Latest Challenges to the Teaching of Evolution

I'm glad to here that. The Creation Science Association was founded in Adelaide by Wieland in the late 1970s, but i don't think they were happy with their lack of success there, and so began to "spread the word" to the U.S. There are now many autonomous "creation science" ministries, although mostly in the U.S.

Hilariously, there is a working geologist in Australia, Andrew Snelling, who accepts the contemporary geological science paradigm when working as a geologist and publishing papers. But his alter ego is Andrew Snelling, "Creation Scientist." I suspect he makes better money lecturing to the faithful than he does publishing obscure papers in geological journals.

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@msolga,

Quote:

The study of science is described as an "empirical discipline, focusing on inquiry, hypothesis, investigation, experimentation, observation and evidential analysis".

We can all agree with that Olga. But when such a severe and rigorous method is applied to what are known as the "facts of life" I think most of your fellow teachers would run a mile as fast as their little legs will carry them. And keep on running.

What evidence have you that religious dogmas and doctrines are not the result of an empirical discipline (theology) focusing on inquiry, hypothesis, investigation, experimentation, observation and evidential analysis but directed to that area of the "facts of life" which your educational authorities have on Ignore for reasons of a personal nature which have nothing whatever to do with science? What evidence of a scientific nature have you to offer to contradict the notion that religious doctrines are a result of such an enquiry by disinterested celibates and are formulated as they are out of discretion. That the results of such an enquiry preceed the religious doctrines which are based upon its conclusions and are presented as they are because legislation is very difficult in this important area of human life.

What evidence do you have, outside your personal preoccupations I mean, that other conclusions stemming from the raw data of investigation and observation of human behaviour would have produced a better result than the one it did? An aspect of which was the conquest of Australia.

Put it this way Olga. Would you like to have been born in Auistralia if the Christian religion had never been heard of?

Your definition is limited to inorganic matter and some harmless and non-contoversial aspects of animal behaviour. It thus cheats. It's lower-middle-class delicacy masquerading as science. It is pure sophistry and, as such, does not belong on a science thread or in a science class.

You might as well discuss the wonders of gluttony without reference to fat and cholesterol.

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@Setanta,

My understanding is that the proposal to include creationism in the Queensland schools is in draft form at this point in time. And that it would not be included in the science curriculum, but in the study of ancient history, to be discussed under the subject of "controversies".

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@msolga,

I'd have no problem with such a proposal. Just don't try to put that kind of dreck in science classes.

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@msolga,

If you did Ignore my last post you are fated to spend the rest of your life thinking that Christian doctrines on religious matters were not the result of scientific investigation presented to the masses in a manner they could understand and avoiding the somewhat sordid details. And you then have a belief system on your hands and a false one.

I accept that the doctrines place women at a disadvantage in certain respects but I hardly think that modern women would prefer the disadvantages of the alternatives.

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@Setanta,

Quote:

Just don't try to put that kind of dreck in science classes.

Who on earth is this Setanta chap issuing barking commands of such a nature at a whole culture and with no attempt to justify them.

A science class is not a specimen in a test tube that can be looked at without its connections to the school, the community and the society.

If anything is boring and predictable that silly statement is. Christian thinking is well entrenched in science classes and to take it out will require a materialist revolution.

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@Setanta,

Snelling is a complete idiopt whose only means to propose any of his hairballs is to require that "Suddenly a miracle has happened".
All his techniques , from Zircon halos, Uranium decay and, sedimentology, requires that standard physics and chemistry be VIOLATED in order to make his bible beliefes correspond with the data.
He was the founding ditor of "Creation ex Nihilo" , which has become the "Journal of Creation".

It is a fact that hes become quite a darling , along with Stephen Austen, in the art of "Fudging data for Jesus".

While these Creation klaverns still exist all over the US, theyve been mostly displaced by the Intelligent Design boys who have gobbled up all the attention.
The Institute for Cretion Research does offer "masters and PhD degrees" in Creation SCience. However, the accreditation boards only recognize these degrees as what they are, divinity school output. (Yas can call it "science", but its still Bible thumpery to the regional accreditos).
The problem with the Australian and the US Constitutional models, the AUstralian version has no strict separation clauses and its more difficult to enforce. (We went through this with ANUS a few months ago)

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@farmerman,

Distracting yourself from the real argument again fm. You really are one of the sweet pretty things.

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@farmerman,

Years ago, in a discussion with that clown "real life" about K to Argon conversion in old lava flows from Mount St. Helens, he brought up Snelling. I looked him up online, and found abstracts from papers he has published, in which he obviously accepts the standard geo paradigm, and which are completely at odds with his YEC stand when lecturing to the choir. As i say, i suspect the "Creation Science" gig pays better.

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SCIENCE EDUCATION CONTROVERSY IN ISRAEL

Quote:

Israeli educator fired after pushing creationism
(Ryan Jones, Israel Today, October 5, 2010)

Dr. Gabi Avital, the chief scientist of Israel’s Education Ministry, was fired on Monday after reiterating his position that evolution is just a theory, and that it should be taught alongside creationism as the two most widely held beliefs regarding how our world originated.

In an interview with Israel’s Ma’ariv newspaper last month, Avital insisted that “the conditions [for life on earth] were not accidental. [Charles] Darwin was a great scientist, but he took his theory in dangerous directions, and we need to teach the flaws of that theory, too.”

Speaking to Israel National News a day after being fired, Avital insisted the education of Israel’s young people is incomplete because it does not take into account the “numerous studies that refute the science of evolution” and show that a human being is not just a “substance without a soul.”

Shortly after being appointed to the post of chief scientist in December 2009, Avital advocated for adding creationism to the school curriculum.

The office of Education Minister Gideon Saar (Likud) issued a statement on Monday claiming that Avital had been hired on a trial basis, and that his trial period had simply expired without a decision to keep him on in the position of chief scientists.

But Avital told Israel National News that there was no question that Saar decided not to keep him because of the Ma’ariv interview. “Apparently, he did not like it.”

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@Setanta,

Snelling and Austen have pimped a good "Variable decay rates for all radioisotopes provide answers to the REAL age of the earth" . They fail to consider that the decay rates are calculated by the second and not some variable sun year.

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@wandeljw,

wandeljw's source wrote:

Dr. Gabi Avital, the chief scientist of Israel’s Education Ministry, was fired on Monday after reiterating his position that evolution is just a theory, and that it should be taught alongside creationism as the two most widely held beliefs regarding how our world originated.

Either this has been screwed up by the journalist, or this guy is an incredible flake. As we have told so many religious idjits over the years, evolution is not concerned with cosmic origins. It is indifferent to cosmic origins.

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@Setanta,

It is not indifferent to cosmic origins. It is Setanta who is indifferent to cosmic origins and those who have their head in the same bag. Radiations are a possible cause of mutations and seasons alter diets.

And to give Setanta's statement a patina of credibility Israel Today has screwed up or the chief scientist of Israel’s Education Ministry is an incredible flake.

Yeah-well. Keep telling the idjits. They are a suitable audience for somebody who makes up assertions of that nature to prove he's the expert around here.

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@Setanta,

Gabi is merely trying toconflate two unrelated concepts merely for the purpose of simplifying his cosmogenic "Argument" If he were to admit that evolution is merely modification of already living species, then his concept of Creationism would be without any legs. Having it his way, he can try to argue the science that underpins Evolution is also underpinning a Created Planet or Universe. So all he needs to do is fake some evidence about Ages and isotopes and "firmaments" and seven days, and floods.

Not so very tricky.

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@farmerman,

He needn't go to all that trouble fm. All he needs to do is point his finger at you silly fuckers and say" see what rational, empirical evidence does for you."

That's a clincher.

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@farmerman,

It's a pretty standard ploy which they drill into the otherwise clueless faithful, too. We've had any number of christian soldiers who show up here, decry evolution, and immediately begin arguing the implausibility of "the Big Bang." My usual response was to point out that the term "big bang" was invented by a Belgian priest, and not a cosmologist, and that evolution doesn't "care" how the universe came into existence. Not that it ever sinks in with any members of that crowd.

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@Setanta,

precisely, and heres a picture of the dear Fr Georges hisself. Cute little ****** werent he?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/52/Lemaitre.jpg/250px-Lemaitre.jpg

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That boy didn't miss many meals, did he?

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@Setanta,

after all, he was a Frier, no?

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@farmerman,

farmerman wrote:

.... complete idiopt whose only means to propose any of his hairballs is to require that "Suddenly a miracle has happened".

There's a famous mathematical cartoon for the concept of "then a miracle occurs"; here's the thumbnail (original is copyrighted).

http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2008/09/then-a-miracle-occurs-public-beta/

Caption: "I think you should be more explicit here in step two."

1 Reply

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