Like cicadas on a seven-year life cycle, social conservatives are once again challenging the content of high school biology books for the state’s public schools, arguing that too much deference is paid to evolution and none to intelligent design, according to an article in today’s Advocate.
A panel of the state Board of Elementary and Secondary Education is scheduled to review the issue Friday after BESE delayed action on renewing biology textbooks at its most recent meeting. Textbooks for public schools are renewed every seven years through a committee process. The textbooks are made available for public perusal at public libraries statewide during the review process. In the case of high school biology books, state officials received a complaint from, among others, Baton Rouge resident Winston White, the son of Darrell White, co-founder of the Louisiana Family Forum.
“It is like Charles Darwin and his theory is a saint,” the younger White tells The Advocate. “You can’t touch it.”
A Southeastern Louisiana University professor and co-founder of the LA Coalition for Science tells the newspaper she believes the LFF is behind the complaints about the textbooks: “They had their people going through the books, writing up complaints and sending them,” say Barbara Forrest.
... written by Resident , November 09, 2010 - 04:41 pm
Intelligent design is not given any attention in science textbooks because it is not a scientific theory. ID rests on a notion of "irreducible complexity" which states, for example, that the eye cannot be reduced to simpler parts. This ludicrous idea has been scientifically disproven, so ID is not a scientific theory.
Keep religious fundamentalists away from our science textbooks. No one is bashing religion; it just needs to remain a personal matter not a public curriculum.
... written by Human Ape , November 09, 2010 - 04:59 pm
"No one is bashing religion; it just needs to remain a personal matter not a public curriculum."
I'm bashing religion. It doesn't belong in the 21st century and it needs to be eradicated.
http://darwin-killed-god.blogspot.com/
... written by Let intelligence win , November 09, 2010 - 05:44 pm
Please let your kids learn intelligent Design and teach them that science is wrong.
Science, based on observation and testing is the playground of the devil, whereas accepting only intelligent design will get your child into heaven and make your country stronger.
Thank you very, very much. Yours Truly,
Bin Laden
... written by Curks , November 09, 2010 - 06:01 pm
Yes, you can "touch" Darwin. Here's how: 1. Go to school (this is where you will learn the definition of a scientific theory, and things like "evidence") 2. Become a scientist 3. Do research. 4. Do more research 5. Write 6. Be scrutinized by some of the most brilliant educated humans alive 7. do more research 8. Consider working at McDonalds 9. Do more research 10. Write 11. Contribute your part to the human collective understanding and knowledge, expanding it ever so slightly. 12. Introduce a theory which explains the natural world more comprehensively and accurately than Darwin did. 13. Be acclaimed by some of the most brilliant educated humans alive. 14. Live in constant frustration forever as multitudes of mindless idiots, who don't even know what a theory is, complain when educators don't give as much attention to their half-baked ridiculous ideas as they do to your life's work.
... written by Cajunhiker , November 09, 2010 - 06:09 pm
I wouldn't mess with Dr. Barbara Forrest. There is no finer person or debater on the subject. She was my philosophy professor and adviser at SLU. I've seen her take on a majority of the Tangipahoa and Livingston Parish school boards and noted intellectuals from across the country pushing creationism. Guess what? Dr. Forrest prevailed. Don't misinterpret her position, however. She's as God-fearing as any preacher.
... written by Woody , November 09, 2010 - 06:31 pm
Walter? Are you sure it is just the "conservatives" or do you have your own agenda? I am a conservative and yet I agree with Resident (above) and others that we should keep religion out of our science books.
... written by Walter Pierce , November 09, 2010 - 06:57 pm
Not simply conservatives, Woody, SOCIAL conservatives, mainly evangelicals. That's an important distinction. I have no doubt that many fiscal conservatives, Republicans, libertarians, etc., share a hostility toward intelligent design/creationism and recognize that evolution is the most rigorously tested, thoroughly vetted SCIENTIFIC explanation of physical phenomena in the history of Western science. I also have little doubt that ragin_cajun is going to step in here at some point and tear me a new one for some perceived ideological slight I've just committed. I'm bracing myself.
... written by Avery78 , November 09, 2010 - 07:33 pm
I wouldn't call these people conservatives, I would call them regressive. What else do you call people that, when presented empirical evidence, refuse to believe that their ideas of reality are wrong.
... written by ragin_cajun , November 09, 2010 - 08:21 pm
Walter --
" some perceived ideological slight " I have proven to you and your readers that your "ideological slights" are objective facts of reality. Have I not?
As for the ID v. Evolution debate....I am keeping my dogs out of this fight. It's just not worth it.
The comment about Dr. Foster is VERY interesting, though. Though I've never heard of her until today, I know this--anyone who teaches classes in Critical Thinking and cites Naturalism as a Field of Study is not to be f'ed with.
So the time that I normally spend debating with you knuckleheads will be spent learning something from her instead. Thanks, Hiker...
... written by PaulBurnett , November 10, 2010 - 01:41 am
Intelligent design creationism is recognized by all actual science organizations - the National Academy of Sciences, the American Association for the Advancement of Science and all others - as being a pseudoscience - it is not science. The only supporters of intelligent design creationism are overtly or covertly religious - not scientific - persons and organizations. This is not a matter of anti-religious intolerance - it's a matter of not tolerating the willful ignorance and scientific illiteracy of creationism, which is totally inappropriate for the 21st century.
... written by James in SWLA , November 10, 2010 - 01:46 am
I guess all of science is lying to us as it is also true that the present universe started about 10 to 15 billion years ago. We didn't have carbon atoms until the first stars formed and blew up. The sun is a third generation. I am Roman Catholic and our schools have no problem teaching all the sciences and they are all very much interconnected.
... written by James in SWLA , November 10, 2010 - 01:52 am
All of science is interconnected from the beginning of the Universe. We only had Hydrogen and Helium to form the first stars and we didn't have any Carbon until they blew up. Evolution started 10 or 15 billion years ago and it is still going on today. Catholic schools from K through PHD have no problem with the truth.
... written by James in SWLA , November 10, 2010 - 01:53 am
All of science is interconnected from the beginning of the Universe. We only had Hydrogen and Helium to form the first stars and we didn't have any Carbon until they blew up. Evolution started 10 or 15 billion years ago and it is still going on today. Catholic schools from K through PHD have no problem with the truth. Evolution is intelligent design.
... written by James in SWLA , November 10, 2010 - 01:53 am
All of science is interconnected from the beginning of the Universe. We only had Hydrogen and Helium to form the first stars and we didn't have any Carbon until they blew up. Evolution started 10 or 15 billion years ago and it is still going on today. Catholic schools from K through PHD have no problem with the truth. Evolution is intelligent design.
... written by James in SWLA , November 10, 2010 - 01:58 am
All of science is interconnected from the beginning of the Universe. We only had Hydrogen and Helium to form the first stars and we didn't have any Carbon until they blew up. Evolution started 10 or 15 billion years ago and it is still going on today. Catholic schools from K through PHD have no problem with the truth. Evolution is intelligent design.
... written by keep religion out of my kids school , November 10, 2010 - 01:17 pm
I enjoyed a morning prayer every day of highschool. Prior to that I do no remember praying in school. We opened most school events with prayer. I miss that for my kids, but I have taught them they can pray any day, any time, anywhere. I do not want religious education in my kids Science class, History class or English class. I will teach them their relligion or send them to Bible school or catechism. I wouldn't mind a history class that coincides with events in the Bible. As a whole, if my kid isn't in a private school, I want to keep religion out of school. I don't want anyone to try to convert my kids to anything.
... written by NORTHSIDIAN SHOTGUN , November 10, 2010 - 10:29 pm
Evolution is "INTELLIGENT DESIGN, AND STILL IN PROGRESS. But some of you commentators are in "PAUSE MODE. No-one really, actually, wholeheartily, believes in GOD,until they draw their last breath. INHALE EXISTENTIALISM EXHALE . I hold that a Thibodeaux/Boudreaux book of cajun jokes contains more truth than any history book or any of the different bibles promoted by the different religions, there is more truth in a Thibodeaux/Boudreaux book of cajun jokes than all the History books and Bibles in this world... Marilyn Monroe Overdosed, this caused her death, DUH.. The Kennedys were Camelot Knights, and Jack Ruby was a Patriotic American. The Alamo is in the history books, esp. in Texas, and only because it did'nt have a back door. Marie Antoinette was a Transvestite (is that a sic), You can put your faith and trust in The Indy before you believe the crap published in the history books. SEE YA'LL IN HELL.
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Keep religious fundamentalists away from our science textbooks. No one is bashing religion; it just needs to remain a personal matter not a public curriculum.