For several months I used to argue, quite a bit, with fundamentalist Christians about evolution on Free Republic, but gave it up recently because I'd said pretty much everything I had to say on the topic. I also gave up because I was tired of the atheist evolutionists pissing on religion, which they do. Fundamentalists make convenient punching bags, but shooting fish in barrels is infra dig.
There are some very close-minded people on every part of the spectrum, whose personal views seem like caricatures, and whose understanding of other people's points of view seem like caricatures, as well.
Clearly, the guys who spend their lives "proving" that Noah had dinosaurs on the Ark are missing a few screws, but what can you say about the people who can't comprehend how one can believe that God created a universe that obeys the laws of physics, and that God created life on Earth using the principles of evolution?
I would say that the latter don't necessarily have screws loose but maybe bees in their bonnets. A bad childhood experience with close-minded people can close your own mind against anyone who resembles them in the least. Science cannot prove that God exists, nor can it prove that God doesn't exist. Faith cannot "prove" that God exists in any way that science can recognize. That's why it's called "faith."
There's a conceptual line between science and religion which at the present time seems insurmountable. But one can believe in both, just as once can like both soccer and basketball. They're different.
America differs from most European countries and Canada by having more people who self-identify with religious beliefs, it's true.
On the other hand, most European countries and Canada have more people who self-identify with Marxism, socialism, Lacan, Derrida, and other strange "isms" that are at least as odd and nonsensical as mere Christianity. |
