Preface: this isn't an attack on people who believe in God, nor an attack on people who believe in creationism. It's an attack on people who want creationism taught alongside evolution in schools.
Alternative viewpoints, my bunghole. Science isn't a hippie love-in. A scientific theory must be disprovable, and is judged on the basis of the evidence that supports it and the predictions it makes. Evolution meets those measures. Creationism fails on all counts.
If you want to teach kids theories about God, do it in Sunday School or private religious schools. Don't try and force your way into secular schools and attempt to debase science.
The latest attempt at an end-around by creationists: intelligent design.
--Nat
The Demon-Haunted World
jhi on 2002-02-21T01:16:33
The Demon-Haunted World is good reading. It is mostly about pseudoscience scams like UFOs, astrology, new age, and so on, but its "baloney detection toolkit" is required reading for anybody that claims to be thinking "critically".
Re:The Demon-Haunted World
djberg96 on 2002-02-21T04:41:27
You forgot to mention Scientology. Why does the "Darth Vader" music from Star Wars always go through my head when I say that word?I prefer my "audits" from the IRS, thank you very much.
Re:Could you miss the point more?
dredd on 2002-02-21T02:09:22
Science is about theories, and proving or disproving them. There are few "cold hard facts" in science, it's - by and large - filled with theories that nobody has disproven yet, and are considered to be "the way it is" until proven otherwise.In this respect "random chance" is the accepted scientific
.. process, if you will. That is not, in itself, a religious belief of any kind. It's a "fact" that science considers that theory the most likely, and that there are no other scientifically-sound theories that have yet to be put forward. And no, you can't say that "intelligent design" is a scientifically-sound theory, not by any stretch of the imagination. Is it a theory? Sure, but not one that has any basis in science, and that's what is being taught. I gotta go with Nat on this one.
Re:Could you miss the point more?
pudge on 2002-02-21T02:31:13
You are conflating two things: the facts of what happened -- evolution of species -- and why that thing happened. Evolution as a scientific theory does not, and cannot, say anything about why it happened. That is philosophy, not science.
Fine, don't call it religion, although I'll disagree, but to call that science? What do you weigh or measure or compare or graph to say it happened by chance? There's nothing empirical about it in any sense. Sure, science can say that because this species didn't have incisors it wasn't able to survive, but science can't say why it didn't have incisors.
I won't pretend to know why it didn't have incisors. Maybe it was purely by chance. But there's no possible way for science to give us this answer. It falls outside what the scientific method is able to do.Re:Could you miss the point more?
jhi on 2002-02-21T04:03:24
If you think the school should answer (or even try to give an answer or a few) to the question "why", then we obviously disagree. The family and the culture in which we grow up should give the building blocks so that we ourselves can then decide what we choose to believe in and not to believe in. "Why" is a question of faith, and public schools should stick to things provable, that is, science. We don't teach alternative histories, like for example that Josef Stalin was a really nice guy, after all.
Re:Could you miss the point more?
pudge on 2002-02-21T05:04:24
If you think the school should answer (or even try to give an answer or a few) to the question "why", then we obviously disagree.
Then we don't disagree! I thought I was clear in my initial reply to gnat, but perhaps I wasn't: I don't want the schools to answer that question. I want them to stick to the facts. The problem is that many schools don't do that; they say that these things happened by chance, effectively telling many children that their religion is wrong.
Well, really, I want local school boards to make up their own minds about what to teach, whether that be creationism or mormonism or atheism or vodooism. But that's very difficult, if not impossible, in our society. So the next best thing is to do exactly as you say. So we agree, for the most part.Re:Could you miss the point more?
jhi on 2002-02-21T05:13:13
In that case, we can agree to disagree about the definition of "facts". From my viewpoint, you are mixing facts with faith.
Re:Could you miss the point more?
pudge on 2002-02-21T15:14:25
Which facts are you referring to? I am only talking about one supposed "fact" here: that these things all happened by chance. You yourself admit that is not a fact. So what's the problem?Re:Could you miss the point more?
jhi on 2002-02-21T15:52:28
I'm sorry but you are reading to my words something that isn't there. Let me spell it out: all these things happened by chance. Your nitpicking over the word is sadly one of the classical misunderstandings creationists like to nag about. Firstly, chance does not mean "completely random", secondly, chance has nothing to with faith or lack thereof. Do not mix faith and facts. Go over to talk.origins and search for "chance".
Re:Could you miss the point more?
pudge on 2002-02-21T16:44:30
Let me spell it out: all these things happened by chance
Not in the very clear context I was using the word, no: chance in the sense of randomness, of lack of design or direction.
In that sense, as I said, science cannot say these things happened by chance. If you prefer, I'll amend that to science cannot say these things happened randomly, without direction or design. But from the context, such a clarification shouldn't have been necessary: I was using "chance" in the context of causation; to use that word with your definition in that context makes no sense.
So as to mixing faith and facts, as to nitpicking, I wasn't. You simply weren't reading in the proper context, or you were the one nitpicking. Either one could apply.
And this highlights the very problem I am describing: teachers usually don't say that chance just means probability. They don't distinguish between how different disciplines use the word. And they use "random" a lot, another loaded and usually left undefined word. It frankly matters not at all what a teacher means when they use words like "random" and "chance," it matters how well the students understand the concept. Teachers aren't judged by what they teach, but what the students learn.
To be more specific: most people in the U.S. use the word "chance" as I did, so when a teacher says "humans evolved by chance" to a child, that teacher is telling the child that humans evolved purely randomly, without any direction or design. Communication is not just intent, it is also intepretation. The child usually won't think that it means that we could not have predicted the conditions by which the human evolved, because that is not how most people use that word.
I am not quibbling over words that are used, I am quibbling over the big picture that is taught to children in public schools. I don't care what words they use, I care about whether or not they teach children the cause of what happens, or whether they leave that to the home. If they can do that and still use words like "chance" and "random," then fine. They rarely can or do, in my experience, and this is my complaint. They -- either purposefully or unintentionally -- teach that the cause of evolution lacks design.
So thanks for proving a part of my point.
Re:Could you miss the point more?
autarch on 2002-02-21T15:42:44
We don't teach alternative histories, like for example that Josef Stalin was a really nice guy, after all.
Well, actually, we do. Except these things are taught more by omission.
For example, I was looking at my thirteen year old cousin's history book on East Asia (primarily, China, Japan, and Taiwan). I flipped to the section on Taiwan and found no mention of the following facts:
- Taiwan was invaded by the Nationalist Party, led by Chiang Kai-Shek, after the Nationalists were defeated by the Communists in the civil war.
- The Taiwanese people did not want the Nationalists there.
- Approximate 20-30 thousand Taiwanese were murdered by the Nationalists during demonstrations against the Nationalists. This is known as the February 28 incident.
- Taiwan was under martial law until 1988.
- Taiwan's first multi-party elections were in 1995 (I think).
- The Nationalists executed and imprisoned numerous Taiwanese natives though to be "communist sympathisers" (sound familiar).
But the book did mention that the Nationalists were against the Communists (that makes them good, right?), and it did mention that they were supported by the US. That leaves students to draw the conclusion that the Nationalists were the good guys.
And there's plenty else omitted. Students learn very little about the genocide of Native Americans or US involvement in South America, or US support for the Nazis in the 30s, or the Ship of the Damned, or US involvement in the Middle East post-WWII.
And a whole host of other things. Sounds like alternative history to me.Re:Could you miss the point more?
jhi on 2002-02-21T16:12:42
That is very true: the Art of Omission is doing well, and no country is free of it, each has their own blind spots in their history they'd rather forget. Another guy's guerillas (I guess the updated term would be "terrorists") are another guy's freedom fighters, another guy's uniter is another guy's oppressor.
For example: I had my hair cut few days ago and the guy who did is of Armenian origin. Search for "armenian massacre": in 1915-1916 Turkish troops killed 1-2 million Armenians. Of course, the Turkish government to this day vehemently denies of it, claiming it to be anti-Turkish propaganda.
The Japanese want to forget their raping and pillage of China; the Chinese want to forget the millions that died building their current system (and everybody has forgotten the occupation of Tibet); Belgians do not want to discuss Congo; we Finns do not like to discuss the concentration camps where our communists were shut for a while after our civil war, and so forth.
Re:Could you miss the point more?
jmm on 2002-02-21T22:28:29
It isn't about teaching alternatives. It is about schools teaching that there are no alternatives, and teaching that there can't be intelligent design (which there's nothing really new about; it's probably been around for at least 30 years).
Schools teach the scientific method. That emphasises the process of analysing the data, trying to come up with a theory that matches the data, using the theory to predict what shoudl happen in similar circumstances (especially emphasizing circumstances in which this theory predicts different results from other theories), running experiments to confirm or deny those predictions.
That scientific method is reviewed at many stages in the educational system (at least twice during the course of primary school). Often enough for students to realize that many things that they are being taught will some day, perhaps not in their lifetimes, be found to be wrong or incomplete.
There is no need (and considerable distraction) in exploring the facets in which the scientific evidence is contradictory or incomplete for each area studied. At higher grade levels, they should be explored in depth for areas in which the student is focussing. By University level, there should be a certain proportion of each course daling with such studies. That time will be balanced between historical study covering how previously accepted theory has since been disproved and study of the results known to be unexplained by currently accepted theory and the prevailing alternate theories that are trying to explain those results.
At all levels, there is no need to studying alternatives for which there is no evidence beyond mythology.
I've not seen any evidence that supports intelligent design. (Admittedly, I haven't looked too hard.) Without some compelling evidence, it is philosophy or wishful thinking rather than science.
Robert Sawyer's story Calculating God provides one interesting sort of possibility in which there is determined to be deliberate design to the Universe. Of course, that is a story and it probably is not an accurate description of the creation/purpose of our Universe.Re:Could you miss the point more?
pudge on 2002-02-21T22:45:58
I've not seen any evidence that supports intelligent design. (Admittedly, I haven't looked too hard.) Without some compelling evidence, it is philosophy or wishful thinking rather than science.
Yet again, people missing the point, right and left and fore and rear. I don't want intelligent design to be taught. Why do you pretend that I do? I've clearly stated I don't.
I simply don't want teachers teaching that the cause of evolution is pure chance or randomness, that the cause excludes the possibility of design or direction. This is what is taught, often -- unintentionally or not -- and it is wrong. That doesn't mean I want design taught, or even mentioned; it means I don't want teachers saying "the cause of this was pure chance." That is not science.
Why people keep misunderstanding what I think I am saying so plainly, I don't know.Re:Could you miss the point more?
jdavidb on 2002-02-22T17:58:26
There is no need (and considerable distraction) in exploring the facets in which the scientific evidence is contradictory or incomplete for each area studied.
Somehow that reminds me of second grade when I got all mad because they kept telling me you had to put the smaller number on the bottom in a subtraction problem and I knew they were wrong. My brother did the same thing, too, five years later. (We Blackstones liked our negative numbers as kids.)
All the same, Pudge isn't saying to examine the possible contradictions of evolution or saying to teach intelligent design. He is simply teaching, "Don't teach that evolution and current theories of origins rule out intelligent design." Or, to put it another way, "Don't institutionalize disrespect for a particular viewpoint."
and now your tax money that pays for the decaying public schools will be siphoned off by the school voucher plan so you can either have religion in the public schools or you can watch the public schools decay at an even faster rate while people who are rich enough to send their kids to parochial schools can get a break. I suppose the 17% of kids who don't finish high school are less important than religion. Move back to NZ and just keep hoping biotech will find the religion gene and remove it from the genepool.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T01:03:43
Fact: schooling of children is a mandate by the government. If the public schools are too bad for the children attend, then schooling of children becomes an unfunded mandate by the government on the parents. It is an obligation of the government to provide parents the funds to fulfill their legal requirement of providing education for their students.Re:education is a bit of a mess
hfb on 2002-02-21T01:10:41
It is a mandate for "public" schooling. If they start cutting checks to people for sending their kids to parochial schools then us non-breeders should be able to opt-out of paying property taxes since I have no kids and don't wish to pay for religious education. The public schools will not benefit from this and the next step would be to abolish public education altogether and just make people pay for their own education like college/university. Your desire for religious education for your children is not my obligation to help you pay for it.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T01:20:04
The government decides everyone must be schooled, so it is obliged to pay for that, and to say that public school is the only way this should be achieved is nonsense, because public schools simply are not an option sometimes. This isn't about religious schools in many cases -- to frame it otherwise is dishonest -- and even when it is, it would be unconstitutional to not pay for it just because it is religious. That is specifically prohibited by the First Amendment in regard establishments of religion. To use a common question: what part of "no law" do you not understand?
Whether or not the public schools will benefit is irrelevant to me. What is relevant is the government paying for what it requires of parents.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
hfb on 2002-02-21T01:44:43
In the pilot program over 80% of the beneficiaries were catholic schools. Why should I be obligated to pay for the middle class to siphon money away from the already hurting public schools so that they can buy an SUV on the money my tax dollars helped them save on their kids school tuition? The government provides for a public education and that is all the constitution provides for so if a public school isn't 'an option' for you then you'll just have to cough up the cash like my parents and others have done for more than a century.
For a guy who doesn't like federal income taxes and thinks social security is only for stupid people you sure are being awfully liberal with my tax dollars to provide you with alternative education. I don't mind paying taxes that go to educate and improve public schools but to pay for the sure destruction of it is not something I would ever support. You want your kids to go to another school, you pay for it. This is america afterall.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T01:58:16
In the pilot program over 80% of the beneficiaries were catholic schools
So 20% weren't. I am just saying you cannot frame this as an issue only for religious instruction, because it is not.
Why should I be obligated to pay for the middle class to siphon money away from the already hurting public schools
Because you -- the American people -- have mandated that these children must be schooled, so you must provide the means for them to be schooled. And again, saying the public schools are the only means by which they should be schooled is nonsense.
The government provides for a public education and that is all the constitution provides for
Sorry, no; the Constitution provides for no public education at all. Education is never mentioned in the Constitution, public or otherwise.
For a guy who doesn't like federal income taxes and thinks social security is only for stupid people you sure are being awfully liberal with my tax dollars to provide you with alternative education.
Well, my preference is that no federal tax dollars would go to education at all. As long as they do, they should go to every child who is required to go to school. The fact is that most education dollars -- at least in my experience in Massachusetts and California -- comes from the local cities and towns, and when it doesn't, it's primarily from the state, so this really isn't a federal tax issue for the most part anyway.
The bottom line here, though, that you keep ignoring, is that public schools simply are not a reasonable option for many children, even when that has nothing to do with religion. It could be because the child learns differently than most children and the school is ill-equipped to handle it, or it could be that the school just sucks. In such situations, the public school simply is not an option. To say one shoul go to public school when it is not an option is, as noted, nonsense. And to say the government can mandate the schooling of these children and not pay for it is unreasonable.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
hfb on 2002-02-21T02:58:46
You still haven't answered why I should help you pay for an alternate school without providing a reason why it should be federally mandated, why my money should fund religious schooling of any kind or what exactly it is about public education that is unsuitable and how abandoning it is a solution for all the people. One dollar of my tax dollars paying for religious schooling of any kind is too much. The libertarians seem to think that public schooling is too governmentally controlled yet want my federal and local tax dollars to pay for their private schooling as a 'separation of shool and state'. If you want separation of school and state then send your kids to private school and pay the tuition...keep my tax dollars out of it and put it towards public education, public transport, special education programs, birth control clinics and what ever else that might have a positive effect for more people.
And noone cares if your kids don't finish school since 17% of the US population lacks a high school diploma and provide us a cheap labour workforce. I believe you even praised this lack of education since america is a country where one doesn't need an education to succeed. There's always the military!
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T03:58:37
I have already clearly addressed pretty much everything you ask; that you don't see it is evidence that to reiterate it would be unhelpful.
As to your final point: I do feel that a high school diploma is unnecessary for many people, of course. You don't need a high school diploma for most jobs. I never said you don't need an education to succeed, I said you don't need a high school diploma; those are two vastly different things.
On the other hand, the standards of high school are a lot lower than they used to be, and many people who graduate high school are functionally illiterate and can't do basic math, so getting a diploma doesn't mean much. If 83% of the US population -- those who have high school diplomas -- were nearly as educated as high school graduates used to be 50 years ago, that would be wonderful. But they're not.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
jhi on 2002-02-21T04:23:13
"high school diploma is unnecessary for many people because you don't need it for most jobs" and "getting a diploma doesn't mean much since many who graduate are functionally illiterate". Oookay. In other words, schooling is required only for jobs, not for your everyday life?
It's fine that most of the people can't read or write, or do basic maths properly? It's fine if most people don't know enough (even) their own language, math, sciences, history, geography, economics, so that the people in power (take your pick: media, authorities, politicians, industry lobby groups, etc) can say pretty much what they want and no one will question that, because they can't tell fact from fiction, or rather, a lie? You don't want people, you want cattle. Mooo.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T05:15:30
I perhaps unclearly am drawing a distinction between schooling and education. I probably would have skipped college altogether were it not for the need to have a college diploma to get most decent jobs. That's not to say I squandered the opportunity, because I made the most of it; but I didn't, and don't, see the need for it. I would have become more educated regardless.
As to it being OK that most people not being able to do basic math, language skills, etc.: heavens no! I am saying that a high school diploma, unfortunately, doesn't mean that they can! hfb loves to quote statistics about how dumb Americans are, and the number of dumb ones is usually far greater than the number of those with a high school diploma.
I'd really love for people to be better educated, but 1. that doesn't necessarily mean more schooling, and 2. more schooling is not anything close to a guarantee of better education. Don't get me wrong: I have no problem spending more money on our schools if it will make them better. I would love to have a better school system. I just don't consider 12 years of schooling for every person to be either necessary or sufficient for an educated people. If people would drop out of high school and read a lot of good books they'd be way ahead of the curve.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
hfb on 2002-02-21T19:47:33
You still have not answered why my tax dollars should go to your own self-serving ideas of education instead of towards improving the system that already is in need of serious help that would help all children instead of just yours.
A good education is one of if not the pillar of a democracy and considering that it is no wonder this country is no longer a well informed democracy. We are the richest 3rd world nation on the planet.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T20:03:05
You still have not answered why my tax dollars should go to your own self-serving ideas of education instead of towards improving the system that already is in need of serious help that would help all children instead of just yours.
Yes, I did.Re:education is a bit of a mess
hfb on 2002-02-21T20:45:41
No, you didn't.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
pudge on 2002-02-21T21:20:20
The government requires schooling (mandate). Beyond that, which I didn't mention, the government promises schooling. Sometimes the provided schooling is unacceptable, and often the reasons why have nothing to do with religion, but they are because the schools themselves are bad, such as is the case with many inner city schools. In such a case, the government has an obligation -- legal and moral -- to provide alternative schooling options.
Simply saying that the money should go to improving the schools is unreasonable; the solution must be immediate, because it is unacceptable to require children to go to schools that aren't working.
It's quite simple, and whether or not you agree with my reasoning, I said it several times, and I can't see how you could think I didn't explain it before, unless you simply weren't reading.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
hfb on 2002-02-21T04:37:05
Most jobs? I encourage you to go look for a job and claim you have no HS diploma or GED. What you are encouraging is a class system of rewarding people with college educations to pay you to send your kid to college with their tax dollars while those who can't afford private schools even with the subsidy will be forced to go to public schools with even less money and even less hope of getting a better education. If this is what you think is constitutional and 'american' and 'democratic' I think it's far too self-serving to be any of those. Abolish public education then and privatise education altogether making that distinction even greater to ensure that there is always a cheap labour force to flip burgers at McDonald's and work in the fields. Do that, just don't call it democratic.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
jdavidb on 2002-02-21T18:48:45
On the other hand, the standards of high school are a lot lower than they used to be, and many people who graduate high school are functionally illiterate and can't do basic math, so getting a diploma doesn't mean much.
How do you know this exactly? You don't believe everything you hear, do you?
:) P.S. I'm on your side, I think, so don't take this too seriously.
Re:education is a bit of a mess
chromatic on 2002-02-21T02:14:31
Death to the infidels, indeed?
And you might also find In search of the Educated American of interest
