Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Oolon Colluphid · 03-18-2002, 01:04 AM

I have a confession to make folks. Whilst I obviously care passionately about evolution in opposition to creationist nonsense, much of what I write here has been in the nature of a game, a hobby. In an area about which I know something, I enjoy giving half-arsed arguments and ignorance a good kicking. It didn't ultimately seem to affect me if creationists are so powerful and vociferous in the US, though I�ll help out against it when I can. 'Just a few loonies in the rest of the world at least', I'd thought.

But now I see that this nonsense is in fact rife in the UK too. The recent Emmanuel College incident has drawn them out of the woodwork, and the British sense of fair play makes the idea of 'equal time' seem perfectly sensible.

First we had Tony Blair�s equivocation; then articles such as mentioned in <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=58&t=000438" target="_blank">this thread</a> in the Daily Mail. Then on Saturday morning I caught part of BBC Radio 4�s Any Answers feedback programme, which featured the �only a theory�, �why should children only be taught one version?�, �aren�t bird feathers incredible?� and �Dr Behe has proved irreducible complexity� non-arguments. Naturally I couldn�t get through on the phone. Nobody defended science, and it seems Dawkins�s few words in a single interview were being turned against science.

Feeling sick with worry and apoplectic with rage, I went for a decent paper to get some sign of rational thought. I bought the Daily Telegraph (don�t snigger). There was only one item about the matter. Here it is.

Quote:

The Saturday Column by Tom Utley

God knows what Professor Dawkins is talking about

I worry about Professor Richard Dawkins, and his crackpot theory that the universe evolved from some kind of accidental explosion at the dawn of time. It is not that I am against far-fetched theories in general. Who knows, the professor may even be right � although it seems much more plausible that all life and matter were created by a supreme and intelligent deity, as most of the cleverest men have believed for many thousands of years.

It may even be that we are both right � that God created the universe, and that He did so by means of an explosion, followed by a process of evolution, which He did not see fit to tell us about in the Book of Genesis.

Why should He give away his trade secrets, after all? The Bible would hardly have become the best-selling book in history if it had begun with several pages of complicated formulae and descriptions of genetic mutations. Far more impressive to kick off with one of the simplest and most powerful opening sentences in all literature: �In the beginning, God created the Heaven and the Earth.�

What worries me is the superstitious way in which Prof Dawkins clings to his theory, and refuses to admit even the slightest possibility that anybody else may be right. There is something almost hysterical about his attack on the science teachers at Emmanuel City Technology College (CTC) in Gateshead that puts me in mind of Torquemada and the Spanish Inquisition. The professor is seeking out heretics � unbelievers in the religion of science � with a view to silencing them.

�These people are teaching that the Earth is a mere thousands of years old,� he said. �The children are being taught ludicrous falsehoods. This is not a matter of one scientific position against another scientific position. There is no scientific position which states that the earth is a few thousand years old.�

Just hold on there, professor. It is true that some Creationists have dated the beginning of time to only a few thousand years before Christ. In 1650, for example, the Archbishop of Armagh, James Ussher, claimed to have worked out that the world was created on Sunday, October 23, 4004 bc. But there is no evidence that this is what is being taught, as fact, at Ernmanuel CTC.

If I understand Prof Dawkins correctly, he is saying that, if man had been created six days after the beginning of time, as Genesis suggests, fully developed and looking like Michelangelo�s vision of Adam on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, then it would follow that the universe could be only a few thousand years old.

This, he would say, is patent rubbish, because we have evidence that mankind has been stalking the Earth for at least 50,000 years � and maybe even for 200,000 years (scientists are terribly vague about these things). There is also some evidence that the universe has been in existence for several billion years, perhaps 15 billion.

I do not know quite how Prof Dawkins arrived at his theory that, if the Creationists are right, the universe can be only a few thousand years old. I may be wronging him here, but I suspect that .he is relying on the work of Archbishop Ussher and others like him.

Ussher based his calculation of the age of the universe on the genealogies in the Old Testament� on what the Bible has to say about who begat whom, and how long everyone lived. Open-minded as ever, I am prepared to admit the possibility that he was talking absolute tosh.

But it strikes me as thoroughly anachronistic � and unscientific � of anybody to believe that the author of Genesis had the same concept of time as we have now. I simply do not believe that Methuselah lived to 969 years, as years are understood now, or that the universe was created in six days, as we now understand days.

Before Herodotus, the father of history, nobody had much of a concept of time, and nobody much thought of writing down events in chronological order. The amazing thing about the Book of Genesis is that it does attempt to put the creation into some sort of order of time � and it is an order not so very different from that in which the evolutionists believe that life evolved: plants, fish, birds, �creeping things�, beasts, man.

It seems odd to me that Prof Dawkins should be so hung up on the difficulty of squaring time, as it was understood by Genesis, with time as modem science understands it. It is less than 100 years, after all, since Einstein came up with his staggering theory � now widely accepted by scientists � that time is relative to space. If Prof Dawkins is prepared to accept that there is no absolute now, and no absolute then, why does he find it so difficult to stomach what Genesis has to say about time?

But enough philosophical meandering. The question that really puzzles me is what Prof Dawkins is so afraid of. Does he worry that the� students of Emmanuel will suddenly rampage through the streets of Gateshead, slitting the throats of the evolutionists and hurling copies of Darwin�s Origin of Species into the Tyne?

I find that very unlikely. They look perfectly sweet to me, from the photograph in yesterday�s paper, and almost everybody seems to accept that they are thoroughly intelligent and well taught � as much about evolution as about alternative theories.

My hope is that, at the last trump, the Almighty will take Prof Dawkins aside and show him, in His vengeful, mysterious way, how the trick of Creation was done.

This is the Daily Telegraph. Despite it�s conservatism, one of the top two or three most prestigious papers in the country. The Daily Telegraph, ferfucksakes!!

Even my wife, who is heartily sick of me talking about evolution, read the first paragraphs and told me to get writing my letter.

Here is my reply:

Quote:

God knows what Tom Utley is talking about

I sincerely hope that Tom Utley's piece, 'God knows what Professor Dawkins is talking about', in Saturday's edition, is not symptomatic of the ignorance of science in our country at large. It is clear that Mr Utley knows very little about evolution � or creationism, come to that. He also knows little about relativity theory. Yet this does not stop him using it to criticise Dawkins � who, incidentally is a biologist, not a cosmologist. Dawkins only uses the "crackpot" theory offered him by physicists, cosmologists, astronomers, geophysicists and geologists: that the earth and universe are old. The theory subscribed to by crackpots such as Stephen Hawking.

Evolution, meaning shared common ancestry for all life on earth, is a fact, and one as well supported as any in science. The Theory of evolution is the group of interrelated ideas that explain this fact. And there is simply no evidence that the universe and the earth are anything less than billions of years old.

Evolution is science, creationism is not. Only the former therefore belongs in science classes.

In the unlikely event that this journalist cares enough about the truth to look into the matter further, he might like to visit <a href="http://www.talkorigins.org," target="_blank">www.talkorigins.org,</a> which provides the mainstream science answers to the creationist propaganda.

Mr Utley asks what Richard Dawkins is so afraid of. Surely children being taught demonstrable lies and antiscience as science is reason enough to be afraid for their � and our � future?

Creationism and scientific ignorance is not just small isolated pockets outside the US. I now belatedly realise that this is no game. The future of science education -- and by extension, of science in general -- is in danger not just in America, but GLOBALLY.

Anyone know of anything positive in the British press? Please?!

Oolon the sickened

liquid · 03-18-2002, 03:16 AM

Yes, this sort of thing is worrying me too. One thing that we can be thankful for is that the RC church and the Anglican church, our largest groups, both accept evolution, but it is surprising how many of their flock don't.

But I want something to be done about this, and we don't have a first amendment to protect us. Any ideas?

As for the telegraph, I have never really had much respect for that paper. It is very establishment and credible, but I have always noticed that its stance on religion is very disappointing.

I know that the guardian ran a small article, which unsurprisingly and pleasingly was secular in opinion, but I find it difficult to like that paper too because it is far too left wing and media-luvvy oriented.

Personally, I read the times. It seems that big-business corruption of editorials is the lesser evil I can stand...

I've been tempted with activism... any ideas?

Pandora · 03-18-2002, 05:07 AM

This makes me so angry that I am not capable of even making a half intelligent comment.

It is impossible to reason with them - their ears are blocked to anything that doesn't agree with their agenda.

Does Tony Blair have any balls? It seems any mention of "faith" or "religion" and we should all creep around not offending people's beliefs.

Well, I say "Bugger your beliefs"

The British Humanist Association has petitions and letter writing going on, plus some articles at <a href="http://www.humanism.org.uk" target="_blank">www.humanism.org.uk</a>

Gwalchmai · 03-18-2002, 08:51 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Oolon Colluphid:
Anyone know of anything positive in the British press? Please?!

Fortunately, yes.

Dawkins' rebuttal to Tom Utley's polemic is pasted in below (It appeared in today's Telegraph).

Matthew Parris also wrote a good editorial in The Times on Saturday. <a href="http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,482-237325,00.html" target="_blank">The Times</a>

Regards,

=================================================

Young Earth Creationists teach bad science and worse religion

By Richard Dawkins

(Filed: 18/03/2002)

THE absurd row over Emmanuel City Technology College in Gateshead has raised an even more absurd confusion, which must be cleared up.

There are not two debating positions, but three. Actually more than three, and some of them could be represented as a shaded continuum, but for simplicity I'll stick to three.

1) Young Earth Creationists. They believe the world is only thousands of years old, based on a literal reading of Genesis (or the Koran, or whatever is their holy book).

2) Old Earth Theists. Theirs is a broad church, embracing the great majority of educated religious people. They believe in a Divine Creator, but they read their creation myth allegorically rather than literally, and accept that the world is billions of years old.

With the exception of some Old Earth Creationists, they mostly agree that evolution happened, but may allow God some supervisory role. Many think evolution was God's ingenious way of accomplishing his creation. Some believe he helped evolution over the difficult jumps.

Others think God kept his hands off evolution, but set up the universe in the first place in such a way as to make it likely to happen.

3) Atheists and agnostics.

Within the broad middle group, you'll find the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Oxford (who gave an admirable Thought for the Day on the subject on Friday) and, I would guess, most of the bishops and clergy of the Roman and Anglican churches.

You'll also find Tony Blair and those of his parliamentary colleagues of all parties who profess religious belief. You will not find the head of science at Emmanuel CTC, Gateshead.

I count myself in the third group, but it is not in that capacity that I object to what is happening in Gateshead. From time to time, I argue against Old Earth Theists, but not on this occasion.

On the Gateshead issue, scientists and theologians, bishops and atheists stand shoulder to shoulder. Young Earth teachers may do some damage to science education, but it's a pinprick compared with the damage they'll do to religious education if they get a grip on this side of the Atlantic.

Confusion is rife because commentators have failed to understand that the Gateshead row is about Young Earth Creationism. Wrongly presuming that we who have asked Ofsted for a re-inspection are attacking religion, they have rushed intemperately into print, not least in this newspaper, imputing to us all sorts of horrific Torquemadan motives.

Without bothering to read what we have said, and - worse - without bothering to read what the Gateshead teachers have said, they have assumed that we are attacking the middle group of mainstream religious believers.

As one retired contributor to The Daily Telegraph (letters, Mar 16) said: "I am a Christian and a scientist. I see no particular problem in reconciling the evolutionary and Creationist approaches to the formation of the Earth."

Well of course you don't see a problem, sir! You are a member of the large consensus in the middle. But the whole point of the Gateshead row is that the head of science at the school does see a problem. He is a Young Earth Creationist.

In the same issue of this newspaper, Tom Utley ("God knows what Professor Dawkins is talking about") tells me at insulting length what I already knew, namely that many Creationists don't think the earth is young. Why, Utley ponderously wonders, do I assume that the Gateshead teachers do?

For one excellent reason. I take the trouble to read what they say. Steven Layfield, the head of science at Emmanuel, gave a lecture on September 21, 2000 (which would therefore have been available to the Ofsted inspectors).

The full text is at: <a href="http://www.christian.org.uk/html-publications/education3.htm." target="_blank">http://www.christian.org.uk/html-publications/education3.htm.</a> Read it. If you love true science, or if you love true religion, the thought of what the children must be missing under this travesty of teaching may sadden you enough to provoke a letter to the Secretary of State for Education, urging her to reopen the case with Ofsted.

Layfield remarks that there is no immediate hope of evolution being removed from the national curriculum, and he lists ways in which Creationist science teachers can compensate.

For example: "Note every occasion when an evolutionary/old-earth paradigm (millions or billions of years) is explicitly mentioned or implied by a text-book, examination question or visitor, and courteously point out the fallibility of the statement. Wherever possible, we must give the alternative (always better) Biblical explanation of the same data."

For Layfield, then, the universe is not billions, not even millions, of years old. It is only thousands.

This head of science - this science teacher and mentor of other science teachers - blinds himself to the whole edifice of exciting scientific work, not just in biology and geology (fossils, the molecular clock, the geographic distribution of species in the light of plate-tectonic continental movements), but also physics (numerous independent methods of radioactive dating converge on the same answer) and cosmology (in a young universe, all stars would be invisible to us except the tiny minority within a few thousand light years).

Moving on in the lecture: "In view of the current inclusion of earth science into the Sc3 component of the national curriculum, it would seem particularly prudent for all who deliver this aspect of the course to familiarise themselves with Flood geology papers of Whitcomb & Morris . . .

"In particular, they would do well to point out that no rock is unearthed with a clear age label and that dating processes in general are speculative, frequently contradictory and in many instances altogether incompatible with a great age."

Yes, Flood geology means what you think it means. We're talking Noah's Ark here. Noah's Ark - when the children could be learning the spine-tingling fact that Africa and South America were once joined, and have drawn apart at the speed with which fingernails grow.

We have here the head of science, in a school that has received star rating from Ofsted. When I suggested a re-inspection, it had not occurred to me that the people who really come out of the affair badly are the Ofsted inspectors. It is not too late for them to make amends and look properly at what they obviously overlooked before.

With hindsight, it might have been better if those of us in Group Three had kept our big mouths shut and left it to the bishops. They have more to lose than we have, and are less vulnerable to prejudiced and perverse misunderstanding.

Over to you, gentlemen. Power to your elbows. If there is anything I can do to help, you'll find me lying low, with my head down. With the best will in the world, I seem to do more harm than good. It's somebody else's turn.

Richard Dawkins FRS is Oxford's Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science. His latest book is Unweaving the Rainbow

[ March 18, 2002: Message edited by: Gwalchmai ]

BolshyFaker · 03-18-2002, 09:05 AM

The observer carried an excellent article on the issue of Emmanuel College <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,668840,00.html" target="_blank">Observer.co.uk</a> and I find that though the Guardian and Observer may be a little too left wing for some people's tastes (not mine

) they are the only consistently pro-atheist/ pro-secualr state papers in Britain.

Alright so maybe the Moring Star carried something equally pro-evolution but then not many people read that do they

?

Coragyps · 03-18-2002, 09:22 AM

Hi, Gwalchmai, and welcome. Thanks for posting that excellent piece by Dawkins - perfectly to the point on this side of the pond as well!

tgamble · 03-18-2002, 10:10 AM

<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2002/03/18/do1801.xml&sSheet=/portal/2002/03/18/por_right.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=11734 " target="_blank">Young Earth Creationists teach bad science and worse religion
By Richard Dawkins
(Filed: 18/03/2002) </a>

THE absurd row over Emmanuel City Technology College in Gateshead has raised an even more absurd confusion, which must be cleared up.

There are not two debating positions, but three. Actually more than three, and some of them could be represented as a shaded continuum, but for simplicity I'll stick to three.

1) Young Earth Creationists. They believe the world is only thousands of years old, based on a literal reading of Genesis (or the Koran, or whatever is their holy book).

2) Old Earth Theists. Theirs is a broad church, embracing the great majority of educated religious people. They believe in a Divine Creator, but they read their creation myth allegorically rather than literally, and accept that the world is billions of years old.

With the exception of some Old Earth Creationists, they mostly agree that evolution happened, but may allow God some supervisory role. Many think evolution was God's ingenious way of accomplishing his creation. Some believe he helped evolution over the difficult jumps.

Others think God kept his hands off evolution, but set up the universe in the first place in such a way as to make it likely to happen.

3) Atheists and agnostics.

Within the broad middle group, you'll find the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Oxford (who gave an admirable Thought for the Day on the subject on Friday) and, I would guess, most of the bishops and clergy of the Roman and Anglican churches.

You'll also find Tony Blair and those of his parliamentary colleagues of all parties who profess religious belief. You will not find the head of science at Emmanuel CTC, Gateshead.

I count myself in the third group, but it is not in that capacity that I object to what is happening in Gateshead. From time to time, I argue against Old Earth Theists, but not on this occasion.

On the Gateshead issue, scientists and theologians, bishops and atheists stand shoulder to shoulder. Young Earth teachers may do some damage to science education, but it's a pinprick compared with the damage they'll do to religious education if they get a grip on this side of the Atlantic.

Confusion is rife because commentators have failed to understand that the Gateshead row is about Young Earth Creationism. Wrongly presuming that we who have asked Ofsted for a re-inspection are attacking religion, they have rushed intemperately into print, not least in this newspaper, imputing to us all sorts of horrific Torquemadan motives.

Without bothering to read what we have said, and - worse - without bothering to read what the Gateshead teachers have said, they have assumed that we are attacking the middle group of mainstream religious believers.

As one retired contributor to The Daily Telegraph (letters, Mar 16) said: "I am a Christian and a scientist. I see no particular problem in reconciling the evolutionary and Creationist approaches to the formation of the Earth."

Well of course you don't see a problem, sir! You are a member of the large consensus in the middle. But the whole point of the Gateshead row is that the head of science at the school does see a problem. He is a Young Earth Creationist.

In the same issue of this newspaper, Tom Utley ("God knows what Professor Dawkins is talking about") tells me at insulting length what I already knew, namely that many Creationists don't think the earth is young. Why, Utley ponderously wonders, do I assume that the Gateshead teachers do?

For one excellent reason. I take the trouble to read what they say. Steven Layfield, the head of science at Emmanuel, gave a lecture on September 21, 2000 (which would therefore have been available to the Ofsted inspectors).

The full text is at: <a href="http://www.christian.org.uk/html-publications/education3.htm." target="_blank">http://www.christian.org.uk/html-publications/education3.htm.</a> Read it. If you love true science, or if you love true religion, the thought of what the children must be missing under this travesty of teaching may sadden you enough to provoke a letter to the Secretary of State for Education, urging her to reopen the case with Ofsted.

Layfield remarks that there is no immediate hope of evolution being removed from the national curriculum, and he lists ways in which Creationist science teachers can compensate.

For example: "Note every occasion when an evolutionary/old-earth paradigm (millions or billions of years) is explicitly mentioned or implied by a text-book, examination question or visitor, and courteously point out the fallibility of the statement. Wherever possible, we must give the alternative (always better) Biblical explanation of the same data."

For Layfield, then, the universe is not billions, not even millions, of years old. It is only thousands.

This head of science - this science teacher and mentor of other science teachers - blinds himself to the whole edifice of exciting scientific work, not just in biology and geology (fossils, the molecular clock, the geographic distribution of species in the light of plate-tectonic continental movements), but also physics (numerous independent methods of radioactive dating converge on the same answer) and cosmology (in a young universe, all stars would be invisible to us except the tiny minority within a few thousand light years).

Moving on in the lecture: "In view of the current inclusion of earth science into the Sc3 component of the national curriculum, it would seem particularly prudent for all who deliver this aspect of the course to familiarise themselves with Flood geology papers of Whitcomb & Morris . . .

"In particular, they would do well to point out that no rock is unearthed with a clear age label and that dating processes in general are speculative, frequently contradictory and in many instances altogether incompatible with a great age."

Yes, Flood geology means what you think it means. We're talking Noah's Ark here. Noah's Ark - when the children could be learning the spine-tingling fact that Africa and South America were once joined, and have drawn apart at the speed with which fingernails grow.

We have here the head of science, in a school that has received star rating from Ofsted. When I suggested a re-inspection, it had not occurred to me that the people who really come out of the affair badly are the Ofsted inspectors. It is not too late for them to make amends and look properly at what they obviously overlooked before.

With hindsight, it might have been better if those of us in Group Three had kept our big mouths shut and left it to the bishops. They have more to lose than we have, and are less vulnerable to prejudiced and perverse misunderstanding.

Over to you, gentlemen. Power to your elbows. If there is anything I can do to help, you'll find me lying low, with my head down. With the best will in the world, I seem to do more harm than good. It's somebody else's turn.

Richard Dawkins FRS is Oxford's Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science. His latest book is Unweaving the Rainbow

stonetools · 03-18-2002, 02:14 PM

Chickens coming home to roost, I say.
In the "YECS have a point" thread, I said that Dawkin's militantly atheistic pronouncements were the catalyst for the creation of the Gateshead school. Nice to see that Dawkins and I can agree

In that thread, I was taken to task for suggesting that Dawkins et al. tone down their rhetoric.Apparently, Dawkins , realizing that he he had made things worse, is agreeing to do just that.
Its nice to see a kinder, gentler, less arrogant Dawkins. I must say I have to laugh when he talk about enlisting the support of the broad Middle.Ha! The older Dawkins saw no "broad middle". There were just intelligent people ( who thought as he did) and superstitious idiots (everyone else). I guess the broad middle will now step up to the rescue( as they have already started to do) . Unfortunately, IMO, the backlash is going to go much further than it has ( in the US, UK and possibly Australia).
I must also say that I feel no sympathy for yon moderator,who acted as if older Dawkins was a role model and who recently referred to the Bible, source of spiritual comfort for millions, as " horseshit". If you keep trashing people's beliefs, the inevitable result is that people will simply withdraw and form their own institutions, taking their tax dollars and political support with them. In the US they are doing so, through the home school and charter school movement. The UK will now follow suit.Get used to it, O. I foresee a hundred Gatesheads blooming...

bluefugue · 03-18-2002, 02:33 PM

Dawkins' impatience with liberal theism doesn't entirely come from arrogance (though he can certainly come off as being arrogant)... I think it comes more from the way he thinks things through. He has no patience for the idea that religion somehow gets a free pass because it is based on faith. He has traditionally disliked liberal theist doctrines because, although they may agree with scientists in many areas, they may still profess belief in certain events (i.e. the Resurrection, the Assumption of Mary, whatever) which, in Dawkins' view, do not hold up to scientific scrutiny. I think Dawkins respects consistency in one's worldview, and this is perhaps why he has formerly preferred the "honesty" of fundamentalism to the harder-to-pin-down beliefs of some liberal theists. I understand where Dawkins is coming from, and I share his anger at being automatically labeled an "extremist" for holding a belief that he (and I) consider to be quite reasonable when it comes to the question of gods and their existence. Anyway, Dawkins has perhaps learned a lesson of politics, which is that occasionally you have to make common cause with the middle ground though you may disagree with them on some things. Personally, though I share Dawkins' misgivings about epistemological compromises, I will take a liberal theist over a fundamentalist. Give me Kenneth Miller over Duane Gish any day of the week.

As for the Bible being "horseshit," well, from the standpoint of being a factual guide to science and history, it frequently is horseshit. That is the position that anyone who respects the findings of mainstream science (theist or otherwise) must take: the global flood, Noah's Ark, the 6-day-creation, etc., are (from a factual, as opposed to allegorical, standpoint) quite simply baloney; at best conjecture and exaggeration, at worst pure fiction. This does not make the Bible worthless, it just means it should be read in a certain context. Perhaps Oolon's choice of language could have been more diplomatic but I doubt he meant to completely denigrate the book's cultural, ethical and literary importance; it's pretty much a given that the debate on this forum centers on the Bible's scientific worth, which is dubious at best. But I'm sure Oolon can speak for himself on this matter...

[ March 18, 2002: Message edited by: IesusDomini ]

Oolon Colluphid · 03-19-2002, 02:11 AM

Thank you IesusDomini. Couldn't have put it better meself. But I'll give it a go anyway.

Quote:

Originally posted by stonetools:

I must also say that I feel no sympathy for yon moderator,who acted as if older Dawkins was a role model and who recently referred to the Bible, source of spiritual comfort for millions, as " horseshit".

And I feel no sympathy for you, since you are de facto defending believers in ludicrous falsehoods.

So I have no qualms about saying: get your facts straight. I assume you're talking about my comment in <a href="http://iidb.org/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=58&t=000451&p=" target="_blank">this thread</a>. In response to spin�s comments on (mis)translation of early Genesis, I said:

Quote:

Not to put your point down, but personally, I'm not too worried about the meaning of 'bereshit' when there's ample hard evidence the bible's description is horseshit.

Note: the bible's description. Of creation.

So tell me, stonetools, just how much 'spiritual comfort' do these millions of normal, 'middle-ground' Christians get from a literal interpretation of Genesis 1 and 2? I'd suggest they get none, because they don't take it literally. They take it as allegory, which is their prerogative, and since it does not conflict with science, matters not a jot to me.

I may or may not think the bible in general is horseshit. To be honest, I don't care one way or the other; mostly I simply ignore it unless it conflicts with scientific evidence.

But Genesis 1 and 2, taken literally as a factual description, really is more manure than you could shake a sauropod's tail at. We know this because of evidence. I see no reason not to say so. Why should I not say the truth, even if it offends? I don't say so to anyone and everyone, I say so to the people who are ignorant enough of the evidence to disagree. And I endeavour to show them the evidence.

I am not saying the bible is crap. I'm saying literal Gen 1&2 is.
If that's offensive, tough.

Oolon

[ March 19, 2002: Message edited by: Oolon Colluphid ]

03-18-2002, 02:33 PM	#9
bluefugue Veteran Member Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Los Angeles Posts: 1,427	Dawkins' impatience with liberal theism doesn't entirely come from arrogance (though he can certainly come off as being arrogant)... I think it comes more from the way he thinks things through. He has no patience for the idea that religion somehow gets a free pass because it is based on faith. He has traditionally disliked liberal theist doctrines because, although they may agree with scientists in many areas, they may still profess belief in certain events (i.e. the Resurrection, the Assumption of Mary, whatever) which, in Dawkins' view, do not hold up to scientific scrutiny. I think Dawkins respects consistency in one's worldview, and this is perhaps why he has formerly preferred the "honesty" of fundamentalism to the harder-to-pin-down beliefs of some liberal theists. I understand where Dawkins is coming from, and I share his anger at being automatically labeled an "extremist" for holding a belief that he (and I) consider to be quite reasonable when it comes to the question of gods and their existence. Anyway, Dawkins has perhaps learned a lesson of politics, which is that occasionally you have to make common cause with the middle ground though you may disagree with them on some things. Personally, though I share Dawkins' misgivings about epistemological compromises, I will take a liberal theist over a fundamentalist. Give me Kenneth Miller over Duane Gish any day of the week. As for the Bible being "horseshit," well, from the standpoint of being a factual guide to science and history, it frequently is horseshit. That is the position that anyone who respects the findings of mainstream science (theist or otherwise) must take: the global flood, Noah's Ark, the 6-day-creation, etc., are (from a factual, as opposed to allegorical, standpoint) quite simply baloney; at best conjecture and exaggeration, at worst pure fiction. This does not make the Bible worthless, it just means it should be read in a certain context. Perhaps Oolon's choice of language could have been more diplomatic but I doubt he meant to completely denigrate the book's cultural, ethical and literary importance; it's pretty much a given that the debate on this forum centers on the Bible's scientific worth, which is dubious at best. But I'm sure Oolon can speak for himself on this matter... [ March 18, 2002: Message edited by: IesusDomini ]</p>

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03-18-2002, 03:16 AM	#2
liquid Veteran Member Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: UK Posts: 1,440	Yes, this sort of thing is worrying me too. One thing that we can be thankful for is that the RC church and the Anglican church, our largest groups, both accept evolution, but it is surprising how many of their flock don't. But I want something to be done about this, and we don't have a first amendment to protect us. Any ideas? As for the telegraph, I have never really had much respect for that paper. It is very establishment and credible, but I have always noticed that its stance on religion is very disappointing. I know that the guardian ran a small article, which unsurprisingly and pleasingly was secular in opinion, but I find it difficult to like that paper too because it is far too left wing and media-luvvy oriented. Personally, I read the times. It seems that big-business corruption of editorials is the lesser evil I can stand... I've been tempted with activism... any ideas?

03-18-2002, 05:07 AM	#3
Pandora Regular Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: UK Posts: 367	This makes me so angry that I am not capable of even making a half intelligent comment. It is impossible to reason with them - their ears are blocked to anything that doesn't agree with their agenda. Does Tony Blair have any balls? It seems any mention of "faith" or "religion" and we should all creep around not offending people's beliefs. Well, I say "Bugger your beliefs" The British Humanist Association has petitions and letter writing going on, plus some articles at <a href="http://www.humanism.org.uk" target="_blank">www.humanism.org.uk</a>

03-18-2002, 09:05 AM	#5
BolshyFaker Veteran Member Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: London, England, UK, Europe, Planet Earth Posts: 2,394	The observer carried an excellent article on the issue of Emmanuel College <a href="http://www.observer.co.uk/focus/story/0,6903,668840,00.html" target="_blank">Observer.co.uk</a> and I find that though the Guardian and Observer may be a little too left wing for some people's tastes (not mine ) they are the only consistently pro-atheist/ pro-secualr state papers in Britain. Alright so maybe the Moring Star carried something equally pro-evolution but then not many people read that do they ?

03-18-2002, 09:22 AM	#6
Coragyps Veteran Join Date: Aug 2001 Location: Snyder,Texas,USA Posts: 4,411	Hi, Gwalchmai, and welcome. Thanks for posting that excellent piece by Dawkins - perfectly to the point on this side of the pond as well!

03-18-2002, 10:10 AM	#7
tgamble Veteran Member Join Date: Sep 2000 Location: St. John's, Nfld. Canada Posts: 1,652	<a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2002/03/18/do1801.xml&sSheet=/portal/2002/03/18/por_right.html&secureRefresh=true&_requestid=11734 " target="_blank">Young Earth Creationists teach bad science and worse religion By Richard Dawkins (Filed: 18/03/2002) </a> THE absurd row over Emmanuel City Technology College in Gateshead has raised an even more absurd confusion, which must be cleared up. There are not two debating positions, but three. Actually more than three, and some of them could be represented as a shaded continuum, but for simplicity I'll stick to three. 1) Young Earth Creationists. They believe the world is only thousands of years old, based on a literal reading of Genesis (or the Koran, or whatever is their holy book). 2) Old Earth Theists. Theirs is a broad church, embracing the great majority of educated religious people. They believe in a Divine Creator, but they read their creation myth allegorically rather than literally, and accept that the world is billions of years old. With the exception of some Old Earth Creationists, they mostly agree that evolution happened, but may allow God some supervisory role. Many think evolution was God's ingenious way of accomplishing his creation. Some believe he helped evolution over the difficult jumps. Others think God kept his hands off evolution, but set up the universe in the first place in such a way as to make it likely to happen. 3) Atheists and agnostics. Within the broad middle group, you'll find the Pope, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bishop of Oxford (who gave an admirable Thought for the Day on the subject on Friday) and, I would guess, most of the bishops and clergy of the Roman and Anglican churches. You'll also find Tony Blair and those of his parliamentary colleagues of all parties who profess religious belief. You will not find the head of science at Emmanuel CTC, Gateshead. I count myself in the third group, but it is not in that capacity that I object to what is happening in Gateshead. From time to time, I argue against Old Earth Theists, but not on this occasion. On the Gateshead issue, scientists and theologians, bishops and atheists stand shoulder to shoulder. Young Earth teachers may do some damage to science education, but it's a pinprick compared with the damage they'll do to religious education if they get a grip on this side of the Atlantic. Confusion is rife because commentators have failed to understand that the Gateshead row is about Young Earth Creationism. Wrongly presuming that we who have asked Ofsted for a re-inspection are attacking religion, they have rushed intemperately into print, not least in this newspaper, imputing to us all sorts of horrific Torquemadan motives. Without bothering to read what we have said, and - worse - without bothering to read what the Gateshead teachers have said, they have assumed that we are attacking the middle group of mainstream religious believers. As one retired contributor to The Daily Telegraph (letters, Mar 16) said: "I am a Christian and a scientist. I see no particular problem in reconciling the evolutionary and Creationist approaches to the formation of the Earth." Well of course you don't see a problem, sir! You are a member of the large consensus in the middle. But the whole point of the Gateshead row is that the head of science at the school does see a problem. He is a Young Earth Creationist. In the same issue of this newspaper, Tom Utley ("God knows what Professor Dawkins is talking about") tells me at insulting length what I already knew, namely that many Creationists don't think the earth is young. Why, Utley ponderously wonders, do I assume that the Gateshead teachers do? For one excellent reason. I take the trouble to read what they say. Steven Layfield, the head of science at Emmanuel, gave a lecture on September 21, 2000 (which would therefore have been available to the Ofsted inspectors). The full text is at: <a href="http://www.christian.org.uk/html-publications/education3.htm." target="_blank">http://www.christian.org.uk/html-publications/education3.htm.</a> Read it. If you love true science, or if you love true religion, the thought of what the children must be missing under this travesty of teaching may sadden you enough to provoke a letter to the Secretary of State for Education, urging her to reopen the case with Ofsted. Layfield remarks that there is no immediate hope of evolution being removed from the national curriculum, and he lists ways in which Creationist science teachers can compensate. For example: "Note every occasion when an evolutionary/old-earth paradigm (millions or billions of years) is explicitly mentioned or implied by a text-book, examination question or visitor, and courteously point out the fallibility of the statement. Wherever possible, we must give the alternative (always better) Biblical explanation of the same data." For Layfield, then, the universe is not billions, not even millions, of years old. It is only thousands. This head of science - this science teacher and mentor of other science teachers - blinds himself to the whole edifice of exciting scientific work, not just in biology and geology (fossils, the molecular clock, the geographic distribution of species in the light of plate-tectonic continental movements), but also physics (numerous independent methods of radioactive dating converge on the same answer) and cosmology (in a young universe, all stars would be invisible to us except the tiny minority within a few thousand light years). Moving on in the lecture: "In view of the current inclusion of earth science into the Sc3 component of the national curriculum, it would seem particularly prudent for all who deliver this aspect of the course to familiarise themselves with Flood geology papers of Whitcomb & Morris . . . "In particular, they would do well to point out that no rock is unearthed with a clear age label and that dating processes in general are speculative, frequently contradictory and in many instances altogether incompatible with a great age." Yes, Flood geology means what you think it means. We're talking Noah's Ark here. Noah's Ark - when the children could be learning the spine-tingling fact that Africa and South America were once joined, and have drawn apart at the speed with which fingernails grow. We have here the head of science, in a school that has received star rating from Ofsted. When I suggested a re-inspection, it had not occurred to me that the people who really come out of the affair badly are the Ofsted inspectors. It is not too late for them to make amends and look properly at what they obviously overlooked before. With hindsight, it might have been better if those of us in Group Three had kept our big mouths shut and left it to the bishops. They have more to lose than we have, and are less vulnerable to prejudiced and perverse misunderstanding. Over to you, gentlemen. Power to your elbows. If there is anything I can do to help, you'll find me lying low, with my head down. With the best will in the world, I seem to do more harm than good. It's somebody else's turn. Richard Dawkins FRS is Oxford's Charles Simonyi Professor of the Public Understanding of Science. His latest book is Unweaving the Rainbow

03-18-2002, 02:14 PM	#8
stonetools Junior Member Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 31	Chickens coming home to roost, I say. In the "YECS have a point" thread, I said that Dawkin's militantly atheistic pronouncements were the catalyst for the creation of the Gateshead school. Nice to see that Dawkins and I can agree In that thread, I was taken to task for suggesting that Dawkins et al. tone down their rhetoric.Apparently, Dawkins , realizing that he he had made things worse, is agreeing to do just that. Its nice to see a kinder, gentler, less arrogant Dawkins. I must say I have to laugh when he talk about enlisting the support of the broad Middle.Ha! The older Dawkins saw no "broad middle". There were just intelligent people ( who thought as he did) and superstitious idiots (everyone else). I guess the broad middle will now step up to the rescue( as they have already started to do) . Unfortunately, IMO, the backlash is going to go much further than it has ( in the US, UK and possibly Australia). I must also say that I feel no sympathy for yon moderator,who acted as if older Dawkins was a role model and who recently referred to the Bible, source of spiritual comfort for millions, as " horseshit". If you keep trashing people's beliefs, the inevitable result is that people will simply withdraw and form their own institutions, taking their tax dollars and political support with them. In the US they are doing so, through the home school and charter school movement. The UK will now follow suit.Get used to it, O. I foresee a hundred Gatesheads blooming...

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