Debating Evolution is a Waste of Time (yeah, I know it's been covered before)

funny-pictures-cat-knows-you-are-aloneDebating Evolution with religious folk is a waste of time.
With the unknown, one is confronted with danger and discomfort--the first instinct is to abolish these painful states. First principle: any explanation is better than none. We all do it, we hear a strange noise and we quickly come up with a guess to explain the noise, i.e., wind, a ghost, a…? All tribes/social groups through time have come up with myths to explain unknowns, answers arrived at not through reason or logic, but to tranquilize the fear of the unknown, providing comfort.

Religious folk form their identities through their religious teachings and any information that doesn’t fit their belief system, triggers feelings of insecurity and fear; emotionally, they feel they are being personally attacked--they must abolish the danger and discomfort they feel. They can’t use reason or logic to evaluate any of the millions of facts supporting evolution--because they are indoctrinated and imprinted as children to feel shame and fear if they question their church's authority.

Don’t waste your time debating Evolution with a creationist; respect the right of others to believe as they wish, but never miss an opportunity to demonstrate the irrational paradox and dangerous delusion that is religious faith.

Anywhere in the world, where education increases, belief in religion declines and inversely, women’s rights increase. The greatest intolerance for religion comes from religious folk’s intolerance of other religions or sub-groups within their own religion.

It's time to tax all religious businesses and for the greater enforcement of the laws separating church and state; including, but not limited to, the armed forces, religious schools and donations to political parties.

9 comments:

  1. I disagree.

    First off, why are you debating them in the first place... just to be right? So it doesn't come to any result, so what? It's the same as why we talk about atheism, really, the title of your article could be changed to "Debating god is a Waste of Time"...
    http://www.alternet.org/story/140914/why_do_atheists_have_to_talk_about_atheism_because_we%27re_right./

    It's not anyways. Every little thing helps break down the dark shackles of the religion empire.

    For that matter, you're going about it the wrong way, as most people do. They have to understand what evolution is first, you can undermine all their so called evidence just by refuting their view of evolution... which is as easy as pie. If their idea of evolution is anything different than life changes, they don't grasp the theory correctly. They try to add so many views into it, such as it being a theory of origin and so forth...

    Strip it down. Teach them what evolution really is, and their whole argument, is completely undermined. And it's easy to boot.

    BTW, it's not where education increases, it's where IQ increases. Education in the form of Bible preaching (like creationism) will not help break religion's shackles.

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  2. I think it's very important to talk about such important issues as evolution. Ignoring the issue only makes things worse. We have to educate people. Sometimes it might look like an argument with someone, but especially online, someone else might read that argument and take away a small nugget of fact that they didn't know before. That's a huge win for science.

    Sure, some people will desperately and fanatically cling to their faith and lies in their religion, but that doesn't mean we're off the hook and have to let everything go to hell in a handbasket, so to speak.

    Educate, inform and fight the good fight, for the good of everyone. We can't just give up and crawl under a rock and feel sorry for ourselves because people don't like reality.

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  3. Personally, I agree that it's a waste of time debating YECs. This is Morton's Demon in a nutshell. How many debates have you engaged in where minds were changed? It's even worse online- I think that for the most part it's like debating a brick wall.

    GMN, do you really think that they're going to pay attention to your "stripping it down" for them? I imagine that most theists will respond by feeling patronized, attacked or made to feel stupid, and put their fingers in their ears and shriek "la la la, I can't hear you."

    Metaphorically, of course.

    Ultimately, I think that sites like this, or Talk Origins or SAB or Iron Chariots do a good deal to get the information out there, but at the end of the day, the only way a person will change their mind is by coming to it on their own. Most of the deconversion stories I've read point to the individual persuing truth no matter where it leads them.

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  4. Excellent points, Steve. I think I am on both sides of this argument. You're right, debating a YEC is pretty pointless. I would hope that sites that tackle the issues (maybe even mine) help people when they are ready to open their minds.
    Only when you're ready to start asking questions and read to start accepting new information that conflicts with your old brainwashed beliefs, will you be able to change.

    Sometimes this takes a long time. And with some people it will never happen. It's up to the individual for when they are ready and willing.

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  5. How many? 6 have changed their minds. About a dozen or so after the fact have told me I started the cogs as it where. I've had numerous people who have read some of my debates (mostly in other places were it is mainly a debate instead of based upon an article) that I helped them in their newly founded atheism, and that I answered many of their questions.

    Is this widespread? No. But it happens. Maybe about three per hundred.

    But here's the problem that I'm hearing even from you. Evolution is not a theory of the origin of life. In execution of just resorting to the basics, what happens is it shuts them up. Now yes, some resort to what you said, but for most of them, their argument collapses and most often they leave it for something else. And here's why, I attack the flaw in their very basic understanding of evolution. They have no come back, there is no, no, evolution REALLY works like this, because it doesn't.

    It really works, try it sometime. I'll maybe elaborate a bit more on this later.

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  6. It’s time to tax all religious businesses and for the greater enforcement of the laws separating church and state;

    Hear, hear. I'm sick to death of them shoving their noses so far up my backside I need a colonoscopy to find them--on my tax dollars. State subsidized religion must end.

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  7. I don't know, three per hundred seems like a huge waste of time. Yeah, you've convinced three people, but those other 97? :)

    Of course evolution is not a theory about the origin of life. I have not even had ten debates or conversations with creationists, let alone hundreds like you obviously have- You have much more patience than I.

    The stupid just hurts too much.

    I've found that when the argument collapses, when their understanding of evolution is so inherently flawed, they change the subject, pretend they didn't hear it or get mad.

    I think, for me, changing minds isn't as important as other things are. I don't like feeding trolls and I

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  8. Oh, I so totally agree. It is especially irksome when you see those large multimillion dollar complexes that don't have to pay property tax...

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  9. It still shocks me to hear people say their belief in a creation story is their opinion (and excuses them from accepting facts).
    I usualy ask them how seriously they would listen to someone's opinion that the earth is flat.
    Not to start a discussion, it's just to let them know how it feels to talk to an ignoramus.

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