And so now we get to the end of the blog. It's only appropriate that I finish this blog with another post on attitudes as that's what I did earlier. I was thinking the other day about atheist attitudes and I began to think about what I talked about earlier, demonizing.
It seems to be that in the same way that fundamentalists demonize, so do atheists. It almost seems like atheists have a fundamentalism of their own in the way they attack religion. But what is fundamentalism? The dictionary would like to define fundamentalism as "strict adherence to the fundamental principles of any set of beliefs." It would seem atheists have something like that, fundamental principals of science. The principals of science, the scientific method and skepticism, seem to be held to in a rather religious way. They use the same thing that the people they are opposing use just in a different way.
Wednesday, April 20, 2011
Tuesday, April 19, 2011
Demonizing
I've heard a lot about demonizing in the past semester. It comes from fundamentalists in the form of demonizing homosexuals, atheists, abortion doctors, Muslims, ect. However, it also comes from the exact opposite place. I've seen plenty of demonizing of fundamentalism. We, in our college culture especially, are so quick to demonize fundamentalism and to say that what they are doing is wrong.
But what does it mean to demonize a group of people? Well, when you demonize, you are basically making an entire group out to be evil. This comes from everywhere, but it especially surprises me when I see it from the college culture. College culture in general is supposed to be more liberal. Undergrads, obviously, are going to be this way, but the surprising part is when professors and grad students do it. There is supposed to be a certain amount of cultural relativism involved in study and academia that seems to be missing.
College culture is so quick to demonize the conservative right or even the fundamentalists. We are so quick to label what they do as illogical or evil. It surprises me.
But what does it mean to demonize a group of people? Well, when you demonize, you are basically making an entire group out to be evil. This comes from everywhere, but it especially surprises me when I see it from the college culture. College culture in general is supposed to be more liberal. Undergrads, obviously, are going to be this way, but the surprising part is when professors and grad students do it. There is supposed to be a certain amount of cultural relativism involved in study and academia that seems to be missing.
College culture is so quick to demonize the conservative right or even the fundamentalists. We are so quick to label what they do as illogical or evil. It surprises me.
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
The "T" Word
As I'm watching this documentary, "Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial" I heard that beautiful word "theory." We talked about in class how that word in everyday language means "guess." People keep wanting to say that evolution is "just a theory" and that it isn't a "law" or a "fact." This, in my opinion, shows the pretentiousness and absoluteness of scientific language.
In the scientific world "theory" means a "a coherent group of general propositions used as principles of explanation for a class of phenomena." Or in other words: "a hypothesis that explains a group of facts" (my abridged version). What is a hypothesis in scientific language? Well I'm glad you asked! "a proposition, or set of propositions, set forth as an explanation for the occurrence of some specified group of phenomena, either asserted merely as a provisional conjecture to guide investigation (working hypothesis) or accepted as highly probable in the light of established facts." Or in other words: "a guess as to why something happens which you than use during an experiment." A "fact" in scientific terms is simply something that happens. "Grass grows," is a fact. Facts really aren't all that important in science, as they are just little bits. The hypothesis and the theory are the important things as they attempt to explain the facts. A "law" is even less important. A law is "a statement of a relation or sequence of phenomena invariable under the same conditions." Or in other words: "something that happens the same way in the same conditions every time." For instance 2+2=4 is a law. It will always work that way.
In everyday language, we put quite a bit of emphasis on the word "fact" and "law." We believe that these are the things that we should look out for because they emphasize something that is real. We take the words "hypothesis" and "theory" as just meaning a guess. As such when average religious people talk about the "theory" of evolution, they really are saying the "guess" of evolution.
This is based in a lack of understanding of scientific language, but there is a worse problem at work here. It has come up several times before in debates and even in the Dennet/Plantiga book. People don't have a common ground from which to argue. They can't even agree as to what the definition of the word they are arguing about means. This happens all to often when people argue over things like religion, morality, or political matters. They are arguing over completely different things as they have different definitions of the same words.
In the scientific world "theory" means a "a coherent group of general propositions used as principles of explanation for a class of phenomena." Or in other words: "a hypothesis that explains a group of facts" (my abridged version). What is a hypothesis in scientific language? Well I'm glad you asked! "a proposition, or set of propositions, set forth as an explanation for the occurrence of some specified group of phenomena, either asserted merely as a provisional conjecture to guide investigation (working hypothesis) or accepted as highly probable in the light of established facts." Or in other words: "a guess as to why something happens which you than use during an experiment." A "fact" in scientific terms is simply something that happens. "Grass grows," is a fact. Facts really aren't all that important in science, as they are just little bits. The hypothesis and the theory are the important things as they attempt to explain the facts. A "law" is even less important. A law is "a statement of a relation or sequence of phenomena invariable under the same conditions." Or in other words: "something that happens the same way in the same conditions every time." For instance 2+2=4 is a law. It will always work that way.
In everyday language, we put quite a bit of emphasis on the word "fact" and "law." We believe that these are the things that we should look out for because they emphasize something that is real. We take the words "hypothesis" and "theory" as just meaning a guess. As such when average religious people talk about the "theory" of evolution, they really are saying the "guess" of evolution.
This is based in a lack of understanding of scientific language, but there is a worse problem at work here. It has come up several times before in debates and even in the Dennet/Plantiga book. People don't have a common ground from which to argue. They can't even agree as to what the definition of the word they are arguing about means. This happens all to often when people argue over things like religion, morality, or political matters. They are arguing over completely different things as they have different definitions of the same words.
Monday, April 11, 2011
Communities
I've started watching the documentary "Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial" by Nova. I will post blogs here if anything is particularly relevant/interesting to me personnally. However, I wanted to comment on the intro.
The beginning talks about how this issue tears communities and friendships apart. People are turned against each other in an epic battle of epic of proportions..... to use the technical term "epic." People can end up hating each other because of their various beliefs about the origin of the world. This can create... tensions, to say the least. It can be a serious problem, though. People can turn on each other and friends can be seperated.
That's all I wanted to say, this whole debate is tearing people apart. In my opinion, this is because people on both sides will not give up their position. People advocating for evolution will not give it up as they believe it is the way the world is. Truth. People advocating for ID believe that God created humans in his image. Truth. They are both essentially campaigning for their version of the word "truth," and they believe that compromise is unacceptable.
The beginning talks about how this issue tears communities and friendships apart. People are turned against each other in an epic battle of epic of proportions..... to use the technical term "epic." People can end up hating each other because of their various beliefs about the origin of the world. This can create... tensions, to say the least. It can be a serious problem, though. People can turn on each other and friends can be seperated.
That's all I wanted to say, this whole debate is tearing people apart. In my opinion, this is because people on both sides will not give up their position. People advocating for evolution will not give it up as they believe it is the way the world is. Truth. People advocating for ID believe that God created humans in his image. Truth. They are both essentially campaigning for their version of the word "truth," and they believe that compromise is unacceptable.
Monday, March 21, 2011
Creationists and Evolution
I was thinking the other day about how creationists, specifically YEC, view the topic of evolution. We have several examples of how it happens, and how it works. I grew up in a YEC culture and environment and I must say, it seems odd. YEC tend to believe that evolution works and happens yet deny that it can be used as an origin story. Basically they accept evolution but only in so far as it doesn't contradict the Bible.
They call this evolution that they do accept "micro-evolution" or evolution on a relatively small scale. Yes, they may say that plants and animals change over time using things like dogs and cats as an example of that. They accept this "micro-evolution" view of animals and biology, generally because we see it before our very eyes. What they don't accept is what they call "macro-evolution." This, they say, is what the evolutionists are making up, a story to attempt to explain origins without God. They may say that dogs turn into other dogs but dogs never turn into cats. This is a common view of YEC. That God created all the animals as they are now but with the ability to change only in that same genus or species.
This view I tend to see as a contradiction. As far as I can tell, scientists don't make a distinction between "micro" and "macro" evolution. Also, it sounds like YEC are trying to admit that evolution occurs without actually coming out and saying that evolution occurs. However, from the YEC point of view, it makes sense. These people are trying to make sense of the evidence for evolution yet still trying to deny it because they think it contradicts the Bible or, even worse, Christianity itself. This I can feel sympathetic for.
They call this evolution that they do accept "micro-evolution" or evolution on a relatively small scale. Yes, they may say that plants and animals change over time using things like dogs and cats as an example of that. They accept this "micro-evolution" view of animals and biology, generally because we see it before our very eyes. What they don't accept is what they call "macro-evolution." This, they say, is what the evolutionists are making up, a story to attempt to explain origins without God. They may say that dogs turn into other dogs but dogs never turn into cats. This is a common view of YEC. That God created all the animals as they are now but with the ability to change only in that same genus or species.
This view I tend to see as a contradiction. As far as I can tell, scientists don't make a distinction between "micro" and "macro" evolution. Also, it sounds like YEC are trying to admit that evolution occurs without actually coming out and saying that evolution occurs. However, from the YEC point of view, it makes sense. These people are trying to make sense of the evidence for evolution yet still trying to deny it because they think it contradicts the Bible or, even worse, Christianity itself. This I can feel sympathetic for.
Friday, January 28, 2011
Creationists, Evolution, and Attitudes
So, going off of our class discussion, I started to think about the attitudes that those in the scientific community take towards those who advocate for creationism and the thinly veiled "scientific" take on creationism "Intelligent Design" (ID). It is definitely an interesting subject, to be sure.
Professor Hart said that there were those who still believe the earth is flat, people who don't get the time of day. Now, this is a comparison, obviously, to not giving creationists the time of day. Clearly, it would be hard to justify a creationist belief and there would be a mountain of evidence you would have to fight against. Though, I often find that popular scientists who fight against creationism and ID; such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Stephen Hawking, and so forth; tend to be fairly smug about what they are saying. They act like those who are ID'ers are idiots or children, talking to them as such. I wonder if this attitude is appropriate for this debate, because clearly they aren't going to convince anyone of their material if their attitudes are bad. Even so, they are giving ID'ers the time of day to talk by addressing their beliefs directly and attacking them. This is completely against what you would think should be done, simply leaving them alone. It won't kill you if someone believes something contrary to the way the world is. It isn't the end of the world. Eventually, people will start to adapt the evolutionary point of view just as they have for the heliocentric model and the theory that the world is a sphere. Remember it's just a theory!!!
As I said in a post on the discussion board, I don't really see any reason why someone can not believe in a God with the way the world is. Of course there are philosophical problems with this, but I digress.
Oh, and I used this background picture of a cross to represent the people who do go against evolution. Clearly it is mostly Christian opposition, though there are some Jews, Muslims and the like who oppose evolution.
Professor Hart said that there were those who still believe the earth is flat, people who don't get the time of day. Now, this is a comparison, obviously, to not giving creationists the time of day. Clearly, it would be hard to justify a creationist belief and there would be a mountain of evidence you would have to fight against. Though, I often find that popular scientists who fight against creationism and ID; such as Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Stephen Hawking, and so forth; tend to be fairly smug about what they are saying. They act like those who are ID'ers are idiots or children, talking to them as such. I wonder if this attitude is appropriate for this debate, because clearly they aren't going to convince anyone of their material if their attitudes are bad. Even so, they are giving ID'ers the time of day to talk by addressing their beliefs directly and attacking them. This is completely against what you would think should be done, simply leaving them alone. It won't kill you if someone believes something contrary to the way the world is. It isn't the end of the world. Eventually, people will start to adapt the evolutionary point of view just as they have for the heliocentric model and the theory that the world is a sphere. Remember it's just a theory!!!
As I said in a post on the discussion board, I don't really see any reason why someone can not believe in a God with the way the world is. Of course there are philosophical problems with this, but I digress.
Oh, and I used this background picture of a cross to represent the people who do go against evolution. Clearly it is mostly Christian opposition, though there are some Jews, Muslims and the like who oppose evolution.
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