"God Bless You" Should Be Banned?

[Kurieuo]

Edward, surely you even see the craziness in this?
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2015/09/27/go ... with-aclu/

[Nessa]

images.jpg (33.67 KiB) Viewed 3262 times

[edwardmurphy]

First off, the ACLU sending a letter to a school asking them to follow the law isn't a big deal. It's only considered news by conservative activists pushing the persecution talking point. Moving on...

No, the phrase "God bless you" should not be banned. However, school administrators should follow the law, which says that they can't show favor to one religion over others. Public school is a good place for learning about religious history or taking a comparative religion class, but not for advocating a particular religion in official correspondence or during academic time.

If you're an educator want to teach kids about God or speak favorably about a particular religion then you can teach your own kids at home, and/or teach other peoples' kids in Sunday School and/or at a religious school. Heck, you can even work at a public school and teach Bible Study to public school kids at that same public school, provided that you do it during non-academic time and in an unofficial capacity.

Long story short, the rules are simple, balanced, and fair. In official correspondence and during academic time I can't teach kids gods don't exist, you can't reach kids that Jesus is whatever, and if a scary Muslim secret jihadist happens by he can't teach kids that there is one true God and his name is Allah.

We can, however, teach kids about a wide variety of religions, compare the histories and philosophies of those religions, and allow kids to decide for themselves what is or isn't true. That's education.

[Nessa]

We have been going through a bit of the stuff edward mentioned..
https://m.facebook.com/KeepReligionOutOfSchoolNZ

[Nessa]

My sons get told by teachers they come from apes even at primary school - now is that 'fair'? Why are my rights as a parent not just as vaild as a non christian parent's rights?

Doesn't evolution get pretty much taught as a fact not just a theory?
Im not too sure on the US school system tho.

Why is it wrong to expect more of a balanced world view in public schools?

[Kurieuo]

Here's why ACLU's bid should fail imo.

"God bless you", while often said by Christians, does not represent religion but ideology.
Despite perhaps preferring the term Allah, I doubt no Muslim would be offended. Certainly no Jewish person would be offended. No JW, no Mormon and even no Pantheist or Post-Modern New Ager who believes the Universe or Nature to be God... any number of other religions out there.

I pray ACLU have fun wasting their money. If they loose, then they will probably do more good in the other direction as people everywhere stand up for their freedoms. If you're Muslim, you should be able to freely say "As Allah Wills", if you're Jewish you ought to be able to freely say "Y'varekh'kha ADONAI v'-yishmerekha" or if Christian "Merry Christmas" on your website won't see you in court.

Certainly, no Christocracy would take such away. Indeed, America seems to be a secular democracy. A secular "democracy" doesn't seem much different from a Secularocracy, or perhaps just plain out Communism which drowns out all belief in God.

It's ironic that people with a secular ideology who really shouldn't see meaning in what anyone believes, seem to care the most about such about forcing their beliefs onto society. It should be classified as a religion of its own given the zealousness. Separation of state and religion is really just one of those mythical slogans.

[edwardmurphy]

My sons get told by teachers they come from apes even at primary school - now is that 'fair'? Why are my rights as a parent not just as vaild as a non christian parent's rights?

Doesn't evolution get pretty much taught as a fact not just a theory?
Im not too sure on the US school system tho.

You're misunderstanding the scientific use of the word "theory." In science a theory is an explanation for an observed natural phenomenon. If I drop a rock it falls. That's gravity. The Theory of Gravity doesn't address whether or not gravity exists - that's self-evident. The Theory of Gravity is a bunch of math aimed at explaining why gravity exists and how it works. It's the same for evolution.

Evolution is an observed fact. We can see it in the fossil record, in DNA, and in vestigial organs on our own bodies. We can watch it happen in real-time with bacteria and fruit flies. Those are the facts of evolution, and whether or not evolution happened (and continues to happen) hasn't been up for serious scientific debate since Darwin's time.

The Theory of Evolution is something else entirely. The Theory is man's attempt to explain how evolution works, why it happens, under what conditions it would happen differently, and so forth. The main idea of the theory - natural selection - is as rock solid as anything in science, but some the details are still being worked out. So the Theory of Evolution represents the best explanation that some of our brightest minds can work out to explain the observed fact that there are changes in the heritable traits of biological populations over successive generations. (Thank you Wikipedia for the science talk. It ain't my field.)

Long story short, the argument that "evolution is just a theory" is spurious. Evolution is scientific fact and as such it is appropriately taught in science classrooms all over the world. The fact that some people object to it on religious grounds is immaterial. Those people are factually incorrect.

[Nessa]

My sons get told by teachers they come from apes even at primary school - now is that 'fair'? Why are my rights as a parent not just as vaild as a non christian parent's rights?

Doesn't evolution get pretty much taught as a fact not just a theory?
Im not too sure on the US school system tho.

You're misunderstanding the scientific use of the word "theory." In science a theory is an explanation for an observed natural phenomenon. If I drop a rock it falls. That's gravity. The Theory of Gravity doesn't address whether or not gravity exists - that's self-evident. The Theory of Gravity is a bunch of math aimed at explaining why gravity exists and how it works. It's the same for evolution.

Evolution is an observed fact. We can see it in the fossil record, in DNA, and in vestigial organs on our own bodies. We can watch it happen in real-time with bacteria and fruit flies. Those are the facts of evolution, and whether or not evolution happened (and continues to happen) hasn't been up for serious scientific debate since Darwin's time.

The Theory of Evolution is something else entirely. The Theory is man's attempt to explain how evolution works, why it happens, under what conditions it would happen differently, and so forth. The main idea of the theory - natural selection - is as rock solid as anything in science, but some the details are still being worked out. So the Theory of Evolution represents the best explanation that some of our brightest minds can work out to explain the observed fact that there are changes in the heritable traits of biological populations over successive generations. (Thank you Wikipedia for the science talk. It ain't my field.)

Long story short, the argument that "evolution is just a theory" is spurious. Evolution is scientific fact and as such it is appropriately taught in science classrooms all over the world. The fact that some people object to it on religious grounds is immaterial. Those people are factually incorrect.

Evolution is not a scientific fact. I would be interested to see what you think of the information enigma vid.

[edwardmurphy]

I haven't seen it, and I don't see myself bothering. If you write me a quick synopsis I'll read it.

[Nessa]

I haven't seen it, and I don't see myself bothering. If you write me a quick synopsis I'll read it.

Well, bascially it makes a case for intelligent design by presenting the information found within DNA to make proteins.etc

[RickD]

While evolution in its basic definition, "change over time" is a scientific fact because it's observable, what is commonly called macroevolution, is not testable, nor observable.

We can obviously observe change, nobody has observed, or can observe, molecules to man evolution. There's evidence that some use to back up macro, but it's not testable nor observable.

[Byblos]

I haven't seen it, and I don't see myself bothering. If you write me a quick synopsis I'll read it.

Well, bascially it makes a case for intelligent design by presenting the information found within DNA to make proteins.etc

It doesn't make a case for intelligent design per se but for intelligence in general as a source for information. The case is such that information is always the product of intelligence (purpose).

While evolution in its basic definition, "change over time" is a scientific fact because it's observable, what is commonly called macroevolution, is not testable, nor observable.

We can obviously observe change, nobody has observed, or can observe, molecules to man evolution. There's evidence that some use to back up macro, but it's not testable nor observable.

Macroevolution may not be observable but it is easily falsifiable.

[RickD]

I haven't seen it, and I don't see myself bothering. If you write me a quick synopsis I'll read it.

Well, bascially it makes a case for intelligent design by presenting the information found within DNA to make proteins.etc

It doesn't make a case for intelligent design per se but for intelligence in general as a source for information. The case is such that information is always the product of intelligence (purpose).

While evolution in its basic definition, "change over time" is a scientific fact because it's observable, what is commonly called macroevolution, is not testable, nor observable.

We can obviously observe change, nobody has observed, or can observe, molecules to man evolution. There's evidence that some use to back up macro, but it's not testable nor observable.

Macroevolution may not be observable but it is easily falsifiable.

Ok. How so?

[Byblos]

Macroevolution may not be observable but it is easily falsifiable.

Ok. How so?

'Easily' may have been a little too hasty but any one of the following discoveries could (potentially) falsify macroevolution:

- Static fossil record
- Contradiction in the fossil record (such as the discovery of say primate fossils that predate dinosaurs)
- No nested biological hierarchy
- Discovery of non-carbon-based, non-DNA life forms (that one is a stretch, I know)

[RickD]

Macroevolution may not be observable but it is easily falsifiable.

Ok. How so?

'Easily' may have been a little too hasty but any one of the following discoveries could (potentially) falsify macroevolution:

- Static fossil record
- Contradiction in the fossil record (such as the discovery of say primate fossils that predate dinosaurs)
- No nested biological hierarchy
- Discovery of non-carbon-based, non-DNA life forms (that one is a stretch, I know)

Who are you, Bill Clinton? I guess it depends on what the definition of "is" is.

You said it "is" easily falsifiable. That's not quite what you meant. So, nevermind.