Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism • Hacker News Board

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#161

Post by fennecfoxen » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 8:16 PM UTC

pdonis wrote: post #120

fennecfoxen wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Funny thing is, I see certain political beliefs -- like contempt for religious freedom (and other freedoms centered around belief and conscience) -- as existential threats to a free and open society. I think I have a good case that they're a far more direct threat as well, as well. I could even make the case that it's a fundamental contradiction, maybe even a lie, to pursue a "free" society by suppressing freedom. :P

I don't disagree that contempt for freedom of thought--which includes the freedom to think thoughts and believe things that are false--is a serious threat to a free and open society. But I would also point out that, taken to its logical conclusion, this is an argument against public education in general. Any system of public education will end up teaching children things that their parents disagree with on freedom of…

To be clear, I haven't attempted to argue against public education existing. (If it seems that way, it's a failure of communication on my part.) The State is not a contaminant whose influence on small children should be avoided at all costs.

But they're not an unmitigated blessing whose opinions should supplant those of parents in all cases either. So I think that it's really good that people have the option to send their children somewhere that isn't a public school system (including a private school or homeschool, possibly even with vouchers). That's a simple, useful check on its power -- and explicitly seeking to remove that check with the goal of changing the way children think is Kinda Creepy or worse. We don't need no thought control...

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#162

Post by thedufer » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 8:18 PM UTC

freehunter wrote: post #49

mschuster91 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Applying common sense should be enough. You as a parent have neither the time nor the knowledge of all the various subjects that are taught in school, not to mention a proper paedagogic/teaching education.

Every study I've seen contradicts this common sense argument. Combined with the fact that home schooled students still must take and pass state standardized tests means the students have to be at least meeting the minimum educational requirements. I have a family member in Texas with a home schooled child. They attend group teaching sessions, sit in on other classes, and use the many reference books that are provided…

> Every study I've seen contradicts this common sense argument.

Can you provide some of these studies? I've never seen one that was written by someone who understood why its important to control for race/financial status/etc, which makes them fairly meaningless.

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#163

Post by thedufer » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 8:25 PM UTC

DanielStraight wrote: post #73

I really think both sides get this issue very wrong. Creationism is not valid science, obviously. But that's because it isn't science at all. It is a religious belief, which is by definition non-scientific. Here is where the science side gets things wrong. Creationism is a NON-scientific belief, not an ANTI-scientific belief. It's not anti-intellectual or stupid or backward either. It's a choice to believe in the sup…

> Here is where the science side gets things wrong. Creationism is a NON-scientific belief, not an ANTI-scientific belief.

Creationism isn't fundamentally anti-scientific, but it teaching it as science is definitely anti-scientific. "Creationism" is usually, in this context, used as shorthand for "creationism taught as science", because that's the only kind of creationism that matters (in this context).

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#164

Post by dkuntz2 » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 8:27 PM UTC

cobrausn wrote: post #81

mschuster91 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, yes, you hit the nail. I see certain religious beliefs, including "creationism" and "vaccinophobia" as existential threats to a free and open society.

Well, first of all, 'vaccinophobia' isn't often directly related to religion. A lot of 'naturalists' reject vaccine science. Second, I find it sad that your solution to existential threats to 'free and open society' is fascism. Your logic applied to 'terrorism' results in where we are now.

Compulsory education is fascism? Teaching truths which can be replicated is fascism?

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#165

Post by DanielStraight » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 8:34 PM UTC

thedufer wrote: post #163

DanielStraight wrote: post #73

I really think both sides get this issue very wrong. Creationism is not valid science, obviously. But that's because it isn't science at all. It is a religious belief, which is by definition non-scientific. Here is where the science side gets things wrong. Creationism is a NON-scientific belief, not an ANTI-scientific belief. It's not anti-intellectual or stupid or backward either. It's a choice to believe in the sup…

> Here is where the science side gets things wrong. Creationism is a NON-scientific belief, not an ANTI-scientific belief. Creationism isn't fundamentally anti-scientific, but it teaching it as science is definitely anti-scientific. "Creationism" is usually, in this context, used as shorthand for "creationism taught as science", because that's the only kind of creationism that matters (in this context).

I agree with you that creationism shouldn't be taught as science. That's what I was trying to get at. I was not using creationism to mean creationism taught as science. Sorry if I've caused confusion to anyone.

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#166

Post by dkuntz2 » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 8:45 PM UTC

piokoch wrote: post #112

The funniest this is that's creationism is a side effect of a strange, but very popular view of "tolerance". We are told that tolerance means that various points of view on any issue must be accepted, regardless if they make sense or not. As a result with hava a wide stream of various absurdities comming from "the left" (gender people claiming that there are no differences between boys and girls) and from "the right"…

BTW it's somehow incorrect to call practitioners of the Roman Catholic Church. They do not follow the traditions and intellectual heritage of the Early Christian Church.

Fuck off. Christianity split multiple times, not just Roman Catholic and Protestant, but also the Early Christian church into the Roman Catholic and the Orthodox Catholic (more commonly called the Eastern Orthodox church) churches. Claiming that because someone doesn't follow the Roman Catholic church they can't possibly be a Christian is ridiculous. The Roman Catholic church elevated the Bishop of Rome above the other bishops, something that wasn't done in the Early Christian church, and still isn't done in the Eastern Orthodox churches. The Eastern Orthodox churches are closer to "traditional Christianity" than the Roman Catholic church.

Learn you some Christian history if you're going to try to argue about it. And I say this as someone who doesn't affiliate with any religion.

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#167

Post by thejteam » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 9:04 PM UTC

tmzt wrote: post #152

thejteam wrote: post #65

I went to a very good public school system in Maryland. More than one math teacher taught me that while we suspect that there are an infinite number of prime numbers, we can't prove it. I found out later that there exists a relatively simple proof known to Euclid. Lots of college students honestly believe that 0.999… (repeating 9's) is NOT exactly equal to 1. My upper level analysis teacher spent an entire class peri…

Do you have any reference/proof/etc. for 0.999... === 1? As one of those taught to believe it is not, I would like to see it. Unfortunately, text books conserve non facts for very interesting reasons. Some good examples are at http://www.textbookleague.org/

A very informal proof:

Let X = 0.999… Then 10X = 9.999…

10X - X = 9.999… - 0.999… = 9 = 9X Therefore X = 1.

Being able to do the subtraction infinitely is a little hand-wavy, but should suffice as a demo for middle and high schoolers.

More formal proofs involve limits that one wouldn't normally encounter until a course in real analysis.

Wikipedia has a whole page devoted to the topic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/0.999...

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#168

Post by stephenhuey » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 9:08 PM UTC

xradionut wrote: post #78

Karunamon wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

..how on earth do you figure creationism is a threat to an open society?

It's a blatant falsehood.

As my geologist friend pointed out, a century ago many laughed at the idea of plate tectonics, but it's now foundational to earth science. As commenters have pointed out here, we do ourselves a disservice if we do not allow the discussion of other ideas.

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#169

Post by pdonis » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 9:16 PM UTC

fennecfoxen wrote: post #161

pdonis wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't disagree that contempt for freedom of thought--which includes the freedom to think thoughts and believe things that are false--is a serious threat to a free and open society. But I would also point out that, taken to its logical conclusion, this is an argument against public education in general. Any system of public education will end up teaching children things that their parents disagree with on freedom of…

To be clear, I haven't attempted to argue against public education existing. (If it seems that way, it's a failure of communication on my part.) The State is not a contaminant whose influence on small children should be avoided at all costs. But they're not an unmitigated blessing whose opinions should supplant those of parents in all cases either. So I think that it's really good that people have the option to send…

I haven't attempted to argue against public education existing.

I know you haven't; that's why I took the trouble to point out the implications of taking freedom of thought to its logical conclusion. Most people (including you, it appears) don't like that conclusion; but that necessarily implies that freedom of thought must have limitations. Any system of public schooling must violate freedom of thought in some respects.

Personally, I would be fine with abolishing the existing system of public schooling altogether, and replacing it with something like this: take the money that used to be spent on public schools and divide up among parents as vouchers. The parents can use the vouchers to send their kids to private schools, religious schools, whatever, or they can use them to acquire the resources to enable home schooling. (For example, the voucher money could eliminate the need for both parents to work, so one of them could stay home to home school the children.) But I don't see any realistic chance of a system like this happening in the US.

Also, to be fair, there are arguments on the other side as well. For example, someone upthread pointed out that public schools can help to equalize opportunities for children whose parents simply don't care about whether they get a good education.

Re: Texas Public Schools Are Teaching Creationism

#170

Post by pdonis » Thu, Jan 16, 2014, 9:19 PM UTC

sentenza wrote: post #143

cobrausn wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, I don't disagree entirely, but I did go to college with a home schooled guy who was one of the most pleasant, hardworking, and intelligent people I met. I have no idea if religious reasons were part of the reason he was home schooled, he didn't really talk about it, but these blanket labels aren't really helping - home schooling sometimes seems to turn out positive results. If one were to read your post cynically…

I am with mschuster on this and I am also German. I am certain that many home-schooled children in the US recieve an excellent education. Also, I am failry confident that I could teach my children (yes I have them) better than public schools in quite a few subjects. Nonetheless, I am glad that public education is compulsory here. Forcing all children to go to the same schools is essential if you want children to have…

You make good points about the advantages of standardized, compulsory public education.

However, one thing I would point out is that your country (Germany) is much more culturally homogeneous than the United States. For example, I don't think there is a significant portion of the population who are religious fundamentalists and don't believe the theory of evolution. So it's much easier to come up with a standardized list of basic information that everyone can agree is worth teaching all children, without getting into endless political and legal wrangles like those that occur in the US over what material should be taught in public schools.