Why are So Many Chemists Creationists?
An evolution educator said a disproportionate number of chemists believe in creationism when compared to other scientists.
Why are So Many Chemists Creationists?
I have plenty to report on the American Chemical Society taking place this week, but my weekly column deadline looms, so for now I’ll just offer this provocative statement by Eugenie Scott, who is executive director of the National Center for Science Education. She spoke Tuesday at an all-day seminar devoted to communicating controversial areas of science.
In an engaging talk, titled, “It’s not just about the science” she noted that a disproportionate number of chemists denied evolution when compared with scientists in other disciplines. (Scientists on the whole are of course much less likely to be creationists than members of the general public). She said she thought the elevated incidence of creationism in chemistry had to do with the fact that chemistry doesn’t have a historical component, and so chemists think differently from other scientists.
I would modify that to say some chemists can get away with the type of magical thinking that can lead to creationism. It is possible to believe in supernatural entities, and even use them to fill gaps in scientific knowledge, and still do good work in some sub-fields of chemistry, engineering and other technical disciplines. In an earlier column we heard from a physical chemist who was also a creationist. Such people can be good, competent contributors to American competitiveness. They’re still wrong.
She was followed by Caltech chemistry professor Nate Lewis, who used a historical component to help the audience understand the possible consequences of radically altering our atmosphere’s carbon dioxide. It will take thousands of years for the earth’s atmosphere to revert to the state it was in before the industrial revolution, he said.
His talk, titled “Where in the world will our energy come from?” ended on a pro-chemistry note. Finding an efficient and affordable way to store and distribute solar energy is a chemistry problem, he said, and if chemists don’t solve the problem nobody will.
Whoever does solve it can even be forgiven for believing in creationism.
The reason so many chemists are creationists is because they're smart!
CREATION 101 with Dr. Ed Neeland
http://www.kcc.net/cgblog/42/CREATION-101-with-Dr-Ed-Neeland.html— dab- So many chemists (and engineers) are creationists is that they know how things work! Chemists know that proteins don't form spontaneously from amino acids, etc. And engineers, such as the late Jules H. Poirier
http://creation.com/jules-h-poirier
know that complex well-functioning machines need a lot of work to design and maintain.— dab - dab, are you serious? Your first quote ("because the're smart!") is vacuous and circular. The second statement thoroughly confuses actions (how chemicals interact and certain conditions in which chemicals can appear) with origins (other/all potential conditions in which chemicals can form).
Also please do not confuse evolution (what this article is about) with exogenesis.— dr-steve - Hmmm interesting theory dab, so i guess i must've done magic when i put together those peptides i synthesized from fmoc amino acids in my lab last week. And the synthesis group must've done some nifty voodoo to make the fmoc amino acids in their lab earlier this month. Clearly biochemistry is all smoke and mirrors and hundreds of people who think they know the chemistry behind proteins spend thousands of hours making stuff up to put in peer reviewed journals.— endospores
- "Chemists know that proteins don't form spontaneously from amino acids, etc. And engineers,..."
I think Bruce Merrifield would have something to say about that statement.— Aquanerd09 - There are few fields of science that show so explicitly the unlikelihood of the Rube Goldberg machine of life happening by chance as much as chemistry does.— FromNoahtoHercules
In pursuit of her stories, writer Faye Flam has weathered storms in Greenland, gotten frost nip at the South Pole, and floated weightless aboard NASA’s zero-g plane. She has a degree in geophysics from the California Institute of Technology and started her writing career with the Economist. She later took on the particle physics and cosmology beat at Science Magazine before coming to the Inquirer in 1995. Her previous science column, “Carnal Knowledge,” ran from 2005 to 2008. Her new column and blog, Planet of the Apes, explores the topic of evolution and runs here and in the Inquirer’s health section each Monday. Email Faye at fflam@phillynews.com.
Reach Planet of the at fflam@phillynews.com.
