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To: Virginia-American

Just my observation, but leftists generally have a problem with natural selection, while conservatives often have a problem with evolution. The two are not the same, though some people in these debates try to confuse this issue.

Conservatives who question evolution generally don't think there is sufficient evidence to declare that we are descended from one celled organisms through accumulated mutations. Natural selection isn't that big of a deal to most conservatives. I doubt evolution but I fully accept natural selection, for example.

Leftists like the idea that we emerged from the primordial slime and got to where we are through mutations which God had nothing to do with. Their problem is with natural selection, at least as it applies to humans. They may accept that natural selection occurs in all other forms of life, but they want humans to be exempted from it. They want us all to be equal, for the genders to be equal and interchangable, for all groups to be equal, etc.


313 posted on 12/12/2005 3:41:41 PM PST by puroresu (Conservatism is an observation; Liberalism is an ideology)
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To: puroresu
I'd have to agree with your assessment. Historically the political camps have tended to respond to evolution like you said. Marxists notoriously dislike natural selection, and favor some kind of Lamarkianism. Conservatives are less worried about the evolution of essences or the idea of competition as they are the implications they see with common descent.
317 posted on 12/12/2005 3:48:14 PM PST by CarolinaGuitarman ("There is a grandeur in this view of life...")
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To: puroresu
Conservatives who question evolution generally don't think there is sufficient evidence to declare that we are descended from one celled organisms through accumulated mutations. Natural selection isn't that big of a deal to most conservatives...

Leftists['] ... problem is with natural selection, at least as it applies to humans. They may accept that natural selection occurs in all other forms of life, but they want humans to be exempted from it. They want us all to be equal, for the genders to be equal and interchangable, for all groups to be equal, etc.

I read an article somewhere recently that put it this way: Creationists accept microevolution but not macroevolution, while leftists accept macroevolution but not microevolution.

324 posted on 12/12/2005 4:06:41 PM PST by jennyp (WHAT I'M READING NOW: Art of Unix Programming by Raymond)
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