Gone for the evening placemarker.
God bless America!
Posted on 10/06/2002 8:16:21 AM PDT by hispanarepublicana
Professor rigid on evolution </MCC HEAD>
By SEBASTIAN KITCHEN </MCC BYLINE1>
AVALANCHE-JOURNAL </MCC BYLINE2>
• Criteria for letters of recommendation: http://www2.tltc.ttu.edu/dini/Personal/ letters.htm
• Michael Dini's Web page:
http://www2.tltc.ttu. edu/dini/
On the Net
Micah Spradling was OK with learning about evolution in college, but his family drew the line when his belief in the theory became a prerequisite for continuing his education.
Tim Spradling said his son left Texas Tech this semester and enrolled in Lubbock Christian University after en countering the policy of one associate professor in biological sciences.
Professor Michael Dini's Web site states that a student must "truthfully and forthrightly" believe in human evolution to receive a letter of recommendation from him.
"How can someone who does not accept the most important theory in biology expect to properly practice in a field that is so heavily based on biology?" Dini's site reads.
Dini says on the site that it is easy to imagine how physicians who ignore or neglect the "evolutionary origin of humans can make bad clinical decisions."
He declined to speak with The Avalanche-Journal. His response to an e-mail from The A-J said: "This semester, I have 500 students to contend with, and my schedule in no way permits me to participate in such a debate."
A Tech spokeswoman said Chancellor David Smith and other Tech officials also did not want to comment on the story.
At least two Lubbock doctors and a medical ethicist said they have a problem with the criterion, and the ethicist said Dini "could be a real ingrate."
Tim Spradling, who owns The Brace Place, said his son wanted to follow in his footsteps and needed a letter from a biology professor to apply for a program at Southwestern University's medical school.
Spradling is not the only medical professional in Lub bock shocked by Dini's policy. Doctors Patrick Edwards and Gaylon Seay said they learned evolution in college but were never forced to believe it.
"I learned what they taught," Edwards said. "I had to. I wanted to make good grades, but it didn't change my basic beliefs."
Seay said his primary problem is Dini "trying to force someone to pledge allegiance to his way of thinking."
Seay, a Tech graduate who has practiced medicine since 1977, said a large amount of literature exists against the theory.
"He is asking people to compromise their religious be liefs," Seay said. "It is a shame for a professor to use that as a criteria."
Dini's site also states: "So much physical evidence supports" evolution that it can be referred to as fact even if all the details are not known.
"One can deny this evidence only at the risk of calling into question one's understanding of science and of the method of science," Dini states on the Web site.
Edwards said Dini admits in the statement that the details are not all known.
Dini is in a position of authority and "can injure someone's career," and the criteria is the "most prejudice thing I have ever read," Seay said.
"It is appalling," he said.
Both doctors said their beliefs in creationism have never negatively affected their practices, and Seay said he is a more compassionate doctor because of his beliefs.
"I do not believe evolution has anything to do with the ability to make clinical decisions — pro or con," Seay said.
Academic freedom should be extended to students, Edwards said.
"A student may learn about a subject, but that does not mean that everything must be accepted as fact, just because the professor or an incomplete body of evidence says so," Edwards said.
"Skepticism is also a very basic part of scientific study," he said.
The letter of recommendation should not be contingent on Dini's beliefs, Edwards said.
"That would be like Texas Tech telling him he had to be a Christian to teach biology," Edwards said.
Harold Vanderpool, professor in history and philosophy of medicine at the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, said he has a problem with Dini's policy.
"I think this professor could be a real ingrate," Vanderpool said. "I have a problem with a colleague who has enjoyed all the academic freedoms we have, which are extensive, and yet denies that to our students."
Vanderpool, who has served on, advised or chaired committees for the National Institute of Health, the Food and Drug Administration and the Department of Health and Human Services, said the situation would be like a government professor requiring a student to be "sufficiently patriotic" to receive a letter.
"It seems to me that this professor is walking a pretty thin line between the protection of his right to do what he wants to do, his own academic freedom, and a level of discrimination toward a student," he said.
"It is reaching into an area of discrimination. That could be a legal problem. If not, it is a moral problem," Vanderpool said.
Instead of a recommendation resting on character and academic performance, "you've got this ideological litmus test you are using," he said. "To me, that is problematic, if not outright wrong."
William F. May, a medical ethicist who was appointed to President Bush's Council on Bioethics, said he cannot remember establishing a criterion on the question of belief with a student on exams or with letters of recommendation.
"I taught at five institutions and have always felt you should grade papers and offer judgments on the quality of arguments rather than a position on which they arrived."
Professors "enjoy the protection of academic freedom" and Dini "seems to be profoundly ungrateful" for the freedom, Vanderpool said.
He said a teacher cannot be forced to write a letter of recommendation for a student, which he believes is good because the letters are personal and have "to do with the professor's assessment of students' work habits, character, grades, persistence and so on."
A policy such as Dini's needs to be in the written materials and should be stated in front of the class so the student is not surprised by the policy and can drop the class, Vanderpool said.
Dini's site states that an individual who denies the evidence commits malpractice in the method of science because "good scientists would never throw out data that do not conform to their expectations or beliefs."
People throw out information be cause "it seems to contradict his/her cherished beliefs," Dini's site reads. A physician who ignores data cannot remain a physician for long, it states.
Dini's site lists him as an exceptional faculty member at Texas Tech in 1995 and says he was named "Teacher of the Year" in 1998-99 by the Honors College at Texas Tech.
Edwards said he does not see any evidence on Dini's vita that he attended medical school or treated patients.
"Dr. Dini is a nonmedical person trying to impose his ideas on medicine," Edwards said. "There is little in common between teaching biology classes and treating sick people. ... How dare someone who has never treated a sick person purport to impose his feelings about evolution on someone who aspires to treat such people?"
On his Web site, Dini questions how someone who does not believe in the theory of evolution can ask to be recommended into a scientific profession by a professional scientist.
May, who taught at multiple prestigious universities, including Yale, during his 50 years in academia, said he did not want to judge Dini and qualified his statements because he did not know all of the specifics.
He said the doctors may be viewing Dini's policy as a roadblock, but the professor may be warning them in advance of his policy so students are not dismayed later.
"I have never seen it done and am surprised to hear it, but he may find creationist aggressive in the class and does not want to have to cope with that," May said. "He is at least giving people the courtesy of warning them in advance."
The policy seems unusual, May said, but Dini should not be "gang-tackled and punished for his policy."
The criterion may have been viewed as a roadblock for Micah Spradling at Tech, but it opened a door for him at LCU.
Classes at LCU were full, Tim Spradling said, but school officials made room for his son after he showed them Dini's policy.
skitchen@lubbockonline.com 766-8753
Sorry, all. I even tried to post in a link and that didn't work. Odd little site controls, I guess.
Besides, my keyboard is Fried!
Doc
Or is it some sort of mental defect?
Maybe you think it's "cute" or "original" to write that way; but as for me, I just think it's extremely annoying and obnoxious.
Please go away.
Actually, it is you who failed to answer the simple question from my first post: The next question would be: Are you either a competent scientist or a competent physician yourself (or Pyysician, as some of you may spell it down there in Tennessee)?
Your private reply said, "Of course."
Sure. Right. Whatever you say (what did you say?).
Let's see, if you are a physician and "fat fingers" get in the way of competent spelling, I hope you don't choose to pick up a prescription pad and mix up a prescription due to your poor spelling any time soon. Furthermore, if you are a surgeon, one would hope you would not brush off the possibility that you dropped a scalpel into someone because manual dexterity wasn't one of your stronger areas in med school. Similarly, we all trust that you don't arrive at your diagnoses with the same careless haste as you post.
If you on the other hand claim to be a competent scientist, as I do, particularly where it comes to making a valid point in this discussion, can you tell us what it is about his faith in the tenets of evolutionary biology that you hope your personal physician relies upon as he treats you for an ailment?
I'm very glad to see that we three are in general agreement on the program.
The sufficiency of our conclusion depends on the accuracy and adequacy of our definitions which are no longer subject to direct test.
IMHO, your statement is so true it bears repeating. To many of us, the lack of direct evidence makes evolutionary theory look thin by comparison to theories which can be tested empirically.
Some on the evolutionist side may bristle when it is suggested that the theory is grounded in faith, but at least one scientist is quite frank about it:
My comment was aimed at why this student should get so excited over the fact that a biology assist. prof. should expect him to believe biological science. If this is a favor provided by faculty, why the article about having to change schools?
And congratulations for joining up. I lurked for about a year before I signed up.
like a blind/dumb man...
describing a pantomime---
when all he knows...
in a previous life...
he was a frog!
"No one doubts the improbability of events. Your existence is highly improbable. So is mine. Think of all the events in just the past 100 generations which could have caused any of our ancestors to behave differently than they did. Yet all the past events happened, naturally, step by step, and here we are, so mere improbability is not much of an issue."
"The facts upon which evolution theory is based are rather well established. Mutations happen. They really do. And new species appear over time, really. And they appear in form and DNA to be related to pre-existing species. No joke, that's the evidence. In every generation, those best suited for the game of life are most likely to breed the next generation. Mutation and natural selection. And time, lots of time. They're the stuff of evolution."
Main Entry: 1pan·to·mime
Pronunciation: 'pan-t&-"mIm
Function: noun
Etymology: Latin pantomimus, from pant- + mimus mime
Date: 1589
1 : PANTOMIMIST
2 a : an ancient Roman dramatic performance featuring a solo dancer and a narrative chorus
b : any of various dramatic or dancing performances in which a story is told by expressive bodily or facial movements of the performers
c : a British theatrical entertainment of the Christmas season based on a nursery tale and featuring topical songs, tableaux, and dances
3 a : conveyance of a story by bodily or facial movements especially in drama or dance
b : the art or genre of conveying a story by bodily movements only
- pan·to·mim·ic /"pan-t&-'mi-mik/ adjective
The second reason I posted was to give a personal first hand testimony of what happened to me. I was healed in a Church service along with about a dozen other people.
I find it pretty humorous that I am debunked. Leg length is debunked, Healers don’t happen, and a million bucks will buy peace for evolutionists at night for easy sleeping.
The only problem is that I am healed. And I listed the research and observation that I and 5 other people did using gold placer placement. Perhaps if I had one of your Priest's Ordainments by having a Doctorate and wrote in your Bible by publishing my research papers you could then dare to read anything outside your little church.
But the placer is there still and that anybody with a gold pan can go test it does not count because dirt is layered and large rocks are in valleys. Only problem is that the research was done, the results posted here and the rocks I am talking about are the anomalies. Which if you actualy read what I wrote is the subject, not the normal rocks in the valleys which are not a result of placer placement anyway because erosion does not placer (or placed here) a rock. The way you can tell a placer rock from a erosion rock is the rounding and smoothing of the rock by streambed action.
So what happened didn't because someone somewhere said it is bunk, and the research is bunk because dirt is layered. Guess what, stream beds are layered. I kinda lean towards A world wide flood making all of the earth a streambed. *doh*
I am not a circus act. I am just another Joe blow on the street, like millions of others. If you want to see healing I suspect that there is a Church a lot closer to you than I am.
But with the "objective reasoning" being shown here I can tell just what spirit your million dollar lottery is done in.
Did you catch the clue that I don't give a rip about your million bucks? I know the concept that there is something more valuable than money is hard to understand.
Keep your bucks, sleep well at night, but remember the dawn comes.
Lets keep this simple, in the same spirit it was offered. I did some research myself, and it is just as valid as anyone else’s even if it refutes your religion. And I am healed. Face it, healing happens. Take a look at how long I have been a Freeper, and notice that I have not been flaming you evolutionist wacko's all this time. I frankly do not give a rip what you choose to believe, obviously I have not tried to "save" you from your folly for two years and I am not going to be forced to do it now. I am no evangelist. I am just a Freeper with a first hand experience that pertained to a thread and gave it as a simple example. Take it in the spirit that it was offered or stuff it in your nose for all I care. I have never played preacher here on Freeper, and resent you trying to force me into that box along with your circus act routine.
I do not give a rip about what some MD says is real, I give a rip about what the Spirit of God says. And this Evangelist that came to church was led by the spirit he said, to check leg length. God seems to have felt that the theory had enough backing it because my leg grew. Did you think the kid that prayed was like some ET throwback that lengthened bones by thinking about it?
You guys are the best at the world in ignoring the obvious to study the sublime. I see your MD and raise you one God. Call.
Go back to your fantasy, and quit trying to debunk what you are afraid to understand. If you do not want to believe in God, fine. Have a nice life. But sheesh, your fear does not make my lifes experience's a fantasy no mater how important that is to your peace of mind.
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