Why Are Some Hell-Bent On Teaching Intelligent Design?

Funksaw writes "Here's an op-ed by first-time politician, long-time Slashdotter Brian Boyko, where he talks about his experiences testifying at the Texas Board of Education in favor of having real science in science textbooks. But beyond that, he also tries to examine, philosophically, why there is such hardened resistance to the idea of evolution in Texas. From the article: '[W]hat is true is that evolution tests faith. The fact of evolution is incontrovertible and supported by mounds of empirical evidence. Faith, on the other hand, is fragile. It is supported only by the strength of human will. And this is where it gets tricky. Because to many believers, faith, not works, is the only guarantee that one can pass God's litmus test and gain access to His divine kingdom. To lose one's faith is to literally damn oneself. So tests to that faith must be avoided at all costs. Better to be a philosophical coward than a theological failure.'"

Comments

why do athiests love to hate belivers so much?

[ZippyTheChicken]

there is a basic concept in science that matter can not be lost or found. When God said let there be light and there was a big bang the universe was created from his energy which was converted to mass. The design of the universe from atomic structures to solar systems is a shared design concept. Atoms have huge amounts of space between a proton and electron and neighboring atoms as do solar systems ... Electrons move around a nuclei the same way planets move around suns. The idea of intelligent design or God Creating the Universe is not dependent on a book that was written by man and then altered by leaders over thousands of years. BELIEF is as in your face as looking how reality is and trying to understand where it all came from and how lucky we are to be here. However as this man and other atheists believe that Science is true at all times... that is a completely false idea because science is merely the reverse engineering of what is. There will be no time in history when we as humans could travel to another planet that is inhabited .. the distance is too grand and we could never survive the trip.. See... people who want to keep God out of Science believe that they are more intelligent then everyone who knows something else created this reality... In simpler terms .. the universe wasn't bought at walmart... Whatever the creator of this reality is.. I call them God and pray they forgive me for my sins... If you want to think you know more about everything then everyone else... and negate god from creation.. then go out and build another universe... or find a way to harvest all the water in the oceans and propel a rocket to another planet that MIGHT support life tens if not hundreds of light years away. I.. myself.. meeeeee ... I am smart enough to know I am not smart enough... and that no one ever will be smart enough and if so never powerful enough... to create what our reality is. I think if you are intelligent you might want to start thinking about what is going to happen with overpopulation because if you are a smartass who thinks they know it all and you are in your 20's by the time you are about to die or at least by the time your grand children are about to die... the world will be in a monumental world war over population and we will be subjected to a thinning of humanity back to the point the earth can support us... however at that point we won't have Oil to power our cars, ships, planes.. and coal will be fought for and not obtainable for most.. there will be wide starvation and reality will change for the worse... If you are so smart .. fix that problem before it happens.. convince a few generations to not have children.. convince people to submit to a lottery to procreate.. and then remember you don't have to convince the west... you have to convince the third world. Good Luck with that... I will keep my faith in God and realize that men altered his word or added or created a book ... where I can see God in everything from the smallest quark .. to the cry of a child.. to the amazing world we still have left.. and the universe that surrounds us.

Evolution is faith AS WELL

[Bruce66423]

The fallacy in this argument lies in the claim that evolution is a 'fact'; the truth is that it is a step of faith to accept evolution, a conclusion drawn from 'loads of evidence', but boosted by a desire NOT to invoke a creator because that's unfashionable, and the way to never get tenure; the fairly desperate step of faith required to believe that very complex coincidences in nature 'just happened' is really only possible because there is perceived to be no alternative. The creationist do ask some good questions see http://evidenceweb.net/index.php?pr=MainPage There may be answers - but the BELIEF that evolution is the right interpretation of the evidence is just that - it's a belief, not a fact.

Re:If evolution is true...

[gd2shoe]

Curious about which apparent contradictions you see there. The ones I normally see pointed out aren't contradictions at all, but I'm always interested in a good theological puzzle.

(Gen 1 talks about the creation of the world, and mentions the creation of man as a blip. Gen 2 goes back and fills in details. That's an old tired, and frankly juvenile "proof" of contradiction. I hope you've got something more interesting.)

... the established church.

This bit confuses me. Are you lumping all Christians together into the same meta-church, are you specifically talking about Catholicism, or did you mean to say "their" instead of "the"? There are so many Christian churches out there with wildly differing beliefs that there are dozens of "official" interpretations of any given Bible passage.

Re:More importantly

[m.alessandrini]

blame the engineer who designed God

You mean Man. This is recursive.

Re:Some research about Authoritarians explains a l

[Mashiki]

Well that explains some other things, like the cult of global warming; and their desire to cover up anything that isn't contrary to what's actually happening in the world.