Chance?

Another area where science education is sorely lacking.

The managing editor of World Net Daily has a long piece on bad ideas that have been sold by popular (leftist) culture and the media. He compares it with the matrix, from the so titled movie.

He points out how all the people who sang the praises of President Reagan after he died sang a much different tune while he was President. Back then, he was a dunce who was going to wreck the economy and drag us into World War III. Or maybe he was Satan incarnate who was going to wreck the economy and drag us into World War III.

Now, enter the Matrix, Kupelian's analogy to the world being projected by the mainstream media.

...the scary fact is that the media – both news and entertainment – are literally the creators and sustainers of what most of us perceive as reality, very much like the malevolent computer program in "The Matrix" film trilogy.

Well, not really. The computer program knew it was projecting a falsehood. I still think, giving as much benefit of the doubt as I can, the mainstream media has bought into a vision. This vision shapes their view of the world, and establishes filters through which perceptions and ideas are sieved. Only those which are compatible with the vision make it through.

And to make matters worse, the process that all their associates go through, from high school to college journamism classes to job interviews, filter out any people whose visions may clash with the organization's vision.

This matrix is not imposed from without; it is carefully built by its inhabitants.

And this sort of matrix is not the exclusive property of the Secular Left.

Kupelian gives a wonderful example of a vision gone wrong from the perspective of the Religious Right.

To demonstrate the real-life matrix programming we consider our reality, let's momentarily set aside the news media and focus on one of the most stunning and audacious real-life matrix programs currently running. I'm referring to what we call "evolution." <snip> In the days prior to the evolution matrix program.... Looking in every direction, we humans beheld not only fantastic complexity, diversity and order, but also the supreme intelligence behind creation, as brashly evident as the noonday sun. <snip> Ever since Darwin and his successors succeeded in loading the evolution matrix program on mankind – a fantastic theory for which there is no proof, and many serious problems – when we now walk outside and look at the created universe, what do many of us see? Chance!

BZZZZZZT!!!

Wrong!

Darwin's model includes small, random variations, and natural selection. In fact, it's so well established, organizations like Answers In Genesis have quit arguing against it. They postulate, with no supporting evidence, some sort of barrier beyond which change cannot go. Why can't change go beyond that barrier? It just can't. Accept it.

Yes, mutations occur by chance. However, natural selection, just like any other kind of selection, is the very antithesis of chance.

Evolution has been studied for nearly a century and a half by dedicated researchers, all of whom work in a field where the best way to make a name for yourself is to overturn the established order. (Ever hear of Einstein? Stephen Hawking?) If these flaws existed in the fundamental notion of evolution, the best way to achieve undying fame would be to demonstrate them once and for all.

Certain words are red flags.

When someone discussing evolution brings up the phrase "only chance", or someone discussing the Iraq War brings up "Bush's lies", I know where he's coming from. I know I'm talking to someone who's been sold a bill of goods, and there's no point in any discussion with that person. His matrix is solidly in place, and he's gobbling down blue pills as fast as possible.

In public, I may take the time to present the facts – the "rest of the story". I may point out the other reasons for invading Iraq, or just have the person read the Congressional resolution authorizing war. There are a couple dozen reasons, none of which were predicated on stockpiles of WMD sitting around.

Likewise, evolution, for all that it's misunderstood on the right and misused on the left, isn't that scary. Here's the basic underlying thesis that all scientists accept:

We came to exist through the operation of natural law.

OOOOOOOooooooooh! Scary!

The stars and planets are not gods or angels. They are objects that move through the sky under the natural laws of gravity and momentum.

Lightning is the result of physical laws, not Thor's bolts striking down those who anger him.

Sickness has natural roots – in chemistry and biology. It is not a curse bestowed by a vengeful God.

And life itself is the result of natural processes operating in known, or at least knowable, ways.

That's all.

I'm afraid you'll have to be terrified of something else.