Religion Question

[Tim]

Good point. I'm not advocating evangelism of any sort in a public school environment, but I am in favor of educating our youth concerning the existance and basic principals of the worlds major faiths.

[jbrown84]

I know in 7th grade geography/history we did a whole unit on the middle east that included a thorough overview of the Islamic faith, and I appreciate knowing these things. I also got a liberal arts college education that included comparitive civilization and was very helpful for being a well-rounded, educated person.

[Edmond_Outsider]

Secular humanism IS NOT taught in public schools.

For that matter, I don't beleave it is commonly taught in college either.

Here's proof: Find an example of ONE public school n Oklahoma or anywhere else in the US that teaches even one course called "SECULAR HUMANISM."

If you find one, I will eat my shoe.

But, what I think is meant here by "teaching" secular humanism is that if we teach religion, then we are teaching religion and if we do not teach religion, then it is also teaching religion.

This is a pretty interesting example of circular logic seem to me.

But this isn't really about teaching secular humanism. It's really about teaching creationism. The whole concept that our schools "teach secular humanism" is one that has been being promoted by Pat Robertson and Jerry Fallwell et. al. for the past 20 years because schools insist on teaching science instead of the bible stories.

[jbrown84]

Intelligent Design is science.

[Tim]

Jbrown, may you be touched by his noodly appendage.

[Easy180]

Stole this from an article, but I agree wholeheartedly

‘Death of science'

After examining ID's two main arguments, the answers to the original questions — what does ID offer? And what can ID explain that evolution can't? — is not much and nothing, leading scientists say.

"The most basic problem [with ID] is that it's utterly boring," said William Provine, a science historian at Cornell University in New York. "Everything that's complicated or interesting about biology has a very simple explanation: ID did it."

Evolution was and still is the only scientific theory for life that can explain how we get complexity from simplicity and diversity from uniformity.

ID offers nothing comparable. It begins with complexity — a Supreme Being — and also ends there. The explanations offered by ID are not really explanations at all, scientists say. They're more like last resorts. And, scientists argue, there is a danger in pretending that ID belongs next to evolution in textbooks.

"It doesn't add anything to science to introduce the idea that God did it," Provine told LiveScience. Intelligent design "would become the death of science if it became a part of science."

[jbrown84]

That's gross generalization by liberal scientists who have an agenda.

The Privileged Planet

There are too many coincidences for the creation of the solar system to have just happened.

[Easy180]

Fine and all wanting to try and figure our purpose in life and why we are here....I completely understand people reaching out to religion for that reason...But until there is some actual scientific evidence then it should be excluded from public schools

I would say 99% of all kids born into a Christian family are getting taught the ID story by their parents and their church anyway...If the kids go against that I suspect many pull them out and home school them or put them in private Christian schools

[jbrown84]

No, most Christian kids are being taught stringent Creationism.

ID is completely different, and asserts no religion. It could be aliens for crying out loud.

It's an alternative explanation that solves the problem of the Big Bang being completely unscientific.

[Easy180]

No amount of spin by Christians will make it anything less than trying to assert their religion into public school teachings...Get that in and kids will be making arks in art class in no time

[jbrown84]

There are plenty of non-Christian scientists that are backing ID.

[Patrick]

Fine and all wanting to try and figure our purpose in life and why we are here....I completely understand people reaching out to religion for that reason...But until there is some actual scientific evidence then it should be excluded from public schools

I would say 99% of all kids born into a Christian family are getting taught the ID story by their parents and their church anyway...If the kids go against that I suspect many pull them out

Really the scientific evidence backing up evolution is pretty flimsy as well. The fossil record is nowhere close to being complete and probably never will be.

[Patrick]

...Get that in and kids will be making arks in art class in no time

That statement actually shows ignorance in re: to the beliefs of Christianity.

And if it wasn't for Noah building an ark, you wouldn't be here today.

[jbrown84]

Easy, if you actually read the book The Privileged Planet, you would see that it's not a bunch of mythological mumbo jumbo, nor is it simply ignoring the complex stuff by saying "God" did it.

[CuatrodeMayo]

The Second Law of Thermodynamics conflicts with the Theory of Evolution.

"The entropy of an isolated system not in equilibrium will tend to increase over time, approaching a maximum value at equilibrium"

--Rudolf Julius Emanuel Clausius

[Patrick]

The Second Law of Thermodynamics conflicts with the Theory of Evolution.

"The entropy of an isolated system not in equilibrium will tend to increase over time, approaching a maximum value at equilibrium"

--Rudolf Julius Emanuel Clausius

[Easy180]

That statement actually shows ignorance in re: to the beliefs of Christianity.

And if it wasn't for Noah building an ark, you wouldn't be here today.

OK if you say so...Remember that story made me laugh as a 10 yr old..Seems completely reasonable he fit in 2 of all species in a boat

[jbrown84]

In other words, everything is constantly moving outward. Without an external force, gases and dust would not collect together in order to explode and create the universe

[Patrick]

Was the ark big enough to hold the number of animals required?

The total available floor space on the ark would have been over 100,000 square feet, which would be more floor space than in 20 standard-sized basketball courts.
The total cubic volume would have been 1,518,000 cubic feet [462,686.4 cubic meters] --that would be equal to the capacity of 569 modern railroad stock cars.
Now comes the question, how many land dwelling air breathing animals would have had to be taken aboard the ark to survive the flood?
According to Ernest Mayr, America's leading taxonomist, there are over 1 million species of animals in the world.
God only provided the Ark for the protection of humans and land-dwelling, air-breathing creatures. A huge number of animals would not need to be taken aboard the Ark because they are water dwellers. Representatives would be expected to survive the catastrophe. With God's protection against extinction during the Deluge, survival would have been assured. (Scene from The World that Perished, a Christian motion picture about the Flood)

However, the vast majority of these are capable of surviving in water and would not need to be brought aboard the ark. Noah need make no provision for the 21,000 species of fish or the 1,700 tunicates (marine chordates like sea squirts) found throughout the seas of the world, or the 600 echinoderms including star fish and sea urchins, or the 107,000 mollusks such as mussels, clams and oysters, or the 10,000 coelenterates like corals and sea anemones, jelly fish and hydroids or the 5,000 species of sponges, or the 30,000 protozoans, the microscopic single-celled creatures.
In addition, some of the mammals are aquatic. For example, the whales, seals and porpoises. The amphibians need not all have been included, nor all the reptiles, such as sea turtles, and alligators. Moreover, a large number of the arthropods numbering 838,000 species, such as lobsters, shrimp, crabs and water fleas and barnacles are marine creatures. And the insect species among arthropoda are usually very small. Also, many of the 35,000 species of worms as well as many of the insects could have survived outside the Ark.
How many animals needed to be brought aboard?

Doctors Morris and Whitcomb in their classic book,The Genesis Flood state that no more than 35,000 individual animals needed to go on the ark. In his well documented book, Noah's Ark: A Feasibility Study, John Woodmorappe suggests that far fewer animals would have been transported upon the ark. By pointing out that the word "specie" is not equivalent to the "created kinds" of the Genesis account, Woodmorappe credibly demonstrates that as few as 2,000 animals may have been required on the ark. To pad this number for error, he continues his study by showing that the ark could easily accommodate 16,000 animals.)
But, let's be generous and add on a reasonable number to include extinct animals. Then add on some more to satisfy even the most skeptical. Let's assume 50,000 animals, far more animals than required, were on board the ark, and these need not have been the largest or even adult specimens.
Remember there are really only a few very large animals, such as the dinosaur or the elephant, and these could be represented by young ones. Assuming the average animal to be about the size of a sheep and using a railroad car for comparison, we note that the average double-deck stock car can accommodate 240 sheep. Thus, three trains hauling 69 cars each would have ample space to carry the 50,000 animals, filling only 37% of the ark. This would leave an additional 361 cars or enough to make 5 trains of 72 cars each to carry all of the food and baggage plus Noah's family of eight people. The Ark had plenty of space.

[Tim]

Gee...I always thought it was an allegory. Boy do I feel stupid!

[Patrick]

Gee...I always thought it was an allegory. Boy do I feel stupid!

Thanks for admitting your ignorance.

[Easy180]

Cause of course the ark story just reeks of sensibility and common sense....Almost as much as the whale story

[Patrick]

Funny you can say that, but you have nothing to back up your statement, as to why the ark story isn't true. All you can say is that it's not sensible. I can make silly claims all day, especially if I don't have to support my statements with fact.

[Tim]

Thanks for admitting your ignorance.

Oooohhh...I see we aced "Arrogance 101" in med school! Congrats!

[jbrown84]

Not sensible to humans, maybe.