Posted on 12/11/2002 6:28:08 AM PST by A2J
By WILL SENTELL
wsentell@theadvocate.com
Capitol news bureau
High school biology textbooks would include a disclaimer that evolution is only a theory under a change approved Tuesday by a committee of the state's top school board.
If the disclaimer wins final approval, it would apparently make Louisiana just the second state in the nation with such a provision. The other is Alabama, which is the model for the disclaimer backers want in Louisiana.
Alabama approved its policy six or seven years ago after extensive controversy that included questions over the religious overtones of the issue.
The change approved Tuesday requires Louisiana education officials to check on details for getting publishers to add the disclaimer to biology textbooks.
It won approval in the board's Student and School Standards/ Instruction Committee after a sometimes contentious session.
"I don't believe I evolved from some primate," said Jim Stafford, a board member from Monroe. Stafford said evolution should be offered as a theory, not fact.
Whether the proposal will win approval by the full state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on Thursday is unclear.
Paul Pastorek of New Orleans, president of the board, said he will oppose the addition.
"I am not prepared to go back to the Dark Ages," Pastorek said.
"I don't think state boards should dictate editorial content of school textbooks," he said. "We shouldn't be involved with that."
Donna Contois of Metairie, chairwoman of the committee that approved the change, said afterward she could not say whether it will win approval by the full board.
The disclaimer under consideration says the theory of evolution "still leaves many unanswered questions about the origin of life.
"Study hard and keep an open mind," it says. "Someday you may contribute to the theories of how living things appeared on earth."
Backers say the addition would be inserted in the front of biology textbooks used by students in grades 9-12, possibly next fall.
The issue surfaced when a committee of the board prepared to approve dozens of textbooks used by both public and nonpublic schools. The list was recommended by a separate panel that reviews textbooks every seven years.
A handful of citizens, one armed with a copy of Charles Darwin's "Origin of the Species," complained that biology textbooks used now are one-sided in promoting evolution uncritically and are riddled with factual errors.
"If we give them all the facts to make up their mind, we have educated them," Darrell White of Baton Rouge said of students. "Otherwise we have indoctrinated them."
Darwin wrote that individuals with certain characteristics enjoy an edge over their peers and life forms developed gradually millions of years ago.
Backers bristled at suggestions that they favor the teaching of creationism, which says that life began about 6,000 years ago in a process described in the Bible's Book of Genesis.
White said he is the father of seven children, including a 10th-grader at a public high school in Baton Rouge.
He said he reviewed 21 science textbooks for use by middle and high school students. White called Darwin's book "racist and sexist" and said students are entitled to know more about controversy that swirls around the theory.
"If nothing else, put a disclaimer in the front of the textbooks," White said.
John Oller Jr., a professor at the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, also criticized the accuracy of science textbooks under review. Oller said he was appearing on behalf of the Louisiana Family Forum, a Christian lobbying group.
Oller said the state should force publishers to offer alternatives, correct mistakes in textbooks and fill in gaps in science teachings. "We are talking about major falsehoods that should be addressed," he said.
Linda Johnson of Plaquemine, a member of the board, said she supports the change. Johnson said the new message of evolution "will encourage students to go after the facts."
No. On the other hand I have heard of Ragnarok, and yes the Vikings did have a belief that world as we know it was going to end.
Remember what's being discussed. I found the Bible to mesh remarkably well with what we know scientifically about the universe. Much better than what I had expected when I read it.
If the Bible had predicted that this world would last forever, and the Sun would never die, and matter would never devolve to disorder, that would be a pretty good strike against it.
Nope, I am absolutely correct in my remarks on Post# 1309. I quoted physicist's own words:
Physicist deserves no apologies. As I said if he is a physicist he should not have made the following statement denying gravity:
Uh, huh. And what makes YOU think that the force that keeps the moon in its orbit is the same thing as the force that keeps your keyster in its chair?
1235 posted on 12/28/2002 8:11 PM PST by Physicist
He is either not a physicist or he is totally dishonest. Such a person does not deserve any apology.
If anyone has to apologize to the readers of this forum it is him. He has either misrepresented himself as a physicist or has lied to the readers of this forum.
BTW - you are guilty of the same crime in your Post #1270 where you said that:
Gravity is a proven fact, and not just on earth. We found Pluto because we saw the effects of its gravity, we were able to land on the moon thanks to gravity. Your denying that gravity even exists shows your total disregard for both science and honest discussion.-me-
Really? Can you explain the difference between pure Newtonian physics and General Relativity? Why do you think its called Gravitational Theory?
My reply in post 1276 shows why you owe the same apology as physicist. Your statement was clearly ignorant or dishonest for someone who claims to be a radio astronomer:
For a supposed astronomer you do not even know your terms. It is called the LAW OF UNIVERSAL GRAVITATION it is far more than a theory. As I told physicist, by denying something which you know to be true you are being dishonest. If you are a radio astronomer you know that gravity has been observed. If you do not know it, then you are not a radio astronomer, so either way you are being dishonest.
You and your friends are trying to create confusion in order to try to dismiss my posts as nonsense. Specifically that gravity has been observed and evolution never has been observed. I ask all those who do not believe that gravity has been observed or do not believe that it is observable to go on top of a 20 story building and jump. This will have two benefits: one it will prove to you that there are indeed universal scientific laws, and two, it will rid the world of a few people lacking in common sense (and perhaps win you a posthmous Darwin Award!). Gravity is observed everyday by everyone. Evolution has NEVER been observed.
BTW - it is interesting that evolutionists when shown that some scientific statement is true, try to challenge the truth of a scientific theory instead of prove their own evolutionary theory. It shows clearly to me that evolutionists are quite aware that evolution is not a fact, but just rhetorical nonsense.
That's a good point that dovetails with why I believe the Bible was written by God, not man. If it was a work of man there would be a whole lot of explanations and just about all of them would be wrong.
One of the interesting things that has happened in recent years is the verification of Genesis by science. The first words in the Bible are "In the beginning ws the Word". Science has verified the "In the beginning" part with the Big Bang theory. Now I am sure that many have thought that when the Bible said "the Word" they thought it was a metaphor or some indirect allusion to God. However, the discovery of DNA has verified that in the beginning was "the Word", that it was meant literally. It is the information in DNA that is the source of life, it is the particular arrangement of the codes that makes life possible.
Great post! I will laugh about the above. How true!
Evolution is about biology, not geology. That you and your friends want to discuss geology instead of the subject of this thread shows quite well that all of you are very much aware that evolution does not have a scientific leg to stand on. It shows quite well that you and the other evolutionists here know quite well that evolution is false so you have chosen to essentially spam the thread with irrelevant information in order to distract from the emptiness of your theory.
Utter bilge. You have just proven to me that you neither have an advanced degree, nor have made it through your sophmore year as an undergraduate.
A gracious and humble apology. Kudos! Now, if only someone else on this thread would learn from your example...
I'm very pleased to meet you and am much impressed with your attitude. Hugs!
Are you going to completely ignore my post #1303 which points out your error?
Or are you going to completely ignore it like your error about circles and ellipses.
It is troubling though that the dialogue took a personal turn. I know both RadioAstronomer and Physicist to be exactly who they purport to be and would have been quick to make that statement.
As to PatrickHenry's challenge to gore3000 about how old is the earth, I'd like to submit my observation that young and old are not necessarily mutually exclusive. For lurkers: my views.
Tribune7 and gore3000 - I really like your point that the Bible is unique in specifying there was a beginning and there will be an end. I also find the statement in Psalms very interesting in light of current discoveries:
The 36-member, international "Boomerang" (Balloon Observations of Millimetric Extragalactic Radiation and Geomagnetics) collaboration, led by Andrew Lange of Caltech and Paolo de Bernardis of the University of Rome, confirms that a plot of CMB strength peaks at a multipole value of about 197 (corresponding to CMB patches about one degree in angular spread), very close to what theorists had predicted for a cosmology in which the universe's overall curvature is zero and the existence of cold dark matter is invoked.
The shape of the observed pattern of temperature variations suggests that a disturbance very like a sound wave moving through air passed through the high- density primordial fluid and that the CMB map can be can be thought of as a sort of sonogram of the infant universe. (de Bernardis et al., Nature, 27 April 2000.)
Big Bang Evidence Found – 5/2/2001
"The early universe is full of sound waves compressing and rarefying matter and light, much like sound waves compress and rarefy air inside a flute or trumpet," explained Paolo deBernardis of the University of Rome La Sapienza, one of the members of the Balloon Observations of Millimetric Extragalactic Radiation and Geophysics (BOOMERanG) team. "For the first time the new data show clearly the harmonics of these waves."
Harmonics in the Early Universe – 6/5/2001
The MAXIMA, BOOMERANG, and DASI collaborations, which measure minute variations in the CMB, recently reported new results at the American Physical Society meeting in Washington, D.C. All three agree remarkably about what the "harmonic proportions" of the cosmos imply: not only is the universe flat, but its structure is definitely due to inflation, not to topological defects in the early universe.
The results were presented as plots of slight temperature variations in the CMB that graph sound waves in the dense early universe. These high-resolution "power spectra" show not only a strong primary resonance but are consistent with two additional harmonics, or peaks.
Cosmological Patterns and Galaxy Biasing (pdf)
It takes guts to apologize that way.
If you get a chance, I'd much appreciate any comments you might have on those articles!
That is the funniest thing I've heard in a while!
OTOH, with a brain like that maybe his mother wasn't human after all!
You say it again. You truly are a simple, simple man. You calim to have "thoroughly disproven" evolution. You are a nut-case...
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