Posted on 08/20/2003 6:24:57 PM PDT by new cruelty
The debate continues over what information Texas biology books should present.
The Texas Board of Education is looking to pick the best science book for students.
Members of a campaign called "Stand Up For Science'' said it's meant to protect the accurate teaching of evolution in Texas high school biology textbooks.
The push was unveiled on Wednesday by some religious leaders, scientists and parents. It comes as the state Board of Education prepares to adopt new biology textbooks this fall.
Terry Maxwell, a professor of biology at Angelo State University, doesn't believe creationism should be in biology textbooks.
"Science uses evidentiary reasoning and it uses no other approach," he said.
Creationists generally believe earth was formed supernaturally by God.
Reverend Tom Hegar said while he believes in God's powers, those ideas need to stay at home or in the church.
"Faith and science are complimentary. Don't use faith to build your science. Don't use science to try to destroy or shrink my faith," he said.
Seattle-based Discovery Institute believes the theory of intelligent design should be in Texas biology books. According to the Institute, intelligent design is the hypothesis that certain features of the universe and of living things are best explained by an intelligent cause, not an undirected process such as natural selection.
Science backers say that's the same thing as creationism.
"Textbooks should fix embarrassing factual errors and tell students about the scientific weakness of neo-Darwinism as well as its strengths," Discovery Institute officials stated in a faxed memo.
Maxwell said two different ideologies make it harder for students to learn science.
"If you interject ways of knowing other than the way science is practiced by mainstream science you confuse children," he said.
Austin biology teacher Amanda Walker said evolution is the cornerstone for understanding the living world, and influences medicine such as prostate cancer, heart disease and AIDS.
The evolution proponents also criticized what they said are attempts to teach creationist theories.
The Board of Education can reject books because of errors or failure to follow the state curriculum.
The board will make its final decision on the biology textbooks in November.
People have until Thursday, Aug. 21, to sign up to speak at the final public hearing Sept. 10.
In July, the first public hearing brought 42 speakers who offered their opinions at the public hearing on biology, but only half of them were familiar with the particular books.
Board member Gail Lowe said then she was disappointed that many of the people who testified for or against certain textbooks hadn't actually read them.
"They seem to be here to express a viewpoint, but it doesn't seem to relate to the textbooks we're actually considering," she said.
Doesn't surprise me a bit. These are Buckleycons--standing athwart Science, yelling "Stop, you're making me uncomfortable!"
Or, as "The Onion" put it: "I don't accept fundamental tenets of science AND I VOTE!"
Liberals are scamming us on global warming, or they were until the Bush Admin. Their current views on socialism are unknown since their last coherent spokesman passed away a half century ago. Evolution, though, is greatly misunderstood.
For practical purposes consider evolution as a set of ordered sets where the order of each set is the complexity of the elements. This has little to do with Darwin or the evolutionary trees of which there are as many as there are paleontologists. That kind of evolution is just something scientists talk about when they're sitting around having a few beers after a hard day at the conference.
UNPOPULAR REASONABLE POSITION #2: Is it so absurd to think that evolution is God's mechanism for creating living creatures? We've discovered God's mechanism for creating stars, God's mechanism for creating crystals, God's mechanism for turning the oceans into rain, and God's mechanism for creating sunlight. All of these things have brought us wonder, and have brought us very little closer to understanding any of the important things which the Truth is about. What is so strange or hostile about yet another discovery?
Once upon a time, education was supposed to be about training people to think. In the Middle Ages, you had to learn Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric (the "Trivia") before you actually got into the "real" studies. Knowing how to read and write, how to follow an argument, and how to express one were considered the elementary stuff.
Not any more. Now that these skills, once considered elementary, are nearly vanished, the aim seems to be to preclude debate, not to foster it. Why do you think the libs are so apoplectic about talk radio? I will take the liberty of answering for you: They don't have any confidence in their ability to defend their position, though they have a religious certainty of its rightness. And the attempt to silence or preclude debate (the natural resort of the ideological monopolists) is in the best tradition of the Spanish Inquisition (bet you didn't expect that!)
It's not the length... its the depth. : )
It's not the length... its the depth. : )
What depth? The explanation given for how God created the heavens, earth, and various creatures is little more than a few paragraphs long. If you take it literally, as pro-creationists tend to do (by definition), then it's a very short and very straightforward explanation.
Right, but it doesn't stop there. In the 2nd chapter there is a different version of the story. And then later there is John, and that is a whole different tradition. It gets very deep, or we can compartmentalize.
All those hours in Sunday school and I could have been outside playing ball. Damn.
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.