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Limiting the Teaching of the Scientific Process In Ohio
frdmfghtr (603968) writes Over at Ars Technica, there's a story about a bill in the Ohio legislature that wants to downplay the teaching of the scientific process. From the article: "Specifically prohibiting a discussion of the scientific process is a recipe for educational chaos. To begin with, it leaves the knowledge the kids will still receive—the things we have learned through science—completely unmoored from any indication of how that knowledge was generated or whether it's likely to be reliable. The scientific process is also useful in that it can help people understand the world around them and the information they're bombarded with; it can also help people assess the reliability of various sources of information."
The science standards would have "...focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes; and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another." Political interpretation of scientific facts include humans contributing to climate change according to the bill's sponsor, who also thinks intelligent design would be OK under the law.
What the hell is up with you people over there in the US. Still using Imperial measurements? Banning science in favour of teaching about a wizard who made everything not so long ago. producing 40% of the worlds pollution whilst only having 4% of the worlds population
Your priorities are fucked.You do good war and spying though, I'll give you that.
just because the dept of ed has utterly failed any of us who went through school in the past 40 years, doesnt mean the right thing to do is go back and not teach you know, the basics. The dept of ed is horrible, but people like this dont belong setting the curriculum either
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
I've argued many times before that the problem with "Intelligent Design" is not that whether it's "true" or not, but rather that it's not science because it ignores the Scientific Method and thus does not belong in a science class. I'm glad that this lawmaker, at least, is willing to address that argument directly instead of obfuscating.
He's still wrong, of course, but at least he's less intellectually dishonest than the average creationist. That's convenient, since it makes his position -- which is that Ohio should prohibit schools from teaching science entirely (since science is the Scientific Method) -- easier to both understand and oppose.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
If you don't want science, then you shouldn't be allowed to benefit from anything created or influenced by it. Say goodbye to your phones, your computers... your massed produced clothes made by machines that use electricity, your fancy guns designed on a computer, your cars.. all of it. Go back to horses and shit soup over a fire while reading your bible and dying of the plague.
A lot of fuss is made about how creationists aren't hurting anyone by teaching creationism in schools. At least a lot of fuss by creationists.
But to knock "how science actually works" off the curriculum in order to make creationism slightly more viable as a meme, knocks a very important and practical tool out of childrens' toolbox for learning about the world.
I'd go as far as saying learning about the scientific method is equally or more important that learning how to write papers expressing your opinions, or solving equations, or how congress works, as far as parity to other common subjects goes.
This is sabotaging a lot of children's' education in a big way for a miniscule victory in the culture wars. This is why creationists need to be far from policy maker positions.
Pretty scare if you consider what it would look like a couple of generations down the road.
Those stupid son of a bitches.
We learned nothing from Galileo's fiasco?
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
I see stories about bills like this all of the time, but they usually die in committee after fulfilling their purpose of giving the guy a bullet point for his next campaign poster. Is this one expected to actually have a shot in hell at passing? Sometimes they do slip through the cracks, especially in the bible belt.
I read the internet for the articles.
This is wide open to interpretation. Obviously it would be insane not to teach the scientific process. I think there are some who feel education has strayed too far from mastering basic facts into abstraction, such as "new math" instead of mastering times tables.
Anyway this is just one guy's brain fart and not a law. I am kind of curious what he meant by it though.
Really, how caveman-like can you get? It seems these people want everyone stupid and uneducated. The only comparison that comes to mind is the Taliban preventing girls from getting an education. Has the US really gone down the drains so far?
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
The law forces a religious view onto education, which is forbidden by the separation of church and state.
The state cannot force religious views onto people, the religions cannot force religious views on the state.
As people continue to leave the church, those who continue to take a literal interpretation of the Bible will become more agitated, and will try harder to use the law as a means of protecting their belief system. Also, they will probably physically group together, both so that they can have a community of like-minded people with whom to associate, but also so they can garner enough voting power to accomplish this sort of thing.
We can deride it all we want....but really this behavior is just an inevitable consequence of human psychology.
Religion has no place in schools. How many times have you seen scientists starting wars over theories and results?
"1 + 1 equals 3!"
"Only for larger values of 1, you heathen!"
Summation 2
The scientific method is the single, most important discovery of the human race. It underlies everything we have achieved. Downplaying it means to reject modern civilization and rationality. But that may be just what these cretins want.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Good way to turn reasonable people in religious nuts.
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
This is just stupid. Where I live a lot of companies prefer technical school education over university, specifically because the tech. schools offer training, while universities give education. The difference? University teaches you to think for yourself, technical schools teach you a very specific set of skills which don't include how those skills were created or why they are needed. The tech. schools training also has a best-before date. As the industry progressed (without the help of tech. school graduates), their skills become dated, and they either retrain, or become unemployed. So here it is: evolution can be demonstrated in 5 minutes in a classroom. Show that, along with a study on feedback and control systems from engineering, and then show how that applies to the political process, and we are good to go.
If we make sure we don't teach our students how to think, acquiring a larger voting base will be much easier in the future!
If they're going to be teaching creationism in schools, they can hire ICP to teach. I can see the classes now, where they teach the children that everything from quantum mechanics to tectonic plate shifts are caused by miracles, regardless of what anyone else says. Magnets? They're like, double miracles man. Miracles on top of miracles.
Predicted by Dr. Kenneth Miller in his 2006 presentation about the Kitzmiller et al vs Dover.
"The Collapse of Intelligent Design: Will the Next Monkey Trial be in Ohio?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ohd5uqzlwsU
11 years in the making, the weakening of the definition of 'science'.
Can't wait for the PhD in Horoscopes, Witchcraft, etc.
Ha ha! Now you're trapped in Ohio!
> The law forces a religious view onto education, w
Hmm, let's look at the actual text of the law:
A (iii) ... prohibit and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... ; and prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
If you skip past the BS /. headline and read the bill, TFS, or even the subtitle of TFS, the bill basically requires teaching science, not politics with a dash of pseudoscience used to support the teacher's political or religious opinion.
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On the bright side, framing the debate in those terms might help convince the kind of people who would argue that we should "respect all sides of the issue" (or some politically-correct BS like that) that these anti-scientific ideas really don't belong in science class after all. I think the lawmaker did us a favor and I'm optimistic that his plans will backfire.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
arguably this is as much about class as it is about religeon. a largely ignorant majority is how slaveowners for example governed thousands of africans. Keeping the scientific process out of schools is palletable to creationists as it disarms future opponents. Its popular for plutocrats as well for this same reason.
and if you think elected officials in Ohio really care about challenging this legislation, they dont. their children attent private institutions that wont need to adhere to this legislation. andy thompson owns a magazine company. Matt Huffman owns a law firm. on top of this, an ohio senators average salary range is in the starting range of six figures.
Good people go to bed earlier.
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What about the things that underlie the scientific method, like mathematics, philosophy of truth(as opposed to other venues like morality or meaning), and logic?
Not that I disagree that science has accomplished wonders, just that it's built on things that can be argued to be more important since science wouldn't be possible without them.
The BS headline Slashdot used most certainly will not pass, guaranteed. Here's the crux of the bill, which could, in theory, pass:
A (iii) ... prohibit and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
Did you even read TFA? This article summary on slashdot is inflammatory nonsense.
I've been in high school. It's not like they really try to teach people how to apply the scientific method. They describe how the scientific method is supposed to work and then continue shoveling facts at the students. If they aren't going to engage, I'm not sure there's much point in telling students something that they'll ignore.
I have the same problem with teaching evolution in schools. They don't have time to explain it well, so students walk away thinking, "We used to be apes, but one of our ancestors magically changed into a human being because apes' necks are too short to reach the leaves at the tops of the trees." What, that was the giraffe explanation? Damn it!
If they can't be bothered to explain how something works, I'd rather they dropped it in favor of doing an in depth understanding of something else. In an ideal world perhaps everyone would get a renaissance education that would allow them to understand the scientific method. Here in the real world we have to settle for what students will actually bother to learn.
> Religion has no place in schools.
So then you agree with this bill, which says:
A (iii) ... prohibit and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... ; and prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
If you skip past the BS /. headline and read the bill, TFS, or even the subtitle of TFS, the bill basically requires teaching science, not politics with a dash of pseudoscience used to support the teacher's political or religious opinion.
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I really appreciate the scientific method and I agree it's a major milestone but it's not our most important discovery, that would be rule of law. Without rule of law there can be no civilization and without civilization there wouldn't be much science going on.
> only schooling in the Bible for boys, the equivalent of the sharia
That would be religion. This bill prohibits teaching the teacher's religious or political interpretations, instead of teaching actual science. Quote the bill:
A (iii) ... and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A (iv) ... and prohibit a specific political or religious interpretation of the standards' content.
It doesn't matter. The WHOLE reason we're having this debate is not about science. It's not even about creationism or "intelligent design" or however we "evolve" the term.
The Discovery institute (the real organization behind all this) believes fundamentally, society went awry when we did the whole "separation of church and state" thing and that religion in school meant students were better behaved and more obedient, and society as a whole was just better off.
So that's the real end goal - to get religion - or more correctly, Christianity, back into schools so everyone becomes a "good little Christian boy".
(Yes, it glosses over a LOT of things, like racial issues, the fact that there are more religions than just Christianity, etc).
Basically all of society's ills are the direct result of secularism and the pursuit of "things" (money, toys, stuff) instead of spirituality.
It's just that creationism is the wedge issue that can get them in the door the easiest since a lot more Americans believe in it (than say, a great flood happened, or that everything we see was made in a week a few thousand years ago). And once you're in the door, spreading the other beliefs becomes a lot easier.
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The religious view was in the part of the law that you reduced to ellipses:
The essential thesis of creationism (and "Intelligent Design") is that the Scientific Method is bunk because "God did it." This law comes very close to prohibiting teaching the Scientific Method (i.e., "scientific processes"). Connecting the dots is left as an exercise to the reader.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Educator John Taylor Gatto has explained both in writing, (PDF link), and in Death by Pedagogy, as well as in many interviews available on YouTube, that the purpose of the education system is to extend childhood and discourage critical thinking. This is done in order to produce more compliant citizens; otherwise their innovation and inventiveness would both disrupt capitalists' ability to control markets, and deny corporations a complacent and pliable workforce.
Before you dismiss this as just another wild-eyed conspiracy theory you should check out what he has to say. For one thing he gives copious references, most of which can be checked, and most of which use such direct language that there is no possible ambiguity as to the intent of the authors. For another thing, it is perhaps the best and simplest explanation for why the Ohio legislature might enact such otherwise inexplicable legislation.
Ask yourself 'cui bono'. Who will be best served by a citizenry that is less and less critical, and less and less scientifically competent? Then look back at the education you received, look at what has happened to schooling in the meantime, look at what is happening to education now, and place it all into the context that Gatto creates. if after that you can honestly call it a conspiracy theory, go in peace.
'The Economy' is a giant Ponzi scheme whose most pitiable suckers are the youngest among us and the yet-unborn.
Not really. It is so poorly and broadly worded such that it could be interpreted in either way. According to the Ars article, the bill's author has been rather vague about how he interprets it. But if you have a legislature and judiciary that strongly favors, say, a creationism interpretation of reality, it can certainly be bent to considering 'the other guys' has having a particular bent.
It's bad legislation (nothing new here). Not necessarily benign. Yes, Hanlon's Razor suggests incompetence but I personally feel that Occam's Razor suggests malice.
Burma Shave
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
Of course, malice and incompetence are certainly not orthogonal concepts.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
To be fair, high school students are simply not ready in their maturity to seriously study philosophy. Even the freshman college students in my introductory classes could barely handle the basics. The simplest logical problems would just blow their minds.
That's exactly it. Intelligent Design is not a naturalistic argument and so, can't be examined as such. The moment people stop trying to give or demand a naturalistic argument for something that will never fit one is the moment we can get on with our lives. Both sides perpetuate this problem.
Logic isn't hard. Proofs can be hard to devise, but logic itself isn't complicated to follow.
Real philosophy(with prepositional logic) should be something we're teaching before we get to unnecessarily specific esoterica like solving systems of equations.
I disagree. As a species we aren't really all that far removed from survival of the fittest (i.e. the richest, these days) and mob justice.
"The Simpsons: Lisa the Vegetarian (#7.5)" (1995)
Principal Skinner: Uh oh. Two independent thought alarms in one day. The students are overstimulated. Willie! Remove all the colored chalk from the classrooms.
Groundskeeper Willie: I warned ya! Didn't I warn ya? That colored chalk was forged by Lucifer himself.
They won't be happy until we have state-run, Christian madrasas. We look so ignorant and foolish to the world. If we didn't have the world's largest standing army we'd be treated much differently. When I travel I just say "Je suis Canadian."
The stated purpose of this bill is, in a nutshell, to eliminate issues created by the adoption of the "Common Core" Science curriculum (NGSS, actually - http://www.nextgenscience.org/..., but related to Common Core).
The criticism amounts to NGSS having "too much emphasis" on "experiment and learn through evidence-based activities," rather than learning the basic literacy of "this is what we've discovered to be true in physics, chemistry, biology, anatomy, geology, mathematics, etc." Now, you can certainly argue that the NGSS science standards haven't been given enough time to properly judge their impact, and you can certainly argue that the Common Core fosters or harms students' learning. But this is NOT a reactionary "hurr durr, just teach Intelligent Design!" maneuver. It is, instead, an attempt to bring the state's educational institutes back to the older-school "lecturer / student" method of teaching, rather than saying "okay kids, today we're gonna do experiments to figure out how soundwaves work." I can see an argument that a mix of the two approaches is most beneficial, personally.
The bill (http://www.legislature.state.oh.us/bills.cfm?ID=130_HB_597 - read it yourself) states the following:
Chemistry doesn't even show up as a first-class field of study in the NGSS. It also focuses on hands-on, "evidence-based" learning, rather than exposure to the 'known' facts and figures related to it. it specifically prohibits "political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another." Which means, on the one hand, you can argue they can't teach ID (religious interpretation), but you can also argue that they have to be very careful when teaching climate change (political interpretation).
It's not the best-written bill in the world, frankly... but at least criticize it for its REAL shortcomings, not on some imagined "AMG, they're gonna turn 'Murica into Martial Sharia Law LOLOLOL." This is NOT an attempt to introduce some sort of religious interpretation into science education, it is a response to the perceived shortcomings of the Common Core and NGSS standards, which do not focus enough on "basic knowledge and literacy," and instead have a prime focus on evidence-based learning.
You're a society in decline, where any moron can claim that his "opinions" about science is as valid as anybody else's.
Where teaching science is unwelcome, and evidence is equated with "feelings".
You have become a society of morons, for whom evidence based policy is impossible because you don't have the barest understanding of what actually constitutes evidence.
You claim to be opposed to things like the Taliban, but your own religious idiots are just as bad -- they want their beliefs to be held up as facts.
Fucking worthless idiots. Just another fucking reason to hate Americans ... a nuclear capable country rules by idiots who can't grasp science is a recipe for terrible things.
You've been reduced to douche-bag capitalism and a fear of science.
Fuck all y'all.
> The religious view was in the part of the law that you reduced to ellipses:
> (iii) The standards in science shall be based in core existing disciplines of biology, chemistry, and physics; incorporate grade-level mathematics and be referenced to the mathematics standards; focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes;
So are you saying that chemistry is religion, or that mathematics is? The simple fact is that the bill prohibits teaching religious interpretation, twice.
Indeed. However, the Discovery Institute's chance of success depends entirely on obfuscating that goal. There's a lot more people who would support "intelligent design" as some sort of oppressed underdog "scientific theory" than who would support it as the blatant theocratic idea it really is.
It's too bad that more Americans believe in creationism than the great flood, since the latter is a lot more scientifically plausible than the other two ideas you mentioned. I mean, it's pretty clear that the "entire earth" didn't flood, but it may sure have seemed that way to somebody living in what is now the Black Sea about 7600 years ago.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Seems to be 100% flames above. But what is so wrong with the suggestion:
focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes; and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
A school's idea is to give a general understanding to the students in things. Since there has ben a huge amount of science done over the past few milennia, isn't it only natural that these researched facts get the focus rather than the process? The other way round means making everyone re-invent the wheel, leading to them learing about that particular "wheel" ony and missing the big picture.
Understanding the scientific process is essential, but that is not something one can really teach above a pretty basic level. It follows automatically for anyone who even tries to think at all. Sure, there are in-depth topics like error margins on your Amp-meter or ethical questions in medicine. But focusing on such matter over the accumulation of facts is a complete waste of students' time. At least untill they reach university levels.
The last part of prohibiting religious or political interpretation of facts is just plain good manners, and essential in any conversation with an american. Of course, it could be just me that never have heard a non-political argument on the climate denialists part, nor a non-religious interpretation of facts suggesting creationism.
So what is the fuss here? The above comments are full of strawman, smokescreen and ad hominem arguments. Did I miss the one that answers my doubts?
Seems to fit in with their general direction.
It must be election season in Ohio.
About as sensible as rutting season.
We get to see legislators butting heads to stake their turf.
In the wild at least the critters manage to do no harm.
If these folks manage to wound science in order to get elected,
that seems to violate the do no harm thing.
It's funny how everyone always talk about the scientific method, how it's great, why they're right because the scientific method says so, and how their rivals are not using the scientific method. It'd be better if people were doing more than paying lip service to the scientific method.
> Connecting the dots is left as an exercise to the reader.
The bill explicitly prohibits teaching religious interpretations. You're claiming it REQUIRES what it in fact explicitly prohibits. If you're going to say "prohibit" really means "require" , that's a dot you need to connect, or just admit you were tricked the clickbait headline.
In support of the above comment for those (like me) that didn't know ICP [members] are Christians: http://www.theguardian.com/music/2010/oct/09/insane-clown-posse-christians-god
And here's their science test: http://img.wonkette.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/creation-test.jpg
I suffered the ignorant until they started making the decisions. Now I will without hesitation joyfully explain in fine detail exactly how ignorant it is to be part of an Abrahamic religion. Everyone is free to believe whatever they want but imposing dogma instead of scientific reason is insane. Smoke your meth at home and not in a public school.
Well said parent [post].
Counterpoint: civilization existed prior to the rule of law. It was just less pleasant for the non-elites.
Yes, lets blow off the scientific process in favor of teaching about 900 year-old men, a talking donkey and a man who lives inside a fish/whale.
Proposed by those the people of OHIO voted for.
Which may be sufficient to see them ousted next time around, Ohio not being a particularly ignorant state as our states go. Here in the US, politicians think that they have to be religious to be elected (and they may still be right about that) but generally speaking, they aren't controlled by this when in office (look to corporations and the money stream for that.)
In the interim, it's worth keeping in mind the degree of scientific and technological progress that's come out of the USA.
We're not all superstitious wankers, though I can see why it might seem that way sometimes.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
Science has a long history of being perpetually wrong. They said all matter was made of earth, wind, fire, and water or something like that because that's what they observed and logic pointed to it and it was somewhat provable. The same goes for the Earth being flat. The same goes for space being made of aether. The same goes for the sun going around the Earth. The same goes for turning lead into gold. The same goes for asbestos being safe. You name it, science was wrong about it but for all given cases, it was widely accepted as correct at the time.
So as long as they preface the scientific curriculum with that, I think they're fine. Then 10 year from now when they disprove the existence of dark matter, they won't feel so bad. Science is just one long history of turning incorrect theories into facts for no reason and then disproving them.
> Did you miss the part where the bills author finds that the bill would allow the teaching of intelligent design?
That's not in the article, and the bill doesn't say that. The bill PROHIBITS teaching any religious interpretation. That's the plain English text of the bill.
What IS in the article, is that when a reporter asked the clickbait question of whether school boards could consider addressing the topic of intelligent design, one of the sponsors said "“I think it would be good for them to consider the perspectives of people of faith." he didn't say the bill would allow it, which makes sense given that the bill explicitly and clearly prohibits it.
It pains me to think that for at least a generation or so, you will still be able to just buy your educated workforce from other countries that have invested in their public education as infrastructure. Otherwise you'd collapse much faster with all this nonsense.
I want to play Free Market with a drowning Libertarian.
How exactly do you think the richest get to be the richest without the rule of law?
The richest in the olden days (Genghis Khan, Alexander the Great, etc.) were the richest because they had the ability to take the most stuff, mostly through murder/war (which is easier than creating the most stuff for a variety of reasons).
The richest in today's society, for the most part, contribute value to society. The Millionaire Next Door outlines most millionaires as plumbers, roofers, construction people, engineers, etc. People, for the most part, nowadays, do not get rich through outright theft/murder. This is, in sole part, due to the rule of law. The fact that wealth can be obtained without murder/theft is of significant societal benefit.
It helps to read the sentence you're arguing about, before you argue about it.
> No, it means you can't teach, you know science
Here's the full text of the science section of the bill:
The standards in science shall be based in core existing disciplines of biology, chemistry, and physics;
incorporate grade-level mathematics and be referenced to the mathematics standards; focus on academic and scientific knowledge
rather than scientific processes; and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
So you're saying that "biology, chemistry, and physics", "academic and scientific knowledge" isn't "you know science". Hmm.
> The scientific method is the single, most important discovery of the human race.
And its genesis was the notion that a rational God would create a rational world that could be understood by humans, which led to the development of processes by which we could tease out the rules which governed the universe.
When did science stop being a methodology and become a belief system?
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
of fucking morons there are in Ohio that think this is a good thing.
My karma is not a Chameleon.
Which is why it's called Intelligent Design. in fact, when they were converting from Creationism to Intelligent Design, they basically did a search and replace. And they left transition fossils to show how "Creationism" evolved into "Intelligent Design" because of a messed up search-and-replace.
(A transition fossil is just that - if you have animal A and animal B, and you know B evolved from A, then there has to exist a creature in-between A and B, called the transition fossil since evolution works on such timescales that many generations of creatures will exist between then and now).
Yes, there was evolution in the DI texts :).
They don't underly the scientific method. Sorry. Philosophy is partially mathematics and partially funded on the scientific method. Any place where mathematics applies to reality (which are not a lot, considering the extreme diversity of mathematics), is "noisy" (i.e. no exact application), and the application is subject to the scientific method. While it is possible to do mathematics and parts of philosophy in ways not subject to the scientific method, these things then do not apply to (physical) reality and are generally not useful at all. Incidentally, all parts of philosophy and mathematics that are intended to apply to reality are founded on the scientific method. Really. The scientific method is what makes any kind of insight possible.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I have once attended a lecture where a philosophy lecturer tried to explain propositional logic. This was so horribly done, I am sure none of the students understood anything. I also suspect the lecturer was mostly clueless as well. So if you do that, have a mathematician or a Computer Scientist teach it, at least they understand what it can and cannot do.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
A group of savages is not a civilisation.
The "rule of law" is badly broken, have you noticed? It is basically a corrupt bureaucracy that serves to enforce whatever those in power want. You are also completely wrong about civilization.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Current elites are hard at work to get back to that state.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Why on earth is the following being removed?
"The state board shall ensure that the standards do all of the following: ... Be clearly written, transparent, and understandable by parents, educators, and the general public."
Before I can answer, please first tell me what you mean by that.
Yes, logic isn't hard. But seriously questioning all of the assumptions you have made regarding the nature of the universe is hard. For some people it is downright emotionally difficult. It takes a certain level of maturity to be able to accept that you don't know what you don't know.
Yep, those ancient Egyptians and Chinese and Mayans weren't civilizations. Thank you for your totally informed perspective.
"My definition of civilization hinges on the thing I declared caused civilization, thus proving me right" might not be the clever argument you think it is.
Nah, I doubt that they want to go much further back than feudalism. Definitely after the advent of rule of law by a couple millennia.
And why exactly does the scientific method do that? I think you'll find that the utility of falsification is established philosophically, not by observational fiat.
(Sigh) Fine, I'll prove it for you.
In other words, if science is prohibited -- and this law does do that, despite claiming not to -- then religion is required (since those are the only two relevant possibilities). Rejecting the scientific method is itself an inherently religious choice.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
civilization existed prior to the rule of law. It was just less pleasant for the non-elites.
You're defining "law" too narrowly. Think of it more in Judge Dredd terms.
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
To be fair, the bulk of Aristotle's and Plato's students were of high school age. They would disagree with you. Perhaps it's your teaching methodology?
No, we're talking about "rule of law", bro. That's an actual thing with a definition and everything.
As to the "rule of law" in feudalism, look up "l'etat, c'est moi".
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I have seen the code of degreed Computer Scientists. I do not hold the same hope and esteem you seem to.
The process is philosophically driven, but then how else do you acquire knowledge without waiting for a piano to fall on your head?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Note there is no real evidence that the threat of a ghost-father BBQ-ing your ass for eternity if you are bad actually works as an incentive. Shorter-term feedback is usually much much more effective on humans (and all animals).
Table-ized A.I.
Remember how important Ohio is in national elections?
And they almost won it the last couple of times.
They need the electorate just a smidgen dumber, or their vote-stealing software just a tiny bit better, to own Ohio.
It is not. The philosophical underpinning was reverse-engineered from observing that some meta-approaches work better than others. The scientific method is _not_ a research result from philosophy. Its description, on the other hand, is.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
But to knock "how science actually works" off the curriculum in order to make creationism slightly more viable as a meme, knocks a very important and practical tool out of childrens' toolbox for learning about the world.
I think that is the ultimate goal: To "teach" children what "they" think children should know instead of enabling children to actually learn.
Don't try to out wierd me, three-eyes. I get stranger things than you, free with my breakfast cereal. --Zaphod Beeblebr
There's no way to articulate how just hard I rolled my eyes at that over HTTP.
I can't see any other way to interpret that except as saying that science itself is beyond human comprehension and fundamental to the universe.
I don't think there is an ultimate goal. It's easier to see through the lens of people trying to use the educational system to justify their own personal beliefs.
It's about time some states learn their place in today's world: to produce ditch-diggers, waiters and other menial labor drones. You don't need to know about the scientific process or even how babby is formed when you're serving me and mine our steak and lobster.
Now STFU and get back to work! That road isn't going to patch itself!
Technically that would be either tribalism or barbarism, not the same thing at all. Either way, my point stands, not much science going on there.
The Discovery Institute... has nothing to d with science and everything to do with undermining it. ... ... ... ...
The American Family Association
The Family Research Council
Family Values
(Basically anything family has nothing to do with actual caring families, and everythng to do with opposing LGBT rights)
Heritage...
Enterprise...
Freedom...
ACLJ (American Center for Law and Justice)
Why so many misnomers over on that side?
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
more correctly, the Southern Baptist form of Christianity, which from science to women's rights, are in total agreement with Wahhabism.
The "rule of law" is badly broken, have you noticed?
It's been bent, that's for certain but it takes quite a bit more bending than we've experienced before it actually breaks. See Somalia for an example of what it looks like when it's broken.
Here we go. a giant list.
http://www.sourcewatch.org/wik...
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Technically that would be either tribalism or barbarism
No, it's really not. Ancient China and Ancient Egypt both lacked formal legal systems for centuries while being organized empires.
And while you're at it, be sure to remove that bit about "science must be based on math" in the same law too. All Good Scientists just KNOW that little unimportant disciplines like math and philosophy can never hold any sway over True Science.
Believe it or not, you can't actually formulate the modern scientific method without a concept of god. (An anti-concept actually, as it is strongly atheistic) Some will argue we've rejected that kind of hard atheistic naturalism in science, but... Look around a bit.
Good science is falsifiable (thanks Karl Popper) and, ideally, predictive. It shouldn't require a mountain of apology to get a handle on it. (a mountain of math? surely... language? not so much)
So that's the real end goal - to get religion - or more correctly, Christianity, back into schools so everyone becomes a "good little Christian boy"
More correctly, their version of Christian theology. When I point out to them that the Catholic Church has stated that evolution and the scientific method are not in conflict they get upset. They point out the Catholic Church is not the decider and get even more steamed when I remind him that Jesus founded the Catholic Church as His Church and thus it and the Pope speak for God; and it says so in the Bible and why do they not believe in the Bible? They claim to be Christians, after all.
That's the real problem. When people want to bring back God into school they mean their version of God which isn't necessarily someone else's. They often claim they want to give religion equal time but get very upset when someone brings religious beliefs in they don't approve of.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Seems to me the problem is anyone who:
a) wants to push Secularism out of schools in favor of Christianity
b) wants to push Christianity out of schools in favor of Secularism
Most other folks I don't have a problem with.
Want to be Philosophically Naturalistic? Go ahead, don't push it on me when I don't ask for it.
Want to be Christian? Go ahead, don't push it on me when I don't ask for it.
(pushing things on innocent kids goes double, I can actually handle the shoving better than they can)
Don't forget how the Texas Republicans opposed the teaching of critical thinking strongly enough to actually put it into their party platform.
I prefer to call it an invention rather than a discovery. It gives more credit to the people who developed it. Either way, I agree, there is literally no other thing that comes close to having the positive impact of the scientific method.
The section of the bill and what it says exactly:
The standards in science shall be based in core existing disciplines of biology, chemistry, and physics; incorporate grade-level mathematics and be referenced to the mathematics standards; focus on academic and scientific knowledge rather than scientific processes; and prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another.
It does not say they can't teach the scientific process. It says their focus should be on the knowledge gained from it prohibits religious or political interpretations of those facts.
Once again, the left's opinions are just as stupid as the rights. If you jumped to a conclusion on this story before reading the actual bill, you're the problem. You're easily manipulated by a group of people that are playing to your preconceived notions and fears just to engender false outrage to discredit their opponents. The Right has Fox news, Rush, etc... The left Has arstechnica, msnbc, etc... It's all BS. For the love of God think for yourself and stop voting for people with (D) or (R) after their names.
A certain direction, eh. "Prohibit religious interpretation " is a step in which direction, exactly?
Yes. many of them DO get rich through rule of law.
Specifically laws that make it legal to exploit the poor, the underprivilidged, the weak, etc.
Or to pass down billions to their children to keep it in the family, lest anyone ever actually have to "work".
You'll have to remind me how they contribute to society though.
Oh wait I know...this is the one I get told all the time: think of all those poor Walmart worker, who would be jobless if not for Walmart. Why, they're doing them a favor by even hiring them. Therefore the Waltons and Walmart deserve every dime they get by exploiting the social safety that keeps their workers from dying and starving homeless in the street cause their job doesn't pay them enough to prevent from being homeless.
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
rule of law back then was "Whatever the Lord of the Manor says, is the law".
The guy who said the election was rigged won the presidency with the second-most votes.
Bullshit. No concept of god is required, not even a negative one. You can derive that if the scientific method works then there is no god, but that goes the other way round. You can also not prove that the scientific method works, you can just observe it. Why do people always screw up implications?
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
... and we can't have that...
www.nazigassings.com
The whole thing is a Jewish LIE. Don't believe me, try researching it yourself. Watch 'One third of the Holocaust', 'The last days of the big lie', etc.
You are a moron. Calling it a thing it is not is a very anti-science thing to do. Really, how stupid can you get?
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
Yeah because without fire we would be fine.
> For some people it is downright emotionally difficult.
Actually... for everyone it ALWAYS is. That's the nature of world-view.
It's just that, it's often very difficult to understand someone else well enough to know enough about their world-view to put it in any kind of real jeopardy. (ie: discomfort)
In fact. It's actually a personal attack to begin tearing apart someone's understanding of the world when they aren't interested and don't want to participate.
Part of why so many folks get fired up about what should/shouldn't be presented to young students and how it should be offered up.
Yep, those ancient Egyptians and Chinese and Mayans weren't civilizations. Thank you for your totally informed perspective.
"My definition of civilization hinges on the thing I declared caused civilization, thus proving me right" might not be the clever argument you think it is.
They weren't savages and they had the LAW. Maybe not Roman Law but Law nonetheless.
Without Law there can be no civilization. Thanks for proving my point.
Oh, so we're clear... you are an upside-down Science is my God nut. Meta-physics (one little branch of philosophy) is responsible for pretty much every branch of scientific inquiry you're fond of... and that's just the philosophical pinky flexing.
Let me know when your experiments are done growing your own brain in a vat with perfect forward predictability and you're able to "prove" the universe is the never changing holographic crystal you always thought it was in the first place...
You know, as opposed to something a bit more chaotic and interesting that us mere mortals can never quite get a complete handle on...
Those desiring education of intelligent design here in Ohio have been infiltrating the board of eduction for years. This is just another embarrassment most likely welcomed by our current governor who just happens to be anti-public eduction. As usual it's a silent baby step, that this time, got noticed.
Not teaching the scientific process may just make things worse. Doubt is a fundamental tennet of science, but many religious people (e.g. Kirk Cameron and his ilk) feel that they were "just told to believe this stuff" when they were in school. Without knowledge of the process that led to this knowledge, students will just start to treat science as an alternate bad religion or something.
Now, many kids handle uncertainty poorly, so this has to be handled carefully, but I think it's critical that science be tought as "this is the best explanation we have." Now, basically everything taught in high school is so well established (misrepresentations not withstanding), so we can explain that what they're being taught is consistent with mountains of evidence. But with the key factor that this stuff, at one time in the past, was cutting edge knowledge and did deserve to be taken with a big grain of salt. This can be expressed in terms of the history and evolution of particular sciences. We understood A at this time, and then someone discovered something, and views shifted accordingly to B. See how new evidence lead to a BETTER understanding through the scientific process??? What we're learning now has pretty well been beaten into submission, but understand that questioning assumptions is an important thing for people to learn.
Religion takes cultural constructs, wraps them up in "God's on our side" dressing, and presents them as facts. How to come to terms with this in a free society is a fascinating introduction to psychology, sociology, and history.
I would also argue that "Intelligent Design" isn't Christian. Arguing that God exists because the world is made the same way a human would make it isn't biblical. An all knowing God doesn't need reason to create anything. An all powerfull God does not care about efficiency. Human asthetics from human culture/biology isn't going to influance how God creates the world. Intelligent Design anthropomorphizes God into a man. You wind up with Zeus instead of a pillar of fire/burning bush/rock of ages.
"rather than scientific processes" does not mean "rather than the scientific method." But like any other vaguely worded law, it will be up to the enforcers to decide what constitutes "scientific processes." Frankly, if you want to weed politics out of the "science," the ONLY way to do that IS the scientific method. Which would mean, forming your own opinion based on the evidence you as an individual observe. With that in mind, neither side wants people forming their own opinions. Congratulations. We are now reaping the results of you people using government to get what you want from other people.
Good intentions my pasty white ass.
Now I will without hesitation joyfully explain in fine detail exactly how ignorant it is to be part of a fundamentalist Abrahamic religion.
FTFY. There are plenty of non-fundie mainstream religions, Abrahamic and otherwise, that recognize science (and in particular, scientific explanations of origins) as correct.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
The heart of philosophy is critical thinking. Asking "what is true" necessarily involves asking "how do we know if these methods of acquiring truth are good ones?" and so on. The various ramblings of historical philosophers are a side-effect of this. Misunderstanding of that tends to give the discipline a bad name.
Philosophy is not "founded on the scientific method." Quite the opposite. The scientific method is an example of critical thinking at work.
Historically speaking, the scientific method, as we know it today, was refined over many decades by various famous philosophers. The scientific method was born from philosophy, and that is an historical fact.
Lastly, the scientific method remains an axiomatic system founded upon a small set of metaphysical assumptions about the universe....but an analysis that deep is reserved for people who have studied enough philosophy do discuss it intelligently (and without anger).
I have a theory I call "The 8 - Percent Rule".
Based on about 8 % of the population believing:
in UFOs,
Elvis being alive,
Crystal Power,
Satanist power,
and any other crazy-ass thing...
I fugure about 8 % of the people probably believe evolution ( Darwinism ) is a religious belief,
and that 8% believe that everyone who plays guitar are going to hell...
not necessarily the same people...
I also believe that maybe 8 % of politicians are honest, 8% of rock bands are religious, and that
manipulation of the education process past reading/writing/arithmetic/history(unedited, unselective)/Science (unedited, unselective)/
is counterproductive and wrong.
So there is an 8 % chance that the bill will pass, and an 8 % chance that the students will not notice the flavor of the meal/curriculum,
and an 8 % chance that at least one student will sue for being uneducated when they graduate.
Recent comments by Alan Greenspan paint a dire picture of primary education in the United States:
Under such dire circumstances and an existential threat, now is not the time for bias.
Actually... for everyone it ALWAYS is. That's the nature of world-view.
I quite disagree. While I agree that for the vast majority it starts out that way (thus requiring a certain level of maturity to even start), you quickly lose the emotional aspect through repetition if you are not overly resistant.
The rest of what you say is quite true. Those with no interest in discussing philosophical concepts will not have developed the emotional disconnect and will take everything in disagreement with their world view as a personal attack.
Oh, what laws did they have? Please tell me about egyptian law under the nomarchs?
What they had was a society. Implied restrictions on behavior aren't the same as laws.
Downplaying the scientific method means rejecting rationality? Do you not know?
Rationalism is the system of which to derive conclusions in a way that does not need empirical evidence. It is logic via a priori knowledge. Rationalism has been used as applied logic as far back as logic goes. The problem with it is it can come up with many extraneous solutions. The scientific method, meaning testing, eliminates those extraneous solutions.
The scientific method is not necessary for rational thought. Rational thought is necessary for the scientific method.
Another point:
It underlies everything we have achieved.
Clearly not. Logic is in the running, though building on past achievements is my pick for the most important discovery. That would go to complex communication or writing or somesuch. Without being able to build on what we know we would still be banging rocks together, each generation having to rediscover fire.
Cataclysmic floods are commonly accepted as having happened now days and probably did influence early paleolithic cultures who would have been around to witness them. The ones that jumps out to me in the Americas are the various emptying of Glacial Lake Missoula in Montana. Other such events happened in Europe and Asia at the end of the last ice age so there would have been a number of flood stories of entire groups of people washed away.
Time to offend someone
You took up the challenge of trying to connect those dots. Nice. That requires more courage than many commenters on Slashdot have, and more thought than many put into their comments. I have one further challenge for you, one you might find rather interesting. I'll put the challenge at the bottom of this post.
Most of what you said is so full of weasel words "essentially, close enough" that I think you realize how weak that line of argument is. So I'll address the one assertion that you may truly and fully believe. You said "the Scientific Method (P) is (essentially) the opposite of religion (Q): P". From my perspective, such an idea indicates a rather bizarre understanding of either science or religion. Let's look at each.
Science:
“Everything must be taken into account. If the fact will not fit the theory---let the theory go.”
A good scientific theory is "a coherent set of propositions that explain a class of phenomena, that are supported by extensive factual evidence, and that may be used for prediction of future observations."
So if one scientists proposes a theory which predicts that mixing sodium and chlorine will produce gold, while another says that it will produce salt, we can test each. The one that produces good, true results in the better theory. Do we agree so far?
Religion:
Asked about how to tell teachers of the truth from "false prophets": “You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit." (Jesus, in Mathew 7).
A good pastor (teacher) is one whose teaching results in good fruits such as happy marriages, well-adjusted kids, and a fulfilling life.
Physics looks at what happens with objects (the apple falls from the tree), tries to come up with a set if rules that describe as accurately as possible what happens (Newton's law of universal gravitation), then applies those rules to make predictions about future situations (if you let go of THAT glass, it will fall).
Chemistry looks at what happens with molecules, tries to come up with a set if rules that describe as accurately as possible what happens, then applies those rules to make predictions about future situations.
Let's compare religion:
"Wisdom will save you also from the adulterous woman, from the wayward woman with her seductive words, who has left the partner of her youth and ignored the covenant she made before God. Surely her house leads down to death."
Elsewhere repeated as:
"keep you from your neighbor’s wife, from the smooth talk of a wayward woman. Do not lust in your heart after her beauty or let her captivate you with her eyes. For a prostitute can be had for a loaf of bread, but another man’s wife preys on your very life."
Someone noticed that in many cases they observed, adultery lead to trouble. They formulated a rule describing that "adultery leads to trouble", and suggest you use that to make predictions future situations - if you engage in adultery, that will probably lead to trouble.
The same observations led the same author to predict how an experiment could be conducted that would achieve the desired result:
"may you rejoice in the wife of your youth. A loving doe, a graceful deer— may her breasts satisfy you always, may you ever be intoxicated with her love. Why, my son, be intoxicated with another man’s wife?"
This is, in my opinion, not unlike a set of instructions for chemistry "use potassium nitrate, not potassium nitrite, for best results".
"Suppose one of you wants to build a tower. Won’t you first sit down and estimate the cost to see if you have enough money to complete it? For if you lay the foundation and are not able to finish it, everyone who sees it will ridicule you, saying, ‘This person began to build and wasn’t able
Because they sound good. It's like a diploma mill PhD, it lends a ton of credence to your publications, while not actually meaning anything.
I don't mind creationism... as long they don't oppose the teaching of ALL the other theories of creation... :)
Sounds about right. Being raised in a fundamentalist baptist church I figure that if there is a god and it is the god of the Abrahamic religions I should have no problem getting into heaven for time already served. The fact that I didn't become a raging self loathing ass hole amazes me given the amount vitriol and hate that I was brought up with. In addition to the standard cruft that most are familiar with in that church there was a fair amount of how other races carried the Mark of Cain and this was in the early '80s.
Time to offend someone
Nope, they don't underlie the scientific method. They are merely tools of the scientific method. Immeasurably useful tools, but it is the scientific method at the base, not mathematics, logic or philosophy. When experiment shows that mathematical models can successfully predict observed phenomena, those mathematical models are used. When experiment fails to show that such models do so, they are tossed out. They may still be of interest to mathematicians, but scientists have no further use for them.
...
So that's the real end goal - to get religion - or more correctly, Christianity, back into schools so everyone becomes a "good little Christian boy".
...
Or even more correctly Evangelical Fundamentalist Christianity into schools. The Fundamentalist bloc is a political powerful sect in the U.S., but fairly unimportant in world Christianity; but has managed to misappropriate the term "Christianity" to only apply to themselves in practice. We shouldn't propagate this erroneous usage.
Starships were meant to fly, Hands up and touch the sky - Nicky Minaj
I call that an emphasis on teaching the scientific facts (average temperature increased by 0.02C, methane increased by 0.01%) rather than putting the emphasis on Al Gore's idea of what processes might lead to those facts (hair spray has CFCs, which causes butterflies to .... therefore California will be underwater by 2010).
I kind of prefer scientific knowledge myself.
I'm not sure if the irony in your post is intentional. The bill says the emphasis should be on scientific knowledge and facts, rather than spending most of their time on one person's idea of what process might result in those facts. Present the facts, the knowledge, and let the students analyze whether or not that proves a process in place which will have California underwater by 2010 (oops, I guess not). Your objection to presenting facts rather than potential processes is "they'll never learn to question your authority". You realize that's precisely what your advocating, that their time be spent hearing about Al Gore's guess as to the process, rather than hear the facts for themselves.
Were you aware that the *word* "nomarch" comes from the Ancient Greek, nomos, meaning law?
Yes, go ahead. Please I assume your familiarity there means you're ready to actually answer the damned question.
And not how to think. You only need to do that if your ideas are not convincing and yet you have a vested interest in getting people to believe them.
...had an impending dustbowl and starvation issue.
We were taught that a large part of the issue had to do with the types of herd animals that were popular over there at the time (sheep and goats).
You see, sheep and goats tear grass out by the roots when they graze; killing it. Cattle and horses crop the grass, which is basically what your lawnmower does.
This was at an American school, overseas.
A decade or two later...
Now, we have a similar thing going on, but it is something we all need to think about.
Unfortunately, Big Sheep wants the teachers to keep their yaps shut.
Baaa...
I agree, only that calling it a discovery is also downplaying it. There wasn't a Platonic ideal of the scientific method floating around beyond the spheres for us to discover. We had to invent it ourselves. We actually invented a new, reproducible kind of thinking.
Explain again how a "focus on scientific knowledge " somehow magically prohibits teaching knowledge of microorganisms? About that Bible thing - I guess you missed "prohibit religious " in the law.
Fucking magnets! How do they work?
I heard something very interesting recently about the separation of church and state. Many of us may already know that the US constitutional support for that separation comes from the first amendment, specifically the establishment clause: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion". This in itself not a separation of church and state, and never was until about the beginning of the 20th century.
But it isn't the timeline that's interesting. It's who supported the change, and why. The historical record tells us the primary supporters of the separation of church and state were Protestant Christians. Why? Because they hated Catholics. The Catholics had all these schools and hospitals, and Protestants didn't want any government money going to them. Protestants didn't want Catholic teachers making religious statements in public schools, either. But for quite a long time, Protestants were allowed to engage their classes in school prayer and bible study even after the Supreme Court definitively established the separation of church and state. This was because it was commonly believed that while Catholics were merely mouthpieces for their Church and ultimately the Pope, Protestants are individually-minded. As long as you're only teaching the children your personal faith, it's not government respecting an "establishment" of religion. Not like spreading the teachings of a particular "establishment" like the Catholic Church.
The great irony of this situation comes from how much Protestant Christianity has changed over the last 200 years. Certain sects now are obsessed with absolute truth in the same way that made 19th century Protestants deeply suspicious of Catholics. While it may have been true at one point that Protestant teachers could preach their individual faith, now there is a set doctrine set by the church. Anybody straying from that doctrine would almost certainly be railroaded out of town, religious freedom be damned. Most Christian organizations now require staff and participants to sign a statement of belief that would have offended our founding fathers. Or confused them. A lot of the ideas 21st century Christians believe didn't even exist 200 years ago.
Tragically, the pursuit of absolute truth tends to also lead to historical revisionism. Soon the only history taught to our children will paint our country as a monolithic Christian establishment. The ideas that didn't exist 200 years ago have become founding principles of our nation. And like every group that has turned towards rewriting its own history, we will gradually forget the foundations of our greatness and fade into nothingness.
I sometimes ask revealing, often ignorant-seeming questions. Maybe they're harder to answer than you think.
It depends on how you want to define the terms of course, but essentially what I'm talking about is that society is run by an agreed on set of rules that transcend individual rulers. You don't need lawyers or a written legal code to live under rule of law. For example, some biker gangs are ruled by the strongest most dominant member who does whatever he wants and tells everyone else what to do, or else. That is not rule of law, that's barbarism. On the other hand, other biker gangs have a set of bylaws that are in effect that determine appropriate behavior, how the leader is selected, etc. that is rule of law despite the fact that it's a biker gang. As with most things, it's not a binary issue, instead it's a continuum that flows from barbarism to civilization.
FTFY. There are plenty of non-fundie mainstream religious people, Abrahamic and otherwise, that recognize the scientific method is meaningful.
FTFY. We can be pretty sloppy with language. It is English after all. So I just wanted to make your point clear and remove the sloppy things that make it easier to *ahem* crucify your argument.
(Science is not something that is "correct" or "incorrect"; it's a meaningful way of observing the world, reducing human bias of those observations, and making meaningful predictions. Focusing on the results as "correct" falls into the trap this law would inflict on our students: without the scientific method, evolution is just another idea with as much evidence, or maybe even less, than the Christian creation myth. As for "religious people", I just don't think that any organizations, not being people, could hold religious beliefs ;) )
I sometimes ask revealing, often ignorant-seeming questions. Maybe they're harder to answer than you think.
You're definitely right that science is not the opposite of religion. There are too many atheists who don't understand that. But there are also far too many Christians who don't understand it either. Otherwise they wouldn't be getting all offended by evolution. I really don't understand why it's so important to some people that the first few chapters of Genesis literally happened. Does it matter? I thought it was just supposed to be parables about human nature.
Also, Proverbs may be part of the Abrahamic tradition, but you're ignoring eastern faith completely. There is no Book of Proverbs in Buddhism or Hinduism. I know that "most of" lets you weasel an implication that "most" people believe in God, but the world is more diverse than that.
I sometimes ask revealing, often ignorant-seeming questions. Maybe they're harder to answer than you think.
I thought about that as I was writing them, and I apologize. Let me clarify:
First, on the use of "essentially:"
My claim that science is the opposite of religion depends on the context, which I explained in my previous posts (and which I go into further detail about below). In some other context, perhaps atheism would be the opposite of religion (but not in this context -- when comparing to science as I'm doing, atheism is every bit as religious as Christianity).
These things are complicated concepts, and if you're going to make a claim that complicated concepts are opposites of each other then you have to clarify what aspect of them, or in what sense, they are opposite. I'd like to think I've done a decent job of that, but I included the word "essentially" to try to prevent the rebuttal that science and religion weren't opposite in some context other than the one to which I was referring.
Second, on the use of "close enough:"
If a law prohibits teaching the Scientific Method, then it establishes religion. Absolutely. No weasel words about it.
However, this law doesn't quite do that. Instead it "merely" removes the "focus" on the Scientific Method -- it uses weasel words itself to attempt to effectively prohibit teaching the Scientific Method without explicitly doing so; i.e., it's "close enough."
You seem to think that just because an idea happens to be written in the Bible, that that makes it a "religious idea." That is a fallacy. If an idea is similar to that of the Scientific Method, then it is scientific, even if it as a quote by Jesus.
I liked that quote about "false prophets," by the way -- I would expect it to surprise and upset creationists (or at least the less well-read ones, who haven't already incorporated it into their cognitive dissonance). If "Intelligent Design" were able to produce "fruits" (i.e., falsifiable hypotheses), then it would become legitimately scientific. But it doesn't, so it isn't.
Those things aren't similar at all. The differences are the tools that are allowed to be used to evaluate and accomplish those goals, and indeed what kinds of goals are valid.
Science is concerned with understanding how and why things do work (using rigorous logical and mathematical models). In contrast, your statement about what religion tries to do is all about making rules to enforce how things should work. Science is strictly objective and descriptive; religion is inherently subjective and prescriptive.
If you're a chemist, for example, and you decide to disregard the results of your experiment because they aren't "good," then you are no longer practicing proper science.
Incidentally, it's possible for an idea to become more or less scientific over time. Who knows; maybe some Babylonian sociologist did a comprehensive, well-researched study of adultery and that passage you quoted ("Wisdom will save you also from the adulterous woman...") was the conclusion of his scholarly journal. That would be scientific! (Well, sort of, anyway -- s
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
(Sigh) Fine, I'll prove it for you.
You fail at logic.
I think you'll find that the utility of falsification is established philosophically, not by observational fiat.
But falsification is at best marginally relevant to science, which is the discipline (not method) of publicly testing ideas by systematic observation, controlled experiment and Bayesian inference.
Falsification simply never comes into it, outside of outlandishly models of science promoted by ignorant philosophers. Promoters of "scientific method" and falsification are almost never scientists, and most scientists will quietly ridicule the ideas if you give them a couple of beer.
Bayesian logic is established by mathematical deduction using an argument from invariance of a kind that originated within mathematical physics (Einstein's arguments for relatively are the most famous of the kind).
Philosophers don't even have the right goal--they are always running after "certainty", which we now know to be a epistemic error. Knowledge is not certain and cannot be certain, because only Bayesian reasoning can produce knowledge, and Bayesian reasoning is not capable of producing a posterior plausibility of 1 or 0 (ie certainty).
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
I stand by my original comment. I was not being sloppy with my language. There are indeed many mainstream religions (or perhaps more correctly, prominent sects thereof) that accept science and the scientific explanations of origins, and have stated as much in their official positions. (Organizations may not have beliefs, but they can have positions.) For them, the origin myths are philosophical and allegorical, not historical or factual.
I just used the word "correct" to be pithy. I agree that science is not something that is "correct" or "incorrect" or that it claims to be able to reveal absolute truth. But I do maintain strongly (and I think you would agree) that science is indisputably the best way to achieve an understanding of nature that is as close as possible to the truth (whatever it may be) even though that understanding needs occasional revision. And despite what you may think, there are many religious organizations that officially hold that position too.
If it weren't for deadlines, nothing would be late.
I really appreciate the scientific method and I agree it's a major milestone but it's not our most important discovery, that would be rule of law. Without rule of law there can be no civilization and without civilization there wouldn't be much science going on.
I'd argue that the rule of law is a result of applying the scientific method to social structure and governance.
The scientific method really consists of making conjectures and analyzing them critically. Some of the criticism comes from experimentation and analysis, but most conjectures never reach that point because simple thought can identify reasons they should be discarded. This process is closely related to (but vastly more powerful than) the mutation and selection process of evolution. At bottom, both are about creating and testing ideas, and selecting the ones that are objectively better (for the relevant definition of "better"). The scientific method does the selection through a tradition of criticism, natural evolution does it via replication (favoring the gene that replicates itself better).
How does this apply to the rule of law? Three ways. First of all, applying the same principle of progress to social structure, trying new methods and keeping those which work well while discarding those which don't, will lead to rule of law because it clearly is a superior social structure "technology". Second, without the rule of law, you really can't apply the scientific method to social structures, because there is no defined structure beyond the whim of the ruler(s). You have to fix the rules firmly so you can see what the outcomes are, and you can observe how to vary them. So any attempt to apply scientific reasoning to governance demands rule of law.
Third, and most important, the tradition of criticism inherent in and necessary to scientific progress inevitably leads people to criticize their government and to demand, among other things, the ability to understand the rules by which they're governed. I don't believe it's possible for any society with a significant number of scientific thinkers with any sort of influence to remain governed by fiat.
I think history bolsters my argument, too, simply based on the sequence of events. The Enlightenment was all about scientific reasoning and learning how to apply it to nearly all areas of human endeavor, not just science, and the Enlightenment came before the spread of the rule of law, not after.
Oh, actually I think there's a fourth reason scientific thinking creates the rule of law. It's even deeper, and is probably the truly fundamental reason, though it's a harder argument to make. That is that moral values are scientifically determined (even if we don't realize it), and the rule of law is morally right. It would take me a few pages to detail how and why I think that moral rightness is a real, determinable thing, derivable from the laws of nature, and not merely an artifact of culture, so I won't bother. Note that I'm not arguing that correct morality is easy to derive. It's not, any more than it was easy to derive General Relativity by conjecturing about observations of reality. But it can be derived, and in the same method: by conjecturing moral positions and then criticizing them, both logically and experimentally, discarding positions that lead to undesirable outcomes.
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No, they claim to be "Reformation Christians", and from there it breaks down hard.
but dont mind saying it again: nothing good comes from Ohio.
I'd argue that the rule of law is a result of applying the scientific method to social structure and governance.
That's a much more optimistic view of how societies are formed than I think is warranted. You're suggesting that A) The scientific method arose prior to the rule of law B) That the earliest civilizations were deliberately structured and C) That there was some kind of rational review process that went on to throw out bad social structures and try new ones
First of all, I was not proposing a categorical imperitive. Obviously everyone matures at different rates. I've met 15 year olds who were more mature than some 40 year olds. In general though, high school aged people in the United States lack the maturity neccessary for serious study of philosophy.
As to the age of the bulk of Aristotle's and Plato's students, interesting. Do you have a source for this? Aristotle did not study with Plato until he was 18, and the Platonic Academy was a highly selective group for discussing philosophical problems. It does not appear to me that it was a place for the young. Either way, different cultures result in different levels of maturity at different ages. My statement is only appropriate to the United States as I do not understand any other culture well enough to claim I know how mature people tend to be at different ages.
I see the glass as full with a FoS of 2.
So, can God create a monopole?
Huh?
You're making some sort of philosophical distinction that doesn't exist for scientists and engineers. "Systematic observation, controlled experiment and Bayesian inference" ***IS PRECISELY*** the method by which Science falsifies hypotheses which fail to match the behavior of reality.
If you thought that "falsification" in the scientific method was performed by some other means (eg. mathematical proofs) then you misunderstood it.
I remind him that Jesus founded the Catholic Church as His Church and thus it and the Pope speak for God; and it says so in the Bible
Say what? I have read through several versions of the christian bible and at no point do I recall Jesus founding the Catholic Church.
In Wikipedia terms: Citation Needed.
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
Re: creationists
When I point out to them that ...
They are insane - insane and (somewhat) nice, but still insane. Don't expect logic to work.
The problem is not that there is no evidence of intelligent design. There is plenty evidence. Me typing this right now is such evidence. The problem is that to an ID-ologist, everything is evidence is intelligent design. If there were a contradiction (e.g. sedimentary fossil record) it is explained away as action of that designer or even worse, a trick played by a mischievous wrecker. Take away the scientific method as a tool to test a hypothesis and this "theory" can be said to be as good as any other.
But schools should prepare students to at least reject what is patently false. Somehow in the 21st Century developed world people still believe in perpetual motion machines. People are convinced that exponential growth can continue indefinitely. People are convinced that exponential growth formula can be applied to non-growth phenomena, e.g improved test scores or stock markets.
I remind him that Jesus founded the Catholic Church as His Church and thus it and the Pope speak for God; and it says so in the Bible
Say what? I have read through several versions of the christian bible and at no point do I recall Jesus founding the Catholic Church.
In Wikipedia terms: Citation Needed.
"Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it... Feed my lambs; feed My sheep" (Matt. 16:18,19; John 21:15,17); thus establishing Peter as the first Pope and an unbroken line of succession has followed.
Star Trek terms: The only canon is that taught by the Catholic Church
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
To take this a step farther: "Science" is an epistemology. It's a way of coming to knowledge. Science will NEVER BE 'correct.' One of the basic tenants of a scientific hypothesis is that it needs to be falsifiable. Science just strives and strives to be *more* correct than it was. As opposed to faith, aka 'belief despite evidence,' aka 'pretending to know things you don't know, then making plans and decisions based on that.'
Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
Hm. I am not entirely certain that counts... but okay. It is more legitimate of a claim than any other assuming they can indeed prove an unbroken lineage.
"Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
> That entire section of the bill is terribly worded, incredibly vague and leaves it open to a great deal of misinterpretation. ...
>
> Take the following line":
> "prohibit political or religious interpretation of scientific facts in favor of another."
Good point. That line is grammatically invalid and has no definite meaning. Also, the line about focusing on scientific knowledge and scientific facts more than processes is, I believe, INTENDED to mean:
"focus on the facts about climate, rather than a given theory about processes possibly involved in climate change ".
The wording is so unclear, if someone wanted to be silly they could even misinterpret it to mean they shouldn't teach much about how to do science - the process of heating a beaker, or the scientific method.
This is all quite unfortunate. Somewhere along the way, "the end is nigh" alarmists took the lead on climate change, with my stepdaughter being taught in school that by 2015 there would be no snow on Kilimanjaro. It's almost 2015, and Kilimanjaro is still covered with snow, so of course I'm going to push back on that crap being taught to my newborn daughter.
OK I am no bible thumper, but even I know one of the primary precepts is that man was created is his own image (i.e. god's own image).
That sort of kills the whole "anthropomorphizes" argument entirely, as Man would look like God... That said, one could argue what image means, and all what that entails, or even what it was translated from...
Personally I believe it is a bunch of BS not worth arguing about in the slightest anyway.
Soon when people say that going after a particular scientist because of their views on climate change is a witch hunt, it will ACTUALLY be a witch hunt. Burn her!
Hopefully it will be of the Monty Python variety... Science! http://www.urbandictionary.com...!
Thanks for the interesting discussion.
> Science is concerned with understanding how and why things do work (using rigorous logical and mathematical models). In contrast, your statement about what religion tries to do is all about making rules to enforce how things should work. Science is strictly objective and descriptive; religion is inherently subjective and prescriptive.
I suppose that's a matter of perspective. I do pyrotechnics. While learning about pyrotechnics, the sources will repeatedly remind you "do not mix chlorates with sulfur, because it will become friction sensitive and could explode". That's applied chemistry. That's quite similar to "do not screw your neighbor's wife, because he may become enraged and kill you". The primary test of a scientific proposition is whether it's predictive - if it correctly tells us what will happen in a given situation. Testing the science, or applying it, means we have statements of the form "if you do this, this will happen". Same with the religious passages - "if you screw your neighbor's wife, that will put your life in danger".
Note the whole "God smite you down" thing is something you made up. That's not in the passage. In fact, it suggests the opposite. The passage is "For a prostitute can be had for a loaf of bread, but another man’s wife preys on your very life." It says a hooker is cheap, screwing another man's wife could cost you your life. Is that because God approves of screwing hookers, but will kill you for screwing a neighbor's wife? Or is it because your neighbor might kill your dumb ass when he comes home from lunch while you're pumping his wife up the butt? I think the latter is more reasonable interpretation.
See also Leviticus 14, and tell me that's the opposite of science, in any way, shape or form. I think you'll need to fall back to your position that most of the Bible is in no way religious. That's an interesting definition of religious.
I agree with you. I do! But even if it's just to be pithy, calling science "correct", or as happens more frequently, claiming to "believe" science or scientific theories, suggests to the ignorant that science is equivalent to faith. If it were just a matter of what to believe, science and Christian literalism would be equally valid. But that's not the point. And since the ignorant are everywhere, we must always be more careful talking about science.
I sometimes ask revealing, often ignorant-seeming questions. Maybe they're harder to answer than you think.
Makes me embarrased to live in Ohio.
Sorry, but all mathematics and all theory, including the scientific method are "discovered". They cannot be "invented". Read up on the philosophical basics if you do not believe that.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
You are overlooking the question of consistency of your chosen axioms with reality. That is very much a part of rationality. In fact, it is the basis. Deriving things from axioms is just a tool that usually comes in handy and is required in basically all practical applications of rationality, but it is not strictly necessary if you get axiom consistency with reality in some other way (which is not practical, hence reasoning is usually regarded as a part of rationality).
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I firmly believe in the theory of evolution. But does the theory of evolution discount intelligent design? I see no evidence in the theory of evolution to discount intelligent design. In fact, just the opposite. We've discovered rapid evolutionary periods that don't quite fit with the time evolution takes. These might be explained by external influence.
Also, we humans are intelligent. Everything we do is by "Intelligent Design".
How did we clone a sheep? By intelligent design. ... oh wait, no, this was by intelligent desing.
How did we create GMO plants? By intelligent design.
How did we eradicate small pox? By intelligent design.
How did we harness electricity? We evolved until our skin could control it and
How did we create a computer? By intelligent design.
How did we travel to the moon? By intelligent design.
We have so many proven examples intelligent design and we are getting more every day. Someday we might, by intelligent design, find a plant that can live in the Mars climate. That plant might help terraform the planet. We might later genetically engineer animals to take to Mars before we put humans there. We might even have to use evolution in terraforming.
By the way. DNA looks like good code reuse, a Biological engineering language, a clue that it may have been created by intelligent design.
To this date, we have uncountable examples of intelligent design. If you are a true scientist and truly believe in the scientific method, then intelligent design is one of the most proven theories. Proven by us.
That's the missing part of the argument any time it's brought up: I wouldn't teach Genesis 1 in my physics class any more than I would teach the Declaration of Independence, the Korean War or *The Iliad*. It's not about whether I think they're real; it's about THEY'RE NOT SCIENCE! That's not the same as saying they didn't happen or are invalid.
Science *is* the scientific method. It is not an ideology. It is not a collection of facts.
So sad! But now's the time to nip that dumb idea in the bud -- not when it becomes law, but now!
So, you're saying that the Intelligent Design texts weren't really designed intelligently?
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
They point out the Catholic Church is not the decider and get even more steamed when I remind him that Jesus founded the Catholic Church as His Church and thus it and the Pope speak for God; and it says so in the Bible and why do they not believe in the Bible?
Of course they get steamed. You're lying to them. Where in the Bible does it say that "Jesus founded the Catholic Church as His Church and thus it and the Pope speak for God"? The main justification for having a church at all is the "Great Commission". The most generous version of this event (to the churches) is from Mark 16:14-18
"Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.'"
The dogma of the RCC that establishes the primacy of the Pope is not even the Bible, and can be summarized thusly:
The apostle Peter had enjoyed pre-eminence among the apostles.
Peter had been Bishop of Rome. (Not in Bible)
Subsequent bishops of Rome were successors to Peter and so enjoyed the same pre-eminence that he had. (Not in Bible)
You should stop lying to them, and let their arguments fail on their merits. They can put their own feet in their mouths. You don't have to do the same.