Angus Reid Public Opinion has just released the results of a poll conducted last year that asked Americans, Canadians, and Britons which of two statements comes closest to their views on the origins and development of human beings. (As the National Center for Science Education notes, the wording of the choices is similar but not identical to the statements Gallup uses.)
Here are the results in a handy little chart (click on image for larger view):

And here are the U.S. results broken down by region:

Pollsters at The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press called more than 1,500 Americans to ask them what life will be life 40 years from now.
Among those polled, 41 percent said they believe Jesus will have returned to earth by then (58 percent of white evangelical Christians, 32 percent of Catholics, 27 percent of mainline Protestants, and 20 percent of those who are religiously unaffiliated), while 46 percent of Americans dismiss the idea. Notably, 59 percent of those with no college education say Jesus will return, while only 35 percent of those with some college education and 19 percent of college graduates agree.
In total, almost two-thirds of Americans think religion in the United States will be about as important in 40 years as it is now, while 30 percent think religion will become less important.
In terms of scientific advancements, most Americans are optimistic, with 71 percent believing a cure for cancer will be found, 66 percent thinking artificial limbs will outperform real ones, and 63 percent expecting astronauts to have landed on Mars by 2050. Half say that there will definitely or probably be evidence that humans are not alone in the universe.
About 80 percent think computers will be able to carry on conversations like humans 40 years from now, while 42 percent say it is likely that scientists will be able to tell what people are thinking by scanning their brains. About half think scientists will have brought an animal species back from extinction through cloning, and 48 percent say humans cloning is probable.
Half of Americans, however, don’t expect improvements in the environment.
Overall, 64 percent of those surveyed said they are optimistic about their life and future—a number that’s down from 81 percent in 1999.

In the years following 9/11 and the Hurricane Katrina tragedy, you might expect that Americans’ desire for security and a sense of belonging has gone up. But not so, discovered a team of marketing researchers from the University of Oregon. They asked people to pick their top social value and found that the craving for security has gone down. While 20.6 percent of people chose security as their most important social value in 1976, only 12.4 percent chose it in 2007 (though it is possible, the researchers admit, that the recent financial crisis has raised concerns about security once again).
The desire for self-respect, on the other hand, has become even more important to Americans, picked as the top social value by 21.1 percent of people in 1976 and 28.8 percent of people in 2007. To marketing professor Lynn Kahle, this suggests that, more than before, people are relying on themselves to solve their problems. Other values going up: “warm relationships with others” (from 16.2 percent to 20.9 percent) and “fun-enjoyment-excitement” (4.5 percent to 9.3 percent.)
What accounts for the shift? The researchers aren’t sure, but Eda Gurel-Atay, the doctoral student who led the study, thinks social networking sites may have something to do with it:

Without Facebook, for instance, we might not contact our friends from primary school or others from years ago, but now we can connect with them, talk to them, share our experiences, tell them what we have done. That phenomenon may help a lot in explaining the increase in the importance of “warm relationships with others,” but this study did not look directly at such influences.

In a national poll last week, Daily Kos asked 1,200 voters:

Most astronomers believe the universe formed about 13.7 billion years ago in a massive event called the big bang. Do you think that’s about right or do think the universe was created much more recently?

The results:


As Joshua Rosenau of the National Center for Science Education points out:

The South and the Republicans are the only groups in the same neighborhood in terms of rejecting basic knowledge about the universe. Disappointing, but not entirely surprising.