Posted on 02/20/2006 5:33:50 AM PST by ToryHeartland
Churches urged to back evolution By Paul Rincon BBC News science reporter, St Louis
US scientists have called on mainstream religious communities to help them fight policies that undermine the teaching of evolution.
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) hit out at the "intelligent design" movement at its annual meeting in Missouri.
Teaching the idea threatens scientific literacy among schoolchildren, it said.
Its proponents argue life on Earth is too complex to have evolved on its own.
As the name suggests, intelligent design is a concept invoking the hand of a designer in nature.
It's time to recognise that science and religion should never be pitted against each other Gilbert Omenn AAAS president
There have been several attempts across the US by anti-evolutionists to get intelligent design taught in school science lessons.
At the meeting in St Louis, the AAAS issued a statement strongly condemning the moves.
"Such veiled attempts to wedge religion - actually just one kind of religion - into science classrooms is a disservice to students, parents, teachers and tax payers," said AAAS president Gilbert Omenn.
"It's time to recognise that science and religion should never be pitted against each other.
"They can and do co-exist in the context of most people's lives. Just not in science classrooms, lest we confuse our children."
'Who's kidding whom?'
Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education, which campaigns to keep evolution in public schools, said those in mainstream religious communities needed to "step up to the plate" in order to prevent the issue being viewed as a battle between science and religion.
Some have already heeded the warning.
"The intelligent design movement belittles evolution. It makes God a designer - an engineer," said George Coyne, director of the Vatican Observatory.
"Intelligent design concentrates on a designer who they do not really identify - but who's kidding whom?"
Last year, a federal judge ruled in favour of 11 parents in Dover, Pennsylvania, who argued that Darwinian evolution must be taught as fact.
Dover school administrators had pushed for intelligent design to be inserted into science teaching. But the judge ruled this violated the constitution, which sets out a clear separation between religion and state.
Despite the ruling, more challenges are on the way.
Fourteen US states are considering bills that scientists say would restrict the teaching of evolution.
These include a legislative bill in Missouri which seeks to ensure that only science which can be proven by experiment is taught in schools.
I think if we look at where the empirical scientific evidence leads us, it leads us towards intelligent design Teacher Mark Gihring "The new strategy is to teach intelligent design without calling it intelligent design," biologist Kenneth Miller, of Brown University in Rhode Island, told the BBC News website.
Dr Miller, an expert witness in the Dover School case, added: "The advocates of intelligent design and creationism have tried to repackage their criticisms, saying they want to teach the evidence for evolution and the evidence against evolution."
However, Mark Gihring, a teacher from Missouri sympathetic to intelligent design, told the BBC: "I think if we look at where the empirical scientific evidence leads us, it leads us towards intelligent design.
"[Intelligent design] ultimately takes us back to why we're here and the value of life... if an individual doesn't have a reason for being, they might carry themselves in a way that is ultimately destructive for society."
Economic risk
The decentralised US education system ensures that intelligent design will remain an issue in the classroom regardless of the decision in the Dover case.
"I think as a legal strategy, intelligent design is dead. That does not mean intelligent design as a social movement is dead," said Ms Scott.
"This is an idea that has real legs and it's going to be around for a long time. It will, however, evolve."
Among the most high-profile champions of intelligent design is US President George W Bush, who has said schools should make students aware of the concept.
But Mr Omenn warned that teaching intelligent design will deprive students of a proper education, ultimately harming the US economy.
"At a time when fewer US students are heading into science, baby boomer scientists are retiring in growing numbers and international students are returning home to work, America can ill afford the time and tax-payer dollars debating the facts of evolution," he said. Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/sci/tech/4731360.stm
Published: 2006/02/20 10:54:16 GMT
© BBC MMVI
Once you download and install it, it will run in your System Tray (bottom right). The when you put your cursor over any Bible reference it will display the text of the reference for you. There are some options which adjusts how it works. It comes with the KJV. But one can buy other Bible versions.
It's very handy.
Still I guess there is a moral in the tale. Don't let your kids play in the forest where there are bears.
?
Only about some things.
How does that 'go on up' thing come out?
It's one word in Hebrew-"aleh" (literally, "ascend"). I assume they meant "get out of here."
When we studied 2 Kings in 8th grade, they taught us that the moral is "don't make fun of people for how they look." A good moral, even if it's not a very edifying story.
...the entire world ecology being saved on a wooden boat...
Poor deluded Jesus, SAYING stuff like THIS!
NIV Matthew 24:37-39
37. As it was in the days of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
38. For in the days before the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up to the day Noah entered the ark;
39. and they knew nothing about what would happen until the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of the Son of Man.
NIV Luke 17:26-30
26. "Just as it was in the days of Noah, so also will it be in the days of the Son of Man.
27. People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up to the day Noah entered the ark. Then the flood came and destroyed them all.
28. "It was the same in the days of Lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building.
29. But the day Lot left Sodom, fire and sulfur rained down from heaven and destroyed them all.
30. "It will be just like this on the day the Son of Man is revealed.
As well as that Bozo who wrote Hebrews...
NIV Hebrews 11:7
By faith Noah, when warned about things not yet seen, in holy fear built an ark to save his family. By his faith he condemned the world and became heir of the righteousness that comes by faith.
And Peter, that betrayer (HISS!), had the audacity to write these:
NIV 1 Peter 3:18-22
18. For Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God. He was put to death in the body but made alive by the Spirit,
19. through whom also he went and preached to the spirits in prison
20. who disobeyed long ago when God waited patiently in the days of Noah while the ark was being built. In it only a few people, eight in all, were saved through water,
21. and this water symbolizes baptism that now saves you also--not the removal of dirt from the body but the pledge of a good conscience toward God. It saves you by the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
22. who has gone into heaven and is at God's right hand--with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him.
NIV 2 Peter 2:4-9
4. For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell, putting them into gloomy dungeons to be held for judgment;
5. if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others;
6. if he condemned the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah by burning them to ashes, and made them an example of what is going to happen to the ungodly;
7. and if he rescued Lot, a righteous man, who was distressed by the filthy lives of lawless men
8. (for that righteous man, living among them day after day, was tormented in his righteous soul by the lawless deeds he saw and heard)--
9. if this is so, then the Lord knows how to rescue godly men from trials and to hold the unrighteous for the day of judgment, while continuing their punishment.
It's no WONDER that right-thinking people reject this all as foolishness!
It is?
Pray tell, how did you come to THAT conclusion?
Where does this REFERENCE come from?
Is there an index where I can search from?
From reading your words. However often you appear to be deliberately somewhat delphic (understandably given the discomfort the subject matter appears to cause you), so I may have mistaken your meaning.
Sorry, but GOD will have to supply you your OWN question, as mine possibly wouldn't work.
(Don't worry, HE's got LOTS of 'em! ;^)
Some folks STILL tell the 'religious' ones that today!
Since plainly the story of Noah's ark is nonsense that fails basic credibility and morality tests at every level I have to agree with you.
Or maybe, "Don't fmess with people who can sic the Mob on you!"
Whatever it takes! Sometimes ya jess gotta get their attention!
The motto of the Spanish Inquisition.
Once the Lord used a talking donkey; today, He's used me!
Indeed.
Does God think you should also torture the innocent grand-children of those who mocked him?
Well now, All Knowing One, how do know the grand-children are 'innocent'?
How guilty can a 9 year old virgin be of anything?
Small wonder the founding fathers didn't want your ilk running the show anymore.
They DIDN'T??
Those SLAVEOWNERS???
Is that your argument? That the 1st amendment doesn't exist because the folks who drafted it were slaveowners? Welcome to creationist logic 101.
"There you go again!"
Spurned opportunity to be less Delphic noted.
The expression, “go up...go up,” is held by many scholars to reflect the wish of these young lads that the prophet go ahead and ascend, i.e., leave the earth, that they might be rid of him. Also, the taunt, “thou bald head,” was likely a reproach. Old Testament scholar John Whitcomb has suggested that this was an expression “of extreme contempt". They were pronouncing a divine curse upon him, for which baldness was often the outward sign.
But be careful with terminology. The words "intelligent design" are not used to describe your outlook. It's prepostrous, but they have come to mean the garbage coming out the the Discovery Institute, the notion that some things are simply too complex to have evolved in a Darwinian manner.
What you are describing, which I to some extent agree with, would be better termed "providential design."
Whatever reference is being displayed anywhere on the screen, will prompt InstaVerse to display the corresponding text. It's good when people list a Bible book, chapter and verse but not the correspondeing text.
Try it, you'll like it.
Physical and chemical processes that require no miracles.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.