Which religion's creation story should be taught?

If we are to teach creation in public schools, which creation story should we teach? Do we teach Genesis? If so which version of Genesis? Do we teach the story of the Norse gods carving the world from the bones of giants? Or the Hindu belief that the world is God's dream? Heck, even Christians don't agree on a literal six-day creation less than 10'000 years ago or Genesis as metaphor for divinely inspired evolution...I say evolution belongs in the science classroom and creation belongs in comparative religion...

---

Our loyalties are to the species and the planet. We speak for Earth. Our obligation to survive is owed not just to ourselves but also to that Cosmos, ancient and vast, from which we spring.
--Carl Sagan, 1934-1996

Thread moved here from the Proposed New Topics forum.

I propose equal time - present every creation story ever written.Give students the the facts then they can compare these to the theories and stories - relious and fact based - so can make up their own minds.I agree with you that creationism should be should be taught, in its various forms, as religious mythology and not science. The reason for this is because so much of our literature, fictional and metaphysical, is based on various creation myths from ancient Babylon to the bible.Additionally, it is difficult to completely understand the socio-economic and political events that have shaped our history without some knowledge of religion.So yeah, throw a bone to Judeo-Christian mythology, but include the others as well. The first thing any inquisitive young mind will do when presented with fifty slightly different versions of the same story will be to ask: why are all these stories the same, I thought the bible was unique?At that point the light bulb goes on - and stays on unless the kid gets a hold of some Chick Tracts.

That's my thinking exactly. I stopped taking Genesis literally when my mom made me watch Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth instead of the Cosby Show.

Ha ha the Cosby Show! That insidious tool of the fundamentalists.(Did you know that Bill's sweaters contained secret messages? All you needed to decode them was the right amount of mescaline and an old pair of reading glasses. Brilliantly infernal).This message has been edited by custard, 06-15-2004 03:59 PM

That explains everything. What a relief. I spent years trying to decode Mr. Rogers sweaters. And all that time I thought I had a bad batch of Maui Momma.

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

That's when either the light bulb goes back out, or the kid develops a really wicked sense of black humor.

---

"Egos drone and pose alone, Like black balloons, all banged and blown
On a backwards river the infidels shiver in the stench of belief.
And tell my mama I'm a hundred years late; I'm over the rails and out of the race
The crippled psalms of an age that won't thaw are ringing in my ears"
-Beck

Speaking of Chick and dark humor, Dan your drawings seem oddly familiar. You sure you didn't help create this?

More likely this one but I could be wrong

---

Aslan is not a Tame Lion

Is THAT what he looks like? I thought this was him.

Back to the theme, please.Adminnemooseus

I'll clear the mystery to kill the topic drift. I've never designed a tattoo, I'd give my left nut to draw a Chick Tract but never have, and I only rarely take time jaunts to the 18th century. It's more of a summer thing.There, the topic can resume. I'm on your side, Moose.

---

"Egos drone and pose alone, Like black balloons, all banged and blown
On a backwards river the infidels shiver in the stench of belief.
And tell my mama I'm a hundred years late; I'm over the rails and out of the race
The crippled psalms of an age that won't thaw are ringing in my ears"
-Beck

I have yet to see real science support the belief of a religon besides the Bible. Creationists show how fossils, young earth, natural selection, complexity, flood evidence, dinasaurs, design, uniqueness of the Bible & Jesus etc are all consistent with the Bible. If there is Muslim or Hindu qualified scientist doing this also then they should have a right to teach scientific creation.This message has been edited by almeyda, 06-15-2004 11:56 PM

actually, the hindu histories of catastrophism are highly aligned with science. they talk about the periodic destruction of the world -- ie: major exitinctions.and there are a lof hindu scientists.and there's a ton of muslim creationists. in fact, they're difficult to tell apart from the christian ones because they "borrow" bad christian creationist arguments wholesale. alot of their "source" is hovind. no, this argument fails all the time. fossil evidence does not fit your literal reading of genesis. every dating method agrees that they do not. didn't you say they were ok with this? behe's argument fails. wanna read my paper on it? you mean, no flood evidence? the people who were alive at the time might be concerned that they were underwater for 40 days. behemoth and leviathan are not dinosaurs. this can easily be shown by, oh, i dunno, reading the bible. see behe, above. you argued the uniqueness of the bible and lost. i've personally read several other similar texts. and jesus was apparently not all that unique. we actually have records of messiahs that said more or less the same thing, died in a similar way, and just happened to have a different name: apollonius was one such man. which is funny, seeing as how the bible itself is anything but consistent.This message has been edited by Arachnophilia, 06-16-2004 02:09 AM

Since you think this flood happened can you explain the fossil record. Please go to this thread:
Message 212
and carry on form there.I'm afraid you may have to read over the whole thing but maybe not. I'll give you the gist: The ordering of the fossil record is completely unexplainable with the idea of a single, global, sudden, short lived flood. Please try an explanation that has not been already knocked off in that thread if you think the flood happened.