…and this is a 
Ron Numbers gave a brief history of creationism, reminding us that perhaps a majority of the people in the world reject Darwin, and he also emphasized a few facts in that history that many would find surprising.
There was no organized opposition to evolution until the 1920s, when it was marshalled by William Jennings Bryan, who was most concerned about the ethical implications of evolution. He made the point that the popular movie about the Scopes trial, Inherit the Wind, was historically inaccurate. One of the most memorable moments in the movie was when Darrow pinned Bryan down on the date of the creation to 4004 BC…but Bryan had no such preconception. The primary strain of creationism at that time had absolutely no problem with the age of the Earth, and Bryan plainly stated in interviews and speeches that he was a proponent of the day-age theory, in which the "days" of creation week were not required to be 24-hour modern days.
These early creationists had no bone to pick with geology at all, and were unperturbed at the thought that the world was hundreds of millions of years old. The two dominant explanations were the day-age theory, which stretched out the time-span of creation week to cover the whole of geological time, and gap theory, which argued that between the creation of the world mentioned at the beginning of Genesis, and the account of the 6 creation days, there was a long undocumented period of time in which geological history occurred. The latter model was also popular because it was presented in the Scofield Reference Bible, which specifically placed the geological column in a 'gap' in the account, and stated that the 6 days referred to the creation of Eden.
The dissenters from this position were a tiny minority, the Seventh Day Adventists, who were regarded as weird by the majority of fundamentalists. The Seventh Day Adventists credited a source of divine information other than the Bible, the prophecies and visions of their founder, Ellen White, who was the source of the idea that Genesis had to be describing a literal six 24-hour day creation occurring 6000 years ago. Her disciple, George MacReady Price, came up with the idea of wedging all of geology into the Noachian Flood. These were not popular ideas.
The mainstreaming of literalist creationism occurred in the 1960s, when John Whitcomb and Henry Morris wrote The Genesis Flood. It's basically the same nonsense he Seventh Day Adventists were peddling, but Whitcomb and Morris were not SDAs, making it possible for conservative Christians, who regarded Seventh Day Adventism as a freaky cult, to coalesce in the formation of the Creation Research Society. These people had no ambition to convert the research community, but instead wanted to wean bible-believers away from what they considered the compromises of day-age and gap theory.
Another consequence of this shift was that it opened up hard-core creationists to a kind of hyper-evolution: they had to explain how a small ark of fixed size could contain all the animals in the world, so they had to postulate a small number of created "kinds" that diversified into new species after the flood, at a pace evolutionary biologists consider absurd.
In the early 1980s, these new, literal creationists got ambitious and started trying to push into classrooms by legislation, efforts that got stymied by major court decisions in Arkansas and Louisiana, which ruled that mandatory teaching of creationism was unconstitutional. One consequence of the Arkansas decision was that, when the creationists had been anticipating victory, they had begun assembling a creationist textbook. When they lost instead, they had to rewrite to remove the word "creationism" and replace it with "intelligent design".
Numbers talked a bit about Intelligent Design, and argued that it was different from the previous version of creationism…but not in a good way, or in a milder way. The brainchild of Philip Johnson, Intelligent Design was far more radical than the previous iterations — Johnson opposed methodological materialism, and specifically wants to incorporate god into science. While arguing that ID is something new, though, he also made it clear that it is not because ID is a secular theory — it's an extraordinarily religious idea, backed by religious proponents, and funded by theocratic extremists like Howard Ahmanson.
He ended by giving us the discouraging news that 65.5% of Americans believe in creationism, and that the movement is expanding beyond US borders to the Islamic and Jewish world, too. Bummer, man. He could have at least offered some hope for the future.
Humanities & Social Science
Comments
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 1:06 AM
It is kind of depressing to know that the creationist movement is actually growing. All the more reason to be vehement in keeping it out of our schools.
When you have to take your beliefs and wrap it in semantics like Intelligent Design just to get it into the school systems you are purposely distorting your motive and misleading those who may not be all that educated in the subject matter.
In other words, Decepticons! Attack!
Holy crap I should go to bed, that was one long sentence.
Posted by: Charlie Foxtrot
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October 30, 2009 1:10 AM
Truth will out.
Posted by: cag
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October 30, 2009 1:11 AM
At last TypePad let me in after interminable 403's from MovableType.
Has there been any discussion (regardless of 24 hour or millennial days) about the fact that for creationists there is still the issue of 5 days being used to create the earth and only 1 day to create the rest of the universe?
Posted by: Dale | October 30, 2009 1:11 AM
A very interesting history! How strange that fundamentalist ideas about the formation of the Earth have gotten progressively less rational as time has gone on. I suppose it's to be expected, since as evidence against their case mounts, the only options for the ID movement are 1) abandon the theory (not gonna happen) or 2) modify it and thereby make it more ridiculous. But why did the once-fringe movement gain mainstream acceptance? All we can do is hope it turns around, I guess...
Posted by: Zeno
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October 30, 2009 1:13 AM
In the United States there is also the political element whereby some kind of creationism (ID, at least, if not YEC) is becoming an article of faith among right-wingers. They're infected with anti-intellectualism and disdain the opinions of scientists (re global warming, vaccinations, etc.). Over at that extremist sinkhole know as Free Republic, anyone who dissents from the creationist party line is hooted down by the true believers. The political right-wing in America is ossifying into a bloc of anti-science creationists. (I wish they were fossils in reality instead of only metaphorically.)
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 1:16 AM
Yea.. anti-science for the win! As they call their spouses on their cell phones, drive their cars, watch their boob tube, and use the internet which is a series of tubes.
Yet the earth isn't old, vaccines are evil, and John McCain is gonna fix the internets with his freedom bill.
Sigh, sometimes I wonder how intelligently designed they think we are.
Posted by: llewelly | October 30, 2009 1:24 AM
cag October 30, 2009 1:11 AM:
The "rest of the universe" was never actually created. Instead, God created 10,000 or so years worth of incoming light. It has features which imply a vast, mostly uninhabitable universe, only to fallible mortals. Those who grasp God's true purpose understand this light was created to test the faithful; those who look into it and lose faith will not ascend to Heaven. In this way, God will see that His Realm is a peaceful place; the pointy-headed intellectuals and other trouble-makers will be in Hell, where they are unable to make trouble.
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 1:24 AM
I should have posted this in my previous comment, but oh well.
This whole predicament kind of shocks me, because people have so many avenues of knowledge they can check into to see the truth of things.
Anti-Vaccinators can just look up information on the internet to sort the truth from the slush. Not only do they not do it you can't even present it to them. They will deny all research and every arrow that points them away from their opinion without even considering it.
How can you enjoy life with a mindset that is completely opposed to learning new things. The fervor to which many want to learn is no less than the fervor of those who want to deny.
I suppose denying is a lot easier than learning.
Posted by: cag
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October 30, 2009 1:40 AM
llewelly #7 - Thank you for the scientific explanation - that is what I needed to see the light. It seems so obvious in retrospect. How blind I have been. The darkness has been lifted from my eyes. Glory. Is it too late to convert? Jebus I'm coming to join the fleeced.
Posted by: Liveliest Crib
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October 30, 2009 1:45 AM
liquidsiphon:
I wonder if the myriad avenues of information isn't part of the problem.
We operate in an educational system that teaches what to think almost exclusively. How to think is rarely addressed. Students from kindergarten to college are forced to memorize absurd amounts of information, but are not taught how to evaluate it. Rarely, if ever, will a child be rewarded for asking, "How do we know this?" (I asked that once in 3rd Grade, and was tersely told, "Because it says so in the book!" When I asked, "How does the book know?" I was belittled. "Books don't know," said the so called teacher, "They just tell you. Now we have to move on!")
So, educated people are used to memorizing and regurgitating. Enter the internet.
We have reached a point where there is so much information available at the click of a button that one can easily confine one's self to the few thousand websites that confirm one's preconceptions and prejudices, whatever they may be. You want news from a left wing perspective and only from a left wing perspective? You could get lost navigating through all the choices available. You want to find a few thousand sites that will confirm your prejudices about the age of the earth and "prove" the faultiness of evolution? Not hard to find. And you can even add your own thoughts to the wiki part of the site, and have your thoughts validated in real time by people 'round the world. Read, consume and regurgitate. You can even sound edumacated when you do it.
And you would like the citizens of Know Knothing Knation to seek information that challenges their preconceptions? They wouldn't know what to do with such information even if they were so inclined. Which they're not.
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 1:48 AM
cag #9 - Careful with that talk! Our light is very limited and will be going away very soon.
Nevermind things like this.. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091028142231.htm
BTW.. First time posting to this site so forgive me as I acclimate myself. Is posting links forbidden? I'm trying to find a ToS but all I see is the Dungeon stuff so I think I'm in the clear.
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 1:58 AM
At #10
What you've said makes a lot of sense. I read a story not long ago about a christian school that got a question not covered in the curriculum and they cried foul because they didn't know how to form their own opinion on it.
I suppose my biggest problem with all of this is I don't know how someone can go through life relying on book smarts only. How do you not get into situations that rely on your own ability to disseminate information for so long that you enter adulthood that way?
I look at these things and the only conclusion that I can come to is that people are happy to let others decide for them. They are happy with it this way and will spout anything said authority tells them to spout.
I would love to see a long term study that begins with middle schoolers to show if more independent minds become liberals and/or atheists and if more dependent children become conservatives and/or religious.
Posted by: darvolution proponentsist | October 30, 2009 1:58 AM
Brain Cell Stimulus - Injection #1
The Indelible Stamp of our Lowly Origin
Posted by: Lion IRC | October 30, 2009 2:00 AM
I find the expression "intelligent design" a little bit arrogant. Humans are smart but if you are going credit God with something at least make the effort to say...."super, amazing, fantastic, incomprehensively superlatively intelligent design unlike anything we could come up with"
I prefer to think of evolution as creation in slow motion and last time I checked nobody is proposing that God wears a stop watch or works to a timetable.
A second, a minute, an hour, a light year. When physics has that whole "time/relative time" thingy worked out then we can go back and nit pick about whether a day is like a thousand years. God is deliberately ambiguous about time in the bible and I am wary of people who assert otherwise.
Lion (IRC)
PS - Before anyone tries to whip out a bible verse about "six day" time specifics for I would caution them to remember that there is ample scripture about God's ONGOING care for the lilies of the field and the sparrows - including beak size sufficient to manage a hard grain of wheat.
Posted by: Midnight Rambler | October 30, 2009 2:02 AM
Numbers' book "The Creationists" tells the full story of the origins of modern creationism very well. Wheaton College was pretty much the epicenter of it for some time. I think he wrote it before ID really took off though.
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 2:04 AM
@ #14
I find the term intelligent design kinda funny since we have so many frailties. I like the fact that you have to monitor young children so much because they are very prone to suffocating themselves eating and drowning themselves drinking.
It would be awfully nice if breathing wasn't made so dangerous by eating and drinking. And if you are like me and accidently had a crushed red pepper go down the wrong pipe, you can almost see smoke coming out your mouth as you say it.
Posted by: Wowbagger, OM | October 30, 2009 2:12 AM
Lion IRC wrote:
Not to mention inaccurate, when you actually think about it. If we were designed by anything then that the designer was either a miserable bastard or drunk off his ass. Or maybe both.
That's all well and good; however, until you can find a way of showing us that the people who wrote the bible had any way of knowing anything at all about the god they were writing about - i.e. how they gained this information and were able to verify it as accurate - then you're wasting your time (and ours) offering information about any of this alleged god's words, deeds or opinions.
Posted by: Suck Poppet
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October 30, 2009 2:19 AM
lyin' jirc spewed forth
What about the banana lyin', what about the banana???
By the way, physics pretty much does have that whole "time/relative time" thingy worked out. It's pretty weird, but if you apply your mind most people of reasonable intelligence can understand it.
Posted by: islander | October 30, 2009 2:22 AM
Lion-
You seem to believe that god used evolution as a mechanism to create humans. Why would god create a universe, wait around 9 billion years, then create the earth, then wait about 4.6 billion years to finally form us? And why would he use evolution by natural selection to do so? Evolution is an enormously wasteful and cruel process (cruel if you believe someone has designed it, that is). Many animals die miserable deaths to fuel natural selection; it would imply a lazy and/or cruel god to choose this path. For example, there is a species of bird that lays two eggs, but when they hatch, the mother keeps one healthy and only feeds the other enough to let it live. The "extra" child is an insurance policy, in case the healthy child dies. It goes for weeks constantly starving until it finally dies of hunger, unless it gets quite lucky.
You can say god is "deliberately ambiguous" about time in the bible, but even if you are granted the day/million/billion year metaphor, the creation list is still out of order. The grass and plants are created before the sun and moon, the birds are created before any other land animal, etc. And we all know the only reason you claim it's a metaphor in the first place is because science has forced you to do so.
I happened to see your post before I went off to bed, so forgive me, but I won't be responding to you until the morning. Goodnight.
Posted by: Charlie Foxtrot
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October 30, 2009 2:27 AM
...and of course the ability to carry a coconut suspended by vines from beneath the dorsal guiding feathers!
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 2:35 AM
No worries. We will continue to die from God's perfection. In the meantime.. was it an english or african swallow? Major difference!
Posted by: Diane G. | October 30, 2009 2:38 AM
Yeah, right. They've been saying this since the Enlightenment.
What's even worse than the "how can ordinary people make sense of the glut of conflicting information" is the fact that it's obvious many have seen/read/heard/been taught the correct scientific stance but intentionally pretend not to believe it, and to believe in claptrap instead. I.e., a fair number of people have no compunction at all about out-and-out lying.
♪ ♫ One of these things is not like the others... ♫
Posted by: Liveliest Crib
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October 30, 2009 2:43 AM
Wowbagger, OM:
Well, the god of the old testament does come off as a raging alcoholic. ;)
Interesting, isn't it? I mean, while many theists deny evolution, I don't think I've ever heard any of them deny the food chain.
So, god's reasoning process was something along the lines of . . .
Ahh, my creatures. I have given you life. You are blessed with consciousness, and can enjoy all of life's pleasures. You can feel, and learn, and love. So, go forth . . . and EAT EACHOTHER!
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 2:45 AM
@ #22
I said that in my post and it amazes me. They will lie to support their position. What will it gain them? They must know something I don't because in the end the ones convincing them of their conviction will screw them over.
Why? I just don't understand why people are willing to let themselves be taken advantage of.
At the same time they'll say I'm the guy in that position. Amazing.
Posted by: Suck Poppet
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October 30, 2009 2:46 AM
lol - missed that completely, good spot
Posted by: Owlmirror | October 30, 2009 2:47 AM
Ah. God cares so much for the Plasmodium parasite that He gladly sacrifices millions of human lives so that there may be plenty more parasites in the world?
And God loves the Staphylococcus bacterium, so He carefully made sure that the poor wee little bacterium could evolve to resist our antibiotics and kill more humans?
Clearly God loves microorganisms far, far more than humans.
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 2:53 AM
You got it wrong. God loves all of us humans! You'd be blind not to see that, just don't look into it too much.
Sorry for the snark, I live in the Bible Belt and I hear crap about how God is necessary all the time. Forgiving the last part after the comma; that saying is pretty common here.
Posted by: Diane G. | October 30, 2009 2:59 AM
@ 24.
Rereading your post, I see you did say that. Sorry. The first time around I really was thinking you referred to people not letting themselves be exposed to information; but your words also include conscious denial despite exposure.
A couple of years ago ID insinuated itself in our local school system, & when this was discovered, a bunch of MSU scientists came down & held teacher in-services, testified at Board meetings, etc., going out of their way to lay out standard biological science. The ID proponents just sat through the presentations with scary smiles on their faces, then got up to spew their prevarications. It was very creepy--like being in a room with pod people.
Posted by: Scott Hatfield, OM
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October 30, 2009 3:05 AM
You know, I have to believe you knew quite a bit of this before, PZ. Certainly nothing in your synopsis of Numbers' talk was news to me or the vast cadre of mainline Protestants and Catholics who already understand that the Bible is not a science textbook, and should not be treated as such.
In fact, even among fundamentalists the learned tend not to make the error of casting the Bible as such. The true 'genesis' (if you will) of the SDA 'flood geology' had less to do with the Bible than with a desire to validate the claims of the 'Prophetess', Ellen White, that in turn were 'inspired' by her literalist (but not terribly learned) understanding of scripture. Her 'take' on the creation had to be accepted as true by the followers of her personality cult.
The broad lesson that I hope the godless might take from this is that the Christianity that they might be most familiar with, the kind that has led to the modern-day creationist movement, the one that's such an easy target for mockery--that kind of 'fundagelical' Christianity is a recent phenomenon, and in many ways ahistorical and heterodox. Doesn't make the orthodox position necessarily any more compelling for non-believers, of course, but fair's fair.
Posted by: Diane G. | October 30, 2009 3:05 AM
Building on Owlmirror @ 26, God watching over his creation:
http://eddirt.frozenreality.co.uk/index.php?id=599
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 3:08 AM
@28
Thanks Diane. I look at the modern movement against science the same way you saw my remark. You looked at it, apologized for missing something, and advanced the dialogue. I love that.
The current anti-science group doesn't do that.. they don't miss anything and certainly won't apologize(douche bags). They are the train that will ram through everything regardless of any body else.
That's a problem. It is also a lot of people which represents a problem. How do you fix that? It isn't simple.
Posted by: DLC
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October 30, 2009 3:24 AM
So, let me get this right --
Yawehthe Unnamed Designer caused 50^100 tornadoes to blow through a junkyard in order to come up with a 737 ?And you can't touch, taste, smell, feel or otherwise measure the designer's presence or lack thereof ?
And he created himself by having sex with a virgin, who was still virginal after the sex ? and he then thereafter had himself arrested, tortured and then executed for treason against the Roman empire, all so that he could save us from his wrath ? Is this confusing to anyone else ?
No doubt I should have sat on the padre's lap during sermon like he wanted me to. . . .
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 3:29 AM
In this age you can educate yourself. The Nike slogan hits very true for me right now.. "Just do it"
Why don't people do this? They are perfectly happy to be led around to what they believe. I wish others wanted to know how the world worked around them, but it is easier to assign it to supernatural beliefs.
I don't blame them, but they don't help do they?
As a close friend told me today.. if you have problems you can't solve, what is easier? Acceptance or hoping a higher divine being can fix it or doing it yourself? Hope is important, and it is easier to find hope in a divine being than finding it yourself.
Posted by: Samia | October 30, 2009 3:40 AM
Creationism really is going global (link in French again). Of course, at this point I'd really like to chide you all for letting it out of your borders (how could you), but hey: I know how hard it can be to contain something like that. Bummer. Can anyone point me to the VERY BEST EVER website debunking each of their arguments? I need to get started on a French translation of some of this...
Thanks!!!
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 3:44 AM
I can try, but what exactly are you asking? You have debunking which is a great word, but I don't know what you are debunking.
Also, I'd use the website you provided, but I don't speak french. Sorry. :(
Posted by: Diane G. | October 30, 2009 3:45 AM
Heh, yeah--esp. in a "democracy." The stupid not only burns, it votes...
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 3:50 AM
@36
Yea.. it burns. I'm sure you can fix that particular problem right?
Sorry, but it seems you are directing your ire towards me. Tell me the solution then? If you have one I'll certainly support it.
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 3:57 AM
I guess it burns then Diane. I said I loved how you advanced the dialogue instead of just insulting.
Are you reading my whole comment? If you are and still dislike what I say that's fine, but I want to make sure you aren't just reacting knee-jerk to my comments.
Posted by: Diane G. | October 30, 2009 4:03 AM
liquidsiphon,
By "The stupid," I meant the intentionally ignorant (&, I suppose, the unintentionally ignorant) groups we've been talking about. Not you at all. Sorry that it wasn't clear.
In other words, if only we could figure out how to keep idiots from having a say in matters...
I'd been thinking what a trip it was to have PZ post at a time when the regulars weren't around to fill up the comments (no offence, regulars--I love you guys!); but I guess I've reached my Peter Principle point...
Irelessly,
--Diane
Posted by: liquidsiphon | October 30, 2009 4:08 AM
Accepted!
Don't sell the creationists short! One day they'll tell me why my parrot insists on chewing my money. I would hit the bastard, but he's been alive over a decade. Lucky asshole. :)
Posted by: Bruce Gorton | October 30, 2009 4:27 AM
Someone needs to do a history of accomodationism to go parallel to this - it is just a hunch at the moment (And therefore suspect) but I think part of the problem here has been an official position of embracing "different ways of knowing" and glossing over where science and religion clash.
The whole strategy comes off as being phony, and as stupid as religious creationism is, it is very hard to combat it when the creationists actually think the scientific community is lying.
Posted by: MadScientist
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October 30, 2009 4:30 AM
I'm always amazed that a hoax like the Seventh Day Adventist persists (I shouldn't be surprized - there's scientology and mormonism, mohammedanism, christianity and so on - bullshit by any other name would smell just the same). I need to re-read "The White Lie" - an account of Ellen White and her chicanery as told by a devout follower who actually knew White.
Posted by: Elaine | October 30, 2009 4:30 AM
OK, slightly off-topic but related post here: I am an English major in a rhetorical grammar class, and I am writing a 4,000 word paper on ID and anti-evolutionism in schools (to be presented in front of a class full of right-wing Christian nutbag education majors). The assignment was that it be an argument about books. I have the whole Kitzmiller v. Dover thing and Of Pandas and People, but can anoyone suggest some other books creationists have tried to crowbar into science classes or documented instances where they have messed with science textbooks?
Posted by: quedula | October 30, 2009 4:31 AM
I'm not a geologist? What are "Ron Numbers"?
Posted by: Kel, OM | October 30, 2009 4:42 AM
There was the sticker incident with Ken Miller / Joe Levine's textbookhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selman_v._Cobb_County
Posted by: Prof. Henry Armitage
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October 30, 2009 4:48 AM
liquidsiphon #12:
You will find Bob Altemeyer's The Authoritarians enlightening. It is a summary of decades of research into the authoritarian mindset, which seems to be responsible for the divide which you identify. And it's free!
IIRC, posting more than two links at the same time will place your comment in moderation.Posted by: Elaine | October 30, 2009 4:49 AM
@45
Thanks, Kel
Posted by: Rorschach | October 30, 2009 4:55 AM
Elaine @ 43,
if you google schoolboard textbook creationism or somesuch, you should find links to the various instances where schoolbook texts had to be rephrased/rewritten etc. This is a huge industry esp in Texas IIRC.
Even Richard Feynman gave up on sitting on a schoolboard, with all the manipulation and behind-the-scenes stuff going on.
Posted by: Rorschach | October 30, 2009 4:57 AM
addendum to my 48,
...although in fairness, it wasnt because of creationism.....
Posted by: Aquaria
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October 30, 2009 5:01 AM
Elaine:
Look up the Gablers in east Texas. For most of my school life (60s/70s) they literally controlled what went into Texas schoolbooks, and therefore what went into schoolbooks nationwide. Evolution was one of the things that they really worked to pull out of science textbooks.
I took a second-year biology course (I guess the equivalent of an AP Bio course-AP was rare in ETX back then), and our teacher had to bring in college textbooks that he'd bought with his own money, to explain evolution to us. It was not available in the textbook that the state of Texas (the Gablers) had authorized for such a class, or it may have been thoroughly misrepresented. I don't remember which, but the teacher made it clear that we would not learn real evolution from our normal textbook.
Posted by: kai | October 30, 2009 5:08 AM
Wowbagger@17: If we were designed by anything then that the designer was either a miserable bastard or drunk off his ass.
Well, but we don't know what the design goals were—maybe the Intelligent Designer was only interested in the particular pattern of clouds on January 13th 9358312 BCE and all the rest is just incidental to that…
Posted by: llewelly | October 30, 2009 5:09 AM
Samia | October 30, 2009 3:40 AM:
Sorry ... I don't read French. However - please see the talk.origins index to creationist claims. It addresses a huge number of past and extant creationist claims. Since most creationists love to re-use arguments (in part because some of them do not know those arguments have been debunked), it seems likely to me that some of the claims you encounter will be similar to those in the t.o archive.
Posted by: SEF | October 30, 2009 5:14 AM
There may well have been a substantial number of literal creationists among the general ignorati of the population long before that. It's not as though the religious leaders have the same theological beliefs as they inculcate in the sheeple.
But, previously, village idiots weren't given a voice. They didn't write books, edit newspapers nor get considered as appropriate people to have running school-boards etc etc. It's the shift to the politically-correct and wrong-headed "everyone's opinion is equally valid" culture and the rise of mass communication, ie most notably the internet, which makes them and their idiocy visible.
Posted by: Richard Eis | October 30, 2009 5:15 AM
-How do you not get into situations that rely on your own ability to disseminate information for so long that you enter adulthood that way?-
You blame someone else for your inability to comprehend what happened, suffer cognitive dissonance or completely ignore the whole thing.
-He ended by giving us the discouraging news that 65.5% of Americans believe in creationism-
Ah yes but it depends how you phrase the question.
Sometimes it's higher. lol.
Posted by: Ragutis
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October 30, 2009 5:17 AM
Links are fine, even encouraged. People here like citations and pointers to interesting stories and articles. But putting more than 2 in a post will send your comment into moderation limbo until PZ has time to check it.
Welcome.
Despite the year of French I took 25-some years ago, I'm having difficulty understanding that site to see what specific creationist arguments are being discussed. :p
Talk Origins has one of the more complete indexes of creationist/IDiot arguments and their refutations.
Posted by: Andrej
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October 30, 2009 5:18 AM
@ Samia (#34)
Can anyone point me to the VERY BEST EVER website debunking each of their arguments?
I think you'll find this link educational:
http://www.talkorigins.org/indexcc/list.html#CH100
Posted by: DaveH | October 30, 2009 5:20 AM
Liveliest Crib @23
It's been said before (can't remember who by, sorry) but god acts drunk all the way through: After the "I'll fight the lotta you" Phase, and the "OK Abraham, kill your son! Hey! It was just a JOKE! HAHAhahaha!" phase, the new testament is all "you're my best pals. I f*ck'n love you guys!" Then he passes out and is still asleep from that day to this.
Posted by: Aquaria
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October 30, 2009 5:22 AM
Addendum to my #50. The Gablers were rabid Christian fundies. Possibly Dominionists or Reconstructionists. Whatever their lunacy, they were radicals that were all about pushing Christianism into every subject they possibly could in Texas. They literally wanted to destroy secular education. There's a reason there's so much fucking stupid in Texas. The Gablers are a big reason why. The state is still battling their ghosts, thanks to millions of brainwashed kids educated with the textbooks they trashed.
One of the most scathing columns that the late great Molly Ivins wrote was her literary dancing on the grave (maybe even pissing on it too) of one of the Gablers. I wish I could find a link for it...
Posted by: Kay-the-fish | October 30, 2009 5:23 AM
I'm new to skepticism. I recently started looking into ID. I was surprised to find out about it's creationist history and the clergy ties to the major proponents. I really had thought it was a scientific position. Are there any non-Christian or non-major-religion proponents of ID ?
Posted by: Christophe Thill | October 30, 2009 5:32 AM
Concerning Bryan, I think it's important to dwell a little on something you briefly mentioned: "the ethical implications of evolution".
Bryan was a populist, he was rooting for the little guy. What he actually opposed was the Haeckelian vision of evolution: nature red in tooth and claw; fight to death as nature's primary principle; survival of the strongest and the most ruthless. For him, this vision was a vindication of predatory capitalism.
There was also the theory of Lombroso, according to which most criminals were "throwbacks", born a few steps lower on the "evolutionary scale" than most of us (therefore they can never be redeemed, and it's better to kill them right away).
Of course this "evolutionary scale" was just a vertical version of the Great Chain of Being: not a very Darwinian idea. But that's all Bryan knew. And for him, this vision was a "scientific" death knell for mercy and human feelings.
Bryan defended freedeom, but he definitely wasn't a fanatic of free markets. He stood for the defence of the poor, which, according to him, would be locked up for life in their miserable condition if evolution prevailed in its vision that they are just where they deserve to be.
Of course, this is scientifically inane. But Bryan is not the only one to blame; it's not just because he was stupid (I don't think he was) or ignorant (higher probability here). Many evolutionary scientists of his time actually had the ideas he fought against, and thought that rich Whites where several "evolutionary steps" higher then the poor Blacks (with the poor Whites somewhere in between, I guess).
In a nutshell: I don't think Bryan was a bad guy. And I definitely don't think he has much in common, ideologically, with today's creationists.
Posted by: Kel, OM | October 30, 2009 5:48 AM
In the Penn & Teller episode on creationism, they pointed out that if you take out God and put aliens into ID, then you have what the Raeliens believe.Posted by: R. Schauer
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October 30, 2009 6:06 AM
First, I think it's ironic to have these evo-devo talks in a cracker-lovin' church (snicker)! Gawd seems to have evolved and must be much more tolerant than previously known or you'd all be pillars of salt.
Second, PZ, you make no mention yet of Marc Hauser's talk; "Where do Morals Come From? NOT Religion!" Wow, does Marc sound interesting!
Posted by: R. Schauer
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October 30, 2009 6:23 AM
To: Kay-the-fish
To answer your question, No. At least not by anyone deemed credible. Welcome to skepticism! You have found the hot-spot for credible science, meaning both observable and replicable, on the Internet. Enjoy!
Posted by: Ragutis
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October 30, 2009 6:41 AM
Really, your only options are extraterrestrial or supernatural. But, the ID proponents are almost entirely Abrahamic religionists. They got a big laugh out of Dawkins entertaining the remote possibility that aliens might be responsible for designing life or seeding our planet with it's most primitive forms. This despite the fact that we have evidence for a lifeform in this universe that we consider intelligent (us) and even we recently depilated apes are taking the first steps into genetic manipulation and might even be on the verge of creating artificial life.
That's no reason to seriously entertain a hypothesis of alien origins, but the self-evident existence of life and technology in the natural universe is substantially more than any evidence we have for gods. Yes, Raelians appear to have a (very slightly) more logical take on the origins of life on Earth than many millions of Christians. They got that free love thing going too. I'm surprised they aren't more popular.
Posted by: Elaine | October 30, 2009 7:02 AM
Kay-the-Fish
I've been researching this a lot lately. If you are interested to know where the "theory" of ID comes from, read this article by Eugenie Scott: http://biology.ucf.edu/~clp/Courses/seminar/papers/07-Scott-scientists_confront-cs_lite.pdf
The term "intelligent design" and nearly all the propenents of it come from the Abrahamic religions, especially Christianity. When they say "designer" they mean their god. They hate it when people suggest aliens or some other god as the designer.
I grew up in a New Age household, so I'm familiar with all the wacky beliefs out there about aliens interfering in human evolution. It's not just the Raeliens who believe it. If you want to know more about those beliefs, read The Twelfth Planet by Zecharia Sitchen, The Gods Were Astronauts by Erich von Daniken, or Red Earth, White Lies: Native Americans and the Myth of Scientific Fact by Vine Deloria, Jr. All these are older books, but they are still fairly popular.
Posted by: Ray Moscow
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October 30, 2009 7:23 AM
Thanks for this summary, PZ.
I think creationism is some form is always going to go with religious beliefs. Even churches that "accept" the TOE try to insert some creation in some form, even if it is supposedly just for the human "soul" or some such.
Posted by: Mark | October 30, 2009 7:52 AM
Creationists and religionists of many stripes are eager to turn the US into a third world country. Indeed, I read that the US's population is just below Turkey - which is at the top of the sh!tp!le - with respect to the number of people who believe in creationism.
If and when they 'win' their argument - they will go down in history, along with GW Bush, as another reason why the US turned into a cesspool.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | October 30, 2009 7:53 AM
Awesome to hear. There are a number of good books on the subject out there. Check out the Dover Trial including the PBS special on it for some background into the political side of the "fight" with some good science thrown in to boot. You'll see the dishonest tactics of the ID proponents laid out in the open for the country to see.
Especially pay attention to Michael Behe's testimony
Posted by: Grog Demijohn | October 30, 2009 7:55 AM
Elaine (#65) If I understood him correctly, Michael Behe
admits (in The Edge of Evolution) that his
postulated designer seems to be both cruel & inept. He
seems to think that it may not be the same entity which he
worships on Sunday.
Posted by: Matthew Sullivan | October 30, 2009 8:02 AM
an interesting book to read about early Protestant engagements with evolution is Jon Roberts' "Darwinism and the Divine in America."
(a few thoughts on it here: http://mconrsullivan.wordpress.com/2008/11/18/book-review-darwinism-and-the-divine-in-america/)
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | October 30, 2009 8:07 AM
Having more than sometimes two, sometimes three links (whether just the naked address or an <a> tag) triggers moderation, that's all.
(You can use a lot of HTML here.)
The silly link rule (a very crude tool to prevent some spam from coming through) is a ScienceBlogs thing. Pharyngula is just one ScienceBlog.
A light year is the distance light covers in a vacuum in one year.
That happened in 1905. You should go out less and read more.
Sorry, that's irrelevant anyway, because both orders of creation (chapters 1 and 2 of Genesis) contradict the fossil record. "Fish" and birds on the same day, and a day before terrestrial animals? FAIL.
But how is God needed for that? Mutations are ordinary everyday chemistry, not miracles, and selection – it's simply a fact that those who can get more to eat can invest more in their offspring. What does adding God to these facts add to our understanding? What does it explain?
Sire, je n'ai pas besoin de cette hypothèse.
Well, sort of. :-)
But understanding it intuitively is not required for being able to calculate it precisely. That is done routinely nowadays. GPS wouldn't work if it weren't known how to do that; it would be off by several hundred meters.
"A species"? This is normal for all birds of prey.
Shouldn't have started commenting – I have to go, and I've only read till comment 22.
Posted by: Elaine | October 30, 2009 8:25 AM
@Grog Demijohn (#69)
Michael Behe admits (in The Edge of Evolution) that his
postulated designer seems to be both cruel & inept.
See, this is why I'm not relgious. Any designer who came up with the human female reproductive system, including menstruation and extremely difficult, painful, and dangerous childbirth, would have to be cruel and inept.
However, when you look at it as an evolutionary trade-off for bipedalism, it's (mostly) worth it.
Posted by: Ray Moscow
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October 30, 2009 8:29 AM
If the food supply is scarce, yes. But if there's enough food, most birds of prey will raise more than one chick.
Barn owl chicks are hatched asynchronously. If food gets scarce, the older chicks will eat the younger ones.
Whooping cranes do the "spare egg" thing, too -- in fact, they seldom if ever bother trying to raise the 2nd chick. Researchers often steal one of the eggs and raise it in one of the projects to introduce new groups of whoopers. The extra egg has about zero chance of making it without human help anyway.
Posted by: Hypatia's Daughter
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October 30, 2009 8:31 AM
I am always a little wary of seeing a figure of 65%. It makes me wonder exactly how the questions in the survey were worded.
I suspect that most of the people self-labeled by the surveys as "creationists" may not actually be the "6-day, 6,000 year, put that in the school" creationists we so dread but more-so a vague "I believe in God and He created the Universe" type. The later type aren't literalists and don't really think too hard about conflicts between the Bible & evolution. They would be appalled that YEC'ism would find a place in the curriculum. (In my old religious days, I was very science oriented and thought of Genesis as a parable of the God-Man relationship - like the mustard seed of the NT - so there was no intellectual conflict for me).
We tend to forget that the CreoID'ers who are the driving force behind push to get religion in the schools are a small minority ; just as we are the small, informed minority fighting to keep them out.
Everyone else are the uninformed fish that the CreoID'ers are trying to lure into their nets so they can have the political and social support to get into the schools (Currently, it is only the law, i.e. The Constitutional clause about separation of Church & State, that is stopping them.) But if you get enough voters they can change laws, get conservative judges appointed to the Supreme Court and "re-interpret" the Clause. Make religion into "science" or science into "religion" - and, voila, either Creationism gets in the schools or evolution is forced out.
So, one solution, is to work really hard at educating the only vaguely informed about what a stinking pile of BS they they are buying if they align themselves with the CreoID activists.
Posted by: Marsbar | October 30, 2009 8:35 AM
From what I understand, many seventh day adventists do NOT believe in a young earth and universe and from what I can gather the church currently has no official position on the age of the earth and universe. In saying this, I suspect that most SDA's probably do believe in a young earth but I do not know whether the majority believe in a young universe.
Posted by: nigelTheBold
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October 30, 2009 8:47 AM
@Marsbar,
My dad worked in a Seventh Day Adventist logging camp in Southeast Alaska. I went to high school there. Most of the SDAs were indeed YECs.
It was very frustrating in science class. We had one teacher for the entire high school, and he was a history/English major. Not that there's anything wrong with that. It's just that he didn't know much about science or math.
Posted by: Drosera
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October 30, 2009 8:52 AM
Moderate Christians are happy that the creationists exist, because it makes them (the moderates) look normal. It's the religious version of the Overton Window.
Posted by: Ray Moscow
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October 30, 2009 8:55 AM
Officially, the SDA still teaches a literal 6-day creation: http://www.adventist.org/beliefs/fundamental/index.html
Check out item 6.
They don't mess about with metaphors and all that crap.
Posted by: Fred The Hun | October 30, 2009 9:16 AM
liquidsiphon #12:
I agree that "The Authoritarians" suggested by Prof. Henry Armitage is enlightening to say the least.
I'd also suggest listening to a talk given by Jonathan Haidt
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3896569197654224883#
Posted by: llewelly | October 30, 2009 9:28 AM
Kay-the-fish | October 30, 2009 5:23 AM:
It is primarily a Christian notion, but Muslim examples are not hard to find. (Obviously, many Christians, notably Wesley Elsberry, who helped found the great weblog Panda's Thumb, and Francis Collins, do not accept intelligent design.)
There are many explanations of why intelligent design is religion and not science. This one is from the aforementioned talk origins index to creationist claims. See also Lauri Lebo's excellent book, The Devil in Dover, reviewed here: pandasthumb.org/archives/2008/03/lauri-lebos-the.html
If you haven't already, you should also read a basic book on evolution, such as Coyne's Why Evolution Is True, or Dawkins's The Greatest Show On Earth.
Posted by: airbagmoments | October 30, 2009 9:39 AM
Christianity doesn't work without original sin. Original sin doesn't work without Adam and Eve. That's really all there is to it. This is what happens when you base your entire system of morality on an ancient text. Once the culture realizes the text is flawed they either have to retreat to a fantasy world of demons and holy spirits and YEC to conform with the text or they have to grow out of it. The cruel biological math of Idiocracy seems to encourage the former. It's really quite disheartening that reality can be so easily defeated by ideology. That a species like ours can have nuclear weapons...
Posted by: charley | October 30, 2009 9:45 AM
Speaking of the Creation Research Society, I have always found it strange that the same guy who funded this:
http://www.creationresearch.org/vacrc.html
Also funded this:
http://www.vai.org/
Posted by: Insightful Ape
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October 30, 2009 9:48 AM
I see that our lyin' jerk is alive and well.
Come to think of it, god is vague about many things. For instance, if god says that collecting sticks during the Sabbath is punishable by stoning, could it be that he actually meant it?
Of course not. That would be sooo cruel. His cruelty is limited to just throwing those who don't come after him into a lake of fire like withered branches.
See, that is why I believe the only logically sensible deity is the Flying Spaghetti Monster. He admits freely that when he created us he was drunk. Now we know why of all mammals only humans can die during child birth.
Posted by: Notagod | October 30, 2009 10:16 AM
What's with all the theory, theory, theory? The christian has no theory, they are barely coherent ideas. Of course, the christian likes to corrupt the purpose of theory but that doesn't mean anyone else has to indulge its backwardness.
I assume that is Numbers and PZ is being a dutiful reporter.
Posted by: Notagod | October 30, 2009 10:31 AM
Christian god-idea has another temper tantrum
God-idea rips steeple from church and hurtles it at man in car but misses due to the effects of wind and turbulence brought on by the rage of the god-idea itself. Later, man was bless-ed:
http://www.ktbs.com/news/toppled-church-steeple-lands-on-car-traps-man-for-nearly-an-hour/
Posted by: Knockgoats | October 30, 2009 10:47 AM
Are there any non-Christian or non-major-religion proponents of ID ? - Kai-the-fish
David Berlinski is claimed as one I think. Steve Fuller is a social constructionist, who believes the whole idea of distinguishing truth from falsehood is a tool of oppression, or something.
Posted by: Knockgoats | October 30, 2009 10:55 AM
The broad lesson that I hope the godless might take from this is that the Christianity that they might be most familiar with, the kind that has led to the modern-day creationist movement, the one that's such an easy target for mockery--that kind of 'fundagelical' Christianity is a recent phenomenon, and in many ways ahistorical and heterodox. - Scott Hatfield, OM
Thing is, Scott, doctrinally orthodox Christians believe things which are even more absurd than creationism. The prime example is the doctrine of the hypostatic union, which is necessarily false: nothing can possibly be "wholly God and wholly man", or "true God and true man", because "God" and "man" have incompatible attributes.
Posted by: Rev. BigDumbChimp | October 30, 2009 10:59 AM
Steve Fuller is a very confused person.
Posted by: Glen Davidson
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October 30, 2009 11:03 AM
The odd thing is, though, that because of Ellen White the SDAs rarely have much problem with an old universe--she claimed that planets had been made and populated by god previous to our own.
A number of SDAs even try to fit an old earth into the creation and the flood, not being comfortable with all of the evidence for an old earth. But almost all of them (other than the relatively few evolutionists among them) have to believe that life is young, which, naturally, is a problem for accepting most of the evidence for an old earth, although most of these people are oblivious to that problem.
It's funny, I've seen Adventists complain that the SDA church doesn't get much credit for its role in the existence of YECism. I'm fully willing to give them the blame for such execrable dishonesty.
Glen D
http://tinyurl.com/mxaa3p
Posted by: raven | October 30, 2009 11:06 AM
Yes, of course. God spent a lot of time and power making a 6,000 year old universe look like a 13.7 billion year old one to fool his creations. The ones who take the bait will go to hell and be tortured for eternity.
God did this because he loves us. He isn't really a bored, malevolent, sadistic genocidal maniac. He just looks that way.
Posted by: raven | October 30, 2009 11:19 AM
Much of US xianity has aligned itself with antiscience and fascist totalitarian hatred ideologies. Dumb move IMO.
People who reject the politics, hatred, and anti-knowledge attitudes frequently toss the religion too.
Between 1 and 2 million people/year drop the religion. Many former xians have been put in the position of cheering xianity on as it shakes itself to pieces before it destroys us.
The outcome isn't clear but probably most people would rather live in a free democracy than a Dark Ages banana republic. Only 20% of the US population call themselves Theothuglicans these days. And that 20% are the dregs of our society.
Posted by: Kamaka
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October 30, 2009 11:29 AM
Kay-the-fish @ 59
I really had thought it was a scientific position.
Um, yah, that's the IDiots game plan. Of course, they have a minor problem...they have no hypothesis, much less any theory. Just an assertion...goddidit.
Posted by: raven | October 30, 2009 11:31 AM
Neither one of those is very sane. Berlinski describes himself as a crackpot and an agnostic. So if Darwin didn't do it and god didn't do it, who did? IMO, Berlinski is just an attention seeker who writes fuzzy books to pay the bills.
Fuller is a kook and basically a complete jerk you wouldn't want to know. He may not fall into any formal mental illness classification but calling him sane stretches that word way past its limits.
Posted by: Butter | October 30, 2009 11:51 AM
Scott Hatfield:
The broad lesson that I hope the godless might take from this is that the Christianity that they might be most familiar with, the kind that has led to the modern-day creationist movement, the one that's such an easy target for mockery--that kind of 'fundagelical' Christianity is a recent phenomenon, and in many ways ahistorical and heterodox.
And what do these "mainline" institutions (not individuals, since I know many of them teach science, protest creationism, and so on) do to disabuse their Holy Spirit-infused coreligionists of such "heterodox" notions? I grew up in a mainline Protestant church in Indiana, and while they eschewed low-brow Jesus-Camp stuff, they also had us recite the Nicene Creed. Sermons tended toward the dry, steward-of-the-Earth-type calls to action, but they never, ever denied the historical, factual basis of the Christian story. We never got a Gospel reading followed by "Oh, but that guy might have just been a mythical figure dreamt up by some Mediterranean cult, so just take the message for what it's worth." We had beautiful Christmas Eve candlelight services, where everyone was dressed nice and sang traditional carols, but "BTW, this was borrowed from the pagans, and anyway, the whole 'virgin' thing might not have been believed when people first started to celebrate this, but peace on Earth is good idea, so join in anyway" was assuredly not the message of the evening.
I also for a brief bit went to a Presbyterian church (considered liberal around here) where the pastor every once in a while whipped out his guitar and led us in Kum Ba Yah, and once had a whole sermon on how Sam carrying Frodo up the slopes of Mount Doom is a perfect example of Christian friendship or something. Yet his co-pastor didn't deny the church's adherence to Calvinism when I asked him about it; he just watered it down with some attempt at "Well, if you're drawn here, you're one of the elect, so no worries!"
And certainly, neither of these churches had, say, an outreach program where they explicitly tried to educate the more fundamentalist and evangelical of their coreligionists that surrounded them about science or biblical archaeology. Rather, both of them are members of a citywide "Associated Churches" umbrella group that hauls a trailer around to local elementary schools for "released-time" religious education, which consisted of such things as having us carry a model Ark of the Covenant down the center aisle, Indiana Jones, style, in an attempt to get us to "use [the Bible] as a guide for life."[*]
IOW, they do jack shit to fight the easily-mockables you rightly complain about, because it would sweep the base layer out from under their own house of cards.
If you have evidence that my experience with "mainline" churches is anomalous, please share.
----------
[*] Witness your "mainliners" in action, Scott.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | October 30, 2009 12:03 PM
It's also funny how it's always one designer.
"Introduction to Multiple Designers Theory" is a Panda's Thumb article!
That's what many fundies seem to believe. Funnily, however, the Catholic Church shows that it's not at all necessary.
The Catholic argument is that, because we are descended from animals, we have an imperfect, sinful nature and therefore too need a Savior.
Posted by: David Marjanović, OM | October 30, 2009 12:13 PM
Isn't there a quote by him practically admitting he's only in it for the money?
Wow. Where I come from, it's recited once a year, in the early-morning Easter service at church.
<headdesk>
Posted by: bobxxxx | October 30, 2009 12:25 PM
He could have at least offered some hope for the future.
I don't think there is any hope for the future. The preachers destroy the minds of children long before their first science class. What chance do they have of ever having a normal life?
Another problem is the growing and very successful business called Lying-for-Jeebus. Countless preachers and creationist organizations, while they are not busy trying to destroy science education, are spreading lies about scientific discoveries. This is how they make a living and until being a stupid asshole becomes illegal, there's nothing that can be done about it.
Meanwhile most scientists just ignore the problem. Why aren't thousands of scientists attacking the religious insanity that's destroying this country?
Posted by: Ewan R | October 30, 2009 12:29 PM
#91:-
"Much of US xianity has aligned itself with antiscience and fascist totalitarian hatred ideologies. Dumb move IMO."
Perhaps antiscience and fascist totalitarian hatred ideologies have aligned themselves with christianity.... which would be a great move, as in the starting population there are certainly a lot more christians than there are antiscientific fascist totalitarians... and it's not like its amazingly hard to convince these people to believe some pretty weird stuff anyway (see transubstantiation, virgin birth, two contradictory creation stories in the same chapter, multiple birth stories for the most important figure in the mythology etc etc) - perhaps the problem is that christianity has been hijacked by these fascist totalitarians - as they're more organized than your average non fascist totalitarian clergy.
Posted by: Beth B.
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October 30, 2009 12:29 PM
Thus stealing a card from the deck held by geologists who were working before the early 1800s. I am continually amused, the more I learn about the history of the geosciences, how so many of the common creationist arguments were once advanced by reputable scientists but then abandoned when proven wrong. Surface heat flow means earth can't be more than a few million years old (Kelvin neglected mantle convection below the lithosphere), the salinity of the oceans proves that the earth can't be billions of years old (salts precipitate out as minerals so that the salinity reaches steady state), etc.
Apparently as per the information in this talk the creationism movement hasn't really been around and organized long enough for this to be word-of-mouth since the relevant time periods. Do the central dispensaries of creationist thought make a point of reading two hundred year old textbooks to get their arguments?
Posted by: Eric P | October 30, 2009 1:22 PM
Damn! For a white guy I spend an awful lot of time in the minority. Just ONCE I'd like to be a part of the popular thing that ALSO turned out to be the correct thing. Why is it that 'popular' and 'correct' turn out so often to be in opposition?
Posted by: charley | October 30, 2009 1:48 PM
Butter
So 80% of the 3rd, 4th and 5th graders in Fort Wayne are excused from public school for a few hours each week to go to Sunday School offsite? That's seriously screwed up.
Posted by: Fatboy
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October 30, 2009 2:21 PM
I've been hearing a lot recently that creationism is a fairly modern American movement, and that Christians were more nuanced in their understanding of scripture before that. How true is that, really?
I went to the first place that all of us lazy researchers go - Wikipedia. Granted, I'm aware with the problems of trying to use Wikipedia as a primary source, but it's usually somewhat useful.
The Wikipedia article lists examples of Christian creationism going all the way back to the beginning of Christianity (as well as numerous flavors of creationism of other religions predating Christianity). Even Saint Augustine, so often quoted for telling Christians not to speak about natural phenomena of which they were ignorant, thought that pretty much all of Genesis except for the creation story was literal, and seemd to think that the Earth was still only a few thousand years old.
Sure, there were people that thought the Earth was much older, but young earth creationism doesn't appear to be a particularly new phenomenon.
SEF made a good point, as well:
What gets recorded in books written by educated priests is not the same thing as what was believed by the uneducated population.
Anyway, I guess my point/question is, is creationism really that modern of a movement, or is it just more vocal?
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | October 30, 2009 2:48 PM
Elaine writes:
I have the whole Kitzmiller v. Dover thing and Of Pandas and People, but can anoyone suggest some other books creationists have tried to crowbar into science classes or documented instances where they have messed with science textbooks?
You might enjoy "Apes, Angels, and Victorians"* - it has some choice bits about Huxley's involvement in revamping the public school curriculum in England in the 1870s. For example, he replaced the memorization of Latin paradigms with memorization of chemical formulas. In his case, getting the catholic clergymen off the school board (the anglicans had already seen that Huxley ate bishops for breakfast and wouldn't go head to head with him any more).
So, you can pretty much say that the battle-lines on the church's influence on education were initially drawn shortly after 1861 when The Royal Commission was established to investigate British public schools. Other than increasing our knowledge of science, I don't think the battle-lines have moved much since Huxley drew them.
(*a wonderful, wonderful, beautifully-written book that does a great job of putting Darwin, Huxley, and the early evolution wars in perspective --- highly recommended!)
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | October 30, 2009 2:54 PM
Eric P writes:
Why is it that 'popular' and 'correct' turn out so often to be in opposition?
Move your goalposts and be in favor of breathing. It's both popular and a good idea. It's even healthy.
Posted by: Marcus Ranum | October 30, 2009 3:13 PM
David Marjanović, OM writes:
It's also funny how it's always one designer.
I was BS'ing about that one day with a friend of mine, who immediately whipped together a 'theory' that it was a committee that designed us. It actually makes more sense than that the current mess was the handiwork of a single competent omnipotent being: a malicious back-biting committee of all-powerful bureaucrats, each of which was trying to get 'pork'* for their favorite project or programme. That would explain why the appendix made it through endless drafting and re-drafting sessions. And the congressman from the district that makes 'teeth' was able to flog that design instead of the technically superior bony ridge design.. And of course there were the sneaky little guys with the cyanobacteria: "just a handful, really."
(* though bacon hadn't been invented yet)
Posted by: kopd | October 30, 2009 3:26 PM
Here's your committee.
Posted by: Ragutis
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October 30, 2009 3:33 PM
Actually, those still calling themselves Republican are probably the saner, more centrist ones. The Teabaggers and all the other nuts seem to be calling themselves Independents, Libertarians* or trying to get a new party started.
*Again, I'm just saying that's what they're calling themselves. Please, no Randian derailment.
Posted by: Kagehi | October 30, 2009 4:17 PM
Umm. Actually, from what I have seen, while its true that some with "specific" crazy ideas are going Independent and Libertarian, these are not the creationists. At the moment, the real fist fight in the Republican Party seems to be between those calling themselves "Republican", and those saying, "Yes, well, but we are ***Conservatives***". They seem to be intent on redefining the term conservative to mean, "Stupid, ignorant, loud mouthed, conspiracy theory driven, creationists, who think like Taliban, while actually creating *real* conspiracies against everyone else."
The ones dropping out of the party entirely, to join up with established parties like Libertarians and Independents, are **not** the wacko creationists, Biblical literalist, types, the are the ones that believe in some seriously stupid shit, but reject the path the "Conservative" party, within the Republican party, stand for.
Posted by: Kel, OM | October 30, 2009 5:26 PM
I'm still a little out on this. My impression from reading up on the likes of Augustine of Hippo and on other biblical scholars is that they wrote about not needing to take the book literally because there has always been that element of biblical literalism. Why else would he need to make the distinction?Though on a less individual scale I can totally buy that the rise of fundamentalism is a recent phenomenon.
Posted by: Butter | October 30, 2009 5:28 PM
charley:
So 80% of the 3rd, 4th and 5th graders in Fort Wayne are excused from public school for a few hours each week to go to Sunday School offsite? That's seriously screwed up.
Yes, it is. Though they offer no citation for that 80% figure, it's probably close. In my fifth-grade class in Fort Wayne, it was all but two kids that had to go.
In neighboring Huntingtion Co., an anonymous parent sued the school district this year, when the permission form for the program was distributed to students in the unmarked trailer in the school's parking lot. The federal district court judge granted the parent's motion for a preliminary injunction, and the released-time program was halted while the suit proceeds.
Relevant precedents about released-time religious-ed programs are McCollum v Board of Education (which said such programs can't be held in school facilities) and Zorach v. Clauson (which said they're constitutional if they're outside the school building and not done at public expense). In the latter the majority justices held that "We are a religious people whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being."
I remember thinking that the stuff they were teaching me in that trailer was on a par with the stuff I was being taught in regular class. I remember thinking the one Jewish girl in class was weird because her parent's would let her go out to the trailer with the rest of us. Those thinking patterns, that "good people=Christians", took a while to break.
That's what mainline churches fund and support in the midwestern U.S. They still won't keep their noses just in their food drives and their Sunday Schools. That's why attempts to present them as some sort of moderate middle ground don't convince me.
That, and like Knockgoats says, they still believe stupid things about the world—and, I'd add, elevate thinking stupid things about the world to a virtue.
They can go fuck themselves.
Posted by: Butter | October 30, 2009 5:39 PM
Um, change "would" to "wouldn't" in the paragraph above that starts with "I remember". Sorry.
Posted by: Samia | October 30, 2009 7:05 PM
Many thanks @52 @55 and @56. The website you all recommended looks very good indeed. I'll see what I can do to start translating some of this.
Posted by: chanson | October 30, 2009 8:42 PM
The "days" = "thousand-year-dispensations" idea has been preserved in the amber of Mormon theology, which reflects many of the popular ideas of that time.
Posted by: RamblinDude
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October 30, 2009 8:53 PM
Fatboy,
Anyway, I guess my point/question is, is creationism really that modern of a movement, or is it just more vocal?
Based on my experience, they are more vocal now and more organized. There has been an orchestrated and well-funded campaign of disinformation for several decades now that has been very successful at sowing doubt about evolutionary science. Back in the 70’s, I remember hearing a whole slew of creationist canards getting passed around and many people repeating them.
“Radio carbon dating has been proven to be unreliable.” “There’s good evidence for a world-wide flood.” Etc.
People would talk about it in the workplace and shake their heads thoughtfully and say, “Hmmm… very interesting.” Today those lies have been spread so effectively that the amount of stupid in the population has reached critical mass. Believers aren’t just irritated at the thought of being “descended from monkeys,” they’re angry about it and want to retaliate.
It really seems to me to be a bigger, more worrisome problem today.
Butter,
Those thinking patterns, that "good people=Christians", took a while to break.
Tell me about it. I grew up in Indiana, too, and central Indiana is absolutely god-soaked. I also remember on Fridays marching down the street from the school to go to bible class when I was in the 4th grade. Parents weren’t happy about that. There was a lot of complaining. It was disgraceful that they couldn’t teach Jesus in school!
Posted by: uncle frogy | October 31, 2009 1:31 AM
like to read all the posts but it is late for me and I have a very long day tomorrow.
I suspect that the only way the creationists will ever let go of their myths is when we make contact with intelligent beings from some far away star system although even then there will be some who will try to twist it to fit their imagined reality.
Posted by: CharlesP | October 31, 2009 12:42 PM
I was raised as an SDA (hell, my great grandmother grew up sharing back yard with EG White). I never knew of ANY SDAs who weren't YECs (though I didn't know how influential/unique they were in this belief in the early days).
In a strange way the SDA unique belief system may have made it easier for me to deconvert because I was raised to be SO skeptical of everything else (and because SDA didn't want to seem like we just bought into every tom dick and harry who said God spoke to them we were skeptical of almost all supernatural spiritualism), that once I finally turned a critical eye towards the SDA teaching I had been raised in (YEC in church schools from 1st-12th grade) when I was approaching 30 it wasn't as intellectually difficult as one would think. It was emotionally difficult of course, especially considering in the past few years all of my grandparents had died and it involved the realization I was never going to see them again, but I think the intellectual part of it wasn't too hard once I found good explanations.
I mentioned this on The Friendly Atheist the other day, but I think the book that had the biggest part of my deconversion was Lee Strobel's The Case for Christ as it struck me as such a smarmy politician sounding book when I read it (as a Christian) that I was prompted to take a critical look at my beliefs. Once I started I went through Collin's The Language of God and found his arguments for evolution to be more compelling than his theology... from there to DS Wilson's Evolution for Everyone and Shubin's Inner Fish for the science side, and Ehrman's Misquoting Jesus and a bit of God Delusion (with a lot of "let's hope this Christian writer makes a compelling case" mixed in).
I'm borrowing a copy of a friend's "Dinosaurs: An Adventist View" book (written by a lawyer?!?!) which I'm going to sit down with a copy of "The Anti-Creationist Handbook" (amongst other resources) and give it a good critique. So thanks for this bit of extra SDA information.
Posted by: Kay-the-fish | October 31, 2009 7:15 PM
Thanks for the warm welcome. And thanks for the resource info. I look forward to digging into reading all about it. It is really disappointing to me that ID could just be spin. Not because I want to believe, but because I want to see more integrity from the believers.
Posted by: kamaka | October 31, 2009 8:10 PM
Not to be harsh, but how can you expect integrity from a group of people who are passing off a bunch of made-up stuff as some profound insight into the nature of life/reality? Read Leviticus, really read it, and then consider the religionists claim to owning a moral high-ground.
ID is not spin, it's a conspiracy of liars who want to force their way into the education system to indoctrinate children.
Posted by: Kay-the-fish | October 31, 2009 10:54 PM
That was a little harsh, considering you don't know my history. I am just not cynical enough yet, I guess. I am trying to keep an open mind and not lump all believers together, although it can be hard at times. I doubt most of the sheeple have read Lev.
Posted by: Hypatia's Daughter
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November 1, 2009 7:23 AM
#94 Butter
I joined an Evangelical Lutheran Church in Ontario when my kids were born (early '80s) because I thought I had a responsibility to raise them with some religion and I wanted to "get right with God". In his Bible classes, my young pastor (in his first posting) taught us the modern interpretations based on linguistic & historical bible research. For example, we read Matthew's & Mark's lineage of Jesus - then he (teacher style) led us to see that they were different (Matthew has Jesus descended from David through Joseph; Mark through Mary. Obviously, the Son of God can't really trace his lineage through his earthly Father!). He also discussed the mis-interpretation of the word "virgin" for Mary.
This didn't appear in his sermons, etc - probably because it would have shocked many of the congregation and the subtleties and significance to theology need in-depth discussion.
Most people don't realize that churches - Protestant and Catholic - DO pay attention to modern scholarly research and try to adapt them into their theology.
The problem is that the average church goer feels no need to learn anything past Sunday school stories (just as the average person thinks learning ends after they graduate from high school).
I find most people are woefully ignorant about what their church actually teaches on various issues. They think what THEY believe is what their CHURCH believes and they are usually wrong.
To go back to my earlier post, many Christians know their church worships "God, the Creator" and are misled by the Fundie PR campaign to think this is YEC, when in fact, their church probably does not hold to a literalist, YEC interpretation of Genesis.
These churches should be doing a better job on educating their congregations. But they are fighting the modern trend that people have a "buffet" approach to religion and pick up and cobble together ideas to create some personal mish-mash religion.
For instance, I have a friend who claims to be a devout Catholic AND "Born Again". Nope, these two beliefs are totally theologically contradictory -but cogitative dissonance is strong in this one!
Posted by: taranaki
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November 1, 2009 12:48 PM
Darwin/Chicago 1959, particularly Julian Huxley's speech "The Evolutionary Vision", led to the publication of "The Genesis Flood". Huxley described religion as an "organ of evolving man" that was no longer necessary in traditional forms.
From the Wikipedia article:
However, the event also reinvigorated American creationism: Henry M. Morris, a coauthor of the influential 1961 young earth creationism book The Genesis Flood, would later credit the Darwin Centennial Celebration for making clear the threat posed by evolutionary science.
If you have some time, look around the archive of material from the 1959 conference. It is fascinating. Listen to the some of the musical composed for the event. In the media files is one of the many letters they got from the devout attacking the conference.
Posted by: Jim
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November 1, 2009 2:55 PM
PZ Myers: "The brainchild of Philip Johnson, Intelligent Design was far more radical than the previous iterations — Johnson opposed methodological materialism, and specifically wants to incorporate god into science."
The claim that Johnson "specifically wants to incorporate god into science" is quite false. Anyone interested in learning what Johnson actually thinks about how science should be defined can read his thoughts on the matter at:
http://www.arn.org/docs/johnson/scirel98.htm
Posted by: Tulse
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November 1, 2009 7:15 PM
Wow, PZ, you got a mention from Andrew Sullivan! (Now if he could just spell your name right...)
Posted by: Nerd of Redhead, OM
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November 1, 2009 7:26 PM
Keep lying to yourself Jim, you don't fool us. The Designer is a code word for God. We understand that, you can't. That makes us ten times smarter than you.Your god doesn't exist, and your babble is mythical fiction. What part of that do you have trouble with?
Posted by: Paul Lundgren | November 2, 2009 9:53 AM
The whole of human history has been a struggle between opposites and extremes. The pendulum will shift back toward rationalism eventually. We just need to remember that we must be vigilant and chip away at the arguments wherever possible.
Posted by: phantomreader42 | November 4, 2009 2:01 PM
Jim the admitted troll @ #122:
Jim, no one with a brain could be stupid enough to claim here that Johnson isn't seeking "To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and human beings are created by God." He has said so in an official Dishonesty Institute document, as much as his cronies have tried to hide it. He's on record as a theocratic, anti-science fanatic. You can't make that record go away.
The question here is, is Jim the admitted troll a brainless dupe who hasn't read the Wedge Document? Or is he a brainless fraud who HAS read the Wedge Document, and is lying about it? Or is he a brainless illiterate nutcase who doesn't understand the English language and is trying some kind of absurd dodge that somehow Johnson isn't trying to incorporate god into science, when he has admitted such in writing?
The only way even such a dodge could work is if Johnson isn't trying to insert god into science, but trying to erase science completely and REPLACE it with the dogma of his cult. And that is far, far worse.
Bottom line, Jim: Johnson is a fraud, a crook, a liar, a propagandist, a religious fanatic, and a hater of science. I can see why you leap to defend him. He's everything you worship. An earthly avatar of willful ignorance and shameless dishonesty.