Here's the infuriating thing about this discussion (and far too many others in the dead season):
Because some don't accept the same theories as fact that others do, those who have a different viewpoint are painted as uneducated, backward, mentally deficient or ignorant.
That's ridiculous. I've been to college. Grew up in a college atmosphere (both parents are/were college professors) where I was taught to think, study and research. Was taught to be intelligent enough to change my views as I gathered more information. Was taught to look past the surface and try to see the true motivations for things. Taught to stick to what I know and learned regardless of what public opinion was, particularly if I'd done the research.
I've looked at the global warming/cooling/change issue and done so since the 70s. I've heard both sides. Ice heard the hysteria and seen essentially the same evidence interpreted in vastly different ways. I've also seen unbiased evidence that shows that the "change" idiots like Kerry freak out about is naturally occurring and has naturally occurred for millions of years. I watched people like him scream about a coming ice age because we were polluting the planet so we spent trillions and ceded control to the government to strangle the coal and timber industries. We cleaned it up so well that now we are all gonna burn!!
I looked at the evidence over a long span of time from a variety of sources and I made up my mind. Just because you choose to believe something different doesn't give you the intellectual high ground.
That I can sort of accept.
But when you drift off into categorizing everyone who believes in God and accepts the fact that the wonders of this earth are divinely inspired as snake-handling, Jesus-rode-a-dinosaur, high school drop out, foot washing, duck dynasty watching, tent revival shouting dimwit, that is patently offensive.
I may not be the smartest guy in this room, but I'm not some unwashed rube either. To claim that because I don't accept your "maybe there was lightning that hit some mud and accidentally formed DNA" hypothesis means I'm somehow less intelligent or less educated or less civilized as you is patently absurd.
And to further that by proposing that anyone with a tenth grade education most certainly believes as you do completely flies in the face of every shred of evidence that exists. Otherwise all the churches in the state would be abandoned.
I'm smart enough to recognize that science and religion are not mutually exclusive. That many religions share similar origin stories and values and codes of morality, so I'm not even talking just about Christianity.
You claim people like me are close minded. What you fail to recognize is that you are far more close minded than I because you refuse to consider the possibility of something you can't see or hear.
For what it's worth I was a raging liberal democrat who trusted nothing but what I thought I could prove scientifically when I was in my 20s. As I've gotten older, lived in this world, had children, suffered loss, developed my own work ethic, bought a house, paid taxes and watched the cycle of life all of that has changed. The only people I grew up with who remained liberal and democrat are those who inherited a family fortune or those who took government jobs. All of us who had to work our way through? We lean more conservative.
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