"Lord Save Us From Your Followers" Book Review & Discussion (4 of 4)

Creationism: check reason at the door

I was walking home with my daughter the other day when I bumped into a neighbor I had only met briefly in our comings and goings. Let’s call him Jeff. Jeff and I exchanged pleasantries as usual but this time he stopped and asked what I did for a living. I told him and then asked the same of him. He said he was retired but was active in leading a Sunday scripture study with some other Christians from the valley. He gave me the usual “What it is to be Christian” pamphlet. We talked some more and one thing led to another and we started talking faith and religion. He expressed some displeasure with other Christian sects because they were not based as strongly on the Bible as he felt was necessary. We talked some more and he told me his son was a chemist. Jeff said he believed in a young earth but his son believed in an old earth. I asked him what he meant by this. Jeff explained that the world is only 7000 years old. In other words, Jeff believes in the creation story in Genesis and the timeline set by the Bible. His son, the chemist, believes the age calculated by science, which is 4.5 billion years (consequently he probably believes in evolution also). I told Jeff that I shared the same beliefs as his son but that it didn’t hamper my faith life because there is always room for God. I explained, “Science will never disprove the existence of God just as we will never prove He exists.” Jeff is a good guy. We don’t agree on how old or young the Earth is or on how we got here, but I respect someone who is willing to share his faith. I just wish I could understand why people like Jeff check reason at the door when it comes to their faith.

As I said in the previous post in this series, one of the more intriguing interviews Dan Merchant included in his book was that with former Republican Senator from Pennsylvania Rick Santorum. Santorum promotes the agenda of the Religious Right. He opposes abortion, same-sex marriage, and supports the teaching of Intelligent Design in public schools. Right off the bat I took exception with the fact that he used Europe as an example of what’s wrong with faith in the world. He claims that Europe is an “advanced stage of the problem.” The problem being there is an “increased secularization of the world. Faith is being replaced with the hard realities of science and materialism.” His support for this statement probably comes from the fact that about 20% of Western Europeans attend weekly church services, less than half that of North Americans. But does this make Europe a den of evil, Rick? They also tend to be more open to same-sex couples and abortion than Americans, which probably adds fuel to his animosity towards Europeans. Santorum says he believes in a “God of faith, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob – [Who is] also the God of reason, the God of philosophers.” But that it “takes more faith to believe the theory of evolution than it does to believe we were made by a divine being.” I’m sorry Rick, but most people find it easier to believe in something tangible or based on sound rational thinking than something shrouded in mystery. I have a fairly strong faith in the existence of God, but it would sure help if He’d wrap me on the shoulder one day and say, “Dude, it’s Me. What’s up?”

Santorum supports Intelligent Design. In 2001, he tried unsuccessfully to insert language into “No Child Left Behind” that would have sought to promote the teaching of intelligent design in public schools. Intelligent Design claims, “certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.” I just shake my head every time I hear the subject of Intelligent Design because there is really a lack of intelligence behind Intelligent Design. Intelligent Design is merely an attempt to skirt separation of Church and State and bring creationism into the classroom. And the sad thing is supporters claim it is a scientific theory; a theory that cannot be tested by experiment, does not generate any predictions, and proposes no new hypotheses of its own. Intelligent Design is not a science. It is a joke.

Creationists have a clear misunderstanding of how science works. Science refers to a system of acquiring knowledge through observation and experimentation to explain natural phenomena. Scientists use a process called the scientific method to test hypotheses (educated guesses). Experiments are performed that will either lend support or refute a hypothesis. Once enough evidence is gathered to support a hypothesis, the results are shared in peer-reviewed journals for further validation. A hypothesis that does not lend itself to experimentation can never be validated and will never be accepted by the scientific community as a truth. Intelligent Design has this problem. How do you provide experimental evidence of an intelligent cause? You can’t. Game Over.

Creationists misinterpret the terminology used in science, like theory in the theory of evolution. In layman terms, a theory is something that is a mere guess, but in scientific terms, a theory is something proven and generally accepted as true. True, like gravity.

Creationists struggle juggling Genesis and Evolution. Christians grow up with the story of Adam and Eve and the Garden of Eden. It is a wonderful tale of love, betrayal, and loss with the hope of someday reentering paradise. But it is just that, a tale. The Book of Genesis is a symbolic text (most Christians would agree). You can’t take it literally. Genesis was written 2500+ years ago to explain Earth’s and humanity’s origins to a people that had a far less understanding of the world they lived in then we do today. It provided comfort and knowledge that they weren’t alone. Since then, we’ve learned that the world is not flat, the Earth is not the center of the universe, the world is much older than the Bible says, we are made up of cells, life originated in the sea, chimps may be our distant cousins, there may be life on Mars, and cloning takes the fun out of passing on your genes. We learned this in school, in classes like earth science, life science, geology, biology, chemistry, physics, and astronomy. It makes sense and supporting evidence has piled up over the years. But there is no assault on a supreme being by science. There is still room for God. What is to say that He made Adam and Eve, two paramecia fluttering around in a primordial soup on distant planet in another solar system billions of years before Earth even came into existence (but then he wouldn’t need Adam AND Eve, Adam (or Eve) would’ve been enough… because he’d simply divide, making a copy of himself, because he’s a single cell organism… never mind)? Why can’t the Lord be a primal mover, a higher being who simply set things in motion? Both explanations take into account the knowledge we’ve gained in the last 2500 years. The phrase “created… in His image” (Genesis 1:27) just paints a different picture of Him. Why can’t God be a paramecium? It would show He has a sense of humor.

So, why is it that creationists throw reason and their education out the door, conclude the Earth is only 7000 years old and dinosaur bones are just an elaborate hoax? Because… “that’s what the Bible says.” Ignorance is bliss, I guess.

To conclude, science has no agenda against the faithful or God. Scientists merely seek to explain the unexplainable, to learn more about the world we live in and the laws that govern it. It is a tedious, detail conscious profession in which you fail more than you succeed. This is what Einstein meant when he said, “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.” In a way, we are all scientists, as long as we still have a curiosity of the unknown. Intelligent Design is not science. It is fiction. And it does not belong in the science classroom. Creationists need to step up to the plate, open up their minds, and evolve a little.

Jumping to Conclusions on Generalizations

Every election cycle we witness politicians flaunting their conservative credentials or trying to persuade voters that they are good church going Christians so they can get the all-important Christian conservative vote. When you think about it, it’s a little counterintuitive. The last time I looked in Webster’s, a liberal meant open-minded and being a conservative meant you were afraid of change. Yet every politician fears the liberal label. And what does it matter how often one goes to church or what religion they practice in a nation that has separation of church and state ingrained in its constitution? We love labels in America. …And I’m not taking about the fashion industry. One of our problems is that we love the ease and neatness of throwing people or ideas into categories like Pro-Choice or social conservative. Unfortunately, these labels never accurately represent a specific person but are just generalizations of a group or set of ideas. View the list below.

Things often categorized as “left-wing” are on the left side and the opposing, “right-wing” groups on the right. It appears upon initial inspection to be a common sense ordering by issue and view. In fact, in the last three, including the current, presidential election cycles, Republican presidential nominees have courted the conservative evangelical vote and Republicans often seek the label of fiscally conservative and purveyors of a free market economy. Democrats receive the opposing labels whether self-described or not. Note that upon closer inspection of the above list of terms, both extremes of some issues are not represented. Also, our economy is neither socialist based nor free market but a combination of both. And a funny correlation can be drawn between a free market economy and evolution. Conservatives will love this. Read on.

Identify The Extremes

Take for example, gun control vs. gun rights. The 2nd Amendment states, “A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Gun Rights advocates like the National Rifle Association (NRA) believe in the strict interpretation of the second amendment and that any legislation restricting gun ownership of any kind is unconstitutional. They believe in the notion that gun ownership makes a civil society and with the NRA pumping millions into congressional lobbying their argument is well heard. The extreme opposite stance to gun rights is not gun control but a universal gun ban where the possession of all firearms, whether for military, personal protection, or game hunting, is illegal. As much as I’d love to see more hunters giving an increased advantage to the quarry in the name of sport by using simpler hunting implements than high caliber rifles, the ban on hunting firearms makes little sense. Hunting firearms fall into an entirely different category than arms designed for the sole purpose of taking human lives. There is also very little money to support a cause like banning guns where the sole product of a movement is peace. War and killing is much more profitable.

The group opposed to gun rights advocates and the NRA, though not opposite in stance is gun control. Gun control advocates believe that the wording of the 2nd amendment does not extend the right for a citizen to own military style firearms, or assault weapons. In some urban areas where crime rates are high, gun control is even extended to include handguns. Gun control does not seek to eliminate hunting firearms. For this reason gun control occupies the middle ground between gun rights and a universal gun ban.

Another example of groups that do not have extreme opposing stances is pro-choice and pro-life (anti-abortion). Pro-choice gives the authority in whether to see a pregnancy to completion or not to every woman. Anti-abortion groups do not support a woman’s right to choose and seek to criminalize abortion procedures by physicians. Anti-abortion activists have the view that abortions should never take place. The extreme opposite stance of pro-life is not pro-choice, but a birth ban. Wow! This scenario is straight out of a science fiction novel. Imagine a place where the human race is dieing because everyone is strung out on contraceptive-laced drugs, (see Mockingbird by Walter Tevis). I don’t believe Republicans would give much support to a birth ban because it’s difficult to pass on our problems to the next generation if we prevent conception from taking place (joke; Ha-ha!). A birth ban is an extreme stance, but just as extreme as that shared by pro-life advocates. Pro-lifers need know that they have more in common with their pro-choice adversaries than they believe.

Americans are not as polarized as opinion poles and politicians would like to let us believe. When put in the correct frame of reference, the majority of Americans occupy the gray area in between. Because I’ve had too many math and science classes, I am prone to visualizing this in the form of the bell curve (see graph below).

The bell curve represents a normal distribution of data. Let me give an example to explain the curve. Let’s say the graph represents the distribution of American men by height. The mean (average) height of an American male is 5’10”, represented by the middle line in the red zone. You would expect the majority of American men to be around 5’10”. That is, that the majority of the population would be close to the mean, while shorter and taller men (to the left and right of the middle) are farther from the mean. And in fact, one standard deviation from the mean, the red zone, makes up 68% of the population.

The curve above is idealized, but it can be applied to the examples of gun control and abortion because if you could devise a study to poll where people stood on the issues of gun control and abortion, a similar curve would take shape. The edges of the curve, where the population approaches zero, is where gun rights (NRA) and pro-life supporters would be, opposite from universal gun ban and birth ban. The edges of the curve contain the extreme groups, the groups that do not recognize the middle ground, that can’t identify that their main adversary, gun control or pro-choice, is actually not 100% opposed to their stance. They refuse to see that the majority of the population lies to their left, near the mean, in the middle ground. It defies logic that gun rights and pro-life groups can be so vocal in their views when their numbers relative to the majority is so small. The only conclusion that can be made is that these groups must be well endowed and this is supported in the example of the NRA.

Is America a Free Market Economy?

In a land that flaunts it’s free market economy any mention of a socialist undercurrent is met with a unified front of opposition from both sides of the congressional aisle. This of course is to gain support from the ignorant public who is not educated in the reality of government programs. Reality check people, we do not have a true free-market economy and some of our most useful government programs were born from socialistic ideas. Oh, and by the way… socialism does not equal communism. Again…

Socialism ≠ Communism

Socialism is a socio-economic system in which property and distribution of wealth are subject to control by the community. The idea is to create a kind of utopia in which the needs of all citizens are met by the whole. Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in “The Communist Manifesto” outlined a blueprint for the implementation of socialism into policy. It outlined the creation of a strong central government with wide sweeping authority to efficiently organize people into labor groups. Americans often make the irrational assumption that socialism equals communism as it was implemented in the U.S.S.R. The majority of Americans were alive to witness the cold war. People identify everything to do with the former world power as wrong and anti-American. The U.S.S.R. and its socialist experiment ultimately failed because it put the power of organizing the society in the hands of a few and gave little incentive for people to work hard. It’s a weakness of man that power corrupts and people don’t work hard for the ‘idea’ of creating a better society. Though socialism may be intrinsically flawed because it doesn’t adequately address people’s motivational needs, its idealistic goal of taking care of its people’s necessities is high-minded.

The opposing economic system to socialism is a free market economy. In 19th century America, the term Laissez-faire was used to describe this system as America was spreading its influence West of the Mississippi. Milton Friedman, a vocal proponent of a free market economy, believed that economic freedoms equal civil and political freedoms. The idea is that with little government interference people will self regulate by the practices of supply and demand. A free-market economy, like socialism has the idea of creating a kind of utopia. Unfortunately, there is little economic incentive in caring for the poor and little method to control the build-up of wealth among an elite minority in a free market.

Senator Hubert H. Humphrey (MN) in his last speech on Nov. 1, 1977 said, "...the moral test of government is how that government treats those who are in the dawn of life, the children; those who are in the twilight of life, the elderly; those who are in the shadows of life; the sick, the needy and the handicapped. " America today calls itself the lone super-power, but 200 plus years after its inception we still struggle with the method of addressing this issue. In conversation you hear the loathing of ‘free-loaders’ and the programs like unemployment or welfare, because they ‘steal from the working man’. News Flash! Socialism began as a working class movement. This insensitivity is contrasted by the fact the Americans are thought of as the some of the most charitable people in the world when it comes to sharing their treasure. What better way to help out our sick and poor than to offer programs like Medicare, Medic-aide, WIC, Social Security, and Welfare? These programs embody the selflessness and charitableness of our people. Many of these programs were born in the Great Depression under FDR, at a time when many Americans struggled to scrape a living together. How soon we forget.

America is not a true free market economy. The uneducated public may not understand this, but they enjoy the benefits of our hybridized free market and its social programs run by the government.

Evolution and the Free Market Economy

In describing a free market economy you come to the realization that some of the principles are borrowed from a scientific theory, Darwin’s theory of evolution and more specifically, the terms natural selection and survival of the fittest.

The theory of evolution has had some press time recently because of Christian fundamentalist attempts to bring creationism into the science classroom in Delaware and Montana. It’s humorous to listen to their reasoning because it proves that they don’t understand the scientific definition of a theory. And with fundamentalist thinking, reason plays no part in their argument.

Darwin believed that the exchange of genes through sex produces unlimited variations in a species, but only those with the characteristics necessary to survive are able to mate and pass on their genes to the next generation. In other words, a species optimizes itself for the sake of survival. The same could come from a boardroom only exchanging and implementing ideas instead of genes. The ideas that turn into profitable business ventures survive while those that do not are left by the wayside (think of this in terms of people). The urban jungle meets the original jungle.

So, if one can link free market economy with Darwin’s theory of evolution, under the organization of terms in the first table, you can flip the arrow to read:

This makes evolution a right-wing term. Right?

How would you like to tell an Evangelical republican from Savannah that the blueprint for deregulation of government oversight and taxation of business is in “On Natural Selection” but he can’t get a copy of it in Billy Bob’s Bookstore because he’s a fundamentalist and “don’t believe in no men com’en from monkeys.”

That was fun. Interesting, contradictions…

To conclude

The terms listed in first table do not accurately describe anyone. But by reading it, one could incorrectly conclude what it is to be a democrat or republican. How easy it is to jump to conclusions based on generalizations.

It’s important to have sound judgment when identifying what side of the fence you are on, especially in an election year. Understand which stances are ones of tolerance and which allow no room for debate.

Understand the system of government you live under and what you would like available to you if financial hardships came your way.

Figure out the contradictions in your beliefs and resolve them.

Don’t let anyone put you in a category. Be your own man and don’t label yourself unless you are willing to accept all generalizations that come along with the label.