My apologies to the Congressman for my last post…Larsen actually started the courageous comebacks to the democracy disrupters:

“Now folks will say that’s not true, but I’ve got facts on my side and you’ve got Glenn Beck on your side.”

Too good….

Congressman Barney Frank asks a teabagger/birther/deather/pissed-off-Obama-won/whining conservative:

“On what planet do you spend most of your time?”

Finally….

From Dispatches From The Culture Wars:

Lord (may I call you Yahweh?)-

Look, I know we don’t talk very often, what with me not believing in you and all. If you’ll check your records, I’m sure they will show that I don’t ask for your help when my loved ones are sick or when my favorite team needs a victory the way so many selfish human beings do. I save my pleas for help for the really important things, and I assure you that this is one of them.

I don’t care if you never do anything for me ever again, but I implore you…if you truly love me as it says in scripture, please, please, please call Michele Bachmann to run for president. I can’t imagine anything that would cause as much joy and amusement in my life than watching that batshit insane gorgon humiliate herself on a national stage on a daily basis for months on end.

And all it takes is one call from you. I’ll pay the long distance charges if you’re short of cash. Whatever it takes. You already “called” Pat Robertson to do the same thing and look at the joy that gave me? If you really love me, you can make this happen.

In Gordon Klingenschmitt’s name,

Amen.

From Box Turtle Bulletin:

San Diego hotelier Doug Manchester, whose $125,000 donation to support California’s Prop 8 sparked a boycott against his Manchester Hyatt and San Diego Marriot hotels and Grand Del Mar and White Tail Club Resorts, is divorcing his wife of 43 years.

Manchester said he made his Prop 8 donation to “preserve marriage” because of “my Catholic faith and longtime affiliation with the Catholic Church” — the very same church that condemns divorce. His Catholic faith doesn’t restrain him from thumbing his nose at the Church in ending his own marriage, but it does serve as a convenient excuse for denying others the right to marry.  There’s a word for that, isn’t there?

If religious faith is apparently so fleeting, then what use is it? Hat tip to Andrew Sulliven.

Anyone actually paying attention to the world beyond their small, conservative community in northeastern California (around whom the world decidedly does NOT turn, no matter how many times the county supports Republican candidates) would know that this is Evolution Weekend and the yearly culmination of the Clergy Letter Project. From the Clergy Letter Website:

Evolution Weekend is an opportunity for serious discussion and reflection on the relationship between religion and science. One important goal is to elevate the quality of the discussion on this critical topic – to move beyond sound bites. A second critical goal is to demonstrate that religious people from many faiths and locations understand that evolution is sound science and poses no problems for their faith. Finally, as with The Clergy Letter itself, which has now been signed by more than 11,000 members of the Christian clergy in the United States, Evolution Weekend makes it clear that those claiming that people must choose between religion and science are creating a false dichotomy.

Every year the project gets larger as more and more people come to understand that they do not have to give up their faith in order to accept the scientific fact of evolution. As expected, no congregations in Lassen County are participating, but I understand that it would be difficult for them to consider a serious discussion of science and faith without sacrificing the illusion portrayed to the community that they have all the answers. I see, however, that the Clergy Letter Project lists a local consultant, Dr. Christopher O’Brien, to help any congregation sufficiently courageous to engage in reasoned conversations about evolution and religion. Doubt any of them will take him up on it. There are churches in Redding and Reno, however that will be participating in the effort to educate their congregations on this subject as opposed to simply offering the usual false portrayal of evolution as a theory in crisis, the basis of Nazism and Communism, and inherently atheistic.

Louisiana’s recent efforts to insure that its children’s science education better reflects the 12^th century than the 21^st are having consequences for their economy. Members of the Society for Integrative and Comparative Biology will not be holding their annual convention in New Orleans as long as that state’s Science Education Act remains on the books.  From the SICB press release:

The SICB leadership could not support New Orleans as our meeting venue because of the official position of the state in weakening science education and specifically attacking evolution in science curricula.

Scientists should not be supporting ANY state with anti-science legislation on the books by holding annual conventions in their cities. Just to make sure, I checked the Society for American Archaeology website to see if they had any upcoming conventions in Louisiana (New Orleans was often a favorite of the society) – fortunately, no, they are not scheduled to be in Louisiana for the near future.

You can read more at the Louisiana Coalition for Science website.

Professor Holly Wilson of the University of Louisiana has a wonderful essay in the News Star this morning regarding Louisiana’s recent efforts to weaken science education. As Wilson notes, these efforts were supported by the Discovery Institute, which promotes an agenda of creationism and intelligent design in the nation’s classrooms. Wilson’s concern is that the effort to teach “strengths and weaknesses” of evolution in Louisiana classrooms is tied directly to efforts by the Discovery Institute and other fundamentalist Christian organizations to infuse public schools with Protestant rhetoric on species origins. As a Catholic, she has an issue with this:

I don’t want my children or my students being exposed to the Protestant idea that the Bible has to be interpreted literally. I want my children and my students exposed to Catholic interpretation of the Bible, namely that the Bible needs to be interpreted in its own historical context and hence the words used then don’t mean the same things they mean now in the 20th century…

Frankly, I don’t want my children or students exposed to the Protestant version of creationism. Intelligent design is nothing by the Protestant version of creationism. All the talk of irreducible complexity is just their way of arguing that species had to be created by God as they are because they could not have evolved from other species the way evolution tells us they did. And that metaphysical argument is precisely against my beliefs as a Catholic about how God created the species.

Wilson raises interesting connections between an essentially Protestant creationism involving a literal reading of the Bible, efforts by the state to encourage these ideas as an alternative to evolutionary science and the Discovery Institute’s role in supporting such legislation. However, in doing so Wilson raises the ire of Discovery Institute President Bruce Chapman by daring to link the institute’s programs with fundamentalist views of creation. In a response to Wilson’s comments, Chapman writes:

Holly Wilson (“It’s Not a Catholic Theory”) misrepresents Discovery Institute, intelligent design AND the Catholic Church in her ill-informed and ill-tempered column. As President of Discovery Institute I resent any attempt to place a sectarian tag on our think tank, whether “Protestant” or anything else….The Wilson attack is a monumental misrepresentation of Vatican policy and intelligent design alike. It does not promote accurate dialog and understanding on any level.

The fact that offers such a vehement response suggests that Wilson touches a sore spot with the Discovery Institute. As usual, however, it is Chapman’s Discovery Institute that monumentally misrepresents the issue – as has been demonstrated time and again with any reasoned analysis of the Institute’s positions, their proponents and their history. Science blogs and websites such as Pharyngula, The Panda’s Thumb and the National Center for Science Education; researchers like Barbara Forrest, Kenneth Miller, Richard Dawkins and Jerry Coyne; and ultimately the results of the Dover Trial, repeatedly demonstrate the great efforts made by the Discovery Institute to misrepresent evolutionary theory and the authenticity of any “science” behind Intelligent Design. They also spend a great deal of time attempting to conceal their ultimate religious connections, particularly those directly tied at efforts to get literal biblical creationism into the classroom. Wilson is ultimately correct in her assessment of the Discovery Institute’s nefarious tactics and Bruce Chapman, as usual, is blowing smoke to cover his tracks.

An interesting new poll by the Barna Group regarding religious trends in the United States. I caught this on, of all places, the Answers In Genesis website. As might be expected, the AIG take on it is much different from mine, but first some data and implications of the research:

• - 50% of all Americans no longer automatically accept that Christianity is the “religion of choice” for those in the United States;
• - 71% of all Americans are more likely to develop their own set of personal beliefs than accept those taught by a particular church;
• - Young people (under 25) are far more likely (82%) to abandon traditional church beliefs and adopt their own;
• - Almost half of Americans no longer believe in Satan;
• - 40% say they have no responsibility to evangelize or share their personal beliefs with others;
• - 25% dismiss the idea that the Bible is accurate in all it says;
• - Americans have generally become comfortable discarding biblical teachings where those contradict evidence from their personal experiences and relationships;
• - Growing numbers of people feel comfortable serving as their own theologian-in-residence;
• - There is a growing number of unique personal worldviews derived from multiple religious and non-religious sources (including secularism);
• - Biblical study plays an increasingly smaller role in forming a person’s particular faith;

Of course, AIG, who are dependent upon people taking a literal biblical worldview for their funding sources, are upset by the results:

Sadly, these results shouldn’t surprise us as we see the steady “evolutionizing” of the culture and the march away from the authority of God’s Word-the only reliable, unchanging source of truth. While it is inspiring that the majority of people still view religion as the source of moral guidance, it seems “religion” is becoming just as subjective as morality.

Religion should be subjective. AIG continues to cling to a primitive interpretation of 4000 year old manuscripts written by simple agriculturalists with an infantile knowledge of the world. That people continue to cling to these beliefs says more about their psychological inadequacies (regarding both religious and secular ideas) than the veracity of their belief system.

I used to worry about confronting creationism advocates in classroom situations, largely because creationist arguments seemed to come out of the woodwork, from all directions, and from such a variety of seemingly independent sources that I figured I could never be adequately prepared for all arguments. However, after researching every creationist or intelligent design “argument” in preparation for such confrontations, it became apparent that ALL creationist arguments are based on misinterpretations, false information, or are purposefully deceitful. None come from competent scientific sources.

Texas State Board of Education member Cynthia Dunbar is a classic example of why this holds true. Josh Rosenau from Thoughts From Kansas has been reporting on the recent review of state science standards by the Texas State Board of Education. Dunbar, who is outspokenly anti-science in her views of what students should be taught, used the usual creationist tactic of citing a scientist’s viewpoint on the “weaknesses” of evolution. As Thoughts From Kansas reports:

 

California State University, Chico is sponsoring a series of events in honor of the anniversary of Charles Darwin’s 200th birthday. Additional information on the festivities can be found here. Will anything be planned for Lassen College?