Repeal of Louisiana Science Education Act Rejected

egjertse writes "A Louisiana law that opponents say leaves the backdoor open to teaching 'creationism' in public schools will stay on the books after a Senate committee Wednesday effectively killed a bill that would repeal the statute. After hours of testimony for and against House Bill 26, which repeals the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act, the senators narrowly deferred the legislation, effectively killing it in committee. The bill was sponsored by Sen. Karen Carter Peterson, D-New Orleans."

Comments

And then there's this asshole:

[Threni]

Sen. Elbert Guillory, D-Opelousas, said he had reservations with repealing the act after a spiritual healer correctly diagnosed a specific medical ailment he had. He said he thought repealing the act could "lock the door on being able to view ideas from many places, concepts from many cultures."

"Yet if I closed my mind when I saw this man -- in the dust, throwing some bones on the ground, semi-clothed -- if I had closed him off and just said, 'That's not science. I'm not going to see this doctor,' I would have shut off a very good experience for myself," Guillory said.

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[kruach aum]

Oh my god. And you have to live in a country like that.

Re: And then there's this asshole:

[MightyMartian]

Close minded towards precisely the kind of fuzzy thinking based on anecdotal evidence that science was designed to avoid? Yes, I think sensible should be.

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[Intrepid imaginaut]

Politicians are perfectly rational. They do and say exactly what it takes to get themselves re-elected. Whether or not this man believes a word of what he said, he knows full well which side his bread is buttered on.

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[Anonymous Coward]

Sen. Elbert Guillory, D-Opelousas, said he had reservations with repealing the act after a spiritual healer correctly diagnosed a specific medical ailment he had.

Like it was that hard to diagnose Cranial Colon Envelopment in a politician. He probably ran into her right outside the Asshat Haberdashery (a dead giveaway).

Re: And then there's this asshole:

[Bosconian]

Hey AC,

Please watch this YouTube video; it may be the best 9:40 you'll invest in the inexorably slow building of your critical thinking discipline.

Open-mindedness by QualiaSoup

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[Intrepid imaginaut]

That's more the career beaurocrat track, but whatever, my point is that there was never a stupid and successful politican. Don't kid yourselves, these guys are slick fish, and it suits them just fine to let people believe they are stupid. Even the most celebrated of the ignorant politicians, GW Bush, famed for his consistent foreign policy gaffes, knew full well that his constituency didn't give one fuck about offended foreigners or their customs. The problem doesn't lie with the politicians, they're just working the system and the electorate.

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[Darinbob]

What countries are not like that? You will find those people everywhere, don't be smug and assume they're not where you live.

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[tehcyder]

I noticed that particular passage, too. One of the things that bothered me about his "decision making" is that spiritual healer is not the opposite of evolution or science. I can't remember a single science or math class where spiritual healers came up even once. I don't recall any lesson about how species evolve including, "therefore, spiritual healers suck". Moreover, "That's not science. I'm not going to see this doctor." Who does that? I would have been driven off by the "semi-clothed" aspect, but the its not science would have never crossed my mind.

Moreover, if it worked, I would want to "use my science" to learn more about it and figure out how it works. If I just accept that it was magic, I would close my mind to learning.

That's a pretty bold statement.

Why?

[MrEricSir]

Why are we allowing people who aren't smart enough to decide what's best for children do just that? Why aren't we re-thinking how our government operates to prevent this from happening again?

Re:Why?

[jfengel]

Democracy. Rule by the people, half of whom have IQs in the double-digit range.

Or, as Mencken put it even better: "Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard."

Re:Why?

[femtobyte]

Well, we have democracy whenever it suits the interests of a tiny power elite. If "the people" really ruled by democracy, we'd be entangled in a lot less foreign wars, have much lower disparity in wealth distribution, no big push for austerity, no too-big-to-fail bank bailouts, etc. As it is, we get stupid crowd-pleasers like nods toward eliminating separation of church and state, but not any democratically favored changes that oppose the oligarchy.

Re: Why?

[UnknowingFool]

In the Dover case the school board voted to have a disclaimer read before the biology class about how "Evolution was just a theory" and have an Intelligent Design textbook available. When asked later why the board members said they were following the advice of a conservative outside group. The judge noted in the judgement that the board never consulted any national or professional science groups and ignored the very vocal protests of their only experts, their science teachers.

Re:History

[CrimsonAvenger]

PS does anyone know when that "Earth is 6,000 years old" started? I'd like to know how many years I have to add to come up with a more accurate number.

The name you're looking for is James Ussher, a Calvinist archbishop.

The specific works where he specified that the date of Creation was the nightfall before 23 OCT 4004 BC (Julian calendar, mind you) were published between 1650 and 1654 (I don't know which of them first used the 4004bc creation time).

Why so many flavours of Christian seem to be addicted to the writings of a Calvinist archbishop, I've never understood. Most American Christians are, at best, uninspired by Calvinism....

Re:History

[Longjmp]

History is a breeze on these schools... they only go back 6,001 years (to include 2013).

What puzzles me, or rather amuses me is how many of the people believing in this nonsense are happy to operate their DVD players and/or GPS (among other things) without hesitation;
- And accept they will work, completely ignoring that those items are based on the same physical laws we determine the age of earth with.

Re:So sue them.

[femtobyte]

Why? It's their own kids that will suffer.

Is this the same logic you'd use if you noticed that your neighbor came home stinking drunk and beat his kids every night? And, in case caring for the well-being of other peoples' kids is too much of a stretch for you, how about a little self-interest: you own kids are going to grow up to share the world with these guys.

Re:History

[Anonymous Coward]

Because such people do not think about why their GPS works, they expect that it just does as an article of faith. In short, it's magic.

Re:So sue them.

[femtobyte]

No, I wouldn't use the same logic there. ... See the difference now?

Yes, I can see that if you are a coward, standing on principle to help others is not part of your logic.

Digital code in genes, proof that Jesus rode dinos

[PopeRatzo]

The "Discovery Institute", the leading purveyors of pseudo-science hokum to the Far Right, who have somehow become a "think tank" involved in creating science curriculum in more than 25 states, has started a nationwide campaign on right-wing radio programs, pushing their notion that it's the Christian Conservatives who are the "real protectors of science" not those awful secular scientists (who are probably kenyan muslims too).

I heard their "director of research", a "Dr Stephen Meyer" who wrote a book called Darwinâ(TM)s Doubt: The Explosive Origin of Animal Life and the Case for Intelligent Design on the radio earlier this week, talking about how the fact that our genes have "digital code" in them is proof of an "intelligent designer" because you can't have things like "circuits and digital code" without someone intelligent to design them.

I'm not joking, they are spending millions on a PR campaign talking about how the Christian Right are the true lovers of science. And exhibit A is how "the science establishment" still teaches evolution.

We are so fucked.

Scratch Louisiana

[edibobb]

Louisiana is one place I will not consider moving to.

And, for you grammar Nazis, Louisiana is one place to which I will not consider moving.

And, for you Cajuns, I ain't gonna go to loosiana no more.