Repost - did not stick after previewing and then posting - lucky I saved it....

QUOTE
"Not only have you avoided the issue, by accusing me of being slipping 'fundamentalist' Christian teachings, into the mix, you've misstated what is being said"
UNQUOTE

Unfortunately what you said is exactly what the 'Creationists' and now 'ID' proponents say to deliberately twist and misrepresent something that not only is it clear that they DO not want to understand, but FEAR that if they do and accept, they will lose temporal power in manipulating others. From the very beginning of the publication of the concepts of Darwin and Wallace, such religious fanatics have trumpeted that 'evolution cannot exist, cause my magic sky fairy did it - and we do not believe that Man evolved from monkeys'. Science never said that Man did.

Once you bring forth that same misrepresentation, whether you are one of that crowd, or just a misinformed layman (whether you have been brainwashed by those with a political agenda to 'discredit Darwin' or not), it doesn't matter. The type of thinking that leads on from the thought that species A -> B when both are still current will lead you round in circles of blind misunderstanding. For example it is conventionally accepted to say that 'the sun rises', but unless you REALLY UNDERSTAND that what is happening is different, based on bigger ideas, you have not progressed from the sort of thinking that caused persecution of the man who wrote the book with the maths and said it was just mathematically easier to think differently than the accepted norm of the times. Sadly he BELIEVED in their magic sky fairy anyway, but because he was seen as a threat to their Power, he had to be destroyed - hardly an Act of Love by worshipers of a God of Supreme Love!

You see Science says species A -> both B & C - just because you insist on using the same semantic label for two of the entities doesn't make them the same thing in Science - there are also genetic differences - so before the days of being able to actually examine the DNA, it was probably understandable that the thinking was fuzzy. If you claim that 'man descended from monkeys' then you have to say 'which species of monkey' and since all the species are different from each other (by definition!) AND Man - you are saying something that Science doesn't, and misrepresenting the position of Science. The difference may be far too subtle for some minds to grasp, but it IS critical and fundamental to Science.

Trying to then castigate someone for saying/believing something you don't understand, misrepresenting what they really DID say takes us back to the the time of burning witches. Why is she a Witch? Because I say she is - or even more evidence, my magic sky fairy told me she was. Some of the most clever men of the time in the church began to realize that something wasn't right, and that is WHY the witch burnings were stopped. A lot of people still had the need to believe they existed though.... :-)