Charles Darwin published Theory of Evolution in his
book, Origin of Species, 150 years ago by explaining in exceptional
detail about the evidence and the fact of evolution. Most scientists agree with
Theory of Evolution as the only scientifically testable explanation for
diversity of life on Earth, however, there are numerous groups of people that
reject this theory and prefer alternative ideas such as intelligent design and
creationism. With the emergence of internet as a global media, the proponents
of creationism have used this new means to spread their propaganda. One of the
famous examples of creationist media is Harun Yahya: An Invitation to the
Truth (www.harunyahya.com), a website that is dedicated to spreading Muslim
creationism idea. This website was established by Adnan Oktar, an author and
Islamic creationist that reside in Turkey. Oktar’s works have attracted wide
attention both in Turkey and worldwide and especially targeted toward Muslim
demographic. The purpose of harunyahya.com is to promote and publicizing the works
of Oktar; his writings predominantly are based on religious scripture and deal mostly
with conspiracy theories, refutation of Evolutionary Theory, malicious attacks
on Zionism, and creationism (Harun Yahya International, 2011). The spreading
of creationism propaganda through internet reflects a “Better-Never” state, a
situation where information in the media is being use to misguide the society.
In this case, creationist media such as harunyahya.com have undermined the
scientific knowledge and create a discriminatory environment towards its audiences.
Harunyahya.com is a perfect example of a “Better-Never”
situation as described by Gopnick (2011), because it is in a “constant conflict
and are packed with unreliable information”. The main problem is, most of the
information contain in his websites are not accurate and overly bias because the
author himself does not have a deep understanding about Theory of Evolution.
According to Carrier (2011) in his
article that analyze Oktar’s work asserts that Oktar is “cherry-picking facts”
to support his claim that refute the occurrence of evolution in nature. Carrier
also further explains that Oktar frequently misinterprets quote by the famous
scientist to make his argument. For example, in his book, Atlas of Creation
tries to disprove Evolution Theory, Oktar misquotes famous scientific journals
such as Discover, Science and Nature to provide scientific
proof for creationism, but in fact, these references support evolution fully, and
reject creationism totally. In Turkey, most of Oktar’s arguments go
unchallenged because it is so difficult for Turkish reader to have access to
these scientific journals (Sayin & Kence, 1999) . Another problem
with Oktar’s work is he did not follow any traditional logical and scientific
methods to reach the conclusion; instead, he cites and treats religious
scripture as the ultimate truth (Sayin & Kence, 1999) . Clearly, the tactic
of pseudo references and lack of scientific methods in Oktar’s work can
misguide and deceived general public in understanding Darwin’s Theory of Evolution.
The inaccuracy and overly bias contents in this website
are harmful to its audiences because it undermines the scientific knowledge and
can mislead general public especially students in Muslim countries. Whereas
Western values have secularized and move away from religious orientation over
the past few centuries, the Islamic world has not. According to Hameed (2008),
Harun Yahya is the “loudest voice in the debate over evolution in Islamic World.”
Religion is embedded deeply in its culture and people in Muslim countries are
more willingly to support the opinions that agree with their religion.
Furthermore, a survey that was done by Hassan (2007) to study the pattern of
religious commitment in Muslim communities founds that more than 75% of the
respondents think that Darwin’s Theory of Evolution could not possibly be true
or never thought about it. This data is truly disturbing because it shows that most
Muslim countries do not understand Evolution Theory, which is a foundation of
modern biology today. An article in Economist (2007), states that
harunyahya.com publication has been translated into various language such as
Arabic, Urdu, and Malay to reach out further into Muslim world. Furthermore, it
is widely used in the biology classroom as a reference and alternative for
Theory of Evolution. Undoubtedly, harunyahya.com and its creationism propaganda
are detrimental and able to distort the general public’s understanding of
science.
One of the other reasons why harunyahya.com is
considered as the better-never situation in the information society is because
it contents encourages hatred and discrimination towards a certain group of
people. Homosexual, Jewish and evolutionist are the most targeted group in
Oktar’s work and he openly condemns these groups of people and encourages
people to hate them. He prescribed that homosexuality is unnatural in nature
and should be demolished. Also, for example, in one of his book Atlas of
Creation (2006), Oktar states, evolutionists and many scientists in the
19th and early 20th centuries “held almost totally racist views.” He also
blatantly blames all the war that occurs during 19th and 20th
century is related to Darwin’s Evolutionary Theory and linked it with evil and
social inequality. Furthermore, he is also a proponent of conspiracy theory,
Holocust denial that blame Jewish for terrorism and devastation in the world,
especially in World War II. These bigoted statements that encourage hatred
toward certain minority by harunyahya.com should not be encouraged and should
be banned. With a large group of supporters and audiences in harunyahya.com
website, this clearly is a serious problem that needs to be handled.
Gopnick (2011) states “cognitive entanglement, after
all, is the rule of life”, which means that in the information society, deception
and treacherous arguments are inevitable. Certainly, in the global information
network, especially through internet, everyone has the right to speak and
express their idea freely without censorship. In the free marketplace of ideas,
Harunyhya.com itself has every right to produce and publish it creationism
material on its websites and every person has the right to access it. Nevertheless, since its material deal mostly
with scientific facts, the publisher of the websites itself must hold the
responsibility to provide the public with accurate information. However, there
has been huge discussion over how freedom of speech applies to the internet. Office
of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) an organization under United
Nation states that "any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred
that constitutes incitement hostility or violence shall be prohibited by
law." (OHCHR, 1996). In this case, discriminatory materials in
harunyahya.com that discriminate certain religious group and minorities should
be abolished because it is incoherent with law.
Islamic creationism has become a threat not only to
science but also to social equality in Muslim world. If an organization like
harunyahya.com is unchecked by the scientific community, universities and
government organization, this organization will continue spreading their
inaccurate and biased creationism propaganda to the public. With low level of
scientific understanding in Muslim countries, emergence of harunyahya.com will
make this thing worse and will dampen the political, social and economic growth
of the nations. Aykut Kence, a professor of biology at Ankara's Middle East
University states, if Muslim world cannot reconcile with Theory of Evolution,
they “are going to fall behind the modern countries in terms of development,
economy, culture. Everything" (Schleifer, 2007) . Therefore, the only
hope and action is to educate and communicate Theory of Evolution in a right
way to avoid any misconception.
Bibliography
Carrier, M. (2011). Muslim creationism and the
curious case of Harun yahya. Skeptic Magazine Society, 16(3), 32-37.
Economist. (2007, April 21). In the beginning. Economist,
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Gopnick, A. (2011, February 14). The Information:
How the Internet gets inside us. The New Yorker.
Hameed, S. (2008, December). Bracing for Islamic
Creationsim. Science, 322, 1637-1638.
Harun Yahya International. (2011). About This
Site. Retrieved October 24, 2011, from Harun Yahya- An invitation to the
Truth: http://www.harunyahya.com/m_about_site.php
Hassan, R. (2007, July). On being religious: Pattern
of religious commitment in Muslim societies. The Muslim World, 97,
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Office of the High Commisioner for Human Rights
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Sayin, U., & Kence, A. (1999, November). Islamic
Scientfic Creationsim: A new challenge in Turkey. Reports of the National
Center for Scientific Education, 19(6), 18-20, 25-29.
Schleifer, Y. (2007, August). Islamic creationist
group launcehes glitzy, global bltz. The Christian Science Monitor.
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