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The Daily Dish - 2006-2011 archives for The Daily Dish, featuring Andrew Sullivan

The Politics Of Evolution

By The Daily Dish
Jan 9 2008, 11:51 AM ET

It's a deal-breaker for me too. If a candidate cannot accept Darwinian evolution, then I simply lose all respect for him or her. I do not trust their empirical judgment, which means I don't believe their political decisions will be affected by, er, reason. Joyner is right:

One of the things that never ceases to amaze me about those who support creationism, intelligent design and oppose the concept of evolution is that they are amazing hypocrites. They will say things like, 'Evolution is only a theory.' No. This. Is. Wrong. Evolution, i.e. that organisms change at a genetic level, is an observed fact. The theory man has constructed to explain the myriad of facts that fall under the broad umbrella of evolution is 'just a theory'.

However, this applies to other real phenomena such as gravity.



Take a penny and drop it. It falls to the floor. It always falls to the floor. Of all the billions and billions of times people have dropped pennies (hear on earth) there is not one instance where the penny has not fallen to the floor. Do we fully understand gravity and how it works? No. Is there a single theory of gravity? No. Are there gaps in the theory? Yes. So why dont all these people who fight so vigorously against evolution fight just as vigorously against gravity? My guess is because they know that people will regard them as irrational kooks who really and truly are anti-science.

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