Posted on 02/17/2005 5:30:03 PM PST by Happy2BMe
| News Alert: On January 13, a federal judge in Georgia ruled that stickers placed in textbooks of an Atlanta area school district saying “Evolution is a theory, not a fact” are unconstitutional! ( View sticker.) According to this judge, such criticisms of evolution are an endorsement of religion. The judge’s action is the latest example of the nationwide effort to ban any critical analysis of the theory of evolution and insist that evolution be taught as the only option! The Action:
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You know, you can debate whether or not it makes sense as policy to do this, or if it is even true/untrue. However, I find no basis as to how this involves the U.S. Constitution one way or the other. This is ridiculous.
Well, that's your opinion...and that's fine - but how does it involve the U.S. Constitution?
Your 234 is just evolutionists willing to change the long-accepted terms and ideas of science in an effort to cram macroevolution down our throat.
I will quote from Webster's New Collegiate dictionary (1981). Def. 6 for law states "a statement of an order or relation of phenomena that so far as is known is invariable under certain conditions".
Def 4 for Theory says" a plausable or scientifically acceptable general principle or body of principles offered to explain phenomena". 5 b calls it "an unproved assumption"
So one is an offered explanation of phenomena, and the other is an explanation that has been invariably confirmed. Can't you see that a Theory that gets confirmed over and over again can then indeed become accepted as a Law? It may take more than one lifetime.
Is it not clear that a LAW must start as a THEORY that has been confirmed (100% of the time)?
Did I even mention the Constitution in my argument? I was arguing strictly from a scientific viewpoint.
Note: Gravitational theory and the like are not an "opinion". They exist sans my personal views or opinions.
Theory: Chocolate Cakes contain chocolate.
Data on which TOCC is based: Some really clever scientists got a grant to eat lots of cakes and analyse them for the presence of chocolate. Everything they ate that had been called chocolate cake had chocolate in it.
The theory is falsifiable: if ever a scientist eats something called chocolate cake, analyzes it and finds no chocolate, the TOCC has to be fixed.
Law of My Mother's Chocolate Cake: this would be the proportions in the recipe.
The real problem here is jargon.
For practicing scientists a "theory" as written up in a scientific paper is much firmer than in conventional usage. That's why scientists see red when the phrase "just a theory" is used. We work really, really hard to get to the exalted level of a sound theory.
A Law is somewhat less firm than conventional usage and may contain "fudge factors". Those are something that makes the equation work but there's no solid theory to explain why. Generally a Law is expressed in mathematical terms. For instance:
let E = any given experiment
and X = things that can go wrong
and Y = things that do go wrong
Thus Murphy's Law: for all E X=Y or
EX=EY ...
The term "law" as it applies to science is somewhat outmoded. You can still use it, but the main terms are hypothesis and theory. If a hypothesis is confirmed it might be like a law if it is mathematical or it might be just substantiated data. A theory is more broadbased in its underlying principals. Not all hypotheses become theories whether substantiated or not.
Because of Einstein's work in such things a relativity, it is now known that what were thought to be laws only apply under a set of conditions. Under other conditions they don't apply anymore.
The difference between science and religion is that science is willing to discard its findings if they are falsified. Religion cannot be falsified. It can only be argued.
My irritation with literalists is that no matter how convincing and rational arguments against their positions are, they never back off from them. For instance, once considered, my argument that you can't have a 24 hr day without the Sun is obviously true. Most of the literalists will not back away from the absurd position they hold on that.
If we are correct, that fear is involved, then perhaps we should work on diminishing the fear and making it safe to curiously rather than defensively explore the scientists' positions.
"Your 234 is just evolutionists willing to change the long-accepted terms and ideas of science in an effort to cram macroevolution down our throat. "
I am sorry I wasted my time explaining science definitions, when you are unable to understand science. You have repeatedly been told that there is no difference in the process of microevolution and macroevolution, yet you will not come off your misinformed opinion about the terms.
It is clear that you should study only the science definition for terms if you want to study science. For science, "theory" is not a guess or assumption. It is essentially a set of substianted data supporting an observed phenomenon (read fact). Thus the ToE supports the observed fact of evolution.
"If we are correct, that fear is involved, then perhaps we should work on diminishing the fear and making it safe to curiously rather than defensively explore the scientists' positions."
I agree. The problem with your idea, which I have attempted at various times, is the theological basis from which the creationists derive all their science. It is not so much fear of science that drives them, but fear of going to H E double hockey sticks.
They have been told by their pastors they respect that the Bible means thus and such and that is all there is to it. If they depart from the pastor's opinions, they are first regaled with condemnation, then eventually shunned for their different ideas. You can see this in some of the posts to me.
When they find out I am a Christian pastor that does not agree with their pastor they go into "blackmail mode". "How can you be a Christian minister when you don't believe the inerrant word of God?", they bellow. So their fear entails their whole social network, most of their close friends and their respect in their community.
Thus, it is not the merit of a translation of the Hebrew in Genesis that convinces them. It is the fear of being alone that exerts the peer pressure for conformance in absurd positions, even among people who are otherwise quite intellegent and scientific. I have talked to several engineers who are convinced the Grand Canyon was formed like the Mt. St. Helens rills and rifts.
I have been refused consideration for various positions at some churches and agencies because I do not believe in the fantasy.
Sorry. You again are wrong.
I see your point.
I see a possible additional problem besides fear. Many seem to be of the authoritarian stripe. Once somebody or other in their camp said "microevolution" is ok, these seems to have been a collective sigh of relief as they all accepted that. And, equally, they "cannot" see that cumulative micro-evolution adds up to true evolution.
Fortunately, the logical step is so small I think there is a brittleness to the position and that also explains the number of ad hominems coming at us. The old "When in doubt, shout" principle.
Don't go to a crevo thread without it! ;)
Constant appeal to the Evil Dumb Conspiracy to make you wrong. I've been trying to tell you about that. The CIA is not planting evidence that you're wrong. You're just flat-busted wrong.
You're absolutely addicted to the intellectual equivalent of welfare. You always need another "gimme."
Wipe off your snotty little nose and wake up!
I was referring to your opinion on the stickers - though I think you probably already knew that. Let's not play these games.
My opinion is clear. They are silly and detract from learning.
though I think you probably already knew that. Let's not play these games.
No, I honestly misunderstood your meaning. Sorry.
"Many seem to be of the authoritarian stripe."
Another very good observation on your part. The pastors tell them that the Bible is inerrant in its "literal" meaning. Every word of the Bible is true, as the pastor interprets it. They must believe in the full authority of the text if they are truly believers.
So, they would like science to be that easy.
Also, in a world that is complex and technical, how much simpler it is to have someone tell you exactly what to think, instead of having to do the work to come to your own conclusions. It is a way to feel in control in a out of control world.
I don't think this is the type of peace Christians should seek. We should be able to live with joy no matter what the real world around us is doing. We must be in the world without succumbing to evil.
You guys are making your own "gimmies". I quote the definitions for Hypothesis, Theory, and Law straight from a pro-evolution text book (from the #1 text book publisher in the country) and Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary (the Gold Standard for word meanings).
These are either unbiased sources or sources biased in favor of evolution. The favor my position. All you can find for your own position are web pages specifically devoted to claiming that the Theory of Evolution is ABSOLUTELY TRUE because Law and Theory don't mean what the textbooks and dictionaries say they mean.
Why don't you spew a few more paragraphs of personal insult at me as "evidence" for your position? It is about all you have done so far.
Minus the use of personal rancour as the other two did, the previous post applies to you as well. Surely a man of your eloqunece could find a better rebuttal than "you are just wrong"- if you had the facts to support such a rebuttal.
I have never insulted you. I am sorry if I was short. My foot hurts, got out of surgery the previous night and couldn't sleep.
That a theory never becomes a law does not only apply to evolution but to all the sciences.
Like I stated earlier, the Law of Gravity falls short. Gravitational theory explained by General Relativity is a better explanation of the mechanisms. However, it too is incomplete. There is much to discover. But no matter what discoveries are made, Gravitational theory will always be a theory. You may note, I have not even address evolution here.
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