Britons Unconvinced on Evolution

pryonic writes "The BBC is reporting that more than half of Britons do not believe in evolution, with a further 40% advocating that creationism or intelligent design should be taught in school science classes. I'm a Brit myself, and I thought most people over here thought these views were outdated and lacked substance. None of my close friends give any credit to creationism or ID, but we're all well educated athiests so I guess that's to be expected. Maybe I've been blind to the views of the majority in this proudly secular country?"

Et tu, Britannia?

On one hand, I'm happy to see that rampant idiocy isn't a uniquely American trait.

On the other hand, however, I'm seriously troubled by this. I guess I was kinda counting on the rest of the world to bitchslap America back to sanity sooner or later, but now it appears that we can't count on the global community saving the day for rationality.

Of particular concern is the statistics quoted:

• 22% chose creationism
  
• 17% opted for intelligent design
  
• 48% selected evolution theory
  
• and the rest did not know.

In other words, 39% chose creationism, as there is no discernable difference between creationism and ID. Score another victory for ID, for once again successfully obfuscating the issue.

Even worse were the statistics regarding what to teach in schools:

• 44% said creationism should be included
  
• 41% intelligent design
  
• 69% wanted evolution as part of the science curriculum.

Again, nice and confusing, especially when you consider that these statistics don't add up to 100%. I understand that some people would like to see more than one 'theory' taught (the old 'teach the controversy' BS), but displaying the results in this manner is misleading in the extreme. Equally confusing is the fact that the percentage of people who 'did not know' in the previous set of statistics isn't enumerated. One would assume it to be 13%, but in the light of the second set of statistics, who knows?

Re:Et tu, Britannia?

>39% chose creationism

still less in total than evolution though.

one important thing (in my experience) the UK doesn't have so much of is militant fundamentalism. people might say they believe in creationism, but then lots of people still claim to believe in god. they don't do anything about it though. even if they agree it should be taught in schools they aren't taking over schoold boards for it.

basically I think the difference is that in America you have the very dangerous combination of
1. Churches are big businesses (much more so than elsewhere)
2. businesses can easily buy into politics

the ID movement is 99.9% a PR campaign.

Re:Et tu, Britannia?

But that doesn't mean I think Intelligent Design is science, either. But neither is a whole lot that goes on with Evolution and other supporting theories that are based on something other than experimentation. Fact is, there has never been an experiment with macro-evolution - until there is, Macro-Evolution is simply a theory and, IMO, a weak one at that.

You're right there. Same with Plate Tectonics. I mean, sure, we've found the mid-Atlantic ridge and measured how it's spreading a tiny amount each year, I don't disagree with Micro-Continental-Drift. It's only Macro-Continental-Drift I disagree with. Pangaea? Rubbish. And all the magnetic reversal patterns and matching rock formations on separate continents that the scientists come up with are IMO really weak.

And don't get me started on Macro-Addition. I mean, we know 1+1=2, we can test that by counting things, but AFAIK nobody in the world has ever seen more than a few million of anything at one time. And yet these scientists tell us about billions of this and trillions of that, and then they even make up a new way of writing numbers that doesn't even use names! Exponential notation is only a theory, and IMO, a weak one at that.

Re:Et tu, Britannia?

Personally, I don't believe in Evolution. That doesn't make me an idiot.

Yes it does. Do you believe in gravity? Do you believe in medicine? Electricity? Mobile phones? Radio? Nuclear physics? Biology? Geology? Maths?

Why is it that evolution gets special treatment in the world of science? It's as scientifically valid as all these other things, and yet somehow ill-educated pseudo-itellectuals like yourself think that you get to pick and choose what is valid and what isn't. Science is not a democracy, it's fact based. Don't "believe" in evolution, show us something better.

That doesn't mean I don't understand it

Yes it does.

Just as the Theory of Gravity has some problems

Really? You pass yourself off as being some sort of expert. What exactly are the problems you see with the theory of gravity? Why not write them down, present some evidence, I'm sure your views will be published in some learned journal and then we can all see how wise you are. Then you can tell us what's wrong with evolution as well.

Throughout the entire history of science, when things "need to be understood better" it has generally been through an evolution of ideas -- Newtonian mechanics wasn't wrong, it just needed some extra bits bolting on, Einsteinian relativity isn't wrong, it just need some quantum stuff attaching. Each discovery builds on the last. Evolution is the same, there are holes and gaps and things we don't yet understand, but these will be filled and modified and adapted - the theory will get better.

There have been very few absolute reversals in science, why do you expect that evolution will be any different?

Re:Et tu, Britannia?

As a particularly comical example of this, have a look at the recent Dover County court decision (Kitzmiller). In it, the ruling Judge wisely points at that amongst the advocates of intelligent design, there was essentially no agreement as to its meaning. In fact, one school board member continually referred to it as "intelligence design [sic]", another believed it was the same as creationism, another believed it only referred to the emergence of intelligence, etc.

The Economist

I think The Economist said it best:

"Intelligent Design is something Britons read about with a smirk before they turn to the Horoscope section"

(from memory, but very close)

Not surprised

This seems to happen everywhere. Mostly people think that a certain idea, that perhaps has little scientific basis, should be taught in school, when they support the idea.

I believe in a creator. Sure. But should creation be taught in a science class? No. Why?

Because I know that somehow my religious beliefs that I want to teach to my children will not be taught according to how I believe. Worse off would be if they were completely opposed, like someone teaching creation by that damn spaghetti monster.

Keep science to science. Start teaching classes that encourage people to look at other viewpoints and learn to see the downsides of their own arguments. Only then will a generation gain the wisdom to not think this is such a great idea.

Re:Not surprised

Damn spaghetti monster? BLASPHEMY!!!!

Proudly secular?

You mean that country in Europe where the head of state is also the head of the state's established church? And where you can't be head of state unless you're a member of the established church.

Re:Proudly secular?

It's true that we have a state religion. It's also true that it receives no government funding and is followed by a minority of people.

It's true that our head of state is the Queen. It's also true that the monarchy lacks any real power and is kept around out of tradition.

It's true that our schools are legally bound to provide collective daily worship of a Christian nature. It's also true that more than three-quarters of schools ignore this law, and that parents have the legal right to have their kids opt out anyway.

I think you are mixing up England and the UK too. While it's true that there's a Church of England and a Church of Scotland, other areas of the UK got rid of their official faiths.

So technically we are under the rule of a religious monarchy, but in practice we are a modern democratic secular country.

Re:Proudly secular?

there's no requirement for our Prime Minister to be Christian, or any of our MPs.

More importantly, they can get voted in without being Christian. I believe that if somebody wanted to make it an issue, they could overturn the requirements that various USA states have on constitutional grounds. However, even if they did that, not being a Christian would be a severe impediment to their election campaign.

I don't have to swear my allegiance to God at school every morning.

Take a look at the Education Reform Act 1988 [opsi.gov.uk]:

6.--(1) Subject to section 9 of this Act, all pupils in attendance at a maintained school shall on each school day take part in an act of collective worship.

7.--(1) Subject to the following provisions of this section, in the case of a county school the collective worship required in the school by section 6 of this Act shall be wholly or mainly of a broadly Christian character.

You'll be pleased to know that 76% of schools break this law [bbc.co.uk].

Ambiguity

Believing in evolution is something of a vague concept. If I believe in the concept of natural selection (which is readily observable), do I have to believe that life came from a chance encounter of amino acids in some primordial soup a gazillion years ago? How much am I agreeing to?

Genius

None of my close friends give any credit to creationism or ID, but we're all well educated athiests so I guess that's to be expected.

Wow. Fantastic deduction.

Species Evolve

I am always confused by the fact that everyone thinks the theory of evolution is a theory about the creation of life on earth. The theory of evolution can be summed up in two words; species evolve. Sure there is all that subtext about natural selection, but in essence, the theory is that species evolve.

I do not understand how anyone can deny the truth of this. We see it in action time and time again. There are species that were introduced to Hawaii in modern times that have since evolved into new species. I saw one of the best arguments for evolution here on /. as a sig. It said "If you do not believe in evolution, why are you worried about the bird flu?"

Re:Species Evolve

Either that, or God is the kind of programmer who likes to create reusable objects.

Sorry, I couldn't help it

Finkployd

I'd like to see the questions they asked

I'd like to see the questions they asked for the survey. It's all too easy to get the results you want with carefully worded questions. I can't think of anyone I know who believes in such nonsense, so I'm taking this with significantly large grain of salt.

I call major bullshit

As an Englishman in my late 30s I call utter bullshit on this article. These are the fanciful lies of someone with an agenda. I don't know where they pretend to have got their research from, but it's patently untrue. I never met a single person over here who even heard of "intelligent design" (a USA manufactured nonsense) and seriously nobody believes in creationism, even really old people. A more interesting question for me is, why would someone make up such an obvious pack of lies and for what reason?

There's something wrong here

I really have difficulty in beleiving this. Even here in god-fearing catholic Ireland, everyone I know thinks that creationism is bunk. The only thing I can think of is that they stood in the middle of the street and shouted, "Anyone like to give their views on Creationism and Intelligent Design?" That way they would only have got the religious nuts who espouse this pre-enlightenment throwback. Even the Vatican says that Intelligent Design is not science [com.com].

Chuck Norris Is Evolution

There is no theory of evolution, just a list of animals Chuck Norris has allowed to live....

Re:ID != Christian creationism

If evolution is scientifically sound, can't you present sufficient evidence in the classroom to prove it?

Yes. Any molecular biology textbook is full of factual proofs of evolution.

Re:ID != Christian creationism

"If taught correctly, creationism does not necessarily imply one religion. It implies intelligent design meaning God, gods or advanced aliens. And why shouldn't it be taught? If evolution is scientifically sound, can't you present sufficient evidence in the classroom to prove it? Or are you worried that *gasp* some people might prefer to continue to adhere to their faith?"

Exactamundo. Except science and faith are two completely different things. Science is descriptive and predictive based on a sort of majority rules perception, faith is belief in something that exists beyond our perception. Once something exists in our perception, that aspect passes into the realm of the scientific. What makes evolution science is that tangible things that exist in perceptive reality have been discovered that support the theory. ID is presented as a faith issue, because (and feel free to correct me if you think I've overlooked something) the arguments for it are either purely abstract exercises with dubious logic or attacks against evolution. I mean dubious in a purely logical sense, and I freely admit that logic does not necessarily apply to faith. But it's the cornerstone of science.

"Growing up in America, I could never decide who had a greater missionary zeal: the Southern Baptists or the evolutionists, most of whom were not even fit to be called amateur biologists."

Here's where I may agree with you. How many that scoff at non-evolutionary beliefs actually know a real justification for evolution? However, most people can understand the two theories well enough to understand that one is faith and the other science.

Re:Is Darwinism the Only Factor?

A species (chimpanzees, our "closest" relatives, for example) with 21 pairs of chromosomes can EVOLVE into one with 22 pairs. Do the fossil records indicate critters with 21.1, 21.2, 21.3, 21.4.... pairs of choromosomes?

No. Fossil records do not show DNA. However the clues in our genomes today show that what happened was that in a human ancestor one chromosome split into two.

If not, then explain how a (presumably) mutant new example of an "evolved" chimpanzee with 22 pairs of chromosomes can find another exactly evolved 22-paired mutant -- at the same time -- in the same place -- recognize him or her -- and develop a brand new and unique mating ritual that works. All of these steps are recognized as being necessary to begin to form a new species.

These are not the steps recognized as being necessary to form a new species. It is not clear that the offspring of a 22-pair mutant and a 21-pair non-mutant would be infertile, so it might not be necessary for two 22-pair mutants to mate. And there is certainly no reason for a new mating ritual to magically appear or for mutants to recognise each other.

That said, to deny Darwinism is to ignore the stages and features our own embryos develop and discard: gills, tail, front legs.

This is also incorrect, and has been widely discredited. I wonder if I have just been trolled.

Re:Is Darwinism the Only Factor?

I'm not sure where you are getting your information. Chimpanzees have 24 pairs of chromosomes and humans have 23 pairs. And what happened is that two of the chromosomes fused into one chromosome. Our chromosome two is essentially two of the chimp chromosomes (2p and 2q) stuck together. http://www.gate.net/~rwms/hum_ape_chrom.html [gate.net] has a pretty good picture of the chromosome two and its ape versions.

Re:Is Darwinism the Only Factor?

> A species (chimpanzees, our "closest" relatives, for example) with 21 pairs of
> chromosomes can EVOLVE into one with 22 pairs. Do the fossil records indicate critters
> with 21.1, 21.2, 21.3, 21.4.... pairs of choromosomes?

First: Chimpanzees did never "evolve" into humans, we both share a common ancestor.

Second: We do have humans with half an extra chromosone (xyy males).

Third and most important: Evolution leaves out *a lot*. Really, it is not like evolutionary biology is a closed and finished science that explains everything. We learn new stuff all the time and adapt the models, as in all other active scientific disciplines.

Actually evolution is more of a frame or paradigm, than a theory itself.

Re:Is Darwinism the Only Factor?

It turns out that variations in chromosome number are known to occur in many different animal species, and although they sometimes seem to lead to reduced fertility, this is often not the case. For example, Przewalski's Wild Horse has 66 chromosomes, but domesticated horse has 64 chromosomes, yet they can breed to produce fertile offspring.

The is good evidence [gate.net] based on structural analysis of human chromosome 2 that it is the fused version of two chromosomes found in modern apes.

The genetics of "Post-zygotic Isolating Mechanisms" of speciation is under much study now. Here is a great review [usc.edu] of speciation mechanisms.

Generally the strong force on post-zygotic speciation is "epistasis", negatively interacting genetic loci. So different and negatively interacting genes are more important in speciation than slight differences in chromosomal configuration. There are some speciation events driven mainly by chromosomal configuration, though most are not.