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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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Posted on 10/01/2002 6:32:12 AM PDT by Phaedrus
Edited on 04/22/2004 12:34:48 AM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
More than 40 years ago, the film "Inherit the Wind" presented the controversy over the teaching of evolution as a battle between stick-figure fundamentalists who defend a literal reading of Genesis and saintly scientists who simply want to teach the facts of biology. Ever since, journalists have tended to depict almost any battle over evolution in the schools as if it were a replay of "Inherit the Wind"--even if it's not.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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Why not? Does the board member misunderstand the relation of religion to science? One of the features of a true liberal education is an integrated understanding of all the sciences, including theology. Why the various sciences have to bunker and protect themselves from others appears to be more of a disease, than an liberal education. If science abandons metaphysics, not to mention relgion, you know they are cheating for a monopoly.
Ha ha ha, "scientific"???? It presupposes a "designer" aka God. It might fool members of the choir, but it's a religious faith.
Come on. If it weren't for the fact that evolution disagrees with the Biblical account of creation, none of this would be under discussion. There's scientific disagreement about the underlying theory of gravity; why isn't Georgia insisting that that controversy be included in the curriculum?
Dr. John G. West, Jr., is a senior fellow at the Seattle-based Discovery Institute and an associate professor of political science at Seattle Pacific University.
The Discovery Institute is a stealth creationist think-tank. Of course they're going to run interference on this play.
I agree with you that an education in the liberal arts should encompass a wide variety of subjects, including science and theology. However, metaphysics and theology are NOT sciences and should not be construde as such. Nor is science a theology, even though certain stringent athiests have tried to force-fit sience into a theology. THe theological and the scientific extremes have both become extremely dogmatic in their views.
TO me, the Cobb county decision is interesting, provided the critiquing of evolutionary theory is done constructively. In other words, it is done to show the dynamic nature of scietific understanding and that all theories have limitations and areas that lack a complete understanding. It is the process of science that explores those areas, often with conflicting ideas. It happens at the cutting edge of all the sciences, not just biological evolution. What I do fear is that the Cobb county decision will open the door to teach the shortcomings and controversies of evolution rather than focus on the underlying concepts that do unify those scientists involved in biological evolutionary research. ALso, I worry that it will be used to recycle all the worn arguements that abuse other areas of science to try to "disprove" evolution and to "disprove" the chmical, physical, geological and cosmological sciences that are well established.
That is an interesting take. Perhaps there are those who a reserve particular subject matter for the name science. Is it possible to give a date when this shift in the meaning occurred?
The view that only science is science is redundant. The view that areas of human experience cannot come under the scrutiny of human knowledge is the very monopoly of a dogmatism that you warn against.
You're letting the cat out of the bag too soon.
Theology, while one of the most honorable of the schools of thought, is not science. Scientific theories today must be phrased in such a fashion that they are disprovable. Otherwise, they are not considered as valid theories. (A nice side debate might be made, then, on whether the theory of evolution is scientific because it does not conform to that pattern, but that is a separate debate.)
Science mainly consists of using specific techniques - hypothesis, experiment, and theory - to enable use to understand the world around us. One cannot validate or invalidate a hypothesis unless one can phrase it in such a manner that it can be invalidated, i.e. disprovable. Once a hypothesis has been repeatedly hammered by experiment, and as it evolves in response to such experiment, then it becomes a theory. (Hey, look, I used evolve in a sentance. Wanna argue about it?)
It can be argued that certain branches of science fit this conceptual model better than others, and it can be argued that the theory of evolution is no theory at all. But that is not the point here. The point here is that Theology is not science.
Perhaps you want to say it is not specifically a science of matter (or whatever else you reserve for the label).
You're presupposing that the Darwinian evolution being taught is correct. One need not introduce God into the mix to discuss problems with Darwinian evolutionary theory -- problems that even big-name evolutionists acknowledge. If you're as serious about science as you make yourself out to be, I'd think you would welcome something like this, as it allows kids to see the scientific method at work.
Of course, we're still left with the question of God. "Science" tends to assume that God either does not exist, or is irrelevant if He does exist. As Stephen Jay Gould put it, "science covers the empirical realm: what the universe is made of ... and why it works this way and that the nature of religion extends over questions of ultimate meaning and moral value."
Gould couldn't imagine a scheme whereby science and religion could be unified -- a baseless assumption on his part that God is not active in space and time. If God does exist, then theories that incorporate His existence are certainly not improper; indeed, if God exists, your own oft-stated position on the matter is completely irrational. (Of course the atheist position is irrational anyway, for the obvious reason that it cannot prove its fundamental assumption.)
And, of course, God does exist.
So they're all wrong, right? 158 scientists from around the country, and everyone of them are clueless? Sounds to me like they're allowing nothing more than a discussion about the problems with evolutionary theory. Surely you guys don't object to reasoned discussion?
because they don't have to. evolution is a scientific theory with a massive non-scientific lobbying group behind. explain that without bringing religion/anti-religion into it?
Period.
It is critical that theories be stated in such a way that they can be disproved, or they are not theories. If they are not theories, then they are not science. QED.
Theology does not state its concepts in ways that are disprovable. They are not science, they are metaphysics. I personally think metaphysis is very cool. Matters of the spirit, the soul, God, angels, demons, monsters, and things that go bump in the night - very interesting stuff. But unless the studies are done using the scientific method - not science.
Why the heck do certain people want to make them science, anyway? Unless and until science comes up with some way of accessing the dimensions >3 space, it ain't gonna happen.
You can reject the validity of the underlying data, but that doesn't change the methodology used to interpret it.
Why is nonexistence of God a fundamental assumption? I'd say it's one of many assumptions a person can make (and not terribly important IMO).
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