Galileo

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Posts by Galileo

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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

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  Galileo

  Your dismissing comments towards compromise is the exact reason why this will never be anything more then an untaught chapter in public school science textbooks around the US for several decades to come.

  How can there be a compromise? ID is not science. You want to teach unscientific religious views in a science class. If you succeeded, than what would stop astrologers from demanding their compromise, and devoting equal time to astrology when astronomy is being studied? What would stop numerologists from demanding their equal time in math class?

  The fact that you seem to be missing is that their is a massive amount of data confirming the theory of evolution. There is no data confirming ID. Creationists are not being targeted for exclusion. They are being treated the same way as everyone else that has a hypothesis that turns out not to be supportd by objective evidence.
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  19

  Something for the agnostics and atheists - Divine Spark still there

  by Octarine Prince in

  1. social
  2. current

  click for something heartwarming

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  Galileo

  This is an incredible story. It brought a tear to my eye. No need to turn it into a debate over the existence of God in my opinion. Thanks for sharing this. It made my day.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

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  Galileo

  fd,

  You just don't get what I am saying.

  It's funny how the ignorant accuse the knowledgeable of not understanding. I think we all get what you are saying. They are standard creation apologist logical fallacies based on a lack of education about the subject you are defending. Many of us, including myself, used similar arguments when we were Witnesses. After educating ourselves about evolution we realized these arguments are nonsense and don't hold up under scrutiny. You are the one that doesn't understand what we are saying, and in fact cannot, because you clearly don't know enough about evolution to form a coherent argument.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

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  Galileo

  In order to clarify the discussion for the easily riled, we are talking macro, not micro-evolution here.

  This is a very common statement amongst crationists. Macro-evolution is micro-evolution plus time. If any creationst wishes to assert that there is some boundary beyond which a "kind" cannot evolve, than it is up to them to propose what universal mechanism it is that stops evolution at that point. No such mechanism has ever been found, or to my knowledge, even seriously proposed.

  It is the equivalent of someone claiming that water cannot erode a rock. When a geologist takes him to a deep canyon eroded by a river, the erosion denier says "That isn't proof that the river created the valley. No one has been around for ten thousad years to observe the entire process, so therefore my claim is as valid as yours!"

  So the geologist sets up an experiment where a stream is diverted over a rock bed. After ten years, both return to see a six inch gully is cut where the stream has been flowing. "Ah," says the erosion denier "but that's MICRO erosion! I always believed that. But a river can never erode more than four feet total of rock! That would be MACRO erosion! Anyone that can cross the street at a green light can see that macro-erosion is impossible!"

  We have evidence of "macro" evolution in the fossil record. We have it in genes. We have it in DNA. We see evidence of it in vistigial legs on whale calfs, vistigial tails on humans, vistigial organs throughout the animal kingdom. If the creationists wish to assert that "micro" evolution happens but "macro" evolution doesn't, than it is up to them to counteract the mountains of evidence from all the earth sciences.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

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  Galileo

  I just got caught up on four pages of this thread. Wow. I'm speechless. I really have nothing to add at present, but I'd like to ask: Brother Apostate, are you joking with that garbage? No, seriously, are you joking? Are you intentionally trying to make creationists look like total irrational idiots with those ridiculous articles? Is your entire personna a charicature of a semi-literate creationist nutjob? Because, if so, well played sir. Well played.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

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  Galileo

  Appeal to authority?

  If you can't think of any, than you must admit that evolution is not science. It is religion/philosophy.

  Not at all. I jotted my reply quickly on my phone frm Starbucks on my way to work this morning. I didn't have time for a lengthy response. My point wasn't that I couldn't think of any, it was that there was no need, as there are numerous examples that have not only been thought of but actually tested in laboratories. I fully expected that others could provide examples of these if examples were asked for. I'm glad to see my faith was not misplaced. Nice job as always Derek.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
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  Galileo

  "So, what tests would you propose to falsify evolution?" I don't have to propose any. Better minds than mine have been doing so for over a hundred years. It's why it is one of the most well established theories in modern science. It is more proven than the theory of gravity.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

  1. 
  2. 
  3. 
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  Galileo

  I find it quite interesting that one theory 'should' be taught but the other theory 'should not'.

  This very statement shows your scientific ignorance. Creationism is nowhere near a theory in the scientific sense. Intelligent Design isn't even a scientific question. Science is based largely on falsifiability. So, what tests would you propose to falsify creationism? If you can't think of any, than you must admit that creationism is not science. It is religion.
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  360

  Why Evolution Should Be Taught

  by hamilcarr in

  1. jw
  2. friends

  why evolutionary biology is a crucial part of the curriculum .... .

  optimism in evolution.

  by olivia judsonlondon.

  1. 
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  Galileo

  What a terrible, terrible idea. Don't teach the foundations of modern biology simply because some fundamentalists want their myths taught instead! You don't have to imagine how catastrophic the results of that sort of glorification of ignorance would be; large parts of your country amply demonstrate the results. Teachers who don't teach but let their students "discover on their own" are not doing their job. The embarrassing levels of scientific ignorance in your country will not be remedied by not teaching the basics of science until university level.

  As much as I hate to see someone from another country trashing the U.S., I have to agree with Derek. I didn't even have to look at who he was responding to or where they were from, I knew he was referring to Americans. What does that tell you? We Americans should be deeply embarassed about the accepted ignorance of our primary school students. I myself went through all of my school years believing evolution was nonsense believed by zealots. It wasn't until I was in my mid to late twenties when I took it upon myself to educate myself about evolution. What an eye opener! The dishonesty of the religious fanatics that wrote anti-evoltion information for the uneducated masses to disseminate to their children was staggering. How can any child be expected to "decide for themselves" when their families are hiding the truth and filling their heads with religious propaganda? If I had been exposed to the true theory of evolution in school, instead of the rediculous characature I was getting at home, I may have been able to see through the other nonsense much sooner as well.
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  13

  How to Install Windows Vista in Two Minutes

  by brinjen in

  1. social
  2. humour

  http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=fvbf9togwno.

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  wish i'd thought of that one!

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  Galileo

  I was a beta tester for Windows Vista, so I have been using it now for over two years in some form or another. I have never understood the complaints people had about it. At launch, it had some incompatibility problems with some very old hardware, a few programs like Quickbooks (which is the fault of the software developers that wanted to force people to buy new versions of their software instead of patching their old stuff), and some sound cards. All of these issues were fixed long ago. Vista is far superior to XP on a modern computer. My computer is four years old and runs Vista blazingly fast and is far more reliable than it ever was with XP. Bashing Vista has become the fashionable thing to do, but it is unjustified. The guy in the video that says Vista was incompatible with everything in his brand new computer is a liar, a moron, or both.

  Have you seen "The Mojave Experiment?" http://www.mojaveexperiment.com/