Texas Science Director Forced To Resign Over ID Statements 984
jeffporcaro writes "Texas' Director of Science Curriculum was 'forced to step down' for favoring evolution over intelligent design (ID). She apparently circulated an e-mail that was critical of ID — although state regulations require her not to have any opinion 'on a subject on which the agency must remain neutral.' 'The agency documents say that officials recommended firing Ms. Comer for repeated acts of misconduct and insubordination. The officials said forwarding the e-mail message conflicted with her job responsibilities and violated a directive that she not communicate with anyone outside the agency regarding a pending science curriculum review.'"
Science curriculum (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:1, Insightful)
Chris Comer is his name.... (Score:1, Insightful)
Beginning of End (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Biggest cop-out excuse ever.
Evolution is proven as far as I'm concerned, we see how micro-organisms become resistant to anti-biotics. This can't be god stepping in and changing them just so someone's ageing relative dies.
If god is in control of everything then why is it the most religious countries get hit with major earthquakes, flooding and tsunamis?
Re:What the!?!?!?! (Score:1, Insightful)
Re:Science curriculum (Score:5, Insightful)
Opinions are irrelevant? (Score:3, Insightful)
I mean, someone at some point had to assert an opinion to put (un)intelligent design at the top of the chain. Was that person fired?
This whole country is going right down the shitter because of policies like this. I also believe that draconian enforcement of this ilk is what causes people to be even louder and more obnoxious about their perspectives. This is a one-upmanship power struggle.
What was Leia's comment to Tarkin?
Re:Probably Justified (Score:4, Insightful)
But by my definition, a majority of US citizens aren't rational people!
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Cliff notes: you can't have a "science" that studies "the design" without first positing that there is a designer. That's where ID becomes a religion, and non-scientific. This should not be a complex subject for anyone who was awake during High School science.
Re:What the!?!?!?! (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't require any faith at all, nobody asks for faith that biology or the rules it follows is constant. That's why we run actual experiments and take actual measurements, to see if they are constant or not. For several thousand years biology has proven remarkably consistent, but if you were to come up with evidence tomorrow that showed biology was different at some point in the past, you'd win the Nobel Prize. No faith required.
Re:What the!?!?!?! (Score:5, Insightful)
Same with everything else incl. evolution. Evolution HAS been proven. Sure, it IS possible (and likely) that other ideas are found in areas where theory of evolution is weak right now, but that won't invalidate already existing experiments and data!
So yes, you always find something new, but if you successfully used a theory to predict something and it reliably works all the time those experiments continue to work even after new stuff is found. It's just that new theories may be better at explaining MORE, but once proven to work - and that means that predictions made using the theory reliably turn out right each time, whoever does the experiment - continue to do so. Even though Newton is "wrong" he's still right, it only depends on if you want to try to explain more stuff with it than originally intended, which is when it fails and relativity and quantum theories may be better suited. When the airplane was invented the arguments of the nay-sayers who said it's impossible were NOT proven wrong. They simply found another way AROUND the issues they had raised. That doesn't invalidate the physics of the scepticts, it merely extends it!
Re:Probably Justified (Score:3, Insightful)
9/11 is a perfect example.
Its in your bloody constitiution that ID is illegal in schools.
Yet there is a review to see if they should ignore it or not.
If you feel your a rational person then my advice is to get the hell out of there asap.
Australia is a nice place.
Re:What the!?!?!?! (Score:3, Insightful)
That is actually not true. The church admitted few years ago that Sun is the center of our solar system, not Earth as it was bulieved. Also few years ago in my country, women could operate as priests, which had been long forbidden.
So the theism also evolves. Religion is changed when they notice that people won't tolerate or bulieve the old story any more. First the stories in Bible are literal. After sciense proves them wrong, they became metaphoras or just stories that try to teach us some lesson, or they are simply interpreted differently.
Re:Probably Justified (Score:4, Insightful)
That assumes a false equivalence between religion and science. Those rational people should recognize that pushing a particular religious belief into policy is a violation of church-state separation in a way that simply promulgating a scientific curriculum never was. The fact that some religion has a doctrinal problem with a scientific finding is neither here nor there as far as science and education policy is concerned. A faith that cannot survive a collision with the truth is not worth many regrets. But when we start withholding information from students because of someone's goofy interpretation of his religion's mythology, then we have a problem. And "teaching the controversy" like Texas does, with a neutral presentation of both the truth and crap without saying which is which, is withholding information from students.
Re:how, exactly (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Science curriculum (Score:3, Insightful)
USA, please! (Score:1, Insightful)
summary wrong, as usual (Score:5, Insightful)
Not according to TFA.
Now one might certainly deduce that she wasn't enamoured with ID, but she did not "apparently" criticise ID. She announced a talk by someone who probably does, though. Which is not the same thing as stating it was her opinion.How anyone can argue with a straight face that ID is anything but "Creationism in a new suit" is beyond me. Every single ID proponent was, and I'm sure still is, a Creationist. Their literature has been shown to be creationist tracts with a search-and-replace applied.
Re:Science curriculum (Score:1, Insightful)
Please explain (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Science curriculum (Score:4, Insightful)
In effect, they are both talking past each others heads. The only way to attack the IDers and creationists is to question their central axiom. Of course, that is unquestionable. They in return can hammer at the scientific evidence and pick at gaps and make misinterpretations as long as they want. As far as a creationist is concerned they are solving a math problem when they already have the answer book--the method that they use to get to the conclusion isn't really that important.
But, say that you do fill in all the gaps and correct their misinterpretations--will you convince them?
Of course not. They will then turn to David Hume's classic argument that there is no reason whatsoever that anybody should trust the results of inductive reasoning (i.e. they will say that evolution can never really be proved).
At this time, both parties will leave exasperated that the other doesn't understand their argument.
Form a hypothesis ... (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a scientific method - you can apply it to religion - if it doesn't work you get to call religion 'bunk'
ID may be a hypothesis - it's allowed to be that - but the people who put it up need to come up with some experiments to prove their hypothesis if they want respect of other scientists and if they want their hypothesis to be taught as 'science' - otherwise it's just an idea that hasn't been proven
The problem of course is that approaching religion like this upsets a lot of religious people - largely I think because this sort of approach has tended to upset apple carts over the centuries - doesn't mean you should stop doing it though
Re:Intolerance (Score:5, Insightful)
Any person not believing in the basic scientific principles which are the underpinnings of evolution is simply NOT QUALIFIED to hold any position which is in charge of establishing the curriculum to teach said principles.
In your example, the person in question most certainly should be fired as they are not qualified to hold the position -- just as you would fire a salesman for disparaging the product he's been hired to sell. If you believe science is a bunch of hooey, you shouldn't be in charge of how children are taught science. That's just common sense.
In the REAL situation, however,someone is being fired who is perfectly fired -- even suited -- to the job in question.
In short, your comparison is stupid.
Re:Beginning of End (Score:2, Insightful)
So, I guess, Texas is full of stupid people, and Chuck Norris!
Re:Science curriculum (Score:3, Insightful)
Her position needs her to be impartial on scientific matters, and religion is NOT a scientific matter.
Sounds like she did an excellent job, they only didn't fire her because she could have rightly sued for unfair "creative" dismissal.
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Easy.. to test their faith.. see if they're truly worthy. Those that aren't religious are going to hell anyway.
That's the fun thing about most religions - you can easily explain everything away as a whim of a/the god(s). Something good happens? Praise God. Something bad happens? Maybe not praise God, but at least accept that it was 'His' will and he moves in mysterious ways for the greater good and all that.
Assume we take evolution as fact - then after discarding the whole Adam&Eve bit, the religious can easily drop back to "but God -designed- evolution". There's your ID right there.
In the end, even if you can explain every single thing except the "why did the big bang happen?" (assuming the big bang theory is the correct one), then the religious can still say "God made it, and therefore everything, happen".
But where to draw the line? (Score:3, Insightful)
That said, say I believe there are 3 gods, and to honor those gods I must sing melodic song in their praise every morning at sunrise. Not too far-fetched, I hope.. however, I can't identify with any of the major religions out there. So if I were to end up in such a prison, they'd go over the list of 'recognized' religions, say mine's not on it, and tell me to stfu when I do my singing.
Remember the 'Jedi' religion answer on census inquiries in the UK, Australia and other countries? There was fairly massive response from that, with Jedi ranking -above- Buddhism and Hindu in New Zealand in a census poll. As it was a census poll only, that didn't automatically make it a 'recognized' religion - but be darned if any of the reports from the time mention how one might actually do such a thing. I can't even find where one might apply for 'recognized' religion, what the minimum requirements are, or anything of the sort.
But even without having a 'recognized' religion - who is to say my religion is less valid than e.g. Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, etc.?
From a Texas student (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Intelligent design begins with an affirmation: The universe is complex, therefore, it must have been designed by a sort of intelligent being. You just can't jump to assumptions like that. That is a debasement of all that science is. Just because we don't understand something doesn't mean it cannot be understood with more research. Just because we can't explain something through modern scientific theories does not mean that later theories cannot explain them. And most of all, just because we do not KNOW the answer to a question does not mean the answer defaults to "God."
We do not know for certain what created the universe. We theorize the Big Bang, but as to what lead to that, we don't know. This does NOT mean "God willed it to happen." It just means we don't know for now.
We can explain many properties of gravity, but we do not know WHAT it is, exactly. This is not a sign that God, excuse me, "The Designer" simply said "let's have mass attract each other at a rate proportional to the product of their masses and inversely proportional to the distance between them." All it means is... we don't know.
This is why ID is not a science. You cannot, under any circumstances, simply declare something "too complex" to occur naturally (which in and of itself is a bit of a joke. Anything that occurs in nature is, by definition, natural, regardless of means.). The only "evidence" we have that suggests God--pardon me, "designer" (and certainly not a thinly-veiled cover for the Judeo-Christian God), created all life is that we don't know for certain what did.
Intelligent Design by its very fundamental nature is not, cannot, and will not ever be a science. It's a debasement of all that is science. It's the lazy man's way out. "Oh, it's too complex for me to understand. It's much easier to just say God did it." If you want to believe that, fine. But keep that thinking, or lack thereof, out of our science classes and don't you dare expect those who actually KNOW what the Scientific Method is to just sit back and ignore the attempts to get rid of it.
Re:Science curriculum (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
I find that people pray for or about all of these things truly believing that God will listen. I think they are mixing their mythologies up... they have been praying to Goda Claus!
And while I'm on the subject of double-standard beliefs and understandings, we have established that some people have genetic predispositions for violence or impulse controls. We have established that some drugs can even induce violent behavior as a side effect. Why are we always cutting the heads off of people when we're looking at their health? Are the mind and body really as separate as we want to believe? What roles do genetics and chemical balances play in determining the behavior of individuals? We routinely punish and judge others for their behavior, however. Gays, thieves, molesters, even killers might be victims themselves due to defects or the influence of something affecting their brains. We don't want to change our convenient pre-packaged ideas of "good and evil" any more than we have to, though, because changing our understanding of things is bad.
Ambivalence (Score:5, Insightful)
This is both funny and scary at the same time. If it happened anywhere except in the most powerful nation in the world it would only be funny.
I don't see how anyone who thinks it's a good idea to treat christianity as "science" and make policy based on it could complain about states that make policy from other religions, such as sharia law.
I am. (Score:1, Insightful)
All hail Beef. In the beginning, now, and as it shall forever be, it is what is for dinner.
Re:Form a hypothesis ... (Score:4, Insightful)
Eivind.
Re:Holy missed the point, Batman!! (Score:3, Insightful)
IF the court rules that ID is NOT worthy of consideration in any Science Curriculum, then it's NOT something she would have to remain neutral on, as the Board shouldn't have ever been considering it.
Re:Form a hypothesis ... (Score:4, Insightful)
ID proponents love to use the illusion of something incredibly complex that doesn't have any clear intermediary stages showing how we got there. Think about that in every other aspect of life for a moment - old technology is replaced leaving little to no trace of the past. The same would happen with an evolutionary advantage - imagine going from basic light detection to high resolution, dynamic range, color reproduction and so on, it doesn't happen all at once. But surely once good eyesight had evolved, those with lesser eyesight would slowly die out. So in the end you sit with a highly specialized organ and claim "this couldn't have evolved". And in retrospect it's probably hard to see how we got there, but lack of creativity is hardly enough to conclude an intelligent designer must have been at work.
schools exist to educate, not to brainwash (Score:4, Insightful)
No it must not, the agency has a moral obligation to support what is true ie science. Science (hard science at least) is not opinion, it's proven fact. When you land a spacecraft on the Moon you prove that there are rocks in space, you don't just opine on their existence. Neutrality does not imply that one is expected to give equal status to unfalsifiable claims. ID and creationism should never reach the brains of students through taxpayer's money.
If governments start using the school bureaucratic apparatus to teach what I believe are byproducts of malfunctioning brains then this will mean that our societies will have entered a new dark age. The last dark age existed for more than 1500 years, so if you allow this to happen again then you will share responsibility for causing your children and future descendants to suffer in a mad society.
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
All you can do ever with ID theory is try to falsify evolution theory, and then propose ID as the alternative. You can never go further than that. It can never be "science", because you can't repeatably and reliably test a being that exists and acts outside the system of the universe. ID theory is only philosophy. I'm not saying ID is right or wrong. I actually believe in an old Earth ID theory, but that's part of my religious belief. What I'm just saying is that if you have a philosophical theory, then it should be taught in a philosophy class, along with string theory.
Re:But where to draw the line? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Besides, if were all supposed to be companions to God after we're dead, why the hell would he want to surround himself with stupid people?
Re:Please explain (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a very active, vocal, influential and dedicated group of people who honestly, truly, 100% believe that the word of the Bible and faith in the Christian God will solve ALL of society's problems. In their view, society as a whole is morally corrupt and the only way to fix it is to push their own "superior" morals onto society and "save" them. Nothing is sacred in their pursuit of their agendas.
These people are called Neo-Conservatives.
Anything that gets in their way must be discredited, marginalized or outright destroyed. Science poses the single greatest threat to their core agenda (enforcing Christianity) because it erodes the ignorance required to maintain such strong convictions. Evolution is a direct threat to what makes God so influential - it explains life itself, something only God is "qualified" to deal with. Other hot-button issues include drugs, sex education and abortion... all of these have perfectly sensible, empirical solutions that the "Moral Right" refuse to entertain purely on principle. (And anyone who says otherwise gets labeled a "Liberal" - the Neocon's personal swear-word)
This is not to say it's some big huge conspiracy. Some, even most, of the ID proponents are otherwise good people who just believe in ID more out of ignorance than deliberately attempting to squash science. They are stuck in a "us verses them" mentality, so they side with the people who align more closely to their own beliefs rather than find a middle ground. However, it's no accident that there's a lot of politics behind what should otherwise be a purely science vs. superstition issue.
To be perfectly blunt, Neo-conservatism is the all American version of Islamic fascism. The only real difference is Neocons use immense political and economic influence to push their agenda while the Islamic fascists use direct violence. Neocons have also been a lot more successful at it.
=Smidge=
But he loves you! (Score:5, Insightful)
No contest. No contest. Religion.
Religion easily has the greatest bullshit story ever told. Think about it.
Religion has actually convinced people that there's an invisible man....
an invisible man, living in the sky, who watches everything you do, every minute of every day.
And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do.
And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, and suffering, and burning, and torture, and pain, and burning, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever 'til the end of time!.........
But He loves you.
He loves you, and He needs money! He always needs money! He's all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, and all-wise, but somehow, He just can't handle money!
Religion takes in billions of dollars, they pay no taxes, and they always need a little more. Now, you talk about a good bullshit story. Holy Shit!
Re:how, exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
There really isn't any reason science must preclude God or religion. One may simply state that science is a process of understanding God's creation through reason. You also have to admit that science can describe the "How" but not the "Why". You can describe how the universe was created through the Big Bang, but you can never say WHY it was created because that is an article of faith.
CONVINCING religious people of all this is another story...
Double standards rule! (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
One of the recurring problems in these kinds of discussion is the definition of speciation. If you nail down an ID'er with evidence of speciation, they change the definition ("Oh, well, it's still a bacterium, isn't it?" ) and start talking about an amorphous concept called "kinds". Then you show the feathered dinosaur fossils, and they yell "hoax" (in spite of the fact that there have been many more species of feathered dinos than archeopteryx discovered), and when that doesn't pan out, they say it's not really a transitional species, it's a distinct, god-created animal that is now extinct. This is clearly the avoidance behavior we all sometimes engage in, designed to protect a comfortable delusion.
You can't 'win' this kind of argument. The BEST we can hope for is that it will fall 'out of fashion' over time.
Re:The US is the new middle ages. (Score:3, Insightful)
It is no arrogance to mention it. They require religion to manipulate them, and they become enraged at anything different. Their betters understand this.
The ruling classes don't hold to that superstitious nonsense, and realists like Karl Rove understand how to use it.
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Form a hypothesis ... (Score:2, Insightful)
No. People say this all the time, but it isn't simply isn't true. Proving a negative to a scientifically-formulated theory is EASY - it requires a single counter-example. I say, "all grues are pink", and you say, "look, there is a purple grue!", and POOF, you have proved the negation of my theory. Or, I say "the standard model predicts that neutrinos should have no mass", and you say "but look, I've shown that neutrinos do have mass", and then we know that the standard model isn't correct.
The standard model is thus a scientific theory. ID is not - "life is too complicated for evolution" is not a theory that you can test. It is actually not incumbent on ID supporters to PROVE anything - they need only make falsifiable, testable predictions.
One of the reasons why this whole debate is so astonishingly stupid is the whole "falsifiable, testable prediction" thing. The #1 way to make various timecube-style crackpots leave you alone is to say "OK, great, what testable predictions does your crazy crackpot theory make?" For ID, just as for timecube, the answer is "not a one." In principle, then, we're done. It's not science! It fails the one and only test that a scientific theory must pass!
In conclusion, my original point was ... uhh ... oh yeah ... stop saying "you can't prove a negative." 'cus you can.
Re:how, exactly (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
Very simple explanation of the differences (Score:3, Insightful)
"Micro-evolution" refers to changes within a single population.
Macro-evolution is the just the micro-evolution of two isolated populations to the point that, if the two populations were to merge back together and try to interbreed, they would be unable to produce fertile, viable offspring. The two populations have diverged too much, and will continue to diverge from then on.
uh huh (Score:2, Insightful)
Of course it wasn't for opposing ID, just like Wal-Mart has never fired anyone who's tried to organize a union. When a company wants to fire someone but their reason is illegal, unpopular, or actionable, they can be very creative in finding other reasons to terminate you.
Re:Science curriculum (Score:1, Insightful)
While science may not directly be inconsistent with the abstract notion that a supernatural entity such a concept generally doesn't remain so abstract. In all of the major branches of religion the doctrine built up around the diety brings with it stories which by divinitation must be completely true and these stories stand to describe our world and various natural processes. As it becomes a fundamental part of the religion, and even used as observable evidence to "prove" the religion. When refined observations and models are shown to contradict the divine models, the religious become exceedingly defensive.
Religion, in these ways, consistently undermines rational science. It takes a very long time for people to be willing to give up their divine stories. In the face of overwhelming evidence the story eventually migrates from absolute truth to some form of a folk metaphor for the scientific processes. This will eventually happen with evolution. If seven days can account for 13 billion years, then God could have played a hand in evolution in only a matter of hours.
Re:how, exactly (Score:2, Insightful)
This, incidentally, makes the idea of 'species' almost total nonsense. If you had all of history to kidnap animals from, there is something you could breed with that could breed with something that could breed with something...that could breed with something that could breed with an gorilla. Or a cat, or a goldfish, or a spider. Or a potted plant.
It's just all those things are dead.
Any ID supporter or anyone fighting the inanity who tries to hang too much on 'species' is a fool. It's like trying to hang things on the names of colors, and arguing that while shades can change, blue can never turn into green, or that a ranch style house and a cap cod house are different. There's no such thing as those things! A species is just a term we hang on a bunch of animals that are close enough to interbreed, it's not a 'scientific concept' in any real sense.
All evolution says is that populations of interbreeding animals will, over time, suffer genetic drift towards a 'fitter' state, and sometimes this will result in them being unable to interbreed with other animals that, had they not drifted, they would have been able to interbreed with. It doesn't require a concept of species, the only reason a non-interbreeding change is interesting is because, from that point on, it changes the possible 'population of interbreeding animals'.
Post is pretty much right. (Score:1, Insightful)
Basically, outside of the major coastal and midwestern urban areas the whole damn nation is uneducated white trash, eating, drinking, sleeping, and living the Bible, the small print on Wal-Mart labels, and little else. They're about as different from a New Yorker or a San Franciscan as a microscope lens is from the bottom of a beer bottle.
They probably shouldn't be allowed to vote, much less raise their own children.
Re:how, exactly (Score:3, Insightful)
The answer is that populations drift as a group. See Ring Species [wikipedia.org]. Let's do a thought experiment:
There are two colonies of large farting rodents: One lives in the northern brush where predators largely ignore them because of the smell of their flatulence, and the other group lives on a warm little island in the Mediterranean where their farts, combined with the warmth and humidity, attract bacterial infections on their eggs and genetalia. In the first group, rodents born with a slight 'deformity' that causes smellier farts, or longer or thicker hair to combat the cold, or even oilier skin and hair to keep them warm when it rains, are more able to survive. In the second group, however, rodents born with a 'deformity' that causes them to fart less, or not at all, or with decreased smell, are more fit. Furthermore, finer, sparser hair allows them to stay cool when they run from the occasional predator, and the question of dry vs. oily skin and hair seems not to matter at all.
There are hundreds of traits like this that can come up in different environments. Sinus size, leg length, bone shape, sweat glands, skin pore size, ability to digest certain toxins, ability to respond to certain plants as immune stimulants -- the list could go on forever. The 'deformities' that work propagate through the population until the individuals without them are the odd ones out. They become the 'low hanging fruit' for predators, or are simply shunned by potential mates who want the genes more suited to the environment. Speciation "has occurred" when most or all of the members of one population have become different enough from the other population that offspring don't (or very rarely) survive, and/or are infertile.
It may not even be the selected traits that are causing the speciation. It could be genes that have no selective pressure at all, that simply 'piggyback' on the same chromosomes as the enhanced genes, that cause an incompatibility. Even in identical environments, since mutations are random, two other phenomena occur: Different traits have survival advantages for different reasons, and the same feature develops independently multiple times. If a source of food goes extinct in the area (a particular family of nuts, we'll say), the rodents can go in several directions -- and probably would, if they were on opposite sides of a river or mountain, or on two nearby but well-separated islands. A rat with stronger teeth or a shorter jaw will be healthier because he can eat tougher nuts instead. A rat with longer legs, or a better tail for balance, or a longer snout can catch insects more easily. But the same physical trait can come about in several ways. Perhaps some of the rats have longer legs because of hormonal changes, whereas other rats grow an elongated spongiform pattern in their bones, while still others grow denser, thicker, longer bones because they can digest more calcium from the same food.
The rats could even have been in the population for hundreds of years, through the good times, but now that something bad has happened, they're pretty much the only ones who will survive. Survival in the island climate may have been completely neutral to hair and skin oil, or the direction of hair growth, but if the rodents had to start swimming for some reason, perhaps to avoid a new predator, those traits would start to matter very quickly. It could even be a one-time event. A pack of predators gets lost, and wanders into a rat camp; Those that are best able to climb trees, or dig a hole deep into the ground, or swim out to a rock for safety, are the only ones that survive. And, therefore, only the chromosomes containing those genes still exist for that population.
Whenever the 'standard' set of genes for one population changes, you increase the chances that they won't mix well with another set to create a viable organism. In the end, after several hundred generations, provided that the relevant traits occ
Re:how, exactly (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, most Biblical arguments against homosexuality all come from the old Testament (most often cited are Genesis 1, Genesis 19, various other Genesis passages, Leviticus 18:22, Leviticus 20:13, and various passages from Deuteronomy, Judges, and Kings). And the hypocrisy is that books like Leviticus are also the ones that admonish, for example, wearing wool and cotton at the same time. If a Christian is not going to keep a completely kosher house and lifestyle, it is pretty hypocritical to attack homosexuality from that same reference.
Some references in the New Testament include Romans 1, 1 Corinthians 6, and 1 Timothy 1. Jesus, however, was notably silent on the issue, despite having a great deal to say about all sorts of other practices in his day. (In fact, Jesus doesn't really have much to say about any of the major "Christian right" hot topics, from homosexuality to abortion, whereas he has a great deal to say about welfare, health care, and the evils of money.)
Re:how, exactly (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm not a religious person myself, and I've been ridiculed for that on numerous occasions by those same touchy, sensitive people you speak of. You'll pardon me if I'm not terribly concerned about the feelings of people that have no sense of humor about their belief systems: I find them to be the most intolerant, generally unpleasant people to be around. If the hypersensitive religious component of our culture truly wants people like me to spare them any empathy, I have only two words for them: lighten up! It works both ways: their hurt feelings aren't somehow special or more important just because they believe in God.
Re:how, exactly (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm not sure if you're making stuff up or if you're simply repeating something you pulled off the Internet, but mutations are significantly more common than you seem to think they are. Mendel's work definitely does not prove what you think it does.
Well, mutations are a pretty good source of new information.
Research (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is that ID closes down scientific inquiry, it doesn't expand upon it. It is a proposition unto itself with no scientific proof and even no way to research it. The Theory of Evolution came about by looking at the natural world and noticing something peculiar, then trying to reason why this occurred. ID simply says "We don't understand how this occurred, so a supernatural force must have done it." If ID were really trying to be a scientific theory, it would try to explain what the designer is, why it did what it did, when this occurred, and how the designer implemented his designs.
1 - What designed us? What scientific methods would you use to research this? The only theories I know of are religious and come from books written thousands of years ago with no evidence to support them. This exposes ID as a religious theory and not science.
2 - Why did the designer make us? Well, without any evidence that there is a designer or knowledge of it existing, how do we learn anything about its motivations? This exposes ID as a religious theory and not science.
3 - When did this occur? They don't attempt to explain the fossil record or use the scientific methods of radioactive dating (or come up with their own) to show when this happened. They don't explain why there are fossils in the record that are so much different than our own. Did the designer make some mistakes and kill off those creatures? The only thing proponents of intelligent design say here are religious quotes from the Bible. This exposes ID as a religious theory and not science.
4 - How did the designer implement his designs? ID proponents don't even attempt to explain the scientific origin of the designer's designs. The designer couldn't have just "designed" them, they had to actually be created some how. Oh wait, we can't say that word because that exposes intelligent design as being the same thing as creationism. Any scientific inquiry into ID would try to explain the forces at play that made the first molecules come together into the first human being though. Did the designer use magnetic forces to draw atoms together? Did it it use a laser? Here again we have nothing from ID proponents on the issue except for quoting from the Bible. This exposes ID as a religious theory and not science.
THESE are the four areas of research that ID "scientists" should be focusing on. If they could come up with a single published scientific paper showing actual research into any of these four questions, maybe ID could start to be seen as a scientific theory. Meanwhile there has been vast amounts of research over the last 150 years into evolution and natural selection. THAT is what scientists do. They come up with questions and research them, they don't just posit logical theories and rest on their laurels.
Re:how, exactly (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Post is pretty much right. (Score:4, Insightful)
I am so goddamn sick of seeing tripe like this being moderated up when it was recognized correctly in the GP as the shit it is. I have a couple points to debunk your arrogant asshole elitisim:
1) You seem to be making the assumption that everyone in urban areas are intelligent. Really? You are going to tell me with a straight face that your average blue collar worker in NY is any smarter than a farmer in Iowa? Bullshit. Maybe if you only look at urban professionals you might be on to something, but in my experience the most ignorant and idiotic people I've ever met have been born and rised in inner cities. YMMV.
2) You make the assumption that there is something innate to being from New York or San Francisco that makes you smarter. But a huge percentage of those urbanites who are intelligent and well-educated are emigrants who were raised and educated by the "uneducated white trash, eating, drinking, sleeping, and living the Bible, the small print on Wal-Mart labels, and little else." The intelligent, educated people move to the big cities because, well, they're big cities. That's where the most opportunity lies.
But no, you're right, everyone that lives a different lifestyle or has different beliefs than you does so because they're stupid and uneducated. I can totally see where you're coming from. You're very deep and insightful.
Fuck you.
Re:how, exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
I fucking hate this goddamn ignorant argument like poison, as if science is somehow deficient and in need of some faith-based concept like religion to fill in the blanks. Here's a 'why' for you: why is it that people are so fucking childish that they need to cling the idea that things are the way they for some Higher Purpose? If I roll a die and it comes up 5, I don't ask why that happened: I recognize that given certain physical realities and a finite number of possible outcomes, 5 was one possibility that just happened to come up. The question 'why are we here' is no different, except replace 5 with 'everything happens in such a way that it produces the world we live in now' and add about a zillion other possible outcomes to your die. We're here because things happened the way they happened--they could just have easily happened a different way, in which case we might not be here to see it. But some people obviously need the security blanket of believing that existence has some kind of magic meaning.
Re:how, exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
I read an interesting article a while back that would take exception to your statement; the concept is often refered to as 'God in the gaps'.
Put it this way: we don't understand natural process X, so the philosophers says "well, science cannot explain X, so X must be the work of God." Then, a year or two later, scientists figure X out. God has been shoved back by science, and the more we know, the further back he retreats. Theologically speaking, a philosophy that relegates God to more and more marginal roles in the universe is hardly desirable. It's good to think about these things, though. Cheers!
Re:Post is pretty much right. (Score:2, Insightful)
And most people don't say "Fuck You" in the middle of intelligent discourse. Unless, of course, you're a rural hick.
Re:Post is pretty much right. (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone who flunked out of high school can either be a janitor in New York city, or a high-school science teacher in East Bumfuck, Arkansas.
To put a personal touch on it, I grew up in WV, but I moved to Baltimore to go to college (and stayed in the Baltimore/DC area ever since).
Disproving Evolution... Howto (Score:3, Insightful)
Evolution is based on a concept of common ancestry, and that speciation occurs in the branches, where organisms can no longer interbreed. This means that you can build a tree of life that is untangled between major branches, with minor tangling of the twigs within a branch. (theres quite a bit more to evolution, but these are the parts I'm using).. So a reptile can mutate to get hair, passing the trait to its progeny. Eventually those progeny have a vast array of variation in their hair. The hair becomes more advanced (hollow hairs in the case of the Pronghorn). Now this bit of evolution is a pretty advanced piece of work.
Now to disprove Evolution we need to show that this trait shows up in another major branch of life IE find a tangle. So if we can find a plant with these kinds of hairs, or a bird that has the same kind of hair, were golden. Now since we classify all things with hair as mammals we might never find a bird with hair. So we could look for something more useful from birds in mammals.
Birds have a four cycle lung which is more efficient than the mammalian 2 cycle lung, because it vents nearly all the waste gases in each breath. If we found a mammal with a four cycle lung, that could also be evidence that something is wrong with our theory of evolution.
So then there is the platypus, a mammal that lays eggs, is that evidence? Since we're pretty sure that reptiles were the forbearer's of mammals, then mammals can still have the egg laying apparatus from the reptilian side. So the branches haven't been crossed.
So to disprove evolution you need to find highly evolved traits which don't appear to exist in a common ancestor, but are copied nearly exactly. (so birds and bats flying doesn't count, because the wings aren't even close to being similar)
Storm
p.s. for you ID advocates, happy hunting. Find where the designer is cutting and pasting at the top levels, and you have a way better case...
Re:Post is pretty much right. (Score:1, Insightful)
--set up their own religious persecution. I know you're no doubt a product of the sub-standard southern public school system, but after God helped Columbus discover America [dianedew.com], but before Abraham Lincoln and FDR took the Christ out of Christmas, there was this bit where the Puritians were just another religious group, who took their silly superstition a lot more seriously than most others.
Jefferson and Franklin aside, the "founding fathers" wanted a land that was safe... for Christianity. Not the "land of freedom and justice for all" that you southern types love to dribble about.
Re:Post is pretty much right. (Score:4, Insightful)
--in between trying to outlaw homosexuality and persecute Mexican immigrants, of course.
Freedom and justice for all, so long as all are white and Christian.
Re:how, exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
scientific review of religion (Score:3, Insightful)
Step 1) Hypothesis: Someone, somewhere, somewhen, created everything.
Step 2) Create an experiment to prove said hypothesis. Uhh, can't.
Verdict: It's unprovable crap.
DONE.
Re:Post is pretty much right. (Score:4, Insightful)
> New York or San Francisco that makes you smarter. But a huge
Being packed together in a crowded metropolis full of people who ARE NOT
LIKE YOU makes it much more likely that you will NOT BE ABLE TO AVOID
things that would push you out of your comfort zone. You're pretty much
gauranteed and forced to be more worldly. You are forcibly exposed to
diversity that someone from the midwestern bible belt doesn't have to.
In a town of 30K or 50K it's much easier to avoid people not like yourself.
It's like trying to be amish in a city of 1 million versus lancaster county.