If evolution was factual, why would there be such a controversy?

Answer 1

Because fact only comes from ancient textbooks, silly!

Answer 2

It boils down to the sixteenth century invention of the idea of sola scriptura or "scripture alone." The controversy is the logical outcome of that idea. There are all kinds of philosophical problems with sola scriptura, but science acts as a falsification of it. It is extreme Protestantism that has the problem and that is because they really believe this sixteenth century idea.

Prior to the sixteenth century, no one articulated nor would articulate such an idea. It would have been considered anti-Christian. The earliest writers, who knew the apostles, actually write against any such idea strongly. It was a political outcome of a problem Luther had. He was rejecting the papacy, but it is the papacy that promulgated the books of the bible, so he rechose the books himself. But he did so in contradiction to the opinions of the early Christian writers who knew the apostles and write about what the apostles meant by certain passages. Luther could win by picking the books that fit his point of view (he threw out books he called the apocrypha and James, Jude and Revelations.)

The problem he had was no one prior to him would have agreed with everything he said. It is important to remember that the Catholic Church immediately embraced 54 of his 95 thesis and disputed most of the rest on technical grounds. Luther was mostly right, but Luther believed he was entirely right.

Four centuries later, we are still living with the fallout of that idea. One of the side effects is that if scripture is wrong in any way, then Protestantism is wrong. Mainline churches embrace evolution because there are billions of pieces of data supporting it and none supporting the scriptural account. So they reinterpret scripture. Extreme Christian groups understand what is theoretically going on. They are rewriting the revelation by doing that in the Protestant tradition. In this sense, Lutherans, for example, are strictly wrong from that perspective.

The problem is that factually, scripture is in error. This does not impact the ancient churches such as the Orthodox or Catholicism because even Augustine in 350 was able to point out false passages that conflicted with the scienc eeven of that period. The problem is sola scriptura is false. The ancient churches have a broader understanding of what scripture is and isn't. There are hundreds of passages that are strictly false when viewed from todays science, particularly physics. We are not talking about just miracles but in operational descriptions of how the world works.

Some people feel they must pick between God and science and their eternal soul is on the line with this. Really, they must pick between a false view of religion and science. Many scientists are religious, but intelligent design people cannot permit their God to be majestic and profound. He must be very insignificant and small.

Answer 3

Religion.

If evolution were proved to be real, that would, essentially, disprove the Bible.

Though evolution has been proven to have happened in the past and even today, (for example, why would humans have tailbones, and sometimes even tails (mutated), if we hadn't evolved somehow? Why have scientists been able to observe birds developing more useful beaks over time to better reach their prey? All evolution takes is a genetic mutation, really--is that so hard to believe?)

However, people are very tied to their religions that are, really, so outdated and yet so militantly followed...that they wouldn't be able to see new truths if the truths were dancing right in front of them.

Answer 4

Autism is factual, and there's a huge controversy on that. As long as there's free will, there will always be a group of people who dispute something.

Answer 5

I could ask the same thing about religion. Or about the moon landing. Or about 9/11.

Pretty much everything has a body of people who disagree with it. In the case of evolution, the body of people are very vocal about it.

Answer 6

Yes, since it IS factual, and provably so. But the bible-thumpers much prefer their mythologies (from which they take comfort) to realizing the truth.

Answer 7

There was a huge controvery over the heliocentric model of our solar system, too.

Why? Because people have a lot invested in believing one way, and so they resist change.

And, of course, there's a drive to keep people seeing it as "controvery":

http://www.doonesbury.com/strip/dailydose/index.html?uc_full_date=20070114

Answer 8

There is no controversy. Just people who refuse to see what is in front of them.

Answer 9

Because religion is involved. Religions are the last to adapt to changes in knowledge.

Answer 10

Excellent question.