Come to think of it, I don't really even recall being "taught" this stuff, until I took a 100-level Anthro class in college. H.S. biology was biology, and focused mainly on crap like mitochondria, photosynthesis and flagella and whatnot.

I don't remember if human development was even in the book.

I know it makes for interesting debate fodder, and the press has really sold the notion that there's some massive battle out there, but can anyone with kids tell me exactly in what context this is even an issue? Are we talking 4th graders, who are generally pretty curious and absorb everything uncritically, or high schoolers who just want to get the test over with?

In my dimly recollected experience, the sciences were rather glossed over and mushed together as it was. It was bad enough that history, geography, economics, and politics were weakly slapped into "Social Studies".

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"My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I am right." - Ashleigh Brilliant(?)
(Voting for None Of The Above, so far...)

Well, I must give you credit for the nice polishing job you did on that turd of an explanation after you reached in & pulled it out of your butt.

First of all, it has nothing to do with the amount of scientific evidence that supports evolution. The fact that there is NO amount of scientific evidence supporting creationism is the point. And the only way an issue can be "scientific" is for there to be a sizeable body of scientific evidence to support it, hence you said basically the same thing I did right before you ridiculed what I said for no apparent reason other than maybe a poor command of the English language.

Secondly, I really have to ask you if you honestly think that scientists & average people of average intelligence don't yet know that sexual reproduction is a scientific fact. Because where I come from, we're all quite certain that it requires copulation between a male animal & a female animal to result in pregnancy & a resulting offspring. To claim that it's not actually a known fact is (if I may quote you) "OPINIONATED NONSENSE".

Lastly, what I said regarding the teaching of evolution as a valid, viable science over, above & to the exclusion of creationism being acceptable because of the body of scientific evidence I laid out is just another way of saying exactly what you are attempting to say, I just used more adjectives, & I guess maybe it confused you or something.

Anyway, I hear most local public school systems offer remedial reading courses for adults in the evenings. Assuming you're an adult, of course.

This is exactly what is wrong. That an issue can be scientific has nothing, I repeat, absolutely nothing, to do with any amount of scientific evidence. It solely has to do with the issue qualifying for investigation by the method we call science.

The simple reason that biological evolution is scientifically researchable is because all parts of it rely on natural phenomena. Not because there is this or that amount of evidence. The latter is why it's considered a scientific fact but it has nothing to do with why it's scientific.

You have no idea what I was saying, do you? What I said was this: "You also said that we know that animals do not reproduce via a deity. We know no such thing. We can't know such a thing."

How you get that to be about knowledge of natural phenomena such as sexual reproduction is beyond me. Heh, it's been a while since I saw such a wrong turn in a post.

A scientific issue is not and should not be taught over, about or to the exclusion of any religious idea. It is and should be taught as science, regardless of any kind of unrelated subject. For example, science is not taught over, above or to the exclusion of history, music or English, either. It's just taught as it is, - science.

I had coursework in high school that addressed evolutionary biology to some degree, but I also wasn't in mainstream science courses, so take that for what it's worth. I also seem to recall units from elementary education that addressed things like the diversity of species in a general sense. Of course, growing up in a "liberal" and very secular area, the public schools reflected that, so there was never any issue with this sort of thing (certainly I recall no traumatic experience of angry parents storming in demanding to know why we were being told we were monkeys or something).

But, I imagine it's more important as a "potential issue". If you talk about natural selection and whatnot in a passing sense, some clever kid will probably ask about where we came from, and then the teacher needs to be up on local politics/regulations to know whether to pander or whether to answer that question scientifically

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

It seems that the "religion versus science" argument draws its silliness from both "sides" of the aisle, eh, Smadsen? Asserting science as superior to religion turns science into religion, which I find distasteful.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

That sounds right - I don't think either one is based on obersvation, per se.

In that thread, I tried to keep it generally about scientific theory and not about evolution or creation specifically. It had some links to definitions of scientific theory as well as a site addressing the difference between the use of the word in scientific circles and common languages. As I recall, back when I did that, there were a lot more evolution/creation debates and people would continually say things like "why should we teach evolution - it's just a theory!"

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

Yup. Evolutionary biology (like archaeology) is considered a "historical science", rather than an experimental one. Obviously, we can't reproduce 100 million years of speciation in any lab, but we can formulate hypotheses based on the data.

Really, it wouldn't take much to blow current evolutionary theory right out of the water. One instance of a stegasaurus fossil coincidental with modern hominids, or a single instance of creation ex nihilo, and poof!

But since all the data continually and consistently confirms the theory, we have to assign evolution a very high degree of probability.

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"My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I am right." - Ashleigh Brilliant(?)
(Voting for None Of The Above, so far...)

No, what is wrong is splitting hairs over inconsequential silliness.

No, YOU have no idea what you were saying. Because you weren't really saying anything other than a lot of meaningless hot air.

And BTW... why didn't you quote the entire passage? I suppose that wouldn't have facillitated your pathetic attempt at a rebuttal. Same tired old crap all the time with some people.

Now are you going to sit there & try to say that isn't a "scientific" fact????

That is like.... sooooooo intelleck-shul, duuude. I am like, soooooooo impressed.

Unbelievable. Apparently some old farts have nothing to do with their time. All this bullshit word parsing & extracting one or two words out of a post then nit-picking their meaning for the sake of starting stupid pointless arguments is beyond absurdity to the point of childishness. And I've met children with more maturity.

Go ahead & take whatever meaning that blows your skirts up & gets your little panties in a bunch from the words "over & above" & make them mean whatever you want them to, but it's pretty obvious that what meant was "instead of".

If someone is educated beyond their level of intelligence to the point that they couldn't figure that out for themselves, or if they have no life & get their jollies by spending all day in front of their computers being internet jerks, that's OK with me. I'm just not going to waste anymore of my time responding to silly bullshit.

Have a nice day.

I'm very amused that you would accuse others of "childishness" in the middle of a temper-tantrum laden with insults and name calling in lieu of any intelligent discourse. That's more interesting than your apparently common approach of I'll belittle what I don't understand because that alleviates my insecurities without the tiresome effort required actually to learn and understand it. Of course, giving me a chuckle probably wasn't the intent of that hissy fit, but c'est la vie.

In your exchange with SMadsen, you demonstrated a clear misunderstanding of the application of the scientific method and then used that misunderstanding to arrive at a silly comparison of religion and science. When Smadsen pointed that out, you appeared to (as you put it) "[get] your little panties in a bunch" and once again miss the point he was making. That is, you seemed under the impression that he was disputing the mechanics of reproduction when he was taking issue with your apparent misunderstanding of what science actually is. Your unnecessarily hostile reaction only seems to reinforce the impression that you don't understand and that your lack of understanding bothers you.

If you don't like "bullshit word parsing & extracting", I'd suggest discussions about reality television and what celebrities are doing, where you're less likely to encounter that sort of high-fallutin' book learnin'. When you start or participate in discussions about the focus of academia or scientific principles, you're going to get the sort of semantical arguments you seem to despise.

But, I do appreciate the well wishing for my day, by the way. So far, it's pretty pleasant.

(@Smadsen - remember kingdaddy? )

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

Yeah, that does represent an interesting distinction. I think you could address this by requiring (or offering, as I'm not big on forced curricula) scientific lab courses and scientific theory courses. Until my undergrad days, these were generally mashed into one (a few days a week you'd have two class periods of 'lab'), but you could separate them. Or, perhaps a general theory course could exist and cover a broad range of topics that don't lend themselves to experimentation: string theory, quantum mechanics, evolutionary biology/speciation, astronomy. That could actually be a useful class for giving people a broad overview and scientific understanding of the world without bogging children in the minutiae of scientific study that many find tiresome.

Exactly. This is why I found that earlier post from Eagle so puzzling about the idea that evolution could be disproved at any second, so it isn't valid. The fact that it would be that easy to disprove and yet hasn't been certainly seems to lend it weight as a scientific theory.

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

No, I just don't place any credibility in pseudo-intellectual bullshit from hot air bags.

But I'm happy that you both take yourselves so seriously.

It must be kinda sad for you that nobody else does.

Do you make any posts where you don't unnecessarily bring up intelligence and/or education? Why the obsession with these things? And, are you now a spokesperson for everybody or is the declaration that no one takes us "seriously" just overreaching in the continuation of your hissy fit?

And, by the way, what are you saying "no" to? Or are you just borrowing from the George Bush lexicon of beginning sentences with "no" in response to nothing and for no apparent reason?

DubyaSpeak.com : Dubya the Grammarian

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"Government big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have... The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases."

-Thomas Jefferson

Again, though, at what level of schooling is this stuff even mentionable? I would say that at the K-12 level, very broad concepts and overall info about what science is,and critical thinking/scientific methods would be most appropriate.

If I were King, critical thinking and basic household finances wouldbe two mandatory H.S. courses. We focus too much on what to think, and not enough on HOW.

I digress.....

Absolutely. And that's perfect for college level stuff, which is far more optional. Kids just need to know the basics of how it works, and that science changes, and here's why...the ID proponents seem to think schools are devoting half the year to detailed evolutionary theory, for some reason.

Agreed. Perhaps we need to throw the ball into ID's court more, and promise that, upon receipt of confirmable evidences, subject to review, debate and analysis, science is more than happy to revise.

Science is emphatically NOT dogmatic. That's the whole point. History is replete with visionary individuals who radically shifted the paradigm. Copernicus, Wegner, etc.

So, if some ID proponent somehow furnishes serious proof, instead of vague supposition, no problem. Until then, ID is to biology what alchemy is to chemistry.

Bottom line: reality is not subject to popular vote.

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"My opinions may have changed, but not the fact that I am right." - Ashleigh Brilliant(?)
(Voting for None Of The Above, so far...)

Taking seriously the things we say to each other on serious subjects. What a waste of time. By the way "pseudo intellectual" is a term usually reserved for people who pretend to knowledge they don't actually possess.

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A nation of slaves is always prepared to applaud the clemency of their master who, in the abuse of absolute power, does not proceed to the utmost extremes of injustice and oppression.
Edward Gibbon