Believing in a talking snake

So Bill Maher is interviewing a sitting US Senator about evolution. This Senator is not so sure about evolution ("the scientific communty is a little divided on that") and Maher is a little sceptical that intelligent people could actually believe in a talking snake:

You're a Senator. You are one of the very few people are really running this country. It worries me that people are running my country, who think, who believe in a talking snake.

And the Senator's defense?

"You don't have to pass an IQ test to be in the senate"

No kidding you don't!

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I'd say Maher is gullible.

Mark Twain said it best: "Faith is believing in something you know isn't true."

The religious make stuff up and demand that everybody else take their nonsense seriously.

Why not call them on their lies?

Bill Maher:"Maybe your thinking should be higher."
Guy in Jesus disguise:"That is a good point!"

I laughed at that.

Its a pity there isn't a REAL religious test in the US. Imagine hooking McCain or Obama to a lie detector and asking them if they really believe what they claim to believe.
I doubt even many religious types would get off unscathed, "Talking snake?, errrr yes of course I believe in that.
Jonah in the whales belly?, Dinosaurs on Noahs ark?, Why not!"

Maher is himself kind of an interesting character, cognitively speaking.
He is hard as nails on biological evolution, and doesn't hesitate a microsecond to call religious types on their pretensions.
Yet he uncritically accepts every goofy pseudo-medical theory that comes down the pike.
If there's a better poster boy for compartmentalization, I don't know who it is.

That exhalation Sen. Pryor lets out before he answers Maher's question speaks volumes. I'd be willing to bet that he knows full well that the theory of evolution is scientifically sound. But the constituents he represents in Arkansas? That's another story. Got to keep the voters at home happy ...

@Bill Kanapaux...

You sir have hit the nail on the head. Well done.