Without intending to be hypocritical, I'm going to recommend an action about which I have mixed feelings! On the whole, however, I believe that the positives outweigh the negatives and thus I hope you will follow my recommendation.
My recommendation? Go to Facebook and become a fan of the page entitled "We can find 1,000,000 people who DO believe in Evolution before June."
Let me explain my two main reservations.
The best place to begin is by saying simply that the concept of "belief" in science makes little sense. Scientists, and I hope the general public, accept scientific ideas because experimentation and observation have provided a wealth of data in support of their claims. Belief, or a conviction that something is true regardless of evidence, should play no role in science.
The National Academy of Sciences addresses this point clearly while differentiating religion from science. The Academy writes, "Many religious beliefs do not rely on evidence gathered from the natural world. On the contrary, an important component of religious belief is faith, which implies acceptance of a truth regardless of the presence of empirical evidence for or against that truth. Scientists cannot accept scientific conclusions on faith alone because all such conclusions must be subject to testing against observations. Thus, scientists do not 'believe' in evolution in the same way that someone believes in God."
My second concern is that the validity of a scientific idea is absolutely independent of its popularity in the general population. Even if the vast majority of non-scientists attested that they did not believe in evolution, it would have no impact on the scientific legitimacy of evolutionary theory. Again, scientific advances proceed on the basis of experimental and observational evidence rather than on popular opinion. Collecting signatures in support of a scientific concept is thus an utterly meaningless action from a scientific standpoint.
And yet, I'm encouraging you to join with me in signing on to this Facebook page! And I'm doing so for political rather than scientific reasons.
The page itself began as a political response to a creationist ploy. Earlier this year, creationists began a Facebook page designed to sign up 1,000,000 people who did NOT believe in evolution and while this page is every bit as meaningless from a scientific perspective as is the pro-evolution page, it is possible that it will generate significant media attention. So, the pro-evolution page was created to provide balance and to demonstrate that lots of people support evolution.
This is important stuff because the evolution/creation controversy, after all, is all about politics. It's clearly not about science since the world's scientific community has spoken out regularly about the centrality of evolution, the power evolutionary ideas have to explain much about the natural world, and the overwhelming data from a host of biological subfields supporting evolutionary theory.
And the evolution/creation controversy is clearly not about a conflict between religion and science since more than 13,000 clergy members have joined The Clergy Letter Project and said that evolutionary theory is fully compatible with their religion. It's also well worth noting that Christian religious denominations in the United States representing a majority of Christians are comfortable with the teaching of evolutionary theory.
No, the evolution/creation controversy is solely about people with one particular religious belief wanting to impose that religious belief on the rest of the world. Political outlets, from school boards to state legislatures, have regularly been used to promote this narrow religious perspective. This has been the case regardless what the creationists have called their ideas, from creationism through "scientific creationism" to "intelligent design." The Discovery Institute, the world's foremost proponent of the non-science of "intelligent design," has made this point more clearly than I ever could when it wrote that "Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions."
I'm not in the least interested in "a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions" and I suspect that neither are the vast majority of people. Rather, I'm interested in a science that helps us understand the natural world. Religion, whatever you may think of it, exists for a different purpose.
So, for the political statement it will make, I urge you to go to Facebook and become a fan of "We can find 1,000,000 people who DO believe in Evolution before June." Even though this page was started after its creationist counterpart, as of this writing it has exceeded the creationist version by more than 200,000 fans. Spread the word and increase the margin!
(I want to conclude with an aside to deflect a criticism that I'm certain some will level against me and The Clergy Letter Project. I've made it clear that I don't believe that the validity of evolutionary theory is enhanced by petitions and yet, some will surely say, "isn't that exactly what The Clergy Letter Project is all about?" The answer is a simple and unqualified NO! The purpose of The Clergy Letter Project is to demonstrate that thousands of religious leaders see no conflict with their religion and evolution. These people are uniquely qualified to make this statement, a powerful statement that is both theologically and politically based.)
Follow Michael Zimmerman, Ph.D. on Twitter: www.twitter.com/mzclergyletter
John Farrell: Bad Faith (in Science): Darwin as All-Purpose Boogey Man?
Evolution - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
we can find 1000000 people who don't believe in Evolution befor ...
"A five-day conference held in March 2009 by the Pontifical University in Rome, marking the 150th anniversary of the Origin of Species, generally confirmed the lack of conflict between evolutionary theory and Catholic theology, and rejection of Intelligent Design by Catholic scholars"
"The Church has deferred to scientists on matters such as the age of earth and the authenticity of the fossil record. Papal pronouncements...have accepted the findings of scientists on the gradual appearance of life.
International Theological Commission (July 2004) statement endorsed by Cardinal Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI:
According to the widely accepted scientific account, the universe erupted 15 billion years ago in an explosion called the 'Big Bang' and has been expanding and cooling ever since. Later there gradually emerged the conditions necessary for the formation of atoms, galaxies and stars, and about 10 billion years later planets. ...On earth (formed about 4.5b years ago), conditions have been favorable to emergence of life. [While there is little consensus about the origin of the first microscopic life], there is general agreement ...that the first organism dwelt on this planet about 3.5 - 4b years ago. Since ... all living organisms on earth are genetically related, it is virtually certain that all living organisms have descended from this first organism."
Also there is not much evidence that multiple random mutations over any period of time could create an entirely new anatomical feature such as kidneys to filter blood, or lungs to oxygenate the blood or veins to carry it or muscles to use it, or a brain to control the muscles. Finch beak size is not a new feature nor is the coloration of a moth. Nor is antibiotic resistance.
I'm a supporter of the sciences, but I don't see how the overall theory is evidence supported if it takes millions of years and we have only a few hundred years of observation. This is not like gravity. I got a perfect score on the science portion of the ACT and I studied engineering at a top 10 university, please don't tell me I'm ignorant or that I hate science or america.
I will point out that you're not telling the truth, though.
As for the other things you question, we can take modern examples and compare with basic assumptions, then compare against historic, fossilized, or otherwise preserved species. In current life forms, for example, you can find every permutation of light responsive tissue from small dots on a dorsal surface of a flatworm to the fully developed human eye, then take that and make conclusions on how such an eye developed over succeeding generations.
Aside from a VERY strong positive correlation between Creationist belief and cacography, they will stubbornly not follow any line of logic or reasoning. I presented one Creationist adherent with the fact of the 13,000 signators of the Clergy letter Project and she simply dismissed them as not being true Christians and being corrupted by Satan.
It seems that your efforts on the clergy letter and endorsement and the FB petitions do strike a sensitive nerve with those in 'almost' total denial. True, the effort does nothing for science...but hey..."they" don't listen to science!!! Keep fighting the good fight.
Taken from the info tab of the aforementioned facebook group
"Apologies for the name of the group, it has been pointed out numerous times that 'believe' is really the wrong word word when talking about a scientific theory...
I didn't really think about it at the time of creating, I just copied and pasted the opposing group's name, and there's no way of changing it now. If you feel that strongly then you are free to create another group with a more appropriate title, but please don't complain about it on this group wall as there is nothing more I can do about it, other than apologise."
the sequence of events is in line with scientific theory.
then their is
Psalm 90:4
For a thousand years in your sight are like a day that has just gone by, or like a watch in the night.
so how long is a day for G-d. more then humans can imagine.
the anti evolution crowd is a bunch of anti americans who want to keep the people of this county uneducated and drive america to the conditions of a third world nation.
“When the Holy One Blessed be He created Adam, He took him and caused him to pass before all the trees of the Garden of Eden. He said to him, ‘See how beautiful and praiseworthy are my works; and all that I have created, I have created for your sake. Take heed that you do not damage and destroy my world.’” (Koheleth Rabbah 7:28)
2 Now the earth was [a] formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
so we are not talking about earth as we know earth.
nice try but no banana
“When the Holy One Blessed be He created Adam, He took him and caused him to pass before all the trees of the Garden of Eden. He said to him, ‘See how beautiful and praiseworthy are my works; and all that I have created, I have created for your sake. Take heed that you do not damage and destroy my world.’” (Koheleth Rabbah 7:28)
2 Now the earth was [a] formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.
genesis 1:2
i have no idea how a formless object rotates. it gives us no idea when it obtained form. their is nothing it the entire genesis creation story that indicates we are talking about a 24 hour day.
the only people who believe otherwise are deliberately misreading the bible for anti american political purposes. to attempt to make american uneducated and destroy our economic scientific power.
btw --- what do you believe the moral spiritual meanings of the biblical creation story are.
“When the Holy One Blessed be He created Adam, He took him and caused him to pass before all the trees of the Garden of Eden. He said to him, ‘See how beautiful and praiseworthy are my works; and all that I have created, I have created for your sake. Take heed that you do not damage and destroy my world.’” (Koheleth Rabbah 7:28)
The clergy letter project actually lists 732 churches who have "signed up".
By comparison, there are 67,055 Seventh-day Adventist churches in North America alone, and NONE of them have signed on. These are "Blue Zoners" who have followed the Bible's health principles, even when they were also considered "unscientific" (remember physicians recommending cigarettes?). They worship on the Bible Sabbath, as a memorial to the Creator and His creation. They are in the minority, but it seems that wisdom and truth have more to do with whether we choose to obey God or not.
I realize Zimmerman is mostly "preaching to the choir" with his essays. But there are many who do not accept evolution as an explanation of our origin, or survival of the fittest to be our moral destiny.
The writer goes on to say, "I realize Zimmerman is mostly "preaching to the choir" with his essays. But there are many who do not accept evolution as an explanation of our origin, or survival of the fittest to be our moral destiny." I urge the writer to take a look at my piece last month on Social Darwinism (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-zimmerman/social-darwinism-a-bad-id_b_489197.html) since I explained how evolution does not imply that humans have to passively accept biology as destiny. It makes no sense, however, to object to the science of evolution because you don't like the (false) implications you draw for morality from your misunderstanding of science.
I think that is kind of the point. You very well might get one million people to sign up, but you still got....what? over two billion to go..?
Lets have a moment of truth, if you don't mind. A very large percentage of the faithful aren't buying what you're selling. And it isn't because you're not asking in a nice enough manner.
I would just like to add two points. First, the comparison between evolution and physicians recommending cigarettes is quite inappropriate. As a scientific theory, evolution is on the same footing as gravity, plate tectonics, atomic theory, germ theory, and so on. Second, while some do not "accept evolution as an explanation of our origin," all available scientific evidence supports evolution and no evidence exists for an alternate explanation. This is readily confirmed by perusing a database of peer-reviewed scientific literature at the National Library of Medicine, over 19 million citations strong and growing: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez/
For those that reject evolution, I would ask the following: do you believe there is a decades-long global scientific and media conspiracy to exclude any evidence for creationism or against evolution from the peer-reviwed scientific literature, or that scientists are incompetent?
I argue that rejection of evolution is mainly due to rejection of atheism or social Darwinism, neither of which is equivalent to evolution, combined with ignorance of scientific evidence. If you hold that God is the author of nature, then our ever-expanding knowledge of the natural world obtained through science need not conflict with your beliefs.
Why are there both young earth and old earth creationists, who believe the earth is 10,000 or 13,700,000,000 years old respectively? This is a significant difference in Bible interpretation.
I have read that the new Creation Museum has an exhibit with human children riding dinosaurs. Since creationists have denied their existence (dinosaurs, not children) for years, how did this happen? If dinosaurs, which are not mentioned in the Bible, once existed, what else might the Bible have excluded? Evolution? And if children rode dinosaurs that surely would have been mentioned.
Let's encourage creationists to tidy up their worldview before we engage them in a debate. Then we can ask them a simple question:
"Since evolutionary biology is inconclusive on many fine points of the theory and silent as to the possibility of an ineffable cause (God?), where is the disagreement?
Would a transcendent creative source be limited to creating everything from scratch or might that source modify existing forms in creating new ones? (Oops, that would be evolution. Sorry.)
Ultimately, facebook is a pretty silly place to have this debate, but I suppose it now receives more daily traffic than google so what do I know.
However, if one were to be more witty and want to cock a snook at creationists, we could choose a name like " We can find 1000000 people who unhesitatingly affirm their preference for an ape" with a picture of T H Huxley as the mascot. (http://www.todayinsci.com/H/Huxley_Thomas/HuxleyThomas-Quotations.htm )
The brain is working correctly when it adapts its internal world view to incorporate evidence and facts as they arrive and are assessed. Brains that refuse to adapt and keep running the same circuits.... well they're broken.