Posted on 04/22/2005 4:21:47 AM PDT by PatrickHenry
Evolution found a home Thursday in the oldest church in Kansas during a forum about the controversy over science instruction for public school students.
"There is no conflict between evolution and the Christian faith," said the Rev. Peter Luckey, the senior pastor of Plymouth Congregational Church, 925 Vt.
Luckey was preaching to the choir during a five-hour forum that featured scientists, teachers and politicians who argued in favor of teaching students evolution because it is the foundation of science, knowledge of which will be needed to compete for jobs in the growing bioscience industry.
About 75 people attended the forum at Plymouth, which was founded in 1854 and was the first established church in the Kansas Territory. Attempts to inject intelligent design -- the notion that there is a master planner for all life -- into science class should be rejected, they said.
"Intelligent design is nothing but creationism in a cheap tuxedo," said Leonard Krishtalka, director of the Kansas University Natural History Museum and Biodiversity Research Center.
‘Think critically'
The forum was another round in the debate that has thrust Kansas on the national stage.
With control of the State Board of Education in conservative hands [AAARRGGHHH!!], state officials again will consider science standards that will guide teachers.
A committee of scientists has drafted standards that include evolution teaching, but a minority report, led by proponents of intelligent design, wants criticism of evolution included. A State Board of Education committee, comprising three conservative [AARRGHH!!] board members, plans six days of hearings that will revolve around that debate.
The speakers at Thursday's forum were adamant that evolution instruction not be reduced, watered down or dumbed down.
Gov. Kathleen Sebelius' science adviser, Lee Allison, said when the state approved a $500 million bioscience initiative, it included a provision to recruit top scholars who met the standards of the National Academy of Sciences, which supports evolution without equivocation.
"The state really has taken a position on this in a broad, bipartisan way," Allison said.
Charles Decedue, executive director of the Higuchi Biosciences Center, said teaching evolution was critical because bioscience companies want to locate in places where the work force has received a solid education in chemistry, physics and biology.
"They want people who can think critically," he said.
‘Hayseed state'
Andrew Stangl, a Kansas University sophomore, said his high school science teachers in his hometown of Andover refused to teach evolution.
He bought books and taught himself. He said fear of teaching evolution would hurt the United States in the long term. "I don't want to see other countries pass us by. We are going to economically suffer as a result," he said.
In 1999, Kansas made international news, much of it negative, when a conservative [AARRGGHH!!] board de-emphasized evolution. The 2000 election returned moderates to power, and evolution was reinstated. But with conservatives [AARRGGHH!!] back in control, international criticism was starting again, several panelists said.
Rachel Robson, a doctoral candidate at KU Medical Center, said one of her friends was applying for a job with a Japanese company, and the company officials made fun of Kansas and questioned whether good scientists could come from there.
Thursday's forum attracted national attention from National Public Radio and NBC.
Krishtalka said even though the battle over evolution was going on in several states, "Kansas will be tarred and feathered by the media as the hayseed state."
Carol and Tom Banks, of Prairie Village, attended the forum, saying they were getting tired of conservatives [AARRGGHH!!] controlling the political agenda.
"If intelligent design were taught, that would be teaching religion in public schools," Carol Banks said.
But Jerry Manweiler, a physicist from Lawrence, said he supported teaching intelligent design. "It's important to know the theory of evolution, but it's also important to understand the nature of God," he said. Manweiler said he was put off by the forum speakers' "lack of humility."
Don Covington, vice president of networking for Intelligent Design Network Inc., said he disagreed with the speakers.
"They want their kids to know how to think, but you can't develop critical thinking skills when you tell them to memorize Darwin," he said.
• May 5-7: Science standards hearings in auditorium of Memorial building, 120 S.W. 10th St., Topeka. Time to be determined later.
• May 12-14: Science standards hearings, time and location to be determined later.
And I strongly urge you not to be troubled by this turn of events. The liberal politicians are "newbies" to the voting theater of believers and near-believers. Moreover, they have no moral authority based on their own initiatives for abortion, for euthanasia, for homosexual marriage and so on.
The conservative politicians have been in this theater for a very long time. Evidence how the social conservative voter will abandon the Republicans altogether - sitting out elections - if an elected Republican official is righteously tagged for moral turpitude. Compare that to the social liberal reaction to Clinton's scandals.
Here in Illinois, the conservatives are still stewing over Governor Ryan’s misconduct – until they heal from that insult, a conservative cannot win federal office because the offended won’t show up to vote.
Liberal Democrats couldn’t take that kind of heat. So if they begin raising this issue to the undecideds (many of whom will be theologically firm in their views, esp blacks, Jews, Muslims and Hispanics) - and speaking of religious doctrines to which they probably have no clue while at the same time upholding a platform of moral relativity - IMHO, those undecideds will run to the Republicans as fast as they can.
You are the one who talked about tendencies. What did you have in mind?
There are indeed such statements. And there have been numerous statements (and surveys) indicating the contrary -- many Christians support the theory of evolution. One could probably find atheistic opinions in any group of dentists, optometrists, and dermatologists, but it wouldn't mean anything about the fields in which they work. We don't hear about their views because, I assume, the press doesn't think the religious views of such groups are worth popularizing.
The point is that if a scientific theory like evolution is accepted by both theists and non-theists, which is certainly the case, then the theory is religiously neutral, notwithstanding the assertions of people like YECs. This is why -- in my always humble opinion -- the religious opinions of individuals has no bearing on the scientific value of the theory.
Well, it is. Individual scientists aren't neutral, of course, nor are they required to be. Poor ol' Einstin was a socialist, so whatcha gonna do? Individuals aren't omniscient. The best we can hope for is good science, and we can sort out the other issues for ourselves.
But I can imagine a situation where someone's religion might feel threatened by science. Suppose some cult believes that the Garden of Eden exists today, and it's physically located on the moon. Then, those nasty astronomers go and actually photograph the moon and whaddaya know -- their ain't no Garden there. So the Lunar Eden cult claims that astronomy is hostile to their religion. We can't help that kind of thing. It's gonna happen.
Oh, you mean the "atheist tendency" of neo-Darwinism? The neo-Darwinist position is effectively that God did not create Life or the Universe: Instead, both are purely material processes constituted by a virtually infinite series of fortuitous accidents. To some of its adherents at least, I suspect this is neo-Darwinism's principal attraction.
But no genuine theist (and some supposedly religiously committed individuals are "theist-in-name-only") would understand this assertion as anything other than the most profound falsification of reality possible. So I guess we can speak of a "theist tendency" as well.
PH thinks we shouldn't mix science and religion (and I certainly agree with him). Well, then, why doesn't he send a letter of admonition to Dawkins, Pinker, et al -- you know, the "usual suspects" -- requesting that they desist from promoting what are essentially religious ideas? For if any statement whatever is made about God, pro or con, we have left science behind, and are engaging in theological speculation.
The charge of theological speculation is routinely laid to the account of "creationists" and ID-ers, and YECs, etc. Yet to me, coming from a neo-Darwinist, this charge is a case of "the pot calling the kettle black": They "see the mote" in the other guy's eye, but not the "beam" in their own.
For it is so clear that the "usual suspects" that I typically cite, to the last man, routinely either frankly assert, or strongly imply, that God is only the figment of a superstitious imagination, a "projection" of an undercultivated, undereducated person, a vaporous epiphenomenon of a sub-par brain -- which is wholly consistent with the theory of Feuerbach and Marx from which this idea originally sprang. Indeed, the leading spokesmen of neo-Darwinism seem to take great delight and pride in making such assertions. (Certain of them are Marxists themselves; e.g., Lewontin and, I strongly suspect, Dawkins.)
Now it will be objected that neo-Darwinist theory is not the same thing as its leading spokesmen's statements about it. In which case I would reply: Well then, it needs better spokesmen, if what they are saying the theory holds does not accord with what the theory says itself.
So where do you want to go from here?
I suspect that I could come up with a more pertinent example. However, I don't think you would want to hear it right now ...
And you claim to be rational. Shame.
You could quit asking us if we've stopped beating our wives.
I suspect that the idea of atheism is about one second younger than theism. Or one second older. Take your pick.
Lunar Eden, Lunar Eden. It's a good example. Just keep repeating it. (Unless your interests are focused on the Seventh Planet.)
I'd love to know what your criterion of rationality is.
Cardinal Bellarmine placemark
BB, what would you like me to say to Dawkins?
Dear Professor:And he will write back:
I understand you're a good biologist, but I have a dear friend who finds your religious opinions obnoxious.
Yours truly,
PH
My Dear PH:So what have we accomplished?
Bugger off!
Your obediant servant,
Professor Richard Dawkins
LOLOL PH, but this misses the point. He's entitled to whatever religious opinions he likes, be they "obnoxious" or otherwise. But if he stuffs them into his science, then we have to recognize that he's not doing science; he's doing theology under cover of science. Then if he goes around "evangelising" same, I would have to regard him as a missionary, not a scientist. And recognizing that, I would find it difficult to take his so-called "science" seriously.
Which is probably too bad, for I'm sure that not everything he has written or said is total bunk. But if you can't trust a man to tell the truth on one point, then you can't trust him to tell the truth about anything else. Integrity is everything -- in a scientist, and in a public figure.
If others don't find this "mixing of metaphors" (i.e., science and religious perspectives) objectionable, well, that's their lookout. The world is full of credulous people, a/k/a "prey."
Many people today couldn't stand it, indeed would resent it as the worst scandal, indeed as a personal affront, an insult to their "intelligence," to hear someone allege that God has on past occasions performed miracles.
But let a neo-Darwinist cite a "naturalistic" miracle (e.g., turning a reptile into a bird), and that's just fine and dandy with them.
The shifting sands of "public opinion" is not a good place to stand if you want to survive a tsunami. FWIW
Maybe your letter to Dawkins would be more persuasive if you were to quote my first couple paragraphs. But then again, who am I kidding? :^)
Thanks for writing, dear Patrick!
And yet, that is Intelligent Design in one sentence.
Hey, don't insult their Clinton-think double standard by recognizing it for what it is.
I don't know, but based on his reputation, I suspect that his work in biology is quite good. I'm not aware that any of it is bunk, and in all probability, dear BB, neither are you. (But you're certainly a fire-eater when you're mad.) His work can be checked, like all science work, so unless someone is accusing him of faking his data, let's put his science work off to one side.
As for his opinions on everything else, I generally disregard such stuff. I don't think anyone's opinions are any better than mine. Some are just as good. (Some are worse, because they're contradictory, incoherent, etc.) But no one's in any position to prove his theological opinions, thus we can either accept them, reject them, or ignore them.
So it is with Dawkins. I don't see any problem. (If we can separate Einstein's work from his goofy socialism, we can handle just about anything.) And as long as we're all free to speak our minds, I don't see any solution to your objections. So relax.
I rejoice that somewhere, way back along that great family tree we all share, you and I are cousins.
Darwin's credentials were in theology, not science, so is it any wonder we have a religion born out of his efforts? And for those with ears to hear, it is the god of forces who rules that little domain
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