Peter Hitchens: Fanatics in the classroom
Jason Spaceman
---------------------------------------------------------------------
The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it
calls "creationist teaching materials" being used in British schools. What
is this row really about? What does "creationism" mean? Why does hardly
anyone discuss it honestly?
The cause of the controversy is a concept called 'Intelligent design' (ID).
Unlike most British journalists, I have spent some time in the parts of the
USA where this idea is popular, and have talked to its supporters as well
as to its opponents. I touched on this a few months ago when Archbishop
Rowan Williams came out against ID, and I'd like to go into a bit more
deeply now.
For what I noticed (as I have also observed over the global warming
controversy) is that the people on one side of this dispute tend to
misrepresent the other side. Rational scientists who are doubtful about
Darwinism are abused. And expressions such as 'Creationism' are used to
suggest that a complex, nuanced position is in fact a crude Hillbilly
superstition.
I think this form of intolerance is always a bad sign. For instance, it is
the fury of the pro-MMR people against the MMR sceptics, and the way they
try to stoke up unjustified panics about measles, that has always made me
suspect that there might be a problem with this injection.
If you cannot give an honest account of your opponent's position, then you
cannot argue properly against him. If you lose your temper with him, and
seek to shut him up, then you are revealing your weakness, not his.
Now, there is no doubt that some of the people behind the campaign
for 'Intelligent Design' are passionately religious. Well, so what?
Religious belief is a legitimate position of choice, held to by many of the
greatest minds who have ever lived (including many scientists) and in my
view religion is the foundation of all morality, art, literature and
culture. The Darwinist theory of evolution seems to me to knock religion on
the head. If Darwin is right, the realm of nature was produced out of
random, undirected chaos, in which case we have invented God, and there is
no reason why any idea, action or work of art should be considered superior
to any other.
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Read it at
http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2006/11/fanatics_in_the.html
J. Spaceman
CreateThis
Unless, of course, you just like being happy. What are the odds of
that?
CT
Bobby Bryant
Jason Spaceman <notr...@jspaceman.homelinux.org> writes:
> From the article:
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it calls
> "creationist teaching materials" being used in British schools. What
> is this row really about? What does "creationism" mean? Why does
> hardly anyone discuss it honestly?
Why indeed? Shouldn't the writer be setting an example, rather than
participating in the problem?
--
Bobby Bryant
Reno, Nevada
Remove your hat to reply by e-mail.
Pithecanthropus Erectus
>
> If you cannot give an honest account of your opponent's position, then you
> cannot argue properly against him. If you lose your temper with him, and
> seek to shut him up, then you are revealing your weakness, not his.
I turned off my irony meter, my finances are tight and I can't afford to
keep replacing them; because of the paragraph which follows the preceding.
>
> Now, there is no doubt that some of the people behind the campaign
> for 'Intelligent Design' are passionately religious. Well, so what?
> Religious belief is a legitimate position of choice, held to by many of the
> greatest minds who have ever lived (including many scientists) and in my
> view religion is the foundation of all morality, art, literature and
> culture. The Darwinist theory of evolution seems to me to knock religion on
> the head. If Darwin is right, the realm of nature was produced out of
> random, undirected chaos, in which case we have invented God, and there is
> no reason why any idea, action or work of art should be considered superior
> to any other.
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Read it at
> http://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2006/11/fanatics_in_the.html
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> J. Spaceman
>
--
“What concerns me now is that even if you’re as brilliant as Newton, you
reach a point where you start basking in the majesty of God and then
your discovery stops — it just stops,” Dr. Tyson said. “You’re no good
anymore for advancing that frontier, waiting for somebody else to come
behind you who doesn’t have God on the brain and who says: ‘That’s a
really cool problem. I want to solve it.’
geo...@hotmail.com
Jason Spaceman wrote:
> From the article:
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it
> calls "creationist teaching materials" being used in British schools. What
> is this row really about? What does "creationism" mean? Why does hardly
> anyone discuss it honestly?
Honesty is being rationed lately. Some people don't get any at all.
>
> The cause of the controversy is a concept called 'Intelligent design' (ID).
> Unlike most British journalists, I have spent some time in the parts of the
> USA where this idea is popular, and have talked to its supporters as well
> as to its opponents. I touched on this a few months ago when Archbishop
> Rowan Williams came out against ID, and I'd like to go into a bit more
> deeply now.
>
> For what I noticed (as I have also observed over the global warming
> controversy) is that the people on one side of this dispute tend to
> misrepresent the other side. Rational scientists who are doubtful about
> Darwinism are abused. And expressions such as 'Creationism' are used to
> suggest that a complex, nuanced position is in fact a crude Hillbilly
> superstition.
At least he didn't call ID a theory.
Let's look at some other misrepresentation, shall we?
'Evolution is just a theory.'
'Evolution is not science - it is a belief system.'
'Evolution is atheist propaganda.'
Note that, because creationists (or, if you really think there's a
difference, ID proponents) love to project, the second one of these is
the same charge against evolution proponents above!
>
> I think this form of intolerance is always a bad sign.
Intolerance? All we want is science, and none comes.
For instance, it is
> the fury of the pro-MMR people against the MMR sceptics, and the way they
> try to stoke up unjustified panics about measles, that has always made me
> suspect that there might be a problem with this injection.
'Evolutionists say that common anatomical features are evidence for
descent from a common ancestor. We say this is evidence for a common
designer. What do /you/ think?'
Justify that panic, go on.
>
> If you cannot give an honest account of your opponent's position, then you
> cannot argue properly against him.
Perhaps the truest part of the article. This made me laugh. Have you
ever tried asking an ID chap for an honest account of their position?
If you lose your temper with him, and
> seek to shut him up, then you are revealing your weakness, not his.
Are you reading, Uncommon Descent?
>
> Now, there is no doubt that some of the people behind the campaign
> for 'Intelligent Design' are passionately religious. Well, so what?
> Religious belief is a legitimate position of choice, held to by many of the
> greatest minds who have ever lived (including many scientists) and in my
> view religion is the foundation of all morality, art, literature and
> culture.
I must be secretly religious then.
The Darwinist theory of evolution seems to me to knock religion on
> the head. If Darwin is right, the realm of nature was produced out of
> random
Nope. It's been explained at length why this is wrong.
>, undirected chaos,
Random chaos? That's really random.
> in which case we have invented God
A position lots of people hold, but it doesn't follow from the premise.
>, and there is
> no reason why any idea, action or work of art should be considered superior
> to any other.
Um... that doesn't make sense to me. What's that to do with Darwinism?
Ilas
in news:8OSdnc4-7Z2nMfLY...@comcast.com:
> Jason Spaceman wrote:
>
>>
>> If you cannot give an honest account of your opponent's position,
>> then you cannot argue properly against him. If you lose your temper
>> with him, and seek to shut him up, then you are revealing your
>> weakness, not his.
>
> I turned off my irony meter, my finances are tight and I can't afford
> to keep replacing them; because of the paragraph which follows the
> preceding.
Hitchens is a ranting right wing lunatic, a very nasty piece of work. We
have them here too.
Alexander
On Dec 1, 2:49 am, Jason Spaceman <notrea...@jspaceman.homelinux.org>
wrote:
> From the article:
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it
> calls "creationist teaching materials" being used in British schools. What
> is this row really about? What does "creationism" mean? Why does hardly
> anyone discuss it honestly?
>
> The cause of the controversy is a concept called 'Intelligent design' (ID).
> Unlike most British journalists, I have spent some time in the parts of the
> USA where this idea is popular, and have talked to its supporters as well
> as to its opponents.
Great - now you can just spend time in the US and be qualified to
comment on biological science. That will make education cheaper - and
a whole lot simpler for the UK.
>I touched on this a few months ago when Archbishop
> Rowan Williams came out against ID, and I'd like to go into a bit more
> deeply now.
>
> For what I noticed (as I have also observed over the global warming
> controversy) is that the people on one side of this dispute tend to
> misrepresent the other side. Rational scientists who are doubtful about
> Darwinism are abused. And expressions such as 'Creationism' are used to
> suggest that a complex, nuanced position is in fact a crude Hillbilly
> superstition.
We're sorry - we should have said complex, nuanced, hillbilly position.
>
> I think this form of intolerance is always a bad sign. For instance, it is
> the fury of the pro-MMR people against the MMR sceptics, and the way they
> try to stoke up unjustified panics about measles, that has always made me
> suspect that there might be a problem with this injection.
Yeah - doctors worrying about the health implications of not being
vaccinated - scare mongers the lot of 'em.
>
> If you cannot give an honest account of your opponent's position, then you
> cannot argue properly against him. If you lose your temper with him, and
> seek to shut him up, then you are revealing your weakness, not his.
How true ... oh - you're not talking about the ID brigade are you
Peter?
>
> Now, there is no doubt that some of the people behind the campaign
> for 'Intelligent Design' are passionately religious.
Hitchens has obviously never played 'spot the atheist' with the ID
crew. The point being it IS a religious campaign.
Well, so what?
> Religious belief is a legitimate position of choice, held to by many of the
> greatest minds who have ever lived (including many scientists) and in my
> view religion is the foundation of all morality, art, literature and
> culture.
So .... no bias then.
The Darwinist theory of evolution seems to me to knock religion on
> the head. If Darwin is right, the realm of nature was produced out of
> random, undirected chaos, in which case we have invented God, and there is
> no reason why any idea, action or work of art should be considered superior
> to any other.
Except that this is not what Darwin's theory of evolution says at all -
guess we'll have to cancel the round trip to the US after all.
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Read it athttp://hitchensblog.mailonsunday.co.uk/2006/11/fanatics_in_the.html
>
> J. Spaceman
Josh Miles
> From the article:
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
<snip>
> For what I noticed (as I have also observed over the global warming
> controversy) is that the people on one side of this dispute tend to
> misrepresent the other side. Rational scientists who are doubtful about
> Darwinism are abused.
There are no *rational* scientists who doubt evolution.
> And expressions such as 'Creationism' are used to
> suggest that a complex, nuanced position is in fact a crude Hillbilly
> superstition.
Intelligent design is far from a "complex, nuanced position." It's
simply creationism stripped of biblical references and dressed in
scientific-sounding words.
> I think this form of intolerance is always a bad sign.
Yes, it's so terrible for scientists to be so intolerant of pseudoscience!
<snip>
RAMat...@gmail.com
"Dear Peter,
As a lecturer in Science, I have attempted to mark your article as if
it were a student essay broadly about the science of ID and Darwinism.
Every paragraph and almost every sentence contains unsupported
supposition, conjecture or implied views and assertions, most of which
are even irrelevant with regard to either concept. Not a single
quantitative fact or scientific detail is presented. There is some
evidence presented for a limited understanding of a few Darwinian and
ID concepts (such as irreducible complexity and the idea of something
being more or less improbable) but these are not backed up with named
examples. I would be pushed to award a mark of around 20% (a clear
fail), largely for filling up the pages and naming a few people and
concepts. The almost crushingly low esteem with which science
scholarship is held in this country is in unfortunate contrast to the
confident arrogance of your contribution to confusing the public
understanding of science.
Posted by: Charles Bishop | 30 November 2006 at 02:36 PM"
RAM
>
>
>
>
>
> J. Spaceman
Bob D
Jason Spaceman wrote:
> I think this form of intolerance is always a bad sign. For instance, it is
> the fury of the pro-MMR people against the MMR sceptics, and the way they
> try to stoke up unjustified panics about measles, that has always made me
> suspect that there might be a problem with this injection.
Or might it be the worry that Measles, Mumps and Rubella are serious
diseases?
What about the rampant posturing of anti GMists.
Now they are protesting about the inclusion of a potato gene in a
potato.
Scientists could have spent maybe 50 years getting to to this point by
cross breeding and selection. So why not short cut and just insert the
required gene?
Not good enough, say the anti GMists. It's a "Frankenfood", whatever
that means.
Bob D
Jason Spaceman wrote:
> I think this form of intolerance is always a bad sign. For instance, it is
> the fury of the pro-MMR people against the MMR sceptics, and the way they
> try to stoke up unjustified panics about measles, that has always made me
> suspect that there might be a problem with this injection.
Or might it be the worry that Measles, Mumps and Rubella are serious
Jeffrey Turner
> Jason Spaceman wrote:
>
>
>>, and there is
>>no reason why any idea, action or work of art should be considered superior
>>to any other.
>
> Um... that doesn't make sense to me. What's that to do with Darwinism?
I don't know, but, apparently, God tells the Academy which is the best
picture.
--Jeff
--
It is only those who have neither
fired a shot nor heard the shrieks
and groans of the wounded who cry
aloud for blood, more vengeance, more
desolation. War is hell.
--William Tecumseh Sherman
Desertphile
> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it
The Guardian is moderately right-wing. I guess USA fascists would
consider it "lkeft-wind" in contrast to themselves.
ric...@cbrp.co.uk
The Guardian is decidedly left-wing!
If you want a moderately right-wing newspaper chose the Times.
A more right-wing newspaper is the Telegraph.
Mind you, the Telegraph would be considered left-wing in the USA
JTEM
Jason Spaceman wrote:
> From the article:
[---snip---]
Peter Hitchens is far less a journalist or commentator
than he is an Inteligence agent.
And the really funny thing being, maybe one in 100
people will even consider what I'm saying....
http://www.guardian.co.uk/shayler/article/0,2763,339990,00.html
No. The story doesn't name Hitchens, it's me who's
doing that.
Desertphile
ric...@cbrp.co.uk wrote:
> Desertphile wrote:
> > > From the article:
> > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------
> > > The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it
> >
> > The Guardian is moderately right-wing. I guess USA fascists would
> > consider it "lkeft-wind" in contrast to themselves.
> The Guardian is decidedly left-wing!
I find nothing left-wing about The Guardian. I suppose these days, when
fascism is very popular, moderatly right-wing papers are now considered
"left-wing."
Ilas
news:1165462643....@73g2000cwn.googlegroups.com:
>
> ric...@cbrp.co.uk wrote:
>> Desertphile wrote:
>> > > From the article:
>> > > ------------------------------------------------------------------
>> > > --- The left-wing Guardian newspaper is in a state about what it
>> >
>> > The Guardian is moderately right-wing. I guess USA fascists would
>> > consider it "lkeft-wind" in contrast to themselves.
>
>> The Guardian is decidedly left-wing!
>
> I find nothing left-wing about The Guardian. I suppose these days,
> when fascism is very popular, moderatly right-wing papers are now
> considered "left-wing."
Speaking as a lily assed old school limey euro socialist, I'd say the
Guardian is certainly not right-wing by any definition, but it has moved
towards the centre in the last decade or so, perhaps as UK politics has
become less polarised since the demise of Thatcherism. I'd say it's broadly
liberal (meaning centre ground, in the European sense of the word) but with
a few more radical columnists. The Morning Star and Socialist Worker apart,
there aren't really any left wing papers here, just a few more or less
liberal papers, some screamingly right-wing ones, and a lot of tabloid
comics.