Science 1, Superstition 0

National Center for Science Education: Antievolution bills dead in Florida When the Florida legislature ended its session on May 2, 2008, legislative attempts to open the door to creationism died in the House of Representatives. Senate Bill 2692, as originally introduced, purported to protect the right of teachers to "objectively present scientific information relevant to the full range of scientific views regarding biological and chemical evolution." The bill resembled a string of similar bills in Alabama as well as a model bill that the Discovery Institute's Center for Science and Culture, the institutional home of "intelligent design" creationism, recently began to promote, and was widely viewed as a backlash against the treatment of evolution in Florida's new state science standards. As NCSE reported, SB 2692's originally identical House counterpart, HB 1483, was substantially altered, requiring public schools to provide "[a] thorough presentation and critical analysis of the scientific theory of evolution." The phrase "critical analysis" is commonly used by "intelligent design" advocates in their campaign to undermine the teaching of evolution. The sponsor of SB 2692, Senator Ronda Storms (R-District 10), then sought to smooth the bill's passage by revising it to match HB 1483, but was unsuccessful. On receiving SB 2692 from the Senate, the House substituted the text of HB 1483 and returned it to the Senate, which then restored the text of the bill and sent it back to the House, where it died. HB 1483 was already tabled, and is now dead, too. I don't care if a voodoo doctor is a college-educated jerk wearing a three piece suit (Hello, Mr. Stein), because once he starts babbling about "intelligent design", he has negated whatever fragile opportunity he had to be taken seriously. Science, not superstition, is the only means we have to fix the problems that are facing every single passenger on Spaceship Earth, and we've already wasted too much time.

MY God doesn't fear science

I struggled for a title for this post--indeed, I struggled with what to post about the Creation Museum, or even if I should post about it. It does seem ripe for mockery--anything so utterly filled with animatronic creatures is probably going to get a lot of that. The thing is, I *don't* want to make fun of what these people believe. But it does make me sad... A photo from the official Grand Canyon web site. During some down time at work, I read an article from last week's Columbus Dispatch about the opening of the Creation Museum. It's not available for linking any more, so I looked for another article and found this one at Salon. The teachings about the Grand Canyon are fairly new to me... In Ham's view, the great flood explains not only where scientists find fossils today but also the topography of the modern world. The Grand Canyon, he informs me, was made in a matter of days or weeks as the waters of the flood rushed away and the land was reclaimed. In the exhibit, you walk through a winding canyonlike corridor with spinning, dizzying lights into a wide-open room with videos, exhibits and diagrams explaining the hydrology of instant canyon-making. Ham says that instant canyon-making is based on the fact that volcanoes, such as Mount St. Helens, created reservoirs of water for a time in their altered topography. When those reservoirs breached, deep grooves were cut by the flowing water, leading to the fast formation of canyons. ... Inside the Confusion exhibit, I strike up a conversation with Tim Shaw, a high school student visiting from Florida. "I don't care how long it took to make the Grand Canyon," he tells me. "It's not how old it is that matters to me. What matters is being right with God. Darwin's theory has no God. It can't be right. I don't know if this story is truer than Darwin's theory, but I do know it's better." I do empathize. When I first started to tenatively question some of the things I'd grown up believing, it was kind of anxiety-inducing. Sort of like I was tugging at a loose thread and could end up unraveling *everything* if I wasn't careful. I suppose I should point out, though, that it wasn't creationism versus evolution that I was struggling with. *That* was never presented as problematic, and I was taught the theory of evolution in science class at the Catholic elementary school I attended. In the Dispatch article, Ham is quoted as saying that there is a "cultural war" going on between secular humanism and the Christian worldview. I disagree. Maybe evolution is threatening to *his* version of Christianity, but it has never been anything but compatible with mine. Also at Street Prophets, My Left Wing and Booman Tribune

Darwin's Revenge

"If fifty million people say a foolish thing, it is still a foolish thing." --Anatole France, understanding the difference between lies, damned lies, and statistics Seeing these pasty-faced lumps of Whitebread Privilage on stage stuffed in expensive, ill-fitting suits made me wonder (and not for the first time) how mankind ever graduated from the primordial jambalaya.

Goddamn

"There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there always has been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.' ". --Dr. Isaac Asimov, proving to us that nothing has changed.

Blog Against Theocracy

In August, 2005, George W. Bush endorsed "teaching the controversy," teaching "Intelligent Design" alongside evolution in our nation's schools. "Intelligent Design," for those who do not know, is little more than reverse-engineered creationish disguised as science, or, as one wag put it, "creationism in a cheap tuxedo." This is disturbing in its own right. But it gets far more disturbing when you consider the willingness of this Administration to pervert science to its needs. James E. Hanson, once NASA's director of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has accused the Administration of muzzling him and censoring his findings on global warming. He was warned there would be "dire consequences" if he spoke publicly about his findings. They even had an oil lobbyist and a college dropout editing his work at the direct instruction of the White House. And then, at the end of last year, the Admnistration issued new rules requiring all scientists to submit papers and speeches for "review" before they could be presented. And it just keeps getting worse, as now scientists are forbidden from speaking at all if they disagree with Administration dogma. Of course, there is an easier solution than gagging the scientists. The government could just sign a new no-bid contract for the computers the scientists use: Enough about science. What about theocracy? Well, that's where it gets interesting. As I noted up front, Bush is pandering to his "base" by insisting that our children get "taught the controversy," as if any time a moron disagreed with Galilleo we should start teaching the earth is the center of the universe. But will "teaching the controversy" be enough? Or will the White House start tilting the controversy, too? It certainly has no trouble doing so when it comes to global warming, so why should it not do so in a fight even more of its "base" holds dear, the inerrancy of the Bible? Gag the scientists, don't let them talk about Ardipithecus ramidus, or Australopithecus afarensis, or Paranthropus robustus, or Homo habilis, or even good old Homo neanderthalensis. After all, if human beings shared the Garden of Eden with dinosaurs, what room was there for ancestors? Of course, presuming everything started on Day 1 (or is that Day 6?) fully made, what happens to the creatures that stay "created," particularly if they have to compete with the ones that didn't read the Book, so they go ahead and evolve all on their own? I think we know the answer to that: The truth of the matter is (and now I'm just pumping in cartoons as part of Blogging Against Theocracy Weekend), the whole concept of religion is just one of explaining what you don't understand (and then using it to control people, but that's another story entirely): While people insist we "respect" religion in a way we would never even consider respecting other fairy tales, does it really have that many good lessons for us? Sure, people pick and choose the parts they like, or the parts that support their own particular hatreds or prejudices, but is that any way to construct morality? Ultimately, though, it's really pretty simple. The Bush way, the theocrats way, is one that insists we accept faithful ignorance over reason, and that is most certainly NOT the way to assure our nation's future:

Ultimate Anderson Cooper Cage Match

click to enlarge I was really impressed with the Anderson Cooper's "What Is A Christian?" series. And I am thinking you just can't make this shit up. TOM FOREMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): In the beginning, an explosion rocked the cosmos, and the universe was born. Primitive life crawled from an ooze, mutating, changing. Dinosaurs lived, died, left nothing but bones. And evolution rolled on, until millions of years later. Science tells us that's what happened. But what if it's wrong? What if another story, a very old one, is right? (on camera): So, this is the Garden of Eden, and you have dinosaurs in the Garden of Eden? KEN HAM, FOUNDER, CREATION MUSEUM: That's true, because God made the land animals on day six. He made... FOREMAN (voice over): Ken Ham is the founder of a $27 million Creation Museum set to open on Memorial Day in rural Kentucky. The message: God made the Earth, the heavens, and everything in them in just six days, just 6,000 years ago. Can you believe $27 million for this? How many people will that feed I wonder? Then there is the hot topic of homosexuality and how they think "therapy and prayer" can solve that. TUCHMAN: At Love Won Out, self-proclaimed ex-gays like Haley (ph) and Fryrear enthusiastically regale the crowd with their personal stories. Dr. Joseph Nicolosi is at the center of this. He's an unorthodox Catholic psychologist. He runs the National Association for the Research and Therapy of Homosexuality. NICOLOSI: Homosexuality, as we said, is a gender-identity problem. TUCHMAN: Nicolosi concludes boys can become gay if they don't get enough attention from their fathers or if they were abused as children. NICOLOSI: The guy with a homosexual problem does not trust men. When he begins to trust men, his homosexuality disappears. WTF?