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."
I do not think we are communicating here.
Only for some homosexuals.
Does “threeness” exist separately from 3 chairs, 3 apples, 3 dogs? Yes, but it is an invented concept. Threeness as a concept is neither confirms nor denies the existence of three apples nor a pawnshop.
Invented.
One does try to make the inventions predict reality.
It can be a bit difficult to distinguish invention from discovery. For example, some sculptors say they are only bringing out or discovering a previously existing form in the raw marble. On the other hand, did Beethoven discover or invent his symphonies? Mathematics seems to have more in common with music than with trekking over the frozen wastes looking for a new island (at least on my good days it does.)
And why do you not think this happens? Why do you think people don't kill at will? Because MAN has created LAWS using REASON and LOGIC. People that break those laws are considered evil, by rational men. God doesn't come down and support his own absolute laws with punishment for the murder of innocent people. What good does it do to bring Him into the picture on this? It is a weak argument to say that there must be a God to have a civil and free society.
These methods are far from infallible and are based on three arbitrary assumptions: a constant rate of decay, an isolated system in which no parent or daughter element can be added or lost, and a known amount of the daughter element present initially.
Hope this clears up your confusion.
discover . . . theory // 'faith'
reality // Truth . . . LIFE // creation // science // GOD ! ! !
Good News For The Day
‘I am the bread of life. . .(John 6:35).’
"There was a day when Jesus stood up and announced to the people: I AM THE BREAD OF LIFE. The day before Jesus made that speech, he had amazed everyone by miraculously feeding thousands of people with a few loaves of bread. A lot of people had seen that miracle, so, the next day, they went to a lot of effort to find Jesus, in the hope that they would see something similar happen. They were hoping for more of the same. They were being led by their stomachs."
"In response to them, Jesus said, Do not work for the food that spoils. You have gone to some trouble to seek me out in the hope that you will score another belly full. Your effort is misplaced. You need to work for food that does not spoil. You ought to labor for the food that will . . . link - - - you to the life of God."
"Suppose every young person arriving in this world, could be given a piece of advice. One vital clue, that would set them on a course through life that would save him from wasting his time on vanities; that would keep her from going down dead end roads in futile endeavors. It is just such advice that Jesus is offering here. He is saying : Don't give yourself to that which will end in disappointment. Don't let the whole effort of your life be for nothing. Work for something that ultimately affirms your worth. Work for the bread that endures to eternal life."
. . "I am the bread of life."
That's the way it is with me, but all of the marble I get contains only shapeless blobs with sharp edges and chisel scratches. The stuff is crap. I wonder where Michelangelo got his marble?
You are confused as well. People do kill at will. What planet do you live on? Have you read a word I have written? Reason is not an end, it is a means to an end. Logic doesn't help your position, it destroys it.
People that break those laws are considered evil, by rational men.
Evil? What is your standard for evil. There can't be one without a standard for good. What is that? Men?
That's reasonable. Truth is always "useful," for it is always more efficient than a lie (and lies can get you in trouble). Heaven knows Revlon, et al., does well because women widely believe that there is practical "use" to be had from projecting an image of youth and beauty (helps ya get a husband, or even certain kinds of jobs, etc.). A composer knows how to "use" harmony to express what he wants to convey in a musical composition. Etc.
We could say these are examples of the "immanent" uses to which truth, beauty, and harmony can be put. But it seems to me their "usefulness" depends on their universality, which suggests to me that they are transcendent values. That is, they are beyond the reach of proof.
Similarly, mathematical systems, as you note, cannot prove their own truth. Yet mathematics is "useful" to us all the same; and its utility may consist only in the simple fact that mathematics is "God's language" (so to speak). But then we can't prove the "truth" of God either, in the sense of "proving" that He "exists".
We seem to have some categorical problems here....
That he fails to maintain a consistent position is also frustrating (see exmarine's post 3882 and my response at post 3900.)
Not quite accurate. Plane geometry proves its own truth as does first order logic. Arithmetic and set theory do not.
True, we do assume that the universe doesn't play tricks, so we assume that the appearance of millions of years worth of apparant radioactive decay didn't happen yesterday in the blink of an eye
"Radiometric dating is predicated on the . . . assumption - - - that throughout the earth’s history radioactive decay rates of the various elements have remained constant. Is this a warranted assumption? Has every radioactive nuclide proceeded on a rigid course of decay at a constant rate? This has been challenged by studies involving Carbon (C)-14."
"At the temperature or pressure, collisions with stray cosmic rays or the emanations of other atoms may cause changes other than those of normal disintegration. It seems very possible that spontaneous disintegration of radioactive elements are related to the action of cosmic rays and the rate of disintegration varying from century to century according to the intensity of the rays. The evidence for a strongly increasing change in the cosmic ray influx is most favorable especially in light of the decay of the earth’s magnetic field."
"Most geochronologists maintain that pleochroic haloes give evidence that decay constants have not changed. Crystals of biotite, for example, and other minerals in igneous or metamorphic rocks commonly enclose minute specks of minerals containing uranium or thorium. The a-(alpha) particles emitted at high velocity by the disintegrating nuclides interact, because of their charge, with electrons of surrounding atoms which slow them down until they finally come to rest in the host material at a distance from their source that depends on their initial kinetic energy and the density and composition of the host. Where they finally stop to produce lattice distortions and defects there generally occurs discoloring or darkening. Each of the 8 a-particles emitted during the disintegration of U238 to Pb206 produces a dark ring in biotite. Each ring has its own characteristic radius in a given mineral (in this case biotite). This radius measures the kinetic energy, hence the probability of emission of the corresponding a-particle and also the half-life of the parent nuclide according to the Geiger-Nuttall law. The Geiger-Nuttall law is an empirical relation between half-life of the a-emitter and the range in air of the emitted a-particles. If the radii of these haloes from the same nuclide vary, this would imply that the decay rates have varied and would invalidate these series as being actual clocks. Are the radii in the rocks constant in size or are there variable sizes?"
"Most of the early studies of pleochroic haloes were made by Joly and Henderson. Joly concluded that the decay rates have varied on the basis of his finding a variation of the radii for rocks of alleged geological ages. This rather damaging result was explained away saying that enough evidence of correct radii for defferent geologic periods and sufficient variation in the same period have been obtained that one is forced to look for a different explanation of such variations as were observed by Joly."
"Measurements were later made in an excellent collection of samples with haloes. It was found that the extent of the haloes around the inclusions varies over a wide range, even with the same nuclear material in the same matrix, but all sizes fall into definite groups. The measurements are, in microns, 5,7,10,17,20,23,27, and 33."
"More recent studies have been made by Robert V. Gentry. Gentry also finds a variation in the haloes leading him to conclude that the decay constants have not been constant in time."
"Gentry points out an argument for an instantaneous creation of the earth. He noted form his studies of haloes: “It thus appears that short half-life nuclides of either polonium, bismuth, or lead were incorporated into halo nuclei at the time of mica crystallization and significantly enough existed without the parent nuclides of the uranium series. For the Po218 (half-life of 3 minutes) only a matter of minutes could elapse between the formation of the Po218 and subsequent crystallization of the mica; otherwise the Po218 would have decayed, and no ring would be visible. The occurrence of these halo types is quite widespread, one or more types having been observed in the micas from Canada (Pre-Cambrian), Sweden, and Japan.” The argument seems hard to refute."
"So, then, careful scientists have measured variations in halo radii and their measurements indicate a variation in decay rates. The radioactive series then would have no value as time clocks."
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Very easily you can entertain the possiblities of a godless science // evolution // govt // schools // society - - - universe . . . uniformism too - - -
all meaning // philosophy . . .is religion // fairy tales . . .
you are looking at the props // ghost town . . .
try the playwright // God . . . script // bible - - - the theme // purpose - - -
that would explain it all to you ! ! !
I know you think it is all fantasy // funny ! ! !
Something you said got my undivided attention:
Despite your engaging counter-argument, and that it fits nicely with my hypothesis that algorithm at inception is proof of intelligent design --- I remain a Platonist.
I consider mathematicians to be the most important explorers throughout history, and the most important to our future. You all seemingly have no limitation of thought, e.g. space/time, domain, etc.
Lava flows (and other igneous formations) make great yard sticks for radiometric dating because heated rocks release the daughter isotopes whose ratio is used for dating. Hence, lava can be dated most accurately and rock formations above ancient lava flows would have to be younger, while those below would be older. Also, this is another reason that multiple tests are conducted on the same samples using different methods. Even if there was a skew in one parent-daughter ratio, that exact same skew would not be present in another parent-daughter ratio. If several methods converge on a specific date, odds are that's how old the rock is.
What other religion in the world teaches that the Creator of the universe loves you as a father loves a child?
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