dk

[/list]<ol type="1">[*]Xixax: So, if a religion found young human sacrifice important, the law would be to blame for their lawlessness?
dk: History records many religions that sacrifice people to the gods. Sadly, they all met with ruin.
Xixax: Sadly they all met with ruin? How about, "Happily they all met with ruin." It would still be inaccurate, but at least it would hide your preference for religions with human sacrifice.
Judaism/Christianity has a history of human sacrifice.... perhaps you consider that because it was so infrequent it excuses it?
dk: No, Christian doctrine teaches stuff like,
Matthew 25:40 “And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.”
Matthew 5:43-48 Ye have heard that it hath been said, Thou shalt love thy neighbour, and hate thine enemy. But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you; That ye may be the children of your Father which is in heaven: for he maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.”
.
Did you learn Christianity practiced human sacrifice in public school?[*]dk: What do you think the place of religion in US society?. permit me 2 questions
1) Does the constitution prohibit or protect the right of religious speech?
2) Does the constitution prohibit or protect the right of religious groups to organize?
Xixax:: Religion has a place in our society. I personally feel that a more natural basis for morality would be a much better choice, but considering most people following a religion only adhere to the 'good' points anyway, knowing little of it's past and thinking even less of it's overall consequences, it provides positive experiences for them.
It doesn't make it real.
1) It protects the right of religious speech.
2) It protects their right to organize.
( Note: Neither however is protected if taking funds from taxation etc., it must be sponsored and paid for by the groups in question )
dk: It impossible for a religion to correct disinformation taught in public schools when one is censored from public schools. You’ve hit upon the problem, such sensitive matters need to be resolved at the local level, not from a distant table in Washington ruled by the Supreme Court.[*]Xixax: I mean, this mock persecution you seem to present just doesn't exist. So... you can't have spirituality and the super-natural taught to children in public school:
dk: Xixax I suspect you’ve been educated at public school, and have been taught some of nonsense you echo in public school. We have a problem that needs to be addressed reasonably, not emotionally. Christians censored from public schools, can’t correct the disinformation taught in public schools about Christians.[*]dk: In communities that are 90%+ Christian children should be treated as sacred gifts from God, and expected to act in the manner of Jesus Christ. I think that is what the vast majority of Christian parents expect of public schools. To the extent public schools deviate from Christian doctrine as a matter of policy needs to be publicly posted for discussion.
Xixax: You do understand the difference between tolerance, disagreement, and persecution right? Just because they aren't thumping a Bible in class doesn't mean you're being persecuted.
That schools 'deviate' from Christian doctrine is an IRRELEVANCE, as much as it is irrelevant how it deviates from Muslim doctrine, Hindu doctrine, and the doctrine of the great IPU or IWA's.
It's irrelevant, and doesn't deserve serious discussion.
dk: In a Hindu, Jewish, Muslim or Buddhist community I want public schools to be sensitive to the communities religious doctrine, and where public school policy or curriculum violates the communities doctrine reason not deception, or emotion, should be used to resolve the problem. For example, many Hindu’s believe cows are sacred, so it’s prudent for a public school in a Hindu community not to serve cow for lunch. In a public schools that serves a Moslem Community reasonable accommodation for daily prayers cost virtually nothing. Now, if in a Hindu community rats present a health threat, then the rats must be exterminated, but as a matter of public health policy, not some serpentine wall erected by a distant Washington Oligarchy (Supreme Court).[*]dk:But if you want your children treated as strict naturalists, then you need to know to what extent public schools deviate. Lets be clear, to cover a child parents need the open support of schools, and visa versa. When parents and schools don’t have a clue who’s responsible for what, then the child is more often than not left uncovered.
Xixax: No, I don't have to know how they deviate. They aren't addressing issues like whether or not a child should believe in the supernatural in a classroom! Hopefully they are instilling critical thinking skills, but stopping short of telling them what to believe. I'll do that when they get home.
dk: Think critically. If you don’t know what public schools teach, then you don’t know if your children are being taught to think critically.[*]Xixax: The best bet is to make sure the school does not deviate into -any- religious doctrine, unless the child enrolls in a class where the discussion of those issues is expected. In those cases, I would then hope the teacher does not lay any bias on the children during grading, but I would be fine with the teacher expressing their personal beliefs and even defending them. So long as it doesn't get molded into a math class, a chemistry class, or a biology class etc. Keep it in classes where those issues are in context and I'm fine with it.
dk: Earlier on this thread pretty much everyone on the thread agreed 90% of k0-k12 education was indoctrination. I personally think public schools make their first mistake by creating artificial egalitarian environments (campuses) ruled under a strict bureaucracy. Institutions should practice what they teach, kids see right through the facade to hypocrisy. Nonetheless a kid that graduates high school competent in literature, writing, language, algebra, civics, US History, and analytical geometry with a rudimentary knowledge of physics, astronomy, biology (hygiene), chemistry, World history and physical fitness can compete in any field they choose with anyone in the world. I submit there simply is no substitute for sound fundamentals. I have a niece who was in a gifted program K3-8, then quite high school as a freshman to attend a Junior College (she was denied access to 4 year schools) because the gifted HS program was all a review and route repetition.[*]Xixax: Not only that, what tactics are you talking about anyway? Teaching? Heh.... you are still in this "evilutionist conspiracy" mode were you somehow feel there is a large group of people hiding "the truth" from everyone else. That isn't the case. How could such information be stopped?
dk: I’m not talking about information, but doctrine, and indoctrination. Doctrine is composed the concepts, structures and forms absent information, used to explain information. For example the utter failure of doctrines to curb drugs, drunk driving, teen suicide, STDs, teen pregnancy, intolerance, non-violence, and illiteracy.[*]dk: I oppose the “Closing of the American Mind” under the auspices of pseudoscientific evolutionary social doctrines.
Xixax: Ahhh.... I read a few reviews and notes from that book by Allan Bloom your'e referring to. What I read sounds eerily similar to the same crap you're spewing on this forum. For instance:
From Blooms book:
blacks are not sharing a special positive intellectual or moral experience; they partake fully in the common culture, with the same goals and tastes as everyone else, but they are doing it by themselves. The heat is under the pot, but they do not melt as have /all/ other groups." "Affirmative action now institutionalises the worse aspects of separatism. The fact is that the average black student's achievements do not equal those of the average white student in good universities and everybody knows it." "Those who are good students fear they are equated with those who are not, that their hard-won credentials are not credible. They are the victims of a stereotype, but one that has been chosen by black leadership."
dk: I did read Blooms book, and thought he made some good points. But I was speaking more generally about a materialism fundamentally locked into a systematic methodology incapable of meaningful self criticism. That’s why I’ve hammered so hard on the scientific breakthroughs as a window of opportunity seized in the moment, as opposed to a systematic methodology justified as the lesser of two evils.[*]Xixax: It's so easy to release and publish information these days, that if there were any truth to any of the garbage your spewing out about a lack of evidence for evolution, it would be widely discussed, and thought would change! It may very well happen. It's extremely unlikely considering the overwhelming amount of positive evidence for evolution, but the fact that it's not a dogmatic religious belief means it can be overturned by evidence. Not by whining, not by wishing it away, not by thinking we must be more special than just another evolved species on this planet, but by evidence. Until that happens, and it more than likely never will, evolution belongs in the biology classroom.
dk: The concept of evolution isn’t going away, its embedded into every category of science as the underlying explanation. It’s a problem to the extent people find the explanation so systematic they stop asking questions.[*]Xixax: The problem you have with evolution is all you. Evolution is a science. It's facts, theory, mechanisms and observations. It has no morality or amorality. It doesn't need or deny a God. It doesn't speak to any social ills or causes.
dk: The problem I have with evolution is doctrine, absent evidence. For example for a long time people just took for granted petrified forests were fossilized of millions of years, until Mount Saint Helen erupted laying down hundreds of strata and depositing a petrified forest at the bottom of Ghost Lake. To the extent the science of evolution makes inquiry obsolete, it becomes evolutionism and an obstacle to science. Science learns from its mistakes, so to assume evolution can’t be wrong is a mistake. To be fair, creationism has probably done more to advance the science of evolution than evolutionism.[/list=a]

[ October 04, 2002: Message edited by: dk ]</p>

dk

I don't disagree scigirl, but would add the theory of evolution doesn't address the first cause. Really what you're advocating is for science to distinguish dogma, doctrine and evidence. From a philosophical viewpoint, I'd say people think in absolute concepts, structures and forms about the objective world, but the objective world is finite and only contains finite concepts, structures and forms. For example Mechanics, QM and Relativity only apply within finite determined boundaries, each from a unique perspective. This supports the plural viewpoint of Moderate Realism that radical materialism and idealism can't accept.

lpetrich

I was making an analogy with micro vs. macroevolution; I know that it's the same force. And yes, some people have believed that microgravity exists, but not macrogravity.

So what? You mentioned them as if they somehow imply that evolution does not happen.

However, no "design" was involved in those magnets getting strung together.

Or consider this. Put some sand into a bucket and then pour it out, trying to pour it in a thin stream. Notice how the sand forms a conical pile, with a slant that stays constant as the pile increases in size. Note that the only "design" here was in pouring the sand, not in arranging it into a neat conical pile.

This experiment will work with salt, sugar, etc., anything composed of grains that one can easily pour.

It's not at all obvious to me. In fact, it's irrelevant. What does that have to do with how (say) bird, bat, and pterodactyl wings are these creatures' front limbs?

And if you keep this up, O dk, this thread might end up in Rants, Raves, and Preaching, alongside of QueenofSwords's Weekly Nutwatches. O dk, would you enjoy seeing your comments alongside QoS making MST3K-style comments about fundie lunacy? In fact, would you enjoy having QoS give your comments a similar treatment?

What does simplicity have to do with success? Newtonian mechanics is an APPROXIMATION of relativistic quantum field theory, and that's very complex and difficult -- and very successfully tested in some cases.

Also, biology != sociology. O dk, your remarks do have some pedagogical value -- as examples of rhetorical fallacies for a class on critical thinking and reasoning.

(embarrassments like thalidomide, the Dalkon Shield, female-hormone supplements, etc. ...)

So what about them? What does this have to do with evolution?

Because careless use of antibiotics lets bacteria ... EVOLVE .. resistance to them. It's evolution in action.

I'd be surprised if dk really understands what the issue is all about.

No, just well-documented history. I seem to be touching a raw nerve somewhere.

More likely because they believed that their religion and their religion alone is the One True Religion and that every other religion is false and evil -- a notion that people have been willing to kill each over for many centuries.

I'd be surprised if dk knows what he is talking about.

Showing only that dk does not know what he is talking about.

Famous for his errors? I hope that dk does not get into the textbook-writing business.

Which ones? O dk, I suggest that you check out some young-earth-creationist sites some time. Like the Institute for Creation Research, Answers in Genesis, etc.

And, O dk, for all I know, you might be a young-earther who is trying to deflect criticism of young-earthism by getting indignant at anyone who criticizes young-earthism.

Those black helicopters are everywhere, aren't they?

(dk on the supposed fall of US public schools...)

And what does this have to do with evolution?

Show me one person who has ever practiced that teaching consistently. Even Jesus Christ did not -- we are told that he had zapped a certain fig tree for not bearing figs when he was hungry. And driving demons into some pigs, who then proceed to stampede into a nearby lake -- that was not very nice to those poor pigs.

So fucking what?

I've never seen any mainstream geologist make that "concession".

And this is geology, not biology -- and, O dk, if you think that big volcanic eruptions are something that geologists have never heard of before, you are sadly mistaken.

I think that dk's views have a place in the classroom -- as spectacular examples of non sequiturs.

This is the biggest load of dinosaur dung I've ever seen. Evolutionary biologists are sometimes their own biggest critics -- consider the numerous controversies that have raged over the years.

Why this obsession with some supposed first cause? I suggest that you consider what the Buddha had once compared origin-of-Universe speculations to:

Being shot with an arrow and being unwilling to pull it out unless one has answered numerous questions about its origin and who shot it and so forth.

[ October 05, 2002: Message edited by: lpetrich ]</p>

pz

In the late 50s, there was a call to improve US science education (it was called sputnik). Throughout the 60s and into the 70s, we were the fortunate recipient of increased funding for science education in the public schools. Beginning in the 70s, we saw increasing activity by creationists to undermine good science teaching.

At the times you are claiming the public schools were "jewels", evolution and good science were taught without question. I'm not so deluded that I will claim that evolution was the cause of the good, but it's pretty silly to argue that it was a cause of the bad. I also think that the correlation between the attempts by meddling incompetents seeking to corrupt science teaching, and the decline of science teaching that you cite, is pretty good.

Camaban

*didn't know it was supposed to*

Dr Rick

Right...and the problem I have with creation is science, absent divine intervention.

<strong> So?

<strong> Just like to the extent the religion of Christianity makes God dead, it becomes Christianism and an obstacle to Jesus.

<strong> To assume the overwhelming evidence supporting evolution can't be right is a mistake.

<strong> To be just as nonsensical, Hinduism has probably done more to advance the science of astronomy than physics.

Rick

dk

Between 1930-1945, per capita, very few working people had the money for college (Great Depression and WW II). Washington enlisted University expertise to organize and centralize the War effort. Biometrics and social sciences were used to organize test, place and field an army, air force, navy and oversee the Industry complex, then after the war rebuild Europe and Japan. After WW II an army of veterans on the GI Bill of Rights attended college to expand the university system ten fold (or more). Sputnik did focused education on science and technology, but their was also a movement afoot to “win the peace” with the same directed effort used to “win the war”. The close bonds forged between University and Washington stirred the soup that cooked the Great Society of the 1960s. The great society was about power politics under the guise of science, but had little to do with science. The expansive powers the Federal Government assumed after WW II were acquired by the courts erecting a wall between Church and State. The history gives insights into the power politics that caused many of the problems education suffers today.

dk

Let me try to explain, but I think you make a good point. Dogma, doctrine and science are plural and complex (like people), as opposed to singular and direct. Since Descartes the goal of philosophy (and the philosophy of science) has been to systematize human thought conclusively to reliably direct human enterprise, but just when the conclusion seems in the grasp of human experience it sputters and falls back into the depths of cynicism. Cynicism powers alternating currents in people that align around poles of chaos and tyranny. There is a place for dogma, doctrine, and science but they can’t hold the same place, at the same time, in the same sense because faith leads to absolutes and reason leads to particulars, and both faith and reason are necessary to one another. Dogma tempers ‘faith’ with laws necessary to reliable traditions in opposition to radicalism. Doctrine is ‘relative’ to bridge the past and future with hope. Science roots people in the particulars of the moment so people can serve with dignity the needs of social intercourse constrained by a finite reality.

Dr Rick

Dogma is a belief that is considered settled and established beyond question; it can be very simple as well as complex. God is good is an example of simple Christian dogma; its ramifications may be explored by theologians, but the principle itself cannot seriously be questioned. The goodness of God is assumed and established, and to question that dogma is to commit heresy.

Everything in science, on the other hand, is open to question; there can be no dogma nor heresy in science. If someone states a scientific principle dogmatically, the fault is with that someone, not with the scientific principle.

Evolution is not dogma. It is a scientific principle that stands on the weight of the overwhelming supporting evidence. It is still open to question, but to date there is not a single shred of evidence to refute it, and no alternative theory can explain the data that we have as evolution can.

Doctrines are principles or rules that are taught, and they can also be simple; they may or my not be open to inquiry depending on the source. Religious doctrines that may not be questioned are dogma. Doctrine is not commonly used to describe anything in science, but if something in science is to be called doctrine, than it must be open to inquiry (or it is not science) and so cannot be dogma.

Science is a method of inquiry and knowledge based on facts and observations of the material world that are systematized so as to be explanatory and predictive. Evolution fullfills that criteria, but the dogma of creation does not.

<strong> Scientific inquiry has nothing to do with cynicism, and it reliably directs human enterprise, whereas religion does not. Science, not religion, took us to the moon and brought about the discovery of antibiotics. Science succeeds and religion fails. Evolution is science; it is explanatory and predictive. Creation is religion, and it neither explains the objective evidence nor reliably predicts what we will find as we explore our world.

<strong> Faith is belief in the absense of or contrary to the objective evidence; it is anathema to reason and completely independent of it. Reason does not rely on faith, and faith clouds reason.

There is no place for dogma in reason or science.

<strong> Dogma arises from faith, and both are unnecessary and harmful. They both block inquiry and learning, and they both impede science. Religion has dogma and requires faith, and creation is part of that dogma and faith.

<strong> Doctrines are rules or principles that are taught, and they may be taught independently of hope.

<strong> Science provides the tools to explain and manipulate our world. Evolution is part of science; dignity is not. However, when it comes to human dignity, it is religion, and particularly Christianity with its dogma of the sinful nature of man that degrades humanity. Creation is a faith-based and dogmatic belief that includes the completely unsubstantiated and disgusting myth that we were created in perfection but then debased ourselves. It destroys human dignity and replaces it with a requirement for salvation. Such degrading beliefs do nothing to help us in a social context, and they certainly do not advance science or human dignity.

Evolution is science; creation is religion. Science should be taught in public schools as science, and religion should be taught only as religion.

Rick

[ October 05, 2002: Message edited by: rbochnermd ]</p>

dk

<ol type="1">[*] rbochnermd: Dogma is a belief that is considered settled and established beyond question; it can be very simple as well as complex. God is good is an example of simple Christian dogma; its ramifications may be explored by theologians, but the principle itself cannot seriously be questioned. The goodness of God is assumed and established, and to question that dogma is to commit heresy.
dk: I think of dogma as those specific, essential and basic tenants that contain the fixed truth of some doctrine or a specific belief. Heresy supplants or reforms dogma in some sense, but once the dogma is changed, it becomes another dogma. This is called a schism.[*]rbochnermd: Everything in science, on the other hand, is open to question; there can be no dogma nor heresy in science. If someone states a scientific principle dogmatically, the fault is with that someone, not with the scientific principle.
dk: Rather, as a matter of Dogma everything in science may be open to question. Still every question isn’t science just as every answer isn’t scientific. So the dogma of science asks certain kinds of questions, then goes about answering those questions with a fixed methodology that varies from subject to subject. I’m not trying to be agrumentive but science tries to explain things in terms of an underlying reality that can be empirically tested and positively known. Science does have a dogma.[*]rbochnermd: Evolution is not dogma. It is a scientific principle that stands on the weight of the overwhelming supporting evidence. It is still open to question, but to date there is not a single shred of evidence to refute it, and no alternative theory can explain the data that we have as evolution can.
dk: Can anyone question positive evidence? Lets see. I might fairly toss a fair coin three times and get three heads, but if I toss a coin 30 times and get 30 heads, then either the coin or the toss is unfair. Is this a matter of science fact, or dogma? The odds of tossing 30 heads in a sequence are less than one in a trillion. Still, the probability indicates if I can repeat the experiment 300 trillion times, eventually I will produce 30 heads in a row. The truth is that I can write a simulation program to flip a coin 30 or 100 trillion times, and never get 30 heads in a row. Does this experiment disprove the laws of probability? No. Why? Answer: Science does have dogma that defies question. In fact the question of a random number generator defies science in one distribution or another.[*]rbochnermd: Doctrines are principles or rules that are taught, and they can also be simple; they may or my not be open to inquiry depending on the source. Religious doctrines that may not be questioned are dogma. Doctrine is not commonly used to describe anything in science, but if something in science is to be called doctrine, than it must be open to inquiry (or it is not science) and so cannot be dogma.
dk: What can be simpler than tossing a coin? But I don’t follow... people question Dogma all the time, especially religious Dogma. What distinguishes dogma from science or doctrine is: ‘No matter how many times Dogma is questioned it remains the same.’ so false dogmas are quite common, while true dogmas quite rare. Do you remember the comedy skit, “the Swami”, Johnny Carson played on the Tonight Show. The swami tapped a sealed envelope upon his turbine to telepathically gleam the answer, Carson might say, “4 million years”, then handed the envelope to McMahon who read the question “When did the first Hominid walk upright?“. It was amazing but the Swami always knew the right answer.[*]rbochnermd: Science is a method of inquiry and knowledge based on facts and observations of the material world that are systematized so as to be explanatory and predictive. Evolution fulfills that criteria, but the dogma of creation does not.
dk: Seems to me Paleontologists are a lot like the swami. The researcher sends hundreds of fragments in a sealed envelope to a lab for an answer, if the lab says, “4 million years” then the paleontologist asks the question, “When did the first Hominid walk upright?”. Indeed it appears Paleontologists are kinda like Swami, they know the answer before the question is ever asked, and they are never wrong, relatively speaking.[*]dk: Since Descartes the goal of philosophy (and the philosophy of science) has been to systematize human thought conclusively to reliably direct human enterprise, but just when the conclusion seems in the grasp of human experience it sputters and falls back into the depths of cynicism. Cynicism powers alternating currents in people that align around poles of chaos and tyranny.
rbochnermd: Scientific inquiry has nothing to do with cynicism, and it reliably directs human enterprise, whereas religion does not. Science, not religion, took us to the moon and brought about the discovery of antibiotics. Science succeeds and religion fails. Evolution is science; it is explanatory and predictive. Creation is religion, and it neither explains the objective evidence nor reliably predicts what we will find as we explore our world.
dk: Yes swami, sorry I asked and I agree the hard sciences have proved reliable. The positive sciences of ethics, psychology, economics, political science, and social science have however proved unreliable, except for the swami. By comparison the hard sciences are so much simpler and straight forward.[*]dk: - There is a place for dogma, doctrine, and science but they can’t hold the same place, at the same time, in the same sense because faith leads to absolutes and reason leads to particulars, and both faith and reason are necessary to one another.
rbochnermd: Faith is belief in the absense of or contrary to the objective evidence; it is anathema to reason and completely independent of it. Reason does not rely on faith, and faith clouds reason.
dk: Science has made a lot of progress. For example Nobel believed science could make modern weapons systems so terrible nations would live in peace. In matters of morality and ethics science has proven unreliable even MAD.[*]rbochnermd: There is no place for dogma in reason or science.
dk: Can I take that as dogmatic statement?[*]dk: Dogma tempers ‘faith’ with laws necessary to reliable traditions in opposition to radicalism.
rbochnermd: Dogma arises from faith, and both are unnecessary and harmful. They both block inquiry and learning, and they both impede science. Religion has dogma and requires faith, and creation is part of that dogma and faith.
dk: Says who, and on what authority, Science?[*]dk: Doctrine is ‘relative’ to bridge the past and future with hope.
rbochnermd: Doctrines are rules or principles that are taught, and they may be taught independently of hope.
dk: You mean like, “May I have permission to hope?” or “To teach hope is unprincipled?”[*]dk: - Science roots people in the particulars of the moment so people can serve with dignity the needs of social intercourse constrained by a finite reality.
rbochnermd: Science provides the tools to explain and manipulate our world. Evolution is part of science; dignity is not. However, when it comes to human dignity, it is religion, and particularly Christianity with its dogma of the sinful nature of man that degrades humanity. Creation is a faith-based and dogmatic belief that includes the completely unsubstantiated and disgusting myth that we were created in perfection but then debased ourselves. It destroys human dignity and replaces it with a requirement for salvation. Such degrading beliefs do nothing to help us in a social context, and they certainly do not advance science or human dignity.
dk: Unless you can provide a source for this dogma it lacks substance.[*]rbochnermd: Evolution is science; creation is religion. Science should be taught in public schools as science, and religion should be taught only as religion.
dk: Seems to me several reliable scientific sources have proposed a god equation. At any rate your statement reeks of dogma. Dogma isn’t science, but a source of science. Do you think God or Science makes people deny ‘dogma’ dogmatically?[/list=a]
[ October 06, 2002: Message edited by: dk ]</p>