As is seen in the video above, Ron Paul shows a total lack of understanding of modern biology as he rejects science in response to a question on evolution.
This is not the first time I’ve noted that, despite his training as a physician, Paul has taken positions which vary from established science. Paul has supported legislation to eliminate the legal distinction between a zygote and a fully developed human. His support for the ban on so-called partial birth abortions can also be seen as taking an anti-science position considering the lack of medical validity of the term “partial birth abortion.”
While Ron Paul will never win a major party nomination or have enough influence on public policy to really matter, this is of some concern as Paul’s view does influence a small but noisy crowd. There are two general characteristics of the group which spams the internet supporting Paul: 1) they tend to follow their leader and lack the ability to think for themselves and 2) they are intolerant of the views of others and will spread their beliefs regardless of how absurd they are.
Just as Ron Paul’s followers have spent the last few days making lame excuses for Paul’s refusal to return the contribution from a white supremacist and neo-Nazi, we can now expect them to spam the blogosphere with all the usual bogus arguments given in favor of creationism.
This is entirely consistent with all of the personal conversatons I had with my boss Ron Paul, and his stated views on evolution to me, during my 12 years of employment with the man.
Ron Paul is surrounded personally by a number of hardcore Religious Conservatives, including his longtime Campaign Manager Marc Elam. Elam’s views on religious matters are in the extreme to say the least. You might say he’s a “Evolution Truther”.
Eric,
Yes, there is a correlation between the mind set which could lead to rejecting basic science and/or accepting conspiracy theories. There was even the inevitable response from a Paul supporter who didn’t care about Paul’s views on evolution because of all the other candidates being in the CFR. Of course the Paul cultists fail to understand the problems of having a president who rejects such basic science in the 21st century as they repeat the usual creationist lines opposing science.
“Ron Paul is surrounded personally by a number of hardcore Religious Conservatives…”
If Paul ever gets out of single digits it will be necessary to take a close look at the people Paul is surrounded by as the people a candidate will bring into their administration is important.
Such a look into the people that surround Ron Paul won’t be a pretty sight, I promise you. As kooky as Paul can be, his supporters and handlers are even more so. I can only think of one single sane person in the entire Ron Paul operation. The rest are all eccentrics in the extreme.
While we can’t blame Paul for people commenting on the internet, they are the supporters I see the most views of and the bulk of them are extremely kooky. They are far more racist/conspiracy theorists/states rights advocates than libertarians. Most also have difficulty expressing a coherent thought when they try to move beyond their own echo chamber where they can just discuss things with people who share their own warped world view.
Interesting. I’m very disappointed to learn that Ron Paul, a man which I had believed to be very intelligent, is a creationist. I really thought becomming a Doctor would fix such ridiculous notions.
Nonetheless, his political ideals still at least secure that people and corporations will have the freedom to do what they want – so in theory his own personal beleifs should not impede scientific advance in any way. He probably won’t provide much funding for scientific research – but that has nothing to do with his beliefs, just that he is advocating a small government, hence there shouldn’t be much funding for just about anything – they have to fend for themselves.
It is the only really fair system IMO.
An argument could certainly be made that Paul’s views don’t matter because he opposes government funding for education and scientific research. However the fact remains that we currently have a system of public schools and considerable public funding for scientific research and this isn’t going to change overnight. In coming years matters related to biology are going to continue to have an impact on public policy. Evolution is such a fundamental concept upon which biology is built that someone’s with Paul’s views cannot make intelligent decisions related to biolgical science.
Then there’s the basic question of the candidate’s intelligence and judgement. Even if I agreed with him on most other issues I’d have serious qualms about someone who expresses this degree of ignorance of science.
In the video, Paul is asked whether he thinks evolution is true or false. He replies that no one has absolute proof either way, but that it doesn’t bother him, doesn’t make any major difference, and that if it were the major campaign issue he would not be running.
None of which makes him a Creationist – an actual Creationist would differ with Dr. Paul on each one of the above points. Your headline is misleading.
His claim of a lack of evidence for evolution shows a profound ignorance of modern science at very least. He is merely repeating creationist memes and clearly appears to be on their side.
George Dance’s comments rings true to me. Maybe both creationism and darwinism should be removed from schools, as it clearly entails a religious preference (Science VS Church) The issue is more often used as a moral litmus test and has no place in federally funded institutions in the first place — either way you look at it
Science should certainly be taught in science classes in school and you cannot teach science without evolution. Evolution provides the framework of modern biology.
Science vs. Church is not a religious preference. Religion is based upon faith without evidence. Science requires proof of its validity–and evolution has withstood this test.
I hope I’m not being too confrontational here, but George and Brother are both morons. Paul said that evolution is a theory, and that he doesn’t buy it, showing a complete ignorance as to what a scientific theory is. He’s talking about common theory which is made up of guesses and conjecture. Scientific thoery, like the theory of evolution, theories of gravity, atomic theory, etc., are made of of a bunch of observational and tested facts (and also SOME conjecture) that attempt to teach us about a particular something that happens to factually exist, such as evolution, gravity and atoms. Scientific theory doesn’t graduate into fact or law, and them being called theories do not mean the things they are attemping to teach us about are not facts. Is the existence of atoms in question because there is a theory called atomic theory? No. Same is true of evolution. Atoms exist, gravity exists and evolution exists. Anyone who understands what evolution ACTUALLY means, instead of the fictional bullshit creationists have come up with to confuse the issue and make their religion look more like science, understands that evolution is very factual and very observable just by looking around and using your brain. Ron Paul needs to go back to school, learn what theory means, what evolution means, and then get back to us. Right now, he has no business being in charge of anything other than possibly a religious organization.
“I hope I’m not being too confrontational here…”
It would be preferable to simply show how far they are off on the facts. At that point, whether or not they are morons might be rather obvious.