How Fundamentalist Collectivism Empowers Hardliners Against the Wishes of Most Americans
From the article:
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This is one reason that, no matter how often the courts try to kill it off, creationism ends up being presented again and again in classrooms as if it’s a scientific theory. The majority of Americans agree that evolution is how humans came to be. Despite this, as Slate recently reported, Texas students in charter schools are not only being incorrectly taught that evolution is a scientific “controversy” (it’s actually not controversial among scientists at all), but are being given religious instruction in the classroom. It’s not subtle, either, with one popular science workbook opening with a Bible quote, “In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth.”
Only about 21 percent of Americans reject the label of Christian, which means that the majority of people who accept evolution is a fact are actually Christians. So, if there’s so much Christian support for the theory of evolution, why is this such a struggle? The problem is that the Christian right has successfully framed the issue as a matter of atheists and secular humanists against Christians. While some pro-science groups like the National Center for Science Education, try really hard to avoid talking at all about religion – except to say it should not be taught in science class – the truth of the matter is the pro-evolution side is strongly associated with atheism and secular humanism.
A lot of Christians actually believe that creationism is not true and should definitely not be taught in the classroom, but coming out and saying so can feel like you’re siding with the atheist team instead of the Christian one. Unsurprisingly, then, the notion that pro-evolution forces are atheist and secularist becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Nearly all the most prominent voices on the pro-science side of this issue are atheists or agnostics, because they, for obvious reasons, aren’t particularly worried about being perceived as not Christian. Once again, identity works to scare Christians into toeing the party line even if they privately disagree with what the leadership wants.
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This is one reason that, no matter how often the courts try to kill it off, creationism ends up being presented again and again in classrooms as if it’s a scientific theory. The majority of Americans agree that evolution is how humans came to be. Despite this, as Slate recently reported, Texas students in charter schools are not only being incorrectly taught that evolution is a scientific “controversy” (it’s actually not controversial among scientists at all), but are being given religious instruction in the classroom. It’s not subtle, either, with one popular science workbook opening with a Bible quote, “In the beginning, God created the Heavens and the Earth.”
Only about 21 percent of Americans reject the label of Christian, which means that the majority of people who accept evolution is a fact are actually Christians. So, if there’s so much Christian support for the theory of evolution, why is this such a struggle? The problem is that the Christian right has successfully framed the issue as a matter of atheists and secular humanists against Christians. While some pro-science groups like the National Center for Science Education, try really hard to avoid talking at all about religion – except to say it should not be taught in science class – the truth of the matter is the pro-evolution side is strongly associated with atheism and secular humanism.
A lot of Christians actually believe that creationism is not true and should definitely not be taught in the classroom, but coming out and saying so can feel like you’re siding with the atheist team instead of the Christian one. Unsurprisingly, then, the notion that pro-evolution forces are atheist and secularist becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. Nearly all the most prominent voices on the pro-science side of this issue are atheists or agnostics, because they, for obvious reasons, aren’t particularly worried about being perceived as not Christian. Once again, identity works to scare Christians into toeing the party line even if they privately disagree with what the leadership wants.
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And the movements of celestial and planetary bodies is a natural occurrence, not a supernatural one. Science is concerned only with the natural. Religion is the realm of the supernatural.
Why wouldn't there be affordable private schools for the poor in a free market?
Your argument sounds like old-fashioned 1930s Soviet agitprop: "Comrades! Private farms? Under that system, only the filthy rich would be able to afford bread! Our system of publicly owned collective farms makes it possible for poor people to obtain a guaranteed minimum number of calories!"
>And yes, that's exactly what I mean.
Then it follows that Objectivism is a religion. It was Ayn Rand herself (later echoed by acolytes like Peikoff) who ridiculed the notion of intellectual flexibility by means of "keeping an open mind" when she suggested that by doing so, one's brains would leak out.
It's a funny line, no? But its message is clear: "question others, but don't question me."
And when some of the original inner circle did start to question her — the Brandens, Murray Rothbard, Robert Efron, Edith Efron, Robert Hessen, Allan Blumenthal — they were excommunicated. Sounds like religion to me.
That's the way an inflexible religious leader of a cult would talk.
And both the Jewish and Muslim faiths both come from the same origins as Christianity and believe that a deity created the world. Whether they have lobbyists on the subject is irrelevant.
Misc comments:
"anti-clerical writers", "hardcore Darwinist believers". "Darwinist community". various other put-downs, etc.
A lot of people are described nowadays as hardcore right wingers when they are for economic freedom (pardon the expression).
Burgess shale- this location of a rich variety of fossils shows how fast evolution works.
'Design'- agreed, it is not an attempt to reconcile but to overrun science with religion.
Gaps- proof that Darwin was wrong, but when a gap is filled it is micro-evolution. Like carbon changers creationists have been caught in fraud - the human and dinosaur footprints for example.
Easy to claim that the designer came down, discontinued the old model and replaced it with the new shorter armed bigger headed variety as that fitted the grand plan which only our priests know about.
Large populations - enable more diversity.
Final cause- something to do with atheists for the intelligent designer. We do not want to call it god so call it a space alien and it is ok. Better, as there is nothing there, no need for a name. Actually I prefer Steven Weinberg's In Search of a Final Theory tho' you could say he is also a hardcore darwinist, zionist, capitalist etc.
As I understand evolution, it is "spontaneous" mutation that provides an advantage over the non-mutated type which results in the mutated version having a better capability at survival.
That also brings up the question of those plants/animals that have shown little mutation over tens of thousands of years - sharks and cockroaches come to mind, as they have been virtually identical for seemingly forever. If evolution is "fact" would these creatures not have continued to mutate and evolve?
So yes to Map.
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