ClydeR
02-11-2009, 09:14 PM
Tomorrow is Charles Darwin's (and Abraham Lincoln's) birthday. I don't have strong feelings about Darwin's work one way or the other, but a lot of my fellow conservatives are planning to counter tomorrow's celebration of "Darwin Day."
I like the approach of the Discovery Institute --
"We're celebrating Charles Darwin's birthday by supporting what he supported: academic freedom," says Robert Crowther, Director of Communications at Discovery Institute. "Like Darwin, we recognize the importance of having an open and honest debate between evolution and intelligent design."
Discovery Institute today announced the launch of Academic Freedom Day in honor of Charles Darwin's 200th birthday on February 12, 2009.
In his revolutionary On the Origin of Species, Darwin wrote, "A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question." This quote is the cornerstone of the Institute's Academic Freedom Day efforts.
More... (http://sev.prnewswire.com/education/20090204/DC6687604022009-1.html)
The Pew Forum has put together a guide (http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=114) to the political controversies lingering 150 years after the publication of Origin of the Species. When I look at those controversies, I am reminded of William Jennings Bryan's prosecution of a Tennessee school teacher who illegally taught evolution in 1925, in what has popularly become known as the Scopes Monkey Trial. In his closing argument, he noted a rural/urban distinction --
Let me, in the first place, congratulate our cause that circumstances have committed the trial to a community like this and entrusted the decision to a jury made up largely of the yeomen of many of the State. The book in issue in this trial contains on its first page two pictures contrasting the disturbing noises of a great city with the calm serenity of the country. It is a tribute that rural life has fully earned.
I appreciate the sturdy honesty and independence of those who come into daily contact with the earth, who living near to nature, worship nature's God, and who, dealing with the myriad mysteries of earth and air, see to learn, from revelation about the Bible's wonder-working God. I admire the stern virtues, the vigilance and the patriotism of the class from which the jury is drawn....
More... (http://www.csudh.edu/oliver/smt310-handouts/wjb-last/wjb-last.htm)
If you look at the state-by-state breakdown in the Pew link above, you see that Bryan was on to something. Rural people seem to have a stronger belief in allowing all sides to present their argument, including the argument for Intelligent Design. Urban people mostly want to suppress dissenting viewpoints by disallowing the teaching of Intelligent Design in science classes.
So says Clyde.
I like the approach of the Discovery Institute --
"We're celebrating Charles Darwin's birthday by supporting what he supported: academic freedom," says Robert Crowther, Director of Communications at Discovery Institute. "Like Darwin, we recognize the importance of having an open and honest debate between evolution and intelligent design."
Discovery Institute today announced the launch of Academic Freedom Day in honor of Charles Darwin's 200th birthday on February 12, 2009.
In his revolutionary On the Origin of Species, Darwin wrote, "A fair result can be obtained only by fully stating and balancing the facts and arguments on both sides of each question." This quote is the cornerstone of the Institute's Academic Freedom Day efforts.
More... (http://sev.prnewswire.com/education/20090204/DC6687604022009-1.html)
The Pew Forum has put together a guide (http://pewforum.org/docs/?DocID=114) to the political controversies lingering 150 years after the publication of Origin of the Species. When I look at those controversies, I am reminded of William Jennings Bryan's prosecution of a Tennessee school teacher who illegally taught evolution in 1925, in what has popularly become known as the Scopes Monkey Trial. In his closing argument, he noted a rural/urban distinction --
Let me, in the first place, congratulate our cause that circumstances have committed the trial to a community like this and entrusted the decision to a jury made up largely of the yeomen of many of the State. The book in issue in this trial contains on its first page two pictures contrasting the disturbing noises of a great city with the calm serenity of the country. It is a tribute that rural life has fully earned.
I appreciate the sturdy honesty and independence of those who come into daily contact with the earth, who living near to nature, worship nature's God, and who, dealing with the myriad mysteries of earth and air, see to learn, from revelation about the Bible's wonder-working God. I admire the stern virtues, the vigilance and the patriotism of the class from which the jury is drawn....
More... (http://www.csudh.edu/oliver/smt310-handouts/wjb-last/wjb-last.htm)
If you look at the state-by-state breakdown in the Pew link above, you see that Bryan was on to something. Rural people seem to have a stronger belief in allowing all sides to present their argument, including the argument for Intelligent Design. Urban people mostly want to suppress dissenting viewpoints by disallowing the teaching of Intelligent Design in science classes.
So says Clyde.