Posted on 08/01/2005 10:58:13 AM PDT by wallcrawlr
The half-century campaign to eradicate any vestige of religion from public life has run its course. The backlash from a nation fed up with the A.C.L.U. kicking crèches out of municipal Christmas displays has created a new balance. State-supported universities may subsidize the activities of student religious groups. Monuments inscribed with the Ten Commandments are permitted on government grounds. The Federal Government is engaged in a major antipoverty initiative that gives money to churches. Religion is back out of the closet.
But nothing could do more to undermine this most salutary restoration than the new and gratuitous attempts to invade science, and most particularly evolution, with religion. Have we learned nothing? In Kansas, conservative school-board members are attempting to rewrite statewide standards for teaching evolution to make sure that creationism's modern stepchild, intelligent design, infiltrates the curriculum. Similar anti-Darwinian mandates are already in place in Ohio and are being fought over in 20 states. And then, as if to second the evangelical push for this tarted-up version of creationism, out of the blue appears a declaration from Christoph Cardinal Schönborn of Vienna, a man very close to the Pope, asserting that the supposed acceptance of evolution by John Paul II is mistaken. In fact, he says, the Roman Catholic Church rejects "neo-Darwinism" with the declaration that an "unguided evolutionary process--one that falls outside the bounds of divine providence--simply cannot exist."
Cannot? On what scientific evidence? Evolution is one of the most powerful and elegant theories in all of human science and the bedrock of all modern biology. Schönborn's proclamation that it cannot exist unguided--that it is driven by an intelligent designer pushing and pulling and planning and shaping the process along the way--is a perfectly legitimate statement of faith. If he and the Evangelicals just stopped there and asked that intelligent design be included in a religion curriculum, I would support them. The scandal is to teach this as science--to pretend, as does Schönborn, that his statement of faith is a defense of science. "The Catholic Church," he says, "will again defend human reason" against "scientific theories that try to explain away the appearance of design as the result of 'chance and necessity,'" which "are not scientific at all." Well, if you believe that science is reason and that reason begins with recognizing the existence of an immanent providence, then this is science. But, of course, it is not. This is faith disguised as science. Science begins not with first principles but with observation and experimentation.
In this slippery slide from "reason" to science, Schönborn is a direct descendant of the early 17th century Dutch clergyman and astronomer David Fabricius, who could not accept Johannes Kepler's discovery of elliptical planetary orbits. Why? Because the circle is so pure and perfect that reason must reject anything less. "With your ellipse," Fabricius wrote Kepler, "you abolish the circularity and uniformity of the motions, which appears to me increasingly absurd the more profoundly I think about it." No matter that, using Tycho Brahe's most exhaustive astronomical observations in history, Kepler had empirically demonstrated that the planets orbit elliptically.
This conflict between faith and science had mercifully abated over the past four centuries as each grew to permit the other its own independent sphere. What we are witnessing now is a frontier violation by the forces of religion. This new attack claims that because there are gaps in evolution, they therefore must be filled by a divine intelligent designer.
How many times do we have to rerun the Scopes "monkey trial"? There are gaps in science everywhere. Are we to fill them all with divinity? There were gaps in Newton's universe. They were ultimately filled by Einstein's revisions. There are gaps in Einstein's universe, great chasms between it and quantum theory. Perhaps they are filled by God. Perhaps not. But it is certainly not science to merely declare it so.
To teach faith as science is to undermine the very idea of science, which is the acquisition of new knowledge through hypothesis, experimentation and evidence. To teach it as science is to encourage the supercilious caricature of America as a nation in the thrall of religious authority. To teach it as science is to discredit the welcome recent advances in permitting the public expression of religion. Faith can and should be proclaimed from every mountaintop and city square. But it has no place in science class. To impose it on the teaching of evolution is not just to invite ridicule but to earn it.
The facts of Scripture are more trustworthy than science.
No scientific theory is ever proven.
A scientific theory is an explaination for some phenomenon. The theory of evolution is an explaination for the diversity of life on Earth. The strength of a scientific explaination is largely measured by how testable it is.
In this regard evolution is really the only scientific theory that exists for the diversity of life on earth. Creation Science does not make testable predictions (so it really isn't even a hypothesis), probably out of fear of them turning out against it.
For example take the fossil record. The evolutionary explaination is so specific that it leads to the prediction that there will definitely be no mammal or bird fossils ever found in the cambrian period because this is way way before the origin of mammals or birds. This is testable - anyone can go search for mammal fossils in the cambrian. If you find one well done that pretty much disproves evolution.
Creation Science on the otherhand does not provide testable explainations about the fossil record. It has a fuzzy explaination of the fossil record whereby it doesn't predict anything about its pattern. If no mammals are ever found in the cambrian this is compatible with Creation Science. If a mammal is found tommorow in the cambrian this is still compatible with Creation Science.
This is just one example.
Is he a leftist?
PH - how about a picture?
As an expert on The Origin of the Stooges, I think i should weigh in here. The complete, proper sequence was:
Shemp : Curly : Shemp : Joe : Curly Joe
Shemp only appeared in 1930's "Soup to Nuts" with "Ted Healy's Stooges" before leaving the Stooges. He returned in 1947 when health problems caused Curly (Shemp & Moe's real-life little brother) to retire.
The anomalous reappearance of Shemp in the celluloid record at first appeared to contradict the theory, but most experts now believe Curly to have been a neutral mutation within a single phylo-stooge-etic branch.
Good questions. Many have written how these evolved over the eons. Obviously, you have read none of it.
OK Mr. Turkey. Gimme a hint.
The microbial theory was proven. The heliocentric theory has been proven. Tons of theories have been empiracly proven. It is only the lazy who would argue otherwise.
Sounds good. If always wanted to fool with Liszt's lists, Danteing as it is.
I don't have a clue. Give me the numbers for your ex's and I will give you my ex's and we can compare notes.
If you have genuinely attended a class where evolution (not "macro" evolution, which is not a scientific term) is taught as a matter of faith or a political theory rather than empirical science, I would like the details: professor's name, university, and course number. Like I've said, I have NEVER seen science taught that way, and I've taken a LOT of science courses. If you can't provide specifics, then I have to conclude that you are making up baseless accusations about scientists and science teachers (or you are repeating the words of a baseless accuser).
No they haven't been proven. There is lots of evidence for them but there is no mathematical proof.
Is it my imagination, or is it "Internet Night" at the Outpatient Clinic on the thread tonite?
Faith vs faith. Faith in a millenia old religion, or faith in 19th century science. Tough choice? Not if you don't have a dog in this fight. Up until quite recently you could find oogles of comparably fervent and feverish faith in two other 19th century "scientific" theories, as rigorously scientific as this one, the theories of Freud and Marx. What "science" have we got now in every American university and college? Political science, ethnic studies science, education science, you get the idea...
Teach ebonics instead of creationism? Yeah, why not! Who'll dare speaking against it?!
Actually the microbial theory has not been proven. Koch's postulates collapse when confronted with things like prions and some viroids. But us bug guys blithely go on by updating our theory to accomodate new things, but we still leave the door open. For all we know the nanobots are coming to falsify our beautiful THEORY.
He'll never get your allusion.
No you don't ned mathmatical proof unless it's a mathmatical theory, dumbass. Microbial theory, the notion of the existence of microbes, was proven when a microscope powerful enough to see them was developed and used. Futher the theory that the sun is the center of the universe was easily evidenced when we were able to send a satilite there to send photos. frankly there's myriad ways Evolution could be proven if anyone was interested. For isntance a closed environment breeding apes until they all lost the tails, and started talking. Frankly if evolution can do this randomly selective breeding should be able to do it easily and quickly.
Every week I go to the store and use my Chopin Liszt.
I see #568 went right over your head!
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