From: Arlo J. Bensinger (ajb102@psu.edu)
Date: Fri Nov 12 2004 - 01:31:15 GMT
Hey Rich,
> I'm with Steve here. If people want to throw in ID and creationism with
evolution what's the problem? Doesn't this give people a greater degree of
freedom to judge the Quality of each themselves. It's all about Freedom, folks.
Certainly is, and like we've been saying, if you want to throw these things in
to a metaphysics course, and ensure that no one is given superiority to the
rest based on nationalistic or religious pressures, then there is no argument
at all.
So throw in ID, creation stories, metaphysics and use a healthy dose of critical
thinking and cross-cultural competence and who's arguing with you?
But I doubt the evangelicals, who are the ones supporting this, would take
kindly to teaching that the christian creation myth is morally equal to, and
only culturally varied from, say the Inuit traditions or the Mahayana Buddhist
beliefs. I doubt very much that these evangelicals would sit well with the
christian stories being taught side-by-side with the Icelandic sagas or the
Navaho tales, while critically examining the culturally-specific elements and
teaching the moral equality of them all.
Hell, Rich, if that's what they were supporting in their agenda, ***I'D*** be
out there right along side of 'em.
As it is, it will be a quick trip from "intelligent design", to "which"
intelligence, to the occidental god. Then you are teaching that the biblical
creation account is morally superior to all other cultural-mythological
creation accounts, and from there it is a straight nose dive into simply
dismissing contradictory data or claiming it was "placed by satan" (I've heard
evangelicals on the radio, only a few years ago when I lived in the great city
of Chicago, talk about dinosaur fossils, radio-carbon dating and geological
records as being deliberately planted herrings-by Satan- to turn man away from
the path of god.)
So, the argument is not about censorship (although the evangelicals may claim
so), it is about proper placement (in metaphysics), critical examinations
across all cultural-mythological creation accounts, and a dismissal of claims
of moral superiority based on nationalistic or religious pressure.
Do you firmly believe that is what the evangelicals want?
Arlo
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