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Towards a Deeper Understanding: How the Experiences TOWARDS A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING: HOW THE EXPERIENCES OF MUSLIMS IN AMERICA CONTRIBUTES TO THEIR REJECTION OF EVOLUTION A Thesis Presented to The Graduate Faculty at The University of Akron In Partial Fulfillment Of the Requirements for the Degree Master of Arts Thomas Snyder May, 2018 TOWARDS A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING: HOW THE EXPERIENCES OF MUSLIMS IN AMERICA CONTRIBUTES TO THEIR REJECTION OF EVOLUTION Thomas Snyder Thesis Approved: Accepted: _________________________ _________________________ Co-Advisor Executive Dean of the Graduate School Dr. Juan Xi Dr. Chand K. Midha _________________________ _________________________ Co-Advisor Interim Dean of the College Dr. Rebecca Catto Dr. John Green _________________________ _________________________ Committee Member Date Dr. Matthew Lee _________________________ Department Chair Dr. Bill Lyons ii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page LIST OF TABLES………………………………………………………………..iv LIST OF FIGURES.................................................................................................v CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION……………………………………………………………....1 Statement of Problem…………………………………………….……......4 ‘Science,’ ‘Islam,’ and Conflict?.................................................................4 Darwinism………………………………………………………....5 Contextualizing Views of Evolution………………………………….…...8 Present Paper…………………………………………………………......12 Hypotheses………………………………………………....….....14 II. METHODS…………………………………………………………………....15 Data………………………………………………………………...…….15 Measures………………………………………………………………....16 Analytic Strategy………………………………………………………...21 III. RESULTS…………………………………………………………………....24 IV. DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS……………………………………...32 V. REFERENCES…………………………………………………………….....36 iii LIST OF TABLES Table Page 1 Means, Standard Deviations (SD), and Correlations..............................23 2 Goodness of Fit Indices..........................................................................26 3 Effects Decomposition for Independent Variables.................................28 4 Effects Decomposition for Control Variables ........................................30 iv LIST OF FIGURES Figure Page 1 Theoretical Model...................................................................................22 2 Estimated Model.....................................................................................25 v CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION The alleged conflict between science and religion arose in the early nineteenth century when students and practitioners of natural philosophy and history began to refer to their work as science (Numbers 2009). Science as a field or discipline was relatively new at this time; it was not until 1833 that the term scientist was coined (Harrison 2006). The profession emerged around the same time when positivists like Auguste Comte claimed that the world was evolving from the metaphysical stage to one characterized by the search for universal laws of the social world. Many of the new scientists sought to validate their work and separate themselves from the clergy—who largely dominated the discipline of natural history—and deployed rhetoric of conflict between science and theology (Harrison 2006). The writings of John William Draper and Andrew Dickson White substantially shaped the modern relationship between science and religion. Draper, an established chemist and physician, thought his work entitled A History of the Conflict Between Science and Religion (1875) presented a “clear and impartial statement of the views and acts of the two contending parties” (p. ix). In reality, this book—largely aimed at Catholicism—offered no such unbiased account. Concerned with the power held by ecclesiastics, Draper urged civilization to separate from the Church to prevent retracing its steps back into “semi-barbarian ignorance” (p. 365). Twenty-two years later White’s A History of the Warfare of Science with Theology and Christendom (1896) was released. Despite what the title suggests, White (1896), a former President of Cornell University, thought that science and religion would go “hand in hand” and that “although theological 1 control will continue to diminish, Religion…will steadily grow stronger and stronger…in the world at large” (p. xii). This is somewhat surprising given his lecture “The Battle- Fields of Science” in which he cast religion as the enemy of science and progress through telling stories of the “scientific martyrs” (Numbers 2009: 2). It is now understood that Draper and White’s accounts are historically “bankrupt” (Numbers 1985: 80) and offer more propaganda than truth, but whether this notion—or one of conflict and warfare—exists beyond the academy has been the focus of much recent research. Studies show that people may not see an overall conflict between science and religion (Vaidyanathan et al. 2016; Scheitle 2011; Evans 2011; Ecklund 2010), but they also demonstrate that what is meant by conflict depends on many factors, including socio-demographic and socio-political contexts, as well as who is being asked (Kaden, et al. 2017; O’Brien and Noy 2015). These studies are largely concerned with the epistemological conflict between science and religion (Evans and Evans 2008), seeking to document how respondents position themselves within one or both of these sets of truth claims about the world. Others (Evans 2002; Toumey 1984; Gieryn 1983) view science and religion as social institutions competing for power and authority. The current nature of the relationship between religion and science also depends on what is meant by ‘religion’ and ‘science.’ Both are recent terms (Harrison 2006), with religion being an inherently modern concept that has been shaped by reason, rationality, and colonialism. The focus on external, objective aspects of religion post-Enlightenment has implications for religion(s) in the Western world, but also for religion beyond the US and Europe. Harrison (2006) notes that the world religions were created through the projection of the Western conception of Christianity. Christianity was something of a 2 Weberian ideal-type to which other faith traditions were compared. Many of the Eastern religions were seen as inferior for their “imperfect deities, their erroneous scriptures, their fraudulent miracles, and superstitious cults” (Harrison 2006: 93). This had important consequences not only for the religious classifications themselves, but also for how their relationships with science and other truth claims were interpreted. In other words, these traditions were born into an assumption of conflict. Much of the research examining the relationship of religion with science focuses exclusively on Christianity, and for good reason. As noted above, the conflict originated between scientists and theologians in Europe and the US. However, if we are to expand and test our knowledge of other traditions’ associations with science—and not simply export our own—we must move beyond a Christonormative research design, or one that assumes issues specific to Christianity will apply to other religions in other parts of the world. Historians of science and religion have made strides in this regard (Brooke and Numbers 2011; Numbers 2009; Numbers and Stenhouse 1999), as have sociologists (see Ecklund et al. forthcoming), but the amount of empirical studies is insufficient. Moreover, if we are to enrich our understanding of the connection(s) between other faith traditions and science our analyses should focus on aspects related to science rather than using a catchall term. This could mean evolutionary theory, the focus of the present study, but also genetic technologies (Evans 2010), human consciousness (SRES 2017), and medicine (Cadge et al. 2009), among others. Put differently, in order to continue to move science and religion research forward, we need to extend the focus of our analyses beyond a matter of perceiving conflict. 3 STATEMENT OF PROBLEM This research intends to add to the literature by answering the following questions: (1) How do the experiences of Muslims in the United States impact their identification, and (2) Does this identification lead to the rejection of evolution? Studies show that most Muslims believe in human exclusionism (Elsdon-Baker 2015), meaning they accept that bacteria and animals evolve, but reject the notion that humans came from a related, simpler species (Everhart and Hameed 2013; Hameed et al. forthcoming; Hameed 2010). Rather than attempting to verify the rejection of evolution within this dataset, the present study seeks to show the forces behind the rejection, namely how the experiences of being a Muslim in the context of the United States influences this rejection of evolution. Using existing research and structural equation modeling, this paper will offer a final model that can be used as a guide and theoretical model for future studies wishing to study US Muslims’ beliefs about evolution. The following section will outline Islam’s history with ‘science’ exploring the reception of the conflict narrative, and Darwinian evolution in Muslim societies. Then, hypotheses will be offered after reviewing the literature. ‘SCIENCE’, ‘ISLAM’, AND CONFLICT? ‘Science’ and ‘Islam’1 are thought to have been in concordance from the time of their respective emergences, yet the conflict narrative still appeared in Islamic society, albeit in unique ways. After losing battles against the Russians, the Ottomans sought to improve their society by making technological advancements, and founded schools of engineering, and medicine (Ihsanoglu 2011). As these schools progressed, the curriculum
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