Re: [silk] Science vs. the Intelligent Design movement.

[Ashok Hariharan]

here in east africa i tend to run into strong christian religious belief, people emphatically
believing in various divine creation stories (even though they might be engineers, doctors etc...)
its more interesting talking about it with such people, rather than ignoring the topic.
converts to christianity are quite recent here...its true that the zeal of a recent convert is much
more than someone born of that religion.....

> Udhay Shankar N wrote:
> ,----
> | classroom abrogates the divide  between church and state that has
> | served
> `----
> I wanted to know people's opinions on this:
> Do you guys keep 'away'  from talking about one's beliefs because
> you think belief is a matter of 'personal choice'?  I see it as a
>

i guess it depends on how you explain religion to them.  for example,
if you took them -every- sunday to mass at church -- chances are they
might have distorted views....instead, there are normally less formal
channels to educate people about religion, some religious institutions
(the hare krishna is a good example) conduct informal classes on the
bhagvad gita...some catholic orders have similar ones for the bible....
i have generally found such methods to be fairly balanced and open to
opposing viewpoints...

> More  importantly, when entrusting  someone a  big responsibility
> (like  teaching  your  child)   do  you  make  sure  they  aren't
> "distorted" in their views? If yes, How?

:-)
but it didnt affect you did it? otherwise you would still be believing
that god actually punished hitler with bolts of lightning from heaven
....there will always be a teacher  who has ideas like that, if the
kid is smart enough he is going to question it (either with the
teacher, or back home with his parents....)

>
> To  me, it is  of utmost  importance because  I was  personally a
> victim of such a "believer-coloured teaching process". I was told
> by my history  teacher that 'God' punished Hitler  because he did
> bad  things and  that Karma  takes effect  even in  one's current
> birth if the amount of evil  has exceeded so much.  It took a lot


there is a church here that i went to sometime back, where in the middle of the sermon they
played clips from "the matrix" and the "the lord of the rings"....and ....the last star wars movie
...apparently all these movies had messages from jesus ...:)  they are targetting a youth audience
in Kenya...and of course the church has its roots in the US...!

i dont think the US has really much to worry about...cos is a similar problem across the
world and not restricted to the teaching of science....for example i met a teacher from Italy,
who told me their problem was the science books were too wordy and literary...written in a prose
style of the italian classics....which led him to believe that the decline in science/engineering in
italy was as a result of that.

in east africa...most of school text books are rooted in different styles
of teaching science....since science was never formally taught (i.e. sometimes
the books are direct reprints of american or british text books....) in
other countries in the region i have seen Indian text books also being used
a lot....so these deficiences will have a parastic carrier effect....

> ,----
> | this   country    so   well   for   so    long.   Moreover,   the
> | intelligent-design   (ID)  movement   imperils   American  global
> | dominance  in science  and in  so doing  presents the  gravest of
> | threats to the  American economy, which is driven  by advances in
> | science and in the technology derived therefrom.
> `----

Ashok