Re: Kansas and the future

Moorad Alexanian (alexanian@uncwil.edu)
Sat, 14 Aug 1999 10:18:05 -0400

Our main purpose in our schools is to teach science and not speculations. If
the assumptions being made in evolutionary theory were clearly stated and
discussed in class, then I have no objections to that. However, if it is
taught as something that did really happened, then I have a qualm with that.
Scientists as scientists can only make scientific assumptions but that does
not mean that the question they are attempting to answer is actually a
scientific question. The answer may lie outside science! I do not think any
parent has any qualms about teaching Mayan or Egyptian history. What many
parents would object is to teach in a history class, say, that Jesus roamed
around in America like the Mormons claim. What parents do not want is the
teaching in our public schools of atheism in the guise of science!! The
question of origins may not be a scientific question. However, if
scientists insist that it is, then other answers to the same question must
be addressed, even in a "science" class. Perhaps, some questions are best
answered by "God did it." It is persumptuos of man to think that all is
whithin his intellecual reach!!

Moorad

-----Original Message-----
From: masters@ballistic.com <masters@ballistic.com>
To: asa@udomo3.calvin.edu <asa@udomo3.calvin.edu>
Date: Friday, August 13, 1999 11:22 AM
Subject: Kansas and the future

>Moorad:
>
>But surely you are not suggesting we should only teach what we can see and
>test today? I live in an EXTREMELY conservative community which hosts many
>parents who want entire history books thrown out. Why? Because we don't
>really know if our historical analysis of the Mayas or the Egyptians is
>true. We have merely taken bits and pieces of evidence, put them together
>in a logical fashion, and devised a logical interpretation of what those
>cultures must have been like. The history of life on earth is not
>different. Evolution involves the accumulation of bits and pieces of
>evidence which have been put together in a logical fashion to devise a
>logical explanation for the history of life on earth.
>
>Essentially, these ultra conservatives want the fields of archeology,
>paleontology, geology, and anthropology thrown out. They see them as
having
>little value at all. They want their children taught ONLY what we can
prove
>at this very moment in time.
>
>I shudder to think of what our schools would be like absent any historical
>perspective on where we've been. In addition, I shudder to think what our
>students will be like intellectually if their answer to every question is
>simply, "God did it." Ask a creationist student to explain the theological
>significance of DNA sequencing which definitely shows man's relatedness to
>chimps and the answer is "I don't need to understand God's ways." Shall we
>create a nation of non-thinkers?
>
>Lucy
>