On a regular basis the well-known polling organization Gallup will do a survey on what people believe regarding human origins. Because they gather such data insights like this it is not just a measurement of what people believe to be true right now, it also enables us to see how such beliefs have changed and evolved over time (yes sorry, I could not resist popping the word “evolved” in there, it was too hard to resist such a temptation).
Things have not remained static. Vast numbers of people have altered their views.
Spoiler, it’s an ongoing win for rationality and common sense … and yet vast numbers have quite some way to go.
I’ll take you through the details shortly, but first I have a couple of preliminary things to mull over. If some of it comes across as a bit of a rant against some deeply whacky “thinking”, then that’s because it is.
Key preliminary Point – Voting on Reality
Let’s start with this. There is one vitally important point to make, one that is very obvious, and yet still needs to be pointed out – We don’t get to vote on reality.
If everybody sincerely believed that magic invisible pink unicorns actually existed and ran everything, then such a prevailing omnipresent belief does not make it true. (Sarcasm mode on) Clearly the unicorns do of course exist – how can you dare to doubt a divineness coupled with a powerful magic that enables them to be both pink and also invisible at the same time. I have absolutely no evidence for this, you just need to trust me that it is all true and not be tempted by the black unicorn to doubt, you need to have faith, it’s a test. It is also all clearly documented by Saint Terry Pratchett within his divinely inspired Diskworld gospel, so you have no excuses, and will face eternity in Gre’thor instead of being rewarded with divine bliss in Sto’Vo’Kor if you don’t embrace the truth. (Sarcasm mode back off)
Well yes, a gullibility test perhaps, and yes I’m mocking. Because so many have worked ever so hard to promote the claim that mythology is fact, and have dismissed verifiable fact as myth, then proceeded to label myself and others as crazy when it has been suggested (politely) that their hypothesis might not be correct, then yes, we earned the right to mock the utterly absurd.
I sincerely stand in awe of the thought that we as a species have managed to put aside a great deal of superstition and replaced it with a far better fact-based grasp of our origins. We still have a long way to go and there is also much we don’t yet know, and many have yet to catch up, but we are indeed making real progress in putting aside the things that are not true and embracing insights that are confirmed to not be wrong.
Why not say “Right” instead of “Not Wrong”?
Basically because it is open to modification if new insights are obtained.
What exactly does “God did it” mean?
Let’s also briefly cover this off as well. The survey itself has a percentage for the number of people that believe that a god created humans in their present form. Rather obviously this is a religious belief and not a scientific one.
You will no doubt also encounter, “Yes, but science confirms …“. No stop, it does not. The attempt to do this involves stripping away all religious terms and strives to make the case for what is termed “Intelligent Design”. To be clear, the number of credible peer-reviewed scientific papers published within reputable scientific journals that have successfully established a case for “Intelligent Design” is more or less zero.
Just yesterday I was advised …
atheists in a sort have to have faith since most scientific discoveries are pointing toward intelligent design. It would take possibly 2.2 trillion years for this world to evolve without an alien force of some kind influencing this planet.
I did ask for an example of just one scientific discovery that pointed towards intelligent design, and also asked where he got his 2.2 trillion year number from. Inevitably, as you might guess, the response has been crickets.
Seeing a percentage of those that embrace “god did it” might suggest that there is a consensus on that. Another point I wish to make is that there is no such consensus at all. The arena marked “God did it” contains a vast diversity of belief.
Just to give you the idea, here are the major variations …
- Young Earth creationism – Planet earth, and for some also he entire universe, is younger than 10,000 years old
- Gap creationism – The scientifically verified age of earth is correct, but there is no evolution, just a recent worldwide flood.
- Progressive creationism – scientific age is correct, also there was no flood, and primates were created asis by god
- Intelligent design – basically religion without all the religious jargon, so the word god is replaced with “Intelligent Designer”.
There is also what is termed Theistic evolution (evolutionary creationism) … as in – everything science says it true, but a god guided it all.
OK, let’s park all this now and get into what the latest Gallup data reveals.
Gallup insights into what people believe
The Gallup Press Release dated July 22, 2024 can be found here. The actual data was collected a couple of months ago (May 1-23).
If curious, then here is the complete question responses and trends (PDF download).
The last time they collected such data was 2019, so what does the latest data now reveal?
Basically this …
The big increasing trend is that 24% embrace the scientific understanding. That’s very close to a quarter of the entire population. This is most probably a consequence of the rising “none” demographic.
- Back in 1982 this was only 9%
Another 34% do also accept the prevailing scientific consensus, but because they are religious, they also embrace the idea that this is how the god they believe in did it all.
- This one has remained fairly flat and has bounced up and down between a high of 40% in 1999, and a low of 31% in 2014
Finally we have 37% who roll with “Fuck Science, God did it all by magic“. Well yes, we do also live in a world where many deem the convicted felon and sexual predator to be the chosen one of god, so clearly stuff like evidence and facts do not matter.
- This sounds bad, but wait, it is actually a good news item. They have been doing polls like this for over four decades, and in all that time 37% is the lowest this has ever been.
You might also wonder about the observation that 24% + 34% + 37% only adds up to 95%, so what about the other 5%. They simply refused to answer the question.
Let’s break this all down a bit more by subgroup
You can drill down into further detail like this …
We can see the expected …
- Regular attendees of religious services lean away from a God playing no role in human origins.
- Conservatives lean more into some variation of “A God was involved”
- Nones lean strongly into “no God involved”
- The more educated you are the more inclined you are to lean away from Creationism.
Why are 37% of the Population so stupid?
Actually, I’m going to push back against that by suggesting that it is neither stupidity nor a lack of education that is in play.
Back in the 1950s psychologist Solomon Asch conducted a rather fascinating experiment. Here it is …
On the left in a card showing you a line. One the right you can see three different lines … A, B and C.
A group of participants would be asked to pick A B or C as the line that matched the one on the left. All the participants, except one was an actor. They were instructed to pick the wrong one, and the actual lone participant who went last then faced a choice … does he push against the entire group and pick B as the right one, or does he instead go along with what everybody before him picked, the wrong answer.
Yes, you can see exactly where this is no going. In many cases the one real participant would always align with the group, reject the very obviously right answer, and go for the wrong answer.
This is known as the Asch conformity experiments …
In the actor condition also, the majority of participants’ responses remained correct (64.3%), but a sizable minority of responses conformed to the actors’ (incorrect) answer (35.7%). The responses revealed strong individual differences: 12% of participants followed the group in nearly all of the tests. 26% of the sample consistently defied majority opinion, with the rest conforming on some trials …
…Regarding the study results, Asch stated: “That intelligent, well-meaning young people are willing to call white black is a matter of concern.”
Yea, no kidding, and yet here we are.
If you live in a community, family, or church, where everybody around you tells you that Science is BS and “God did it” is right, then a good chunk of the population will conform to the group belief.
We are social animals and so belonging to a group and being accepted means that we embrace the prevailing ideas and beliefs. The alternative is to be cast out. Many will strive to avoid that social death.
Peer Pressure: The Candace Owens Theory
On July 29 she recently promoted this claim on her show…
… we have a creator. Right? We have a Bible that tells us the story of exactly what happened. And then it takes some modern Satanists to come around and to convince you that actually you’re from an ape. No, like, they’re like, this is this is science. It’s science, guys. You come from apes. You were an Australopithecus, and then you were like, oh, and then one day you started walking erect, homo erectus, you started walking around, and now you can speak and, yeah, the chimps are still here and you — you share a DNA with them. You’re — you come from monkeys. And there are people that believe that because trust the science. Right? They pollute our bodies every single day …
Did she really say this?
Yes, she really did along with a great deal more nonsense.
So there you go then – all you naughty people have rejected bible “truth” and embraced Science because (*checks notes*) “some modern Satanists came around and convinced you“.
My point is this. There have always been in-group personalities like her banging the creationism drum while promoting utter BS as “truth”, and so those within the group reject our scientific understanding and instead embrace superstitious nonsense.
These can be smart intelligent people conforming to the group.
That’s why we still have 37%.
One Last Thought – Pat Robertson also had a few thoughts on stuff like this
Yes “that” Pat Robertson, the one who would often make wild and totally crazy religious claims, but has now passed away, and so we have all almost forgotten about him.
… I don’t think most Christians are stupid enough to believe that other…
Narrator Voice Over in my head: “Oh yes they are“
…The other is the Ussher theory… if you added all the generations from Adam until the current time, and you say, “Alright, that adds up to 7,000. Okay. And so, therefore, the Earth’s only 7000 years old.” Well, that’s just nonsense.
I mean, there are just too many geological factors, too many things that have happened on our Earth. The Earth is about 14 billion years old, and there’s just no question about it.
You’ve got the dinosaurs. You’ve got all the things that have happened on this Earth. And there’s too much geology, I mean, it’s just established science.
Wait what! … Pat Robertson calling Biblical literalists “stupid” and being pro-science?
Yes, that was indeed the sound of hell freezing over.
It’s sad of course that he promoted so much nonsense, but on this (to my complete astonishment), he was actually right. That’s perhaps a cue for a comment regarding a stopped clock being right twice a day.
Perhaps the best way to sum all this up – The Onion
Back in 2009 they had this …
Satire often is the best response to ridiculous ideas, even if they are popular.