Kansas State Board Approves Teaching Standards Skeptical of Evolution

This makes no sense.

 

Exactly

 

I want a bumper sticker that says, "LOL Kansas LOL."

 

I have no idea and in the example, it doesn't matter....but it would appear what the board is trying to do (right or wrong) is to say that science is not limited to explaining things naturally. If this were a lesson, the teacher would be allowed to say perhaps it was karma, perhaps it was prayer, perhaps it was somethign else.

 

Why does this not make sense? There are times when there is no explainable medical reason for a person recovering from an illness. Perhaps it is because the scientific reason hasn't been discovered yet (maybe some weird interaction of medications, food and environment). Perhaps it is faith and prayer. Perhaps it is the brain "thinking" it is faith and prayer.

 

Well if there was no natural empiracal reason about why the person recovered then the only thing you would teach about it in science class is that medically we don't why this person recovered. You could still teach that metaphysical / spiritual forces cured the person in a religion or philosophy class but since such things are quantifiable they're not science.

Science is about what is quantifiable and empiracal provable. There is nothing unscientific about saying that we don't know something since there isn't an empiracal quantifiable solution. The problem I have with saying that science is no longer just about what is provable would mean that it would be just as valid to say that planes fly because of prayer.

IMO its a disservice to both science and faith to start mixing the two in such a way.

 

I am making an assumption since I do not know all the details of what they passed with respect to science being limited to explaining things naturally. Assume a student in a high school class asks a question about my example (someone recovering from an illness that is not medically explainable). Considering the absence of "religion" in public schools curriculum, can the teacher in Kansas currently (legally) say "We can't explain this scientifically. The family believes that their prayers allowed this person to recover". I would assume that it would be questionable for him to include the second sentence in his reply. I would also assume that the new law would allow him to say it without reproach.

 

science is practiced equilaterally by all nations and faiths. there aren't two ways to interpret it. there are many religions. one of them may be right or all of them may be wrong. it is a subjective, faith-based agenda best left out of school. religion is an individual pursuit, not a collective one.

 

But you're reading the previous law as an absolutists ban on mentioning prayer at all. There's nothing stopping a teacher from saying that the family believes that prayer played a role because that is the teacher relaying a fact that that's what the family believed. There's no law in the land that I'm aware of that outlaws the mention of prayer at all or the relaying of a fact that some people believe in prayer.

That's a different issue than what Kansas is saying. Under a broad reading of it the science teacher in Kansas could say that scientifically prayer played a role since science is no longer constrained by looking for naturalistic explanations. That opens a whole can of worms regarding what qualifies for science.

 

We'll just have to call in the Ghostbusters.

 

Who ya gonna call!