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To: Betis70

I am new to these kind of threads. Is there always so much "disbelief" of science and its work? On the crevo threads it is easy to understand that attitude, because evolution hits so hard inside one's soul. But here? Could this "disbelief" be from the same source (religious, strict interpretation of the bible)?


90 posted on 12/17/2004 5:03:39 PM PST by furball4paws ("These are Microbes."... "You have crobes?" BC)
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To: furball4paws
"I am new to these kind of threads. Is there always so much "disbelief" of science and its work?"

Generally no. It usually occurs when the title indicates anything older than 6,000 years old.

96 posted on 12/17/2004 5:12:45 PM PST by blam
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To: furball4paws

I dunno. It's pretty disappointing actually.


100 posted on 12/17/2004 5:21:48 PM PST by Betis70 (I'm only Left Wing when I play hockey)
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To: furball4paws; blam; Betis70
I am new to these kind of threads. Is there always so much "disbelief" of science and its work?

Unfortunately, yes.

On the crevo threads it is easy to understand that attitude, because evolution hits so hard inside one's soul. But here? Could this "disbelief" be from the same source (religious, strict interpretation of the bible)?

I think there are many root causes for such reactions:

1. Active disinformation by creationists, trying to undermine confidence in the science which seems to contradict some of their beliefs. This causes distrust of all scientific results, not just the "hot-button" ones.

2. Resentment of the "know-it-all" scientists by people insecure in their own mental abilities or knowledge.

3. Anyone can toss on a labcoat and call themselves a "scientist" and make idiotic announcements of their "discoveries". After seeing enough stupid pseudoscience, people can be forgiven for thinking that such stuff is representative of the field of science as a whole.

4. Bad science reporting for the public, which often leaves out key information, misstates results or methods, or "dumbs down" things to the point where the original research ends up looking simplistic, idiotic, or wrong.

5. Bad science education in schools, which often just tells students to memorize findings, instead of giving them an understanding of how science is actually done, how results are vetted, how errors are rooted out, why scientific disputes or revisions don't mean that earlier knowledge was "wrong", and so on. Most people actually have a very poor idea about how science is done, and why it's done that way.

And so on.

126 posted on 12/17/2004 9:38:10 PM PST by Ichneumon
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