Absolutely un-***** believable!

Lowaicue said:
This is staggering.. and people have the bloody cheek to talk about Islamists wanting to take the world back to the 7 Century.

Four US states considering laws that challenge teaching of evolution

Critics charge 'academic freedom' legislation in Colorado, Missouri, Montana and Oklahoma is just creationism in disguise

Paul Harris in New York

guardian.co.uk, Thursday 31 January 2013 16.31 GMT

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Four US states are considering new legislation about teaching science in schools, allowing pupils to to be taught religious versions of how life on earth developed in what critics say would establish a backdoor way of questioning the theory of evolution.

Fresh legislation has been put forward in Colorado, Missouri and Montana. In Oklahoma, there are two bills before the state legislature that include potentially creationist language.

A watchdog group, the National Center for Science Education, said that the proposed laws were framed around the concept of "academic freedom". It argues that religious motives are disguised by the language of encouraging more open debate in school classrooms. However, the areas of the curriculum highlighted in the bills tend to focus on the teaching of evolution or other areas of science that clash with traditionally religious interpretations of the world.

"Taken at face value, they sound innocuous and lovely: critical thinking, debate and analysis. It seems so innocent, so pure. But they chose to question only areas that religious conservatives are uncomfortable with. There is a religious agenda here," said Josh Rosenau, an NCSE program and policy director.

In Oklahoma, one bill has been pre-filed with the state senate and another with the state house. The Senate bill would oblige the state to help teachers "find more effective ways to represent the science curriculum where it addresses scientific controversies". The House bill specifically mentions "biological evolution, the chemical origins of life, global warming and human cloning" as areas that "some teachers are unsure" about teaching.

In Montana, a bill put forward by local social conservative state congressman, Clayton Fiscus, also lists things like "random mutation, natural selection, DNA and fossil discoveries" as controversial topics that need more critical teaching. Meanwhile, in Missouri, a bill introduced in mid-January lists "biological and chemical evolution" as topics that teachers should debate over including looking at the "scientific weaknesses" of the long-established theories.

Finally, in Colorado, which rarely sees a push towards teaching creationism, a bill has been introduced in the state house of representatives that would require teachers to "respectfully explore scientific questions and learn about scientific evidence related to biological and chemical evolution". Observers say the move is the first piece of creationist-linked legislation to be put forward in the state since 1972.

The moves in such a wide range of states have angered advocates of secularism in American official life. "This is just another attempt to bring creationism in through the back door. The only academic freedom they really want to encourage is the freedom to be ignorant," said Rob Boston, senior policy analyst at Americans United for Separation of Church and State.

Over the past few years, only Tennessee and Louisiana have managed to pass so-called "academic freedom" laws of the kind currently being considered in the four states. Barbara Forrest, a philosophy professor at Southeastern Louisiana University and close observer of the creationism movement, said that the successes in those two states meant that the religious lobby was always looking for more opportunities.

She said that using arguments over academic freedom was a shift in tactic after attempts to specifically get "intelligent design" taught in schools was defeated in a landmark court case in 2005. Intelligent design, which a local school board in Dover, Pennsylvania, had sought to get accepted as legitimate science, asserts that modern life is too complex to have evolved by chance alone. "Creationists never give up. They never do. The language of these bills may be highly sanitized but it is creationist code," she said.

The laws can have a direct impact on a state. In Louisiana, 78 Nobel laureate scientists have endorsed the repeal of the creationist education law there. The Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology has even launched a boycott of Louisiana and cancelled a scheduled convention in New Orleans. Louisiana native and prominent anti-creationist campaigner in the state Zack Kopplin said that those pushing such bills in other states were risking similar economic damage to their local economies. "It will hurt economic development," Kopplin said.

There is also the impact on students, he added, when they are taught controversies in subjects where the overwhelming majority of scientists have long ago reached consensus agreement. "It really hurts students. It can be embarrassing to be from a state which has become a laughing stock in this area," Kopplin said.

Others experts agreed, arguing that it could even hurt future job prospects for students graduating from those states' public high schools. "The jobs of the future are high tech and science-orientated. These lawmakers are making it harder for some of these kids to get those jobs," said Boston.
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It's a great idea, dude. Why are you so upset? Let's get all ideas out on the table. Or are you too narrow minded for that kind of thing?
 
Grecian said:
It's a great idea, dude. Why are you so upset? Let's get all ideas out on the table. Or are you too narrow minded for that kind of thing?
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In a science class we should limit the ideas to those with some scientific basis. As someone has said, teaching a Comparative Religion class is fine.
 
WinterBorn said:
You have changed topics and plain made up shit.

Its funny that you quote me and then post nonsense that does not have anything to do with what you quoted.

Plus, you then tell me what I push as fact. Care to provide any evidence of this accusation? Or will it be like the rest and just be further proof that you willingly lie and make accusations without any thought as to their accuracy?
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How did I change the subject?
I have yet to see convincing evidence of many scientific theories.
There is a scientific theory that claims to prove the biblical story of genesis!
I am sceptical about that as well as the belief that climate change is caused by human activity.
 
WinterBorn said:
I didn't see anything saying it was caused by man. Which is the actual controversial part. That the climate is changing is documented.
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Not positive but this is what tweaked me on it...

Climate change is taught directly in 30 states, and indirectly in 12 states, according to a study by the Technical Education Research Center for Earth and Space Science Education and NOAA. However, climate is absent from the science curriculum in eight states, including Florida, Maine, and Wisconsin (see PDF). What’s more, climate change education is under attack by those challenging the preponderant science, and some are trying to insert what most climate scientists view as anti-science views into the country’s classrooms.


Efforts along those lines abound and in some cases have succeeded. In at least three states — Texas, South Dakota, and Louisiana — laws exist to make sure climate change lessons are balanced equally with a denier’s point of view, if they are taught at all.


“The evidence that climate change is happening is clear. This is an issue that is not 50-50,” said Teresa Eastburn in a telephone interview. Eastburn is the education coordinator at the Boulder, Colorado-based University Corporation for Atmospheric Research, which has held in-depth climate change workshops, webinars, and multi-week seminars for about 700 K-12 educators in the past five years.


“Science isn’t about sides or rhetoric, it is about evidence. There is a misconception that the science of climate change is up for debate. Now, politics has entered how science is taught, but [politics] certainly doesn’t belong in the science class,” she said. “I could see that it could be a part of a social studies course, about what to do about climate change. Social studies is where teachers grapple with politics, economics, and some of society’s issues.”
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Now I know the bold is a favorite line of those who believe in AGW. Pretending that people oppose the concept of climate change in general rather than opposing the 'man caused' portion of AGW. When you hear the word 'denier'... that says to me they are teaching it is man caused. Because that is where the argument lies.
 
007 said:
No one has argued that the pollutants are there, just that no solid evidence exists to tie them to climate change.
The scientific method is clearly flawed.
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Well unfortunately for you there's a large number of credentialed climate scientist who've garnered large volumes of facts supporting human activity impacting climate. To say they are doing so with out solid evidence supporting their position if laughable. That's not to say there isn't legitimate dissent but your argument is a joke.
 
Superfreak said:
CONSENSUS!!!!
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There is a consensus of scientist that human activity is impacting climate. How is that a scientific theory? Which is my point. Look I'm not going to be dragged into a climate change debate. The point I'm making is that the idea that someone who doesn't even have a comprehension of what a scientific theory is, like 007, Dixie and PiMP, can be permitted to undermine sound science education in our public schools is just plain stupid.
 
Grecian said:
It's a great idea, dude. Why are you so upset? Let's get all ideas out on the table. Or are you too narrow minded for that kind of thing?
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Why? Why waste time giving impressionable kids that these fringe concepts, like Intelligent Design Creationism have scientific credibility? Oh sure I could develop a lesson plan that simply shows that ID creationism isn't science, doesn't even remotely come close to being science. I can also waste time refuting the legion of creationist claims regarding evolutionary theory that have no scientific validty what so ever but what purpose would that serve other than to confuse young students at to what science is and what it is not and to generally just waste time? There are more important things to do in a high school science class room. Like teach important foundational concepts, like biological evolution, and how to observe and apply those concepts in nature.
 
007 said:
I am aware of the topic, it's an interesting THEORY.
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Ahh again you demonstrate that you don't know what a scientific theory is and thus discredit your self. Anyone with even a remedial science education would laugh at the scientific illiteracy of comments like that. LOL
 
Mott the Hoople said:
Well unfortunately for you there's a large number of credentialed climate scientist who've garnered large volumes of facts supporting human activity impacting climate. To say they are doing so with out solid evidence supporting their position if laughable. That's not to say there isn't legitimate dissent but your argument is a joke.
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No hard proof though?
 
Mott the Hoople said:
There is a consensus of scientist that human activity is impacting climate. How is that a scientific theory? Which is my point. Look I'm not going to be dragged into a climate change debate. The point I'm making is that the idea that someone who doesn't even have a comprehension of what a scientific theory is, like 007, Dixie and PiMP, can be permitted to undermine sound science education in our public schools is just plain stupid.
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CONSENSUS!!! Thou shalt not say any other word!
 
Superfreak said:
CONSENSUS!!! Thou shalt not say any other word!
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I see, so you would, based on your dissent on the consensus built around an emperical observation on anthropogenic climate change, permit scientifically illiterate loonies like 007 and Dixie to undermine science education? Particularly in important and foundational concepts in biology, geology, cosmology and physics?
 
WinterBorn said:
In a science class we should limit the ideas to those with some scientific basis. As someone has said, teaching a Comparative Religion class is fine.
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But evolution isn't quite an exact science, is it? I think the instructors should consider all ideas until they know something for certain.

Besides, it's more than that for Lowaicue. I believe the man truly hates all things religious ... especially all things Christian. It's like he's on some kind of crusade against Jesus Christ.
 
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