Well Darwin, this year it’s been 150 years since your book On the Origin of Species was published, and we’ve come a long way. Scientists have a much deeper understanding of the relationships between all known life on Earth, and your ideas have even helped guide us to a world without smallpox and polio, a world where influenza can be prevented, a world where we can understand what we are and why we are this way.

Sadly in some parts of the world, despite enjoying the many benefits of our understanding of evolution, a large percentage of people refuse to accept the simple truths that the rest of us have known for a century and a half.

Do they reject your theory based on a mountain of evidence piled up against it? Do they reject it based on even one piece of solid evidence against it? No. Most of them reject it based purely on their religious beliefs.

Sure there is “Creation Science”, also called the “science” of Intelligent Design, but this is science in the same way that claiming birds are carried through the sky by a divine hand is science. As much as they want to pretend it’s science, it’s simply not.

I’m sure you would recognize the problems we’re having though, you had to deal with the same kinds of people 150 years ago. If only today’s creationists would look at how their predecessors have fared, every one of them trying to disprove evolution and not a single one coming close, the debate might finally be over.

For the book’s 200th anniversary, I hope I have some better news for you. With any luck, medical science will enable me to live at least that long, in part thanks to you.