"Believe what?" I asked.
"Believe in God."
As expected, we dived right into a crash version of the typical god-talk between a secular humanist and a devoted Christian, highlighted by a ridicule almost as old as Darwin's discovery. "So you think humans came from the monkeys?"
Despite its factual inaccuracies (the closest statement is that we share common ancestors, and monkeys are not our closest species, apes are), such ridicule summarizes the difficulty of propagating scientific understandings against Christian fundamentalism, and if my experiences with my former friendly Muslim roommate were any guide, against all religious fundamentalism. The false dichotomy between science and religion is too often associated with the struggles between values and "cold" facts. Somehow, it seems that if we swallow the facts that our status on Earth is not sanctioned by a higher being, we will lose important meanings that make us alive. As one of my friends from Ann Arbor Chinese Christian Church put it, "If you believe evolution, you only get some scientific knowledge. If you believe in the Bible, you get a set of wonderful principles and guidelines".
This is understandable. It would certainly be comforting if we were created special with higher purpose, a purpose so high that is incomprehensible for us, and under the perfect love of the Creator. The ultimate inevitable (A few scientists on the verge of science fiction would disagree, though) many people dread about is not in His original plan. Death is merely a glitch that can be fixed with faith. Heaven awaits us, as the projection of the desired perfection. It is very plausible that it would sadden the Creator if we deny that we are His creations.
However, bear with me and believe for a moment that human beings, defined as Homo sapiens now, evolved from a common ancestor that we share with chimpanzees, as suggested by sheer and ever increasing weight of evidence. What would this mean? Our parents gave unconditional love to us, the love we will in turn give to our own children, along with generations of hopes and wishes that our descendants will live a more prosperous, meaningful life than us. Although neither provable nor falsifiable, millions of years of such affection throughout the history of human evolution should carry weight beyond imagination. I would believe that thousands of generations of our ancestors would want their descendants to live in comfort, both physically and spiritually. But what if in doing so, we deny their existence? It is not unlike sons and daughters who, after reading a bestseller, claim that they are created miraculously and deny that they are born to their parents because they are somewhat ugly and not as intelligent. In a sense, it is exactly that.
All these might be too philosophical and abstract. But there are also real-life implications if people are willing to accept human evolution and forsake castle-in-the-sky explanations of our origin like creationism. By definition, our nature is derived from our origin. Controversial and nascent as fields like evolutionary psychology might be, we should benefit from scientists' struggle to understand human nature with a healthy dose of caution, if we are willing to put aside the cynicism of implementing anything involving laws and politics. An example hypothesis: if for thousands of years, children grow up with their parents and other responsible adults, learn from them as apprentices and contributing members of their family, and become fully-fledged adults as teenagers, should we be surprised that children usually have trouble adapting to school, develop vacuous teen culture criticized by books like The Dumbest Generation when they spend time with each other rather than with adults, and become sexually active when they enter adolescence? Please don't get me wrong. I am not advocating "Return to the nature" - spiritual left can be as problematic as religious right - nor am I rejecting the notion of individual responsibility. Nevertheless, the adaptability of our children (and ourselves, for that matter) should warrant appreciation, with hardships recognized with compassion -- if we are willing to think in the framework of our real origin and acknowledge its implication on human nature as a possibility. Perhaps in this information age with amazing devices like iPhone, we may even adjust this system to fit the nature of a child.
US is incredibly religious by western standard, and I am still wondering if our off-the-chart prevalence of ADHD medication for children and adolescents (doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.26.2.450), highest rate of teenage pregnancies among developed countries, and our rejection of The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child are all coincidences. While the freedom of religion should be protected by all means, it wouldn't hurt to give values and meanings consistent with our best knowledge a chance. After all, they don't have the head start of ancient believes.
