This month is being celebrated by the scientific community, and by people in Britain, because it marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of one of the great men of science, Charles Darwin, the English biologist who put forth his theory of evolution by natural selection. This year is also the sesquicentennial of Darwin’s greatest work, The Origin of Species.
If Darwin were alive today, I can’t help but believe that he would be stunned that his once-controversial theory of evolution was still a very contentious topic even today. Of course, in reality, whether evolution occurred is not debated at all among scientists. No, far more than 99 percent of all scientists worldwide take the theory of evolution for granted. It is a factual account of how all life on Earth developed. There is no wrangling over whether evolution occurred or whether some competing theory best describes the diversity of life on Earth. In fact, there is no other scientific theory that explains the existence of life’s diversity. Evolution is it.
In Britain, as well as nearly all of Western Europe and in fact throughout the entire developed world, evolution is not controversial even to ordinary people. It is not even a controversy to the mainstream Christian churches, including the Church of England, the Catholic Church, and many protestant denominations such as the Methodist Church, the Presbyterian Church, the Lutheran Church, the Episcopal Church, the Disciples of Christ, and myriad other smaller denominations. Most of the mainstream religions have come to terms with evolution and accept it as scientific fact.
But only about half of all Muslims in the U.S., and far fewer than half, about 25 percent, of the evangelical Christians in the U.S. accept evolution. They believe that life appeared on Earth by an act of creation by God during a six-day period around 6,000 years ago. In other words, they believe the bible, and specifically the Book of Genesis, is true and literal.
Why they believe this when their more mainstream fellow Christians are able to interpret the bible more liberally I can’t say. It is especially puzzling to me how they insist that the Creation story in Genesis is absolutely literal, but they are willing to overlook obvious falsehoods and inconsistencies in other parts of the bible.
Even within Genesis there are two separate and mutually-exclusive stories of Creation. In Genesis 1, God takes six days to create the universe as follows: On day 1 he created light; on day 2 he created the sky; on day 3 he created the land, sea, and vegetation; on day 4 he created the sun, moon, and stars; on day 5 he created the animals; and on day 6 he created man and woman.
In Genesis 2 it does not enumerate on which day he created what. But it does begin with the earth after it was created and presumably after the land and sea had been separated, which would have been day 3 from Genesis 1. But it also said that there was not yet any vegetation, which there should have been.
The first creation of life by God in Genesis 2 was man. After that, he created vegetation, and planted a garden in Eden for the man to take care of. Following that, he created animals. Finally, he created woman.
Now, it’s obvious to anyone who reads these accounts that they are conflicting. But evangelical Christians will say that one story just expands on the other or that it is told from two different viewpoints.
But there can only be one literal interpretation. Either it’s literal or it isn’t. Either God created vegetation before man or he created man before vegetation. You can’t have it both ways.
And do the evangelical Christians also believe that there is a huge ocean of water above the sky? It clearly says in Genesis 1 that on the third day God separated the waters of the earth from the waters of the heavens by placing the sky between them.
My mother is an evangelical Christian and that is how I was raised. I went to Sunday School and learned all the bible stories. But when I grew up and started questioning things, I learned the truth and I came to understand that those bible stories were meant to enhance people’s spirituality. They are not historically accurate.
So when I began discussing things like the age of the earth and evolution with my mother, I fully expected that she would refute everything I told her. To my surprise, she did not. She believes that God did create everything, but she is more than willing to admit that it might have taken him longer than six days. She reminded me that, to God, a day may be like a thousand years. She acknowledges the existence of fossils and understands that there may have been evolution taking place. She told me the bible doesn’t tell us everything God did or how he did it. And she said God may have used evolution as his tool of creation.
I was pleased at my mother’s open-mindedness. At the same time, it made me wonder how a 75-year-old woman who didn’t even graduate from high school could come to understand and accept the fact that maybe the bible shouldn’t be taken literally when so many college-educated, otherwise rational adults insist that every word of the bible is literal.
It’s one of life’s amazing mysteries to me, and I’m sure it would be a great wonder to Charles Darwin if he were still around today.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Saturday, February 07, 2009
Caution Needed when Funneling Tax Money through Churches
Pres. Barack Obama has signed an executive order that extends, and tweaks, former Pres. George W. Bush’s Faith-Based Initiative. It was a fulfillment of a campaign promise.
But like his predecessor in office, Obama may be flirting with violating the First Amendment’s prohibition against government entanglement with religion. He claims this isn’t the case and says he will appoint the right people to make sure there is no entanglement. But in the trenches, who can really be sure? Has Bush’s initiative already become a slippery slope, one that even Obama can’t walk away from?
The Bush initiative was fraught with violations. Of course, the Bush administration couldn’t care less, since the former president was an evangelical Christian himself. Some of the religious leaders that are involved in Obama’s revamped initiative are worried that they may not be able to participate without compromising their religious beliefs. But the moderate Christians and those on the left are also not happy. They want to undo the Bush administration’s practices on hiring as quickly as possible.
Obama wants to reevaluate hiring practices to make certain that those in charge of distributing government funds do so in a purely secular manner, with no evangelizing. But once taxpayer money starts flowing into religious institutions, it opens the possibility that some of that money will filter over to the evangelical side, as happened during the Bush administration.
Besides, Obama doesn’t really need to kowtow to the religious right. They are all but irrelevant these days. The country took a major turn to the left last November, and that left the evangelicals crying foul. And none have cried louder than that ultra-conservative loudmouth Rush Limbaugh. But that just proves my point, Limbaugh and his ilk of brainless whiners are irrelevant. Obama doesn’t need to pay them any heed whatsoever, and that includes continuing the faith-based initiative of his predecessor.
Now, it’s true that faith-based organizations, such as churches, are flung far and wide across the country and that they are already set up to distribute charity to those in need. They already have food pantries, shelters, and distribution centers for clothing and other goods. So it does make a certain amount of sense for the government to use this infrastructure.
But it is also very important to keep in mind that those who run this infrastructure of charitable giving have a larger purpose in mind. They want to convert the masses to religion, and most of those doing the converting are evangelical Christians. It is dangerous to put government money into their hands.
As an illustration of how the thought processes and worldview of the religious right differ from secular humanists, take the example of the bus ad wars going on in London. A secular group paid to run ads on the sides of London buses that said, “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”
The slogan made no definitive pronouncements about God. There is nothing in the slogan that requires them to prove anything. It’s just a statement of their belief and it leaves nothing to question.
But after a failed attempt to get those ads banned for being “offensive,” the religious groups decided to fire back with an ad campaign of their own. Their bus sign reads, “There definitely is a God. So join the Christian party and enjoy your life.”
Notice the absolute certainty espoused by this ad. The sentence proclaiming that there definitely is a God requires proof. Yet they offer none. It shows a level of narcissism lacking in the secularists’ ad. And the Christian ad also asks people to join with them, something that is lacking in the secularists’ ad. Secularists aren’t recruiting.
That type of mentality is widespread among all Christian conservatives. They can’t help it; it’s who they are. Throw government money at them, and they will find a way to use it to further their religious causes. They will find ways to use it to proselytize or coerce.
The caveat that Obama seems to already be aware of, but one which requires constant attention, is that when you give tax money to religious groups for them to use for purely secular purposes, there must be a system in place to make sure it is being used properly and with no strings attached.
But like his predecessor in office, Obama may be flirting with violating the First Amendment’s prohibition against government entanglement with religion. He claims this isn’t the case and says he will appoint the right people to make sure there is no entanglement. But in the trenches, who can really be sure? Has Bush’s initiative already become a slippery slope, one that even Obama can’t walk away from?
The Bush initiative was fraught with violations. Of course, the Bush administration couldn’t care less, since the former president was an evangelical Christian himself. Some of the religious leaders that are involved in Obama’s revamped initiative are worried that they may not be able to participate without compromising their religious beliefs. But the moderate Christians and those on the left are also not happy. They want to undo the Bush administration’s practices on hiring as quickly as possible.
Obama wants to reevaluate hiring practices to make certain that those in charge of distributing government funds do so in a purely secular manner, with no evangelizing. But once taxpayer money starts flowing into religious institutions, it opens the possibility that some of that money will filter over to the evangelical side, as happened during the Bush administration.
Besides, Obama doesn’t really need to kowtow to the religious right. They are all but irrelevant these days. The country took a major turn to the left last November, and that left the evangelicals crying foul. And none have cried louder than that ultra-conservative loudmouth Rush Limbaugh. But that just proves my point, Limbaugh and his ilk of brainless whiners are irrelevant. Obama doesn’t need to pay them any heed whatsoever, and that includes continuing the faith-based initiative of his predecessor.
Now, it’s true that faith-based organizations, such as churches, are flung far and wide across the country and that they are already set up to distribute charity to those in need. They already have food pantries, shelters, and distribution centers for clothing and other goods. So it does make a certain amount of sense for the government to use this infrastructure.
But it is also very important to keep in mind that those who run this infrastructure of charitable giving have a larger purpose in mind. They want to convert the masses to religion, and most of those doing the converting are evangelical Christians. It is dangerous to put government money into their hands.
As an illustration of how the thought processes and worldview of the religious right differ from secular humanists, take the example of the bus ad wars going on in London. A secular group paid to run ads on the sides of London buses that said, “There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.”
The slogan made no definitive pronouncements about God. There is nothing in the slogan that requires them to prove anything. It’s just a statement of their belief and it leaves nothing to question.
But after a failed attempt to get those ads banned for being “offensive,” the religious groups decided to fire back with an ad campaign of their own. Their bus sign reads, “There definitely is a God. So join the Christian party and enjoy your life.”
Notice the absolute certainty espoused by this ad. The sentence proclaiming that there definitely is a God requires proof. Yet they offer none. It shows a level of narcissism lacking in the secularists’ ad. And the Christian ad also asks people to join with them, something that is lacking in the secularists’ ad. Secularists aren’t recruiting.
That type of mentality is widespread among all Christian conservatives. They can’t help it; it’s who they are. Throw government money at them, and they will find a way to use it to further their religious causes. They will find ways to use it to proselytize or coerce.
The caveat that Obama seems to already be aware of, but one which requires constant attention, is that when you give tax money to religious groups for them to use for purely secular purposes, there must be a system in place to make sure it is being used properly and with no strings attached.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Making the Digital Switch Soon
By the middle of the year, the United States will be an all-digital TV nation. The exact date of the switchover will be either February 17 or June 12, depending on whether or not Congress decides to delay the conversion. As of this morning, January 31, the switch is still scheduled to take effect February 17.
I say let’s keep it that way. A delay will do nothing more than add to the confusion of those who are already confused.
The world has been planning a switch to digital television for a decade. Some countries, the Netherlands, Finland, Switzerland, and Sweden to name a few, have already made the switch. Others are in the process of switching now.
It has been two years since Congress passed the law mandating that the conversion to digital take place on February 17. Since then, consumers have been able to order coupons to help defray the cost of purchasing a digital converter box. But you only need one of the boxes in the event that you watch television using rabbit ears or an outside antenna and the TV is more than three years old.
If you have a newer television, manufactured since 2005, or if you get your programming from cable, telephone, or satellite providers, then you don’t need to do anything. You’re already set for the change.
Those who are pressing for a delay, including Pres. Barack Obama, say that as many as six million Americans are not yet ready for the switch. They point out that the government has been slow in sending out the coupons and that money has run out to continue the coupon program.
Well, tough. Procrastinators are often left behind and suffer the consequences for their slow action. I can’t imagine anyone with a television who hasn’t been bombarded dozens of times a day with announcements from local TV stations about the coming change. It started way more than a year ago and has been incessant. If you don’t know by now that the changeover date is February 17, then you probably don’t watch TV often enough to be affected much.
The current date set for the change represents at least two previous delays. Another delay will mean very little to those who are going to be affected; they would be affected if you gave them another 10 years.
Wilmington, NC made the switch last September. There was some degree of chaos, but it quickly got ironed out. Hawaii made the switch January 15. A few states and cities are making the bold move of turning off analog signals early. But in the long run, they will be ahead of the game.
The FCC has already auctioned off the frequencies that are to be made available when TV becomes all digital. Television stations are losing money by simulcasting all their programming in both digital and analog. Let them use that money to help develop the clearest high-definition picture possible, the upcoming 1080p standard.
When the switchover is made, whether on February 17 or June 12, there will be those left without a signal. There will be those who are confused and angry. But that will happen no matter when the switch occurs. Let it happen. I guarantee those who are really at a disadvantage when the analog plug is pulled will make all haste in upgrading their equipment, something they should have been planning for years.
Within a month or so, everyone will be back on the couch again, enjoying their favorite programs, in digital. It might as well occur sooner as later.
I say let’s keep it that way. A delay will do nothing more than add to the confusion of those who are already confused.
The world has been planning a switch to digital television for a decade. Some countries, the Netherlands, Finland, Switzerland, and Sweden to name a few, have already made the switch. Others are in the process of switching now.
It has been two years since Congress passed the law mandating that the conversion to digital take place on February 17. Since then, consumers have been able to order coupons to help defray the cost of purchasing a digital converter box. But you only need one of the boxes in the event that you watch television using rabbit ears or an outside antenna and the TV is more than three years old.
If you have a newer television, manufactured since 2005, or if you get your programming from cable, telephone, or satellite providers, then you don’t need to do anything. You’re already set for the change.
Those who are pressing for a delay, including Pres. Barack Obama, say that as many as six million Americans are not yet ready for the switch. They point out that the government has been slow in sending out the coupons and that money has run out to continue the coupon program.
Well, tough. Procrastinators are often left behind and suffer the consequences for their slow action. I can’t imagine anyone with a television who hasn’t been bombarded dozens of times a day with announcements from local TV stations about the coming change. It started way more than a year ago and has been incessant. If you don’t know by now that the changeover date is February 17, then you probably don’t watch TV often enough to be affected much.
The current date set for the change represents at least two previous delays. Another delay will mean very little to those who are going to be affected; they would be affected if you gave them another 10 years.
Wilmington, NC made the switch last September. There was some degree of chaos, but it quickly got ironed out. Hawaii made the switch January 15. A few states and cities are making the bold move of turning off analog signals early. But in the long run, they will be ahead of the game.
The FCC has already auctioned off the frequencies that are to be made available when TV becomes all digital. Television stations are losing money by simulcasting all their programming in both digital and analog. Let them use that money to help develop the clearest high-definition picture possible, the upcoming 1080p standard.
When the switchover is made, whether on February 17 or June 12, there will be those left without a signal. There will be those who are confused and angry. But that will happen no matter when the switch occurs. Let it happen. I guarantee those who are really at a disadvantage when the analog plug is pulled will make all haste in upgrading their equipment, something they should have been planning for years.
Within a month or so, everyone will be back on the couch again, enjoying their favorite programs, in digital. It might as well occur sooner as later.
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