Posted on 04/17/2009 9:54:10 AM PDT by GodGunsGuts
Polling evolution in Louisiana
April 14th, 2009
"Just in time for the bicentennial observance of Charles Darwin's birth, a new survey of Louisiana residents shows 40 percent of the respondents believe evolution is not well-supported by evidence or generally accepted within the scientific community," the Baton Rouge Advocate (April 14, 2009) reports. The Louisiana Survey, sponsored by the Manship School of Mass Communication's Reilly Center for Media & Public Affairs at Louisiana State University, asked (PDF), "Do you think the scientific theory of evolution is well supported by evidence and widely accepted within the scientific community, or that it is not well supported by evidence and many scientists have serious doubts about it?" Of the respondents, only 38.8% preferred the correct option, with 40.3% thinking that evolution is not well supported and 20.9% listed as saying they don't know. The survey also asked, "When teaching students about human origins, would you generally favor or oppose teaching creationism along with evolution in public schools?"; 57.5% of the respondents said that they favored teaching creationism, 31% said that they opposed teaching creationism, and 11.4% were listed as saying they don't know.
The Advocate was editorially appalled, commenting, "The level of belief that evolution is not supported by scientific evidence is startling. Equally amazing is the percentage who believe evolution is not generally accepted within the scientific community," and adding, "Such indifference to basic principles of science doesn't position Louisiana very well to embrace the knowledge-based economy it needs to advance its future." (As Barbara Forrest recently observed in a post at the Louisiana Coalition for Science's blog, the state is next-to-last in the nation with respect to student educational success and economic prospects.) In a jab at Governor Bobby Jindal, who signed the so-called Louisiana Science Education Act into law in 2008, thus opening the door for creationism and scientifically unwarranted critiques of evolution to be taught in public school science classes in Louisiana, the Advocate also remarked, "How ironic that Jindal's wife, Supriya, has launched a private foundation to promote math and science education in Louisiana's classrooms. We encourage the governor to promote science education by working to keep religion out of science classes in public schools — something he's been unwilling to do so far."
Ping!
40% of Louisiana residents polled are idiots. One may well reject the science of evolution for religious reasons, but to claim that the theory of evolution is not well accepted within the scientific community is to deny reality.
Maybe by “scientific community” they mean Dr. Dino Kent Hovind and other ridiculous quacks with paper mill diplomas?
Chinese poster saying: "Smash the old world / Establish a new world." Classical example of the Red art from the early Cultural Revolution. A worker (or possibly Red Guard) crushes the crucifix, Buddha and classical Chinese texts with his hammer; 1967.
Maybe they just assumed that a majority of the scientific community can’t be so ignorant as to fall for Darwood’s materialist creation myth. On that point, I quite agree with you, they gave the science community waaaayyyy to much credit.
Thanks for playing. Boobie prize bag by the door.
This is simply because many of us in Louisiana refuse to evolve.
The more educated someone is the more likely they are to accept the theory of evolution through natural selection.
Making Creationism the refuge of the ignorant and the uneducated or ill educated.
The more you know, especially about science, the more likely you are to accept evolution.
Idiots? Not sure about that. They're definitely wrong. I don't think you're necessarily an idiot if schools don't teach what they should be teaching. If the Louisiana schools are so backwards they're not teaching the science of evolution (when normal states had evolution in their curricula 100 years ago), can you really blame the public for not being educated?
Yeah, because attending Harvard makes you smart like Obama.
Since creationists now believe in “fast evolution,” I can’t tell which side wins here.
There needs to be a catchier name for “fast evolution.”
Society of the Godless (The Union of Belligerent Atheists or The League of the Militant Godless
S.o.G. embraced workers, peasants, students, and intelligentsia. It had its first affiliates at factories, plants, collective farms (kolkhoz), and educational institutions. By the beginning of 1941, S.o.G. had about 3.5 million members of 100 nationalities. It had about 96,000 offices across the country. Guided by Bolshevik principles of antireligious propaganda and party's orders with regards to religion, S.o.G. aimed at fighting religion in all its manifestations and forming scientific mindset among the workers. It popularized atheism and scientific achievements, conducted individual work with religious people, prepared propagandists and atheistic campaigners, published scientific literature and periodicals, organized museums and exhibitions, conducted scientific research in the field of atheism and critics of religion.
S.o.G.'s slogan was "Struggle against religion is a struggle for socialism", which was meant to tie in their atheist views with economy, politics, and culture. S.o.G. had vast international connections; it was part of the International of Proletarian Freethinkers and later of the Worldwide Freethinkers Union.
Making Creationism the refuge of the ignorant and the uneducated or ill educated.
The more you know, especially about science, the more likely you are to accept evolution.
What effect do increasing levels of education have on the likelihood a person will resort to logical fallacies like, I don't know, argumentum ad populum, appeals to authority, ad hominem, and others? I only ask because your post consists entirely of these.
Exactly. The science is settled, and the time for debate is over. Global warming is real, it's caused by humans, and it's going to destroy the world.
Oops, sorry, wrong issue...
WOW! You don’t even deny it anymore. I guess that’s progress against that rejection of facts you are so opposed to.
Don’t bring that up they hate it when you do that!
Ignorant is also not an ad homonym, it is an accurate assessment of their state of knowledge about the subject. I am, for example, completely ignorant of most sport teams; and would not take umbrage at someone saying “Allmendream is completely ignorant when it comes to sports.”.
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