for homosexuals, said exhibit being the founder’s favorite?
Wonder how they tie lesbians into that?
I’m like a kid at Christmas waiting for his sentencing hearing, which is scheduled for Friday. I’m pulling for the 288 year maximum sentence.
Maybe he meant homosexuals that don’t provide him with hot visuals.
I’m guessing with rope.
In my opinion, a lot of the primary and secondary schools in this country aren’t teaching science to kids to a point that they fully understand enough of the processes to really “get” evolution. Hell, a lot of kids (and adults-- yikes!) out there don’t really understand their own biological functions. Part of being able to ignore science is not understanding it, perceiving it as scary/useless, and discarding it so they don’t have to deal with it. It goes further out into other religious debates (that I will not mention here) that cause a lot of heated arguments on either side and a lot of the people who are so angry don’t necessarily understand the science required to have a clear picture of what they’re angry about.
Actually, I don’t believe they do know. More’s the pity.
My eighth grade daughter was told two days ago by her science teacher that my daughter couldn’t use radiometric evidence in her case for evolution and an old earth during classroom discussion. The reason? “Some dates were off and it is invalid.” At least, that is how my daughter paraphrased the objection.
I promptly showed her the Radiometric Dating - A Christian Perspective I’ll have to ask her tonight if she showed that to her teacher.
Amen and amen. The philosophy of science is completely absent from scientific instruction, especially below the college level. It seems to me that very few of today’s scientists even understand the essential nature of their own discipline. They do not know that science is a branch of philosophy. They do not know that religion is a sibling branch to science. They do not know that logic is not science. And they do not know that empiricism doesn’t even address, let alone prove, analytic claims (like 1+1=2, or God exists).
In fact, after many years of networking in the scientific community (though not a scientist myself), I have encountered few who even know how Einstein’s theories were derived. Oh, they know all about the conclusions of special and general relativity, I guess because they memorized them. But they know nothing of how they were deduced. Many do not even know the two premises that the whole of special relativity is based upon.[sup]1[/sup] Some have never even heard of Karl Popper.
For me, this has been a real sore spot at the Dope. And sometimes I think I may come across as hostile to science when in fact, I am a lover of science (and all philosophical studies). It’s just that I, like Dan Dennett, hate to hear bad arguments for a view that I hold dear. Science and its methodologies are the absolute perfect solution for all our empirical questions. But only for those. It pisses me off when people — and honestly, I think it’s mostly just the young’uns — make science into a religion, evolution into a plan, or natural selection into something of existential significance.
Just riles my ass is all. Sorry for the rant.
[sup]1/sup The speed of light in a vacuum is constant. (2) Physical law is everywhere the same.
I shamefully just avoid conversations about evolution vs creationism these days. My girlfriend is a creationist and doesn’t ‘believe’ in evolution. Oddly enough it doesn’t come up much and I’m hoping it never does. She knows how I feel about it, however, and is still with me, so apparently it isn’t that big of a deal for her.
My parents are both Young Earth Creationists, Evangelical Baptists, and outspoken about their beliefs. I lean toward atheism, but have strong tendencies to be more of a Deist. I guess I am just used to it.
I did go through a phase where I liked to argue about it. I figure I was just naive and thought I could convince people otherwise.
What a shame it is that more Fundie Christians don’t come to the same endpoint.
Time and time again over the centuries, scientists have made discoveries that Christians have insisted just can’t be so.
In not one instance, not one, have the Christians ever been right.
Now, what kind of omniscient, omnipotent god, who surely must know that the scientists know what’s what, would inspire his followers to such incorrigible, militant ignorance?
Or is it that the message, as Arlo Guthrie once put it, is “If you didn’t know about that one, well then, what else don’t you know?”
Well you could certainly apply that same reasoning to science. Before we KNEW that the atom was composed of millions of particles, we KNEW it was composed of hundreds. Before that, we KNEW it was a single solid particle.