Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former - Albert Einstein

[BigLouie]

Here is proof that what Albert said is so true.

Loch Ness Monster used to debunk evolution in state-funded school



It sounds like a hoax, but it's apparently true: The Loch Ness Monster is on the science class syllabus for kids at Eternity Christian Academy in Westlake, Louisiana.
As reported by the Herald Scotland (which must track all Loch Ness-related news), a school that will receive tax-payer dollars, will teach kids that the mythological sea creature is real in order to debunk the theory of evolution. So pay attention: That will be on the test.


Eternity Christian Academy uses the fundamentalist A.C.E. Curriculum to teach students "to see life from God's point of view."
According to the Herald, one textbook, Biology 1099, reads, "Are dinosaurs alive today? Scientists are becoming more convinced of their existence. Have you heard of the 'Loch Ness Monster' in Scotland? 'Nessie' for short has been recorded on sonar from a small submarine, described by eyewitnesses, and photographed by others. Nessie appears to be a plesiosaur."


Starting in the fall, thousands of schoolchildren will receive publicly funded vouchers to attend private schools, some of which are religious. Religious schools in Louisiana will receive public funding as part of a push from Louisiana's governor, Bobby Jindal, to move millions of tax dollars to cover tuition for private schools, including small bible-based church schools. Money will fund schools that have "bible-based math books" and biology texts that refute evolution.


At Eternity Christian Academy, pastor-turned-principal Marie Carrier says that the her first through eighth-grade students learn at their own pace from Christian workbooks. The beginning science text explains "what God made" on each of the six days of creation. Evolution is not taught.


Carrier said, "We try to stay away from all those things that might confuse our children." She hopes to secure enrollment of 135 voucher students for the 2012-2013 school year. According to the website Salon, the school currently has just 38 students.
Whether this gambit will help move Louisiana from the bottom of math and science rankings in the country is unclear. A 2011 study of how well primary education prepares students for engineering careers had Louisiana third from the bottom, with only West Virginia and Mississippi performing worse.

[Fast Gunn]

It is hard to believe that even in this day and age some schools will still not teach evolution!

I know of otherwise very educated people that don't believe in it either.

I heard of a school that was reluctant to even teach math.

. . . They finally agreed, but it was going to be called "cyphering"

[IIFFOFRDB]

We don't drink your Okoolaid.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k7T6gACFd-U

[gnadfly]

BigLouse: Your posts prove Einstein's latter assertion.

[BigLouie]

So gnadfly and IIFFOFRDB are you saying that you support teaching children that the Loch Ness monster myth is proof that evolution is not correct?

Oh and see that gnadfly is just like the rest of the conservatives on here who seem to thing that if they can't refute they try to insult.

Here is some facts for you.

Glacial activity during the last Ice Age deepened and smoothed the Glen and, as the ice retreated around 8000 BC, it left behind a string of lochs - Lochy, Oich, Ness and Dochfou. So bascially Loch Ness was created about 8,000 BC so unless the monster was hiding somewhere for millions of years waiting for the Loch to be created there is no way that species could be around when the Loch was created.

[CuteOldGuy]

I am not a fundamentalist Christian (or Christian at all under many definitions) and I don't believe evolution. I also don't believe in the Bible story of Creation, which is obviously an allegory, not to be taken as scientific fact.

That being said, since the theory of evolution is so prevalent, and permeates so many levels of thinking in the modern age, the failure to educate children in its fundamentals will result in their being ignorant of the basics of society.

In other words, these people are nuts. But the last thing to do is involve government. God knows, if the government gets involved, they might teach even stupider things, like it is a crime to be critical of the President.

[joe bloe]

I don't think Darwin's theory of natural selection through accidental variation could account for life in all of it's complexity. The human brain, the eye, the optic nerve, the spinal cord didn't just happen. They are unimaginably complex. I think life on Earth, and probably elsewhere in the universe, is the result of design. There has to be intelligence behind it. God may use evolution, but evolution by itself is not sufficient, not in fourteen billion years or even fourteen trillion years.

The lyrics from a song by David Wilcox called "Big Mistake" show the absurdity of the theory of evolution.

They taught us kids in school between the recess breaks
That the universe just sorta fell together like a Big Mistake
It started with a bang that sent the pieces flying
Then it cooled and twirled into dinosaurs and dandelioins

Chorus:
It was a Big Mistake to have eyes that see
To have love like this inside of me
To have lips that smile as I swim your kiss
To have minds that will forever every part of this
All the moonlight shrouded in the clouds above and
the autumn leaves and the falling love
The still reflection in the moonlit lake
All, they said, it was a big mistake, it was a big mistake

Now back to science class through the looking glass
We were magnifying little ancestors of our ancient past
Watch 'em break a couple chromosomes, wait a zillion years or so
And get an ostrich, a jellyfish, a kangaroo, and a Romeo
Chorus

The choreography of a coincidence
At the turning point there was eternity behind a moment's glance
It was for you and me the timing made us laugh
The fact that anyone could find their only one along this darkened path

[CuteOldGuy]

Evolution doesn't make sense. The idea is that a fish crawled on land and over several million years learned to walk. Several questions:

1. Why was the fish dissatisfied with the sea?
2. If the prior fish died on land, how would the subsequent fish know they needed feet and lungs to survive?
3. If food was scarce in the sea, isn't it more likely the fish would die off after several million years rather than figure out they need feet and lungs?

Or the case of the giraffe. The giraffe developed a long neck to eat the higher leaves.

1. What was wrong with the lower leaves?
2. How many million of years did it take to get the neck stretched out?
3. Why would they stretch out if the lower leaves were ok?
4. If the lower leaves were scarce, wouldn't they have died out before their neck stretched enough?

It doesn't make sense.

[joe bloe]

If life began with a single celled protozoa, and now billions of years later, we have liberal Democrats, isn't that contrary to the idea of life increasing in complexity over time?

[CuteOldGuy]

+1

[essence]

Talk about 'believing in' evolution or any other scientific idea shows complete ignorance of the nature of scientific discovery.

No scientific idea is every proven.

To those detractors of 'evolution', don't you think that at least some of your questions have been addressed by the proponents?

To those of you who say 'it doesn't make sense' or 'it doesn't sound sensible to me', you would say the same thing about quantum chromodynamics. A lot of science is far from intuitive.

[essence]

A good starting place to learn more is

http://nationalacademies.org/evolution/index.html

and this shows the attitude of a wide variety of religious leaders

http://nationalacademies.org/evoluti...sReligion.html

Excerpts of Statements by Religious Leaders
Who See No Conflict Between Their Faith and Science

Many religious denominations and individual religious leaders have issued statements acknowledging the occurrence of evolution and pointing out that evolution and faith do not conflict.

"[T]here is no contradiction between an evolutionary theory of human origins and the doctrine of God as Creator."
— General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church

"[S]tudents' ignorance about evolution will seriously undermine their understanding of the world and the natural laws governing it, and their introduction to other explanations described as 'scientific' will give them false ideas about scientific methods and criteria."
— Central Conference of American Rabbis

"In his encyclical Humani Generis (1950), my predecessor Pius XII has already affirmed that there is no conflict between evolution and the doctrine of the faith regarding man and his vocation, provided that we do not lose sight of certain fixed points…. Today, more than a half-century after the appearance of that encyclical, some new findings lead us toward the recognition of evolution as more than an hypothesis. In fact it is remarkable that this theory has had progressively greater influence on the spirit of researchers, following a series of discoveries in different scholarly disciplines. The convergence in the results of these independent studies — which was neither planned nor sought — constitutes in itself a significant argument in favor of the theory.”
— Pope John Paul II, Message to the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, October 22, 1996.

"We the undersigned, Christian clergy from many different traditions, believe that the timeless truths of the Bible and the discoveries of modern science may comfortably coexist. We believe that the theory of evolution is a foundational scientific truth, one that has stood up to rigorous scrutiny and upon which much of human knowledge and achievement rests. To reject this truth or to treat it as 'one theory among others' is to deliberately embrace scientific ignorance and transmit such ignorance to our children. We believe that among God's good gifts are human minds capable of critical thought and that the failure to fully employ this gift is a rejection of the will of our Creator…. We urge school board members to preserve the integrity of the science curriculum by affirming the teaching of the theory of evolution as a core component of human knowledge. We ask that science remain science and that religion remain religion, two very different, but complementary, forms of truth."
—"The Clergy Letter Project" signed by more than 10,000 Christian clergy members.

[Fast Gunn]

Evolution is perfectly evident to anyone with an open mind, but

apparently, evolution has not caught up to everyone.

You're living proof of that!

But, don't worry, give it another couple of eons and hell, who knows?

. . . Even you might be walking upright and maybe know how to use fire!

Originally Posted by CuteOldGuy

Evolution doesn't make sense. The idea is that a fish crawled on land and over several million years learned to walk. Several questions:

1. Why was the fish dissatisfied with the sea?
2. If the prior fish died on land, how would the subsequent fish know they needed feet and lungs to survive?
3. If food was scarce in the sea, isn't it more likely the fish would die off after several million years rather than figure out they need feet and lungs?

Or the case of the giraffe. The giraffe developed a long neck to eat the higher leaves.

1. What was wrong with the lower leaves?
2. How many million of years did it take to get the neck stretched out?
3. Why would they stretch out if the lower leaves were ok?
4. If the lower leaves were scarce, wouldn't they have died out before their neck stretched enough?

It doesn't make sense.

[i'va biggen]

Originally Posted by joe bloe

If life began with a single celled protozoa, and now billions of years later, we have liberal Democrats, isn't that contrary to the idea of life increasing in complexity over time?

right wing nuts visit the zoo so they can visit their relatives in the monkey area.

[CuteOldGuy]

Geez. After FastGoon's and Essence's posts, it makes even less sense. I think Joe was right.