Thinking About Evolution

[Ex-COG]

Interesting blog I ran across that tries to answer the question "How do people think about evolution?". He presents three factors that make the job of biology teachers more difficult when they're trying to teach evolution, either to children or adults.

1. Intuitive theism, in which our intuitions lead us to make design inferences about complex kinds or under conditions of uncertainty; intuitions that can be reinforced culturally to an extent that it may be almost impossible to overcome them by the time we reach adulthood.

2. Intuitive essentialism, which causes us to believe that biological kinds have hidden internal essences which determine what they are, how they will behave, and what features they should have, and which may make us interpret evidence of adaptation in transformationalist, rather than Darwinian/modern biological varationist terms.

3. The role of explanatory power in determining the value of beliefs, and the fact that we may resist explaining our most cherished beliefs in order to avoid devaluing them.

 

Number three may be the biggest hurdle to jump. With the role that home schooling/private church schooling takes in many evangelical/fundamentalist families, it's quite possible for a person to have only heard the Creationist side of the story growing up, making it near impossible to convince them of evolution as an adult.

 

But then I think that the church used to control education in Europe at one time (think Middle Ages), and people still managed to break out of the mold. Most people did resist evidence that proved their beliefs wrong, but enough persevered in questioning to break the grip of complete church control, making the way for modern scholarship and discoveries.

 

Give it a read and tell me what you think.

 

Thinking About Evolution

[Zach]

I agree, those are real and difficult hurdles to jump. But just think how counter-intuitive it is to accept the idea that the earth revolves around the sun, and not the other way around.