Any creationists in the house?

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    I am curious if any of you live in places where creationism, or intelligent design is taught in schools as a solid fact on the same level as evolution?

    In the uk, we keep creationist ideas to religious education classes, and it is never taught as anything other than religion (IE, not science). But I know there are lots of places in the US where people have tried to get evolution out of the classroom.

    Any thoughts on this/experiences with it?

  • sibyllene
    11 years ago

    No experience with it, but I sure have thoughts on it... ; )

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    It may be needless to say I will never be remembered for any academic achievement . I received the first eight years of my education in a private catholic school and was forced to memorize paragraphs from the Baltimore Catechism . Many of my classmates were sons and daughters of engineers who worked as civilians at an Air Force Base close by, so I literally have rubbed elbows with rocket scientist .Yesterday I attended a church fundraiser for goodwill and found myself in a conversation with the author of a book. We discussed a wide range of topics ranging from genealogy to a well known college challenge issued to engineering students on whether hell was exothermic or endothermic . He laughed at some of the things that pass for science today. I asked if he thought politics had always attempted to control scientific truth and religious truth and he felt as I did that it is no less true today. As I was leaving my sister informed me the man I was speaking to was diagnosed as having Alzheimer's disease and I told her he has probably forgot more than I will ever know ,but I perceived a rare wisdom in him

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    Interesting Mike, yeah.

    Come on Sibby, don't by coy!

    I personally think all children should be taught religious education, but the class should cover all the worlds major religions with equal detail and respect in much the same way science does with its various topics.

    Religious ideas cannot be taught in a science classroom for the very simple reason that they are not tested, peer reviewed and then retested using known scientific methods. If it hasn't been proven by that method, it isn't science worthy of a classroom.

  • sibyllene
    11 years ago

    You basically just did it for me. I'm even fine if a private religious school wants to talk about creationism. But it doesn't belong in a science classroom, because, definitionally, it isn't science. It's the responsibility of science education to pass on the best of what is believed to be true at the time, based on scientific evidence and what we know of universal laws. If a creationist account of the birth of the universe has gone through the same channels as current scientific theories and seems to be relevant, then maybe. But it won't. Science and creationism as they stand are coming from two distinct and hardly overlapping methodologies, and I guess I don't see why people are even trying to make them smush together.

    You could argue, perhaps, that science doesn't offer a complete picture of reality, and I could maybe get behind that. But it doesn't try to, either. It tries to understand the universe -from a physical, observational, evidential- standpoint. Tada.

    And yes to world religions. It sure couldn't hurt our current climate.

    And while we're at it let's force every high school senior to take a logic course. At least informal logic. I think it could cut YouTube comments down by half.

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    I have a quote here from Michael about this issue Bob.

    "You know man, I'm not trying to rock the boat, because I love boats, I mean I think I was one of the animals Noah took on his boat...maybe like a Turtle or something..but Bob, poetry is alive like sexual energy..and you know, when I see a thread..sometimes I get all excited and it just flies out of me! I'm not trying to be bad, I want to be good..I want to be on the Ark...Bob, don't tell me I'm one of the animals that isn't aloud on board...I have so much...poetry to give"

    I hope this helps Bob

    I have always felt that reason should not appose faith and my hero's were the Giordano Bruno's and the Galileo Galilei.'s in the world that I believe believed that it is only perception that changes and not the laws of nature that always was and always will be .
    PS Kevin we cannot deny the use of logical fallacies such as

    "An ad hominem (Latin for "to the man"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an argument made personally against an opponent, instead of against the opponent's argument.[1] Ad hominem reasoning is normally described as a logical fallacy,[2][3][4] more precisely an informal fallacy and an irrelevance.[5]"
    wiki

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    "You basically just did it for me. "

    You all read Sibs words to me. I think I just died of happy.

    Mike, no idea what you are going on about dude, and pulling quotes of mine from years ago is just creepy.

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    How creative!

    I quoted you because that is the only thing on your level.You still cannot see how Genesis is related to this topic

    I never believed you are as shallow as you pretend to be. lol

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    Got anything to say that is original MIke?

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    I don't have Alzhiemers so I remember the circular arguments we have been through well over a hundred times
    Original? May I refer you the the 4th post down in this thread
    http://www.poems-and-quotes.com/discussion/topic.html?topic_id=115634

    lmao
    "Substances High In Transmutations"
    We are both full of "it."
    The only difference between us is one is more willing to admit to" it"

  • sibyllene
    11 years ago

    "You all read Sibs words to me. I think I just died of happy."

    Bahahahaha.... I didn't realize those connotations. Welp, I guess the secret's out.

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    Sibby, you can't hide the truth, not even between the lines.

  • Larry Chamberlin
    11 years ago

    A fundamental element of science theory is that it must be capable of being disproved.

    Creationism and every other faith based system ultimately cannot be disproved because it requires that element of faith beyond proof.

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    Well said Larry. I think quite a lot of the confusion from the creationist side is their poor understanding of what a scientific theory is.

    Gravity and bacterial disease are working "theories". I have some theories about why I'm the tallest person in my family. I don't have any evidence, just my ideas. Bit of a difference between those two sets of theories ey?

  • Larry Chamberlin
    11 years ago

    Actually even your theory may be put into a scientific fashion.
    work up your hypothesis. Determine what variable may tend to prove or disprove your theory. Set the control specimen. Test away. Might take a few years, but it is capable of being disproved.

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    Oh, I like to have a few personal theories that I never test Larry, like my own urban myths. I wouldn't want to disprove them or know how they really work because they are small silly things of no real consequence.

    Of course I don't share them with anyone else or expect other people to respect/follow em so the pressure on me to back up my ideas is tiny.

    /wink

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    "Georges Lemaître first proposed what would become the Big Bang theory in what he called his "hypothesis of the primeval atom." Over time, scientists would build on his initial ideas to form the modern synthesis
    Georges Henri Joseph �douard Lemaître (French: [l�m�t�] ( listen); 17 July 1894 - 20 June 1966) was a Belgian priest, astronomer and professor of physics at the Catholic University of Louvain. He was the first person to propose the theory of the expansion of the Universe" Wiki
    Science is the observation of natural phemomenon and its origins have been in pseudo sciences . The astrologers that sought to honor a King that was to change the course of history were well versed in such sciences. The word myth has evolved far from its original meaning

  • Larry Chamberlin
    11 years ago

    Michael I agree that much of science is a working theory not immediately capable of being disproved.

    However, the consistency is important of any theory such that it does not have to be laboriously explained to fit in more and greater exceptions. I think of Ptolemy's basic geocentric theory, with ever more complicated formulas to explain the retrograde motion of the planets, then Copernicus comes along and provides a theory that simplified the system elegantly. Yet, relatively speaking, it is possible to "fix" any point in space and call it "the center" and thereby formulate the math of all other bodies around that center. Possible but not practical.

  • Jordan
    11 years ago

    Even the Dalai Lama said that there's no room for religion in serious discourse today.

    Religion only forces borders upon mankind.

    I believe that it's good to teach religion to children as it is an important part of many people's lives, but as Sibs and Kev pointed out, it's only really useful to teach in that it promotes well-roundedness in our population.

    Spirituality? I'm all for it. A healthy mind is one of the most important things to have, but religion is a topic that's been bludgeoned to death and hasn't contributed to human progress for way too many years.

  • Kevin
    11 years ago

    Well said Jordan.

    We once needed religion to fill in the blanks when we didn't know even the most basic details of how our world works. The kinds of things a 10 year old could explain now used to horrify our ancestors and further empower their need for a God of explanations.

    That isn't the case anymore.

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    I think a very wise man meditated on the subject of religion and came to the conclusion that religion was just a path and not a destination . It seems to take a lot of time for order to come from a random big bang and if anyone knows of an organism that is not dependent on the seasons and natural cycles of solar systems please do share . We are free to credit chaos for life or acknowledge Good Orderly Direction

  • dan
    11 years ago

    Science works making things God proof while God makes things for scientists to prove.

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    According to evolutionist the world has been animal proof for billions of years. The human animal has added several challenges

  • will
    11 years ago

    Wow. I still recall all of you. Its been like 5 years. Look my old tag was the last foolish child to a fallen king. Despite that I think god is a personal journey. Schools should refrain from teaching god to any one. There is curuch for a reason. School is about facts and questions. You cannot question religion or ask how. There is no direct answer. Its based on faith. We should not teach faith. Will

    Also I would go into greater detail but it's pretty much been covered. Plus it's rather difficult to type on my cell phone

  • Michael D Nalley
    11 years ago

    Good to have you back

  • Edward D Zurovec
    11 years ago

    Nice to have you back.

    In the End, we Will, still
    be searching for the Light.
    I think Death is Dark.

  • onethuscome
    11 years ago

    There seems to be a lot of chatter here on the relevance of the scientific model of reality and its bearing on "religious" belief.the way i see it science does not pretend to absolute certainty.it is a working hypothosis based on best available data.concluding atheism from scientific discovery demonstrates only where you stand relative to the question "is there a god" aside from scientific discovery