Posted on 02/02/2012 8:47:24 PM PST by sreastman
“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.” — The Declaration of Independence
Thanks to Senator Dennis Kruse, Indiana educators may soon have the same freedom to express their beliefs about the origin of man as Thomas Jefferson did when he wrote the Declaration of Independence. This week the state Senate passed SB-89, which states, “The governing body of a school corporation may offer instruction on various theories of the origin of life. The curriculum for the course must include theories from multiple religions, which may include, but is not limited to, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Scientology.”
Although some Indiana school districts currently teach creationism alongside evolution, the legislation may result in a layer of state support whenever the action is challenged in court. The usual argument against teaching both sides of the issue is the so-called separation of church and state. However when the First Amendment is actually examined, instead of merely referred to, unbiased observers find there is no mention of any level of government below the federal. “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Asserting the equivalence of a school board to Congress is like saying local board members can declare war, balance the federal budget and impeach a President. There was an attempt in the nineteenth century to extend the Congressional prohibition to the states, but the proposed constitutional amendment failed.
In this century, there is a feeble attempt to say that the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause requires states to make sure atheists are not exposed to the other side of the issue. If that were a true reading of legislative intent, the reverse would also be true, that people of faith have a right to only hear about divine creation.
Charles Darwin is not entirely to blame for his fanciful theory of origins. He was a child of his times. The nineteenth century was a period of great scientific naivety, when Newtonian physicists never dreamed of relativity, flight in heavier than air craft was declared impossible and biologists were blithely ignorant of the multiple interdependencies of the microscopic structures within a living cell. Today, intelligent design biologists use the term “irreducible complexity” to describe this system of mutual reliance, something that could never spring fully formed from ”natural selection.”
It is expected that the Indiana House will pass its version of SB-89 and that Governor Mitch Daniels will sign it. And it’s even more certain that today’s descendants of the Flat Earth Society will use threats of expensive lawsuits to fight discoveries made since evolution was cutting edge science.
© 2012 FaithIssues.com
Howdy newbie.
They make it sound like you’d have competing classes for Christians and evolutionites across the hall from each other in schools but that isn’t realistic. To have a meaningful dialectic you’d need an apples/apples comparison that is, you’d need a religion which operated on an intellectual level similar to that of evolution to compare to evolution and there isn’t really any sort of a religion which operates on that sort of an intellectual level. Closest would be Rastafari but that’s almost an insult to the Rastas.
Oh my, the disciples of the church of Darwin are going to screech like a tree full of monkeys. Congrats to the people of IN for electing brave wise leaders.
re: “To have a meaningful dialectic you’d need an apples/apples comparison that is, you’d need a religion which operated on an intellectual level similar to that of evolution to compare to evolution and there isn’t really any sort of a religion which operates on that sort of an intellectual level.”
Oh, that’s rich! It’s also difficult to discuss anything with “intellectual” evolutionists who are completely full of themselves and who’ve already decided that all people who have a belief in God and differ with evolutionists as to the where the scientific evidence leads are just morons who simply cannot function on the same “high” intellectual plain that they operate on.
God forbid that evolutionists be open to allowing research/discussion by professors on all sides of the issue to examine the physical evidence and allow it to lead us to wherever it leads and not just try to fit the evidence to evolutionary dogma or to the Biblical accounts of creation.
Of course I realize that I speak out of place and should not dare attempt to “dialectic” with you on the high intellectual plain you operate on.
You obviously have no clue what the word "dialectic" means but I'll give you a hint: It's not a variation of the word "dialog" as you are attempting to use it. Further, your laughable misuse of the word lets us know right off the bat of the intellectual pretension you bring to the argument. Second, religion and evolution are not inherently conflicting constructs as there are plenty deistic evolutionists so the whole dichotomy upon which you base your "intellectual level" argument is totally meaningless. Thanks for playing though.
Wow, I never knew you were such a scholar. Too bad that the "scholarly" have to scoff at and belittle those they disagree with; it sounds so.....Leftist.
I have a pretty good vocabulary, but make mistakes, especially when going off the cuff - it doesn't mean I'm stupid any more than your down the nose comments to the other guy make you superior.
Get over yourself and accept the challeng of actual discourse/debate.
PS - I dropped the "e" off of "challenge" but decided not to correct it - you have been provided the leverage to discount me as a twit too.
I did. I demonstrated that your entire vacuous post didn't make any sense at all in the context of the comparison you were attemting to portray, all in addition to the pretentious misuse of words you don't understand. If you are going to chide the religious as not being up to your "intellectual level" you'd better bring some intellectual firepower to the table next time before you embarrass yourself again.
Look aghain "genius". I'm not the guy you originally belittled - I only responded when I saw the crap you spouted.
PS: I also believe we were CREATED, and did not see where the other dude was anti-religion - usually the "allow both sides" folks are believers who want their views allowed.
And your response was more infantile than the original post. When someone asserts that religion does not rise to the "intellectual level" of evolution I feel comfortable in taking it as anti-religion.
Newt Gingrich once stated the problem of evolutionism and morality about as succinctly as is possible in noting that the question of whether a man views his neighbor as a fellow child of God or as a meat byproduct of random processes simply has to affect human relationships.
Basically, every halfway honest person with any brains and talent who has taken any sort of a hard look at evolution in the past 60 years has given up on it and many have denounced it. A listing of fifty or sixty such statements makes for an overwhelming indictment of that part of the scientific community which goes on trying to defend evolution and they (the evolosers) have a favorite term ("quote mining") which they use to describe that sort of argument.
My own response to that is to note what I view as the ultimate evolution quote by the noted evolutionist (actually, FORMER evolutionist) Jeffrey Dahmer:
"If a person doesn’t think there is a God to be accountable to, then—then what’s the point of trying to modify your behaviour to keep it within acceptable ranges? That’s how I thought anyway. I always believed the theory of evolution as truth, that we all just came from the slime. When we, when we died, you know, that was it, there is nothing…"Jeffrey Dahmer, in an interview with Stone Phillips, Dateline NBC, Nov. 29, 1994.
Dahmer converted to Christianity before he died. The basic tenets of true religion appear to be inprinted upon most of us biologically which is the only reason that Islammic societies and "secular humanist" societies like Britain and Canada function at all. A psychopath like Dahmer is basically somebody on whom that imprint did not take. For those guys, it has to be written down somewhere, and it has to be written down accurately; the bible does that. Telling somebody like Dahmer that we all evolved from "lucky dust" is a formula for getting people killed.
Evolution was the basic philosophical cornerstone of communism, naziism, the various eugenics programs, the out of control arms races which led to WW-I and WW-II, and all of the grief of the last 150 years. Starting from 1913, Europe had gone for a hundred years without a major war. They didn't even have to think. All they needed to do was act cool, go to church, have parades, formal balls, attend board meetings, and they'd still be running the world today; they'd be so fat and happy they'd not know what to do with themselves. Instead, they all got to reading about Darwinism, fang and claw, survival of the fittest and all the rest of that nonsense, and the rest as they say is history.
The most interesting analysis of that sad tale is probably Sir Arthur Keith's "Evolution and Ethics"
Keith apparently viewed belief in evolution as some sort of duty of the English educated classes, nonetheless he had a very clear vision of the problems inherent in it and laid it out in no uncertain terms:
From Sir Srthur Keith's "Evolution and Ethics:
Chapter 3
The Behavior of Germany Considered from an Evolutionary Point of View in 1942
....It is worth noting that Hitler uses a double designation for his tribal doctrine National Socialism: Socialism standing for the good side of the tribal spirit (that which works within the Reich); aud Nationalism for the ethically vicious part, which dominates policy at and outside the German frontiers.
The leader of Germany is an evolutionist not only in theory, but, as millions know to their cost, in the rigor of its practice. For him the national "front" of Europe is also the evolutionary "front"; he regards himself, and is regarded, as the incarnation of the will of Germany, the purpose of that will being to guide the evolutionary destiny of its people....
... "Humanitarianism is an evil . . . a creeping poison." "The most cruel methods are humane if they give a speedy victory" is Hitler's echo of a maxim attributed to Moltke. Such are the ways of evolution when applied to human affairs.
...I have said nothing about the methods employed by the Nazi leaders to secure tribal unity in Germany methods of brutal compulsion, bloody force, and the concentration camp. Such methods cannot be brought within even a Machiavellian system of ethics, and yet may be justified by their evolutionary result.
12.
....No aspect of Hitler's policy proclaims the antagonism between evolution and ethics so forcibly as his treatment of the Jewish people in Germany.... ...Hitler is an uncompromising evolutionist, and we must seek for an evolutionary explanation if we are to understand his actions....
It must not be thought that in seeking to explain Hitler's actions I am seeking to justify them. The opposite is the case. I have made this brief survey of public policy in modern Germany with a definite object: to show that Dr. Waddington is in error when he seeks to place ethics on a scientific basis by a knowledge of evolutionary tendencies and practice.
Chapter 4
Human Life: Its Purpose or Ultimate End
IN THE COURSE OF GATHERING INFORMATION concerning man's morality and the part it has played and is playing in his evolution, I found it necessary to provide space for slips which were labeled "Life: Its Ultimate and Proximate Purposes." Only those who have devoted some special attention to this matter are aware of the multitude of reasons given for the appearance of man on earth. Here I shall touch on only a few of them; to deal with all would require a big book. The reader may exclaim: Why deal with any of them! What has ultimate purpose got to do with ethics and evolution! Let a man with a clearer head and a nimbler pen than mine reply. He is Edward Carpenter, who wrote Civilization: Its Cause and Cure (1889).
14.
It is from the sixteenth edition (1923) I am to quote, p. 249:
If we have decided what the final purpose or Life of Man is, then we may say that what is good for that purpose i
s finally "good" and what is bad for that purpose is finally "evil."
...If the final purpose of our existence is that which has been and is being worked out under the discipline of evolutionary law, then, although we are quite unconscious of the end result, we ought, as Dr. Waddington has urged, to help on "that which tends to promote the ultimate course of evolution." If we do so, then we have to abandon the hope of ever attaining a universal system of ethics; for, as we have just seen, the ways of national evolution, both in the past and in the present, are cruel, brutal, ruthless, and without mercy. Dr. Waddington has not grasped the implications of Nature's method of evolution, for in his summing up (Nature, 1941, 150, p. 535) he writes "that the ethical principles formulated by Christ . . . are those which have tended towards the further evolution of mankind, and that they will continue to do so." Here a question of the highest interest is raised: the relationship which exists between evolution and Christianity; so important, it seems to me, that I shall devote to it a separate chapter. Meantime let me say that the conclusion I have come to is this:
the law of Christ is incompatible with the law of evolution as far as the law of evolution has worked hitherto. Nay, the two laws are at war with each other; the law of Christ can never prevail until the law of evolution is destroyed.
All of that, of course, deals only with the question of ethics and the logical consequences of evolutionism. The fact that evolution is junk science argues against it as well.
You win - I quit. To quote an old saying: I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed person.
That's first intelligent thing you've said in this discussion yet.
I am a firm believer in the Bible and, while religions of Christianity have sprung from it, I believe it stands on its own and "Religion" is a way to try to organize (with many "interpretations" of how to look at the teachings in the Book) and many "sects" seem to have belief systems involved that appear to be abit contradicitve to what Scripture says.
In a way, he was partially correct that religion doesn't base itself on the same "intellectual" basis as so-called science (which also has many who veer off the use of intellectual thought).
Religious beliefs necessarily require Faith, but I believe that it is an intellectually informed Faith. That's why Apologetics came into being - to help use rational arguments to explain why there is a rational reason for the Faith.
Vigilanteman, and those on his side, cannot conceive that a Creator was not only responsible, but necessary for us to be here. They would rather believe that out of nothingness, there was an inevitability that something had to happen and we are the product of that "inevitability". I can't conceive that the astronomical odds were beaten and that we are a product of a series of absolutely perfect "mistakes/accidents".
At any rate, I do apologize because we lowered each other in our attempts to one up each other. I wish there was a way to reach the non-believers, but they are also a nnecsessity as Christ told us they would hate us because we love Him. God also let us know that the world will deteriorate into a moral cesspool before He comes back to set things right. I have troubel following the edict "Resist not evil" as Christ counseled us, even though I know He was telling us it is His job to vanquish evil because we are incapable of doing it and our real job is to try to carry The Word. We are ineffective in carrying The Word when we resort to personal attacks. God Bless.
I appreciate the articulate, well reasoned post but I would humbly disagree with this assertion. I believe the Christian worldview is much more logically consistent and has a more solid intellectual foundation than any competing worldview based on an empirical epistemology as the axiomatic starting point.
I can't argue against that. I believe we are using slightly different semantcs and really have the same views on the matter. Because of Apologetics, I strengthened my Faith because the very existence of the Bible in its present form(s), speaks of a Truth that cannot be denied. Over 150 authors over a couple thousand years and it does not contradict itself. I don't believe that even in this technologically-connected age, that a mere dozen people could compile a similar work on any topic and manage the same record. Plus, the Bible has prophesized so many events that have come to fruition, and I have no doubt the rest will occur. Just as we cannot be mere accidents, the Bible's record also cannot be an accident - it requires a Divine oversight. The real trick is to use some of these arguments as effective rebuttals.
Some of the best preachers of Biblical Christianity started as Atheists/Agnostics, and became believers because of their attempts to disprove Scripture. Unless motivated to do some serious research, most non-believers will never have the Truth slap them upside the head hard enough to know the Truth. That's why we really need to do as "suggested" and to treat those who do not believe with love while firmly and gently sticking to the Truth. My tagline is an example of it - many think it is merely a cherry-picked bit to push conservatism, but if they go and read the whole passage and the directions given, they will understand what the Bible preaches about ensuring s stigma is attached to bad behavior - something society has effectivel removed.
You made the statement:
I assume the idea that the First Amendment is a requirement upon Congress only is an opinion of yours, and those who think like you. I doubt that any federal court would express or endourse your opinion. So, I have a few questions.
Who are these “unbiased observers”?
Do you also contend that the state of Indianna can enact laws that abridge freedom of speach, allow the arrest, prosecution and imprisonment of people involved in peaceful assembly, and eliminate redress of grievances to the state government?
What state religion would you like Indianna to establish? What should the punishment be for violations of the tenents of the state religion?
Do you believe that all the Amendments to the Constitution apply only to the federal government?
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