A recent survey conducted by researchers at Michigan State University reports that, among 32 Eurpoean countries, the USofA, and Japan, majorities of people in only two countries reported they REJECTED evolution as the explanation for human development,Those two countries?
Turkey, where a large segment of the population consists of pre-literate peasants and herders (but which is also the site of some of the first human experiments in controlling evolution by selective breeding of live-stock, in Anatolia)...
and the United States of America.
Human beings, as we know them, developed from earlier species of animals: true or false?
This simple question is splitting America apart, with a growing proportion thinking that we did not descend from an ancestral ape. A survey of 32 European countries, the US and Japan has revealed that only Turkey is less willing than the US to accept evolution as fact.Religious fundamentalism, bitter partisan politics and poor science education have all contributed to this denial of evolution in the US, says Jon Miller of Michigan State University in East Lansing, who conducted the survey with his colleagues.
"The US is the only country in which [the teaching of evolution] has
been politicised," he says. "Republicans have clearly adopted this as one of
their wedge issues. In most of the world, this is a non-issue."
Miller's report makes for grim reading for adherents of evolutionary theory. Even though the average American has more years of education than when Miller began his surveys 20 years ago, the percentage of people in the country who accept the idea of evolution has declined from 45 in 1985 to 40 in 2005 (Science, vol 313, p 765).
That's despite a series of widely publicised advances in genetics, including genetic sequencing, which shows strong overlap of the human genome with those of chimpanzees and mice. "We don't seem to be going in the right direction," Miller says.
Only 40% of USers confidently acknowledge the unity and totality of nature, and admit themselves, humbly, to be part of it? Only 40% of USers recognize unambiguously their mutual affiliation and intimate relation with the great 'web of life?
Izzis a great fuukin country, or what?
Izzere ANYBODY who does not now have a pretty good idea why USers are ready to just let the perils of global change continue unabated?
3 comments:
Only 40% of USers confidently acknowledge the unity and totality of nature, and admit themselves, humbly, to be part of it? Only 40% of USers recognize unambiguously their mutual affiliation and intimate relation with the great 'web of life?
There's the rub. I think we (most of mankind) has adopted some notion that we (humans) are Life, itself, and everything else has become so many products on the shelves of the great Grocery Store - simply objects for our amusement and convenience.
Is it any wonder that the thought of Peak Oil causes such distress? We don't know how to live, frankly. Modern civilization has built itself from, and upon, so many false constructs that we, as mammals, don't know how to survive anymore. Where would we be without jobs and bank accounts and insurance, etc.?
We rely on others for every aspect of our lives because we've lost touch with what it means to be human and a part of this Universe. We don't grow our own food, make our own clothes, build our own shelters - in short, we're living thru other people's work. Think of all the 'middle-men' that are involved in simply getting an ear of corn or a t-shirt.
We've created a 'Society' that assigns more importance to government, religion, entertainment and the Economy than the actual act of living, itself.
We are some strange monkeys, my friend.
Well, now, I've based my whole blog on the notion that there's no such thing as evolution, that we were created by someone named Sky Woman, and our planet rests on the back of a giant turtle. And of course the world is flat. And of course the sun revolves around the earth. Hey, the earth isn't the one that moves. It's the sun. Any moron can see that.
And I guess there are a lot of morons in Merica.
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