Summations Only

In my opinion, the main reason that evolution should be taught in US public schools and that creationism/ID should not is because we, in the US, have a tradition of separation of church and state. Evolution is the central theory of biology, the single, coherent explanation of a wide variety of biological phenomena. The vast majority of biologists accept it; the only conceivable reason not to teach it would be because it goes against the religious beliefs of a minority. Likewise, creation/ID is considered an acceptable alternative by religiously motivated people, not by the biological community at large.And let us not forget the reason for separating church and state. Traditionally, Christianity has been a very intolerant religion -- not only demanding proselytizing by its members, but the violent suppression of alternative religious views (even heresies within Christianity itself), and even used to justify the suppression of political dissent.The main parties advocating the teaching of creationism/ID in the US are a particularly intolerant religious group. They are also working to suppress homosexuality and other forms of sexual expression, reproductive freedom for women, the repression of various alternative religions, and even straying into the advocacy of hyper-free market capitalism, the elimination of social welfare programs and the implementation of police power to control the resulting unrest, and a violent, military-based foreign policy based on the self-interest of Americans as opposed to everyone else.Also, Rremember that the religious right itself does not actually believe in "equal time" -- what they are really aiming for is to do away with evolution altogether and replace it completely with their religious dogma. If they were to succeed and the non-fanatics were to ask for "equal time" for evolution, they would be the ones saying "f*** you" (and probably throw them in jail, if they could).In my opinion, creation/evolution is a silly, unimportant debate...except it is an important plank for a group whose goal is to determine what everyone else thinks and believes. Not only is fighting the religious right in this area a way of distracting their resources from more dangerous policies, but when they succeed in this one area, as unimportant as I feel that it is, then they are one small step closer to their totalitarian hegemony over thought.

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"Intellectually, scientifically, even artistically, fundamentalism -- biblical literalism -- is a road to nowhere, because it insists on fidelity to revealed truths that are not true." -- Katha Pollitt

Yeah, creationists usually don't like it when their cherished creation myths cannot hold up under close scrutiny, and so they leave.Added by edit:That said, there a few creationist members here, but they tend to avoid the science forums. If you want to engage them, you usually have to discuss a topic in politics or social issues.But we do get creationists (sometimes new, sometimes old) who come in to discuss creationism or evolution.Edited by Chiroptera, : No reason given.

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Computers have cut-and-paste functions. So does right-wing historical memory. -- Rick Perlstein

This is not true in general. Not any old conclusion can be reconciled with a given body of evidence regardless of world view. It is simply not possible to fit any worldview onto a given set of evidence. If it were, then our ideas and theories of the world would never change since the evidence would simply be fit into the old world view every time.The reason theories change and our ideas of the universe changes is because evidence accumulates to the point that the old "worldview" can't be reconciled with the data. This is what happened with the theory of evolution. By the time Darwin presented his data and his arguments, it was impossible to reconcile a young earth or static species or special creation of species into the known evidence.

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Computers have cut-and-paste functions. So does right-wing historical memory. -- Rick Perlstein

I don't buy this. The scientists who study fields relevant to evolution (and old earth geology) live in so many countries and come from so many different social, political, and religious backgrounds. I have a hard time believing that so many varied people in so many different situations can be "brainwashed" for so long a time.- And what does this have to do with evolution? There are many, many people who believe and worship God (even Christians, Jews, and Muslims) who accept evolution. What is more, if evolution were somehow demonstrated to be false, that doesn't indicate that a god exists -- someone could prove once and for all today that evolution is false, and even that the earth is less than 10,000 years old, and I, for one, would remain a happy atheist.

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Computers have cut-and-paste functions. So does right-wing historical memory. -- Rick Perlstein