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exton
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 Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 6:08 am Post subject: Re: Inconvenient Truth, Inconvenient in Seattle school |
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| Mike wrote: | | Save it for college when people actually give a shit. |
The problem is that people who don't go to college can vote too. You need an educated population if you want to avoid terminally stupid government. |
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Lester
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| Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:02 am Post subject: Re: Inconvenient Truth, Inconvenient in Seattle school |
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| exton wrote: | | Mike wrote: | | Save it for college when people actually give a shit. |
The problem is that people who don't go to college can vote too. You need an educated population if you want to avoid terminally stupid government. |
Agreed. |
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Mike
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| Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 2:41 pm Post subject: Re: Inconvenient Truth, Inconvenient in Seattle school |
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| exton wrote: | | Mike wrote: | | Save it for college when people actually give a shit. |
The problem is that people who don't go to college can vote too. You need an educated population if you want to avoid terminally stupid government. |
If you're talking about environmental issues, I don't feel that is the same issue as evolution. I didn't say that we shouldn't teach about environmentalism and eco-friendly behavior in school, mainly because we actually do have factual evidence on climatic changes, and it's silly to not show a movie just because it's got some fictitious facts, just keep that "Earth is 500000000000000 years old, worm-to-fish-to-monkey-to-man, and that's a fact" bologna out of required science classes, and make it an elective. I'm in a class on evolution right now, actually, I have it again tonight at 5:30, so I'm not saying that it's a completely pointless subject, I'm just saying that it shouldn't be forced on kids and said that it's fact or anything. We should teach kids what we know to be true, not force theoretical science on them, especially theoretical science that conflicts with nearly every religion in existance. Seriously, pushing your theoretical science on unwilling recipients is just as bad as forced religion. Science is a religion in itself, after all. |
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CryxicKiller
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| Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:06 pm Post subject: |
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I was originally joking, but now I feel like I must "step up" my involvement in this thread. First to Mike: I am slightly disappointed that you compared anime to evolution, mostly because the relevance of the latter should be quasi-axiomatic to all humans, whereas the relevance of the former does not even hold a quasi-axiomatic status even among those that are huge fans. Evolution and evolutionary theory are pretty much the basis for understanding just about anything in biology and physiology. This point is fundamental because it has consequences for what you apparently want to do with scientific teaching. If you want to leave out evolution and evolutionary theory, you're pretty much also throwing out biology. I'm not sure that this is what you wished for, although I suspect not. The problem may be that you do not quite fully realize how powerful and far-reaching the statements of evolution are. As the title of the famous essay by the great biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky clarified, "Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution." You can read that essay here if you wish: http://www.2think.org/dobzhansky.shtml
In a strictly educational context, leaving out the ontological and "truth" principles for now, I favor evolution and evolutionary theory for the above reason: if you get rid of them, you must also pretty much eliminate biology as humans understand it now. So you're basically truncating the curriculum by a whole field of science. Quite a move. While you ponder the practical implications.....
Let's analyze those ontological values now. Evolution is not a scientific theory; evolution is a natural process, a fact, a common thing that happens among species on Earth. At its most basic, fundamental level, leaving out the modern evolutionary synthesis and its accompanying mechanisms, evolution simply means the biological and physiological change in species over time. The "exact" mechanisms, simplifying a lot here, go something like the following: genes mutate, individuals are selected, and populations evolve. So evolution, as defined above, is absolutely true. It happens. You can blabber all you want about why you don't like that, but it happens and it's just something that you have to live with. To explain evolution, we now have what's called the modern evolutionary synthesis, a huge intellectual achievement that unites Darwin's natural selection, Mendelian genetics, random genetic variation, and population genetics. It is the most powerful tool we have to explain how evolution occurs, and the evidence to support its conclusions is overwhelming.
I do not know what you personally believe, though I am certainly entertaining several propositions right now, but the Earth is roughly 4.5 billion years old. Just like for evolution, the evidence for this is overwhelming. It is absolute truth. In fact, these are just about the only things in life likely to yield absolute truth. It is absolutely true that evolution happens (we've even observed it happen among fish in Africa, for one example) and it is absolutely true that Earth is roughly 4.5 billion years old. Again, you can question that all you want, but I suspect you are doing so because you believe these facts somehow violate a worldview that's dear to you or something. If that is the case, you are not holding rigorous and appropriate standards for analyzing evidence.
Science has similarities to religion, but there are vast and fundamental differences that cannot unite the two. For just one example, note the reason-faith distinction. For many people out there, their religious beliefs are a matter of faith, whereas most other beliefs they hold are a matter of reason and nomological analysis. As a way to understanding the intrinsic features of the Universe, science is far more valuable, practical, and effective. Deluding yourself with religion is something that you can do on your personal time, but I would take your recommendations and switch them around, admonishing you not to force theological and sociological positions on areas that have been decisively settled nomologically (like evolution or the age of the Earth). |
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Mike
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| Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 8:42 pm Post subject: |
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| CryxicKiller wrote: | | I was originally joking, but now I feel like I must "step up" my involvement in this thread. First to Mike: I am slightly disappointed that you compared anime to evolution, mostly because the relevance of the latter should be quasi-axiomatic to all humans, whereas the relevance of the former does not even hold a quasi-axiomatic status even among those that are huge fans. Evolution and evolutionary theory are pretty much the basis for understanding just about anything in biology and physiology. This point is fundamental because it has consequences for what you apparently want to do with scientific teaching. If you want to leave out evolution and evolutionary theory, you're pretty much also throwing out biology. I'm not sure that this is what you wished for, although I suspect not. The problem may be that you do not quite fully realize how powerful and far-reaching the statements of evolution are. As the title of the famous essay by the great biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky clarified, "Nothing in Biology Makes Sense Except in the Light of Evolution." You can read that essay here if you wish: http://www.2think.org/dobzhansky.shtml |
Well, I read the essay, and it's frankly nothing I haven't heard before. I notice it pulls out the tried and true "monkey and humans are 99% identical" nonsense, and my response to that is that tomatoes and watermelons are both something like 98% water, yet are two completely and utterly seperate species of plant. In fact, the only similarities are that they are considered "fruit", and have red colored pulp. Now as for his claim that he's both creationist and evolutionist, it doesn't make sense since creationists believe that God created man in his image whereas evolutionists believe that humans came from mutant worms. I realize that disproving evolution would trump many secular, by which I mean scientific, beliefs, but science has a habit of being wrong from time to time. Biology has no bearing on whether or not the Earth is thousands or billions of years old, biology is the study of life, namely modern life Evolutionary biology studies those fragmented, ambiguous, semi-fossils of what looks like unicellular creatures that may or may not have been the first living creatures on Earth.
| Quote: | a strictly educational context, leaving out the ontological and "truth" principles for now, I favor evolution and evolutionary theory for the above reason: if you get rid of them, you must also pretty much eliminate biology as humans understand it now. So you're basically truncating the curriculum by a whole field of science. Quite a move. While you ponder the practical implications.....
Let's analyze those ontological values now. Evolution is not a scientific theory; evolution is a natural process, a fact, a common thing that happens among species on Earth. At its most basic, fundamental level, leaving out the modern evolutionary synthesis and its accompanying mechanisms, evolution simply means the biological and physiological change in species over time. The "exact" mechanisms, simplifying a lot here, go something like the following: genes mutate, individuals are selected, and populations evolve. So evolution, as defined above, is absolutely true. It happens. You can blabber all you want about why you don't like that, but it happens and it's just something that you have to live with. To explain evolution, we now have what's called the modern evolutionary synthesis, a huge intellectual achievement that unites Darwin's natural selection, Mendelian genetics, random genetic variation, and population genetics. It is the most powerful tool we have to explain how evolution occurs, and the evidence to support its conclusions is overwhelming. |
Again, you claim evolution is factual and not theoretical. Just because there are signs of it does not make it fact, and personally, I think God just threw those in to screw with people, lol. It also seems you confuse mutation with evolution, would you perhaps clarify? My understanding is that evolution is where one species of life comes from an entirely different species of life (humans from worms) whereas mutation, which is fact is when a species develops a sort of defect, like that pride of lions with the crooked tails. A pride of lions, including one male lion with a crooked tail, was separated and isolated, and after much incestuous relations, every newborn lion had a crooked tail. There's more stuff in there, but I don't remember off the top of my head. Mutation and evolution are similar, but definitely not the same.
| Quote: | | I do not know what you personally believe, though I am certainly entertaining several propositions right now, but the Earth is roughly 4.5 billion years old. Just like for evolution, the evidence for this is overwhelming. It is absolute truth. In fact, these are just about the only things in life likely to yield absolute truth. It is absolutely true that evolution happens (we've even observed it happen among fish in Africa, for one example) and it is absolutely true that Earth is roughly 4.5 billion years old. Again, you can question that all you want, but I suspect you are doing so because you believe these facts somehow violate a worldview that's dear to you or something. If that is the case, you are not holding rigorous and appropriate standards for analyzing evidence. |
How do we know the Earth is 4.5 billion years old? Did we have humans back then? Recording equipment? No! We analyze rocks to the best of our ability and make several assumptions that point to the Earth being 4.5 billion years old. Maybe after 3000 years, nuclear decay speeds up dramatically in rocks, who knows?
| Quote: | | Science has similarities to religion, but there are vast and fundamental differences that cannot unite the two. For just one example, note the reason-faith distinction. For many people out there, their religious beliefs are a matter of faith, whereas most other beliefs they hold are a matter of reason and nomological analysis. As a way to understanding the intrinsic features of the Universe, science is far more valuable, practical, and effective. Deluding yourself with religion is something that you can do on your personal time, but I would take your recommendations and switch them around, admonishing you not to force theological and sociological positions on areas that have been decisively settled nomologically (like evolution or the age of the Earth). |
Atheists have faith in humanity. A very laughable concept since humanity is the most corrupt, seedy, and disgusting species on Earth, but anyway, both science and religion involves faith, but religion has faith in a higher power whereas science is the religion of vanity. I have many, many, many personal reasons as to why I think evolution is bullshit, but I won't bore you with the details, I feel dirty enough taking a class on it. The point I was originally trying to make was that neither evolution nor creationism should be forced in school. They should either be both taught minimally, or taught as an elective. Do not force your ideals on me or anyone else. We do not all believe the same, and the majority of people don't hold as much stock in humanity and human science as you do. |
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CryxicKiller
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| Posted: Tue Jan 16, 2007 11:44 pm Post subject: |
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Dear me you are confused.....
Let's first backtrack to our original battleground before heading off in new directions. The Dobzhansky piece was meant to show the extent to which evolutionary theory influences our very understanding of biology. If you want to throw out evolution and evolutionary theory, then inevitably you would damage the entire field. You can't just ignore evolution and hope everything in biology will move on. Now I want to know your opinions on the possible implications of your suggestion that we drop evolutionary theory from the curriculum. It is virtually assured that getting rid of evolutionary theory will ruin biology, so.....are you maintaining that we drop biology from the list of possible science courses people can take in high school? I actually don't think so. What your "arguments," more like rants, seem to show is that you are unaware of the fundamental pertinence of evolutionary theory in modern biology. Academically, however, the two are strongly connected. All analogies spark some misperceptions and should be used carefully, but taking evolutionary theory out of biology and hoping that biology keeps going normally is like cutting off the legs and arms from a human body and hoping that it too functions normally. You can't impact evolutionary theory and think that you're sparing biology somehow. If you sever evolution from schools, you might as well eviscerate biology as well.
The above argument is meant to reach a sensible policy decision. Again, it does not adjudicate on the ontological status of evolution and evolutionary theory, but it does offer a glimpse on what would happen academically were we to adopt your standards. Getting to evolution itself: you are wildly off the mark on just about anything that you could be wildly off the mark on in this subject. I do not claim to be an expert, I am not, but there are many areas where I can offer guidance on how to better understand evolution. Often what causes problems with human beliefs and dialogue is misunderstanding, and you have plenty of the latter in this case. When we speak about two species being 99% idential or something, we're doing so genetically. That is, two species that are 99% the same have 99% of the same genes. So it refers to the number of genes that they have in common. Your response is ludicrous as it doesn't pertain to the scenario. I do not know how closely, genetically speaking, watermelons and tomatoes are related, but the fact that they both may be composed of 98% water is insignificant. In that sense, you are right: water percentage similarities don't determine what species you are. I'm sure there are many other animals out there who have roughly the same water percentage composition as humans (near 75%), but they are not human. But, as I said, your analogy is misguided because we're talking about genetic similarities, not just "any similarity that my mind can possibly think of." However, what we should keep in mind at this point is that two species can be different even though they have amazingly close genetic records. Genes are, essentially, hereditary units, and the fact that humans share more of the same genes with monkeys merely highlights the obvious: we are more closely related to monkeys than we are to, say, flatworms. It's expected that humans and monkeys are genetically similar, but obviously humans are one species and monkeys fall under a wide array of species all over the world. What makes us different, of course, are the genes that we possess and that some or all monkeys don't. That's what makes us "human," which means it's what gives us opposable thumbs (though we're not the only ones that have these), the ability to walk upright, our eyesight, and just about everything that you can think of relating to human physiology. Evolution is responsible for all of it. I will explore some further confusion you have regarding evolution, but I'll move chronologically now and address your point regarding what creationists can or should believe.
First, let me begin on a sociological note. I have several friends who believe in both creationism and evolution. It's a quasi-deistic sort of view, holding that god created all the requisite material for life on Earth and let evolution do the rest. Now, I am not really interested in debating how plausible this view is, but I announced it solely to show that there are people out there who do believe this, with, obviously, what they think are good reasons. Furthermore, Pope John Paul II blatanly stated in 1996 that evolution is compatible with Christian teachings. According to him, Christians were not required to believe in the validity of evolution, but it was alright if they chose to do so. Pius XII made similar statements in the early twentieth century. It is important to realize, once again, that I am not making ontological arguments on this issue right now, but I am giving you fair "warning" that there are droves of people out there who believe in both creationism and evolution. Evolution states that all life on Earth had a common descent, but the part about humans coming from worms is simply your voice being pejorative and uninterested in the mechanisms of evolutionary theory.
Science has made many mistakes, true, but it also has had spectacular achievements, ones that blow out of the water anything accomplished by another human endeavor, excluding Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and Michael Jackson's Thriller album, whose uberness still defy ratiocination (kidding...sort of). To highlight the degree to which science has progressed, one merely needs to take a survey of physicists, many of whom believe we are very close to a Theory of Everything, a theory that can describe all materialistic interactions in this Universe. Many fields in science are, indeed, approaching "the truth;" that is, they are approaching correct descriptions regarding the particular aspects of the external world that they are studying. This view is most often associated with a scientific realist, which I happily am, but it can easily be corroborated historically and ontologically. All this aside, however, evolution contains almost nothing that we have to seriously worry about in terms of accuracy. That is, evolution is true. It happened and it's happening right now. Period.
You are right that biology does not have a bearing on the age of the Earth, but I wonder why you said that. I cannot find a statement of mine that implied we use biology to determine the age of the Earth. What we do use to measure the age of the Earth is called radiometric dating, which also does apply to evolution. Uranium-lead dating, probably the most used technique, gives the age of the Earth that we know now: 4.5 billion years. Nuclear decay does not "speed up." I would ask if you know the basics of nuclear physics, but this statement plainly lets me know that you don't. A wide variety of readings have all pretty much centered on that date with high degrees of accuracy. It would be something like non-sensical to dispute so much evidence.
We can have a debate on the existence of god since you are mentioning that entity so frequently. Whether you want this or not I'll leave for you to decide, but we may come to a point when we'll have to undertake the debate because the entity becomes so essential to the arguments involved. That aside, the second paragraph nicely highlights my point about how misunderstanding is inciting much of your conclusions. I basically defined evolution above: genes mutate, individuals are selected, and populations evolve. This is somewhat simplistic; a better defintion might be: the change in frequency of a population's genes. The alleles are the traits that the genes encode. Different species eventually can result from evolutionary processes, yes, though mostly it takes a long time (not always, however). You also completely do not know how mutations are involved in evolution. Mutations, which are basically base pair changes in RNA or DNA, can be "bad" and "good," by which I mean they can help towards an organism's survival or hurt towards that same end. "Good" mutations accrue over time and lead to evolutionary change. You should know that I find it very funny that you believe in mutations but not in evolution, which is driven forward, significantly anyway, by mutations. Once again, misunderstanding and lack of knowledge are impacting your views. Keep in mind that not all mutations are "bad," and the "good" ones are selected by natural selection. Mutation and evolution are not the same, we'll agree there. But mutation is an integral part of the larger process of evolution.
Being a human, I take umbrage with your description. I can only surmise that your religious upbringing has filled you with such bs, but humans are fundamentally good and rational beings, tempted to act badly mostly under stress from larger conditions. Science has (mostly) reason, religion has (mostly) faith. The former method, although obviously oversimplified in my account here, is far more superior when it comes to discovering answers to general and specific inquiries about our world. Religion can blabber all day long, but it can't do much more. Frankly my Mike, when it comes to this, I don't give a damn what you believe. You can believe there's a unicorn inside your room for all I care. Hell, it's just as plausible as believing in this silly thing you call "god"! If it's a topic that relates to science, people should be expected to learn what science has discovered on it. Again, what science, not religion, has discovered on it. It's completely irrelevant that you believe what you do, outside a sociological context, because you have no reasons and no good evidence to back up your claims. You can be safely ignored. |
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Mike
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 2:43 am Post subject: |
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First, I went through biology just fine without touching on evolution. It is possible, even if you don't think it is. Second, the Pope doesn't speak for me, nor many other Protestants as we feel the Catholic church has lost focus and has twisted the Word to fit their own needs. I take no stock in what the Catholic Church pronounces worthy. I trust the Bible only, just as Martin Luther did. The Bible says man was created in God's image, and it's what I believe. I will not change my views to fit modern thought processes. Again, about science, humans do not have the power to comprehend the cosmos, and I highly doubt they ever will. Humans saying that humans are discovering the secrets to the universe makes me laugh, because we could possibly be all completely wrong and nobody would be the wiser. I really wish I had the time to argue for days on this, I really, really do, but jsut today I've neglected doing about seven pages of Calculus homework and all the other homework from my other classes, so I propose we just agree to disagree. You believe in science, I believe in God.
p.s. I agree, Beethoven is crazy awesome |
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exton
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 3:17 am Post subject: Re: Inconvenient Truth, Inconvenient in Seattle school |
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| Mike wrote: |
If you're talking about environmental issues, I don't feel that is the same issue as evolution. I didn't say that we shouldn't teach about environmentalism and eco-friendly behavior in school, |
Understanding evolution is an important part of understanding the ecology.
| Quote: | | We should teach kids what we know to be true, not force theoretical science on them, |
Ah, yes, the "theory" of evolution.
Perhaps we should stop teaching the "theory" of universal gravitation, or the "theory" of electromagnetism, too?
Do you even know what "theory" means, in science?
| Quote: |
especially theoretical science that conflicts with nearly every religion in existance. |
The survival and well-being of society takes precedence over religion. Some people don't like it? That's fine. They can go live like the amish. The rest of us have stuff to do.
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Seriously, pushing your theoretical science on unwilling recipients is just as bad as forced religion. Science is a religion in itself, after all. |
Either you don't know what "science" is, or you don't know what "religion" is. Or perhaps both. |
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CryxicKiller
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 3:43 am Post subject: |
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Mike, sorry that part about you going through biology without evolution is complete nonsense. I mean, you may have taken the course and disregarded evolution, but that's just you ignoring a topic; it doesn't say anything about how fundamental evolution is to biology. Just talk to professional biologists and they'll tell you the same thing I'm telling you now: biology makes no to little sense without evolution. Sure it may be possible to pass the class, but you're missing the point if that's how you're thinking about the problem. The point is that conceptually and ontologically the study of biology is kind of irrelevant outside the context of evolution and evolutionary theory.
The bit about the Pope was just supposed to emphasize that many people out there believe in both creationism and evolution. Like I said, I wasn't trying to prove an ontological point, only a sociological one. Just because the Pope says evolution is compatible with Christian teachings doesn't mean that it is or that evolution is true, taking that line would be a logical fallacy of appeal to authority, but it does mean that many people out there believe the aforementioned principles. Speaking of the logical fallacy of appeal to authority: you can't use the Bible to make a contrarian argument on this specific point. You can only use the Bible in an argument when appropriate, and this is not one of those cases.
Humans have made amazing strides in understanding and even interacting with our Universe. Voyager 1 is outside of our solar system, something like 15 billion km away from us! We've sent humans on the moon and have observed supernova that were millions of light years away. Science did all of this, not religion. I trust science because it delivers results. Why do you trust religion? Because of a stupid book? Frankly, that's what the Bible is: a moronic and pathetic ass book appropriate for the ethical values of the 1st century. I'm afraid you won't get away with the "You believe this, I believe that" line. I care more about why you believe what you do rather than what you actually believe. If you have no satisfactory reasons for holding a belief, you might as well hold a million varying positions and not be bothered one iota. |
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Mike
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:21 am Post subject: |
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| Quote: | | I'm afraid you won't get away with the "You believe this, I believe that" line. I care more about why you believe what you do rather than what you actually believe. If you have no satisfactory reasons for holding a belief, you might as well hold a million varying positions and not be bothered one iota. |
I've said before, I'm Christian because I have faith that there is a God and that he is an integral part of my life. Faith is not something easily comprehended by someone who has never had any. |
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CryxicKiller
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:42 am Post subject: |
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| If faith is all you have, then we are not impressed. Why not be a Muslim and still have faith in your god? Or a Jew? If it's a matter faith, then simply have more faith in something else and it must be true! There are probably some underlying and rational reasons that you do use to believe in god; it can't just be faith. It can never just be faith alone. Faith alone is useless. Why should I care that you have faith in god versus someone who, say, has faith in unicorns? The two are equally ridiculous ontological propositions. |
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Mike
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 4:56 am Post subject: |
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| CryxicKiller wrote: | | If faith is all you have, then we are not impressed. Why not be a Muslim and still have faith in your god? Or a Jew? If it's a matter faith, then simply have more faith in something else and it must be true! There are probably some underlying and rational reasons that you do use to believe in god; it can't just be faith. It can never just be faith alone. Faith alone is useless. Why should I care that you have faith in god versus someone who, say, has faith in unicorns? The two are equally ridiculous ontological propositions. |
As I said, faith is incomprehensible to someone who has none. I know inherently that God exists, just like I know that I am typing right now and that I am sitting down right now and arguing when I should be doing calculus. |
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Lester
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 5:19 am Post subject: |
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| You at least have sensory data for your 'knowledge' of sitting down and arguing, what do you have for God? |
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Mike
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 5:42 am Post subject: |
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| Lester wrote: | | You at least have sensory data for your 'knowledge' of sitting down and arguing, what do you have for God? |
He has shown himself to me (not "physically" like that, but if you want the details, I wrote them in another post). To see God you must first open your mind and realize that there is a higher power and that humanity is not capable of comprehending the universe. We are but mice in a cage and there is a whole other unseen vast universe beyond that. |
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exton
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| Posted: Wed Jan 17, 2007 5:48 am Post subject: |
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| Lester wrote: | | You at least have sensory data for your 'knowledge' of sitting down and arguing, what do you have for God? |
True believers experience god as though he were real and active in their lives. While that's not actually true, their beliefs make it true. They view the world through a lense of belief. |
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