(10-12-2011, 02:11 PM)kandrathe Wrote: When science talks about origin, it raises many questions in people. The problem is more that the science is taught in textbooks and in the classroom in an atheist way. Such as, "By coupling undirected, purposeless variation to the blind, uncaring process of natural selection, Darwin made theological or spiritual explanations of the life processes superfluous." taken from a popular textbook on evolutionary biology. The problem is posed as A versus B, and students are required to choose.
A view which does not involve a God is, by definition, going to be atheistic, in the literal sense. The null case is special - you can't treat it identically with positive hypotheses.
Superfluous is not the same as incorrect. Nothing can demonstrate, in the strictest sense, that God does not guide evolution. But the evidence can (and does) demonstrate, to paraphrase Laplace, that we have no need of that hypothesis. You do not have to choose between A and B. However, there is nothing about A (biology) that requires you to believe B (theology).
Perhaps textbooks do not need to point this out. It is, however, a critical juncture in the history of science, and also a correct explanation of the intellectual history.
Even if your religion overtly contradicts biology, there is no constitutional requirement that you must believe everything you are taught in school. If your religion teaches you that pi is equal to 3, you are free to do so, and to teach your kids thus. But you have no grounds for complaint when they fail their geometry test.
-Jester
(10-12-2011, 02:11 PM)kandrathe Wrote: The people that caused the crisis is us. Every poor person who took the handout, but could have done it on their own, every middle class worker who cheated on their taxes, every patriotic American who cheered as the boys marched off to war and every rich tycoon who lobbied for or exploited a loophole rather than paying their fair share.
You seem to be confusing the Greek crisis with the American one.
The US has a macroeconomic crisis triggered by a financial crisis. Government finances are fine - the US can borrow at fine rates, debt service occupies only a middling place in the budget, creditors are all being paid without issue, taxation is low-to-moderate. The problem is not, therefore, any of the following: Nonpayment of taxes, handouts for poor people, the Iraq war, tycoons exploiting loopholes. These things are bad, but they are not why the US economy is in crisis.
Greece (and to a lesser extent, Ireland, Spain, Portugal, Italy...) is having a *debt* crisis, created by fiscal problems (the origins of which are multiple and debatable.) That is a different issue, requiring different solutions.
These things do not much resemble one another.
-Jester