“Isn’t…evolution just another religion?” I had to ask. Well, why not, I reasoned? It might not have a god or a book all about it, but no one was there at the big bang. They could make scientific statements and approximations about it, but in the end, no one could definitively prove it, no matter how much they believed they in fact had.

Apparently, I was completely whack for ever thinking this.

“What are you talking about?” One girl screamed. “Evolution’s not a religion, it’s scientifically proven!” A boy stood out of his seat. “It’s fact!” Next thing I knew, the entire class was all shouting, all at me, and for some reason, I wasn’t scared at all.

“Whoa!” The teacher waved her arms around, slashing through the air. I half expected her to start whistling. Reluctantly, the voices got quiet. “Whoa, this is U.S. Government guys, not Biology—have this debate somewhere else!” She gave me a threatening look that almost said, never say anything in class again, but not quite, because I knew she, more or less, agreed with me in the end.

“But that’s what we’ve gotta teach,” she explained. “We’re given the papers, and we just have to read off them, no questions asked.”

It didn’t make sense to me, why someone was commanded to teach something, regardless of whether they believed it or not. I don’t ask for my belief to be forced down everyone’s throats, so why should a scientists’? It might sound silly—we look to white jacketed men with Dr. and PhDs as absolute unquestionable authorities, but deep down, aren’t they just people too? I refuse to deny science: I’m pursuing Biology coursework in my major. But neither do I accept only what I see or hear as truth. Isn’t that kind of narrow minded?

Evolution fascinates me, and I think there is a lot of truth to it. However, it’s never fairly presented. All the textbooks I’ve gotten have said “It’s undeniable, all scientists agree…” If we study it, it should be fairly presented with actual evidence. All I ever see are vague statements: “The fossil record proves it…carbon dating proves it…” But if this is science, I want to see numbers, specific findings that would give me real reason to consider it. But at the same time, if one sincerely seeks real truth, he’ll find it, and it won’t ever be as simple as, “The text book said it, or the numbers made sense to me.”
One of my teachers said, “It’s what science shows us now,” as in, we can never fully know what the future holds or what we’ll discover next. And isn’t that really what science is about, what is so fascinating about it: that we never actually know all the answers?