Latest Challenges to the Teaching of Evolution

Apparently the bonehead from across the pond doesn't understand "I recently saw it on PBS Great Performances from the Met." It was a repeat from a year before on a Sunday afternoon. I saw it live at the San Francisco Opera at the premier in 2005.

So as far as a brain that's a vacuum with a few grey cells spinning around there like marble, PSS XX takes the cake.

Anything might be trippy after shock treatments. What an ass.

I could understand such a remark, with an exclamation mark added , being directed at fm's captatio benevolentiae ( attempt to gain goodwill), Ed, rather than at my well reasoned post which contains nothing of a surprising or original nature to anyone who understands the inanity of his pompous and ridiculous remarks concerning INCREASED PROFICIENCY. Not only is such a term undefined but it also is not applied to any particular proficiencies nor to what the purported objective of such proficiency might be in the service of. It was pure, unadulterated bullshit with no meaning outside of its production.

He hasn't the nerve to name any of the "fringe elements" which he is presumably seeking to liquidate possibly because he doesn't wish to rattle his stick against the bars of their cages in case they growl or even because some of his acquaintances may well be engaged in them professionally and are most unlikely not to clamour for their place "on curricula".

His post had that Fabian futility of knowing where it wishes to go but has no suggestions how to get there.

Jesus Holy Christ!! is a fairly adequate response to it seeing as it came from a professional educator but I prefer a more objective approach.

Look Wiz--it is of no interest to this debate where and when you saw the opera. What might be of interest is what you thought of the theme of it and how that theme relates to the subject at hand.

Was Oppie wrong to be wobbly enough to cause the general to have him watched carefully and call for his removal from the team after the test? We were shown a pure scientist dithering on the wisdom of the pursuit of the truth to the exclusion of all else.

Have you nothing to say about that? If not you are trolling goodstyle and your intemperate remarks can only be disguising that simple fact from yourself alone unless there are any other viewers here as stupid as you evidently are.

spendi, You have no "objective" approach; everything you say is 100% subjective.

He asks stupid questions about if I've seen an opera when yesterday I stated quite clearly I recently saw it. The further clarification that I've seen it live and on the telecast seems to have pissed him off. Does it have more to do with teaching evolution that football? Absolutely. The subjective troll of A2K can't keep his thoughts straight, doesn't know how to read, doesn't know how to write concisely with any substance and should go back, sit on the stool, and read the sport's page.

I really dont know why you even give him the TOD. I just listened to an NPR program and it reminded me of the same type of people we all knew in the 70's. You know, those that read AYn Rand and believed that they had all the answers? Hes not an Ayn Randite, hes an Orthodox Veblenite.and a fanatic one to boot. Let him wallow in his delusions . As Ed said, "Jesus Christ".

Spendi belives he has answers and the more he posts, the more he offers evidence counter to his belief.

I realize his stupid questions are mostly to himself.

Ayn Rand showed up at a couple of Los Angeles Science Fantasy Society meetings but I believe it was because her husband was more interested in sci-fi than her.

PS XXX has a belief? Never been able to actually find what it was in all his meandering, quoting the five books he's ever read, or going of on his troll's tangent of figuring that putting everyone's else's ideas down will make his valid.

"Jesus Christ" is right.

More bullshit from the triad of anti-IDers. Not one intelligent idea in sight.

Tell us fm what you mean by INCREASED PROFICIENCY. In what areas it should be applied to and for what purpose. You used the term.

And Wiz might try answering the question he was asked. We know he's "seen" Doctor Atomic but he doesn't seem to know what it meant. It's as much use artistically to say it was about Dr Oppenheimer as it is to say it was about three hours in length.

I only raised the matter because it dealt with the fundamentals of this debate. I think Wiz was more interested, perhaps exclusively, is seeing himself at such a high falutin' gig and imagining that he has artistic appreciation simply because he was there. It being posh and all.

Blow it out your ass.

spendi, Please define "anti-IDer" for us?

He has no idea, it's just his little pet phrase -- from his troll pet frog.

However, here's an essay from 2005 which could be read as anti-ID:

The Bait and Switch of "Intelligent Design"
By Keith Lockitch (San Francisco Chronicle, August 4, 2005; Canberra Times, December 29, 2005)

Legal and political battle lines have been drawn across the country over the teaching of "intelligent design"--the view that life is so complex it must be the product of a "higher intelligence." The central issue under debate is whether "intelligent design" is, in fact, a genuine scientific theory or merely a disguised form of religious advocacy--creationism in camouflage.

Proponents of "intelligent design" aggressively market their viewpoint as real science, insisting it is not religiously based. Writes one leading advocate, Michael Behe: "The conclusion of intelligent design flows naturally from the data itself--not from sacred books or sectarian beliefs."

Proponents of "intelligent design" claim that Darwinian evolution is a fundamentally flawed theory--that there are certain complex features of living organisms evolution simply cannot explain, but which can be explained as the handiwork of an "intelligent designer."

Their viewpoint is not religiously based, they insist, because it does not require that the "intelligent designer" be God. "Design," writes another leading proponent, William Dembski, "requires neither magic nor miracles nor a creator."

Indeed, "design" apparently requires surprisingly little of the "designer's" identity: "Inferences to design," contends Behe, "do not require that we have a candidate for the role of designer." According to its advocates, the "designer" responsible for "intelligent design" in biology could be any sort of "creative intelligence" capable of engineering the basic elements of life. Some have even seriously nominated advanced space aliens for the role.

Their premise seems to be that as long as they don't explicitly name the "designer"--as long as they allow that the "designer" could be a naturally existing being, a being accessible to scientific study--that this somehow saves their viewpoint from the charge of being inherently religious in character.

But does it?

Imagine we discovered an alien on Mars with a penchant for bio-engineering. Could such a natural being fulfill the requirements of an "intelligent designer"?

It could not. Such a being would not actually account for the complexity that "design" proponents seek to explain. Any natural being capable of "designing" the complex features of earthly life would, on their premises, require its own "designer." If "design" can be inferred merely from observed complexity, then our purported Martian "designer" would be just another complex being in nature that supposedly cannot be explained without positing another "designer." One does not explain complexity by dreaming up a new complexity as its cause.

By the very nature of its approach, "intelligent design" cannot be satisfied with a "designer" who is part of the natural world. Such a "designer" would not answer the basic question its advocates raise: it would not explain biological complexity as such. The only "designer" that would stop their quest for a "design" explanation of complexity is a "designer" about whom one cannot ask any questions or who cannot be subjected to any kind of scientific study--a "designer" that "transcends" nature and its laws--a "designer" not susceptible of rational explanation--in short: a supernatural "designer."

Its advertising to the contrary notwithstanding, "intelligent design" is inherently a quest for the supernatural. Only one "candidate for the role of designer" need apply. Dembski himself--even while trying to deny this implication--concedes that "if there is design in biology and cosmology, then that design could not be the work of an evolved intelligence." It must, he admits, be that of a "transcendent intelligence" to whom he euphemistically refers as "the big G."

The supposedly nonreligious theory of "intelligent design" is nothing more than a crusade to peddle religion by giving it the veneer of science--to pretend, as one commentator put it, that "faith in God is something that holds up under the microscope."

The insistence of "intelligent design" advocates that they are "agnostic regarding the source of design" is a bait-and-switch. They dangle out the groundless possibility of a "designer" who is susceptible of scientific study--in order to hide their real agenda of promoting faith in the supernatural. Their scientifically accessible "designer" is nothing more than a gateway god--metaphysical marijuana intended to draw students away from natural, scientific explanations and get them hooked on the supernatural.

No matter how fervently its salesmen wish "intelligent design" to be viewed as cutting-edge science, there is no disguising its true character. It is nothing more than a religiously motivated attack on science, and should be rejected as such.

Keith Lockitch, PhD in physics, is a fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute in Irvine, Calif. The Institute promotes Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand--author of Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead.

Most of us understand what ID is, but not "anti-IDer."
To get to the knub of what anti-ID is, we must first know what ID is. "Complexity" only tells us that science has not answered the question. ID on the other hand tells us science will never answer these questions; not a realistic scenario considering the fact that science continues to progress whereas ID remains stagnant and answers nothing.

I want spendi to answer for me what "anti-ID" is.

If you get a specific definition of an "anti-IDer," I'd be very surprised. In many people's mind, that's being anti-religion when it's not. It's being tied up in some imaginary dogma of science and following the viewpoint that the DI, as an instance, is an advocacy of religious self-described scientists who want to peddle the idea that evolution is bad science and has to be qualified with their "discoveries." Ultimately, it's just a crass generalization from a mind which cannot deal in specifics and wants all his utterances left a open ended. It's spin.

(Or bullshit, take your choice).

anti-ID is a faith based on an opposition to Christian religion because of the discipline it imposes on (mainly) sexual behaviour. It cannot have any scientific justifications and, like ID, is an argument from silence.

But because "God" is silent does not mean we cannot read His mind from his productions. Which results in many readings of course. The matter then resolves itself into which reading provides for the success of the group accepting it as if it is God's message. The Christian reading gave wings to the modern science of dynamics, which I believe Jesus prophesied and was crucified for doing so: infinity talk in public was a capital offence throughout the region, particularly in Greece and western Asia Minor where Euclidean statics held sway and where they feared such ideas in the same way we fear nuclear fission, bio-chemicals and biological and psychological delvings.

It goes without saying that the mathematics of modern dynamic science is the entity to which you owe everything you have and even your very existence.

And the Christian reading has been a success, in an evolutionary sense, seen as a species of mankind. To oppose it is to oppose that success. Mankind has had a long time to invent modern mathematics in a vast number of conditions and lo and behold, in the twinkling of an eye, what's 400 years to Darwin, here comes the sun. Even the ones it doesn't shine very brightly upon are a quantum, a large one, you can have big quanta as well as teeny-weeny ones, sight better off than many a powerful potentate ever was at 125 degrees or minus 15.

And the success is being exported a mile a minute. Like Mr Bush and Mr Cheyney I could not understand why the Iraqi people did not strew roses and perfumes before the American tanks. They must have been very frightened to have not done that. In case the tanks pulled out say. But despite that the success is still being exported.

As someone who has been conscious of participating in a great success from an early age, at five I got an apple and an orange for Christmas and things just got better and better. Dentists became more humane gradually for example. Farm girls and mill girls became birds of paradise. I daresay a number of A2Kers are descended from a father who used a pair of sheer, nylon stockings as a lure. I hope so. Hairy legs are a bit off putting to those with delicate sensibilities such as myself. The remnants of the beast. Movies got better by the week. One foot having to be touching the ground by law, like in Greek statues, went by the board just at the right time.

An anti-IDer is someone who seeks to put this successful reading of the mind of the Desingner at risk by turning to the reading of the minds of men. Which he wouldn't be doing if he kept his disbelief to himself. Such a person is not an anti-IDer. He is capable of seeing that his indiscipline is rightly disapproved of and can put it down to his own weakness which is God's fault anyway. The person without any weaknesses cannot possibly bring himself into that position logically. God is deemed an IDiot and there's the problem solved.

So an anti-IDer is a person with no weaknesses who loudly condemns those who say that he didn't ought to have done something he has done and by discrediting the God he thinks he has justified those things he has done which is not logical.

After that the actual discrediting is very easily done. It should be seeing as how long it has been going on. So--an anti-IDer is boring.

spendi wrote:

You are befuddled and confused. God has not done anything; they are all imaginations of man who happen to have written them to take control of others foolish enough to believe in fairy tales.

A lot of claptrap signifying nothing. He is nothing.

I'm sat here laughing at the thought that the two previous posters are in anyway qualified to have any say in the education of a superpower's kids.

What has "superpower's kids" have anything to do with education?

Are we discussion religion or politics? Still traveling around the world - firstthought