Slashdot Mirror
Course Debunking Intelligent Design Canceled
Thib writes "As widely reported everywhere, University of Kansas chairman of religious studies Paul Mirecki has withdrawn the "Special Topics in Religion: Intelligent Design, Creationism and Other Religious Mythologies" course that he was preparing for the upcoming Spring semester. From the AP: "Mirecki recently sent an e-mail to members of a student organization in which he referred to religious conservatives as "fundies" and said a course depicting intelligent design as mythology would be a "nice slap in their big fat face." He later apologized, and did so again Thursday in a statement issued by the university." Mirecki was inspired to offer the course after the Kansas Board of Education moved to back intelligent design in state science standards in November."
If I.D. is religion - and it is - then you doun't get to debunk it in public school on the goverment dime. Otherwise the next class might be "Islam, why it's a steaming heap of camel dung" or "Christianity and other ridiculous middle-eastern folk tales".
It strikes me as interesting that he's out to "debunk" intelligent design. Isn't the complaint that everyone here on Slashdot makes against it that it's unfalsifiable- unable to be proved false?
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
Although I agree that I.D. as a theory is unfalsifiable, the claim that I.D. is not religiously inspired (as made by many of its supporters) is falsifiable - i.e., through letters, e-mails, etc.
Additionally, I'm not sure that he ever said that he was out to "debunk" intelligent design, that's just the headline, and you know how accurate /. headlines are...
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
The trouble with Kansas is; you can click your heels three times and repeat "There's no place like home", but you'll still end up in Kansas.
Slashdot social media options: AIM, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber and Mobile Text. Why no MySpace?
Sigh. It always saddens me when great ideas and concepts are clouded by irresponsible speech. I think such a course would be a great benefit to students in Kansas. However, when someone (and professor of all people!) utters such uselessly degrading and unprofitable remarks, he destroys his own credibility. How many debates have decended into childish name-calling so that no-one is listening to anything that is being said? How many people, defending a just cause (such as environmentalism) have failed to pick their battles and have rabidly pursued a course to such an extreme as to alienate otherwise sympathetic folk?
C'mon, if you have something valuable to say or important to do, then say it or do it with prudence and wisdom at least!
Unity in Diversity
FSM
'nuff said.
I just pooped your party.
"Professor Paul Mirecki, chairman of religious studies"
This is like the chairman of the math department making fun of people for studying the work of Gauss, Galois, Ramanujan, Hilbert, etc.
Having been a college student and teacher, I have a hard time beliving that anyone who feels like mocking people that are passionate about his subject is very effective as a professor. I don't trust his apology, either.
Exam 4/C again. Maybe I'll do better this time.
No, "everyone here on slashdot" (whoever that is) complains that ID is put forth as a "scientific theory".
You see, Creationism can't be taught in schools officially because it's a religious belief, and we have separation of church and state (short short version). So, Creationism, version 2, relabeled "Intelligent Design" is put forth (to the best of my understanding) as a *scientific theory*. Since it's now "scientific", the claim goes, it can be taught in schools as an alternative theory to evolution.
That's what the critics are complaining about - that it's being pushed through as being "scientific", though at it's core (the criticism goes) it's nothing more than Creationism wrapped in pseudo-scientific language. Presumably, the course would take the "scientific theory" angle and attack ID in terms of science (i.e. to be a theory it must be verifiable by experiments, be predictive, etc..) A real pity it got canned over some (from what I understand) private emails.
I just have to mention this, thought: In one of the articles, someone criticizing this professor says "he is so full of hatefullness for religion". George Carlin moment here: WTF is "hatefullness"? Would that be something similar to...I don't know..."hate"? This person must have studied at the George W. Bush school of "Higherest Linguistication of the English Language".
It's too bad that now fundamentalists are going to have this news story as a weapon against proponents of science. This is despite this person apparently having nothing to do with science. We need better representatives, like the following:
Skeptical Inquirer: The Magazine for Science and Reason
http://www.csicop.org/si/
Discussion and debate of biological and physical origins
http://www.talkorigins.org/
Understanding Evolution
http://evolution.berkeley.edu/
This certainly underlines the double standards of the ID right. They want religious criticism of evolution put in science classes, and are using the ID trojan horse to do so, while trying to silence those who point this out in those self same classes.
If ID is to be taught as science, it must be subject to the same tests every scientific theory is subjected to. You can't wave your arms and yell "My religion is being oppressed" simply because ID gets the same treatment as any other theory.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
"Teach religion as religion, science as science" and "ID is religion". Therefore, don't intrude it into science (because it isn't), and don't directly attack it from science class (because the government isn't allowed to pick and choose religions).
Of course, if the government doesn't own your school, do as you please.
High school science classrooms are not a forum of scientific debate. What bothers me most about this entire discussion is the assertion that, for some reason, a board of education decides what is science... that introducing it in classrooms is somehow equivalent to having it published in Nature... and that, for some reason, this is a valid way to discuss what is and isn't science.
It just isn't. Classrooms are for teaching science. Science has its own forums for such debates.
Now, when you put it in that light, the question becomes "do we want material that is not accepted by the scientific community taught in classrooms.
For those of you digging at religion, remember that a good portion of the religious community, including the Catholic Church, do not accept ID.
How is a math professor discussing religion in any way the same as the "Chairman of Religious Studies" mocking religion?
And - whether you or I, personally, believe ID or not - most major religions include the fundamental belief that the world and our lives have purpose, and that the world and life did not come about by chance.
Also: "Mirecki repeatedly criticized fundamentalist Christians and Jews and mocked Catholicism."
Exam 4/C again. Maybe I'll do better this time.
And the people promoting this intelligent design crap are not putting it forward as just their opinion. They are trying to pass it off as though it were a respectable scientific theory. They deserve to be called names.
I am glad this guy made this comment and wanted to have this class. Intelligent design is not backed by any biologists. It is only so we can have creationism taught in our schools. What a bunch of shit. bunch of shit.
When they have more than the bible and a few theologians then maybe it could be considered.
If they worked with biologists to understand organisms and all of the stuff already studied, then maybe it could be considered.
If they didn't just deride evolution instead of studying real things and relating them to the world, then maybe there could be a discussion considered.
But when some jesus waving ignorant religious fanatic undermines hundreds of years of study with a good catch word, that pissed me off.
If I were him I would not have apologized. I WOULD HAVE TELEVISED!!!
"It strikes me as interesting that he's out to "debunk" intelligent design. Isn't the complaint that everyone here on Slashdot makes against it that it's unfalsifiable- unable to be proved false?"
There is a nearly universal skepticism in Academia (and, well, the world at large) for things that have no evidenciary support. Demonstrating that I.D. has no evidenciary support is the same as "debunking" it. A serious claim need not be falsifiable to be wrong, it simply must have no support. It is up to the scientist to demonstrate "the burden of proof".
Intelligent Design as a "theory" has never once offered any proof that has ever stood up to any intellectual rigor. More importantly, as a "scientific" theory (as proponents claim), it has never inspired or guided the production of new, published, empirical data.
This is what is so hateful in Darwinian evolution to religious folks. It's not just that it opposes religious teaching, but that it appears to promote a selfish, self-centred (or, if they're more sophisticated, gene-centred) teaching in its place. You don't find the same opposition to humanism, do you?
I wrote a JE on this.
Wikileaks, no DNS
I think this story nicely illustrates how you needn't be religious to be ignorant, insensitive and over-zealous. Also, I have a feeling that if this course was presented in an neutral and objective manner (with a nice boring title like, "Comparing and Contrasting Different Paradigms of Origin") nobody would've cared - not even the students. Indeed, I imagine the talk around campus would be "Don't take Origins, Mirecki's a dick" or "I wrote a 20 page paper where one of my points disagreed with his and he gave me a D!". I'm sure we can all relate to similar professors.
http://www.talknerdy.org
Although I agree with most of what you said, I reject your idea that the "world at large" rejects things "that have no evidenciary support". I'm fairly certain that the majority of the world's 6 billion plus people believes in one faith or another. Correct me if I'm wrong on this...
Ben Hocking
Need a professional organizer?
What makes FSM a straw man?
The supporters of ID clearly want people to draw the conclusion that they cannot explicitly state in the classroom: God is the "Intelligent Designer". But once you've accepted arguments for some manner of supernatural intervention into the evolutionary process, anything that has the power to make such interventions is a viable possibility. God, Flying Spaghetti Monsters, space aliens, superintelligent hamsters with tiny guitars. It's all the same.
Since The Flying Spaghetti Monster is omnipotent, any evidence for the Judeo-Christian concept of God (the Bible, the ubiquity of belief in God, etc.) must have been created by the FSM in order to test our faith in His Noodly Presence.
If FSM is a straw man, it's a straw man that the God Hypothesis is strapped inside. Because any blow you can land that would discredit the Flying Spaghetti Monster can be turned against any other supernatural agent.
Disagree? Feel free to demonstrate to me, a humble believer, that the Flying Spaghetti Monster is not the creator of our Universe.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
At least we get to witness the fall of this state, and later joke upon it when they know better over tea and strumpets.
The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments. - Nietzche
My Karma is ranked too high, so I may as well fix that with this posting...
1. In my reading of the constitution, it's the Congress (that is the FEDERAL legislature) that's barred from establishing religion. This was intended to preserve the rights of individual states to do what that wanted in this area. So IMO, Kansas may as a state decide to teach whatever the hell it wants, even if (gasp) the citizenries of other states disagree.
2. It's practically speaking impossible to completely avoid the influence of religion on legislation, even if you want to. The teachings of different religions and of different atheiesm philosophies lead to significantly different, mutually exclusive views of both the ideal scope and the ideal content of laws.
So in my opinion, this is NOT a separation-of-church-and-state issue, because the Constitution restrains the Federal congress in this area, not state legislators. And if you don't like the preservation of states' rights, I urge you to reconsider your position if Bush and Congress try to force the inclusion of intelligent design in the national testing standards that are part of the No Child Left Behind act.
There is evidence regarding certain dinosaurs, such as the velociraptor, and how they have evolved into modern day avians. How you could say this with a straight face is beyond me.
Now, when you put it in that light, the question becomes "do we want material that is not accepted by the scientific community taught in classrooms.
I enthusiastically disagree. The teaching of ID in a science class makes the question, "Why are we teaching non-scientific subjects in science class?"
ID cannot be tested by the scientific method; ergo, it is not science! No matter how much the proponents of this backwards "theory" wish it were science, it is not. You cannot test for the existence of God, a pre-requisite for ID (otherwise, to what does "intelligence" refer in the title?). Since there is no test, and can be no test, it is not science.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
You might be interested in the discussion starting from Cujo's reply to my above-mentioned JE.
Wikileaks, no DNS
The comments on this story are full of this type of misinformation spouted as fact with no links for support. I'll provide a rebuttal with fact for a change. NPR has done a few stories about the hostile environment toward intelligent design in the academic community. There are many biologists who see credibility in the idea of ID, but are afraid to speak up for it because of the anger and intolerance from their institutions and colleagues.
Here is a story from NPR about a scientist with a PhD in biology who was attacked for publishing this article in a peer-reviewed scientific journal PROCEEDINGS OF THE BIOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON. (Read the introduction of his paper at least. These lines indicate some of the direction of it.)
Now back to your rant.
That has been done, contrary to your belief. In the article I linked to above, Steven C. Meyer considers the biology aspect of ID, which is a bit misunderstood by people who are antagonistic to creationism. ID does split off the science side from the religious side of creationism. ID looks at the structure of organisms--plant, animal, etc. and sees indications that the structure of these things is so complex that it seems unlikely that it could happen at random from a pure evolution perspective.
I'll use the FSM as an illustration of this difference. The FSM is compatible with the scientific aspect but not with the religious. Intelligent design still applies, in that nature shows itself to be too complex to be random. There is a level of structure and organization that indicates a directing force for this design, rather than random interaction. That designing force could take any form(FSM or God or unknown), as far as intelligent design is concerned. That is why it has equal credence with theoretical evolution as the basis for the origin of life forms. Natural selection has shown to cause differentiation of existing species, but there is no proven cause for origin, so any proposal as an explanation of that is theory.
So the religious side is that people choose to believe what form that "designing force" takes. Various religions attribute that to the specific character and personality of a deity, but that is outside the scope of intelligent design.
We may experience some slight turbulence and then...explode. -Capt. Mal Reynolds
Because it wouldn't help, I won't do your homework for you...
...but, I'll give three hints about the differences:
They are not obscure.
They are not peripheral.
They are not slight.
Exam 4/C again. Maybe I'll do better this time.
The story has been filtered through the oft-incomprehensible process of journalism, so who knows what's really going on, what the Prof really said or did.
But I take away the point that no matter how ridiculous or simple or wrong someone's point of view may seem, if they are sincere about it, that point of view deserves respectful response and dialogue.
Additionally, that respect for someone's opinion can never be confused with respect for the opinion itself; it doesn't mean aquiesence to or approval of those who think differently. Just because I don't froth at the mouth, threaten beheading, or call you a medieval mental case doesn't mean that I think your creation belief is anywhere near rational.
And if your moral opinion is not sincere but invented in order to further financial or political ends, well then, allow me to behead you, you medieval mental case.
I believe the issue is that the ID group *is* not arguing about any evidence of the judeo-christian concept of god but arguing that instead that there is "evidence" in the paleontological record that shows "irreducible complexity" which proves the existence of a creator in the sense that is outside of evolutionary history. ID argues *just* this. The extrapolation to a judeo-christian god is explicitly and carefully not made by the ID community (though you and I know that that is exactly what they are thinking). The proper ID response to the use of FSM would be to state in fact ID states only that there is evidence for a super natural creator in the paleontological record and moreover in "machinery" of living organisms (an argument that can be done scientifically). Most importantly, whether that creator is FSM or a judeo-christian god is outside the realm of ID and science and is simply religion. Hense FSM is may be defined as a new religion and not science. while ID is not a religion but an examination of the archeological record and biological complexity for evidence of "supernatural tampering" and is therefore science.
Of course ID is not science but the reasoning has nothing to do w/ the any suppositions of a creator (FSM or judeo-christian or turtles all the way down) which ID explicitly never talks about. The problem w/ ID is the use of "irreducible complexity" as a "proof" for "that which makes irreducible complexity." This argument is a variation of the "god of the gaps" proof for god. The problem of course is its not so much a proof but a definition of "god" or "evidence for a supernatural creator" is defined by that which does not seem to have evidence naturalistically, where for people like Behe that complexity of DNA and amino acid interactions is that evidence. As our understanding of complex systems and evolutionary processes addresses the specific "irreducibly complex" evidence that behe and their cohorts they will move to another gap. Their definition is not a proof for the existence but a definition that is based on human ignorance that is that "gap".
In this sense, and it is much weaker is FSM relevant because FSM can be defined to be the god of the gaps in the same sense that any other creator but again that is not what ID is arguing, what they are arguing is that the god of the gaps argument is legitimate not *what* the god of the gaps is.
The FSM is funny, I am about to buy one of their shirts because they come off well and have a good sense of humor but I think its a mistake to argue that FSM is a "counter-proof" for ID.
It's a straw man argument.
Try Uncaused Force, Teach the Controversy! then. It's every bit as scientifically valid, detailed, and correct as any ID publication. Feel free to check the references - they are all peer reviewed articles saying exactly what the article claims they say. Of course the conclusion is that the theory of gravity is wrong and we need to teach our children about the "uncaused force" that moves objects - some would say that an uncaused force is God, but of course the theory need not explicitly state that.
Jedidiah.
Craft Beer Programming T-shirts
Specifically, it is ridiculous (scientifically) to reject or fight against a scientific conclusion simply because you don't like its implications. Einstein famously "didn't believe" in quantum mechanics because he didn't like its implications (such as the EPR paradox). But you know what? The EPR paradox is now a famous illustration of the bizarre nature of quantum mechanics.
And, IMO, the philosophical implications of Darwinism have absolutely nothing to do with its scientific validity. (Which, by the way, far supersede any scientific validity ID has in terms of predictive and "post"-dictive power.)
And because that's all it argues (and all it can ever "safely" argue) it's absolutely content free. The whole "science" is that conclusion. They can't tell us anything about the designer. There's no rational way of distinguishing among the possible designers. They haven't even collected any real evidence to speak of aside from a simple argument from incredulity.
It is also worth noting that for not having anything to do with the Judeo-Christian God, a remarkably high percentage of the "researchers" are devoutly religious and funded by religious groups. Not that that casts doubt on the scientific validity of the subject by itself, but it certainly does make one suspicious about the political motivations of a movement that claims to be doing science but is more content to move into classrooms by political means than to publish real research.
The problem here is that regardless of the supernatural entity, any imaginable observation is consistent with it. There is nothing that could possibly falsify the hypothesis that there is a supernatural force interacting with reality in an unexplained and observable way. When they can posit a mechanism through which The Not The Judeo Christian God Desiner operates or give us some testable hypothesis about the designer, please wake me up and I'll be the first to contribute funding for their research.
The point, though, is that the whole "science" of ID stops exactly where it is right now. No more information can be gained or conclusions reached, so all ID does is lend pseudo-scientific creedence to any crackpot's theory of How Things Came To Be. Everybody who has an anti-evolution agenda can get together and hold hands and say, "Beleive whatever you want to believe. We're all equally right!" The reality is, the method is so popular because it appeals to the large Christian fundamentalist population in the US and, to a lesser extent, to people who hold minority views that could only generously be compared to the FSM theory. What it comes down to is that there is no rational way of distinguishing between any conclusion that could be drawn from ID, whether it's the FSM, the JC God, or magical hamsters with tiny guitars.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
Mirecki recently sent an e-mail to members of a student organization in which he referred to religious conservatives as "fundies" and said a course depicting intelligent design as mythology would be a "nice slap in their big fat face." He later apologized, and did so again Thursday in a statement issued by the university."
It's funny how people fully support this kind of forthright talk about any number of groups when it's done by politically-motivated radio and television personalities with license to broadcast over public airwaves to millions of people, but when a man with a doctorate of theology uses similar language in an email discussion with the atheist student group to whom he is an advisor, it causes an uproar.
Don't become a regular here -- you will become retarded.
I wondered about this the other day.
Amendment XIV
Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Has been interpreted to mean that all parts of the Federal Constitution applies to states as well.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
mmmm Is interesting how every part is defending their own point of view... Well..here is my opinion... Imagine you develop a novel theory about...anything... then you develop it to the point that you can prove it to be an suficiently precise interperetation of the problem, then you test it...if it passed every test that you imagined...then you began to consider it as a enough precise model of the problem.... is about that...about models of a certain system... the first models...religions...tried to explain our universe...in a very simple ways someones...more complex another ones...but then came another points of views who where more precise that the old ones... scientific theories in this case... the new models, who where more precise than the old ones...replaced them....only in their own domains...unless the dominant models grow or went replaced by another one...precise one... that is in my opinion, the advance of the knowledge of our universe...is the advance of precision ...
the problem is...that some models fill our desires in a more complete way that another ones...
thats why some people like religion..anothers like science... the battle between desires and facts...
we really dont know what interpretation is the "correct one" (if such thing exists..) but we know that some models adapt better to our observations than anothers, and if your model dont have a way to be tested, it simply wll become a untested model full of untesteable axioms, but with no chance to become a dominant model, unless the testers, became to be emotion-driven rather than fact-driven, then the untested model will probably survive, only because the testers wanted to...the desires again...
in another words: if you dont have a way to test it...is only a untested model...can be as beautifull as you want, but if has no way to be testest, is nothing more than a interesting fantasy.
To belief the reverse is simple Strausian doublethink (paragraph six).
It is amazing how many scientifically educated individuals, or at least scientifically aware individuals in fact appear to deduce the opposite of that which is reached with a simple application of Bayesian logic.
Wikileaks, no DNS
Neither.
Instead, I'll reexplain what you missed from my last post (gp).
I pointed out that:
"it wouldn't help" for me to "do your homework for you."
I also pointed out that the differences are not obscure.
Perhaps if I denied the existence of the Earth, you would feel that you could convince me of its existence with arguments.
From my perspective, this is a very similar situation.
The way that most people believe in God is - obviously, fundamentally and very - different from how people believe in the FSM. If you have already refused (to me, to yourself, doesn't matter) to see or acknowledge those differences it wouldn't do any good for me to point them out.
So, I'll say it once again. It won't help you if I do your homework for you.
Note: Many will have noticed that in this discussion that I have not asserted the existence or non-existence of any kind of supreme being, other than the implication that the FSM was merely a device for an flawed argument. Others will not have noticed, and will have formulated their responses (internal and posted) accordingly.
End of Line
Exam 4/C again. Maybe I'll do better this time.
Good point. I've heard that it was the combination of amendments I and XIV that people apply to this issue. Thanks for posting it.
The problem is, I read the non-establishment clause not as a protection of individual citizen's rights, but as a protection of states' rights. I read the non-establishment clause as a restriction on what the federal government can shove down the states' throats. I don't read the clause as a guarantee to individual citizens that they will be completely free from such legislation.
FYI, here's the text of the first amendment:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Submitting phony nonsense articles to postmodern and feminist journals to "expose" may have no business in an academic setting, but it's been done and met with some degree of praise. Furthermore, I can think of no reasonable motive other than intolerance and hatred. Finally, it's difficult to seperate one's self from their ideas. Hardly anyone comes up with a hypothesis, gets funding to test it, tests it, and decides the hypothesis is wrong when the experiment fails. Animosity becomes a key motivator for scientific inquiry, as an attack on one's ideas is nearly equivilant to an attack on oneself ('They're my ideas, might as well be my children'). Dispute is healthy, and it comes with some degree of internal sentiment exactly as expressed by the professor. His mistake, then, was twofold: 1) publicly declaring his sentiment and 2) cancelling the class.
The instructor in question is closer to offfering a class "debunking computational physics" in an experimental physics department. Two wildly differing opinions on a subject both equally deserving of the title physics.
I Browse at +4 Flamebait
Open Source Sysadmin
That is exactly correct. ID squelches all continued inquiry. Every time the problem gets hard (possible gap), ID proponents simply flash the "Then a miracle" occurs cartoon. There is no motivation or incentive to advance the state of knowledge.
My take on why the general population just can't grasp evolution is that they can't grasp the notion of really, really large numbers as in the time it takes for evolution to occur. If human beings can "evolve" a wolf into 200+ breeds of domestic dogs in 5,000 years, what can nature accomplish in 4 billion years.
...until little Johny trys to do a science fair project on ID and gets a failing grade for not following the scientific method.
In this sense, and it is much weaker is FSM relevant because FSM can be defined to be the god of the gaps in the same sense that any other creator but again that is not what ID is arguing, what they are arguing is that the god of the gaps argument is legitimate not *what* the god of the gaps is.
But that isn't exactly the point of FSM, either, is it? It's an amusing counterexample that highlights some of the flaws (absurdity) in the rationale for including ID (Dont-Ask/Don't-Tell Creationism) in a science curriculum, and it does that quite well. Specifically, if ID meets the standard for inclusion, then what couldn't meet that standard? The prophet has stated that FSM is "based on science, not on faith", which provides just as much rational support for concluding that it *is* a matter of science, not faith, as ID has. (I feel moved by the Noodly Spirit to state that it has much more.)
Interesting you should suggest space aliens. At a major conference on abiogenesis about 5 years back (no Creationists or ID folks attending, it was a standard science convention like a Gordan Research one, or some such thing) the conclusion of the conference was that the Earth was not a suitable place for life to begin. It had to have its origin off-planet. In other words... aliens. (Or, to put it less sensationally we _are_ the aliens.)
What it means is: The federal and state gov't are not allowed to promote, or supress, any one religion with regard to another.
Nothing to say here... move along
I thought the creationist/ID crowd were the only ones who agreed that irreducible complexity even exists.
(ok, I really know otherwise but it sounds good, eh?)
Nothing to say here... move along
In my reading of the constitution, it's the Congress (that is the FEDERAL legislature) that's barred from establishing religion. This was intended to preserve the rights of individual states to do what that wanted in this area.
No, this is untrue. Firstly there is the explicit prohibition on "religious tests" extending to state officials as well, as well as the 14th Amendment: "No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States". There is the other obvious principle that a "Bill of Rights"---as it was described contemporaneously by its adopters---would have no meaning if any state were able to abrogate it, because all citizens of the US were also citizens of some state or another.
Of course there is the similar rationale that if states may establish any religion then they may freely abridge freedom of speech and the press, the right of peacable assembly, possibly the right to bear arms, and the rights of habeus corpus etc.
Clearly the original debaters and adopters of these amendments would never have considered such an enormous loophole to be desirable, and there is ample written evidence concerning the specific arguments in play at that time.
Still, this meretricious line of reasoning did have some following in the Civil War and the 14th Amendment was force-fed to them to ensure that such a dangerous and silly idea would be forevermore seen as wrong.
...wasn't intelligently designed, then?
[deem grinning, ducking and running all implied]
Got time? Spend some of it coding or testing
That's not true either.
m endment01/01.html#4
That would have been one side effect, but the contemporaneous attitudes were generally stronger than that, and more akin to the modern "liberal" interpretation in some areas. In personal feeling it was true that Christians were favored over atheists and non-Christians by almost all at the time, but despite that, the Constitution was adopted as it is.
For example, consider this:
The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
As was discussed at the time of the adoption of the Constitution, this is not just a prohibition against a "state religion", but any sort of religious requirement AT ALL.
For instance, a test which required people to be "Christian", but not of any particular sect (i.e. no state religion) was discussed and was explicitly considered to be disallowed. The writer supporting the Constitution (Madison?) admitted that this meant that "atheists" and "Mohamedeans" (Muslims in modern language) would indeed be permitted in any office.
This gives evidence to the intent at the time.
If it were merely that no state religion was to be allowed, the Constitution would have only said, "The United States shall not establish any national religion."
Madison's original wording here was "The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretence, infringed."
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/data/constitution/a
So, clearly Madison believed in a broad interpretation close to contemporary judicial interpretation, and the possibility of merely banning a national religion could have been entertained. The current phrasing is less specific and hence less definitive, but that it encompasses more than a narrow prohibition on a state religion is a certainty.
The Constitution intentionally does not describe specific, algorithmic statutes: mostly it describes objectives, and leaves the details to legislatures and courts. It is not a piece of prolog software. Therefore the current interpretation by court precedent falls very safely within the parameters of the Constitution and the original intent of those who adopted it.
Madison's original wording here was "The civil rights of none shall be abridged on account of religious belief or worship, nor shall any national religion be established, nor shall the full and equal rights of conscience be in any manner, or on any pretence, infringed."
No national religion, eh? Guess that means that State religions are supposed to be ok?
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Please read this before you say that he shouldn't have spoken out. This is what has happened to him since the incident.
h ospitalized_after_beating/?breaking Mirecki hospitalized after beating
http://www2.ljworld.com/news/2005/dec/05/mirecki_
He was beaten down and sent to the Hospital by 2 people who where upset about his anti fundamentalism/anti ID stance.
THESE ACTIONS are the real problem, as they represent the blindness of religious fundamentalism when pressed by the freedom of speech.
The reason I think ID is an issue, is that fundamentalism doesn't allow for an other opinion, it is intractable in its stance about what is right in religion. (whatever the religion).
Even thought Dr Mireki might not have been the most tactful person in his approach to counter the ridiculous decision in his state; it is NEVER acceptable for anyone to be terrorized because of his/her opinions, and the reality in America is that anyone who EVER confronts the religious rights ideals, gets taken down by any means necessary.
This can be seen in the horrendous actions of anti-abortion activists; the pervasiveness of anti-sex education & the ineffective yet over emphasized abstinence movement; the obvious miscarriages of authority that are happening at the FDA in relation to the abortion pill; the rise of intolerance of religious differences; or any idea that goes against "Christians".
In effect, this is the reflection of the Christian fundamentalist leader currently in power.
So its all grand to have people here criticize his actions, when the reality is that in his particular environment (the middle of the bible belt in Kansas), he actually has to deal with the effects of these religious fundamentalist directly, especially working in the field of religion.
Whether it is from the possibility of loosing his jobs from the university who feels public pressure trough their funding, or attacks on his and his loved ones physical person, this is not like being on slashdot with an alias and saying whatever crap and then disappearing.
If you cross them they go after you especially if you have clout.
Personally I really wish had not backed down, and given the course; furthermore the University should really support him no matter what as this directly reflects on their credibility as an independent institution of learning.
Maybe Iran or China are worse.... or are they?
Content + Container; Content = Container; Content â Container... which is the question?
Thank you, thank you, thank you for helping perpetuate the "hamsters with guitars" meme.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
I was going to make a post until I read your comment, you said it all.
I am Bennett Haselton! I am Bennett Haselton!
A couple posts have addressed your first point, and though we're a bit OT here I have something to say about your second point since it often appears in misinformation about US separation of church and state. It is no part of this principle that Congress should not be influenced by religious views in drafting legislation. The principle is that the government should not help or hinder or endorse or condemn one sect or religion relative to another.
FYI, the Earth has been in existance for some 4.5 billion years. This is broken down into several time groupings starting with Precambrian. The next eras are Paleozoic which begins some 650 million years back, prior to this there were no abundant fossil records. The Precambrian record has been divided into several divisions and the earliest fossils found date back to 3.8 billion years ago. http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/precambrian/precambri an.html
You're very welcome. While FSM theory is far more complete and has greater explanatory power than the Hamsters With Guitars (HWG) theory, I find the HWG theory to be a much more elegant model.
An interesting anagram of "BANACH TARSKI" is "BANACH TARSKI BANACH TARSKI"
So God created humans who then created God to explain why he created humans?
Since there were state religions at the time, I would say, yes.
Laws are horrible moral guides, moral guides make even worse laws.
...but this has gotten waaay out of hand:
Professor Beaten For Evolution Views
np: Kaito - Inside River (Special Life)
"I'm not anti-anything, I'm anti-everything, it fits better." - Sole
I think we're in violent agreement.
Nope.
Unfortunately it isn't as simple or as comfortable as that. While huge amounts of rubbish are written by half-arsed thinkers in the name of post modernism, 'logic' and 'reason' are not (or at least, not primarily) in the science camp. They are, unfortunately, in the post-modern (or, more strictly, relativist) camp.
Arguing from first principles is not, of course, new. Descartes famously tried to do it. But before you can start doing 'science' about the physical world, you have to assert first that there is a physical world, second that we have access to it, and third that we can communicate with one another about it. And, unfortunately, there is no way of proving any of those statements - they have to remain axiomatic.
And in fact they're highly problematic. When you start thinking about how you would go about proving that there was a physical world you discover that the concepts get very slippery. There's actually nothing in the least 'modern' let alone 'post-modern' about this - Gorgias had pointed it out ( in 'On Nonexistence') as early as the fourth century BC.
Of course, at some level this doesn't matter. Pragmatically, modern physics works and delivers us lots of benefits, even if its epistemological underpinnings are extremely shakey. The only philosophical doctrine which isn't full of shakey bits and internal contradictions is solipsism, and frankly even if solipsism is true it's too boring for me to take seriously.
But the social scientists on campuses across the world boring on about how modern science has no more solid foundation than the beliefs of witch doctors, may be intellectually lazy, but they're also strictly, technically, right. As far as we can rationally prove.
I'm old enough to remember when discussions on Slashdot were well informed.