Freethought & Rationalism Archive

Skydancer · 10-16-2002, 07:12 AM

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Originally posted by Camaban:
Who was it that said that the best argument against Democracy was a 10 minute conversation with the average voter?

Heh. Mark Twain once suggested weighting the votes by educational level and income. Of course, with the number of Ph.D. degrees out there in totally subjective fields it wouldn't help any more, either.

The problem is that democracy generally produces mediocrity. All the authoritarian systems oscillate between genius and lunacy. The average is the same, but....

Our system works well enough most of the time. This is one of the unfortunate negative aspects, is all. It's happened before, and it'll go away again, and come back again.

Janaya · 10-16-2002, 07:22 AM

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Because in the US, K-12 education is descided by politicians listening to voters. In most instances, unless the voters listen to scientists and college academics, the Boards of Education won't.

Exactly my point. Science is not a popularity contest. Science facts should be taught as facts. Scientific theories should be taught as theories. Controversies within science should also be taught that way. Am I wrong?

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Your other problem is that textbook publishers on the whole are there to make profits so they want their books to be as applicable to as many regions as possible.

That is something that I hadn't thought of. Though I don't think that education should be held hostage by profits.

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I mean, even if a panel of scientists gets to review books and make recommendations, I don't see this society being happy with not being given a choice. And while there's choice, you have that drive toward popularity in textbook content.

But they would have a choice. Scientists could review the science presented, not necessarily how or when it is presented. I'm not saying that there would be just one or two books recommended, but this would be balance against errors, inaccuracies and down right misinformation.

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And oddly enough, the two markets that textbook publishers apparently really compete for are Texas and California - both populous states with rather centralized decision making on which texts get accepted.

I also was not aware of that. Though that could work in our favor. If a national review board is not feasible or unconstitutional, then perhaps concentration on those two states and maybe a few others is all we would need to do.

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A national board would simply change the politics to a different arena. Frankly, I trust it being handled on the national level even less. The amount of political correctness at the Federal level gives me a shudder as to what would happen if they controlled science textbooks.

You have a very valid point. I guess there wouldn't be any way to divorce the federal government from any sort of national panel. Damn. Even though science is not a popularity contest, I guess science education is. <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" />

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The federal government can set up such a committee but its rulings would be non-binding on the states.

I guess I kinda had in mind (as a backup plan) that scientists could do this on their own. After all the future of their own work is at stake.

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Over here (as far as I know) The idea of parents voting on what their children should be taught is nothing more than an amusing concept.

I am appalled at what is happening here. I thought "shouldn't scientists decide what is accurate or controversial in science?" Just as any other subject should be monitored by it's respective experts. But even more so by a subject that is inherently self-correcting. The only subject that I can think of that would be less controversial would be mathematics.

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They know how they feel. And they understand that democracy is good and authoritarianism is bad. And that they're voters and they deserve to vote. And they don't, on the whole, trust scientists and they do, on the whole, trust their religion. The fact of being woefully ill informed isn't even on most people's horizon.

This just makes me ill. It is backwards. Aren't they even interested in finding out the truth?

I better stop now or I'll start RRing.

Peace,
Janaya

NialScorva · 10-16-2002, 08:02 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Camaban:


That is the exact reasoning I believe the US system is useless on so many things.

Over here (as far as I know) The idea of parents voting on what their children should be taught is nothing more than an amusing concept.

Why when we've got people who actually know what they're talking about? What does the average parent know about most of this stuff?

There are ways around the tenth amendment. The usual way is to deny federal funding to any state that doesn't meet certain guidelines, which is how the 65 interstate/55 everything else maximums were applied federally (though repealed a couple years ago).

Similarly, back during the Kansas snafu a couple years ago, I seem to recall the NSF revoking Kansas's rights to use copyrighted lesson plans and sample guidelines for all the sciences. All the government has to do is cut education funding unless the textbook choice comes from an approved list. The state still has the right to choose, but there's no way it'll choose anything not on the list.

Peregrine · 10-17-2002, 06:58 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Janaya:
I simply cannot understand why school boards/districts can decide arbitrarily what in science is true.

So, why don't we have a national panel of scientists to actually approve what goes into our science textbooks?
[ October 15, 2002: Message edited by: Janaya ]

Nice thought (besides violating the federalist principles of the 10th Amend) but would you want a board selected by Bush to select textbooks or their content? And don't expect Bush to rely on the NSF or some other legit organization, remember he did away with ABA recommendations for selection of judges.

Skydancer · 10-17-2002, 08:58 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Peregrine:


Nice thought (besides violating the federalist principles of the 10th Amend) but would you want a board selected by Bush to select textbooks or their content? And don't expect Bush to rely on the NSF or some other legit organization, remember he did away with ABA recommendations for selection of judges.

Well, that's not exactly the same situation. Judges are the people who lawyers have to deal with - having them approve judges seems like conflict of interest. Having scientists approve of the educational process that feeds into their profession is not the same thing.

That said, no, I don't trust Bush to follow the NSF suggestions, either.

KeithHarwood · 10-17-2002, 05:00 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Camaban:


Over here (as far as I know) The idea of parents voting on what their children should be taught is nothing more than an amusing concept.

The high school syllabuses are intended for university entrance exams. Many high school subjects are pre-requisites for university courses. Any parent who votes for anything different is denying their children a university education. For the state schools and most of the private ones no one gets a vote and no one wants one.

abe smith · 10-18-2002, 04:58 AM

..... Because "scientists" is an undefined category to wh/ any idiot / Sorry: delete "idiot" and insert "incompetent".--- can assert his/her/other's membership. Labelling oneself or another a "scientist" doesn't mean a goddam thing as far as having-authority goes. CF. for example the fact that the Pope asserts that
(the alleged) "Christ" has appointed *him* to run humankind. "Assertion is not demonstration." = my editing of Macaulay's percept.

abe smith · 10-18-2002, 05:04 AM

PS : Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? ( My Latin is probably inaccurate. Means = "So who's going to keep an eye on the (naughty) behaviour of the Guardians?" Juvenal? I forget.) You get the idea. The best defense against JUNK-thinking is, Keep your own brains
clean, dry, sharpened.

RufusAtticus · 10-18-2002, 05:41 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by KeithHarwood:


The high school syllabuses are intended for university entrance exams. Many high school subjects are pre-requisites for university courses. Any parent who votes for anything different is denying their children a university education. For the state schools and most of the private ones no one gets a vote and no one wants one.

But in the US they don't have to go to University. They can go to Bible College. <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" /> <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" /> <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" /> <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" /> <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" /> <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" />

dk · 10-18-2002, 06:30 AM

In the 1930s the German government had bragging rights to the best public education system in the world. A fact manifest in a policy that only Aryans were suited to teach neo-German History. I think the US should follow suite, and require teachers to swear a loyalty oath to evolutionism, scientism and the establishment of educracy, with life, liberty and bananas for all.

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10-18-2002, 04:58 AM	#17
abe smith Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: springfield, MA. USA Posts: 2,482	..... Because "scientists" is an undefined category to wh/ any idiot / Sorry: delete "idiot" and insert "incompetent".--- can assert his/her/other's membership. Labelling oneself or another a "scientist" doesn't mean a goddam thing as far as having-authority goes. CF. for example the fact that the Pope asserts that (the alleged) "Christ" has appointed him to run humankind. "Assertion is not demonstration." = my editing of Macaulay's percept.

10-18-2002, 05:04 AM	#18
abe smith Veteran Member Join Date: Apr 2001 Location: springfield, MA. USA Posts: 2,482	PS : Quis custodiet ipsos custodes? ( My Latin is probably inaccurate. Means = "So who's going to keep an eye on the (naughty) behaviour of the Guardians?" Juvenal? I forget.) You get the idea. The best defense against JUNK-thinking is, Keep your own brains clean, dry, sharpened.

10-18-2002, 06:30 AM	#20
dk Veteran Member Join Date: Nov 2001 Location: Denver Posts: 1,774	In the 1930s the German government had bragging rights to the best public education system in the world. A fact manifest in a policy that only Aryans were suited to teach neo-German History. I think the US should follow suite, and require teachers to swear a loyalty oath to evolutionism, scientism and the establishment of educracy, with life, liberty and bananas for all.

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