That is such a thoughtful chimpanzee.
A few weeks back, after having seen this, I thought “Hey, this will be funny. I’ll order one of these funny little booklets and have a funny laugh and everything will be funny.” So I order the damn thing.
Maybe two weeks later, after I’ve already forgotten about it, a huge fat envelope is sitting in my mailbox, labeled United Church of God. An uneasy weight settles in my stomach. Who is this and how did they get my address? Why is it stuffed so full? I open it.
As it slides out, a friendly chimpanzee thoughtfully considers me from his cover. “OHAI,” he seems to say. “Iz your frndely cretinist chimp, thottfully con’siderin’ the eveedence for evolootun.”
I’m not too good at lolcat speak.
Oh yeah, my fun pamphlet! This will be fun, and hilarious, and I will be entertained. Everything will be funny.
No. No the hell it will not.
When I opened this and read the table of contents, I simply vomited. Right there on my couch. As for the actual content, directly opposite the table of contents is some blather surrounding a picture of a cute little baby, with this for a caption: “If we are the pinnacle of an evolutionary process, why is a human infant so helpless, and for so long, compared to the newborn of other species?”
I couldn’t help it. I had no muscular control over it. But the next thing I knew, I had thrown the book across the room. It was pretty much an involuntary defensive reaction, much like the way one would jerk back after touching a hot pan. My highly evolved body continues to protect me.
But oh no, now I have a blog. With people who read it and everything, demanding entertainment. So, reluctantly, I went and fished it out of the corner of the living room. I am taking this bullet. Over the next *mumble* weeks, I’m going to be dissecting every nuance of this thing. Remember, this is for you.
I urge you to take a picture of said vomit, run it through some kind of software which will translate it into text-drivel, publish it as a creationist rag, and make some money on the side. The only clue that it was indeed derived from vomit and not from a creationist mind, should be the overwhelming recurrence of the word “carrot”.
I admire your courage at even taking that step, even if laughs were not had, and instead, your anger chips were engaged instead.
Does stupidity really bother you that much?
Unsolicited advice: be careful to not feed too much on rotten meat. It is easy to find stupid people saying stupid things. The danger in spending too much time on the stupid arguments of your opponents is that it can enable excessive confidence in one’s own views. It would be terribly irresponsible to assume that the blather found in this pamphlet is somehow representative of what theism is capable of (in other words, don’t make the mistake of taking this pamphlet and concluding “look how dumb all the theists are”).
I am a theist (Catholic), but one who actively engages atheists (in fact, I am a former atheist). I hardly spend any time engaging stupid atheists (and yes, there are stupid atheists). I read and take seriously people I think are serious atheists (Nz in particular). For instance, I don’t take Hitchens all that seriously (he is plenty smart but he loves the sound of his own voice too much), but I take Dennett quite seriously. As for students, I could commend many members of SHAFT, but Jon and Jordan come immediately to mind as students who avoid a “kneejerk atheism” (an atheism that is too easy and too quick to dismiss theism).
My point: don’t waste your time with stupid theists. If you want to engage in the debate, read serious people. Read great theists from the tradition (Aquinas, Augustine) and read formidable contemporary figures like Marion (continental) and Plantinga (analytic) and – perhaps above all else – read Pope Benedict XVI (a real intellectual giant, whether you agree with him or not) and John Paul II.
While it’s generally good advice to avoid unnecessary stupidity, it’s more complicated than that when it comes to creationism. It isn’t the same as like, people who think Elvis is alive. I don’t know how much you’ve been following the creationist movement, if at all, but you might not be aware of how much cultural force it really has. It has money, support, and millions of people.
I’m not really meaning this to be “look how dumb all the theists are”. It should be read as “look how dumb all the creationists are”. But it’s a sad fact that the majority of theists are creationists, when taken globally. That might even be true in just the United States. Aquinas is not trying to take over school boards and ruin curriculum. Plantinga isn’t faking his way though a graduate program and then lying about what he’s learned. These intellectual theologians aren’t trying to stunt a child’s education before it even gets started.
The writings of philosophers and theologians don’t really have a way of trickling down to most of the laity and affecting their beliefs. They hardly ever match. In a perfect world you would be right. But creationism exists, and has quite a lot of money and cultural strength and very negative consequences if the movement succeeds in any real way. It exists and must be addressed and ridiculed.
Fair enough, I am always surprised by the number of people out there who are hard-core “young earth creationists”. In fact, we recently had some family from my wife’s side visit and I argued with them for some time about it. I think they left thinking my faith was dead. Anyway, your point is well taken regarding the cultural force of really silly version of creationism. Still, I hold out hope that the views of philosophers and theologians do eventually trickle down.
It is worth making some distinctions though. “Creationism” is a rather large umbrella term to use. I suspect that most theists, and all Christians, are “creationists” in some sense. I think God “created the world”, though I am pretty agnostic on the details. I am quite sure He did not create it in six days and I, like John Paul II, consider evolution to be “more than just a theory”. Of course, “evolution”, like “creation”, can take many forms. Some versions of evolutionary theory I can accept, others I cannot.
While I am here: you say “My highly evolved body continues to protect me”. What do you mean “highly evolved”? I guess I should say, on what ground do you say “highly evolved”? This seems to suggest some notion of progress (teleology!), that your body is more evolved than others (contemporaneous or past). And how can you make that judgment unless you are making an appeal to some notion of the good or the best that is objective? Any judgement of worse/better (lower/higher) always presumes a best or highest. (This is Aquinas’ fourth way of proving the existence of God, by the way).
One more thought: I have recently started to engage more actively much of what I consider stupid in the “new atheist” movement (though I am not sure there is all that much new about it), for the very same reasons you suggest – it is gaining some cultural force even though it is sometimes pretty unintelligent.
Since my wife’s cousins visited, I’ve spent some time trying to understand why young earth creationism has so much draw for people. The best I can think of: they feel choked out by a culture that is increasingly secularized. They see themselves as taking a stand.
While I have no sympathy for young earth creationism, I have some sympathy for their feeling of cultural displacement. Pope Benedict has written quite powerfully on what he sees as the coming “tyranny of relativism”.
That said, I am sure how one reads the trajectory of culture is highly dependent on perspective. Most of you SHAFTers probably see religion on the march and secularism as the underdog, exactly the opposite of how many religious people (myself included) feel.
About the line “My highly evolved body continues to protect me”: that was meant to be a (poorly delivered) joke at this pamphlet’s expense re: “if humans are so evolved why are babies so helpless.” I guess the thinking is that humans are highly evolved, therefore our babies should become independent and strong much faster than any other animal. Or something. At any rate, I need to learn to make my sarcasm more clear in writing, or just stop writing like that. Maybe invent an HTML tag.
There is, of course, no such teleology. The talk of “higher” and “lower” organisms is for the most part a creationist misunderstanding of what evolutionary theory claims. A human is not “higher” than other life contemporary with humans, say dogs. Higher does not mean stronger, faster, smarter, bigger or more superhero-like in all cases. The only sense in which “higher” or “lower” may have meaning is a general “more or less derived from some given common ancestor.” With that definition, many breeds of dog could be considered “more evolved” than humans, since the degree of difference between their common ancestor (wolves) is higher.
Evolutionary theory does not call for any teleology, nor do I think that introducing it explains anything. I would guess that when you said “Some versions of evolutionary theory I can accept, others I cannot,” you could be referring to some sort of supernatural teleological intervention in–at the least–human evolution. I would be interested to see what you mean by that.
There is a big difference between secularism gaining strength, and religion gaining strength. Secularism is not state-sponsored atheism. The United States has (ought to have) been a secular nation over its entire history. If we became more secular, that would be great for everyone. A secular nation is entirely compatible with individual religious beliefs, of any kind or none. No one is trying to tell people they cannot be religious (at least, not me). There are, however, plenty of people who are trying to tell atheists they cannot be atheist.
The religious are entirely free to believe whatever they want. They are not free to force their personal myths into public classrooms in the guise of fact. That we tell them so is not persecution.
I have a hard time seeing that the latest “New Atheism” movement represents any kind of threat to religious people, let alone grounds to feel choked out. All that most “atheist activists” really want is simply for the wider culture to acknowledge their right to exist, and not be told that we are immoral, horrible people who are poor rolemodels and are “ruining the country.” I don’t want national atheism any more than I want national religion. I just want a secular nation.
The only reasonable conclusion I can make to understand why Young-Earth-Creationism still exists is because sometimes folks feel the end justifies the means. If they genuinely feel that the only way to salvation is thru Jesus Christ, then making huge leaps of faith to justify the bible – no matter how crazy – are ok by them.
Personally, I put them in the “lying for Jesus” camp, and have no respect for them whatsoever.