Sunday, March 14, 2010

Couldn't Resist Another Cartoon on Anti-Science Stupidity

Climate Change posted this Tony Auth political cartoon along with an article entitled "The Dark Ages return: Texas Board of Education rewrites the Enlightenment".  They agree with the magazine Nature that "science is in a street fight with anti-science."  And the Texas State Board of Education seems to be leading the anti-science charge.  The Board has removed Thomas Jefferson as one of the Enlightenment's leading thinkers on  political revolution and replaced him with Thomas Aquinas and John Calvin.  They've also removed the reference to Enlightenment ideas.

Comment:  I do hope this isn't what post-modernism is all about.  Science is, of course, built upon facts, logic, reason, testing hypotheses, and a lot of other ideas that come from the Enlightenment.  We've moved a long way since then and our understanding of our world has grown, but it's scary to think we could go back to where superstition and the loudest voices win the day.  We are called to love the Lord with all our hearts, minds and souls.  Leave out our minds and there's a great big hole left to be filled with nonsense.  One commenter asked if Jefferson wasn't being replaced by Calvin and Hobbes (instead of Aquinas).

7 comments:

June Butler said...

So stupid. I would not be surprised if the Louisiana Dept. of Education chooses to use Texas textbooks. I hope not.

WV: "fights". No joke.

motheramelia said...

It is extremely stupid. I wonder how the next generation of children will cope with the world. They are already getting cheated on quality education in so many places. California passed Prop 13 years ago and the schools have suffered. Now art and music is being cut in lots of places. Add to that a ridiculous "science" curriculum. Maybe moving to Canada isn't such a bad idea.

June Butler said...

Parts of Canada are kind of empty. Perhaps an en masse move might be in order.

motheramelia said...

The parts that are kind of empty are kind of difficult to survive in, although if the world is really warming, it may very well be the place to be.

Brian R said...

I taught the concept of Climate Change to my advanced senior Geography students in the 1980's. It was still a theory then and seemed a long time into the future but I have read nothing serious that rejects it since.

Wade said...

"Science is, of course, built upon facts, logic, reason, testing hypotheses, and a lot of other ideas that come from the Enlightenment."

Well, there you've hit upon the real problem, Steven Colbert notes that "facts, logic, reason, testing hypotheses, and a lot of other ideas that come from the Enlightenment" have a KNOWN liberal bias!

motheramelia said...

Brian, I think that scientists and the general public mean different things by the word "theory." For the public it means something unproven (scientists use hypothesis for this). For scientists it means a concept that fit the facts. I think a new term is going to have to be used because I can't see the public term going away.

Wade, I'm a liberal. What can I say.