Friday, January 3, 2014

Evolution: it's what's happening….


Let's just get this out there:

It's plain goofy to say you don't believe that human evolution is a fact of history. Every credible scientist in the world understands the truth of evolution. Evolution made us what we are.

The classic disdain of the theory of human evolution is that "man did not descend from monkeys." Well, that's actually true. Humans (genus Homo) are biological descendants of the great apes. Gorillas and chimpanzees split off from our human forefathers (Hominidae) about 4.6 million years ago, and the first tool-making human type (Homo habilis) evolved about 2.3 million years ago. The rest is history.

But, here's the thing:

A recent Pew Research Center report says that, along with increasing political partisanship in the United States, belief in evolution has slipped in the last four years. Now, only 60% of Americans believe that humans "have evolved over time." Wow. Yeah. That's 40% of Americans saying either they don't believe it or they don't know.

And by the way, the "don't know" crowd, according to Pew Research, includes about 22 million people. I think those "don't know" respondents must have misunderstood, or they deliberately fudged their answers. How can anyone "not know" about evolution?  I think it's probably fair to say that there are really only about eight people in the U. S. who absolutely never heard any mention of human evolution, I think they all live on a dead end street, somewhere….

I absolutely and forthrightly believe that each individual has the right to independent opinions in all  matters involving personal experience, preference and judgment….however, as the man said, you get to have your own opinions but you don't get to have your own facts.

The sun rises in the east. A dropped apple falls down. A baby can't lift a Steinway. Humans and animals and plants have evolved from earlier forms—the fossil record and DNA chemistry and the universal scientific consensus say so.


I think that many people who say they doubt evolution are saying it for reasons that have nothing to do with biology and chemistry and anthropology.

And this part confuses me: the Pew Research Center reports that, in the last four years, the percentage of Democrats who say evolution is real has increased from 64% to 67%. The percentage of Republicans who accept the reality of evolution has dropped from 54% to 43%, while 48% of Republicans say that "humans and other living things have existed in their present form since the beginning of time."

That's goofy.




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