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Dumbing Down Of America, 2
Topic Started: May 12 2006, 11:46 AM (5,649 Views)
TexasShadow
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Jane
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Do you mean teaching your child your beliefs in your home? By all means, that's your job as a parent. And their job is to figure it out for themselves despite your best efforts it seems.


exactly, but that rule goes for the atheist as well as the fundamentalist.... each has the same rights and personal responsibilities so it shouldn't matter any more to the atheist if his child learns something called ID and he has to denounce this at home... to the believer whose kid learns man came from the sea and has to denounce that.
I mean, just because you think the bible genesis story is a myth doesn't make it so, so that story has the same rights as the evolution from the sea story.
Posted Image "A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking."
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
Just not in the science classroom.

And acceptance of evolutionary theory is not the sole purview of atheism. Most major Christian denominations, including the largest of all, the HRCC has expressed acceptance.

But what you're arguing, Jane, is pure moral relativism: Anything anyone believes true is so. But what distinguishes between belief in your God and belief in unicorns?

Stories do not have rights.
Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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ngc1514
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TexasShadow
Jun 1 2006, 07:44 PM
okay, I agree that debate is good and let society decide what they want in the voting booth.

I myself don't see any difference in you having to "correct" your child's lessons at school any more than I have to correct mine. (if I'm a fundamentalist)

Science is not decided in the voting booth or by government fiat.

Read up on the Soviet Union's attempt to convert science to the socialistic path with T.D. Lynsenko back in the 1930's. He was a world-class crackpot, but had the support of the government and - because of fear of government reprisals - many other Russian scientists.

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Lysenko's crackpot ideas were not subjected to scientific scrutiny either in the Soviet Union or internationally. He was elevated not because his ideas had any scientific validity, but because his claims fitted the propaganda requirements of the Stalinist bureaucracy. Lysenko's ideas of rapidly expanding agricultural production dovetailed with the falsified statistics used by Stalin to demonstrate the advances under his regime.


Article on Soviet Genetics
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
Eric, agreed, science is not a popularity contest, but sadly the politics that decides what's taught in the science classroom often is.
Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
Eric, here's where I am with getting my head around what you're saying about order.

Demski's main argument for ID is the probability of the design perceived is so miniscule it had to be designed.

The WAP says, simplyfying, observed conditions in the universe must be those that allow the observer to exist

Both assume a universe that is special.

But modern physics posits 10 to the 500th, give or take a few trillion, possible universes all with their own laws, particles and constants (c.f., Leonard Susskind).

This universe is not special.

My head hurts! :ohmy:
Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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TexasShadow
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Jane
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Science is not decided in the voting booth or by government fiat.


sure it is, ever since schools were invented. the ones who pay for the schools get to say what is taught in them.
Places like Yale and Harvard are controlled by whoever pays their bills.
today, lots of folks are home schooling because they don't like the way our schools are teaching.
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TexasShadow
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Jane
Tonight I was watching the Rise of Man on the Discovery channel.
The narrator tells a story while actors act out the story.
This is the story, told as if it really happened, with moving pictures and everything.

Somewhere between 400,000 and 100,000 BC something happened that made man "religious" in the sense that he attributed magical powers to accidental/coincidental events. like a person thought to be dead, (really just unconsicious) and then suddenly regaining life/consciousness due to something else happening at the same time... like a lightning bolt or whatever. In this case it was a dying antelope, killed by the group... as it died, the unconscious person awakened and presto/chango... religious ideas were born.

It's a good story. As good as the genesis one. But no better. Just different.
But
It's related to us as factual, as factual as Genesis tells it.
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
"It's a good story. As good as the genesis one. But no better. Just different."

How do you measure better, Jane? Unless you provide your measure so others can apply it, it measures little.


"It's related to us as factual, as factual as Genesis tells it."

It is a fact that Genesis tells a story, two stories in fact. It is also a fact that Discovery told a story.

One way to measure each story is by evidence supporting each, evidence that is testable by anyone, falsifiable.

Another measure, getting back to the original topic, is the value of practical use. While the Genesis myth may at one time have served some social use, the science of evolution, as evidenced by the link in the first post here, now has more practical value.

Measures are meters.
Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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TexasShadow
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Jane
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One way to measure each story is by evidence supporting each, evidence that is testable by anyone, falsifiable.

Another measure, getting back to the original topic, is the value of practical use. While the Genesis myth may at one time have served some social use, the science of evolution, as evidenced by the link in the first post here, now has more practical value.


that's my point. there is no evidence for either story... it's just guesswork, drawing a conclusion based on later evidence of belief in afterlife or magic, etc.

the "how" of it is undetermined (no material evidence), by science or religion.

so... in order to be purely scientifical/honest/straight up and above board, the science teacher should SAY "we don't know HOW and we're not looking for WHY".
Instead, they blithely make up interesting little stories for us and present them as highly probable, much more probable than "silly old superstitious stuff" like the genesis story.
oops, better add a :) to lighten this up a little. I'm not near as angry as it sounds. I'm not angry at all, in fact. Just being ironic
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
But, Jane, there is evidence of the evolution of religion in the anthropological record, ample evidence, to say with some certainty, certainly not complete certainty, when religion arose and how it developed.

And that evidence is avaiable for anyone interested. Those who prefer know nothingism can deny it but that does not change the facts. And the story of religion is based on those facts.


Jane, go to your local school and ask for a biology textbook. It's nothing like you image. It's not like the Bible.

"...A hypothesis is a possible explanation for an event or set of observations. Hypotheses are sometimes confused with the observations themselves....A hypothesis that is supported by many experiments done over a period of time is called a theory. Like hypotheses, theories can be confused with facts. Theories are not facts. Theories are probable explanations for events that are supported by a wide range of evidence."

Pp 21-23, Strauss and Lisowski, Biology: The Web of Life, Scott Foresman Addison-Wesley. My son's high school textbook.

Are you surprised?


I don't read anger. I read passion. It's OK, really. :)
Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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TexasShadow
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Jane
no, I'm not surprised to find such a paragraph in your son's schoolbook.

the problem is not so much with the books as with the teachers.
teachers being people, tend to emphasize what they think is important for the student to know, so the student is directed to read and study by the teacher, and the student, also being human and wanting to get a good grade, etc. concentrates on feeding back to the teacher what the teacher wants to hear.
that particular paragraph may or may not be read, depending on the teacher.

again, it comes down to the parent at home to correct or add or subtract from the teacher's agenda.
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
Like with Teryt then, your argument is not with science or the theory of evolution, but with teachers.

And getting teachers to teach it right is not the same as getting them to teach it wrong with ID.
Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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teryt
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I don't know if this will be helpful, and I'm not even sure what he is talking about, but here is what my amature biology friend had to say about the discussion on here:

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I don't know exactly what they mean by "no scientific footing" but usually they mean that because they have defined science as only naturally occurring events etc. then of course there can be no scientific footing for ID.  However, if the definition for science is returned to its true state as a search for whatever is actually true then ID is equally as valid as materialism.


(He is quoting me as I attempted to sum up the argument on here when he mentions "no scientific footing.")
My Boast is Christ :pray:
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cmoehle
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Chris - San Antonio TX
True state? Ask your friend what the definition of philosophy is, and why he would change the meaning of science to include that, and religion, and etc.

Your friend got one aspect, pertinent, ask him about the other apects of the scienctific method and ID's footing with regard to them:
Quote:
 
        * Consistent. Generates no obvious logical contradictions, and 'saves the phenomena', being consistent with observation.

        * Parsimonious. Economical in the number of assumptions and hypothetical entities.

        * Pertinent. Describes and explains observed phenomena.

        * Falsifiable and testable. See Falsifiability and Testability.

        * Reproducible. Makes predictions that can be tested by any observer, with trials extending indefinitely into the future.

        * Correctable and dynamic. Subject to modification as new observations are made.

        * Integrative, robust, and corrigible. Subsumes previous theories as approximations, and allows possible subsumption by future theories. See Correspondence principle

        * Provisional or tentative. Does not assert the absolute certainty of the theory.

(source)

Politics is the art of achieving the maximum amount of freedom for individuals that is consistent with the maintenance of social order.
--Barry Goldwater
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ngc1514
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cmoehle
Jun 1 2006, 09:03 PM
Eric, agreed, science is not a popularity contest, but sadly the politics that decides what's taught in the science classroom often is.

No argument there, Chris. Best of all, it provides gainful employment for my wife's oldest daughter! She's a newly minted PhD (population genetics and evolutionary biology) and has a teaching postdoc at Duke. Her job is teaching these bright freshmen (or so their transcripts and SAT scores say) - who have expressed an interest in science or medicine - everything that they should have learned in high school.

Most of them read pretty well, a few can write, but almost none have any background in science or math worth talking about. Her job is to get these kids to a level where they can take basic, college freshmen classes. Most of the emphasis is on research and writing, but she also fills in the gaping holes in biology.

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