Posted on 11/29/2005 9:31:13 AM PST by Sub-Driver
Kansas Prof. Apologizes for E-Mail
11 minutes ago
A University of Kansas religion professor apologized for an e-mail that referred to religious conservatives as "fundies" and said a course describing intelligent design as mythology would be a "nice slap in their big fat face."
In a written apology Monday, Paul Mirecki, chairman of the university's Religious Studies Department, said he would teach the planned class "as a serious academic subject and in an manner that respects all points of view."
The department faculty approved the course Monday but changed its title. The course, originally called "Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationisms and other Religious Mythologies," will instead be called "Intelligent Design and Creationism."
The class was added to next spring's curriculum after the Kansas State Board of Education decided to include more criticism of evolution in its standards for science teaching. The vote was seen as a big win for proponents of intelligent design, who argue that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by a higher power.
Critics say intelligent design is merely creationism — a literal reading of the Bible's story of creation — camouflaged in scientific language.
Mirecki's e-mail was sent Nov. 19 to members of the Society of Open-Minded Atheists and Agnostics, a student organization for which he serves as faculty adviser.
"The fundies (fundamentalists) want it all taught in a science class, but this will be a nice slap in their big fat face by teaching it as a religious studies class under the category mythology."
Mirecki addressed the message to "my fellow damned" and signed off with: "Doing my part to (tick) off the religious right, Evil Dr. P."
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
You have to presuppose the nonphysical for there to be any such thing as a scientific explanation in the first place, a concept that itself is untestable and thus a sort of super-natural claim, underived from science.
Cordially,
"You have to presuppose the nonphysical for there to be any such thing as a scientific explanation in the first place, a concept that itself is untestable and thus a sort of super-natural claim, underived from science."
No you don't.
Good point. I think js1138 would agree.
It will be interesting to see your response when one of your kids get sick. I am not a great believer in popping a pill for every ill, but your belief in nutrition is pathetic and dangerous. You will kill someone if you persist.
This nutrition thing would come as a surprise to my father, who is almost 96, and my mother who lived to 97. And their relatives, most of whom have lived to their 90s.
I won't sa nutrition is inimportant, but it doesn't cure disease, except for deficiencies.
I would agree that the statement is flapdoodle.
I'm not a big customer of the pharmaceutical industry. But people who claim diet cures everything are dangerous.
Professor of Biology James Hanken used to tell a story about rabbits in his organismic biology course that has gained new significance in recent years.Source: INTELLECTUAL CURRENTS: Biologists Here Join PR Offensive To Counter Critics.Until the teaching schedule for the team-taught Biological Sciences 51, “Integrative Biology of Organisms,” changed this year, Hanken would talk about rabbits’ digestive systems in lecture. The animals can absorb the nutrients from plant matter only in the small intestine, but food is digested in a part of the gut that’s farther “downstream.” So how do plant nutrients finally get into the rabbit’s bloodstream having already passed through the small intestine undigested?
“They secrete these things through their anus, eat them,” and pass them back through the small intestine, Hanken explains.
And then he adds, “Now you tell me, where’s the intelligence in that design?”
It's funny how kookiness in one thing is associated with kookiness in others. Dembski, for example, was pushing a physically impossible 'alternative energy source' on his web page. Some of our other favorite anti-evos were lauding 'biophoton' theories of developmental biology for a while. And so on. Just go to any kook science thread, and count how many of our fave creationists show up to marvel.
"I'm not a big customer of the pharmaceutical industry. But people who claim diet cures everything are dangerous."
Me too. There are definite lifestyle choices that can eliminate the need for a great deal of medication. But sometimes, you have to.
You should have been pinged on #411, sorry about that.
Huh? Biological evolution is independent of the history of the Universe, and also is independent of the origin of life. It's a consequence of imperfect replication and limited resources.
The ToE was totally unaffected by the steady-state v. big bang dispute in cosmology. "God created the Universe" is also compatable with standard biology (which includes evolution).
This should not be confused with "God created the Universe in six days a few thousand years ago". That has testable consequences, and was known to be false many years before Darwin.
It is also independent of the origin of life. Whether abiogenesis took place on a pyrite surface, in drops, in a "soup"; whether some deity created life; or whether panspermia is true, once life was present on Earth, it had no choice but to evolve.
Imagine putting bacteria or lichens or somesuch on Mars. Once it's reproducing, if fewer than 100% of offspring survive, it is evolving.
No different with Behe, Johnson, et al. Wells and Dembski may however be truly deluded.
In your opinion, is Darwin's theory now a proven scientific fact? Are there any flaws or vulnerabilities in it? Seriously.
Some terms (from a google search):
Hope this helps. Take it away, professor.Theory: a well-substantiated explanation of some aspect of the natural world; an organized system of accepted knowledge that applies in a variety of circumstances to explain a specific set of phenomena; "theories can incorporate facts and laws and tested hypotheses"; "true in fact and theory"
Fact: when an observation is confirmed repeatedly and by many independent and competent observers, it can become a fact
Except that no "choice" was involved, right? Only completely random chance, since no intelligence was involved.
I don't like the word 'proven' applied to science, but evolution is as strongly supported by the evidence as any major scientific theory, and IMO the only serious deficiency in it lies at the very beginning of life, since we're only beginning to discover how the simplest one celled organisms evolved. It would be nice, also, to have more pre-Cambrian fossils, but that gap is covered quite well by molecular evidence.
Of course, there are always new things to learn. For example, we still need to learn the precise molecular mechanisms behind major morphological changes - development of feathers, limbs, etc., but that research are is progressing rapidly.
And I hope I'll live to see some extinct species recreated from DNA fossil relics, with perhaps some deductions from molecular phylogeny. Dinosaurs are too much to hope for, but we might be able to do a mammoth or even a saber-tooth. How cool would that be? :-)
Saying that something seems random to us doesn't preclude God as the controller. God may be guiding the result of all events that seem random to us. That would be God's prerogative, and we would not necessarily have any way of detecting such actions.
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