Monday, November 27, 2006
To: The Canton Observer
Re: Letters to the Editor, Nov. 23.
In recent letters to the editor about religious faith and science, I was dismayed to see that certain common misconceptions about evolution still exist in people’s minds.
The number one misconception is that science somehow knows and teaches how life began; it does not and therefore you will not learn about the origin of life in science class unless and until solid evidence is available to make a scientific assumption possible. In plain words, right now, science cannot tell you how life began and therefore cannot discount the involvement of a supernatural force and does not.
The other great misconception is about the word “theory”. In common usage a theory is not a fact but more like a guess or a hunch waiting to be proven. In science, theories like the theory of evolution or the gravitational theory do not become facts through the accumulation of evidence; theories are the end points of science as defined by the National Academy of Sciences.
Men could not be sent to the moon if gravitational theory was just someone’s gut feeling. The flu virus would not change every year, certain bacteria could not become drug resistant, and mosquitoes could not become resistant to insecticides without the forces of evolution being present. The theory of evolution is the cornerstone of biology, without it nothing would make sense.
That is not to say that questions do not still exists in the field of evolution. Darwin posited in 1859 that evolution occurs through natural selection or the survival of the fittest. His hypothesis, although still conceptually sound, has undergone some adjustment and expansion. We now can document mutation on a genetic level and have found that some mutations occur by pure chance and their survival or demise is then governed by natural selection.
Copernicus and Galileo were condemned by the Catholic Church for stating that the earth revolves around the sun and not that the sun revolves around the earth, as Church teaching avowed. Pope John Paul II apologized before he died for the Church’s grievous error and deplorable treatment of Galileo; one of many examples of why religion and science should be kept as separate disciplines.
Science and religion play important roles in many of our daily lives. They do not have to be viewed as adversarial. I feel it is important to first dispel misconceptions as a way of promoting genuine dialog.
To: The Canton Observer
Re: Letters to the Editor, Nov. 23.
In recent letters to the editor about religious faith and science, I was dismayed to see that certain common misconceptions about evolution still exist in people’s minds.
The number one misconception is that science somehow knows and teaches how life began; it does not and therefore you will not learn about the origin of life in science class unless and until solid evidence is available to make a scientific assumption possible. In plain words, right now, science cannot tell you how life began and therefore cannot discount the involvement of a supernatural force and does not.
The other great misconception is about the word “theory”. In common usage a theory is not a fact but more like a guess or a hunch waiting to be proven. In science, theories like the theory of evolution or the gravitational theory do not become facts through the accumulation of evidence; theories are the end points of science as defined by the National Academy of Sciences.
Men could not be sent to the moon if gravitational theory was just someone’s gut feeling. The flu virus would not change every year, certain bacteria could not become drug resistant, and mosquitoes could not become resistant to insecticides without the forces of evolution being present. The theory of evolution is the cornerstone of biology, without it nothing would make sense.
That is not to say that questions do not still exists in the field of evolution. Darwin posited in 1859 that evolution occurs through natural selection or the survival of the fittest. His hypothesis, although still conceptually sound, has undergone some adjustment and expansion. We now can document mutation on a genetic level and have found that some mutations occur by pure chance and their survival or demise is then governed by natural selection.
Copernicus and Galileo were condemned by the Catholic Church for stating that the earth revolves around the sun and not that the sun revolves around the earth, as Church teaching avowed. Pope John Paul II apologized before he died for the Church’s grievous error and deplorable treatment of Galileo; one of many examples of why religion and science should be kept as separate disciplines.
Science and religion play important roles in many of our daily lives. They do not have to be viewed as adversarial. I feel it is important to first dispel misconceptions as a way of promoting genuine dialog.
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