Religious? Don't Like Evolution? Put Up Or Shut Up In College Bio.

[dd5]

First off I'd like to say a person has every right to believe in anything he or she wishes to. The problem comes when Pre-med, Pre-pharm, Pre-dental religious students absolutely refuse to hear any evolution related material. It just so happens that all of them have to take biology whether they agree,enjoy or are infuriated by it or not. My university just hit one of the top 20 in the country for undergrad biology and I find it ridiculous 60% of the students completely misunderstand evolution and will make the “progressive evolution” assumption and/or get angry at the fact they need to learn the material. It's amazing how many people forget how embedded evolution is in all organic related disciplines. I kind of feel bad for my nerdy old professor who has to deal with them in his office constantly and have his team of partners help them straighten them out.

Please tell me my university is one of the only ones where this happens...

[Legion]

I find it difficult to believe that anyone with an interest in anything remotely biological could deny that evolution has and is happening. But apparently this kind of thing happens more often than people might suspect.

 

I'm not sure but I think that it may have something to do with the fact that one can know all about physiology without knowing a thing about evolution. Likewise one can know all about evolution without knowing a thing about physiology.

 

I can't help but wonder how many doctors there are out there who deny that we have in fact evolved. Oh well, as long as they know their physiology I guess that we are relatively safe.

[Crunk Bishop]

i went to college at a liberal Christian university, and they taught evolution in the Bio department with verve... until the Trustees stepped in and pressured them into making a Creationist who was hired as a "Nursing" prof to head the science department.

[pandora]

Nope, you're not the only one. But I think my college is worse. One of my pre-pharmacy professors was a Creationist and gave me a Creationism magazine when I went to talk to him one day after I made my views known.

 

The student body is 80% Christian, and the conservative evangelical group Campus Crusade for Christ is the largest organization on campus (~300-400 weekly attendance and the student pop. is 5000).

 

However, apart from a few faculty I can count on one hand, the rest of the faculty is very liberal or at least very open-minded.

[chefranden]

I have a friend, an old platoon mate, that has a Phd in entomology (studies pesticides) and is a rabid creationist. I think that it just shows that humans don't relate to the world in a primarily logical/scientific fashion.

[Light_of_Reason]

My wife is an excellent practitioner of cognotive dissonance. She is a biology education major and is more than able to learn, know, and understand what she needs to be able to pass the classes and teach the material, while at the same time maintaining belief in creationism and young earth ideas.

 

I have no idea how a person can know and understand the things that she does and continue to hold the beliefs she does. She has told me that her parents taught her this to get through classes without having to change her beliefs. If this is so, I think her parents have done her a major life disservice.

 

Explaining to her how I am unable to perform this trick boggles her mind. That, for the most part, is the greatest gulf between our worlds. In her world, you can know and understand certain things while maintaining belief in contradictory things. In my world, this is impossible.