Category: Science

If Science Worked Like Religion

Brilliant. Watch.

The Truth of Science is Not Determined by Public Opinion

In a sleepless bout of late night web surfing, I ran across this:

Let’s get the easy criticisms out of the way first. Yes, she does believe evolution is a myth. No, she did not answer the question (but that’s normal for politicians). A national education standard is not a violation of the constitution. And letting local school systems decide what should be taught is a terrible idea.

For those schooled in logic, yes I am about to invoke the slippery slope argument. I don’t think it’s out of place though, because the slippery slope is their agenda. While it may be bad logic to say “because A happens then B will happen”, It’s not necessarily bad logic to say “They want A to happen because it enables B to happen.”  The slippery slope does sometimes happen.

Only a creationist would argue this. It’s the same rehashed party line nonsense that’s been coming from the right (google “State’s Rights”), but this is a frightening turn for it. The problem is that some parts of the country are more fundamentalist than others, and this policy, if it came to pass, would enable those parts of the country to begin teaching religion (read “creationism”) in schools. Creationism is religion. There is no scientific basis for stating that a higher power created the earth and mankind. That science cannot explain everything is a poor excuse to interject religion into federally funded schools. People, Kansas would jump on this in a heartbeat, and I have to live here.

Allowing local schools to determine their own standards could lead to all kinds of nonsense. Would this policy still make sense if a local school system in rural Kansas decided Algebra was too hard, and it was no longer necessary? That’s what she’s arguing for, the right to do that. A national standard for education is not a bad thing.

Once again, there are not two sides to this argument. There is science, and what people believe with no evidence (e.g. not science). In science class, you teach science, not not science. If we can prove there was a big bang, but we cannot say what caused it, then the schools teach that there was a big bang, and that we cannot definitively say what caused it. You don’t say “God” because we don’t know!

The answer is simple here. Teach science in science class, teach religion in Sunday school. If we don’t know what caused life to begin, teach what we do know in science class. Teach them that “God did it” on Sunday morning.

Top Ten Creationist Arguments

What you won’t see at “The Ark Experience”

Turns out you have to gloss over a few inconvenient facts if you want to believe 3000 year old religious texts and ignore science.

Help! Help! I’m being Repressed!

There’s been some noise around the interwebs recently about how oppressed white men are.  Who knew? I’m under the thumb of The Man (or rather The Woman I suppose) and nobody told me. It’s all out there in The Manosphere.

I’ve actually kept kindof quiet about the recent Richard Dawkins flap, but it seems to me a lot of people blew a few passing comments out of proportion. I actually literally laughed out loud when Mr. Deity mentioned how they threw Richard Dawkins under the bus.

I think I’ll just sum the whole thing up here: Guys, don’t be dicks.

I find it personally disappointing when we devolve into this kind of blame game so and so is bad and so and so is wrong. Makes us look like politicians. Issues that are important to me include the quality of American education (including keeping religion out of schools and teaching real science), fair pay, jobs, and care for the underprivileged at home (which is vehemently opposed by the religious right, otherwise known as Republicans), and human rights violations around the world and at home (most of which occur in the name of God).

It occurred to me at some point that most of the issues I care about are caused by or exploited by religion in some fashion, and I threw my lot in with the Atheists. Rebecca Watson was right to speak out on her issue. It matters to her and she raised awareness of it. Her audience is quite a bit larger than mine, so she’s succeeded admirably. Meanwhile I’ve lost nearly everything in a fight to protect my children from fundamentalism. It has truly cost me dearly. That’s why I don’t disagree with Dawkins either: certain issues are just a little bit more important to my life at the moment. When I’ve finished deprogramming my children and teaching them to appreciate the world as it is and not how some ancient goat herders wants it to be, I’ll make sure I cover jerks propositioning women in elevators too. I can’t wait until the day when that’s what I have to be worried about.

Should math be taught in schools?

Recently all Miss USA candidates were asked if evolution should be taught in schools. 

The answers were varied, and most overwhelmingly indicated that they did not personally believe evolution. That’s an appalling statement on American education and the iron grip the religious right holds over our country.  While there were a couple of definite “yes” answers, many “yes” answers were of the variety “well we should teach both sides”. It’s such an appalling state that so many believe there’s “two sides”.  If we teach whatever anybody believes, we must also include creation stories from Hinduism, Daosim, Pastafarianism, Raelianism, and so on.  It’s not just evolution and the Abrahamic faiths.  Evolution differs from all of the creation stories in one important respect: It has evidence.  It’s science. It’s not faith based. We should not teach religion in schools, but we should teach science. Creationism in all it’s varied forms (including Intelligent Design) is RELIGION. Period.

Consider this from another angle: what if the question was “Should we teach Math in schools?”