Wednesday, August 17, 2005

An Outright Lie

In an August 8th article in USA Today, Utah state senator D. Chris Buttars makes the startling claim that...

There is zero scientific fossil evidence that demonstrates organic evolutionary linkage between primates and man.
That's a pretty amazing claim, since a very brief search turned up a list of at least nineteen fossil finds that support the link between modern humans and earlier primates.

The rest of Buttars' article is basically a rant about how the education system is anti-religion, dragging in questions about school prayer which are irrelevant to the Evolution/ID debate. He's oblivious to the fact that the opposition to ID stems from the fraudulence of teaching a concept (ID doesn't qualify as a theory) with no scientific support as science.

It takes incredible audacity for a politician who presumably has no scientific training to bluntly deny the existence of evidence that the overwhelming majority of the scientific community recognizes. What Senator Buttars is saying is an outright lie, and it constitutes nothing short of a blatant attack on the scientific method. You know, the method that produces real, useful knowledge? Knowledge that produced modern medicine, computers, fertilizers, automobiles, satellite communications, and military equipment?

Does Senator Buttars realize that when he attacks science like this, he attacks the foundation of American prominence in the world? If we dismiss science and its methods, we turn from the path of progress and head straight into the Dark Ages. Maybe that's where Senator Buttars wants us to go, but I don't.

If you're a voter in Utah, you should be deeply concerned about this man's remarks.

3 comments:

Tam said...

Er, what % of Utah's population is Mormon? 'Cause... I don't think most people who consider themselves Mormon are going to have a problem with what Buttar said.

And if you think that's scary, I went to high school in a predominantly Mormon town. I remember times when I was literally frightened to voice an opinion in classes.

And in my school, your parents had to sign something before you could stay in the classroom while Evolution was being taught. And that was WITH the biology teacher stressing it was “just a theory.”

Lord Runolfr said...

Well, the only response I can make is that I weep for the state of science education in Utah and Arizona.

Science teachers should be teaching science, not religious dogma.

Ryan Michael said...

Tis frightening indeed, m'lord.

(bet I'm the first one to talk like that on your site! I'm soooo creative. Like that Seinfeld guy. Nevermind, I'm a dork.)

Everytime I read about someone that uneducated involved in politics I pee a little.