Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Eden and Evolution
The Washington Post ^ | February 5, 2005 | Shankar Vedantam

Posted on 02/06/2006 5:02:42 PM PST by CobaltBlue

Ricky Nguyen and Mariama Lowe never really believed in evolution to begin with. But as they took their seats in Room CC-121 at Northern Virginia Community College on November 2, they fully expected to hear what students usually hear in any Biology 101 class: that Charles Darwin's theory of evolution was true.

As professor Caroline Crocker took the lectern, Nguyen sat in the back of the class of 60 students, Lowe in the front. Crocker, who wore a light brown sweater and slacks, flashed a slide showing a cartoon of a cheerful monkey eating a banana. An arrow led from the monkey to a photograph of an exceptionally unattractive man sitting in his underwear on a couch. Above the arrow was a question mark.

Crocker was about to establish a small beachhead for an insurgency that ultimately aims to topple Darwin's view that humans and apes are distant cousins. The lecture she was to deliver had caused her to lose a job at a previous university, she told me earlier, and she was taking a risk by delivering it again. As a nontenured professor, she had little institutional protection. But this highly trained biologist wanted students to know what she herself deeply believed: that the scientific establishment was perpetrating fraud, hunting down critics of evolution to ruin them and disguising an atheistic view of life in the garb of science.

(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Extended News; News/Current Events; US: Virginia
KEYWORDS: creation; crevolist; darwin; evolution; fairfaxcounty; highereducation; id; idiocy; ignoranceisstrength; intelligentdesign; mythology; nvcc; retard; scienceeducation; superstitiouskooks
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-80 ... 201-217 next last
To: CobaltBlue
And the primordial soup theory, while interesting, is just that. I don't think it's any more worth teaching in an intro biology class than ID.

It probably wasn't mentioned in mine, but that was back around 1965. It's outside the scope of classical evolution, but I'm not sure it's outside the scope of biology. I could go either way on whether to put it in a HS intro class. It's an area where I'm willing to let the textbook writers write and the teachers teach.

But it has to be more worth mentioning than ID. There's really no there there in ID.

41 posted on 02/06/2006 7:07:56 PM PST by VadeRetro (Liberalism is a cancer on society. Creationism is a cancer on conservatism.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 31 | View Replies]

To: Rudder

Can't remember much. Some things just stick "...Timothy Leary and his brother, Really..." It's from a few years after the TO'L movie about LSD. I actually saw it (the movie), but don't remember squat - I think I was in love at the time :)


42 posted on 02/06/2006 7:11:48 PM PST by furball4paws (Awful Offal)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 40 | View Replies]

To: CobaltBlue

From the article:

"No one has ever seen a dog turn into a cat in a laboratory."
...
"Humans have souls, which make them different from other animals, she told me later."


And when has anyone ever seen, or conclusively proven the evidence of the soul?


This woman is not fit to be teaching science. She should be teaching Sunday School at her local church.


43 posted on 02/06/2006 7:16:15 PM PST by Blzbba (Sub sole nihil novi est)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: PatrickHenry

I wouldn't bother. If you do, link to the pharyngula commentary on it. Crocker is clearly incompetent to teach biology, and her intrusion of religion into biology class is only the beginning.


44 posted on 02/06/2006 7:19:39 PM PST by Right Wing Professor
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 8 | View Replies]

To: Rudder
If you were with Tim Leary, Owsley and I during 1967's summer in Berkeley, you would have.

The Magical Mystery Tour?

45 posted on 02/06/2006 7:21:05 PM PST by phantomworker ("Grow up and die right.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 30 | View Replies]

To: jonathanmo

I've heard that working on a PhD can do that to you! Kind a went over the edge of reality!


46 posted on 02/06/2006 7:24:40 PM PST by phantomworker ("Grow up and die right.")
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 36 | View Replies]

To: CobaltBlue

I have never had to read so many words to end up with absolutely nothing to show for it.


47 posted on 02/06/2006 7:31:45 PM PST by spinestein (All journalists today are paid advocates for someone's agenda.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: VadeRetro
Regarding biogenesis: I'm not sure it's outside the scope of biology.

Evolution takes many slings and arrrows because it doesn't explain the origins of life. Yet I agree somewhat with our critics: Biology should not avoid the topic, but is in a good position to pursue it (for example: the Miller-Urey demonstration in 1953).

48 posted on 02/06/2006 7:33:11 PM PST by Rudder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 41 | View Replies]

To: balrog666

No kidding. That really jumped out at me too. What evolutionists claim that dogs turn into cats? In petri dishes even!


49 posted on 02/06/2006 7:38:10 PM PST by blueminnesota
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]

To: CobaltBlue

bump


50 posted on 02/06/2006 7:39:40 PM PST by Mamzelle
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: From many - one.

Evolution implies progress. Progress can be going around and around a circular track, which is where these threads go as a rule.


51 posted on 02/06/2006 7:43:27 PM PST by RightWhale (pas de lieu, Rhone que nous)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 27 | View Replies]

To: furball4paws
Can't remember much. Some things just stick "...Timothy Leary and his brother, Really..." It's from a few years after the TO'L movie about LSD. I actually saw it (the movie), but don't remember squat - I think I was in love at the time :)

Oh wow, man...I know where you're coming from...lol!...and the confluence of LSD and love is at best all-consuming.

52 posted on 02/06/2006 7:43:28 PM PST by Rudder
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 42 | View Replies]

To: RightWhale

"Progress can be going around and around a circular track"

That's not progress, that's just activity.


53 posted on 02/06/2006 7:48:16 PM PST by webstersII
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 51 | View Replies]

To: webstersII

I looked it up in your book.


54 posted on 02/06/2006 7:50:35 PM PST by RightWhale (pas de lieu, Rhone que nous)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 53 | View Replies]

To: VadeRetro; CobaltBlue
There do appear to be complications in the moth's story. Much of their activity is at night

How is that an issue? Camouflage is even more important when the moths are resting, during the daytime. They'll still get eaten in the daytime at a rate proportional to their visibility, no matter when they're active. If anything, their visibility during their resting phase is even *more* important since they're a lot more defenseless when they're dormant.

55 posted on 02/06/2006 7:51:46 PM PST by Ichneumon
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 38 | View Replies]

To: RightWhale; From many - one.
Evolution implies progress.

No, it implies change and adaptation. "Progress" is a human notion, not something that nature gives a hoot about.

56 posted on 02/06/2006 7:53:26 PM PST by Ichneumon
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 51 | View Replies]

To: Blzbba; CobaltBlue
"Humans have souls, which make them different from other animals, she told me later." And when has anyone ever seen, or conclusively proven the evidence of the soul?

...or demonstrated that, say, dogs don't have them?

57 posted on 02/06/2006 7:54:39 PM PST by Ichneumon
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 43 | View Replies]

To: RightWhale

"I looked it up in your book."

Huh?


58 posted on 02/06/2006 7:55:36 PM PST by webstersII
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 54 | View Replies]

To: Ichneumon

When I looked it up, the book said progress, among other meanings. Then when I looked up progress it said going around a circular track, among other meanings. The book probably still says the same as it did then.


59 posted on 02/06/2006 7:55:51 PM PST by RightWhale (pas de lieu, Rhone que nous)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 56 | View Replies]

To: webstersII

Youy know, the dictionary. It's a pretty good dictionary.


60 posted on 02/06/2006 7:56:52 PM PST by RightWhale (pas de lieu, Rhone que nous)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 58 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061-80 ... 201-217 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson