The Scientist
One of my best friends from school pointed out how "negative" I'd been lately. And that's something I can't deny - I only point to the many posts I've made in the past on the Religious Right, Christian Conservatives, and the Intelligent Design/Creationism movements. I don't talk about that much anymore because I think that pretty much everything you can say about all of that has pretty much been already said; all of the recent developments that have been made like the court trial in Dover aren't really anything new so much as they are just reiterations of what we've already known all along: Intelligent Design/Creationism is neither a scientific theory nor a scientific school of thought, but rather a socio-political movement designed to forward a Neoconservative Right-Wing agenda heavily based in Christian Fundamentalism.
This can all be proven by looking at what they say or do, and comparing it with - well, reality in general. However, when all is said and done though, there's one question left to be asked. Why care?
Nobody said it was easy
I suppose it could be easy to just say, "Well, these people are obviously crackpots; no one takes them seriously and the people who do are just a marginal part of society anyway.", and use that as an excuse to be blissfully apathetic to the whole situation. That'd be easier, wouldn't it? No more having to rant and rail about Creationism this or ID that.
It's a valid point; it's a wrong point, but it's nevertheless valid. It's wrong when you look at just how popular and pervasive the mindset is in the US which encourages a hostile attitude towards science (not the least of which being evolutionary biology). There's no mistaking that Christianity is the de facto majority religion in the United States. And the segement of that religion which is the most powerful is the most sympathetic and agressive element in forwarding a distinctly anti-science agenda. Case in point: George Deutsch, A George W. Bush appointee who was involved in the censure of scientists over Global Warming, among other things.
Believe it or not though, that isn't what does it for me.
No one ever said it would be this hard
For all of the polemics that Creationists and ID advocates toss around, terms like "honesty", "truth", and "atheist" are tossed around a lot. Modern science (and by extension, scientists) are dishonest, and biased against the Truth (note the big T) in their blatantly materialist, atheistic position. In short, scientists are people deeply immersed in secularist, materialist, atheistic thought who are at best blissfully ignorant about the Truth of Creationism, and at worst are wicked intellectual criminals who delude people through lies and deceit into thinking that God didn't create them in Six Days.
Coupled with that is the invariable implication that they themselves are far more qualified and knowledgable to study biology and science than the people who have spent their entire lives devoted to their fields of research - regardless of their intellectual background. Philip Johnson, "Father" of the ID movement is a lawyer, for example. William Dembski is a mathematician (though some would argue that calling him that is being overly charitable). Look at the credentials of many Creationists or IDists and you'll notice a pattern: hardly any have a rigorous, reputable, and solid foundation in the natural sciences.
Science is hard. And I don't mean school and classes hard - I mean...it's hard work to actually do it. Two research projects and two summers of field work have thoroughly convinced me of that. There's a lot of blood, sweat and tears that go into a paper that may be only five pages long and may end up forgotten to history in a library. But it's the journey along the way to get to that paper that matters.
If you look at the history of science, you see that also rings true of past scientific accomplishments. Looking at the path modern science has taken, you really can't get past the fact that science is a long, arduous process involving a great deal of effort and sacrifice.
The attitude of the people attacking science simply spits in the face of the extraordinary effort that people have made to further our understanding of the natural world. It is a statement that the knowledge and benefit that science and biology have given to society is not only meaningless, but actually evil in its agnosticism. It never came from the Bible, so therefore it must be wrong.
Oh take me back to the start
I feel passionate about this because I care. Because fundamentally, at my very core, I feel that it is important that we study and protect our natural resources before they are destroyed by our own greed.
I've seen for myself with my own eyes how beautiful and wonderous nature is, and how much it needs to be protected and studied before it is lost forever. It just disgusts me than one person's view of religion could compel them to disregard that as "atheistic" nonsense. After all, we shouldn't focus on conserving the rainforest...we should be focusing on converting the people living in the forest to Christianity! No, we shouldn't care about effective scientific study of our world, because it's not Biblical!
I have a right to be upset. I have a right to be angry and sad, and depressed and bitter because I have to fight people who are so set in their own self-important arrogance to even bother to notice that the world is dying around them. As long as they can put in another notch on the scorecard they give to their vision of God, it's all good for them.
I have a right to be angry. And no one can take that away from me.
posted by Ctenuchid @ 6:40 p.m.
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