Fundamentalist Schools Using "Nessie" To Disprove Evolution 936
The debate between creationists and proponents of evolution isn't ending any time soon, but now some creationists have a secret weapon, "Nessie!"
Certain fundamentalist schools in Louisiana plan to teach children that the Loch Ness monster is real in a bid to disprove Darwin's theory of evolution. From the article: "One ACE textbook – Biology 1099, Accelerated Christian Education Inc – 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.' Another claim taught is that a Japanese whaling boat once caught a dinosaur. It's unclear if the movie Godzilla was the inspiration for this lesson."
They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
What debate? (Score:2, Insightful)
"The debate between creationists and proponents of evolution"? What is that? As far as I know, biologists continue to work in their field successfully despite the "lie of Darwinism."
Please. It's more like "the attack on evolutionary theory and its teaching by those with religious and political objections" isn't going away anytime soon.
Flying Spaghetti Monster? (Score:5, Insightful)
OK seriously, if they are teaching that Nessie is real, why not the Flying Spaghetti Monster? And how about all the other urban legends, such as the Jersey Devil, Flying Saucers/Roswell, Bigfoot, Yeti, Dragons, Unicorns, Mermaids, Hobgoblins, and Trolls?
Yes, I know that Trolls are real, we feed them all the time on Slashdot.
Referring to an earlier article... (Score:3, Insightful)
When we continue to try and refute or attempt to disprove a scientific fact simply because our mythological beliefs conflict with the facts, we are failing.
If they really wanted to try and "refute" evolution, they would have used the coelecanth as evidence of a dinosaur we once thought was extinct but which is happily living on in our time.
But then, evolution says nothing about whether an animal can exist for millions of years, so there's still nothing to refute.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Flying Spaghetti Monster? (Score:2, Insightful)
Failed argument on all counts (Score:5, Insightful)
This reasoning fails in at least three fundamental ways.
First, the Loch Ness Monster simply doesn't exist. No reputable scientist would claim that it does, or even that it could exist in the way that it is commonly portrayed.
Second, it's not even necessary for dinosaurs to still exist to support their argument. There are already well-known animals alive today that have been virtually unchanged since the dinosaur times. Alligators and crocodiles are the best examples I can think of, off the top of my head.
Third, as the existence of alligators shows, even if dinosaurs did still exist, that doesn't in any possible way "disprove" the Theory of Evolution. I'm not entirely certain what reasoning would have to apply so that their existence would matter at all.
Really, this mostly just goes to show that any "debate" on the topic is fruitless when one side thinks that an argument like this completely invalidates proven scientific fact. How can you argue against that?
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you really seen any evidence that simple logical arguments will carry any weight. I certainly haven't. The agenda isn't to disprove evolution, the agenda is to assert the correctness of a literal interpretation of the Bible. There's virtually no way to have a debate with them, the only hope is a sufficiently large number of people will realize how woefully wrong they are.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
Until your misinformed spawn grow up and vote. Then we have a real problem.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:3, Insightful)
Evolution is something observed, and tested *every day*.
God is a concept made up by humanity. The core theology Christians believe in was fabricated by man, and the evidence of that is FAR stronger than for evolution. Its trivial to trace back the morphing and origin of key theological cornerstones through history, via primary sources.
So, yes, its okay to lump in all Christians with that lot. Ignorance is ignorance -- it doesn't matter if a larger number of people share it.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
If they want a "living fossil" they only need to look in a mirror.
If you can tell me the difference between religion and mythology, I'd be interested to know.
I wonder what "the dark ages 2.0" will be like. With so many people like this out there, we can't be too far away from another knowledge and development extinction event.
It's like with chimps and human evolution (Score:5, Insightful)
I think their line of "reasoning" here is probably similar to the "argument" that "if humans evolved from chimps, why are there still chimps around?"
They're trying to go "Look, dinosaurs still exist! So how could anything new have evolved since them if they're still around, eh?"
It's a failure to realize that evolution is a branching of the tree of life, not the creep of one single vine of life or something.
Intelligence test (Score:5, Insightful)
Hopefully some kid in one of those wing-nut schools (which are absolutely not representative of American education) will raise their hand and ask:
"Um...how can we find a static shipwreck on the floor of the vast North Atlantic, 12,000 ft underwater, but we can't find a huge moving sea monster in a lake with less than 2 cu mi volume, less than 450 ft average depth?"
And hopefully their teacher actually thinks about the question.
Lake Tahoe, which has 20 times the volume of Loch Ness, marketed a "Tessie" monster for a while. They had cute plush toys, stickers, buttons, a little museum, and all that. But it was just a joke, like Nessie.
The best lessons to teach kids with this, are in gullibility, and tourism marketing.
Not the same (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd agree with your "don't lump all christians in with this lot" statement. Most of my friends and family are Christians, and they are perfectly nice, well-adjusted people, and I don't make a habit of going around arguing with people.
However, please do not try to set up an equivalence between belief in the existence of God and belief in evolution. Christians cannot provide direct proof of the existence of God. They cannot even provide any compelling evidence, except maybe some philosophical thought experiments that pretty much break down when one simply asks, "are there any other alternatives that could explain this?". Evolution, on the other hand, has vast libraries of direct observations, repeatable experiments, and scientifically testable outcomes that support it. There's a huge difference.
Look, I don't have a problem with Christians. If I did, living in the Bible Belt South, I literally wouldn't be able to talk to hardly anyone. You believe things on faith, I get that, and honestly, as far as religions go, it's got some good parts to it that I respect. But please, just admit it and be at peace with it, don't try to either 1) build up your beliefs with misguided scientific "proof" of things that cannot be proven, or 2) tear down bodies of scientific proof for things that can.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
You're talking about "abiogenesis", which does contradict creationism. Evolution is a process that can exist with or without creationism or abiogenesis. Of course, nobody cares about this distinction, but I believe that is the distinction that GP is trying to make.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you can tell me the difference between religion and mythology, I'd be interested to know.
It is obvious - they are spelled differently.
OK, seriously. Religion is what you believe. Mythology is what "unenlightened" people that believe differently than you believe.
Not exactly like that. (Score:5, Insightful)
All the current, known "living fossils" can be traced through fossils in multiple sediment layers. Logically, because they were alive during the years those sediment layers were laid down.
But that contradicts their "theory" that the sediment layers all formed during the same period (the "Flood").
So if they can find a single species that still exists but where the only fossils are in a specific sediment layer then it must "prove" that the Biblical account of Noah and The Flood is correct and evolution is wrong because "God did it".
That is because it would "disprove" the scientific theory (despite all supporting evidence) that the sediment layers formed over hundred of millions of years. Because they were all laid down within several weeks.
And , therefore, evolution is a lie. God did it.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
If it's a testable assumption, yes they can.
And if the sun came up in the west, people on the west coast would have some marvelous sunrises.
I.e., it's not a testable assumption. It's not even a testable belief. It's called "faith" for a reason. I'd also point out that assumptions are called assumptions because they are not testable.
The existance of God is no more provable than the claim that the universe began with a "big bang" or whatever other theory you may have for it, or that life began by millions of years of random chemical reactions in a primordial soup.
I don't know if it was deliberate, but the lumping of the concept of evolution as "changes over time" and evolution as "how life began" has caused more wasted time as people debate two vastly different things.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
just two political parties
You make it sound as though there are more.
Hate to break it to you, but there is only one party. You may enter through the left door or the right door, but once you get in side it is all the same.
Calling it a party is pretty disingenuous. The only people partying are the politicians. You get to sit in the corner facing the wall all night, then get to pick up the bill.
Re:I was homeschooled with ACE (Score:4, Insightful)
Please tell me you no longer believe that bull*hit.
BTW, I've been to Loch Ness and literally NONE of the locals I talked to at ALL believed that the Loch Ness monster exists. They basically thought it was clearly and obviously total crap thought up just to get tourists up to northern Scotland.
Re:Brace yourselves! It has begun! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:4, Insightful)
Maybe you are confusing 'macro evolution' which hasn't been proven with 'micro evolution' which we see all around us every day.
The only difference between micro-evolution and macro-evolution is time.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
Would you areee that in a million years it is possible, via the mechanism of evolution, that a housecat will teach mathematics at a college level.
I await your response.
Future descendants of cats may or may not teach mathematics; intelligence is not a directed goal of evolution. Nice try, but your oversimplification didn't win me over to the "goddidit" side.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is Theism and Atheism are both based on ignorance (a belief or lack of belief, not Truth nor facts.)
An absence of belief in god(s) is not the same as a belief in their absence.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not real news, just anti-US bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)
It's not bullshit.
Nearly half of the US population believes in Creationism. Every year, this study is done, and it's always the same - somewhere around 46-48 percent.
This nations is full of dumb twits. Look around you. Consider who you think is average. Half of everyone is dumber than that, by definition.
>Hands up if you went to a public, private or catholic school that taught you Nessie was real and the Ku Klux Klan is a great force for good.
Reductio ad absurdam.
Evangelical private schools teach that Man walked with dinosaurs and use "Of Pandas and People" as a text. That is a fact on the ground, and as seen in the Dover School Board scandal, they keep trying to bring ID/Creationism into public schools.
--
BMO
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:3, Insightful)
They would probably not look like housecats anymore but more or less, yes.
If we're talking about possible I think it's totally POSSIBLE that life on earth was intelligently designed, I just don't see much evidence worth talking about. The whole discussion about teaching that evolution could be wrong should be moved out of the evolution debate and taught right along with scientific methodology, "These are the best guesses that mankind has been able to demonstrate likely to be true, anything and everything in this book could be wrong, until we know everything we cannot know anything for sure."
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
What is a/the goal of evolution?
There isn't one. Evolution is a process. It is not sentient. "It" isn't trying to achieve anything. It just explains how things happen, not why.
Indiana Jones explained it best:
"Archaeology is the search for fact... not truth. If it's truth you're looking for, Dr. Tyree's philosophy class is right down the hall. "
Replace "Archaeology" with "science"
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
I don't have anything against people practicing a particular religion. I do have problems with advocates of a particular religion latching onto an urban legend (or rural legend, in the case of Loch Ness), suggesting there is evidence to support such a myth which can then be referenced to support their own agenda for the origins of species and the universe, all the while dismissing mountains beyond mountains of evidence that could possibly conflict with their own view of creation.
There is a difference between having faith in what you don't fully understand and just closing your eyes, putting your hands over your years and saying over and over "your wrong! your wrong! I know 100% what I believe is true. All evidence to the contrary is fabricated by Satan. I will not be deceived by your vile lies."
I have to take small "acts of faith" every day. I presume that the dollars I earned this week will still be worth about the same by the time I get the chance to use them. I trust that when my doctor asks for my social security number that he or his staff isn't going to steal my identity. I could be wrong about any of these presumptions, but you have to weigh the risks against the rewards. I don't fault a person for fearing his or her own mortality and living a life based on the faith that if their religion is true they will enjoy an afterlife. Those who desire a better afterlife so much that they ignore the problems of this world, or crash planes into buildings - I do have a problem with that.
As for myself, I actually attended one of these fundamentalist type schools during middle- and high-school. It took several years after leaving to un-warp my mind. Textbooks in the early 90's also had a small paragraph along with a picture of the dead thing pulled up by the Japanese fishing boat. My favorite was a sketch explaining how "evolutionists" used circular reasoning:
Student: "how do you know how old that fossil is?"
Scientist: "because I found it in a particular geologic layer"
Student: "how did you know how old the geologic layer was?"
Scientist: "because of the fossils we found in it"
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
Acting in the name of God is the utmost of arrogance, and doesn't indicate that God was on their side, just that they believed it so.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not about "proving" anything, it's about giving young people a compelling story until they get older and grow out of dinosaurs, and into Thomist exegesis and pre-Tribulationist doctrine.
It's not about evidence, it's about conditioning children to accept fairy stories as valid epistemology. Once that's done, the story is changed to suit whatever purpose is required.
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
"Agnostics" saying this more does not make it more true.
Courtesy of the scientific method and burden of proof, a positive claim is false until proven. That doesn't imply ignorance. God does not exist until god is proven to exist. Further, extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, so god is extremely unlikely until some sort of proof starts showing up.
Here's a test. When it comes to elves, do you say you are "agnostic?" Elves have just as much proof as god. In fact, both Icelandic and LOTR elves have the exact same proof; so you should be agnostic to them both coexisting. Yet no sane person would say "I am not sure" - they would say, "no, elves do not exist."
That's the problem with agnostics. The word means nothing. Atheists ARE agnostics in the strict sense: if god were proven, we would have to accept that god exists (even if that god is evil/incompetent). Until then, we do not say "well, god MIGHT exist, so we should use a special word to make it look like we're not against religion, just in cane," just like you do not say "hmm, well..." when asked if you believe Middle Earth is literally located in New Zealand. The difference that I see existing between atheists and self-proclaimed "agnostics" (most of whom are actually deists trying to sound more intelligent) is that one understands logical processes and probability, and one does not.
Please stop insulting people using your misunderstanding of common words.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:4, Insightful)
At the core, Fundies are pure White Trash and never forget it. They wallow in their degenerate backwardness like the Taliban. They are perfect examples of what religious thinking produces.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:They are even dumber than they seem. (Score:5, Insightful)
The stupid thing is that the debate has nothing to do with God.
God could use natural selection to create humans just as much as he could make them appear of nothingness in a blink of an eye.
Some people want to believe in a very literal interpretation of a set of books that started as verbal stories and then were written, re-written, edited, translated, re-translated, and then re-translated again, by committee, into a language that didn't even exist when any of the Bible took place. Taking the Bible completely literally is a bad idea, and it doesn't help when verses get cherry-picked out of context.
Furthermore, you could easily posit that God did make it all appear in a blink of an eye, but did it in such a way as to look like evolution happened. After that point, normal processes kicked in, and continued to shape the world as we would expect. Which means that a) both creationism and natural selection are correct in their own time and place, and b) that there is no reason you can't respect that God made a world where science obviously helps explain it.
Fact is, the problem has nothing to do with religion, and everything to do with pride and stubbornness.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
But all you've managed to do is prove just how unpleasant a christian ideologue can be.
Science is not a threat to Christianity, friend. Ignorance, on the other hand, almost certainly is.
If you want to cast your lot with those that say "Science can't be right because it disagrees with Genesis" then you prove ignorance of both Science and Christianity. Remember, Jesuits played a big part in establishing the geological record that is used to prove the account in Genesis is meant as creation myth, not as historical record. It's only recently in the past century that there is a movement in pop-christianity to categorically deny science, because for pop-christians, all of reality is a threat to their desire to get people to believe anything they say.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, but the contents of this article ARE what Christians teach. It's just like how it's true that Americans do actually drive around in silly jacked-up pickup trucks. The catch is, not ALL Christians believe this stuff, but the people in this article really are Christian (you only have to believe Jesus was the son of God to be a Christian), and they really do believe it. You don't get to claim they're not "true Christians" just because their beliefs are different from yours.
Christianity is a very large and unorganized religion (certain sects are organized, but not the whole thing), and its members believe in many widely diverging things, such as creationism, snake-handling, that you'll become a god of your own planet if you're a good person in this life, etc.
Re:Was Jesus riding Nessie? (Score:2, Insightful)
And he built my hotrod! (previous to his career as a prophet)
Ding a ding dang a dang a long ling long!
finally a decent argument against vouchers (Score:4, Insightful)
I saw this article was I was at work, and since I usually don't log in there, this comment will probably be lost in the sea of outrage, but...
Back when I was in high school, I took a semister of debate, and I forget the exact proposition, but it had to do with improving school systems. My partner and I ran a pretty air-tight voucher proposition, and since I actually believed in my proposition, I've tended to use similar points in meat-space discussions about the school systems that have come up since then. Of course, never ventured outside of my room back then except to go to school and my partner didn't have much ambition, either, so we never actually competed and I may never know how air tight or not it actually was, but I digress.
I think this article has shown me for the first time some solid evidence why a voucher system could fail. If I were doing negative against my old proposition, all I would have needed to do were jump forward in time to Slashdot in 2012 where I could read about how parents really, really want their kids to fail in the global marketplace just so that their kids won't get eaten by the devil.
Jeebus, the implications are frightening. I've seen how a few choice quotes from the Bible with some wiles (that I suppose this Satan guy might be impressed by) can turn an otherwise intelligent and rational man into a racist homophobe (my ex-father), but just holy shit. Claiming that the Loch Ness monster is real? Please say it ain't so and the article is doing some strawmanning of its own!
Although, I can see it. And that's the problem.
One thing that conservatives or at least "internet tough guys" like to rail against is the idea of relative values. Relative values is, on its surface, the idea that different cultures are all just as valid, which can degrade into arguing that opinions are just as real as facts.
However, it's become apparent to me that conservatives have their own notion of relative values, and they have their own opinions and facts. Except, unlike with its liberal counterpart, the conservative relative values argument starts with the axiom (yes, axiom, not assumption, because an assumption can be refuted) that god exists and that the Bible is fundamentally influenced by him and is intended to be his message to the world.
Therefore, if I conclude that the Loch Ness monster must exist based on some theological contortion, then my opinion has just as much privelege as the complete lack of evidence that Nessie exists. If I decide that blacks should be slaves because of part of Noah's story, then my opinion has just as much privelege as any argument that blacks are just as capable as whites. Q. E. D.
It's really mind-blowing. I work around a lot of people who do not have a basic grasp of maths, geography, reading, or writing. Therefore, to these people, science is just as much mysticism and hand-waving as religion. To these people, science is a religion. And from the temples of science come computers, which are sufficiently advanced technology. That's right! To these people, computers are indistinguishable from magic. Just a very kind of wonky and klunky magic, but I'm beginning to believe that they are serious when they call me a wizard. The fact that I'm obviously LGBT and obviously not a good ol' boy probably drives that superstition home.
It's sad and pathetic, and I don't know what the answer is. I have trouble understanding how I could possibly be the same species as what are essentially hairless apes that wear clothes and can talk. If there were an answer, I suppose that it could only be that perhaps people of all races and genders who really want to live in the real world instead of some medieval fairy story and want to progress their technology to the point where scarcity has been eliminated (at least for them) need to get together and stop contributing our taxes to this madness.
Mythology vs. religion (Score:4, Insightful)
No, its not.
Religions generally include mythology, but religions (dead or alive) are more than just the body of myth they include, in the same way that (for instance) a a nation's system of government is more than just it electoral system, even though the system of government includes the electoral system.
For instance, religions generally include moral precepts, which -- while they may be illustrated by elements of the mythology, aren't part of the mythology, and can be examined separately.
They also often include institutional authority structures, which again may be justified by reference to the mythology, but which are themselves not part of the body of myth.
So your search-and-replace of "religion" with "mythology" in a post talking about what can be learned by examining religion doesn't work as a substitution that doesn't change the meaning, as you claim. Instead, it radically changes the meaning.
Well, yeah. Mythology is often part of a religion (though it can be outside of a religion in the usual sense -- there is a lot of US national mythology that doesn't really have a religious context.)
That doesn't make mythology the same as religion.