Should scientific meeting organizers boycott Louisiana?

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***Furthermore, it would help to avoid writing in fragments if you want to be taken seriously.***

Great argument for scientist boycotting Louisiana you must have thought long and hard on that one.

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As you can see we have a basic disagreement. I have many others with things that are being taught in our classrooms. Would you have a government class teach only the liberal view or only the conservative view or both sides? So if you take a liberal and teach them conservatives views are you violating them forcing them to be conservative? Or simply educating them that there are more then one belief or one theory about government, the U.S. and the people that live here. We’re going to have to agree to disagree, Louisiana has the right to do what the people want, and again if scientist want to boycott us for that so be it. Personally I wouldn’t live up north because one can commit a felony in New York that’s not even a crime down here. So people tend to live in the state that suits them best. This is why our forefathers were so insistent on states rights.

[Amazon 7]

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As you can see we have a basic disagreement. I have many others with things that are being taught in our classrooms. Would you have a government class teach only the liberal view or only the conservative view or both sides? So if you take a liberal and teach them conservatives views are you violating them forcing them to be conservative? Or simply educating them that there are more then one belief or one theory about government, the U.S. and the people that live here. We’re going to have to agree to disagree, Louisiana has the right to do what the people want, and again if scientist want to boycott us for that so be it. Personally I wouldn’t live up north because one can commit a felony in New York that’s not even a crime down here. So people tend to live in the state that suits them best. This is why our forefathers were so insistent on states rights.

How about an education based on facts....not beliefs.

I know that having those terrible people who actually got an education and wish to teach is a scary thing to "conservatives" who couldn't be bothered. I guess that is what scares the right wing so much about the NEA..

A mind is a terrible thing to waste......but the dumb as dirt and proud of it crowd have made a religion of it.

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A mind is a terrible thing to waste......but the dumb as dirt and proud of it crowd have made a religion of it. ***
The irony in that is most of those so called dumb as dirt and proud of it religious crowd wouldn't insult you for your beliefs they would simply say they disagree.

Teach only facts:

That’s not practical scientist don’t agree on so many fronts. Science doesn’t know how the earth was formed, or for that matter how the Grand Canyon was formed. They don’t agree on what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs or even if they were fast, slow grey or multi-colored. The laws of Sir Isaac Newton don’t seem to apply to the universe or the multiverse another thing they don’t agree on. The effects of man on global warming is very controversial but you wouldn’t know that listening to Al Gore. So if we stick with facts all of the above would have to be removed from the classroom and even I’m not that conservative. It’s the liberals that are afraid, I want to add to the curriculum not remove.
As for me I majored Law Enforcement, I was more interested in keeping my community safe then making big money.
Oh and my daughter is in college majoring in education and I’m very proud of her. She has also chosen her community and state over big bucks; I guess that makes us dumb.

As I’ve made clear before if the folks out in California, and up in New York want to think of us as a bunch of stupid hicks We’re ok with that. We would have to respect their opinions for it to bother us!

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I really thought this must be a joke, but if you look at my last post I named quite a few things scientist don't agree on. Here's the short list. Global warming, the universe vs. multiverse, dark matter, the formation of the universe, the formation of earth, the formation of the grand canyon, the extinction of the dinosaurs and the list goes on and on and on. These are all taught in school in some manner. A few more fragments for you

[JackC 0]

Science should be criticised, it's part of what makes it work but it should be criticised for what it is, not what it isn't. But it is becoming painfully obvious that the state of education in this world is so piss poor that people feel they can criticise science and yet they don't even have the first clue what it is. That is a real tragedy and it makes me very sad.

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Here's a scary scientist:
BETHESDA, MD, June 12, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a world where the rate of scientific discovery outpaces anything ever dreamed of in any other era of human history, the idea that “science disproves God” is perhaps one of the commonest arguments now invoked against the existence of an omnipotent Deity.
But according to Francis Collins, who headed the team of scientists who cracked the human genome, the argument is a fallacious one.
In the world-acclaimed scientist’s upcoming book, The Language of God, set to be published in September, he argues that science cannot possibly disprove the existence of God, since science is relegated to the natural world.
If anything, Collins argues, it may be the exact opposite—science aids not in disproving God, but may help in proving His existence. “For me,” says Collins about his work on the human genome, “the experience of sequencing the human genome, and uncovering this most remarkable of all texts, was both a stunning scientific achievement and an occasion of worship.”
“When you have for the first time in front of you this 3.1 billion-letter instruction book that conveys all kinds of information and all kinds of mystery about humankind you can’t survey that going through page after page without a sense of awe. I can’t help but look at those pages and have a vague sense that this is giving me a glimpse of God’s mind.”
This was not, explains Collins, always his way of looking at the world. Indeed, according to Collins' own description of himself, at the age of 27 he was “a pretty obnoxious atheist”.

[wmw999 2,447]

People also don't agree on whether Dickens is better than Shakespeare, but that doesn't mean that they're not both taught in English class.

One of the basic means by which science is defined is how the hypotheses are built. A hypothesis can only be proven false; it can't be proven true. The most you can do to prove something true is to thoroughly define the boundaries within which it's true. So a good hypothesis is falsifiable.

The biggest problem with calling ID science is that it starts with a postulate -- something that it defines as unprovable -- i.e. that a creator was involved. A pretty basic tenet of Christianity (who are the main group that care about this debate) is that God is unknowable. That's why it's called faith. ID research consists of people trying to explain why it's the only answer, rather than trying to figure out if it works.

Science often consists of people trying to disprove theories, or of trying to define the boundaries where the theories work. You get famous by disproving some famous theorem. Really, really famous. So, believe it or not, there's a huge intellectual investment in figuring out that something is wrong.

The fact that there's disagreement should definitely be taught. But the basic structure of science -- falsifiable theories, and experimentation to test them, should also be taught. And examples of science that don't fit into that should be taught in the appropriate venues -- history, religion, philosophy, social studies.

Sorry. This got too long. If anyone gets this far I'll be surprised.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[wmw999 2,447]

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science cannot possibly disprove the existence of God, since science is relegated to the natural world

That is absolutely true. And God is currently in the spiritual/religious world, and cannot prove or disprove science.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

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Teach only facts:

That’s not practical scientist don’t agree on so many fronts.

Uh.. there is always maths, psychology,history, reading, writing and ..a quite a few other subjects I seem to remember in school.

Science doesn’t know how the earth was formed, or for that matter how the Grand Canyon was formed. They don’t agree on what caused the extinction of the dinosaurs or even if they were fast, slow grey or multi-colored


Yes but I am pretty sure it was not done in one week

I think the scientists have a pretty good idea that the Grand Canyon was not miracled into place.. but was eroded over millions of years by the river as it cut thru the Colorado Plateau as it has been uplifted.

I am also pretty sure that the millions of dinosaur fossils and that silly little iridium layer at the KT boundry is not where satan had a bad day.


Fact is.. science has been a search for the how and why... religion has not needed because its the word of god... so no further need for any investigation. Those who have questioned it... have had an interesting array of ways of dieing at the hands of THE BELIEVERS.

Never mind.. that the Bible has been a goldmine to organized religions and the priestly/church leaders class for a few millenia now. IT sure is coincidental for a whole lot of repression of many people and certainly women... and is a very good way of controlling the flock of sheep.

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It’s the liberals that are afraid, I want to add to the curriculum not remove.

I dont think its fear that is driving this as much as a disdain for a state sponsored religion being brought into our schools. I bet Chuteless would support you in your wish to ADD to your curriculum.. religious classes based on the treaching of the King James version of the Bible.

Have you ever read the English history that is the backstory of how that "translation" came about????

It was a VERY bloody period of English history.. lots of burnings and beheadings of heretics. The wars between protestants and catholics that brought about the King James Bibles are STILL echoing in Northern Ireland and in Great Britain.

I think the founders had a pretty good idea that giving people religious freedom was a good thing... and escaping from the Church of England and from the Pope in Rome meddling in our new countires affairs was also a good thing. Personally I think too many Americans don't have a clue of why those portions of separation of church and state are there.

I personally would not like to relive that history.... where believing the wrong way.... was a death sentence for so many. Those incapable of learning from the past.. are doomed to relive it.

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I understand you and I have yet to say that creation should be taught in a science class. But think about this for a moment. The formation of the universe started in one theory as a big bang. Where did all the matter come from to cause and explosion and then formulate the universe? Not unlike creation it was just there and has always been there.

In any case there are many Christian Scientist.

[billvon 2,994]

>Science doesn’t know how the earth was formed . . .

Actually they have a pretty good idea.

>or for that matter how the Grand Canyon was formed.

Actually they have a VERY good idea.

>The laws of Sir Isaac Newton don’t seem to apply to the universe or
>the multiverse another thing they don’t agree on.

Of course they do. They do indeed apply within the boundary conditions Newton was working on. You can test them yourself.

>So if we stick with facts all of the above would have to be removed from the classroom . . . .

Nope. Not even close.

If we only taught material that was 100% proven we'd have nothing to teach in school. American revolution? We're not 100% sure what happened. Smoking causes cancer? Sorry, can't say that with 100% certainty. Terrorists flew planes into the WTC on 9/11? Sorry, some people dispute that. The earth is round? Sorry, the flat-earth society people don't agree.

Instead, we teach our best understanding of science, math and history. That means we teach that the Grand Canyon was formed by erosion, and was not a scar left by a lightning bolt from Thor's Hammer. We teach that terrorists flew airplanes into the WTC on 9/11, and not that George Bush blew them up. We teach that the earth was formed about 4.5 billion years ago from a cloud of dust and gas that circled what would become our sun, rather than created about 6000 years ago out of nothing.

[billvon 2,994]

>Here's a scary scientist:

>BETHESDA, MD, June 12, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - In a world where the rate
>of scientific discovery outpaces anything ever dreamed of in any other era of
>human history, the idea that “science disproves God” is perhaps one of the
>commonest arguments now invoked against the existence of an omnipotent
>Deity.

Hmm. So do you think "science disproves God" should be taught in science class, then? Or should we keep religion out of the science classroom altogether?

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I personally would not like to relive that history.... where believing the wrong way.... was a death sentence for so many. Those incapable of learning from the past.. are doomed to relive it.

Nor would I and I agree, and yes I've read much of the history of religion and especially in England. I have read why the forefathers wanted no laws establishing a religion. However they were trying to protect religion from the government not the Government from religion. If you go back and look at things that were happening during the days when our framers were still alive you will find prayer in school, creation taught in school and yes we were founded as a Christian nation with tolerance for any religion or even the lack there of. I think that's whets been lost.

Time to go do my therapy it’s been interesting.

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I really thought this must be a joke, but if you look at my last post I named quite a few things scientist don't agree on. Here's the short list. Global warming, the universe vs. multiverse, dark matter, the formation of the universe, the formation of earth, the formation of the grand canyon, the extinction of the dinosaurs and the list goes on and on and on. These are all taught in school in some manner. A few more fragments for you

You realize that post supports the criticisms of some here. What are your sources? Hopefully not teachers.

Global warming is a measureable fact. The disagreement is on how much humans are contributing and whether or not it is a significant special cause deviation from the known cycles.

Universe versus multi-verse and formation of the Universe are pretty much the same discussion, and any scientist worth their weight in nuetrinos will tell you it is basically speculation, and could very well never be known to the degree that we could call it a proof.

Formation of Earth, much less formation of the Grand Canyon, is well understood. Who is telling you these things are not understood? The Discovery Institute? The psuedo-science shows on TV? Are you picking at relatively minor details amongst some of the theories on the details of the mechanics, or are you seriously saying that in general, we do not know how planets form?

Guess what? There is a lot of really good debate on the exact mechanics of the human genetic code; but if you think that is reason to doubt the genetic code as the means of inheritance and the foundation of evolution, you have been very poorly informed.

You know someone who doesn't think the dinosaurs are extinct? Just funning you there, but again you are caught up in mechanical details that are of only secondary importance. Mass extinctions happen, and the one at the K-T boundary that included the end of the dinosaurs wasn't even close to being THE BIG ONE. You can do some research if you like for better details; but I believe it was an event prior to the pre-Cambrian explosion that there was an extinction that wiped out at minimum 80% of all species. THAT is a big die-off.

The important nugget there is about mass-extinctions. The fact that a few scientists still hold out on the meteor impact theory should not disuade you from science as the arbiter of truth. Eventually we will probably gather enough evidence to make a definitive declaration that it was a volcano or meteor or some other form of annihilation. That is the wonderful thing about science, it builds from solid foundations and keeps correcting the details.

You should question your sources (as science always does) ans especially question the motivations of any source that asks you to discount well understood foundations because of missing details that do not change that foundation. The Discovery Institute, and all others like them, count on being able to sway people with poor logic and sensational claims.

If I can get it to load, attached is a fun example.

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

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Sorry. This got too long. If anyone gets this far I'll be surprised.

Wendy W.

Not long at all. You should try being me.

I CAN'T STOP MYSELF!!!!!

Oh yes by the way. Very well said.

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

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I personally would not like to relive that history.... where believing the wrong way.... was a death sentence for so many. Those incapable of learning from the past.. are doomed to relive it.

Nor would I and I agree, and yes I've read much of the history of religion and especially in England. I have read why the forefathers wanted no laws establishing a religion. However they were trying to protect religion from the government not the Government from religion. If you go back and look at things that were happening during the days when our framers were still alive you will find prayer in school, creation taught in school and yes we were founded as a Christian nation with tolerance for any religion or even the lack there of. I think that's whets been lost.

Time to go do my therapy it’s been interesting.

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If you go back and look at things that were happening during the days when our framers were still alive you will find prayer in school, creation taught in school and yes we were founded as a Christian nation with tolerance for any religion or even the lack there of. I think that's whets been lost.

Uh you do realize that in 1790.. that was just about all they had for science????

Books were rare for teaching..in many schools they used the most common book available.... the bible for many things.

I would like to think we have a few more options now.

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***However they were trying to protect religion from the government not the Government from religion.

Time to go do my therapy it’s been interesting.

Actually, they did both; quite intentionally.

Therapy heh? How's that working out?

Tell me about your childhood.

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

[wmw999 2,447]

Nah, he hurt his back; I have a feeling it's for that.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[billvon 2,994]

> If you go back and look at things that were happening during the
> days when our framers were still alive you will find prayer in school,
> creation taught in school . . .

You'd also find the 'preformationism' theory being taught, in which each sperm contains a tiny person ready to grow into a full size person. In that tiny person's testes were hundreds more tiny people, and inside each of them were even MORE tiny people etc. Once we ran out of tiny people - no more humans.

Needless to say that's not a good reason to teach it today.

It is perhaps more instructive to note what was NOT happening back in those "good old days" of Christanity.

There was no "In God we Trust" on money.

There was no "Under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thomas Jefferson discovered he did not like the Bible, and thus cut one to tiny bits and re-pasted only the parts he considered valid into his own version. If a president did that today (DESECRATED THE BIBLE! Probably has a KORAN!) he'd be impeached immediately.

George Washington, the father of our country, was not a practicing Christian.

Since then we have gotten considerably more anal about being politically correct. We've put references to God on our money and in our pledge, started presidential prayer breakfasts, and are talking about requiring prayer in schools. People are trying to replace science with religion in classrooms; they have stated that they want to do this to "destroy scientific materialism."

[VTmotoMike08 0]

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I really thought this must be a joke, but if you look at my last post I named quite a few things scientist don't agree on. Here's the short list. Global warming, the universe vs. multiverse, dark matter, the formation of the universe, the formation of earth, the formation of the grand canyon, the extinction of the dinosaurs and the list goes on and on and on. These are all taught in school in some manner. A few more fragments for you

OK, so I poorly phrased my point, but you are also looking at in in too narrow of a scope.

If I say that the grand canyon was caused be the erosion of the Colorado river over 10's or 100's of thousands of years, then we can look at rock patterns, erosion estimates, etc and come to the conclusion that erosion is the most likely cause. This is a legitimate scientific theory because it invokes natural laws to explain the world around us and could be proven wrong by contradicting rock patterns, etc.

If you say that God took one big swipe with his celestial jack hammer because he knew we would want a nice place to go camping, there is no way to prove it wrong using natural laws. Having faith that God did it anyway requires you to abandon the laws that are well established and re-proven countless time each day. A reasonable person would then conclude that God did not do it. By examining further cases, the same reasonable person would probably conclude that God does not exist.

Teaching ID in public school classrooms would be a slap in the face to the entire scientific process. So, if Louisiana wants to slap the scientific process in the face, then I agree that scientists should boycott the state. Fortunately for them, they will still enjoy the modern conveniences that science has brought to them.

I am done with this thread. Enjoy this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Lw4gtT0t2s

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Well it really has been interesting but we could go on for years. But I will leave you with this theory for the formation of the Grand Canyon.

Finally, several people are now saying that the existing Colorado River did carve the Grand Canyon but did so while flowing in the opposite direction of today.

The modern river is just too weird, said Andre Potochnik, a river guide who is writing his doctoral dissertation on deposits related to early Southwest river systems. It does not follow fault lines as most rivers do and it has tributaries that come in at obtuse angles, he said.

Mr. Potochnik argues that a much older river flowed west to east down the Kaibab Upwarp and carved the canyon. Later, as tectonic forces changed the land to tilt in different directions, the river changed the direction of its flow and became the modern Colorado.

Wayne Ranney, a geology instructor at Yavapai College in Prescott, Ariz., argues that the Little Colorado River probably flowed north through Marble Canyon, a stretch of the river where tributaries come in at an angle that is the opposite of what one would expect, given the way the water flows.

"The river system I envision would have flowed north into the Glen Canyon area," Mr. Ranney said. "Every time I see this landscape, I'm more convinced that at least this part of the river went the other way. The beauty of this theory is that it ties together a lot of conflicting ideas concerning evidence for an old river east of the Kaibab Upwarp and a young one west of it."

Figuring out the Grand Canyon is like being a police officer called to the scene of a four-car accident, Dr. Reynolds said.

"But by the time you get there, three of the cars have been towed away, they repaved the road and washed away the skid marks. You are left with only one piece of the puzzle."

Well there is some real precise information on how the canyon was formed. They can't even say with any certainty that the river has always flowed from north to south. Science has its place but much of it is a long way from Fact

I leave this thread with this. Should the scientist boycott Louisianna? I'll let you all decide its been fun. God Bless!

[billvon 2,994]

>Well there is some real precise information on how the canyon was formed.

?? Every person listed agreed that the Grand Canyon was formed via erosion. You are kind of proving my point here.

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Well it really has been interesting but we could go on for years. But I will leave you with this theory for the formation of the Grand Canyon.

Finally, several people are now saying that the existing Colorado River did carve the Grand Canyon but did so while flowing in the opposite direction of today.

The modern river is just too weird, said Andre Potochnik, a river guide who is writing his doctoral dissertation on deposits related to early Southwest river systems. It does not follow fault lines as most rivers do and it has tributaries that come in at obtuse angles, he said.

Mr. Potochnik argues that a much older river flowed west to east down the Kaibab Upwarp and carved the canyon. Later, as tectonic forces changed the land to tilt in different directions, the river changed the direction of its flow and became the modern Colorado.

Wayne Ranney, a geology instructor at Yavapai College in Prescott, Ariz., argues that the Little Colorado River probably flowed north through Marble Canyon, a stretch of the river where tributaries come in at an angle that is the opposite of what one would expect, given the way the water flows.

"The river system I envision would have flowed north into the Glen Canyon area," Mr. Ranney said. "Every time I see this landscape, I'm more convinced that at least this part of the river went the other way. The beauty of this theory is that it ties together a lot of conflicting ideas concerning evidence for an old river east of the Kaibab Upwarp and a young one west of it."

Figuring out the Grand Canyon is like being a police officer called to the scene of a four-car accident, Dr. Reynolds said.

"But by the time you get there, three of the cars have been towed away, they repaved the road and washed away the skid marks. You are left with only one piece of the puzzle."

Well there is some real precise information on how the canyon was formed. They can't even say with any certainty that the river has always flowed from north to south. Science has its place but much of it is a long way from Fact

I leave this thread with this. Should the scientist boycott Louisianna? I'll let you all decide its been fun. God Bless!

VERY old news...Even 30 years ago they had a pretty good idea that the Little Colorado used to flow to the east to the Rio Grande millions of years ago.. BUT due to the west side being far wetter.. the erosion was faster to the west.. and captured the entire flow at some point taking the primary flow away from Marble Canyon and west to the Gulf of California..

[georgerussia 0]

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By the way I recently had a back surgery fused L4-L5 and L5-S1 and I'm in a back brace so there's not much I can do besides hang out on the internet. The science used on my surgery great stuff. The people that prayed for me though it all great stuff!

Cograts on your surgery, but I think you might be in a big trouble now. Your Jesus might interpret your act of preferring going to scientific medical facility instead of submitting to spiritual powers as you really do not have any faith. In the best case Jesus would say that you sold your spiritual soul in exchange for relieving from body pain, which might be a major trouble on your way to the Heaven.

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Statistics were acquired from the prayer and placebo groups both before and after prayer, until the patients were discharged from the hospital. There were no statistical differences between the placebo and the prayer groups before prayer was initiated. The results demonstrated that patients who were prayed for suffered "less congestive heart failure, required less diuretic and antibiotic therapy, had fewer episodes of pneumonia, had fewer cardiac arrests, and were less frequently intubated and ventilated."

I wonder why didn't you post the source you copy-pasted from. Is it because you thought http://www.godandscience.org/apologetics/prayer.htm does not look convincing?

Here's one of the latest researches for you: http://www.ahjonline.com/article/PIIS0002870305006496/abstract

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However, since atheists make up only 1-2% of the population, it would be difficult to obtain a large enough sample size.

According to the Pew Research Center 2008 study, people who are not affiliated with any particular faith today, represent 16.1% of U.S. population, so you're talking about spreading your Christian-based Creation theory over much more than 1-2% of population.

* Don't pray for me if you wanna help - just send me a check. *