Why Darwin Matters_ The Case Against Intelligent Design - Michael Shermer [18]
1. A general resistance to science. If you imagine that you have to “believe in” a scientific theory, a conflict arises between science and religion, in which you are forced to choose one over the other. In particular, if scientific discoveries do not appear to support religious tenets, the religious tend to opt for religion, while the secular tend to opt for science.
2. Belief that evolution is a threat to specific religious tenets. Occasionally, rather than choosing religion over science, religious believers attempt to use science to prove religious tenets, or to mold scientific findings to fit religious beliefs. For example, the effort to prove that the Genesis creation story is accurately reflected in the geological fossil record has led many creationists to conclude that the earth was created within the past 10,000 years. This is in sharp contrast to the geological evidence for a 4.6-billion-year-old Earth. If one insists on the findings of science squaring true with religious doctrines, this can lead to conflict between science and religion.
3. The fear that evolution degrades our humanity. After Copernicus toppled the pedestal of our cosmic centrality, Darwin delivered the coup de grâce by revealing us to be “mere” animals, subject to the same natural laws and historical forces as all other animals.
4. The equation of evolution with ethical nihilism and moral degeneration. Decrying the inevitable dark hole of existence that comes from a “life without meaning” has become a potent tool of social persuasion—what “meaning” means, precisely, being left to whoever is leading the lament. The neoconservative social commentator Irving Kristol expressed the sentiment tidily in 1991: “If there is one indisputable fact about the human condition it is that no community can survive if it is persuaded—or even if it suspects—that its members are leading meaningless lives in a meaningless universe.”10 Similar fears were raised by Nancy Pearcey, a fellow of the Intelligent Design hothouse the Discovery Institute, in a briefing before the House Judiciary Committee of the U.S. Congress. Pearcey cited a popular song urging “you and me, baby, ain’t nothing but mammals so let’s do it like they do on the Discovery Channel” and went on to claim that since the American legal system is based on moral principles, the only way to generate ultimate moral grounding—and, apparently, change the Billboard Top 40—is for the law to have an “unjudged judge,” an “uncreated creator.”11 God and mammon in the halls of Congress.
5. The fear that evolutionary theory implies we have a fixed human nature. The first four reasons for the resistance to evolutionary theory come almost exclusively from the political right. This last reason originates from the political left, from liberals who fear that the application of evolutionary theory to human thought and action implies that political policy and economic doctrines will fail because the constitution of humanity is stronger than the constitutions of states. (This is what I call “liberal creationism,” the doppelganger of conservative creationism.)12
These fears say nothing about the evidence for evolution, and they do no more than conjecture about the effects of accepting evolution on human psychology and behavior. There will always be some—True Believers—who, like Bryan, will not be able to set aside their biggest fear: that accepting a scientific view of the natural world will challenge their faith in God.
But if one is a theist, it should not matter when God made the universe—ten thousand years ago or ten billion years ago. The difference of six zeros is meaningless to an omniscient and omnipotent being, and the glory of divine creation cries out for praise regardless of when it happened. Likewise, it should not matter how God created life—whether it was through a miraculous spoken word or through the natural forces of the universe that He created. The grandeur of God’s works command awe regardless