Happy Darwin Day!
PS: Most Americans don't believe in evolution...

Friday, February 13, 2009 at 2:03 AM Bookmark and Share
At least this seems to be the case, according to findings from a recent Gallup poll entitled On Darwin’s Birthday, Only 4 in 10 Believe in Evolution.

In Gallup's usual good form, the poll also included questions to uncover what major factors contributed to whether or not participants believe in the theory of evolution. The results? Well, they weren't all that surprising in retrospect: religious beliefs and level of education correlated well with whether or not participants believed in evolution, and whether or not they could associate the theory of evolution with Darwin. Interestingly, there is a short video from Gallup News from June 2007 giving the results of a similar poll showing Americans were split closer to 50-50 a couple of years ago.

For more details, check out the article - it includes informative data summaries and a more detailed discussion of the poll results. You can also find other related polls on the site, including One-Third of Americans Believe the Bible is Literally True, May 25, 2007, and Evolution, Creationism, Intelligent Design.

4 comments:

Posted by: Unknown | 2/13/2009 1:08 PM

Now Paul would those people be some of the same people who voted Bush? Sorry, had to get that in there. Of course evolution exists and yes science can co-exist with religion with an opened enough mind. Polls that reveal people who don't believe in evolution worry me. Then again I just write about baseball :) Tommy http://rockymountainway.mlblogs.com

Posted by: Paul | 2/13/2009 3:18 PM

Hi Tom. To be more matter of fact about it, check out the Gallup poll on how Republicans and Democrats Differ on Creationism. I agree that the current level of conflict between religion and evolution/science is way overblown - hopefully science educators and religious leaders do a better job correcting the situation.

Posted by: noflickster | 2/15/2009 8:37 PM

Hey Paul,

Glad to see you in the blogosphere! Great first series of posts, I'm looking forward to where you take this blog.
-Mike

Posted by: Paul | 2/17/2009 1:42 AM

Thanks Mike - I'm as interested to see where it goes as you are! ;)
-Paul

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