“is unified in its rejection of creation myths”

Because otherwise they’d be out of a job.

“Teaching that God created the earth is not traditional science.”

I know. What I was trying to say (not very well) is that while Christian schools teach that God created the world, their science classes are traditional science. By that I mean the same stuff taught to public school goers.

Teaching that God created the earth is not traditional science, or science, period. It’s a faith-bases a priori conclusion rooted solely in tradition.

You’re free to believe what you wish, but we both know that there is no evidence for creationism (otherwise there would be no need for invoking “faith” and we both know that science relies on evidence. “Creation science” is plainly an oxymoron fomented by religious sorts aiming to lend credibility to an endeavor that merits none.

To state that “science can’t disprove” anything is to reveal wholesale ignorance of the scientific method as well as of basic philosophy. How does one “prove” the nonexistence of anything? Can you prove that the other 1,500 deities that are not the Abrahamic one do not exist? Can you prove that there aren’t giant purple cows orbiting Pluto?

Finally, I’m not going to torture you with an explanation of what Lewontin was trying to convey because 1) I’m not a cruel man and 2) your mind is about as malleable as concrete.

I happen to think it ironic what CREDIBLE experts in the field of science actually tell people. They let everyone know how full of crap they are. Such as this quote from Harvard geneticist Richard Lewontin in his review of Sagan’s Billions and Billions of Demons:

“We take the side of science in spite of the absurdity of some of its constructs in spite of its failure to fulfill many of its extravagant promises of health and life, in spite of the tolerance of the scientific community for unsubstantiated just-so stories, because we have a prior commitment, a commitment to materialism. It is not that the methods and institutions of science somehow compel us to accept a material explanation of the phenominal world, but, on the contrary, that we are forced by our a priori adherance to material causes to create an apparatus of investigation and a set of concepts that produce material explanations, no matter how mystifying to the uninitiated. Moreover, that materialsim is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine Foot in the door.”

apostle — I agree with you that public education is a mess and should be scrapped as it exists today. I bet that the Christian community could afford to educate anyone that wanted to be a part of it. This would entail teaching a bunch of mythology and witchcraft masquerading as science, but at least families wouldn’t be paying property taxes in order to fund the teaching of stuff that’s accurate but very disagreeable to them.

That covers a lot of ground. I’d hate to see your title: Dr. Rev. Professor Septeus7, MD.

“Teaching creationism is not illegal as long as it is made clear that it is a religious viewpoint.”

I think this is why public education is the flop that it is. A republican government should not be dictating what the curriculumn is at all. When it comes to law and legislation of any kind, elected officials pass and reject law, and are accountable to their constituents for the results. If they are not properly representing their constituents, they are subject to be voted out.

If a the government insists on ignoring the Constitution and funding a public school, then the tax-payers paying for it should be deciding its structure. That is why we have a majority, and that is why there are school board meetings and PTA meetings, so parents can contribute. It is a fact that most Americans by an overwhelming majority are fine with teaching Creation Science in public school. Just look at the public opinion polls.

This article has some interesting things to say concerning this debate.

False! Teaching creationism is not illegal as long as it made clear that it is a religious viewpoint. If this course makes it clear that it is presenting a religious viewpoint then it is no more illegal than teaching Greek or Native American creation myths is illegal.

If you want to make the case that the course material is biased and doesn’t serve the educational needs of the community tell to the school board. Don’t go reaching for the sickle and hammer and call the ACLU and make a federal case out of it.

Its not a federal issue nor a constitutional issue. Its just an issue of convincing folks to use better course material.

Look, I’m a progressive mediated creationist/semi-theistic evolutionist (cool with common descent and a 14 billion year old verse) and I would actively oppose the way this course way is designed but I wouldn’t immediated try injected the Feds into designing curriculum. I mean there is nothing in the Constitution about public school curriculum so why try to torture the text with nonsense about separation of school and religious statements and deal with issue like adults?

You know like discussing including other views of design and evolution.

If you think you have to go to court and claim that whole constitution is ignored because you don’t like the teacher choice in educational videos then you’ve got serious problem with megalomania and need professional help.

As you can see from post #17, apostle had no difficulty understanding what I wrote.

“more visceral reaction”

Were that the case, you would have been gone a long time ago.

“And you don’t have to use exclamation points in every sentence! It’s as if you’re screaming at me!”

Just view them as emphasis rather than emotion. Maybe that will help with the “visceral” as well.

To scientists, “theory,” contrary to what you are desperate to believe, does not mean “wild guess.” You evidently didn’t follow my link, so I’ll help you out by saving you a mouse click.

“THEORY: A set of statements or principles devised to explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make predictions about natural phenomena.”

See? Now for specifics:

“Biologists consider the existence of biological evolution to be a fact. It can be demonstrated today and the historical evidence for its occurrence in the past is overwhelming. However, biologists readily admit that they are less certain of the exact mechanism of evolution; there are several theories of the mechanism of evolution.”

No conflict at all. So you can let that one go. Take a deep breath and whisper or even muble it out loud now: “Evolution is a collection of facts. Evolutionary theory attempts to properly link and explain those facts.”

The original post here was an uninformed complaint about the failure of the AU to let slide an obvious effort to advance young-earth creationism in a public school in California. The author, in looking at the situation only superficially, had been duped in exactly the manner the special-ed teacher and her minister husband clearly hoped, what with their claim (read: lie) that the “philosophy” class was to be “about” ID. I don’t see the author or anyone else complaining about my initial, dispassionate assessment of what’s really afoot in El Tajon, but you saw fit to wade in and continue your ignorant ranting about the epistemological shakiness of evolution and the alleged number of scientists who reject it. The evidence is right up above.

Then we have this gem a back-pedaling expedition:

“I didn’t say Darwin was responsible. You can now cite where I posted that. Pretty sure I said it was due to the science of Darwin that he believed what he believed.”

Uh-huh. You don’t claim that Darwin is responsible for Hitler’s actions, just that the work attributed solely to Darwin. If you ever find yourself in a position to represent yourself in court, please do yourself a favor and obtain a lawyer, pronto. You wouldn’t last the morning.

If you say things that are not only wrong, but aggressively and virulently so, I will state as much. I am fully capable of doing so civilly, but I do not suffer angry fools gladly, and you have inarguable said many, many things about one of my fields of expertise that any objective observer would term foolish. It’s that simple.