Evolution? How?

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spendi is wrong again! I'm not "intelligent" by any stretch of the imagination - never claimed such an absurdity in any of my posts.

And no torture needed.

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spendi is the only "torture" on a2k.

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xingu, I doubt very much it has anything to do with American education, but rather religious education.

I have a friend of mine who's a teacher. I asked what they do about evolution since it's such a volatile issue among the screaming extremers.

She told me they ignore evolution. They don't mention it. It doesn't exist.

Students come out of biology (high school, not college) not knowing about Creationism or Evolution.

I can't say this is nationwide but looking at the stats I would say many ares will not touch the subject. I would guess this is especially true in the Baptist south.

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spendi, the trend away from real education is relatively recent; to all proctical purposes it began in the latter 1960s and has been having increasing effect as its products - the teachers and administrators turned out by the system - have come more and more to staff the system. In a very real sense we are paying today for the permissiveness and moral relativism under which the generation today in power came of age. In the minds and priorities of today's faculty and students, aroma therapy has supplanted algebra, women's studies has replaced world history, media analysis ranks above mechanical engineering, and the dumbing down of society becomes ever more evident. Schooling used to be - and must return to being - about "'reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic" - along with reason, responsibility, and results. Fortunately, the pendulum appears to be swinging in the proper direction, and though the education establishment is kicking and screaming in objection, current intitiatives promise to establish - and to hold the education establishment responsible for - results calculated to equip tomorrow's graduates to deal effectively with the challenges and opportunities of a techologically evolving world. The days of touchy-feely, politically correct, feel-good education are coming to an end, and long past about time.

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cicerone imposter wrote:

spendi is wrong again! I'm not "intelligent" by any stretch of the imagination - never claimed such an absurdity in any of my posts. spendi's repeat of my quote just shows his inability to process statements without his personal interpretation as "a weakness, a flaw even, in human discourse - as in "trivialitites." Poor man can't even insult properly.

I have to side with CI on this one.

Truthfully, he has emphasized in several posts that nearly all of his friends and family, who are nearly all Christians and not atheists like himself, are all much more intelligent than he is. And that they are more successful in life as well.

He has mentioned this several times and in detail, and has not claimed to be intelligent at all.

Sorry, Spendius. CI is right about this. Better luck next time.

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xingu wrote:

Quote:
xingu, I doubt very much it has anything to do with American education, but rather religious education.

I have a friend of mine who's a teacher. I asked what they do about evolution since it's such a volatile issue among the screaming extremers.

She told me they ignore evolution. They don't mention it. It doesn't exist.

Students come out of biology (high school, not college) not knowing about Creationism or Evolution.

I can't say this is nationwide but looking at the stats I would say many ares will not touch the subject. I would guess this is especially true in the Baptist south.

A high school senior of my acquaintance emailed me her ACT scores recently. After having been homeschooled for her entire education, she scored 35 out of 36 ( in the 99th percentile) on the Science subtest and scored 32 overall (36 is a perfect score). As you might guess she is a creationist, but understands the evolution position very well.

Unfortunately for the government school system, families like hers have left and will never go back no matter how many 'reforms' the public schools announce that they are implementing.

Her family is committed to providing a quality education (both of her parents have only a high school education ) and are running rings around the state institutions.

Timber's optimism notwithstanding, don't look for any substantial improvement in public schools anytime soon. But look for lots of PR and propaganda SAYING that they are improving and will improve. There is too much money at stake for them not to say so. But the proof is in the product.

But to lay this failure at the creationist's feet because they are 'screaming extremers' lets the schools off far too easily.

Else how to explain similar failures in teaching math, English, geography, history, etc?

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I don't lay the failure of our public education system at the Creationists' feet, I lay it, and the pernicious rise of luddite Creationist/ID-iot influence - squarely on the wrong-headed, counter-productive "reforms" that have been inflicted on the public education system over the past generation.

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xingu,

Really ????

I find that appalling.

To understand nothing of evolution is to understand almost nothing of biology.

Do they teach taxonomy, classification...genetics ..??? If so, what would be the point ???

Man, I am soooo glad I live here.

(where, apparently, the gods saw fit to create the platypus just to confuse people)

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timberlandko wrote:

I don't lay the failure of our public education system at the Creationists' feet, I lay it, and the pernicious rise of luddite Creationist/ID-iot influence - squarely on the wrong-headed, counter-productive "reforms" that have been inflicted on the public education system over the past generation.

Hi Timber,

Interesting post. So you blame the public schools which have become evolution 24/7 over the last generation for the rise in creationist influence?

I guess I can see your point. The more I hear about evolution, the more unlikely it seems.

Perhaps that is why homeschooling families of my acquaintance seem to be unafraid to teach their students about both and their kids score high in science on standardized tests; meanwhile public schools are deathly afraid to teach about both.

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rl, whether you see my point or not, your comment deviously misconstrues the point, exhibiting disregard for intellectual honesty typical of ID-iots and wholly consistent with their luddite agenda. If the public education system imparted to its charges actual knowledge, logic, and reason as opposed to socially acceptable pablum, the medieval absurdity of the Fundamentalist Christian proposition would be far more generally recognized for the irrational foolishness it is as opposed to being granted any credence whatsoever, let alone being granted any political influence whatsoever.

Let us return to an earlier theme; demonstrate objectively and in forensically valid manner that faith be differentiable from superstition.

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Oxymoron: educated creationist

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timberlandko wrote:

rl, whether you see my point or not, your comment deviously misconstrues the point, exhibiting disregard for intellectual honesty typical of ID-iots and wholly consistent with their luddite agenda. If the public education system imparted to its charges actual knowledge, logic, and reason as opposed to socially acceptable pablum, the medieval absurdity of the Fundamentalist Christian proposition would be far more generally recognized for the irrational foolishness it is as opposed to being granted any credence whatsoever, let alone being granted any political influence whatsoever.

Let us return to an earlier theme; demonstrate objectively and in forensically valid manner that faith be differentiable from superstition.

Superstition only tries to make sense out of randomness.

Science desires no less...

One example, SETI, it is like listening to white noise on a TV waiting for God to talk...

Smile

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Chumly wrote:

Oxymoron: educated creationist

Oxymoron: educated monkey

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Educated Creationist = educated monkey.

See how silly this is?

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timberlandko wrote:

rl, whether you see my point or not, your comment deviously misconstrues the point, exhibiting disregard for intellectual honesty typical of ID-iots and wholly consistent with their luddite agenda. If the public education system imparted to its charges actual knowledge, logic, and reason as opposed to socially acceptable pablum, the medieval absurdity of the Fundamentalist Christian proposition would be far more generally recognized for the irrational foolishness it is as opposed to being granted any credence whatsoever, let alone being granted any political influence whatsoever.

Let us return to an earlier theme; demonstrate objectively and in forensically valid manner that faith be differentiable from superstition.

Do you actually have evidence that life has proceeded from non-life in violation of scientific law?

Or is this something that you have accepted by faith, without any empirical evidence that it actually has taken place?

If you have empirical evidence of this, we'd all like to see it.

Please specify who observed life being produced from non-life, when and how this was observed.

But I suspect you have no such evidence.

So how is your faith different?

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Well, NASA's Ames Research Centre in January 2001 managed to create complex organic molecules out of stuff resembling the conditions in an interstellar cloud. That kinda lends itself to the argument of life being created from non-living molecules.

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Wolf_ODonnell wrote:

Well, NASA's Ames Research Centre in January 2001 managed to create complex organic molecules out of stuff resembling the conditions in an interstellar cloud. That kinda lends itself to the argument of life being created from non-living molecules.

Hi Wolf,

Generating a complex molecule is a far cry from producing a living organism. Kinda like making a strip of pseudo-vinyl vs. making a car with vinyl seats.

In any case, even if a group of PhD's were able to 'create' a living organism, the only thing they will have proven is that it is possible to create life by using intelligence.

It would in no way prove that life was able to generate itself.

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real life wrote:

Hi Wolf,

Generating a complex molecule is a far cry from producing a living organism. Kinda like making a strip of pseudo-vinyl vs. making a car with vinyl seats.

In any case, even if a group of PhD's were able to 'create' a living organism, the only thing they will have proven is that it is possible to create life by using intelligence.

It would in no way prove that life was able to generate itself.

Well, a complex organic molecule, like the stuff that makes up life. It is only a matter of time before they find out how those organic molecules can come together.

It's not that far a cry from producing a living organism, but yes, it doesn't necessarily prove that life was able to generate itself. However, it's a step forward into figuring out how it can be done. Furthermore, life doesn't generate itself. There has to be an external stimuli, which in this case, was cosmic radiation of some sort.

I have to stop here, because at the moment, I'm tempted to go off into a complete tangent and frankly, I don't want us starting again from square 1 of the debate.

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real life wrote:

Do you actually have evidence that life has proceeded from non-life in violation of scientific law?

Evolution, from the Big Bang on violates no scientific law, it is scientific law. While of course there remains much not yet known or understood, there exists absolutely no evidence which contradicts evolution.

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Or is this something that you have accepted by faith, without any empirical evidence that it actually has taken place?

If you have empirical evidence of this, we'd all like to see it.

Please specify who observed life being produced from non-life, when and how this was observed.

But I suspect you have no such evidence.

So how is your faith different?

Argumentam ad absurdam, rl; you pose specious objection, not counter argument The courses of galactic, stellar and planetary evolution, the properties of matter and energy, the processes of chemistry, the influences of environment, all are well enough understood as to permit no conclusion other than that life on this planet arose as a logical consequence of existing natural conditions. No leap of faith - no "faith" whatsoever - is required in order to understand things are as they are because that is the way things work. The conditions and material precursors for life existed on this rock in space, life evolved and continues to evolve. That such might pose threat, contradiction, or other inconvenience to some irrational, afoundational, absurdly superstitious medeival mindset is of no consequence.

Now, once again, demonstrate objectively and in forensically valid manner that faith be differentiable from superstition.

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Setanta wrote-

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In fact, evolution does have a "goal," which is survival of the genetic material.

I would agree with that superficially.I'm ignoring the idea that a meaningless,purposeless universe can include the idea of a "goal".

That said-the question is how do you justify inhibiting the goal's attainment.If you do inhibit it,as we do,will there be cellular damage or the sorts of psychological damage which Pavlov,and others,have scientifically demonstrated in animals when goals are frustrated.

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