Posted on 10/07/2002 12:44:39 PM PDT by wallcrawlr
A suburban school board declares that evolution is just another theory
NEWT GINGRICH, while he was a Georgia congressman and then as speaker of the House, was known for his interest in scientific research. Some Georgians prefer a different approach. On September 26th the school board of Cobb County, in the north-western Atlanta suburbs, voted to amend existing policy to allow discussion of “disputed views of academic subjects”, specifically the idea that God created the universe in six days—Charles Darwin, Stephen Jay Gould and the rest of them be damned.
The vote came after a month of deliberation, at a meeting crowded with concerned parents. Some 2,000 of the county's residents signed a petition last spring to have the board put stickers on biology textbooks telling students that evolution is a theory, not a fact. “What they're trying to do is appease the religious right,” says Michael Manely, the lawyer representing a local parent who wanted the stickers removed.
The war between creationists and evolutionists had recently fallen quiet. In 1999, the Kansas state board of education dropped evolution from state examinations; but by 2001 the three most prominent anti-evolutionists had been voted out of office, and the decision quietly reversed. Of late, the Christian right has focused on other topics. But the anti-evolutionists' victory in Cobb County may stimulate similar-minded people elsewhere. In Ohio, the state board of education is under pressure to include “intelligent design”—the idea that the complexity of the universe proves the existence of the divine—when it issues a new science curriculum.
Cobb County's new policy argues that providing information on “disputed views” is “necessary for a balanced education” and will help to promote “acceptance of diversity of opinion”. A poll commissioned in 2000 by People for the American Way, a liberal-minded group, shows that many Americans think this way. Nearly half of the respondents believed that the theory of evolution had not yet been proved. And of those who believe in evolution—only a fifth wanted evolution taught alone—three-quarters liberally agreed that students should be presented with “all points of view” and “make up their own minds”. In this post-modern reasoning, evolution and the Book of Genesis are equally valid.
The losers have already begun worrying aloud that this will hurt Cobb County's reputation as a place where children can get a good education. Cobb's schools consistently rank above the state average, which is not saying much. But what happens if superior schools insist that previously accepted facts have become mere theory? No comment from Mr Gingrich, who now lives in Virginia.
Of course you do not. And you are not a psychiatrist. And even a psychiatrist would not make such a statement from postings. What you do know is that you want to insult an opponent in the vilest way possible. What you do know is that you want to nullify what he says with vile personal attacks. In other words, your are a thugh of evolution.
Wrong, I understand them perfectly, that's why I call them garbage. The 15 Answers, written by the Editor of Scientific American was full of blatant lies. Half the stuff these folk publish is not based on any science at all, it is just nonsense assumptions.
First, f. called me a criminal, of said I was part of a criminal enterprise. Second, he does not say anything, because his posts are incoherent, repetitive rambles -- as opposed to yours, which are well writtten, even though I disagree with them. I have asked him politely, on a number of occasions, to put his thoughts into sentences and paragraphs.
e.e. cummings was an interesting poet, but he was unique. The rest of us get no points for typographical explosions.
Um? So what? Bringing up a known, or at least uncertain, 'gap' or 'hole' or any 'area where evidence or knowledge is currently severely limited (can anybody say "platypus")' doesn't assert anything about ID/IOT or creationism. So, what's the point?
While there are a lot of creationists who believe in ID, ID itself is not contingent on creationism.
Design with no designer? Again, what's the point? And, how's that different than the vast impersonal natural forces of the world (or universe) randowly trying out all potential designs at thoughout the various potential eco-niches in the universe.
I have pointed out that every experiment ever done to prove evolution has had an ID source.
Um, experiments done to "prove" evolution? That's a scientific non-sequitur.
My assertions are quite often dismissed out of hand because my assertions are not 'falsifiable'.
Okay. Now, why is dismissing groundless assertions unreasonable? Perhaps a specific example might help your argument.
[snip] Now I don't have any great feelings about evolution one way or another. [snip] One of the major sticking points I have is the "random chance" factor that evolutionists seem to want to push onto the world. What especially sticks in my craw is the dishonesty of many evolutionists who state that evolution doesn't talk of random chance, but then go on to denigrate those who talk of "controlled chance" or directed evolution.
Hummmmm, honest evolutionists pushing the "random chance" factor and dishonest evolutionists say no random chance. And denigrating those who talk of "controlled chance".
It couldn't just depend on the context of the "randomness" could it?
And they wouldn't just be denigrating the ideas instead of the person could it? (In the interest of evolutionary honesty, gore3k might be an exception here.)
Nah, I guess that would be too simple...
Evolution is not taught as theory once you get past the theory itself. When one travels off in any direction from it, it is treated as hardset fact. And it isn't a theory, it's a collection of theories. If one set of theories is disproven a new set comes up to replace it, yet it all houses itself under the tag "theory of evolution". It's a moving target. If you want to play games over validity verses the number of attempts to refute, then the Judaic creation story of the Bible far outweighs evolution on that scale of credibility, as well as others.
Originally the word liberal meant social conservatives(no govt religion--none) who advocated growth and progress---mostly technological(knowledge being absolute/unchanging)based on law--reality... UNDER GOD---the nature of GOD/man/govt. does not change. These were the Classical liberals...founding fathers-PRINCIPLES---stable/SANE scientific reality/society---industrial progress...moral/social character-values(private/personal) GROWTH(limited NON-intrusive PC Govt/religion---schools)!
Evolution...Atheism-dehumanism---TYRANNY(pc-religion/rhetoric)...
Then came the SPLIT SCHIZOPHRENIA/ZOMBIE/BRAVE-NWO1984 LIBERAL NEO-America---the post-modern age
You mean such concepts as widespread human engineering of the biosphere for agricultural (and other) use and the manufacture, distribution, and dissemination of antibiotics are "intelligently designed experiments"?
So, hypothetically speaking, if "evolutionists" can show that under such-and-such defined conditions, a specific combination of primoridial soup can give rise to self replicating protein chains, it means life was designed by an unknown party, which may or may not have been a deity or deities.
Is that it? Is that your thesis here?
3) Intelligently designed experiments cannot happen randomly, therefore
4) Nothing can.
Got it?
So even if every step can be replicated, and every step shown to occur naturally, this would prove nothing?
Sounds like we're all on the same page.
Everybody has their style. If one does not like how someone writes, one does read it. There are many so called 'great' authors which I find infinitely boring and would not bother with. I do not call them crazy though just because I do not like their style. As to his not making sense, well let me just say this, he is against evolution and those who like evolution do not like his posts. Seems to me they understand pretty well what he is saying.
It is indeed a smear for several reasons:
1. Those who are being referred to with that word are almost invariably Christians. Christianity is a religion not an ideology and the term is being used to degrade their beliefs to the level of an ideology.
2. Everyone that believes in a Creator is essentially a creationist. Evolutionist's use of the term though implies that such a belief is somehow disreputable since it is always used as an epithet.
3. The reason evolutionists use that term instead of Christian which is who they are really fighting is that they want to make it look like their argument is not against Christianity but against just some Christians which is false. The vituperations of evolutionists against Christianity and the Bible more than prove it.
This whole nonsense about amino acids is just a fairy tale for atheists. Amino acids do not create life, life creates amino acids. Proteins do not create life, life creates proteins. Like so much of evolution and materialism, they have everything backwards.
3) Intelligently designed experiments cannot happen randomly, therefore 4) Nothing can.
While I realize you are trying to laugh off frumius's argument, he is far closer to the truth than you wish to admit. Here's the problem - if evolution, abiogenesis, and all that nonsense are random events, how can they be subject to scientific proof? Science is about repeatable experiments therefore to propose that something that happens only at random can be the subject of a repeatable experiment seems silly.
The problem goes even deeper. Science is fruitful not just because its experiments can be repeated - which is very important since if you can find a cure for an illness say, it is important that it can be repeated otherwise what's the use of such a discovery? Science is also fruitful because it discovers universal laws of wide application which can be used not only for a specific purpose but to build upon to achieve new discoveries. If there was no order but just randomness in the world, science would be totally impossible. For this reason materialistic theories are anti-scientific.
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