India Cuts Periodic Table and Evolution From School Textbooks (nature.com) 309
In India, children under 16 returning to school this month at the start of the school year will no longer be taught about evolution, the periodic table of elements, or sources of energy. Nature: The news that evolution would be cut from the curriculum for students aged 15-16 was widely reported last month, when thousands of people signed a petition in protest. But official guidance has revealed that a chapter on the periodic table will be cut, too, along with other foundational topics such as sources of energy and environmental sustainability.
Younger learners will no longer be taught certain pollution- and climate-related topics, and there are cuts to biology, chemistry, geography, mathematics and physics subjects for older school students. Overall, the changes affect some 134 million 11-18-year-olds in India's schools. The extent of what has changed became clearer last month when the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) -- the public body that develops the Indian school curriculum and textbooks -- released textbooks for the new academic year that started in May.
Researchers, including those who study science education, are shocked. "Anybody who's trying to teach biology without dealing with evolution is not teaching biology as we currently understand it," says Jonathan Osborne, a science-education researcher at Stanford University in California. "It's that fundamental to biology." The periodic table explains how life's building blocks combine to generate substances with vastly different properties, he adds, and "is one of the great intellectual achievements of chemists."
Younger learners will no longer be taught certain pollution- and climate-related topics, and there are cuts to biology, chemistry, geography, mathematics and physics subjects for older school students. Overall, the changes affect some 134 million 11-18-year-olds in India's schools. The extent of what has changed became clearer last month when the National Council of Educational Research and Training (NCERT) -- the public body that develops the Indian school curriculum and textbooks -- released textbooks for the new academic year that started in May.
Researchers, including those who study science education, are shocked. "Anybody who's trying to teach biology without dealing with evolution is not teaching biology as we currently understand it," says Jonathan Osborne, a science-education researcher at Stanford University in California. "It's that fundamental to biology." The periodic table explains how life's building blocks combine to generate substances with vastly different properties, he adds, and "is one of the great intellectual achievements of chemists."
Yay (Score:5, Interesting)
Why do auth-right and anti intellectualism always go together?
Re:Yay (Score:5, Insightful)
This is how cults work. They also try to isolate you from the outside world by labelling people from other countries as "bad" in one for mor another.
Re:Yay (Score:5, Insightful)
It's much more likely that the "Southern Baptist" interpretation of the Bible will be the theocratic basis of the upcoming American dictatorship.
On paper the words will be different but fundamentally it's pretty much the same with the added benefit of having a built-in boogeyman in the "Al-Qaeda" interpretation of the Quran.
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I was told by Muslims that some aspects of the Al-Qaeda interpretation of the Quran were pretty shaky, theologically. This all goes back to a scholar called Muammad ibn Abd al-Wahhb (1703 - 1792) who preached a "back to the roots" Islam, as he perceived it. He was very controversial at the time but his backers rose to become the ruling dynasty in Saudi Arabia.
https://www.britannica.com/place/Saudi-Arabia/The-Wahhabi-movement [britannica.com] gives an indication of the chaos of those years.
Re: Yay (Score:3)
Yeah. He (and others) somewhere along the line got some people to conflate the Quran with 7th century bedouin Arab cultural traditions. They are not the same. In fact, much of the Quran speaks to rules to overcome the culture into which it came. Like a woman's right to divorce, a hard-to-reach number of witnesses required to convict women of adultery, a prohibition on killing Jews for following the wrong faith, etc.
Re: Yay (Score:3)
About as many as you would expect by looking at the number of Christians who have read the bible. Most faith adherents just listen to the man in the front of the room.
Re: Yay (Score:4)
The eye for an eye rule was famously corrected by Jesus in the new testament. One of the main reasons the old testament should not be taken literally and ignored when contradicting the teaching of Christ.
Of course all that doesn't stop the idiots self identifying as Christians
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Yes yes, the infallible omniscient creator of the universe fucked up and said a bunch of things he didn't really mean, so he sent his son/not son/himself to be ritually killed to say "my bad" (but actually yours).
It wasn't really his fault though, he was drunk for most of the old testament. You should read that one as comedy. The new one is totally legit though.
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Hopefully they don't add any of the magic based books to the American curriculum.
Re:Yay (Score:4, Insightful)
Sometimes you can study documents in school without being pressured to believe in them. Ie, learning some of Das Capital doesn't turn someone into a communist, but it does let you know about communism from someone other than preachers and political partisans. Similarly, knowing what's in the Quran doesn't turn you into a muslim, but it does let you know what they believe. The danger in some people's minds is that the students might think that perhaps these people aren't actually monsters.
Even catholic schools will teach holy books from other religions; not a proselytizing but as education.
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So, if what you want is to understand muslims, you better study their culture(s), of which the Quran is just a part.
Re:Yay (Score:5, Interesting)
If you want to run an authoritarian government, you are probably in it for your own personal reasons, with little general concern about the people who you are leading.
To achieve this, you need a population of doers, but not thinkers. Thinkers will question your commands, they will also evaluate their own stances and biases to try to keep them honest as well. They will often see threw the authoritarian ruler and note that much of its commands are stupid and misinformed, with the only goal of keeping them in power.
The doer, respect the authoritarian ruler, as they are telling them what to do, and how to see the world. A seemingly stupid idea, is actually some ingenious big picture problem solving that is just above the average guys comprehension. Which gives the authoritarian the power and respect they think they deserve, as well an army of cannon fodder to protect their position of power.
The best way to appease the masses of doers, is to make sure they have jobs and are doing things. High polluting industry jobs are easy to start up, they make cheap product that will sell, and give you an economic advantage over other countries that try to be more careful about the envrionment.
Evolution makes people think about their progeny, and if their offspring can survive the environment.
Chemistry explains how things work, and why pollution is bad, at a more detailed level.
Also they bring up a history where the scientists had to show that their ideas conflicted with ideologies of the time, and forced change.
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This was started in the US when those in power started serious de-funding education. During the time of the Sputnik scare, education funding went way up. Problem is, people started learning more, and more logically. Suddenly holding people back because they were the wrong color or gender seemed odd and arbitrary. People demanded equality, and gosh darn it, some people didn't get jobs or promotions they felt entitled to.
Maybe with less education people won't know as much or demand as much. So, in the ea
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Also, "and there are cuts to biology, chemistry, geography, mathematics and physics subjects for older school students". Kind of feels like an across the board cut in education. Nothing for more advanced students maybe. Maybe this is yet another ignorant "reading, writing 'rithmetic" style of dumbing down (ie, teach only the basics).
Now how does this fit with India's economy? It's doing well in the IT industry, it's doing well with call centers. And this needs certain skills - mathematics, fluency in Eng
Re: Yay (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Both political extremes reject science. Right now, the right wing is demanding religious conformity and various forms of priestly reverence. To quote Science magazine about Critical Theory: "Further, it considers it a cultural artifact of white, Western, masculinist cultures, which makes it a “way of knowing” that is inherently problematic"
The result is the infamous Cape Town University forum where one of the presenters demanded "western science must be replaced by African science", and demanded
Re:Yay (Score:5, Insightful)
You clearly have a different definition than me of what "right" and "left" wing means. Placing traditional religion above modern science is the very definition of conservative. Literally. The very first meaning [dictionary.com] listed at dictionary.com is, "disposed to preserve existing conditions, institutions, etc., or to restore traditional ones, and to limit change." Compare that to the definition of "liberal" [dictionary.com], which begins, "favorable to progress or reform, as in political or religious affairs."
The event you described is the very definition of right wing, and the opposite of the definition of left wing.
They're black. That's his problem. (Score:3)
Black means woke. Don't you know that?
First, let's address Antique Geekmeister's barely coherent racism, in defense of right-wing lunacy through tu quoque [wikipedia.org] whataboutism. [wikipedia.org]
If you actually watch the linked video it is ABUNDANTLY CLEAR that the notion of "scratching off science as a product of western modernity" is both presented as a "well, if you ask me..." JOKE [youtu.be] - and understood as such by the audience laughing at that.
NOT a case where "one of the presenters demanded "western science must be replaced by Africa
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Because educated people are less likely to vote for the authoritarians. This is true for the authoritarians on the left and the right.
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Re:Yay (Score:5, Informative)
I can't believe the level of response this article is generating disregarding all the facts. I joined slashdot almost 2 decades ago expecting little better standards but it seems to have deteriorated.
I can't even imagine a reputed journal like this prints politically motivated article. There is absolutely zero evidence of RSS involvement and it puts 100% blame on them. Seriously, is their editorial board is so dumb not to ask to produce a single evidence in regard to this?
1. Affects 134 million students: Wrong. NCERT only makes syllabus for central schools which are not even 10%. Most schools are state schools and they are free to make their own syllabus.
2. There were 5 chapters in 10th grade chemistry book and they removed the 5th chapter which was on periodic table. This was to reduce burdens on 10th grade students. FYI, California high school students are not required to take any chemistry at all. Not sure about other states in US. I studied in India during the time, when the current ruling party had less than 1% of representations and we didn't have periodic table in 10th grade.
3. The chapter is already there in 11th grade (mandatory for science majors. yes, in India, you have to select major in 11th grade).
4. Same goes for periodic table. California students are not required to take biology in high school at all. India moved the evolution from 10th grade to 11th grade.
5. RSS/hindutva.....? Where the hell did the author get? No evidence at all. Moving from end of 10th grade (they were last chapters in 10th grade) to 11th grade will save hindutva? Are they thinking readers are stupid? Well, reading the responses makes me feel they thought that way and were even right.
Re:Yay (Score:5, Insightful)
Is DEI the new term to anger the rubes? Is woke starting to lose it's momentum? Is CRT still a thing to be angry about?
Re:Yay (Score:5, Funny)
Is CRT still a thing to be angry about?
If I still had to use a CRT monitor I'd certainly be ticked off.
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Not sure, but I think they were white, but just tanned? Like Jesus.
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Nope, the BJP is still riding hatred of Muslims to electoral victory. The inclusion I've heard Indians advocating for seems to not extend beyond "please don't burn down any more mosques".
I would be interested to know how the politicians are speaking of the Partition of India now. Are they taking ownership of it and saying yes, expelling Muslims to Pakistan was a good idea, and we should continue? (I would give them credit for at least being internally consistent, which is more than I can say for Republican
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Are they taking ownership of it and saying yes, expelling Muslims to Pakistan was a good idea, and we should continue? (I would give them credit for at least being internally consistent, which is more than I can say for Republican in the US.) Or, are they also trying to remove discussion of the partition from schools, and otherwise minimizing it?
It all gets blamed on the British Empire. No Hindu ever did anything wrong then or since, according to Modi and the BJP.
In practice, of course, Muhammed Ali Jinnah had the most to do with it: he was determined not to share a post-Empire Indian state with Hindus (or anyone not Muslim).
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They should replace it with studies in magic.
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Well, they did used to be known for flying carpets, snake charming and ropes you could throw up in the air...have float and climb up and disappear.
I've not heard of such feats in years...maybe they need to revisit some of these old industries indeed!!
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You're thinking of Fakirs, who sometimes performed tricks like that in public. It's actually Arabic and more traditionally a Fakir would be Muslim, but the term has drifted over the years and could include an Indian Hindu as well.
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I'm joking. They are not.
Re:Yay (Score:4)
That's called Home Schooling here in the States.
Re: Welcome to Potions Class (Score:3)
You have to say the incantation:
"Molluscum Contagiosa!"
DEI [Re:Yay] (Score:4, Informative)
So..what are they replacing the curriculum they cut with....? Is DEI starting to be a thing over in India too?
If you mean Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: no, that got cut, too.
" In non-science content, chapters on democracy and diversity; political parties; and challenges to democracy have been scrapped. "
India will not stop polluting (Score:5, Insightful)
Rose-colored glasses (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Rose-colored glasses (Score:5, Insightful)
You're forgetting about step two. Make it illegal to teach and then threaten teachers with harsh penalties. Florida has that covered.
https://www.theguardian.com/us... [theguardian.com]
https://www.firstcoastnews.com... [firstcoastnews.com]
Now the next words out of your mouth are going to be pornography. Well here's the chilling part of the law.
Under new Florida law, all books in elementary school libraries (including classroom collections for independent reading) must be reviewed by a certified media specialist.
Oh good, all material has to be picked by a government official. Never thought I'd see the day when republicans want MORE government in their lives.
Re:Rose-colored glasses (Score:5, Informative)
Then you haven't been paying attention. This has been going on for decades. Bigger, more intrusive, more expensive government is what Republicans want. They claim to want smaller government, but actions speak louder than words.
Re:Rose-colored glasses (Score:4, Insightful)
Straw man my ass. Republican platform from 2016 [gop.com]: talks about limited government, removing government regulation, etc. Yeah, they're lying out their asses, but Republicans have (at least since Reagan) claimed to want smaller government. "Small enough to drown in the bathtub."
And yes, they also claim to want to stop pissing away tax dollars on stupid shit. Which is why they always limit spending on stupid things that help the poor and middle class (like tax credits for children which cut child poverty by 50% during the pandemic, education, health care for all, etc) and spend more on things like the military and tax cuts for the ultra-wealthy. But yes, both parties want a larger government, just for different reasons.
Idiocracy everywhere? (Score:4, Insightful)
And I thought only the USA was going through a caveman anti-intellectual, anti-science phase.
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India is going through an auth right phase and this is what typically happens. Can't have the masses too educated.
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India has a space programme, so a good level of education should be considered.
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They can send the privileged castes abroad for education. I mean, not to America, but somewhere.
Wasnt that long ago... (Score:5, Insightful)
It wasnt that long ago American conservatives were trying to cut evolution from school text books. Between that and global warming and covid denialism it's awfully frustrating how anti science some conservatives can be as I guarantee you these cuts are coming from India's right wing. The country has taken a huge shift to the right these last couple of decades and now we're seeing the same type of loonies in India pop up that we see in the US.
It's like conservatives want to pick and chose their science like they do with lessons in their holy books.
They still are trying (Score:2)
Texas is managing to get the Ten Commandments back in schools. With the current Supreme Court they'll probably win this time. The Satanist will show up to put their documents in, but again, with the current Supreme Court they'll probably lose. From there they next step will be to go after Evolution again.
Extremists never give up. K
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With the current Supreme Court they'll probably win this time.
I dunno, while I have certainly found frustration with some of their rulings and actions they havent always just automatically agreed with conservatives in their rulings. Off the top of my head they refused to entertain Trumps false election claims and this case right here https://www.npr.org/2020/06/15... [npr.org]. I think could have very easily been decided against LGBQT rights in the workplace but it wasnt.
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They did throw us under the bus when it came to nondiscrimination and equal access to commerce (Colorado) and adoptions (Pennsylvania) though. And when they did away with Roe, they didn't coordinate to get all their ducks in a row with their messaging and accidentally let slip that Obergefell and Lawrence are next on their chopping block. Maybe we rolled a critical success D20 with the workplace ruling. But this SCOTUS is still very much our enemy.
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Texas is managing to get the Ten Commandments back in schools. With the current Supreme Court they'll probably win this time.
They have failed on this [abc13.com] for now. I am sure this stupidity will come back.
Re:They still are trying (Score:4, Informative)
And that the most frustrating thing really. Horrible people have boundless energy to make things horrible. But for a reasonable person, it's exhausting to expend a lot of energy just to keep things sane.
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"Success" would probably mean that policies against teaching evolution in a school happened to more than 6% of kids in Texas https://ballotpedia.org/Privat... [ballotpedia.org] as that is about the total amount of kids in Texas going to private schools.
I hear what you're saying about the conservative effort to ban teaching evolution is still ongoing in this country though.
Re: (Score:2, Troll)
At least they didn't lock people in their homes and close schools for two years over....nothing?
Sweden, which DIDN'T follow the ridiculous quarantining, has the lowest excess deaths of any EU country.
https://nypost.com/2022/05/06/... [nypost.com]
Israel's latest reports (which are only *partial*, to be clear) strongly suggests that NO young healthy people actually died of Covid. None.
Are we #followthescience yet?
Re: (Score:2)
I'm done taking the time to debunk covid deniers. I concede, you are correct. Covid never existed or was minor or whatever and the both massive and global scientific and medical consensus who warned us of its dangers and had us take precautions were really just evil power mongers who want to control us.
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Almost like science isn't a fixed outcome and changes with repeatable experiments and new data.
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Of course that isnt what the CDC is recommending at all. It does help my point to have some ignorant person chiming in with made up crap about Covid though so thanks for that.
At least they're taking it to logical conclusion (Score:5, Funny)
It's always weird when politicians try to keep people from finding out about evolution, but don't have any problems with less-understood, more controversial, and iffier phenomena such as gravity.
What I "like"(?) about this instance, is that it's consistent and broad-spectrum. Maybe students shouldn't know about gravity, covalent bonding, optics, and (if you really clamp down on science enough) you can drop large swatches of math, much of which is taught to solve physics problems. (Shit, I think it was actually my chemistry teacher who taught us logarithms, because math class hadn't gotten to it yet. Boy was our math teacher surprised later!)
Once you see the savings, you'll realize that spelling isn't really all that necessary, either. People can look up history in wikipedia. ChatGPT has made essay-writing obsolete. Once you come at the education problem this way, you'll realize that you probably don't want any education at all, resulting in 100% taxpayer savings. Surely a win/win for India's future economy.
Excellent! (Score:5, Funny)
As an American I applaud India's move to decrease the competitiveness of their students and, ultimately, their industries on the world market.
Their loss is our gain (but we have to remain vigilant lest the whacko religious fundamentalists do the same thing over here).
Interesting times ahead! (Score:2)
It will be interesting to see if there is a US decline in H1B visas issued to people from India in 20-25 years. It will also be interesting to see if companies like Accenture, Tata, and Wipro see declining revenue during that same time period. Perhaps by then, AI will replace the need for that type of labor anyway.
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> we have to remain vigilant lest the whacko religious fundamentalists do the same thing over here
You seem to be under the mistaken assumption that they don't.
And the regression continues. (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a shame to see a global force like that opting out of the scientific future by stunting the intellectual growth of their young. I have the same concerns about the U.S... but they aren't as far down the path.
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It will probably be the opposite, at least for some. Gen Alpha will probably use this as a point of rebellion against their parents' and grandparents' generations and just self-educate and we'll also see a rise of social learning / and other similar uses of social media.
I'm okay with this trend. (Score:4, Funny)
If the world trends more towards ignorance, when I retire in five or ten years I won't have to work hard to not be an old, uninformed jackass. I might be permanently smarter than those pesky young'uns.
low education = more manual labour workers (Score:3)
This is a short sighted government policy, maybe trying to please friends or relatives that own agriculture or industrial businesses.
Admission requirements to higher education will seem impossible to meet for these students and so are forced to remain and compete for a low wage job.
Their only hope is to still have internet access and discipline themselves to self educate. Then challenge admission exams to hope the opportunity for a higher education.
periodic table? (Score:2)
Ok, I understand why you would cut all the "environmental" stuff, since it undoubtedly makes value judgments. I understand why you would cut evolution, because it offends some religions. (And 99% of biology does not depend on evolution. For example, do you need to know how hearts evolved to know what they do? Or that all life is based on DNA and RNA? For all we care, that could just be Shiva's plan.)
But the periodic table? What political or religious interest does that offend?
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That one caught me off guard as well. There's probably a reason, it's just that Westerners might not understand it.
When did (Score:3, Funny)
DeSantis move to India?
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We should be so lucky.
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Dude! That was awesome! So funny! The virtue signal is strong in this one! Ha ha ha! Way funny!
How are there people who want this? (Score:2)
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The level of human stupidity never ceases to amaze.
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Good luck with engineers and scientists.... (Score:3)
By not teaching that at the primary school level you just added a massive hurdle to anyone who was thinking of going into these fields and set them back probably 2 years of studying to catch up to fundamental knowledge they need to have before they can even begin learning the more advanced topics. A fundamental knowledge that is so important that it dictates the types and kinds of chemical reactions that can and will occur and components that are possible to build, make, and the by-products of those reactions.
It will also tell you the ratios needed for the reactions, the mass and weights of the products that should be produced when the reaction occurs correctly (so you can check and verify that it is complete), and will tell you if it will produce energy or require energy added for the reaction to occur. And on top of that, it will also tell you how strongly the new compounds are held together as well as if the byproducts themselves are volatile in nature or a more stable end compound.
In other words, the periodic table (especially one that also lists the valence electrons) will tell just about everything you will need to know for how chemicals can react with other chemicals, which is fundamental for the disciplines I noted above.
Re: (Score:3)
So exciting (Score:2)
Comment removed (Score:3, Informative)
not invented here (Score:2)
There might be some more reasonable rationale behind these decisions, for example the Indian authorities may believe that there is a more profitable time to learn about the periodic table, eg. once a background of quantum mechanics has been taught (I doubt it but they don't seem to be sharing their reasoning).
This article [nature.com] gives a little more perspective.
Good news for the US (Score:2)
Because yay - more Indians for us, and just in time for the massive personnel needs of the CHIPS And Sciences Act.
Fact (and sanity) checking (Score:5, Informative)
This sounded like clickbait, so I did the needful.
First, this specific statement is true.
There was a 13 page chapter on the periodic table that has been removed.
If you're writing clickbait, you stop there. On behalf of Paul Harvey, may he rest in peace, here is "the rest of the story".
Instead of that 13 page chapter the chemistry chapter's section 3.2 covers what atoms are and their size. 3.2.1 discusses Dalton as the first scientist to name elements and has a little chart of his symbols. The next page discusses modern IUPAC names for elements, includes a chart of common element names, covers atomic mass, and atomic numbers too. Then the chapter continues with the law of definite proportions, etc.
They needed to cut some material to give more time to catch students up after losing two years of schooling to Covid. I, personally, would like to see at least a single sentence that points an enterprising student to the Periodic Table, but the changes here are not unreasonable. Anyone want to take a bet I'll find something similar if I check the other claims?
Re:Fact (and sanity) checking (Score:4, Informative)
On a related note, props to India for putting their textbooks online in toto without requiring any logins or hoop jumping. America should learn from that.
Politically motivated article with half truths (Score:3)
I can't even imagine a reputed journal like this prints politically motivated article. There is absolutely zero evidence of RSS involvement and it puts 100% blame on them. Seriously, is their editorial board is so dumb not to ask to produce a single evidence in regard to this?
Here are few other glaring errors:
1. Affects 134 million students: Wrong. NCERT only makes syllabus for central schools which are not even 10%. Most schools are state schools and they are free to make their own syllabus.
2. There were 5 chapters in 10th grade chemistry book and they removed the 5th chapter which was on periodic table. This was to reduce burdens on 10th grade students. FYI, California high school students are not required to take any chemistry at all. Not sure about other states in US. I studied in India during the time, when the current ruling party had less than 1% of representations and we didn't have periodic table in 10th grade.
3. The chapter is already there in 11th grade (mandatory for science majors. yes, in India, you have to select major in 11th grade).
Re:Can conservatives go one day (Score:5, Insightful)
Without thinking about trans people? I mean really it wasn't even mentioned in the story. I have never seen a group that is so concerned about what genitals another person might have.
So there's actually a reason for that (Score:2)
Historians generally don't think that t
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
They don't like the fact that they may be attracted to someone who they may not be predisposed to be attracted to.
In general western culture had portrait Trans people, as people hiding their identity just to trick attract people of the sex they are attracted to.
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If trans people disgust you, why are you always talking about them?
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No, not really. The more extremes of the diversion/inclusion community ideology makes me roll my eyes (the danger here being eye-strain), but the anti-trans reactionaries sound downright unhinged in comparison.
This has absolutely turned into the rage-inducting distraction of the time for the right. The whole "grooming" terminology is pret
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The whole trans "you can become a biological other sex".
It's about as anti-science as it gets.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
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I think one problem is people like Dylan Mulvaney are what people think most trans women are like which is not true. She is a caricature of a woman.
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Born with penis, XY chromosomes, male.
If you think otherwise you failed anatomy and biology class.
You are wrong. That is all.
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Scientific fact: intersex exists. That is, there is more than just male and female, no matter how fervently one pounds their Bible. Now intersex is not at all the same as trans, but the fact that intersex gets dismissed as non-existent so often means it's an anti-science thought process.
Also, "trans" is not necessarily gay either. Most of the trans I know personally are still 'straight', as in the keep their normal sexual orientation based upon their birth sex, even though they dress and act like a diffe
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Wait until they find out it's the male seahorse which gives birth.
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I've never heard anyone--no matter how out there--say anything against the periodic table. Any idea what the cause might have been?
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Really? I've got southern relatives that get pissed I have a poster of it on my wall in my home office because it's supposedly "scientism propaganda" and "completely made up nonsense." It happens.
Re:American religious extremists are pushing hard (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, about that https://www.charlotteobserver.... [charlotteobserver.com]
We don’t need to be teaching science
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Did you read your own article. The guy quoted says the exact opposite of what you claim. His statement is that kids in k-5 should be learning science not social studies and racial this n that agenda.
He is pro-science.
Do you think posting a link will get you +mod points because no one will actually read it and assume you've been intellectually honest for once and posted a link that says what you say it says?
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He is pro-science.
He's against teaching evolution. Tell us again how pro-science he is.
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There are plenty pushing for removing evolution and instituting mandatory prayer times, with recent Supreme Court victories in pursuit of the latter.
But these things are more of a culture-warrior sideshow, the way they aim to fundamentally undermine public schools is by sucking the funds out of them to put in the pockets of investors in privatized schools. So that the entire school system is as dysfunctional as the colleges are now.
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Who is "they" pushing for mandatory prayer? Reference please.
Re:American religious extremists are pushing hard (Score:4)
The aforementioned "fundies." I'm not going to give you the names of people I've spoken to when my job takes me to churches, which is quite often. I've heard these things at all of them. Original research, reference sound+vision. The Supreme Court decision I referenced was Kennedy vs. Bremerton from 2022.
Re: (Score:2)
Who is "they" that has a list that includes getting rid of the periodic table?
Do you have a reference to who "they" are? Where did you acquire "their" list?
Thanks. Asking for a friend!
Roman Catholic priests teach chemistry (Score:3)
No, it's on the list, but after they deal with sex education, evolution, keeping the brownie down, and prayer in school. Then they'll go after things like this. India is just jumping the gun and doing it all at once.
That will be a surprise to the Roman Catholic priests, and other religious folks, teaching chemistry across the USA.