Opinion, Volume 9 number 2, February 2007, by Neal Matson
The Missionary Position On Project Steve
I support Project Steve though I'm not eligible to sign on because my name is not Steve, Steven, Stephen, Stephanie, or even Esteban, Etienne, or Istvan. Nor do I hold a PhD in the sciences. However I do heartily endorse their membership statement, below:
Evolution is a vital, well-supported, unifying principal of the biological sciences, and the scientific evidence is overwhelmingly in favor of the idea that all living things share a common ancestry. Although there are legitimate scientific debates about the patterns and processes of evolution, there is no serious scientific doubt that evolution occurred or that natural selection is a major mechanism of evolution. It is scientifically inappropriate and pedagogically irresponsible for creationist pseudoscience, including but not limited to "intelligent design", to be introduced into the science curricula of the public schools.
This project originated several years ago as a tongue-in-cheek response to creationist listings of scientists who deny evolution in their continuing attempt to sway the unsuspecting public into believing that evolution is a theory in crisis.
Compiling a list of the hundreds of thousands of scientists who accept evolution would be tedious, so the creators of the list decided to count only scientists named Steve (and variations thereof) in honor of the late Stephen Jay Gould. Census Bureau data indicate that approximately one percent of the United States population carry a qualifying name, so every "Steve" signatory represents about 100 scientists. The count, as of January 26, 2007, stands at 720 or 72,000 actual scientists.
The creationists have only three "Steves" in their corner, which shows just how miniscule their ranks really are in the scientific community. Evolution is in no danger and, in fact, is growing in acceptance in the religious community. Sunday February 11 was celebrated as Evolution Sunday in at least 530 Christian churches, according to the Darwin Day website. Last year 467 congregations participated.
Darwin Day is February 12, Charles Darwin's birthday. Did you know that both Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were born on February 12, 1809? Another interesting fact about the father of evolution is that he believed in a Creator. It's right there in the final sentence of The Origin of Species.
There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathed by the Creator into a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being evolved.
So shall we call Darwin a creationist? Not by today's fundamentalist definition of creationism that requires, among other things, man to be a special physical creation distinct from the created animals. Does the Bible consistently support this position? No.
Ecclesiastes 3:18-21 reads: "As for men…they are like the animals…. All have the same spirit; man has no advantage over the animal…all come from dust, and to dust all return…. Who knows the spirit of man which rises upward, or the spirit of the animal, which goes down into the earth?" The difference between men and animals is of a spiritual nature, not a physical one, and this is what the fundamentalists don't understand or can't accept. In their minds, if human evolution is true then the basis of their faith, which is inerrant literalism (especially of the Bible's opening chapters), collapses. They cannot accept the truth that Genesis 1-11 is a parable or their world is overturned. This is actually a form of mental illness.
A similar situation exists with the horror of war trauma. In her book, What Was Asked of Us, Trish Wood lets Iraq War vets tell their individual stories. One of them, Cavalry scout/sniper, 1st Infantry, Garrett Reppenhagen, recounts one of the worst injuries he witnessed from an IED and how later the disabled soldier would never be able to overcome the military brainwashing and accept that the war was wrong because "it's hard to admit that you've been duped and that you got all f_ _ _ed up for nothing." A much more severe situation than that of the creationist, to be sure, but the same mental process applies. They both need healing, our prayers, and to be kept out of positions of influence.
That's my position and I'm sticking to it while I hoist a mug of primordial soup to both Charles Darwin and Stephen Jay Gould. | ||
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