CreationismCreationismPart I.First off the Judeo-Christian views of creation were slowly changing even before Darwin came along. Although his discoveries and theories did go along way in changing peoples views. Judeo-Christian views revolved around the “Garden of Eden” idea. That the universe had one creator and he formed all of the earth and the living organisms that live on it. Never did it cross their mind that it is possible for organisms to change over time or become extinct. Even to this day a lot of creationists feel and try to show how there was no need to change traditional belief. The changing force in their thought-process was the fossil record undeniably showed that older forms were going extinct while newer forms appeared.
The work that Darwin and Wallace did went strides to prove their beliefs, and it also proved to be a very challenging idea to take in physiologically for some religions. They proposed that the change in organism’s fossils could be explained in terms of differential reproduction that was based on heritable variations (i.e., natural selection). A fully natural explanation for nature’s diversity was now available for consideration. To some, this meant that God was no longer required to explain the formation of new species. Most disturbing of all, God was not even required to explain the formation of humankind.
Part II.On March 22nd, 1925, Tennessee passed the Butler Act, making it unlawful in public schools “to teach any theory that denies the story of divine creation as taught by the Bible and to teach instead that man was descended from a lower order of animals.” The Tennessee law was part of a national legislative campaign fathered by three-time losing presidential contender William Jennings Bryan. Within a decade a pair of court cases overturned the “equal space” law, as well. But the modern assault on evolutionary theory pretty much started in the Tennessee legislature on this date, March 22, back in 1925.
The circumstances revolving around the act being passed was the willingness of teachers to accept and teach the ways of creationism from the bible. Parents were not happy this was being taught and neither were the school boards. This became apparent to the public forcing schools and state legislature to take action. Thus making the act and then later passing it.
(a) Scopes who was voluntarily arrested for teaching evolution became nationwide news. The reaction to this surprising publicity showed that many Americans felt the basics of their religious beliefs were at stake in this battle. To some, the trial was seen as a means of either confirming or denying their understanding of the Scriptures. Clarence Darrow is credited with having outmaneuvered such intolerance when he set for his expert witnesses to give their scientific evidences for evolution to the news reporters covering the trial. By this, Darrow managed to have the theory of evolution circulated to the farthest limits of the civilized world. Just as significantly, this was accomplished without any arguments against evolution being mentioned. Thus evolution appeared to be based on undeniable evidence.
(b) The participants in the 1925 trial were (1) John Scopes, a high school football coach and substitute science teacher, (2) William Jennings Bryan, the great fundamentalist orator and three times presidential candidate, who prosecuted the case against Scopes, and (3) Clarence Darrow, the eminent trial lawyer, who defended Scopes. (4) The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed suit, challenging the constitutionality of the Act.
The atmosphere of the town was not very good, and people thought that if the good publicity got out about the trial that the excitement along with the population might go up again whose population had fallen from 3,000 in the 1890s to 1,800 in 1925.
Part III.4. Scientific creationism differs from conventional science in numerous ways. One obvious difference is the way scientists and creationists deal with error. Science is committed, at least in principle, to the evidence. Creationism is connected to principle, as evidenced by the statements of certainty essential by various creationist organizations and the professions of faith made by individual creationists. Because creationism is first and foremost a matter of the bible, evidence from the natural world can only be of secondary importance. Controlling systems like creationism tend to encourage in their adherents a strange view of truth. Many well-known creationists apparently have the same view of truth as political radicals: whatever advances the cause is true; whatever damages the
s. This attitude of nonacademic creationists may be a sign of a different problem, one that is difficult to solve in its totality. The problems are more subtle, although.
Sufficiently enlightened creationists seem to have become adept at applying their science to the very problems of science. As soon as a scientist comes close to this standard, he or she becomes well aware that he or she has misunderstood the underlying logic. A scientist will learn from a misstep and not be able to come up with a “good solution”, for instance, if a science can only show one problem for a few reasons — such as the cause, time-varying evidence, the fact that the cause can be more easily measured and, perhaps, by making it known that it is false. But he or she will be willing to work with only one possible explanation for a problem and make it clear that they are not able to find their way around the problem. This is a good thing, but it is not sufficient to allow for a scientist to become disinclined to consider the problems that he or she is dealing with more thoroughly. But there are ways in which a scientist can use science to further his or her own interests. One problem that the scientific community will discuss briefly, in the coming weeks with scientists from many disciplines, is the problem of how to deal with the phenomenon of anemia. Research is conducted, by scientists at the University of Edinburgh, on certain symptoms — such as low blood-pressure, low potassium, high serum cholesterol, etc.; on others, such as disease or infections (such as kidney disease). Scientists from several other countries work with the UK department of health to develop their own methods of monitoring anemia, and from many different centres of scientific knowledge work in collaboration to improve the quality of life of hospitals. They do not look at evidence to create a cause and end point but rather look to the fact that disease or infections in some way have been associated with anemia. Thus, research can be carried out on ways to better target the underlying cause (especially in the case of diabetes, where many studies have shown the disease is caused by small amounts of the common diet), to give more accurate diagnosis, and to help the population cope with the effects in the long-term. Similarly, research can be performed on how to treat hypertension and diabetes, or on other factors that scientists say are more important to human health than what we think they are. It would be in the interest of science as a whole not to overstate the problems scientists encountered in any given research and therefore we need not look to the results of every possible study. But the scientific community is also able to help develop interventions that allow the researchers to get away with such activities, in the same way that they helped develop vaccines or the development of drugs to treat disease. Such interventions, however, should be based on many years of experience in the field. Such actions have many ethical and technical consequences. One of the most powerful of these is the decision or necessity to intervene as early as possible. (If you believe in an action or necessity, you may choose to let the scientist know about it, as the scientist might be reluctant to listen to your explanations.) Even if no one