Posted on 12/01/2007 12:39:07 PM PST by Alter Kaker
AUSTIN, Tex., Nov. 29 (AP) — The state’s director of science curriculum said she resigned this month under pressure from officials who said she had given the appearance of criticizing the teaching of intelligent design.
The Texas Education Agency put the director, Chris Comer, on 30 days’ paid administrative leave in late October, resulting in what Ms. Comer called a forced resignation.
The move came shortly after she forwarded an e-mail message announcing a presentation by Barbara Forrest, an author of “Creationism’s Trojan Horse.” The book argues that creationist politics are behind the movement to get intelligent design theory taught in public schools. Ms. Comer sent the message to several people and a few online communities.
Ms. Comer, who held her position for nine years, said she believed evolution politics were behind her ousting. “None of the other reasons they gave are, in and of themselves, firing offenses,” she said.
Education agency officials declined to comment Wednesday on the matter. But they explained their recommendation to fire Ms. Comer in documents obtained by The Austin American-Statesman through the Texas Public Information Act.
“Ms. Comer’s e-mail implies endorsement of the speaker and implies that T.E.A. endorses the speaker’s position on a subject on which the agency must remain neutral,” the officials said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
If you put a sampling of all Christians sects into the mix, you will likely find quite divergent views of the "truth." A Catholic man can drink but have one wife. A traditional Mormon can have many wives but can't drink. Something here is not "Absolute." Now you might say Marxists are a murderous lot. They spent a lot of time killing their enemies. So did European Christians. The killing may be more to about keeping a despot in power rather than about ideology.
It is all laid out in the Wedge Strategy.
Governing Goals
Five Year Goals
- To defeat scientific materialism and its destructive moral, cultural and political legacies.
- To replace materialistic explanations with the theistic understanding that nature and hurnan beings are created by God.
Twenty Year Goals
- To see intelligent design theory as an accepted alternative in the sciences and scientific research being done from the perspective of design theory.
- To see the beginning of the influence of design theory in spheres other than natural science.
- To see major new debates in education, life issues, legal and personal responsibility pushed to the front of the national agenda.
- To see intelligent design theory as the dominant perspective in science.
- To see design theory application in specific fields, including molecular biology, biochemistry, paleontology, physics and cosmology in the natural sciences, psychology, ethics, politics, theology and philosophy in the humanities; to see its influence in the fine arts.
- To see design theory permeate our religious, cultural, moral and political life.
One of the most pertinent sentences:
Design theory promises to reverse the stifling dominance of the materialist worldview, and to replace it with a science consonant with Christian and theistic convictions.ID is a political movement, centered around an old idea, designed to promote a particular religious viewpoint.
This is ad hominem. “Christians act ridiculously, therefore ID is incorrect.” The first is, sadly, true. But you are not providing a third world view that is absolutely verifiable. Please, let us examine your alternative. Is there something other than:
Time+space+nothing
Not really held by anyone
Time+space+something impersonal
(energy, mass, motion, etc.) Marxism
Time+space+personal something
Christianity
Fill us in on another alternative that has the scientific support of verifiable evidence.
“Apologies (rather than apologetics) may be in order. Do the postings of the scientists you refer to establish without question Common Descent as the origin of all life?”
Absolutely and unequivocally not.
The “origin of all life” is completely outside scientific studies of the mechanisms for speciation (that’s all evolution is).
A theory? ID might be called a hypothesis but certainly not a theory. A theory is well-established, having survived repeated testing via the scientific method.
The reason so many take umbrage to ID is that its proponents put forth no testable hypotheses, yet offer all sorts of conclusions.
I have no objection to teaching ID in philosophy class, but to date it has yet to rise to the level of science. (BTW, it is fine with me to discuss why it does not meet the standards of the scientific method in biology class.)
Hmmm. Apparently the big evolutionary players, like TalkOrigins and Nova, don’t agree with you. They believe Common Descent is absolutely the realm of science and anyone questioning their right to this claim are “religionists” trying to jam out-dated dogma down the public’s throat.
Check out your compatriots.
http://www.talkorigins.org/origins/faqs-evolution.html
Common descent is science. Abiogenesis (studying how life might have originated) is also science. They are not the same field of science, however.
Steak is food.
Pizza is food.
They are not the same food.
OK?
Sorry. “Hypothesis” works for me.
I was thinking of more generalized morality. Christians understand God makes the rules, meaning they’re fixed and absolute (whether men interpret rules correctly is a separate question). Marxists think man makes them, so for Marxists the rules are arbitrarily changed according to whoever is in power.
I'm not. Ergo your premise is flawed (and since your entire argument depends upon your premise, that must mean that your argument is likewise flawed).
Where to start?! First of all, just because *you* haven't researched something doesn't mean that something doesn't exist or isn't a certain way.
In this case, ID is the *only* theory that explains the origin of transgenic lab animals such as pigs that are genetically designed to grow human growth hormones.
Second, as far as "testable hypotheses" go, ID is testable and falsifiable (no bias means no ID) whereas it is Evolutionary Theory that has no published, peer-reviewed falsification criteria.
So enjoy eating your crow. You've earned it.
Time+space+personal something
Christianity
Fill us in on another alternative that has the scientific
support of verifiable evidence.
How about
Time+space (mass, energy, motion, etc.)
Logical speculation and experiment lead to
I said PROMINENT ID proponents.
Have you published any books on the subject? Do you have an academic appointment somewhere?
Name a single ID advocate to which the above applies who's not affiliated with the Disco Institute.
And no, Ann Coulter doesn't count. She's an ID advocate, but pretty much everything she wrote about it in her latest book came straight from Dembski, who's a Disco fellow.
It has not been demonstrated that the Universe runs on a precise, mechanical, set of tools and devices. On the other hand, there's a tremendous amount of evidence that it has randomness, free-will, forces we don't know about, and so forth ~ maybe even three different types of "time" dimensions.
When scientists say there is a 20% chance of finding an extraterrestrial civilization in the next 20 years, they are not acting as scientists.
Best you focus on the creation of a double-helix molecular/crystalline form in water under 53 atmospheres pressure. That's where the neat stuff is just squeezing out all over the place ~ no accidents at all ~ or even "special creation".
Just had a steak pizza last night. Threw away the crust though ~ too much gluten in it. Otherwise it was excellent.
Everything has been demonstrated to somebody or other some time or other.
Successfully demonstrated meaning that the monsters have burrowed beneath our cities and are waiting, breathing?
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