Why Gary Goodyear Must Be Questioned About His Beliefs

Gary Goodyear is Canada’s science minister who couldn’t give a straight answer when asked if he believed in evolution. In other words, he’s probably hiding his Creationist beliefs — which means Canada’s science minister may not accept science.

Dan Gardner of The Ottawa Citizen satirically defends Goodyear:

I believe the earth has existed for precisely 3,213 years, five months, seven days, and four hours…

I further believe that scientific evidence to the contrary — geology, biology, and a couple of other “-ogies” — is uncertain, inconclusive, hypothetical, epistemological, scatological, or phantasmagorical. As these polysyllabic words plainly demonstrate, I am an expert. Plus, I’m a trained chiropractor. And I’m really big on natural health products. So I’m a physician, a scientist, and a guy who uses very long words. I believe I have earned your respect.

…

So many people are intolerant and hateful toward people whose views are not their own. Just look at what Gary Goodyear went through.

Goodyear is the minister of state for science and technology. He’s also a chiropractor, so he’s practically a scientist himself.

It’s an entertaining piece 🙂

This is a serious problem, though. Canadians should be demanding that their news sources get the real story from Goodyear. Does he accept evolution? Does he believe humans evolved over billions of years? Does he accept that Creationism has no basis in Science?

(Thanks to AxeGrrl for the link!)

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Eamon Knight

Hurray for Dan Gardner! He goes a long way to make up for the general idiocy at the Citizen. I also recommend his blog:
http://communities.canada.com/ottawacitizen/blogs/katzenjammer/default.aspx

Note however, the postscript, in which a Conservative backbencher — also a chiropractor — got up to defend Goodyear, and managed to surpass him in creationist malicious stupidity:
http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2009/04/not_so_smug_now_are_you_canada.php
MC Pickard

I’m a graphic designer. God is a designer. Worship me.
Jeff Satterley

A chiropractor turned science minister? C’mon Canada, I thought you were better than that!
Reginald Selkirk

Gardner should be careful, sometimes satire is lost on these people.
Indigo

Actually, Goodyear did later say that he “believes in” evolution; he just said it in such a way that even this semi-educated layperson concluded he didn’t understand it.
IasonOuabache

A chiropractor? What, Canada? You couldn’t find a good homeopath or witch doctor to hire as your science minister?
IasonOuabache

Actually, Goodyear did later say that he “believes in” evolution; he just said it in such a way that even this semi-educated layperson concluded he didn’t understand it.

Yep, the fact that he answered the original question by saying that he didn’t want to answer a religious question shows that he is a Creationist. Is it possible for the Canadian government to toss him out for being so incompetent?
Eamon Knight

Is it possible for the Canadian government to toss him out for being so incompetent?

Um, these are the Tories. If they started down that road….
Only we can toss them for being incompetent — but we blew it, last chance we had (don’t look at me, I voted Green. And don’t bitch at me about vote-splitting, either — in my riding, the Tory incumbent won by a clear majority. I may as well not bother voting, ever).
jim666

And I thought all the fruitloops were over the border. So we won’t be expecting any Nobel Prizes going to Canada in the near future.
Nathan Tjoa

Relativistically speaking, TIME doesn’t pass throughout the universe in the SAME PACE.

Gravity in Earth might make us experience a (relative) thousand years, but in the outer edges of our galaxy where gravity is almost non-existent, time might probably NOT EXIST in the same pace as Earth’s.

About the planet’s age, geological evidences and the sort… it will take a great deal of time to interpret all of our findings of these past centuries.

But honestly, rather than looking behind, I don’t care whether we evolved into homo sapiens or we God’s wonderful creature of wisdom…

what matters is that we’re WISE, and WE don’t become SELFISH GREEDY funny looking APES.

(Latin: Homo sapiens = the wise man.)
Paul

Actually, very few people in Canada are getting steamed about this because we understand what is being misconstrued all across the blogosphere. That is that Gary Goodyear has no real authority or power in the Canadian government. He is not “The Minister of Science and Technology.” He is a “Minister of State” for science and technology. The “Minster of State” position is mostly ceremonial here. His position is just a way for our Prime Minister to throw a bone to a supporter from the last election. Goodyear gets a government car, a bigger office, and the chance to travel around and gladhand a bit, but he doesn’t actually have any say in official Canadian government science policy. He’s just a figurehead.

This has been blown all out of proportion on the ‘net. It really isn’t that big a deal.
Kevin

Was that meant to say millions, not billions?
Anyway, even if he doesn’t have any real power, his response was ridiculous. Lets fire him already.
Nabi

What about Harper? He okayed the guy, gave him the green light. He also put someone from Nunavut, another extremely dubious pick, in charge of the health portfolio. Wouldn’t surprise me if the lot of them are closet creationists–just a bit too scared to formally declare themselves yet. Even more problematic is that quackery has become legal and institutionalized in Canada, licensed and promoted by most of the provincial governments. A baffling mess, particularly for the traditional medical/science community. Evolution’s always been a target–somewhat harmless, but you’d think anyone would hesitate before trying undermine the medical system.