Canada – On The Fast Track to Ignorance

Canada’s science minister, Gary Goodyear, will not confirm whether he believes in evolution.

“I’m not going to answer that question. I am a Christian, and I don’t think anybody asking a question about my religion is appropriate,”

Okay, let’s reboot for a second and approach this in as calm a manner as possible.

What the fuck!!???

First, the question is meaningless to begin with; one does not “believe” in evolution. One accepts the vast, overwhelming evidence for evolution, in the same way that one accepts the vast, overwhelming evidence for gravity.

Second, what does being a Christian have to do with this? “Do you believe in evolution?”, no matter how silly the question (see above), is not in any way a question about religious faith. No, it is a question, asked of our minister of science (who’s job it is to promote and defend science in Canada), about whether he accepts scientific evidence.

Mr. Goodyear also apparently believes in the god-of-the-gaps:

“I do believe that just because you can’t see it under a microscope doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. It could mean we don’t have a powerful enough microscope yet. So I’m not fussy on this business that we already know everything. … I think we need to recognize that we don’t know.”

This is, of course, technically true; he’s merely stating the fact that one cannot prove a negative. No one is claiming we already know everything, Mr. Goodyear. In fact, science says precisely the opposite (that is why we need more money, sir); we need to know more about how the universe works, about how the human body works, and about myriad other things; that’s how we’ve grown as a society. The history of empiricism shows that science works.

On the contrary, you’ve had two-thousand years to provide some evidence for your god, and still you have nothing.

So Mr. Goodyear, let’s have it out; do you accept scientific fact or do you accept magic?