School teacher implies that evolutionists are extremists

Posted on July 22, 2008
Filed Under Uncategorized |

I am shocked in a good way by this.

Over on Republitarian there is talk about the Kyoto Treaty and the U.S. Mayors’ Climate Protection Agreement. Unsurprisingly, Myron does not support either and called the supporters extremists. Our local friendly school teacher came along and left this surprising tidbit:

Maybe we have different definitions of “moderate” and “extremist”, but the vast majority of Americans believe global warming is occurring, and the vast majority believe that humans are at least part of the cause for that warming. FOX News poll says so. TIME magazine poll says so. So actually, it’s the “it’s an unproven theory” folks who are extremists, both scientifically and politically.

Basically those polls say that about 82% of Americans believe in Global warming and about 79% of those believe that humans are at least part of the reason for it. Thus, reasons the government school teacher, those in the minority are actually the extremists, both scientifically and politically.

Since those that hold a minority opinion are now extremists, both scientifically and politically, I urge this good teacher to start a petition to remove the teaching of evolution from our government schools. After all a vast majority of Americans believe God had a hand in our origins. Our schools shouldn’t be used to promote extremist views.

On a slightly different note, yet somewhat related, I’m surprised this man would accept the results of the polls he cited. If you read closely you will see that one poll used the opinions of 1,002 people while the other only had 900 participants. Assuming a US population of about 303,824,000 this means that only between 0.00029622% and 0.00032978% * of Americans were surveyed.

Back when a petition was being circulated in Harrisonburg to remove the treasurer 10% of total number of voters that voted last time to elect the treasurer was deemed insufficient by this same teacher. 10% is about 30,000 to 33,000 times greater than the percent of Americans surveyed in his polls.**

*rounded to the nearest ten millionth

** I am being factious. At least a little. I know these two things aren’t exactly the same, but still…

Comments

17 Responses to “School teacher implies that evolutionists are extremists”

  1. The Republitarian » The Republitarian’s Wife(a.k.a., Whackette) slams local school teacher with own words…… on July 22nd, 2008 3:07 pm

    [...] Isn’t it ironic? Don’t ya think? [...]

  2. Frank J Witt on July 22nd, 2008 4:11 pm

    Now all you are doing is confusing the kid…geez, I thought teachers at Governemtn Schools were GOOD for the rest of us …

  3. hall monitor on July 22nd, 2008 10:26 pm

    See what else teachers are getting in trouble for at http://detentionslip.org! Voted #1 for crazy news in education.

  4. linz on July 24th, 2008 8:35 am

    Please enjoy the following multiple choice quiz. Which best describes this blog posting?

    1) If A is not equal to B and B is not equal to C then A is most likely a really long way from C.
    2) You might want to check your sources (or think back to high school) if you think you know his religious views.
    3) Is this really WJWD?
    4) Check out this video

  5. Whackette on July 24th, 2008 9:22 am

    1) Would you like to come join our logic class this year? Syllogism really isn’t so hard.
    Major premise–Those with a minority view are extremists.
    Minor premise– Pure evolutionists hold the minority view
    Conclusion–Pure evolutionists are extremists

    2)This post isn’t about anyone’s religious views.

    3) What is WJWD?

    4)Not applicable.

    I’m surprised that you all would have a problem with a factious post that uses logic to play upon the image of a stereotypical government school teacher when the man in question runs a satirical blog that does much worse.

  6. Hard Right Rudder on July 24th, 2008 10:44 am

    nice smack-down, whackette. i was about to say the same thing only in my rambling, incoherent and intentionally insulting way.

  7. Hard Right Rudder on July 24th, 2008 10:46 am

    “cybor-bullying” = the next big craze in political correctness. mark my words.

    p.s. linz is stupid, fat and ugly and he/she smells bad. ;)

  8. Right Field on July 24th, 2008 11:12 am

    Yeah, Whackette is right on the money with this post. I find it interesting that the friendly local school teacher didn’t bother to comment on it here…

    And HRR, I agree to a certain extent. “Cyber bullying” is a part of the PC craze, but when children are involved and they’re the targets of the vitriol, particularly from adults (!), then I have a problem with it. There was the instance fairly recently where a teenage girl hung herself after some other kids mom posed as another kid on MySpace and viciously attacked this poor girl online.

    Besides that, I’m not sure why linz even linked to that video in the first place. How is whackette’s post anything resembling cyber bullying?

  9. Jeremy Aldrich on July 24th, 2008 11:24 am

    “Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty and the pig likes it.”

    Major premise - Those with a view held by 20% of people are more accurately labeled “extremist” than those with a view held by 80% of people (nb: this is NOT the same as “those with a minority view are extremists”, particularly when the subject in question is more like a 50-50 or 60-40 split).
    Minor premise 1 - I am not a government teacher.
    Minor premise 2 - I personally believe that God created everything, and He may have used evolution to do so (but maybe not - He didn’t have to). Evolution and creation do not describe the same phenomenon and are not opposites.
    Minor premise 3 - A discussion about your husband’s use of the word extremist to define a political candidate I support in a hotly contested race has nothing to do with my occupation, my beliefs about God, my beliefs about evolution, or my beliefs about what should be taught in public schools.
    Minor premise 4 - A statistically valid opinion poll has nothing to do with a petition for removal from office that, despite heavy media attention and hours of door-to-door signature collecting, took 2 months to complete because people didn’t care as much as you wanted them to (and those that did care were often misinformed).
    Conclusion - You don’t know what you’re talking about in this post, and it’s a shameful departure from your normally witty observations. There is absolutely nothing in this post that made me smile and think “touché”.

    Anyway, thanks linz for piping up, and I think Megan is smart enough to realize you accidentally transposed the letters in WWJD.

  10. Hard Right Rudder on July 24th, 2008 11:43 am

    Right Field, I agree, but I assumed Jeremy wasn’t a child. ;)

    Jeremy, come on, keep it real. You KNOW evolution is taught in schools with the premise that life sprung up from non-life in the primordial oooze billions and billions and billions of years ago. I was a agnostic heathen young teen who slept through most of biology, and even I laughed at that lesson. I agree with you that creationism and evololution, in the abstract, are not mutually exclusive, but you are kidding yourself or grossly uninformed if you don’t believe that is how it gets taught in schools. In fact, that is what parents who disagree with it are protesting and trying to introduce creationism into the teaching. Schools should either stop teaching life evolved from nothing, which is purely faith based and non-scientific, or they should include other ideas too.

  11. Whackette on July 24th, 2008 12:09 pm

    Basic structure. Ur doin it rong. rly.

    Point 1(mislabeled Major premise)–Did you look at the poll I cited? Only 15% don’t think God played a part. It is not a 50/50 or 40/60 split.

    Point 2 (mislabeled minor premise 1) You are correct. I left out “school” by accident and will go correct it.

    Point 3 (mislabeled minor premise 2)I don’t think I ever said one way or another what you believe and it really isn’t relevant to the post.

    Point 4(mislabeled minor premise 3)I haven’t discussed your beliefs on these issues. Closest I came was suggesting that you might not want extremist views taught at your workplace. Sorry if I was wrong.

    Point 5(mislabeled minor premise 4)Did I not say “I am being factious. At least a little. I know these two things aren’t exactly the same, but still…”?

    Point 6 (mislabeled conclusion)I do know what I’m talking about. You just didn’t like my observation. It’s logically sound. You may want to look into purchasing this book and this one also. They really are great and I don’t think our school covered the topic very well.

    There are so many abbreviations floating around that I didn’t want to assume.

  12. Jeremy Aldrich on July 24th, 2008 12:12 pm

    Actually, as one who read books and watched videos produced by “Creation scientists” even when I was a 10th grade biology student (and as one who was undoubtedly the bane of my poor biology teacher’s existence), I recognize that a huge part of Creationist/Intelligent Design work is to discredit the concept of evolution generally, not necessarily speaking to the issue of origin of life. Even in today’s DNR is an op/ed attempting to discredit “macro-evolution” from a Creationist perspective. The Virginia Standards of Learning for Biology make no mention of origins, though the suggested curriculum framework says, “Scientists have developed hypotheses about conditions on early Earth that could have led to the formation of the first
    organic molecules, early self-replicating molecules, the source of free oxygen in Earth?s atmosphere, and the appearance of prokaryotic and later eukaryotic cells.”

    Most “Creationist” parents and students, and I say this because I was one and was heavily into their literature, reject the concept of evolution a priori and are interested in far more than discussion of origin. Typically this involves appeal to unusual fossil discoveries, trying to distinguish “macro-evolution” from “micro-evolution” (where the key distinction is time), and of course constant reference to long-discredited “proofs” of evolution that turned out to be hoaxes or speculative claims.

    A typical viewpoint, which you expressed at the end of your post, is that since the Creationist belief in a literal 7-day Creation and macroevolution are equally unobservable, then they equally rely on faith. However, science is not narrowly defined by observability and there is a reasonable claim that the theory of evolution meets more of the criteria for being “scientific” than the belief that there has been no evolution because everything was created as is in 7 days because our religion says so.

    I do not oppose allowing discussion on different beliefs (and evidences) for differing ideas about origins (or development for that matter)…in fact, I think it’s pretty important that such discussion be allowed and encouraged.

  13. Jeremy Aldrich on July 24th, 2008 12:17 pm

    Whackette, I realize that I wasn’t following the basic structure…I was mirroring your post in an attempt to be condescending.

    One thing that many homeschoolers teach that I wish was taught in public school more often is logic.

  14. Whackette on July 24th, 2008 12:20 pm

    LOL

    Seriously, those two books I linked to are very good. Very readable and fun.

  15. Hard Right Rudder on July 24th, 2008 12:48 pm

    Jeremy, I can’t speak to the motive behind those who are creationists, so I don’t know if their motive is to discredit evolution. My motive is that I am a skeptic about scientists. I see how humans work in general, having their own biases and misconceptions, and how they jump to conclusions. I see how many (generalization) evolutionists attack and scoff at creationists, and it fits with my view of the world, that people glom (sp?) onto an idea and refuse to listen to anything that doesn’t fit with that idea.

    Not all creationists believe in a literal 7 days to create the world, or that the world is 12,000 years old. At one time I was well-read about Creationism. I was skeptical of them too. But just because somebody has biases (we all do) doesn’t mean that they can’t occasionally make a good point.

    Personally, I believe that their is not sufficient evidence to prove macro-evolution. It may be true, but I don’t believe the evidence supports the theory.

    I have no problem with informing kids of scientific hypothethes as to how life may have started from non-life, but the truth is we just don’t know. What’s the harm in teaching here is one hypothethis, hear is another, blah blah blah, but we just don’t know? Since when is teaching the truth in school not allowed? Since the liberals took over.

  16. linz on July 24th, 2008 6:27 pm

    Whatckette - you failed my quiz! I’m so disappointed. You failed because you did not choose an answer! By the way, #3 said Is this really What Jesus Would Do (WJWD)? Too bad… but maybe since the acronym was apparently hard to guess (even Jeremy didn’t guess it!) I’ll give you another quiz someday so you can redeem yourself.

    But good job to Right field for pointing out one of the wrong answers(”Besides that, I’m not sure why linz even linked to that video in the first place. How is whackette’s post anything resembling cyber bullying?”) But I do have my doubts about how much Megan would really say to Jeremy’s face if the opportunity presented itself…

  17. Whackette on July 24th, 2008 9:03 pm

    What part do you think I wouldn’t say?

    I didn’t choose an answer because all the options made no sense. And, yes, I would say that if you were sitting right here next to me. :)

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