Post #190,158
1/14/05 9:39:20 AM
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I don't think he does "get it"
And while the general subject of the article is supportable...did a judge just rule that evolution is science >fact< and any questioning of that fact is an actual >ENDORSEMENT< of religion?
I think thats a bit strong in the other direction.
I'm not arguing against evolution...but last I checked there were still some intellectual leeps required to start at the goo and get to a human. I'll admit not having paid much attention to the subject since high school biology...but have the proven everything since then (ages ago)
Intelligent design is a bridging theory that affirms evolutionary steps (I thought) ... does offering that as an alternative truly ENDORSE religion or just offer the possibility that "those nutcases" might have a point?
If you push something hard enough, it will fall over. Fudd's First Law of Opposition
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #190,175
1/14/05 10:34:39 AM
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No, he didn't.
A judge ruled that evolution is a scientific theory.
Just like gravity is a scientific theory.
I'm reminded, when the word "theory" is bandied around as meaning "hypothesis", of "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."
Peter
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Post #190,177
1/14/05 10:38:30 AM
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But his ruling..
...basically states taht any statement critical of that scientific theory is an official endorsement of religion...EVEN WHEN RELIGION ISN'T MENTIONED.
Am I the only one that sees the ice on that hillside?
If you push something hard enough, it will fall over. Fudd's First Law of Opposition
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #190,178
1/14/05 10:40:31 AM
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No.
I think you're reaching too far. What the problem is, is that a specific theory (scientific sense) that is contradictory to the fundamentalists' belief system is being singled out for attention.
It's noticeable that these people (the fundamentalists) do not have a problem with science when they drive their cars, get into an aircraft, post crazy websites on the internet, take large amounts of cocaine or build air-conditioned kennels for their pet dogs.
But evolution? OH NOES!
Peter
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Post #190,212
1/14/05 3:12:28 PM
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ACLU made this point better
Heard their lawyer on NPR last night. She said in the end all scientific theories are just that: theories. To single out this one theory as being more questionable than all the others demonstrates that the sticker was not an exhortation to continually question conventional wisdom. No matter how neutral the text of the sticker may have been, its application to a single scientific theory was sufficient to demonstrate the implicit support of the alternative theory put forth by the members of the school board who had the stickers made.
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Post #190,222
1/14/05 3:57:52 PM
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Thats a little better...
...but without reading the entire judgement...this is a pretty fine line they are playing with. That is my only worry.
If you push something hard enough, it will fall over. Fudd's First Law of Opposition
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #190,224
1/14/05 4:08:12 PM
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It is a fine line
It is a fine line, but it isn't the judge that brought it up. It was brought into the case when the sticker people set out to find a way to violate the spirit of the constitution without violating the words of the constitution.
Jay
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Post #190,228
1/14/05 4:35:54 PM
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But I am less likely to...
...be upset about a school board that will eventually die off and and a legal ruling that will stick around for-evah.
If you push something hard enough, it will fall over. Fudd's First Law of Opposition
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #190,246
1/14/05 7:52:01 PM
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Other outcome would also have set precedent
When then school board tried, as Jay so succinctly put it, to violate the spirit of the constitution while not violating the letter, they forced the issue. They're trying to force the issue. As long as all the teachers "just know" what they're supposed to say, but there's no stickers in the textbooks, the majority might be getting what they want. But this majority[1] wants their position validated by the court. It's their stated agenda. Look for any sites advocating ID theory and you'll see it laid out plainly.
If they're going to force the issue to the courts, I hope the courts continue to do the right thing, as they did in this case.
[1] Majority of those who care about it enough to make a huge issue of it, anyway.
===
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Post #190,280
1/15/05 3:40:37 AM
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Next time someone says "evolution's just a theory"...
...remind them that the laws of thermodynamics that make their cars go are also "just a theory". Gravity is "just a theory". The carbon cycle is "just a theory".
My, how I detest the phrase "just a theory".
Peter
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Post #190,289
1/15/05 7:49:28 AM
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*GRIN*
[link|http://forfree.sytes.net|
] Imric's Tips for Living
- Paranoia Is a Survival Trait
- Pessimists are never disappointed - but sometimes, if they are very lucky, they can be pleasantly surprised...
- Even though everyone is out to get you, it doesn't matter unless you let them win.
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Nothing is as simple as it seems in the beginning,
As hopeless as it seems in the middle,
Or as finished as it seems in the end.
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Post #190,180
1/14/05 11:26:17 AM
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Judge didn't say that.
He said: "While evolution is subject to criticism, particularly with respect to the mechanism by which it occurred, the sticker misleads students regarding the significance and value of evolution in the scientific community." An absolutely true statement. [link|http://forfree.sytes.net|
] Imric's Tips for Living
- Paranoia Is a Survival Trait
- Pessimists are never disappointed - but sometimes, if they are very lucky, they can be pleasantly surprised...
- Even though everyone is out to get you, it doesn't matter unless you let them win.
|
Nothing is as simple as it seems in the beginning,
As hopeless as it seems in the middle,
Or as finished as it seems in the end.
|
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Post #190,192
1/14/05 1:18:19 PM
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Assumes too much
Based on what the sticker says, I think he's reaching.
And while I agree with his reach and the outcome...the way it was done is problematic for me...because it will be used to over-reach in the opposite direction.
There are times when I beleive the "separation of church and state" clause is not used as intended, but rather used by a small minority to actively discriminate against ALL religion.
And since its based (very loosely) on constitutional doctrine, it escapes scrutiny of its real intent which is discrimination. No better than exluding color...and you can see the extreme of the view from dozens of recent posts...the pendulum has swung too far...and this I see as a way to keep it swinging.
If you push something hard enough, it will fall over. Fudd's First Law of Opposition
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #190,195
1/14/05 1:35:28 PM
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I must disagree.
To imply that anyone other than those with a religious motive is questioning whether 'the origin of living things' involves evolution is FALSE.
[link|http://forfree.sytes.net|
] Imric's Tips for Living
- Paranoia Is a Survival Trait
- Pessimists are never disappointed - but sometimes, if they are very lucky, they can be pleasantly surprised...
- Even though everyone is out to get you, it doesn't matter unless you let them win.
|
Nothing is as simple as it seems in the beginning,
As hopeless as it seems in the middle,
Or as finished as it seems in the end.
|
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Post #190,198
1/14/05 1:46:26 PM
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But the opposite
is to completely disqualify any alternative and/or any marriage of that scientific structure into any other set of beliefs.
It is not allowing gray...which, in the end, is what area this falls in, like it or not.
And MY issue is not this sticker being removed...it was a stupid idea. Its the fact that this ruling was such a stretch based on the crafting of the sticker's language...that this ruling will extend well beyond science textbooks.
It was done with the right intention, exacted the correct reponse...but in a way I fear will be abused.
Thats all.
If you push something hard enough, it will fall over. Fudd's First Law of Opposition
[link|mailto:bepatient@aol.com|BePatient]
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Post #190,204
1/14/05 2:11:11 PM
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Ummm.
This was a book on evolution. The sticker wasn't adding anything to it, it wasn't fitting evolution into any other framework, nothing like that. It was only there to question the validity of evolution. Not the details, not where evolution fits in the scheme of things.
I don't see anything bad here.
[link|http://forfree.sytes.net|
] Imric's Tips for Living
- Paranoia Is a Survival Trait
- Pessimists are never disappointed - but sometimes, if they are very lucky, they can be pleasantly surprised...
- Even though everyone is out to get you, it doesn't matter unless you let them win.
|
Nothing is as simple as it seems in the beginning,
As hopeless as it seems in the middle,
Or as finished as it seems in the end.
|
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Post #190,184
1/14/05 12:49:01 PM
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Use the Source Beep!
[link|http://www.aclu.org/Files/OpenFile.cfm?id=17310|Ruling] - a 44 page .pdf. It's an image so I'm unable to cut and paste the text. But here is an excerpt: p.42: Adopted by the school board, funded by the money of taxpayers, and inserted by school personnel, the Sticker conveys an impermissible message of endorsement and tells some citizens that they are political outsiders while telling others that they are political insiders. Regardless of whether teachers comply with the Cobb County School District's regulations on theories of origin and regardless of the discussions that actually take place in the Cobb County science classrooms, the Sticker has already sent a message that the School Board agrees with the beliefs of Christian fundamentalists and creationists. The School Board has effectively improperly entangled itself with religion by appearing to take a position. Therefore the Sticker must be removed from all of the textbooks into which it has been placed. Happy browsing. :-) Cheers, Scott.
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Post #190,528
1/17/05 10:42:31 PM
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a simple sticker that sez "evolution is gay" prob solved
or educated negroes believe this
a jew wrote this book
the above 3 would have had the same effect and kept religion out of it as long as all the school board members name and adresses were on the bottom of the sticker. Code words is code words,
regards,
daemon
that way too many Iraqis conceived of free society as little more than a mosh pit with grenades. ANDISHEH NOURAEE
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Post #190,691
1/18/05 9:36:44 PM
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Al punte - code words *indeed*
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Post #190,230
1/14/05 4:50:22 PM
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No, that is not too far
Evolution is about "descent with modification" - it covers how life diversified into current forms. It does not address how life started, that would be abiogenesis which is a substantially harder question. (And isn't helped by the fact that we're trying to figure out molecular interactions that happened billions of years ago and didn't exactly fossilize very well.) What the judge ruled is exactly correct. Evolution is clearly science fact. And has been accepted as such within science for close to a century with no major challenges. The theory of intelligent design is the attempt to reintroduce God into evolution. Fine. It is not a testable theory, and hence is not an appropriate subject matter for scientific investigation. That is not a statement that it is necessarily wrong - just a statement that it makes no predictions or claims that can be tested and hence cannot be addressed by science. However I'll say that the history of science suggests that the gaps that intelligent design folks point to have a tendancy to shrink and shrink. In fact a lot of the ones that they think require explanation don't - but to see that you need to understand what happens on timescales which are so vast that our intuition of what is likely to happen leads us astray. Incidentally the best comment that I know of against Intelligent design comes from Mark Twain: Man has been here 32,000 years. That it took a hundred million years to prepare the world for him is proof that that is what it was done for. I suppose it is. I dunno. If the Eiffel tower were now representing the world's age, the skin of paint on the pinnacle-knob at its summit would represent man's share of that age; & anybody would perceive that that skin was what the tower was built for. I reckon they would. I dunno. (Note that when Twain wrote we had not yet discovered radioactive dating, and so had no accurate way of figuring out the true age of man or of the Earth.) Cheers, Ben I have come to believe that idealism without discipline is a quick road to disaster, while discipline without idealism is pointless. -- Aaron Ward (my brother)
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Post #190,288
1/15/05 6:22:09 AM
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I see it more starkly -
Stickers stating, "this is 'just' a theory" are akin to,
Log entry:
The Captain was on the bridge. And he was sober.
Ah the inflections of straightforward English, uttered by un-straightforward crooked tongue.
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