(no subject)
I had this huge discussion with my brother about religion the other night--we rarely do this, not only because I am only in the mood for a religious debate on the third blue moon of the decade, but because I tend to get vicious when debating things with my brother and neither of us ends up enjoying it very much. I was still a bit mean this time round, but, well, the nature of the game, and all that.
This is something I'd written just previously in my paper-journal and it is a bit...strenuous. I don't mean to mock anyone's religious beliefs, but I reserve my right to have an opinion about those beliefs, nevertheless. I know, of course, that many people have no trouble reconciling evolutionary theory and creationism--but, well, some people do and I find the fact that some schools are actually teaching creationism alongside evolutionary theory, or even instead of it...quite telling. And I admit to great generalisations--I'm not speaking so much about specific religious tenants, but, well, generally about the religious urge.
As to the various scientific arguments that are put forward by what is, let's face it, a highly marginalised debate from a scientific point of view, and a deadly serious one from the religious side...well, I don't know all of them, or of the supposed facts on either side. But it is hardly surprising some people spend so much time and energy attempting to defeat evolution as a reputable theory. Because it is a theory that does so little to support the notion that the earth is ours, was created for us, and is somehow tied to our fate. Instead is posits human beings as merely one species among hundreds of thousands of millions, one that will, in the greater scheme of things, exert control over this planet for a mere blink of the eye. It suggests unequivocally that if we have begun the process of turning our environment against us to the degree that it will threaten our survival--the fight we will then endure is no more than that endured by countless other species, over all the years of history that we can give an estimate to, a rough number, given without any understanding of what it really is that we are naming.
Creationism tells us the most comforting of bed-side stories: that this world is ours, that we are beloved of its creator, that we participate in a narrative encompassing its beginning and end. This is my problem with Christianity, with any religion that promotes a similar theory--I mistrust the convenience with which it fits within our existential insecurities, I mistrust the mechanism I see working within it, a mechanism designed to assist survival, a trick of the brain to keep us alive and at peace until we can procreate and pass that most central of imperative on to our children. Evolution is an explanation of religious belief, for its endless permutations, its all-encompassing spread across humanity--and I think religion is ill-equipped to give equal explanation of evolutionary theory. They sit ill side-by-side because in its central tenants evolution renders religion a function of itself; the retaliation of denial, rejection, a retreat into ignorance is understandable.
This is something I'd written just previously in my paper-journal and it is a bit...strenuous. I don't mean to mock anyone's religious beliefs, but I reserve my right to have an opinion about those beliefs, nevertheless. I know, of course, that many people have no trouble reconciling evolutionary theory and creationism--but, well, some people do and I find the fact that some schools are actually teaching creationism alongside evolutionary theory, or even instead of it...quite telling. And I admit to great generalisations--I'm not speaking so much about specific religious tenants, but, well, generally about the religious urge.
As to the various scientific arguments that are put forward by what is, let's face it, a highly marginalised debate from a scientific point of view, and a deadly serious one from the religious side...well, I don't know all of them, or of the supposed facts on either side. But it is hardly surprising some people spend so much time and energy attempting to defeat evolution as a reputable theory. Because it is a theory that does so little to support the notion that the earth is ours, was created for us, and is somehow tied to our fate. Instead is posits human beings as merely one species among hundreds of thousands of millions, one that will, in the greater scheme of things, exert control over this planet for a mere blink of the eye. It suggests unequivocally that if we have begun the process of turning our environment against us to the degree that it will threaten our survival--the fight we will then endure is no more than that endured by countless other species, over all the years of history that we can give an estimate to, a rough number, given without any understanding of what it really is that we are naming.
Creationism tells us the most comforting of bed-side stories: that this world is ours, that we are beloved of its creator, that we participate in a narrative encompassing its beginning and end. This is my problem with Christianity, with any religion that promotes a similar theory--I mistrust the convenience with which it fits within our existential insecurities, I mistrust the mechanism I see working within it, a mechanism designed to assist survival, a trick of the brain to keep us alive and at peace until we can procreate and pass that most central of imperative on to our children. Evolution is an explanation of religious belief, for its endless permutations, its all-encompassing spread across humanity--and I think religion is ill-equipped to give equal explanation of evolutionary theory. They sit ill side-by-side because in its central tenants evolution renders religion a function of itself; the retaliation of denial, rejection, a retreat into ignorance is understandable.