Posted on 09/24/2009 6:08:52 AM PDT by xcamel
William Dembski, the “intelligent design” creationist who is a professor in philosophy at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas, has some rather interesting requirements for students of his creationism courses — 20% of their final grade comes from having written 10 posts promoting ID on “hostile” websites: Academic Year 2009-2010.
Spring 2009
Intelligent Design (SOUTHERN EVANGELICAL SEMINARY #AP 410, 510, and 810; May 11 – 16, 2009)
NEW! THE DUE DATE FOR ALL WORK IN THIS COURSE IS AUGUST 14, 2009. Here’s what you will need to do to wrap things up:
AP410 — This is the undegrad [sic] course. You have three things to do: (1) take the final exam (worth 40% of your grade); (2) write a 3,000-word essay on the theological significance of intelligent design (worth 40% of your grade); (3) provide at least 10 posts defending ID that you’ve made on “hostile” websites, the posts totalling 2,000 words, along with the URLs (i.e., web links) to each post (worth 20% of your grade).
AP510 — This is the masters course. You have four things to do: (1) take the final exam (worth 30% of your grade); (2) write a 1,500- to 2,000-word critical review of Francis Collins’s The Language of God — for instructions, see below (20% of your grade); (3) write a 3,000-word essay on the theological significance of intelligent design (worth 30% of your grade); (4) provide at least 10 posts defending ID that you’ve made on “hostile” websites, the posts totalling 3,000 words, along with the URLs (i.e., web links) to each post (worth 20% of your grade).
True conservatives support the Constitution and are for freedom of religion and freedom for religion, not freedom FROM religion.
Promoting that atheistic, religion free environment, political climate, and society, is a recipe for disaster.
Conservative values are pro-God and pro-freedom, just what adhering to Judeo-Christian values brought you when they wrote this.....
When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
Note the part about *nature's God*. Not a God-free world.
This is an example of what Christianity can lead to which is why conservative values (ones that uphold the Constitution) are also Christian values.
There are no conservative values that can't be supported by the Judeo-Christian morality and belief system.
==A small group of fundamentalists somehow manages pressure or coerce JR to bend to their demands and drive FR to the fringe, driving off other true conservatives at a time when they are most needed to fight against the tidal wave of socialist and anti freedom agendas?
I think little miss xcamel is trying to commit suicide by Mod...and I say let her. Let xcamel go over to her fellow leftist, evo-religious, human-caused global warming fanatics at LGF where she will feel right at home.
BTW, do you consider Irving Kristol part of the conservative movement, little miss xcamel?
“Here, for your delectation, is Kristol on teaching the evolution controversy, from a New York Times op-ed (”Room for Darwin and the Bible”) in 1986, one that likely could not be published there today (or in many a conservative venue for that matter):
The majority of our biologists still accept, and our textbooks still teach, the ‘’neo-Darwinian synthesis’’ ....
Though this theory is usually taught as an established scientific truth, it is nothing of the sort. It has too many lacunae. [The] evidence does not provide us with the spectrum of intermediate species we would expect. Moreover, laboratory experiments reveal how close to impossible it is for one species to evolve into another, even allowing for selective breeding and some genetic mutation. There is unquestionably evolution within species: every animal breeder is engaged in exemplifying this enterprise. But the gradual transformation of the population of one species into another is a biological hypothesis, not a biological fact.
Moreover, today a significant minority of distinguished biologists and geneticists find this hypothesis incredible and insist that evolution must have proceeded by ‘’quantum jumps,’’ caused by radical genetic mutation. This copes with some of the problems generated by neo-Darwinist orthodoxy, but only to create others. We just don’t know of any such ‘’quantum jumps’’ that create new species, since most genetic mutations work against the survival of the individual. So this is another hypothesis - no less plausible than the orthodox view, but still speculative.
And there are other speculations about evolution, some by Nobel prize-winning geneticists, that border on the bizarre - for example, that life on earth was produced by spermatozoa from outer space. In addition, many younger biologists (the so-called ‘’cladists’’) are persuaded that the differences among species - including those that seem to be closely related -are such as to make the very concept of evolution questionable.
So ‘’evolution’’ is no simple established scientific orthodoxy, and to teach it as such is an exercise in dogmatism. It is reasonable to suppose that if evolution were taught more cautiously, as a conglomerate idea consisting of conflicting hypotheses rather than as an unchallengeable certainty, it would be far less controversial. As things now stand, the religious fundamentalists are not far off the mark when they assert that evolution, as generally taught, has an unwarranted anti-religious edge to it.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2346442/posts
As a conservative site, Free Republic is pro-God, pro-life, pro-family, pro-Constitution, pro-Bill of Rights, pro-gun, pro-limited government, pro-private property rights, pro-limited taxes, pro-capitalism, pro-national defense, pro-freedom, and-pro America. We oppose all forms of liberalism, socialism, fascism, pacifism, totalitarianism, anarchism, government enforced atheism, abortionism, feminism, homosexualism, racism, wacko environmentalism, judicial activism, etc. We also oppose the United Nations or any other world government body that may attempt to impose its will or rule over our sovereign nation and sovereign people. We believe in defending our borders, our constitution and our national sovereignty.Free Republic is private property. It is not a government project, nor is it funded by government or taxpayer money. We are not a publicly owned entity nor are we an IRS tax-free non-profit organization. We pay all applicable taxes on our income. We are not connected to or funded by any political party, news agency, or any other entity. We sell no merchandise, product or service, and we offer no subscriptions or paid memberships. We accept no paid advertising or promotions. We are funded solely by donations (non tax deductible gifts) from our readers and participants.
We aggressively defend our God-given and first amendment guaranteed rights to free speech, free press, free religion, and freedom of association, as well as our constitutional right to control the use and content of our own personal private property. Despite the wailing of the liberal trolls and other doom & gloom naysayers, we feel no compelling need to allow them a platform to promote their repugnant and obnoxious propaganda from our forum. Free Republic is not a liberal debating society. We are conservative activists dedicated to defending our rights, defending our constitution, defending our republic and defending our traditional American way of life.
Some small group of religious conservatives made me put it there. LOL!
The Godless liberals have outlawed discussion of God's work from schools, government and all public places, but I'll be damned if they're going to outlaw it on FR.
If that means liberals, atheists, Darwinists, RINOS, etc, withhold their donations from FR, well, I guess we'll get along without them.
So, just to be clear...the mods aren’t going to wash my car?
:-)
Rats...
I was just putting together a list, too....
Jim, you are a true HERO, and an oh so welcome antidote to ZERO!
May God bless you and yours, and may God bless Free Republic!!!—GGG
Ah...so it's "idol worship" for a Christian to believe the same things about Genesis that Jesus, the disciples and Paul believed.
Yeah, right. And Michael Moore is the Pope.
It just fits in with the typical evo mentality that believing that the Bible means what it says and is authoritative, is being a cultist.
I wonder what that makes all the Christian denominations which claim the Bible as their foundation.
Evologic makes swiss cheese look like it has the density of a neutron star.
[[I think little miss xcamel is trying to commit suicide by Mod...and I say let her. Let xcamel go over to her fellow leftist, evo-religious, human-caused global warming fanatics at LGF where she will feel right at home.]]
I think you’re right- when they run out of arguments (not that they ever had anything substantial to support macroevolution with in the first place), they seem to throw up their hands and drop right into vitcim mode- looking to get banned so they can whine on DC and LGF about the intolerant FR (translation- they could force the mods to suppress Creationist articles, so they scream about FR being intolerant) It’s the martyre syndrom which they wear as a badge of honor over on DC (not sure why- it just shows they had nothign of substance to argue with over here, and had to resort to attempted coersion to get hteir way- or attempt to anyways- but meh- they feel it’s important ot play the victim, and apparently feel ‘justified’ when htey get banned- so I say let em feel this way- them ore that choose suicide by mod, the better if they haven’t got anythign to contribute tyo FR but petty accusations and false allegations)
[[It is reasonable to suppose that if evolution were taught more cautiously, as a conglomerate idea consisting of conflicting hypotheses rather than as an unchallengeable certainty, it would be far less controversial.]]
This will never happen- As I mentioned- their hypothesis is so fragile, and they have so little faith in it that their only recourse is to shut down all opposition to the hypothesis, and now, apparently, they are moving fro mthe schools and tryign to shut down any discussions they can in public sites- you can see the fear by some of hte posts squacking about how they don’t liek hte fact that religious views are posted ‘on hte front page’ (of course, by ‘religious views’ they ONLY mean Creationist views- and ‘religious views’ that support macroevolution faith is a-ok with htem)
[[If that means liberals, atheists, Darwinists, RINOS, etc, withhold their donations from FR, well, I guess we’ll get along without them.]]
I wouldn’t worry too much about that- it’s only a small handful of complainers that stomp their foot- and they probably aren’t old enough to donate much anyways- even if they do contribute from time to time- I think most liberals, darwinists and Rinos etc realy apapreciate your no nonsense site as a breath of fresh air amidst the stench of political activism in the mainstream media, myriad far left liberal blogs and websites etc- Fox news is stomping the left in the ratings because peopel are sick and tired of far left crap for brains mainstream media Obama-bots tryign to force their agenda on America, and tryign to ocnvince everyone it’s ‘for our own good’. Peopl,e are flockign to Fox, and I beleive you’ll get plenty of peopel coming here to replace the few whiners that adopt the religion of victimology and rant on about how you’re ‘supposed to run’ this site- They won’t be missed
I propose a solution to this mystery. It seems to me that the self-described "true conservatives" who are complaining about fundamentalist pressure on JimRob on this thread are actually Libertarians.
Strictly speaking, Libertarians aren't "conservatives," because they refuse to "conserve" the founding tradition of the "nation of liberty under God." They tend to object to that God part.
They simply want to banish religion from the Public Square, and that's the long and the short of it. They are the ones doing the "pressuring" of JimRob.
Well, that's just my humble opinion, for whatever it's worth.
[[True conservatives support the Constitution and are for freedom of religion and freedom for religion, not freedom FROM religion.]]
Exactly- some folks are apaprently so ashamed of mainstream religion that they can’t bear to see it voiced in public, and so they dress themselvs up as ‘religious’ just for the sake of attackign the true religious- Be not astonished though, this is exactly what happened to true Christians all along- false prophets and teachers dressed themselves up in robes of religion and persecuted, suppressed, and murdered true Christians (and stil ldo to this day to the tune of over 200,000,000 in a decade).
False religion hates true religion because true light exposes the darkenss lyign beneath those parading around in religious garb pretendign to be ‘religious’. Obama is doign htis very same thing- Attackign TRUE Christianity, while supporting the ‘new relgion’ of Islam i nhtis country- He’s dropped the national day of prayer in favor of a muslim call to prayer- dissallowed flyovers by hte military to support fallen troops because the pilot’s website included ‘America is a Christian country’ on and on it goes, and its gettign worse- Obama is no Christian regardless of how many times he claims to be- His heart, when exposed to the true light of God’s word, proves to be as dark as death itself, and htose he chooses to surround himself with are as evil as they come-
The obvious solution to this problem of how the website is run, is for those who object so vehemently to how JR runs HIS site, is for them to simply start up their own private conservative website where all this *fundamentalist* drivel and pressure to allow creationist viewpoints to occur, doesn’t happen, or is strictly regulated by the management.
They can turn it into FR (more of less, copyrighted material excluded of course) sans religion.
If people are leaving the conservative movement in droves because of the creationist element, anti-science, anti-intellectual element, then theoretically, they should be ready to flock to a new site that purports to be conservative and science loving.
Since no one is forced to post on FR, or any other website, it could be presumed that they are posting of their own free will. The websites would then sink or swim, depending on simply supply and demand.
[[They simply want to banish religion from the Public Square, and that’s the long and the short of it. They are the ones doing the “pressuring” of JimRob.]]
EXACTLY! and htey won’t rest until they’ve shoved TRUE Christianity underground where it can’t be seen much by hte public- anythign less than that is concidered a failure to their agenda- all while wearing the robes of ‘religion’ no less (so as not to be seen as anti-Relgious) (Not sure what ‘religion’ they claim, but it certainly isn’t one in compliance with God’s actual word- a book they simply refuse to ackowledge as His infallible word- just a ‘good book’ full of ‘good sayings’ written by nothing but ‘a bunch of ignorant sheephearders who were ignroant of science’ dontchaknow?) (And they wonder why they get called to the carpet for their statements? lol Again, apaprently the light of God’s word burns too much- no wonder they want to shove Christianity underground- they aren’t secure enough in their own viewss to allow the light to freely expose the darkness apaprently)
It’s worth a lot.
Libertarianism would get on much further if they weren’t so anti-God and anti-morality.
Too many of them come across as a toddler throwing a tantrum about not being able to do what they want, when they want, everyone else be damned.
Jim, speaking just for myself, when I first started surfing FR (over ten years ago) I was a lapsed Christian, an agnostic. Over the intervening years I have sought to better understand the world and myself. The internet has been (perhaps literally) a Godsend to me, and FR has been the single most important site by far in my quest for the truth. I once read somewhere that I would know the truth and that the truth would set me free. This has come to pass. Thank you for your help in this quest, Jim. Please carry on, and you too, GGG.
[[The obvious solution to this problem of how the website is run, is for those who object so vehemently to how JR runs HIS site, is for them to simply start up their own private conservative website where all this *fundamentalist* drivel and pressure to allow creationist viewpoints to occur, doesn’t happen, or is strictly regulated by the management.
They can turn it into FR (more of less, copyrighted material excluded of course) sans religion.
If people are leaving the conservative movement in droves because of the creationist element, anti-science, anti-intellectual element, then theoretically, they should be ready to flock to a new site that purports to be conservative and science loving.]]
They tried that- but DC turned out to be a failure-
[[If people are leaving the conservative movement in droves because of the creationist element, anti-science, anti-intellectual element, then theoretically, they should be ready to flock to a new site that purports to be conservative and science loving.]]
They did- and all 10-12 of them found out that there really wasn’t as many of htem as they thought, and people got sick of visiting a site who’s only apaprent goal was to monitor FR and bash Creationists and ID folks- they foudn out DC was heavy on promisses, light on actual delivery- Heavy on assumptions., but woefully light on actual scientific evidence- most folks found out the lack of actual evidnece supporting Macroevolution on DC was JUST as FR has been statign for years now- Macroevolutionsits are heavy on promisses by woefully lacking it comes to delivering the goods (much the way Obama is)
Don’t get me wrong. I love science. It’s one of God’s greatest creations for man.
You are why I do this, Rogue Yam. Thank you so much for your testimony!
Tantrum throwing? Your side had to go to daddy (JR) and complain that “He’s looking at me”.
Where’s the scientific proof I asked for Saturday to start the civil debate? Still waiting.
The evolution side asks for scientific proof time after time. All we get in return is religion masquerading as science from people with NO background in the field they are talking about. The articles they post have NO data, they are just incorrect (or purposely slanted)reviews of actually articles supporting evolution with a paragraph tagged on at the end saying god did it.
Isn’t one of the commandments “Thou shalt not lie”?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.