To the secular left, the controversies surrounding intelligent design might appear to emanate from some sort of parallel universe wherein the faithful have somehow turned postmodernism against us by accusing science of being pure ideology, a tool of its trade. A gross misunderstanding of the word ‘theory,’ equated by many an evangelical with a wild hunch a grad student scribbled on a cocktail napkin, has propelled contentless pseudo-science to the fore.  Perhaps reasonable people can disagree over contentious issues such as abortion or gay marriage, but (as liberals seem to think) for anyone truly to disbelieve the bedrock of contemporary biology seems to categorize them in the basement percentiles of the gullibility index.

Or so it would seem.  To those who interpret the Bible (if they care to at all) non-literally, it is all too easy to think of I.D.’s proponents as the craziest of the crazy, but with surveys showing that evolution and its godlier rival neck-and-neck, the statistics simply don’t bear that out.  Much of the controversy’s visibility comes from regions such as Kansas and suburban Georgia where conservative Christianity reigns supreme, and since the bulk of scientific study is produced outside of those areas, it is easy to see this whole issue as yet another permutation of the red-state/blue-state cleavage.  But as usual, there is a large, amorphous middle composed largely of mainstream Christian denominations and the unaffiliated who claim that belief in God and belief in science are not mutually exclusive.  Nonetheless, the battle lines are drawn, and while I support any move by what passes for a left in this country to pulverize and annihilate conservatives (rhetorically, of course), I believe it’s very important to isolate who in the United States remains skeptical of evolution and why.

Evangelical political discourse enjoys playing with numbers.  When courts pick away at unconstitutional anachronisms like school prayer, evangelicals depict themselves as a persecuted minority smothered by the curiously powerful (yet politically unrepresented) liberal left.  Ignoring here conservatism’s conflation of those very different systems of thought, there are also occasions where evangelicals emphasize the 85% of the country that is at least nominally Christian in order to legitimize their grievances within a democratic system.   As David Frum told The New Republic on July 7, “I don't believe that anything that offends nine-tenths of the American public should be taught in public schools.”  The assumption that damn-near-everyone is a Christian – and a very specific type of Christian at that – floods the media and gives credence to the idea that the U.S. is a Christian nation singularly blessed by God.  Combating evolution is one of a dozen fronts on which the secular left needs to articulate a vision of the nation as one committed to playing by the sensible rules we set, not exceptionalism.  In order to do that, we must accept as true the first of the two evangelical headcounts: there really are not that many fervent anti-evolutionist Christians.

Then who are the rest?  At the risk of quantifying the unquantifiable, it is a safe bet to assume that most of the people who prefer intelligent design or creationism are simply poorly educated in the sciences.  Very few people on either side of the issue can explain the process of natural selection, so it’s only logical that widespread ignorance should perpetuate itself, and, exploited by a right-wing propaganda apparatus bent on cultivating patriotic and religious anti-intellectualism, perpetuate itself very successfully.  That, coupled with the fact that most people are generically religious and not religiose, means that people are just accepting what they’re told from people they trust.  One can never underestimate the number of people for whom religion is basically car insurance, a Sunday-morning investment to keep the possibility of hell from intruding on their already stressed lives.  In keeping with the watered-down “God made me, and He loves me” theology of a self-help culture, from Dr. Phil to AA, creationism can fit right in – exactly as well as the continents of South America and Africa do, belying the idea that the earth was spontaneously created over a weeklong period in October, 4040 BC.  For most people, church and school are equally boring obligations, but a week-long segment in sophomore biology can hardly be expected to compete with a pervasive litany from Pat Robertson, the president, their preacher and the other Christians they happen to know.