Futility is arguing with fundamentalists, or should I say that arguing with fundamentalists is futile, either way I have spent too much time arguing against the creationist idea, largely because I find it entertaining. Recently they have been citing the existence of DNA as evidence for a creator. The argument being that something as beautiful and amazing could not possibly have arisen by chance alone, therefore it must have been created.
DNA is of course the mechanism of inheritance, it is in essence who we are and much of what we will ever be. Even the means of our demise is possibly coded in our DNA. Family traits, strengths and weaknesses are transmitted through DNA and yes, it is amazing.
I read the other day that intelligence is inherited from your mother, suggesting a link with the X chromosome but it was a newspaper article and I skimmed it so cannot really comment. We are, of course much more than the product of our genes, we are capable of making decisions and choosing the way we live. Thus if you have a genetic propensity towards certain diseases, you can, by choice, avoid the conditions that favour the development of that disease.
Talents and skills may be to some extent genetically determined, but most great skills are learned through sheer hard work as much as by innate ability. We would not wish for our doctors, dentists or any other professionals to inherit their positions, even from their mothers, neither would we expect them to be inbred so as to maintain a family line, and yet many people think that Royalty is a good thing. We as a nation support a growing band of inbreds that have simply inherited their positions because they have been allowed to do so. They serve no real purpose and surely they have become an embarrassing anachronism as well as a huge expense. I know that there are vested interests in maintaining them as a symbol of the ruling class but in the interests of unification, can we not grow up and realise that they are not needed.
Napolean Bonaparte said that religion was the only thing that stopped the poor from murdering the rich; I think that ignorance has a role there too.
No comments:
Post a Comment