Posted on 08/02/2008 8:44:19 AM PDT by Soliton
don't remember when I first learned about the theory of evolution, but nowadays I find myself reading of it a great deal in the popular press and hearing it discussed in the media. As my daughter enters elementary school, I find myself anxious to discuss with her teachers what they will cover in science class and where in their curriculum they plan to teach evolution. OUR COUNTRY HAS LAWS THAT SEPARATE church and state. Public institutions like schools must be neutral on the subject of religion, as required by the Constitution's First Amendment. Our courts have mandated that creationism is not an appropriate addition to the science curriculum in public schools; yet supporters of intelligent design press to have antievolutionary discussions enter the science classroom. Creationists even advocate that, when leaching evolution, educators should add the disclaimer that it is "just a theory."
Let's consider why all of us as educated persons, scientists and nonseientists alike, should take note of what science is taught - and not taught - in our public schools. In common language, a theory is a guess of sorts. However, in scientific language, a theory is "a set of universal statements that explain some aspect of the natural world... formulated and tested on the basis of evidence, internal consistency, and their explanatory power."1 The theory of evolution meets all of these criteria.
(Excerpt) Read more at redorbit.com ...
I believe it has never advanced past a hypothetical construct.
Your belief is wrong
She doesn’t really say why eveolution “must” be teached. Maybe the headline editor at Red Orbit got carried away.
The author points out indirectly that it is really more of a guess than a theory.
Yes she does. You teach evolution because it is science and you teach science in science class.
You are putting words in my mouth. I never said that !
Read it again, she explicitly states that it is not a guess and provides the scientific definition of "theory". Genetics has verified Darwin's original hypothesis as has numerous laboratory and field studies. It is a fully formed and robust scientific theory.
You never said that?
Why? Because the Temple of Darwin relies on force and tolerates zero dissent.
Sure she does. She says:
The curriculum taught in our science classrooms should be that which is based on measurable, quantifiable fact.
By the way, until and unless one develops an experiment to prove or disprove the existence of a Creator, ID is not science.
> The author points out indirectly that it is really more of a guess than a theory.
Really? Where? She says quite the opposite and takes great pains to differentiate the common language use of the word theory vs. the scientific definition of theory.
Evolutionism fails to meet the first criterium, and the latter two criteria are the product of ignorance about the validity of philosophical presuppositions.
Evolution, self-admittedly, deals with suppositions which cannot be reproduced experimentally, since the events in question (i.e. macroevolution) are not currently being observed, and are presumed to have occurred sometimes hundreds of millions of years in the past. Evolutionists resort to "experimentation" which is circular in reasoning, seeking to reproduce what they "think" happened, by engineering experimentation around the foregone conclusion of the results they seek to validate. That is scientifically invalid, even if it is politically acceptable to evolutionists. There is therefore no actual "basis on evidence" for evolution. Just a lot of suppositions, wild guesses, ridiculous arguments from homology, and extrapolation from the evidence of horizontal change to the supposition of vertical change.
Even leaving aside the questionable assumption that evolutionism is self-cohesive, "internal consistency" is not necessarily a hallmark that something is true. There are many, many philosophies which are "internally consistent" that none of us here would accept as true, merely because they are internally consistent.
"Explanatory power" is also not an evidence for truth of a proposition. Ptolemy's geocentric model had "explanatory power", but was obviously not true. The theories about aether and phlogiston had explanatory power, but were not true. "Explanatory power" indicates a that one has produced a theory only, not experimental verification or "science".
Tolerates zero dissent? Evolutionists argue fine points all of the time. They just require scientific evidence.
Well,the theory DOES explain the chicken or the egg riddle.
Forget for the moment that eggs were around long before the first chicken—the theory of E states that whatever hen laid the first egg containing the first chicken was not a chicken—close to but still not EXACTLY a chicken.
Growing up the chicken or the egg paradox drove me crazy—I was just happy “something” answered it.
My personal belief is,of course,that all physical laws in the Universe,both discovered and yet to be discovered,were put in place by intelligent design.
To believe otherwise is to be inconsistant with the evolution of the human brain—which has finally advanced to a stage where healthy specimens can sense things beyond the physical.
Explain this:
“Here we present a draft genome sequence of the common chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes). Through comparison with the human genome, we have generated a largely complete catalogue of the genetic differences that have accumulated since the human and chimpanzee species diverged from our common ancestor, constituting approximately thirty-five million single-nucleotide changes, five million insertion/deletion events, and various chromosomal rearrangements. We use this catalogue to explore the magnitude and regional variation of mutational forces shaping these two genomes, and the strength of positive and negative selection acting on their genes. In particular, we find that the patterns of evolution in human and chimpanzee protein-coding genes are highly correlated and dominated by the fixation of neutral and slightly deleterious alleles. We also use the chimpanzee genome as an outgroup to investigate human population genetics and identify signatures of selective sweeps in recent human evolution.”
Do you have a degree in science, or are these just your suppositions?
This is such B.S. The first admendment requires no such neutrality! The word "Establish" makes it very clear what the law intends. The reason we are in such moral decay and have a selfish attitude in today's society is because we've allow IDIOTS like this to define the law on religious free speech.! It's the totally oppsite from the standard the securalists have set. In public discourse and especially public schools you should be debating and discussing religion as a topic every day!
Again, what the gov't can not do as required by law is "establish" a religion. Discussing religion and praying do NOT establish it, but rather positively foward the first admendment precept!
Sense what things beyond the physical?
That's what the creationists hate! They can't get their religious beliefs considered as scientific evidence. (Hey! There's a tagline in there somewhere!)
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