A new study found many highly religious older adults have favorable views on science, but still reject scientific explanations for creation and evolution.
The findings show one in five deeply religious American adults have these particular views, the University of Wyoming reported.
"These people know the scientific explanation for the origins of humanity and the universe because they are, overall, knowledgeable about things like genetics, radioactivity, planetary motion and other scientific issues," said Shiri Noy, a UW Department of Sociology assistant professor. "However, they disagree that the universe began with a big explosion and that humans evolved from other species of animals. This indicates that it is not that they don't know the science; they just don't agree with it."
To make their findings the researchers looked at nationally representative data on U.S. adults from the 2006, 2008 and 2010 general social survey; the sample contained people who self-identified as Protestant, Catholic, Jewish and followers of other faiths, as well as those who did not subscribe to a particular religious group. The team found Americans who were part of this "post-secular perspective" tended to have high levels of education and income.
"We argue that some individuals reject certain scientific theories not because they lack information or knowledge, but because of a personal preference to interpret certain aspects of the world in a religious light," Noy said.
The findings suggest about 21 percent of Americans hold a post-secular perspective, 43 percent hold a traditional perspective (favoring religion over science), and 36 percent hold a modern perspective (favoring science over religion).
"Our study is the first study that looks at how individuals view these two knowledge systems in tandem with one another," Noy said. "Previous studies that look at both science and religion tend to use very blunt measures of science and religion that ignore the underlying complexity of people's views of science and religion."
The findings were published in a recent edition of the American Sociological Review and was funded by the National Science Foundation.
