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On second day, evolution trial [Dover, PA] delves into topic of faith
The Intelligencer (PA) via phillyBurbs ^ | 27 September 2005 | MARTHA RAFFAELE

Posted on 09/27/2005 9:21:27 AM PDT by PatrickHenry

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To: general_re
Looks like someone picked the wrong week to switch to decaf ;)

Reading glasses gone missing. Good excuse?

41 posted on 09/27/2005 10:54:16 AM PDT by jwalsh07 ("Don't get stuck on stupid!" General Honore to twit reporter)
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To: jwalsh07

I'll buy that ;)


42 posted on 09/27/2005 10:57:56 AM PDT by general_re ("Frantic orthodoxy is never rooted in faith, but in doubt." - Reinhold Niebuhr)
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Comment #43 Removed by Moderator

To: Antonello
Actually since the you like the word lying, I suppose it could be applied to you. Let's test that proposition.

What religion is being "imposed on students"? By your standards, you are a liar if you can not answer that question. Claiming that ID is a religion is simply false and arguing that ID is being imposed as a mandadtory requirement is patently false since any reading of any ID information is strictly voluntary.

As a rule I don't like to toss the word liar around casually but I also don't flinch at tossing it back in the faces of people who do use it casually. So I repeat, what religion in the context of the 1A has been "imposed on students"?

44 posted on 09/27/2005 11:01:25 AM PDT by jwalsh07 ("Don't get stuck on stupid!" General Honore to twit reporter)
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To: general_re

You're a fair minded guy general but I knew you wouldn't buy the dog ate my glasses excuse so I came up with that one. :-}


45 posted on 09/27/2005 11:04:15 AM PDT by jwalsh07 ("Don't get stuck on stupid!" General Honore to twit reporter)
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To: Mulch

Use your brain. At 10,000 years ago, what are the chances that you would be on FreeRepublic on September 27th, 2005? Or even be born at all?

Astronomically looooooooooooow. But yet you're alive. How is this possible?!


46 posted on 09/27/2005 11:06:22 AM PDT by Vive ut Vivas (Deity in training.)
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To: Right Wing Professor
"Interesting that you characterize a devout Roman Catholic like Miller as an atheist wannabe. It's a shame the anti-Catholicism that historically characterized some extreme Protestant sects seems to be alive and well here on FR."

Please don't forget to mention anti-Lutheran, anti-Reformed, anti-Anglican, anti-Congregational, anti-Presbyterian and anti-Anabaptist/Baptist attitudes and actions that "historically characterized extreme" Catholicism in Europe for many centuries, and is currently "alive and well" in some predominantly Roman Catholic countries.
47 posted on 09/27/2005 11:20:44 AM PDT by Free Baptist
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To: Free Baptist

What would expect of the religion of Love?


48 posted on 09/27/2005 11:32:59 AM PDT by js1138 (Great is the power of steady misrepresentation.)
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To: Mulch
Would it be ok for schools to teach children that evolution is possible but highly improbably?

No, because the "probability" calculation based upon faulty premises. It's fundamentally meaningless if you can't fully define the starting variables, and it's dishonestly misleading if you're simply calculating the end result of evolution producing the existing diversity of life.
49 posted on 09/27/2005 11:33:35 AM PDT by Dimensio (http://angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif <-- required reading before you use your next apostrophe!)
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To: jwalsh07
What religion is being "imposed on students"?

Deism. Which happens to be my religion, by the way.

ID denying religious motives is akin to Peter denying Christ. It is a falsehood, and one meant for selfish benefit.

The reading of the statement is a mandatory requirement being imposed on the teachers by the school board. That statement presents ID as an implied equivalent competing theory and endorses an ID text, which is conveniently available right there in the classroom.

To me it appears you either cannot or will not see the deception being put forth, and instead you are willing to rationalize it as virtuous through word parsing. As such, you are aiding in the promotion of Satan's plan of forcing God's children back to Him by denying them their free agency.

50 posted on 09/27/2005 11:42:31 AM PDT by Antonello
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To: editor-surveyor

>>> Biology is science, while evolution is merely academic opinion based largely on philosophy...Biology continues regardless of what the origin of any species is, whether one be creationist, or evolutionist, biology remains the same.

Would you apply similar thinking to say Geology and the theory of plate tectonics(continental drift)? Should ID be taught in Earth Science classes as well?


51 posted on 09/27/2005 11:55:03 AM PDT by NC28203
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To: Free Baptist
Please don't forget to mention anti-Lutheran, anti-Reformed, anti-Anglican, anti-Congregational, anti-Presbyterian and anti-Anabaptist/Baptist attitudes and actions that "historically characterized extreme" Catholicism in Europe for many centuries, and is currently "alive and well" in some predominantly Roman Catholic countries.

Oh, well that makes it OK then.

52 posted on 09/27/2005 12:01:22 PM PDT by Right Wing Professor
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To: Mulch; bobdsmith
Impossible? Why?

There are far to many variables. We're not talking coin flips here. And that's even if we knew all the applicable laws of nature precisely, which we don't. For instance there's much that's relevant (even if independent of evolution per se) that is unkown or inadequately known in the realm of simple chemistry.

53 posted on 09/27/2005 12:22:15 PM PDT by Stultis
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To: Antonello
Deism. Which happens to be my religion, by the way.

Forget lying, this is simply stupidity. Now you're arguing that Christian Creationists are imposing Deism on public school students. Your argument is breathtaking in its lunacy.

ID denying religious motives is akin to Peter denying Christ. It is a falsehood, and one meant for selfish benefit.

You don't seem to understand that motives are non-justiciable. Why is that?

The reading of the statement is a mandatory requirement being imposed on the teachers by the school board.

That's what school boards do in the American Federalist system. Local school boards tell teachers what to teach. You with me here?

That statement presents ID as an implied equivalent competing theory and endorses an ID text, which is conveniently available right there in the classroom.

Well, by all means, call Farhrenheit 451, a book needs burning. The book is not taught, it is not in the classroom and thus you have made another false assertion. False assertions win no arguments and put no gold stars on your forehead.

To me it appears you either cannot or will not see the deception being put forth, and instead you are willing to rationalize it as virtuous through word parsing.

What I see as non virtuous is faux conservatives driven by their science influenced ideology willing to trash the Constitution and the powers of locals. That would be you. You don't want your kids in that school, move. You want school board members who won't challenge scientific dogma, vote them out. But keep the feds the hell out of my towns business. Clear enough for you?

As such, you are aiding in the promotion of Satan's plan of forcing God's children back to Him by denying them their free agency.

LOL, you can't help yourself, you are what you claim anybody who disagrees with you is, a damn liar. I belive that's called projection.

Project on!

54 posted on 09/27/2005 12:51:07 PM PDT by jwalsh07 ("Don't get stuck on stupid!" General Honore to twit reporter)
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To: NC28203
Should ID be taught in Earth Science classes as well?

In this particular federal case the school in question does not teach ID. Got another argument?

Now here's a question for you. Is there anything you don't think the federal courts should have their black robed noses stuck in?

55 posted on 09/27/2005 12:53:25 PM PDT by jwalsh07 ("Don't get stuck on stupid!" General Honore to twit reporter)
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To: jwalsh07
I don't attend mass at the DI, I attend mass at St James in Danielson, Ct.

You suggest a false, even farcical, reading of the First Amendment. It doesn't prohibit only the establishment of a full and functioning religion complete with churches. It prohibits any law (and by extension of the 14th Amendment, any formal government policy) "respecting," an establishment of religion. "Respecting" is not a throwaway word. It means that anything like an establishment, or anything touching upon an establishment, is prohibited.

IOW it doesn't merely say you can't go all the way toward establishing religion, it says you can't go part of the way either.

It's also worth bearing in mind, which is frequently forgotten today, that "establishment of religion" had a much broader connotation in the American colonial and early republican context than it did in the European context.

The Europeans did typically, and in some cases still do, establish a particular church or denomination as the official state religion. This was almost never done in the colonies or the early American states. Virtually all "establishments of religion" in America were either multiple (more than one denomination was recognized as official and supported by the state or by taxes) or general (for instance the citizen might be able to specify without restriction which denomination his otherwise mandatory religion tax would go to).

In consequence of these uniquely American patterns of religious establishment the writers of the constitution would have, and in fact did, recognized the term as including general measures respecting the advancement, or inhibition, of religion, not just specific favors toward a chosen sect or denomination.

I think it's pretty clear that government policies tending to validate the existence of an "intelligent designer" advance religion.

Now if there are independent reasons for such policies (for instance that ID really is, on objective examination, a part of science) then there's no problem with that. This same issue came up concerning evolution back in the 70's, when some creationists were still trying to ban it outright. They argued in court that evolution either inhibited religion, or that it advanced the "religion of secular humanism," and therefore that it was illegal to teach it. Judges refused to consider this argument because, they noted, evolution clearly was a part of science, and therefore there was a valid secular purpose in teaching it in a science class. IOW it didn't matter if it incidentally advanced or inhibited religon, so long as that wasn't the purpose of principal effect of the policy.

In short it seems to me that the defendants will have to show a valid secular purpose, and that this purpose was the intent of the school board, and will be the principal effect of the policy, or they will lose.

I think they will lose, and rightly so.

56 posted on 09/27/2005 12:56:13 PM PDT by Stultis
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To: jwalsh07
In this particular federal case the school in question does not teach ID.

So what? They reference and recommend specific ID materials. Therefore the policy advances ID, and therefore subjects the school board to the same vulnerability (if the court finds that advancing ID = advancing religion) as if they were teaching it more actively.

57 posted on 09/27/2005 12:59:05 PM PDT by Stultis
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To: bobbdobbs; KMJames; DaveLoneRanger
"All science necessarily has a philosophical component. You're engaging in a false dichotomy."

Drivel !!!

Show us the philosophical component of any branch of Mathematics, or Physics, or Chemistry? I engage in no dichotomy whatsoever. Philosophy negates the necessary objectivity, thus rendering academic dogma rather than scientific observation. Belief in evolution is an insurmountable barrier to objective science.

In 1939 the late, great Robert Heinlein, Naval officer, futurist, and author wrote:

"There are but two ways of forming an opinion in science. One is the scientific method; the other, the scholastic. One can judge from experiment, or one can blindly accept authority. To the scientific mind, experimental proof is all-important, and theory is merely a convenience in description, to be junked when it no longer fits. To the academic mind, authority is everything, and facts are junked when they do not fit theory laid down by authority.

"It is this point of view - academic minds clinging like oysters to disproved theories - that has blocked every advance of knowledge in history."


58 posted on 09/27/2005 1:31:04 PM PDT by editor-surveyor (Atheist and Fool are synonyms; Evolution is where fools hide from the sunrise)
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To: NC28203
" Should ID be taught in Earth Science classes as well?"

Only if the disproven philosophy of evolution is being presented there.

59 posted on 09/27/2005 1:34:28 PM PDT by editor-surveyor (Atheist and Fool are synonyms; Evolution is where fools hide from the sunrise)
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Comment #60 Removed by Moderator


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