Islamic Anti-Evolutionism

[Dr_Evil_Mouse]

I think this goes a long way in explaining some of the tension and rivalry between Christian and Muslim (etc.) conservatives - they just want to corner the market, but can only do so by splitting all the theological hairs.

French Schools Swamped by Books Challenging Evolution

PARIS (AFP) - Tens of thousands of French schools and universities have received copies of a Turkish book refuting Darwin's theory of evolution and describing it as "the true source of terrorism."

The education ministry said Friday that it had warned school and university directors that the textbook is not in line with the recognized curriculum and that they should disregard it.

Entitled "The Atlas of Creation," the 770-page book by Turkish author Harun Yahya quotes several passages from the Koran and asserts that "human beings did not evolve (from another species) but were indeed created."

"We believe that there are lots of resources behind this campaign and the mass distribution, but were are not alarmed as the book has not reached the classrooms or documentation centers," said the education ministry.

The book features a photograph of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center with the caption: "Those who perpetuate terror in the world are in fact Darwinists. Darwinism is the only philosophy that values and incites conflict."

The theories of Charles Darwin are "the true source of terrorism," it said.

The books sent by post from Germany and Turkey began arriving in French schools and universities about 10 days ago.

The Figaro newspaper quotes an education official from Lyon as saying that this is not the first time that schools are swamped with controversial material.

The official said that the Church of Scientology had also embarked on a mass distribution of literature to schools a few years ago.

[afro poppa]

I wonder if the book says why it thinks Darwinism values and incites violence or just keeps saying over and over again that it does...

[Dr_Evil_Mouse]

The latter probably carries the day more . I expect the former will consist of all the same reasons that evangelicals use, though - that only obedience in the particular ways that they dictate can bring about order.

I'm guessing, more particularly, that they might also draw on the logic reflected in that famous line from Tom DeLay after the Columbine shootings, that "[o]ur school systems teach our children that they are nothing but glorified apes who have evolutionized out of some primordial soup of mud, by teaching evolution as fact."

The author in question, though, has his own website, which I'll have to look at some time when I have an hour to kill - Harun Yahya

Interesting, though, that he might seem to be distancing himself from the Intelligent Design folks (as I'm guessing, given how much evangelicals et al. throw around the phrase "God's plan") -

In order to create, God has no need to design

It’s important that the word “design†be properly understood. That God has created a flawless design does not mean that He first made a plan and then followed it. God, the Lord of the Earth and the heavens, needs no “designs†in order to create. God is exalted above all such deficiencies. His planning and creation take place at the same instant.

Whenever God wills a thing to come about, it is enough for Him just to say, "Be!"

As verses of the Qur’an tell us:

His command when He desires a thing is just to say to it, “Be!†and it is. (Qur’an, 36: 82)

[God is] the Originator of the heavens and Earth.

When He decides on something, He just says to it, “Be!†and it is. (Qur’an, 2: 117)

Edited February 5, 2007 by Guest
you know, editing.

[d_rawk]

I got the impression that he was drawing on the tendency for the logic of natural selection/Darwinism to be extended to other areas (social Darwinism and all the perverse behaviour justified with a flippant "it's the survival of the fittest").

Of course, if so, he's guilty of making that same mistake and giving it currency. (ie. Darwinism might not be applicable to social behaviour at all, and it might be a great abuse of Darwin's theories to pretend that it does - but Yahya is only adding to that confusion)

The fact that he refers to Darwinism as a "philosophy" is telling. And kinda troubling, really.

[StaggerLee]

Yeah, I say we go a step further and string up Newton and Copernicus along with Darwin -- that'll end terrorism.

[jonyak]

so if we were created why can;t we also evolve?

[Dr_Evil_Mouse]

- because that wouldn't allow them to set out the Established Order of Things (that they have privileged access to) that we would all have to obey from here till the end of time.