A Question for EvC's Great Minds to answer:

Why are Creationism and Evolution such controversial topics in the U.S. today ?***Support your answers with 3 specific details and/or examples...Yeah, it's for my World History class, and yeah, I'm a sophomore high school student and I must admit that I don't have decent clues about this topic so if you can help me out, it would be appreciated very much . If not, then, oh well . Thanks anyway.Sincerely,
J to the Nizzle.This message has been edited by Jenilicious, 04-16-2005 05:22 PMThis message has been edited by AdminPhat, 04-16-2005 11:07 PM

Hi Jen, welcome to EvC.Many of our regulars are in education, so I expect you understand their aversion to doing homework for people. I will move your post to short term topics if you remove the second question. That is an opinion question and I suspect that your instructor wants YOUR opinion.

---

AdminAsgara Queen of the Universe

http://asgarasworld.bravepages.com http://perditionsgate.bravepages.com

Yeah, you're right, my teacher wants my opinions so I'll remove the second question and you guys can do what you want with the first one. Thanks for the reply; I appreciate it.1

Hi, Jen. I am waiting for asgara to move ya...if she does not get back to us in a day or so, I'll move you over to short subjects. In the meantime, I will be thinking of my answer to your question.I am a Christian Believer. I believe that God started everything, but I am not a strict Biblical literalist creationist. I give the science guys some respect. They have earned it with those years in school!Oh Queen? Shall we move Jen to short subjects? This message has been edited by AdminPhat, 04-16-2005 11:12 PM

Thread moved here from the Proposed New Topics forum.

Quite simply, ignorance. A large body of people are under the impression that the Theory of Evolution is somehow Un-Christian or that it in some way attack the concept of the existence of GOD. That is simply a false statement and belief, and is countered by the evidence at hand. Whenever the issue of Creationism and the Theory of Evolution comes before the public, the vast majority of opponents to the idea of teaching Creationism are Christian and Judaeo-Christian-Islamic Theologians.For more information I suggest you look at the lists of groups who have testified at the various times the issue has been discussed publicly. You could begin by reading of The Significant Court Cases dealing with this issue.But YOU need to do the research and form your own opinions on the matter. Don't try top get the folk here to do your homework. We can point you towards sources but YOU must do it yourself.Strat by doing a web search for the position papers of the major Christian sects on this issue.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

It's really not such a difficult question, in itself at least. To answer it, I think you need to know a bit more about history than you do about creation or evolution. And since this is a World History assignment I suspect your teacher is not expecting you to turn in a scientific or theological research paper.The evc debate is simply the latest permutation of the science vs. religion debate that's been going on for centuries, quite intensely since the enlightenment.Creation is religion, evolution is science. Creation is a belief in something that cannot be observed and in many cases contradicts what can be observed, while science is what can be observed, along with conclusions drawn from what is observed. In other words, creation (at least in the context of the evc debate) is a set of beliefs about biology held in spite of evidence while evolution is an aknowledgement of biological evidence and a set of scientific assumptions based on that evidence. Thus, religion vs. science.This issue at the root of the religion vs. science debate changes from time to time. It used to be over the structure of the solar system and whether the planets circled the sun or the earth. Now it's over evolution. In a few years it will probably be over something else, like Big Bang.

---

Keep America Safe AND Free!

quote:

---

The evc debate is simply the latest permutation of the science vs. religion debate that's been going on for centuries, quite intensely since the enlightenment.

---

I don't see how this really answers the question. Religions have responded to science in a wide range of ways, ranging from acceptance of scientific findings and support for scientific research to complete rejection of science and the murder of scientists. So the fact that creationism is a religious view doesn't really tell you why, in this particular place and time, this particular religion has chosen to reject this particular part of science, and why it's raising a public stink about it.Even if you confine yourself to conservative Evangelicals in the U.S and their attitude toward evolution, the picture is not simple. At the beginning of the 20th century, fundamentalists (as they were soon to be called) were not crazy about evolution, but many managed to make some sort of peace with it, and opposition to evolution was certainly not a major issue. Even in 1917, when _The Fundamentals_ was published, evolution was a minor issue and the articles on the subject in that series were not all negative. By the early to mid 20's, however, fundamentalism had embraced anti-evolutionism whole-heartedly, and their attacks on teaching evolution turning into a public campaign -- leading fundamentalism directly into the debacle of the Scopes trial. Shortly afterwards, fundamentalism withdrew into the backwaters of U.S. life and creationism subsided, at least as movement. (Evolution, to be sure, was not taught in lots of schools as a result of religious pressure.)Anti-evolutionary fervor started to build again in the 60s, with the publication of Whitcomb and Morris's book, and for the first time young-earth creationism became the main force in the movement. That wave seems to have peaked in the 80s, with the latest wave, intelligent design, forming in the 90s and rising in recent years.So why now? I don't know. One factor is the overall conservative political shift at the moment, which is perhaps a reaction to the changing ethical and social climate of the last 40 years, including the latest round of secularization of society, amplified by the feeling of crisis produced by 9/11. (One might want to draw a parallel with the original rise of anti-evolutionary fundamentalism, which was certainly fueled by the marked secularization of the U.S. in the decades around the turn of the centruy, and which was sparked by the sense of crisis produced by WWI and the subsequent Red Scare.)Another important element may be the appearance of a politically savvy and intellectually respectable form of anti-evolutionism in the Intelligent Design movement.Another factor may be that evolution simply wasn't taught much until roughly the early 60s, and so didn't present much threat. (Note that I'm unsure on the facts here -- my impression is that teaching of evolution increased during the 60s.) With the post-Sputnik concern for better science education, teaching evolution became more common, leading to more pressure against it from people who already opposed it. The pressure against it has been there ever since, but it has become more overt recently both because other factors have produced a tilt toward Republican control of the government, and because someone has finally come up with a version of anti-evolutionism that isn't laughably stupid.

Jen,
You're asking a question that has been asked quite a few times. The fact is any time you have differing ideas that are so near and dear to the person or group, then you are going to get controversy. The reason this one gets so heated is because it hits at the heart of Christianity and science. If one wins over the other their goes a belief system or a way of life. For christians it really hits hard because the bible doesn't speak of evolution it speaks about a GOD that created. I believe when people try to say something like... oh let's say; people evolved from apes, it is a slap in the face of our creator. If we say things against the pro-evolutionists they feal it's a slap in their face so neither of us are all too happy. So it's either a slap in GOD's face or the face of an evolutionist. The answer will come in the end not any sooner. So we get to argue in the meantime. And like said previously, this world is secular the more that can get in the way of spreading christian views the better. Shalom. -Z

Because Americans, culturally, have a distrust of the conclusions of authorities, particularly intellectual authorities. We love it when our moms turn out to have been right all along. We never believe the government when it tells us it knows what's best. We love to root for the underdog.Well, creationists, hampered as they are by a lack of scientific credentials, a lack of rigorous reasoning, and a lack of good evidence, are certainly the underdogs. It's no surprise that creationism as a means of "sticking it" to those know-it-all scientists would appeal to the significant portion of the population that view themselves as Davids to various Goliaths, as well.

quote:

---

I believe when people try to say something like... oh let's say; people evolved from apes, it is a slap in the face of our creator.

---

Only Creationists and others who do not understand Biology ever make this claim, because it is false.

quote:

---

If we say things against the pro-evolutionists they feal it's a slap in their face so neither of us are all too happy.

---

It has nothing to do with pride.It has to do with what we decide to teach as science.If the anti-science religious extremists weren't working hard to get their dogma taught as science in public shcool science classrooms, I doubt that many scientists would give any thought at all to creationists.

What in the world are you talking about? The overwhelming majority of people in the world are religious. The overwhelming majority of Americans are christians.This is the typical cry-victim that certain christians like to do for some reason still unknown to me.

Just so Jen understands that the vast majority of Christian Churces disagree with you and that for them, there is no conflict between the Theory of Evolution and Christianity.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

quote:

---

I believe when people try to say something like... oh let's say; people evolved from apes, it is a slap in the face of our creator. If we say things against the pro-evolutionists they feal it's a slap in their face so neither of us are all too happy.

---

The difference is no one is out to prove you wrong. When Christians denounce evolution, protesting documentaries at IMAX theaters, protesting outside of science museums and things of that nature, they are in essence saying "You, the scientific community, are LYING to the public." This is, as Jar stated, a relatively small segment of evangelicals.That's just ridiculous.If scientific research happens to challenge previous worldviews, is that the fault of the evidence?The same was said during the flat/round Earth "controversy."This message has been edited by dsv, Monday, April 18, 2005 03:53 PM

Jen,For your paper I might compare the current debate between creationism and evolution with the previous debate between geocentrism and heliocentrism. This debate happened many years ago between science (ie Galileo) and religion (ie The Inquisition). It has a lot of similarities with the debate between science and religion today.