https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/antiscience-beliefs-jeopardiz...
Interesting article, and if anyone has been following Chuck's astonishing anti-scientific creationist claims in the hilarious thread claiming atheism is a religion then it's a startling glimpse of why we should be worried. Those of you in the US in particular I'd say, as approximately 45% of adult Americans share Chucks woefully ignorant beliefs that the universe and everything in it is just 6000 years old.
I wonder how these delusional lunatics square getting medical treatment? Do they even know that all medical research accepts and is based on the fact of species evolution I wonder? You have to wonder why a YEC thinks they need a new flu jab every year? The mind truly boggles, but this is a massive problem that isnlt going away, and most especially in the states where your economy is driven by science and technology.
Imagine that article in light of Donald Trump being elected president, just a few years later? What does that say about where politics in the states is heading.
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I agree with you on this. But I think there is a little good news. According to a recent and many preceding polls... The number of Americans who hold the yec view has dropped in recent years... A bit off topic I know... But 38 percent yec... And a slightly increased percent of those who believe in god guided evolution... And a significant increase in believers in non god guided evolution... From 9 percent in1981 to 19 percent in 2015. While the progress is show and it's still abysmal... We are making progress.
I read this in a poll just a few days ago. While polls don't tell all, they do indicate a slight trend towards atheism. And while I agree entirely with your post and how this is still disturbing, I think there is some good news.
The rest of the anti science beliefs is still disturbing. It's kind of embarrassing. And I hope the poll I read is correct, because, though it's not much, it would be an improvement.
I would prefer that science denial did not occur at all. The anti vaccination people and the climate denial people need to go. Also the anti abortion people. Yec... Lol... How do they still exist? Like flat earthers... They survive like cockroaches.
The fight is to keep YEC's and the re-branded creationist movement of ID out of science education, where it has no place. The stats for people of faith losing their beliefs and becoming atheist when they leave home and attend university is extremely high. This then is when they are free to think for themselves, surrounded for this time with a wide variety of views that differ from their own, and where they consequently learn critical thinking skills and to question what they have been told. It's no accident that religions want to indoctrinate children as early as possible before they have learned these skills, and no accident that as part of that indoctrination they want to dishonestly teach superstitious religious beliefs like creationism as science. This has to be resisted at all costs, in order to stop children's education being blighted in the way we can see Chuck's has been.
In the UK the Labour party under Tony Blair broke a longstanding pledge not to use state funds for faith schools in a shocking betrayal, and it has been a disaster for the pupils who have had their science education ruined by such schools. It makes me laugh when I hear adults like Chuck espouse their creationist nonsense, but it breaks my heart to think of small children being indoctrinated to belief that bilge.
I promote scientific literacy with every breath.
There is a wonderful correlation between education and religiosity. The tendency is that... The more educated people are the less religious. Weird, right?
@ApostU
Re: There is a wonderful correlation between education and religiosity.
There's a strong correlation between levels of inequality and religiosity, too.
"The tendency is that... The more educated people are the less religious. Weird, right?"
There is a mountain of research supporting this as well, based on decades of research and very large test groups in multiple countries, and as you say they have consistently shown a negative correlation between education and religiosity for many decades.
In the US for one example, theism is currently around 95% of the population, and atheism around 5%, but in the elite body the National Academy Of Sciences, this is almost exactly reversed, with atheism at around 93%. Can it really be a coincidence that best educated and most intelligent scientists in the US are overwhelmingly atheists.
Then there is this Source: Scientists data from Pew Research Centre for the People & the Press survey, conducted in May and June 2009
"A survey of scientists who are members of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, conducted by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press in May and June 2009, finds that members of this group are, on the whole, much less religious than the general public.1 Indeed, the survey shows that scientists are roughly half as likely as the general public to believe in God or a higher power. According to the poll, just over half of scientists (51%) believe in some form of deity or higher power; specifically, 33% of scientists say they believe in God, while 18% believe in a universal spirit or higher power. By contrast, 95% of Americans believe in some form of deity or higher power, according to a survey of the general public conducted by the Pew Research Center in July 2006. Specifically, more than eight-in-ten Americans (83%) say they believe in God and 12% believe in a universal spirit or higher power. Finally, the poll of scientists finds that four-in-ten scientists (41%) say they do not believe in God or a higher power, while the poll of the public finds that only 4% of Americans share this view."
There also seems to be a negative correlation between IQ and religiosity. When one rises, the other falls. Here's an interesting discussion of this tendency.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/mr-personality/201312/why-are-relig...
The author thinks the key may be "openness," which tends to be an indicator of intelligence. But he also suggests that hardcore atheism could be as much a sign of rigidity as extreme religiosity.
I don't disagree with the study necessarily, but to suggest atheism is as close minded as religiosity is silly. Show me evidence and I'll be more likely to believe in your god. If not then... Well, I won't.
@AU: "to suggest atheism is as close minded as religiosity is silly."
I agree. I think atheism is the natural consequence of openness. There are highly intelligent religious people, but I'm always dubious about their true feelings. After all, religion can be the ultimate power trip for someone with enough intelligence to get to the top of the food chain, whether they believe in it or not.
We have checks and balances which the constitution allows, so I don`t see science or scientism threatened at all. the funding and research goes on. I do see a danger for Christianity with college bound students who blend in the campus culture of secular humanism which eventually leads to the anti- god posture that they profess. We should all be on the alert what the average student in college from Berkley to catholic university outside Washington dc teach and stand for.
@AB
Beware the student.Where have I heard that before? Oh yes! Here:
https://www.google.com.au/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://soundclo...
Talk it over with Pat Jarrett: 1967
And here:
https://youtu.be/gkyijCCIP_c
Barbara's call to Alan Jones
Though that last one probably doesn't count.
I also see a danger for Christianity. But I don't see that as a bad thing. And yeah, as more people are educated more people tend to abandon religion. Also not a bad thing.
@Agnostic believer: "so I don`t see science or scientism threatened at all. the funding and research goes on."
The biggest threat to science isn't through universities and research funding, although the impact has been bad enough in fields like stem cell research.
I think the greatest danger to science is the corruption of developing minds through the addition of theocratic idiocy like creationism to science curricula in schools. Children should be taught to question, and to keep questioning until their curiosity is satisfied. They should be taught how to think, not what to think. They should never, never be told that we know all the answers, because god did it all. That's a crime against humanity.
I remember the first time I came across a YEC. It was online, I've never met one in person. They're not a thing in Australia, I think. Anyway, he started by telling me god is real, but evolution isn’t. Pages and pages of evolution isn’t. I'd never come across that before. I know lots of Australian theists and they all accept evolution, including the clergy. I couldn’t see the connection. I sat there, scratching my head, thinking it was a windup, for awhile.
I've spoken online to a lot of young American atheists who swear their teachers are pushing Creationism in science class. Not directly, but in a round about way by the "science" teacher ridiculing the Theory of Evolution. One young lady told us her teacher was supposedly teaching evolution, but commented " As if a kitty can turn into a puppy. It's just silly!" Giggle, giggle. The young lady tried to politely correct her teacher's misinformation and it didn't end well. She put in a complaint and was told the teacher was entitled to her opinion. It started a mini-avalanche of comments from other young Americans in the same boat at school.
IF you believe for one moment that we evolved then where did the different sexes originate from? was it what you call micro or macro evolution? Do you know the difference here?
There's no such thing as micro /macro evolution. But if there was macro would just be a whole bunch of successive micros... Oh, he'll, I'm not explaining evolution to you... You wouldn't hear a word I said.
@Apost Re: Explaining evolution to AB
Phew! Close call. Glad you caught yourself. For a second there I thought I might have to throw you a life preserver. LOL
Yeah. Some people no... However opening a thread about it might not be a bad idea.
there sure is a thing called macro and micro evolution. macro evolution is from one species to the other while micro evolution is mutations within that species.
Macro and micro evolution are the same thing, only with different time scales. So when a credo-tard tells us there is no such thing as macro evolution, that is equivalent to say there is no such thing as long timescales. Which might make sense if you are gullible enough to think the Earth is 6k years old.
Evolution is the change in allele frequencies of a population over successive generations. Species is a loosely defined term that is used to distinguish two populations that were once one population but either because of geographic isolation or migration or a number of other factors became distinct enough to no longer be able to interbreed with each other across population lines. If you call that macroevolution then it has been observed to happen both in the lab and in the field. Raise the bar again, I Dare you.
"there sure is a thing called macro and micro evolution. macro evolution is from one species to the other while micro evolution is mutations within that species."
The point he was making is that those are not scientific distinctions, they's bullshit propaganda claims by creatards.
However please cite the peer reviewed research that shows this difference, and the news story covering their Nobel prize, and of course the worldwide new frenzy covering the falsification of species evolution through natural selection. Only none of that is on any of the news channels I have?????
In science, macro and ,micro evolution are the same thing, only creatards try to claim they are different things.
@Agnostic believer: "where did the different sexes originate from?"
I believe sex was invented by sponges.
Is this a previously practiced tactic, or has this been attempted before? The topic is education for children, and AB attempts to derail the entire thread by slipping in the evolution argument.
Let's get back on track, not get derailed so easily.
Nice try AB, you really are a despicable person.
If you are going to be a YEC you have to be willing to accept the idea that your god is the " great trickster" rather than the Satan character.
With a naked eye, the Andromeda galaxy is visible. That's 2.6 million light years away.
If the universe was only 6000 years old, your god would have to put on one hell of a light show to simulate the light from everything that is over 6000 light years away --- and he' d have to keep this sham up 24/7.
You see - light travels in a straight line - and the universe is obsevably moving.
Were the universe only 6000 years old - any light set in motion towards us - at the center of the universe- ( that is the only way the YEC scenario can work) would make the universe appear static.
But it's not. It is observably moving - rotationally - and expanding.
Once you understand that - the whole YEC bit rapidly looks like nonsense.
For the last few hundred years, science has eroded religion because it has peeled back religious fallacies. The list of scientific disciplines that have individually dis-proven the 6,00 year old claim is substantial. From astronomy to genetics to geology, each can individually dis-prove the 6,000 year claim. And those religious fanatics who hold any power realize they can not defeat scientific claims (with the exception of the nutjobs like Comfort) so they are attempting to kill off scientific education. Or divert it.