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India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

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Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#181
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea exactly how much this particular curriculum change is influenced by religion. But your assertion that science is depoliticized in India is very wrong. In 2018, the education minister declared Darwin was wrong. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/23/indian-educati... This is just one of many such troubling incidents, including apparent indifference to the murder of pro-rationalism academics. Anec…

In the West, any attempt to debate science is declared to be anti-science, which eventually suffocates science. Conformity to the party line is the ticket to funding (from the political establishment) and acclaim. Are there anti-science people? Sure, but far fewer than the knee jerk reactionists say there are. And someone who goes around calling everyone anti-science without logical basis is antithetical to scientifi…

There needs to be some added context to this. Many anti-science advocates mask as "just asking questions." This was the whole Koch strategy over climate change (they didn't invent it though) where they exaggerated uncertainties in data/conclusions. These always exist, they are called error bounds, but can be quite nuanced. It is easy to bastardize scientific language, which is different than laymen (and why it is possible, though noisy, to identify scientists on semi-anonymous forums like this one).

> Let us remember where a lot of "scientific" funding comes from, the politicians and Uncle Sam; which inherently tends to corrupt the "science" to become political.

Which this is a flag about your political beliefs and lack of experience. It just doesn't follow the practicality of the situation. Neither democrats nor republicans control government science. If you look at DOE secretaries you'll see their party affiliation matches the sitting president. In the labs, there are a lot of political diversity (including a need to ban news being played in the cafeterias because it led to fighting). It is far from monolithic and it's absurd to paint it with a wide brush. You also need to decouple the science (what's being published) from what becomes political narratives (news/directions from secretaries). Gov scientists frequently publish works contrary to the normal political narratives (even of the agency) and if they are prevented from publishing leaks happen pretty quickly.

Some science itself is innately connected to politics (others "aren't"[0]: e.g. cosmology or particle physics). The question is how science should be participating (leading, participating, or auxiliary). You invent new technologies that affect societies and governments... govern societies. You find information that affect citizens and of course this is going to affect policy (e.g. climate change). Of course there are going to be biases, but there is less than what you'd find in an industry. Government science is different, especially since the focus is far less profit motivated (the scientists also aren't making much and can make far more in industry if they are profit motivated). While not ideal, gov science should be a third party verification of information. As an example, looking at climate again, you look at the results of 3 (not independent) different groups: gov, industry, academia (influenced by both gov and industry). If gov + academia comes to a consensus, industry agrees with data but not conclusions, then there's reason to distrust the industry conclusions as there's profit incentives. Your comment is destructive because it has been the narrative that has led to industry capture and manipulation. We've seen it in leaded gasoline, cigarettes, climate change, and many others. No, gov and academia aren't perfect, but this shouldn't result in defaulting to industry opinion or allowing them to dominate narratives. This has to stop.

[0] quotes because money and funding is political, but this is different than conclusions like climate change. Most gov science is in the low politics camp btw.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#182
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All languages derive from Sanskrit is another trope. An indo-european language no less. It's beyond pathetic.

You misspelled Tamil! /s or was it Telugu. I forget lol.

Can't be Tamil, that's a Dravidian language - not Indo-European. It's usually Sanskrit because that's the High Language.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#183
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have no idea exactly how much this particular curriculum change is influenced by religion. But your assertion that science is depoliticized in India is very wrong. In 2018, the education minister declared Darwin was wrong. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/jan/23/indian-educati... This is just one of many such troubling incidents, including apparent indifference to the murder of pro-rationalism academics. Anec…

> The story goes that Hindus had nuclear energy 10,000 years ago, but filthy foreigners corrupted Mother India. I’ve never understood this kind of messaging. You see it in all sorts of supremacists. But how is it a credit to you and your ancestors that they had the ability to create nuclear power or fly, etc and then they just lost it! That’s a sign of deep shame. The particular group of people you’re claiming are su…

It's also like bragging that you were a highly advanced civilization and got conquered/occupied by a bunch of dumb savages. There's a few more prominent countries that follow similar narratives and I agree with you that it sounds far more embarrassing than boasting. And if you're superior then why haven't you caught up or surpassed the others? I can understand if this is like As to why it works, I completely understand. We just want reasons to feel superior. It is why in high school jocks define metrics as strength and why nerds define metrics as intelligence. It's why we have "well I have street smarts" and other things like that.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#184
post #75

Why would you cut the periodic table from curriculum? I'm a chem major and have never heard of such a thing before.

The closest I see the article coming to explaining the changes are in this passage:

"... considered whether content overlapped with similar content covered elsewhere, the difficulty of the content, and whether the content was irrelevant ... It also aims to provide opportunities for experiential learning and creativity."

i.e. to reduce redundancy, make room for something else in the curriculum, or to improve grade point averages.

Another possibility not mentioned would be to provide ideological cover. Delete some things unrelated to ideology, and you have some degree of plausible deniability re. accusations of dogma.

But I find the earlier rationales more plausible. Particularly if they come from people who do not themselves understand the importance of the concepts they are cutting.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#185
post #141
post #23

This makes no sense to me. This highly unlikely to be a political move. Science education is not political in India. Evolution, abortion, chemistry are not debated at all. This is more likely for the reasons to be innocuous. > In explaining its changes, NCERT states on its website that it considered whether content overlapped with similar content covered elsewhere, the difficulty of the content, and whether the conte…

As with a lot of India news appearing here of late, take this with a pound of salt. Like you were saying, this makes no sense as a political move. Hinduism (and by extension Hindutva, the problematic political form) has no bone to pick with Darwin and evolution. Actually the opposite is true - it's likely to be promoted because evolution is a point of contention in Abrahamic religions. The Indian far-right promotes a…

> Hinduism (and by extension Hindutva, the problematic political form) has no bone to pick with Darwin and evolution

This is irrelevant to Hindutva qua politics.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The story goes that Hindus had nuclear energy 10,000 years ago, but filthy foreigners corrupted Mother India. I’ve never understood this kind of messaging. You see it in all sorts of supremacists. But how is it a credit to you and your ancestors that they had the ability to create nuclear power or fly, etc and then they just lost it! That’s a sign of deep shame. The particular group of people you’re claiming are su…

The corollary story that usually shows up is that Westerners "stole" scientific discoveries from India and suppressed them while the country was under occupation. There's a fairly standard example of this at: https://pparihar.com/2017/05/22/modern-inventions-stolen-fro... And the BBC reported on some instances of this sort of thought at the Indian Science Congress in 2019: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-46…

But how is knowledge "stolen"? I understand in the context of piracy, but like piracy you can't really remove it from the originator. Sure, you can take and destroy all books you can find, but it is also pretty easy to make new books (and hide them) or pass knowledge through word of mouth (or hidden in stories). Wouldn't a highly intelligent society be able to accomplish such a simple feat that's been demonstrated by hundreds of civilizations through historY?

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The story goes that Hindus had nuclear energy 10,000 years ago, but filthy foreigners corrupted Mother India. I’ve never understood this kind of messaging. You see it in all sorts of supremacists. But how is it a credit to you and your ancestors that they had the ability to create nuclear power or fly, etc and then they just lost it! That’s a sign of deep shame. The particular group of people you’re claiming are su…

Haha, it's funny but that's the story they go with. There's also great anger in India for "paid conversions" where Christian missionaries give people money and resources if they'll become Christian. Ultimately, it seems reasonable that you go with the god who serves you best.

Reminds me of the story of Job. I'm not sure how people read it any other way than Satan pulling a fast one over God. How is it not a story where Satan tricked God into torturing Job?

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#188
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like the "Leaving apart the sewing of an elephant's head" is the whole point the poster was making. lol

Not how I read it. OP seems to completely dismiss the possibility that some surgical techniques may have been known in Ancient India because of what I’m sure is prejudice against one or more of religion/Hinduism/speaker(Modi in this case). Like I said the story about the elephant’s head is likely mythological/religious but that doesn’t take away from the other basic facts.

Advanced surgery could hardly exist or be even close to efficient without drugs used to treat/reduce infections.

And when somebody says the thing about sewing heads nothing else that person says can really be taken seriously or be worth discussing.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What countries don't look back at their past glories?

Germany, the US in more lefty towns, eastern Europe were the colonial past half devoured the culture. Conquered and defeated empires.

> Conquered and defeated empires

These are the cultures that do this most. Pointing to a mythologized and stolen past greatness is a coping mechanism for the insecurities of a flagging present.

Re: India cuts periodic table and evolution from school textbooks

#190

Kinda wild to see comments on here saying that India's slide into religious fascism isn't a big deal. "We/Indians don't politicize science" "There are many education authorities" I think this is only affecting a particular grade, but we already have seen the slow rollout of other efforts. You can't normalize politicians saying stuff like "our ancient civilization had nuclear energy". edit: surprised that I wasn't imm…

[flagged]

> This, my dear friends, is Abrahamic privilege at work

I mean, yes. There are idiots in the world, and they're not limited to one religion. We generally decry putting them in positions of power, particularly over eduction.

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