The Flying Spaghetti Monster
Pastafarians Bring Another Side to Intelligent Design, Evolution
A new pasta-like deity brings a new slant to a debate that is over a century old by parodying many religious statements on science.
A new side has emerged in the creation versus evolution debate. The new side more or less agrees with the Creationists side, but has a remarkably different interpretation of the being who brought about the universe and everything it contains. Three long years ago followers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster began to appear in our society.
Proponents of this version of the Creation story point out that many things in the universe look like a giant plate of spaghetti and that this resemblance is not an accident, but the manipulations of His Noodly Appendage in the physical universe. His followers know that the theories of evolution and creation are both wrong. They favor the alternate theory that the universe was created by a being known as the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Pastafarian History
Pafarianism's older sibling, Discordianism, was inspired by the freer use of drugs that started in the late 1960s. The people who conceived the Flying Spaghetti Monster and His Noodly Appendage have a far more recent history. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that the Flying Spaghetti Monster has not chosen to reveal Himself to his creations until now.
The ancient roots of the Pastafarian movement stretch all the way back to the year 2005, when a Kansas City School District reignited the debate over evolution saying that schools must spend equal time discussing intelligent design. The divine nature and social satire of the Flying Spaghetti Monster have caused the rapid spread of the Pastafarian Religion.
The Serious Side of Pastafarianism
The debate that sparked this is a conflict that is over a century old. Darwin's Origin of the Species has been controversial since its publication in 1853. The opposition to the scientific theory in the West has always been that Darwin's theory of natural selection contradicts the literal interpretation of Genesis.
Bobby Henderson, the person who first saw the Flying Spaghetti Monster, wanted to show that any ridiculous idea could be proposed as a Creation theory. Under the proposed ruling, schools in Kansas would have to devote an equal amount of time to evolution and its competing theory, intelligent design.
If a competing explanation came forward, the schools would have to devote equal time to the new theory. In a now famous letter, Henderson claimed to represent 10 million followers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster and that the Pastafarians had proof that the Flying Spaghetti Monster created the universe, according to the International Herald Tribune.
The Flying Spaghetti Monster vs. Intelligent Design
Pastafarianism is not the first religion to challenge traditional religious beliefs, but the satire of the Flying Spaghetti Monster is more easily grasped. Intelligent Design relies on many assumptions, similar to the satirical claims made by the followers of the Flying Spaghetti monster.
The debate over evolution and intelligent design will rage on, but the creation of the Flying Spaghetti Monster reveals more about current society and the stretches believers sometimes have to make to believe what they want to believe than it does about the creator of the universe.
Resources:
“Academic Debate with a Side of Pasta: Religious Scholars Meet Flying Spaghetti Monster.” The International Herald Tribune. November 16, 2007.
“Spaghetti Monster is Noodling Around with Faith.” USA Today. Dan Vergano March 3, 2006.
