# Kansas Redefines Science **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 8, 2005, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132 "2005-11-08T23:25:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/21 "2005-11-09T01:57:59Z")
Chill out. There’s an IQ test for state legislator; if you pass it, your name gets stricken from the ballot! :rolleyes: I’d like to hear what **Baker** has to say about this, and a few other Kansan Dopers who have been doing their part to keep the state from being Phelpsistan. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/22 "2005-11-09T01:59:11Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > I’d like to hear what **Baker** has to say about this, and a few other Kansan Dopers who have been doing their part to keep the state from being Phelpsistan. …and of course, with my luck, I hit “submit” just as **Baker** posts her comments. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![World\_Eater](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/f04885/32.png) [@World\_Eater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/World_Eater)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/23 "2005-11-09T01:59:31Z")
> [@Jeep's Phoenix](#): > > Some people are just plain stupid. > > How is this going to affect college admissions for these kids? Could an out-of-state university refuse to acknowledge that a student from Kansas had taken biology, for example? 20 - 30 years from now this is really going to fuck the US. India and China will be kicking our asses in tech. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/24 "2005-11-09T02:00:46Z")
> [@Polycarp](#): > > I’d like to hear what **Baker** has to say about this… Hey, can you tell me which stocks to buy tomorrow? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/qadgop_the_mercotan/32/83_2.png) [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qadgop_the_Mercotan)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/25 "2005-11-09T02:02:08Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > Maybe if you stopped feeling the rush of being “smarter than thou” you would come to realize that there are those here who look upon the board’s actions with a sense of dismany. How many is _dismany_? 😃 Heh. I’m from Wisconsin. One past governor, who went on to become Secretary of Health under Dubya once was quoted as being concerned about the West Nile virus. He stated he’d take rapid action to ensure our state received adequate supplies of “encephalupagus”. We think he meant “vaccine for encephalitis” but noone’s sure to this day. There’s idiots everywhere. But the Kansas School Board does, at this point, really stand out as exceptional idiots. ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/26 "2005-11-09T02:06:04Z")
> [@Jeep's Phoenix](#): > > How is this going to affect college admissions for these kids? Could an out-of-state university refuse to acknowledge that a student from Kansas had taken biology, for example? I’m sure they’ll be able to get into [Oral Roberts University](http://biology.oru.edu/servlet/page?_pageid=1626&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&dept=BIO). ---
**Author:** ![rayh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@rayh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayh)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/27 "2005-11-09T02:07:44Z")
As a non-American reading this all I can say is :- Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/28 "2005-11-09T02:07:50Z")
Encephalupagus is a rare disease of the brain that only snuffelupagai get. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/29 "2005-11-09T02:07:59Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > Ok, folks, I’ll admit it. I’m from Kansas. > > I’m sure if all of you would let me know _your_ locations, I could quickly come up with a list of stupidities for YOUR states. Oh yeah, well I live in Florida! Try to come up with anything stupid from… err, ahhh…never mind. Point taken, my apologies. ---
**Author:** ![Firebringer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f04885/32.png) [@Firebringer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Firebringer)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/30 "2005-11-09T02:08:46Z")
I guess in some ways the Kansas folk who made this decision are themselves evidence against the concept of evolution. Perhaps rather examples of unintelligent design? :smack: ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/31 "2005-11-09T02:09:12Z")
> [@Baker](#): > > Ok, folks, I’ll admit it. I’m from Kansas. > > I’m sure if all of you would let me know _your_ locations, I could quickly come up with a list of stupidities for YOUR states. > > Maybe if you stopped feeling the rush of being “smarter than thou” you would come to realize that there are those here who look upon the board’s actions with a sense of dismany. > > In other words, you’re all dissing a place I love. So shut up with your knee-jerk, oh so sophisticated and learned reactions of “fuck em all”. > > To the OP in particular. If you can’t even compose your own paean of outrage then you either are very poorly educated, or you must have had some other reason to post. Eaten many goats lately? Ha! Just try it, baby. I’m from California! We’re bulletproof, I tells ya! Bulletproof! ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/32 "2005-11-09T02:16:23Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Ha! Just try it, baby. I’m from California! We’re bulletproof, I tells ya! Bulletproof! Yeah, it’s not like in our last election for governor we had 135 candidates, including every unemployed C-list actor and a porn star or two! 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/33 "2005-11-09T02:18:00Z")
Tell ya what. We’ll stop acting “smarter than thou” when the holy rollers in Kansas (and other places) stop their “holier than thou” crap (yeah, as if). Teaching ID, dissing evolution, redefining science. It’s stupid, capital S-T-U-P-I-D. ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/34 "2005-11-09T02:24:33Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Hey, can you tell me which stocks to buy tomorrow? 🙂 Yes. Whether they’ll be **good** investments or not, though… 😛 (I recommend warrants for common stock in Answers in Genesis Press, though. They have a hot line of new science textbooks coming out…) : ducks and runs : ---
**Author:** ![SteveG1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bb73d2/32.png) [@SteveG1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SteveG1)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/35 "2005-11-09T02:37:46Z")
> [@MSNBC](#): > > “This is a sad day. We’re becoming a laughingstock of not only the nation, but of the world, and I hate that,” said board member Janet Waugh, a Kansas City Democrat." Yup, ya got that right. > [@MSNBC](#): > > “It will be marketed by the religious right … as a huge victory for their side,” she said. “We can expect more efforts to get creationism in.” Gee. Ya think? > [@MSNBC](#): > > Abrams. Another board member who voted in favor of the standards, John Bacon, said the move “gets rid of a lot of dogma that’s being taught in the classroom today.” And replaces it with a different one, that has NO scientific value. > [@MSNBC](#): > > “This is a significant attack on science,” said Jack Krebs, vice president of Kansas Citizens for Science. “They really are advancing a sectarian religious view. They’re treading on constitutional grounds.” Well, maybe, but what about people whose church or temple etc teaches against this re-packaged creationism? There are quite a few religions that have no beef with Darwin or evolution at all, and this move forces such students of those beliefs to have to “learn” this bull shit ID/creationism. Requiring students to swallow one sect’s version of the world (ID or creationism) to the contradiction of their own religion (whatever it is) may be a violation of the Constitution. “New scientific knowledge has led us to the conclusion that the theory of evolution is no longer a mere hypothesis,” Pope John Paul II stated in 1996. Father George Coyne of the Vatican Observatory made at least two other multiple-choice references to the deity: – “The Intelligent Design movement actually belittles God and makes him or her an object of ridicule” “…the Intelligent Design (ID) movement, while invoking a God of power and might, a designer God, actually belittles God, makes him/her too small and paltry.” –“It does not make God the great God that he or she is.” ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/36 "2005-11-09T02:40:16Z")
With all this Kansas bashing…and Kansas defending…and so on…aren’t we losing site of the OP’s point? Not just that the school board passed an anti-evolution measure (they’ve done that before) but that they **rewote the definition of science!** Or to put it another way they rewrote the definition of science!!! My lord. If it takes changing the definition in order to skweeze ID in _you would think that might tell them something._ Apparently not though. So is it a slippery slope? Well it might be if the idea catches on. ---
**Author:** ![WolfpackJeep](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpackjeep/32/2921_2.png) [@WolfpackJeep](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WolfpackJeep)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/37 "2005-11-09T03:01:02Z")
> [@EddyTeddyFreddy](#): > > I’m sure they’ll be able to get into [Oral Roberts University](http://biology.oru.edu/servlet/page?_pageid=1626&_dad=portal30&_schema=PORTAL30&dept=BIO). I wonder if that makes my major the “God-ordained calling into the study of the wonders of the Diesel cycle.” ---
**Author:** ![rayh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@rayh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayh)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/38 "2005-11-09T03:01:19Z")
> [@betenoir](#): > > With all this Kansas bashing…and Kansas defending…and so on…aren’t we losing site of the OP’s point? Not just that the school board passed an anti-evolution measure (they’ve done that before) but that they **rewote the definition of science!** > > Or to put it another way they rewrote the definition of science!!! > > My lord. If it takes changing the definition in order to skweeze ID in _you would think that might tell them something._ > > Apparently not though. So is it a slippery slope? Well it might be if the idea catches on. Yes, perhaps we could redefine religion to remove any references to god, ---
**Author:** ![ZebraShaSha](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/eada6e/32.png) [@ZebraShaSha](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZebraShaSha)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 3:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/39 "2005-11-09T03:01:31Z")
Many people say that there were better times to grow up. Times of more innocent curiosity, times when the world was simpler and less complex. Times when education actually taught the world something. I hate those times. I find it refreshing, bold, and promising of what may come when a legislator can openly redefine what I’m trying my damndest to be taught. Sure, it doesn’t affect me - I’m several states over, with a completely different legislator. Still, NCLB is as equally lead-based for education as is this bold new step in sawed off puppydom, along with the 20 hours of busy work needed for graduation that directly lines the governments coffers. When laws are made that fundementally alter my education, on grounds that are quasi-constitutional and moronic at best, I give up hope a little bit more. Even though this will probably be appealed and everything else wrong in education today will someday be universally discarded does not alter my present day reality. There is only so much a citizen can do to change the system, especially a citizen in no voting sense of the word. For me, I’m most pissed off that the kids most affected are the ones who can’t vote on the people who alter their education. How can this be? Shouldn’t they have a say, ultimately, in what they are taught? Woe is me. ---
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2005, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132/40 "2005-11-09T03:09:53Z")
Was just reading the article about this on CNN and was going to open a thread in here on this. Now I can just vent here. I think this [sums](http://www.cnn.com/2005/EDUCATION/11/08/evolution.debate.ap/index.html) it up: > [@](#): > > “This is a sad day. We’re becoming a laughingstock of not only the nation, but of the world, and I hate that,” said board member Janet Waugh, a Kansas City Democrat. These folks in Kansas are just militantly stupid. They have been pushing this same BS for years…this is just the latest version. :mad: I just thank the gods I don’t believe in that I don’t live there. -XT [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/kansas-redefines-science/330132.md?page=3)