the Kansas court will be debating whether creationism, evolution, or a combination of the two should be taught in Kansas classrooms -- with the majority of people present being in the pro-creationism camp.
What I don't understand is, since evolution is the accepted "secular" explanation, why can't parents just say "Tommy, mommmy and daddy don't believe in evolution, we believe in creationism." As I'm sure most parents do when secular vs. religious comes up.
It's what secular parents do for their kids! "Mommy and Daddy don't believe in God, but many other people do." We're (meaning, those without religion) not demanding that schools denounce religion -- why would religious folk demand as much?
[ May 02, 2005, 02:04 PM: Message edited by: Leonide ]
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
Buckle up and enjoy the ride.
-Trevor
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
I would like to take this opportunity to reopen the following debates, with suggested titles for each thread:
The Earth is Flat - "40 Reasons Why Liberal Democrats Want You To Fall Off the Earth"
Earth Is At the Center - "Why the Universe Revolves Around God's People"
Electricity Is Magic - "Will the Rising Costs of Magic Be Off-Set By the Discovery of a New Fuel Source Called Coal?"
[ May 02, 2005, 02:34 PM: Message edited by: TheHumanTarget ]
Posted by Teshi (Member # 5024) on :
They can't teach just creationism...
...can they?
Posted by Megan (Member # 5290) on :
That seems to be the direction that the country is headed lately. Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote: The Earth is Flat - "40 Reasons Liberal Democrats Want You To Fall Off the Earth"
haha, I like that one.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
I can understand not wanting your kid taught "God didn't create man, because we've proven that it happened through evolution," which is how evolution is portrayed all too often.
But it is impossible to be an educated adult without understanding the theory of evolution. Even if they aren't taught that evolution is "true", students still should be taught what it is.
Posted by Bob the Lawyer (Member # 3278) on :
Sometimes I wonder why people think science teachers are qualified to teach creationism over ministers. What are their pastors teaching them, anyway?
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I'm fine with people mentioning creationism and intelligent design in schools -- just not in science classrooms. They're modern religious movements, and should be taught about in appropriate contexts.
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
quote: I can understand not wanting your kid taught "God didn't create man, because we've proven that it happened through evolution," which is how evolution is portrayed all too often.
I don't ever remember evolution being portrayed this way in school. It was only outside class that the debate over creationism vs. evolution began.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I saw it portrayed that way in class many, many times. And I lived in Virginia Beach, home of Pat Robertson.
Posted by TheTick (Member # 2883) on :
Hmm, I went through VB schools and never heard it like that. Perhaps it has to do with the different eras Dag and I were in school?
I did have one former hippy science teacher who taught both. Mostly to make sure we questioned assumptions, not to actually show how the rest of the teachers we had were wrong.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Yeah, evolution being taught that way would certainly be a problem.
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
Dag, I live in the DC metro area, and I just don't remember it coming up.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
I grew up in the Bible Belt, and I saw that.
I think part of it is being smug in not being as ignorant/superstitious as the general populaiton.
edit: just trying to make it clearer and more accurate.
[ May 02, 2005, 02:56 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by Promethius (Member # 2468) on :
I was also taught that way. I had a teacher who actually said condescendingly, "Does anyone actually believe the story in the Bible of how the earth was created?" One person raised their hand, and it was not me. This teacher really gave him a hard time about his belief. I was bothered by this at the time, and even more so now.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:There was the attitude of some science teachers being smug that they weren't as ignorant as the believers.
Exactly.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:I had a teacher who actually said condescendingly, "Does anyone actually believe the story in the Bible of how the earth was created?" One person raised their hand, and it was not me. This teacher really gave him a hard time about his belief.
This is as much a violation of the separation of Church and State as many other things that people cry foul about.
If you can't teach that a certain religion is true, you shouldn't be able to teach that it is false, either.
[ May 02, 2005, 02:57 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by Megan (Member # 5290) on :
In my bible-belt high school, my biology teacher (who was admittedly, a little off-kilter) explained that he would not discuss either, since he 1) refused to engage in a protracted battle with the uber-conservative Baptist parents in order to teach the theory of evolution, and 2) refused to teach creationism on the basis that it didn't belong in a biology class.
The loud-and-rowdy uber-conservatives in the class (who were ALWAYS explaining to me, in GREAT DETAIL, why I was going to hell) IMMEDIATELY responded by DEMANDING to know what he personally believed. He informed them that it was none of their business, though they continued to press the issue for quite some time. In retrospect, I wish he would've gone ahead and taught the theory, though, in spite of the crap he would've had to take from students (forget the parents; in my school, it was the kids who were the problem).
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
I think it is also safe to say that the academic atmosphere in most high schools has changed a great deal from the 40's to the 00's.
-Trevor
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
How old do you think we are?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:This is as much a violation of the separation of Church and State as many other things that people cry foul about.
It is, in fact, a violation on two counts. It's an establishment clause violation, because it's giving official imprimatur to a particular religious belief. And it's a free exercise violation, because it's a government official penalizing someone for their religious beliefs.
Dagonee
Posted by TMedina (Member # 6649) on :
It wasn't personally directed towards anyone, but the unwritten sensibilities of a teacher in the 40's would be different from a teacher in the 00's.
If you wanted a less extreme example, how about a teacher in the 70's and a teacher in the 00's?
Someone teaching in the 70's was molded, academically, in the atmosphere of an earlier period.
Someone teaching in the 00's was molded possibly in the same time period, but more likely influenced in a later period where academia was possibly not as rigid or regimented.
Just a hypothetical.
-Trevor
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
I'm all for evolution being taught in science class, but it should be taught as science.
Posted by UofUlawguy (Member # 5492) on :
The only time I ever recall evolution being discussed directly in school was in a social studies class (called World Civilizations). The teacher was 100 years old, give or take, and had a handful of set rants that he would give each year. One of his rants was about evolution, and how ridiculous it was. He talked about the insanity of believing a woodpecker could evolve from an alligator, and gleefully pointed to such hoaxes as Piltdown Man, and even harped on the arthritic Neanderthal skeleton.
At the time, we all just let him rant, because we knew what he was like. It never occurred to wonder why we were discussing evolution for an entire session of class when it had nothing to do with the ostensible topic of the course, neither did it occur to me to question his rabid and unreasoning personal biases against evolution. It wasn't something I was that interested in becoming embroiled in as a fifteen-year-old.
This same nut had an annual lesson about the disgusting things that are put in many of the tasty foods teenagers like to eat, another about his days working in a mental intitution, and one more about proving that even at his advanced age he could hurdle his desk with a typewriter sitting on top of it.
Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
It is seriously disturbing that evolution is not being taught in some cases.
Another symptom of America falling behind in science.
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
quote: If you can't teach that a certain religion is true, you shouldn't be able to teach that it is false, either.
I agree with this in principle, but since so much of religion is based on articles of unsubstantiated faith, you will eventually teach something that invalidates an article of faith in someone's religion.
EDIT: Sorry. I dropped off part of my post and will ineloquently summarize
This isn't specifically denying someone else's faith on a whole, but that doesn't seem to be the driving force of the creationism argument.
[ May 02, 2005, 03:31 PM: Message edited by: TheHumanTarget ]
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:Another symptom of America falling behind in science.
Actually, I think it's more an overreaction to the anti-religious sentiment of the last couple of decades.
[ May 02, 2005, 03:37 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by Traveler (Member # 3615) on :
I'm just embarrassed that this is still an issue in this country.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:so much of religion is based on articles of unsubstantiated faith, you will eventually teach something that invalidates an article of faith in someone's religion.
There's a big difference between saying "the geologic evidence indicates that the earth is millions of years old" and saying "because of science we know that the earth is millions of years old, so if you believe otherwise, you are wrong."
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
*Agrees with the fungus in this thread*
Hobbes Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:To many people, there isn't a difference between these two statements at all.
That's because those people have faith that science is Correct.
[ May 02, 2005, 03:34 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
quote: There's a big difference between saying "the geologic evidence indicates that the earth is millions of years old" and saying "because of science we know that the earth is millions of years old, so if you believe otherwise, you are wrong."
If someones religion teaches that squares are circles, and triangles are squares, how could they be taught a subject like Algebra without being corrected to the scientifically excepted norm?
Posted by Raia (Member # 4700) on :
quote: I would like to take this opportunity to reopen the following debates, with suggested titles for each thread:
The Earth is Flat - "40 Reasons Why Liberal Democrats Want You To Fall Off the Earth"
Earth Is At the Center - "Why the Universe Revolves Around God's People"
Electricity Is Magic - "Will the Rising Costs of Magic Be Off-Set By the Discovery of a New Fuel Source Called Coal?"
TheHumanTarget:
[ May 02, 2005, 03:36 PM: Message edited by: Raia ]
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
Now you are being more than a little silly.
Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
psst: accepted.
(just sayin')
Posted by Peter (Member # 4373) on :
I'm really glad that for the most part we can talk about this without getting ticked off at each other.
I agree with many here that it's not right that one should be taught when the other isn't.
As a side note, i never had the problem with teachers talking about how evolution is either stupid or the truth in class, but then again, i never had the fanatical teachers.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:Or that religion is Correct to the exclusion of science.
Agreed, so in the confrontation of the two, acknowledge both. I'm totally on board with teaching the science, just teach it as science and not as unassailable truth.
Hobbes Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:Or that religion is Correct to the exclusion of science.
Probably just one of those random things. I had awesome science teachers, but my math teachers...ugh.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:I agree with many here that it's not right that one should be taught when the other isn't.
I personally believe that creationism, not being scientific in the slightest, has no place in a science classroom.
Posted by Traveler (Member # 3615) on :
quote: Agreed, so in the confrontation of the two, acknowledge both. I'm totally on board with teaching the science, just teach it as science and not as unassailable truth
Well..there are OTHER creation myths/stories subscribed to by other religions. So if we go down this road we should make sure that we teach ALL of them. After all..Christianity isn't the only religion practiced in this country.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Does anyone actually believe that creationism needs to be taught? What I mean is, the people who care already know it. The rest of the people get nothing out of it. People are fighting to get it into schools as a way of marking their territory, not because they think people are lacking the information.
On another tack, say you're on the admissions staff of like MIT. Kansas already ranks around the lowest of sceince educations in the nation. If they pull things like this, can you even take their students science grades without a huge grain of salt?
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
If evolution is being taught correctly, then it will always be subject to scientific inquiry. The fact that evolution is not 100% confirmed (although you'd think 99.99% would be enough) does not invalidate it or substantiate creationism.
EDIT: Adam, you beat me to it. Evolution is science. Always subject to the scientific method.
[ May 02, 2005, 03:53 PM: Message edited by: TheHumanTarget ]
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:People are fighting to get it into schools as a way of marking their territory, not because they think people are lacking the information.
While I believe they are misguided, I can understand why they feel the need to do this. They feel under assault by the general culture (which they are), and are doing everything they can to keep the advancing hordes at bay.
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
And Squicky finally points out exactly why I think it's stupid for Kansas to have this "debate."
I'm not quite sure they will be able to make a permanent change to curriculum. Back in 1999, they tried, and the people of Kansas voted several of the board members off in the next election. Sadly, the board has tipped in favor of religious conservatives with an Intelligent Design agenda yet again.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote: Actually, I think it's more an overreaction to the anti-religious sentiment of the last couple of decades
Seriously?
Anyway. I think evolution should be mentioned in biology class, it was in mine. But it wasn't an overwhelming influence, I think we spent maybe one or two days on it, it was a small three page blip on my AP science book (which is the same text I used in college by the way). We went over it, and that was it. There wasn't emphasis on it, no one said that it was the best, or that creationism was crap, though we did have a devout Christian in the class that said evolution was crap.
But we moved on and it wasn't mentioned again afterwards. Likewise, I've learned the bible in both history and literature classes in high school. I think we read a little bit of the torah and the hadith too.
We went over what it was, but never said that it wasn't true, or that it was true, just looked at it from a literary and historical point of view.
I think that is best. Everything gets covered, nothing gets emphasized, nothing is discredited.
The only unknown element there is the teacher actually teaching it.
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:Does anyone actually believe that creationism needs to be taught? What I mean is, the people who care already know it. The rest of the people get nothing out of it. People are fighting to get it into schools as a way of marking their territory, not because they think people are lacking the information.
Yes, sadly enough, but not on this thread. Well let me back-track, and say I'm talking specifically about biology class, beyond a "many people believe that... [insert 20 seconds]" I don't think anywhere here wants biology to be about the Bible.
quote:On another tack, say you're on the admissions staff of like MIT. Kansas already ranks around the lowest of sceince educations in the nation. If they pull things like this, can you even take their students science grades without a huge grain of salt?
Well their biology scores anyways, but then grades are much more a symbol of the students effort and dedication than what they learned anyways.
quote:And that's what bothers me about this entire argument. Science should NEVER be taught as unassilable truth, because it isn't. Science changes as we discover more about the universe.
Totally agree.
quote:If evolution is being taught correctly, then it will always be subject to scientific inquiry. The fact that evolution is not 100% confirmed (although you'd think 99.99% would be enough) does not invalidate it or substantiate creationism.
Yes it will be, but I'm confused, are you saying that you feel evolution is 99.99% confirmed?
Hobbes Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
quote: I personally believe that creationism, not being scientific in the slightest, has no place in a science classroom.
Yet another reason I usually get along with MPH.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
quote:"If students... do not understand the weaknesses of evolutionary theory as well as the strengths, a grave injustice is being done to them," Abrams said.
I think this quote from the article says it well enough, as have several other here.
I'm not against the popular theory of evolution being explained in a science classroom, as long as -- as others have said -- it isn't portrayed as the "ONLY" allowable explanation, and no respect is given to those who voice their opinion that they believe otherwise.
I'm not fully in favor of "creationism" being taught at the schools -- because the teachers may not be believers in intelligent design - so they would have difficulty teaching it. In fact, some of you will agree that even among religious peoples, there is some disagreements on exactly how the creation took place (those who take it literally as opposed to those who see it metaphorically).
It comes down to respect -- respect the rights of the Christian kids to say they don't believe in the evolutionary theory as the origin of all life.
I think this whole debate only came about because some teachers/professors felt it their "mission" to "convert" some children away from their beliefs by making them feel inferior for not embracing the entire evolutionary theory.
My kids were taught evolution in school, and creationism at home. Worked out okay for them. But in their schools (at least on the high school level, but not on the college level) both views were treated with respect.
Farmgirl
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
Lyrhawn makes a good point here, this is like focusing millions of campaign dollars on sex-ed politics when it so often makes up a couple of weeks of health class. Biology classes in high school cover everything from bio-chemistry to zoology, the time spent on evolution or any of its counterparts should be minimal. It should be taught, yes, but it's only a small part of a vast field of study.
Hobbes Posted by UofUlawguy (Member # 5492) on :
I am a deeply religious person. I believe that God created the world (indeed, the whole universe). I am a member of a pretty conservative Church, and I am by no means on the liberal fringe of that Church.
And yet:
I do not believe that Creationism or Intelligent Design should be taught in public schools, in any form.
I also do not believe that there should be any school-sanctioned prayers during classes, assemblies, activities, or graduations.
I think abstinence-only sex education is ludicrous.
I think I am far from being alone, and I think that the existence of people like me tends to disprove the accusations of many political liberals that claim that the religious people of this country are trying to impose their belief systems on the nation.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:09 PM: Message edited by: UofUlawguy ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:I think this whole debate only came about because some teachers/professors felt it their "mission" to "convert" some children away from their beliefs by making them feel inferior for not embracing the entire evolutionary theory.
Oh bullcrap. The need for the dominant Christian majority to force it's religion and it's epistemological unsuitability on other people is one of the major causes of this situation. I'm not going to deny that there are plenty of people who are irrationally and irresponsibly opposing religion, but, jeez, have the integrity to admit the very obvious truth that Christians (especially ones in Kansas) are not these innocent victims.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:10 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by screechowl (Member # 2651) on :
Did I misunderstand the original topic that the courts were to decide this issue? The issue is before the Kansas State Board of Education, not the courts. It might end up in court, but not yet.
I hope I did not miss this point in the discussion. If so, sorry.
The issue now before the supreme court in Kansas is school finance. That is entirely different problem.
Yes, Kansas is having a good old time right now.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:
quote: Actually, I think it's more an overreaction to the anti-religious sentiment of the last couple of decades
Seriously?
Seriously. Note the word "overreaction.
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
I'm sorry you feel that way, Mr. Squick
I'm not saying this was done rampantly -- as I said -- my own children had no problem with it in their schools.
I think you will find plenty of Christian Kansans who, like UofULawGuy - don't want creationism taught in schools. Including me.
Farmgirl
Posted by UofUlawguy (Member # 5492) on :
I didn't say anything about victims. I merely voice the opinion that, where many liberals see a vast, consolidated movement of the religiously devout working toward the remaking of the government, I see smaller, more radical religious groups working just like any number of other special interest groups, with the exception that they happen to have some religious beliefs in common with millions of others who actually OPPOSE their political mission. In my mind, the liberals are not my enemy on this front. The militant religious folks are, both because their goals are not my own, and because they invoke principles that I honor in support of their cause, which I do not.
Posted by Tstorm (Member # 1871) on :
Screech, the issue is being debated "in a court room style setting."
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
quote: Yes it will be, but I'm confused, are you saying that you feel evolution is 99.99% confirmed?
I would say 100%, but nothing is ever 100% certain, especially scientific theories Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote: I think this whole debate only came about because some teachers/professors felt it their "mission" to "convert" some children away from their beliefs by making them feel inferior for not embracing the entire evolutionary theory.
quote:Oh bullcrap. The need for the dominant Christian majority to force it's religion and it's epistemological unsuitability on other people is one of the major causes of this situation.
Like I said before, I think that some Christians are behaving badly as a reaction be having been treated badly for so long.
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
Christians have been treated badly? That's a bold statement. Where is the proof to back this up?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I don't think you can IGNORE the drive of the more radical religious groups. I don't think it's a vast movement, it's not everyone. But it's a lot of people. Must be noisy people too, for this issue to be so hot button, so widespread, and to be moving so fast.
On one hand, I'd almost be willing to say that, since creationist parents have to teach their ideology at home, evolution parents should have to teach theirs at home as well.
While that is quite fair to the parents, the real losers are the students.
Shouldn't young people have the right to all the information, and to make an informed decision themselves? Let parents do whatever they want teaching religion in the home, but at school they learn the progress of science. Nor forced, not influenced, just give them the information and let them digest it.
The key is force. You can't have any. The information just needs to be there.
Edit to add: woah, woah, Christians have been treated badly? Where? This is a nation that caters to Christians.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:24 PM: Message edited by: Lyrhawn ]
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:Christians have been treated badly? That's a bold statement. Where is the proof to back this up?
Here's an example from earlier in this thread:
quote: I had a teacher who actually said condescendingly, "Does anyone actually believe the story in the Bible of how the earth was created?" One person raised their hand, and it was not me. This teacher really gave him a hard time about his belief.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
You really believe that is the norm though Portabello?
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
I never said it was the norm.
But I do believe that attitude is pretty prevalent. Unfortunately, it only gets worse when Christians over-react to it in this way.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:33 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I can't speak to the rest of the country, just my own home town, my school, my family. But I honestly can't ever remember ever seeing anything that insults or oppresses Christians.
I've only ever seen them receive special treatment and concern. I think America is more concerned with making them happy than with trying to hold them back.
Posted by TheHumanTarget (Member # 7129) on :
Lyrhawn, I would tend to agree with you. I've only ever seen policies and arguments that seek to comfort the poor Christians, and never do anything that might cause them to practice the tolerance that they preach.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Most of the time I see Christians complaining about being oppressed, it means that they are being prevented from forcing their religion on other people (just in the example of evolution, there's the Scope's monkey trial). Occasionally, they're getting their feelings hurt, like in Porter's example, but yeah, I don't know how I'd call characterize that as being treated poorly for so long. That's like saying that your generally indulgent parents forgetting to show up for one of your baseball games means that they've a long history of child abuse.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:49 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Farmgirl (Member # 5567) on :
As I said, it has to due with a lack of respect and instead, ridiculing Christians for their beliefs.
which you are doing a wonderful job of demonstrating for me. Thank you.
FG
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Porter, would you object if the story went like this?
quote: I had a teacher who actually said condescendingly, "Does anyone actually believe the story in the Bible that the Earth is flat and has four corners? One person raised their hand, and it was not me. This teacher really gave him a hard time about his belief.
This is not a subject on which rational people can disagree : Evolution is as much a fact as the roundness of the Earth. Deal with it.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I'm sorry, how are we demonstrating disrespect for you Farmgirl?
Posted by Megan (Member # 5290) on :
While I would not wish to discount anyone's personal feelings of being ill-treated, I do think that a large portion of neo-conservative and evangelical Christian doctrine of late has drawn on a persecution complex. You can see it even now, when the country is swinging very, very heavily toward the right. Evangelical Christians seem determined to believe that everyone is out to get them, and squash their beliefs, when usually people just want the freedom to not be religious, if they so choose.
Posted by ricree101 (Member # 7749) on :
quote: I would say 100%, but nothing is ever 100% certain, especially scientific theories [Smile]
I have to disagree. There are quite a few holes in evolution which have yet to be explained. It isn't 90% confirmed, it certainly isn't 100% confirmed, and I would hesitate to even call it 50% confirmed.
Of course, this is not an either/or proposition. My biggest problem with most creationist arguments I've seen is that they pretend that invalidating evolution proves creationism. Proving evolution false only means that we need to find another theory.
As a side note, is anyone familiar enough with creationism to describe it in detail. Pretty much all I know is that they believe that evolution is false and that god created all living beings. What do they propose was the actual process of the creation.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:Porter, would you object if the story went like this?
Absolutely. Singling a student out because of his beliefs? Wholely inappropriate.
How appropriate would it be for a Christian teacher to single out his one athiest student and ridicule his lack of belief? Not at all.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:55 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
*ridicules Christians for their beliefs*
*ridicules Buddhists for their beliefs*
*ridicules Athiests for their beliefs*
*ridicules beliefs*
<-- an equal opportunity provocateur. Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
*smacks down*
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I honestly bothered by the lack of understanding, on both sides, of what science actually means. To me, that's a grave educational deficiency that we should be focusing on.
edit: And KOM, yes, I'd object to the story the way you presented it as well. It's never okay for a teacher to single out and ridicule a student, at least not until they get to college.
[ May 02, 2005, 04:58 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
FG,
I see your point, but I don't know if I really see that a lot. The problem I think many Christians have is differentiating between lack of respect for their religion and lack of respect for the person. I don't respect Bush, Jerry Falwell, Pat Buchanon, most of the leadership of the radical evangelical agenda, it isn't because of their religious beliefs.
It's because of who they are as people, and the things they do.
If they act abrasive and desconstructive, they aren't going to enjoy much respect. And that has little to nothing to do with their religion, and everything to do with who they are as people.
I'm not saying that is you, Farmgirl, or that you have that particular blind spot. But many do. It goes towards their siege mentality.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
quote: I merely voice the opinion that, where many liberals see a vast, consolidated movement of the religiously devout working toward the remaking of the government, I see smaller, more radical religious groups working just like any number of other special interest groups, with the exception that they happen to have some religious beliefs in common with millions of others who actually OPPOSE their political mission. In my mind, the liberals are not my enemy on this front. The militant religious folks are, both because their goals are not my own, and because they invoke principles that I honor in support of their cause, which I do not.
UofUlawguy, this is an interesting way to look at things. It's all to easy to lump every non-liberal Christian into a monolithic blob and call them the Religious Right. When in reality, many conservative Christians disagree with the goals and tactics of these small groups of politically active conservative Christians.
On the other hand, those activists are extremely influential in Republican politics, setting the agenda for the party in many cases.
On a talk show recently, the host wondered why there is never any mention in the media of the Religious Left? There are certainly liberal Christians active in politics.
[ May 02, 2005, 05:07 PM: Message edited by: Morbo ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:I have to disagree. There are quite a few holes in evolution which have yet to be explained. It isn't 90% confirmed, it certainly isn't 100% confirmed, and I would hesitate to even call it 50% confirmed.
Then I'm sorry, but I would hesitate to call you 50% informed on the subject. We have observed evolution and speciation both in the lab and in the wild. Evidence of common descent with apes is scattered all through our genome. Evolution-as-fact is as certain as scientific facts get. Evolution-as-theory, that is, how it occurs, is a subject for some small disagreement within the scientific community, but that's not really an area where either of us is qualified to comment.
quote:How appropriate would it be for a Christian teacher to single out his one athiest student and ridicule his lack of belief? Not at all.
Here we speak not of religious beliefs, but of verifiable facts. To ridicule someone for believing the Earth is flat is not out of line, at least after the evidence has been explained a few times.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I'm also worried by the apparent need for a relatively pampered group to nurse a feeling of ubiquitous persecution. Historically, this has been used for justification for attacking minority groups, kind of like how a lot of the "Defending Marriage" crowd is primarily interested in attacking gays.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
While we're bringing up anecdotes about religion in the classroom: my brother and I had a shop/drafting teacher in HS that would ask for Bible verses on tests, for extra credit. We both thought it ironic that we both usually knew the verses (the verses were easy, like John 3:16) despite being agnostics, while some Christians forgot them.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
ricree -- this is part of the problem. There is no mostly agreed to "theory of intelligent design", much less of other forms of creationism. Here's an overview of the basic beliefs of the various camps:
YEC (Young Earth Creationism): the world is young, typically circa 6000 years old, and pretty much everything was placed here by God, or something close to it. Some YECs accept "microevolution", while others think that all the basic species have been around from the get go. This is despite that the only difference between micro and macroevolution is the degree of change, not the sort, which I find rather amusing.
OEC (Old Earth Creationism): currently the least common variant. OECs accept the old age of the earth, but reject "macroevolution" (and very rarely "microevolution" as well). They believe that either things have just been around a really long time, or more commonly that whatever supernatural force they subscribe to has placed more and more things on the planet over time, or rarely that the earth is old but the presence of creatures on the earth is young.
ID (Intelligent Design): very popular right now. Most proponents of ID accept at least a bit of "macroevolution", and all accept "microevolution". In ID, not only is evolution "guided" (by unstated mechanisms, of course) by some outside intelligence, which is completely compatible with normal evolutionary theory, but this guidance is necessary for the physical explanation of evolution, which is not. I have yet to see any testable predictions ID theory makes that evolutionary theory does not (and evolutionary theory has resulted in numerous testable predictions, many of which have been tested), which prevents me from considering it a scientific theory. Of course, the lack of any coherent formulation of it is also a significant impediment.
There are also some esoteric schools of thought such as the "there is a God, and since this God is omnipotent and could have created the universe 5 seconds ago, screw origin theories" school. But the above pretty much covers Judeo-Christo-Islamic creationism categories.
Posted by ricree101 (Member # 7749) on :
quote: Then I'm sorry, but I would hesitate to call you 50% informed on the subject. We have observed evolution and speciation both in the lab and in the wild. Evidence of common descent with apes is scattered all through our genome. Evolution-as-fact is as certain as scientific facts get. Evolution-as-theory, that is, how it occurs, is a subject for some small disagreement within the scientific community, but that's not really an area where either of us is qualified to comment.
First off, I have to admit that the 50% statement was more rhetoric than anything else.
That said, I have to disagree with some of your statements. First off, evolution is in no way "as certain as scientific facts get." Whether or not the arguments against it prove true, they are numerous and must be carefully examined before calling evolution true. A nearly certain scientific fact would be, for example, saying that newton's laws of motion hold true for all but extreme values. That is a fact that is pretty much undisputed.
I don't have time to do much searching, but later on I will try to dig up links regarding some of the problems that evolution has. I can't promise that it will be posted soon, since I'm going to be offline most of the rest of today. I'll have it as soon as I can.
Before I leave, I have one question for you and anyone else who is familiar with evolution. I don't lay this out as a challenge to evolution, but as a question that I have honestly wondered about. Different species often have different numbers of chromosomes. Humans, for example, have 46, mice have 40, and fruit flies only have 8. As far as I have seen, the number of chromosomes in an individual differing from species norms is very rare. Furthermore, in most cases where this does occur there is either retardation or undeveloped sexual characteristics. How does evolution account for this?
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
Good summary, Fugu, though we share a disdain for creationism, especially YEC. I was about to do that for ricree but you beat me to it.
When my eight grade science teacher had to teach evolution and creationism, six students were excused by their parents from the lecture on evolution. I therefore excused myself from the lecture on creationism. My dad was called and he laughed in their faces.
I insisted that since we were teaching Christian Myth we needed to cover the creation myths of all the major faiths to be fair.
I think this tactic would work to squeeze the creationists out of the science class. Insist on equal time for Shiva and Brahma and the turtle theory and pretty soon they would all end up in a seperat class where they belong. This method also enshrines the highest ideals of religious tolerance! Pretty slick Huh!
BC
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Actually, there are several quite common chromosomal abnormalities in humans which don't inhibit normal functioning.
Furthermore, there are numerous species which can have diploid or haploid offspring, including startlingly complex species, which function mostly normally, and even some where the diploidy or haploidy breeds true with like. In fact, its long been noticed that closely related species of certain sorts tend to be within a couple of chromosomes of double or half the chromosomes of each other.
Posted by Foust (Member # 3043) on :
I wrote a paper for an American history class on this topic this year. I covered the scientific/ideological/religious roots of both sides, and how the issue has played out in the courts since the Scopes trial.
This issue has been in the courts many times before, and it's always the same.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Most of the time I see Christians complaining about being oppressed, it means that they are being prevented from forcing their religion on other people (just in the example of evolution, there's the Scope's monkey trial).
quote:I'm also worried by the apparent need for a relatively pampered group to nurse a feeling of ubiquitous persecution.
Squicky, you seem to be very good at blatantly ignoring a lot of what goes on in this country. Get this through your head: Christians are being attacked often, and not as you mischaracterized it here.
At one point I listed dozens of cases of Christian groups being discriminated against in schools, many of which got to the appellate level, some to SCOTUS, before they were vindicated. And those were only some of the federal cases.
At UVA, my student activities fees were going to a group that worked actively to promote abortion, another to support gay rights, and a magazine that published anti-Christian articles almost every issue. The first two made anti-Christian comments a regular part of their propoganda. A speech code was promulgated that would have made statements such as "I believe pre-marital sex is immoral" actionable if anyone felt "oppressed" by it. (Yes, that was an actual example in the official comments). It wasn't implemented, because after it got through several official committees we rallied against it.
Why are Christians sensitive to attacks in educational settings? Because we see them constantly.
Dagonee
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
And, to bring it up again, Farmgirl has made accusations that we (and, while I may be wrong, I feel as if I were a primary target) were behaving disrespectfully towards her and ridiculing her beliefs. I'm hoping that either she or someone else could show me where this happened, because I really don't see it.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Ricree, I am quite familiar with the basic strawmen arguments of creationists. They come in three main categories :
Irrelevancies, such as "If evolution is true we cannot behave morally".
Bunk, such as "Radiocarbon dating does not work".
Outright lies, such as "Dinosaur and human footprints were found side by side".
If you have something outside those three, I shall be delighted to hear it. As for your question, I don't see how it is in any way a problem for evolutionary theory (or, to be fair, for ID "theory"), so I don't understand what you mean by accounting for it. You get chromosomal abnormalities when something goes wrong in the copying process, and then you get too much of several kinds of protein. Obviously that causes trouble. The reason it's pretty rare is that creatures with better error-checking mechanisms had more offspring, and passed on their good error checking. Basic differential fitness. Where is the problem?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dag, Could you substantiate your claims that Christians are getting attacked constantly? Because, as I said, I don't see it. There are some instances of this, but taken against the backdrop of priviledged status that Christians enjoy in this country, I don't feel that the attitude of ubiquitous oppression is justified.
And, man, you accusing someone else of ignoring a lot of what goes on? That's terribly ironic.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
There are a large absolute number of "attacks" on christianity, but I'm not so certain its that large in comparison to, say, the inverse occurence.
Posted by Bean Counter (Member # 6001) on :
If you do not want your beliefs to be scorned apply just a bit of... I guess sense to what you believe.
I mean if we postulate that all the fossil, DNA, RNA and biochemical evidence for evolution is a false creation to mislead us from God, then we have an impotent God or a deliberatly deceptive one. It is then a short step to wonder if the Hell of such a God can be less tolerable then his Heaven!
If you dismiss the evidence, without accounting for it, you are not postulating a valid theory, you are not following the scientific method and you do not belong in a science class! (period)
So go away and shame on you for bringing this sillyness before real grown ups!
BC
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
And I'd argue that it's relatively small compared to the number of times Christians have tried, without much justification, to cast things (like for example the judicial philibusters) as an attack on their religion. Or people protesting changing the law in PA to allow liquor stores to sell alcohol on Sunday as being religious oppression because they can't tell other people to follow their religious laws.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Could you substantiate your claims that Christians are getting attacked constantly?
*points to his previous post* Evidence for one four-year period at one institution in America. At that point in time, I was very involved in this issue and heard about it from people at dozens of schools around the country.
quote:Because, as I said, I don't see it. There are some instances of this, but taken against the backdrop of priviledged status that Christians enjoy in this country, I don't feel that the attitude of ubiquitous oppression is justified.
I didn't say an attitude of ubiquitous oppression is justified. I said attacks can be seen constantly.
quote:And, man, you accusing someone else of ignoring a lot of what goes on? That's terribly ironic.
Only because you insist on taking my statements about somethings as proof that I don't know about other things. For example, my stating that many Christians do not oppose gay marriage out of bigotry seems to provoke you into claiming I'm denying that such bigotry exists. It's comforting that you do it to other people, to: for example, Catholics who saw The Passion and were moved by it were somehow ignoring the rest of Christianity by focusing on one element for a brief period of time. Every post I make does not have to be a complete exegesis of every possible subject which you think is related to the one I'm commenting on.
In this instance, you seem to be trying to raise the privileged status of Christians to counter my proposition that "Christians are being attacked often."
Both can be true. Focusing on one does not mean I deny the other.
It's really quite a simple concept.
quote:There are a large absolute number of "attacks" on christianity, but I'm not so certain its that large in comparison to, say, the inverse occurence.
I've made no statement about the frequency of the inverse occurence, have I?
quote:And I'd argue that it's relatively small compared to the number of times Christians have tried, without much justification, to cast things (like for example the judicial philibusters) as an attack on their religion. Or people protesting changing the law in PA to allow liquor stores to sell alcohol on Sunday as being religious oppression because they can't tell other people to follow their religious laws.
Which, of course, has nothing to do with my point above.
Dagonee
[ May 02, 2005, 05:57 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
I see a lot of pushing on both sides.
It seems to me that for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction--if not in physical reality, then certainly in politics.
The secular people push for the absence of religion in their government. The religious see this as an attack on them, and push for prayer in the schools. This goes on and on, and today, more than ever, we see this played out on the national stage.
Most of the problem is a fear of being attacked, and a reaction to that fear in the form of a counter-attack. It doesn't end.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I know you didn't, Dag, but there's a difference between being persecuted and being attacked, and a large part of that difference is how disproportionate the attacks are.
Many Christians have a sense of persecution that I feel is inaccurate.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dag, You've displayed a pretty consistent tendency to twist things to make Christianity look good in most of our conversations about it, such as Galileo or the Crusades. I expect extreme, fact-warping bias from you.
I don't deny that Christians get attacked, never have. However, as I've said, they are a relatively priviledged group and, from what I've seen, the majority of times they've played the attack card were not really justified.
edit: And seriously, those are not accurate descriptions of our interplay on those issues. I realize that we both tend to miscontrue the other and I think you've done it to me there.
[ May 02, 2005, 06:11 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Bean Counter (Member # 6001) on :
I have seen that science is taught backwards. I am so excited about the discovery of the Black Holes already pointing to proff of String Theory, (Well M-Theory) it may be that we can start teaching science 'ab inito' rather then jumping around and leaving people with such huge gaps in their understanding. Science may soon be taught starting with space time and going up to theories of consiousness and cosmology. We do ourselves no favors by sarting in the middle.
BC
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
There is a schism which I think will characterize American politics for a long time to come, and it is clearly seen in this thread. One side simply discounts the position of the other side, despite clear examples and anecdotal evidence brought to bear.
Here are a few points which seem clear to me:
1) Anyone with a minority opinion will always feel that their adversaries have an unfair advantage, whether they actually do or not.
2) There has been a huge, ongoing cultural shift away from nearly universally shared (Christian) values to...I don't think anyone really knows what. Perhaps it is best characterized by a shifting sandy plain of relativistic values which are constantly redefined. Those who still hold the old values see this as something to be resisted, and many of them do.
3) Christians as a group have historically not voted as a block or exercised much political clout. How could they when the opposition were also Christians? Recent trends away from traditionally Christian morality have galvanized many Christian groups who oppose those trends. It seems likely that the more those who wish to change the old views of morality push for adoption of a new value system, the more strenuously Christian groups are likely to oppose them.
4) Evolution means many things to many people. If you assert that "evolution is 100% proven", or something to that effect, chances are that you mean speciation has been proven. The theory of evolution has absolutely no power to explain certain things such as abiogenesis. And short of the invention of a time machine, it is unlikely that it ever will. The process of evolution is also much debated by those who care about such things. There have been a number of different suggested models, but once again, without a time machine or a few hundred million years of data, there is simply no way to come to a sound conclusion which is applicable to all species. Hence, people who do not buy evolution lock, stock and barrel are not necessarily uneducated fools. They do not necessarily ignore scientific data. In some cases they may even be scientists who happen not to agree with other scientists.
To me the two sides of the issue look like this: Christians who feel that their very way of life is threatened by those who wish to completely overturn the old social order.
On the other side are those who are afraid that Christians will use their numerical superiority to either take away recently gained rights (or at least culturally acceptable actions) or to disallow future changes to the law (and by extension the cultural climate).
To me it seems unlikely that this schism will be resolved. Gains by either side must come at the expense of the opposite group.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:And seriously, those are not accurate descriptions of our interplay on those issues. I realize that we both tend to miscontrue the other and I think you've done it to me there.
Yes, they are. It's a fairly constant thing you do to me.
quote:You've displayed a pretty consistent tendency to twist things to make Christianity look good in most of our conversations about it, such as Galileo or the Crusades. I expect extreme, fact-warping bias from you.
No, I've displayed a pretty consistent tendency to refuse to let you redefine what I'm saying and then attack that redefined statement.
Dagonee
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Jacare -- minor point, the theory of evolution makes no attempt to explain abiogenesis, its not of any concern to it, so the lack of explanatory power over abiogenesis means absolutely nothing. The theory of abiogenesis works to explain abiogenesis, and while its necessarily impossible to be sure, we've got some pretty darn good ideas that are consistent with what we know of reality.
As for the notion of increased secularization, one quite interesting thing is its not born out by the data, which has led to some very interesting new theories on the subject (take a look at Stark & Finke's work).
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
quote:Jacare -- minor point, the theory of evolution makes no attempt to explain abiogenesis, its not of any concern to it, so the lack of explanatory power over abiogenesis means absolutely nothing. The theory of abiogenesis works to explain abiogenesis, and while its necessarily impossible to be sure, we've got some pretty darn good ideas that are consistent with what we know of reality.
As for the notion of increased secularization, one quite interesting thing is its not born out by the data, which has led to some very interesting new theories on the subject (take a look at Stark & Finke's work).
Fugu- like I said, evolution is many things to many people. Your point is at least as correct as mine about speciation, but the fact is that evolution and abiogenesis are at the very least philosophically linked by many people as, at least in these sort of debates, evolution is seen as the theory about how life, in all of its variety, originated, without invoking a supreme being.
As far as increased secularization goes- it all depends on definitions, again (wow, I sound like Tresopax). However, clearly American society is much more accepting of behaviors which are contrary to Christian morals than it once was.
[ May 02, 2005, 06:31 PM: Message edited by: Jacare Sorridente ]
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
America hasn't been around particularly long
Take a look at, for instance, village mores in certain periods in Europe, and you'll see that adherence to typical Christian mores is something that goes in and out of practice depending on a number of factors which are largely independent of both the "expressions of religiosity" among the populace and church attendance. Its really a fascinating thing to study. Of course, this is quite a sidetrack, so I'll try to avoid getting too involved
While many people consider evolution and abiogenesis the same thing, there're actually a decently significant number of people who accept evolution and reject abiogenesis.
Not to mention that no matter what lay people think, the theory of evolution doesn't explain abiogenesis because the origin of life is independent of the change in existing life (which is what evolution is concerned with). And the theory of abiogenesis does have explanatory power for the origins of life (how much is open for debate, of course).
And I do find it amusing how people have such a problem with evolution not invoking a supreme being, when none of the scientific theories they readily accept do.
[ May 02, 2005, 06:39 PM: Message edited by: fugu13 ]
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:And I do find it amusing how people have such a problem with evolution not invoking a supreme being, when none of the scientific theories they readily accept do.
The problem isn't that it doesn't invoke a supreme being, but that it is often taught or presented that evolution invokes the lack of a supreme being. Few other scientific ideas are presented that way.
For example, I have never heard anything remotely similar to "Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it, therefore there is no God."
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Oh yes, I readily agree that's quite silly, as I stated the first time you brought it up in this thread .
I predict there are many more people opposed to evolution claiming it involves rejecting God than people in support of evolution.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:I predict there are many more people opposed to evolution claiming it involves rejecting God than people in support of evolution.
I predict the opposite. Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
(that is, than in support of evolution and claiming evolution involves rejecting god. silly unclearness of sentence construction).
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
quote: America hasn't been around particularly long [Wink] Take a look at, for instance, village mores in certain periods in Europe, and you'll see that adherence to typical Christian mores is something that goes in and out of practice depending on a number of factors which are largely independent of both the "expressions of religiosity" among the populace and church attendance. Its really a fascinating thing to study. Of course, this is quite a sidetrack, so I'll try to avoid getting too involved [Wink]
Granted. However, in Christianity the emphasis is often on personal morality. Historical trends are more or less meaningless in individual terms.
quote:While many people consider evolution and abiogenesis the same thing, there're actually a decently significant number of people who accept evolution and reject abiogenesis.
True enough.
quote: Not to mention that no matter what lay people think, the theory of evolution doesn't explain abiogenesis because the origin of life is independent of the change in existing life (which is what evolution is concerned with). And the theory of abiogenesis does have explanatory power for the origins of life (how much is open for debate, of course).
The link is, I think, more tight than you portray. In order for abiogenesis to be viable there has to be a mechanism for selection and propagation of self-replicators- evolution. Abiogenesis as a theory requires 1) the initial self-replicator and 2) propagation, selection and modification of that replicator.
quote: And I do find it amusing how people have such a problem with evolution not invoking a supreme being, when none of the scientific theories they readily accept do.
It is rather amusing. I am also amused by folks that believe that saying God did something also indicates how he did it. If I say "John built a house" should one assume that he used no materials and no tools to do so? <shrug>
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
quote: The problem isn't that it doesn't invoke a supreme being, but that it is often taught or presented that evolution invokes the lack of a supreme being. Few other scientific ideas are presented that way.
For example, I have never heard anything remotely similar to "Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it, therefore there is no God."
Good point.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:It is rather amusing. I am also amused by folks that believe that saying God did something also indicates how he did it. If I say "John built a house" should one assume that he used no materials and no tools to do so? <shrug>
Of course, if you said that he did it in six days, and rested on the seventh, then it's not unreasonable to assume that he didn't use any method that takes longer than that.
edit: than vs. then
[ May 02, 2005, 06:55 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
If you look at everyone, there's a lot more people with the right belief set to argue that God is a reason to reject evolution than has better odds of being right.
But, if you look at just scientists, it goes the other way, and the 'shroom has better odds of being right.
What's amazing is how the percentage of theistic evolutionists is constant between scientists and the population as a whole.
Dagonee
[ May 02, 2005, 07:03 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Except that I'd hope most scientists would be educated enough on the nature of science to understand it didn't cover much of the supernatural as commonly understood in religion, whereas most people who oppose evolution lack the education in science to understand why scientific theories don't involve the necessary rejection of God (indeed, any theory which is scientific cannot necessarily reject God).
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Dag, I'm sorry, but that whole post made no sense to me. Could you perhaps rephrase the first sentence for clarity?
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
quote: Of course, if you said that he did it in six days, and rested on the seventh, than it's not unreasonable to assume that he didn't use any method that takes longer than that.
I disagree for two reasons: 1) Translation. As I understand it the word used in Hebrew has several potential meanings.
2) There is no reason to assume that a more powerful being no longer has to follow a process.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
Um, I thought we were talking about John who built a house.
You didn't tell me he said it in Hebrew or that he is a more powerful being.
[ May 02, 2005, 07:21 PM: Message edited by: Portabello ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Dag, I'm sorry, but that whole post made no sense to me. Could you perhaps rephrase the first sentence for clarity?
"Here are some figures" is confusing?
According to the link, 44% of Americans believe in young earth creationism and 10% in naturalistic (nontheistic) evolution. This means there are a lot more possible people who reject evolution because it would deny God than who reject God because he is denied by evolution.
Edit: The percentages flip when discussing scientists.
Dagonee
[ May 02, 2005, 07:46 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
quote: For example, I have never heard anything remotely similar to "Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it, therefore there is no God."
No, but I've heard the second law proves the existence of God as the only possible prime mover.
******** As far as the persecution issue goes, you could call it a chicken and egg scenario, with each side escalating the persecution at every step. But Christianity came before Darwinist evolutionary theory, so we do have a starting point for reference. Prior to Darwin, no one would have called it "creationism," they simply would have said that was how the earth was created.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:No, but I've heard the second law proves the existence of God as the only possible prime mover.
This is the one that confuses me the most. And it keeps popping up.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Yes, or the ones who keep saying the second law of thermodynamics disproves evolution . . . even after having it explained in really simple terms why that's poppycock.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
"The Sun! You're forgetting about the Sun!"
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
My favorite is the way many Intelligent Design theorists ignore, obfuscate or flat-out contradict basic axioms and definitions of information theory in their proofs.
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
I wasn't aware that Intelligent Design theorists had done any proofs.
For that matter, I wasn't aware that there are any Intelligent Design theorists.
From what I can tell, Intelligent Design proponents simply claim that the probability of life without an intelligent designer is "vanishingly small." That's not much to go on.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
quote:Prior to Darwin, no one would have called it "creationism," they simply would have said that was how the earth was created.
Point of order. Darwin didn't really have anything to say about how the earth was created -- just about how all the different species on earth came to be.
Posted by Pelegius (Member # 7868) on :
It is always a shock to find that these 19th century mindsets are still alive in the Wrold today. Incidently, the 19th century was when myn faith accepted evolution. But the againg, Darwin was himself an Anglican Priest, so that probably helped.
Posted by Bean Counter (Member # 6001) on :
The theory is based on statistical rates of change or mutatation and assumptions about them with various constants, What is seen as proof is the difficulty of finding values that are not 'as close to the maximum possible' as possible.
BC
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Actually, theories of change in species and especially old earth theories were around long before darwin. He was just the first one with a credible way to explain species change.
But old earth theories have been around ever since intelligent people looked at the Grand Canyon and the like and realized the arrangement could only have resulted from a very, very long time period and not a catastrophic global flood.
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
quote: Point of order. Darwin didn't really have anything to say about how the earth was created -- just about how all the different species on earth came to be.
True, but the point being that the labeling of "creationism" (which does include the creation of the earth) is contrasted with the "darwinism" label, which is associated with all kinds of scientific proof of an "old earth."
Collectively, religious creation arguments predate scientific ones. 'sall I'm sayin'
Posted by Glenn Arnold (Member # 3192) on :
quote:What is seen as proof is the difficulty of finding values that are not 'as close to the maximum possible' as possible.
As you say, "what is seen as proof" is not proof at all. And without a testable hypothesis, ID doesn't come close to being a theory.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Considering we knowingly don't have the ability to make more than the vaguest guesses about the overall probability of various occurences, much less the overall probability of evolution producing some output, that's not a proof, that's a wish.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
I think the argument about creationism and evolution is quite easy to solve. Make creationism withstand the same rigorous tests/scrutiny that its proponents want to use AGAINST evolution. If it stands up, then it really should be taught alongside evolutionary theory.
I personally don't think it has a snowball's chance of making it past the first few obvious inquiries, but that's the beauty of the scientific method. Someone will find a way to generate testable hypotheses, conduct the appropriate studies, and produce the results for a panel of peers to scrutinize.
The average school board member, if you'll pardon a gross over-generalization, doesn't have the knowledge to make the kinds of decisions that would actually affect curriculum in most subject areas, and in science in particular.
Members of state board of education, judges and others in the government are similarly under-educated in the appropriate scientific disciplines to effectively take part in this decision.
Sadly, a lack of knowledge has never stopped the parties from turning in a decision.
Oh well.
At least the Bible can't be misinterpreted by people, and thus is not prone to misuse or abuse in the name of Godliness. Not like those other holy scriptures SOME poor beknighted cultures use to run THEIR pitiful countries.
Posted by Joldo (Member # 6991) on :
It doesn't matter what the legislature decides. No doubt if they attempt to implement this in public schools, someone will take it to court (and if they don't, I'll move to Kansas and do so myself) and this will never stand up past any higher court. Recall that the Supreme Court doesn't worry about reelection.
Still, it does make a frightening precedent. I've never had a teacher who tried to teach anti-religion, though I've had a few who fed us ID (and were promptly attacked from all sides by IB kids who thought you shouldn't be able to do that kind of thing in school).
Posted by ssywak (Member # 807) on :
Bob,
Beknighted or Besotted?
Or ill-begotten?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Actually, come to think of it, I think the proper word is "benighted." Ooops.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
"IB kids"?? Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"I didn't say an attitude of ubiquitous oppression is justified. I said attacks can be seen constantly."
Ants often march across our kitchen. I have many, many ways to exterminate them, and often succeed in wiping 'em out for a time, but the ants always come back. Clearly, I should feel threatened by the ants.
Seriously, the areligious pose no real threat to the Christian way of life; it's only Christian paranoia, coupled with a need for a persecution complex in order to maintain community, that makes it seem that way.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Well, actually, I don't know. If you are saying the Christian community is so weakened that it needs to resort to desperation tactics like creating a sense of persecution, doesn't that mean they are in some sense justified in doing so? That is, if you need to scare people into staying by telling them your community is under attack, doesn't that mean it really is disintegrating, even if it's not external attack that's causing it?
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
Actually, there's a long, long history of persecution in Christianity. One might simply assume that it has become so ingrained to assume that there IS persecution that this colors Christians' perception of the world around us. It's subliminable.
That doesn't mean the church is disintegrating. It means that people haven't stepped outside the tradition to objectively evaluate reality.
Some evidence in favor of this view can be found in various sects within Christianity which, though once small and persecuted, are now major forces both in terms of sheer numbers of members and in terms of economic and political power. The members of which still talk as if they were the underdog and not, in many ways, the overwhelmingly large force that their denomination has truly become.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Come now. Christian sects have been persecuted, certainly, but Christianity as such has been dominant since Constantine, at the very least. Surely you cannot be postulating an institutional memory stretching back the better part of two thousand years? Even the two hundred since the founding of the US is stretching it a bit.
Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
KoM...I'm just making an observation.
There's a persecution meme surrounding Christianity. It may even stretch back further than that, with the continuity of the persecution meme arising out of Jewish tradition.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Neither here nor there, but "dominant since Constantine" seems a stretch.
Christians didn't really start grasping any real world power until the 15th century. Before then, it was a Muslim show. Christians fought a defensive war against Muslims for hundreds of years, but were never militarily dominant.
If you mean they were dominant in numbers, that's different, but I don't think numbers is as significant as power.
And this is also neither here nor there, but I'd wager at LEAST 50% of the persecuting and mass killing done during the time of Christendom's height were committed by Christians on Christians.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
I meant dominant as a force within European and Western society, rather than as the primary ethos of global powers.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Seriously, the areligious pose no real threat to the Christian way of life; it's only Christian paranoia, coupled with a need for a persecution complex in order to maintain community, that makes it seem that way.
Sure, ignore the actual threats I've posted about.
UVA spent 3/4 of a million dollars to attempt to avoid giving our magazine $2500 a year. I've posted dozens of cases where schools try to discriminate against the religious - many of which have to go to the appellate level to get justice. That's not even mentioning the times it happens when the people just give in.
The attacks happened. Had people not fought back - people who donated a hell of a lot of time and money with no guarantee of ever getting reimbursed - then the attacks would have succeeded. That's not paranoia.
Can you find examples of Christians being paranoid about it? Sure.
And I can round up more than a few examples of anti-religious-activists being paranoid about Christian activities.
Dagonee
Posted by Foust (Member # 3043) on :
Half the problem is that Christians in the west - especially so in America - have spent the last century crying wolf. I admit, I am predisposed to ignore Christian cries of persecution - because so often in the past and the present, it's been nothing but the paranoia others have mentioned.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"Sure, ignore the actual threats I've posted about."
You call that a threat? Show me an atheist federal Senator and I'll pretend to care.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Of course atheists and atheism pose a threat to Christianity, Tom-I'm surprised you would claim otherwise.
Right now, in the present, the threat posed is minimal. But turn back the clock two centuries, then one century, then five decades, then one decade, then five years, to now, and you'll see that atheism and the 'areligious' do pose a very obvious, potent, and growing threat to Christianity-indeed to all religions, but it just so happens that we're talking about America, which is primarily a Christian bastion as far as religions are concerned.
And you're being pretty dismissive of Dagonee's point. People wanted threats, threats were listed. Now they're not big enough threats.
Anyway, I think I could point to several atheist Senators and Congressmembers who happen to go to church on Sunday or profess Christianity. I tend to believe national-level politicians believe in little but themselves, for all intents and purposes.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:You call that a threat? Show me an atheist federal Senator and I'll pretend to care.
Well, yes, I call it a threat when my free speech rights are interefered with because of my religion. Silly me.
If something can't be a threat to me because there are worse threats to other, then you have no cause to say atheists are threatened in this country.
For the last f&^%$ing time, something worse happening to someone else does not somehow prove that something bad isn't happening to another group.
Dagonee
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"For the last f&^%$ing time, something worse happening to someone else does not somehow prove that something bad isn't happening to another group."
Ah. But, again, let's go back to the ants:
Yeah, I have to stomp the occasional ant to keep the kitchen clean. But it's hardly reasonable for me to complain to my wife that the damn ants are vying for control of my own house; there's simply no basis for comparison.
The occasional Christian has his feelings hurt and/or has to remind people of his rights. Yeah, it's a shame. I wipe a tear.
But to be fair, let's say we've reached the situation we have in this country -- where the ants are fairly numerous and have demanded the right to cross the counter unscathed, in return for which they won't eat anything off the dinner plates (although they'll take whatever isn't nailed down.) Would I feel threatened? Irrationally, yes; I'd've lost ground, and every ant I'd see would be a reminder that I didn't have complete control over my own environment. But even if a single ant occasionally freaked out and tried to grab something off a plate, we're still so far from parity that my reaction isn't likely to be appropriate.
--------
"I think I could point to several atheist Senators and Congressmembers who happen to go to church on Sunday or profess Christianity."
Perhaps. But the very fact that they feel the need to profess Christianity and attend church is further proof of my point.
[ May 04, 2005, 10:06 AM: Message edited by: TomDavidson ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
So these atheist Senators are, in fact, being forced to deny their faith in order to have a political career; and you complain that they are a threat to your faith? Dag, that is utterly arrogant and dishonest. Get some perspective.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
And my point, Tom, is that undeniably the need for that has been diminishing as time passes, and shows no signs of slowing down.
I'm not saying it is a bad thing that it's happening, but I don't think you can really argue that Christianity isn't threatened by the 'areligious' just because the threat isn't that serious now.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:But it's hardly reasonable for me to complain to my wife that the damn ants are vying for control of my own house; there's simply no basis for comparison.
Yes, let's go back to your analogy that you made in direct response to one of my posts yet that is irrelevant to the point I made.
The threats exist. Without organizations like the Rutherford Institute and the Center for Individual Rights, those threats would have been successful.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
First of all, KoM, it wasn't Dagonee who said that.
Second, I doubt you even know what my faith is.
Third, I am well aware of the perspective, as I've pointed out more than once. By the perspective you are pointing out, I could watch the water rise for an hour on the beach and rest assured that change wasn't imminent.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:So these atheist Senators are, in fact, being forced to deny their faith in order to have a political career; and you complain that they are a threat to your faith? Dag, that is utterly arrogant and dishonest.
I didn't claim they were a threat to my faith. I said they were a threat to my civil liberties. And the Supreme Court agreed, although 3 lower courts didn't.
quote: Get some perspective.
I'll get some perspective when you learn to read.
Dagonee
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:But to be fair, let's say we've reached the situation we have in this country -- where the ants are fairly numerous and have demanded the right to cross the counter unscathed, in return for which they won't eat anything off the dinner plates (although they'll take whatever isn't nailed down.) Would I feel threatened? Irrationally, yes; I'd've lost ground, and every ant I'd see would be a reminder that I didn't have complete control over my own environment. But even if a single ant occasionally freaked out and tried to grab something off a plate, we're still so far from parity that my reaction isn't likely to be appropriate.
They haven't agreed not to take anything off our dinner plates. There are organizations dedicated to taking kicking us out of the kitchen. They win about half the time in our courts.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
"They haven't agreed not to take anything off our dinner plates."
I wasn't clear enough in my analogy. Your dinner plates are, of course, your constitutional rights, to which people of any faith are entitled.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
And my point is, and always has been, that there are systematic attempts to take those constitutional rights away. That's the threat. It's real, and it requires the maintenance of organizations dedicated to combat it.
If you have to keep a weapon at the ready to protect something, then it's threatened. In this case, without those weapons (the organizations), the dinner would have been taken from lots of people.
Dagonee
Posted by Traveler (Member # 3615) on :
I don't see how not teaching creationism in PUBLIC schools impacts anyones constitutional rights.
If we were to teach creationism and not evolution THAT would be a clear violation of the separation of church and state. Unless we teach ALL creationism stories of all religions AND evolution...but I never hear anyone arguing for the inclusion of Hindu, Native American, or any other religions creationism stories.
The government can not promote one religion over all others in a public institution...and that seems to be what people want when the argue for creationism being taught.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:I don't see how not teaching creationism in PUBLIC schools impacts anyones constitutional rights.
If that was in response to me, I haven't said that it does.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
So, Dag, how about the constant attempts to have creationism and ID taught in public schools? Does that threaten our constitutional rights? How about yon pldege of allegiance, putting people "under God" - a god in whom many do not believe? This is not just a threat, but an actual violation of the right to freedom of religion - including freedom from other people's religion. I look forward to you showing some similarly widespread attack on Christianity.
Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
*fluff alert*fluff alert*fluff alert*
From "Random Jesseisms" at sakeriver:
quote: I don't give a [darn] because I know that ants can't afford PCP.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:So, Dag, how about the constant attempts to have creationism and ID taught in public schools? Does that threaten our constitutional rights? How about yon pldege of allegiance, putting people "under God" - a god in whom many do not believe? This is not just a threat, but an actual violation of the right to freedom of religion - including freedom from other people's religion. I look forward to you showing some similarly widespread attack on Christianity.
Why do you look forward to that? Do you think my contentions somehow depend on my ability to do that?
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Are you even listening, King of Men? Dagonee has not said (and he's tired of saying it, I'm sure) that there aren't widespread attacks on the 'areligious'. Constant harping on this point is tiresome and irrelevant.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Yes, in fact they do. You started out this path by telling me I was willifully blind to reality because I took objection to porter's statement that our society has treated Christians poorly for so long by saying that most of the time I see Christians complaining about being attacked, it's really because they are not allowed to force their religion on other people. You then claimed that Christians are often attacked and that they justifiably think that they are constantly under attack.
Now, you've backed off of this to saying "Christians are attacked sometimes.", which is something I don't think anyone is going to dispute (although I'll grant you that some of the stuff people said might make it seem like they were). But yeah, I certainly never suggested otherwise.
What I said and still stand by is the thing that you claimed means that I am blind to reality, which is that the claim that Christians have been treated on the whole poorly by society is not correct and that the majority of times that Christians complain about being attacked, it really means that they are being prevented from forcing other people to do what they want, such as being "attacked" by people (such as John Scopes) teaching actual science in science class.
You need to make up your mind. Are you saying that Christians are being oppressed and anyone who says otherwise is just an anti-Christian bigot or are you saying that Christians are sometimes unjustifiably attacked, in which case yu don't have a good argument against what most of the people are saying (and I think you owe me and apology)?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:anyone who says otherwise is just an anti-Christian bigot
you want to know why you piss me off so much, Squick: here's why. Have I intimated anyone in this thread who's been disagreeing with me is an anti-Christian bigot?
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dag, Yeah, what I took out of your accustaion was the implication that I willfully ignore reality because of an antipathy towards Christians. To me, that's calling me an anti-Christian bigot. Maybe I read you wrong, but I feel like that's pretty much what you were trying to imply.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
And constantly is perfectly apt - there's at least one of these cases somewhere in process at any given time. Many (most) of them don't get to court.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Bullcrap. While semantically correct, that's not what the word meant in that context and you know it. You could just as easily saying that people are constantly dying of tetanus, because there's always at least one person who's got it.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Yeah, what I took out of your accustaion was the implication that I willfully ignore reality because of an antipathy towards Christians. To me, that's calling me an anti-Christian bigot. Maybe I read you wrong, but I feel like that's pretty much what you were trying to imply.
You added the "because of an antipathy towards Christians." Same thing you did in the very first thread I ever interacted with you in.
You also added the willfully, but that arguably could be inferred from my post.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Bullcrap. While semantically correct, that's not what the word meant in that context and you know it. You could just as easily saying that people are constantly dying of tetanus, because there's always at least one person who's got it.
Bullcrap. It's exactly what I meant, and the context is entirely there in my post. I specified the types of attacks I was thinking of.
If the defending of the discriminatory, unconstitutional polices doesn't count as part of the attack, then the only alternative I see is the initiation of the policy. Unless you thought I meant that every second of every day a principal or dean was initiating such a policy, you have no grounds to stand on. And if you did think that, then you need more reading comprehension classes than I thought.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Yeah, I did. Because one of the things you do is imply things that you don't explicitly state, or at least so it appears to me. Are you saying that you thought I was ignoring this for some other reason than that? What reason would that be?
And, incidentally, are you actually going to address the points I made about the difference between persecution and sometimes attacks and the unjustified "They won't let us tell people what to do." persecution complex?
[ May 04, 2005, 12:44 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Yeah, I did. Because one of the things you do is imply things that you don't explicitly state. Are you saying that you thought I was ignoring this for some other reason than that? What reason would that be?
I implied nothing of the kind. I didn't speculate. I could think of lots of reasons other than anti-Christian bigotry. Ignorance springs readily to mind. I don't know what your particular reason for doing so is.
quote:And, incidentally, are you actually going to address the points I made about the difference between persecution and sometimes attacks and the unjustified "They won't let us tell people what to do." persecution complex?
I don't care about that point. I wasn't directly refuting it. I was pointing out a class of attacks that seemed to have escaped your notice.
Dagonee
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I'll see your bullcrap and raise you another bullcrap. The way you used it was that Christians were justified in thinking that people were constantly attacking them, not that there was always at least one attack around somewhere.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Because they are constantly being attacked. In a documentable, specific way.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
But then you weren't addressing my point (or most other people's points), because I (and they) never denied that those attacks existed. What we were saying was a very different thing that you haven't then touched on at all.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
But then, again, you've switched from one use of constantly to another. You have shown (well not shown as much, but I'll grant that it's likely true) that there is at least one case in the court system at any one time. But that does not in fact support the idea that Christians are constantly being attacked any more than one person always having tetanus at any one time supports saying that people are constantly dying of tetanus.
[ May 04, 2005, 12:56 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
Out of curiosity, is it fun for you two to continue talking past each other?
Edit: spelling
[ May 04, 2005, 12:55 PM: Message edited by: saxon75 ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
You are the only person I've responded to who wasn't addressing my posts.
"[M]ost other people's points" that I've been addressing have been people posting reasons why anti-Christians are attacked or threatened by Christians more than Christians are attacked or threatened by anti-Christians. And those posts have been in response to my posts. I've been dealing with them as responses to my posts.
As for my first post in response to you, I've already said, "I wasn't directly refuting it. I was pointing out a class of attacks that seemed to have escaped your notice."
You claimed that "most of what I've seen is of type X." I posted a string of examples and a category of very common attacks that are not of type X. I don't know if it tips the balance; I do know it's not a trivial amount.
Dagonee
[ May 04, 2005, 01:02 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Dear me, Dags, calm down. When you get to the point of writing "Canti-hristians" you know that the discussion is not doing your blood pressure any good.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:But that does not in fact support the idea that Christians are constantly being attacked any more than one person always having tetanus at any one time supports saying that people are constantly dying of tetanus.
But it would be correct to say that people are constantly fighting tetanus infections. And if tetanus were 100% fatal, then it would be support for that proposition.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:As for my first post in response to you, I've already said, "I wasn't directly refuting it. I was pointing out a class of attacks that seemed to have escaped your notice."
You claimed that "most of what I've seen is of type X." I posted a string of examples and a category of very common attacks that are not of type X. I don't know if it tips the balance; I do know it's not a trivial amount.
Come on. You said this:
quote:Squicky, you seem to be very good at blatantly ignoring a lot of what goes on in this country. Get this through your head: Christians are being attacked often, and not as you mischaracterized it here.
You were trying to refute what I was saying and imply that I was motivated in my ignorance. Either stand behind what you wrote or say you were mistaken, but don't expect me to believe that it was meant as a "Oh, I don't know if you are aware of it, but there are some cases that might affect your view of the situation."
As I said, I stand behind what I said. You had a problem with it when I first posted. Do you still have a problem with it now, or were you wrong then?
edit: KOM, Dag made a slip of the finger. Chill out already.
[ May 04, 2005, 01:08 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
I think MrSquicky's the one mostly doing the talking past, though Dag's done a bit. Either way, though, the productive part of this conversation got passed long ago.
Posted by Suneun (Member # 3247) on :
Out of curiosity, do you (any of you) think that women are attacked or treated unfairly because of their gender more or less than christians are because of their religion?
BTW Dag, when you talk about freedom of speech are you actually referring to the UVA case? Because while it's discriminatory for the activities office not to give the magazine money, I can't see how that act restricts free speech.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I actually had no hope of affecting your view of the situation. I was hoping that the mischaracterization you were making wouldn't be accepted by other readers.
I totally stand behind what I wrote. The only thing that kept me from outright calling you a liar was that you included "Most of the time I see". Which left open the possibility that you just aren't seeing these episodes, although I find it doubtful.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:But it would be correct to say that people are constantly fighting tetanus infections. And if tetanus were 100% fatal, then it would be support for that proposition.
No, it wouldn't The use of the word constantly in that context means that it is a set of cases that are happening very often. Using it in a situation where there are few cases, but where the cases, due to their duration, overlap, is not tenable.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
Suneun: its a freedom of speech issue because the reason they were being denied funds was the speech they wished to make (with public funds that had been set aside for, among other things, students to learn how to run a newspaper, which activity is not dependent on the speech in the newspaper).
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:BTW Dag, when you talk about freedom of speech are you actually referring to the UVA case? Because while it's discriminatory for the activities office not to give the magazine money, I can't see how that act restricts free speech.
Yes, I am referring to the UVa case, among dozens of others. Denial of a government benefit on the basis of the content of speech is legally considered a restriction on free speech. The Court has ruled that most of the justifications that might be present in a high school or elementary school setting don't exist in college. And UVA had a policy of not exerting editorial control over any student-run publication. I've stated before my preference is to avoid government funding of purely expressive activities. But if the funding exists, the eligibility criteria must be content neutral.
In other cases, the actual restriction on speech are even more blatant: banning of Christian fliers from general purpose bulletin boards, etc.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:No, it wouldn't The use of the word constantly in that context means that it is a set of cases that are happening very often. Using it in a situation where there are few cases, but where the cases, due to their duration, overlap, is not tenable.
Whatever. I used other temporal frequency descriptions in that same post - "often." I stand by the post, I stand by often, and I stand by Christians seeing the attacks constantly.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
See, there you go. So you disagree with my assessment that the majority of cases are of Christians complaining about not being allowed to force their views on others because of these cases. And you think that my reasons for saying so were of low moral character, but you didn't want to say it outright, so you only implied it.
Can you in any way substantiate that was I said was a mischaracterization, which, if you look back is what I asked you to do and which you then said wasn't revelant to what you were saying?
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
Dags, dude, the most important thing for a lawyer to learn (if you're going to be doing any trial work, or work with people in general) is the art of understanding how people think. I'm not sure why you think that they will hear and understand what you say with perfect clarity.
If I were you, I'd spend my time at Hatrack learning how people interpret, or misinterpret what I say and why. And how you can change what you say or how you say it so that they take away what you wanted them to. Because even though you are precise with your language, your readers (or juries) are still going to fill in any perceived blanks what they want. And you aren't going to be in the jury room to correct them about all the words you didn't say.
They are going to hear the exact words you said and believe you've said something completely different. That's what would concern me. We already know you know how to argue technically. Now, can you learn to shape your arguments so that the most ignorant are hearing what you are trying to say?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:See, there you go. So you disagree with my assessment that the majority of cases are of Christians complaining about not being allowed to force their views on others because of these cases. And you think that my reasons for saying so were of low moral character, but you didn't want to say it outright, so you only implied it.
I did not imply it. I specifically avoided commenting on your motives, a courtesy you've denied me in the past.
[ May 04, 2005, 01:30 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Kayla, One of my arguments with Dag is that he already does that. He uses implication carefully to say thing he doesn't want to come out and say.
In this case, he went from "I wasn't trying to refute what you were saying and how can you say I implied that you were a bigot." to "I was trying to refute what you were saying. It was a mischaracteization and I was coming from the perspective that you were a liar." in the space of a few minutes, and apparently, I'm the one who's off-base.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Damn, I wish this forum had an ignore feature.
Posted by Portabello (Member # 7710) on :
Maybe somebody could create a firefox extension that does that.
Posted by fugu13 (Member # 2859) on :
You can find that control just behind your right ear . . . well, if you're a Soong-type android.
Posted by no. 6 (Member # 7753) on :
quote: So you disagree with my assessment that the majority of cases are of Christians complaining about not being allowed to force their views on others because of these cases.
Much as I am annoyed as any other athiest about Christian ideology in pamphlets and gratutous Sunday Morning Programming in America, I do not think that they are forcing their ideas on others. I can still choose to throw away pamplets with any other junk mail. I don't have to watch their programming which labels me as one of the problems with society. I have a problem with being demonized by them in that way. Personally, I have a complete set of morals which I adhere to very strictly, just as they do. And my system of morality is just (or to myself more) valid.
I don't like the fact that they included "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance. I simply skip that part when I am saying it. It is offensive to me, however. I don't like the idea because Christians might be offended if someone put "created by Vishnu" in the pledge, and that doesn't show parity. The idea that it could represent all Gods is vacuuous at best, and does offend those of us who believe that there is no such diety.
edit:errant parentheses.
[ May 04, 2005, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: no. 6 ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Most of the time I see Christians complaining about being oppressed, it means that they are being prevented from forcing their religion on other people (just in the example of evolution, there's the Scope's monkey trial). Occasionally, they're getting their feelings hurt, like in Porter's example, but yeah, I don't know how I'd call characterize that as being treated poorly for so long.
You presented two categories of instances where Christians said they were oppressed: not being allowed to force views on others and feelings being hurt, leaving out a very major one - outright denial of constitutionally protected rights. This is the mischaracterization I was correcting. That there's a third category, and it is extensive.
I left the second line out of the quote in the initial post.
[ May 04, 2005, 01:35 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Yes, and as I said in a post above that one:
quote:I'm not going to deny that there are plenty of people who are irrationally and irresponsibly opposing religion
Christians do in fact get attacked. I never denied it. Though nowhere near as involved in it as you, I was in fact aware that these cases existed. If you could demonstrate, as I asked, that they really do, as you said, make what I said a mischaracterization, I would admit it and change my view. However, you've haven't made an attempt to do this, at least in past because you seemed more concerned in denying that you were trying to refute what I said.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:I'm not going to deny that there are plenty of people who are irrationally and irresponsibly opposing religion
Which doesn't acknowledge that there are results other than hurt feelings.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Nor does it or anything else I said in any way preclude that.
Because this seems to be the thread for me to repost things, Dag, you said:
quote:Every post I make does not have to be a complete exegesis of every possible subject which you think is related to the one I'm commenting on.
Does that not apply to me? Because, if you said, "Hey Squicky, you're leaving out cases where their Constitutional rights were being stepped on." I would have replied, "Yeah, they exist, but in regards to the whole, I think that they (along with the other serious threats) are present a great deal less than Christians make out."
[ May 04, 2005, 01:52 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Yep. That's true. I'm telling you why I posted what I did. This is the first time you've acknowledged such cases, which, as I said, I didn't even expect you to do.
Good.
Posted by UofUlawguy (Member # 5492) on :
Amazing. This is an issue I care deeply about, and have studied in some depth, and yet I am completely bored and turned off by the present discussion of it.
You guys killed it. Took all the fun, interest and passion out of it. Bummer.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Ok, so now that I'm not some Christian hating person with no integrity, can you present me with reasons why I should accept what I said as a mischaracterization of the situation?
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:Ok, so now that I'm not some Christian hating person with no integrity...
Nope. I'm done with you. I've never called you that, you know it, and I'm done having this discussion.
Edit: Just so you have some closure, my first two posts on this page explain why it was a mischaracterization. You've clarified. Done.
[ May 04, 2005, 01:59 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Yes, you in fact did say that this was your impression of me.
quote:This is the first time you've acknowledged such cases, which, as I said, I didn't even expect you to do.
edit: And yeah, I don't accept your closure. The posts you point to are mostly irrelevant to our disagreement, which was about relative amounts of types of perceived attacks and never about whether there were serious ones at all.
[ May 04, 2005, 02:04 PM: Message edited by: MrSquicky ]
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
Be fair, Squick. That just implies the "no integrity" part. It doesn't say anything about the "Christian-hating" part.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
Nope. Not the same thing (edit: as an accusation of lack of integrity). I expected you to go off on a tangent and question my motivation, and to make accusations about my expected motivation of you. Pretty good guess, huh?
No matter how you take that quoted sentence, you can't twist "Christian hating person" out of it.
You've been accusing me of that since the very first time we ever interacted. Stop it.
[ May 04, 2005, 02:06 PM: Message edited by: Dagonee ]
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
quote:edit: And yeah, I don't accept your closure. The posts you point to are mostly irrelevant to our disagreement, which was about relative amounts of types of perceived attacks and never about whether there were serious ones at all.
I told you my thinking when I made the post - that you were leaving out a very large category of attacks. That's it. I haven't been arguing about the proportion at all in this thread.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Dag, Honestly, most of the time we run into problems it starts, like here, with you telling me I don't understand something or I'm ignorant about something. From my perspective, you're the one who goes off on tangents and doesn't want ot address the points of contention, which, as I've done here, I keep bringing up. When we stay on the relevant points, we tend to have interesting discussions, but it's hard for me to get you to do that when it's about an issue that's in your in-group. And you imply I have a prejudice against Christians all the time. Even here, I can't think of a supportable reason why my no integrity would come into play unless it was because of my supposed antipthy towards Christians.
Posted by Kayla (Member # 2403) on :
Can anyone imagine the poor jury (in some imaginary world) that has to sit through testimony as presented by Dagonee and Mr. Squicky? The ones that didn't hang themselves before the end of the trial would probably dead-lock over which attorney was the most [insert adjective here.]
Though, I suppose if your sole goal was to get the jury not to decide the guilt of your client, this would be a good outcome.
Posted by Dagonee (Member # 5818) on :
I AM NOT CONTENDING WITH YOU ABOUT THE PROPORTION. I NEVER WAS.
Is that clear enough.
As for the rest, nothing productive can come of discussing that right now. Suffice it to say I disagree.
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
You two seem to be spending quite a lot of time very heatedly agreeing with each other, actually.
"I concede A, but you're not even talking about B."
"I'm not talking about B. I'm talking about A."
"Fine, A. But what about B?"
"I give you B. But I'm talking about A."
"Yes, I already gave you A. I'm talking about B."
"I've never even said anything about B. Shut up about B already. I'm talking about A."
"B."
"A."
"B."
"A."
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
sax, I guess I feel I was never granted A and I never even considered B relevant to what I was saying.
Posted by saxon75 (Member # 4589) on :
If I were to hazard a guess, I'd say that Dag probably feels the same way.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
I don't know, I'd be interested to see if he actually does agree with the main thrust of my argument. I still don't think he does, just that he wasn't discussing it.
Posted by Bean Counter (Member # 6001) on :
Until all the creation Myths of all the faiths represented in America have equal time in the classroom, we will just have to keep them all out and teach silly old evolution in science class. We cannot afford to leave out the Hopi indians, and the Hindu and Shinto and Muslim and so forth by placing the Christian version above their version, that would smack of a state endorsed religion!
Hee Hee... I win!
"When the natives solemnly rub blue mud on their navels I do the same!"
Jubal Horshaw
BC
Posted by Leonide (Member # 4157) on :
oh my goodness.
what have you done to my thread?!
Posted by Tony (Member # 7956) on :
Somebody back on page 3 mentioned us IB kids, and someone else asked what one is. Considering that we IB kids often have a lot to do with and arguments about school curriculums, bigotry, science, religion, and proving anything from the existence of god(s) to the color of a sock, and everything I've seen on these boards suggests to me it will be good for you to hear about us. IB stands for International Baccalaureate, and it is a program used in select high schools throughout the world. In the USA, it's considered by universities to be slightly better than having all AP courses. The idea is that we're intelligent and interested in learning, which already tends to put us fairly far ahead of our fellows academically. Our curriculum is not particularly affected by local policy, and by local I mean state and federal. The only thing decided here is whether the school is going to have such a program or not. The curriculum is decided on by an international panel and handed down from Geneva. Geneva had this to say about evolution: "Evolutions is a collection of popular theories that generally state that all life is actually the result of millenia of mutations from an original proto-organism, most likely created spontaneously through electro-chemical reactions. There are other schools of thought." If you took Bio instead of Chemistry as I did, they went into more detail about the different theories. As far as religious studies went, it was generally considered that to study one in a school setting was to study them all, and we didn't have nearly enough time for that. That's the way I think it should be done. Now, what students thought was another matter entirely, and we frequently got into some of the more even-handed arguments about it I've ever heard, and ultimately many of us decided that, just as I don't have enough evidence to determine if it will rain on February 8th, 3021, in Greenwich, I can not determine if there is a god or gods from the information provided. As to the matter of oppression between christians and non-christians, it happens all the time, in both directions, and I personally have been involved in both. When I was held back from recess for not reciting the pledge, I was being oppressed by the Christian majority. When I make Catholic jokes, I'm oppressing Christians. I don't think you'll find any dividing line without strife in both directions, be it gender, race, creed or what have you. The trick is keeping it out of hand, and any time the logic "You can't do this because I don't want you to" is the main reason, it's out of hand. If I say "You can't teach your children what you want, because I don't want you to", it's out of hand. If you say "You can't keep us from teaching your children what we want because we don't want you to" then something is equally wrong.
Posted by Traveler (Member # 3615) on :
I agree BC...that is why I had mentioned that twice already in this thread.
Posted by TrapperKeeper (Member # 7680) on :
Heres a really good read about creation science, pseudoscience, evolution etcetera. It was a bit long to copy and paste in here though.
quote: Until all the creation Myths of all the faiths represented in America have equal time in the classroom, we will just have to keep them all out and teach silly old evolution in science class. We cannot afford to leave out the Hopi indians, and the Hindu and Shinto and Muslim and so forth by placing the Christian version above their version, that would smack of a state endorsed religion!
I often marvel at the pseudo reductio ad absurdum people will apply in the question of separation of church and state. Only a fool would attempt to class all references to religion irrespective of all societal and cultural context and applicability as state sponsored religion if uttered in a public forum by a public official.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
quote:Only a fool would attempt to class all references to religion irrespective of all societal and cultural context and applicability as state sponsored religion if uttered in a public forum by a public official.
It doesn't look to me like that's what's going on. The issue is specifically references to religion as an alternative to a particular form of science.
Consider the dialectic. Creationists claim that they're discriminated against because evolution is offered as truth/verified theory without mentioning Christian creationism as a viable alternative. Suppose that the courts accepted their argument. Wouldn't it follow from that very same argument that not mentioning Hindu creationism as a further alterative discriminates against Hindus?
Looks to me like a reductio of the creationist take on religious freedom.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
We have an IB school near me, the International Academy. It's a private school though, and cost far more than what most kids in the area can afford, otherwise I would have loved to go there.
I tend to agree with the general point of all or none. I don't think it's stupid to say that if one is taught and none of the others, then it gives some support to the one that IS mentioned.
There are a lot of plans out there to solve Social Security, Bush chose one to champion at the State of the Union, and we believe that is his choice. Not the best example I know, but if there aren't alternatives, it's hard to claim there isn't support for the one that is mentioned.
If high schools want to create an optional, key word optional, religion class that teaches all religions for a semester, or at the very least, the biggest religions, Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Hindu, Buddhist and Shinto, I don't have a problem with that. I think it's a waste of money personally, but I wouldn't have a problem with it. It would not only make students broader minded about the world (the most important aspect in my opinion), it would be equally fair.
Posted by Jacare Sorridente (Member # 1906) on :
destineer- I was actually addressing the specific comment I quoted, not the wider debate. Certain posters here seem to believe that separation of church and state means that no public official can discuss, show preference for or otherwise demonstrate religious predilections. I submit that such a view is patently absurd.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote: Certain posters here seem to believe that separation of church and state means that no public official can discuss, show preference for or otherwise demonstrate religious predilections. I submit that such a view is patently absurd.
I don't think most people have a problem with individual public officials showing their faith (possibly excepting when they use it as a tool of scorn and invective, such as Tom DeLay). I think what they are nervous about is a consensus amongst the people of government that one religion should be supported, and when laws are passed that closely mirror one specific religion's tenents. Personally I get nervous when I see the 10 Commandments outside a courthouse, I think that is out of bounds and silly. More silly than anything else.
If Bush wants to go to church on Sunday, more power to him. If he wants to pray left and right, and make references to God in his speeches, I'm even okay with that. But if he starts giving more money to Christian groups, empowering them, and making Christian laws into national laws, then I have a problem.
Drawing from your faith is one thing, making your faith the law is another.
Posted by Puppy (Member # 6721) on :
[pet peeve]The word is "tenet". A "tenant" is a renter in an apartment building.[/pet peeve]
I think it is perfectly reasonable to have a religion class that teaches about the core philosophies of the major religions in the world, while leaving out the minor ones. That's just as valid as teaching a civics class that addresses major political movements while ignoring minor ones, or a history class that addresses major historical events while ignoring less-significant ones, or a geography class that spends more time on more powerful or populous or historically-influential countries.
There's a difference between teaching about religions as an outside observer ("This religion believes this, while this religion believes that.") and teaching the tenets of a religion, as though under the assumption that the teacher and all students are members (or should be members) of that religion.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
Religion class, fine. What is under discussion here is science classes.
Posted by Puppy (Member # 6721) on :
That's what paragraph 3 was about.
Paragraph 2 was responding to a comment someone made way above about religion classes needing to cover lots and lots and lots of religions.
But I'm thinking of ten things at once right now, so maybe I'm not making much sense Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote: Religion class, fine. What is under discussion here is science classes.
I think that was rather rude of you, but whatever.
And if you look at the last 50 posts or so by Dag and Squick, that hasn't been the discussion at all.
And my point is relevant. I'm talking about where I think religion SHOULD be discussed, as opposed to a science class. It's valid because I'm saying it should have it's own class, and not be in science class.
And sorry about the tenet/tenant thing, I knew I was wrong, but didn't feel like looking up the correct form of the world. My bad.
Posted by eslaine (Member # 5433) on :
Religion should be discussed in a comparative religions course. I encourage everyone to take such a course, and compare religions objectively.
Then decide.
Posted by Morbo (Member # 5309) on :
Thank you for the info on IB, Tony. Posted by Bob_Scopatz (Member # 1227) on :
What really IS religious freedom?
Is it the freedom to never have to encounter an opinion other than your own? Clearly, that's not tenable since your freedom would necessarily impinge on the freedom of others.
Is it the freedom to practice your religion without ever having someone insult you because of it? No. Government can only react after the fact to the worst (actually destructive or violent) acts of private citizens.
Is it the freedom from official (government-sponsored) promotion of religious ideas that you disagree with? Well...no not even that. The government isn't allowed to sponsor a state religion, but ideas drawn from religious sources are still fair game for a government to use. They'd have to be. Just because an idea can be found referenced in a religious text doesn't make its use "state sponsorship" of religion.
(but this is a gray area we in the US are always having to grapple with).
No...religious freedom is simply the right to practice your own religion without interference from the government. And, by the same token, freedom from a state-sponsored religion in that you can't be forced to profess any particular faith or belief in order to "get things" or have equal treatment under the law.
(Dag can correct this with more exact language if necessary).
But the bottom line is that no-one is guaranteed freedom from being verbally abused about their religion. Except that officials representing the government can't do it legally. Everyone else can. It's rude and unpleasant, and repugnant, but not illegal. Under some conditions (such as relationships between employers and employees) this kind of thing is also illegal in private (non-governmental) settings.
The question isn't whether some Christians are maltreated in some instances by some people. That is certainly the case. The question is (or should be) whether that rises to the level of religious persecution -- official state-sponsored or even done by someone who is acting as a representative of the government -- in which a person is inhibited from practicing their religion in the freedom guaranteed by our Constitution.
If we take that as our definition, then there really is precious little that would rise to the level of religious persecution. At least there's precious little of it that wouldn't just as easily be chalked up to the illegal actions of a few individuals who exceeded their authority and, one presumes, will be getting the smackdown as soon as their behavior catches up to them.
In contrast, Christians who try to use their elected positions on School Boards to systematically inject their religious views into non-religious areas of school curriculae (such as biology classes) are, indeed and in fact, attempting to create a little pocket of state-sponsorship for religious education.
They should be viewed as violating the Constitution, and the result should be reversal of the offending curriculum changes.
Keeping ID or creationism OUT of school curriculae is NOT a violation of the religious freedom guarantee because, quite simply, no-one is stopping those who want it from getting this education. They are just saying that we're not going to provide it at public expense.
And only those who try to twist the truth to say that teaching evolution is anti-religion, or that evolution is, in itself, a religious concept, are confused by this issue.
I'm not sure what the discussion over the past 2-3 pages of this thread have been about. Ants and contrived examples of not-very-analogous situations, for the most part.
In essence, I think this discussion could be about many things. But it has drifted so far afield that I'm having trouble connecting it to anything meaningful.
Question:
If an individual who works for a government agency berates a person specifically BECAUSE they are a Christian... 1) is that an action of the government agency? 2) does it only rise to that level if the agency, upon hearing of it, does nothing? 3) If the person is still free to practice their religion, does it rise to the level of religious persecution by the definition we understand commonly? Or is it something lesser? 4) Is it REALLY about the person's religion or is it more about the illegal and reprehensible behavior of one person toward another person?
[ May 04, 2005, 09:20 PM: Message edited by: Bob_Scopatz ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
See, KoM, that's the way to argue about freedom of religion. *Takes notes*
Posted by Bean Counter (Member # 6001) on :
I see that it is settled then! I win!
As to whether I am attempting to reduce to the absurd with the seperation clause, well I find it interesting that the creation epics of those non Christians bring the word absurd to mind. Especially after the way the Old Testement was cobbled together by borrowing from its influeces in exile. I just think of it as poetry and always have.
We have a duty to remember that anything the government supports with money comes tied around a brick of influence. It is not bad that this is so, responsibility is the flip side of the coin of power, so by pushing for the high ground we can shut the creationists up in sullen mumbling while we continue to teach science. It is never needful to dirty our hands and seem anti christian, we need merely to seem as if we are open and loving to all religions to get our way. It is good strategy.
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