Comments on: Bill Nye warns: Creation beliefs threaten U.S. science

By: SOCOACH

SOCOACH — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 23:29:37 +0000

Science is curiosity, hard at work. Religion is often no more than mythology, superstition and an extremely sketchy sense of history.

Oddly, they both require a degree of faith; both share a fierce hope that what they believe, yet cannot see, is true.

Scientists and science supporters continue to search tirelessly for answers, even when their quest leads them to even more questions. Yet they push on, and their discoveries – those answered questions, those beliefs that can now be seen in fact rather than mere faith – often benefit mankind.

Non-scientists don’t have to work at their beliefs. They merely point to a passage in a text and say, “God said it is so.” They make this statement of faith without any effort beyond a reference to scripture, a place in their book. How does this deliberate blindness benefit anyone but themselves?

I agree with what Bill Nye has said. If you are blind to the research, the data, the facts that prove that evolution is, beyond a doubt, the way life on Earth has grown and will continue to develop, no one can open your eyes.

But would you deliberately pass on that blindness to your children? Is that what your “religion” demands? Won’t your religion go even so far as to admit that it is, perhaps, God who encourages the curiosity of the scientist?

By: harry674

harry674 — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 14:31:12 +0000

From the article, “children should be exposed to both ideas concerning our past.”

Let them be “exposed” in their homes or religious institutions. This non-science does not belong in our school science classrooms.

By: harry674

harry674 — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 13:09:52 +0000

Universal gravitation also is a “theory.” So is plate tectonics.

In science, a theory is the highest level to which an idea can rise. It’s been proven “beyond a reasonable doubt” to take a phrase from the law. That does not mean beyond ALL doubt. In science, that never happens.

The so-called missing link turns out to be lots of links that have been found. However, the geological fossil record is difficult because what you find is almost by accident. More looking will, nevertheless, result in more finding.

By: dragonhavn

dragonhavn — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 04:35:27 +0000

OK, while engineering may not be a pure science field, it is certainly based in the hard sciences: physics for one. Chemistry for chemical engineers. Physics again for electrical engineers. So, while Engineering (hmm, wonder what genetic engineering is based in … thoughtful look) may not be hardline in biology, it does have some decent basing in other things. As a taoist, I don’t think it’s particularly relevant what your belief system is as long as you are exposed to both concepts. I believe in evolution, but it is still a “theory” where homo sapiens sapiens is concerned because we have yet to find the elusive missing link. As to the 10k history of humanity … uhm, no. And somewhere there is a wonderful biblical statement that “a thousand years is but a day to me” … frequently used in the calculations for the second coming, among other things. Literalists often find themselves at point non plus because most things in religious writings don’t mean the same thing today they did when they were written … not because of flaws in the translation, but because we have changed a lot and our understanding of such things is no longer what it once was. For hundreds of years we’ve had scientists who were also believers. Hasn’t stopped out inventive investigative insanity yet, has it?

By: harry674

harry674 — Tue, 02 Oct 2012 04:05:04 +0000

Engineering is not a field of science. Shows how much the science deniers know.

Let’s just consider the fields of science that conflict with literal Bible interpretation.

Well …

It’s all of them.

By: dadoffive

dadoffive — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 22:13:35 +0000

“If we raise a generation of students who don’t believe in the process of science … you’re not going to continue to innovate …”

Classic misrepresentation of an atheist. Christian scientists who “failed to innovate” include: Copernicus, Bacon, Kepler, Galilei, Descarte, Pascal, Newton, Boyle, Mendel, Kelvin, Planck, and Einstein, to name a few. Nye lost all credibility with that gross attempt to mislead his audience.

By: mathonline

mathonline — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 19:03:04 +0000

Mr. Nye’s assertion that everyone must buy into a secular theory which he favors in order to become proficient in ANY field of science, including engineering, is untenable. I know quite a few christian professors in scientific fields who would dispute that with him, and I work in a very secular public university.