Creationist view of humans losing ground in America

Fewer Americans believe the creationist view of humans, which states that God has created humans in their current form.

The percentage of U.S. adults who believe that God created humans in their present form at some time within the last 10,000 years or so has hit a new record low. According to a recent Gallup poll, 38 per cent of U.S. adults now accept creationism, while 57% believe in some form of evolution, either natural or guided by God.

Gallup first started asking the question regarding views of human evolution back in the 1980s and looking at the data, this is the first time since 1982 that belief in God’s direct creation of man has not been the outright most common response.

Also, since 1982, the number of Americans that accept that humans evolved from lower life forms without God’s intervention has nearly doubled.

A breakdown of the results shows that people with higher education tend to believe the scientific explanation, with 31 per cent of those with postgraduate studies and 27 per cent of college graduates agreeing that humans evolved and that God did not play any role in it.

The majority of those that have graduated high-school or less, believe that God has created humans in their current form, in the last 10,000 years.

Still, the majority of all participants believe that God played a role in human evolution, either by guiding the process or by directly creating humans just as they are today.

Looking at religious preferences, the highest percentage of those that accept the scientific theory of evolution said they hold no religious affiliations while 11% of Catholics agree with this secular view.

Protestants are the least likely religious people to believe that God played no part in human evolution while almost half of Catholics trust in a God-guided process.

The findings are relevant as there is still an ongoing debate about evolution and how it should be taught in schools across the U.S. Conservative groups are promoting including the creationist view, dubbed “intelligent design” in the school curricula, alongside the scientific theory of evolution.

The scientific community repeatedly came out against teaching “intelligent design” in schools underlining that evolution through natural selection is a scientifically proven theory while creationism is a belief system.

The recent March for Science also included posters and chants that underlined this particular message coming from the scientific community.

Personalities like Richard Dawkings, Bill Nye, astrophysicists Neil de Grasse Tyson and Lawrence M. Krauss have been the public figures of promoting the scientific theory of evolution. They frequently debated creationists like Ken Ham, in an effort to raise public awareness about this issue.

This poll’s findings come after another Gallup study found that less and less Americans think that the Bible is the actual word of God while more and more regard the texts as stories and fables.