Having this last ten days had an email discussion with a fundamentalist Christian "biologist" about evolution, I can assure you the problems run very, very deep. There's a large chunk of the electorate that believes in truths which have no bearing in reality. Yet they learn their propaganda well, lay their traps carefully, expect to get away with things that they shouldn't as a result of their "specialist knowledge". Unfortunately this one picked the wrong person with whom to argue as I am aware of the devices they employ, but I could see the process in action first-hand and it was quite impressive - I imagine they will usually win such debates and folks will be left thinking that the evolutionary hypothesis is very weak. What is particularly disarming is how very nice such people actually are, in spite of being woefully informed!
It's an odd combination: anti-science; pro-wealth protection; fundamentalist; anti-government; anti-welfare; pro-war.
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