Repeal of Louisiana Science Education Act Rejected

egjertse writes "A Louisiana law that opponents say leaves the backdoor open to teaching 'creationism' in public schools will stay on the books after a Senate committee Wednesday effectively killed a bill that would repeal the statute. After hours of testimony for and against House Bill 26, which repeals the 2008 Louisiana Science Education Act, the senators narrowly deferred the legislation, effectively killing it in committee. The bill was sponsored by Sen. Karen Carter Peterson, D-New Orleans."

Re:History

[CrimsonAvenger]

PS does anyone know when that "Earth is 6,000 years old" started? I'd like to know how many years I have to add to come up with a more accurate number.

The name you're looking for is James Ussher, a Calvinist archbishop.

The specific works where he specified that the date of Creation was the nightfall before 23 OCT 4004 BC (Julian calendar, mind you) were published between 1650 and 1654 (I don't know which of them first used the 4004bc creation time).

Why so many flavours of Christian seem to be addicted to the writings of a Calvinist archbishop, I've never understood. Most American Christians are, at best, uninspired by Calvinism....

Re: And then there's this asshole:

[Bosconian]

Hey AC,

Please watch this YouTube video; it may be the best 9:40 you'll invest in the inexorably slow building of your critical thinking discipline.

Open-mindedness by QualiaSoup [youtube.com]

Re: Why?

[UnknowingFool]

In the Dover case the school board voted to have a disclaimer read before the biology class about how "Evolution was just a theory" and have an Intelligent Design textbook available. When asked later why the board members said they were following the advice of a conservative outside group. The judge noted in the judgement that the board never consulted any national or professional science groups and ignored the very vocal protests of their only experts, their science teachers.

Re: And then there's this asshole:

[epyT-R]

Open mindedness is not the same thing as tolerance of baseless claims.

Re: Why?

[Daniel Dvorkin]

Whereas evolution has not been revised since it was proposed by Darwin.

I hereby nominate UnknowingFool for "most appropriate Slashdot user name of the year."

Re:Why?

[meglon]

This stupid argument.... again. Why is it people can't pass a simple civics class?

We are a democracy and a republic. We are not a direct democracy, we're a representative democracy, so no.... it's not mob rules, tyranny of the majority (you may be confusing us with Switzerland, or simply be confused for no reason). It can also be called a representative republic, as our president is elected and not a monarch (like in England).

Whenever this stupid argument comes up, i'm often humored by the split in terminology. Conservatives want to claim loudly we're a republic, not a democracy... somehow i'm guessing that this makes them think republicans are better than democrats... yet when push comes to shove, what conservatives really want is a direct democracy so they can continue the tyranny of the majority against gays getting married, women having the right (or not) to self determine their own medical situations, and pretty much every social issue; after all, "the people should be able to vote on that..." as they tend to say right after a judge throws out their discriminatory laws. THE only reason they think that is because they believe they're in the majority.

So, back to the stupid argument...yes, we're a republic...and YES, we're a democracy.

Looks like more work for Zack

[Covalent]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zack_Kopplin [wikipedia.org]
http://www.repealcreationism.com/ [repealcreationism.com]


FYI: Zack is a college student who, while a high school student in Louisiana, decided that no one was going to repeal this law while he was in school. He started an organization to try and ensure that Louisiana students could get a proper education.

Maybe he should run for state senator!

Pseudoscience in Louisiana

[David Gerard]

Pseudoscience is everywhere in Louisiana [rationalblogs.org] - a report from the ground.

Re:Why?

[tehcyder]

Majority gets what it wants, even if it means a minority is oppressed.

That's the reason why in a civilised society you try to get everyone educated to as high a level as possible, so that there is more chance of people being able to think critically and objectively.

Whereas with an oligarchy, the poorer and dumber the hoi polloi are the better.

ochlochcracy

For those who, like myself, hadn't heard this word before, it's just a knob-end's way of saying "mob rule". Whereas it is simple common sense that having the majority of people on the side of just law and order is the only way to prevent the oppression of minorities.

Re:And then there's this asshole:

[ArsonSmith]

What most Europeans don't understand is that Louisiana is about as foreign too 95% of the US as Romania is to the UK. While the states of the US are a little more alike than the countries of Europe, they are still run independently and only tied together by the Federal government. That pendulum is something that swings at times, but is still there. The main example I hope the Europe takes from the US is, don't let the EU become what the US's Federal government has become. It's on that path though, unfortunately.