Should we teach both evolution and religion in school?

Science deals with facts, objective empirical evidence, not with fantasy, myth, belief, faith, opinion, imagination, etc. Things that apply to everyone, not just to people who are follows of fantasy, myth, belief, faith, opinion, imagination, etc. ... it excludes concepts that are not fact-based because they cannot be validated.History also deals with facts, objective empirical evidence, not with fantasy, myth, belief, faith, opinion, imagination, etc. Things that apply to everyone. Historical accuracy is subject to validation with facts, objective empirical evidence. History can deal with how beliefs have affected historical behavior but not with whether those beliefs are valid. Ah yes, the logical fallacy of an appeal to popularity:

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The Appeal to Popularity has the following form:

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1. Most people approve of X (have favorable emotions towards X).
2. Therefore X is true.

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The basic idea is that a claim is accepted as being true simply because most people are favorably inclined towards the claim. More formally, the fact that most people have favorable emotions associated with the claim is substituted in place of actual evidence for the claim. A person falls prey to this fallacy if he accepts a claim as being true simply because most other people approve of the claim.

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It is clearly fallacious to accept the approval of the majority as evidence for a claim. ... At one time people approved of claims such as "the world is flat", "humans cannot survive at speeds greater than 25 miles per hour", "the sun revolves around the earth" but all these claims turned out to be false.

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Facts are not subject to popular opinion, they exist and will continue to exist long after beliefs have died.Do you want to vote on whether or not chairs exist? The place to teach religious beliefs is in the respective houses of worship, in the homes of the believers, and in any gathering of believers.Forcing non-believers to be included is imposing beliefs on non-believers, and that is wrong. Says the person who wants to impose his beliefs on science, the universe, and all non-believers in his personal fantasy.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : .

Nope. This has been explained to you ad nauseum, but it would appear that the only thought process you are capable of understanding is belief based systems. Science is tentative, belief isn't. Science tests the tentative conclusions/predictions to see if they are valid, belief doesn't. Science alters the tentative conclusions when tests show they are invalid, belief doesn't. You have it the wrong way around ... again.They are in no position to say whether spirits lived long ago or not ... because there is a distinct lack of evidence for any such existence. History documents events, including human caused and natural disasters. Evidence of those events validates the history. And that is done by finding evidence that supports the factual parts or contradicts the fictional parts. Evidence is the key, whether it confirms belief or invalidates it. Rational people discard beliefs that are contradicted by evidence (such as the earth is not flat, the earth is not the center of the universe or age of the earth). Human behavior. Indeed. There are options in the US: private schools and home schooling for example.However, I don't think known falsehoods should be taught (Holocaust denial for instance, but also flat earth, geocentric earth, young earth). But they should be able to expect acceptance and respect for their alternative views ... as long as they do not involve known falsehoods.Enjoy

The science of abiogenesis is relatively new, the theories deal with self-replicating molecules and how they arise in certain situations, but have not reached any major conclusion about the origin of life as yet. That is not a belief. That is not evidence, that is belief, mythology, story-telling. You do not know what evidence is if you pretend that stories are evidence of anything more than human imagination. ... that for which there is no evidence. Agreed. All it can say is that there is no evidence for it or against it, and leave it until such time as there is evidence. To pretend either way is dishonest. That is your belief, for which you have no evidence, and to pretend otherwise is dishonest. To pretend that others should live by your beliefs instead of theirs is evil. That is the option. Public schools should not be in the business of teaching beliefs, they should be teaching fact based courses and leave the beliefs to the homes and religious institutions.Then everyone has the same access to factual education and religious beliefs to suit their particular beliefs and understanding. Says the person who has no evidence to back his beliefs, but wants them to be considered equal to or superior to fact based, evidence based knowledge. The irony.There is enough objective empirical evidence that shows the earth is not flat -- teaching such a belief is teaching a falsehood.There is enough objective empirical evidence that shows the earth is not the center of the solar system -- teaching such a belief is teaching a falsehood.There is enough objective empirical evidence that shows the solar system is not the center of the universe -- teaching such a belief is teaching a falsehood.There is enough objective empirical evidence that shows the earth is not less than 12,000 years old -- teaching such a belief is teaching a falsehood.When beliefs are contradicted by objective empirical evidence they are false/invalid beliefs and should be discarded. Teaching such a belief is teaching a falsehood.Enjoy

From Victory in Arizona :

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The Arizona state board of education voted 6-4 to adopt a new set of state science standards at its October 22nd, 2018, meeting. These standards were recently revised in accordance with recommendations from the Arizona Science Teachers Association to restore the concepts of speciation and common ancestry as well as high school-level standards about climate change, which were previously deleted.

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"The revised standards approval received thunderous applause from educators and education advocates sitting in the boardroom," reported the Arizona Republic (October 22, 2018). The vote came after a series of attempts by Superintendent of Public Education Diane Douglas to compromise the treatment of evolution in the standards in particular, as NCSE previously reported.

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This is a tremendous victory for Arizona science education," commented NCSE’s executive director Ann Reid. "Only with a scientifically accurate and pedagogically appropriate treatment of evolution and climate change in their state science standards — and in their textbooks and classrooms — will Arizona's public school students be adequately prepared to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century."

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I had to look up pedagogy

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Pedagogy (/ˈpɛdəˌɡɒdʒi/) (most commonly understood as the approach to teaching) refers more broadly to the theory and practice of education, and how this influences the growth of learners. Pedagogy, taken as an academic discipline, is the study of how knowledge and skills are exchanged in an educational context, and it considers the interactions that take place during learning. Pedagogies vary greatly, as they reflect the different social, political, cultural contexts from which they emerge [1]. Theories of pedagogy increasingly identify the student as an agent, and the teacher as a facilitator. Conventional western pedagogies, however, view the teacher as knowledge holder and student as the recipient of knowledge (described by Paulo Freire as 'banking methods' [2]).

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The pedagogy adopted by teachers shape their actions, judgments, and teaching strategies by taking into consideration theories of learning, understandings of students and their needs, and the backgrounds and interests of individual students.[3][4] Its aims may include furthering liberal education (the general development of human potential) to the narrower specifics of vocational education (the imparting and acquisition of specific skills).

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Instructive strategies are governed by the pupil's background knowledge and experience, situation, and environment, as well as learning goals set by the student and teacher. One example would be the Socratic method.[5]

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Sounds good to me.Enjoy

Quite amusingly and obviously wrong. At 4.5 billion years ago there was no life, at 3.5 billion years ago there was fully developed (single cell prokaryote) life.In between something happened, we don't know what, but obviously somehow it (life) happened. Because science uses natural processes that can be tested and cannot use supernatural processes that cannot be tested. Thus the current theories all employ natural processes. The several existing theories are being tested to see how they can predict how life could form.Creation (pan-spermia, etc) are possibilities but they are untestable and therefore not subject to scientific inquiry. Indeed, there is a wide and rich variety of mythologies from all cultures and all corners of the world. What is also remarkable is that there is little consensus between these mythologies. LOL. It is the lack of evidence -- objective empirical evidence -- for these stories to be historically factual. Some may have tid-bits of fact (the city of Troy was held to be mythological until an archaeologist found it using the mythology for hints to the location), but that does not make the stories factual (ie that Achilles was a real person with magical invincibility).

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Trojan War:

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The ancient Greeks believed that Troy was located near the Dardanelles and that the Trojan War was a historical event of the 13th or 12th century BC, but by the mid-19th century AD, both the war and the city were widely seen as non-historical. In 1868, however, the German archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann met Frank Calvert, who convinced Schliemann that Troy was a real city at what is now Hissarlik in Turkey.[1] On the basis of excavations conducted by Schliemann and others, this claim is now accepted by most scholars.[2][3]

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The Wizard of Oz is not a historically factual story even though Kansas exists.The reason for dismissing the stories from a teaching of history is that there is no evidence they are factual. Find that evidence and things can change. Human behavior is a result of both cultural morals and innate (instinctual) behavior, and varies from culture to culture. Some behaviors are learned, and successful ones are passed on to others. Behaviors that lead to early death are not passed on (see Darwin Awards). Some behaviors are genetic (right-handedness), and successful ones are passed on to following generations. Again with the logical fallacy of appeal to popularity.There is the additional problem, for you, that you are also employing the logical fallacy of the part for the whole: not all Christians believe in a young earth or a factual world wide flood, only a fraction of them: you do not speak for the others, and hence your use of the inclusive "Christians" is a false portrayal of beliefs.It is only the much smaller number of Fundamentalist Christians that you can claim to represent ... if even that.So a majority Christian population that has no problem with an ancient earth, that sees the flood as an allegorical story, and that even embraces the teaching of evolution (see The Clergy Leter Project), that believes public school should teach based on known facts rather than beliefs would still be a problem for you in spite of you fallacy based argument. and that would be at home and in religious institutions. Such learning would be available to each and every person according to their beliefs, without bias for any one belief over another. Which you have yet to demonstrate are beliefs and not fact based knowledge. Your assertions are based only on your belief and not on any accurate portrayal of science. Says the person hard at work trying to fool himself with his beliefs.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : .

Yes, you’ve raised several issues, each one worth if debate. I’ll pick the first one atheist biologist ...To begin with most scientists believe in a religion.Second, science is agnostic neither pro religion nor contra religion. This is because it deals with the natural world and natural processes that can be observed, tested and theorized for better understanding of how the natural world works. By definition it cannot work with supernatural processes.For instance we can observe evolutionary processes in action, we can see that there are changes in the composition of hereditary traits, and changes to the frequency of their distributions in breeding populations from generation to generation, in response to ecological challenges and opportunities for growth, development, survival and reproductive success in changing or different habitats. This is the process of evolution. It is a fact that this process occurs and is ongoing in all the species we can observe.(*) This is a two-step feedback response system that is repeated in each generation: Like walking on first one foot and then the next. (/*)The Theory of Evolution (ToE) is that this is sufficient to explain the diversity of life we see around us and in the fossil record. As a theory this is regarded as a tentative explanation of how biology works, the best explanation using natural processes we know, an approximation of reality. It is testable, and has been tested, a lot. Every field and lab study tests the theory, every new fossil tests the theory, every new genetic finding tests the theory. So far the theory has held up, and is considered a strong theory that we can have confidence in.That is the goal of science to develop strong theories that explain life, the universe and everything, to the best of our ability and knowledge, ones we can have confidence in for making predictions for new knowledge.As a Deist I believe god/s are unknowable, but that what we can know is their works and the laws that operate to keep them working. Thus evolution, celestial mechanics, etc.ABE:So what should be taught in school is how to learn, specifically how to learn what is valid in relation to reality, what can be tested for that validity and how we can know that it approximates reality.EnjoyEdited by RAZD, : ABEEdited by RAZD, : (*) image added (/*)

Whoa Nellie! Cease with the broad brush branding ... it is the extreme right that is ignoring facts in favor of "alternate reality" feelings."Feelings over facts" would be anti-science, like climate change denial, and I'm pretty sure that is not "left".Enjoy

Just to clarify, are your parents dogmatic or was their school dogmatic? Also, do you include evolution with religion or do you mean religions other than Catholicism? Well and good, keep at it. I've always felt that if religious teachings were taught in public school that it should be through comparative religion, where each are presented, to help in accepting culture and ancient literature and alternate beliefs. Indeed no one has all the answers. Even science does not have all the answers, but the answers it has have been tested against reality to improve their ability to understand it and predict its behavior.Enjoy

Science works with natural processes, processes that can be observed, tested and explained by natural means. Throwing in a supernatural event involves a process that cannot be observed, tested and explained by natural means or it then becomes a natural event. Which is why so many scientists also have religious beliefs. Engineering is built on trial and error testing of hypothesis, and uses what works, usually with a factor of safety thrown in for good measure to cover most unanticipated situations. We've had this discussion before.If you studied biology I think you would find it just as demanding of being based on evidence, hypothesis and validation through testing. And yes, it also uses math not to confirm but to validate the results. Do you mean Archaeopteryx?Morphing is not an evolutionary process, rather each generation is different from the one before, and if we look at the continued effects of evolution over many generations, the accumulation of changes from generation to generation may become sufficient for individuals to develop combinations of traits that are observably different from the ancestral parent population. This is also sometimes called arbitrary speciation in that the place to draw the line between linearly evolved genealogical populations is subjective, and because the definition of species in general is tentative and sometimes arbitrary.If anagenesis was all that occurred, then all life would be one species, readily sharing DNA via horizontal transfer (asexual) and interbreeding (sexual) and various combinations. This is not the case, however, because there is a second process that results in multiple species and increases the diversity of life. The reduction or loss of interbreeding (gene flow, sharing of mutations) between the sub-populations results in different evolutionary responses within the separated sub-populations, each then responds independently to their different ecological challenges and opportunities, and this leads to divergence of hereditary traits between the subpopulations and the frequency of their distributions within the sub-populations.Over generations phyletic change occurs in these populations, the responses to different ecologies accumulate into differences between the hereditary traits available within each of the daughter populations, and when these differences have reached a critical level, such that interbreeding no longer occurs, then the formation of new species is deemed to have occurred. After this has occurred each daughter population microevolves independently of the other/s. These are often called speciation events because the development of species is not arbitrary in this process. If we looked at each branch linearly, while ignoring the sister population, they would show anagenesis (accumulation of evolutionary changes over many generations), and this shows that the same basic processes of evolution within breeding populations are involved in each branch. Curious then how evolution explains so well all the known fossils and all the known genetic information, all the way back to single cellular life.Enjoy

The laws of physics, the ToE, all the other mechanisms that make life and the universe operate the way it does.Enjoy

Not the topic of this thread, but I will note that you have not been able to show that any one of the dating methods used on Age Correlations and An Old Earth, Version 2 No 1 are wrong, nor have you explained the correlations. Continued assertions of your personal fantasy are not evidence. Likewise fact based history (as opposed to mythology) depends on verifiable facts, not fantasy or unevidenced spirits. That renders science -- and fact based history -- unable to partake in any discussion of fantasy/mythology as if it were fact. This has already been discussed. Still wrong.Enjoy

Agreed, but it is a good approximation. If it is explained well and can make predictions that can test it further, then we can see if those predictions come true. That increases our confidence that the explanation is a good approximation of reality.This is how all science operates: take evidence, make a hypothesis or theory to explain it, use the hypothesis/theory to make predictions, test the predictions, if true then make further predictions, if not true then modify then hypothesis/theory to include it or discard the hypothesis/theory and make a new one.It's a never ending process, and the goal is to refine our approximations of reality and increase our knowledge.For instance relativity is a better explanation than Newton's law of gravity, but is it "true" or just the best explanation we currently have. What is "true" and how would we know?Enjoy

Nope. Kenneth R. Miller, for example.

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(born July 14, 1948) is an American cell biologist and molecular biologist who is currently Professor of Biology and Royce Family Professor for Teaching Excellence at Brown University.[2] Miller's primary research focus is the structure and function of cell membranes, especially chloroplast thylakoid membranes.[2] ... Miller, who is Roman Catholic, is opposed to creationism, including the intelligent design (ID) movement. He has written two books on the subject: Finding Darwin's God, which argues that acceptance of evolution is compatible with a belief in God; and Only a Theory, which explores ID and the Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District case as well as its implications in science across America.

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That's hardly a valid reason to throw out the whole field.Enjoy

So you can't explain the correlations. Then you better get busy and provide the evidence.This of course, is a prime example of what should not be taught in school -- the idea that mere fantasy is valid when there is a total lack of substantiating evidence.Enjoy.

By actual old age.Age based on facts and objective empirical evidence. The kind of thing that should be taught in school, as opposed to fantasy and unfounded speculations on a magical change in nature.No other attempt at explanation has been presented that even comes close to dealing with the correlations. And that still does not explain the correlations. It's just blather like a broken record.Enjoy