Majority of Americans don't believe evolution - Page 2

On August 15 2006 17:41 jkillashark wrote:
Well America IS a nation with Christian roots, you friggin pagans.

On August 15 2006 17:39 aseq wrote:I'm in favor of teaching creationism in schools too (flame me), but alongside evolution.

On August 15 2006 17:58 QuietIdiot wrote:
Similiar to the Galapagos Islands theories? :o

On August 15 2006 17:39 aseq wrote:
Hot77.iEy: I'm not a christian, nor am i certain of either evolution or creation, but i do believe that a single flood COULD / MAY have created the grand canyon (this flood + the aftereffects of the erosion, formed rivers, winds etc. ). When you look at it from the evolution point of view, the grand canyon wasn't formed during or shortly after the big bang, so there must have been some forces involved after that (like a giant earthquake, a meteorite hit (possibly resulting in a massive flood) or stuff like that). It's not all that unthinkable imo.

I read a theoretical book about this supposed flood once, which was inspiring and a great read (but in dutch). I'm in favor of teaching creationism in schools too (flame me), but alongside evolution. To me, neither are proven, evolution is still a theory, as is creationism, so let's learn kids all there is to know and let them make their own decision.

On August 15 2006 17:54 Jathin wrote:
The problem with teaching creationism in schools is how you present it.

Do you present it from a Christian standpoint?
A Buddhist standpoint?
How about Hindu?

On August 15 2006 17:54 Jathin wrote:
The problem with teaching creationism in schools is how you present it.

Do you present it from a Christian standpoint?
A Buddhist standpoint?
How about Hindu?

It's very difficult to approach it because each religion has its own explanation for how humans came about. Evolution, on the other hand, is a theory that's very consistent and has ample evidence to support it. Creationism isn't science, evolution is. There is data supporting evolution. We have witnessed descent with modification with our very own eyes (in the 80's-90's there is decades of data on bird beak length increasing throughout generations to adapt to the strain of harder-to-obtain food)

And if science threatens your faith, perhaps you ought to re-examine your beliefs. Science and religion don't have to be mutually exclusive things. It's really just a handful of overly-dogmatic religious sects (read: fundies) that need science to be wrong on evolution (and a number of other things, for that matter), in order for their religious beliefs to be right.

Devil's advocate.

Your average non-scientist citizen is not likely to go and check all the sources to verify that, yes indeed, evolution is the most likely explanation for the diversity of species. So, to demand that this average citizen believe in evolution is to demand the same leap of faith as for that citizen to believe in creation. Either way, some "expert" is telling this citizen what to think about something s/he doesn't understand.

Why don't these polls include an "I don't know, I don't have time to check the facts, and it really doesn't matter in my everyday life" option? I think that would be the best response for a thinking non-scientist.

It's sad that most Christians base their faith on The Bible and not the teachings of Christ. This is the same problem Fundamentalist Muslims are suffering from...they confuse the Qur'an(and subsequent mistranslations and commentaries) with the spiritual message of Mohammed. Both Mohammed and Jesus promoted love, tolerance, forgiveness, and understanding. None of which is in conflict with science(the pursuit of truth).

If the direct teachings of these prophets were the focus of religious organizations(instead of using scriptures to control their followers through fear), science would be embraced by the world religions rather than shunned by it.

i don't think so whatsoever. the good thing about science is it systematically corrects itself via peer review when contrary evidence arrives--even if "correction" means scrapping the whole thing. That's what WORKS about science.

that said, when the entire fossil record we have supports evolution and predictions are made and proven true, I don't think I need to worry about semantics. It's fact.

Some predictions made based on evolution:

• Darwin predicted, based on homologies with African apes, that human ancestors arose in Africa. That prediction has been supported by fossil and genetic evidence (Ingman et al. 2000).
  Theory predicted that organisms in heterogeneous and rapidly changing environments should have higher mutation rates. This has been found in the case of bacteria infecting the lungs of chronic cystic fibrosis patients (Oliver et al. 2000).
  
• Predator-prey dynamics are altered in predictable ways by evolution of the prey (Yoshida et al. 2003).
  
• Ernst Mayr predicted in 1954 that speciation should be accompanied with faster genetic evolution. A phylogenetic analysis has supported this prediction (Webster et al. 2003).
  
• Several authors predicted characteristics of the ancestor of craniates. On the basis of a detailed study, they found the fossil Haikouella "fit these predictions closely" (Mallatt and Chen 2003).
  
• Evolution predicts that different sets of character data should still give the same phylogenetic trees. This has been confirmed informally myriad times and quantitatively, with different protein sequences, by Penny et al. (1982).
  
• Insect wings evolved from gills, with an intermediate stage of skimming on the water surface. Since the primitive surface-skimming condition is widespread among stoneflies, J. H. Marden predicted that stoneflies would likely retain other primitive traits, too. This prediction led to the discovery in stoneflies of functional hemocyanin, used for oxygen transport in other arthropods but never before found in insects (Hagner-Holler et al. 2004; Marden 2005).

The problem lies not with the people, as Americans are as smart as anyone else, but with the educational system. In the US, only those that get to college are taught to ask questions and challenge any preconceived notions that they have. Even then, not all colleges to an adequate job of it.

Thus, the majority of the population that has a high school education at best has never been taught to change their minds. Instead, they are taught to learn material and repeat it. When what they are taught (at church, or on the TV/radio) that the world is 6000 years old, that global warming is a liberal hoax, or that we were divine creations dropped into the Garden of Eden, that's what they repeat. They were never told that they could question what they hear, nor that they should.

You want to fix this problem? Be willing to pay higher property taxes, attend school board meetings, and push for changes to the curriculum that encourage curiosity and questioning... Then maintain the effort for a generation so that the kids who start with the program in kindergarden can progress through the system and go into politics.

And you can blame it on modern schools... the problem is the definition of "modern". Schools have been focused on churning out industrial workers (factory-workers, etc.) for the last century. That's the "modern" model. Now that we're largely post-industrial, we notice the need for people who can reason and think, as opposed to people who only had to read, write, and do basic arithmetic. We need to take a long, hard look at what the current school curricula are designed to teach, and work from the ground up. Moreover, the more recent fixation on testing to academic standards only exacerbates the problem; we're telling schools that so long as kids can regurgitate information, they're okay.

On August 15 2006 18:09 gameguard wrote:
there is plenty of measurable data supporting evolution. However, there is also areas that are kind of grey.

think about the very beginning of life. The general concensus is that lightning in the pre-oxygenated atmosphre caused the formation of simple molecules like ammonia. Simple molecules aggregate to form more complex molecules such as RNA. Lipids and such form globules that have an internal invironment. RNA is incorporated and voala - the primitive cell is born.

There has been experiments to prove some of these could happen, but its hard to say that all of these processes came together to form the cell. Now if there was some supernatural guidance.....

On August 15 2006 18:12 VietBitter wrote:
To say you don't believe in Humans came about as the result of evolution and to say you don't believe in evolution is two different things. Although evolution is a theory, but come on theres ample evidence for evolution to be true, whereas creationism requires faith, tell me which one is logically more correct.

On August 15 2006 18:07 Mynock wrote:

However, we've gotta be honest. There is 0 data of a species evolving into another species. No data. No proof.

That is the main reason evolution theory is still just a theory.

On August 15 2006 17:22 gameguard wrote:
I dont understand how anyone with a reasonable amount of education can look past the overwhelming evidence for evolution and say its false.