Why do so many scientists believe in evolution?

The obvious reason that so many scientists endorse the theory of macroevolutionary process as the best explanation for life origins and development here on earth is because they really believe such to be the case. But is that true, really? Is it possible that there's a lot more to the story than meets the eye?

Wayne Friar, Ph.D., AIIA's Resource Associate for Science and Origins, says this:

Polls have shown that about 40% of scientists acknowledge a supernatural power. But the majority of the scientific community, especially evolutionary leaders today, hold an atheistic worldview. As support for their anti-supernatural worldviews, these scientists need mechanisms for the origin of life, especially humans.

Atheism needs evolution to escape from any implications regarding a creator. If one starts with Darwinism, certainly it is easy to escape from any obligation to God. Those opposed to their reasoning are branded as obscurantists who are trying to intrude religion into science.

Dr. Emery S. Dunfee, former professor of physics at the University of Maine at Farmington:

One wonders why, with all the evidence, the (Godless) theory of evolution still persists. One major reason is that many people have a sort of vested interest in this theory. Jobs would be lost, loss of face would result, text books would need to be eliminated or revised.

Evolutionist Richard Lewontin in The New York Review, January, 1997, page 31:

We take the side of science in spite of the patent absurdity of some of its constructs, in spite of the failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so-stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenomenal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherence to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialism is an absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.

Columnist George Caylor once interviewed a molecular biologist for an article entitled “The Biologist,” that ran on February 17, 2000, in The Ledger (Lynchburg, VA), and is in part reprinted here as a conversation between "G: (Caylor) and “J” (the scientist). We joint the piece in the middle of a discussion about the complexity of human code.

G: "Do you believe that the information evolved?"

J: "George, nobody I know in my profession believes it evolved. It was engineered by genius beyond genius, and such information could not have been written any other way. The paper and ink did not write the book! Knowing what we know, it is ridiculous to think otherwise."

G: "Have you ever stated that in a public lecture, or in any public writings?"

J: "No, I just say it evolved. To be a molecular biologist requires one to hold onto two insanities at all times. One, it would be insane to believe in evolution when you can see the truth for yourself. Two, it would be insane to say you don't believe evolution. All government work, research grants, papers, big college lectures—everything would stop. I'd be out of a job, or relegated to the outer fringes where I couldn't earn a decent living.

G: I hate to say it, but that sounds intellectually dishonest.

J: The work I do in genetic research is honorable. We will find the cures to many of mankind's worst diseases. But in the meantime, we have to live with the elephant in the living room.


G: What elephant?

G: Creation design. It's like an elephant in the living room. It moves around, takes up space, loudly trumpets, bumps into us, knocks things over, eats a ton of hay, and smells like an elephant. And yet we have to swear it isn't there!

Dr. John Morris, president of the Institute for Creation Research:

[Scientists] see the evidence for creation, and they see it clearly, but peer pressure, financial considerations, political correctness, and a religious commitment to naturalism force them to look the other way and insist they see nothing. And so, the illogical origins myth of modern society perpetuates itself