guaranteed stupid

You're not very clear, but you seem to be equating political opinion to scientific consensus. Whereas, if I call for a rigorous review of both Dem and Repub political opinions, you seem to think that I should then call for a likewise objective review of both sides of the evolution debate.

Science doesn't really work like that. A lot of people don't seem to understand that, which is why we get all the "teach the controversy" garbage.
 
Neither side can answer my question, what created earth, then what was there before there was an earth, and what created that?

Nobody on either side can answer that question, I can play the what created that game all day long and no science or belief can concretely answer my question.

If you want to explore those subjects as electives and possible reality that is fine with local funding and approval from the elected school board, NO Federal Money on theories or beliefs.
 
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Yep - I am angry. I'm angry with the politicians who have manipulated the principles upon which our country was founded and turned it into a welfare state. And I'm also old - old enough to remember the time in the 50s when people still accepted individual responsibility and didn't wait for the federal government to solve their problems. Do those points also make me "stupid?"

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Husker those are all reasonable postions. Where "stupid" enters the picture is when people start ascribing bizarre motivations for behavior or opposing viewpoint and calling names and instead of genuinely engaging on issues with facts or informed opinions.. I think it's easy to spot where "stupid" enters West Mall simply by scrolling through this thread. Watch when the insults start and when folks start to label and dinigrate. By the way, "stupid" is bipartisan and accepts input from both the left and from the right.
 
It would behoove some here to read this explanation of facts and theory by Stephen Gould. Someone else (paso? GT WT?) posted this in another thread. This covers a lot of the mistakes regarding "it's just a theory" comments and the misunderstanding about facts.



The basic attack of modern creationists falls apart on two general counts before we even reach the supposed factual details of their assault against evolution. First, they play upon a vernacular misunderstanding of the word "theory" to convey the false impression that we evolutionists are covering up the rotten core of our edifice. Second, they misuse a popular philosophy of science to argue that they are behaving scientifically in attacking evolution. Yet the same philosophy demonstrates that their own belief is not science, and that "scientific creationism" is a meaningless and self-contradictory phrase, an example of what Orwell called "newspeak."

In the American vernacular, "theory" often means "imperfect fact"—part of a hierarchy of confidence running downhill from fact to theory to hypothesis to guess. Thus creationists can (and do) argue: evolution is "only" a theory, and intense debate now rages about many aspects of the theory. If evolution is less than a fact, and scientists can't even make up their minds about the theory, then what confidence can we have in it? Indeed, President Reagan echoed this argument before an evangelical group in Dallas when he said (in what I devoutly hope was campaign rhetoric): "Well, it is a theory. It is a scientific theory only, and it has in recent years been challenged in the world of science—that is, not believed in the scientific community to be as infallible as it once was."

Well, evolution is a theory. It is also a fact. And facts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts do not go away when scientists debate rival theories to explain them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's, but apples did not suspend themselves in mid-air, pending the outcome. And humans evolved from apelike ancestors whether they did so by Darwin's proposed mechanism or by some other, yet to be discovered.

Moreover, "fact" does not mean "absolute certainty." The final proofs of logic and mathematics flow deductively from stated premises and achieve certainty only because they are not about the empirical world. Evolutionists make no claim for perpetual truth, though creationists often do (and then attack us for a style of argument that they themselves favor). In science, "fact" can only mean "confirmed to such a degree that it would be perverse to withhold provisional assent." I suppose that apples might start to rise tomorrow, but the possibility does not merit equal time in physics classrooms.

Evolutionists have been clear about this distinction between fact and theory from the very beginning, if only because we have always acknowledged how far we are from completely understanding the mechanisms (theory) by which evolution (fact) occurred. Darwin continually emphasized the difference between his two great and separate accomplishments: establishing the fact of evolution, and proposing a theory—natural selection—to explain the mechanism of evolution. He wrote in The Descent of Man: "I had two distinct objects in view; firstly, to show that species had not been separately created, and secondly, that natural selection had been the chief agent of change. . . . Hence if I have erred in . . . having exaggerated its [natural selection's] power . . . I have at least, as I hope, done good service in aiding to overthrow the dogma of separate creations."
 
Mr. Deez:

I appreciate your rhetorical style, and absolutely agree that ridiculing people who hold an opposing view is counter-productive and uncivil.

Having said that, I strongly encourage you to read the scientific evidence substantiating that species have originated and evolved through natural selection. It really isn’t a close call. I suppose it could still be called a “theory” to the extent with respect to the actual mechanism – random mutations creating genetic fitness and self-propagating as a result (although even this has been directly observed in microorganisms). The evolution itself, however, is factual in the sense that there is direct evidence (fossil, dna, geologic) establishing it.

Also, I mean "theory" in the scientific sense, not in the common usage in this country where it gets interchanged with "hypothesis."

I am not a scientist by profession, but there is quite a bit of good information for the lay person to read. Jerry Coyne’s “Why Evolution is True” is one example, but you can also read shorter summaries, including in National Geographic (recently with “What Darwin didn’t Know).
 
Another good source in this conversation is Francis Collins’ The Language of God.

Collins is a widely respected physician and geneticist, and a devout Christian, and in this book he has basically said that the argument about evolution is over: it happened. But this doesn’t have to conflict with biblical belief or divine creation as the origin of life.

Whatever our thoughts about the emergence of living organisms, the reality of evolution by natural selection is a beautiful thing, in my opinion, and speaks to the amazing power and resilience of life on earth.
 
Clearly the Genesis story was a parable and any intelligent person would see that. You simply cannot take it literally. In fact, the story contradicts itself.
 
So then how are you defining "more religious"?
From your link:

“It all falls down to what you consider to be religious,” said Schwadel, an assistant professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. “If it’s simply attending religious services, then no. Highly educated people are not less religious; in fact, they’re more religious.”

“But if it’s saying the Bible is the literal word of God and saying that only one religion is the true religion, then they are less religious,” he continued.
 
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