Science standards under threat in Arizona

[ecco]

What makes evolution the only science theory that concerns Christians who argue for creationism? There are other scientific theories with less proof than evolution which they seem to accept without question. With evolution they look for any insignificant fact to inflate into an argument knowing there is no proof for creationism. What is the great fear?

The law of gravity does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Atomic theory does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Quantum Mechanics does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.

 

[Polymath257]

The law of gravity does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Atomic theory does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Quantum Mechanics does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.

Well, heliocentrism was certainly *thought* to conflict with the reading of the Bible. Of course, that was significantly before fundamentalism.

 

[Revoltingest]

Well, heliocentrism was certainly *thought* to conflict with the reading of the Bible. Of course, that was significantly before fundamentalism.

Only before modern fundamentalism.

 

[BilliardsBall]

With the possible exception of His imminent return. Imminent since 2000 years.

Ciao

-viole

I may have mentioned before, that although I personally know scholars who teach biblical imminency, that Jesus foretold great things that had to happen before His Return, and Peter and Paul said they would both die long before certain things happened. Imminency is a straw man...

 

[BilliardsBall]

What's the difference?


Let's be clear. I don't want creationism presented by anyone in science class, for the same reason I don't want the KKK's views on race presented in science class.


So are you.

And since you failed to show where I said I didn't want religious people to be science teachers but you also didn't apologize for accusing me of such, I can only conclude that you're the type of person who accuses people of things but feels no moral obligation to back up those accusations (or apologize for them).

That doesn't speak well of you.

I didn't say you want only atheist science teachers, since 99% of science teachers would have to retire. I pointed out the folly, rather, of you accusing me of wishing to invite KKK members to speak in the classroom, while you clearly desire that guest religionists have NO PLACE in classrooms. I find that stance hypocritical, self-defeating.

 

[ecco]

Well, heliocentrism was certainly *thought* to conflict with the reading of the Bible. Of course, that was significantly before fundamentalism.

I'd be willing to bet that the few flat-earthers that are still around are all religious fundies.

 

[exchemist]

What makes evolution the only science theory that concerns Christians who argue for creationism? There are other scientific theories with less proof than evolution which they seem to accept without question. With evolution they look for any insignificant fact to inflate into an argument knowing there is no proof for creationism. What is the great fear?

This is a question to which I have never had a clear answer.

I suspect in part it must be to do with their rather simple view of the connected doctrines of Original Sin and Redemption, but I have never got a creationist yet to give me a straight answer. The literalist idea is that death entered the world with the first sin of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. So obviously you can't have fossils of dead creatures from before the time Man arrived. The idea is that Christ's sacrifice undid the damage and opened the way to eternal life once more.

To accommodate this theology, the Young Earth Creationist has to chuck out not only evolution but also the whole of geology and geophysics, given its abundant evidence for rocks far older than when mankind appeared.

The Old Earth Creationist is more intriguing. He or she has managed to accept the age of the Earth and physical death before man, but still cannot abide the idea that life could have arisen without a supernatural miracle, or miracles. Why, I do not really understand. Some of them also espouse such ideas as the Fine Tuning Argument about the cosmos, for example, so it is not just life, apparently. It may simply be a desire to see, unambiguously, the hand of God in the physical world. But this is speculation on my part.

In the case of ID of course, there is another Machiavellian factor at work. As their own (leaked) Wedge Document makes clear, ID was invented by a lawyer (Phillip Johnson) as a ruse to squeeze God into school science teaching in the USA.Wedge strategy - Wikipedia
So ID is basically a social engineering project, masquerading as science.

While YECs and OECs may be honest, if misguided, people, the cdesign proponentsist (or ID advocate cdesign proponentsists - RationalWiki) is a participant in a scam. This scam tries to create a political climate in which local politicians can be hoodwinked or coerced into altering State educational guidance, to permit God to be taught as part of science - and hence, as the Religious Right sees it, to put God back into society (as if God had ever left, especially in the USA). So for IDers, they have their own disingenuous motives that are nothing to do with specific beliefs at all.

 

[exchemist]

The law of gravity does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Atomic theory does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Quantum Mechanics does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.

No but most of geology, geophysics and cosmology conflicts with it just as much as evolutionary biology, as does meteorology (Noah's Flood) and Newtonian mechanics (sun standing still). So you're not left with a lot, once that has all gone in the bin.

 

[ecco]

The law of gravity does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Atomic theory does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.
Quantum Mechanics does not conflict with a fundamentalist reading of the Bible.

No but most of geology, geophysics and cosmology conflicts with it just as much as evolutionary biology, as does meteorology (Noah's Flood) and Newtonian mechanics (sun standing still). So you're not left with a lot, once that has all gone in the bin.

Not to anywhere the same degree.

Much of geology is acceptable to fundies as long as you don't dig too deep (pun intended). Although they may quibble about how it got there, they don't pretend that Mount Everest doesn't exist.

Much of cosmology is acceptable to fundies as long as you don't dig too deep. Although they may quibble about how they got there, they don't pretend that the stars don't exist.

There is nothing about evilution that is acceptable to fundies. The very word gets them into a tither.

 

[Jose Fly]

I didn't say you want only atheist science teachers

You stated, "you not only want the religious to not be science teachers...".

If I don't want religious people to be science teachers, but I also don't want only atheist science teachers.....who's left to teach science?

I pointed out the folly, rather, of you accusing me of wishing to invite KKK members to speak in the classroom

Why don't you want them presenting their views on race in science class? Why are you censoring them and denying their first amendment rights?

while you clearly desire that guest religionists have NO PLACE in classrooms. I find that stance hypocritical, self-defeating.

The only hypocrite here is you. My stance is quite consistent. I don't want the KKK presenting their views on race in science class, nor do I want creationists presenting their religious beliefs in science class. I want science to be taught in science class...that's it.

You OTOH want your religious beliefs taught in science class, but you want to deny same thing to others.

 

[exchemist]

Not to anywhere the same degree.

Much of geology is acceptable to fundies as long as you don't dig too deep (pun intended). Although they may quibble about how it got there, they don't pretend that Mount Everest doesn't exist.

Much of cosmology is acceptable to fundies as long as you don't dig too deep. Although they may quibble about how they got there, they don't pretend that the stars don't exist.

There is nothing about evilution that is acceptable to fundies. The very word gets them into a tither.

Yes a YEC can deal with a glaciated landscape or something, I agree. But not with the geophysics of how mountains are formed, or with the evidence for continental drift, or with the radioactive dating of rocks, especially if they are fossil-bearing, or with the processes behind volcanism. Frankly I question how far you can get in geology today without running across basic principles of geophysics that conflict with a literalist reading of creation.

But I would be happy to concede that a lot depends on the precise flavour of "fundie"we are considering - hence my attempt at subdivision into YECs. OECs, and IDers. In fact the whole subject is quite interesting. Perhaps we should have a thread on the various forms of creationism and the theological, cultural and psychological factors that give rise to it. There could be a PhD thesis in there somewhere......

 

[Avoice1C]

The creationist never learn. There will be a long drawn out court battle the net result of which will be to strengthen the evolution side by draining taxpayer funds into the evolution coffers as a result to the inevitable and universal court decision that, as part of the decision awards the evolution side reimbursement of costs. That is the history of this issue.

The working definition of insanity is doing the same thing, over and over, and expecting a different result.

You are right about insanity. Perhaps creationists should look deeper into Strong's Concordance definition of the Hebrew word used for Day in Genesis 1&2. Word, H3117, is used 7 times between Genesis 1&2. It can mean a period of warmth which reflects the root word from which it is derived. It can also mean (figuratively) a space of time defined by an associated term ( not particularly available in the Genesis account). It may also mean a process of time. All give God as much time as He wishes to create the earth and all life on it. It does not limit God to man sized days. He is infinite not a creation of man.

 

[ecco]

Perhaps we should have a thread on the various forms of creationism and the theological, cultural and psychological factors that give rise to it. There could be a PhD thesis in there somewhere......

My research* to date has shown that if there are 20 fundies, there are 20 "various forms of creationism"**.


* Reading and listening to the comments of various fundies I have encountered in person and in various forums.

** The beauty of the Bible is that anyone can get anything out of it.

 

[ecco]

You are right about insanity. Perhaps creationists should look deeper into Strong's Concordance definition of the Hebrew word used for Day in Genesis 1&2. Word, H3117, is used 7 times between Genesis 1&2. It can mean a period of warmth which reflects the root word from which it is derived. It can also mean (figuratively) a space of time defined by an associated term ( not particularly available in the Genesis account). It may also mean a process of time. All give God as much time as He wishes to create the earth and all life on it. It does not limit God to man sized days. He is infinite not a creation of man.

That's what's so great about "The True Word Of God". It is all ambiguity.

Don't want to understand science, read Genesis literally and accept Bishop Ussher's chronology. Love science, Genesis is just allegory and poetry.

Don't like regular days, change the meaning to seasons or eternities.

Feel like owning slaves, it's OK, the Bible says so. Think slavery is bad, the Bible backs you up on that too.

As Zero Mostel said, "Something for everyone". (Except maybe a lesbian feminist)

 

[BilliardsBall]

You stated, "you not only want the religious to not be science teachers...".

If I don't want religious people to be science teachers, but I also don't want only atheist science teachers.....who's left to teach science?


Why don't you want them presenting their views on race in science class? Why are you censoring them and denying their first amendment rights?


The only hypocrite here is you. My stance is quite consistent. I don't want the KKK presenting their views on race in science class, nor do I want creationists presenting their religious beliefs in science class. I want science to be taught in science class...that's it.

You OTOH want your religious beliefs taught in science class, but you want to deny same thing to others.

"Nor do I want creationists presenting their religious beliefs in science class," means you DON'T want fundamentalists to be science teachers . . . be consistent.

 

[Subduction Zone]

"Nor do I want creationists presenting their religious beliefs in science class," means you DON'T want fundamentalists to be science teachers . . . be consistent.

No, fundamentalists could conceivably be scientists. They would only need to be honest.

 

[gnostic]

"Nor do I want creationists presenting their religious beliefs in science class," means you DON'T want fundamentalists to be science teachers . . . be consistent.

Being a science teacher is about giving them education in science, not on theology or on creationism.

Neither theology, nor creationism are science, BB.

And fundamentalists are considered biased, because they frequently allowed their personal religious beliefs to cloud their judgement.

Behe, for instance, may be qualified a biochemist, but he allowed his personal ambition and his greed (the Discovery Institute bankrolled his pseudoscience and using media as propaganda) to taint his intellectual works.

Behe’s Irreducible Complexity is pseudoscience and hack job, where he used circular reasoning, not scientific method and not objective verifiable evidences to test his weak papers.

 

[viole]

I may have mentioned before, that although I personally know scholars who teach biblical imminency, that Jesus foretold great things that had to happen before His Return, and Peter and Paul said they would both die long before certain things happened. Imminency is a straw man...

I think Jesus pulled your leg. He raised the bar and/or left things so nebulous that there will always be a justification for his missing.

I also foretell my return after my death. Easily. Verily I say to you, this will happen when the human race will be extinct. Believe me.

Ciao

- viole

 

[Jose Fly]

"Nor do I want creationists presenting their religious beliefs in science class," means you DON'T want fundamentalists to be science teachers . . . be consistent.

Of course fundamentalists can be science teachers.....anyone can, just as long as they teach science.

Is this too difficult for you to understand or something?

 

[ecco]

No, fundamentalists could conceivably be scientists. They would only need to be honest.

Smart fundamentalists become engineers because designing bridges does conflict with their beliefs.