Sorry was just bored

As some of you may have noticed, I have started posting more short stories, with little in the way of commentary. That means more updates for you, but it also means fewer open threads, as I don't have these stories lying around any more. So, on the premise that everybody love kittens, I give you this, courtesy of Cute Overload:

Just another little story for those who think that the creationists are Class A Offenders when it comes to filling schools with junk. An article in the Rethinking Schools magazine describes how some elementary school teachers used Lego to teach kids about the oppressive class-based, capitalist society:

According to the article, the students had been building an elaborate "Legotown," but it was accidentally demolished. The teachers decided its destruction was an opportunity to explore "the inequities of private ownership." According to the teachers, "Our intention was to promote a contrasting set of values: collectivity, collaboration, resource-sharing, and full democratic participation."

The children were allegedly incorporating into Legotown "their assumptions about ownership and the social power it conveys." These assumptions "mirrored those of a class-based, capitalist society — a society that we teachers believe to be unjust and oppressive."

Among the lessons learned were the virtues of community property and standard sizes:

So they first explored with the children the issue of ownership. Not all of the students shared the teachers' anathema to private property ownership. "If I buy it, I own it," one child is quoted saying. The teachers then explored with the students concepts of fairness, equity, power, and other issues over a period of several months.

At the end of that time, Legos returned to the classroom after the children agreed to several guiding principles framed by the teachers, including that "All structures are public structures" and "All structures will be standard sizes." The teachers quote the children:

"A house is good because it is a community house."

"We should have equal houses. They should be standard sizes."

"It's important to have the same amount of power as other people over your building."

PS. If you want to read the original article in Rethinking Schools, you'll have to pay $5 for the issue. I guess not all things should be community property.

Creationism and Baraminology Research News has some novel and refreshing thoughts on creationism and front-loading:

What often happens in the Creationary community is that we have spent so much time arguing against Darwinism that we sometimes forget what it means for Darwinism to be false. That is, once we've won the argument against Darwinism, what then? This time is quickly approaching (or perhaps is already here). The issue is that the arguments against common descent were based on Darwinism. X couldn't evolved from Y because of the hideously complicated algorithms it would have to cross. The problem is that if Darwinism is no longer assumed, this argument doesn't work against common descent. If evolution is directed, then there is no limit to the sophistication of evolutionary pathways. Therefore, complexity cannot be used as an argument against common descent.

Joseph C. Campana has been digging into media reports about Templeton and intelligent design, talking to Charles L. Harper Jr., senior vice president of the John Templeton Foundation (JTF). Looks like the New York Times botched the story:

The media has misrepresented the record of the intelligent design research community. According to Charles Harper, the New York Times essentially invented the claim that they put out a call for research proposals to ID scholars, and then the article's author made up the notion that ID scholars failed to respond to this non-existent request. While the JTF clearly is not enthusiastic about ID, the record shows that the JTF has funded ID research and scholarship, as well as other activities by ID scholars, meaning that the New York Times' portrayal of the JTF's funding of ID was highly misleading. Also, the fact that Templeton gives funding to scholars that are using a particular framework does not mean that they "endorse" that view. Charles Harper’s explanation that the New York Times completely invented this story appears even more credible given his lack of enthusiasm about intelligent design, and the fact that he has no motive to defend ID.

What is evidence?

TheocracyWatch is a project of the Center for Religion, Ethics and Social Policy (CRESP) at Cornell University. We should all feel safe that the scholars are out there Defending Democracy from the Threat of Theocracy. But hold on. Scroll down to the bottom of the page:

Last updated: December-2005

I guess there are more important things to do than Defend Democracy from the Threat of Theocracy.

We're doomed.

Run! They're coming our way!

In the comments to Mike's blog Sober and ID: Part II, NCSE propaganda director Nick Matzke refers to a 1999 essay by Charles Haynes of the First Amendment Center, in which he argues that the evolution vs. creationism debates need "a new script."

Commenter Analyysi offered further observations on the meat of that essay, per how Haynes decries the teaching of scientism in public schools as if it were science. I post below a blog written last year about how evolutionary biology is being taught in my 'economically challenged' redneck corner of the country, to demonstrate that things HAVE changed. For the better.

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In the pages of a scientific journal, Elliot Sober abandoned philosophy and replaced it with armchair pyschologizing. Nick Matzke, who is the Public Information Project Director at NCSE, attempted to rationalize this behavior and, in doing so, has offered a fairly significant observation in the comments section of Telic Thoughts.

He writes:

Another thing you folks are missing here is the impact of Of Pandas and People(both the main book, by Davis and Kenyon, and the concluding essay, by Hartwig and Meyer) on Sober's analysis. He cites it a number of times. Once you are aware of what is in that book, and the fact that all the leading ID proponents participated in and/or endorsed the book — let alone its history — it is extremely difficult to put the rose-colored glasses back on again and see ID as some kind of extremely subtle tweaking of biology.

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