Strange Famous

your view is completely illogical

A simple example is this:

I might be wearing a red shirt or a white shirt right now. It is untestable for you, it is unknowable for you.

It does not mean that for someone to say I am wearing a white shirt is "wrong"

To believe something which is not proven by the current level of understanding or evidence which you have is "wrong" is without logic.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Baraka_Guru

Scientists delight in being proven wrong. It's because it is then they've learned something.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Willravel

That's misrepresenting creationism, SF. Please reread my example. If, by definition, something is contradictory, even if only in theory, then it is wrong. Something contradictory cannot be demonstrated to be. If there were no red shirts in the world and you said you were wearing a red shirt, you would be wrong.

I'll give you an example of creationism's inherent contradictions.
1) Creationism is science.
2) The scientific method did not lead to creationism and has not been used to verify creationism.

This is an inherent contradiction. Here's another:
1) In creationism, the universe was designed for people to live in.
2) The vast, vast, vast majority of the universe would kill humans almost instantly, which no creationist denies.

Ouch. And another:
1) In creationism, infinity is impossible.
2) In creationism, the universe was created by an infinite god.

There are literally thousands of contradictions in creationism. There are logical incompatibilities between the claims of creationism. There are no such incompatibilities with, say, the scientific theory of evolution.
That's a strawman.

filtherton

I wouldn't say scientists delight in being proven wrong. Scientists are people, and many of them can be decidedly less than pleased if their pet theories are challenged by other theories. I don't know that the scientists who develop pharmaceuticals are delighted when clinical trials show their treatments to be ineffective.

The scientific community can be just as protective of the status quo as the most devout religious person. Pythagoras allegedly had someone drowned for proving that the square root of 2 was irrational (I realize that he was a mathematician, but whatever). Einstein was notoriously apprehensive about the notion that the universe might not be deterministic He didn't have anyone killed, but he wasn't exactly enthused.

The nice thing about good scientists is that they tend to be slaves to experimental evidence, so things tend to work out well for scientific progress.

Strange Famous

Creationalism is not a science, it is a belief or faith

Science is a religion, and a rather depressing one in my opinion.

The scientist is rather like a frog hopping up a staircase, and at every step being convinced that it has reached the top. This is a rather well known metaphor I believe - but the scientist is incapable of learning from experience, and will always believe that his current view is the complete one.

The fact that evolution can occur, that is that species can adapt through the "survival of the fittest" and the passing on of characteristics through generations that are compatible with the environment is a hypothesis which is supported by the crrently available evidence when viewed through the cultural and intellectual bias of current society. That is all.

It is not a universal theory of everything, it does not answer the important questions, and no one today can say that future discoveries will not disprove it.

If you dont like to talk of God, one theory is that "evolution" is encouraged and influanced by extra-terrestial beings who are physical but more advanced than humanity. There are folk stories and theories which support this.

Today, the available evidence does not suggest this is the strongest theory

But I am humble enough to admit that I dont KNOW and that nobody KNOWS all of the facts and evidence, and that something in the future may emerge that makes this theory the strongest one, on the evidence available then.

The dogmatic scientist cant accept that.

There are two things which we can say certainly

There ARE universal and unchanging truths
Human beings cannot KNOW these things, only make judgments based on their limited knowledge and intellect.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

filtherton

Strange, I don't know where you get your well-known metaphors, but they fail to describe any scientist I've ever met.

Baraka_Guru

Fair enough. I admit I was being bombastic. What I mean to say is that finding out they're wrong about something is a part of the scientist's job (as far as lab research, etc., is concerned). The Creationist cannot be proven wrong, because everything the believe is True and Right.

There is no "process of elimination" for the Creationist. They were handed down something that is unchanging regardless of evidence or discovery of fact.

What about the changing kind?

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Willravel

That's the problem, though, creationism is being sold as science even though it's not.
I believe you just contradicted your statement above. You suggest that science and belief/faith are different, so different that creationism absolutely is not one and absolutely is another, and yet here you suggest they are one and the same.

Please make up your mind.

Also, you should meet some scientists before declaring universal truths about them. I suggest starting by googling "Neil deGrasse Tyson" into the Youtube and watching a few hours of him speaking. He's a good example of a scientist.

filtherton

I agree with you. It's as if creationists have turned around the relationship between evidence and conclusion, so that the conclusion defines interpretation of any possibly relevant evidence. God exists and actively tests his faithful, and the existence of fossils proves this. It's confirmation bias at its most insidious. They've put the cart before the horse and have convinced themselves that the cart can pull the horse.

Raghnar -ITA-

And that is called Scientific Method. :\

I want to know where you find this illuminating metaphors about scientists, they describe exactly the opposite of the avarage scientist.

__________________
English N00b - Please help if you have time and correct my errors

Strange Famous

There is no evidence that relates to the act of creation - thats the point.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Baraka_Guru

I'm still hanging off of this idea. I don't get it.

"Science" is a religion. "A system of exploration and knowledge" is a religion.

This essentially means we are all parishioners of this religion. Many of us are born at, live beside, and die on the altar of this religion.

We have lifespans longer than 30 years because of it.
We are able to communicate with loved ones over thousands of miles at the push of a button because of it.
We are born with fewer and fewer defects, and have increased chances of living to reproductive ages because of it.
Most of us don't die from simple infections anymore because of it.
We can control and eliminate pain because of it.

I could go on.

What's so depressing about that?

Creationism cannot be taught beside evolution because it isn't the same field. Evolution is a continuing study that requires scientists to produce research and results that are peer reviewed and rejected or accepted as an outcome of that. Just like any other scientific endeavour. This is why we don't teach time travel, teleporatation, resurrection, and biological immortality in scientific curricula (yet?).

Creationism isn't subject to scientific scrutiny because it is accepted as unchangeable fact, even when the facts don't exist.

That's the problem here. We tend to prefer to teach facts when it comes to the sciences.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Strange Famous

The depressing thing about science is its arrogance, the way it dismisses anything that does not fit into its narrow frame of reference, the way its followers feel able to call anyone who believes in God as a morn.

And again you state that the facts dont exist regarding creation. This is false - yet again the same error.

The fact that something cannot be tested or known by you does not make it false, does not make it not a fact.

You do not know how the universe was created, so you call my view "not factual"

The reality is that it may or may not be a fact and you dont know. The problem with science is you believe you ability to know determines whether something is true or not.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

highthief

Never mind, point has been made.

__________________
Si vis pacem parabellum.

filtherton

As far as I can tell, creationism has absolutely no scientific merit. Why would you expect a scientist to do anything other than dismiss it? It isn't an instance of arrogance when a scientist refuses to accept creationism as scientifically valid, it's an instance of a scientist doing his/her job.

I'm not sure why some creationists get all in a tizzy about scientific legitimacy. I'm not even sure why you're all worked up, Strange. They're two different ways of looking at the world. It can't be a matter of wanting mutual understanding and respect; the very methods most creationists use to belittle science show a not only a profound lack of understanding and respect for science, but also an extreme lack of self reflection. I'm fairly certain that most of the general criticisms of science typically offered up in these discussions also apply to religion. Arrogance? Check. Overstated certainty? Check. Inability to acknowledge the validity of competing world views? Check.

I think what really gets creationists is that science is a much more compelling force in which to put blind faith than creationism is. Placing faith in a 6000 year old Earth doesn't help you invent that 46 inch plasma TV.

Strange Famous

Whether it is "scientifically valid" is not the same as whether it is true!

That is exactly my point, science must accept other standards than those of its own rather weak methodology

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Baraka_Guru

You mean like the words of a talking snake or a burning bush?

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Strange Famous

There are many many examples of individuals claiming to receive communication from non physical beings.

Because science cannot explain it, the views of these millions of eye witness accounts are dismissed as fraud or fantasy

Science does not evaluate things neutrally, it only accepts evidence that fits in with its own paradigm.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

filtherton

No. It is science's rigid set of standards which make is so useful.

Willravel

Fortunately, there's been plenty of research into this (more than you know), and it's been VERIFIED that people seeing and hearing things that aren't there is a symptom of schizophrenia
Science absolutely, positively, truly can explain it. It's not a dismissal, as if without rigorous testing, it's demonstrated as "fraud or fantasy" after careful study and experimentation. No such testing is employed by pastors and priests, therefore their explanations are unsupported by such testing.

Baraka_Guru

They're primarily dismissed on a lack of evidence or the ability to study and reproduce the events. If science cannot even have a chance to even observe it, let alone explain it, there is no reason for it to invest time and money into it. Trust me, if there were a way to study paranormal activity in such a way that can be recorded and measured, it would be a scientific endeavour.

If the paradigm of science is that evidence can be studied, reproduced, tested, confirmed, observed, and otherwise depended upon to either negate or confirm a hypothesis (or potential fact), then that's not such a bad thing.

And you aren't implying that Creationists present their "data" with any neutrality, are you? Are they working from a peer-reviewed process? Are they open to scrutiny? Doubt? Verification?

Sorry, who's lacking in neutrality?

Strange, what's your opinion on empiricism?

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Strange Famous

Of course, anyone who see's a ghost is a schizophrenic according to Will

This shows the scientific spirit quite nicely, doesnt it?

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Willravel

That's not how it works and you know it. Stop being glib. Schizophrenia can be diagnosed after careful study and verification. And then, and here's the kicker, it can often be treated. If Jesus or Abraham Lincoln were talking to you when you were on a bus and the appropriate treatment helped to reduce those instances, would you still think you were talking to Jesus or Abraham Lincoln?

ametc

The Christian church is a power hungry monster. They believe in religious freedom.. for themselves. If a commercial doesn't mention Christmas, the church is gonna riot. If commercial mentions other holidays along with Christmas, the church is gonna riot. If somebody isn't Christian and doesn't want to be Christian, they're going to Hell. It doesn't matter how good the person is-- they're going to Hell for not being Christian. A cult pops up in another religion, the church assumes the rest of the religion is just like the cult. No questions asked. The Christian church has had cults pop up.. but oh no.. they're not connected with the church in any way at all. That would be STUPID to think so.

Traditional Chrisitianity embraces its members' ignorance. More modern Christian churches are a lot more open and don't dillydally in mundane topics and ideas. Modern churches teach, "God created the Earth and put us on here." "What about evolution?" "What about it? It says nothing here in the Bible about evolution.. so I dunno. Believe what you want about that. lol"

Stare At The Sun

Without evidence, there is no reason to believe in the existence of claims.

Regardless of what the claim is, be it the existence of a supernatural being or creator, the claim that my shoe size is 14, or that I have brown hair, it would be foolish to accept those claims without evidence.

I hate to say this, but unless you are a trained scientist, or have taken a number of high level college courses on research methodology, your assertions of scientific validity carry no weight.

I suggest you watch this informative video on youtube, explaining what scientific research is.


Science does evaluate things with as much of a neutral and unbiased mindset as possible, and it is done through the accept form of peer reviewed scientific journals. If you took the time to examine the way in which research is systematically done, then submitted, reviewed, and discussed, you would understand why your claims are so...well, off base.

Science, and the research methods therein are the only way to advance society.

If you have ideas that you wish to be known to the scientific community, please write a research paper, and submit it to a peer reviewed journal.

Mantus

I'm trying very hard not to get pulled into the drama in this thread.

So what's the main issue at hand? What is the core motivator here? I'm trying to understand both sides. Being an atheist and having studies several scientific fields casually I can related to the scientist's viewpoint on this.

Placing Creationism besides Evolution in the classroom is not only disgustingly naive but a clear attempt by the Church to gain further influence in a public institution. It's also harmful to the North American culture and economy because it's a direct attack on education, progress and intellectualism.

Organized religion has always had anti-scientific tendencies - sheep are easier to herd after all - but I would have imagined that with all the information available to people now days they would be able to make wiser and more informed decisions.

So my next pursuit is to figure out what motivates people to stay in the dark. I've come across many examples of this anti-scientific movement in the guise of Alternative Medicine, the Anti-Vaccination Movement, Astrology and Creationism. It seems that people want easy answers so badly that they are willing to fight for their right to be fooled.

Willravel

It's fear, Mantus. It's masked behind things like anger or indignation or piety, but it's always there. The interesting thing is that most religious people don't have that kind of fear. They have uncertainty, but that comes with the faith territory. It's the terrified folks that tend to cause trouble, that fall in with the bad crowd, that take up hating people because of the color of their skin or who they love, and who decide that science is evil and go to work trying to undermine it.

Raghnar -ITA-

Always searching for the "easy way".
Never happened when someone asked "what are the proofs of Big Bang?" and you start talking about black body radiation in order to explain microwave cosmic background someone get bored from the start asking "where the explosion part begin?" or "I don't want to know about radiation, I want to know about big bang!".
They are not the sharpest tool in the shed, but are part of it, and are the ones that "when you're able to make a movie about it, then is interesting".
And is difficoult to make a movie about cosmic background radiation...

__________________
English N00b - Please help if you have time and correct my errors

Strange Famous

Again, a very perverse scientific answer.

We should trust mind numbing drugs which effect the brain in ways we really dont understand other than by the symtoms of those effects, before we trust our own experience.

The "rules" of science say you cannot hear a spiritual voice, ergo you are mad, ergo take some drugs and stop hearing it.

The open minded thinker says we shall treat all evidence as possible. Science closes more doors than it opens. People today are as ignorant as those who thought the world was flat. And the one lesson they will not learn (the scientist again) from history is to be less proud and less sure.

---------- Post added at 06:27 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:20 PM ----------

The rational man (such as myself) will state that theology and physical observation and theory are equally valid ways to understand the world we are in.

The belief in the holy is as important as testable obsevations in explaining and understanding the human condition and experience.

But the closed mind scientist places his fingers in his ears (and I say "his" because all of the errors of science are male errors) and chants that nothing that he cannot test in his own little labority can possibly exist and anyone who believes in it is a moron...

And the great "King" science after all gave us atom bombs, children born with missing limbs do to drugs given to their mothers unknowingly, AIDS, gas chambers, cancer... I would call someone who is anti-scientic a human being.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Willravel

Not knowing the first thing about psychology, you're skipping the science part of the equation altogether. "Speaking to god" can generally be treated with antipsychotic, antidepressant, and antianxiety medication, along with therapy after being carefully reviewed using time-tested techniques and diagnosed using scientific criteria. Psychiatrists don't just write "talks to God, LOL" on a prescription after spending two minutes with a possibly schizophrenic patient, just like a medical doctor wouldn't write a "stigmata, LOL" prescription for someone bleeding from the wrists. Psychology and psychopharmacology are sciences. You don't seem to be grasping that.

The funny thing is that you seem to be assuming that the most powerful supernatural being in existence can't stand up to Clozaril or Thorazine. If someone really was talking to god or xenu or ba'al, why would antipsychotic drugs be able to manage the symptoms? Does omniscience exclude drugs that effect dopamine levels? I must have missed that passage in Leviticus.

Strange Famous

I dont think the claim is that God can be numbed with drugs, it is that drugs can half kill a human being so that they can no longer perceive anything, or live emotionally.

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Willravel

What are the side effects of the drugs I listed and how common are those side effects? Please, be precise.

Baraka_Guru

I'm sorry, what?

Who were the ones who accidentally invented AIDS and cancer?

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

Stare At The Sun

That is absurd.

Again, in everything you state, you fail to present any evidence for your claims.

Believe what you wish, just don't try to push your unfounded beliefs on others, nor expect anyone else that actually understands science and what real research entails to give you a grain of respect. Your anti-intellectual are both shocking and misinformed.

Really? How exactly did we do that?

You speak as if religion is some totally peaceful force, yet there have been countless atrocities committed in the name of religion.

I suggest you look around you basically every single piece of technology you take for granted was created through science, and by researchers.

If you don't like the benefits of science, go live in a cave. If I didn't know better, I would swear you're just trolling.

Halx

I think I finally understand the meaning of the statement: There is no such thing as bad science, it is what you do with it that can be judged.

__________________
You have found this post informative.
-The Administrator
[Don't Feed The Animals]

Strange Famous

I dont claim that religion is only a force of peace - many wars have been fought under religious banners, and religion is one of the causes of dis-unity amongst societies. But religion IS the strongest force in most individual human beings, and human society and all known history.

It is important to separate what the church does and what God is to those who believe in Him. Most atheists find this hard of course - and their problems with religion always seem to come down to examples of abuse of power and hypocrisy amongst one church or other.

Religion is more important than science, a soulless world is more dangerous than one lacking in technology (hence - the Savage was better off where came from then in the Brave New World)

Creationalism and all major religious beliefs should be taught in schools - not as fact, but as a version of fact and a fact of human experience. What makes us human and our core beliefs that spread unconnected across every known society in all human history - this is a rather more important thing than a small theory about how animals may develop new characteristics.

I have no objection at all to schools teaching the theory of evolution. As a theory of how animals may change over generations to meet the needs of their environment, there is evidence which supports it and evidence that questions it. I dont object to the teaching of the so called "law of supply and demand" alongside other theories such as the labour theory of value either. An education should be broad and cover many idea's withOUT proscribing one as true.

As a theory outside of what it is, as a theory of what is humankind... again, I have no objection to it being taught, along with other theories.

Of course, if the teacher must stand in front of the class and describe how the human soul is the result of a million accidents applied to a single cell piece of crawling river slime... well, I think any clear thinking person would find it hard to keep a straight face.

_

At this point we expect the scientists to declare again that evolution must be factually true because God cannot be tested in the labrority (and nothing which the scientist cannot understand can exist). I give the school children of this nation credit for more sense than that though.




---------- Post added at 08:08 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:02 PM ----------

I think it is widely held that AIDS is a man made virus.

The glorious badges of honour of scientific progress - ie, revolting pollution of the food chain, the water supplies, the air itself by chemicals; the increased mass production of cancer causing drugs and electrical energy - this things cause a huge increase in incidents of cancer.

_

Science is male insofar as it seeks to master the world rather than live within it; that it arrogantly declares itself master of all without regard to the many things it does not understand; that it is a weapon, a means of exploitation, a means of the immerseration of the people. These errors are described as male, and we rightly call the scientist "he"

__________________
"Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate,
for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing
hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain
without being uncovered."

The Gospel of Thomas

Raghnar -ITA-

Strange:
1- Crationism (as other things you cited) is not a Theory, is a Belief. It MUST NOT be Taught as a Theory in the hours of Science, but as a Belief in hours of Religion. Yourself told that Creationism is not science, then why the hell it should be teached as a theory? Otherwise I agree with you, Creationism should be teached, as long with other religious beliefs. I don't know if you have it, here in Italy there's an Hour per Week teaching Religion. The problem is that is very Chatolic Biased, without a specific program, so depends very much on who is the teacher what you're going to study in detail and what pass, but usually creationism is teached widely (most of all the official position of the Chatolic Church)
2- AIDS created by science is not "widely held" is an insolent conspirative ranting.

__________________
English N00b - Please help if you have time and correct my errors

MSD

Be careful of what you're saying. The wonderful thing about science is that by providing verifiable and repeatable results, it is available to anyone, not just the elite. Elitism by scientists will only make science less accessible to the public and promote scientific illiteracy. Carl Sagan was the epitome of what a scientist should be: he was a fearless champion of science, yet he was able to convey it in terms that a layman could easily understand and was patient and willing to calmly and rationally debate or discuss any scientific issue with anyone, even those who made infuriatingly illogical arguments or who tried to trap him with pseudo-scientific arguments.

Those who are more educated in certain areas are more qualified to interpret certain data, but while I don't have an intimate knowledge of epidemiology, medicine, or biology, I can fully understand the meaning of a statement like "In a controlled study of 1000 patients, 7% responded favorably to placebo and 90% responded favorably to the drug." I don't have to know how it works to know that it does because the scientific method produces honest, unbiased results.

With that same lack of knowledge of those fields, I can take a culture of bacteria, observe them under a microscope and verify what strain they are by referencing the same materials biologists at the top of their field use, put a drop of antibiotic in the petri dish, and observe as the bacteria die and fail to reproduce.
It is accepted that HIV-1 is a mutation of Simian Immunodeficiency Virus that became pathogenic and transmissible in humans. HIV-2 is similar and has been traced back to a species of Old World monkey in West Africa. A sequence of lentivirus (the same genus of virus as HIV) DNA has been found to be embedded in the genetic code of a species of Lemur that is immune to similar lentiviruses and has been in the species' genetic code for roughly 14 million years, indicating that similar viruses have existed for at least that long.

The claim that it is a man-made virus has come up repeatedly and in each case their has been either no evidence to support the claim, and in many cases there is evidence that specifically contradicts those claims.

Baraka_Guru

Widely held by whom?

Putting cheap rhetoric aside, I don't deny that these things may have an impact on cancer rates. But is this worthy of damning science altogether, or is it worthy of damning human society? What is to blame? Science or our use of it? Perhaps we should do some soul searching to find out a better way to live that doesn't involve dispensing of surgical procedures, antibiotics, electricity, and important advances of personal hygiene.

Wow. How old is this thinking? 50 years? 100 years? Older?

If you want to call it male, then it would be best to view it at a "protector" of humanity. Science protects humanity from a harsh universe by seeking to understand it and to thwart the things that would destroy us. Science is the protector of our world, for the only way to prevent the ignorant from destroying it is by developing new practices and technologies. In order to do this, it requires advance scientific endeavours. That is the way I'd view science as male if there is such as way of calling it. However, it is also female in that it is a "nurturer." It determines what is wrong in humans and the world and seeks to make it better. It seeks better ways of living and doing things, as it wants the best out of everyone and everything.

Creationism is of no help in this matter. Actually, it would be harmful. This is one reason it shouldn't be taught alongside scientific topics. It's theology, so keep it there or along with philosophy. Creationism should only be taught at the post-secondary level or in private religious schools.

So, yeah, I think science is both male and female, like most things. [That is, if one still likes to think along these lines.]

The dark side of science is not to be overlooked. But this does not make science inherently evil (or male, if you think these are synonymous). My parents would both be dead if it weren't for science. Actually, I likely would be too, and so might you.

__________________
Knowing that death is certain and that the time of death is uncertain, what's the most important thing?
—Bhikkhuni Pema Chödrön

Humankind cannot bear very much reality.
—From "Burnt Norton," Four Quartets (1936), T. S. Eliot

roachboy

it seems that several things are getting mixed up here.

first off there is a genre problem: is the development/evolution of life a properly scientific or religious question? who decides that?

personally, i don't find religious explanations to be compelling, and many in this thread obviously don't either--but that's not really the issue.
who decides in a public school, say, where to put questions regarding evolution? if it's a scientific question, then at least some of the standards of scientific explanation can be said to obtain. by that i mean when the question is classified as scientific, certain standards obtain for what counts as evidence, what kind of narrative is admissible, that kind of fit there needs to be between evidence & explanation.

what this classification would resolve then is the matter of which type of explanation counts and which do not.

in a public school context, where would such a decision be made?
probably at the level of setting the ciriculum, yes?

if creationists wanted to be consistent, they would not be trying to get their beliefs taught in science classes as if they were a viable alternative explanation for data understood in more or less science-based terms: they'd be trying to get the space in which the question of the origin of life moved to something like a religion course.
and that would amount to a decision about what kind of question it is.
and deciding that would also decide what kind of explanation is and is not legitimate.

that seems to me to be the underlying issue here: what kind of question is being asked when one asks about the origin of life.

second, there is a problem with the assumption that science is a single entity, that it occupies a position of producing entirely "objective" or non-problematic information. like anything else, in principle scientific results should be approached critically, engaged, interpreted. the problem is obviously the nature of technical language involved & the ways in which access to that language is distributed socially.
the one place i agree with strange famous is in the claim that would lead in this direction, to advocating a critical relationship to scientific information. but i don't see the need to go from there in the direction he goes in. i understand the critiques of scientific rationality that are being kinda mangled in his post--i just dont see any reason to go there.

at the same time, these professions of Faith in this abstraction called Science (btw what does that word refer to? are theoretical physics and, say, botany doing the same thing? do they use the same language games? are they parsing the world in the same way? how so? you could think about the divergent understandings of, say, entropy that happen when you shift from physically-based to bio-system based systems...but that's another matter)---these professions of Faith are kinda quaint.

as are the accompanying claims that Science=Reason and so Religion=the opposite. it's not so simple. if it were, we wouldn't be having this conversation because religions would have long ago imploded. this isn't simply to stand the above on its head either...it's to say that Religion is no more a single thing than is Science.

so the debate has headed into a goofball space.
but carry on.
it's fun anyway i suppose.

__________________
a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite