Altabin
Posts: 308
Joined: Sep. 2006
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This really upsets me. However much fun it is to laugh at the 'tards over at UD, things like this remind us of what is at stake.
A middle-school video exploring the ID debate. What do we learn:
1: These 8th graders have a science teacher who is in favor of ID, and is one of the "expert witnesses" who tells them that science is stalled, at a dead end, and needs ID to proceed any further. (Granted, though, that they have another teacher who says ID belongs in church).
2: The virus of "balance" is everywhere - picked up from our pathetic news media, and no doubt instilled into them by their journalism teacher: for every statement in favor of evolution, there has to be another in favor of ID, with no attempt to assess how much veracity to attach to the claims. It's telling that, somewhere in the video, they ask whether "Evolution and Intelligent Design should both be taught at school, or neither?" - it would be unfair, clearly, to consider just the one that is science.
3: Indiana State Representative Peggy Welch is an evil 'tard. All this cr#p about students needing to be "given all the information" so that they can make up their own minds. Why do I think that she wouldn't be so keen on their being given all the information about, say, contraception. And while we're letting them hear all sides of every story, let's give them a hefty dose of Voltaire, Hume and H. L. Mencken, to provide them with means to question what they're exposed to in church every Sunday and to make up their own minds on the God thing - surely she'd be in favor of that too?
4: The "Christian Minister" who is one of their witnesses for ID states that he is "more comfortable" with the conclusions ID reaches. Because the universe cares about his comfort, I guess.
5: 50-something percent of 8th-graders believe in ID, 20-something in evolution. That's the kind of statistic that gets UDers very excited - "look how we're making inroads into the schools, despite Darwino-fascist opposition!". But all it shows is that sheer ignorance and lousy teaching (see point 1 above) is the natural matrix of ID.
The only hopeful thing here is the interview with the 8th-grader who made the piece. She said that she and her collaborators are all Christians and went into the project convinced that ID should be taught in the schools. Now that they've listened to all the arguments, they're no longer certain, and are at best neutral on the issue. That's a start, at least....
The comment thread at UD is just packed with tarditude. This is my favorite, from idnet.com.au (who, I think, is not just one of the stupidest regulars, but also one of the plain nastiest - is there a category in the Awards for "Biggest ###hole at UD"?):
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I think the primary argument that ID is non science, concerns whether intelligence present before intelligent beings have evolved is “natural”.
If ID is necessary to explain any form of life in our Universe, then intelligence creating life must be outside our “natural” Universe.
I would argue that ID uses only natural evidence and as such it is science.
Is relativity “natural”? It must be present at the birth of the universe. Is maths “natural”?
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