Darby (MT) schools OK 'objective origins' (anti-evolution)

[Newsjock]

http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2004/02/03/news/top/news01.txt

DARBY - Against the advice of the principals and teachers it employs and the attorney who represents it, the school board here voted 3-2 Monday night to approve an "objective origins" policy that will change the way science is taught.

The policy, proposed by a Darby minister whose children do not yet attend the schools, "encourages" Darby science teachers to teach criticisms of prevailing scientific theory, but the only theory identified by the policy is evolutionary theory.

... Federal courts have repeatedly struck down religious-based efforts to bring Christian "creation science" into the mainstream of American science instruction.

... And despite what the board said about the policy having no religious purpose, it was clear again Monday that many in Darby wish that it did. A handful of speakers talked about how they'd had prayer in schools growing up, and several more talked about Jesus. They also decried Darwinism as a secular religion.
Once again, the religious proponents were countered by the advocates of current science instruction, which included a boisterous group of Darby High students.

more

[POed_Ex_Repub]

1. This is really sad... especially for the children...

Perhaps they are worried that the students will start making connections between GW and small primates..

[The Backlash Cometh]

2. What evidence does creationism present to support its position?

I'm just wondering how they can poke holes in evolution as a science, when they have no real evidence of their own to support their theories.

What we know is this: Dinosaurs did exist and predated mankind by millions of years. What this tells me is that there's a chapter or two missing in the bible.

[MisterC2003]

3. Creationism evidence ...

basically, there is no valid scientific evidence for creationism. It is all a big crock set up by fundies to support their views. There are some well-funded "institutes" which have attempted to put a scientific veneer on creationism, but they've never come up with anything that any actual scientist has found worthy. You can google "intelligent design" and find a few websites addressing the topic if you want.

And as a resident of Georgia, let me say I'm in no position to criticize anyone here ... just gonna roll up my sleeves and do some ignorance-fightin'!

[Terran]

6. No "basically" about it!

Creationism is faith, nothing more, nothing less, and that makes it the opposite of science.

[Hamlette]

8. What "we" know is this:

Talk to a fundie. I mentioned evolution in passing to one years ago and this otherwise very intelligent man said "evolution has so many holes in it, it makes no sense." I said something like: Yeah, there are a couple of unanswered questions but we do have proof that the world is more than 6,000 years old" when he interrupted me and said, in all damn dead seriousness: "ALL of that evidence is a crock. Carbon dating is idiotic. All that stuff about fossils and life millions of years ago has been faked by so called scientists."

It was a shocked room. We quickly changed the subject and moved on. We have to work with this guy and he is great at what he does. But none of us ever saw him the same after that.

[DrWeird]

9. Dinosaurs? Creationism teaches us...

that God created the dinosaurs six thousand years ago along with everything else, and indeed they were on Noah's Ark but were later hunted to extinction by man.

Seriously.

[Chovexani]

18. You want the evidence fundies use?

*smacks you upside the head with a Bible*

--Chovexani, with apologies to Penn & Teller

[rman]

4. speaking with a double tongue;

- "creatonism is science"
- "science ('darwinism'/evolution) is religion"

make up your mind, you can't have it both ways.

[reprobate]

7. Certainly you can have it both ways. it's a syllogism

Reaching way back to college days course in logic.

A=b
b=c
therefore a=c

creationism is science
science is religion
therefore creationism is religion.

Q.E.D.

[democract]

5. They managed to get this rolling

in many district, even California. Never lasted long and ht emajority of the school board (voting in favor) had to resign.

Nothing to worry about - yet.

[kitkatrose]

10. I'm really confused as to why conservos want creationism taught.

Well, actually, I'm not, but aparently they haven't really thought about what that actually entails. Since creationism is religiously based, it puts science in the awkward position of having to prove an article of faith. For there to be an "intelligent design" there has to be a designer (God). The science community can't really prove that--at least not now. So what happens if we conceive of an experiment that tests the presence of God? And it finds that He doesn't exist?

I guess they'll just ignore it like they do everything else. They really need to stay out of things they don't understand.

[denverbill]

11. They'd better ban all physics theory as well.

After all, assuming scientists are correct about the speed of light, because it's a little difficult to explain how the universe is only 6000 years old when light from a source 10 billion light-years away has already reached the earth.

[Throckmorton]

12. Thats right, its all whoey!!!!

Everyone knows that the stars are affixed to the outermost Crystal sphere. Comets are actually gods tears, wept for all the murdered babies ripped from their the mothers wombs.

Get thee behind me Satan!!!!!

[myrna minx]

16. Oh my gawd...

Soda through the nose is quite painful. You cracked me up. :toast:

[hatrack]

13. To say nothing of optics!

As we all know, the rainbow God displayed to Noah was the first of its kind, meaning that light could not have been refrangible prior to the Flood.

Down with Newton!
Down with Galileo!
Down with Copernicus!
Down with Bruno!
Down with Kepler!

[KamaAina]

15. They've already made an end run around the speed of light!

Say hello to "cDK" (c - decay) theory*, which purports that the speed of light has actually decrased over time, thus explaining* the illusion* that the stars are millions of light-years away!

http://www.jpdawson.com/pelgnet/pelchap8/Chap8.html

It has been proposed by Setterfield 173 that the speed of light may not have always been constant. That light travels at a constant speed, 186,000 miles per second, is one of the things that troubles most scientists about the Creation Theory. This presents a problem to them if the earth is only a few thousand years old as creationists claim, rather than millions of years old as science accepts. The problem stems from the idea that God created everything whole. But, if the speed of light is constant, then the stars one sees now would had to have existed millions and millions of years ago, or when God created the stars, he would also have created the light from these stars on a path toward earth. That would mean that one observes light from a star that did not exist when the light was created. God could not create anything imperfect, and all things must follow His physical laws. The only way this is plausible, while retaining the physical laws and God's integrity, is to postulate that the speed of light is decaying, is slowing down. This would be totally consistent with the other things discussed, the decay of the earth's magnetic field, the radioactive decay, and the decay of the human body.

"On a path toward earth"?! Silly me. I was under the impression that light radiated from stars in all directions. But then again, I'm only a cum laude Yale grad, not a fundie or anything... </sarcasm>

Edit: When I see "cDK", I'm thinking "see Dennis Kucinich"! :-)

[yellowcanine]

17. There is a much simpler explanation - "Apparent Age" creation

It solves all of the problems - belly buttons on Adam and Eve, fossils, Grand Canyon, light from distant stars. God simply created everything to look as if it had been here a while, don't you know? Only problem it doesn't solve is that pesky old Noah's Ark - but a miracle or two - ok - several hundred- would take care of that. Of course to believe anything like this you would have to have a fairly cynical view of God - but if I were going to be a creationist I think I would find it more convincing than the explanations of Henry Morris, Duane Gish, and Barry Setterfield.

[0rganism]

19. You underestimate their versatility

There are two standard YEC answers to "old light" in a "young universe":

1) The speed of light has decreased exponentially over six thousand years (yes, this is a common answer)

2) The light was started out closer, so we could see it sooner (a somewhat less common answer)

No shit, I've seen both of these used in origin discussions.

[yellowcanine]

14. The way it is worded - no problem for a good biology teacher

' "encourages" Darby science teachers to teach criticisms of prevailing scientific theory, but the only theory identified by the policy is evolutionary theory."

Hell they should be teaching it that way already - that's the only way to teach any science. Of course I recognize that what the rev thinks is "criticisms of prevailing scientific theory" is not remotely close to what I would recognize but that is his problem isn't it? If they worded the policy that way, good science teachers can sail a Noah's Ark through the loopholes.