Archive for August 2008
Can we put the debate of the Scopes’ Monkey Trial to bed at some point or are we seriously going to continue to find ways to re-ignite it. This is just sad.
Already, more than half of the state’s eighth-graders lack basic competence in science, according to recent national test scores.
But despite pleas from scientists, civil liberties activists and educators like Peebles, Gov. Bobby Jindal signed Louisiana Senate Bill 733 into law. The new statute will allow teachers to introduce into the classroom “supplemental textbooks and other instructional materials” about evolution, the origins of life, global warming and human cloning.
He may have wanted Michael Palin but at the last minute remembered he is not a naturalized citizen and that would not work.
So barring that as the rationale behind what could be shaping up to be a gamble that might not pay off, here are some other thoughts around the blogosphere that makes points in addition to those I raised yesterday.
1) James McGrath points us to this article that gives a more in-depth view of Sarah Pailn’s favor towards “teaching the controversy” as if teaching is all about “information” and not about what kind of information is taught in which course. Said Palin:
“Teach both. You know, don’t be afraid of information. “Healthy debate is so important and it’s so valuable in our schools. I am a proponent of teaching both. And you know, I say this too as the daughter of a science teacher. Growing up with being so privileged and blessed to be given a lot of information on, on both sides of the subject — creationism and evolution. It’s been a healthy foundation for me. But don’t be afraid of information and let kids debate both sides.”
To be sure, she nowhere advocates that it needs to be or even should be mandated. However, this view continues the notion that any alternative to evolution is acceptable in a science classroom. John Shuck has a thought or two as well.
2) Julie Bogart calls her out on how her own role as Vice President and on the campaign trail would actually support her own “pro-family” position - to which she aligns herself according to Gary Bauer.
To be governor in a state the size of AK (read small: the 47th largest in the country in population) is not the same thing as to be vice president of the entire country. I’m not even sure what I think about her being a mother of a special needs child and governor at the same time, but I know without hesitation that I can’t bear the thought of her being the vice president and raising that baby, caring for it, nursing it while she is on the campaign trail, while that special needs child especially needs her.
The question is when ideological support of specific issues meets reality. How does a candidate live out their own ideological committments? What does a candidate’s set of ideological committments actually look like if they were to become law?
3) Melissa Rogers has a post detailing Sarah Palin’s statements concerning the role of religion and public life. It is quite revealing and worth your time.
[TIME:] Where do you see yourself going? Staying on in Alaska. Washington?
[Palin:] You know, I don’t know. I knew early on that the smartest thing for me to do was to work hard, do the best that I can, make wise decisions based on good information in front of me. And then put my life, get myself on a path that could be dedicated to God and ask Him what I should next. That will be the position I will be in as long as I’m on earth — that is, seeking the right path that God would have laid out for me.
4) Revdarth shares Sarah Palin’s view of global climate change. More and more this position sounds like the assertions that evolution is just ideology and not science.
What is your take on global warming and how is it affecting our country?
A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made.
In short the Dems have got to be licking their chops - and are. It seems like a miscalculation on McCain’s side and even a loss of identity for him as well. He seems to be so after the same voting (meaning market) clusters as Obama and so beholden to a cluster of the conservative base, that he loses something of the identity that makes him who he is.
So how do you feel about McCain’s choice if you are a Republican?
It’s starting to come out now. The base. The base. The base.
If you are pro-life, as I am, this is one of the happiest days you have had politically. Palin has governed well and she lives her values. She chose life for own precious baby, born with Down Syndrome. Like McCain she has a son in the military.
If her ideological position on the ever ambiguous “values” word and her position on hot button issues is the only reason you would vote for a President…wake up! Really. The world is much bigger than these few thorns in the side of politics and civil discourse.
By the way. Remember that while Obama does not have a lot of experience in Washington, Palin has none.
Yet neither candidate is really Jesus.
Young rising Democrat picks a warhorse veteran as partner.
Warhorse veteran picks a young rising Republican as partner.
Barack Obama’s campaign has been based on the principle that sound judgment is what leads to change. At the DNC he seemed to clarify what that means and what it might look like for the first time. He has been quite plastered, at least on the various McCain and Republican National Committee ads that have been dominating Pennsylvania airwaves (at least in my south central region), for being the youngest and most inexperienced candidate ever; a torch McCain has borrowed heavily from the Hilary Clinton campaign.
McCain has taken the position that his experience and his “maverick” nature as a senator make him more fit to lead. However, with his selection of former beauty queen Sarah Palin, can he continue to sell people the idea that he makes the better choice due to his experience now that he has chosen someone younger and with even less experience in Washington that his opponent? It seems to discredit his brand quite a bit or at least it cheapens it.
I am very interested to see how McCain’s brand will play out, especially after Obama basically told him that the gloves were off and that it’s “go time soldier” in his DNC speech.
Here are some clear issues with the decision to select Sarah Palin, which make no mistake was a risk for McCain.
- Palin has already been called out that she was chosen to compete for the Hilary Clinton cohort. Bloomberg quotes her saying, “‘Hillary left 18 million cracks in the highest, hardest glass ceiling in America,” Palin said, referring to the votes Clinton won. ‘We can shatter that glass ceiling once and for all.’” The use of the same metaphor is telling. That 18 Million is a market. It’s the same number of listeners of the Howard Stern Show at the time he signed with Sirius. He got an enormous contract because of that size of a base. Her job is to market to that market cluster to get McCain in the White House. But is it too transparent of a move after Hilary Clinton’s speech at the DNC? You bet the Obama camp thinks so and will play that out. How will McCain parry that blow?
- Palin will play the Dan Quayle role and will be pigeonholed there. Just when we thought that those “potatoe” clips were long gone, they will be back. She is the youngest on either ticket, and clearly has the most conservative values. If Gary Bauer applauds your conservatism, you bet that you are anti-abortion, anti-stem-cell, anti-gay marriage, and pro-evangelical. Although I sincerely doubt she will look nearly as confused and juvenile as Quayle, McCain does not have a Reagan popularity to fall back on.
- In Alaska she has a little street cred taking on “big oil” in the second richest oil state in the Union. This might help, but it could backfire. Do we really want another representative from a big oil state in the White House again? We’ll see if Obama tries that card and looks for other cracks in the “oil fighter” image Palin will bring to the ticket.
- How will McCain answer the question of the role Palin will play in the White House? Obama has made it clear that Biden’s role is to be an advisor in his areas of expertise that in theory balance out those domestic areas of expertise that Obama himself can actually lay claim to. To get past these three critical issues that will make or break McCain rather quickly through next week, he has to sell people on the role that Palin will play when her current role as a brand enhancement to get the product out to the young conservative and Clinton cluster, what role will she be to McCain?
- What I think we will see more of to counter these obvious risky areas is that McCain will counter-punch the “It’s more of the same” line with a visually compelling and tangible example of how it’s clearly not more of the same in order to try to put that line to rest. But will that be enough to overpower these already emergent fault-lines?
One thing is for sure, the Obama camp is already producing an advertising blitz that will try to pop holes in these issues quickly and relentlessly. Will this gamble by McCain pay off? I seriously have my doubts. It will be fun to watch the chess game in this totally unexpected new world of US politics take shape. It’s clear that it’s not business as usual - at least from an imaging and marketing perspective.
Barack Obama is apparently going to make some kind of a speech or something or other in Denver tonight.
Notes From Off Center: Scooping the news for you one story at a time.
If you think that Viva La Vida is the best thing that the UK has put out since Leona Lewis’ whining R&B, do yourselves a favour and toss them out the window or into a fire and pop in or download The Verve’s unexpected and long-awaited new release - Forth. It’s sublime.
I found a fellow music snob’s site here and his preview is, I think, spot on. “Numbness” is indeed the weakest song, but it hearkens back to earlier Verve meanderings through psychedelic seas of a reformed shoegaze coloured with blues. Don’t go quite as far back as their awesome EP, but think of those odd little pieces with the somewhat misplaced sax solos in A Storm in Heaven; or somewhere in between the two. Read his entire review for more because I think he got what I was going to write, probably did it better, and he had more time to do it.
The user rating on Rolling Stone is so more accurate than Fricke’s - which is pretty high. It’s not a perfect album, but it is the best this year by a long-shot. The cover art is a perfect symbol for how it makes you feel start to finish. Is it the Verve’s best? I can’t say yet, but I’m feeling it. It’s the same Verve, but it is its own animal at the same time and hard to compare. I will say that the movement from “I See Houses”, to “Noise Epic”, to the aptly title “Valium Skies” is brilliant, absolutely brilliant. It is, to my mind, the best sequence of songs they have ever put together.
Cheers!
If this doesn’t make your inner funk meet the mothership, then you have no soul and should have your pulse checked because you might just be dead.
The Neville Brothers doing “Yellow Moon” with John Hiatt and Herbie Hancock who adds the hint of that Hammond B3 in the background. I really like Hiatt’s phrasing. He’s not afraid to let it breathe. He creates a tension that was not there before and adds another layer to it.
This is brand Neville’s own sound. It’s gospelsoulorleansragfunk and no one else does it like these dudes live.
Trying to be tactful since any person who has to deal with cancer and miscarriages has got a really tough haul independent of morality. I’m not sure what’s wrong with this article. Hmmm… What do you think? Has US Weekly got it right?
The day after she received the happy news, the porn star miscarried, probably due to the stress of the cancer.
The following month, Jameson had the mole excised and has been 100 percent cancer-free ever since. In an exclusive interview, the 33-year-old devout Catholic (and author of How to Make Love Like a Porn Star) tells Us Weekly that she’s made peace with her heartbreak.
“If the pregnancy would have lasted, I wouldn’t have had the surgery,” she says. “So it was all in God’s plan.”
Usmagazine.com | News - Jenna Jameson: My Secret Cancer Struggle.
So anyone hear from her local parish priest to confirm her status as “devout”? I mean I guess anything is possible. But it’s not all sitting well with me. Maybe it’s the porn thing. I don’t know.
Maybe the XXX Church is effective?
Here’s another take on this little odd news tidbit here.
In related news about nuns see Scotteriology here.
Interesting set of responses to a New York Times article by Jim, James, and others. The article states, among other things:
As recently as three years ago, the guidelines that govern science education in more than a third of American public schools gave exceedingly short shrift to evolution, according to reviews by education experts. Some still do, science advocates contend. Just this summer, religious advocates lobbied successfully for a Louisiana law that protects the right of local schools to teach alternative theories for the origin of species, even though there are none that scientists recognize as valid. The Florida Legislature is expected to reopen debate on a similar bill this fall.
As Mr. David Campbell, who helped devise science teaching standards for the state of Florida, tell his students:
“Faith is not based on science,” Mr. Campbell said. “And science is not based on faith. I don’t expect you to ‘believe’ the scientific explanation of evolution that we’re going to talk about over the next few weeks.”
“But I do,” he added, “expect you to understand it.”
At Fellowship of Christian Athletes meeting one student says this which relates evolution to ethics:
“Evolution is telling you that you’re like an animal,” Bryce agreed. “That’s why people stand strong with Christianity, because it teaches people to lead a good life and not do wrong.”
Later, the same student responds with a very different kind of response than Mr. Campbell’s open invitation for students to explore the evidence as scientists and to make an argument based on that evidence.
The last question on the test Mr. Campbell passed out a week later asked students to explain two forms of evidence supporting evolutionary change and natural selection.
“I refuse to answer,” Bryce wrote. “I don’t believe in this.”
I think a major problem is that the nature of a scientific theory and the nature of doctrine that explains the nature of God and right living are confused. In a scientific framework, using scientific methodology, intelligent design or its related notions of cosmology cannot be tested - at all. Just because some will call ID an alternative “theory” does not mean that it is a theory at all since it is an amalgamation of unsupported hypotheses. Evolution, on the other hand, forms a very powerful systematic set of mutually supported hypotheses based on several sources of countervailing evidence.
If I were to engage ID in a science class it would be to argue to my students why it is not a proper scientific theory. It is simply unnecessary why we should present any notion of cosmology that requires a first cause in order to be true for the purposes of predicting how nature unfolds right now. That a big bang, quantum fluctuation, primordial soup, etc. probably (and very highly probably) occurred and thus produced bacteria that lead to life as we know it is sufficient enough to do good science since a first cause cannot be determined by the evidence in a scientific manner.
Now some may no doubt raise the issue that ID and so forth are engineering concepts. So be it. The same problem applies. To say that things are designed by people and apes who use sticks as tools in different ways thus engineering their environments does not require a first engineer if you will to make those various hypotheses valid. It is a slippery slope to make that claim.
The point is that belief that God structures this reality is a claim of faith in the reality of God, and not because we have faith in science. The fact is that evolution, as with all science, predicts events in reality with an astonishing rate of consistency. That is why it is the theory. Doctrine does not predict, it attempts to explain in order to shape human behavior and so, it is intimately involved with one’s own cultural semiotics and structures. Doctrine evolves as do species and as do theories. But this does not mean that a theory is a doctrine since it has predictive power external to the cultural structures that shape belief. Einstein falsified Newton’s theories of gravitation. But guess what, Newton’s theories still work - albeit in a limited way.
What seems to me to be the case is that people in general do not know exactly what science is and what it seeks to do.
UPDATE: Looney has corrected me below and the title of this post should be “Evolution is Fact, Not Doctrine”.
The discussion on GetReligion is a good one with numerous helpful comments on the NYT article. The author of the article in GetReligion does not make a very good judgment by calling evolution an article of faith.
If you could take only five albums with you to a desert island for a year, what would they be?
Welcome to my eclectic jungle.
- Radiohead - OK Computer
- It is a sublimely constructed piece that seamlessly fits each song together. Nothing is quite as brilliant in form from the 1990’s save Ladies and Gentlemen… by Spiritualized.
- Pink Floyd - Dark Side of the Moon
- Because I have a penchant for space rock this is the source and still moves me. I almost cannot bear listening to any of the tracks unless in the company of all the others.
- Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
- This is the birth of the cool. If we mix blues and bop, this is the origin of it all. A sick lineup made something with depth and it’s so damn chill.
- Meshuggah - Catch 33
- I need heavy music and nothing is as abstract, strange, and mesmerizing as this one. Great for those really late nights where exhaustion becomes the best narcotic one could intake.
- Neville Brothers - Live on Planet Earth
- This is a funky zydeco with all the right fixins’ for a soulful New ‘Awlins music gumbo. These guys bring the soul, the funk, and the party all at once.
And that’s just what I would bring today!
So what would you bring with you?
Not tagging anyone in particular, but I would be interested to see what you think!
