Science for Idiots (Idiots like me...)

Over on Coffee Bean's brilliant 'An Uneducated Housewife's Guide to Politics' there is all sorts of angry debate going on, encompassing many topics, including the perennial discussion about creationism versus evolution.

One of the angriest voices has been mine - simply because the whole existence of 'creationist doctrine' continues to astonish me.

Living in America, I'm often astonished at how similar things are to life in Britain. Oh, sure, the accent and the weather is different, but things are largely the same, aren't they?

Well, it stuff like creationism (and maple syrup on bacon, but I digress) that throws into sharp relief how different things in America actually are.

Here in the United States, people - and I'm talking about a lot of people - actually believe that the world was created in six days, exactly as it's written in the Bible.

This truly astonishes me.

For the most part, I like to think I'm fairly open minded and slip quite effortlessly into the conventions of different cultures. However, I find this particular one very difficult to swallow.

Over on Coffee Bean's blog, I haven't been altogether gentlemanly in my discussions. The words 'religious nutjob' and 'idiot' have passed my (virtual) lips more than once. This really isn't very mature of me. I should simply accept that other people have opinions different to my own (and then I should take the time to explain to them, in very simple terms, why they're wrong.)

Which is the point of the next few posts. I'm not a scientist - but I am a reasonably literate human being. I'm going to explain what I believe and why I believe it.

Now, as arrogant and opinionated as I am, I'm not always right. In fact, I'm not even often right! So there may be typos and errors in the next few posts that people should be more than willing to point out (for example, in a previous post I described the Earth as being 150 million years old. In fact, it's more like 5 billion years old.)

However, everything I write is going to be based in fact and science. I'm sorry, but evidence I can see and touch with my own two hands will always trump what's written in a two thousand year old religious text - no matter how 'inerrant' irrational people claim it to be.

Let the fun begin...