This has an excellent explanation for why evolution deniers have to deny evolution no matter what.

Why are some Hell-bent on Intelligent Design?

This has an excellent explanation for why evolution deniers have to deny evolution no matter what.

Here is the whole thing, some of which I disagree with because he looks for excuses to call the god fairy "real".

Why are some Hell-bent on Intelligent Design?

Yesterday, I attended, and gave testimony at the Texas State Board of Education meeting.  The issue in front of them was whether to accept textbooks provided by the textbook publishers as they have presented them, or whether they should require that they alter them according to comments made by reviewers.

Of course, this being Texas, many of the reviewers’ comments were aimed at areas where they were simply not subject area experts, and proposed to “teach the controversy.”

You know.  The old “evolution vs. intelligent design” junk.

The problem is, within any scientific body of merit, evolution is not under controversy.  Certainly the methods by which evolution manifests can be; but to say that evolution isn’t real is to be blind to the mountains of evidence that support the theory; while “intelligent design,” or “creationism” isn’t supported by any scientific evidence at all.

Maybe there’s a philosophical argument that God works though evolution; but I am not prepared to say definitively what, if anything, God decided to do with His infinite free time.  I suspect He watches a lot of Reality TV – minus the TV.

There were amazing speakers there, from microbiologists to accomplished lawyers – I felt intellectually outmatched and the sophistication of the arguments (at least the ones on the side of science) made my little prepared testimony seem weak in comparison.

But I left the meeting feeling that nothing was accomplished.  I don’t believe anyone exited that room with an opinion that was different than the one they came in with.

Let’s be frank for a second: Faith is a powerful motivator.  It is very hard to convince someone that they’re wrong on the facts when they believe it is a moral duty to insist their side is right.

Because to a believer, faith is a virtue.  Indeed, the highest virtue.  And evolution may not challenge God’s throne, but it challenges a highly held belief that God created man as the apex of life on Earth.  To suggest that man holds no special place amongst the beasts – that our rationality was not the spark of divine creation but the machinations of blind terrestrial navigation belies the idea that God places us first among all his creations.

And it humbles us. It humbles us because there is no guarantee that mankind will or can remain the apex of God’s creation, and that should we falter and face ecological or nuclear Armageddon, He may save our souls, but not our species.

Some people, quite frankly, can’t handle that.

The argument has been made that evolution is in contrast to faith.  This is not true.  But what is true is that evolution tests faith.  The fact of evolution is incontrovertible and supported by mounds of empirical evidence.  Faith, on the other hand, is fragile.  It is supported only by the strength of human will.

And this is where it gets tricky. Because to many believers, faith, not works, is the only guarantee that one can pass God’s litmus test and gain access to His divine kingdom.  To lose one’s faith is to literally damn oneself.  So tests to that faith must be avoided at all costs.  Better to be a philosophical coward than a theological failure.
I have always known that no sane, benevolent God would create a cosmos where faith was an absolute requirement for salvation, yet also create a universe for his creations where that faith was constantly challenged. Such a god would be cruel; and by no means worthy of the title of God.I do not hold to that.

Instead, consider the possibility God wants us to grow.  He wants to push us towards greater understanding.  And the only way we’re going to learn is if He lets us figure it out for ourselves.

There may be blind turns, dead ends, and mistakes.  There may be long strides forward, followed by heartbreaking setbacks.  But such a God would want us to ask Him questions.  And the way to do that is to seek the answers to those questions in His creation.  Every time we turn away from the question, every time we remain purposefully blind to the contradiction, every time we patch holes in our ignorance with “God did it,” without following up with the question “How did God do it?” is a far more disappointing result to Him than blindly holding faith.

We learn through our successes, and we learn through failure.  And no God worth the name would punish a man or woman who tried to hold faith and failed.

I seem to have digressed  – back to the point at hand.  From a practical matter, I think the SBOE meeting was a bit of a waste – I doubt that anyone was swayed by the arguments – that those members who knew of the importance of science in science instruction were emboldened knowing that the majority of people out there who cared about the issue supported them; but that the members who did not felt pride in taking on such a large opposition.  That doesn’t mean we shouldn’t have gone en mass, and shouldn’t have spoken, but that is politics; individuals rationally act in collectively irrational ways.

The only thing that I could try to do to change the status quo there was to try to convince those members whose faith was strong that there was an argument based in faith that they had not considered.  And so I delivered this testimony.