sir_eccles

http://ncse.com/news/2013/01/antisci...rizona-0014695

Idiots in the AZ state Senate want to teach the nontroversy and sneak creationism into schools. It's unconstitutional of course.

If any other AZ voters want to write to their state senator and urge them to vote against you can find your senator here

https://az.gov/app/govinfo/

http://www.azleg.gov/MemberRoster.asp?Body=S

HarryTheSpider

I am very happy for students to explore the whole Intelligent Design question in its entirety as they develop their critical thinking skills, examine the evidence and come to the conclusion that Intelligent Design is in fact bollox as a scientific theory, and that any position that supports Intelligent Theory is based on the blind faith of the existence of some kind of Supreme Being e.g. 'God' despite evidence to the contrary...

And I'm very happy that many more students will be afforded the opportunity of seeing for themselves what a bunch of backward looking, narrow-minded, chauvinist, hypocritical F-Wits are to be found behind advancing this agenda behind the front of 'science' education...

I can see a time when there are States in the Union that are in the 21st century, or 20th century at least, and others that have gone back to the 'good old days'. These 'good old days' States may be very business friendly, but there's not likely to be too many people living in these states to actually work for the companies that set up shop there... and that companies that do set up shop there may find an awful lot of sane people boycotting them for being purveyors of the worst kind of knob-jockery. And as bits of the US head back in time 250 years, other parts of the world will fill the vacuum. The century of the US is all but over. Shit science legislation and other 18th century cr@p is simply going to speed it up...

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EDIT: I know my second paragraph is badly phrased. People who are able to figure out broadly what I mean will be OK. Anybody/ everybody else doesn't deserve to know what I'm prattling on about and can move to Kentucky or some other leading exponent of 'freedom'.

sir_eccles

I would agree with you if that was how it would actually pan out. They would not discover the flaws in ID.

I would agree with you if this bill was about a course on comparative religion and covered ALL religions. But no it's about science classes.

Sally Redux

Evolution is not a 'scientific controversy'.

Get me out of here.

paddingtongreen

Bollocks. They will not be taught in a comparative way.

They will be told in no uncertain terms that Evolution is a far out and incomplete theory that can't be trusted, that takes care of all they need to know about Evolution in half a lesson period. Done and done.

Then, on Intelligent Design, they will get the religious and "scientific" positions presented as talking points about the impossibility of the eye reaching its present structure except by design etc etc. These will continue for the duration.

THEY WILL BE BRAINWASHED.

RoadWarriorFromLP

I refuse to call it "ID", and I would hope that the rest of you won't, either. They want to teach the Book of Genesis, i.e. creationism as science in public schools, and we should call it out for what it is.

"Intelligent Design" was an invention by the right in response to various Supreme Court rulings that prevent creationism from being taught in public schools. By giving it a new name and removing the explicit references to the Christian god, they hoped to create a loophole.

There's nothing intelligent about it, and its design is strictly political.

kimilseung

It is absurd, as most proponents of ID, do not believe it anyway, it is just a convenient political tool.

HarryTheSpider

All - I utterly agree with you. But it's Sunday, and I thought I might hope, and have some faith that it would all turn out OK...

There is no controversy with Evolution. Only that it doesn't fit some people's agenda... the Truth hurts sometimes...

Yes, it's a theory. Pretty much everything is a theory until it is disproved. Most of scientific progress is like this... We had a theory that the Earth was at the center of the universe for a very long time, and the theory largely held with various observations... but not all... Eventually a new theory was proposed, on pain of death, that better fitted all of the observations, not just some. Now we know that the Earth is just the 3rd planet orbiting an ordinary G2V class star at the arse end of the Milky Way...

The theory of Evolution has only grown in efficacy in the years since Darwin put it forward in 1844. More evidence sides with it. Where there has been evidence that suggests Darwin was wrong, it turns out he wasn't, just that Evolution is more complex than anybody thought...

There is no merit for Intelligent Design from a scientific stand point. None. Nada. Not even if your brain was replaced by a tape recorder. Every single argument that has been put forward by the ID brigade has been shot down. Repeatedly. But just saying that you have a theory doesn't make it so. For a theory to be part of science it has to be inherently testable, which allows for the fact that today we can't test it as we don't have the technology etc, but in the future we might be able to - for example by building an even bigger particle accelerator... Until we can test the theory, it is just an untested theory. Until such time as we as individuals can see the theory at work, tested, then all we can do is individually BELIEVE that the theory is correct (or not). If it cannot be inherently tested, then we are very much dealing with FAITH. There is no way imaginable today that can allow for proving or refuting the existence of God or any gods. That's faith. And there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. Unless you call it science. Or scientology. Or anything, other than faith.

And I do not trust the motives of those putting forward these bills. Not in the state of AZ, not in that language. But I am happy for kids to develop critical thinking skills and call these pillocks out for being knobs. Just saying...

Sally Redux

Yes absolutely.

Uncle Ebenezer

Point of fact, Mr. Speaker - the belief that a higher power may have had a hand in designing the universe around us is not exclusively a religious one. Albert Einstein believed in a creator - one that was indifferent to the fate of humanity, quite the opposite to the fatherly god of religion.

Lion in Winter

Well Einstein was actually intelligent. Which is a crucial difference as compared to the Arizona lot.

Uncle Ebenezer

I agree. I was merely pointing out that discounting something, just because religious nutcases choose to hitch their wagon to it, is misguided.

Lion in Winter

Agreed. I don't discount it because of that. It's just that belief systems, while used by human beings for ever to explain the world to themselves in satisfactory ways, fall into a completely different category from science. I don't say that there is no knowledge or enlightenment to be gained from them, only that they are not a science and cannot and do not answer to the laws of science. It is when people confuse the two categories that the trouble starts.

HarryTheSpider

Especially when done deliberately...

Uncle Ebenezer

I find it a little disconcerting, us agreeing on something - though not as unsettling as you do, I bet.