Read the article on this link (it's worth it)

[Soulforged]

[HTML]http://www.venganza.org/[/HTML]

[dragon wench]

I'm a bit cautious about clicking on links I know nothing about. Any chance you can supply some information on the site?

[Nar]

Link is safe . It's an open letter to Kansas school board about teaching alternative theory of Intelligent Design with Evolution theory. And about flying spaghetti monster, and it seems to be a critical look over religion at school...

[fable]

We've had that discussion regarding attempts to impose alternatives to reality inside US schools several times, before. It might be better to just do a search on evolution, and post to one or two of the goodies from the past.

[Silur]

Now it's official

I guess since Shrub says so , I'll just toss out my old natural sciences books...

Not as funny as the previous link, but equally absurd.

[fable]

Shrub is playing to the far-right zealots who comprise part of the voting strength of his party. My hope is that he and his pals use this kind of rhetoric loud and long. I want it to be dunned into the heads of the empty-skulled voting populace to the point that they finally associate such remarks with the neo-cons and the far-right, come 2006 elections.

[Silur]

[QUOTE=fable]Shrub is playing to the far-right zealots who comprise part of the voting strength of his party. My hope is that he and his pals use this kind of rhetoric loud and long. I want it to be dunned into the heads of the empty-skulled voting populace to the point that they finally associate such remarks with the neo-cons and the far-right, come 2006 elections.[/QUOTE]

We hoped for that last time, and see where it got us...

Sheep have more collective intelligence than humanity - at least they run away from danger when they see it. I should bump my "can the patriot act happen in europe" thread. There has been some developments in the area... double-

[fable]

[QUOTE=Silur]We hoped for that last time, and see where it got us... [/quote]

The thing is, there was nothing very demonstrative that the average citizen could point to in the last Shrub administration and say, "But that's patently ridiculous!" Well, there was plenty. But it was not the kind of thing that most urban, educated people could regard as a wake-up call. I'm only hoping this bit of publicity for the rolling back of science in favor of fiction gets heavily publicized. Though it's also possible that it will only truly reach the ears of those who already know Bush is a neo-con zealot who will do anything for the sake of Party.

Sheep have more collective intelligence than humanity - at least they run away from danger when they see it. I should bump my "can the patriot act happen in europe" thread. There has been some developments in the area... double-

Yes, I'm quite curious to see where Europe goes on this. Most Americans are unaware, unfortunately, not only of the details of the Patriot Act, but of the Freedom of Information Act has been severely rolled back by the Bush administration after it was actively pushed forward under every successive administration since Nixon.

[Xandax]

[QUOTE=fable]<snip>

Yes, I'm quite curious to see where Europe goes on this. Most Americans are unaware, unfortunately, not only of the details of the Patriot Act, but of the Freedom of Information Act has been severely rolled back by the Bush administration after it was actively pushed forward under every successive administration since Nixon.[/QUOTE]

Interestingly - while more Danes infact wish more survilance the danish politicians are generally against it (except for the more right wing parties).
Now Denmark isn't typical for europe I think, and if we are infact hit by terrorist bombs, then perhaps even the political climate would change - but I find it fun on some level that here it is the politicians pulling the breaks and not the "civilians"/population.

[Lestat]

[QUOTE=Silur]Sheep have more collective intelligence than humanity - at least they run away from danger when they see it.[/QUOTE]
That's goats, sheep usually stay, looking dumbly, in the middle of road until you horn. Sheep are dumb animals that can be herded by a dog, try doing that with goats. Goats rule!

So far on livestock

But I agree with Fable: if Bush continues like this, at one moment or another it should become clear to the American public that these people have an religious-political agenda where faith is more important than fact. I think these type of relipolitics sits uneasy with a majority in the US, and even if they don't vote Democratic, let's hope for some non-fundamentalist Republicans.

[Silur]

[QUOTE=Lestat]That's goats, sheep usually stay, looking dumbly, in the middle of road until you horn. Sheep are dumb animals that can be herded by a dog, try doing that with goats. Goats rule![/QUOTE]

Ok, so maybe we are *as* intelligent as sheep. Still pretty depressing...

[QUOTE=Lestat]But I agree with Fable: if Bush continues like this, at one moment or another it should become clear to the American public that these people have an religious-political agenda where faith is more important than fact. I think these type of relipolitics sits uneasy with a majority in the US, and even if they don't vote Democratic, let's hope for some non-fundamentalist Republicans.[/QUOTE]

Considering how much fiction is considered fact by the general public (please note that Im not pointing out just americans here), why should this particular fiction be such a wakeup call? 47 % of the US public actually thinks ID is how things happened. 84 % believe in god. The general idea of "hearing both sides of the story" has been nourished by so many talk shows, that just because one side of the argument is completely ridiculous doesnt mean it shouldn't be heard.

[fable]

[QUOTE=Silur]Considering how much fiction is considered fact by the general public (please note that Im not pointing out just americans here), why should this particular fiction be such a wakeup call? 47 % of the US public actually thinks ID is how things happened.[/quote]

Could you provide a link to that poll? Because I would like to see how it was worded, the size of the sample, and where it was taken. Thanks.

[Silur]

[QUOTE=fable]Could you provide a link to that poll? Because I would like to see how it was worded, the size of the sample, and where it was taken. Thanks.[/QUOTE]

The data is rather old. CE referenced it way back, but I cant find it. I found the following in the great digital fish pond:

Gallup data from 1991. Not the original report, but Gallup.com want you to register to get their information.

Summary of key data. Same as above, but only the creationist vs other value up to and including 1999. Be warned, the site is by creationist nuts.

[Chimaera182]

LoL what an article.

As an atheist, I can tell you how little I want to learn about "Intelligent Design." Being force-fed religious dogma is not my idea of education. Religion needs to be kept in the churches and synagogues and temples and mosques, or even at the home. Just changing the name from God-made to "intelligent design" and "creation science" does not turn it from faith-based to scientific. All the proof anyone has that God made the world is in the Bible, and that's it; it's all faith-based. And if we have to learn about how the world was made by some all-powerful being, that letter does bring up a good point: you can't just teach how the world was made from one perspective, you will have to teach every single "approved" theory of creation. And who has time to learn all the different theories of how the earth came to be? You'd need to tack on a few extra years to the school curriculum to cope, and I can't imagine kids liking that idea one bit. Although, if you do have to teach "creation science" to kids, and you separate them into groups where one group who believes in the Christian God studies one way, and so on, segregating the different groups. But then you're pretty much sending them to Sunday school for that, so what's the bloody point?

There was an episode on Penn & Teller's BS where they talked about people wanting religion to be taught in public schools. None of the people on the side of "creation science" were able to come up with hardcore proof that God is the ultimate creator and that's why the earth is here. But because they won out over a man who argued against it (and he was a Christian, too), now science books in that town have to have a sticker that states how "evolution is only a theory," and some such nonsense. I'd love to see Christians have a sticker like that shoved up in their Bibles.

P&T also did something on the Patriot Act, most of which I forgot. But they did do a nice little segment which was great, where ordinary citizens were recruited into helping the government keep an eye on suspected terrorists. The lovely citizens were ecstatic, and why not? They were serving their country. Then, of course, it turns out the next door neighbor is having an affair, and this woman and man began having blatant sex right out in the open (the open being right in the doorway, and then right at the window where the civil do-gooder had a good view). Then, the man's wife comes home, and there's a fight. What happens next? The van that the civilian was supposed to watch snuck out, but because that person decided to watch something more fun, the "terrorist" got away. That is a direct invasion of privacy, and with cameras popping up all over cities, it's becoming more difficult to go about your daily business without being catalogued. But the Patriot Act says it's okay.

And don't get me started on human intelligence. We're the only species that fights among different breeds just because we're different breeds. That alone makes us dumber than sheep.

[fable]

[QUOTE=Silur]The data is rather old. CE referenced it way back, but I cant find it. I found the following in the great digital fish pond:

Gallup data from 1991. Not the original report, but Gallup.com want you to register to get their information.[/quote]

This doesn't tell me how large the sample, or where it was taken. The question is also ambiguous. It says nothing about teaching any kind of creationist nonsense in schools, anything relating to the Judeo-Christian bible or Q'aran, or what areas of the US displayed what percentage of results. I think this is all very pertinent to analyzing the poll's results, because rural areas in Europe show a strong evangelical Christian cultural basis, including parties in the Netherlands that have recently attempted to have a form of Creationism introduced there, too.

EDIT: Mind, I am worried about the US--not so much because a fair number of it's citizens live perpetually in a fantasyland comprised equally of ignorance and entertainment; but because that group of citizens, most of whom originate in rural areas, now have a voice, a focus, and zealous cause for the first time in roughly 160 years. We already have a fair taste of what they can do. The greatest hope is that the economy crashes due to Bush's mishandling of the federal budget, because nothing awakens people from a happy dream as well as a good swift kick in the wallet. This worked before; but will it work again, or will Bush's budgetary manhandling simply be visited upon his successor, as Reagan's were, upon Bush Sr and Clinton?

[Silur]

[QUOTE=fable]This doesn't tell me how large the sample, or where it was taken. The question is also ambiguous. It says nothing about teaching any kind of creationist nonsense in schools, anything relating to the Judeo-Christian bible or Q'aran, or what areas of the US displayed what percentage of results. I think this is all very pertinent to analyzing the poll's results, because rural areas in Europe show a strong evangelical Christian cultural basis, including parties in the Netherlands that have recently attempted to have a form of Creationism introduced there, too.[/QUOTE]

I didn't say it did. I said "47 % of the US public actually thinks ID is how things happened" which isn't that different from "God created man pretty much in his present form at one time within the last 10,000 years". Gallup is a reasonably accredited statistical institution and I was not making any new bold claims, but since the two statements dont exactly overlap, I'll give you a couple extra percent margin of error, say 10%. At best, 37% still sucks. Don't try to make a strawman out of my statistics!

Don't worry, Fable. I'm not trying to pin all the nuts on the US. We have our share of creationists in europe albeit a very small (but growing) share. To compensate, we have more idiots in other parts of society. I have this theory that the intelligence is a planetary constant, so it gets spread thinner the more of us there are.

[Fiona]

In Britain we have had this problem for a long time. I'm not sure when it emerged in the US but Tony Blair's evasions in this link are very clear.
[url]http://wiki.cotch.net/index.php/Talk eter_Vardy_Today_interview[/url].

It is a besetting sin of British political and cultural life that we tend to assume that the "middle" opinion is always the correct one. The right have exploited this for 20 years; as they move further right the middle follows. Those who were on the left for no very considered or principled reason are led to positions which would have been anathema a few years ago. Since they are still in the middle, hardly anyone seems to notice they have become extremists, on any sane analysis. At least that's what seems to happen. This nonsense is one result.

[Lestat]

[QUOTE=Silur] "47 % of the US public actually thinks ID is how things happened" [/QUOTE]
Playing Devil's Advocate here (well, OK, the term is not really appropriate):
The fact that they think ID is how things happened, does not mean they want ID taught in science classes. So if anybody knows of a survey/poll that asks the question 'Do you want ID taught as an alternative to Evolution theory in science classes?' or something to that effect, that would be helpful.

[fable]

[QUOTE=Silur]I didn't say it did. I said "47 % of the US public actually thinks ID is how things happened" which isn't that different from "God created man pretty much in his present form at one time within the last 10,000 years". Gallup is a reasonably accredited statistical institution and I was not making any new bold claims, but since the two statements dont exactly overlap, I'll give you a couple extra percent margin of error, say 10%. At best, 37% still sucks. Don't try to make a strawman out of my statistics![/quote]

I'm not looking for charity, just facts. In my extreme old age, I have taken a very chary attitude towards statistics of any kind. Gallup is trustworthy, but the facts could be wrong, or taken out of context, or again, representative of a particular culture within the US--the rural section, which has just begun to flex its political muscle.

Don't worry, Fable. I'm not trying to pin all the nuts on the US. We have our share of creationists in europe albeit a very small (but growing) share.

I don't care. I WANT OUT!

[Chimaera182]

[QUOTE=fable]This doesn't tell me how large the sample, or where it was taken. The question is also ambiguous. It says nothing about teaching any kind of creationist nonsense in schools, anything relating to the Judeo-Christian bible or Q'aran, or what areas of the US displayed what percentage of results. I think this is all very pertinent to analyzing the poll's results, because rural areas in Europe show a strong evangelical Christian cultural basis, including parties in the Netherlands that have recently attempted to have a form of Creationism introduced there, too.

EDIT: Mind, I am worried about the US--not so much because a fair number of it's citizens live perpetually in a fantasyland comprised equally of ignorance and entertainment; but because that group of citizens, most of whom originate in rural areas, now have a voice, a focus, and zealous cause for the first time in roughly 160 years. We already have a fair taste of what they can do. The greatest hope is that the economy crashes due to Bush's mishandling of the federal budget, because nothing awakens people from a happy dream as well as a good swift kick in the wallet. This worked before; but will it work again, or will Bush's budgetary manhandling simply be visited upon his successor, as Reagan's were, upon Bush Sr and Clinton?[/QUOTE]
It's that fundamental reason why I don't like democracy. It gives voices to people who really have no right to have them. I'm not saying it should be done away with, and I'm sure several politicians enjoy having the ignorant around to sway, but it leads to so much trouble. So many voters are just completely uninformed about what's going on, and they get brainwashed by political propaganda (that and they may only have the best of intentions, but the road to Hell is paved with good intentions). As such, the ignorant vote for things they want that wind up being detrimental to the country as a whole (Bush, for example). But because he's a Republican with good Christian ideals (like stamping out Islam, it seems), and he stands up for the rights of fetuses everywhere, that makes him a good guy. And these people vote for having Creation Science taught in public schools, whereas such things are supposed to be taught in church and Sunday school (that's what they're there for); we do have a rule about keeping the church and state separate, and public schools fall into the category of "state." But this doesn't matter to them, and now we have this crisis hovering over our heads.