Academics see rise of Muslim creationism
The New York Times has an interesting story this week about the apparently growing belief in creationism across the Muslim world. Kenneth Chang writes:
For many Muslims, even evolution and the notion that life flourished without the intervening hand of Allah is largely compatible with their religion. What many find unacceptable is human evolution, the idea that humans evolved from primitive primates. The Koran states that Allah created Adam, the first man, separately out of clay.Pervez A. Hoodbhoy, a prominent atomic physicist at Quaid-e-Azam University in Pakistan, said that when he gave lectures covering the sweep of cosmological history from the Big Bang to the evolution of life on Earth, the audience listened without objection to most of it. “Everything is O.K. until the apes stand up,” Dr. Hoodbhoy said.
Mentioning human evolution led to near riots, and he had to be escorted out. “That’s the one thing that will never be possible to bridge,” he said. “Your lineage is what determines your worth.”
Participants in a conference last month at Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass., said the rejection of evolution appears to be growing.
Chang quotes Truman State Univesity physicist Taner Edis as saying that he never encountered creationist undertones when he was growing up in Turkey in the 1970s: “I first noticed creationism when I came to America for graduate school,” he said.
But visiting a bookstore in Turkey some years later, Chang writes, Edis was surprised to find books about creationism filed in the science section.
The creationism in question is not of the young earth variety common among Christian fundamentalists, who take the six-day building project described in Genesis literally, and reckon the age of the universe at no more than 10,000 years. While the Quran also says the universe was created in six days, Chang writes, it also says that "day" is metaphorical: “a thousand years of your reckoning.”
Comments
In spite of the fact that animals change because of changes in their environment, for example in dryer weather some insects do better and in wetter weather others do better and tend to flourish, the theory that we evolved from apes is ridiculous. The closest thing to human apes is probably NFL players or the wrestlers you see on tv who dont really wrestle but put on a show like Hulk Hogan. What gets me is how many women go for them. I think it is because the women didnt have a strong father figure when they were younger, and the guys maybe had too strong of a father figure. Pointing that out to women doesnt help guys get dates, but that doesnt mean that guys should act like apes. Thanks.
Posted by: Clay | November 4, 2009 11:13 AM
Clay, I... that's... wow... Talk about feeding trolls. You didn't just toss them some peanuts, you gave 'em a bloody whole sit-down banquet...
Posted by: Brian | November 4, 2009 11:21 PM
Ah Clay, you're having trouble getting dates. I actually agree with you on this one! I hate the assiduous overeating sons of guns too--the obsessive body builders, who have to admire their biceps in every shiny surface that reflects their contours and silhouettes. But what has that got to do with creationism dear God believer? You are having a stream of consciousness bout and have gone off topic. So you don't believe that men could have come from the apes? You haven't heard of Ardipithecus Ramidis--Ardi for short--4 feet tall, 100 lbs, she could climb like the apes and walk like humans, and you haven't heard of Ida, discovered in Germany a proto ancestor of humans and apes, she was only 9 months old when she died, and she gave birth to different branches of creatures--the lemurs and other exotics and the apes and the humans. The Muslims come out of the woodworks and claim the story of creation as their own. When it comes to stupidities there are many adopters and imitators. The outrage is the classification of these fables as science and the thrusting of creationism down the gullets of students as inquiry equivalent to science. The great apes are beautiful creatures. They live in complex colonies, they frolic and play with abandon, they protect their young fiercely, they have fascinating pecking orders and they are keenly intelligent. We have slaughtered them for fun, tortured them during war and peace times, we have experimented upon them, separated ape mothers from their offspring, invaded their habitats and chased them into higher and higher ground in Africa. They look on us with despair and fear and we don't want to be descended from the apes? We want to keep our pedigree pure by claiming descent from a man made out clay called Adam and a woman called Eve who danced the tango with a serpent? What the hell is wrong with the God believers?
Ravensfan Anon
Posted by: Anonymous | November 5, 2009 9:58 AM
Actually satan I am trying to decide what to do with a woman who seems to want me more than I may want her. The bible says that before Noah's flood that there were giants on the earth. They were all killed in the flood, which for your info scientists all agree on the fact that there was one, and we are all descendents of Noah and his sons and their wives. Since Abraham came after Noah, that kind of makes us all Jewish. We came from the same family as Abraham. Anyway I dont believe that those giants were descended from apes. Even if they were and God wanted to wipe them out because they were even worse than most NFL players, we are all descendents of Adam and Eve, as Noah was. We were not a result of any evolution. You can condure up all the missing links you want, and if some creature came out of them it wasnt one of my ancestors and it wasnt the ancestor of anyone in sports either. I hope you dont mind being part Jewish. Please get with the program. Thanks.
Posted by: Clay | November 5, 2009 1:27 PM
Clay,
You have an infantile mind and you are a goner. This women must be a nut case. There is no redemption for thee. Perhaps those giants were apes and any ape in Africa probably thinks a bit deeper than you are capable of doing.
Ravensfan Anon
Posted by: Anonymous | November 5, 2009 3:04 PM
Clay - Christains can't be ignorant to facts/science. Ardi's a beauty indeed! We don't know for certain, but what if we did have a tie to her? It could be very possible. Doesn't change that we (humans) are spiritual beings. As far as taking Genesis literally? 7day's creation, flood ... etc, etc, I would be careful Clay, you may get trumped on that one. I mean you don't believe the earth is only 2000 years old too do you?
Posted by: pattycakes | November 5, 2009 8:03 PM
Who is Ardi? I remember Arby's roast beef but I havent heard of Ardi. I dont think we had a tie to anyone other than Adam and Eve, regardless of whether or not some ape/human ever existed. They were killed in the flood if they did. Having Hulk Hogan is bad enough. Perhaps one day in creation was a lot longer, and that explains how the earth could be older. I dont believe any real evidence of evolution has ever been found. Natural selection, yes, but not evolution for humans. And Anon, who knows? I may keep the woman. Eve made mistakes and Adam kept her. If not, we wouldnt be here. Thanks.
Posted by: Clay | November 6, 2009 9:57 AM