Again, creationists are trying to use the power of the state to force their religious views on all others. It is a battle that, alas, never ceases. It is simply mind boggling to me that the very people who profess to be Christian paragons of Family Values, strive mightily to deceive the courts into allowing evolving forms of creationism to be taught alongside real science in our schools. "No sir! It is not religion," they claim.
Take for example Texas School Board's chairman Dr. Don McLeroy, who pushed in 2003 to have the board introduce a "more skeptical version of evolution" into the science textbooks. McLeroy stated, according to a report in the New York Times, that "he does not believe in Darwin's theory and thinks that Earth's appearance is a recent geologic event, thousands of years old, not 4.5 billion as evolutionary scientists contend.” Fortunately, the school board, that time, didn’t buy it, and didn't allow him to use them to inculcate children across the state with his views.
Enter Stephen C. Meyer, director of the Discovery Institute, the Christian fundamentalist strategic command center for the rightwing's war on evolutionary science. Meyer denies the institute is advocating the biblical version of creation, yet, the organization which he heads, in a document entitled, "The Wedge: Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture," clearly states, "The Center seeks nothing less than the overthrow of materialism and its cultural legacies." and laments that "discoveries of modern science" have debunked "traditional concepts of both God and man . . . thinkers such as Charles Darwin, Karl Marks, and Sigmund Freud portrayed humans not as moral and spiritual beings, but as animals or machines who inhabited a universe ruled by purely impersonal forces and whose behavior and very thoughts were dictated by the unbending forces of biology, chemistry and environment"
In other words, the thrust of the Discovery Institute, from the get-go, was to fight science (evidenced-based reason) with established Christian belief.
The statement, "traditional concepts of both God and man," cannot be denied to be based on the Genesis creation story of the Bible. Therefore, Meyer is lying when he says the group is not advocating Biblical version of creation. This is, indeed, the very reason for the existence of the organization. Apparently, deceit is a family value for the members and supporters of this organization.
Testifying before the Texas board, Meyer was either showing his ignorance of science, or he knew the science, and lied, when he stated that evolution has trouble explaining the Cambrian Explosion. It does not. The Cambrian Explosion can easily be explained by pointing out that, before the Explosion, the bodies of animals had no hard parts. Soft body parts do not normally fossilize. It was the evolution of the chitinous exoskeletons of invertebrates—a sea-change adaptation in survival strategy—that caused the Cambrian Explosion. In fact, the fossil record has now been pushed back to 2.3 and 3.5 billion years before the present.
Again, either Meyer did not know that, and he was showing his ignorance of science, or he knows the science, and is lying. Either way, he does not deserve to be trusted in matters of evolutionary science.
But, hordes of creationists continue to attack. Legislators in six states, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan—Michigan(?) joining anti-science, pro-ignorance, Southern states?—Missouri and South Carolina (where’s Kansas?), have considered legislation to force Meyer's religious views on unsuspecting science students.
The fact that state legislators are even considering such legislation is a strong testament to the abysmal state of science education in the United States! Had the legislators obtained a well rounded education themselves, they would recognize the deception, and the proposals would never come up in the first place.
How many times will creationism mutate and evolve into more complex, deceptive forms under the stress of real science? There will probably be no end, but we can hope for, and strive for, better schools devoid of religious interference. Insecurity is the mother of fear. To accept the science is to destroy the comfort of easy theological answers, and lay bare the possibility that what one was taught as a child to believe—taught by loving parents who, at that time, were like infallible gods—was not entirely correct. Pondering the hard questions is difficult and mentally taxing. A Bible believer recoils from considering the contradiction of the widely held view that the God of the Old Testament is the same God of the New Testament, and that He is omnibenevolent, loving all humankind, and that he is unchanging. Having pondered these questions, I now hold that the popular concept of the Anselmian God--that he is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, is not possible, nor are the Biblical versions true, and I have no fear.
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Friday, May 15, 2009
US detainee abuse 'unprecedented'
AlJazeera.net reports on the depth of the torture committed by the United States, including the possible complicity of Nancy Pelosi.
We, in the United States, understand that it is probable that no one but a few low ranking individuals, will ever pay for the crimes of the Cheney/Bush Administration. We can only hope that, by showing the world what we have done, and letting all know that we no longer torture, a modicum of respect will return.
However, by allowing the perpetrators (Cheney first and foremost) to go free, we will never regain the level of respect, nor the moral high ground, we had, and the next Republican neo-con administration will know that there is no restraint on their power, as the Democrats have demonstrated that they are toothless clowns who don't have the guts to enforce their own subpoenas.
We, in the United States, understand that it is probable that no one but a few low ranking individuals, will ever pay for the crimes of the Cheney/Bush Administration. We can only hope that, by showing the world what we have done, and letting all know that we no longer torture, a modicum of respect will return.
However, by allowing the perpetrators (Cheney first and foremost) to go free, we will never regain the level of respect, nor the moral high ground, we had, and the next Republican neo-con administration will know that there is no restraint on their power, as the Democrats have demonstrated that they are toothless clowns who don't have the guts to enforce their own subpoenas.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Florida School Attempts to Inculcate Third-Graders with Fundamentalism
St. John’s County School got an education from U.S. District Judge Harvey E. Schlesinger of northern Florida. The judge saw a blatant and overt attempt inculcate the children with a particular fundamentalist religious view and to marginalize and punish any student objecting.
Fundamentalists seem to be the most insecure people in the world. They aren't happy pompously believing themselves to be God's anointed, but must force others, by the power of government, to believe as they. They are quick to use our government to induce our children to believe as they, but if the government refuses to comply, they consider themslves victims of government anti-Christian oppression.
It is a fundamental fact that they do not understand the Separation Clause of the First Amendment, and probably never will. In their willfully abysmal ignorance, they claim there is no separation of church and state in the constitution.
However, those who take pride in possessing a high degree of intellectual honesty, have read (or will read) the Virginia Statute for Religious Liberty, and the Letter to the Danbury Baptists, both authored by Thomas Jefferson. The Virginia Statute is the document from which the Separation Clause of the First Amendment was crafted.
Fundamentalists seem to be the most insecure people in the world. They aren't happy pompously believing themselves to be God's anointed, but must force others, by the power of government, to believe as they. They are quick to use our government to induce our children to believe as they, but if the government refuses to comply, they consider themslves victims of government anti-Christian oppression.
It is a fundamental fact that they do not understand the Separation Clause of the First Amendment, and probably never will. In their willfully abysmal ignorance, they claim there is no separation of church and state in the constitution.
However, those who take pride in possessing a high degree of intellectual honesty, have read (or will read) the Virginia Statute for Religious Liberty, and the Letter to the Danbury Baptists, both authored by Thomas Jefferson. The Virginia Statute is the document from which the Separation Clause of the First Amendment was crafted.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
Tired of Reaganomics Yet?
Do you wonder why, in the 1950's up until the 80's, one person's labor could provide for a family, and still save some money, and take a vacation? Now, it takes both parents working, and often it is still a struggle to survive, and the net savings of the nation, which was 8.8 % in the first year of the Reagan Administration, fell to 5.8% by the last year of his term, and 0.8 by 2005 (also see the drop during the Reagan years.)
Note also, that the bold economic policy of the Reagan Presidency was to get government out of the way by deregulation, and let corporate America have free reign in a "global free-market," where U.S. workers compete with China's workers who currently make about 160 per month. By the way, income for China's workers is rising dramatically. Why? They still have many trade barriers against many U.S. products. We have little.
So, are you tired of Reaganomics yet, where corporations get the lion's share of the no-tax carrot and the tax burden is increasingly on the backs of the middle class who are making less in today’s dollars?
How far will it go? Is it the intention of the right wing to take this nation back to the days of Dickens when one had to beg the boss for an extra pence to help pay a health expense? Will we have old ladies and children begging in the streets? I believe that is where we are headed if Labor dies.
I have high hopes for Obama's attempt to turn all this around and take us back to the days of high wages and good healthcare, but I fear that multinational corporations, who owe no loyalty to this nation, are in the driver's seat, as they own too many politicians. The rise of the neo-cons, corporate power, deregulation, and the current economic disaster are all interrelated.
If the conservative democrats continue to vote with the corporate-blessed republican party, even republican voters will wakeup one day to realize they have no savings, no healthcare, and their lives are wholly controlled by the Corporation. They are already, they just don't see it, believing that theirs is the party of god, and all evil is derived from the liberals, whose policies gave us sustained economic growth and a strong middle class for over 40 years (until the 80's).
But, at least them damn gays can't get married and we still have our guns!
From the Concordcoalition:
The net national savings rate for the year 2008 will be negative for the first time since 1934.
From the Washington Post.
More than a third of private-sector workers belonged to unions in the early 1950s; today, less than 8 percent do. As unions declined in the past three decades, wages have lagged behind rising productivity.
Note also, that the bold economic policy of the Reagan Presidency was to get government out of the way by deregulation, and let corporate America have free reign in a "global free-market," where U.S. workers compete with China's workers who currently make about 160 per month. By the way, income for China's workers is rising dramatically. Why? They still have many trade barriers against many U.S. products. We have little.
So, are you tired of Reaganomics yet, where corporations get the lion's share of the no-tax carrot and the tax burden is increasingly on the backs of the middle class who are making less in today’s dollars?
How far will it go? Is it the intention of the right wing to take this nation back to the days of Dickens when one had to beg the boss for an extra pence to help pay a health expense? Will we have old ladies and children begging in the streets? I believe that is where we are headed if Labor dies.
I have high hopes for Obama's attempt to turn all this around and take us back to the days of high wages and good healthcare, but I fear that multinational corporations, who owe no loyalty to this nation, are in the driver's seat, as they own too many politicians. The rise of the neo-cons, corporate power, deregulation, and the current economic disaster are all interrelated.
If the conservative democrats continue to vote with the corporate-blessed republican party, even republican voters will wakeup one day to realize they have no savings, no healthcare, and their lives are wholly controlled by the Corporation. They are already, they just don't see it, believing that theirs is the party of god, and all evil is derived from the liberals, whose policies gave us sustained economic growth and a strong middle class for over 40 years (until the 80's).
But, at least them damn gays can't get married and we still have our guns!
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Pope Benedict XVI: Doing What He Can to Spread Disease in Africa
(From CNN) -- Visiting Cameroon, the pontiff reiterated the Vatican's policy on condom use.
Few People have done more to bring disease, misery and suffering to children and adults than the Pope! Yet he can't claim all the glory for this. Much guilt is shared by the millions around the world who support the Vatican and its primative beliefs.
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Happy 200th Birthday Charles Darwin!
A Pew Forum Religious Landscape Survey, conducted in 2007, found that only 48% of Americans agree that "evolution is the best explanation for the origins of human life on earth."
A 2006 Pew survey found that 68% of Americans favor teaching Creationism along with evolution in public schools.
These figures tell us a lot about the poor state of science education, and the power of myth. In the very first place, it shows that most Americans, including many highly educated Americans, haven't a clue as to the nature of a valid scientific theory. Most see it as no more than a guess--something on the order of an hypothesis.
Perhaps we should present creationism in schools--for one day--the first day of class only. Have science teachers show on the board, the logic of the scientific method, and how it applies to evolution.
Juxtapose that with creationism, and show how it fails logic and the scientific method by starting with the conclusion, then throwing out any evidence to the contrary. Such an honest display of reason vs. belief may swing some perceptive kids to the scientific method, but, of course, it also could make some ignorant parents irate, and get some teachers fired. Political/Religious correctness, you know. Too many politicians and educators still walk on their mental knuckles.
A 2006 Pew survey found that 68% of Americans favor teaching Creationism along with evolution in public schools.
These figures tell us a lot about the poor state of science education, and the power of myth. In the very first place, it shows that most Americans, including many highly educated Americans, haven't a clue as to the nature of a valid scientific theory. Most see it as no more than a guess--something on the order of an hypothesis.
Perhaps we should present creationism in schools--for one day--the first day of class only. Have science teachers show on the board, the logic of the scientific method, and how it applies to evolution.
Juxtapose that with creationism, and show how it fails logic and the scientific method by starting with the conclusion, then throwing out any evidence to the contrary. Such an honest display of reason vs. belief may swing some perceptive kids to the scientific method, but, of course, it also could make some ignorant parents irate, and get some teachers fired. Political/Religious correctness, you know. Too many politicians and educators still walk on their mental knuckles.
Saturday, January 24, 2009
The Rightwing Creation Deception
Again, creationists are trying to use the power of the state to force their religious views on all others. It is a battle that, alas, never ceases. It is simply mind boggling to me that the very people who profess to be Christian paragons of Family Values, strive mightily to deceive the courts into allowing evolving forms of creationism to be taught alongside real science in our schools. "No sir! It is not religion," they claim.
Take for example Texas School Board's chairman Dr. Don McLeroy, who pushed in 2003 to have the board introduce a "more skeptical version of evolution" into the science textbooks. McLeroy stated, according to a report in the New York Times, that "he does not believe in Darwin's theory and thinks that Earth's appearance is a recent geologic event, thousands of years old, not 4.5 billion as evolutionary scientists contend.” Fortunately, the school board, that time, didn’t buy it, and didn't allow him to use them to inculcate children across the state with his views.
Enter Stephen C. Meyer, director of the Discovery Institute, the Christian fundamentalist strategic command center for the rightwing's war on evolutionary science. Meyer denies the institute is advocating the biblical version of creation, yet, the organization which he heads, in a document entitled, "The Wedge: Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture," clearly states, "The Center seeks nothing less than the overthrow of materialism and its cultural legacies." and laments that "discoveries of modern science" have debunked "traditional concepts of both God and man . . . thinkers such as Charles Darwin, Karl Marks, and Sigmund Freud portrayed humans not as moral and spiritual beings, but as animals or machines who inhabited a universe ruled by purely impersonal forces and whose behavior and very thoughts were dictated by the unbending forces of biology, chemistry and environment"
In other words, the thrust of the Discovery Institute, from the get-go, was to fight science (evidenced-based reason) with established Christian belief.
The statement, "traditional concepts of both God and man," cannot be denied to be based on the Genesis creation story of the Bible. Therefore, Meyer is lying when he says the group is not advocating Biblical version of creation. This is, indeed, the very reason for the existence of the organization. Apparently, deceit is a family value for the members and supporters of this organization.
Testifying before the Texas board, Meyer was either showing his ignorance of science, or he knew the science, and lied, when he stated that evolution has trouble explaining the Cambrian Explosion. It does not. The Cambrian Explosion can easily be explained by pointing out that, before the Explosion, the bodies of animals had no hard parts. Soft body parts do not normally fossilize. It was the evolution of the chitinous exoskeletons of invertebrates—a sea-change adaptation in survival strategy—that caused the Cambrian Explosion. In fact, the fossil record has now been pushed back to 2.3 and 3.5 billion years before the present.
Again, either Meyer did not know that, and he was showing his ignorance of science, or he knows the science, and is lying. Either way, he does not deserve to be trusted in matters of evolutionary science.
But, hordes of creationists continue to attack. Legislators in six states, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan—Michigan(?) joining anti-science, pro-ignorance, Southern states?—Missouri and South Carolina (where’s Kansas?), have considered legislation to force Meyer's religious views on unsuspecting science students.
The fact that state legislators are even considering such legislation is a strong testament to the abysmal state of science education in the United States! Had the legislators obtained a well rounded education themselves, they would recognize the deception, and the proposals would never come up in the first place.
How many times will creationism mutate and evolve into more complex, deceptive forms under the stress of real science? There will probably be no end, but we can hope for, and strive for, better schools devoid of religious interference.
Insecurity is the mother of fear. To accept the science is to destroy the comfort of easy theological answers, and lay bare the possibility that what one was taught as a child to believe—taught by loving parents who, at that time, were like infallible gods—was not entirely correct.
Pondering the hard questions is difficult and mentally taxing. A Bible believer recoils from considering the contradiction of the widely held view that the God of the Old Testament is the same God of the New Testament, and that He is omnibenevolent, loving all humankind, and that he is unchanging. Having pondered these questions, I now hold that the popular concept of the Anselmian God--that he is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, is not possible, nor are the Biblical versions true, and I have no fear.
Take for example Texas School Board's chairman Dr. Don McLeroy, who pushed in 2003 to have the board introduce a "more skeptical version of evolution" into the science textbooks. McLeroy stated, according to a report in the New York Times, that "he does not believe in Darwin's theory and thinks that Earth's appearance is a recent geologic event, thousands of years old, not 4.5 billion as evolutionary scientists contend.” Fortunately, the school board, that time, didn’t buy it, and didn't allow him to use them to inculcate children across the state with his views.
Enter Stephen C. Meyer, director of the Discovery Institute, the Christian fundamentalist strategic command center for the rightwing's war on evolutionary science. Meyer denies the institute is advocating the biblical version of creation, yet, the organization which he heads, in a document entitled, "The Wedge: Center for the Renewal of Science and Culture," clearly states, "The Center seeks nothing less than the overthrow of materialism and its cultural legacies." and laments that "discoveries of modern science" have debunked "traditional concepts of both God and man . . . thinkers such as Charles Darwin, Karl Marks, and Sigmund Freud portrayed humans not as moral and spiritual beings, but as animals or machines who inhabited a universe ruled by purely impersonal forces and whose behavior and very thoughts were dictated by the unbending forces of biology, chemistry and environment"
In other words, the thrust of the Discovery Institute, from the get-go, was to fight science (evidenced-based reason) with established Christian belief.
The statement, "traditional concepts of both God and man," cannot be denied to be based on the Genesis creation story of the Bible. Therefore, Meyer is lying when he says the group is not advocating Biblical version of creation. This is, indeed, the very reason for the existence of the organization. Apparently, deceit is a family value for the members and supporters of this organization.
Testifying before the Texas board, Meyer was either showing his ignorance of science, or he knew the science, and lied, when he stated that evolution has trouble explaining the Cambrian Explosion. It does not. The Cambrian Explosion can easily be explained by pointing out that, before the Explosion, the bodies of animals had no hard parts. Soft body parts do not normally fossilize. It was the evolution of the chitinous exoskeletons of invertebrates—a sea-change adaptation in survival strategy—that caused the Cambrian Explosion. In fact, the fossil record has now been pushed back to 2.3 and 3.5 billion years before the present.
Again, either Meyer did not know that, and he was showing his ignorance of science, or he knows the science, and is lying. Either way, he does not deserve to be trusted in matters of evolutionary science.
But, hordes of creationists continue to attack. Legislators in six states, Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Michigan—Michigan(?) joining anti-science, pro-ignorance, Southern states?—Missouri and South Carolina (where’s Kansas?), have considered legislation to force Meyer's religious views on unsuspecting science students.
The fact that state legislators are even considering such legislation is a strong testament to the abysmal state of science education in the United States! Had the legislators obtained a well rounded education themselves, they would recognize the deception, and the proposals would never come up in the first place.
How many times will creationism mutate and evolve into more complex, deceptive forms under the stress of real science? There will probably be no end, but we can hope for, and strive for, better schools devoid of religious interference.
Insecurity is the mother of fear. To accept the science is to destroy the comfort of easy theological answers, and lay bare the possibility that what one was taught as a child to believe—taught by loving parents who, at that time, were like infallible gods—was not entirely correct.
Pondering the hard questions is difficult and mentally taxing. A Bible believer recoils from considering the contradiction of the widely held view that the God of the Old Testament is the same God of the New Testament, and that He is omnibenevolent, loving all humankind, and that he is unchanging. Having pondered these questions, I now hold that the popular concept of the Anselmian God--that he is omnipotent, omniscient, and omnibenevolent, is not possible, nor are the Biblical versions true, and I have no fear.
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