What Are Creationists Afraid Of?

Third, complexity does not imply “design.” One of Adam Smith’s most powerful insights, developed further by Friedrich Hayek, is that incredible complexity can emerge in society without a designer or planner, through “spontaneous order.” Hayek showed how in a free market the complex processes of producing and distributing goods and services to millions of individuals do not require socialist planners. Rather, individuals pursuing their own self-interest in a system governed by a few basic rules—property rights, voluntary exchange by contract—have produced all the vast riches of the Western world.

Many creationists who are on the political Right understand the logic of this insight with respect to economic complexity. Why, then, is it such a stretch for them to appreciate that the complexity we find in the physical world—the optic nerve, for example—can emerge over millions of years under the rule of natural laws that govern genetic mutations and the adaptability of life forms to changing environments? It is certainly curious that many conservative creationists do not appreciate that the same insights that show the futility of a state-designed economy also show the irrelevance of an “intelligently designed” universe.

Many early proponents of science and evolution were on the political Left. For example, the Humanist Manifesto of 1933 affirmed support for evolution and the scientific approach. But its article fourteen stated: “The humanists are firmly convinced that existing acquisitive and profit-motivated society has shown itself to be inadequate and that a radical change in methods, controls, and motives must be instituted. A socialized and cooperative economic order must be established to the end that the equitable distribution of the means of life be possible.”

Subsequent humanist manifestos in 1973 and 2000 went lighter on the explicit socialism but still endorsed, along with a critical approach to knowledge, the kind of welfare-state democracy and internationalism rejected by conservatives. The unfortunate historical association of science and socialism is based in part on the erroneous conviction that if humans can use scientific knowledge to design machines and technology, why not an entire economy?

Further, many supporters of evolution were or appeared to be value-relativists or subjectivists. For example, Clarence Darrow, who defended Scopes in the “monkey trial” eight decades ago, also defended Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb. These two young amoralists pictured themselves as supermen above conventional morality; they decided to commit the perfect crime and killed a fourteen-year-old boy. Darrow offered the jury the standard liberal excuses for the atrocity. He argued that the killers were under the influence of Nietzschean philosophy, and that to give them the death penalty would hurt their surviving families. “I am pleading for life, understanding, charity, kindness, and the infinite mercy that considers all,” he said. “I am pleading that we overcome cruelty with kindness and hatred with love.” This is the sort of abrogation of personal responsibility, denial of moral culpability, and rejection of the principle of justice that offends religious conservatives—in fact, every moral individual, religious or atheist.

In addition, nearly all agnostics and atheists accept the validity of evolution. Creationists, as religious fundamentalists, therefore see evolution and atheism tied together to destroy the basis of morality. For one thing, evolution seems to erase the distinction between humans and animals. Animals are driven by instincts; they are not responsible for their actions. So we don’t blame cats for killing mice, lions for killing antelope, or orca whales for killing seals. It’s what they do. They follow instincts to satisfy urges to eat and procreate. But if human beings evolved from lower animals, then we might be merely animals—and so there would be no basis for morality. In which case, anything goes.

To religious fundamentalists, then, agnostics and atheists must be value-relativists and subjectivists. Whether they accept evolution because they reject a belief in God, or reject a belief in God because they accept evolution, is immaterial: the two beliefs are associated, just as are creationism and theism. By this view, the only firm basis for morality is the divine edicts of a god.

This reflects the creationists’ fundamental misunderstanding of the nature of morality.

We humans are what we are today regardless of whether we evolved, were created, or were intelligently designed. We have certain characteristics that define our nature.

We are Homo sapiens. Unlike lower animals, we have a rational capacity, an ability to fully, conceptually understand the world around us. We are self-conscious. We are the animal that knows—and knows that he knows. We do not survive automatically, by instinct, but must exercise the virtue of rationality. We must think. We must discover how to acquire food—through hunting or planting—how to make shelters, how to invent medicines. And to acquire such knowledge, we must adopt a rational methodology: science.

Furthermore, our thinking does not occur automatically. We have free will and must choose to think, to focus our minds, to be honest rather than to evade facts that make us uncomfortable—evolution, for example—because reality is what it is, whether we like it or acknowledge it or not.

But we humans do not exercise our minds and our wills for mere physical survival. We have a capacity for a joy and flourishing far beyond the mere sensual pleasures experienced by lower animals. Such happiness comes from planning our long-term goals, challenging ourselves, calling on the best within us, and achieving those goals—whether we seek to nurture a business to profitability or a child to adulthood, whether we seek to create a poem or a business plan, whether we seek to design a building or to lay the bricks for its foundation.

But our most important creation is our moral character, the habits and attitudes that govern our actions. A good character helps us to be happy, a bad one guarantees us misery. And what guides us in creating such a character? What tells us how we should deal with our fellow humans?

A code of values, derived from our nature and requirements as rational, responsible creatures possessing free will.

We need not fear that with evolution, or without a god, there is no basis for ethics. There is an objective basis for ethics, but it does not reside in the heavens. It arises from our own human nature and its objective requirements.

Creationists and advocates of intelligent design come to their beliefs in part through honest errors and in part from evasions of facts and close-minded dogmatism. But we should appreciate that one of their motivations might be a proper rejection of value-relativism, and a mistaken belief that acceptance of divine revelation is the only moral alternative.

If we can demonstrate to them that the basis for ethics lies in our nature as rational, volitional creatures, then perhaps we can also reassure them that men can indeed have morality—yet never fear to use that wondrous capacity which allows us to understand our own origins, the world around us, and the moral nature within us.

[Sigh... Look, if you're not going to actually read the material for yourself and understand it -- if you're just going to fling "anti-links" as a talisman protecting you from learning anything -- why should we bother with you, and why do you pretend that you're approaching this intellectually instead of reflexively defending your cherished preconceptions from being challenged?]

Good heavens! Talk about the "hand-waving".

Yes, I was indeed talking about your habit of hand-waving away information AFTER YOU HAD SPECIFICALLY ASKED TO SEE IT instead of actually reading it and dealing with the material it contains. You do more of the same in this post.

Nothing in my own posts has been hand-waving -- I explain my points in detail, I address the points of the posts I reply to, and I provide documentation for what I say. If you think you can divert attention from your own evasions by playing "I know you are but what am I", you're sadly mistaken, and should have picked a target about whom your accusation isn't so transparently false.

I read at least as much "you're an idiot because you don't agree with me" contention from the evolutionist side as the other.

What does this have to do with the points I made and the evidence that has been posted? Oh, right, nothing! More diversions -- you're getting monotonous fast, and you're still not fooling anyone.

And I never called you an idiot (not in my prior posts, anyway -- you've certainly given me plenty of reasons to do so in *this* post...) I pointed out that you were rationalizing your failure to read to the material you've been presented, and that this wasn't very intellectually honest of you.

In any case, no, you *don't* see a lot of "you're an idiot because you don't agree with me" claims from "the evolutionist side". With rare exceptions, we don't make such vacuous accusations. What we *do* do is point out when someone's being an idiot because, well, they're being an idiot. You know, like your idiotic misconception that evolutionary biology asserts animals evolved from plants. The idiocy of that statement has nothing to do with you "disagreeing" with anyone, it has to do with the fact that you are making incorrect claims due to your gross ignorance of the subject you're attempting to pontificate upon. We'll see several more examples in the rest of your current post.

You yourself are quite a case of "look at my HUGE postings! You don't stand a chance!" masquerading as honest intellecutal discussion.

No, I'm not, as I'm sure you well know. My posts may often be long, but they're quite intellectually honest contrary to your slander, since they deal directly with the specifics of the topic being discussed, provide documentation for the claims made, and I'm perfectly willing and able to further explain, document, or defend what I write and the links I post. I directly deal with objections and other kinds of replies. If that's only "masquerading" as honest intellectual discussion in your view, then you clearly haven't a clue what honest intellectual discussion actually looks like, which from your posting behavior doesn't surprise me.

Unlike you, I do not waffle, evade, fail to read what is posted for my benefit, fling slander due to an inability to deal with the material, etc. etc.

As for your whine about the length of my posts, I can understand why you would be frustrated at the way that the pro-evolution side constantly has far more facts and evidence at its disposal than your side does. You're hardly the first person to whimper about the "unfairness" of being slammed with more facts refuting your nonsense than you can handle, and far more than you can marshal to "support" your own notions against evolutionary biology. That state of affairs was well described in this classic essay: The Mirage. You would do well to actually read it and ponder its significance for a change, instead of blowing it off entirely without even bothering to read it like you do with the other material you've been presented with. It directly addresses behavior like yours.

Tautologies are put forth as proof.

No, they aren't. I note that you didn't even try to pretend to document this accusation, or provide even a single example. So who's not actually engaging in "honest intellecutal [sic] discussion" here, hmm?

Evidence which comfortably fits evolution and creation equally well is declared proof of evolution.

Now see, here you're being an idiot again. Not because you "disagree" with me or anyone else, but because you're saying something idiotic. What's *especially* idiotic about it is that I already *explained* the elementary fallacy in this kind of statement, in the very post to which you are responding, and which YOU EITHER DID NOT BOTHER TO ACTUALLY READ BEFORE YOU WENT OFF ON A RANT, or YOU WERE UNABLE TO UNDERSTAND. So which is it -- are you inexcusably careless, or just plain stupid? Either way, that's behaving like an idiot. Idiots *remain* idiots because they keep acting that way.

Actually, there are *two* such fallacies in your above sentence, BOTH of which were already explained to you, which makes your comment *doubly* idiotic. (The two fallacies are: 1) that science claims to deal in "proof" -- this was specifically addressed in the "29+ evidences" link posted for your benefit, and 2) that a hypothesis can only be validated by finding evidence which matches ONLY that hypothesis -- this was addressed BOTH in the "29+ evidences" link, *and* my link explaining the scientific method).

Too bad you didn't bother to *read* the material we gave you before you rushed back to make an idiot of yourself.

The definitions of terms are changed when the data doesn't work out.

Wrong again, and *again* you just fling an accusation without even a pretense of being able to actually support it with examples or by any other method.

Anomolies are either insufficiently explained, or simply discarded.

Wrong again, and *again* you just fling an accusation without even a pretense of being able to actually support it with examples or by any other method.

...I may have to make that a hotkey if you persist in such dishonest tactics.

Outright fraud has been perpetuated.

...by a very small handful of people (countable on one hand) over more than a century. If you thought this somehow undermined all of evolutionary biology or excuses you from dealing with the evidence and the science on its own merits, you're *very* mistaken, son. Nor is this kind of slur and attempted "guilt by association" anything approaching "honest intellecutal [sic] discussion". How hypocritical of you to stoop so low, after falsely slandering me on that same standard.

And the tiny amount of fraud in biology is *nothing* compared to the *constant* barrage of falsehoods coming from the anti-evolutionists. To that list we'll add the multiple perjuries of the anti-evolutionists on the stand in the Dover "ID" trial as well.

How can evolution even be considered scientific, when the bedrock scientific principles of observability, measureability and repeatability are, by definition, lacking in evolutionary theory? Nobody can create laboratory experiments demonstrating macro (mega) evolution.

Congratulations! You're being an idiot again! How proud you must be!

Son, this is YET AGAIN another ignorant fallacy that is even *more* inexcusable because I have ALREADY PRESENTED YOU with material which addresses it in detail, IN THE VERY POST TO WHICH YOU ARE RESPONDING. So I ask again: Are you behaving like an idiot because you're idiotically careless about responding to things you haven't even *read*, or because you're just plain too dumb to grasp it?

I hate to break this to you, but when pro-evolution people characterize anti-evolution people as "idiots", "ignorant", etc., it's because over and over again, that's exactly what they have proved themselves to be. Thanks for providing more fine examples!

The data used are interpretations of historical events.

Horse manure, you're being an idiot again. The "data used" are the actual data -- DNA sequences, fossil structures, lab experiments on various living things, field studies, careful observations of what happens in nature, mathematical analyses of evolutionary processes and population dynamics, protein assays, observations of biochemistry in action, etc. etc. etc.

Try to learn something about a topic before you spout off about it. To do otherwise -- spouting off in ignorance -- is how idiots behave. If the shoe fits...

And, because the theory is so magnificently flexible, it is practically impossible to disprove. There is no conceivable discovery that would cause evolutionists to say, "Wow, we were wrong!" That is the hallmark of a solid theory, that it can be disproven.

Wow, this is the THIRD TIME you have made a grossly ignorant and fallacious statement that was ALREADY ADDRESSED, IN DETAIL in material that has ALREADY been presented to you on this thread. Again, you're behaving like an idiot by blathering on about things you should have known better about if you had bothered to actually just READ AND LEARN the material that was put right in front of you. What an *idiot*. Third strike, you're *out*.

Man, it's like trying to talk with a liberal...

As for your reeking arrogance,

At least I have something to be arrogant *about*. I actually have a broad understanding and knowledge of the topics I discuss. This is unlike the anti-evolutionists, who are so mind-bogglingly arrogant that they feel qualified to "instruct" everyone about how 150+ years of solid science is "wrong", WITHOUT KNOWING THE MOST ELEMENTARY THINGS ABOUT IT. It's like watching a five-year-old walk up to Erwin Schroedinger and try to "disprove" quantum physics. It would be funny if it weren't so obnoxious and pathetic. It's the same whenever we see endless waves of anti-evolutionists without a shred of solid knowledge of biology think they can make evolutionary biology and all the research and evidence underlying it come crashing down with something they thought up on their lunch break, or by flinging one of these age-old debunked creationist canards. It's like the liberals who think that slinging the phrase "blood for oil" will be enough to leave conservatives without a leg to stand on. If you're going to be a belligerent idiot, at least try to come up with something *new* -- we're getting tired of the same old ignorance. We've seen it, *literally*, thousands of times before.

please tell me who is worthy of your time?

Anyone who has a clue what they're talking about, or is open to actually learning things in order to fill gaps in their knowledge.

I submit that nobody but a fellow believer in megaevolution would qualify in your book.

I submit you haven't a clue what you're talking about, and are mistaking your prejudices for facts.

Obviously, those scientists who argue against it are bumbling, buck-toothed, knuckle-dragging dolts who couldn't reason their way out of a wet paper sack. Am I right?

No, you're not, but thanks for sharing more of your own prejudices with us.

I do, however, understand the arguments that the "scientists who argue against it" are making, and I can explain the fallacies and errors in their arguments to you. Not that you'd ever actually even bother to *read* the explanations, of course -- that might endanger your proud ignorance, which you use to protect your shaky beliefs from any thought that might potentially challenge them. This is such a common mental defense mechanism among anti-evolutionists that it was even described in detail and given a name (by a former sufferer, who has since recovered).

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