Or, to expand on what AZCowboy is try ing to say, there are an inordinate number of people like this
in Georgia, but they’re not usually in the majority anywhere, even among the more conservative and traditionalist areas of the state.
Cobb County (and parts of Forsyth and northern Fulton Counties, both adjacent to Cobb) represents one of the larger bastions of social neoconservatism around. The only comparable area I can think of right offhand is Orange County, CA - and just as Orange County played a key part in Ronald Reagan’s political fortunes, Cobb County is mostly famous for being the political birthing grounds of Newt Gingrich (no jokes about the names down here, I beg of you).
Point is, there are plenty of Cobblets out there who would do this sort of thing just to piss people off. Combine them with the benighted ignoramuses who actually think that “Creationism” (which ought to be called “Evolution-Denialism”, since that’s the only intellectual underpinning it has) is somehow good science, toss in a few people who are all to willing to exploit the above ignoramuses for political gain, or even just publicity, and it’s not surprising they did this.
Then again, we more enlightened Georgia residents aren’t ever surprised when Cobb County does something stupid They’ve got a pretty extensive record on that front, after all.
The way I understand it, if you have an idea, it’s a “hypothesis”. If you test it for awhile, and it’s generally accepted as true, it’s a “theory”. A “law” is something that has been observed to be true in all cases, and is pretty darn certain, but cannot be proved. It’s more of an observation, something that can’t be derived, and usually pretty simple.
For instance, Einstein had an idea. It was tested, and found to be pretty accurate, and became the “Theory of Relativity”. It’s held up for almost a century, so it’s accepted as fact, but it’s still “just” a theory. Newton’s Laws of Motion are things that Newton observed, and wrote down, and are pretty much inviolable as far as we can tell, but there’s no way to “prove” they’re true, in the sense that it can be verified that every thing in the universe obeys these laws. Whereas relativity is complicated, and is derived from the fact that c = constant, Newton’s laws (such as F=ma) are simple, and are pretty much just there.
That was pretty rambly, but I hope I was able to get some sort of point across. It’s been a long day and my brain isn’t firing on all cylinders.
To be fair, the “equal time” bit would apply to the evidence that Creation Scientists have to support their theory of “God did it”. While I can’t speak to the validity that Creationism has, they at least make a pretty thorough case, superficially speaking. Given that I’m not an evolutionary biologist, I can’t really tell what’s bogus and what’s not, but if you look around, they have mounds of evidence they say supports their claims.
The way I understand it, if you have an idea, it’s a “hypothesis”. If you test it for awhile, and it’s generally accepted as true, it’s a “theory”. A “law” is something that has been observed to be true in all cases, and is pretty darn certain, but cannot be proved. It’s more of an observation, something that can’t be derived, and usually pretty simple.
For instance, Einstein had an idea. It was tested, and found to be pretty accurate, and became the “Theory of Relativity”. It’s held up for almost a century, so it’s accepted as fact, but it’s still “just” a theory. Newton’s Laws of Motion are things that Newton observed, and wrote down, and are pretty much inviolable as far as we can tell, but there’s no way to “prove” they’re true, in the sense that it can be verified that every thing in the universe obeys these laws. Whereas relativity is complicated, and is derived from the fact that c = constant, Newton’s laws (such as F=ma) are simple, and are pretty much just there.
That was pretty rambly, but I hope I was able to get some sort of point across. It’s been a long day and my brain isn’t firing on all cylinders.
To be fair, the “equal time” bit would apply to the evidence that Creation Scientists have to support their theory of “God did it”. While I can’t speak to the validity that Creationism has, they at least make a pretty thorough case, superficially speaking. Given that I’m not an evolutionary biologist, I can’t really tell what’s bogus and what’s not, but if you look around, they have mounds of evidence they say supports their claims.
I have looked around. The evidence, such that exists, consists of little more than misunderstanding or misrepresenting current evolutionary theories (as well as those of genetics, geology, embryology, and nuclear physics, just to name a few others) not in the presentation of any counter-theories. No predictions are made, no experiments put forth; no scientific verification of the Creationist position is, indeed, possible. You either accept it on faith, or you don’t (and, in the more extreme versions, you either accept it on faith, or you’re going to Hell).
Thanks, DF. ElJeffe points out the insidiousness of the denialists’ (I coined that phrase a while back, Some Guy, but a couple people tried to convince me there was no such word.) campaign. It’s completely true, as you say, that they offer no evidence or any semblance of proof to positively support their claims; they just use a misunderstanding of the scientific method to “refute” evolutionary theory. I have never come across a denialist “refutation” that did not contain its own fatal contradiction, usually based on a disingenuously obvious misstatement of evolution science.
I just had this funny feeling today to do a vanity search and this is where I’ve ended up.
I read the article and I do understand both sides and I do see the point that all children should be given a chance to make their own choices. It isn’t fair to teach the big bang theory and not give creationism at least a mention. I’m not saying there has to be textbooks on creation or bible scripture or anything like that, but at least the idea that maybe there is a God out there who had something to do with it. Keep the books on evolution, that’s fine with me, but since we live in a free country and we are allowed to make our own choices, shouldn’t the options of all those choices be discussed and open for kids to decide for themselves?
The process of evolution is a matter of scientific inquiry. The question of whether it was guided by a Higher Power is a matter of religious inquiry, and not appropriate for public schools.
Biology should be taught in biology class. Mandating that teachers include the christian creation myth in their biology class is not “balanced” by any stretch of the imagination.
Children will learn science, art, literature, religion, etc., and will gradually synthesize for themselves their own view of the universe. Mandating that ONE religion’s understanding of things be included in nonreligious curricula is beneficial to exactly NO ONE, least of all the children being “taught.”
In biology class, they should learn the current scientific consensus, which views evolution as one of the best documented and most irrefutable facts known to modern man; and at home, in church, or in private religious school, they can learn their family’s chosen religion’s view of our place in the universe. Then they can decide for themselves.
BTW, *dreamer, this is predicated on the fact that evolutionary theory and evolutionary denialism (a.k.a. ‘creationism’) are most definitely NOT simply two different but equally valid interpretations of biological science. You write as if you believed they both deserve equal emphasis in a scientific setting; as if the jury were still out and students should be taught the controversy. Well, such is not the case: there is no controversy, except that conjured up by a small minority who choose not to learn all the available facts before pandering for votes. There is zero controversy about evolution in the mainstream scientific community, though there continues to be a healthy debate about the mechanics behind it. In other words, there is no doubt in any well informed person’s mind that genetic changes accumulate over time and lead to speciation, but there are many different theories about what causes those changes and drives the accumulation. (None of which, in my opinion, are entirely wrong or right: I think there’s room for any number of factors to be involved in such a complex and variable process.)
First, let me give the obligatory “Big Bang and Evolution are not the same thing”. It’s clear that dreamer was wrong to bunch them together.
Secondly, El Jeffe is pretty close to the “Law/Theory” distinction, but let me qualify. I’d say (and we’re talking about personal opinions here more than anything else, IMHO) the distinction is pretty much a purely semantic thing. There’s nothing intrinsically different about a law or a theory and there CERTAINLY isn’t a progression from one to the other. Something is described in science as a “law” when it is self apparent, sort of self referential. That is to say, the Second LAW of Thermodynamics says for a closed system, entropy increases. This is a statistical statement, not a rigorous, mathematically definitional one. I use it as a good example of a law that isn’t simply a definition like F=ma. We see an inherent property of a “closed system” is that its entropy increases. If entropy is not increasing, then it’s no longer a closed system. This is how a law is concisely self-referential. There’s really not much more content to the second law of thermodyanmics than that idea. A theory on the other hand is about a relationship and how the relationship predicts things about the universe. The THEORY of relativity can be boiled down into Einstein’s Field Equations, but by themselves, without manipulations, they hardly define in totality the implications of relativity unless you’re some sort of whiz-kid mathematical genius. So the “theory” part just means there’s a whole lot to learn about in the particular area you’re studying where as a “law” acts a bit more axiomatically. Regardless, the scientific proof is just as rigorous for any “theory” or “law”.
Now, dreamer, we’ve got some ironing to do.
Well, perhaps we should qualify this. I don’t think children should be given a chance to make uninformed choices. Do you? I mean, I think children should be presented information in a fair and unbiased manner. I hope we can agree on this much.
Depends on what class is being taught. If I’m teaching a class on “Theories of the Universe from Babylon to the Big Bang”, you better belive Bishop Ussher and his cohorts get a mention. This is not teaching current scientific paradigm, though, this is history of cosmological thought. There’s a big difference between what we SEE and OBSERVE by means of scientific method and what people actually believe.
If I were teaching the Big Bang to people from the perspective of SCIENCE, I would absolutely NOT to mention creationism. It has nothing at all to do with science. It is an argument that’s built up from saying, “okay, Genesis 1 is literally true in its presentation. Let’s go try to reverse engineer some justification of this or make up explanations for why it’s true.” Regardless of whether you believe this to be the right way to approach the world, this is not science and doesn’t belong in a science classroom. There is nothing in so-called “scientific” creationism that is remotely scientific. Therefore, it would be wrong to teach creationism in a setting that is attempting to present what has been discovered scientifically to be true about the universe (that is, there was a Big Bang, it occurred roughly 15 billion years ago, etc. etc.)
God is an inherently unobservable phenomenon in terms of science. Now, one can INTERPRET science to say all sorts of things about the supernatural (whether those interpretations are TRUE or not is a whole other debate), but it is disingenous for us in a scientific setting to teach something in science that is not objectively observed. This is not a statement against belief in a diety at all; it’s simply a fact about the position that science has to play with faith. Science has built into it a fundamental observational skepticism. If you can’t observe the thing objectively, you cannot study it. Scientific proof of a diety is just not available for us to present. Students should make up their minds about their belief in God outside of the science classroom. They may find they wish to use some of the tools they have gained in science education to help them in the process of that decision, but that decision itself is wholly apart from science. I hope that you would agree to that much, dreamer.
So, the reason we do not mention God in science classes unless explicity called upon to do so (e.g. we’re dealing with the philosophy of science at some interdisciplinary point in a course of study: then we might address the fact that various interpretations of science work for both theists and atheists and agnostics… though strictly speaking science as an unbiased collection of measurements and theories is completely agnostic) is because education in science is supposed to teach what science is about. That means I teach about observation, I teach what has been observed, and I teach how these observations fit into theories. This is all I should be equipped to do WITHIN pedagogical models of science.
The problem with this argument is once you decide NOT to appeal to science as the criteria for “choices” within the science classroom, you open up for all kinds of craziness. There is a limited amount of time to teach children and a nearly unlimited amount of things to teach them in this case. How much time do we devote to teaching children the theory of life coming from space? How about Scientologists views of the thetan? A week or more about pagan theories of the origins and development of life? How about astrology? What about Douglass Adams’ “the world as a computer simulation”? What if some kid comes into class and declares that life development occurs because of rollerskates? Do we tell him that his choice makes sense and that he should inform us about it for the next class period? Where do you draw the line, dreamer?
So Dreamer, you’d be OK with Cobb County teaching the creation explanations/stories/myths of the Navaho, Inuit, Viking, Yanomamo, !Kung, stone-age Philippine tribes, etc. on par with evolution? It’s a free country and we are allowed to make all our own choices, right? Or do these options apply only to those who hold to the Genesis versions of Creation?
I work with Junior High and Elementary school kids and I’ve spent many hours digging through their science text books helping them with their homework. From what I’ve seen they are teaching the big bang theory as fact. There’s no mention that they could be wrong or that it’s a theory.
So these kids get to grow up thinking without a doubt that God had nothing to do with the creation of life and the earth. When they hear some fundie saying God created the earth, then they’re going to be quite confused because that’s not what they learned in school. Maybe at least they will have the chance to question it then.
What do religious parents tell their kids? The textbooks in school are filled with lies? If the teacher is a religious person who believes in a “higher power” is it fair to force them to teach the big bang theory as fact and not be even able to mention anything about a higher power at all? It just doesn’t seem fair that both sides cannot have a fair chance and that children with young, naive minds are taught this is the truth and that’s that.
Would it be fair to have a statement in the beginning of their textbooks that says " we may be wrong - decide for yourself"?
I have no desire to debate evolution/creation in this thread, but I have to say to anyone who says this (and mind you the same has been said to me concerning my beliefs) but is it not true that there is room for reasonable doubt? Or are you 100% sure that science is correct about this?
I see your point about evolution being taught in a “science” only classroom which I don’t have a huge problem with, but the big bang theory is where I don’t think it’s fair to be taught as fact.
Yes, there are tons of other religions and theories out there and I haven’t at this time put enough thought into how the approach should be. The “public” is made up of all of us who believe different things, so shouldn’t a “public” school be able to teach the viewpoints of the public? I’m absolutely positive there is no easy answer here but it’s something I will put some thought into as we all should.
Sorry; that was flip. You continue to conflate the “big bang” with evolution. I’m an evolutionary hobbyist: I’ve read an awful lot about evolutionary theory. That’s the subject about which I started this thread. I’m, personally, not as fascinated by astrology as I am by biology, so I don’t know anywhere near as much about the big bang. But I do know enough to know that one is astrology or, at least from our earthbound perspective, geology; and one–the one under discussion–is biology. I also seem to recall that the big bang theory is not as thoroughly accepted and endorsed by the scientific consensus (Anyone?).
Insofar as the word ‘fact’ has a scientific meaning, however, evolution is a ‘fact’. So teaching theological creation myths has NO PLACE WHATSOEVER in an academic setting.
And for someone who ‘work[s] with Junior High and Elementary school kids’ to express an opinion on such a subject without more thoroughly educating yourself is, IMHO, irresponsible.
Just so you know lissener I’m not teaching anything, I’m just there to help them with their homework if that makes you feel any better. Besides I’m not really “allowed” to express my opinion with them anyway.
Gobear: I describe myself as a Fundamentalist because I believe in the Five Fundamentals. The “fundamental” that concerns us here is the one that says that the Bible is the inspired word of God, not merely a collection of human-generated stories.
However, saying that one believes that the Bible is the “inspired word of God” doesn’t automatically mean that one believes that every jot, every tittle is absolutely 100% accurate. All the rest of it, all that “inerrancy” baggage that you’re talking about, has been tacked onto it by right-wing fanatics like Jerry Falwell and Ken Ham, and you shouldn’t lump all Fundamentalists in with them.
Guess what? I’ve got a typo in the copy of the NIV that I’m using for my Bible study–it didn’t print right, so there’s a blur in the middle of the verse and you can’t see what the word is, something my Sunday School teacher years ago assured me could never, ever happen, because God would always watch out for His word and make sure it was printed perfectly every time. Well, common sense tells me that the Bible I’m using for Bible study is only a book, set up with type and printed, just like any other book. God expects us to use our common sense.
Or we read something like Matthew 6, which says:
Lilies are not a “grass”–but many of us don’t get all hysterical about it and go through all sorts of theological contortions, desperately struggling to reconcile this “mistake” in the Bible. We just shrug and say, “Hm, the Bible isn’t a science textbook. Jesus was obviously talking about plants in general, not saying that lilies are a grass.” Similarly, when we read that God created the world in six “days”, we shrug and say, “Hm, the Bible isn’t a science textbook. God must have meant something else besides what we know as a ‘day’.”
You’re allowed leeway in interpretation for things like this that don’t affect a major doctrinal issue. Whether you believe the world was created in six days or 12 billion years doesn’t affect your salvation. The only reason you think that we aren’t allowed this leeway is because Bible-thumpers like Jerry Falwell don’t think we are, and they get all the press coverage.
Notice that none of these is mentioned in the Five Fundamentals. It says “inspired”, not “inerrant”. One can be a Fundamentalist and not be ignorant–one can still believe Science when it tells us that the Universe is 12 billion years old. To believe that the Bible is the “inspired” word of God doesn’t necessarily mean that one believes that it’s a science textbook. It means that one believes that it’s composed of commands, advice, and guidelines in general for living according to God’s Way, handed down by God Himself. However, none of these commands, advice, and guidelines concern themselves much with the natural world around us. We’re expected to get our information on that from other sources. The Bible is silent on the subject of dinosaurs, for example. What to do in case of food poisoning? Not mentioned. So we look to Science for answers on these subjects.
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Well, you’re wrong. It’s not. Sorry. You’ve been listening to Pat Robertson too much.
FTR, I’m what’s called a “directed evolutionist”, which means I believe evolution happened, but that God made it happen–that it wasn’t a random accident of amino acids coming together and being hit by lightning, ka-POW! Let there be Life.
So, file this for future refererence: There are many Fundies out there just like me, who believe in “(f) All of the Above”, and who also believe that the Universe is 12 billion years old, and that at some point homo sapiens evolved from hominids. Try to ignore the foaming-at-the-mouth right-wing loonies like Donald Wildmon and Pat Robertson–many of us already do.
Right, I got that, I was reading up on Cobb County in some other articles.
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No, I’m suggesting that it’s not necessarily a bad thing for kids to know that there are other points of view out there. I have no doubt that any Cobb County biology teachers worth their salt will find a way to get the message to their students that Creationism isn’t a “theory” the way that Evolution is a “theory”, with things like “facts”, but that’s it’s more a religious viewpoint than a real scientific theory.
My best rebuttal for the ‘theory/law’ argument is the Theory of Gravity. We still don’t know just how gravity works. It’s ‘just a theory’. However, you don’t see too many fundamentalists protesting the teaching of the existance of gravity in schools (the “Down With Gravity” signs would be cute though). There is no ‘progression’ from a Theory to a Law.
And dreamer? The validity or lack thereof of the Big Bang has absolutely nothing to do with evolution. Zip. Zero. Nada. The Big Bang could be disproved tomorrow and it would have nothing to say about any of Darwin’s theories or what anyone else has said in support of evolution after him. Debates on evolution will go a lot smoother if you realize this. Nor does evolution have anything to do with abiogenesis i.e. the start of life on Earth.
As far as Creationism goes, it might be able to get its foot in the door (and stay) if it had anything to say about the matter scientifically. However, it never has. One spontaneous generation of a species or one ‘half dog/half cat’ being born is all that’s asked (Ironically, the things that Creationists often say must happen under evolution are exactly the things that would disprove it). The burden of proof for Creation has rested squarely on religious shoulders for hundreds of years and there’s nothing to show for it. That’s not to say there never will be, although I doubt it. Until then though, there is no justification to teach Creationism in a science class.
I had a big and beautiful post to send when my netscape quit and left me in the cold. Unfortunately emacs save didn’t help me out either, so this is my second time through this argument. So help me God, I’m going to get through it though!
First, let’s get things straight. A theory within the current paradigm is synonymous with a fact as far as scientific knowledge is concerned. Whether or not science can be trusted to offer the correct paradigmatic view of the world is another debate entirely. To answer your last two questions, you need to be clear what you mean by “reasonable” and “doubt”. In terms of science, doubt is quantified using a measurement of uncertainty. This is built into the way scientific observation works. “Reasonable” is a value-judgment and pretty much wholly outside of science. Critical thinking is a skill that can be amplified by using the scientific method and evaluating scientific theories, but it is not something that is defined by science, per se. It’s simply a skill, or in a formal setting, the workings of logic.
dreamer, I too am familiar with science texts for all ages and I know for a fact what you say about them to not be true. The current way science texts are set-up came out of a design that was instigated during the “Great Science Scare” of the Sputnik Era. In order to keep up with the Russians, US science curricula were tweaked to mirror basically what is most often presented today. The idea is to model for children what it would be like to continue on into science or engineering courses, that is, teach the children based upon current scientific paradigms and only let them investigate things for themselves as an afterthought. This technique is employed at the high school and university level in order to get students acquainted with the subject material well enough to actually begin to do science and engineering work. It is not, however, the way science operates itself.
I am of the personal opinion that the current way science is taught in the schools should be changed toward the inquiry science based method. This is likely to be a difficult transition for teachers who are used to teaching science like a history text: this what science tells us about the world… yadda, yadda, yadda. This is not, however, how science operated in principle. Getting the children familiar with the scientific method and using it day to day would allow them to be familiar with all the concepts of “how do we know what we observe in science is true?”. Today, this is most often done in the first chapter of the school science texts. The statement is there right in front of their text.
So what happens is that the first month or so is spent on the scientific method and thinking about these subjects of uncertainty and critical thinking. Then we move on to weather. No problem for the creationist here (I guess they don’t think there is a conflict between meteorology and God causing the rain to fall on the just and the unjust). Then maybe it’s on to chemistry. Again, no complaints (apparently the references to alchemy in the Bible are not that important to the fundamentalist’s worldview). But as SOON as we get to talking about evolution or the Big Bang someone begins clamoring for, “but you can’t BE SURE it’s correct! Why haven’t you mentioned it?” It would be intellectually dishonest to single out particular subjects in the science curriculum for scrutiny simply because a particular constituent group has belief-objections to it. The uncertainty in science was addressed. That’s what the scientific method is all about. Yes, I believe that the scientific method gets the short shrift in current modes of public education, but why should an objection be singled out only for specific scientific paradigms if not to force the agenda of a particular group’s belief onto pedagogical policy?
I assume, dreamer, that you are aware that one can be a theist and still believe in the Big Bang. In fact, the pope, a theist though maybe not a fundamentalist, is himself a fan of the theory. It’s funny that you are so quick to jump on the atheist interpretation of the theory Big Bang when you declare yourself a theist. As I said above, science cannot observe God. It is simply impossible to do. The best we can do is simply plead agnosticism from the current data. If you wish to push into your children that the Big Bang theory necessitates driving a stake into the heart of God, then that is your decision. But it is by no means the only interpretation of the theory.
This is a hard one. Certainly, I’ve heard my fair share of fundamentalists bible-beat and declare with full authority of God that theory I study that is based on observations just as sound as, say, the atomic theory is a lie. That’s about as far as they can get though. This message board is actually a fairly good repository for discussions on the implications, observational evidence, and extensions of the Big Bang theory. Please, dreamer, use this resource if you want to talk about this subject or open another thread. I am MORE THAN PLEASED to give you any evidence or information you may wish to see for why the Big Bang is true from a scientific, observational standpoint. However, Captain Amazing brings up a good point I think you should consider, dreamer. If a religious parent truly wishes to reject the Big Bang in spite of the evidence, that is their belief choice. They can still allow their child to be exposed to said evidence and offer their rationale for rejecting the paradigm without readily appealing to whether or not something is a “lie” or not. The whole point of the matter is, within the perspective that one can get an accurate idea of the way the world is through the tools of science the Big Bang model is true. However, you may not buy the perspective as being a tenable one in which case you reject the scientific theory that conflicts with the “Word of God”. If you really wish to debate the truth of science, that is a whole other thread.
To be perfectly frank, I’m of the opinion that the teacher should not impose their beliefs upon children. They should teach the children, rather, the critical thinking to be able to come to their own conclusions. I am confident in saying that such an approach to tutelage and pedagogy will only serve to enhance the minds of the students in the classroom. The issue of a higher power is, as I’ve said before, moot in the scientific setting. Science is internally consistent without appealing to supernatural cause by definition. It requires neither a belief in a deity nor prohibits it. Again, dreamer, you have to realize that as soon as you let things that aren’t science into the discussion you have thrown away all criteria for deciding what is to be taught. You seem to think it is unfair. Well, is it unfair to all the rest of the groups you and I BOTH disagree with that we exclude them from teaching their theory of goblins or mystical secrets of the universe? This is the question.
What, praytell, is your rationale for this statement? Methinks, however, this belongs in another thread. I will say this unequivocally (because I believe in science as a way of presenting the way the world is), the Big Bang is fact. How one presents this to students is a matter of choice. I, personally, would be thrilled to take anyone through the evidence for the Big Bang. Please, open another thread if you do not believe me. Or simply do a search on the message board.
Not as science they shouldn’t. Just because everybody believes one thing, doesn’t make it true (you as a fundamentalist, more than anyone, should be willing to agree to that). The criteria that is used to decide what gets taught in schools are the collected observations and paradigmatic theories that have been patiently checked, derived, and debated by scientists. That’s it. I’m sorry if this sounds a bit unfair or rude to those who don’t believe in science, but the fact of the matter is, there is no conspiracy to isolate the “true” observations on the part of an ogrely and atheistic scientific intelligentsia. This is part of the reason I think we need to start teaching inquiry-based science, as it reaffirms that fundamental point that ANYONE and EVERYONE can be a scientist and look at the world through a systematic, scientific way. People who do this have discovered amazing things about the world. Some of them are atheists. Some of them are theists. Some of them don’t care to tell you which they are. The fact of the matter is, religion doesn’t come into play in the arena unless your religion expressly demands that it must (or you have an epistemological quarrel with science, which I’m guessing is probably not the case… but I could be wrong). So, should the public have equal time to say what they will about this or that? Would you wish a student to learn history from someone picked randomly off the street? Should just anybody be allowed to teach their opinion of mathematics? Should someone only fluent in German give their opinion on the English language? Should a scientist unversed in Fundamentalist Christianity teach about the subject in a comparative religions course? I believe the crux of the matter be public educators need to teach competently the critical thinking skills needed to be intelligent, capable, and thoughtful adults. I think that is done not by letting just anybody teach anything they believe, but by being discriminating in your tastes. If you believe differently, please explain why.
