Democracy Gone Astray

Democracy, being a human construct, needs to be thought of as directionality rather than an object. As such, to understand it requires not so much a description of existing structures and/or other related phenomena but a declaration of intentionality.
This blog aims at creating labeled lists of published infringements of such intentionality, of points in time where democracy strays from its intended directionality. In addition to outright infringements, this blog also collects important contemporary information and/or discussions that impact our socio-political landscape.

All the posts here were published in the electronic media – main-stream as well as fringe, and maintain links to the original texts.

[NOTE: Due to changes I haven't caught on time in the blogging software, all of the 'Original Article' links were nullified between September 11, 2012 and December 11, 2012. My apologies.]

Tuesday, June 05, 2012

46% Americans Believe In Creationism According To Latest Gallup Poll

A new Gallup poll measures Americans' belief in the origin of human beings, and how this belief correlates with church attendance, political party affiliation and education level. The poll was conducted by interviewing a random sample of 1,012 adults, aged 18 and older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

The following question was asked to determine Americans' views on origin of human beings:

Which of the following statements comes closest to your views on the origin and development of human beings?
1) Human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God guided this process,
2) Human beings have developed over millions of years from less advanced forms of life, but God had no part in this process,
3) God created human beings pretty much in their present form at once time within the last 10,000 years or so.

Respondents were categorized as believing in theistic evolution (option 1), evolution (option 2) and creationism (option 3) depending on their answer choice.

Forty six percent Americans believed in creationism, 32 percent believed in theistic evolution and 15 percent believed in evolution without any divine intervention. As the graph below shows, the percent of Americans who believe in creationism has increased slightly by 2 percent over the last 30 years. The percent of Americans who believe in evolution has also increased by 6 percent over the last 30 years while the percent of Americans who believe in theistic evolution has decreased 6 percent over the same time period.

evolution creationism


Regular church attendance is strongly positively correlated with believing in creationism, and negatively correlated with believing in theistic evolution and evolution. Among those attend church weekly, two-thirds believe in creationism, 25 percent believe in theistic evolution and a mere 3 percent believe in evolution.
evolution church
Americans who believe in creationism are more likely to be Republican than Democrat or Independent, whereas those who believe in evolution are more likely to be Democrat or Independent, than Republican. Interestingly, nearly an equal proportion of Republicans, Democrats and Independents believe in theistic evolution.
evolution politics
Education level is strongly positively correlated with believing in evolution, and theistic evolution, and negatively correlated with believing in creationism.
evolution education
Overall, in the last 30 years, there hasn't been a significant shift in American's belief in creationism or evolution.

Original Article
Source: huffington post
Author: Jahnabi Barooah 

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