While it is always great to have civil dialogue on the issue of religion, I took some objection to the recent letter to the editor about the merits of creationism as a field of study. The letter said many respected scientists worldwide have argued with scientific data for the creationist theory.

Those three main points 8212; that many scientists believe in creationism, that scientists use scientific data to defend creationism, and that creationism is a theory 8212; are all wrong.

First, a study conducted back in 1998 by Edward J. Larson and Larry Witham regarding scientists’ faith found that only 3.3 percent of scientists believed in a god, while 77 percent did not. Three percent is not “many.” That is just a select few.

Secondly, outside of the Bible and biased sources, no publication has shown that creationism is accepted scientifically in any way.

In writing his decision on the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District, which found the teachings of Intelligent Design, a spin-off of creationism, to be unconstitutional, Judge James E. Jones III wrote, “…evolution, including common descent and natural selection, is “overwhelmingly accepted’ by the scientific community and that every major scientific association agrees.”

Also, using the science that we can properly test, scientists have found through the study of DNA that sharks and dolphins share very similar traits, despite thriving in different environments, and that chimpanzees and humans have a DNA structure that is almost 98 percent identical, according to the University of California at Berkley website on evolution.

Finally, creationism is not a theory. Webster’s Dictionary defines a theory as a “scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena.”

For instance, scientists, through centuries of study and testing and with the help of Darwin, have come up with the theory of evolution. It as close to a fact as possible, in terms of science.

In fact, the use of science to prove creationism is literally impossible because it requires the existence of supernatural powers that simply do not exist.

There is no way to test whether Moses could part a sea or whether God created humans because there is no proper independent or dependent variable that we can use to test those claims.

If people want to believe in creationism, they have every right to do so. But they should know that creationism is not something accepted by science whatsoever.

News editor Patrick Burns is a senior news-editorial journalism major from Plano.