Should we teach both evolution and religion in school?

It seems that the current debate is not accomplishing much in the way of value to the topic. So let's be creative: suggest a lesson plan that you think would provide children with a good background in science and show the value of creationist teaching.After all, if all you do is criticize and don't offer an alternative, how are we to judge the positive value of your position?Enjoy

Well, let me explain this to you.Are you a troll? We are hesitating between two possibilities:(1) You are the most ignorant person we have ever met, drooling out halfwitted nonsense about subjects that you've never studied, and telling obvious lies about subjects you know nothing about. In that case, you have genuine mental problems, but you are not a troll.(2) You are pretending to be the most ignorant person we have ever met, drooling out halfwitted nonsense about subjects that you've never studied, and telling obvious lies about subjects you know nothing about, and you're doing this deliberately, in order to annoy intelligent and well-informed people with your pretended stupidity. In that case, you have genuine mental problems, namely that you are a troll.It's hard to tell which mental deficits you are suffering from. Your defects in personality suggest that you are a troll, but then this leaves us again with two possibilities:(1) You are genuinely socially handicapped, and you are not a troll.(2) You are genuinely socially handicapped, which is why you have chosen to be a troll.So, we are again left with two choices:(1) You are really mentally and socially defective, and we should feel sorry for you.(2) You are really mentally and socially defective, and you have chosen deliberately to present yourself as being mentally and socially defective ... in which case we should still feel sorry for you, but we probably won't.

He kinda admitted to trolling in Message 800:

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So if and when people are not prepared to listen, give them what they want to engage in, -useless arguments.

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You do seem to be mixed up. The only person here who is showing sensitivity and being all offended is you. What is being challenged is your view of evolution, because it has no resemblance to actual evolution that is studied by science.You have it all wrong, Mate. We are responding to you here because it is entertaining to watch someone make a fool of themselves and spout nonsense about subjects that you clearly do not have a clue about.It is like watching the movie Dumb and Dumber. We cannot believe anyone could be that stupid. What the heck does this word salad mean? Maybe what you mean here is "It is your own responsibility to understand what you are talking about and the only way that can happen is through study. If you want to increase your knowledge of science you have to study. It won't happen by chance. It will never happen, no matter how much time passes, if you don't study"

Because that showed you to be a liar. An advocate of knowingly spreading false information to forwards his agenda.Is that the person you want to be?Edited by Larni, : No reason given.

In my mind this is the biggest indictment of the Creationist approach -- that they have to lie and present false information against the science in order to look like they have a valid challenge, because they do•not•have any real evidence of problems with the science.Of course this only fools the gullible, the deluded and the ignorant. Which is why they get beat up here.Enjoy.

He has even admitted to committing troll-ful acts with troll-ful intent; in Message 745: Then in the same message he complains about being identified as a troll, after admitting to behaving as a troll for a troll's reasons. What hypocrisy! Haven't any of those idiots actually read the Gospels? Does their utter cluelessness also extend to how Jesus felt about hypocrites?

I think that it's mainly my moral outrage at creationism's deliberate deceptions and lies that keeps me involved in this issue even after more than three decades.Within a few years of starting to study "creation science", I learned that they were lying through their teeth. When I was a Christian (now half a century ago), lying was a sin, so I could not understand how these devout and very zealous Christians could deliberately lie as I saw them doing. My very first conversation with a creationist, a co-worker named Charles, started with my asking him whether Christian doctrine condones or even promotes lying in service of the faith. That question surprised him and he answered that, no, it does not and why did I ask. So I told about Duane Gish's false claim about the bombardier beetle and how Awbrey and Thwaites demonstrated that fact in front of Gish and their two-model class such that Gish had no choice but to respond and he admitted in public that that claim was wrong, but then he continued to use that same false claim (which is standing operating procedure among creationists). In the three decades since then, I have repeatedly asked the same question and only maybe two other creationists have ever offered any response, both times that lying for the Lord is not condoned, but none of them have ever continued that discussion. In Charles' case, he was sincerely surprised at Gish's dishonesty, saying that Gish was his hero.At first I thought that the followers of "creation science" repeating the lies just did not know any better and would realize that their claims were false when shown the truth and that then, since they were devout Christians, they would do the right thing and stop using those proven false claims. I was bewildered by their "unChristian" (according to my own Protestant schooling) and immoral response, the same type of responses that we have seen far too many times. I can understand their strong religious motivation to wish their claims to be true and I do understand the theological corner that they have painted themselves into by insisting that their faith and the very existence of God depends directly on their false and contrary-to-fact claims being true. But what I cannot understand is how they can justify their deliberate lies and deception, along with all the other mean, nasty, ugly crap that they feel the zeal to pull (Colbard's trollness being yet another example).Creationists' lies, deceptions, hateful conduct, self-delusion, etc, are all fruits of their theologies which either base themselves on "creation science" or at the very least vitally dependent on "creation science." Clearly, those fruits of those theologies are wicked. In the Matthew 7:20 Test, Jesus very clearly states that a good bush cannot produce any wicked fruit and that a bush that produces any wicked fruit is a wicked bush. And he very clearly commands that a wicked bush is to be cut down and thrown into the fire. Jesus' orders!

The coin story is true, and typical of teenagers, which I was at the time. What the mix up was did not concern me at the time and neither did I find out.
So you can have your lie accusations and religious injunctions back.I let the story out to watch the seagulls fight over a stone thought to be bread, to prove that contemplative thought is not going on at all, but bickering and fault finding, which are not the elements in which to introduce truth.The very fact that the argument has turned from the thread subject to the disputes over the two fields of thought, together with mud slinging and proof calling, shows that the opposition to creationism, is unable to focus on the subject at hand. An indication of a lack of intellectual application, which is necessary in order to be able to comprehend the implications of Divine thought as presented in the Bible. (but not necessarily by religions and its proponents).You claim that there is no evidence for creationism and so demand it. But I am aware that to a large degree you are not open to that evidence, but only to information that seems to agree with popular sanctions on evolution.
Evolution theory is just a way of looking at things. It's a point of view, and it sees what it does for evidence of itself. just because it is widely accepted, including by intellectuals of high standing, does not mean it is flawless, or even altogether true.Creationism does not have to find evidence, because everything that exists, is proof of creation, rather than snippets from nature.Once a person or society has decided to go down a certain track of philosophy which includes denial of the Creator, it is nigh impossible for them to see any evidence of truth outside of their head space. This also happens in false religion and in nearly every challenge the human mind faces.The only way to prove this point is to have two groups of schools, and universities, one which teaches creationism in the full sense, not half way as many denominations take it, and have the other schools strictly the regular teachings of evolution.Then the results can be compared in the students, for aptitude, achievements, intuition, practical skills, and every facet of learning including emotional, physical and mental balance.

Two men in an identical situation.The beautiful and faithful wives, have left the house unoccupied when the husband arrives home.
They have left a love note on the fridge, indicating that she has gone to town for the dry cleaning and won't be back until 8 pm.
There's a warm dinner in the oven and desert in the fridge.The men come home each to their own identical house.Husband A is totally delighted, that the house is so well run, and there are signs of her love everywhere, the whole house is a place of love.Husband B is a weak man, and does not notice anything, and gobbles the food down.9 pm and she does not arrive. There's a weather storm.A does not finish his meal, reads the note again, when the phone rings, he picks it up and it is cut. He decides to wait for 15 minutes and then drive to meet her.B freaks out about the lightning and gets a knot in his stomach, decides to look for an aspirin to settle himself and finds the note on the fridge. The phone rings and he picks up the phone when it goes dead. He notices the house is all tidy, and suspects she has left him for good. And in anger rips the phone out, trashes the kitchen, and burns the note. (the French revolution)A decides to meet her when the phone rings (1844 AD) she'll be home in two minutes.B has no phone, and decides that she never loved him, and as far as he is concerned she is as good as dead.A's wife enters the door and there's total happiness.B's wife could not contact him by phone, she finds the house trashed and a drunk on the lounge.Both had the same evidence.

Your posts, rather than supporting the creationist cause, will likely have the opposite effect.Irrationality is not a trait that is generally admired.

This makes perfect sense. The human mind is not like a video recorder. When you recall something the memory is reformed from scratch from a myriad of stored bits of information that change over time. No one believes this, but if true it kind of means you're a troll. It's a prime example of something trolls do, purposefully cause disruption and argument. I think they already do this. The creationist schools are Christian schools, home schooling and Bible colleges. Here ya go (from http://scienceblogs.com/.../26/biblical-literalism-or-low-iq, click to enlarge): --Percy

Pssh. You give them too much credit.They're just backpedaling and playing clean up. They didn't really foresee the replies that they were going to get.They didn't actually set up that slow pitch for us to knock out of the park, they really did think they knew how to pitch a ball.They were not ready for the big leagues, and now they're trying to act like it was all a big set-up.Don't fall for that crap.

So then in our context, you are clearly Man B, who ignores all the evidence and goes into wild flights of fantasy, ending up reaching irrational conclusions against which he lashes out angrily. Notice that in that process of irrationality, you not only ignore the evidence but you also even go so far as to destroy the evidence.Man A is obviously the scientific-minded man who is observant of his surroundings and who takes all the evidence into account in order to arrive at rational conclusions.The knowledgeable and rational Man A weathers through the events quite well, whereas you, the ignorant, irrational, and self-centered Man B, live in constant fear and self-delusional turmoil which leads you to lash out irrationally.

Oh yes, there is that too. But I was talking about the overall situation instead of the immediate encounter.In the immediate encounter, the creationist goes in overconfident that he's armed with deadly ammo which is recent scientific findings that will just blow those evolutionists away. Instead, he discovers that he's been given blanks as he is very quickly informed in no uncertain terms that those "recent scientific findings" are nothing be false creationist claims that were soundly refuted decades ago and are very well known to his opponents. I have seen that happen in real life (informal debate night where anyone could get up a present their creation/evolution case) when a young creationist got up with "new scientific evidence" that the speed of light has been slowing down, whereupon half the audience immediately broke into uncontrollable laughter while at the same time trying to tell him why the old claim is false. The effect on that young creationist was absolutely devastating.When that happens on-line, then the creationist can either turn and run or try to handle the situation. Since he cannot allow his position to suffer any defeat, both for the sake of keeping face before lurkers and for the sake of his own self-delusion, he will usually choose to stand and fight. Since he is unable to deal with it rationally, he will turn to dishonest tricks whose primary intent is to deflect attention away from his false claim. That is when we see such tactics as trying to Gish Gallop us with a flood of more false claims, but most often they become increasingly belligerent and start to complain loudly and incessantly about being insulted and ganged up on and treated horribly, etc, etc, etc. IOW, the mode that Colbard is running in.When the encounter happens in email correspondence, it follows a very predictable pattern -- a Christian posted about this on his site, but I'm in a rush to leave for work and can't access it now. You read a creationist claim on-line so you email him with questions about that claim (the surest way to anger a creationist is to try to discuss his own claim with him, which is evidence that he doesn't understand it himself). The reply, if you get one, just dances around your question, so you send a follow-up email to get your answer. The replies you get become increasingly belligerent and unpleasant until you just have to give up. For example, when I contacted Kent Hovind with questions about his obviously bogus solar-mass-loss claim, he actually tried to pick a fight with me over my AOL screenname, DWise1 -- and he tried that twice!In Colbard's case, I think that he actually thought that he had a good argument with that beyond-idiotic carbon-dated coin nonsense, but now he's playing the belligerent and martyred creationist card. But now he has also indicated that he's been on many other forums as well, so obviously this was not the first time he had used that claim. That being the case, he had to have been informed of his massive mistake each time (unless those others were purely on creationist circle-jerk forums), which would mean that when he posted it here he knew full well that it was wrong. That would make his posting of that claim here a deliberate lie.Running late now. PS {ABE}
I've had some time now.A few years ago I wrote a webpage that discusses encounters with creationists. It should embellish and explain more fully a lot of what I had written above. You can find it at Encounters with Creationists.On that page, I quote from Carl Drews (see below). Carl Drews is a fundamentalist I met on-line. He had developed into theistic evolutionist and tells his story at http://www.theistic-evolution.com/mystory.html. First day in high school science class, his teacher told them the basic difference between religion and science and why they do not conflict: religion tells us who created the universe and why, while science tells us how the universe works. As long as either side does not attempt to usurp the other's role, there is no conflict. That laid to rest any possible theological problems, but then a few years later in his young adult Bible study group he had his first brush with creationism. Someone brought the first edition of Chick Pubs' "Big Daddy?" (rewritten many years later, apparently by Kent Hovind) and Carl volunteered to check its claims. Checking the pamphlet's references in the library, he very quickly learned that the author had lied about what each and every source had actually said. He reported his findings to his group and they all realized how false that form of creationism was.Carl didn't encounter creationism again until years later when he and his family had joined a fundamentalist church that they really liked. Then one Sunday a strongly anti-evolution sermon filled with the same "Big Daddy?" inaccuracies raised concerns which he expressed to the pastor, who insisted that Carl attend a weekly creationism class they were having (basically conduct a video-based creationist seminar). Again, Carl wrote down all the claims that were presented on the video along with their sources, researched them, and yet again found that they were all lies. He presented his findings to the class, but nobody was interested in the truth because they just wanted "ammo" to use in proselytizing. He talked to his pastor again and the pastor expressed the opinion that using lies and deception is acceptable so long as it's against evolution. Carl could not in good conscience belong to a church that taught that, so they left.On his website, Carl described the typical encounter with a creationist (Evolution, One Christian's Perspective), which agrees with my own repeated experiences:

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Typical Encounters with Young-Earth Creationists

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A few times I have written to the authors of young-earth creationist publications, pointing out some inaccuracy or a faulty analysis. The encounter follows the following pattern:

1. I write to them.
   
2. They write back to me refusing to admit error; "I make no apologies."
   They defend their position and manner of expressing it.
   I notice some misinterpretation of my letter, or ignoring of what I clearly said.
   
3. If I write back to them a second time, rebutting their response or bringing up another point,
   
4. Their communication becomes unpleasant.
   
5. At this point I have nothing further to do with them.
   

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On the subject of creationists gathering "ammo" to use in their proselytizing, Glenn R. Morton used to have a page of newsgroup posts that included a post by a former creationist, Scott Rauch (links are broken):

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I still hold some anger because I believe the evangelical Christian community did not properly prepare me for the creation/evolution debate. They gave me a gun loaded with blanks, and sent me out. I was creamed.

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Edited by dwise1, : PS