Why Tie Politics to Science?

I continue to be shocked at the relationship between political conservatism and religious conservatism. To be honest I’ve always considered the two to be very different, perhaps because in my mind one has nothing to do with the other.

Specifically I didn’t think it possible to predict one’s view about the Theory of Evolution based upon one’s political viewpoint. For instance, I was absolutely flabbergasted to learn that Ann Coulter is of the opinion that Evolution is a “discredited theory.” Whatever one might think of Ann’s political opinions, and lord do most of them stink to high heaven, she is clearly an intelligent and educated individual.

Similarly, I don’t often agree with L. Brent Bozell’s editorials but I was absolutely stunned to read a recent article by him entitled “Ben Stein Vs. Sputtering Atheists”
applauding Ben Stein’s so-called documentary “Expelled,” for exposing that due to “PC Liberalism” ”the concept of Intelligent Design is stifled in academic circles.”

Really? And here I always though it was because “Intelligent Design” is not science. I call “Expelled” a “so-called” documentary due to the reports of getting scientists to participate under misleading premises and the fact that no pre-screening was made available for participants to review. The latter usually indicates an intention to play fast and loose editing games to get your opponents to appear to say want you want them to say or to look stupid saying things that contradict your position. Anyway, I posted the following response to Mr. Bozell’s editorial.

“Dear Mr. Bozell, allow me to explain (one more time) that "I don't know how that happened, therefore GOD DID IT" is not a scientific hypothesis. Actually though, to be fair, academia considers itself smarter than the rest of us and doesn't suffer what it considers to be fools gladly. Often they're right, and often they're not. How would you like it if someone with absolutely no training or understanding of journalism began to pontificate on how you should write or publish based upon what someone that predated Guttenberg said. That's often what these guys encounter when talking about Evolution.

The Origin of Life, or abiogenesis, on the other hand is a totally different story. The fact is that nobody has a clue how life began and I guess "GOD DID IT" is probably as likely as any of the other hypotheses being thrown around. The problem is that once one accepts "GOD DID IT" the need for any additional inquiry ends. That's why science can never accept that as a conclusion and has to continue searching for a naturalistic explanation even if one may not exist. That is the very nature of science and I guess the arrogance of scientists sort of comes as a byproduct of that nature that we'll have to live with.

But would you really want it to be any different? If it were up to religion we would have stopped searching for answers 2,000 years ago and just sat around and waited for the second coming. By all means, if you’re of that mindset, sit around and wait, but let those of us with a different mindset work like hell searching for answers while you’re waiting. I also don't see what PC Liberalism has to do with this? This is a question of science vs. not science. It's as simple as that.”

Bozell got 22 comments, most of which were negative and none of which he’s going to read. Mine was actually one of the more polite ones. One guy complemented Bozell on his courage in publishing an article that demonstrated such a degree of ignorance.

Mixing politics and religion is very, very dangerous but either conservatives are doing it more and more, they're just making it more obvious or I just realized what's going on. Giving political arguments for religious issues or religious arguments for political issues strikes me as a formula for disaster.

Do liberals do the same thing? Since most liberals don't really have strong religious ties I don't think they do and I doubt atheists let their atheism dictate their politics although I guess it's possible. Any mixing of that sort on the left is just as dangerous as on the right. People being people one can't avoid having different aspects of one's life influence other aspects. But to my mind influencing is far different from using one to justify the other.