more on Intelligent design vs. evolution, From Neil Munro. So, I got a bunch of interesting replies ....

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

------ Forwarded Message
From: "Munro, Neil" <NMunro () nationaljournal com>
Date: Mon, 14 Feb 2005 15:30:26 -0500
To: <dave () farber net>
Subject: RE: [IP] Intelligent design vs. evolution, From Neil Munro. So, I
got a bunch of interesting replies ....


 .... some of which were on-point.

 This one from Eric Grimm struck me as interesting; "The mere
fact that those issues [Sudan, AIDS, etc.], too, are important, in no
way suggests that political efforts to brainwash schoolchildren and to
indoctrinate them into non-scientific patterns of thought, is somehow
unworthy of comment or remark."

 But most of our social relations, law, constitution and lives
must be guided by "non-scientific patterns of thought." What we eat for
dinner, how our political leaders manage our fractious disputes, what
careers we choose, how we scramble for grants and tenure, how we treat
strangers, whether we cheat on our spouses, how and why we vote or fight
for advantage, are all driven by non-scientific thoughts of good and
bad, fair and unfair, cheat or trade. Even if we hand these personal
decisions over to committees of PhDs, they're going to be decided by
non-scientific patterns of thought, so it is only rational to educate
kids in the better types of non-scientific patterns of thought. Of
course, that begs the questions of what are better patterns.

 But here's an example where one type of non-scientific pattern
of thought has had a very bad impact on education, yet those who protest
creationism remain silent. A school system in liberal Newton Mass., has
pushed down math scores among poor kids by using math class to educate
against racism.  

http://www2.townonline.com/newton/opinion/view.bg?articleid=161257.com

 Nexis.com does not include ANY media stories on the topic over
the last 90 days. The combination of "creationism and schools" reveals
826 articles over the same period.

 I understand why creationism is a ridiculous notion, that ID is
not even a testable theory, that people are busy and can only focus on a
few things at a time; But why do so few people who strongly oppose
creationism CHOOSE not to also protest against this and many other
real-world example of bad education policy by established
education-professionals?

 Is it because they also see creationism as a populist threat --
not to the quality of education - but to the political and social clout
of organized science and its allied professions?

 I hope not, but if so, it would only be an entirely human and
natural response, because history is full of examples where people
rationally protest what hurts them, and rationally ignore what hurts
others. 


Neil 



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