March 2005 Archives

The Seattle Times reports today that the Seattle-based Discovery Institute is trying to side-step the whole problem of teaching creationism (or "intelligent design") in public schools by encouraging teachers to discuss the so-called "evidence" against Darwinian evolution. They say that this "teaching the controversy" strategy encourages healthy debate.

The only problem with that is that there is no controversy in the scientific community over evolution.

"You're lying to students if you tell them that scientists are debating whether evolution took place," said Eugenie Scott, director of the National Center for Science Education, a nonprofit group that defends teaching of evolution in school.

The Sunday New York Times will carry an essay by Frank Rich entitled "The God Racket, From DeMille to DeLay" that exposes the blatant political maneuverings and "religio-hucksterism" of Republicans over the Terri Schiavo case.

A dozen IMAX theaters in the South are refusing to screen a movie that refers to the dangerous witchcraft idea of "evolution." [NY Times link] The Daily Kos observes:

[This] gives the lie to the oft-stated claim by rightwing Christian fundamentalists that they don't object to the presentation of evolution but just want equal time for creationism (or its stalking horse, "intelligent design") so that science students and other citizens can "decide for themselves."

Full post

In related news, astronomers who claimed the earth orbits the sun were stoned to death, and doctors who disputed the notion that storks deliver babies were burned at the stake.

I'm from Michigan. This article from the Detroit Free Press annoys me.

Quoting scripture and taking a page from President George W. Bush, Gov. Jennifer Granholm called Monday for closer ties between religious leaders and state services to reach more people in need, and to funnel more government money to faith-based programs.

She apparently did more than "call" for closer ties. The State of Michigan's web site reports that Governor Granholm enacted an Executive Order creating the Governor’s Office of Community and Faith-Based Initiatives.

Perhaps she forgot about this little section in the Michigan State Constitution [Article 1, section 4]:

No money shall be appropriated or drawn from the treasury for the benefit of any religious sect or society, theological or religious seminary; nor shall property belonging to the state be appropriated for any such purpose.

If you live in Michigan, contact the Governor at this address and ask her how she reconciles her new Office with the State Constitution:

Governor Jennifer M. Granholm
P.O. Box 30013
Lansing, Michigan 48909
PHONE (517) 373-3400

This week's The New Yorker features an article by Peter J. Boyer about a religious discrimination lawsuit filed in November 2004 by a teacher in the Cupertino school district who is backed by the ultra-right-wing, uber-Christian Alliance Defense Fund. The article is not on-line.

It seems that the Stevens Creek Elementary School principal alledgedly stopped a born-again Christian teacher from distributing an 3-paragraph excerpt of the Declaration of Independence because the particular sections mentioned "our Creator" and "Divine Providence." The teacher claims there was systematic efforts by school officials to police his classroom and prevent him from even mentioning God or Jesus. The school maintains that the teacher repeatedly overstepped the admittedly fuzzy line dividing teaching about religion and proselytizing.

Dan Savage, editor of our local weekly, The Stranger, reports that the legal arguments against gay marriage being made to the Washington State Supreme Court are largely pathetic since lawyers can't really plead the only case the religious right has against it -- a religious one.

By the end of the arguments in the sweltering chamber, the legal (that is, secular) arguments against gay marriage were on shaky ground. Perhaps the lawyers arguing against gay marriage would have been better off (and more honest about the whole thing) channeling the Bible-thumpers outside. After all, the religious argument is the actual argument of the anti-gay-marriage crowd. Unfortunately for the bigots, the fact that it's irrelevant was made all too clear by the choices their attorneys made inside the courtroom today. We don't live in a theocracy. Yet.

This showed up over our house at about 5:30 today, apropos of St. Patty's Day.

The other night on Dr. Phil, a viewer called in (or something -- I don't know how Dr. Phil works) with a concern regarding her young son. The son, she reported, had been asking "tough" questions, like "If God made everything, who made God?" and "Why did God allow the Asian tsunami to happen?" The mother was beside herself and asked Dr. Phil to give her advice on what to tell her son.

I didn't continue to watch, but I have a pretty good idea of what I would have told her. How about "Stop lying to your son." I also have a pretty good idea that Dr. Phil didn't tell her that.

The fostering of a belief in God requires so much twisting, so much side-stepping, so many logical leaps and contradictions, you'd think it would occur to more people that, huh, maybe there's something inherently flawed in this line of thinking.

I just don't get it.

UPDATE: The story I referred to is on Dr. Phil's web site (direct link to story). Dr. Phil's advice wasn't as bad I expected. He writes: "It's OK to say, 'Mommy doesn't always know why something happens,' ... You have to look at your belief system and decide what it is you want to give him for comfort."

I didn't expect him to say "Maybe you shouldn't teach your child to base his concept of the world on something imaginary," but at least he didn't tell her to cop out with the "God works in mysterious ways" BS.

Two items to report:

Several months ago (like, September) we took Ray to Golden Gardens park and I pushed him in a swing. We took pictures; it was very cute.  The other day, Amy took him back to the park and put him a different swing. He leaned over and pointed at the one he had swung in before and started saying "Da-da! Da-da!" We assume he was remembering the time I pushed him in the other swing. What else could it be?

Last weekend, Ray and I were playing on a slide at Green Lake and he somehow flipped over and hit his eye on the edge. It was no big deal; he was a trooper about it. Then we went to play in the sand. Last night, I pointed out to him that a character in one of his books was playing with sand. "Remember sand, Ray? You played with sand at the park." He looked at me and pointed to his eye and said "Ow-a" (for "Owie") and then pointed out the window and said his word for "slide."

That his little brain is making such connections is quite amazing, really.

Ray has a "lovey" named "Kitty Lovey." It's a cat head atop a cloth body, and there are several small knots in the ends of the cloth that he is encouraged to chew on when he needs to teeth.

At the park the other day, we were sitting in a tree and he pointed at a knot in the branch and said "Uh oh!" He was quite concerned about this abnormality in the otherwise smmoth surface of the branch.

I explained to him that it was a "knot." He looked at it, then looked at me, then looked at the knot again and opened his mouth and leaned over to try to get it in his mouth!

I stopped him and, laughing, explained to him the concept of the "homonym."