Posted by Bob 2 on August 31, 1998 at 00:44:28:
In Reply to: Nuts and losers posted by Mike on August 30, 1998 at 19:07:17:
I fully agree that the real "beast" is religion, and in this country, primarily Christian religion. However, when we engage in overly scientific arguments that the general public doesn’t understand, (or doesn’t want to understand), the religionists/creationists often win by appealing to the public’s emotions. When we win a debate with religionists/creationists we only satisfy our own egos. That’s all they are doing. They are not interested in science or society except as means to an end.
Creationists and religionists are people trying to make up for their insecurities by trying to see themselves as righteous crusaders for "The Cause" because it’s easier and more comforting than admitting that they are, who they really are. Logic and reason are only weapons for their "ego crusade", not their ultimate goal.
Trying to make logical debates with illogical people, we get nowhere. Religionists are the masters of denial and subterfuge. That's why religion has lasted so long. The Bible is the bible for professional liars and scoundrels. It’s so powerful that most of those who use it for deceptive purposes, often don’t even know they are doing it. Think about how powerful that is. The tricksters who put that morass of ridiculous tales together, created a work that controlled the lives of their victims by making the victims control themselves. Even creationists who claim not to be motivated by it, really are. The foundation of their illogic is religion.
We are right about logic and evolution and we know it. Even the ancients who wrote the creation myths that the biblical authors distorted, knew it. All of the myths of the Bible are allegorical descriptions of evolution. Yet even they couldn’t stop the tricksters from destroying their work. The real trick is not only to discredit our competitors inferior product, we need to better sell our product. To do that effectively we need to understand what the public likes and dislikes just like the graduate snake oil salesman of the world do. You know who I’m talking about, Sadam, Clinton, Regan, Rush, Pat, Jerry, etc.
That’s why automobile advertisers use emotional imagining instead of detailed descriptions of their product’s features as they did in the past, because they know that emotion sells better than logic. In other words, to use a machine designer’s term "kiss it" (keep it simple stupid). I have no problem with real scientific discussion on the many theories of evolution, but the general public will never understand the intricacies of evolutionary principle. Arguing with creationists is useless. To win over the public, we need to make creationism look just plain silly by letting the creationists make themselves look silly. (Monty Python showed that better than anyone) At the same time we need to describe the "logic of evolution" in the most simple terms and make it palatable. Kind of the way the "Scopes Trial" did.
That is the dual purpose of my methodology. First, give no credibility to religion. Just trying to debate a religionist you give him (and religion) credibility. This was our president’s biggest mistake. From the first question about Monica, he should have said, " I will not even entertain that question". This way the inquisitor has to make his own credibility, instead of having it handed to him. Second, make the concept of evolution simple, easy to understand and palatable. This is what’s needed to make evolution really popular again, thereby not giving the religionists any ground.
The final frontier of science is the mind. Creationism Vs Evolution is really a debate about sanity Vs insanity. In the final analysis, the peace, stability, and cultural evolution of civilization can only be achieved by making sanity popular and easily replicable.