Limiting the Teaching of the Scientific Process In Ohio 528
frdmfghtr (603968) writes Over at Ars Technica, there's a story about a bill in the Ohio legislature that wants to downplay the teaching of the scientific process. From the article: "Specifically prohibiting a discussion of the scientific process is a recipe for educational chaos. To begin with, it leaves the knowledge the kids will still receive—the things we have learned through science—completely unmoored from any indication of how that knowledge was generated or whether it's likely to be reliable. The scientific process is also useful in that it can help people understand the world around them and the information they're bombarded with; it can also help people assess the reliability of various sources of information."
The science standards would have "...focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes; and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another." Political interpretation of scientific facts include humans contributing to climate change according to the bill's sponsor, who also thinks intelligent design would be OK under the law.
The US slides back to the caves (Score:3, Insightful)
Your priorities are fucked.You do good war and spying though, I'll give you that.
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
This is a proposed bill. Come back and say that when it actually passes. Yeesh. You would think Europe forgot they still have politically active nationalists throughout.
Not sliding, just jostling at the cliff (Score:2)
Proposed by those the people of OHIO voted for.
Which may be sufficient to see them ousted next time around, Ohio not being a particularly ignorant state as our states go. Here in the US, politicians think that they have to be religious to be elected (and they may still be right about that) but generally speaking, they aren't controlled by this when in office (look to corporations and the money stream for that.)
In the interim, it's worth keeping in mind the degree of scientific and technological progress tha
Re: (Score:3)
Because of the size of the population (which exceeds that of all Europe)
It always surprise me how americans see the world: in their head.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W... [wikipedia.org]
Europe: population is 742 millions
USA: population is 352 millions
Yes, there are people outside the USA, and MUCH MUCH more than inside. And you still don't know it and display your ignorance right out there for everyone to see... Nice job, really.
To be fair, Europe is a continent while the United States is a country. A more accurate comparison would be North America versus Europe, which would be 742M to 565M. Of course the continent of Europe includes Russia, which most people don't include. Take out Russia and the two populations are very closely matched. If you want to compare by country, then the US still is many times larger than most European countries.
Re:The US slides back to the caves (Score:5, Funny)
Of course the continent of Europe includes Russia, which most people don't include.
I think you'll find that most people include Russia as part of Europe.
Or maybe it's Russia the considers Europe as part of them.
Re: (Score:3)
What the hell is up with you people over there in the US. Still using Imperial measurements?
The US has never used Imperial measurements [wikipedia.org]. We use US customary units [wikipedia.org]. They're both [wikipedia.org] derived from the same English units [wikipedia.org], but they do actually have several differences [wikipedia.org].
Re: (Score:2)
Actually, the metric unit of time is the second ;)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Re: The US slides back to the caves (Score:4, Insightful)
...and at a research institution in Ohio... I think we're going to have a moment of silence at lab meeting. And then start screaming.
Re: (Score:2)
Not to worry. It will drag through the courts, get defeated, wasting huge amounts of taxpayers' money, all so a bunch of moronic religious ingrates can try to make some sort of point.
Re: (Score:3)
The bill, overall - and any chance it has of passing - is a response to the common core. This particular bit seems to be all about the scientific method. I mean, really - not teach scientific process?
I suppose one could formulate non-religious reasons for this, but in our current context I can certainly see why people would jump to religious explanation (the bill's sponsor supporting intellignet desin certain suggests that this is so).
Re: The US slides back to the caves (Score:5, Funny)
Keep in mind how big the us is and deverse. Head to the coasts and you will find that its like compairing night and day. Still it makes the us the butt of other peoples jokes.
I know you're only trying to help defend the image of the American education system, but please, stop. I'm not sure you could have packed more condemnation of your school's English curriculum into a three sentence reply.
You did remind me of a joke, though. "The bigger America is, diverse it gets."
Re:The US slides back to the caves (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
Agreed, it's intended to incide the typical jokes about Americans being idiots. Imperial measurements can't vanish overnight and are not a sign of ignorance or of being backwards, but the pragmatic reality that you can't just switch it all of and use something else overnight, at least not peacefully. Yes, there is some politics involved, we tried going metric in the past but pushed it too hard too fast and in response funding for conversion was removed. But the American scientific community uses metric e
Re: (Score:3)
If inches were truly still based on someone's thumb, while meters are not, you would have a point.
But since all measures are tied back to standards internationally agreed upon to be the one true Measure of X, you have no valid point.
Conversion factors aren't hard.
just because the dept of ed.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Right, you seem to be of the mistaken impression that people are getting less educated or something. Drop out rates have lowered across those 40 years, while test scores have mostly gone up.
You've only been "failed" inasmuch as other first world nations have been doing it better.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Bullshit. Ask the College Board. They've had to raise SAT difficulty for decades due to increasing standards.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Which of course explains away why a steadily increasing number of incoming college freshman have to take remedial courses. Here's a quote from http://www.highereducation.org... [highereducation.org] for you.
"he California State University (CSU), a large public university system, for many years has applied placement or readiness standards in reading, writing, and mathematics that are linked to first-year college coursework. All first-time students at all 23 CSU campuses must meet these standards, principally through performance o
Re: (Score:3)
Ah, but that's not hard to see the cause of.
College enrollments are up. More people are going further in their education.
Re: (Score:2)
But your quote specifically says, "principally through performance on a common statewide placement examination." It does not say the CSU system uses SAT or ACT for admissions standards. Perhaps if they based admissions on the SAT or ACT results, they'd need less remediation. Of course, that means rejecting a bunch of the little revenue-generating tykes instead of sending them over to the bursar's office to extract the maximum amount of Financial Aid money from them.
It would be interesting to compare the
Re:just because the dept of ed.... (Score:4, Interesting)
Do you have a source for that? The only things I can find in this area:
1) In 1995 they "re-centered" the test because scores were starting to slip.
2) In 2005 the Math section was made marginally harder to reduce the number of perfect scores. They also changed the verbal section to remove analogies.
3) In 2016 they will remove the more obscure vocabulary words to focus on more commonly used words.
4) MENSA will no longer take scores from the SAT after January of 1994 as criteria for admission.
None of this speaks to a steadily rising difficulty. And with one exception seems to indicate a little bit of the opposite.
Re: (Score:3)
You know what? You're right. I seem to have gotten that mistaken impression at some point in my life. Consider the claim completely retracted. We're all doomed(except the higher participation mitigation)
Re:just because the dept of ed.... (Score:4, Interesting)
You know what? You're right.
These sentences, found in an internet forum, have renewed my faith in humanity! Thank you!
Re:just because the dept of ed.... (Score:5, Informative)
the US DoED has nothing to do with this.
i know people on the right like to mock the department of education, as if education and a department to oversee it are bad things.
but this view is born out of ignorance over what exactly the department of education even DOES.
unlike most countries, the US DoED has almost nothing to do with curriculum.
most of thethey do is disburse funds from the fed to the states, along with some minor oversight responsibilities regarding civil rights on college campuses. That's it. But after articles like this, and others, maybe they should have something to do with curriculum.
Also, fun fact: the republicans opposed the creation of the US DoED as well. Apparently they were of the opinion that education is unconstitutional because education is not in the constitution...boy, they've sure come a long way in 40 years, haven't they ?
Re: (Score:3)
Also, fun fact: the republicans opposed the creation of the US DoED as well. Apparently they were of the opinion that federal control of education is unconstitutional because federal control of education is not in the constitution...
FTFY. Maybe you don't realize that opposition to the creation of a federal government department to control something isn't defacto opposition to whatever that something is, so you make your flamebait accusation...
Re: (Score:3)
most of thethey do is disburse funds from the fed to the states
and this is the exact problem I have with the dept of ed. People in ny shouldnt be paying for students in cali, and people in north dakota should not be paying for students in fla. Keep the money local, and get rid of the overhead.
The portion of the Dept of Education you are complaining about, the appropriations part, comes to 65 billion dollars a year, out of total U.S. education spending of about 850 billion a year, so it is a grand total of 7.5% of that; the vast majority of U.S. education spending is already local -- exactly what you want. Happy?
And people in New York are not paying for students in California. The people in the wealthy states are, by and large, helping to educate people in poorer states, who otherwise have fewer
Re: (Score:2)
This is good! (Score:5, Interesting)
I've argued many times before that the problem with "Intelligent Design" is not that whether it's "true" or not, but rather that it's not science because it ignores the Scientific Method and thus does not belong in a science class. I'm glad that this lawmaker, at least, is willing to address that argument directly instead of obfuscating.
He's still wrong, of course, but at least he's less intellectually dishonest than the average creationist. That's convenient, since it makes his position -- which is that Ohio should prohibit schools from teaching science entirely (since science is the Scientific Method) -- easier to both understand and oppose.
Re:This is good! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:This is good! (Score:5, Funny)
without the how, facts mean nothing
5 * 5 =25
don't ask why it just is memorize it and every other result of a process!
Re:This is good! (Score:4, Insightful)
Not only that, but without the "why", the facts can be easily undermined.
Teacher to kids: "Evolution is the process by which species change over time to better suit their environment."
ID Advocate: "See? There's no evidence for it and the so-called scientists are just making things up as they go along. It's not like they have some 'process' they follow. If they did, wouldn't you have been taught that in school?"
Re: (Score:3)
Hysterical exaggeration. It is explained to small children what multiplication means. After that, rote memorization of the tables increases efficiency.
Re:This is good! (Score:4, Informative)
I got my first programming job, after a couple of years of struggling to find one, in part because I remembered how to do long division (and some other pencil and paper math). No joke, it was my big break.
But it's been shown that memorizing multiplication tables (and using them in drill until you reach effortless competence with multiplication) directly improves your ability to learn more abstract math and related reasoning.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I didn't say it wasn't dishonest (or unethical, for that matter) at all, just that it was less so. The important thing is that obviously self-contradictory arguments are easier to refute. This lawmaker's stupidity has eclipsed his dishonesty, and that's good (for the rest of us).
Theology is bad too (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Re:This is good! (Score:5, Insightful)
Plus, it implies that things like evolution and anthropogenic climate change are merely "political" rather than well backed by scientific evidence. Just because there are people who have political reasons for not wanting kids to believe them doesn't mean the conclusions themselves are political.
Re: (Score:3)
That's strange; if there's no way that someone could interpret "scientific processes" as referring to the Scientific Method, then how did Ars and I (and so many others here) manage it? I think you're the one who's mistaken on this point.
Re: (Score:3)
Still pretty awful. This is "teach a man to fish" stuff. The scientific method and critical thinking are basic intellectual tools that everyone should learn at a very young age, not simply to progress their careers but to learn to question the ever increasing torrent of bullshit being disgorged from spheres political and academic, to say nothing of the fourth estate. The only thing that shouldn't be questioned (without plenty of evidence) is the maxim that everything should be questioned.
And this is how we get to the more concrete harm (Score:5, Insightful)
A lot of fuss is made about how creationists aren't hurting anyone by teaching creationism in schools. At least a lot of fuss by creationists.
But to knock "how science actually works" off the curriculum in order to make creationism slightly more viable as a meme, knocks a very important and practical tool out of childrens' toolbox for learning about the world.
I'd go as far as saying learning about the scientific method is equally or more important that learning how to write papers expressing your opinions, or solving equations, or how congress works, as far as parity to other common subjects goes.
This is sabotaging a lot of children's' education in a big way for a miniscule victory in the culture wars. This is why creationists need to be far from policy maker positions.
Re:And this is how we get to the more concrete har (Score:5, Insightful)
The scientific method is the single, most important discovery of the human race. It underlies everything we have achieved. Downplaying it means to reject modern civilization and rationality. But that may be just what these cretins want.
Re: (Score:2)
On the bright side, framing the debate in those terms might help convince the kind of people who would argue that we should "respect all sides of the issue" (or some politically-correct BS like that) that these anti-scientific ideas really don't belong in science class after all. I think the lawmaker did us a favor and I'm optimistic that his plans will backfire.
Re:And this is how we get to the more concrete har (Score:5, Insightful)
It doesn't matter. The WHOLE reason we're having this debate is not about science. It's not even about creationism or "intelligent design" or however we "evolve" the term.
The Discovery institute (the real organization behind all this) believes fundamentally, society went awry when we did the whole "separation of church and state" thing and that religion in school meant students were better behaved and more obedient, and society as a whole was just better off.
So that's the real end goal - to get religion - or more correctly, Christianity, back into schools so everyone becomes a "good little Christian boy".
(Yes, it glosses over a LOT of things, like racial issues, the fact that there are more religions than just Christianity, etc).
Basically all of society's ills are the direct result of secularism and the pursuit of "things" (money, toys, stuff) instead of spirituality.
It's just that creationism is the wedge issue that can get them in the door the easiest since a lot more Americans believe in it (than say, a great flood happened, or that everything we see was made in a week a few thousand years ago). And once you're in the door, spreading the other beliefs becomes a lot easier.
Re: (Score:2)
Indeed. However, the Discovery Institute's chance of success depends entirely on obfuscating that goal. There's a lot more people who would support "intelligent design" as some sort of oppressed underdog "scientific theory" than who would support it as the blatant theocratic idea it really is.
Re:And this is how we get to the more concrete har (Score:5, Insightful)
So that's the real end goal - to get religion - or more correctly, Christianity, back into schools so everyone becomes a "good little Christian boy"
More correctly, their version of Christian theology. When I point out to them that the Catholic Church has stated that evolution and the scientific method are not in conflict they get upset. They point out the Catholic Church is not the decider and get even more steamed when I remind him that Jesus founded the Catholic Church as His Church and thus it and the Pope speak for God; and it says so in the Bible and why do they not believe in the Bible? They claim to be Christians, after all.
That's the real problem. When people want to bring back God into school they mean their version of God which isn't necessarily someone else's. They often claim they want to give religion equal time but get very upset when someone brings religious beliefs in they don't approve of.
Re: (Score:2)
What about the things that underlie the scientific method, like mathematics, philosophy of truth(as opposed to other venues like morality or meaning), and logic?
Not that I disagree that science has accomplished wonders, just that it's built on things that can be argued to be more important since science wouldn't be possible without them.
Re: (Score:3)
Logic isn't hard. Proofs can be hard to devise, but logic itself isn't complicated to follow.
Real philosophy(with prepositional logic) should be something we're teaching before we get to unnecessarily specific esoterica like solving systems of equations.
Re: (Score:3)
And why exactly does the scientific method do that? I think you'll find that the utility of falsification is established philosophically, not by observational fiat.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Counterpoint: civilization existed prior to the rule of law. It was just less pleasant for the non-elites.
Re: (Score:3)
Yep, those ancient Egyptians and Chinese and Mayans weren't civilizations. Thank you for your totally informed perspective.
"My definition of civilization hinges on the thing I declared caused civilization, thus proving me right" might not be the clever argument you think it is.
Bye, bye, STEM ... (Score:2, Insightful)
Those stupid son of a bitches.
We learned nothing from Galileo's fiasco?
Is it going anywhere? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Is it going anywhere? (Score:5, Insightful)
Is this one expected to actually have a shot in hell at passing?
No, it's just clickbait. There are thousands of stupid bills introduced in State legislatures every year. Slashdot sure doesn't have time to cover them all, but I guess one once in a while is good for revenue.
The bill, maybe. The BS headline? No. (Score:2)
The BS headline Slashdot used most certainly will not pass, guaranteed. Here's the crux of the bill, which could, in theory, pass:
A (iii) ... prohibit and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
Re: (Score:3)
Re: (Score:2)
Or a "religious interpretation" as creationists are fond of claiming that Evolution (or, to use the more religion-sounding name they call it: Darwinism) is a religious belief.
It isn't, of course, but if they can claim it to be so, and if they can get some politicians to agree, then perhaps they can get Evolution banned as a "religion."
Re: (Score:2)
Whether the bill would pass or not is irrelevant. It's extremely disturbing that we have a certain percentage of people running this nation that believe in fucking magic.
Eh, not exactly (Score:3)
This is wide open to interpretation. Obviously it would be insane not to teach the scientific process. I think there are some who feel education has strayed too far from mastering basic facts into abstraction, such as "new math" instead of mastering times tables.
Anyway this is just one guy's brain fart and not a law. I am kind of curious what he meant by it though.
Re: (Score:2)
Agreed. The intent, if I had to guess, was not to stop teaching the official Scientific Method (ask, research, hypothesize, test, analyze, share), but to draw focus away from discussions that would muddy the Method. "But Jesus says..." or "I don't think the FSM's tentacles could reach THAT far to anoint the ninjas and therefore cause a tsunami that overwhelmed the Pacific pirates..." As much as those are processes. So teach the scientific method, but leave out the part discussing how or why you're quest
Re: (Score:2)
The stupid is strong with these people... (Score:2)
Really, how caveman-like can you get? It seems these people want everyone stupid and uneducated. The only comparison that comes to mind is the Taliban preventing girls from getting an education. Has the US really gone down the drains so far?
Re: (Score:3)
Yep, and for roughly the same reasons. An ignorant populace is far easier to manage and control from the top. Look at North Korea for a live example of this. With no external facts or even a method to determine if a particular "fact" is grounded in reality, you can insert whatever you like and ignorant people will swallow it wholesale simply because they literally do not know any better. (an aside, the latin root for the word science was scientia, knowledge, very telling in this context)
TL;DR - Orwell said
Here we go again (Score:3, Interesting)
Religion has no place in schools. How many times have you seen scientists starting wars over theories and results?
"1 + 1 equals 3!"
"Only for larger values of 1, you heathen!"
So you agree with this bill. Cool. (Score:2, Insightful)
> Religion has no place in schools.
So then you agree with this bill, which says:
A (iii) ... prohibit and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... ; and prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
If you skip past the BS /. headline and read the bill, TFS, or even the subtitle of TFS, the bill basically requires teaching science, not politics with a dash of pseudoscience used to support the teacher's political
Re: (Score:3)
1. Read 2. Argue (Score:2)
It helps to read the sentence you're arguing about, before you argue about it.
> No, it means you can't teach, you know science
Here's the full text of the science section of the bill:
The standards in science shall be based in core existing disciplines of biology, chemistry, and physics;
incorporate grade-level mathematics and be referenced to the mathematics standards; focus on academic and scientific knowledge
rather than scien
Clever (Score:2)
Idiots with power (Score:5, Insightful)
If we make sure we don't teach our students how to think, acquiring a larger voting base will be much easier in the future!
Now ICP can finally achieve their teaching dreams (Score:4, Funny)
If they're going to be teaching creationism in schools, they can hire ICP to teach. I can see the classes now, where they teach the children that everything from quantum mechanics to tectonic plate shifts are caused by miracles, regardless of what anyone else says. Magnets? They're like, double miracles man. Miracles on top of miracles.
As predicted by Kenneth Miller, in 2006! (Score:2, Interesting)
Predicted by Dr. Kenneth Miller in his 2006 presentation about the Kitzmiller et al vs Dover.
"The Collapse of Intelligent Design: Will the Next Monkey Trial be in Ohio?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ohd5uqzlwsU
11 years in the making, the weakening of the definition of 'science'.
Can't wait for the PhD in Horoscopes, Witchcraft, etc.
Re: (Score:3)
I, for one, welcome the day I can get a degree in alchemy. That way, when I attempt to convert basic chemicals (acetone, pseudoephedrine, etc) into gold using methamphetamine as an intermediary, I can tell the cops I'm doing my doctoral thesis and everything will be perfectly legitimate. Whoever said you can't convert base chemicals into gold was wrong - they just weren't doing it right.
Re: (Score:2)
On the other hand... (Score:2, Interesting)
I've been in high school. It's not like they really try to teach people how to apply the scientific method. They describe how the scientific method is supposed to work and then continue shoveling facts at the students. If they aren't going to engage, I'm not sure there's much point in telling students something that they'll ignore.
I have the same problem with teaching evolution in schools. They don't have time to explain it well, so students walk away thinking, "We used to be apes, but one of our ancest
Not as inexplicable as it might seem at first (Score:4, Insightful)
Educator John Taylor Gatto [wikipedia.org] has explained both in writing [tripod.com], (PDF link), and in Death by Pedagogy [youtube.com], as well as in many interviews available on YouTube, that the purpose of the education system is to extend childhood and discourage critical thinking. This is done in order to produce more compliant citizens; otherwise their innovation and inventiveness would both disrupt capitalists' ability to control markets, and deny corporations a complacent and pliable workforce.
Before you dismiss this as just another wild-eyed conspiracy theory you should check out what he has to say. For one thing he gives copious references, most of which can be checked, and most of which use such direct language that there is no possible ambiguity as to the intent of the authors. For another thing, it is perhaps the best and simplest explanation for why the Ohio legislature might enact such otherwise inexplicable legislation.
Ask yourself 'cui bono'. Who will be best served by a citizenry that is less and less critical, and less and less scientifically competent? Then look back at the education you received, look at what has happened to schooling in the meantime, look at what is happening to education now, and place it all into the context that Gatto creates. if after that you can honestly call it a conspiracy theory, go in peace.
What is the issue here? (Score:2)
Seems to be 100% flames above. But what is so wrong with the suggestion:
focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes; and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A school's idea is to give a general understanding to the students in things. Since there has ben a huge amount of science done over the past few milennia, isn't it only natural that these researched facts get the focus rather than the process? The other way round means making everyone re-invent the wheel, leading to them learing about that particular "wheel" ony and missing the big picture.
Understanding the scientific process is essent
God dun it (Score:2)
USA as an intellectual parasite (Score:4, Insightful)
It pains me to think that for at least a generation or so, you will still be able to just buy your educated workforce from other countries that have invested in their public education as infrastructure. Otherwise you'd collapse much faster with all this nonsense.
Belief systems (Score:5, Insightful)
When did science stop being a methodology and become a belief system?
Re: (Score:2)
No schooling for girls, only schooling in the Bible for boys, the equivalent of the sharia, etc. This is the road to hell.
Sharia is religion, prohibited under this bill (Score:2)
> only schooling in the Bible for boys, the equivalent of the sharia
That would be religion. This bill prohibits teaching the teacher's religious or political interpretations, instead of teaching actual science. Quote the bill:
A (iii) ... and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... and prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
Re:Sharia is religion, prohibited under this bill (Score:4, Insightful)
That's not in the bill, and he didn't say that (Score:2, Interesting)
> Did you miss the part where the bills author finds that the bill would allow the teaching of intelligent design?
That's not in the article, and the bill doesn't say that. The bill PROHIBITS teaching any religious interpretation. That's the plain English text of the bill.
What IS in the article, is that when a reporter asked the clickbait question of whether school boards could consider addressing the topic of intelligent design, one of the sponsors said "“I think it would be good for them to cons
Re:If you don't want science... (Score:5, Insightful)
They will not even have the bible, as paper and printing (or ink) is a result of applied science. So is incidentally horse-husbandry, the fire and the pot the soup is in.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If you don't want science, then you shouldn't be allowed to benefit from anything created or influenced by it. Say goodbye to your phones, your computers... your massed produced clothes made by machines that use electricity, your fancy guns designed on a computer, your cars.. all of it. Go back to horses and shit soup over a fire while reading your bible and dying of the plague.
You seem to easily (purposefully) forget that most of the early and bright scientists were religious and finding out how the Creator made things work. So no we would not be going back to the stone age.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
So what? They weren't anti-science. They didn't think that science and religion cannot occupy the same space. If they did, they would have been taking chunks out of their god with their work.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
If you don't want science, then you shouldn't be allowed to benefit from anything created or influenced by it. Say goodbye to your phones, your computers... your massed produced clothes made by machines that use electricity, your fancy guns designed on a computer, your cars.. all of it. Go back to horses and shit soup over a fire while reading your bible and dying of the plague.
If you don't want God, you're gonna burn. Death to the Philistine!
Who wins in this game?
Re: (Score:3)
The religious view was in the part of the law that you reduced to ellipses:
The essential thesis of creationism (and "Intelligent Design") is that the
Chemistry is religion now? (Score:2)
> The religious view was in the part of the law that you reduced to ellipses:
> (iii) The standards in science shall be based in core existing disciplines of biology, chemistry, and physics; incorporate grade-level mathematics and be referenced to the mathematics standards; focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes;
So are you saying that chemistry is religion, or that mathematics is? The simple fact is that the bill prohibits teaching religious interpretation, twice.
Re: (Score:2)
Without the Scientific Method, chemistry is nothing more than alchemy. In that case, yes, it is religion!
prohibit == require is a dot you need to connect (Score:2)
> Connecting the dots is left as an exercise to the reader.
The bill explicitly prohibits teaching religious interpretations. You're claiming it REQUIRES what it in fact explicitly prohibits. If you're going to say "prohibit" really means "require" , that's a dot you need to connect, or just admit you were tricked the clickbait headline.
Re: (Score:2)
Not really. It is so poorly and broadly worded such that it could be interpreted in either way. According to the Ars article, the bill's author has been rather vague about how he interprets it. But if you have a legislature and judiciary that strongly favors, say, a creationism interpretation of reality, it can certainly be bent to considering 'the other guys' has having a particular bent.
It's bad legislation (nothing new here). Not necessarily benign. Yes, Hanlon's Razor suggests incompetence but I pe
Re: (Score:2)
Of course, malice and incompetence are certainly not orthogonal concepts.