What do religious people find so hard to believe about evolution?

Question

Not an attacking question here, just wondering what parts of the theory make you decide not to believe it.

LEt me clear some things up.
The bible isnt a factual reference point you can use to win arguements anymore than any other fictional book. Couldnt i then say evolution is proven as it is in The Origin of Species? No i couldnt, because it is just a book.
Where is it that creationism and belief in god is proven correct in astonomy? As far as i can tell there are no biblical teachings on astrophysics and planetary systems.

It seems a lot of you people do not undertsand exactally what a theory is. You say you cant believe in a theory, and yet i bet any money you believe in the theory of gravity. And dont go saying gravity is a law, because it isnt. If you reference any of Newtons laws on gravity i think you will find they are outdated these days.
Cheers

Answer 1

It doesn't have anything to do with the theory, per se... it has to do with how their brains work... which is different from the way that the brains of rational people work. There are subtleties, concerning the nature of 'belief, which seem to escape the notice of most people.

A rational person might say "I believe in the Big Bang." A religious person might say "I believe in creation, as described in Genesis." But these statements are not even remotely similar, with respect to what is meant by the word 'believe'.

For the rational person, the statement of 'belief' in the Big Bang means that they understand that the concept provides a scientifically and mathematically consistent explanation, congruent with the evidence, which accounts for the evolution of the universe from a fraction of a second after the initiating event, up until the present. When the 'inflationary model' came to the fore, rational people said "Well, good... that clears up a few questions and makes things even more coherent." NOBODY threw up their arms and wailed "Oh, no... oh, no... ain't so... ain't so... the Big Bang is the inerrant truth... not this ridiculous, atheistic 'inflationary' model."

See... when we say "I believe in the Big Bang", we don't really mean the same thing as the religious person means when he says "I believe in creation, as described in Genesis," or "I believe in God." Our 'belief' in the Big Bang (or anything else) isn't really a 'belief'... it is more properly a 'paradigm'... a useful way of looking at something, or thinking about something. If additional information is uncovered that adds to the conceptual model, that is a good thing... not a disaster. If part of the conceptual model is discovered to be incorrect, and must be tossed in the trash and replaced with something completely different... that is also a good thing... not the end of the world as we know it. And often, no matter how highly confident we may be of the accuracy or completeness of a particular paradigm, we may have reason to apply a DIFFERENT paradigm to the same thing, in an effort to tease out new insights; for example, we might want to contemplate the potential implications of a change to a theory from the perspective of the Tao Te Ching, the Gaia hypothesis, or ecological homeostasis. We KNOW that all theories are approximations... and that is OK. We KNOW that we don't have all the answers... and that is OK, too. There is nothing wrong with saying "We don't know... yet; but we're working on it."

But these modes of thinking, perceiving, contemplating and understanding are utterly alien to the 'religious' mind. For the religious mind, a 'belief' is not a paradigm... not a useful way of thinking about something... it is an internalized conviction that one knows the absolute 'truth' pertaining to some aspect of existence and/or fundamental reality. 'Beliefs' are one of the key interpretive component filters of the religious person's 'self-description'... a part of what DEFINES them as a person... the very thing that creates their world-view... an underpinning of their 'subjective reality'. Any challenge to one of these internalized 'beliefs' is perceived and interpreted as a vital threat... an attack upon the 'self-description'... and an assault upon their subjective reality.

And here is the key difference: When there is a change in one of the paradigms dealing with a scientific concept, or a new insight into the workings of the universe, to the 'rational' person it merely constitutes an interesting new piece of knowledge and understanding... a new insight, to be appropriately incorporated into one's world-view However, if that same new insight, or piece of information (a feature of the universe, for example) seems to threaten a tenet of Christianity, everybody goes to battle stations, goes into 'damage control' mode, for fear that the whole edifice will come crashing down... and ultimately, it will.

So, when a fundie disparages evolution, for example, it really has nothing to do with a genuine, intellectual dispute regarding scientific details... they are generally scientifically illiterate, anyway. Any 'scientific' arguments that they present are inevitably not even understood... they are just lifted from the pre-packaged lies, misrepresentations and pseudo-science that are found on dozens of 'Liars for Jesus' (LFJ) web sites, and parroted. They are in a battle. They are trying to sink science before science sinks them. They are desperate... and science is (mostly, and unfortunately) oblivious to the fact that they are even in a fight, and that somebody is trying to sink them. They just keep blithely bopping along, doing what science does... trying to figure out how nature works.

No... none of this has anything to do with a mere disagreement pertaining to evidence and understanding. It has to do with minds that deal with fundamental issues in an entirely different way. It has to do with a flexible, open-minded (willing to honestly consider alternative possibilities), intellectually honest (willing to question and doubt one's own presumptions) curiosity about the universe, contending with a rigid, unyielding world-view that depends from a conviction that certain delusional faith-based (willful ignorance and magical, wishful thinking) 'beliefs' represent the absolute 'truth' of reality.

We might as well be talking to an alien species, from a distant planet.

When the religious enter a venue like this one, they are (generally) NOT seeking answers, or new information... these might cause them to QUESTION their beliefs, or might put their beliefs at risk. No... they are closed-minded, seeking only VALIDATION of their beliefs... and hence, of their self-description.

*****************

"When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called Religion." ~ Robert M. Pirsig



Re: Gary referred to the 'Cambrian explosion', wherein many creatures 'appeared suddenly' in the fossil record... it is useful to note that 'suddenly' means over a period of 30 to 40 million years.

Answer 2

The major religions of this world like Judaism, Christianity and Islam have the same concept of evolution as given in Old Testament. According to this theory, earth was created by God in six days. By calculating the age and time-gap between various prophets, we would arrive at earth's age from creation (i.e from Adam's time). The earth's age from this method will come to around 6,000 years.
Evolutionist and other scientist say that earth is 4.5 billions year old; and the life on the earth has evolved over this period from microscopic organism to present day man. There is no concept of a God in these scheme of things.
So obviously religious people deny evolution theory as it goes against there scriptures and sacred texts.

Answer 3

i'm particular there are a variety of of diverse the reason why human beings believe what they believe. or maybe even with the actuality that i believe that folk should be respected, anybody has diverse critiques, i truly dislike all faith. there are such fairly some topics in the international that are "arguable" that encompass party A no longer having the ability to do ____ because of party B. properly, party B doesnt ought to stay with the outcome, yet they can make regulations that devistate human beings. through ways.... the position the **** is seperation of church and state???? And.... remove the Bacholer, undesirable females favor Love, A Shot of love, and so on. THEN we are able to communicate about the sanctity of marriage. =( In an afternoon in which divorce is as common as marriage, i imagine the individuals battling for it have a extra perfect shot.

Answer 4

" I Believe" that God created science. That he created the world and the animals and people through evolution. I don't believe that most religions take that into account. Although Darwin's theory of evolution was disproven by Darwin himself...
Any logical person looking at our world today has to be able to see that we are still evolving. Human beings are still changing. So it would stand to reason that evolution is valid. But I believe it's Spiritually based.

Answer 5

The biggest problem, and the one that takes it off on so many tangents, is when evolutionary data is used to draw the conclusion that God does not exist.

That's kind of a sideways leap in logic.

Answer 6

For one: It's a THEORY....??? The Bible is truth. We believers know from the BIBLE and the Lord's word, that we didn't "evolve" from a monkey,etc. We know and trust His word that we were created in his same form (human) and all then everything with Adam and Eve. So, I guess since it's written and proven, then we can believe in something factual....not Evolution.

Answer 7

Basically, everything about macro-evolution. There is no compelling or irrefutable evidence to support it. From DNA information systems to fossils, from biology to astronomy, the evidence strongly weighs in favor of creation. I have not seen nor heard anything that would make me think it is even a possibility. It is a world view, a religion, a belief system, nothing more.

Answer 8

Christians do not disbelieve evolution - CREATIONISTS do. Creationists believe that the world was created just like it says in the Bible - word for word. They aren't personally against evolution - they are against anything that contradicts the Bible.

Answer 9

Fundamentalist Christians believe in the Adam and Eve story, that's why. They think if any part of the bible is not literally true, then all of it is questionable, and they cannot bear that.

Answer 10

Gary is lying, and it's sad there is so much misinformation on the internet.

However, you can't 'believe' in evolution, because a belief is an idea not founded on evidence or proof. There is a vast array of evidence to support evolution.

Answer 11

Science can't prove anything about it, they aren't sure if it can happen. We know more about planets on the other side of the universe than we know about evolution. I think it's turning out to be a dead end theory like the big bang theory. Science is now trying to figure out how the universe was formed because they know it wasn't like they thought for so long. They will give up on evolution soon also, it's a waste of time to keep pursuing something that doesn't seem plausible.