Why do people deny evolution?

@Setanta,

I agree. Most of the human suffering in history resulted in one way or another from the actions of some who were sure they alone knew what was good for everyone else. I believe the key words are "willing to impose their .... whatever .... on everyone else. The core problem of civilization is in finding a sufficient common basis of general agreement or at least toleration.

Perhaps the contemporary political divide comes down to differing views of morality, at least in the sense that many progressives tend see their social programs and constructs as something more or less equivalent to morality. (the morality of the group vs. the morality of the individual)

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@georgeob1,

You keep talking about progressives. That's an essentially meaningless label. The conservatives of Ontario, for example, call their party the Progressive Conservatives. That title was used by the national party before Stephen Harper. The Tories began calling themselves Progressive Conservatives in the early 20th century an attempt to steal the moral high ground from the left, and to attempt to control the pace of change.

Exactly the same thing happened in the U.K. in the early 19th century. The Tories, the conservatives, enacted social reforms in an attempt to control the pace and extent of change--reluctantly conceding that change was needed.

Your use of "progressive" is like your use of "freedom"--emotive, but sufficiently vague to avoid having to accurately describe just what you mean.

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@georgeob1,

conservatives fee that the bedroom is governable

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@georgeob1,

conservatives seem to feel that the bedroom is governable

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@Setanta,

I agree most labels become meaningless if examined under a wide enough field of view, and Canada's "Progressive Conservatives were nearly the antithesis of what I had in mind. However I was referring to a specific political movement in the USA for which the label does indeed have a definite meaning, and for them the point I made is entirely valid.

I believe the central point about individual freedom vs various social & economic controls is as valid today as it was in the early 19th century. In the latter case transformative economic changes, attendant to industrial development tore at the fabric of a formerly agrarian economy & society. The effective reforms involved labor laws & protection and new structures for local government in rapidly urbanizing areas. Those kinds of external changes aren't nearly as present today. There is no equivalent external force.

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

conservatives seem to feel that the bedroom is governable

I believe that is a rather tired old saw. It doesn't take much experience to know that the governance of bedrooms has almost always been an illusion.

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@georgeob1,

I note that you still have not defined this "specific political movement." Can you name the leaders of said movement, who self-identify with that label? Conservatives certainly call themselves conservatives. In the early 19th century, the United States continued to be an agrarian nation. America did not undergo a "transformative economic change" until the Great Depression (as the rest of the world called it) of the 1870s. That resulted from European investors putting their capital into economic development in the United States, where there was still a prospect of a good return on investment.

It's easy to make silly economic arguments if economics are examined under a wide enough field of view.

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@georgeob1,

georgeob1 wrote:

It doesn't take much experience to know that the governance of bedrooms has almost always been an illusion.

That hasn't stopped conservative from trying. Sodomy laws in the United Stats have only slowly been overturned, beginning in the 1970s and continuing into this century. As recently as 1986, the Supreme Court upheld a sodomy law applying to same sex partners. That was only overturned in 2003 in Lawrence versus Texas.

Additionally, conservatives are constantly on the attack against abortion and birth control, and often even sex education. It was only in 1970 that Congress removed references to contraception and abortion from Federal obscenity statures. In George Bush's first budget to Congress in 2001 the provision which required insurance companies to pay for contraception in health plans for Federal employees was removed. That budget also cut off funds to overseas organizations which provide contraception and abortion counseling. Bush actively appointed anti-abortion and anti-contraception men (all men) to positions of responsibility in the FDA and to UN agencies.

Conservatives continue to push their moral agenda, which often includes weakening the enforcement powers and reducing the budgets of agencies the purpose of which is to prevent consumer and investment fraud. That's your vaunted "freedom." Caveat Emptor--the more than 2000 year old battle cry of freedom of capitalists.

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Make no mistake! The political parties and the 'possibility' to voting is only here to fool us in to thinking there isn't one equal force behind it.
They are ALL wings from he same bird.
Don't believe me? Read "Tragedy and Hope" from prof Quigley!

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@Setanta,

You are asking silly questions and I think you know it. The basic political debate in the U.S. for the past several decades has been between those who seek ever more government directed solutions to social and economic problems and those who are skeptical of their efficacy and the wisdom of the designers of those "systems", preferring the dynamics of individual choice and relatively free markets. It doesn't matter much who the leaders (whether actual or self-proclaimed) are or, for that matter how they identify themselves. It is the contest of ideas and outlooks that interests me.

Ordinary humans pursuing their self interest will, over time, corrupt any system, whether designed by a government or a corporation. That's why corporations need to recreate themselves or undergo major reorganizations periodically - no system involving humans lasts very long ; focus is lost; purpose is replaced by procedure which eventually obscures the objective; side effects end up dominating the result; etc. Government is generally slow to recognize and deal with these effects, and it doesn't go out of existence easily. Marketplaces generally overcome these effects. They, of course, have their own excesses and side effects so we must find a balance and that is the issue here.

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@georgeob1,

Quote:

You are asking silly questions and I think you know it. The basic political debate in the U.S. for the past several decades has been between those who seek ever more government directed solutions to social and economic problems and those who are skeptical of their efficacy and the wisdom of the designers of those "systems", preferring the dynamics of individual choice and relatively free markets. It doesn't matter much who the leaders (whether actual or self-proclaimed) are or, for that matter how they identify themselves. It is the contest of ideas and outlooks that interests me.

Ordinary humans pursuing their self interest will, over time, corrupt any system, whether designed by a government or a corporation. That's why corporations need to recreate themselves or undergo major reorganizations periodically - no system involving humans lasts very long ; focus is lost; purpose is replaced by procedure which eventually obscures the objective; side effects end up dominating the result; etc. Government is generally slow to recognize and deal with these effects, and it doesn't go out of existence easily. Marketplaces generally overcome these effects. They, of course, have their own excesses and side effects so we must find a balance and that is the issue here.

Whay utter uter uttter bollocks you wrote! Really!!!

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@Quehoniaomath,

Evidently you don't know much about either the world or human history.

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@georgeob1,

Quote:

Evidently you don't know much about either the world or human history.

Really? And cn you tell me why that is?
I just don't believe fairy tales, not even if zillion believe it!

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@Quehoniaomath,

I certainly don't know. It's a question you will have to answer for yourself. Ignorance makes its own rules.

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The result of turning away from liberalism entirely is an unbalance of economic power, just as turning away from conservatism is the same. One end of the teeter totter slams to the ground. There has to be social programming and there has to be individual initiative. There has to be compromise. But first each has to recognize in the other a right to exist.

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@edgarblythe,

I suspect nearly everyone here agrees with that. The political dispute today is about the right balance, though many of those involved pretend their opponents are absolutist deniers if they offer any resistance at all..

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@georgeob1,

The absolute deniers are the Teabaggers, in collusion with people like the Koch brothers.

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@georgeob1,

Quote:

I certainly don't know. It's a question you will have to answer for yourself. Ignorance makes its own rules.

So, you don't know but think you can say something about something you don't know. How stupid that is.
You may call it ignorance. I prefer to call it "awake"
Because the offical history that is sold tyo us is bullocks and shite!

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@Quehoniaomath,

did it ever occur to you that the only reason you deny all that you deny is because it was served up to you during the process of your education?

You have neither the knowledge nor the skill to deny anything. Even if you happen to be correct about some of your pet beliefs, it isn't because of superior knowledge, its only dumb luck.

I await some discovery that you've made and the underpinning data and evidence.
(Hint: I don't think itll be forthcoming, since you are basically clueless)

You could be an interesting topic of some psychologits research, a deeper clinical view of "conspiracy theorists' and "Science deniers".

Soemewhere you've been hit in the pre-frontal cortex and its apparently rendered your reasoning and analytical powers non-functioning.

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

did it ever occur to you that the only reason you deny all that you deny is because it was served up to you during the process of your education?

You have neither the knowledge nor the skill to deny anything. Even if you happen to be correct about some of your pet beliefs, it isn't because of superior knowledge, its only dumb luck.

I await some discovery that you've made and the underpinning data and evidence.
(Hint: I don't think itll be forthcoming, since you are basically clueless)

You could be an interesting topic of some psychologits research, a deeper clinical view of "conspiracy theorists' and "Science deniers".

Soemewhere you've been hit in the pre-frontal cortex and its apparently rendered your reasoning and analytical powers non-functioning.

Yeah, yeah, yeah...but how do you really feel about him, FM?

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Why do people deny evolution?

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