Do you believe Creationism should be taught in public schools

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Yes, it needs to be part of the social studies curriculum.  A significant portion of this country believes in creationism so it needs to be covered from that POV.  However, it has absolutely no place in a science class except maybe as an example of what is not science.  Basically, the non-theistic attempts at creationism all boil down to, I can't imagine how evolution might have produced a particular characteristic, therefore it must be impossible for it have done so.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

If you learn biology as a list of discrete concepts, you're getting a bad education.  You should be understanding biology as a series of systems that work together.  You have to learn evolution to understand biological systems.  I don't know how many days you need to spend learning it, but it's a central theory.  If you don't understand evolution, you can't truly understand anything in biology. 

It is true that biology does work as systems working together, but a lot of it does boil down to understanding and memorizing different processes, such as all the intermediates in cellular respiration or photosynthesis, or the different organelles in a cell, etc. You can have broad knowledge of how body systems work, how cells function, etc. without knowing evolution, so I think your definition of what "understanding anything in biology" means is pretty darn arbitrary.   

No, you can't.  Evolution is such a basic element in biology that you can't understand anything without it.  You can memorize what is in a cell or what a nucleus, but you will never understand the "why" of anything.  If you don't understand the "why," you really have a superficial understanding of the subject.  Without understanding systems and theories and how things tie together, it's just a series of facts.

And how many people actually need more than that series of facts?  You're making an argument that would be akin to arguing that you need to know how internal combustion engines (or batteries) work to be able to drive a car.  Heck you don't even need to know that to be an auto mechanic.  You would to be an automotive engineer, but even in the biological equivalent of a genetic engineer, you don't need to know how evolution works to splice a genome.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a firm believer in evolution, but the idea that it is essential to be able to work in the biological sciences is ludicrous.  You do need to know genetics, but while evolution depends upon genetics, the reverse is not true.  Our understanding of genetics works equally well regardless of whether one believes in the standard scientific cosmology (Big Bang+Evolution) or in Young Earth Creationism.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

As a student of biology I mist tell you: the entire academic discipline is made into nonsense if evolution is thrown out the window. One can 'understand' the subject without it, but only at an entirely superficial level that lacks scientific grounding.

How so?  What is there in biology that you think is best explained by evolution that cannot be equally well be explained via genetics alone?  I don't see anything, tho I will admit my science studies were more in the field of the physical sciences than in the biological ones.  Take for example cladistics.  While evolution is used as the standard theory to explain why the genetic relationships between species exist, I don't see any particular loss in cladistics' value to understand the world we live in if the cause of those relationships is not specified.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

No.  Just no.  Give me a break. 

It appears we have different views on what constitutes science.  For me, science is the subset of natural philosophy that creates testable propositions.  Unlike the Big Bang theory, which has produced testable propositions such as the existence of background microwave radiation, evolution has to date been a descriptive theory rather than a predictive one. As such it is a branch of natural philosophy, but not of science.  Its value lies chiefly in explaining how in a deistic/atheist worldview, the genetic diversity we observe could have arisen in a cosmology that has existed long enough for evolution to work. Genetics is testable and thus is science and is an essential basis for understanding biology.

Evolution also is largely compatible with theistic worldviews. The primary exception is with theologies such as Young Earth Creationism which don't allow for there to have been enuf time for evolution to work.  I suppose that's why YECers waste so much of their time trying to "disprove" evolution and why in response so much effort is spent defending the theory.  Rather a waste of time since even without the natural philosophy of evolution, there is considerable science that contradicts YEC. Furthermore, since evolution is not a testable science, it is not capable of being disproved.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Of course evolution produces testable propositions.  What the hell are you talking about?  We have things like experiments on fruit flies and bacteria, those show evolution in progress and we base tons of research in medicine on the fact of evolution.  Do you think we should stop medicine from worrying about antibiotic resistance because it's based on evolution?

I'd classify that as genetics, not evolution. The central thesis of evolution that makes it controversial to creationists is not that species adapt to their environment, heck even the Bible has an example of that. Rather it is that new species arise out of old ones.

Or, what about the following.  Hypothesis: The fossil record will show living things have a common ancestor.  This has been proven and it has huge explanatory power for the world.  The world we live in only makes sense if you believe in evolution.  Like, how could you possibly understand bio-geography without evolution?  In that sense, we don't need to bother proving or testing evolution, it's proven to have occurred.  But, it's an unspoken assumption in biology that underlies all other research, all research keeps proving it more.

Biogeography is easily explained by creationism. Indeed, as a descriptive but unprovable theory, creationism excels at providing explanations. In the specific example you just pointed out, the creator chose to have creatures with similar genetics be close to one another.

Your total ignorance on this stuff is really on display with that last sentence.  "Furthermore, since evolution is not a testable science, it is not capable of being disproved." 

WTF are you talking about!?  If you found human fossils 500 mya, that would disprove evolution.  No?

No. Were you or anyone else around 500 mya to see those fossils deposited? Unless we're actually directly observing the creation of fossils and establishing different conditions to observe the results, then no testing is taking place.

Isolated examples of out of time fossils suggests error in measuring the temporal origin of them and thus they would be useless as proof or disprove. Extensive examples would indicate our theories of geologic history are so out of whack that geology couldn't be used to say anything about biology.  Evolution is dependent upon certain untestable assumptions such as physical processes operating in prehistory the same as they have in historical times and that nature acts without the intervention of an outside force upon it. Those aren't unreasonable assumptions, indeed I believe in them myself, but I also recognize them as axioms. When it comes to explaining the biological world as it is, there are other axioms that work.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

As long as we're going to bring up appeals to authority.

mirriam-webster.com on science, in particular the third definition:

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My emphasis on the testability of science as what differentiates it from the rest of natural philosophy is hardly unique to me.  Just as the insistence of some that their viewpoint is the only possible one without being able to explain why that is the case is hardly unique to this particular topic.

The analogy some are making here with history strikes me as a bad one.  With history we have a chain of human experience which allows us to know what happened within the historical past despite no one alive today having directly experienced that.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Let's just say I have a very strong skepticism of ivory tower mentalities that dismiss practical results as being mere window dressing on the "really important" abstract theories  I say that as someone who has been in that ivory tower, albeit in the mathematical sciences and not the biological sciences.

Evolution is a good theory.  I believe it to be true.  But I have yet to see one practical result that depends upon it being true.  Nor do I see where it is more useful as an organizing principle for biology than genetics alone.  Whether our current genetic diversity occurred by chaotic processes alone (aka natural selection), orderly processes alone (like the breeding that produced domesticated plants and animals from wild ones), or some mixture of the two doesn't affect the practical results one can obtain from biology.

The only practical effect the theory of evolution has had that I can see is that it helped spur the acceptance of genetics.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

As TJ pointed out I hadn't said whether I thought what you referred to as the "record of evolution" should be taught as part of biology. I didn't bother to refute your assumption because I was fairly sure whatever I said, especially since it wouldn't boil down to a simple yes/no, you'd send some more invective my way, but since it appears you can always find things to invect...

First off, cladistics these days is based so heavily on genetics, to the point of overriding in some surprising ways earlier views based on morphology and the fossil record, that I wouldn't include it as part of the "record of evolution" but as part of what I've been referring to as "genetics" which largely includes what you refer to as "the processes of evolution" since those are applied genetics.

Second, we don't need to know what atoms did 500 mya to teach atomic theory. We have atoms right here.

Third, you seem to be reducing "creationism" to solely YEC which has so many scientific flaws beyond incompatibility with the "processes of evolution" that using it as your counterexample is using a strawman. Consider for example "directed evolution", which is often put forth by creationists trying to have their cake but eat it too. Philosophically, it doesn't appeal to me, but the fossil record doesn't speak as to whether natural selection or divine selection took place.

Lastly, my point was not that the "record of evolution" should not be taught as part of the science of biology but that it wasn't a part of the subject necessary to be able to work with biology. We include a number of non-essentials in the curriculum, for a variety of reasons, but there also are time constraints so we can't include everything. There might be better uses of the time, at least at the grade school level. If it is included, it needs to be taught in a way that does not advocate a deistic/atheistic viewpoint.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

You do enjoy making strawmen out of what I say, don't you? I believe I've made my views clear and I have no wish to continue the process of deconstructing your strawmen by giving further details you would only make more strawmen out of.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

You do enjoy making strawmen out of what I say, don't you? I believe I've made my views clear and I have no wish to continue the process of deconstructing your strawmen by giving further details you would only make more strawmen out of.

You had no point.  You usually don't have a point, you just find a semantic argument and repeat it over and over again.

I had a point, but it wasn't one that you wished to debate, so instead you provided points for us both. Your "debating" style is to put words in the mouths of those you argue with and then attack the strawmen you've built.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

Only if they also teach Pastafarian beliefs.

They should only do that on days they are serving spaghetti in the cafeteria.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

TJ and RFayette, I view the Fall of Man narrative in Genesis as myth, but for me that doesn't detract from the truth I think the original author was trying to convey.  Taking the Fall of Man narrative as literal truth might be a prerequisite for a belief in Calvinistic "total depravity", but I don't share that belief.

In my view, the narrative is conveying the awful realization that because Man does not have the omniscience of the Divine, we cannot fully comprehend the import of all of our actions. Thus, not only is it possible that we undertake actions intending to do good that end up being evil, it is inevitable that will be the case.  The eating of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, symbolizes the time when Man realized that fact.  Man then goes on to mistakenly think that our imperfections make it impossible for the Divine to care for us and thus Man tries to hide from God.  Man wasn't expelled from Eden as punishment but because until Man could come to truly accept that Man's imperfections bar him from the Divine presence, Man cannot bear to be in the direct presence of the Divine. The flaming sword was not placed to guard Eden from Man, but Man from Eden.

In short, what the Fall of Man narrative conveys to me is not "original sin" but "original knowledge of man's intrinsic evil". That conveyance does not require the narrative to be historical because it doesn't make the story revolve around sin. For me, the first Bible narrative that is primarily about sin is that of Cain and Abel.

[True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)]

NeverAgain, why do you assume religion must invariably include worship? By that limited definition, not only atheism, but humanism, and some strands of the daoist and dharmic belief systems would not be considered religions.