Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Man's Ego

According to your text, Darwin's theory was the "sharpest blow" to modern man's ego since Copernicus "moved the earth from the center of the universe." Why has this particular scientific theory caused so much fuss over the past century and a half? Why have US Courts come down so hard on "creationism" and its younger relative "intelligent design"?

32 comments:

  1. Humans have believed in religion and God since the beginning of first society. The theory of evolution takes away God from the equation of how life on Earth has become this way. As we have seen in the past like in the French Revolution, people are still not ready to have God taken away from them completely. We brought up in class that this theory is only really fought over in the United States in industrialized nations. I believe that it is the politicians hoping that they can score more points in their elections if they appeal to the voters ("God Gap"). The U.S. courts have to come down hard on creationism because religion is outlined in the Bill of Rights, so Americans have the right to freedom of religion. Freedom of religion is usually the most popular statements in the Bill of Rights. Eventually this argument should end because it has been an issue for a dozen nonconsecutive decades.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Like Bianca says, Religion was the basis for all human beliefs. Nobody really understood creationism until Darwin came along. US courts have come down on it so hard because people love religion. They love having something to blame, or something to praise. Religion is something people need, so there's something that they can feel that they know about how man was created, and how things came to be. Creationism challenges the ideas that humans have had since the beginning of time.
      Science depends on testing to help give an explanation for the way things are. Testing of religion is informal, and it doesn't really provide proof of anything. Science relies on hypothesis and theories/testing, while religion relies on trust and faith. That's why it's called the "Christian Faith." Even though Religion relies on centuries of blind faith, people rely on it to help discern the meaning of life.
      God may be the ultimate solution but he is not the scientific explanation. Evolution is arguably taught in schools because it is a scientific explanation for the way humans were evolved, but religion doesn't necessarily agree with that. Either way, Religion is a way for people to believe, and science is a way for people to know.
      http://humanorigins.si.edu/about/bsic/science-religion-evolution-creationism-primer
      https://answersingenesis.org/creationism/young-earth/creation-is-religion/
      http://www.religioustolerance.org/evolutio.htm

      Delete
  2. Religion has been something believed in and followed since the beginning. People used to rely on it for all their answers and still do somewhat today. As Bianca said, evolution does not really include God with how the Earth has become this way. With Catholicism being so strong during these times, it was not a big hit and made many Christians upset. The theory of evolution eventually became very accepted, especially to those who just needed a little proof to do so. Darwin never tried to explain how humans got here, and he never said there could not be a God in all of this. He was not atheist, although many believed he was. Evolution is not something you can choose to believe in because belief requires proof,and there is proof in this theory. It is illegal to teach both evolution and creationism in a public school in a science class. Why is this? Freedom of religion is in the Bill of Rights, therefore public schools cannot teach or persuade you to think one way or another. They are only allowed to teach what has been proven and in science, evolution has.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Before Darwin's theory, religion was usually a very important aspect of a person's life. When something was not explainable, the first reason as to why it would happen is because God wanted it to. If somebody got sick and/or died, it was because God wanted it to happen, and nobody should interfere with it.
    Darwin's theory about evolution was extremely controversial at the time he made it because evolution goes against God in many ways. According to Darwin, evolution takes many generations to take place, and usually that would take thousands, if not tens of thousands of years to complete. This goes against the Christian idea of the earth only being 4000 or so years old. The theory also goes against the story of how God created man. According to the Bible, God created man (Adam) out of dust and the first female (Eve) was made from Adam's rib. On the other hand, Darwin says man was not created right away. Man developed over time from other creatures and has not always been on earth, as told otherwise by the Bible.
    After Darwin hypothesized about evolution, many scientists studied it and over decades have found a lot of evidence that can prove Darwin's theory. That is why evolution is taught in science: it is provable. Creationism is not provable, therefore cannot be taught in science legally. This does not mean that God doesn't exist, though. It is definitely possible that God is part of the existence of the universe, especially knowing that the very idea of God has been around for some millennia.
    It doesn't matter if one believes in the theory of evolution or not, it is still a scientific theory, meaning it is the most studied subject in science. The denotation of the word "theory" is a very fitting word to use with evolution, but when most people think of a theory, they think of the connotation, which is a myth or something made up. It is important to know that a "theory" is really the most important thing studied in science.

    Sources:
    http://m.livescience.com/43126-creationism-vs-evolution-6-big-battles.html
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creation%E2%80%93evolution_controversy

    ReplyDelete
  4. Religion is something that people believed in and lived by since the beginning. It was the way of life for virtually everyone and was not to be questioned. That all changes when Darwin comes around and brings up the idea that there may not be a God. This brought a lot of controversy because it was challenging to the Christian religion because it was turning more towards logic instead of God since Darwin said nothing required God. He never talked about how humans appeared on earth; he left this open for God but only started the thought. After 20 years, e finally published his theory of evolution because he was scared and didn’t want to be wrong. He also knew this would be a big thing. As mentioned in class, it’s illegal to teach both evolution and creationism in public schools in a science class because freedom of religion is in the Bill of Rights. That being said, public schools cannot teach this because they can’t try and make us think one way or another. Science classes in public schools can only teach us what is proven.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I would say they can only teach what is "science" rather than what is "proven". Most of science is constantly being tested and retested and proven and disproven, if we waited for only absolutely "proven" things there would be no science.

      Delete
  5. So far everyone has gone straight to the controversy with this theory and religion, but I think the controversy goes even further than just religion. Yes, Religion is the main opposer of the natural selection theory, although many christians and other people in different religions still believe in this theory, just not what Darwin may have been implying when it comes to the birth of mankind. Personally, if I was living back when this first got introduced, I would have been also very skeptical of the fact that this theory can explain so much about biology and how our medicine and medical care work today is just mind blowing. That a single man could come up with this theory is just crazy, but now that it has been tested we can call it a theory. Back then when Darwin published this idea without all of the proof we have now, I think many people would have not believed simply because it had not been tested thoroughly over and over again, and maybe not because it went for or against their religious beliefs.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Good discussion. There is so much more to be explored here. (I just now realized I used the term "ego" in this post. (Thanks Freud!)

    ReplyDelete
  7. Where humans came from and how we were created has always been a touchy subject that most people avoid. Nobody wants to offend anyone else because of religious aspects. When Darwin came up with his theory of evolution, he never discussed where humans came from, I think, because he didn't want to step on anyone's toes and cause anymore controversy. His theory did turn heads because it was a new idea that caused a lot of people to question their religion. It also led to more people looking into it and looking into how humans were created. I think for some it provides another explanation besides "God created us because he created everything." For many, the explanation of God is the only one we have really heard and has been drilled into our heads, at least it has for me, so to take the time to understand anything else is difficult. The part that gets most people is that the explanation of God is just a belief, it isn't proven, whereas the theory of evolution is just that, a theory. It has been proven and tested so that it is science. It is real and true and some people have a hard time understanding that because their beliefs overpower science.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree with Shelby in the fact that Darwin didn’t say where humans come from to keep that argument out of the question. Also it raised a lot of discussion with other things that their religion had been saying. It gave another answer besides, thats the way God wanted it to be. Before Darwin that’s the way just about every question was answer, God wanted it to be that way, so that’s the way it is. Today people say they don’t believe in evolution, which is impossible. There is facts and multiple studies on evolution and each study has come up with the same stuff.

      Delete
  8. I think this is because there still so many people that still rely on the religion aspect of their live to stay prominent. I believe that people want to believe that creationism was actually real so that the bible stories would stay true, that Adam and Eve were put on this earth by God and God created mankind. By bringing up that mankind was created by evolution, was a huge change and a huge idea to everyone at that time. Before that, people had an explanation on how man was created since what couldn't be explained, was explained by religion. People do no like to have changes, especially this big of a change. They were comfortable with the idea that religion started their live that they had. And they were comfortable with the fact that they had someone to believe in that created the beautiful world they lived in.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Darwin's theory has caused a lot of talk in not just the scientific community, but in almost every part of life. The reason for this is that Darwin's theory is one of the most important scientific theories to have ever occurred. Darwin's theory also caused a lot of controversy, mostly about his idea versus the idea of creationism. Many religious people believe that creationism is how the world was created, but scientists have found overwhelming evidence that Darwinism is the right answer. This controversy has been brought up quite a bit in the modern United States. People are fighting over which one is right, and whether or not we should teach Darwinism and creationism, or just one of them. In reality, Darwinism should be taught in schools, because we know how it works, and we know that that is how the world works. Creationism needs to stay out of schools, because you can't teach beliefs. It's okay to believe in creationism, but you still should treat Darwinism as a scientific theory, and realize the importance of it. The U.S government realizes this, and push to keep creationism out of schools. Even the Catholic church agrees that creationism should stay out of schools, which is ironic since it's Catholics that keep bringing this topic up.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Before Darwin’s theory of evolution, everything humans knew about the world relied completely on what we knew about religion. People were taught that God created everything in the world in seven days. According to the bible, God created us in his image. Since all we knew about our creation was in the bible and what we were taught in church, no one ever really questioned this theory. For a person living in that time period, everything we knew came from our religion. If a loved one died, it was because God willed it--no one was ever supposed to question the will of God.

    This theory of Creationism caused a sense of fear for the people before Darwin’s time. If God willed every event in history, no one could go against that will. The very idea that we were created by something other than an all powerful God was beyond our human knowledge. When God created us, we pretty much came from nothing. However, Darwin would suggest that we evolved from something less, but the appearance of humans is still a mystery.

    Creationism and Evolution were extremely controversial when Darwin’s ideas were still new. Many would argue that evolution was wrong because it didn’t include God or religion. However, evolution was the closest biological evidence we had to the truth of the world’s creation. Those who are religious would often struggle with coming to believe Darwin’s ideas even though they made sense. Even today, historians and theologians argue over which theory is right. The historians often argue that creationism is not a scientific theory because their is no science behind religion--it’s something that you choose to believe in. Creationists argue that the historians don’t take God into account and that evolution is just a theory, not a scientific fact. Despite these arguments, evolution is a theory that has been tested thousands of times, even if it is hard for us to imagine.

    http://www.scientificpsychic.com/search/evolution.html
    http://www.theonion.com/articles/creationism-vs-evolution-the-arguments-for-each-si,35804/
    http://www.allaboutcreation.org/creationism-vs-darwinism-faq.htm

    ReplyDelete
  11. It makes sense that the court system has banned creationism in public schools as a way to explain the Earth because there is no proof behind creationism. Things is science must be proven by tests and creationism can not be tested. It is not good science to teach something that can not be proven. America is also all about freedom of religion so if a public school was to teach some kind of creationism then what story would they choose. There are hundreds of stories to explain how the earth and mankind came to be. This would then be going against our constitution by forcing a religious view on people who are not a part of that religion.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I agree with Cooper, schools really shouldn't teach creationism because it's not proven or there is no proof if it really happened or not. That doesn't mean that it shouldn't be taught, they should teach that it was a thing because that is what people thought actually happened. They use to think that the reason for everything that happened was God made it happen. Science came along and started to explain to why certain things happened or what everything is. Science is something that is proven and tested. As Cooper said there are hundreds of stories to explain how the Earth and mankind existed through creationism so there isn't any proof as to why things like started, but scientists have ideas to why things started, but it's not definite proof.

      Delete
  12. Our discussion with Darwin really started with that quiz. The question was asked, do you believe in Darwin's Theory? The answer to that was solved in Western Civilization. There is no believing in something that is found to be true. This theory has been tested by thousands of people over hundreds of years. That's what people get confused about. They are mistaken by the use of the word theory. They want the choice of choosing between Darwin's theory and creationism, but actually Darwin's theory is science and creationism isn't. That's not saying people who know and believe Darwin's theory is true, don't believe in God, but that people can believe in both and not coincide with each other. Why? Darwin didn't explain how the earth was created, he knew that would spark more confrontation, so he stuck with what he could prove. This is also why we can't teach creationism in science class. Why not? It's not SCIENCE!

    ReplyDelete
  13. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  14. I think the biggest hit to mans ego was that we were not created like we are today. WE started from the simplest form of life, just like every thing else in the world. We were not above them like today but we were very equal. Over the years of evolution we became the Superior species and have done many great things in the world. Yet for the longest time we were completely wrong about or origin on earth, God did not create us in the forms that we are today we evolved into our bodies. This was a huge blow to many religions and their fundamental teachings of or origins on earth. One again we were wrong. Many religious people argued that the creation story was still correct and that the evolution theory was wrong but to day it is accepted by the church that evolution was in fact the right theory. But they do say that Gods hand was in the process of evolution.

    ReplyDelete
  15. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  16. Darwin’s theory of evolution has caused so many disagreements, because although Europe has greatly gotten away from religion being the most important part in society, it still had a fairly large role. Darwin’s theory disagreed with the religious belief of creationism. For hundreds of years, people believed that God had created the earth and all living things on it, however Darwin’s theory stated that humans (which is the main topic in the controversy) and other living things, evolved from an earlier life form. The reason why this created so much fuss, was because where does God fit into this theory? Darwin is not coming straight out and saying it, but in a way, he is referring to the option that there doesn't necessarily need to be a God in order for the creation of humans and other living things. This is the part of his theory that had people so worked up.

    ReplyDelete
  17. I agree with Joe's point that Darwin's theory could almost insult people it means that God did not make humans exactly the way we are today. I can see where people would not want to believe that they could possibly be a result of the same processes that has shaped the rest of the living organisms for millions of years. We are taught in the Bible that humans were made in God's image but when the theory of evolution was introduced people had to figure out, what exactly is God's image. We could no longer look around at each other an say, "Yep, God's just and all powerful human and that's why we are the way we are." Though Darwin didn't say much about humans, it didn't take long for people to find out that his ideas applied to all living things, making the idea that humans were made in God's image a bit harder to understand.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Courts have come down so hard on the idea of creationism, because it has not been proven. Darwin's theory of evolution has been scientifically proven; scientists have found an ape-like remains that leads to the idea that humans have evolved from earlier forms. However, there is no backing proof or evidence that God has created all humans (and the world). The idea of creationism is just a belief, which is why courts are coming down so hard on it. The main cause of these problems stems from the teaching of evolution and creationism in schools. The courts believe that those who teach creationism in school are violating the law of separation of church and state.

    An example of one of these court cases is Kitzmiller vs Dover Area School District. This case happened in 2004. A Pennsylvania public school teacher was teaching “intelligent design” which was basically “creationism in disguise.” Intelligent design is the thinking that humans and other living organisms are so complex that they had to have been created by a higher force. The court then stated that this was a teaching a form of a religious belief, rather than a scientific theory.

    Sources:
    http://m.livescience.com/3998-judge-rules-intelligent-design-taught-class.html
    http://www.clarku.edu/~piltdown/map_receptionfav/darwintheoryproved.html

    ReplyDelete
  19. Courts have come down so hard on the idea of creationism, because it has not been proven. Darwin's theory of evolution has been scientifically proven; scientists have found an ape-like remains that leads to the idea that humans have evolved from earlier forms. However, there is no backing proof or evidence that God has created all humans (and the world). The idea of creationism is just a belief, which is why courts are coming down so hard on it. The main cause of these problems stems from the teaching of evolution and creationism in schools. The courts believe that those who teach creationism in school are violating the law of separation of church and state.

    An example of one of these court cases is Kitzmiller vs Dover Area School District. This case happened in 2004. A Pennsylvania public school teacher was teaching “intelligent design” which was basically “creationism in disguise.” Intelligent design is the thinking that humans and other living organisms are so complex that they had to have been created by a higher force. The court then stated that this was a teaching a form of a religious belief, rather than a scientific theory.

    Sources:
    http://m.livescience.com/3998-judge-rules-intelligent-design-taught-class.html
    http://www.clarku.edu/~piltdown/map_receptionfav/darwintheoryproved.html

    ReplyDelete
  20. The most industrialized nation in the world is the only country that has the problem of accepting the idea of creationism and evolution. Evolution is a tested scientific theory, which is science that should be tested in school. Creationism is only about faith and believing that God created life on this planet to do good. Our whole world was based on faith before the enlightenment and that was over 500 years ago in Europe, so it is difficult to understand why only this topic is not accepted.
    The politicians have a large affect on how the people vote and who they vote for based on their campaign promises. The "God Gap" is created by people who only vote for politicians who believe in God. Those people are more likely to vote for the Republicans because they are the conservative party, but Republicans have used this gap to help their votes in election times. PEW has found that it is mostly Republicans that don't accept evolution which makes sense. Republicans know that using that campaign promise helped them win the election one time, so they try out that tactic in later elections.
    It is not about what the students and parents accept should be taught, but only what is constitutional should be taught. Most of the United States citizens do not understand the basic processes of government, so they don't understand constitutional and unconstitutional. Unlike the second source says, there is no credulous part of creation. Once creation is proven, it becomes science.

    https://www.icr.org/article/48/
    http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2013/12/31/3108741/republicans-evolution-demographics/

    ReplyDelete
  21. Teaching creationism is illegal. There are many instances to back this up. Edwards v. Aguillard, Louisiana had a creationism act that did not pass. This act demanded that if a school were to teach evolution, public schools would also have to teach creation science. Just like we talked about in class it's not legal so the courts couldn't say that the only way to teach evolution is to also teach creation science. The reason the website gives; advancing the religious belief that a supernatural being created humankind, which is embraced by the term creation science, the act impermissibly endorses religion. That is not allowed.


    Another way we looked at creationism was the fact that people think it is the opposite of evolution. It's not. In Freiler v. Tangipahoa Parish Board of Education they had this same dispute. The teachers had to read a disclaimer whenever they taught about evolution. The critical thinking the kids were told to use while learning about it, was not needed since they already should be using critical thinking. By saying this to the kids the teacher was saying that creationism is the opposite which why it's illegal.


    "This textbook contains material on evolution. Evolution is a theory, not a fact, regarding the origin of living things. This material should be approached with an open mind, studied carefully, and critically considered." This is the label that was going on textbooks in Cobb county. Because of Selman et al. v. Cobb County School District et al. this label was declared as illegal and all labels were to be taken off. With any of these examples, you can see where people get very hard pressed on their freedoms, but don't really understand that evolution needs to be taught in biology in order to explain a lot of our world.


    http://ncse.com/taking-action/ten-major-court-cases-evolution-creationism

    ReplyDelete
  22. It is definitely understandable as to why we do not teach creationism. The point is that most people don't understand this or wonder why a choice isn't given. I will admit that until I learned about the differences between evolution and creationism and learned the specific points about each, I didn't realize that each had good reason to be believed. As most people believe, evolution is completely against what they think is correct. This could be true, but there is more to the theories of evolution that people don't understand. As well, most don't understand the points of creationism, what it's about, and why it is not taught. I believe that these subjects are misunderstood and need to be learned more about before people make conclusions on what their real personal thoughts are.

    ReplyDelete
  23. Evolution has caused a lot of controversy over the last decade and a half. At the time the theory was released by Darwin, the majority of the world believed in some type of creationist God. The scientific theory of evolution did not disprove the existence of a God, but instead allowed an explanation of creation that does not involve God. This shocked many people, mostly because for every point in history up to this theory, it was assumed by most people that God created us. It was also a sharp blow to many Christians beliefs, because they had been told that they were created in God’s image and were “special”. While this theory states that they may have evolved from the same species as apes. The theory of evolution also sparked a new interest in scientific explanations for how the world came to be. More and more scientific theories have attempted to explain creation, leading to less and less who believe in creationism.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Darwin's theories have caused problems because of religion. If the people back then didn't believe in religion so heavily, there wouldn't have been so many problems, but the church wanted everyone to believe in what the Bible told them. Which is another reason Darwin waited so long to release his book, 'Origin of Species'. If he would have released it any sooner than he did, he would have been put in jail and punished for going against religion. He later became an athiest because of his findings. God and the church's beliefs were supposed to be worshipped at that time, and when people betrayed that, they were supposed to be 'in trouble', because the church was in charge.

      Delete
  24. Before Darwin's theory, people have always believed that they were created by God and were completely unique. Darwin's theory shows that we have evolved from something else and allows for a world with no God and created an alternate explanation to why we are here. This theory caused a lot of controversy and led people to believe that we, just like everything else, had evolved from simpler life forms. Religion was still a major part of society and accepting this theory allowed God to not be a part of this. It went against creationism. While Darwin didn't directly say there was no God, his theory allowed room for that idea. However, Darwin didn't have an explanation to how this process started. This hole allowed religions to adopt his ideas and claim that God was the one who started evolution. Creationism is not taught in schools, even though some people believe in this idea. It is not a theory and doesn't have evidence to back it up, unlike Darwin's theory of evolution. Therefor, public schools are not allowed to teach creationism in school and are allowed to teach evolution in science. Evolution is a scientific theory with evidence backing up his claims. Even so, Darwin's theory could change as scientists develop better ideas and improve on his theory.

    ReplyDelete
  25. Before Darwin's theory, people have always believed that they were created by God and were completely unique. Darwin's theory shows that we have evolved from something else and allows for a world with no God and created an alternate explanation to why we are here. This theory caused a lot of controversy and led people to believe that we, just like everything else, had evolved from simpler life forms. Religion was still a major part of society and accepting this theory allowed God to not be a part of this. It went against creationism. While Darwin didn't directly say there was no God, his theory allowed room for that idea. However, Darwin didn't have an explanation to how this process started. This hole allowed religions to adopt his ideas and claim that God was the one who started evolution. Creationism is not taught in schools, even though some people believe in this idea. It is not a theory and doesn't have evidence to back it up, unlike Darwin's theory of evolution. Therefor, public schools are not allowed to teach creationism in school and are allowed to teach evolution in science. Evolution is a scientific theory with evidence backing up his claims. Even so, Darwin's theory could change as scientists develop better ideas and improve on his theory.

    ReplyDelete
  26. Darwin’s theory of evolution has always been very controversial when it comes to the God aspect. After reading what the theory includes, there isn’t a lot room left for God. Many people do not like to think that science has found a theory to prove human existence that doesn’t require God. Before Darwin’s theory there was reason to believe that God created mankind, the earth, the plants, and the animals. After his theory was published, people couldn’t always use the reasoning of… well, God willed it so it happened, or God loves us so he gave us this. They has to look at the reality of the situation and admit that God may not have been necessary in Darwin's theory.

    ReplyDelete