Posted on 04/08/2010 9:32:18 AM PDT by ilovesarah2012
Government being overtly hostile to religion is a violation of the First Amendment.
Sure seems like it. I don’t remember any science books when I was in school, albeit years ago, that called creation a myth.
By definition, to be a hypothesis, it is a prediction of what MAY have happened or may happen.
A theory is a conceptual structure used to explain existing facts and predict new ones. None of us were here and we cannpt "test" assumptions made with evolution. So the "facts" used for evolution are constantly being challenged.
It also depends on how YOU interpret the evidence.
If you find evolution acceptable, then your PREMISE is that there is NO GOD. Something is generated out of NOTHING. Random order creates ORDER. On it's face, this contradicts common sense.
Intelligent Design or Creation acknowledges something bigger than any of us that creates with a purpose. ONLY GOD creates. Man will take what is ALREADY created and make other things from what is ALREADY created.
The point of this parent's complaint is not about evolution. The point this parent is making is his belief being ridiculed - “biblical myth” when there is much EVIDENCE to support it.
Try trashing Islam and see how far you get in a public school. Double standards abound.
“Why does the book have to say anythign about creationism at all, just remain silent on it. Seems like it is used as a tool for slamming Christians.”
That is exactly what they are doing!
Dopes here and elsewhere happily assist in that process.
There's a mathematical proof then? Metaphysical certainty? Don't use the language of mathematics to describe what is barely a theory (more of a paradigm, really).
I know what a theory is. It gives rise to equations. F=ma, E=mc^2. Now that's a scientific theory.
Write down Darwin's equation for me. I'll wait.
Think about it, the theory of evolution is useless as a predictor, which is the whole point of science. Physics can tell me where a cannonball will land. Can biology tell me whether species A or B will survive, how they will mutate, etc.?
Predicting the past. Wonderful.
ok
Ayn Rand tells us ...
"Philosophy studies the fundamental nature of existence, of man, and of man's relationship to existence. As against the special sciences, which deal only with particular aspects, philosophy deals with those aspects of the universe which pertain to everything that exists. In the realm of cognition, the special sciences are the trees, but philosophy is the soil which makes the forest possible."
>>Evolution is a hypothesis.<<
Wrong. TToE is a Scientific Theory.
>>By definition, to be a hypothesis, it is a prediction of what MAY have happened or may happen.<<
But since your definition is wrong, this is irrelevant.
>>A theory is a conceptual structure used to explain existing facts and predict new ones. None of us were here and we cannpt “test” assumptions made with evolution. So the “facts” used for evolution are constantly being challenged.<<
You are half correct (and you gainsay your opening statement). Microevolution (observed) and independent data confirm the accuracy of the theory thousands of times over. Or are you saying Geology is a hypothesis because were weren’t here to see the Earth form?
>> It also depends on how YOU interpret the evidence.<<
No, it a structure that evaluates the evidence using scientific methods and principles. If you don’t know how electricity works, that doesn’t mean your lamp won’t turn on.
>>If you find evolution acceptable, then your PREMISE is that there is NO GOD. Something is generated out of NOTHING. Random order creates ORDER. On it’s face, this contradicts common sense.<<
Wrong. God created the Universe, including the rules by which it operates. Rules that are discoverable and consistent. And TToE has nothing to do with abiogenesis, any more than physics or chemistry do.
>>Intelligent Design or Creation acknowledges something bigger than any of us that creates with a purpose. ONLY GOD creates. Man will take what is ALREADY created and make other things from what is ALREADY created.<<
No argument. The saying “only God can make a tree” is quite apt. It has noting to do with TToE though. And ID is merely an attempt to slip theology into science via a cloak.
>>. The point this parent is making is his belief being ridiculed - “biblical myth” when there is much EVIDENCE to support it.<<
Agreed again. Several us on the thread have pondered whether those were the exact words use or if it is an interpretation by the guy in the OP.
>>Try trashing Islam and see how far you get in a public school. Double standards abound.<<
Unless and until we know what the text says, we can’t determine if this is an attack on Christianity. But islam also does not support the understanding of TToE so it is in the same boat.
>>Ayn Rand tells us ... <<
All well and good, but try getting a degree in philosophy and then performing a physics experiment testing string theory or graviton reactions.
Philosophy tells us why we need to know, science tells us what we need to know (about the physical universe).
>> There’s a mathematical proof then? Metaphysical certainty? Don’t use the language of mathematics to describe what is barely a theory (more of a paradigm, really).<<
Nothing in science is metaphysical certainty. But more is known about Evolution than say, gravity (the why not the observed effect).
>>I know what a theory is. It gives rise to equations. F=ma, E=mc^2. Now that’s a scientific theory.<<
No you don’t. The equations you have live withing a theoretical construct within physics. String Theory, for example is a construct that is a superset of your equations. The equations REPRESENT the Physical Univers, they don’t EXPLAIN it.
>>Write down Darwin’s equation for me. I’ll wait.<<
TToE is a stoscastic process.
>>Think about it, the theory of evolution is useless as a predictor, which is the whole point of science. Physics can tell me where a cannonball will land. Can biology tell me whether species A or B will survive, how they will mutate, etc.?<<
You don’t understand the theory. Things like bacteria developing immunity to antibiotics is just a single, simple example.
>>Predicting the past. Wonderful. <<
Explaining the past. Or does Geology not matter? How about astronomy? We are observing the past.
No doubt there is a chapter in that book detailing the objections to the TToE.
The students in todays public schools have absolutely no ability to think critically, they just reverberate what they are told ... evolution, global warming, save the whales, etc. etc. etc.
I seriously doubt your average union-member HS teacher can cogently explain the issues. Apologies to the truly good ones out there seeking to teach the sciences the way they were meant to be taught, in a biblical context.
Please elaborate on what exactly? My statement was an axiomatic truth. The premise of the Bible that claims there is a God, is mythical, unseen, unknown, unknowable.
To the other poster: I see no inherent contradiction between a belief in intelligent design, and evolution. In fact, in the realm of contemporary physics, scientists are stuck. They’ve conjured up fantasies such as M-Theory, String theory, multiverse, and extra dimensions; all, as it would imply, a fantasy in realistic parlance.
Tim-
Math is. But you keep using the language of metaphysical certainty. There may be a much better theory. See Newton/Einstein.
But more is known about Evolution than say, gravity (the why not the observed effect).
Damning with faint praise. Physics doesn't even know what light is. The equations REPRESENT the Physical Univers, they don’t EXPLAIN it.
They explain it in the sense that they predict what will happen next. Other than string theory, they haven't really managed to make that work yet.
TToE is a stoscastic process.
I know what a stochastic process is. I also know Ito calculus. Write down the equations. I'll wait.
You don’t understand the theory. Things like bacteria developing immunity to antibiotics is just a single, simple example.
So predict it. Species A and B in environment E. Go.
Explaining the past. Or does Geology not matter?
Even geologists are useful for finding stuff like oil. But it really isn't so much whether or not what one does is useless but whether or not what one does is easy.
How about astronomy? We are observing the past.
Only in a technical sense inasmuch as light (whatever the hell it is) takes time to travel. Kepler knew what would happen next.
But, this is just one of the many subjects where textbooks and public schools are attempting to brainwash kids, much in the way they were in the old Soviet Union.
The public schools are one of the first things that need to be dismantled when conservatives take control of government again.
Yes, that is what evolution is ALL about, ah, with a predetermined OUTCOME! Isn't that wonderful? It's outcome based education with “science”. Is it any wonder that OTHER countries according to the Timss scores of the 30 industrialized countries have the U.S., EVERY year getting closer to the BOTTOM of the list in Math and drum roll, science. Heck even Costa Rico is more literate than the U.S.. I am not kidding you.
Yes, junk science as is evolution and dumbed down math all contribute to this CONSISTENT pattern of educational deterioration in the U.S..
Darwin's "Origin of the Species" was updated by Steve Jones in "Darwin's Ghost," and your question about "Darwin's equation" sent me to page 214 ... where Jones tells us that ...
"Measurements of dozens of real rivers, and computer simulations of many more, shows that the relationship between their shortest path across a plain and their actual length is always the same. It is Pi, the ratio between the circumference of a a circle and its diameter."
From that, we might say that Pi = Circumference / Diameter is Darwin's equation.
At the middle school and high school level, science is taught as religion. Or as history, if you like. There’s a practical reason for it, of course. You can try to do experiments to try to verify that F=ma, but the experiments don’t often work in HS labs anyway and there are thousands of experiments over hundreds of years that verify it.
But ultimately, one must have faith in the scientific method and moreover must have faith in the scientists who report their findings.
We are finding out, through AGW, what happens when the foundation of that faith breaks down. The evolution debate is interesting, but if I were an evolutionary biologist, I would be running to shut down Climate Science completely.
One must have faith that science is honest and is done in accordance with transparent methods and is subject to repeatable experiments.
freeDUMB2003, I know better than to waste any effort on you. Circular reasoning and illogical defenses of your faith in evolution are amusing.
I’m sorry, I don’t know what that sentence means and what rivers have to do with evolutionary biology.
“Shut up, I’m not talking to you.” is not a persuasive argument.
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