Critias said:
I know what you mean. If it was allowed to be taught in a High School philosophy class truthfully then that would be a start. Since it is mostly taught in a way to make fun of it, then it isn't really being taught.
I don't care if it is taught or not. What is interesting with the TEs in this thread is that even if the whole country of people decided it should be taught, TEs say it shouldn't. Therefore, public opinion on this issue doesn't count for anything and the public doesn't have a right to vote on what they would like taught to their children.
Odd that some people think they don't have the right to be involved in what is taught to their own children.
I think you have a right to pull your kids from a class you totally disagree with, if you want. What I don't think you have a right to do is insist that everyone is taught something as science when in fact the proportion of the scientific community that accepts it is vanishingly small. That is why we compare it to holocaust denial.
It is not about saying you cannot teach evolution. It is about teaching creationism with evolution so children can see both points of view.
But from a scientific viewpoint there are not "both points of view". As I said, the number of practicing scientists who think creationism has any credence is vanishingly small. There is not space in the curriculum to teach every minority view, especially views that, let's be honest, are held exclusively because of the
religious views of their adherents. This is why we compare creationism to Raelianism
When someone feels that threatened that they cannot have the other point of view taught, then it only leads to the conclusions that that person feels evolution is on shaky ground. That is the impression left by those who say no, your child is not allowed to be taught another perspective in school.
It's a mistaken impression. The reason science teachers don't want to teach creationism is that they know it's scientifically bunk and do not want to teach it as if it had any credibility.
It is equal to saying that Social Studies class cannot teach about Christianity, but can teach about all the other religions.
No, it isn't, because there's no question that Christianity exists and is believed in as a social phenomenon. Creationism does
not exist as a scientific model, except in a tiny religiously motivated minority of scientists.
Why is it that evolutionists who are not scientists cannot even recognize that there are creationists who are scientists? Is it that you cannot believe that someone who has a different opinion and world view can hold a position of being a scientists? Or do you just hate anyone who goes against evolution?
I don't hate anyone. I object to a religious belief being categorised as science. I am well aware that there are creationists who are scientists, just as there are Raelians who are scientists, holocaust deniers who are historians, and inventors of putative perpetual motion machines who are physicists. That does not make their fringe views any more appropriate for school curricula.
This looks very strange from this side of the pond. You have a bizarre situation in America where a majority of the population disagrees fundamentally with an almost 100% scientific concensus on a particular topic, giving the impression that there is a debate going on in science - creation or evolution - which in fact there isn't. Science, as a whole, closed that debate and chalked it up to evolution over a century ago. That is why scientists don't want to teach creationism - it would be teaching that the debate is still open in science. It isn't.
