Posted on 11/17/2004 7:13:45 PM PST by naturalman1975
Schools should teach the biblical creation story alongside evolutionary theory, Family First chairman Peter Harris said yesterday.
While his fledgling party - arising out of the Assemblies of God church - had no formal policy on school curriculums, Mr Harris said his personal view was that children should be taught both perspectives.
Asked at the National Press Club in Canberra whether he supported both perspectives being taught, he said: "Of course we'd like to see a balanced approach to education, and... all options and all viewpoints, world viewpoints, should be put forward and people should be entitled to make their own decisions," he said.
Mr Harris said his party had raised $1.2 million in donations for the federal election, but had none from the United States, where the religious right has become a political force.
There was diverse support for Mr Harris' views on teaching creationism alongside evolution.
Australian National University anthropologist Alan Thorne said there was nothing wrong with putting both views to students.
"A balanced view is better than an extreme view in education," he said. "From a scientific perspective, it would be very silly indeed to claim God went around poking fossils into rocks, (but) the two can be quite compatible. There's no reasons why they can't address different aspects of our development."
Labor's federal education spokeswoman Jenny Macklin said: "All young people should have an understanding of a range of religious beliefs."
But acting Australian Education Union Victorian president Ann Taylor warned schools should distinguish between established scientific fact and philosophical or religious belief.
Nice line. But I have no idea what it means.
It means your hypothetical is just that, hypothetical. God(religion) will not be "destroyed" no matter what argument you start with.
Really? I didn't think that the scientific history of Earth had anything whatever to do with accepting Christ as your saviour.
"Believing in the Bible" has nothing to do with it either. Genesis only has a few hundred words on the subject. Contained in two slightly different creation stories. Once you decide that you can rationalize away the differences between them, then you can rationalize your way to all kinds of things. Evolution, for example.
Are you Methodist? Lutheran? Southern Baptist? Episcopal? None of them agree totaly on many very important parts of Christian faith. That's proof right there that man has imperfect understanding of the Bible.
I believe you misunderstand Genesis. Are you right? Or am I?
By making this a Christian vs. non-Christian fight, there will be some people who will look at the evidence for Evolution and decide that it is correct and then abandon God. And you're going to pursue this point anyway when you just might be wrong?
There is no conflict between Genesis and science. Generating a conflict when there need be none is stupid for Christians.
Oh, and it damages the conservative political cause as well.
Amen to that! The usual suspects pretend they are enlightened but typically offer insults and name calling as their best proof for evolution.
That's not my point. My point is that some believers will reject God because they're given an either/or situation. I never claimed that someone's goal of "destroying Christianity" would be successful. Just that they will succeed in tempting some away from God by starting an emotional fight over an unimportant issue. Every person lost in this way is a tragedy and believers should not enable it.
Scientific history? Don't you mean conjectured history? Maybe philosophical history? By definition, the materialistic suppositions about Earth's history cannot be scientific.
Dataman! Long time, no read.
You gonna try and tell me that the existence of music is just a guess or hunch again? Being as how it's music theory and all.
Fabricating again, are we? Next you'll be telling me that Nebraska Man disproves creation.
The issue was whether the scientific history of earth had anything whatever to do with accepting Christ as your saviour. Being as how the previous post was from someone claiming that Creationism was the very center of Christian belief.
Stay with the subject Dataman.
Sorry. You can't expect to keep getting away with sneaking in those pseudo facts without a challenge.
?????????
Actually, we haven't been talking about those kinds of details. But then, you would have figured that out had you been capable of reading the previous posts.
We've been talking about whether it is true that when Creationists force their arguments to be discussed, some people see the issue as whether God exists or not. And if some of them, just even one of them, decides that God doesn't exist becuase of this argument. Then the stated goal of most religious people to bring people closer to God has been harmed.
Then they don't believe. Not a particularly difficult situation to parse. Lot's of people, knowing the truth, have rejected God.
Jos 24:15 And if it seem evil unto you to serve the LORD, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods which your fathers served that [were] on the other side of the flood, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land ye dwell: but as for me and my house, we will serve the LORD.
Jhn 6:65 And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
Jhn 6:66 From that [time] many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.
Huh, pseudo facts. Huh, you mean when I was saying that Creationism was being taught? Or that there is an argument between Creationists and Evolutionists? Which of those facts would you like to challenge now that you've changed the subject again.
2) Every creature was suddenly created at one moment. Since nothing has ever changed over time, this should be very easy to document.
3) Mental energy is able to influence cell division and development. This should be easily demonstrated in a laboratory petri-dish.
I have absolutly no problem with these theories being taught in school!
Allow me to again point out to all the lurkers that ad hominem attacks are, to date, the best argument in favor of evolution that you've been able to offer.
The story in Genesis is WHAT God did, not HOW He manipulated the molecules and atoms to get the job done. That's not the point, and there's precious few words in Genesis to determine details from anyway.
You apparently did not read the post. Rather than reproduce it here, I suggest you read the original.
Lurkers should further be warned that changing the subject away from issues that are indefensible is the best argument for believing the Earth is 6000 years old. Or was that 4 billion years under ID? I'm confused.
LOL
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